GCHQ and the NSA between them employ tens of thousands of people. I am bemused by the shock at the “revelation” they have been spying. What on Earth did journalists think that spies do all day? That includes electronics spies.
Since Katherine Gun revealed that we spy on other delegations – and the secretariat – within the UN building, it is hardly a shock that we spy on other governments at summits in the UK. For once, the government cannot pretend that the object is to save us all from terrorism, which is the usual catch all excuse. Nor in the real world is any of the G20 nations a military threat to the UK. The real truth of the matter is that our spies – GCHQ, MI5 and MI6 – are themselves a large and highly influential interest block within the state. Lots of people make a great deal of money out of the security state, and this kind of activity is actually simply an excuse for taking money from taxpayers – which is from everyone who has ever bought anything – and giving that money to the “security industry”.
I do not view spying on other governments as quite as despicable as spying on ordinary citizens, which is an unspeakable betrayal of the purpose of government. Spying on other governments is a game they all play to extort money each to their own security elites. But I will say that spying on the South African government seems pretty low. Why?
Interception of diplomatic communications is plainly a gross breach of the Vienna Conventions, even if the forms of communication have changed since they were drafted. I have never studied the particulars of international law as they relate to spying, but it seems to me an area that in the modern world needs regulation. There must be room here for the UN to be involved in preparing a Convention to outlaw the interception of international communications, with recourse to the International Court of Justice for those victim of it.
There is more work for the UN on Syria. We should all be grateful that Russia is holding out against the very dubious western claims that the Syrian government has deployed chemical weapons. But while Obama can declare all the red lines he wishes, they do not give any country a right to take action on Syrian soil without UN authority. That needs to be restated, strongly. There is no basis at all for the continued and massive Israeli attacks on Syria – they are absolutely illegal. Israeli strikes have definitely killed more people than the alleged deaths from chemical weapons. Can someone explain to me why that is not a red line?
The UN Secretary General should be speaking out, and the UN Security Council should be meeting, to discuss the Israeli attacks on Syria. The system of international law has broken down irretrievably.
The CE
24 Jun, 2013 – 10:31 am
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/24/stephen-lawrence-family-smear-met
Why do you post a link to this Guardian article without explanation or comment?
Are you pretending to be concerned about the Lawrence family?
KingofWelshNoir
24 Jun, 2013 – 8:16 pm
Over time, I have come to observe that some people take Habbabkuk, even more seriously than he takes himself. (e.g. his sense of humour, to me absolutely essential especially over a period of time.) Other way round with Mary she takes herself much more seriously than some others do. I have yet to see he laugh. And yes, like you, i believe Habba’s tone has evolved.
With similar humility as you, I would suggest that Mary ceases to label Habbabkuk a Troll. To borrow your phrase calling people trolls “is ugly, and only diminishes the person who does it.” And, respectfully, it rather debases the whole blog.
Re Al Hilli case.
@Habba. 5 43pm
“…should it turn out that he is found guilty, I must confess that I look forward with unalloyed pleasure to the sight of so many people…… having to eat humble pie…”
I’d be happy to see the killer(s) identified and convicted.
But are you really suggesting that a guilty verdict in a UK court would really dispel reasonable doubts?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guildford_Four_and_Maguire_Seven
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_Six
Watching MSNBC ‘Hardball’ and the media campaign to discredit Snowden continues. David Corn, normally an outlier wrt mainstream corporatism is falling under the spell;
‘Ecuador is still ‘harboring’ Assange in the Embassy’ Words are important. The more you repeat key words, the more it’s accepted.
Habbabkuk
Actually, I wasn’t accusing you of gloating, but just anticipating it, inferring from the relish with which you greeted this latest plot twist. Sometimes it is just cooler to enjoy quiet satisfaction in these things, no?
And anyway, if the brother takes the rap, who’s to say he isn’t a patsy, being set up by the dastardly State? Oops, there I go again 🙂
The CE
24 Jun, 2013 – 10:41 am
The Scourge a buffon as ever as I see.
“I’m off to Wimbers next week and got my tickets for a reasonable £70. Tickets for this week were available for less than £50, but hey, you’re never one to let the facts get in the way of a misinformed rant.”
I was quoting prices from the official Wimbledon Tennis website.
If you can obtain tickets for seats inside the courts for the prices you mention then please share that information with the rest of us.
Or are these tickets for watching the events on big screens outside the courts i.e. on muddy Henman Hill?
Or even illegal tickets?
Pray tell.
“I was quoting prices from the official Wimbledon Tennis website.”
http://www.wimbledon.com/en_GB/tickets/201205091336561699698.html
I find myself in the embarrassing position (not for the first time) of having to apologise to a complete tosser or two.
The CE 24 Jun, 2013 – 10:41 am
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!) 24 Jun, 2013 – 11:27 am
The outside courts are available for the prices CE stated.
@ The Scorge
With all due respect to your apparent experience in ticket-touting, I’d venture to suggest that illegal tickets usually sell at over and not under face value.
Furhtermore, pray ask yourself why someone should travel a long way and spend £50 or so to watch Wimbledon from a giant screen on a muddy hilltop when you can watch it from your armchair for part of the price of an annual TV licence.
Are you barking?
****************
La vita è bella, life is good! (win in straight sets – again)
@ KoWN :
“Actually, I wasn’t accusing you of gloating, but just anticipating it, inferring from the relish with which you greeted this latest plot twist. Sometimes it is just cooler to enjoy quiet satisfaction in these things, no?”
________
They say that revenge is a dish best eaten cold. Trouble is, I like my food hot…
Anyway, my final reaction, if and when, is likely to be warmer than quiet satisfaction but less gloating than you fear. Does that sound fair?
This ad won’t do much for Mercedes sales in Israel or America, for that matter, where the Israel lobby is so strong.
http://windowintopalestine.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/mercedes-benz-smashes-through-israels.html
@ Sophia :
“But are you really suggesting that a guilty verdict in a UK court would really dispel reasonable doubts?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guildford_Four_and_Maguire_Seven
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_Six”
___________
I understand your point. But, as so often, context is important: the cases (the injustices) you refer to took place in a certain context of considerable ‘political heat’ for want of a better expression, whereas the context now, x months after the Al-Hilili murders, is ‘cool’ (ie, the affair has been forgotten by 99% of the population and anyway didn’t pose a threat to anyone else at the time itself for that matter).
Saying this more clearly would have taken up more time but I think you know what I mean to say.
Best to you!
“This ad won’t do much for Mercedes sales in Israel or America, for that matter, where the Israel lobby is so strong.”
Good job it wasn’t a palm tree.
I find myself in the embarrassing position (not for the first time) of having to apologise to a complete tosser or two.
The CE 24 Jun, 2013 – 10:41 am
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!) 24 Jun, 2013 – 11:27 am
The outside courts are available for the prices CE stated.
—————————————————————–
Afraid you’ll have to do it again then;
Show Court tickets for today were available through the Ballot(how I obtained mine)and The Queue for £45 and it was the Show Courts I was referring to. A bargain in my eyes for a days top class tennis including seeing the might Murray triumph.
However Outside court tickets are available for as low as £12 and a fiver at weekends. Nowhere near the ‘elitist’ event it is made out to be by our sporting experts Mary and Scourge.
And a Punnet of strawberries and cream is only £2.50. As another contributor is fond of saying, life is good, I think I’ll have two.
Whatever happened to angrysoba? Perhaps he’s soba’d up?
Sorry, couldn’t resist it.
In fact Wimbledon remains one of the very few major UK sporting events where you can still buy premium tickets on the day of play.
Looks like AFL150 will be landing in Havana in roughly 30 secs. Will there be a mad scramble to search the plane??
The Ecuadorian foreign minister, referring to the charges of treason which have been directed towards Snowden, sums up the irony of the situation with one simple question ….
http://xrepublic.tv/node/3960
@Habba, or should I still be calling you Dad! 10 56pm
I admit that the context of “context of considerable political heat” made it expedient for the state to have the Guildford Four and Birmingham Six found guilty.
Sadly though in recent times our society has witnessed, then largely forgotten, many miscarriages where there was no political heat:
Barri White
Keith Hyatt.
Sion Jenkins
Suzanne Holdsworth
David Carrington-Jones
Barry George
Angela Cannings
Donna Anthony
The Gurnos Three……………….
(At this point I had to stop copying and pasting as a cold sweat was dripping onto my keyboard. I think you will understand, that simple act will never be the same for me after 11 21am yesterday! Suffice it to say, this list is an awful lot longer.)
What I am suggesting is,
a. Miscarriages of justice are sadly an all too regular occurance in the UK justice system.
and
b. If it suits powerful elements within the state machine for a person to be found guilty, for whatever the reason, then there is a history of that being accomplished.
Across the ocean I fear we will witness Bradley Manning as another victim of a state’s ability to find the innocent guilty. I hope and pray I am wrong.
……………………………….
@Doug. 10 39pm
What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.
I am honoured to have you as a fellow member of this blog’s Cock-up Team.
Onwards and uwpdasr!
Sorry to see, Habbabkuk, your most premature gloating over Ziad al-Hilli being the cruel assassin of his brother, his wife, her mother, and Mollier when he has not even been indicted, tried and convicted of the terrine crime when there is still a chance even then by the beleaguered spooks/coppers having somehow making him look like the culprit.
Just look at how L.C. Underwood was set up to look like the killer of Viktor Gunnarsson, the alleged assassin of Olof Palme – what required another murder of a Mrs. Miller, and was used by North Carolina prosecutors and judges to rule that if Underwood killed Mrs. Miller, he could have killed Gunnarsson, and the reverse.
This was such a fabricating of evidence that a federal appeals court ruled that Underwood be released after 180 days if there was not a retrial of his alleged murder of Gunnarsson, only for it to quash its own order long after Underwood should have been released.
Our spooks can always get away with murder if their bosses really want it.
And your comparing Moscow’s dealing with Snowden to how the Soviets acted during implementing the Soviet-Hitler Non-Aggression Pact is simply ludicrous Russian bashing.
Let’s hope tomorrow turns out finally better for you.
@ Dreoilin, re “Don’t be utterly daft. Nobody can judge sincerity from written words. You need facial expressions, body language, tone of voice. You’re blathering. “
Rather I think you are sobering, and I don’t need facial expressions, body language or even your tone of voice, to read you like I read the Habbu-Clown; amazing how protective the new disciples are of their new Gang Leader, King Troll Habbu-Clown; all it took for poor Villager, was for a little buffoon humour, and suddenly Krishnamurti has been replaced by a new Guru, but from the Dark Side; as for you “Sweet Dreoilin”, I guess that your antagonism towards Mary must be due to some sort of jealous rivalry, as you do sometimes tend to post very similar links, so you quickly jumped on the Clown’s anti-Mary bandwagon, pulling her up for petty semantics, & constantly having little snide digs; I suggest that you should try sucking on a lemon or two, to see if that helps to really sweeten you up.
@ Suhayl Saadi, I take it you have miraculously & finally noticed that this Blog has been cleverly sabotaged as to make it impossible to have any dialectical or meaningful discourse without being distracted by both the sly & the obvious trolling; the Habbu-Clown straight from the off, targeted one of this Blog’s most active Posters, namely Mary, trolling her with constant off-topic accusations, and various semantic & other shenanigans. He has now through various tactics, managed to divide the Posters here, between those that are not fooled by his masquerade, and those that have either fallen for his ruses, or have jumped on his bandwagon for their own cynical reasons; I am not surprised that Mary took offence at your intervention, for you seem, just like Jon & Craig, to be totally oblivious to what has actually been occurring on this Blog since the arrival of Habbabkuk.
‘dialectical discourse’…I wish.
Well Said Macky
I was reading about this EX soul
Daniel Somers
Then, I pursued replacing destruction with creation. For a time this provided a distraction, but it could not last. The fact is that any kind of ordinary life is an insult to those who died at my hand. How can I possibly go around like everyone else while the widows and orphans I created continue to struggle? If they could see me sitting here in suburbia, in my comfortable home working on some music project they would be outraged, and rightfully so.
http://gawker.com/i-am-sorry-that-it-has-come-to-this-a-soldiers-last-534538357?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_twitter&utm_source=gawker_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
In his tiny and lonely cube of space Ed Snowden must be feeling incredibly frightened and exhausted.
My thoughts are with him.
@ Brian. 2 48am
Thanks for the link. Who could read that and not be moved?
Maybe those of us with friends and family who protect the elites, whether uniformed or not, need to get them to look at it, if only for their own good.
………………………………
@phil. 1 49pm
“…what does it take to tarnish a copper?”
Plus ça change.
Your link shows the modern workings of a long and proud tradition.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Melville
But at least he didn’t get his very own statue like Sir Arthur “Bomber” Harris.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Arthur_Harris,_1st_Baronet
Macky –
We’ve had our differences, but you’re dead right. H. has been following this
http://www.mepc.org/articles-commentary/speeches/hasbara-and-control-narrative-element-strategy
to the letter.
In some countries, like the United States, Israel can rely upon a “fifth column” of activist sympathizers to amplify its messages, to rebut and discredit statements that contradict its arguments, facts, and fabrications, and to impugn the moral standing of those who make such statements. Israel makes intelligent use of the possibilities this creates for public-private partnership in propaganda. As one pertinent example, the Jewish Agency for Israel has sponsored an online “Hasbara Handbook” for students around the world to use as advocates of Israel and its policies.1
The “Hasbara Handbook” explains many standard techniques of propaganda and deceptive rhetoric. It rehearses specific arguments and counter-arguments and outlines a program of training for advocacy and rebuttal. It also stresses the importance of labeling or “name-calling” – the linking of a person or idea to a negative symbol. The handbook places itself in a larger context. It commends the work of “CAMERA” – the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America – an organization notorious for the viciousness of its efforts to blacken the reputations of those who criticize Israel or advance accounts of events that deviate from the official Israeli narrative by branding them as “anti-Semitic” or “self-hating Jews.” It notes that CAMERA provides a free monthly magazine full of timely hasbara materials for Jewish students in the United States. A myriad of Israel-oriented think tanks provide similar guidance online, as do numerous websites in Israel itself.
The recruitment of the more impressionable commentators on this blog is a recognised technique. Note that the common ground isn’t any coincidence between the political views of the recruiter and recruited, but a shared and carefully cultivated resentment of a single, idiosyncratic poster. Divide and rule.
H. will probably deny this, with added scorn and sarcasm. But we have to ask what motivates someone to persist so long in disrupting a public discussion. Is it merely personal dislike? He is at liberty to go somewhere else, in that case, or scroll past the posts to which he objects – as he has sometimes told other posters to do. No, this guy has a cause. Else, why seek allies?
I’m a little disappointed in Dreoilin, I have to say. I thought I saw some strength of character there. But all H had to do was make some approving noises, and wave a picture of Mary going off on one, and her compliance was assured.
“La Vita e Bella”, by the way, is a film. It’s about the holocaust.
Komodo
24 Jun, 2013 – 4:27 pm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/24/israel-cancels-puppet-show-jerusalem
The excuse: [The event] “…contradicts an Israeli law passed as part of the Oslo peace process.”
Israels violation of the Oslo Accords:
Israel Fails to Withdraw from Palestinian Territories
Israel Fails to Release Political Prisoners
Israel Fails to Open the Northern Safe Passage Route between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank and Closes the Southern Safe Passage Route
Israel Fails to Co-operate on Security Matters
Israel Denies Palestinians Freedom of Movement
Israel Fails to Prosecute Israeli Settlers for Crimes Committed against Palestinians
http://www.nad-plo.org/etemplate.php?id=67
Thanks Brian Fujisan for that last link.
What a powerful suicide/ mercy mission note from a soldier who was emotionally drained, exhausted and utterly removed from humanity by his superiors and the situations he was sent into.
This is the result of brainwashing soldiers, encouraging human beings to act like animals will stun us emotionally and result in evolutionary setback to our primate behaviour.
The UN will never be able to humanise or control warfare.
Doug – for real balls-out nastiness and hypocrisy on the individual scale, let this stand as the year’s (so far) example of Israel’s humanity and desire for civilised values:
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israel-seizes-bedouin-man-s-toilet-in-west-bank-after-deeming-it-illegal.premium-1.531502
@Komodo. 8 51am
Thanks for the link.
I knew there must be a handbook(s).
It took me a while to see the grooming and subtle campaigns of grooming to divide and rule.
I look forward to digesting it.
I’ll keep the slippery elm handy.
………………….
@Mary.
While on the subject of herbal remedys. If only I could recommend something to rub into your hide both to ease the marks of the lashings you get from that quarter, and also to thicken it a bit. No offense intended.
Don’t be distracted. Your tireless mining is much appreciated and I think the unwelcome attention you receive is a measure of your worth. I know you will keep at it. Thanks.
……………………..
Craig. Hoping that foot is on the mend. Look after it.