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.
Ramsey Clark? Hah! Of course he believes that Islamic fundamentalism was created by the U.S. – that’s his job.
Now why would “laws” create fundamentalism?
Have you any idea who Sayyid Qutb was? Do you not know the history of Islamic Jihad? Or the genesis of why bin Laden went on his killing spree?
And whatever “Chicago-based” website you cited above – can we just assume that they believe that 911 was an inside job?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Iran
This is so well-known.
First, the US/UK supported the absolute monarchy of the Shah. Then, when it became clear that he Shah was doomed, they pulled the rug out from beneath his feet (they treated him abominably, btw) and switched to activating their agent of influence in the region, Saddam Hussein of the Ba’ath Party to invade Iran. They also refused to have any dealings with the liberal democratic politicians in Iran, eg. President Bani Sadr (who were furious at the US Embassy siege by religious extremists). Both of these factors drove Iran firmly into the hands of the Islamic Fundamentalists and facilitated the waging of an utterly pointless fratricidal war in which a million people died. Good for US arms-dealers, though, who as we now know, supplied both sides! Iran-Contra, Colonel Oliver North… Santa did indeed come to town!
So, good (and not-so-good) people, we can see that Suharto’s murder of a million Indonesians, Zia ul Haq’s construction of an Islamist infrastructure and army and the crushing of democracy and rise of Islamic Fundamentalism had everything to do with sustained overt and covert US policy.
And that’s without even beginning to talk about the Saudis.
http://www.socialistalternative.org/publications/gulfwar/ch2.html
USA=Neocolonialism/Islamic Fundamentalism=perpetual war=6 million people dead since the end of WW2
Six million individuals have been murdered by the USA since the end of World War Two. That’s directly murdered in armed conflict. We’re not including neoliberal economic murders here.
Think about that, people.
Six million people. Dead. Because the USA killed them.
This gives the USA absolutely no moral position from which to initiate argument about ‘human rights’.
The vast majority of the problems in the world today are a direct result of European (this includes North American) colonialism (and neocolonialism) and its fundamentalist capitalist wars which are ingoing as we speak. People are being murdered in droves as we speak. Right now. This minute.
Wow. Just wow. Obviously you refuse to even attempt to understand the complexities behind the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War, and why Hussein chose to invade when he did.
It’s just so easy to blame the U.S. for everything, isn’t it?
At least on this one particular issue, I encourage you to educate yourself about history. You’re pretty hopeless when it comes to 911, but perhaps you might be saved here.
Where did the six million figure come from?
Why not sixteen million?
Where did the six million figure come from?
Why not sixteen million?
Still, there is much to admire in US culture. But, as Robin Ramsey wrote, it is the “other USA” that we tend to admire, derived mainly from working class and black culture. It is not the imperial aspects of the USA that we tend to admire, but the once-subversive and heterogeneous aspects.
The main function of the UK in relation to the USA is to provide both “an unsinkable aircraft carrier” and political/ war cover. We are wholly subservient. That is why the intelligence services – who are the maintenance engineers of this systemic subservience – get so vexed over anything that might remotely undermine this ‘special relationship’. That is usually why they harass people like Roderick Russell, Corinne Souza, Denis Lehane, etc. Any politician of significance who attempts to break this will be marginalised. The UK hard state owes its allegiance NOT to UK national interests but to the interests of military corporate power based in the USA. They are therefore acting on behalf of a foreign power. The disciples of US power took over the Labour Party during the early 1990s. The Labour Governments of 1997-2010 therefore acted on behalf of a foreign power. The current Con-Dem Govt does the same.
Now we are paying the banksters who bankroll these wars that have killed six million people. Paying with our jobs, homes and our children’s future. Those are the stakes. This is the struggle. It is time either to stand up now, or else to lie down forever and be crushed like the six million.
1) Ask oneself one question in all of this, then: Who are the mass murderers? And who is justifying mass murder?
2) And does anyone deny that the security state harasses individuals? Does anyone have proof that it does not?
3) Does anyone believe that the UK is truly independent? And does anyone have proof?
4) Do we want the UK (or some arrangement of its constituent parts) to become independent of US military-corporate control?
4) needs to be the aim. And it is 4) our ‘rulers’ will not allow.
“As you can imagine, 90% of the true believers there believed that I had to be CIA / FBI / NSA / Secret Service or with some other outfit. And they ended up knowing where I lived, and they followed me around some. I found it all amusing.”
Fear is not amusing Larry – fear and faith = obedience – fear invokes attack Larry (quote “dutifully insulted..”) – that is why you attack, and blind obedience is why you continually think and act in circles, repeating yourself (Quote “nutjobs = Jessie Ventura = Ron Paul = nutjob right-wing Americans”)
I am not being condescending Larry – I am being real – your mind is wrapped in the American flag, a symbol of stability – but the flag is at half-mast – mourning the deaths of innocent souls from illegal wars of want, greed and power.
I have enough evidence to expose the evil of the Bush dynasty from those who knew and paid the price. It is in their honour and the lives of children touched and terminated by the unseen instruments of death that determines my assignments here and elsewhere.
I have touched you Larry so now is your chance to ponder your scorn – it is but one chance before the awareness and retribution.
“your mind is wrapped in the American flag”
So easily refuted … no it’s not.
Just because I don’t hate America, and just because I don’t believe in your dumbass conspiracy theories … that does not remotely make me a flag waver.
On the other hand, you, Mark Golding, run an illegal charity.
Still wondering where the six million figure came from. Wondering if Suhayl pulled it out of his ass.
“My services were at Craig’s disposal earlier this year when I was staying with him, but I got the impression that this weblog wasn’t a priority for him. He uses it as a bulletin board to air his thoughts, and doesn’t spend a great deal of time on it or glean information from it. I don’t see that he has any great incentive to police or edit the Comments. By leaving this section open, he doesn’t have to take any responsibility for the contents.”
Posted by: SamB at December 28, 2010 8:25 PM
Thanks for that, SamB. It’s depressing, but informative. After all the attention Craig got by posting “Still at Schiphol” I would have thought that he’d have signed in here for two minutes to say that he had arrived home safely.
It appears that nobody here (in the comments section) was worth that small courtesy.
Lurking, from now.
Dreoilin
Questions 1-4, at my post of 4:01pm…
Do the people of the UK and the USA want to remain grinning servants of the military corporate machine? Because make no mistake, people in the USA – that’s ordinary people in the USA – are paying just as much as we are. The military corporate machine couldn’t care less about them. There is a lot happening in the USA – people are angry at their ‘leaders’ because the leaders have betrayed them. The trolls who appear here are not representative.
http://www.mwsocialforum.org/
Wow Suhayl. Some random group has an LGBT seminar and you’re declaring revolution?
Have you done any reading on Islamic Jihad, or the genesis of the Iran-Iraq War?
You just proved my point Larry – “run an illegal charity” baseless statements continually repeated. You had your chance Larry – now live with it.
Mark, you’re running an illegal charity.
Do you not understand the law?
Have you people found Bigfoot yet?
The source of chemtrails?
littlegreenfootballs.com
“Those who behave as trolls ought to be treated like trolls.”
Precisely. And the way to treat trolls is to ignore them – fuck all this ‘connecting on a human level’.
@dreolin
Your last post had better not be another farewell. The post from Samb (who he?) sounds like a lightly enciphered instruction to us all to fuck off. Ignore him.
Man, talk about a fantastic post! I?ve stumbled across your blog a few times within the past, but I usually forgot to bookmark it. But not again! Thanks for posting the way you do, I genuinely appreciate seeing someone who actually has a viewpoint and isn?t really just bringing back up crap like nearly all other writers today. Keep it up!
Vronsky’s right, Dreolin – you’d better not go away again. That would drop the lamentably low signal to noise ratio around here significantly. It’s disappointing to see that St. Teabagger from Loony didn’t heed my advice last night. And what happened to Angrysoab? Did he experience a full meltdown just before xmas, or was that someone pretending to be him? He’s not been back to deny it… Dreolin, I hope those shoes of yours are tasty!
@Mark
Further to our earlier exchange on activism, here is an article in the Washington Post which I hope you will find interesting.
preview.tinyurl.com/2a32sp5
Glenn is just mad because it’s been firmly established that 19 Arab Muslim committed those horrible acts on Sept. 11.
“It is time either to stand up now, or else to lie down forever and be crushed like the six million.”
Maybe it always will be that time? Nevertheless, be young, be old. Lie down at night. The little, the crushed, the crashed, the flowing. Nature may also trouble us.
“4) Do we want the UK (or some arrangement of its constituent parts) to become independent of US military-corporate control?
4) needs to be the aim. And it is 4) our ‘rulers’ will not allow.”
I do not know. To divide or unite? Everyone ,almost, wants it to change. But the details seem insurmountable. The cultural, economic, ecological directions seem unsustainable. Solutions fragmented. We live on
Maybe give it a rest. Try small mercies. Maybe dont nip vaingloriously at a dragons heels. Help victims. Wield your arts. Appreciate times while times can.
?
Dont let the bastards turn you into a grindstone? or a crab. :o)
Vronsky’s right on both counts. Dreoilin, don’t go away again!
Crab, yeah, you’re right; wise words from the belly of the whale. Good to see that you’re still making forays to the coastline and into liminality.
“Do we want the UK (or some arrangement of its constituent parts) to become independent of US military-corporate control?”
Yes – although the question (in this company) was perhaps rhetorical.
Dismantling the UK is looking more difficult that I at first thought (speaking as a Scottish separatist, who always supposed it a tough project). I suppose I should have realised that the powerful are very powerful indeed, but then my terrible innocence through life has been a great protection.
Skeins of invisible power are being revealed over at the Lockerbie Case blog (preview.tinyurl.com/388p3r5). Was it Bevan who said: the closer you get to the centre of power, the more you realise it isn’t there?
Cue spooky X-Files music.
No. Cue Yakety Sax.
heya, profliferation of better comments: huzzah.
ingo: problem with posting under own name is that i started idly posting here under this one ages ago & would now feel quite strange changing it. ‘ingo’ is not your full name, either?
glenn: I sympathise actually; not with urging ‘larry’ to top himself, obviously, but with your earlier responses to him & alancampbell. In my experience you’re a considerate, intelligent & interesting commentator, who seems to have been goaded to extremes. Not in the same league as the people (like alancampbell) who persistently resort to deadends and abuse, or ‘larry’, whose attempt at connection is now sad. I too thought Loose Change a mockumentary fwiw, but that’s sadly all we have in common: his recurrent abuse of everyone as antisemites and truthers, over years, prevents me from wanting to pursue that analysis with him further (sorry Clark, but feel free to carry on as far as I’m concerned)
suhayl: you’re welcome: crazy, lazy propaganda, wasn’t it?