Here in Ghana people are stunned by the announcement that a bond of £3,000 will have to be submitted by visa applicants to the UK, redeemable on return.
It is unpleasant for a nation to be singled out as comprised of particularly untrustworthy individuals against whom special measures are needed. Theresa May appears quite deliberately to be singling out countries whose citizens are normally black or brown – India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Ghana and Nigeria. They are all citizens with extremely close ties to the UK. For example, all of those countries supplied large numbers of men to British armed forces in two World Wars; with little resulting gratitude.
The true level of Britain’s regard for the Commonwealth is disclosed in all its arrogance; citizenship of the Commonwealth countries with the longest link to the UK will become a positive disadvantage in visa application. Israeli settlers living in Occupied Palestine on the West Bank, incidentally, will still be allowed to enter the UK without any visa at all, despite membership of neither Commonwealth nor EU. Paradoxical, isn’t it?
The measure shows the arrogant British disdain for these countries – of which India pre-eminently but also Ghana are fast growing and important trading partners. Undoubtedly Ghana will retaliate with measures which hurt British businesses; many of my good friends are senior Ghanaian politicians, and they are all furious. The rhetoric the British employ about transformation from colonial status to a modern partnership of equals is exposed for the tissue of lies it has always been. This is a straightforward racist measure, aimed at securing the racist vote to the Tories.
Not does it make any sense. If you are intending to enter the UK under false pretences, and have the intent illegally to settle and start a new life there, then £3,000 is scarcely a deterrent given the substantial economic gains you intend to make over the long period you intend to stay. It will rather seem a good investment; people will find the money. The people it will deter are those who never intended to overstay. The extra cash upfront, to the businessman for a business trip, for the student coming to study, for the tourist will drive them to go elsewhere, to the UK’s net loss.
More cruelly it will deter decent middle class people from coming to see grandchildren in the holidays, from going to the niece’s wedding, from going to graduation. Those things will become the prerogative of the wealthy, those with plenty of cash to spare.
This does nothing to deter illegal immigration. It merely demonstrates populist racism, demonstrates contempt for some of the UK’s best-disposed friends, and demonstrates that the government thinks the right to travel is only for the rich. It is contemptible.
“We are the Borg. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/video/2013/jul/02/google-glass-video-review
Just wait until they link them in to a real-time Google Earth street-view.
“But I admit is is possible to read your posts as in fact supporting what I said about the number of Gaza deaths. Is that how you meant it?”
No, Habbabkuk. People talk about thousands of ‘casualties’, and in my experience, they often mean both killed and wounded.
1,385 Palestinians were killed, and more than 5,300 were wounded. That’s probably where the “thousands” comes from.
“Even so, though, assisting illegal immigrants is illegal, whereas – unfortunately – screwing the poor is not (usually).”
Charging for accommodation that is way, way, way, below par, and doesn’t comply with the most basic requirements, is sick and should be criminalized if it’s not already. The programme I saw is mentioned here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/22/sub-standard-private-housing
“I wonder what Shannonwatch’s methodology was?”
I have no idea. But I intend to find out. I’m curious myself. They give some figures here
http://www.shannonwatch.org/sites/shannonwatch.org/files/ShannonFactsheet.pdf
Some information is from the Dept for Transport. For example, ‘Permits Issued to Carry Munitions of War
through Ireland or Irish Airspace’
An interview with lying UKIP toad Nige, the Farrage, hollering away against the daemonic Wind turbines, Don quixote eat you heart out, he says he wants to emulate the Lib Dems?
He has a penchant for posh Tories and bankers just like him, he loves the EU for the money it brings to UKIP and despite so desperately wanting out, he has a massive EU campaign plan for next year….
http://www.edp24.co.uk/news/politics/ukip_leader_nigel_farage_wants_to_emulate_lib_dem_success_in_bid_to_hold_balance_of_power_at_westminster_1_2258183
@ Dreoilin
Sorry to have to come back again. I know that people talk about “thousands of casualties”, but I was specifically referring to the outraged posts and comments ommediately after Cast Lead that talked about “thousabds of DEATHS”. They were many and they turned out to have been exaggerating wildly (as the reference you supplied shows yet again) Thousands of deaths it was they claimed, not thousands of casualties.
“Yes indeed. As I pointed out at 13h45 (pls refer).”
That was AFTER the comment I was referring to. My God,the chutzpah! Do you have no shame at all? You were trying to pretend you were joking for those less familiar with your tactics, but you weren’t. You call people anti-Semite for despising a despotic shit-hole like Israel while you cheer on the destruction of Syria.
@Habba.12 00pm
Ok Habba you win.
Number two now reclassified as singular.
Thousands of years of mathematical discovery and semantics down the pan.
Oh! But of course, we’re in Habba-world where all is deffinitely not as it seems.
And all just so Habba can score a point, cosy in the knowledge that not that many US soldiers passed through a neutral country’s airport on the way to shock and awe. What’s all the fuss about helping two million armed soldiers into the killing fields?
HTF can millions morph into millions?
Times like these I really miss Sofia.
Why am I bothering at all. More the fool me.
Now I want to get back and read the interesting stuff.
“There are many complex reasons for people finding themselves in odd situations …”
That’s true. I know someone whose visa in the U.S. was about to run out when he was a witness to a horrible road accident at 2am. He was told by the police not to move a muscle until they had taken a statement from him, and that he might be needed as a witness in court. The person who was injured (brain damaged) was an off-duty police officer. Needless to say, the visa running out became almost irrelevant. Rules can always be bent, if the “authorities” need or want to bend them.
@ Dreoilin
And just as an afterthought:
I should be more impressed by the frequent posts on the number of casualties inflicted by the Israelis on the Gazans, and other examples of Israeli behaviour over the last 50 years, if I thought for one moment that the commenters concerned were themselves even half as concerned by the infinitely higher numbers of people who were killed, executed, imprisoned, tortured and otherwise had their lives ruined over the same period by the leaders of Syria, Egypt (all the way back to Colonel Nasser), Iraq (Saddam Hussein and illustrious predecessors like mad General Kassem), Libya, Jordan (both the boy king and his late father Hussein…not to mention the wonderful regimes in Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia.
(And to those who try and weasel out of this by saying “”oh, but they did it to their own people”, I would reply that….human rights are human rights).
Not too many peeps about all of that, eh, when people qre sounding off about Israel. And they didn’t even have the excuse of being under threat, real or imagined.
“They were many and they turned out to have been exaggerating wildly (as the reference you supplied shows yet again) Thousands of deaths it was they claimed, not thousands of casualties.”
1) Then quote me some of these, and link to them please.
2) Wasn’t the deaths and injuries toll as given by B’Tselem horrendous, Habbabkuk? Against a mostly civilian population who were effectively locked in?? And wasn’t it entirely out of proportion to the force ranged against the Israelis – and the puny weapons they had at their disposal? Talk about shooting fish in a barrel … it was disgusting.
@ Tech Savage (16h18)
Yes, it was after – all of 3 minutes after.
So don’t be a chump and discuss the real issues.
________
And, by the way, I call those who are anti-Jewish, anti-Jewish. As I said, others have noticed and commented and you can’t get round that, can you.
@Habba. Allthefeckingtime today.
I just read the interesting stuff but noticed your little problem with the meaning of numbers resurfacing over other issues.
So, since I am feeling kind today I found this website to help you.
http://www.edurite.com/kbase/free-online-math-for-dummies-online
I’m sure you’ll like it because it says “erudite”
Now for the links.
Yes Fedup, this dummy clicks most of them.
@ Dreoilin
“1) Then quote me some of these, and link to them please.
2) Wasn’t the deaths and injuries toll as given by B’Tselem horrendous, Habbabkuk? Against a mostly civilian population who were effectively locked in?? And wasn’t it entirely out of proportion to the force ranged against the Israelis – and the puny weapons they had at their disposal? Talk about shooting fish in a barrel … it was disgusting.”
___________
I can quote you nothing from this blog because, as you know, I wasn’t following it then. But there were lots of accusation like that out there, believe me. Do you really expect me to have kept a list in the expectation that a few years afterwards I would need to reply to a question like yours?
Re. your second para, horrible as any event like that is, your talk of shooting fish in a barrel is emotional and not rational. The operation went on for several days. Had that been their intention, the Israelis would have been able to kill and injure, and would have killed and injured, many, many more people than they did. As to the proportionality, it is clear that they wanted to teach Hamas a lesson. Perhaps Hamas should have anticipated that, in the same way as it should have – and did, of course – appreciate that the Gazan population is mainly civilian and enclosed.
Habbu-Clown; “Not too many peeps about all of that, eh, when people qre sounding off about Israel. And they didn’t even have the excuse of being under threat, real or imagined.”
Does this ring a bell ?
“I think the reason people don’t post on such issues is simply that these things are universally condemned and hardly worth the effort of pointing out on a forum where it can be tacitly assumed most people are on the same page.”
You have proved that you cannot engage in a rational debate, mostly by ignoring points that are put to you as if they don’t exist; if you were to “man up” & argue your position against counter points instead of ducking them, then you wouldn’t appear as ridiculous as you do; then again if you hold ridiculous positions, you will always appear ridiculous !
Millions of American forces through Shannon Airport on route to mass slaughter, in service of Israel:
“Since the U.S. went to war in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003, about 2.5 million members of the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard and related Reserve and National Guard units have been deployed in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, according to Department of Defense data. Of those, more than a third were deployed more than once.”
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/03/14/185880/millions-went-to-war-in-iraq-afghanistan.html
@ anyone fussed
I shall post as often as I deem appropriate and as often as I please (following the example of others).
And the posts will remain, as ever, focused, to the point, and polite. Those from me, at least.
Those who don’t like it can just scroll past.
@ Herbie
Those figures and those of Shannonwatch (if the latter are correct) would therefore mean that about two thirds went through Shannon.
What other routes were used, I wonder. Perhaps Dreoilin will come across something about that and/or Shannonwatch’s methodology.
“(And to those who try and weasel out of this by saying “”oh, but they did it to their own people”, I would reply that…human rights are human rights).”
Yes, human rights are human rights. But Israel is aligned with the United States, and so is the UK. All under the umbrella of the “West” (or what the U.S. loves to call the “international community”). And Ireland to a large extent comes under that umbrella too. So, in effect, people here are talking about atrocities carried out “in our names”. And that is just not acceptable to most people here.
I doubt very much if anyone here has a problem condemning atrocities anywhere, including Syria, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Jordan, Algeria, Morocco or Tunisia. And how many of the regimes that you’ve listed were being propped up by the United States for its own reasons? How many of them were used by the United States to torture “renditioned” prisoners? The same United States that then turned on some of those regimes, in the guise of ‘humanitarian intervention’, and left the ordinary people much worse off?
I have only one word to describe the United States, Habbabkuk. Hypocrites. Writ large.
Macky
I’m pleased to see that you’ve returned from Paris in fine pugnacious form.
But as you surely know, France was the spiritual capital of the Enlightenment and is the country of the subtle and reasoned argument.
I am therefore less pleased to see that none of these fine qualities appears to have rubbed off on you.
Perhaps you should spend a little longer there?
***************
La vie est belle, ze life eez good!
In killing over one thousand Palestinians in Gaza and maiming many more, Habby says:
“they (Israel) wanted to teach Hamas a lesson”
which is of course a crime against humanity
No wonder Israel and the US are threatening all sorts of retaliation should the Palestinian Authority pursue its desire to join the ICC.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/06/28/the-white-house-threatens-to-end-aid-if-palestine-joins-the-icc/
The thugs and criminals of Israel and the US quite simply don’t want to be subject to any independent law whatsoever, as of course you’d expect from criminals.
Habby-Clown; “Had that been their intention, the Israelis would have been able to kill and injure, and would have killed and injured, many, many more people than they did. As to the proportionality, it is clear that they wanted to teach Hamas a lesson. Perhaps Hamas should have anticipated that, in the same way as it should have – and did, of course – appreciate that the Gazan population is mainly civilian and enclosed.”
So in the habby-clown mindset;
Any mass killer can claim as an excusing or mitigating factor that he could have murder many more.
Massive mass slaughter of overwhelmingly innocents & children, is rational if it’s to “teach a lesson”
Finally to provide further suspicion of his motives here, he concludes with the classic Zionist Apologist line of blaming the victims.
“Those figures and those of Shannonwatch (if the latter are correct) would therefore mean that about two thirds went through Shannon.”
Yes, I was wondering about that too. I’m going to email Shannonwatch (when I get out of here!)
I heard an interesting talk this afternoon by an ex Southern Railways man who started work at the age of 15 as an engine cleaner, then became a fireman until 1967 when steam finished and finally a driver until 1987 on diesel electric and electric trains. Some fascinating anecdotes. What came over was the camaraderie and the working together with a common aim. After leaving driving, he became a driver trainer in the privatised railways.
He mentioned this gathering of Mallard and other engines at the York Railway Museum this weekend.
Nice photos.
‘Magnificent Mallard: The world’s fastest steam locomotive
Three-quarters of a century ago, a locomotive built in Doncaster set a world speed record for steam rail travel on a stretch of track just south of Grantham. That 1938 record – of 126 miles per hour – remains to this day.
To mark the 75th anniversary of the achievement, the National Railway Museum in York has arranged for Mallard to meet its five surviving sister locomotives from the A4 Class – which ran on the East Coast Mainline from the 1930s to the 1960s.
Ahead of the museum’s Great Gathering on Wednesday 3 July – look back at how the record was set, with one of the museum’s curators Ed Bartholomew.’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23137106
“I can quote you nothing from this blog because, as you know, I wasn’t following it then. But there were lots of accusation like that out there, believe me. Do you really expect me to have kept a list in the expectation that a few years afterwards I would need to reply to a question like yours?”
My recollection of events differs, I can’t remember anyone saying that.
I do recall Israel claiming there were no civilian deaths whatsoever.
I can post evidence if you like.
I see there is a court martial now in this case. A fixation with guns and ammunition. Note the colleague’s conviction.
Nightingale: SAS Sniper ‘Put Public At Risk’
Danny Nightingale is accused of illegally keeping hundreds of rounds of ammunition and a working 9mm pistol at his house.
http://news.sky.com/story/1110635/nightingale-sas-sniper-put-public-at-risk
I should have said ‘a retrial of a court martial….’
Another typical Habbu-Clown post at 5.07, empty & devoid of any substance or argument, much like so many of his posts.
“I was specifically referring to the outraged posts and comments ommediately after Cast Lead that talked about “thousands of DEATHS”.”
But you can’t find (or won’t look for) one of them to quote me, Habbabkuk?? (I know you’re not referring to this blog, since you weren’t here then)
And as Herbie said, “teaching Hamas a lesson” was a crime against humanity.
I called it a “vicious punishment” way back when the subject came up.
Sorry, but I have to leave. Duty calls.
Any bonds or visas required? Silly question.
It is well known that certain elements within the Government are eager to provide a safe haven for suspects wanted for the vilest war crimes and crimes against humanity, and will happily jettison the UK’s binding obligation under the Geneva Convention to seek them out and bring them, regardless of nationality, to justice. There should be no hiding place, not even in the British Foreign Office.
‘Lt. General Benny Gatz, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), is due to visit the United Kingdom this week; it will be the first visit of an IDF Chief of Staff to the United Kingdom since 1998. Lt. General Gantz is suspected of involvement in the commission of war crimes, particularly with respect to his role in the November 2012 attack on the Gaza Strip, codenamed Operation Pillar of Defense.
Prior to his visit, the UK Government awarded Lt. General Gantz’s trip the status of a Special Mission, thereby granting him immunity from the UK’s criminal justice system. It is noted that Mr. Gantz would not ordinarily be entitled to immunity, and that the UK is under a binding legal obligation to search for and prosecute those suspected of committing war crimes, including before their own national courts.
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights and Hickman & Rose Solicitors, who represent the victims of Lt. General Gantz’s actions, condemn the decision to grant immunity to a suspected war criminal. This decision sends the dangerous message that political considerations will be placed ahead of the rule of law.’
[..]
/..
http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=9650:suspected-war-criminal-lt-general-gantz-offered-special-mission-immunity-before-visit-to-the-uk&catid=145:in-focus
“Yes, I was wondering about that too. I’m going to email Shannonwatch (when I get out of here!)”
I often wonder why people fall for Habby’s troll games; to question absolutely everything, and demand proof, which is then rejected as unconvincing or unreliable, is just one of a common diversionary troll tactics. The give away being does it really alter the point ? ie would it have been wrong to allow 2 million US troops to pass through, but ok for 200 ?
Flaming June
30 Jun, 2013 – 7:02 pm
“Is there a collective noun for trolls?”
A Coffle of Trolls has a nice ring to it. (Coffle: line of Asses tide together)
But when they post on here they come out with a Drunkship of Cobblers!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_collective_nouns