Stating the Obvious 189

 in Uncategorized by

One of the ironies of the Ukraine situation which has drawn no comment I can find is that the Ukrainians have been lectured on democracy by Baroness Ashton, who heads EU foreign policy despite never having been elected to anything.  A distinction she shares with Baroness Amos, now in charge of beating the drum for a war on Syria at the UN.  Amos was closely involved as a minister with the UK invasion of Sierra Leone, and shortly after resigning from office became a Director of Sierra Leone’s rutile mine, the single most profitable mine in the world.

Allowed HTML - you can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

189 thoughts on “Stating the Obvious”

1 … 4 5 6 7
  • Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!

    Yonatan /Tovarish Goss

    Well, thanks as well for that article on Timoshenko, but it doesn’t tell us anything we didn’t know already, does it? Essentially – she is at least a multi-millionaire (some say billionaire) and that it’s impossible that she could have made her money in an honest way. Also : she’s not a natural blond (that too was obvious already).

    So, not a very nice person. But the upside is that SHE is not what the people on the streets of Kiev were demonstrating for, and she is, politically, a busted flush.

  • N_

    Yes, but there’s not much production in the US apart from a few million fuel-guzzling cars once you take away

    * financial scams (loansharking, gambling, insurance)
    * sex ‘n’ violence ‘culture’
    * weapons
    * drug-dealing and
    * dumbed-down entertainment and propaganda

  • John Goss

    Brian and N_

    Very disturbing footage. Once you’ve gone down that road of murdering others, especially children, you probably cannot stop. You have the blood lust. Tony Blair is a good example of this!

  • Ba'al Zevul (Mas Loco)

    On topic (There’s a topic?)

    “One of the ironies of the Ukraine situation which has drawn no comment I can find is that the Ukrainians have been lectured on democracy by Baroness Ashton, who heads EU foreign policy despite never having been elected to anything.”

    She was appointed by a majority vote of the European Council, which is composed of heads of government – themselves (one hopes) elected.

  • John Goss

    Ba’al Zevul (Mas Loco) 10 Mar, 2014 – 8:37 am

    Whether she was appointed or elected makes no difference – she’s there. Everybody knows these decisions are made outside of the meetings in which appointments and elections take place. You would not think the Zionist Neocons would allow the appointment or election of someone they could not manipulate?

    It occurred to me again going round the lake this morning that the mindset conditionings of those of us living in the west and those living in Russia are entirely at odds. Take computer games. In the west computer games are aimed at conditioning people to believe that war and killing is right and you only have to press a button from your computer screen. These are the destructive games. Russia gave us Tetris, one of the world’s best-loved games, comprised of building blocks. It is thirty years old in June. Such games are constructive. In the early days of computerised games, working as a technical author, I applied for jobs in the electronic games industry with a hope of changing the mindset that was developing. It is too late now.
    Sadly.

  • John Goss

    Someone, the Guardian is owned by big money people who are part of the agenda. I think Alan Rusbridger has done an excellent job in challenging these people. He will not always get his own way. But let’s face it without the Guardian we would know none of Ed Snowden’s exposures. Sick people call him a traitor but that is because they are sick. Anybody with an iota of logic is aware that he is a very brave and caring man, who does not want his country to be seen in the world as an intruder into other people’s lives. He is a true patriot.

    “Breathes there a man with soul so dead,
    who never to himself hath said:
    This is my own, my native land . . .”

    Sir Walter Scott

  • Ba'al Zevul (Mas Loco)

    Ashton succeeded Mandelson as EU Trade Commissioner. She was a definite and visible improvement, although, I concede, a penguin on the take would have been an improvement. I have no objections to Lady Ashton, personally, as if she or anyone else cared. And someone who negotiated with the Egyptian Army for a visit to Morsi, as well as being central to the latest negotiations on Iran – with Iran’s stated approval – can hardly be said to be under Zionist influence.

  • Ba'al Zevul (Mas Loco)

    And the Independent is presently owned by the former KGB agent Lebedev. Neither side of any current dispute is free of very rich and inevitably corrupt people looking to fill their boots. No moral high ground is available.

  • Clarence

    @ Anonymous Moderator (and why do you hide as such?)

    Under my comment you wrote:

    [“Clarence” used to comment as “Gideon”, but changed username after posting the following]:
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2014/03/putin-and-international-law/comment-page-2/#comment-443771
    I responded:
    Re my change of username listed above by the anonymous moderator – no doubt to discredit my opinions and comments. Few people use their own, real name (eg Black Jelly, Fool or Someone) but an internet pseudonym. As I do. Nor am I consistent. Not to deceive concerning my opinions or personality, often I cannot remember the name that I use on different forums, but just as a matter of course (although I am sure that it does not really protect me from the NSA spies) as as a weak protection against intrusion. So my posting under Gideon was not to deceive – and if you look at the thread it was entirely consistent with what I had written previously under Clarence – but because I changed browsers and this browser “remembered” my prior Gideon name even though I had forgotten myself. I do think that the anonymous moderator knows this quite well but is annoyed by my criticisms of Craig and has thus chosen to present the name change as a deception when, actually, his/her addition is the true deception.
    Appended to this you then added:
    [Doublespeak; revealing truth is deception!]
    [This user has also commented as: Sheila (2 comments), Ian (1), Greg (1), Gaius (2), David (3), John (5), Edwin (5), Emma (2), Mhairi (2), Moira (1), Ex Academic (1), Margo (1), Frank (1), Sheila (again, 2 comments), Leo (16 comments). Ian (again, 3 comments), John (again, 1 comment), Gideon (13), Brian (1), Leo (again, 6 comments), Clarence (4), Gideon (again, 1 comment), Clarence (again, 10 comments), Gideon (again, 5 comments), Clarence (again, 20 comments).]
    My question follows. I have stated that I use pseudonyms – as most posters do – and that I change these when I change browsers and/or cannot remember my previous internet identity. Often these posts are made in vino veritas but, as I stated, there is no intention to deceive.
    So why then do you persist in adding anonymous addendums to my comments and not to any others? Also, when you do so, why do you not reveal your identity? Nor do you make it clear that your late addendum is added some time after my comment. Who are you?

  • ESLO

    Clarence/Whole drawer of socks

    Given you are prepared to diagnose other’s medical conditions from their blogposts – are we allowed to have ago from your postings? Schizophrenia, paranoia and alcoholism all come to mind.

  • Ba'al Zevul ( Il burattino!)

    That’s a lot of forgotten nicks, Clarence, but we are not all blessed with perfect recall, and I guess anonymity must be preserved – though not, it seems, by moderators. But surely you can remember if you are male or female?

  • Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!

    “That’s a lot of forgotten nicks, Clarence, but we are not all blessed with perfect recall, and I guess anonymity must be preserved – though not, it seems, by moderators. But surely you can remember if you are male or female?”
    __________________

    You took the words out of my mouth – “Clarence” (Duke of?) is a forgetful sort of chap, isn’t he. Or a multiple schizophrenic.

    Re your last sentence – don’t be too sure. Or perhaps it’s a hermaphrodite?

    Enough of this trivia!

  • Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!

    Tovarish Goss (and also Ba’ar Zevul) re Catherine Ashton

    “Whether she was appointed or elected makes no difference”
    _____________

    Well, it does actually, at least in terms of Craig’s post.

    Craig’s post reflected on the hypocrisy of a non-elected Ashton lecturing people on democracy.

    I pointed out that that point was erroneous in the sense that Ashton is a bureaucrat and not a “Foreign Minister”; and that all EU Commissioners (which is one of her hats) as well as the President of the European Council (van Rompuy) and the Representative for Foreign and Security Policy are bureaucrats.

    Hence they are – as Ba’ar Zevul points out – appointed by politicians in the form of the Heads of State and Govt of the EU and the members of the European Parliament (both are elected politicians).

    At the risk of boring everyone, I should point out again (how many times must I do so before the Tovarish and like-minded Excellences finally grasp the point?) that Catherine Ashton, as a bureacrat, is NOT an autonomous player in the foreign policy sphere? There is no way that she could suddenly come up with any statement or action of SUBSTANCE which has not been cleared by the EU’s politicians meeting either in Council or behind the scenes?

    SIGH – I do wish that the Tovarish and others who wish to comment on EU matters – and it’s of course their perfect right to do so – would do some elementary homework first. A good start would be to read the parts of the Treaty on European Union as modified by the Treaty of Lisbon referring to the European Council (including its President) and the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (including the rôle of the High Representative). Much better than relying on a series of dubious links!

  • Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!

    “Indeed. I blame the malmsey.”
    _______________

    It has a lot to answer for 🙂 !

    As do barrel makers.

  • Jon

    Clarence

    I used to be a moderator on Craig’s site, now an occasional reader. It has been a convention here of long-standing that people stick to a single username, regardless of whether there is an intention to create sock-puppets. From what I recall, the moderation policy of correcting usernames (by examining IP addresses posting under different handles) has had generally good support in the past. If you wish to change your handle, please declare it, and stick to the new one, rather than bouncing from one to the other.

    I am quite certain that the mod isn’t looking to discredit you – and criticism of Craig or anyone else here is perfectly okay.

  • BrianFujisan

    Hullo Jon…

    Good to see you you are still around out there.

    Ba’al Zevul – 11:45 am…. Lol

  • BrianFujisan

    Some bits From An Excellent Piece by Medialens –

    Exactly what is happening in Ukraine is not easy to disentangle from corporate news media reports. The current crisis began last November when the Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych, withdrew from a cooperation agreement with the European Union to forge closer ties with Russia. As Peter Oborne notes:

    ‘Up to that point, the West had concealed any distaste for Yanukovych. Thereafter, we [sic] started to ally ourselves with the protesters against his regime.’

    These included ‘a group of violent and unpleasant Right-wing parties’. Three months of violent protests followed in Kiev. On February 22, Yanukovych suddenly fled Kiev and the pro-Western opposition took power. Peter Schwarz and David North write that:

    ‘the United States and Germany instigated the crisis in Ukraine, installing a right-wing nationalist regime completely subservient to Washington and NATO, with the intention of provoking a confrontation with Russia. […] American warplanes have been dispatched to the Baltics and US warships have entered the Black Sea.’

    Within days of the coup, troops loyal to Russia took control of Crimea, the peninsula in the south of Ukraine. Later, on March 6, the Crimean parliament asked Moscow to become part of Russia, which it had been in the past (Crimea was transferred from Russia to Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, in 1954).

    The motives and actions of the various factions involved, and the rapidity of developments, make ‘the story’ difficult to follow; certainly as presented by the ‘mainstream’ media. But one unchanging and reliable factor is that BBC News sticks to a propaganda framework which reflects the values and priorities of the UK government and wider Western power.

    For example, there was repeated headline coverage given to the deceptive rhetoric of Foreign Secretary William Hague:

    ‘We have to recognise the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of Ukraine has been violated, and this cannot be a way to conduct international affairs.’

    Or, even more galling, US Secretary of State John Kerry:

    ‘You just don’t in the 21st century behave in 19th century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pretext.’

    But when it came to purported ‘analysis’ by senior BBC correspondents, such as Bridget Kendall and John Simpson, nobody made any reference to the West’s invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya. Not a single BBC journalist, as far as we know, pointed out the hypocrisy displayed by Hague and Kerry. And not even just hypocrisy; but something bordering on contempt for public memory and understanding of recent historical events.

    For BBC News to be a prime mover in this sham tells us much that we need to know about the BBC’s propaganda role.

    ‘Bare-Chested Thuggery’

    Another salutary reminder of the BBC’s default power-friendly mode is to recall the way the broadcaster reported the conflict between Russia and Georgia in 2008. It was encapsulated by this introduction by Emily Maitlis to an edition of Newsnight:

    Last week on Newsnight, Maitlis once again demonstrated that her intuitive grip of the required propaganda role has not loosened. Chairing a discussion on Ukraine with the former Kremlin adviser Alexander Nekrassov and Liberal Democrat Sir Menzies Campbell, she leaned forward and challenged Nekrassov:

    ‘So there is no moral authority with Putin’s actions. It looks like bare-chested thuggery, doesn’t it?’

    But when has Maitlis ever challenged a former White House adviser along similar lines?

    ‘So there is no moral authority with Obama’s actions. It looks like bare-chested thuggery, doesn’t it?’

    The Full Article –

    The ‘Professorial President’ And The ‘Small, Strutting Hard Man’ –

    is @

    http://www.medialens.org/index.php/alerts/alert-archive/2014/757-the-professorial-president-and-the-small-strutting-hard-man.html

  • Ben

    The US is tickling the tail of the dragon, Brian.

    http://defense-update.com/20140309_russia-welcomes-us-destroyer-truxtun-moving-bastion-anti-ship-missiles-crimea.html

    “Unconfirmed news reports claim the Russian Navy is deploying land-based ‘Bastion’ anti-ship missile systems as a response to the recent U.S. move entering two naval vessels to the Black Sea. The two American Arleigh Burke class destroyer USS Truxtun (DDG-103) crossed the Bosphorus Strait Friday, headed into the Black Sea, as tensions simmer over Ukraine’s Crimea region. The Russians also moved two naval combatants from the Mediterranean Task Force back to the Black Sea Fleet. Tension is mounting in the Crimea Peninsula with the preparations for a referendum on independence from Ukraine later this week.”

  • mike

    “The Russians also moved two naval combatants from the Mediterranean Task Force back to the Black Sea Fleet”

    I wonder it the US will try the old one-two: up the ante in Syria to stretch Russia’s ability to cover both there and Ukraine.

  • John Goss

    Cameron and Miliband are talking about an illegal referendum in Crimea. There has been no mention of the real illegitimacy of an unelected government. How do we get rid of these shits with all the media supporting them? There’s more chance of them getting rid of people like me, methinks.

    Head-torturer Jack Straw talks of “thugs in the Crimea” meaning Russians who are legitimately there.

  • Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!

    Any thoughts on the apparent refusal of either Russian soldiers or Russia-favorable militiamen refusing to let an observer mission from the OSCE into the Crimea?

1 … 4 5 6 7

Comments are closed.