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.
“PS There were 8 minutes between the time of my post and the one above. Hardly any time to read two long links or perhaps speed reading is another one of the contributor’s attributes.”
Mary, several people had mentioned the Diana story before you. The first was Fred, I believe.
Herbie, thanks. This board was indeed once a stimulating and lively combination of research, and challenging interaction. I don’t know what you do about someone who really just wants to make mischief, if indeed that is their point, and that is debatable, but I am pretty sure that some other way has to be found. Just as there is no point in endlessly reposting from the media while constantly decrying the media, there is no point lamenting the inability to make peace while making a war, even one of words. Interesting, for example, that you start using ‘she’ to refer to one of ‘the habbies’: I did not intend my query over gender to be picked up and used as part of an insult.
Top Ten Reasons Washington’s Egypt Aid Continues
Juan Cole
Another 80 people died in violence in Egypt on Friday, as Muslim Brotherhood crowds protested the military crackdown on their sit-ins that cost hundreds of lives this week. Some of the violence resulted from police heavy-handedness, some from an armed Brotherhood attack on a police station. The continued unrest upped the pressure on the Obama administration to cut off military aid to Egypt. It is the only legal and ethical thing to do, but here are some reasons it has been difficult [sic] for Washington to take that step.
1. The US doesn’t give much aid to the Egyptian people per se. Only $250 mn a year out of $1.55 bn is civilian. The aid is to cement a relationship between the Egyptian officer corps and the Pentagon.
2. The military aid, $1.3 billion a year, is mostly in-kind, a grant of weaponry . It must be spent on US weapons manufacturers. It is US arms manufacturers like Lockheed-Martin and General Dynamics (and their employees) who would suffer if it were cut off.
3. The Congress gave the Egyptian Generals a credit card to buy weapons, and they’ve run up $3 billion on it for F-16s and M1A1 tanks. If the US cancelled aid, the US government would still have to pick up that bill.
4. Even most of the civilian aid is required to be spent on US goods and materiel. It is corporate welfare for the US
5. The aid was given as a bribe to the Egyptian elite to make nice with Israel. Given the chaos in Sinai, and Egypt’s instability, Congress is more worried about that issue than at any time in 40 years.
6. The Israelis asked the US not to suspend the aid.
7. Congress even structured the economic aid to require some of it help joint Israeli-Egyptian enterprises in Egypt, so some of the aid to Egypt actually goes to . . . Israel.
8. It is not generally recognized, but the Egyptian military provides a security umbrella to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE against Iran (and sometimes Iraq). The Gulf oil states also have powerful Washington lobbies and want Egypt to continue as a Gurkha force. Children, can you say oil?
9. Many in Congress don’t actually disagree with the generals’ actions in overthrowing the Muslim Brotherhood-backed Freedom and Justice Party and driving it underground, since they agree it is a terrorist organization
10. Behind the scenes Egyptian military intelligence has helped the US track down Muslim extremists and in the Mubarak era ran black sites where they tortured suspected al-Qaeda for Washington. The US deep state would like to ramp that relationship back up.
https://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/08/17-6
Does the USA give a shit about the deaths in Egypt? No.
Dreoilin: thanks, and quite. Fedup, your weird attacks on Suhayl aside, is there anything you know of that we can do here to help the people in Egypt of all persuasions who are being killed?
Mary: maybe you could make a list of links to sites which you have found trustworthy and then we can get them into RSS feeds. Or even reporters who you trust?
Who cares if Suyahl,or anyone,smokes weed or not?
He’s one of the most articulate and reasoned posters here.In fact,he’d almost be a poster bgoy for weed smoking if judged on these merits.
Many of the greatest artists,writers,musicians were out of their gourds and their works deeply inform the human condition.
**********
Villager…if,as you state,you’re so bored here why don’t you leave?
***********
Habbakuk…still not answering questions,as per eh? And the Diana developments are hardly a conspiracy if the Met are investigating,yet again,are they?
What is it with you Habbakuk? Forever the instinctive tug of the forelock to the Establishment line,without question? It makes you appear simply as a blind,unquestioning servile droid.
Tech
I’d worked out a long time ago that habby was female and that’s why I’ve been using she rather than he or it in reference, for quite some time now.
Not quite sure why you think this is insulting.
Have you been captured by the all powerful Matriarchal Army and this post was forced under duress, or is it just confused absinthe induced cobblers?
The world needs to know.
“I’d worked out a long time ago that habby was female”
You worked out, or you guessed? If you worked it out, I’d love to know how. And do you therefore think that Villager is female too?
Because I think their posting styles are far too different to be one and the same person.
All sorts of little things give a person away, if they’re posting as two people.
BTW, I’ve been dropping in here all day, since early morning. Can’t believe it. It’s been like a school playground, full of squabbles and rubbish and one-up-man-ship.
Ask the superman or ring the bat phone for batman to get stuck in and sort out Egypt, I would suggest!
When the time was ripe to protest and make a fuss about the coup, that was planned and orchestrated in US to be enforced in Egypt, all of you were too cock-a-hoop that the “Muzzies” got it right up the jacksie, and now you want to put an end to the killing of the said “Muzzies”?
Weird attack?
Go back and read the bilge that he was writing on the “Islam-ists” in a blunderbuss fashion, stooping as low as harping on about fucking gays, and LGBT! That fucking makes me so sick. To find sexual predilections of a bunch of fuckwits trumps the lives of poor bastards who are shot to death and burned to death in the attacks carried out by the “liberating and democratic” Egyptian forces. Serves the bastards in the MB right the same intolerant and bigoted bastards who diss the lesbian and gays!
Yeah we must all thank the Egyptian forces for killing the fucking “Muzzies”, so that gays and lesbians can safely indulge in their coital practices. How screwed up are our imperatives and priorities?
Right to food, right to water, right to shelter, right to life matters not one fucking iota but hey gays, LBGT, and fuck knows what other irrelevant cause, is all that matters.
Go fucking watch this
They can tell the truth about us because they are our enemies and have nothing to lose!
Tech. @ 12;17
Maybe we could all try somthing like that, and with Possibly Craig / Jon’s help vote on best sources, with notes on the not so credible sites for unwary newbies. and as Macky has sugested a sidebar window for older active thread’s, we could have the same for good sourced info, Medialens, ect.
And while i’m trying to increase you’re workload Jon, i have heard many times posters saying things like ” Doug, habby, get a room ”
Is that possible on the sidebar too ? Lol
Reason i’m asking is because sometimes VERY ( or is it ) off topic STUFF comes up – like the recent Asteroid STUFF with Alcanon along with others, myself included. Craig’s Blog for me seems to be the only contact source, but how can ot topics be held in ernest away from the main content / topic
Just wonderin
Also tech,
i don’t think that because a person Swears He / she is unintelligent, and is intelligence more important than Honesty, Sofia’s Compassion / empathy experiment really caught my attention,
Fedup watched some of that last time you posted, Harrowing STUFF,
Had my dose for tonight with Rabbit Proof Fence, AGAIN.
“but how can ot topics be held in ernest away from the main content/topic”
I’ve thought for some time that there should be a “News” (or other title) thread where Mary, and others, could post items that catch their attention, in the relevant comment section.
If it gets too long, older items could be pruned. But meanwhile everyone would know where to go if they were looking for items of interest – and it would have the added bonus of being a collection that could be searched (Ctrl+F) if someone was trying to remember the source for a particular topic, something they wanted to quote later.
I thought Jon had said (in the past sometime) that he would put this suggestion to Craig. But maybe I’m mistaken. I know the subject did come up before.
Dre
It all goes back to the differences in this board between those who wanted to discuss political issues and those who viewed the forum as a chatroom, where they’d meet with their virtual friends and be cuddled, coddled and so on.
In other words, people in need of reassurance.
That’s understandable, but it shouldn’t drown out other, more sensible voices.
Thank you Brian Fujisan for reminding me of what we talked about yesterday lunchtime, it is indeed a sore subject.
Newcomers to this blog will be deterred by the arguments and accusations of dope smoking on here, by someone everyone should be careful of.
It has come to the point were new posters have to be warned that if they post subjects that are in the news, or in support of those suffering within the Gaza concentration camp, and no I have no time for Hamas or Fatah, then they are in danger of being accused of being anti semitic, dope smokers or going against the moderation on this blog.
Further to Brian’s excellent post of the Rennie’s backside interview, NATO stipulated that countries that have sovereignty issues or are arguing with their neighbours about the validity of an ancient nuclear deterrent in the 21st. century, could not possibly be expecting to stay in NATO.
Well big deal, NATO is two faced, has lost its aims and objectives, a cold war bopdy of calcified generals and spooks.
NATO’s arguments does not hold water because Britains long standing issue over military and sovereignty related problems with Spain makes it rather unsuitable to stay in NATO, a fallacy from the start.
Why should Scotland be wanting to stay in a cold war mongering body that has lost its aims? when there are the BRIC countries and an EU that is reorganising itself to engage with? NATO is doomed and its time Cameron engages in the EU to enable Britains economy to flourish within. Sitting on the fence, hoping for a free market will not necessarily be it. Its time for him to explain why and under what conditions he will stay inside the tent.
UKIP’s men are advertising their next years crop of MEP’s, stooges whop take the money, just like all the other party politicians, fraudsters who commit British taxpayers to rip off bank deals they call PFI’s/PPI’s. How come UKIP wants to take our money and get out of the EU? an oxymoron.
A warm welcome to all newcomers, but be very aware that engaging with certain posters can seriously land you in hot water, depression or with a feeling of inferiority!
I hope Craig will be hoping for the same independence for Cymru (that’s Wales to yous monoglots) The Guardian reading frappuccio drinking proponents of Tibetan and Palestinian freedom will of course come up with their own inverted snobbery against such notions but they are the biggest victims of their own idle cultural cosmopolitanism and delusional superiority. As all intelligent cultured Britons know , the Welsh are the original Britons (yes that includes what is now modern day Scotland,England,Cornwall and Wales) and whose language is the true native tongue of Britain. With Welsh independence, England will lose another ‘surly neighbour’ and also gain another helping friend. The question is – what will become of England? Surely the corrupt Saxe-Coburg-Gotha veil has worn thin and the game is up by now??
Chris Jones: Totally agree, but note that more wealth has been extracted from the Rhondda Valleys in terms of minerals, than was taken by the British Empire from India. Our resources have largely been stripped, and our language virtually destroyed. Our people and culture are mocked, our old kings and queens murdered, much of our landscape despoiled, and what remains is isolated and ignored. With friends like the English who needs enemies eh?
Amid all the squabbling, something on here seems to have attracted the attention of the stasi. Are we pen testing?
Hav-a-sack says;
“Sorry to be boring, but lies must be countered. The liar in question this time is Corporal MACKY (18h52).
1. “Not the impression that I get when I read “smoke a milder weed”, being just one of the Habbu-Clown’s retort when mocking Ben’s comments”
______________
Please indicate where I wrote “smoke a milder weed”. Thread, date and time, please.”
Isn’t that clever. The semantics of questions gives broad expanse to the dishonesty.
Why should anyone waste precious time chasing down your limp musings?
I actually find your attempts to derogate somewhat humorous. Forget about soft drugs, you should try mainlining DMT as milder psychotropics wouldn’t punch a hole in your crust, and I think that’s the only prescription for engaging with you in any common sensical dialogue.
A shift in your consciousness might bring you the solace you seek through negative attention.
Lacking the intestinal fortitude for that avenue, I suggest a session with a Dominatrix who could teach you the meaning of love.
Dreoilin
Yes. three parallel threads would be useful: one for on-topic, one for off-topic, and one for on-troll.
Dreoilin I was well aware that Fred and John Goss had raised the Diana story. I was asking a question and posted the Sky report in full. Hope that meets with your approval. You seem to take a great interest in my activity on this blog. Leave me out please.
Did you see my later post about the choice of pathologist by the establishment in the Diana/Dodi inquests and by Grieve when he squelched the doctors’ request for a proper inquest for Dr Kelly?
~~
Technicolour I think you know why I changed my name – to avoid the unpleasant and sometimes distressing attentions of the troll although he and some others took delight in declaring my identity. I will resume use of my original name on the first anniversary of the troll’s appearance in November 2012.
~~~~
I have never seen one drop of the milk of human kindness come from Habbabkuk or any pertinent information that would enhance the greater good. Why do people correspond with him? It was decided months ago that he fitted the description and purpose of a troll. I cannot find the link now nor will I waste time looking for it.
Still photos of the Cairo bloodbath. Shocking.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article35858.htm
London emergency room physician Tarek Loubani on route to Gaza arrested in Cairo.
John Miner, The London Free Press
Saturday, August 17, 2013 4:19:52 EDT PM
http://www.lfpress.com/2013/08/17/london-emergency-room-physician-tarek-loubani-arrested-in-cairo
Please demand his release from: [email protected] (e-mail)
More contacts of Egyptian Embassy in London:
http://www.mfa.gov.eg/arabic/embassies/egyptian_embassy_london/contactus/pages/default.aspx
Not a very strong statement in the circumstances. I have a feeling he is not in the office.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/foreign-secretary-speaks-to-egyptian-foreign-minister
Saw this on his Twitter page!
William Hague @WilliamJHague 1 Aug
Visiting staff at GCHQ today to thank them for their work protecting UK national security and to discuss global cyber issues
My position on Egypt has been consistent throughout. The Muslim Brotherhood was behaving as an elected dictatorship, undertaking torture, murder, etc. just as the previous Mubarak regime had done. The right to life, food, etc. – “bread, justice and freedom” – of the people of Egypt were not being met by this authoritarian regime that was trying rapidly to impose its own ideology on a complex society. That process itself might be described as a coup d’etat. The economic situation also had become dire; the IMF and the Muslim Brotherhood both played a key role in this. The people of Egypt rose up in protest. The Army hijacked the situation and undertook a military coup. And now the Army are behaving in a fascist manner.
I have stated on virtually every occasion that I am against what the Muslim Brotherhood regime was doing -that what they were doing was typical of Islamist regimes/organisations – and also against the military coup.
As the Egyptian actor/activist said in the interview I would urge you all to watch (posted earlier), both the Army and the Muslim Brotherhood are fascistic organisations and behave in a fascistic manner. However, the situation is extremely complex, the population, very divided. Civil war is a real danger. And if there is civil war in Egypt, the most populous country in the Middle East and its historical and cultural centre, it will dwarf the conflicts in Libya and Syria and may well become contiguous with those ongoing conflicts on either side of Egypt. The whole region will go up in flames.
I would suggest that contributors here try to refrain from attacking me from this or that angle and concentrate on the issues.
In this regard, many thanks to Technicolour and Jives for their wonderfully supportive comments – and if I’ve missed anyone out, may thanks to them too.
Oh, and btw, as a writer I do not need to imbibe psychoactive substances to produce material that may seem to derive from multiple levels of consciousness.
Although, as Jives correctly said, many artists have done so, some with astounding results (Thomas de Quincy, Coleridge, Dylan Thomas and The Beatles are some of the more prominent ones that come to mind), in the end, I think that the routine use of psychoactive drugs represents a short-cut to cosmic consciousness (or whatever it is) for which people often pay dearly and which ultimately can reduce the imagination’s scope to ever-decreasing circles of monotony.
Nonetheless, I do find the concepts and processes of cerebration entailed, fascinating and often draw on them (and I have written about this area), so to that extent, Macky had a point about me seeming “stoned” when I write. A part of me probably is, but not in the literalist sense he meant. So, I do not regard his contention as any kind of negative assertion, but a tribute to the effectiveness of this procedure.
Furthermore, if one is sufficiently adroit, since one has not wholly abrogated control of one’s narrative, one can leap from that to rational analysis without blinking an eyelid. This technique produces a counterpoint which can be generative and useful.
On the subject of LSD and Britain, I would recommend a book entitled, ‘Albion Dreaming’, by Andy Roberts.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/jul/25/albion-dreaming-andy-roberts-review
@Chris Jones
So what you are effectively saying is that the Welsh are the Master Race superior to everyone else.
@ Mr Scorgie
“But if the Met has received credible information that could give greater insight into what happened, do you not think that they should investigate it?”
______________
Of course I do.
This is a complete distortion of my argued views and says more about Fedup’s own deeply intolerant views than mine and certainly adds nothing to the discourse on the situation in Egypt. I think Jon has broadcast this specific point to Fedup on at least six separate occasions across various threads but there seems to be a lack of radio reception. In some ways, though, through the loud static, it may be fruitful that there is discomfiture and dislocation through the continuous application of the dialetic.
Re. the death of Princess Diana, I have to say, I still have my suspicions. I know some very ‘mainstream’ people in the public eye who also harbour these suspicions.
Of course there is absolutely no possibility that the British State will acknowledge that it commits assassination. Look at the contortions surrounding the very obvious state complicity in assassination in Northern Ireland (see under, ‘Pat Finucane’, the blue card system, the Force Research Unit and many others). It most certainly is never going to admit that it killed the mother of the heir to the throne. Maybe it didn’t, but as I say, I have my suspicions.
What a breath of fresh air washed through the thread overnight. Thanks all.
@ Brian. 1 49am
“Sofia’s Compassion / empathy experiment really caught my attention…”
You are very kind, even if it was in the context of a suggestion that you don’t need intelligence to make a point!
It strikes me that whatever intelligence we are dealt has it’s work cut out unpicking the endlessly repeated mandated narratives.
Which brings me back to my request to Villager to discuss the issue of narrative which he/she sweetly reintroduced (7 23pm yesterday).
“…is this your little baby Sofia’s history ‘narrative’ lesson?”
My invitation to discuss the topic was met with ,
Sofia,
The Doors – You’re Lost Little Girl (Lyrics, in the description.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKzZOkQH-S8
Better than history lessons from Uncle Herbie.” (9 25pm)
Now I don’t mind you enlisting Krishnamurty as a point-scoring aid, but what did Jim Morrison ever do to deserve being dragged in?
But let’s return to your problem with “narrative”. Can you discuss any aspect of this issue?
For example, Egypt, a tough restoration of democracy or a proxy US/Israeli coup?
Us donated cluster munitions scattered over south Lebanon, the seeds of democracy or a war crime?
Israel, a beacon of democracy in a savage region or a brutal, expansionist apartheid state?
Why do you get so bothered about “narrative” that you get all rude and dismissive?
You choose. Please don’t be shy.
…………………………………
And finally, a chilling and timely warning to Ben and Suhayl!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHzdsFiBbFc