I have been against the hosting of the Olympics since the inception. It seemed a vainglorious waste of money, to enable politicians to wave the patriotic flag, even before they gave away all our money to the bankers. Now it is just crazy.
It is also scarey. It has been announced that 13,000 military personnel will be policing the event together with 8,000 private contractors and 12,000 police. There will be battleships on the Thames. Euronews has just quoted a British official as defending this as being in line with what was done in Beijing. But Beijing is not in a democracy. It also claims that London in 2012 will be the “safest place in the world”.
That is “safe” in the same way that Jean Charles De Menezes was safe with all those armed police around.
Open your eyes, Angry.
.
I thought and think Brendan’s comparison of the London Olympics to the Berlin Olympics is only slightly less mad and wrong than the videos posted before showing that the Olympic logo is supposed to be a Satanic image (everyone knows it is Lisa Simpson giving a blowjob to London). I can only imagine that what Brendan is trying to say in one of those spooky hushed-voice fear-mongery ways so beloved among conspiracy theory-addled analysts is that Britain is like Nazi Germany. Nevermind the fact that while Hitler certainly used the Berlin Olympics as a tool to project an image of a revived and potent Germany with the help of Leni Riefenstahl, the London Olympics is set to be an embarassing shambles which will show off a wilted and drained UK with the help of Boris Johnson (if he’s still mayor; that other paragon of crazed fascistic hubris, Ken Livingstone, if he’s not). It’s a big boondoggle anyway, with lots of already very wealthy people making pots more cash from taxpayers who will be moaning and sulky throughout the fiasco. Thankfully Britain is still too shabby and indolent to make convincing fascists.
Anyway, one more thing that’s worth knowing, if you really must throw that comparison around, is that 1936 was the year in which the Nazis deliberately eased off on their oppression and persecution of minorities for the simple reason that they wanted to make a good impression on all the visiting journalists.
“I thought and think Brendan’s comparison of the London Olympics to the Berlin Olympics is only slightly less mad and wrong than …”
.
Ok, but did you read what I posted above “open your eyes Angry”? Do you dispute that the US is turning into a police state? Or that the UK will copy?
The Olympics facilitates grandiose posing for politicians and other luminaries. Nonetheless, everyone remembers the Munich Olympics of 1972 for the ‘Black September’ operation which resulted in the deaths of a number of athletes. It would be a major policing operation, regardless of where it was staged. I am more concerned about the erosion of the Bill of Rights in the USA right now, with the attempt to pass a law which would faciliate indefinite detention of US citizens – which of course already seems to have happened to a number of people from elsewhere, including the UK. One of my friends’ brothers, a UK citizen and a good poet and activist named Talha Ahsan, currently is facing 70 years’ detention in the USA.
.
This is really shocking thing. Not even convicted major Nazi criminals, who had murdered countless people, faced that after WW2. It’s disgraceful.
.
http://freetalha.org/about/
“with the attempt to pass a law which would faciliate indefinite detention of US citizens”
.
It’s already passed, and signed.
And ‘Anonymous’ has reacted (but the majority of Americans are still sitting wathing TV):
.
http://freakoutnation.com/2011/12/17/anonymous-retaliates-massive-information-dump-released-on-senators-who-passed-ndaa/
Oh, that’s dreadful.
It is, Suhayl, and when you think of all those Americans jealously holding onto their “right to bear arms” (specifically put into their constitution to enable resistance to such a move by government!) it’s even more mind boggling.
I’m sorry to hear about your friend’s brother. And even sadder is the fact that being a UK citizen will not necessarily help him. Perhaps it will.
Angrysoba,
.
Maybe the games,for athletes,should be junked and instead have them based on IOC Committe members activities.A medal chase for,say,free champagne and food blagged,lines of coke snorted and prostitutes used.I’m sure there would be some star performances by those freeloaders.
Jives,
Have you seen http://www.just-humor.com/olympics.htm?
@ Clark…Mary..
No idea where he got his numbers from…Mary..An FX 50 is a generic name for any type of explosive device that is rigged with a secondary detonator…
Agree with angrysoba (!) the programme could be cut drastically. No need to give every kid in the class a gold star.
.
Security: the pretence that the Olympics is in any way about fostering international relationships is completely negated by aggressive security measures to prevent nationalists/religious maniacs committing mass murder. And the pretence that the Olympics are about generating revenue is simply laughable.
.
Olympics: past their sell-by. Terminate. Restore strictly noncommercial, amateur status on trial basis, and if no-one buys tickets…probably…scrap the whole charade completely.
.
The money would have been infinitely better spent on rescuing school playing fields from the hands of the developers to whom they have been sold to boost council revenues over the last decade.
.
Grrrr.
Suhayl, would this be a case for a reverse extradition request to the US for having this chap being brought back to his family? reasons: writing excellent poetry and being active at removing the obstacles to true democracy worldwide, whatever that is.
It would not have any chance, but it would make the cause more plausible for media recognition. Extradition requests only work for those in power it seems, when did a paupers request ever be successfull?
And now this in The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/dec/18/ministry-of-defence-jobs-cull
Suhayl, apologies.
Obama was due to sign that NDAA last Friday, but nowhere on the web (so far) can I find out for sure whether he signed it or not. Campaigns ongoing in the US to stop him, but he HAS withdrawn the veto he promised. (Twitter going ga-ga last night with Americans waking up to the implications … )
@ Mark,
Whether you knew what you did or not, Id’d say thanks. In your response to Should the Russians be assisted…there was an explanation of the Kursk (Koorsk) and its cargo. You said something I should have picked up long ago. It would be surprising to find that anyone could de-code ()decode).
Other than that I am unable to discuss this. Thank you.
As a point of note I intercepted American communications which was a discussion on Craig’s website regarding comments posted by Ishmael. Seems the Americans would like to have a little chat and are busy trying to find where to send the invitations. An Apache?, seriously?. Oops.
Craig, they may ask you for something.
Ingo, Nuid, thanks, people. Do feel free to contact the folk at the site-link I gave if you want to express your support for the campaign. I’m sure Hamja Ahsan (the wonderful chap I know – the brother of the imprisoned poet) would be very grateful for any help. They launched a collection in Edinburgh last year. Gareth Peirce has been involved:
.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n09/gareth-peirce/americas-non-compliance
.
http://www.ihrc.org.uk/multimedia/video/9872-free-talha-ahsan-qaa-with-lawyer-gareth-peirce-
Ingo, Nuid, thanks, people. Do feel free to contact the folk at the site-link I gave if you want to express your support for the campaign. I’m sure Hamja Ahsan (the wonderful chap I know – the brother of the imprisoned poet) would be very grateful for any help. They launched a collection in Edinburgh last year. Gareth Peirce has been involved:
.
lrb.co.uk/v32/n09/gareth-peirce/americas-non-compliance
.
ihrc.org.uk/multimedia/video/9872-free-talha-ahsan-qaa-with-lawyer-gareth-peirce-
.
Sorry if this gets posted twice – usual stuff with prefixes!
Speaking of protest in the UK, here are some excellent articles by another genuine person, Tabitha Troughton, freelance journalist and activist extraordinaire! She has a really good blog – check it out:
.
http://tabithatroughton.wordpress.com/
Craig –
It could be worse. They might have chosen Uzbekistan.
http://www.wps.ru/en/pp/kursk/2001/04/17/1.html
http://www.dotan.net/prayer/
.
Is the only link still working from this:
.
{http://photios.blogspot.com/2005/06/us-sunk-kursk-proof.html}
.
Scroll to the bottom of the first link to see who sponsors the memorial.
.
Curious, eh?
Komodo,
What gives? The dedication crap is weird of the third order tending to the 34th root. Any suggestion O’wise Lizard?
Your guess is as good as mine, Passerby. The second link appears to be that of a US libertarian type who is using a single technical error from an alternative account of the Kursk’s loss to rubbish the entire thesis: that the Kursk was sunk by a US torpedo during a spell of mutual confusion (at best) Everything else he cites in support has been removed from the Web. He may be right. He may not.
.
The official US version – a far as I can tell – of what happened is that the peroxide propellant of one or more of the Kursk’s torpedoes decomposed explosively. IE the USN was not involved in any way. There are several other versions of events, some of which put US ships/submarines close to the Kursk, and allege that a US submarine went for repairs in Norway and then Southampton very shortly after the incident.
. The variety of the stories is interesting. Why the Israeli military should be so keen on mourning the Russian dead is even more interesting IMO.
So, no wisdom, I’m afraid. But what’s on t’internet is fascinating…
The Kursk incident.
.
The Cheonan incident.
Before this gets totally out of hand, I had a friend of mine whom worked on the joint recovery of the Kursk.
First hand account from him is that it was absoloutly no way the sub had been sunk by a exterior torpedo..it was obvious that there was an internal explosion aboard the sub which caused a hull breach internally…what was left of the foreward torpedo compartment was blown outwards, in other words the metal was facing outwards and peeled back from the sub…Hope that stops this here and we can get back on subject or await another pearl of wisdom from Craig, who, is extremely busy at the moment in Ghana…Again posters…as of last year we should wish him and his family a Merry Xmas and all prosperity for the New Year…As do I to you all…
Its not getting out of hand. A state of the art warship sank in shallow water. No one is saying much other than the official version. Frazer, your information comes post incident. We need to go back to when the sailors were alive and re-create the event. We need to know what the electronics picked up onboard before the incident, and what was written after the event by survivors.
Advanced military technology. And weapon systems you can only dream about. Some our, some not.
I would like to obtain all information to confirm the official explanation.
I said an over indulgence of sake because the original angrysoba purports to live in Osaka and his live link used to take one to his blog http://angrysoba.blogspot.com/
,
About me
My blogs
angrysoba
Blogs I follow
JS-Kit
About me Gender Male
Industry Education
Location Osaka, Japan
.
Now that is in disarray with dead You Tubes posted. The live links above against his name now take you to different You Tubes. WTF is going on?
@Ishmael
Really…please pander to another audience..and by the way,there were no survivors ..those trapped in the rear compartment lasted for about 7 hours and died when a carbon dioxide filter exploded after falling into sea water..I will not answer any other posts on this as I refuse to get dragged into completely ridiculous conspiracy theories but admit that the moon landing was filmed in Hollywood…Area 51 is used to test alien UFO’s and of course the entire planet is going to explode on Dec 22nd 2012….ho hum..As for the damaged US sub..well the footage of the vessel putting into Faslane for repairs was actually shot 2 years before the Kursk incident and the sub in question had actually damaged it’s conning tower after diving too close to a Brit warship and hitting the keel….but feel free to surf the net for other unexplained mysteries…
As I said, there are several versions out there. However, a visit to Faslane by a US sub (then or two years earlier) escaped me completely. The visit to Norway for repairs ( later denied by the Norwegians and the US – it was allegedly prescheduled, and for supplies) followed by a spell in dock at Southampton, was apparently well documented, however. There are also photos of an indented round hole just aft of the mangled bow section which have given rise to speculation. And no, the Mk 48 torpedo is not designed to do this. As far as we know.
.
Worth reading the Wiki entry for a discussion of how long the crew might have survived, also mentioning the fact that the bow section was cut off before recovering the hull. The bow was never recovered:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_submarine_K-141_Kursk
.
{http://www.bellona.org/english_import_area/international/russia/navy/northern_fleet/incidents/17587)
.
{http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/KURSK/index.html}
.
There is an awful lot of bollocks on this last site. Not least the damage to the sail, which mysteriously disappeared when the Kursk was raised. But it’s still an interesting exercise for those interested in sifting fact from fiction.
@Frazier
Yes, you should not get involved. You are making yourself look like you are the one making it up.
You are quite right….there is no talking sense into those obsessed with conspiracy theories….