The Foreign Office has denied the existence of any such memo as that allegedly leaked to the Daily Telegraph, which has now published the full text. Reading it, I can say for sure it is not an FCO memo. That has led some to assume this means it is a Scottish Office memo. But there is a problem here.

Firstly, if the Scottish Office – or any other government department – made a record of a conversation with the French Consul-General, they would undoubtedly have copied it to the FCO. Particularly as the FCO is mentioned and a number of overseas visits and an international negotiation are discussed. If this were a genuine minute, the FCO would undoubtedly have a copy. If the FCO denies it exists, that means there was no such memo made in the Scottish Office and distributed in the ordinary channels.

Secondly, as I stated, the media’s claim that it was a protocol requirement for the French Embassy to report such conversations to the FCO was a complete fabrication. Not only is there no such requirement, it would be contrary to normal diplomatic practice. That is even more true with the Scottish Office. It is unthinkable that the French Consul-General would report those kind of confidential comments from Nicola Sturgeon to the Scottish Office.

If Embassies reported everything people told them to their host governments, nobody would tell the embassy anything. Indeed this episode has already damaged the French Embassy, because it casts a slur upon the discretion and confidentiality which is essential to operate as a diplomat. It may well be that driving a wedge between the SNP and the French Embassy was part of what the security services sought to achieve.

It damages the French Embassy, it damages the SNP, and it damages Miliband by repeating the meme about his being weak and unfit. Those would all seem good results to the security services. Only Miliband has been stupid enough to go along with it.

It seems to me the overwhelming probability is that this document, whether it purports to be a FCO or Scottish Office document, was originated by the Security Services, possibly with the active collusion of someone in the Scottish Office, or equally possibly without their knowledge. Whatever it purported to be, it never entered the normal civil service distribution systems, as the FCO would have a copy, and it would have raised alarm bells all over the place as seriously weird and improbable. It is in that sense a fake, even if it were physically produced inside the Scottish Office. Its purpose was to be leaked to the media and influence the election.

The fake FCO memo has MI5 written all over it. This is the worst example of British security services influencing an election campaign since the Zinoviev letter.

For those whose history is a bit shaky:

The Zinoviev letter – one of the greatest British political scandals of this century – was forged by a MI6 agent’s source and almost certainly leaked by MI6 or MI5 officers to the Conservative Party, according to an official report published today.[4 Feb 1999]
New light on the scandal which triggered the fall of the first Labour government in 1924 is shed in a study by Gill Bennett, chief historian at the Foreign Office, commissioned by Robin Cook

Ever since Treasury Permanent Secretary Nicholas MacPherson stated that civil service impartiality rules do not apply in the case of Scottish independence, I have been warning the SNP that we are going to be the target of active subversion by the UK and US security services. We are seen as a danger to the British state and thus a legitimate target. I spelled this out in my talk to the Edinburgh SNP Club on 6 March, of which more below.

The FCO “memo” reporting that Nicola Sturgeon would rather have a Tory government, is a remarkable document. Firstly, its provenance is very strange. It has been leaked ostensibly by the FCO to the Telegraph. According to the Guardian:

“The leaked document was drafted by a Whitehall official after Coffinier called the FCO, as protocol requires, to pass on a confidential account of several of the ambassador’s meetings in Edinburgh, which included a meeting with Alistair Carmichael, the Scottish secretary.”

The extraordinary thing is, this is just a lie. As someone who worked in the FCO for over twenty years and was an Ambassador myself, I can assure you there is absolutely no protocol requirement on the French Ambassador to give the FCO the content of the meetings she, her Consul-General or anybody else from the French Embassy held in Edinburgh. That claim is absolute nonsense.

Look at it from the Embassy’s point of view. If you repeated everything Nicola Sturgeon told you to the FCO, do you not think she would shortly stop telling you anything at all interesting? That is why diplomats absolutely do not retail such conversations to their host governments.

The second quite extraordinary thing is that both sides of the alleged conversation categorically deny it was said. Nicola Sturgeon denies she said it and the French Embassy deny she said it. So we have a leaked account of a conversation which all the participants say is untrue, yet the unionist media all feel this evidently untrue account is worth splashing as their lead story? The collusion of security services and corporate media is terrifying.

Timing is all. I was wondering how the security services would react to the seemingly unstoppable SNP momentum, following Nicola Sturgeon’s brilliant performance in the leaders’ debate. When I gave that talk to the SNP club, I warned that, as the main threat to the British state, we would suffer the full panoply of dirty tricks from MI5 and CIA. This would include increased penetration, communication interception, agent provocateur activities, forgeries and eventually might include false flag violence blamed on nationalists.

We are at a crisis in our constitutional history. I believe the momentum towards a Scottish exit from the UK is unstoppable. The British state is seeking to appear on the surface to agree to give Scots a free and democratic choice, while using every dirty trick to subvert that choice. Those tricks range from complete control of state and corporate media to the darker arts of the security services.

As I also stated to the SNP club, the USA has decided it is in their interest for the Unionists to prevail, not least so Scotland remains a base for the American controlled Trident missiles the UK taxpayer so obligingly funds. A large part of the CIA’s existence has been and is dedicated to covert activity to keep the forms of government it wants in power in the world. It does not want the SNP.

That the attempt to destabilise Nicola Sturgeon originates with the UK government and the Telegraph should give everyone pause. It is very obviously a security service effort. How otherwise is an account which the French Embassy says is completely false, contained in an official memo to be leaked?

This episode raises very serious questions. But they are not questions about Nicola Sturgeon. They are questions about the subversion of democracy by the security services, and the willing complicity of the corporate media.

Three months ago, I published this: “I remain hopeful that Iran will realise that there is a huge opportunity here. If Iran tactically backs down on its nuclear programme in the current circumstances, that will not be a defeat for Iran but a defeat for the neo-cons.”

That is precisely what has happened. My own Western diplomatic source with access to the talks, has told me today that he estimates 96% of the movement since December has been on the Iranian side, and only 4% on the international side. At the end, the Iranians took everyone by surprise by agreeing to take 2,000 more centrifuges out of use than anybody ever thought they would.

The Iranians have played a blinder by conceding. When Netanyahu had stripped off his thin cloak of international respectability and revealed himself to the world as an arrant racist warmonger, and Israel enjoys less popular support in the West than ever, Iran reveals itself as sensible, moderate and forward thinking in terms of its international relationships.

What is more, Iran has embarrassed and isolated its enemies. The enemies of this deal stand starkly displayed as the Saudi Arabian Royals, Israeli Zionists and United States Zionists – and a more evil combination it is difficult to imagine.

I remain strongly opposed to theocracy. Iran’s human rights record remains very poor and its treatment of gays utterly unacceptable. But by making plain that it is telling the truth in denying it is pursuing a nuclear arsenal, it is making a step in the right direction. If the West shows good faith – which I do not take for granted – and lifts sanctions, then we will see further development in Iran that I hope may produce improvement in democracy, society and human rights. But for now Iran has played a blinder.

If the congressional Zionists do manage to stymie Obama on this one, that will harm the US more than Iran as it will leave Israel and the US alone in sanctioning Iran, and almost certainly a situation where the US is sanctioning EU companies for trading perfectly legally with Iran after the EU lifts sanctions. The EU lifting of sanctions will not be conditional on the US lifting sanctions.That will drive a wedge between the EU and US. So this is a win/win situation for the world whatever Congress does.

It is worth reading the comments section on my December article, and seeing just how many commenters could not see that taking a step back would bring a victory to Iran, and that the Ahmadinejad policy of macho confrontation was deeply unintelligent. Sometimes you win by stepping back and watching your assailant blunder over.

If you thought that Nicola Sturgeon repeatedly mentioned the waste of money – 100 billion pounds – on updating the Trident nuclear missile system, during the leaders’ debate, plainly you need to be committed to a state mental institution. It is unthinkable that Britain’s possession of nuclear weapons should ever be questioned on British mainstream media.

It is so unthinkable, that IT NEVER HAPPENED. Not one British mainstream media report of the debate mentions Trident missiles or nuclear weapons. A Google news search on trident missiles or on nuclear weapons throws up zero references to the leaders’ debate or Nicola Sturgeon in British mainstream media today. Not one of the broadcasters’ highlight packages repeated Nicola’s outrage at the country’s throwing away money on weapons of mass destruction when so many children are living in poverty.

The media manage to report the many polls and commentators that say she won the debate, while suppressing what she actually said.

So there is nothing to see here. Go back to sleep. IT NEVER HAPPENED. YOU IMAGINED IT. IT NEVER HAPPENED.

Seriously, is that not really, really sickening and deeply, deeply scary?

In 90 minutes of BBC coverage and analysis of the leaders’ debate on the BBC News channel, the single Scottish commentator the BBC have had on that channel – and he has appeared three different times – is the ludicrous Torcuil Crichton of the Labour Party (and Daily Record), introduced by the BBC as though he were an independent commentator. Without being challenged by anybody, Crichton has again and again been allowed to expound the ridiculous argument that Cameron benefited from Nicola Surgeon’s strong performance because it weakened David Miliband.

This is ludicrous because of course it makes no difference to the balance of the House of Commons from a Tory point of view whether the Scottish MPs facing them are Labour or SNP. Three times Crichton has been on, making his invalid point, with nobody making the obvious response – or indeed any response. Three times – separate times, they are not repeats – he has been allowed to make a jibe about the SNP promising “a land of milk and honey”, as his Labour Party dismissal of anti-austerity economics. Again, without reply.

The BBC is an utter disgrace in the way it covers Scotland. My personal view is that post independence we don’t need state propaganda in news or current affairs, and should simply sack everybody in the BBC news and current affairs departments in Scotland, without compensation.

On the debate, without detracting in any way from Nicola Sturgeon’s excellent performance, I think the personalisation of it is wrong and that what the polls are reflecting is a strong desire right across the UK to support anti-austerity policies and no nuclear weapons. Sadly this is probably the last time even the possibility of such policy options will be allowed a significant hearing on mainstream media in England for the next five years.

It is fantastic to hear austerity economics being challenged before a huge audience, who don’t normally get to hear it. Miliband, Cameron and Clegg arguing like they have never heard of Keynes – rather wish Nicola would mention him which might help frame the debate for some viewers. Farage one trick pony blaming foreigners for everything, very nasty and sinister.

When did anybody last see nuclear weapons directly challenged on mainstream TV?

The state of Palestine today becomes a member of the International Criminal Court. This has a practical significance beyond the additional political pressure it piles on Israel. It means that in future Israelis will be liable to the jurisdiction of the court for crimes committed on Palestinian territory, despite Israel’s refusal to sign up to the court along with that other international rogue state, the United States of America.

In the case of the murders on the Mavi Marmara, the Court ruled that the scale of the incident did not reach the bar required for the Court’s jurisdiction – that it does not try war crimes which are individual acts. However it will be impossible to argue that at the next mass Israeli killing in Gaza, or even at the next large scale seizure of territory for Israeli settlements.

One of the many disgraces of neo-con government in the UK is the existence of legislation passed by the UK parliament specifically to allow Israeli war criminals to visit the UK without fear of arrest. That however will be overridden by Britain’s obligation to detain and hand over persons indicted by the International Criminal Court. Today’s apparently small step could change the atmosphere for the arrogant Israeli elite in a fundamental way. They will no longer be able to massacre hundreds of Palestinian women and children whenever they feel it boosts their cause, without some concern about personal consequences.

With the prospect of a deal bringing Iran back into the international community also appearing bright, we can be allowed a rare moment of optimism.

A monumental amount of naivety is being displayed by those heralding the election of Muhammadu Buhari as a new democratic dawn for Nigeria. I certainly hope that Jonathan’s concession does lead to a peaceful transition. But analyses which ignore the tribal factor are worthless. What has happened since 2011 is simply that the Yoruba have changed sides and swung behind Buhari. They did so largely because of his Yoruba running mate, married to a granddaughter of Awolowo. Awolowo is relevant because the map of the results looks just like the disposition of forces at the start of the Biafran war, with the Yoruba/Northern alliance back in existence.

I confess I am relieved that Buhari won, as the Muslim north would simply not accept a fourth consecutive southern Christian presidency, a potential situation which arose due to the death of Yar Adua. I feared very substantial violence following a Jonathan victory. Nigeria is spared that, and this tumultuous, sprawling and totally illogical colonial creation will be able to hang together a while longer. A northern Muslim President is better placed to crack down on Boko Haram, though given the abysmal condition and discipline of Nigeria’s armed forces I remain dubious about how effective this will be.

What will not change is the abysmal poverty, inequality, pollution and corruption. Buhari claims to be a reformed character, but his previous military dictatorship was characterised by massive corruption and human rights abuse, some of which – like his imprisonment of Fela Kuti – was hard to explain. Fela was only released by Buhari’s overthrow.

As ever, I shall watch events in Nigeria with great interest. I have fond memories of the countryside around Buhari’s home town of Katsina. But naive reactions like those of the Robert Kennedy Centre for Human Rights which sees this as a “watershed moment” for Africa will, I predict, only lead to great disappointment.

I am campaigning for the SNP in this general election. As I am still locked away finishing my book for 95% of my waking moments, that campaigning has been desultory so far, but will shortly be more lively. I am vain enough to think that my talents stretch beyond canvassing and delivering leaflets, but as the SNP show no desire to ask me to do anything else, that is what I shall be doing.

I did however emerge from my cocoon at the weekend to attend the SNP conference. Here are some very brief thoughts.

Firstly, it was great to be at the conference speech of the leader of a mainstream party, in which she pledged to no replacement for Trident, no more benefit cuts and the abolition of the House of Lords. The last got the biggest cheer of the whole Conference. I was wondering just how many people in England would like the chance to vote for the SNP.

I had a counterbalancing doubt at the back of my mind about this enthusiasm for – as Nicola Sturgeon put it – “Improving” the UK. I don’t want to improve the Union, I want to end it. Power has a fatal attraction to politicians, and I think I detected that exercising power in the United Kingdom is today gleaming brighter in the dreams of some professional SNP politicians than is independence for Scotland.

The other thing I did not like was the machine politics and management of it all. The entire first day there was not a motion that was passed other than by acclaim, and there was not a single speech against anything, though there were a couple of attempts at referral back. The only item permitted on to the conference agenda, in closed session on day 2, that was in the least likely to cause controversy was the adoption of all women shortlists – and the only reason that was on the agenda was that the leader made it abundantly plain she wanted it. I incline to the view that as a short term measure it is justified, but I abstained because I did not like what I saw of the way it was managed.

It was the only debate the leader sat through, and it was very plain she was watching carefully how people were voting. There was a definite claque of paid party apparatchiks and organised feminists occupying front centre of the hall. There was a strong suspicion, voiced by Christine Graham, that deliberately weak and left field speakers had been chosen against women shortlists. And for the vote, party functionaries including Angus Robertson and Ian McCann stood at the side of the hall very ostensibly noting who voted which way and making sure that the payroll vote performed. I was right next to where Angus Robertson stood as he did this. He moved into position just before the vote, made it very obvious indeed what he was doing, and left immediately after. I found myself regarding the prospect of a whole raft of new MPs, their research assistants and secretaries providing 200 more payroll votes, as depressing.

Coming back to the plus side, I was delighted by the content of many of the resolutions passed, including on the right to return of the Chagos islanders and the inequity of financial tests used by the Home Office to keep immigrant families apart. I left pretty convinced that if we can get the abolition of the monarchy, leaving NATO, and an independent Scotland abandoning the pound sterling onto the agenda, we will pass them. But how to get past the agenda gatekeepers? The party is completely sewn up.

I had intended to speak against the new standing orders for Westminster MPs, which contain eleven draconian clauses on whipping and discipline, as against three more liberal ones in the old standing orders. I confess I did not get to speak because the item was called at 9.05 on Sunday morning, on the morning the clocks went forward, and I was commuting from Edinburgh. The spirit was willing but the flesh is pretty knackered.

After such an extended break from blogging, you will be deeply disappointed that I restart with something as mundane and trivial as Jeremy Clarkson. I have defended the man in the past, because I much enjoy Top Gear and consider that much of what he has been criticised for in the past had been an amusing winding-up of the po-faced of the kind I employ myself. But nasty, indeed vicious bullying of a subordinate should always be a sacking offence.

That did not ought to be the question, though. He hit someone and they had to go to hospital. Where are the police? They are incredibly fond of sweeping up scores of teenagers for thought crime, but here we have an actual violent assault that spills blood, and it seems completely out of the question the perpetrator is brought to account. Why is that? I had a personal experience a couple of years ago when I was very mildly hurt – less than young Oisin – in an assault, and the police insisted on arresting the perpetrator despite my repeated requests to them not to do so. They told me rather firmly that the idea that it is the victim who has a say in pressing charges, is a myth. Why was Clarkson not arrested?

I cannot in my mind dissociate this from the non-arrest of Jimmy Savile for his crimes, despite their being well-known and reported at the time. That seems to link in to the wider paedophilia scandal, and the question of why no action was taken even in the most blatant of cases when there was compelling evidence, such as that of the extremely nasty Greville Janner MP.

But then I think still more widely as to why, for example, Jack Straw has not been charged with the crime of misfeasance in public office after boasting of using his position to obtain “under the radar” changes in regulations to benefit commercial clients, in exchange for cash. I wonder why a large number of people did not go to jail for the HSBC tax avoidance schemes or the LIBOR rigging scandal, which involved long term dishonest manipulation by hundreds of very highly paid bankers.

At the top of the tree is of course the question of why Blair has not been charged for the crime of waging illegal war. The Chilcot Inquiry heard evidence that every single one of the FCO’s elite team of Legal Advisers believed that the invasion of Iraq was an illegal war of aggression. Yet now the media disparage as nutters those who say Blair should be charged.

Then I think of all the poor and desperate people who get jailed for stealing comparatively miniscule amounts in benefit fraud, or the boy who was jailed for stealing a bottle of water in the London riots.

The conclusion is that we do not have a system of justice in this country at all. We have a system where the wealthy and governing classes and those associated with them enjoy almost absolute impunity, broken in only the rarest of cases. At the same time those at the bottom of the pile are kicked hard to keep them there. There is no more chance of justice against those in power in the UK than there is of the killers of Nemtsov being brought to book in Russia.

But what has really scared me is this thought. This situation has been like this my entire life: and I have reached the age of 56 before I realised it. A very great many people have still not realised it at all.

What does not scare me is this. I realise that if the system of justice is completely corrupted, then there is no obligation on me to follow the laws of the state. In fact it would be wrong of me to do so. I must seek my ethical compass elsewhere than in the corrupt power structure which weighs so hard upon the people.

Honoured to give the keynote speech at Amnesty’s conference on torture in London yesterday. Then dashed back to Edinburgh for a very romantic evening with Nadira – and Cameron!

Bloody hell. Read this. Brilliant.

I am so committed to getting my book finished I really don’t have time or energy to blog at the moment, and realise it has been very desultory the last few weeks. I am well and happy, it is just that writing a properly researched history is incredibly intensive. I realise there is much of great interest happening in the world, but I must sometimes cut myself off from it.

This is why I don’t ask for donations for the blog…

The Labour Party supports austerity in England but opposes it in Scotland. If Labour were to win the general election, and also find themselves in power in Scotland’s 2016 parliamentary elections, there would be “new and higher” benefits in Scotland, whereas sanctions and cuts would continue to oppress the ordinary people of England. Indeed, they have repeatedly promised to be tougher on benefits than the Tories – in England.

Now let us for a moment suspend all our critical faculties, and believe that Gordon Brown is sincere about the higher benefits in Scotland. Let us also ignore the fact that to be practical, that would require devolution of a vastly greater proportion of the tax base than anything Labour or the Smith Commission are suggesting. Let us, just for now, believe it is a sincere and practical offer. It is possible to understand why it could attract some people – the union without the cuts and austerity.

But why one earth would any left wing person in England want to vote for a party which, if in power in both England and Scotland, would pay higher benefits to Scots than to English? Why would the English vote for a continued retrenchment of the welfare state there but not in Scotland. Indeed, is there not liable to be some resentment in England at this rather strange proposition? When you add to this Labour’s absolute insistence that while English MPs may not vote on Scottish affairs, Scottish MP’s must be allowed to vote on English affairs, it seems to me you would have to be nuts to vote for Labour in England at present.

The BBC’s latest promotion of super-Brown and his new promises has caused much hilarity in Scotland. I cannot improve on this incisive comment I lifted from the Guardian, by MurphyUKOK:

What is it with the Labour Party and these 2 in particular? The sequencing of their ‘pledges’ on Home Rule so far had been
1) totally opposed to home rule – it is either yes or no
2) eh no actually, we are shitting ourselves, it looks like we might lose- we ‘vow’ home rule
3) we didn’t vow home rule
4) the smith commission has finalised its position- we have delivered home rule
5) eh no … that actually isn’t home rule but if you vote for us again we will give you home rule
A party of lying fucking idiots!!!

But I think the Greens, the Tories and UKIP in England must be those most amused and delighted by Labour’s latest incredible convolution. All of which reinforces my frequently repeated assertion that Labour are going to be nowhere near government after the general election, unless in coalition with the Tories.

Independence is so close now we can almost touch it.

You can see me speaking 24 minutes in here. Can’t work out how to embed this one. It was literally freezing and the very small crowd was understandable. I think four hour rallies outdoors in Scotland in midwinter are somewhat optimistic. I think we also need to face that the high excitement of the referendum campaign, where you could just put something out on Facebook and 10,000 people would show up, is behind us. What we have now is a period of hard graft towards the general election.

I think what I say in this short speech will give comfort to those in the SNP who blocked me as a candidate, because as usual I am joyfully off message. Shortly after me there is an amazing speech from Tommy Sheridan; his physical voice projection alone is astonishing! It was bouncing back off Salisbury Crags and Holyrood Palace.

This really is under 100 yards from where we live. That view of Salisbury Crags is what I see every time I look out the window. The balcony will be great once it gets a bit warmer.

My successor as Rector of the University of Dundee, Brian Cox, has left Labour and joined the SNP. Almost no mainstream media coverage – if it was the other way round, we would have Murphy and Cox wall to wall for weeks. I am delighted about Brian’s move as it is more evidence of genuinely radical voices coming in to the party. I was similarly happy yesterday to find that Tommy Sheppard, for whom I voted, has been selected to fight Edinburgh East, where I live. I think the SNP with its new membership is going to be a great deal more radical than it was before.

Long term readers may recall that in 2010 I stood down as Rector of Dundee University after only one term, as I did not feel I had been able to give it as much time as I would wish to do a really excellent job. Now I have moved back to Edinburgh, those problems no longer apply, and I shall be standing for election to take the post again next year, as Brian Cox completes his second (and final) term.

I cannot help but recall that on the polling day of my election as Rector in 2007, the Daily Record came out in Dundee with a full front page photo of my opponent, Andy Nicol (unionist rugby player), and a single front page headline “I was born to lead Dundee students”. The lengths to which the Establishment will go to try to ensure that whistleblowers stay down and stomped upon sometimes surprise even me.

There is a pro-Independence rally outside parliament from 11 am on Saturday. I shall be speaking. I am not sure how widely it has been publicised, but I do hope that it will show that the extraordinary spirit that has been awakened in Scotland is still alive and kicking.

I was involved in the organisation of the 50th anniversary commemoration of the liberation of Auschwitz, while First Secretary at the British Embassy in Warsaw. The 50th did not receive anything like the media coverage given to the 70th, of which more later.

Senior British visitors to Poland invariably included a concentration camp on their itinerary, and from escorting people around I visited camps a great deal more often than I would have wished. I found the experience appalling and desolate. The first I ever saw was Majdanek and I recall that I just had to sit helpless and shivering for some time. One thing the experience left me with – including meeting survivors and both Polish and German eye-witnesses, and seeing the architects’ plans for camps – was a contempt for those who claim the whole thing did not happen, or was an accident, or was small scale.

It in no way diminishes the genocidal attack on the Jews to remember that a vast number of Poles also died in the camps, as well as gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and disparate political prisoners. I tried sometimes to diminish the horror I felt at involvement with the camps, with attempts at humour. I was present at a meeting listing the guests of honour; the President of Lithuania was included. I whispered that he was coming to represent the camp guards. That was offensive, and I apologise. But there is a real problem that to this day Eastern Europe – including Poland itself – has not come to terms with historical truth about collaboration with anti-Jewish genocide and other attacks on minorities. I recommend this website, which tackles these issues very honestly and is well worth a lengthy browse.

It requires bigotry not to be able to understand why nationalist resistance movements against Russian occupation became allied with Germany during World War II. That would be reprehensible only in the same sense that allied collaboration with Stalin might be reprehensible, but for the added factor of enthusiastic collaboration with genocidal and master race programmes and fascist ideology. That is what makes the glorification of Eastern European nationalist figures from this period generally inappropriate.

I fear however that the real reason that the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz received so much more coverage than the 50th is a media desire to reinforce the narrative of the War on Terror and Western policy in the Middle East by invoking the spectre of massive anti-Semitism. There have been isolated but deplorable, apparently anti-Semitic attacks of a small-scale terrorist nature in France and Belgium in recent years. But to conflate this into stories of a wave of popular anti-Semitism in Europe is a nonsense. Maureen Lipman’s claim that she may have to leave the UK is not just silly but disingenuous. I do not believe she feels in personal danger of attack – there is absolutely no reason why she should – she is rather making a political point.

There are two factors which could exacerbate anti-Semitism at present. One is the appalling behaviour of Israel and its indefensible action in continually seizing Palestinian land and using its military superiority to dominate and occasionally massacre Palestinians. Regrettably, there are a very small minority of people who wrongly blame Jews in general for the actions of Israel.

The second factor is of course the terrible economic hardship wrought across the whole world by irresponsible banking practices, and the fact that the bankers luxury lifestyles were maintained at the cost of everybody else. There are still a tiny minority of people stuck in the medieval mindset associating banking with the Jewish community. There is in fact a very plausible argument that if any “race” has a disproportionate influence on the development and character of international banking since the mid eighteenth century, it is the Scots! But those who see banking as a racial issue are nutters.

You could construct an argument from these factors, and you could identify that anti-Semitic people do exist. They certainly do. They dominate the very small category of people who get banned even from this free speech blog. But are their opinions intellectually respectable, promoted in the mainstream or able to be expressed openly without fear of either social or legal consequences? No, no and no. Anti-semites are fortunately a tiny and strange minority. I might add that in my numerous and frequent social contacts in the British Muslim community, I have never encountered anti-Semitism (unlike, say, Poland and Russia where I encountered casual anti-Semitism quite frequently).

The final point, is of course, the conflation of anti-zionism with anti-Semitism. That seems to me the fundamental design of the media campaign exaggerating the scale of anti-Semitism at the moment. Yes, we must always remember the terrible warnings from history and it is right to remember those who died in the concentration camps, Jewish, Polish, Romany, Gay, Communist or any other category. But we should be aware of those who wish to manipulate the powerful emotions of horror thus evoked, for present objectives of the powerful.

The entire purpose of this blog is to ask you to think outside the box. It therefore cuts across the lines of dogma of any group, and is formed purely by my own independent thought. As I have frequently stated, if anybody agrees with every point I make, something is wrong.

This is going to annoy both left on Greece and right on banks, and my own party on the SNP and Labour. Here goes.

The citizens of the United Kingdom gave 45,000 pounds each, every man woman and child of them, direct to the bankers in bailouts. We will be paying off that money in taxes – with vast sums in interest to the same bankers, from whom we borrowed virtual money they did not have, to give to them as real money – for generations to come. Quantitive easing gives yet more money to the bankers, cash in place of risky bonds they wish to dump.

When you add it all together including interest, every man, woman and child in the UK will pay over 100,000 pounds each to the bankers, to bail out the bankers from the mess their own extreme greed had created. Indeed it is possible to argue rationally that the payment will be infinite, as the debt incurred will never be repaid but continually rolled over, and interest payments continue.

We did not have to do this. We could have let the bad banks go bust, started new ones, and boosted the economy by spending just 20% of the money we have given the banks on crucially needed public infrastructure works – railways, renewable energy, housing, insulation, hospitals, schools etc. But Gordon Brown and New Labour decided just to give money to the bankers instead.

In Greece, the people have actually given much less to the bankers for bailout than people in the UK. It is important to acknowledge that the causes of the Greek financial collapse are different. Greece was rather a recipient of bad lending, a country which received loans it could not possibly afford. Due to corrupt networks of elite collusion embracing both government and private sector, much of this money was simply siphoned out of the country into overseas accounts in London and Cyprus. The British people are suffering from the banking collapse through being forced to bail out the bankers. Greece is more in the position of somebody in a huge house who could not afford the mortgage – except for the vital distinction that all the people in Greece were paying the mortgage, but the large majority living in sheds behind the mansion.

I welcome Syriza’s victory as an indication that people are not content just to accept the narrative given them by the mainstream media and the parties in the pocket of corporations. I hope that they negotiate hard and force the banks to take a huge haircut on Greek sovereign debt. I acknowledge their commitment to social justice. But I do hope they will be realistic with both themselves and their people on the amount of blood, sweat and tears that is going to need to go in to building a productive Greek economy. An example of Keynesian stimulus is much needed by the rest of Europe.

Gordon Brown’s bank bailout was probably the biggest single gift any politician has ever given his corporate masters in the entire history of the world. It is worth reminding ourselves just how very right wing the Red Tories are. Not to mention the fact their front bench remains littered with war criminals. I therefore have grave reservations about Nicola Sturgeon’s weekend interview indication that the People of Scotland want a Labour Government with SNP support. I don’t. I am not going to elect somebody to represent me as chief bag carrier to a war criminal.

The SNP leadership remain infected by managerialism. It is easy to convince yourself you are doing good things while not changing anything fundamental, and at the same time building a very well paid career and a personal powerbase. I don’t want devo-max, I don’t want more powers, I don’t want something “as close to federalism as possible”. I want freedom for my country. I want independence. I want to live in a country which does not illegally invade other countries, collude in torture, carry out mass surveillance of its citizens, or possess nuclear weapons. The idea of running the Union a little bit better, making it a teeny bit more humane and competent, does not interest me. Nor does dulling the edge of austerity, when it is going to behead us anyway.

Besides which I am absolutely convinced the Tories will win the election, which will make all this jostling for position look rather foolish.

I am in Berlin for the annual Sam Adams Award – this time to William Binney, formerly Technical Director of the NSA. There will be an address by Edward Snowden (and a short contribution from me). It really is a tremendous event, with some very senior former intelligence professionals making revelations about the extent to which the security state is out of control, a tool of immoral governments dominated by corporate interests.

The event is at the Berlin-Moscow Venue, 52 Unter Den Linden, and starts at 7pm (6pm UK time). It will be livestreamed on the Sam Adams website.

7:00-7:05 Wilkommen by Joerg Dreger, Managing Partner, Dreger Group
7:05-7:12 Ray McGovern, veteran CIA senior intelligence officer (27 years) and presidential briefer; SAA cofounder and Master of Ceremonies: Moment of Silence for Ambassador Robert White; acknowledgement of David MacMichael, retired Senior Estimates Officer in National Intelligence Council; Overview of history/purpose of Sam Adams Award
7:12-7:15 Annie Machon, former M15 intelligence officer (speech + introduction of Katharine and Craig)
7:15-7:20 Katharine Gun*, former GCHQ intelligence officer
7:20-7:25 Craig Murray*, former British ambassador to Uzbekistan
7:25-7:28 Coleen Rowley*, former FBI Special Agent and Minneapolis Chief Division Counsel (brief remarks +introduction of Todd P., Jesselyn & Tom)
7:28-7:33 Jesselyn Radack*, former ethics adviser, US Department of Justice and National Security; Human Rights Adviser, Government Accountability Project (GAP)
7:33-7:37 Todd Pierce, Major, US Army Judge Advocate (ret.); Guantanamo Military Commissions Defense Counsel
7:37-7:45 Thomas Drake*, former senior intelligence service executive, National Security Agency (NSA) – (speech + introduction of Ed Snowden)
7:45-8:00 Edward Snowden* (by video link), former NSA contractor; former CIA systems administrator
8:00-8:05 Ray McGovern segue to SAA Award Announcement; Reading of SAAII citation by Annie M. & Elizabeth M.(English and German versions, respectively); conferral by Thomas Drake of Sam Adams Integrity in Intelligence Corner-Brightener Candlestick to William Binney, former National Security Agency (NSA) Technical Director, World Geopolitical and Military Analysis, NSA, and co-founder, Signals Intelligence Automation Research Center
8:05-8:20 Acceptance speech by William Binney, former Technical Director, World Geopolitical and Military Analysis, NSA, and co-founder, Signals Intelligence Automation Research Center; Q & A
8:20-8:25 Wrap-up by Ray McGovern
8:25-8:30 Closing remarks by Joerg Dreger
8:30-9:00 Reception
*denotes former Sam Adams Award recipient

The BBC led their 10 O’clock News today with a five minute piece on the delay to the Chilcot report. It gave a retrospective on the Iraq War that did not mention, once, Weapons of Mass Destruction as the raison d’etre but told us the war “removed a brutal dictator”. They said the dead of the war were in thousands – not hundreds of thousands, not even tens of thousands. “Thousands died”, they said. Literally true, but diminishing the scale. They could equally have said dozens died, also literally true – just an awful lot of dozens.

Then they allowed Blair unanswered and unquestioned to speak sincerely to camera about how much he wanted the report published, and the reporter stated without challenge that Blair had not delayed publication and had not objected to the publication of his correspondence with President Bush – both statements which are a very long way from the whole truth.

Even by recent BBC standards, it was the most vomit inducing production. They compounded it by finishing with Ed Miliband in parliament demanding publication, when he has a shadow cabinet packed with the very criminals who launched the illegal war – a fact they did not note. Anti-war opinion was briefly represented by – Nick Clegg!!!

I do not recognise what the British state has become. Or rather I do recognise precisely what kind of state it has become, and it bears no relation to the democracy it claims to be.