The Respectability of Torture
St Mary’s University College, Thurs 1st August, 7.30pm
Craig Murray, former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, was a whistleblower who was removed from his ambassadorial post by Tony Blair for exposing the Tashkent regime‟s use of rape and systematic torture, including the boiling to death of political opponents. He has also spoken out against Central Asia‟s appalling dictatorships, regimes which are allies of the West, involved in torture and rendition, and was accused of threatening MI6‟s relationship with the CIA. Now a human rights activist, author and broadcaster, he outlines the dynamics of torture and the hypocrisy of incriminated Western governments.
My first public appearance for a while will be in Belfast on 1 August where I shall be giving a talk. Long term readers of this blog will recall that, while my focus is largely on international affairs, the domestic political achievements I most hope to see are a united Ireland and an independent Scotland.
Someone ‘does not read’ my posts but somehow their content crosses through the ether into his/her consciousness and his/her retorts are transmitted back to the blog. Jolly clever I call that.
@Habbabkuk 22nd, 11:27pm
Actually I have a lot of time for Ronnie’s ideas (recently retired from the same sort of thing). His battles with the biomedical model of mental illness prevalent at the time undoubtedly helped changed attitudes towards mental health … stuff like talking to the patient, looking at the context in which illness presented itself etc. The usual options at the time were swallowing the chlorpromazine or being restrained while haloperidol was injected into one of the upper, outer quadrants of your bottom!
Having said that, pharmacology has made tremendous contributions to the treatment of mental illness. Today’s pills are nothing like the stuff of old and allow a lot of unfortunate people to lead pretty “normal” lives.
However, I don’t think its delusional to believe most nation states are self-serving and often hypocritical. Some even appoint themselves as moral arbitors standing firm in the face of “evil/brutal* dictators” and bringing “freedom” and “democracy” to those lucky ones left alive after the cruise missiles and bombs have stopped falling.
ἐπὶ δηλήσει δὲ καὶ ἀδικίῃ εἴρξειν!
* delete as appropriate
“And you wonder why so many here think you a pompous oaf?”
__________________
Hello and welcome back, Jives, nice to hear from you again!
“Jolly clever I call that.” Honest brokers just keeping things fair, FJ 🙂
@Dad! 4 23pm
“If I didn’t exist, they’d have to invent me!”
And there I was thinking I was the most modest poster on this thread!
Saw this from Richard Kay yesterday.
‘The rehabilitation of former defence secretary Liam Fox continues apace.
Next month he will launch his first book, Rising Tides, at the London Film Museum in County Hall, in which he shares his wisdom on globalisation and other equally high-minded matters.
‘Liam remains convinced that he will return to frontline politics sooner rather than later,’ says a friend, almost two years after Fox resigned from the Cabinet over the Adam Werritty affair.
‘This book shows he has the perspective to be an effective force in Westminster and sets him up nicely for the party conference,’ adds the pal.’
Wonder who the pal doing the PR is.
~~~
‘The world has changed more and faster than any of us could have imagined. While that may be accepted in terms of global business and financial markets, and to some degree the worldwide web, people including their political leaders may have been slower at grasping what these new interconnections mean for the way we operate in this new era.
Liam Fox begins by questioning what decision-makers fear as the threats to world stability and peace, and then, using the techniques derived from his medical training, gathers his data, before giving his diagnosis and suggestions for treatment.
The journey of discovery which Liam Fox shares with us raises many important issues and presents fascinating insights and information. The world may at last be near the end of the fallout from The Treaty of Versailles, may finally be in a time which is neither dominated by two Superpowers nor by Cold War confrontations. So will we sink or swim among the rising tides?’ Amazon.
Hilarious stuff. Who writes it?
Will Werritty feature or Matthew Gould feature?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liam_Fox
Western backed Syrian rebels using chemical weapons:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXezs1YY01I
Need to improve your reading skills Mary.
I said I did not read your links(especially Daily Heil), not your posts.
HTH.
http://rt.com/news/syria-chemical-prepared-advance-901/
FJ, is this Liam Fox the same Dr. Fox involved in cocaine scandal in eighties?
Herbie: You saw Clinton plead with an audience that “9/11” wasn’t a false flag operation? I haven’t seen that, but did see him very angrily lash out at someone in a (friendly) audience, saying “An ‘inside job’? How dare you!” Has he become slightly less menacing towards anyone suggesting the official conspiracy theory is less than convincing?
The link about Dave’s beach foray was from the Mail. Correct. It was also in the Torygraph and the E Standard. I chose the Mail as their photojournalism is very good.
CE speaks of ‘celebrity encounters in the Daily Heil’? Is Dave a celebrity? Gosh! I did not know that.
What is Heat magazine btw? I have not heard of it. Something to do with wood burners perhaps?
Over and out. Watching NK and the Palestine Strings play Vivaldi on BBC Four now until 9 pm.
Herbie at 5.53 pm. Israel has already attacked Syria to try and destabilise the legitimate government. My guess is Israel has been funding the Saudi supply to rebel forces and that the whole ploy to enable the use of such “retaliatory” measures to Overthrow Assad will not stop until the Zionists get their way.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glMcnUhzO6g
Hi Jon, yes i worry now that Chelsea will be in for even more of a rough time now, Knowing what they are capable of, i hope She is a little Too high profile to be badly treated But then again She was always high profile, and they didn’t give a shit, i worry about her.
@ Flaming June
been thinking a lot about you’re post @ 2;19 pm yesterday
I was stunned when you commented that was the day John Smith Died
and the more i think about this the more horrendous i find it,
right there, the genesis of all the horrors to come in far flung lands in our name, Also Re Mark’s post @ 12;23 am wrt NPT / MDA
The evil wee shit along with bush made the world a much more dangerous place by shredding the NPT.
Tech @ 2;54 pm yesterday Well said too, re FJ’s post
Mark S.T. @ 4;10 pm.22nd Also well said on same subject
Thank Fuck for people like Brave Chelsea Manning, and The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission
I don’t see any pleading; just some idiot getting a well deserved humiliation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdtTccXcThE
@ Herbie 23 Aug, 2013 – 5:08 pm
“A while back I saw Bill Clinton plead with an Amerrican audience that 911 was not a false flag. I’m sure there are numerous other examples, though even one example is enough to make the point.”
“What that means, habby, is that despite their best efforts, elites are losing control of the narrative, they know it and are having to engage with alternative explanations for their conduct. That’s quite an achievement, in the circumstances.”
We often hear the ancient media — The Big Organs of State/Party Propaganda, more and more becoming Big, Wheezing Steam-Punk Calliopes — lament that this or that event further erodes peoples’ trust in government.
It would help if our governments occasionally told the truth, not only about alleged conspiracies (at least concoct a half-believable narrative), but on economic matters too, instead of overcooked unemployment and inflation numbers, that people know from direct experience are rubbish.
John there also an informative video by Syrian Girl, where she talks of shipments of Gas masks to be used by west backed rebels / terrorists,
The Syrian’s new this would come, the warnings were all there, From the U.S, and Isreal
A new recent shipments of Gas masks has turned up in syria for use by the Syrian foreign funded insurgency affiliated with AlCIAda. Perhaps in preparation for the planned false flag chemical weapons attack that will be used by NATo as a tool to get sanctions and interventions approved by the UN. And in the last 24 hours the Israeli ambassador to the UN repeated the accusations that the syrian govt would use chemical weapons against its own people, laying the ground work for the false flag event to take place. This video is a summary of recent and past events.
Some Supporting information:
‘JERUSALEM — Israel would “have to act” if the Syrian regime collapses and there’s a risk Syria’s chemical weapons and missiles could fall into the hands of militant groups, Israel’s prime minister warned Sunday.’
Sorry John the Effin Link For Syrian Girl
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbMdll58lis
“i hope She is a little Too high profile to be badly treated But then again She was always high profile, and they didn’t give a shit, i worry about her.”
What’s all this “she”? The MSM have all been at it but you don’t change sex simply by putting on a cheap wig and some lipstick. He’s still male and probably always will be. It’s like something out of Monty Python.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFBOQzSk14c
Brian, you’re right. I can’t argue with the logic.
@Chris Jones
I don’t suppose you could cite this international law outlining a territory’s right to be a sovereign state could you?
Kempe
That ain’t it.
GlennUk
The one I’m referring to has him walking around, speaking in a theatre in the round set up.
I’ll dig it up later and we’ll see.
Anyway, at least Hague is keeping his options open in engaging openly with a false flag narrative. That’s quite important.
Kempe
Point Noted, i respect that he wishes to be known As Chelsea
Though, and maybe he thinks he has always been a She, in which case She may never have been a he ( inside as it were )i suppose these things shall be revealed one day
i don’t hold out much hope for a presidential pardon.
He / she must be Strong inside, that they didn’t manage to completely Destroy Him/her.
‘You Failed to Break the Spirit of Bradley Manning’: An Open Letter to President Obama
http://www.globalresearch.ca/you-failed-to-break-the-spirit-of-bradley-manning-an-open-letter-to-president-obama/5346623
You are very close to the mark, both on Chelsea and the past plans to smear Assad as the bad man who uses gas on the innocent.
Fighters from 84 countries, mercenaries and western backed terror groups, regardless of their aims, as long as they were prepared to fight against Assad, they were supported by the Quatari and Saudi paymasters.
All this to wind up Assad and his Iranian backers. If they can’t get them on the nuclear story, they try just about everything else.
Thanks to all for the great links, some which I had time to read others which will come later, its hard for an occasional visitor, however regular, to follow the fast pace here.
Unless they are speed readers.
first sentence is missing the name Brian fujisan, doooh.
Yup. “Pleading” is a fair assessment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ROwxGR85YY
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
We seem to be in the early stages of the third phase, though Kempe doesn’t seem to have got beyond first base.
@ Splittists “That’s what Scotland will have to do, and it will be particularly effective at a time when the UK is shitting on those documents.”
What Scotland is doing is holding a referendum, the British government has agreed that should the majority wish it Scotland may become a sovereign state. If Scotland would rather go down the route you suggest then please do, there is absolutely no chance of success because there is no law giving Scotland any rights to sovereignty.
If you disagree then cite the law.
Yes, wrt chemical weapons use’ in Syria, it seems like a stitch-up. Hague, annoucning with such certainty before any investigation has been done. The chances clearly are far from “miniscule” that the rebels might have used chemial weapons. It is entirely possible that they used them, before and again now. Again, Britain, France and Saudi Arabia/UAE seem to be leading, since, as with Libya, the Obama Administration is reluctant to commit overtly (covertly is another matter) due to domestic political considerations wrt being sucked into another war. But in PR terms, the USA is acting as a sort of eminence grise.
The Syrian regime is notoriously ‘paranoid’ – possibly with good cause, in view what has happened over the past two years. But they sometimes miscalculate external intentions, eg. wrt their presumed ‘vassal’ state, Lebanon and Rafik Hariri, etc. Also, UN weapons inspectors in Iraq were infiltrated by the CIA et al, who allegedly gave NATO the coordinates of sensitive military sites so that they could bomb more effectively. Nonetheless, these areas in Syria are not sensitive military sits, but civilian suburbs, though they seem to be in ‘rebel’ hands. So, if they are in ‘rebl’ hands, ought not we to be asking the ‘rebels’ to allow access to the UN inspectors?
Scott Shane I suspect is a shit-heel, but this may be a good thing overall. The US press not subject to ‘prior restraint’ and GG can keep them honest with cross-publication.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/23/guardian-news-york-times-partnership
I’ve been asked to convey the message that any bloggers would be most welcome to go to the Doune the Hole festival, near Stirling. Craig’s bar – named The Whistleblowers’ Bar’ – went extremely well, last night, I hear! Wish I was there!