This is the speech I came down to London to give.
I have had a fascinating few days catching up on many people. It is an interesting fact that one of the suite of rooms where the great ones gather for their sparkling wine and snacks before and after the Cenotaph ceremony on Remembrance Sunday is literally my old office, from when I was Deputy Head of the Africa Department of the FCO. It has always interested me that the grand people of British society, particularly those born to it, overlook the “little people” and forget they have agency. People like Boris Johnson do not see janitors, cleaners, cooks, drivers and waiting staff as anything but cyphers. They however see him, and I can tell you with certainty that the reason he messed up the Cenotaph ceremony, starting backwards and forward at the wrong time, laying the wreath upside down and generally stumbling around looking like an unmade bed, is that he was drunk. You could smell it off him. He arrived in that condition.
I am working on a longer and more thoughtful piece about the morality of the use of force. I hope to post that tomorrow. Am on the train back to Edinburgh.
As we expect from this eminent thinket writer his speech commenced by highlighting who sponsored the church we sat in empifes built on slavery and so Craig demonstrated little of the elite power has changed with Julian incarcerated in top security prison largely for murders and terrorists with a rogue government making it up as they go along. Change is coming from the usual source ordinary folk canvassing up and down the country inspired by Labour giving hope from years of austerity.
Thankyou Craig for your wisdom
You also have to remember that when a politician is asked: ” Do you like Coke? ” they will always refer to he drink but think of something
different in their heads.
I hear it’s rife amongst them and the media who serves them.
Perhaps the price is kept down that way.
When Eric Joyce used to get barred from parliament it was for fighting whilst drinking.
The reason for his fighting was he hated the Tories ( not a bad thing at all) which was never mentioned in the press.
Then again if I was Tory MP or even a voter the strain of self deception would drive you to drink and drugs.
Bad for your health constantly lying I think.
Ken, constantly lying and self deception as an impeller to drink and drugs implies conscience. Doesn’t work for me. The notion that psychopaths devoid of both conscience and empathy are somehow rare is also a deluding myth – sure as the lone killer gaining his power trips from taking the lives of innocents this may be comparatively rare, but in general terms not. Just check out the next G20, or the boardrooms of some of the multinationals and banks for a whack job fest.
You leave Jo Swinson out of this and every ‘Celebrity ‘ in Christendom.
The phrase – the insanity of vanity sums these people up perfectly.
No doubt every would be saviour of the world thinks that by ‘removing ‘ people from the Middle east to Norway due to their opinion that somehow they were doing God’s or someone’s bidding.
Politicians on coke ( or worse not on it ) have levels of self regard which would horrify ordinary people due to those people being ordinary – i.e. not above IT all in a demi God like way.
This is the US view currently see Bannon et al for details.
Back to Swinson and her almost gleeful YES! to sending one back and the interviewers response was even worse and they are both women with kids no doubt.
I’m not saying that women should be softies but those wrods coming form a woman and a mother were almost shameful.
Nicola Sturgeon said a definitive no to using the nuke button and I applauded form my sofa.
In fact she should have added – Send tthe bloody nukes to Uxbridge as we’re sick of being a target.
Bravo Nicola!
Excuse me, the citizens of Uxbridge include large numbers who did not select the current PM as local candidate nor vote for him either.
As Uxbridge does not have a harbour, the submarines housing the nukes might have a hard time getting there. Not to mention that the large RAF base is now undergoing large scale transformation into a new community (including new primary school with ecobuilding powering itself), thereby making it unavailable for future military activities. Nothing to do with the PM, I might add. The local council have rather more addiction to cost-conscious value-for-money adminstration than any national government….
Likely candidates outside Scotland for nuclear subs: Barrow in Furness; Milford Haven; Devonport.
I forgot to add.
Many of these people are on television.
With nuclear ‘armaments’ already being stored in Trecwn, I fear it will be Milford.
Yep, Labour, the government that brought us the sexed up dossier, the Iraqi war and extraordinary rendition. I bet you just can’t wait …
Wait a minute. That was “New” Labour. The ones with the masonic/rosicrucian red rose logo, remember?
Cenotaph eh? I prefer to remember the citizen armies of 1915-1918 and 1938-1963 as citizens, not attached to the mercenary rabbles before and after.
You have just called my Great Uncle a mercenary. He was an Old Contemptible mobilised in August 1914. He was not regular army, he was in the Yeomanry, the territorials of their day. He was a farmer’s son (tenant farmer, we paid rent to the Spencers) so could provide a horse. They were not cavalry though but mounted infantry. He joined in essence as a grown up boy scout. The war was his great youthful adventure. He served in France on the Western front first on his horse then in the trenches. He was then one of those sent to bolster the Italians in the Po Valley in their fight against Austria-Hungary. He served right through to 1919 as did many of the conscripts. Your truncation of it at 1918 is historically ignorant.
I am no militarist as his grand nephew, I’m a Scottish CND member and a pacifist. But you cannot judge people from yesterday by the standards of today. If he hadn’t been in the Yeomanry he would have been conscripted so would have served in some capacity or other regardless. His younger brother, my grandfather was too young in the First and in a Reserved occupation in the Second. Those do not make him a better man than his big brother and I doubt he would have thought so. He did not become an engineer to avoid military service.
My father avoided national service by dint of passing his engineering exams. He told of how those who failed disappeared into the ranks very fast. He might have been sent to oppress the Kenyans or fight in the Malayan emergency. We had an engineer family friend in NZ who served in both Korea (post the war) and in Malaya during the emergency as a combat engineer. A fine man who was involved in the NZ-Korea friendship society as result of his experience.
Fact of the day 1: the war in Malaya was only called an “emergency” because insurers wouldn’t pay out for damage caused by a conflict that was admitted to be a war.
2: it’s also where the British poshboy regime’s general Gerald Templer first used the phrase “hearts and minds”.
“you cannot judge people from yesterday by the standards of today”
Says who? Some would argue that we can’t judge by any other standard.
Moreover, since there were many who thought the First World War was folly at the time, for much the same reasons we regard it as folly today, it would be easy to make a counter argument along the lines that we are actually judging by contemporaneous standards.
I think those who opposed the war at the time deserve credit for doing so. And I think those who welcomed it and enthusiastically took part were wrong to do so. Being wrong in large numbers doesn’t make you any less wrong. I understand that there was a lot of pressure on people to join up, many did so out of hunger too, but that doesn’t make them less wrong either.
This argument, that we can’t judge people in the past by today’s standards, comes up in history all the time in regards to things like the slave trade and colonialism. I guess in some abstract universe it would be possible to take the argument seriously if people didn’t question and criticize slavery and colonialism at the time, but the fact is many did question and criticise at the time.
‘“you cannot judge people from yesterday by the standards of today”
‘Says who? Some would argue that we can’t judge by any other standard’.
Then I hope that you yourself are content to be judged by the standards of some future time.
I am. And it’s something I remind myself of and others of regularly. And I think it’s fair that future generations do that. I believe I even addressed a lengthy comment on here in letter form to people of the future.
Anybody that suggests those responsible for the Iraq war can’t be judged by future generations has a screw loose in my opinion. Of course, I could provide many other examples. And if it applies to them it applies to us all and all people in history.
My grandfather was born in 1866; his mother died giving birth to his younger brother; at 12 he was orphaned when his father died. For four years he lived and worked with a shepherd who taught him to read and write – schooling for the Victorian poor was best described as somewhat sketchy.
At 16 he ran away and lying about his age joined the 2nd Hampshire Regiment of the British Army, he saw service in Malta, India, the 3rd Burma War and the 1st and 2nd Boer Wars.
Although of very limited education, his letters home (British Army correspondence remained uncensored until May 1915) clearly illustrate that he knew exactly what the army was doing in those countries. We were suppressing and where required killing their people so that we might steal their land and resources.
Technically and legally of course, neither he nor his fellows could be described as mercenaries but he was certainly not acting to defend or safeguard Britain but rather to expand her rule and wealth.
The 3rd Anglo Burmese War was of course all about conquest disguised as regime change; so not much has altered in a hundred years.
Seems to me that we’ve been a rogue state for much of our history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Anglo-Burmese_War
Incredible that your grandfather was born in 1866.
Mine too!
But in Berlin.
What has always been a bit difficult for me to wrap my mind around is that he was born before the Unification of Germany.
My grandfather ran away from life in one of London’s worst slum areas (probably either dark blue or black on the poverty map – i.e. really f***ing bad and a match for the Gorbals in Glasgow – yes, London did have such areas) to join the British army when he was 15, in the mid-1920s. (He lied about his age.)
Don’t you mean 1939? (Although it is true that conscription was reintroduced several months before WW1 started.)
You have a point, and it is doubtful that the Soldiers’ Parliaments would have happened in the British Army in Egypt in 1944 had it not been for the conscripts – and the network of the Communist Party. Nor have US privates in Afghanistan or Iraq “fragged” their officers as some did in Vietnam. US and British service personnel today are barbaric thugs and murderers, probably exceeded only by Daesh and the Israelis.
But to imagine that the British army in 1918 was a “citizens’ army” (not run by posh public school alumni?), that the soldiers at Maryhill Barracks in Glasgow in 1919 were a lot of bosses’ men (so why did the ruling class decide not to deploy them against George Square?), and that the men who mutinied in Invergordon in 1931 were a “mercenary rabble” (so why did they sing the Red Flag?) would be way off the mark. A friend of mine knew an ILP guy whose job it was in the army to guard British cabinet meetings during WW2. My friend asked him what he’d do if a revolutionary workers’ militia turned up and made it clear they had “business” with the ruling class criminals in the Cabinet whom he was supposed to be protecting. His answer was “I’d draw my weapon and lead them right up those f***ing stairs”.
Note to left-wing Scottish friends reading this. ^^^ There are some good reference-points for you 🙂 Much better than all that cr*p about the Declaration of Arbroath and the removal of the Stone of Scone (which was damaged when the suffragettes bombed the Coronation Chair, but no information about THAT is displayed at Edinburgh Castle!)
Good stuff Craig, I wish I’d come to see you but by the time I’d heard, tickets had gone!
Dear Mr. Murray,
Thank you for such a well prepared and delivered speech. Fuck the microphone, this space was designed for projected speaking 🙂
As for internet control, yes, its getting worse and that will continue. The problem is not the control of Big Tech, but the lack of education of the masses. I dont use Facebook or Google. I keep an HTML file with the links to all sites I think are useful, and yours is close to the top of the list, along with sites like Corbett Report, Consortium News, Caitlin Johnstone, Moon of Alabama, Global Research, The Gray Zone, Chris Hedges’ “On Contact”, The Last American Vagabond, and many more. For those who can’t be arsed to learn the few things you need to know to maintain an HTML file, just use the Bookmarks in your browser of choice.
This is the principle: when you find an independent voice for which you develop respect (for me that means they publish source material and I can verify it) then RECORD their site, and just go there when it suits you. Do NOT swim in the 24 hour news cycle social media for your information diet.
With the deepest respect,
Some random dude on the internet
PS: The world needs independent media, and the scots need an independent Scotland.
Chris Hedges accepted an award alongside the BellEndcrats!
Journalist Dilyana Gaytandzhieva is suing Bellingcat – the paragraph below summarises her case.
‘Bellingcat, an online investigation organization headed by Eliot Higgins, has deliberately and with malicious intent manipulated evidence by hiding crucially important documents in order to slander me as a journalist and misrepresent my investigation, 350 flights carry weapons for terrorists, as “intentionally incorrect”.’
It’s all documented on her site
http://armswatch.com/exposed-bellingcat-fabricate-evidence-deliberately-hide-documents-in-new-russian-spy-plot/
Excellent advice.
This is also what I do.
That is, bookmark the sites that I rely on.
Of course there are usually interesting links within reports, but I only bookmark sites that I come to consider “regulars.”
Some more: Strategic-Cuture.org; ICH.
“This is also what I do.”
Then I’m sorry but you also seem to misunderstand how these things work.
One way or another, you’re going to use a browser and everything you look at is going to go through your ISP — yes, even with a VPN that’s the case.
The only thing you’re avoiding with your direct links is the search engines but you can avoid search engines with any browser anyway by typing the address into the address bar. Bookmarking a site is no different to using a direct html link.
Please: we are not “the Masses”. We too are people.
Yeah – masses of people.
Well said Craig, and what a wonderful parisan crowd, the echos of the endless applause are still ringing in my ears.
Better to be at London Bridge where the real people cleaned up what the rogues had allowed.
the uk in it’s infinite wisdom only let known convicts out that aren’t a threat, or so they think.. meanwhile assange continues to sit in jail, not a convict (treated as one), and apparently a much bigger threat to this system of governance presently masquerading as a joke… what to make of that?? the murder of innocents is happening as we speak…
It’s GE2017 all over again.
https://twitter.com/LucianSamosata/status/872694637567389696
i don’t know what that means – canuck here… but i did like a statement from that person on twitter – “Some rumours say that Germany, Canada, Australia and USA are talking about kicking out from international cooperative intelligence the United Kingdom because the country is “too compromised” with russian interference and consider the uk ‘a rogue state’.” wish it was true! these are all rogue states at this point as i see it..
Usman Kahn was never a threat to the Government, was he?
They’re surrounded by (taxpayer funded) bodyguards and ferried around in limousines
It’s only us ordinary folk at risk from the likes of Kahn
In fact, he’s probably increased the incoming tory majority
He was a rogue in more than one sense that Khan. There is no democracy in Britain, but there is rogueism designed to all but insure, by hook or by crook, that the Tories or Tory-like win; it’s much the same in Israel, and may indeed have begun there, by which I mean the practice of inhibiting the chances of democratic leftism through the fortuitous eruption of terror.
Kahn’s are untouchables because they share their religion with the Anglo elite biggest enablers, the Arab oil elite. The dollar floats only on Arab oil after the gold standard was dumped. No unlimited dollar printing no unlimited CIA / Military-Industrial empire. Even sites like this or Off-Guardian keep off Islam: part of this “grand” setup.
Accepting more influx from Muslim nations in Western Europe is the present price and Corbyn (+EU) is buying: more voters for his experimental Lab.
In your enthusiasm to attack Corbyn, perhaps for reasons not stated, you forget:
1. That Corbyn would stop arms trade to KSA and other countries with repressive policies, clearly stated in the manifesto.
2.That Corbyn will stop interference with countries that leads to this sort of Jihadi action as blowback.
3.That this supposed influx of foreigners of this disposition has been happening in the watch of the Tories.
I should also have added that some of these regimes to which arms are supplied by GB include those who regularly kill unarmed civilians and enclose them in a very large open air prison just because they get in the way of further expansion.
The Tories are also fully into cheap Islam voter import and the “liberals” too. The Brexit party probably the only ones who are not.
By doing so, james, they make it perfectly clear to the whole world that their definition of “terrorism” is “telling the truth”.
The worst crime of all, in their book.
tom – very good! i think you are bang on.. thanks..
One candidate for British Prime Minister is rightly accused of being an alcoholic, while another is falsely accused of being a racist. Wonder which one the British people will choose?…
Is the “alcoholic” not also a racist?
That aside, Scotland will reject them both, although I have a fondness for Corbyn (Labour’s only certainty for a Scottish MP is not a supporter of his leader). As for Johnson…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qngb9jTDwv0
“Boris” – a musical parody of “Sugar, Sugar” by The Archies, courtesy of Yew Choob (Jock Scot).
Boris Johnson is without doubt a racist. He has called black people “piccaninnies”, a word which appears in the famous 1968 “blood” speech of Enoch Powell, the biggest hero of all for the Tory Partei’s members and voters. (Or “Brexit”, as Powell is known today.)
If only that fact was published, with evidence. The scumbag would out of office and shamed forever from public life. What a bonus that would be. He did look particularly dishevelled and stumbling that day – given that Corbyn usually gets the derision, it was notable that none of the oligarch press mentioned it, and of course the BBC replaced his disarray with old footage. What an appalling prospect that this imposter, fake and abuser of women has a chance of being PM for five years. Only with the connivance of the media. Any other individual with that character and behaviour would have been hounded out of office by now.
Or slaughtered by a strong Labour leader in the forthcoming election rather than relying on a overgrown student demo protester .,,,
Is that “strong Labour leader” as in Denis Healey or Tony Blair? Or is it a Labour leader strong enough to stick to his principles and fight the good fight?
Just look at the way successive Labour leaders have led the working class into one disaster after another until the ordinary worker has fewer rights at the workplace than at any time since 1825.
Dennis Healey was a participant in the 1954 meeting of the Bildeberg group. Moreover, he attended various USA right wing think tanks in the 50s. Harold Wilson often accused Healey of leading a soft coup to oust him as leader of the Labour Party and trying to create a Chinese whispers of Wilson being paranoid Hence his famous quote at a Labour Party conference of “ I know what is going on?. I am going on! “.
In less than a fortnight from now, Jeremy Corbyn could be the first prime minister since Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 to win office for the first time at a general election without being an Oxford graduate 🙂
“Come home to Labour”, the line being used on Labout posters in the North of England, is a brilliant slogan and could kick the Tories’ “Get Brexit Done” out of the park. Many many older people in this country do not like it one bit that younger people are faced with the prospect of a future that’s much worse than what their parents experienced when they were their age. We are talking about dealing with sh*tty private landlords including when they’re raising children and when their children have grown up too, being heavily in debt for most of their lives, and having nothing that even approaches job security.
Meanwhile today Boris Johnson, leader of a party that has held government office for NINE YEARS, says the reason why a convict was allowed out of prison early wearing a tag who then went and murdered people near London Bridge was all the opposition Labour party’s fault. Is he taking the piss? And people are supposed to vote this joker back into office? The scary thing is that some voters will “think” “Yeah” when they hear what he’s saying.
“Come home to Labour” is much more musical than “For the many, not the few”.
Everybody likes coming home.
It also works excellently in the run-up to Christmas.
Top work!
And those bozos in the Tory campaign thought they could lead working class people in the North of England to vote Tory by offering to “get Brexit done”, something they’ve signally failed to do by chucking their majority away and then having an internal Tory party stabfest. F*** Brexit! F*** the whole question of British EU membership, one way or the other!
“Is that AS for me to post?”
It’s certainly riffing on an anti-semitic trope, so, yes, you probably are opening yourself to that accusation. And trailing your coat whilst doing so, because I doubt the Sassoon family’s actual religion or culture were of importance in their drug-trading activities at all.
There were plenty of others involved in the opium trade, and the wars to protect it, including Jardine, Apcar (an Armenian), the East India Company, P&O, and of course the British Government and military.
The actual content of the chapter to which your link refers offers very thin gruel when compared to its grandiose title, referencing just one Jewish family, the Sasoons, in evidence. Its larger context, as a screed to reinforce US isolationism in the early 1940s should be considered to be of dubious motivation.
Bear in mind that the other 99.999% of Jews had no opium-based fortunes, wielded no great economic power, and had absolutely no inside connection to British Royalty, or inhabited any sort of “gilded” towers, metaphorical or otherwise.
I should have added that I personally have NO opprobrium for these who are of any religion (unless the scientologists are considered one) as I know the Hassidic community of Stamford Hill have NO problem with JC and Labour.
Thank you Craig. It’s what the little people have suspected for a long time and to a certain extent accept it as they are the invisible below stairs players in the Downton Abbey that they wish this country to be. However the wonderful Internet has opened the eyes and ears especially the young who see they’re being shafted by incompetent entitled buffoons. Hence the poll rating for Johnson in that group. Thanks for speaking truth to power
Bear in mind also that the literary editor of the Daily Herald and the author of the three volumes that begin with the Memoirs of a Fox Hunting Man, one of the great poets of the Great Poets War was Siegfried Sassoon. His mother I believe, and my memory is generally more honest than wikipedia, was a Thorneycroft of Military Industrial Complex avant la lettre (as they say in Perkinsfield) fame.
Much, in the way of ‘breaks’ can be forgiven the family-whose origins were in I believe (see memory above) in Baghdad, that produced:
“Good-morning, good-morning!’ *the General said
When we met him last week on our way to the line.
Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of ‘em dead,
And we’re cursing his staff for incompetent swine.
‘He’s a cheery old card,’ grunted Harry to Jack
As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack.
But he did for them both by his plan of attack.”
Excellent. Thank-you.
Great Speech Craig.
Well all all the Speakers and Organizers of the event.. John Pilger’s description of what visitors go through is in itself nightmarish.. What an evil lot the UK gov are, with the relentless torture of Julian
well Gordon Dimmack for putting the full speech up.. and all the other speakers too –
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCV-ZJdwMlWHox0_TM1rC_kQ
And btw these are the people who I have animus for
http://tapnewswire.com/2016/01/breaking-the-bullingdon-club-omerta-secret-lives-of-the-men-who-run-britain/
From an excellent post by commentaor Maggie who tells us of the characters and careers of the Cameron/Osborne/Johnson era.
https://off-guardian.org/2019/11/29/member-of-ukraines-parliament-leaks-trove-of-biden-financial-records/#comment-103499
Worth a read.
WHO has the POWER over what ‘still’ is used as the Thumbnail to YT videos ? This ‘still’ has SSome unfortunate connotations that could be [probably will be] used by our Overlords to discredit the message !! It’s the same when they catch ”enemy” politicians waving. They’re praying for THAT shot !
Very good question
I recently witnessed Jeremy Corbyn arriving at Waterloo station (my workplace) on his way back from Southampton. To see the genuine rapport he struck up with the “little people” – specifically the member of platform staff who opened the gate for him – and the laughter on both their faces at a shared joke, highlighted what a huge contrast there is between the two leaders.
philshems, and where was that rapport when Corbyn bombed Syria (gave a free vote to Labour MPs knowing full well what the result would be), when he joined in with arming and supporting terrorists, with stoking a civil war, with creating mayhem and bloodshed in a futile attempt to overthrow Assad? One 12-year-old boy had his head slowly cut off by one of “our” groups of “moderate rebels” – Corbyn knew exactly what was going on:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jifS0fi9WB8
Corbyn also said he would oppose the Snooper’s Charter, then let it pass into law unopposed; he’s thrown his left-wing allies under the bus of fake anti-Semitism charges, and remains silent as Assange slowly dies in Belmarsh.
I will NOT be voting – AT ALL! Over 200 Labour MPs either abstained on or voted for the “Welfare Reform Bill” that has led to so much suffering and death – including children being orphaned. One of Corbyn’s shadow DWP ministers said the Tories aren’t doing enough to get the disabled back into work. Google “atos mirror suicide” and “calumslist” – the guy who set up “calumslist” is also now dead (page 4 of the site) – I will NOT side with cowards and murderers!
He should have been charged with being drunk on duty as prime minister, if he still is prime minister.
It’s a wonder Johnson didn’t whip out the boaby and have a piss on the war dead.
Fathers, sons, brothers, husbands all slaughtered in their millions and this bastard turns up drunk stumbling about and laying his wreath upside down.
And the BBC covered it up
Pissed on the graves of the dead – it’s as simple as that.
As one Tory blimp opined many years ago …..the men died a good death today!
Fake terrorism used as excuse to remove all rights and take over the internet and to win elections
I think that was the reason of the yesterday (islam), today and tommorow it will be so called russian trolls that western governments will legislate against – EU, right now working a media law that will target so called russian propaganda, but domestic dissent will be covered in that net which is the ultimate goal by these scary censorship-lovers.
something special might happen tonight after 9pm. Talk of Russia report being leaked. I wasn’t interested in it before, still think it could be a load of nonsense. Was also worried they’d release a fake version with Corbyn’s name in it, real one to be released officially after the election. But I am hearing that it is no Tory fan that is talking of releasing it, and he fears for his safety. I’m also hearing NZ already has it and the UK may be kicked out of the international cooperative intelligence (5 eyes alliance) ‘because the country is too compromised’ and they consider the UK a ‘rogue state’. Now I don’t buy into all this Russian interference crap, but when you have the Tory party funded by “dining clubs” with a £50K minimum annual contribution per member, with some paying over £1m, all to get the ear of sitting and future Tory leaders, you have to wonder. FYI the Tory party has received over £150m from one such ‘club’ in the past 8 or 9 years. Dodgy whatever the nationality of these ‘donors’. I’m also hearing that other European countries and even the US are reporting on the corruption of our election/democracy saying things like ‘spare a thought for the British people’.
AKAaka. Indeed. La Clinton raised millions for her campaign and foundation prior while being a murdering Secretary of State. She still lost.
I don’t believe in any honest funding by “dining clubs”. Here in Russia we see a lot of examples how easily it turns into bribes and trade. The system itself has a bug in it.
You may observe it in some companies – an interested person (e.g. a supplier) invests good money into a project to achive his own commercial goals, and to win the contract he pays a good sum of money to the employee responsible of contracts. In Russia we have a special term for this kind of bribe – откат (*rollback, recoil* though the better translation is ‘share’ or ‘slice’.)
“Kickback” has this meaning in the UK/US.
The Skripals saga, and the ongoing mis-treatment of Julian Assange has moved me to disbelieve and mistrust anything issued by the UK media and the UK government. I really need to hold a check on my cynicism. – A terrorist attack on London Bridge just prior to a general election, really?
President Kennedy, “shot’ Harvey Oswald, Oswald then shot by the nightclub owner, Jack …Pallance? who armed, found himself so close to Oswald to assassinate him. Why, just why did he shoot Oswald?
Condolences to the families of the two persons killed at London Bridge. Condolences to the family of the lady who died in the Skripal saga through finding a bottle in a rubbish bin.
Collateral damage, how cold an expression it is.
An interesting fact. Usman Khan was a prisoner at Belmarsh for terrorism offences. Julian Assange is a prisoner at Belmarsh for telling the truth.
While the government says he served several years in prison how do we know he didn’t spend five of them in Syria or wherever, destabilising another government in the interests of the west? While he probably was in prison I wouldn’t stake money on it. Nothing they tell us is believable, everything is suspect. Some say it’s not known where in the prison estate the two people supposedly convicted of the supposed murder of the supposed soldier Lee Rigby are held, including prison officers. I believe that was all staged.
An iteresting fact. Humpback whales population today announced to escape the extinction danger. Some good people united once to save the species.
I ask myself, why is it possible to save whales, and still not possible to free Julian? To bring a prince to the court? To stop Syrian war or Israel intervention into Palestina’s territory? To stop Russophobia and also prevent Ukraine from selling her lands?
Comparing to the problem of the extinction of a biological species, those problems are just a question of due will. Yet we cannot deliver them.
“I ask myself, why is it possible to save whales, and still not possible to free Julian?”
A fair question, Tatyana. The answer is that nobody really cares very much what happens to the humpback whales, one way or the other. (Apart from intelligent people who care about the environment, our species and other species – a vanishingly small fraction).
But many very importnat, powerful and influential people want Julian Assange crushed, smashed, tortured, abused, and killed – preferably in the full glare of publicity – to make the following points:
1. Thou shalt not publish the nasty secrets of the rich and powerful.
2. The law, religions, morality and other figments of the imagination will not protect you in the slightest if you offend the rich and powerful.
It appears that these days, telling the truth *is* terrorism. Lets face it , if everyone knew what really goes on, they’d be terrified.
Gavin C Barrie
“I really need to hold a check on my cynicism. ”
Great point, reading the news really have an impact on ones mental health these days,
one really needs to be careful not to sit 24/7 reading that, that stuff or one will become very cynical and agitated.
Dread, I call it. Sense of dread.
A terrorist attack on London Bridge just prior to a general election, really? – Yep, as in 2017 at Borough Market. 5 days before the election. Free interviews on the BBC for Boris (not with Andrew Neil ) What a lying conman, Corbyn only agreed to his so long as Boris also did the same.
President Kennedy, “shot’ Harvey Oswald, Oswald then shot by the nightclub owner, Jack …Pallance? who armed, found himself so close to Oswald to assassinate him. Why, just why did he shoot Oswald? ‘- Jack Rubenstein (Ruby) Pretty obvious that Oswald had to be silenced since it could not fail to come out in his trial that he was involved with anti-Castro CIA and FBI operations prior to Nov 1963 as well as anti-Soviet provocateur operations in Moscow. It was obviously planned for Oswald to have been shot by Dallas PD at the cinema but he sat there without resisting and some police sergeant hadn´t got the memo that he needed to be gone so there couldn´t be a trial. Not a single record of Oswald´s interrogation was kept in the days of his detention up to Ruby shooting him on locked and guarded Police property.
Interesting that the parole people announced yesterday that Usman Khan had not been up for, or released on parole. So Belmarsh just released a convicted terrorist early, on their own authority, without good reason? The guy had supposedly written a (now published) letter asking for de-radicalization help.
So, was he talking to anybody prior to release and then, after release, of course no official monitoring? Did he get that ¨help¨? and perhaps more? The fake suicide vest ensured that he also wouldn´t get a trial, although the public heroes nearly put a spanner in the works. The police had to drag them off Khan so they could immediately put half a dozen bullets into him.
Either way, another terrorist act by someone very well known to the authorities. If only they had more money for surveillance of the public
There are just so many tens of thousands of convicted terrorists walking the UK streets that they cant cope with tracking them all?
I suppose they will need to get more money?
intp1
Somebody has decided to let Khan out early.
Khan was banned from entering London.
Khan was wearing a tag.
Probably the first person in the World to be wearing a fake suicide vest as well as a Home Office tag.
Somebody made the choice to let Khan enter London for one day, to attend the course at Fishmonger’s Hall adjacent to the scene of our last terrorist attack, London Bridge.
Somebody is going to be in trouble.
Perhaps his controllers advised him to wear it, so that they knew he would be shot and not be in a position to identify them.
Khan did butcher a few people, two of them dead, surely if he must have realised there could be a good chance of getting himself shot with such behavior? I’m not convinced of a conspiracy.
I am more surprised that the event he and others attended was to be held in central London and in a prestigious venue more suited to corporate events and similar hospitality when it could have more easily and economically held in some anonymous office block or industrial estate. Now that is a bit strange, but will this win an election for Johnson? I doubt it .
Blood must be shed to make the ritual look meaningful.
“…we have lost all faith in the practicability of making this decency the foundation of our attitude in world politics…We have ceased in international affairs, to have any guiding principles at all, or to know either what we are aiming at or how we propose even to take the next step…the situation is the outcome of a moral apostasy, a falseness to the tradition of western civilisation, which has left the entire people sadrift and has practically abolished public opinion, as the mouthpiece of that tradition, and thus deprived it of any power to make its voice heard in the shaping of our national course in international affairs..”
GDH Cole The Intelligent Man’s Guide to the Post War World” (1947.)
That is quite a find….and written so long ago. How amazing to have had such insight. I had not heard of the author. Must look him/ her up.
There is a white space where the speech is supposed to be. This happens frequently…
Anybody know why?
It could be for several reasons, Walt.
1. The video is blocked where you live.
2. Your computer refuses to play the video. It might lack the necessary proprietary codecs or other software, or it may lack some permission.
Where do you live, and what type of software does your computer run? (Windows 7, Windows 10, Mac, Linux, Unix…)
For what it’s worth, I had no trrouble watching the video and hearing the sound track. I live in southern England and run Windows 7; I watched the video using Firefox 70.0.1 (64-bit).
Excellent speech!
I do hope that somehow Julian can view/hear it.
Also: the i newspaper has been sold to the Daily Mail.
It’s not perfect, but the Indy online is now the last vestige of essentially honest MSM reporting in the UK.
It has Robert Fisk, Patrick Cockburn, Bel Trew….
Please sign up and support it.,
Usual disclaimers.
Powerful and eloquent speech, and I agree wholeheartedly.
Thank you!
Craig.
Posted a link to this speech of yours in the Guardian Australia to highlight the similarities between your governments actions and those of mine under Morrison and his predecessors.
It’s been up for ten minutes without being taken down.
The longest any link to yourself or your work I’ve posted in Guardian comments section has ever remained up before being removed as breaching their public standards.
An important speech and well made.
Top stuff as we say down here.
I had the pleasure of attending this evening of speeches and was moved by the powerful sentiments shown by all speakers. Your speech condensed a number of important points that you have posted on your blog over the last few years. There was so much support and agreement from the crowd for what was being said. John Pilger’s account of his trip that day to see Julian Assange was harrowing, and shows the cruel way he is being held. Assange is being silenced and we should support him and make the general public aware of his plight.
Keep up the great work Mr Murray.
The difference between having a Conservative government in power and a Labour government in power after December 12th is stark.
Oh well done Craig – great stuff. Ditto Mark Curtis, John Pilger and Nils Meltzer.
I liked the way Craig kicked off with references to the irony of this event taking place in the beautiful building paid for or dedicated to families who were at the heart of the corrupt system which spawned the society we live in today. But who, amongst the common folk in those days, would have questioned the morality of the slave trade or the opium wars, even if they had been aware of what was happening in their name? Fewer then than now.
This is why I feel optimistic for Julian. With so many powerful voices raised in support justice and mercy must surely prevail. And It seems there is a growing groundswell amongst so called ordinary people around the world of resistance to the destructive forces. As Craig said, they are becoming so frenzied in their pushback, that they have abandoned all pretence of decency, decorum or due process. Everyone can see it. The gloves are off, the mask has slipped, the evil is exposed for what it truly is – ridiculous, incoherent, impotent and as Hannah Arendt said – banal.
Craig that was a perspicacious observation of the constructs of the current bunch of thugs and crooks masquerading as our dear leaders.
Assange made a mistake of believing; there existed a rule of law and checks and balances, regards for human rights and internation conventions. Thus, he was manipulated and ultimately betrayed by the very people whom apparently were supporting him and disseminating his grave message to the world.
Judas was alone and one could forgive him for his immaturity, as he had no one to guide him. That cannot be said of the corporate lickspittle deployed in no less than five corporations, that accepted the respective bags of silver and betrayed Assange.
Sadly all revolutionaries seem to suffer the same fate in the hands of powerful of the time. Let’s hope that Assange will be finally breaking out of this Kafkaesque nightmare, despite the efforts of our very own Attorney General who is resorting to the French version of a law in a macabre charade of upholding the law of the land.
A MUST WATCH – Nils on Going Underground –
” I Offered to go on bbc’s Hardtalk ”
Stunning Stuff from the UN Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer on the ongoing detention of Julian Assange.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8RU5MJb1m8&t=848s