Still at Schiphol 1154

 in Life by

I am becoming quite fond of my little corner of Schiphol airport. I have put up my Christmas cards and a few bits of tinsel. I now have a boarding card for the 0800 to Manchester. This is the sixth boarding card I have had. It is very hard to understand why, time after time, they don’t know a flight is cancelled until some time after it was due to leave and all the passengers have queued at the gate for hours.

Of course, Manchester is a lot further from Ramsgate than Schiphol is, so even if the flight atually goes, this represents rather dubious progress.

Happy New Year everybody.

Remarkably, KLM delivered my lost luggage, including my laptop, at 9.30 pm on New Year’s Eve. At that time a pretty lively party was already in full swing,much improved by the presence of a great many beautiful young women, mostly from Latvia. I am not sure why; my life as ever consists of a bewildering succession of chance encounters with really nice people. I am in the fortunate position of being able to say that Nadira was the most lovely of all, without indulging in dutiful hyperbole.

It was an extremely happy Christmas. Having my mum, both my brothers and all my three chidren together was as great as it was rare.

We have been through the laptop in lost luggage discussion before. The problem is that my shoulders dislocate at the drop of a hat, and I travel without hand luggage to avoid an accident.

2011 is going to be a very important year for me. particularly the first quarter. A number of crucial events are going either to set me up financially for the rest of my life, or result in real distress and failure. At present I have reason to be very optimistic. I am also very absorbed in my life of Alexander Burnes, which I hope will help establish a serious academic reputation.

The Portuguese edition of Murder in Samarkand has sold unexpectedly well in Brazil. The translation of the Turkish edition has just been finished.

I hope to do a Wikileaks retrospective in the next couple of days. Just a quick thought on the case of the poor young gardener in Bristol. Of the Jill Dando case, long before Barry Bulsara’s succesful appeal I blogged that this appeared to be a miscarriage of justice in which the police had fitted up the local weirdo.

Despite not being enamoured of landlords in general, I fear the same dynamic is at work in Bristol, albeit Chris Jefferies is much more intellectually capable than Bulsara. My instinct is that the police have picked up on Jefferies for being camper than a boy scout jamboree and archer than Trajan.

Jefferies’ release on bail has me worried that there was nothing against him other than the “He’s a weird one, guv” instinct of some not very bright cop. The case needs to be closely watched as history shows that the powers of the police to make the evidence fit the suspect are considerable.

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1,154 thoughts on “Still at Schiphol”

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  • Somebody else

    Frazer, I’m afraid Opmoc’s habit of hijacking this blog with alcohol fueled personal drivel predated your encouragement by a long way, which is why I called it reckless. The double spaced writing was on the wall for everyone to see….

  • Mark Golding - Children of Iraq

    Somebody,

    The limited money trail from Companies House leads nowhere simply because the ‘blood money’ is ‘advice money’ but in reality to secure deals for Blair Petroleum or BP.

    In the public domain we can read the deal with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi that led to the release of the Lockerbie bomber just hours before BP unveiled a $billion oil contract with Libya, and the deal from Bush as a thank-you to Blair (for what?), to advise the Royal Family in Kuwait, and the ‘secret’ deal to advise the South Korean firm, UI Energy – Geez so much ‘advice’ – obviously from ex BP Chairman David Simon.

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Simon,_Baron_Simon_of_Highbury

    and/or John Browne

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Browne,_Baron_Browne_of_Madingley

    But Anji Hunter, bless her, holds a few keys – she slipped into BP to become Director of Operations in November 2001 having been Blair’s ‘confidante’ for years (lovely lucid lady) – Andrew Grice – Independent Nov 9th 2001.

  • Somebody else again

    @somebody. Surely the tag “Somebody else” makes it quite clear that he or she is not just somebody.

  • Larry from St. Louis

    Somebody: “Frazer, you encouraged him in the past by saying that you enjoyed reading his posts. Like prodding an IED, a reckless activity bound to blow up in your face.”

    Yep, just like the way that Dr. Suhayl Saadi encourages Roderick Russell. Roderick Russell is clearly delusional – the only “evidence” of his state-sponsored prosecution is a set of insane letters that he’s written to members of the media and British and Canadian MP’s. He’s a nut. Suhayl is either a sadistic fuck for knowingly encouraging that sad case, or Suhayl is a bizarrely incompetent example of what sort of idiots become doctors in the U.K.

    At some point on this blog Suhayl wrote a letter addressed to Roderick’s wife. I have no idea what that was about, but it can’t be good.

  • Jaded.

    He’s been there and got the straitjacket to prove it probably. Lamby knows all too well what state harassment can involve. Don’t you just my little Lamby…

  • Larry from St. Louis

    Obviously I know a bit more about psychiatry than the resident British doctor here.

    Heh – btw – Craig Murray doesn’t believe what Roderick writes, so why should you?

  • somebody

    Written by Jackie Ashley, wife of Andrew Marr. It’s a pity her husband was such an avid Blair messenger. Blair continued to dismantle the NHS in Thatcher’s footsteps. Cameron hopes to complete the process. Ashley says that the PCTs are already imploding without any assistance.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/27/david-cameron-nhs-reforms-sick

    a~

    Somebody else – did you see that LarryfStL is attributing your post to me. Can you please change to a more distinct name.

  • Vronsky

    @Mark

    “I see activism as having a well defined meaning, that of action for change that is deeply rooted and possibly part of that persons personality or disposition or both”

    Nah. Wonderfully idealistic definition, but only true for some people. For others activism is a brief spell pounding the beat before promotion to a cosy office job. Ian Hamilton (QC – he of Stone of Destiny fame) said of Labour politicians that their election was not an opportunity to serve, but a reward for service. Unfortunately I think it generalises.

  • Suhayl Saadi

    Odd, isn’t it, the way in which every time one mentions Roderick Russell (or Lila Rajiva), both of whom claim harassment (of varying sorts) by agencies of the corporate state, the troll-machine swings into overdrive and attempts to discredit me as a rational commentator on this blog. It’s not a good tactic, if I may say; they would be best to ignore my information altogether if they want it to be forgotten. Every time they attempt to attack me, the information in my posts risks being remembered by everyone at some level. So actually, they are doing my job for me. Not very good, are they? Not very good at all. Perhaps this level of incompetance should be raised with someone close to ‘our mutual friends’.

    Furthermore, as everyone can see, their reflexive intervention might well suggest to the objective observer that there is indeed veracity to the claims of, not only Russell and Rajiva, but also Denis Lehane and Corinne Souza, whose father, Lawrence de Souza, remember, worked (salaried) for the SIS (aka MI6) for decades (1958-1979). Here is her first book, again:

    http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Baghdad%27s+Spy%3A+a+Personal+Memoir+of+Espionage+and+Intrigue+from+Iraq…-a0101497675

  • Vronsky

    “their reflexive intervention might well suggest to the objective observer that there is indeed veracity …”

    Yes. That is what I christened the ‘Sunstein Effect’ on that other thread whose name we dare not utter. If we suppose truth to have an inverse relationship to troll activity, all of the the following might be inferred:

    * ix/xi was an inside job, and Israel had a hand in it

    * David Kelly was murdered

    * Lee Harvey Oswald did not act alone

    * Harassment of ordinary citizens by the security services is commonplace

    * Wikileaks is not genuine

    Perhaps it’s time for an evaluation your methodology, guys.

  • Parky

    @Suhayl seasons greetings 🙂

    re your previous post

    It may be the case that this blog is of interest to those spooky type folks and who knows they might well have paid for nutters who write here also. They might well read it to actually get an idea of what really is going on.

    However these folks are part of the so-called “civil service” and why should we expect joined up thinking, excellence, competence or awareness of anything outside their immediate responsibility when any day to day dealings with them indicates people who are rarely any of these things.

    Hate to generalise but why should anyone of merit or competence want to join the CS which at the middle and lower levels pays crap wages?

    At one time a career in the CS would have been revered however much better pickings are to be had in the private sector. Most join the CS because it is deemed a safe unchallenging job which pays the bills and has some kind of secure pension at the end. I can’t think of one CS I’ve ever met who would last more than five minutes in the private sector. They just can’t cut it !

  • Suhayl Saadi

    Thanks, Parky, and seasons greetings to you too! An excellent point. Indeed, that’s one of the very points which Corinne Souza makes in her book, ‘Baghdad’s Spy’. Vronsky, yes, an intriguing deduction. I like your use of Roman numerals.

  • Larry from St. Louis

    Suhayl Saadi – you still think the state cares about you, do you? Hah!

    I’m sure you ran across narcissistic personality disorder during your failed education. Perhaps you should seek a medical intervention. Failed doctor – heal thyself!

    I’m simply a person who is disgusted with sadists like you egging on delusional people like Roderick. You can’t possibly believe that the British and Canadian intelligence services are harassing Roderick merely because he once quit a job. So you egg him on out of some really bad motives – possibly you’re hoping that he straps bombs onto himself and wanders into a crowd.

    It is clear that Craig Murray doesn’t believe a word of Roderick’s story – so what the fuck is wrong with you, Suhayl? Just like the fact that Craig Murray doesn’t believe in 911 trutherism, yet you believe that too.

    And why did you write a letter to his wife here?

    What a twisted fuck you are.

  • Jon

    @all – agreed regarding topicality. I didn’t mean that we should restrict ourselves to talking about airports! 🙂 Just that, while it is genuinely interesting for individuals to add some colour about their lives (music, arts, festivities and the aroma of burning peat) there are some levels of detail that force a great deal of vertical scrolling.

    @Clark, on the Islamic index – interesting. I wonder if such a mechanism would have a positive activist effect, like a consumer boycott? Thinking about it, I am surprised that they’ve not done it already, tbh.

    @Mark,

    “but to me it [the hyperbole] is amplification or magnification of horror, a horror that has permeated my mind and eventually frustrated rational thinking.”

    Yes, I see how this process works. In fact, the Israeli attack on the Lebanon had a similar effect on me, in 2006. I set up a paste-table in my nearest town centre, on my own, and handed out Stop the War leaflets to anyone who’d take one. Interestingly, it brought out several local StW activists to help who’d been dormant for several years.

    “If I have over-stated I sincerely apologise although I hope you understand the operandi and the importance of my work.”

    No need for an apology, and if your target is incrementally bringing Blair et al to justice, you have my understanding and applause in spades. My point was that, when you take your messages to a wider (and more cynical) audience, they may be more receptive to the simple arguments that (a) Blair lied to follow the US into the Iraq war, (b) the war may not have happened if the UK had not gone, and (c) perpetrators who are signed up to the ICC should voluntarily submit their war-leaders to the Hague, so they can prove their innocence in front of a court. If however you paint Blair as an Attila the Hun, or Hitler, then your overall message may be less effective.

    Frustratingly, when wants to broadcast the truth about war, one needs to know about PR – even though the truth should be able to stand on its own, unvarnished.

  • Jon

    Suhayl – if the trolls want to ignore the evidence that Roderick has been compiling, that is up to them. But don’t respond to his messages – his increasingly shrill and abusive tone would perhaps merit some gentle self-reflection, which is ironic, given the content!

  • Clark

    Larry, you wrote “So you egg him on out of some really bad motives – possibly you’re hoping that he straps bombs onto himself and wanders into a crowd”.

    Suhayl Saadi has written nothing here to suggest “bad motives”. Ever. So these motives that you ascribe to him must flow from some part of your self.

    One of Suhayl Saadi’s earliest replies to a comment of yours was sympathetic about your loss of a friend. Or had you forgotten that?

  • Larry from St. Louis

    Roderick is clearly insane. Suhayl Saadi clearly eggs him on. Where is your morality?

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