The Russians call it Kompromat – the use by the state of sexual accusations to destroy a public figure. When I was attacked in this way by the government I worked for, Uzbek dissidents smiled at me, shook their heads and said “Kompromat“. They were used to it from the Soviet and Uzbek governments. They found it rather amusing to find that Western governments did it too.
Well, Julian Assange has been getting the bog standard Kompromat. I had imagined he would get something rather more spectacular, like being framed for murder and found hanging with an orange in his mouth. He deserves a better class of kompromat. If I am a whistleblower, then Julian is a veritable mighty pipe organ. Yet we just have the normal sex stuff, and very weak.
Bizarrely the offence for which Julian is wanted for questioning in Sweden was dropped from rape to sexual harassment, and then from sexual harassment to just harassment. The precise law in Swedish, as translated for me and other Sam Adams alumni by our colleague Major Frank Grevil, reads:
“He who lays hands on or by means of shooting from a firearm, throwing of stones, noise or in any other way harasses another person will be sentenced for harassment to fines or imprisonment for up to one year.”
So from rape to non-sexual something. Actually I rather like that law – if we had it here, I could have had Jack Straw locked up for a year.
Julian tells us that the first woman accuser and prime mover had worked in the Swedish Embassy in Washington DC and had been expelled from Cuba for anti-Cuban government activity, as well as the rather different persona of being a feminist lesbian who owns lesbian night clubs.
Scott Ritter and I are well known whistleblowers subsequently accused of sexual offences. A less well known whistleblower is James Cameron, another FCO employee. Almost simultaneous with my case, a number of the sexual allegations the FCO made against Cameron were identical even in wording to those the FCO initially threw at me.
Another fascinating point about kompromat is that being cleared of the allegations – as happens in virtually every case – doesn’t help, as the blackening of reputation has taken effect. In my own case I was formerly cleared of all allegations of both misconduct and gross misconduct, except for the Kafkaesque charge of having told defence witnesses of the existence of the allegations. The allegations were officially a state secret, even though it was the government who leaked them to the tabloids.
Yet, even to this day, the FCO has refused to acknowledge in public that I was in fact cleared of all charges. This is even true of the new government. A letter I wrote for my MP to pass to William Hague, complaining that the FCO was obscuring the fact that I was cleared on all charges, received a reply from a junior Conservative minister stating that the allegations were serious and had needed to be properly investigated – but still failing to acknowledge the result of the process. Nor has there been any official revelation of who originated these “serious allegations”.
Governments operate in the blackest of ways, especially when it comes to big war money and big oil money. I can see what they are doing to Julian Assange, I know what they did to me and others (another recent example – Brigadier Janis Karpinski was framed for shoplifting). In a very real sense, it makes little difference if they murdered David Kelly or terrified him into doing it himself. Telling the truth is hazardous in today’s Western political system.
Dreoilin: my point is that if the tape wasn’t examined by the authorities before the match (even if they sat up at midnight to do it), I didn’t see how they could prove that the taps wern’t forged afterwards.
Suhayl is a doc, so I’m sure the Greek yogurt will work .. one way or the other. Personally if my stomach were upset I would make some strong tea.
For the cosmos of the night, here’s a beautiful, crystalline song, by the genius, Gene Clark. A hymn.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGwlkGWfCkI
What a load of bollocks from “My Existence Isn’t Real”, apart from the bit about supporting Bradley Manning. Yes, support Bradley Manning.
Somebody,
good point. Incidentally, I never liked Intel much; their processors use too much power and get too hot. I wouldn’t pay for one. The 6800 derivatives and the ARM are my favourites.
TM,
I retract my apology. I believe that you are deliberately trying to smear WikiLeaks and incite fear of them. Go to hell.
Richard Robinson,
no, I don’t believe that involvement with Open Source / Free Software guarantees a good personality, either, but it does suggest a commitment to openness.
Dreoilin,
I’m sorry about your cat. I hope your tummy feels better soon.
I see the anti wikileak trolls have been in abundance. Discrediting at every opportunity. Smoky mirrors and foggy paths lead to nowhere. Let’s all go there?
Wouldn’t it be a rather good idea if Craig himself set a ‘WikiLeaks’? It would really complement his blog but most important of all there wouldn’t be any dispute whether he was a CIA/MI6 asset. His reputation would be a huge draw.
I’d gladly contribute and I’m sure lots of others would too.
Another interesting article about Wikileaks from Online Journal:
Wikileaks’ CIA release — say what?
By Michael Collins
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_6283.shtml
dreoilin: I’m also sorry to hear about your cat. Sorry too that you had to watch Blair on TV without some “advisory content” warning or whatnot.
“TM” sounds more to me like Angry than Alfred under another identity, particularly after trying to throw the scent like that. Alfred doesn’t strike me as one who has any need for alternative guises, whereas Angry has long since blown any personal credibility.
Clark said
“TM,
I retract my apology. I believe that you are deliberately trying to smear WikiLeaks and incite fear of them.”
The easiest thing to say, Clark, would be eat shit buddy, since you seem to unable to understand a simple argument. But I’ll put it one more time.
If a person is about to commit the serious crime of revealing state secrets and possibly committing treason, they’d be smart to think seriously about how they go about it.
If they want to introduce an intermediary about whose integrity they know virtually nothing beyond your unsubstantiated opinion, by all means let them go ahead.
But if they want to minimize the risk of substantial jail time, or perhaps a well-stuffed sports bag, they might think how to do it all on their own, and certainly without putting their trust in a flake with a Ph.D. from Moffet U. and a multi-million dollar budget — all from small donations.
Incidentally, not a single person here has acknowledged making any donation whatsoever to Wikileaks.
How about it Clark? Why not send ’em something, even if it’s only five quid.
LOL
My sense of identity has unravelled to such an extent that I no longer who or what I am. Every morning when I wake up I just feel dirty inside. I urgently need some professional psychiatric help and am going to get it. I hope you will all wish me well and support me in my quest for a healthy existence. Screw the Agency!
“TM” and Alfred both have the same tendency to wail on and on about being smeared while unself-consciously spending most of their time indulging in the same behaviour they deplore.
I do not KNOW they are the same but they sound the same and they make the same comments. This one is a dead giveaway for me:
“Anyway, in signing this TM, I think I have the correct identity — if anyone cared, and I don’t really see why, unless it helps those who engage in smear tactics to have a clear identity to smear.”
This is pretty much the same as what Alfred said on the other thread. Apparently, my request that Alfred stop posting anonymously was considered by him to be so that I could smear him more easily. No, it was because it is very confusing to have a conversation with several people who may all be the same person and confusing to have a conversation with “anonymous” if the posts come from several different people.
Strangely neither TM nor Alfred has denied being the same person.
One way a person might catch themselves out using sock puppets is if what the two socks are saying is too similar. On this thread, however, Alfred hasn’t really talked much about Wikileaks whereas TM hasn’t stopped going on about how Julian Assange is an intelligence asset. He lists such stuff as Osama bin Laden being alive, something about Halliburton, education level of Assange etc…
Over on Alfred’s blog we find:
“”Of course, the good news is that false realities often fail when the public trusts its own critical intelligence, not the media. Two classified documents recently released by WikiLeaks express the CIA’s concern that the populations of European countries, which oppose their governments’ war policies, are not succumbing to the usual propaganda spun through the media.”
This is hardly a secret. Why else did the Bush administration pay Haliburton hundreds of millions for the construction of those mass detention centers.”
“Wikileaks Founder Wins Sam Adams Award for Integrity in Intelligence
So does that mean that Trikileaks founder Julian Assange is in intelligence? And if so, shouldn’t the award be for integrity in counter-intelligence — yer know, conning the public about having to bomb the Pakis because they’re providing refuge to Osama bin Laden and generally assisting the Taliban in the war to terrorize those poor cowering sods in America?”
“.
4 September 2010
Flying the Flag; Faking the News
Edward Bernays, the American nephew of Sigmund Freud, is said to have invented modern propaganda. During the First World War, he was one of a group of influential liberals who mounted a secret government campaign to persuade reluctant Americans to send an army to the bloodbath in Europe. In his book, “Propaganda,” published in 1928, Bernays wrote that the “intelligent manipulation of the organised habits and opinions of the masses was an important element in democratic society” and that the manipulators “constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power in our country.” Instead of propaganda, he coined the euphemism “public relations.” …
“Of course, the good news is that false realities often fail when the public trusts its own critical intelligence, not the media. Two classified documents recently released by WikiLeaks express the CIA’s concern that the populations of European countries, which oppose their governments’ war policies, are not succumbing to the usual propaganda spun through the media.”
This is hardly a secret. Why else did the Bush administration pay Haliburton hundreds of millions for the construction of those mass detention centers.
Obama And Family Tied To CIA Over Three Generations
EeeYoo Subsidizing the Albanian Mafia
Paul Craig Roberts: The True Cost of the War
Stef: Ah, the Good Old days (before Magna Carta and all that crap)
Paul Craig Roberts: Death By Globalism?conomists Haven? A Clue
Canada’s Tory Gov’t. welcomes Tamil boat people
Serco: The model of the modern multi-national (Flash Vid)
Nigel Farage: Rubbishing the EU’s unelected leaders
Loonie Israelis on the need to kill innocent goyim children
Glenn Beck to 9/11 Victims — SHUT UP
Steve Keen: What Bernanke doesn? understand about deflation
INTERMISSION: A little light entertainment
UK Government Think Tank Calls For Infiltration of Conspiracy Websites
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
United States Constitution
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Paul Craig Roberts: Death of the First Amendment
Whoops! Looks like I quoted quite a bit more than I intended.
“”TM” sounds more to me like Angry than Alfred under another identity, particularly after trying to throw the scent like that. Alfred doesn’t strike me as one who has any need for alternative guises, whereas Angry has long since blown any personal credibility.”
No Glenn. TM sounds a lot like Alfred and nothing like me. I don’t, for example, believe that Assange is an intelligence asset. Both TM and Alfred do think so.
Maybe you need another holiday in Cuba.
“Well, angrysoba, tell us how you know – know, not imagine – that TM is Alfred. Come on. And as someone said, who are you? I ask this literally, not rhetorically.”
Hi Suhayl. A few posts up is where I give my explanation. I don’t KNOW TM is Alfred but it looks pretty clear to me that they are, so I wouldn’t call it pure imagination. Their views on Assange are identical anyway.
When you ask me literally who I am, you mean you want to know my name? My occupation perhaps?
Well, Clark has my name and I give him permission to forward it to you but I’d rather not put it online. Far too many weirdos around.
I think I’ve also given you my occupation before. You’ll just have to take my word for it. I could PROVE it but I’d rather not and especially not online for the same reason as I’ve given you about my name.
Apart from that I’m really not sure what else you want by literally asking who I am.
Thanks, angrysoba, much appreciated. It had occurred to me that (as far as I could tell) Alfred had not expressed his views on Assange on this thread, which seemed odd.
I understand, too, about your identity, my question wasn’t meant to be a challenge, just an assonant expression of my own confused negotiation amidst the ‘Looking-Glass-like’ quality of webversation. Much appreciated.
Weirdos is right! Of course, I am completely and utterly sane. On my days off, though, they (the voices in the light-bulbs) call me Napoleon… (!)
Now, Alfred, although earlier, I’d tried to suggest that the main focus now ought to be on the substance of the ‘leaks’, rather than always on the qualities of the leaker, please do feel free to impart to us your views on Assange/ Wikileaks. The floor is yours. Thank you.
Mark Golding
Now has been the time for Britain to show leadership etc for the last thousand years. Unfortunately, all we get is more of the same, Mrs T. Let’s gamble instead of working. Gordon Brown, Let’s gamble against our gambling losses. David Cameron, Let’s borrow a bit more, we’ve got to hit the jackpot sometime soon.
It requires a whiff of common sense to achieve leadership, but our leaders do not possess more than a whiff of hair gel. The answers lie in Islam.
Thanks everyone for your kindness about my little cat. I had her for 18 years.
Suhayl and Abe, thanks for the yogurt and tea recommendations. 🙂
Can’t comment on how Ryan Tubridy dealt with Blair on the Late Late Show, as I missed the greater part of the interview. I gather there were protesters outside RTE and that there will be more today at his book signing. No citizen’s arrest, sadly, but that was never on.
Blair was followed by ‘Jedward’. From the sublime (?) to the utterly ridiculous.
“my point is that if the tape wasn’t examined by the authorities before the match … I didn’t see how they could prove that the taps wern’t forged afterwards”
Agreed, Abe. I assume the police will be examining it. But, whatever about scurrilous rumours about sex lives and all that jazz, would the NOTW make up something like this from scratch? I don’t know anything about cricket. Never read the NOTW either, only know it by reputation.
No problem, Suhayl.
And, Alfred, as it IS a claim made on your site that “The leaked documents …claim that Osama bin Laden, who was reported dead three years ago by the late Pakistan candidate Benazir Bhutto on BBC, was still alive, conveniently keeping the myth alove for the Obama Administration War on Terror” maybe you could back up the claim that Benazir Bhutto claimed Osama bin Laden had been murdered on the BBC.
I realize, of course, that it is an axiom of certain theories that Osama bin Laden is no longer alive but as has even been pointed out here the view is not one that is common in the mainstream press and the reports from Wikileaks that there had been “sightings” of Osama bin Laden were not widely picked up on. I certainly didn’t read about them until conspiracy theorists began claiming it means Julian Assange is an intelligence asset. Maybe I should spend more time reading the MSM.
“that Benazir Bhutto claimed Osama bin Laden had been murdered on the BBC.”
Or less ambiguously, “that Benazir Bhutto had claimed, on the BBC, that Osama bin Laden had been murdered.”
Where did he day “murdered”?
Didn’t you quote it yourself as “reported dead three years ago by the late Pakistan candidate Benazir Bhutto”? Are you at your twisting again?
“the view is not one that is common in the mainstream press”
I’m not so sure about that. Jon Snow for one has stated that he has believed him dead for ages.
Angrysoba,
good work. “TM” is revealed.
Anno,
I agree with your assessment of British political leadership. However, I think that there are other routes to the answers than Islam, and Islam does not guarantee a route to the answers. It seems more a matter of personal integrity. We see some people that seize upon a belief system, and use its dogma to justify their actions. Others display a humility in their acknowledgement of something greater than themselves.
Glenn,
I think you’ve been unfair to Angrysoba there. As I’ve said before, I get frustrated with his argument technique, but I think he just gets a bit carried away with his enthusiasm to argue for what he believes is true. But he’s a good researcher and he really does do some reading.
“Or less ambiguously, “that Benazir Bhutto had claimed, on the BBC …”
Awww, disappointed now. *grin*.
I think that we need some kind of reconciliation of skepticism, suspicion and ‘paranoia’, and also of ‘Left wing’ and ‘Right wing’.
‘Left wing’ and ‘Right wing’ seems easier, so I’ll start there. Many people end up defining themselves as being on the side of either socialism or capitalism. They then come to see themselves as opposed to the people in the opposite ‘camp’.
My own view is that competition and altruism are instinctive (ie evolved) urges that exist to varying extents in all people. Similarly with attraction to and fear of different cultures and races.
We attempt to make to make sense of a vast world of highly varied human behaviour and belief with our limited brainpower, so we simplify and categorise into ‘Left’ and ‘Right’. We each tend to ally ourselves with people of similar outlooks to our own, and thus the ‘opposing camps’ are formed, leading to a polarisation that is only partly justified.
A similar argument applies to individual issues, like what people believe about some specific event, 9/11 being a particularly vivid example.
The matter of trust vs suspicion is related to this polarisation. Members of each ‘camp’ come to be suspicious of the motives of their ‘opposite’, or come to suspect a deficiency in the ‘opposite’s’ thinking abilities.
Again, trust and suspicion are both essential human attributes. Both began as evolved instincts. Possibly they define opposite ends of a spectrum, or possibly they are independent mental functions.
The categorisation and alliance processes works on these differences, too. At the most extreme, the camps thus formed refer to their opposites with the derogatory labels of “sheeple” and “conspiracy theorists”, and call each other’s sanity into question.
I’m sorry that this description is vague and inaccurate; these concepts exist in my mind as a combination of graphs, venn diagrams and shadings of colour. Putting them into words is something that I find difficult.
Clark,
I’ve taken this “test”, which is anonymous. I know where I’m placed on it. Take it yourself and I’ll tell you later where I was placed, if you wish.
http://www.politicalcompass.org/
I’m just about to do it again, more for fun than anything.
Angrysoba,
those reports of Osama bin Laden were picked up on immediately. On the day that the Afghan War Diaries were released I saw such an article on either the Guardian or the Telegraph’s front web page, maybe both. It’s pathetic, really, but I suppose the papers need their bogeyman.
How much does Osama bin Laden’s continued existence really matter? Could it be a case of “Strike me down, and I’ll become more powerful than you can possibly imagine”?
“I think you’ve been unfair to Angrysoba there”
I agree. He can make some good points, and argues them sensibly.
I get the impression he gives way to frustration from time to time ? A tendency to the ad hominem rant (though perhaps less these days than in the past) ? I can certainly sympathise with feeling like that, but the resulting feedback loops don’t really get anyone anywhere. IMO.
But, tentatively, I don’t agree on the Alfred=TM thing. It seems to me that if the person who, a hndful of threads back, can fling out allegations of ‘treason’ concerning the construction of a ‘semi-genocide’ in Leicester can also write that sneer at ‘patriotism’ somewhere upthread, then either they are sockpuppets on a hand that suffers from severe internal dissonance, or Occam’s razor fails completely. Which may be so, but I’m inclined to argue against until the necessity is proved. (Necessity is necessary).
The overquoting above is unfortunate, I can’t see the wood among the trees. I’ve looked at his website too, and can’t really spot much coherence among the jumble.
Hi Dreoilin,
I did that test a while ago. My result was in the bottom-left quadrant, left – libertarian, quite near the Green party. I had some difficulty answering some of the questions; I wanted to say “it depends”, or “could you give me more details, please?”.
That’s where I am, Clark. Slap-bang in the middle of the bottom-left quadrant.
BTW, the fan on my laptop is going mad, but only when I’m on this site. I can’t scroll up and down the page too well either. Weird.
Dreoilin,
disable Javascript, clear the cache and try again. Tell me what happens.
Dreoilin,
it could just be that the page is getting really long – you could try another long page for comparison.
Waste of good eggs or perhaps they were bad and sulphurous like the intended recipient.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-11187320
Wish that house in Ramsgate was finished. I miss Craig’s commentary esp on the ConDem cuts and the way in which we are being anaesthetized by the BBC ready for the amputation in October. Did you read about Mark Thompson’s visit to No 10 with a e-mail about the news management strategy from Helen Boaden in full view?