This is a genuine offer. I will pay £100 to any person who can provide a convincing reason why Denis MacShane’s expense fiddling, involving his creating false invoices, was not a criminal offence. Your argument does not have to be unanswerable – merely respectable. Up to three prizes will be given, for the three first and not essentially the same convincing arguments.
This competition specifically is open to employees of the Metropolitan Police and the Crown Prosecution Service; we would love to know their reasoning. It baffles me. I confess I can think of no single circumstance in this case that would prevent MacShane being convicted for theft and fraud. What is the answer?
Denis MacShane is a criminal. If he wants to try his chances with a jury, the libel courts are open to him and I am here.
“David Anderson (Blaydon, Labour)
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what recent discussions (a) he and (b) officials in his Department have had with the Attorney-General’s office on the legality of armed drone strikes.”
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2012-11-05a.126289.h&s=speaker%3A11427#g126289.q0
Yes Mary. We have a choice. We could vote for a Green and console ourselves that we voted our conscience for that pyrrhic victory. Then you could really get upset with Romney’s ‘Merica.
No wonder you have not found anything, Komodo,have a look at this PDF
http://www.csok.cz/files/dokumenty/UOB_Text_Letak_1.pdf
No point entering as you are correct.
Has anyone watched Dispatches on Channel 4 yesterday?
.
What was it all about, I wonder? Do Israel/US/UK send signal to Iran that if Israel bombs Iranian nuclear targets and Iran does not retaliate it will be it?
.
Whole narration of the story was rather amusing, especially when Israelis were acting as Iranians. And also mother crying while driving to see her Israeli soldier son. Or when it was mentioned that despite having UN resolution issued against Israel Israelis were still prepared to raid Iranian territory. Does this speak of impotence of UN.
.
And NOTHING was mentioned about other side. One sided, bluntly presented propaganda.
Re: James Andrew Athill, there is a rather dubious looking website
http://www.policecrimecommissioner.co.uk/content/candidate-services
run by a rather anonymous outfit One Team Policing
“The role of the PCC will be one of the most challenging roles in public life and One Team Policing offers a range of essential services to PCC candidates throughout their election campaigns and beyond, including our FREE online service. We are also particularly well qualified to advise private, public and third sector organisations that will or want to be working with PCCs, Chief Constables, PCPs and Government once PCCs have been elected.”
and
“Thank you for using our Police Crime Commissioner web site which we provide primarily for commercial purposes.
Our site has no association with the Home Office or any other Government department. Consequently, we are unable to provide contact details for candidates (other than those already provided on our website) or pass on messages on your behalf either to candidates or to the Home Office.”
I think we can see where PCC budgets will be going.
Yes Ben Franklin. But voting for a Green in the US would achieve nothing. They have not had access to $1billion like Romney and Obama, nor the almost hysterical media coverage they obtained.
The BBC are already predicting Obama as being re-elected with 50% and Romney with 47% of the votes.
“They have not had access to $1billion like Romney and Obama,”
Exactly why we need Publicly Funded Elections, Mary. The tyranny of a two-party system creates that very monopolistic hoarding of cash.
O/T If you had not noticed, Craig Murray, your blog post on “CIA look to swamp Correa” has been translated into Spanish at Hispaleaks:
http://hispaleaks.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/la-cia-busca-empantanar-correa.html?showComment=1352213835081#c8044886740994989860
“Has anyone watched Dispatches on Channel 4 yesterday?”
I started watching it on 4od but killed it after hearing “If Israel and Iran get involved in an attack”. I presume that they meant “if Israel launches an unprovoked attack on Iran”. Can’t tolerate such mealy-mouthed language.
Where’s Werritty?
Here, perhaps:
The 2nd International Conference
By HLS, Israel Homeland Security
October 2012
Dear Friends,
It is with great pleasure that we invite you to the 2ND International Conference on Homeland Security, to be held November 11-14, 2012, in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Initiated by the Israel Export and International Cooperation Institute in cooperation with the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Home Front Defense, the Israel Police, Ashdod Port Company, the Israel Ports Company and the Israel Trade Fairs Center, Israel HLS 2012 will include lectures, seminars and panel discussions, and an exhibition showcasing some of the finest field-proven and next-generation technologies and systems in the industry. As well, there will be lots of opportunity to greet colleagues and create new business relationships through formal and informal meetings.
Israel HLS 2012 should be attended by all public decision makers, security professionals and HLS industry managers with an interest in:
Cyber Security
Securing Smart Cities
Critical Infrastructure Protection
Emergency Management and Preparedness
Our previous HLS conference, held in 2010, attracted more than 500 security officials from around the world, including public security ministers, senior government and municipal officials, emergency response and port authorities, police commanders and HLS industry managers. They heard and met with security experts and industry leaders discuss today’s challenges in the light of growing global terror, criminal activity, threats to public order and natural disasters.
Of particular note, a full half-day on November 14 has been dedicated to on-site technology demonstrations at Israel’s busiest seaport, the Port of Ashdod, located on the Mediterranean Sea a half-hour south of Tel Aviv, to be followed by a tour of Jerusalem’s Old City. Both tours are by advance registration only.
……….
Israel HLS 2012 is a closed event, taking place at The Israel Trade Fairs & Convention Center Tel Aviv. Open only to government officials and HLS industry managers.
http://jfjfp.com/?p=35720
One final get-together for the US Presidential candidates
http://original.antiwar.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/clowns1.jpg
We are doomed.
Aha, Nevermind. My previous post is perhaps relevant after all. CSOK was also wining and dining Kazakhs recently.
Gandalf attacks NZ PM for using the word ‘gay’ but keeps his mouth shut about everything else.
Reminds me of Stephen Fry’s recent public exhortations to recognise gay marriage – while the country is reeling from one crises to the next and is preoccupied with the vilest corruption scandals imaginable.
What planet are these people on?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/newzealand/9657490/Sir-Ian-McKellen-attacks-New-Zealand-prime-minister-over-gay-comments.html
Good suggestion from The Slog on the forthcoming election for police
commissarscommissioners:Noting in passing that if recorded crime rates continue to fall at the present rate, there will be NO CRIME in 2029, he continues:
The Conservative Party’s answer to the problem of a stats-bending, promotion-hungry, pc arse-licking, couldn’t care a toss police force is….elected police commissioners. More politicians – and a continuation of the process of turning the Thin Blue Line into the Big Fat Gestapo – has sweet diddly-squat to do with the rising level of endemic lawlessness in our country. It is on a par with Tessa Jowell’s 24/7 piss-artistry charter as the solution to binge-drinking.
I have just completed my voting form by writing ‘detection of crooks not jobs for the boys’ on it. Let us all, each and every one of us, apply our own forms of wit to this charade.
http://hat4uk.wordpress.com/
No comment on McKellen. This is offered instead:
http://mingle2.com/online-dating/ontario/mordor/gay-personals
In Ontario. Seems apt, somehow.
btw, Oldmark; thanks for making the distinction. Villager, yes, it’s good to understand why (beyond a lust for power and self-gratification). Re victims and responsibility: if my fifteen year old, on a wild night out, was sexually assaulted by a predator, the fifteen year old would bear the responsibility for being a typical fifteen year old, and the predator would bear the responsibility of performing a violent non-consensual act which damages and can destroy. It would make more sense to lock up men than it would to cloister potential victims.
thatcrab: I agree on individual distinctions. In France the age of consent is 15, for example. I think the point here is that all adults, where children, pre-pubescent or not, are concerned, are in loco-parentis. This is why it was entirely wrong of the 30 year old teacher to run away with his fifteen year old pupil: he may not have been the predator, but his responsibility was to her welfare, not her (vulnerable teenage) crush.
Very interesting, chilling piece by Andrew O’Hagan, apologies if posted before. Would disagree that the public ‘loved’ Savile: no-one I know had any love for him at all.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n21/andrew-ohagan/light-entertainment
Middle East Monitor today:
“A group of illegal Israeli settlers have thrown the Abul-Hawa family out of their home in occupied East Jerusalem, forcing the seven family members onto the street with their belongings.
The settlers broke into the house through a window. Fatimah Abul-Hawa, the mother of the family, said that she was shocked and surprised to see the intruders. The owner of the house, Mahmoud Abul-Hawa, was handed an eviction notice from the Israeli High Court, which claimed bizarrely that an anonymous person had bought the property and sold it on to the Ilad Organisation, to which the settlers belong.”
Anyone who believes a two-state solution is what Israel is working towards has to be thick!
And there’s more.
From Haaretz today:
Israel’s Housing Ministry published tenders for the construction of 1,285 new housing units in East Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ariel on Tuesday, in what left-wing activists said was an attempt to avoid American criticism of the move by releasing the plans during U.S. Election Day.
A good and timely post reminder from Komodo on the different (at least Parliamentary) treatments being handed out to Mr MacShane and Mr David Laws.
Compared to Mr Laws (investment banker, self-made millionaire (and more clever, and therefore more dangerous, than he is given credit for), Mr MacShane (less clever than he thinks himself) is just a small time crook.
All of which adds strength to my puzzlement – is that not so? – at the amount of stick Mr MacShane is getting, and got, on this blog…as compared to, say Mr Laws.
Perhaps because you’re
(1) going (went) softly on Mr Laws for fear of being labelled anti-gay
and
(2) slamming on Mr MacShane because he’s pro-Israel/a Zionist ?
Who knows what goes on in the sub-conscious?
One quick example of the convergence of politics, finance and media ownership in Jersey:
John Averty was earlier this year reappointed as Deputy Chairmen of the Jersey Financial Services Commission, the Jersey financial regulatory body.
Averty is a director of Fairbairn Private Bank Limited.
Averty was a Jersey Senator from 1972 – 1984.
Averty is chief executive of The Guiton Group which owns Jersey’s only newspaper.
The Jersey Evening Post, along with all other Jersey media, has failed to publish a report by ex Police Chief Graham Power for over a year. Power, not from Jersey, was removed as Jersey Chief Constable by the Jersey Senate at the height of the child abuse cases investigation. Subsequent to Power’s removal the investigations were dropped.
http://www.gov.je/GOVERNMENT/PLANNINGPERFORMANCE/Pages/MinisterialDecisions.aspx?showreport=yes&docid=03d395d739314d24fc3b66b010ce479f_MDs
Nadine Dorries suspended … can’t have her being a cat on TV …
Or eating Joey’s testicles!
“…hold on ,i just made that point before you”
So you did, so I believe we are joint winners. Craig has to deliver on this and pay up because I’m quite sure we have the correct explanation. I’ll go along with your 70/30 split since you were first – so he sends £70 to a charity of your choice, and £30 to a charity of mine.
C’mon Craig, ante up.
Dreadful to read those reports Doug Scorgie. As you say, a two state solution is just a joke/pie in the sky.
Ref Poliminance’s post earlier.
McKellen says:
“I’m currently touring secondary schools in UK, attacking homophobia in the playground and discouraging kids from the careless use of ‘gay’ which might make their gay friends (and teachers) feel less about themselves.[.]”
How many of us ordinary mortals are given the opportunity to enter secondary schools and proselytize to children on whatever subject? What arrogance these theatrical knights (and there are dozens of them) possess.
I had to look up the spelling!
1.Convert or attempt to convert (someone) from one religion, belief, or opinion to another.
2.Advocate or promote (a belief or course of action): “Davis wanted to proselytize his ideas”.
Just checking on the Bradley Manning Support Network site, I get this up –
This website is offline
No cached version is available
What’s wrong?
The most likely causes:
•The server is down for maintenance
•There may be a network problem
•The site may be experiencing excessive load
Retry for a live version of the site
What’s CloudFlare?This website uses CloudFlare in order to help keep it online when the server is down by serving cached copies of pages when they are unavailable. Unfortunately, a cached copy of the page you requested is not available, but you may be able to reach other cached pages on the site.
WTF????
http://www.bradleymanning.org/
Mary, this is turning up on Twitter too:
“Searches for “WikiLeaks” in the public search engine for the US National Archives have been blocked, according to a posting at Cryptome.org. Any search containing the word “WikiLeaks (like “Congress” and “WikiLeaks”) turns up an error message.”
Continues
http://dissenter.firedoglake.com/2012/11/03/us-national-archives-has-blocked-searches-for-wikileaks/
Oh no. Perhaps the Manning site could have used Sourceforge (I miss Clark)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_%28computing%29
I think Wikileaks has been prevented from appearing on US gov search terms since March…