Treason Felony Act and the Crime of Aggression

by **antiaristo** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 7:06 pm

Remember this guy, identified in the first post on this thread as invoking the Treason Felony Act? <blockquote>Quote:<hr>When the issue came before the court of appeal in July 2004 the judges were handed an extraordinary witness statement 10 minutes before the hearing began. From Sir Michael Jay, permanent secretary to the Foreign Office, and authorised by the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, it asked the judges to refrain from ruling on the legality of the war for fear of "giving comfort to terrorists, endangering the lives of Britons in Iraq and harming foreign relations".<hr></blockquote> Turns out he is ANOTHER serial offender. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Foreign Office chief accused of cover-up By Philippe Naughton The Whitehall mandarin who heads the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) was today subjected to a withering attack by an influential committee of MPs, one of whom accused him of a "cover up" over the organisation's failures. The criticisms of Sir Michael Jay, the FCO's Permanent Under-Secretary, relate to a report by external consultants detailing a series of leadership failings at the organisation, which employs 6,000 people worldwide and has an annual budget of almost £1 billion. Today, in its own report, the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC) accused Sir Michael of originally attempting to suppress the document and of acquiescing with senior staff who failed to co-operate with the consultants Collinson Grant. It concluded: "Sir Michael is part of the problem." Today’s report was also scathing about the FCO’s introduction of the Prism computer system in embassies and MI6 stations around the globe, which it said had caused "great dissatisfaction" among diplomats. One staff member wrote that "in the FCO’s long history of ineptly implemented IT initiatives, Prism is the most badly-designed, ill-considered one of the lot", the report revealed. The committee was also critical of the FCO’s failure to inform MPs of the largest fraud in its history, involving more than £790,000 in falsified allowances in the Tel Aviv embassy, exposed last year by the National Audit Office. The FAC said that the Foreign Office had "failed seriously in its duty" by not informing it about the fraud, which continued undetected for four years "as a result of weaknesses in financial control and involved clear breaches of long-standing accounting procedures". Andrew Mackinlay, a Labour member of the committee, said that today’s report detailed "the failure to disclose fraud, mismanagement, incompetence, adverse reports by independent consultants, indeed wilfully trying to cover up this catalogue of failure from the public and Parliament". He said it was the FAC’s third "major confrontation with the culture and style of senior managers of the Foreign Office", following controversial reports on Sierra Leone and the Iraq war in earlier parliaments. The Collinson Grant report was produced in January 2005 following analysis of the work of almost 3,000 Foreign Office staff. But today’s report noted that it remained unpublished until July, following pressure from a member of the FAC. The consultants raised concerns about the quality of leadership at the FCO and proposed cuts of as many as 1,200 posts and the removal of layers of management to achieve savings of £48 million annually. "The entire organisation needs to be challenged and reformed, but the leadership lacks the skills needed and the will to upset the status quo," the consultants wrote. They also complained of a lack of co-operation from some senior staff, particularly at the Paris Embassy, one of Britain’s largest and most prestigious overseas posts. In evidence to the committee last October, Sir Michael, the former Ambassador in Paris, said he accepted many of the consultants’ conclusions, but not their "root and branch criticism". He said he was "proud" to lead an organisation which did "an extraordinary job in difficult circumstances", but acknowledged that a "culture change" was needed. In a later letter, he said that the FCO believed some of the consultants’ recommendations to be "ill-founded" and some of the figures used to draw up possible savings inaccurate. The FCO had in fact cut costs by £6.6 million in 2004-05 and was confident of cutting £39 million this year. The FAC today responded: "We can only conclude from this that Sir Michael is part of the problem. Under his stewardship, the report was originally suppressed. It criticised the management he was supposed to lead. "He acquiesced in a situation where some senior managers failed to collaborate with Collinson Grant’s proper inquiries. His senior managers did not contest or seek to correct prior to publication errors which they now allege are contained in the Collinson Grant report. "When asked what he deems to be ‘ill-founded’ in the recommendations of Collinson Grant, he failed to give a specific example. This is all wholly unacceptable from a Permanent Under-Secretary." It added that the failure to share with MPs the Collinson Grant report or an internal report by Norman Ling, a senior official, into IT failures was "evidence of a disturbing aversion on the part of FCO management to proper scrutiny of its activities". The Prism system was designed to replace 30 separate existing systems, with new software and hardware, and changes in management and working practices in virtually every FCO post in Britain and overseas. But a "hugely embarrassing" internal review by Mr Ling last year listed a long series of flaws in the project, including hasty and bad decision-making, inadequate funding in some areas, lack of management skills and an exaggeration of the potential benefits of the new system, said the FAC. The "anguished" letter sent to an internal FCO magazine gave "only a hint of the true scale of anger in the ranks", said the committee. "Anyone who has visited a post where Prism has been rolled out knows that many staff are at their wits’ end about it," it said. Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, rejected the committee’s criticisms of Sir Michael, who is due to retire in July and is expected to be replaced by Sir Peter Ricketts, the envoy to Nato. "I cannot and do not accept the criticism of Sir Michael Jay which I regard as wholly unreasonable," Mr Straw said in a statement. "Indeed, the report commends much of the important work Sir Michael has driven forward under his effective leadership of this organisation. "For example, the report praises ‘the FCO’s commitment to changing aspects of its culture and to giving leadership and management skills their appropriate place in the organisation’."<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-2-2076280-2,00.html">www.timesonline.co.uk/pri...-2,00.html</a>

by **antiaristo** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 7:48 pm

They can dish it out, but they sure can't take it. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Royal secretary criticises Times John Plunkett Thursday March 9, 2006 The Prince of Wales' private secretary has condemned the Times for printing photographs of Prince William and Prince Harry next to a picture of a prisoner being tortured at Abu Ghraib. Patrick Harrison said the use of the images, on a report about a new ethics training course at Sandhurst, was "misleading and offensive" and "inaccurate, in poor taste and completely at variance with the article itself". The Times reported that Army officer cadets were being given training in how to overcome the desire to abuse prisoners and inflict revenge on the enemy. Prince Harry has already completed the course while Prince William will begin it next term. Yesterday's page three story, by Ruth Gledhill, was accompanied by pictures of Princes William and Harry flanking an image of a hooded, naked prisoner handcuffed to the wall of a prison cell. "I write to object strongly to the fact that photographs of Prince William and Prince Harry were placed either side of an image of an abused prisoner to accompany your article about the teaching of ethics at Sandhurst," wrote Mr Harrison, the press secretary to the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall. "To flank a picture of a handcuffed and blindfolded prisoner at Abu Ghraib with two photographs of Prince William and Prince Harry is misleading and offensive. "The addition of a secondary article on medieval torture, entitled Royal Revenge, simply adds further to this erroneous impression. "The entire presentation of the page, which has clearly been designed to be as eye-catching as possible, is inaccurate, in poor taste, and completely at variance with the article itself." In response, spokesperson for the Times said: "Each day. the Times carries many contrasting views and opinions in the paper and debate is encouraged." Under the heading, Royal Revenge, the paper listed various forms of torture employed by the likes of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, including the rack and Scavenger's Daughter, "an iron restraint that tightened around the neck, hands and feet. The torturer slowly reduced the distance between the knees and the chin."<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,,1726892,00.html">media.guardian.co.uk/site...92,00.html</a>

by **antiaristo** » Wed Mar 15, 2006 8:34 pm

This is the connection. Harold Wilson was destabilised, and resigned. The office of Prime Minister was assumed by Jim Callaghan. The same Jim Callaghan of whom I wrote on the first post. The class traitor. You see there WAS a coup d'etat thirty years ago. And it was carried out by the Windsor family. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Enough of this cover-up: the Wilson plot was our Watergate It seems fantastic now, but 30 years ago there really was a plot to carry out a coup d'etat against a British prime minister Jonathan Freedland Wednesday March 15, 2006 The Guardian Tomorrow marks the 30th anniversary of Harold Wilson's resignation as prime minister. For most people under 40 that fact will mean little; many will struggle to place the name. And yet, at the time, Wilson's departure was a political earthquake, wholly unexpected and assumed to have reshaped the national landscape. For Wilson had been at or close to the top of British politics for 12 years, spending all but four of them in Downing Street. For a large chunk of the 60s and 70s, the words "prime minister" instantly evoked the face and flat Yorkshire vowels of Harold Wilson. Now, though, he is all but forgotten. He did not have long to play the elder statesman, pounding the lecture circuit or doing prestigious TV interviews: his galloping Alzheimer's disease, and the assault it made on his once-famed memory, put paid to that. He became a shambling, confused figure, spotted wandering on his own around the House of Lords, until his wife Mary finally took him off to his beloved Isles of Scilly. On an ITV1 documentary, whose first part aired last night, the journalist John Sweeney recalls seeing a familiar face on a Westminster park bench, sandwiched between two winos: it was the former PM, his eyes vacant. Yet we should not let Wilson slip so easily into oblivion. Both his career, and the manner of its ending, have some useful lessons for today - ones that Tony Blair would do well to heed. First, that resignation has never been fully explained. The ITV programme offers the personal, medical theory: Wilson could tell his brain was weakening, and rather than deny reality - as his Alzheimer's-afflicted mother had done - he resolved to quit while he was still on top. But that cause was almost certainly joined by another - one argued in tomorrow's BBC2 docudrama, The Plot Against Harold Wilson. As Peter Wright confirmed in his book Spycatcher, Wilson was the victim of a protracted, illegal campaign of destabilisation by a rogue element in the security services. Prompted by CIA fears that Wilson was a Soviet agent - put in place after the KGB had, the spooks believed, poisoned Hugh Gaitskell, the previous Labour leader - these MI5 men burgled the homes of the prime minister's aides, bugged their phones and spread black, anti-Wilson propaganda throughout the media. They tried to pin all kinds of nonsense on him: that his devoted political secretary, Marcia Williams, posed a threat to national security; that he was a closet IRA sympathiser. Such talk stoked up an establishment already trembling at what it saw as Britain's inexorable slide towards anarchy, if not communist rule. Institutions were collapsing, inflation was rising, tax was at a near-mythic top rate of 98%, and Britain was losing the last outposts of empire. Above all, the trade unions, riddled with leftists and Soviet sympathisers, seemed to have the nation under their thumb. "It was no longer a green and pleasant land, England," recalls retired Major Alexander Greenwood, Colonel Blimp made flesh. The great and the good feared that the country was out of control, and that Wilson lacked either the will or the desire to stand firm. Retired intelligence officers gathered with military brass and plotted a coup d'etat. They would seize Heathrow airport, the BBC and Buckingham Palace. Lord Mountbatten would be the strongman, acting as interim prime minister. The Queen would read a statement urging the public to support the armed forces, because the government was no longer able to keep order. It sounds fantastic, almost comic. But watch Greenwood talk of setting up his own private army in 1974-75. Listen to the former intelligence officer Brian Crozier admit his lobbying of the army, how they "seriously considered the possibility of a military takeover". Watch the archive footage of troop manoeuvres at Heathrow, billed as a routine exercise but about which Wilson was never informed - and which he interpreted as a show of strength, a warning, even a rehearsal for a coup. Listen to the voice of Wilson, who five weeks after resigning summoned two BBC journalists to tell them, secretly, of the plot. Much of this has been known for a while; many of those involved have admitted as much and do so again in the BBC film. Yet officially it never happened: a 1987 inquiry under Margaret Thatcher concluded the allegations were false, implying that the fading Wilson had descended into paranoia. This can't be allowed to stand. Not only does it do an injustice to Wilson, it also represents an enormous cover-up. For this was the British Watergate, a conspiracy designed to pervert the democratic choice of the people. The circumstances of that time - mighty unions and the cold war - were entirely different. But if we are to learn the lessons of the Wilson plot, to realise what Britain's hidden powers are truly capable of, then these events deserve a proper reckoning. Blair should do a final service to the last Labour leader before him to win an election - and establish an independent inquiry. In the process, he might realise how much the two have in common. The early Wilson, like the early Blair, was hailed as the harbinger of a new Britain, in touch with the mood, and the young people, of the age. Wilson gave MBEs to the Beatles, Blair gave tea to Noel Gallagher. Both were multiple election winners, skilful players of the media. Still, historians may spot other, less comfortable parallels. First, both took heat for backing the US in an unpopular war: Wilson and LBJ in Vietnam, Blair and Bush in Iraq. Second, their reputations were badly muddied by sleaze - specifically alleged abuse of the honours system by handing out gongs and peerages to undeserving cronies. Third, they will both stir admiration for the electoral sorcery that produced winning streaks for Labour, but will both face a question: what legacy of substance did they leave behind? If anything, these parallels are unfair to Wilson. He may have publicly backed LBJ, but privately he rejected the president's repeated request to lend even a symbolic British military presence to the war in Vietnam; Wilson refused to send so much as a marching band. Johnson punished him for it, but the PM held firm. The Lavender List was a bad error, rewarding some, like Lord Kagan, who were later revealed to be corrupt. But Wilson did not sell peerages for cash, as Blair's Labour has done. In his day there was no need: his Labour party was funded by the trade unions, so did not need to go cap-in-hand to millionaires. As for legacy, Wilson was mocked for citing the Open University as his greatest achievement: but that is an institution which has changed thousands of lives for the better. Along with facing down Ian Smith in Rhodesia, and steering Britain towards a Common Market yes vote in 1975, it's not such a bad record. Blair should reflect on it and pause: if his destiny is to be remembered for Iraq, he might prefer to suffer Wilson's recent fate - and be forgotten.<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1731065,00.html">www.guardian.co.uk/commen...65,00.html</a> By contrast Blair wages war at the drop of a hat. Who do you think HE is working for?

by **sussurus2** » Thu Mar 16, 2006 1:36 pm

Anti, here's our version, coming into being, of that Act you've mentioned so many times. All happening in plain sight. Posting to this board in this vein as so many of us have; forwarding emails with content of this type, all would be come federal crimes. Would be only a matter of time before other similar but more diverse set of pre-designated pre-emptive "crimes" would be added to the list, until it wouldn't matter any more what the specifics might be. Any opposition that raises the curtain even an inch to reveal the real show would become a federal crime. From: <a href="http://www.cryptogon.com/">www.cryptogon.com/</a> Fascism Fully Unfurled in the U.S. :. original article: <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/10/AR2006031001677.html">www.washingtonpost.com/wp...01677.html</a> Expose the crimes of the Bush regime, go to jail: The draft would add to the criminal penalties for anyone who "intentionally discloses information identifying or describing" the Bush administration's terrorist surveillance program or any other eavesdropping program conducted under a 1978 surveillance law. Under the boosted penalties, those found guilty could face fines of up to $1 million, 15 years in jail or both. Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies, said the measure is broader than any existing laws. She said, for example, the language does not specify that the information has to be harmful to national security or classified. "The bill would make it a crime to tell the American people that the president is breaking the law, and the bill could make it a crime for the newspapers to publish that fact," said Martin, a civil liberties advocate.

by **antiaristo** » Thu Mar 16, 2006 5:56 pm

sussurus, Thanks for that. It's moving in that direction, for sure. It's happening everywhere. I've posted here about the Madrid bombing, where nearly two hundred were murdered on 11 March 2004. But nobody seems to want to explore what I've written. Why is that? Here are three articles from the Spanish Constitution of 1978. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>22.5 Secret societies and those of a military character are prohibited. 56.3 The person of the King is inviolable and is not subject to responsibility. His acts are always endorsed in the form established in article 64, invalid without said endorsement, except that granted in article 65.2. {edit Household staff.} 64.1 The acts of the King shall be endorsed by the President of the Government or, where appropriate, by the responsible minister. The proposal and nomination of the President of the Government and the dissolution previewed in article 99 shall be endorsed by the president of the Congress<hr></blockquote> That document was signed by King Juan Carlos I of Spain. The following year Adolfo Suarez and King Juan Carlos passed a law which made Freemasonry a legal practice. The Constitutional Court, it seems, uttered not a word. In 1983 Pope John Paul II issued an ambiguous Papal Bull about Freemasonry. Twenty years later Ratzinger confirmed that Freemasonry had been permisible for Catholics for the last twenty years. But ONLY THE SCOTTISH RITE. King Juan Carlos is a Knight of the Garter. He has sworn personal alleigance to Queen Elizabeth. The Order of the Garter controls the Scottish Rite throughout the world. The bombing of Madrid was executed by Aznar and Juan Carlos. In his Masonic guise, Aznar accepted the command from his liege lord. In his citizen guise Aznar, the President of the Government, endorsed the actions of the King. Who is responsible for the atrocity? It could be argued that the responsibility lies not with Aznar, but with the man that commanded him. After all, Freemasonry is legal in Spain, Right? Never mind Article 22.5 of the Constitution. That's "quaint". But the King is inviolable. He can't be touched. So the investigation by Judge Juan del Olmo is going round in circles. The whole thing is a mess. So maybe Aznar will be forced to carry the can after all. But there is NO DOUBT that the King is the intellectual author of the murder of nearly two hundred Madrileños.

by **blanc** » Thu Mar 16, 2006 9:11 pm

Just watched beeb docu on coup preparations, our pal Aitken, as friend of Angleton, contributed. Apparently Mountbatten went to Queen Mum with plot-prep Anti aristo - lending a je ne sais quoi to your favourite hypothesis.

by **antiaristo** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 7:36 pm

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>Apparently Mountbatten went to Queen Mum with plot-prep Anti aristo - lending a je ne sais quoi to your favourite hypothesis.<hr></blockquote> blanc, And she went for it. But in her own style. We just have to get rid of the queen. Then we can begin undoing all the damage caused by her family. And the traitor families that have done her work. Did you know that Blair was recruited to the cause at around this time? From Oxford he was recruited directly into barristers chambers. A chambers with a long history of association with the labour movement. But the principal had just "died suddenly". It was taken over by Derry Irvine. A Scot (Quelle surprise!) AFTER he was recruited by Irvine, Blair joined the Labour Party. He married the right sort of woman. Working class Irish father, raised in a single parent family, groomed by Derry Irvine. Thirty years later he starts all sorts of wars for no good reason. He destroys the Labour Party, much as Thatcher destroyed the Conservative Party. Adolph Hitler was absolutely right. He called her "The most dangerous woman in Europe". I prefer to call her a dirty old slag.

by **antiaristo** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 9:27 pm

I was going to start a new thread on this - "Britain's own campaign finance scandal" - but it's all about blair, so I'll put it here. The first few grafs. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Labour finances under new scrutiny Press Association Friday March 17, 2006 8:48 PM The controversy over Labour's finances deepened after the party disclosed that it received almost £14 million last year in loans from wealthy supporters. The figure is far higher than the £4 million known to have been lent by three millionaire backers and appears to account for the bulk of the £18 million that the party spent on the General Election campaign. However party officials said that they would not be revealing the sources of the loans as the money had been lent on the condition of confidentiality.<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-5693583,00.html">www.guardian.co.uk/uklate...83,00.html</a> The Labour Party spent 18 million pounds in winning the last General Election. Of that sum fourteen million came in the form of "commercial loans" from wealthy individuals. More than seventy-seven percent of the total! It all came via Lord Levy, fundraiser extraordinaire, and Mr Blair's personal Envoy to the Middle East. This is all about the Blair/Brown "party within a party" which controls the heaving hulk of the party of organised labour. This is illegal fundaraising, bribes, if you wish. But the British Media is pulling the same stunt used by Bush when he invented "illegal combatant". They are calling this money "commercial loans". They are trying to pretend this is the same as going to the local bank and securing an overdraft. It is no such thing. Just because a "loan" carries a notional rate of interest, that does not make it "commercial". Look at this <blockquote>Quote:<hr>However party officials said that they would not be revealing the sources of the loans as the money had been lent on the condition of confidentiality<hr></blockquote> What sort of "commercial loan" has to be kept a secret? A commercial loan is one where the lender is identified, where the obligations of the borrower are specified, where the term is identified, where the interest rate is specified, where any security is registered and where the default conditions are set out. Would a corporation get away with this secrecy? Not a chance. The courts would be on the directors like a dog in heat. The assets of a company belong to the shareholders, and shareholders have the right to know what the directors are up to IN THEIR NAME. Is it right that a political party should have lower standards of transparency than a commercial enterprise? The question answers itself. These cannot be taken as "commercial loans" on the basis of Tony Blair's say-so. He has form as a man of his word. They must be proven to be so. By the production of a loan agreement. But I don't think they can. Because they are not commercial loans. They are something else. The National Executive of the Labour Party is doing an excellent job in assisting Mr Blair to destroy the party of organised labour. The Labour Party 1906 - 2006. Rest in Peace.

by **blanc** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 12:30 pm

thanks for slotting Tone into the story for me. it all makes too simple sense, the same chaps popping up to do their stuff again and again. I was interrupted by a neighbour calling a couple of times during the documentary, so in trying to summarise it here I may make mistakes. It seems the intelligence community had become convinced that the soviets had decided to remove a western leader and put in their own man. Gaitskell popped his clogs some short while after taking tea and biscuits with the soviets and Harold took his place, so with mind bogglingly sharp deduction he was fingered. further agitation in the establishment minds was engendered by public demonstrations and strikes, and the feeling was that if there were to be 3 or 4 "Grosvenor Squares" simultaneously, law and order could not be guaranteed. this in itself is an interesting thought it was in this context that a bunch of senior gung ho's made plans, and the rolling of tanks around Heathrow, given out as an exercise in the event of terrorist attack, was supposedly in fact a rehearsal for the coup d'etat. Joined up Johnno was a neighbour of Harold at the time, and also dating carol Thatcher, and was entrusted with a letter to Maggie outlining suspicions which by then (if I caught this right) had extended to Hollis MI5 the Jeremy Thorpe saga was linked with this,it was intimated that a senior civil servant (not named - blast!)must have been involved to make social security files disappear to order. This story had a few resonances with my personal history - hence my interest. I am still working through these and trying to join the dots, but it does make wonderful sense that the same power mongers were using the intelligence community and co-opted spooks and senior civil servants over many decades, getting shot of genuinely elected leader, and smoothing out the operations so that a well groomed lad like blair could be handy when even the most blinkered bits of middle england started to notice the smell around so many of blessed margaret's coterie. as when I work through the ra survivor accounts and the how, who and why come in to focus, one is left with almost a sense of disappointment that it had taken SO LITTLE meddling by such greedy but stupid giants to create so much harm.and then it turns out that this is echoed in yet wider plans by these (often self same) greedies. and it does look as though the subtlety of blackmail and mayhem for which ra is so handy is preferred to tanks these days. and blow me, no one in power, not even a christian would be gooder like tony, will undertake to deliver the right of investigation to even the most insignificant, socially outcast survivor, instead he prefers firming up the processes of cover-up, slamming down the lid tight, and labelling the most reasonable well educated civilised supporters crazy. well well well er, ps. J-U-Johnno was claimed to be in procurement of children for his arms clients, by someone on this board: his arms deals were at back of ra case I know very well; and what was it I heard about Mountbatten's death?

by **antiaristo** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 1:09 pm

Mathew Parris is probably the best, and certainly the bravest of the political commentators. A long standing Conservative Member of Parliament, he left to take over from Brian Walden on Weekend World. In the days when ITV made programmes of quality. Gay himself, he outed Peter Mandelson, aka the Prince of Darkness. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>No more excuses. Just hand in your homework and go, Prime Minister Matthew Parris THE WORST OF IT is the waste. The waste of brains, of talent, idealism and nervous energy — the sheer waste of time — as Cabinet ministers tour the broadcasting studios at ungodly hours in yet another desperate exercise to get the Prime Minister out of a new hole he’s dug. Clever men like Charles Clarke and John Reid — serious politicians, fundamentally straight, men with thoughts of their own, big things to do — are hurried by interviewers through perfunctory inquiries about their departmental briefs, then forced to sweat, duck and weave, compromising their own reputations and spending personal credit as the interview lurches to the only question that's really hot, the question that’s always hot, the question that can only grow hotter: “How much longer can Tony Blair go on like this?” What a waste of hope. Were I on the Centre Left I would this weekend be reflecting bitterly on how much remains to be done, as a Labour administration is stalled in mid-journey by the delusions and duplicities of a lame-duck leader. So many new ideas still to discuss; so many plans only half-completed; so much to think about, to talk to the nation about, to talk to each other about; such a store of early optimism, early idealism, early trust . . . And all rotting away. The clock is ticking, the voters’ credit is ebbing, the Green Papers are yellowing — and the phone rings: “Have you heard, Minister . . . ?” “Can I warn you, Secretary of State . . . ?” and yet again the topic of the decade is swept aside to make way for the panic of the hour. Mittal, Dr Kelly, Scarlett, Caplin, Campbell, Hutton, Butler, Berlusconi, Cherie, Patel, Garrard, Townsley, Levy . . . ministers speed-read hastily prepared briefs at the Commons dispatch box, interviewers steer conversations deftly from their promised focuses . . . “and while we have you with us, Home Secretary, can I just ask you about last night’s revelations that Downing Street . . . ?” — and another chance to get back onto the front foot is wasted. Political journalists love it. Lobby corrrespondents don’t want to talk about Crossrail, nuclear-generated electricity, DNA fingerprinting, child poverty, Trident, congestion charging, a new North-South rail line. Lies and misdemeanours are our stock-in-trade. We rejoice when the worthy gives way to the unworthy and a boring but important centrepiece of the parliamentary session is elbowed to the margins by some slimy little half-truth or grubby impropriety. When it does, time and again, the same name crops up: Anthony Charles Lynton Blair. What now for him? On this question I sense that from contrasting corners of the political spectrum, opinions are now converging upon the next step. My ancient doubts are less important than new doubts among new Labour’s friends, but let me put my own opinion delicately. I believe Tony Blair is an out-and-out rascal, terminally untrustworthy and close to being unhinged. I said from the start that there was something wrong in his head, and each passing year convinces me more strongly that this man is a pathological confidence-trickster. To the extent that he ever believes what he says, he is delusional. To the extent that he does not, he is an actor whose first invention — himself — has been his only interesting role. Books could be written on which of Mr Blair’s assertions were ever wholly sincere, which of his claimed philosophies are genuine, and how far he temporarily persuades himself that each passing passion is real. But deconstructing Mr Blair’s mind is hopeless. Suffice it to say that I used to believe that, at the moment of saying anything, our Prime Minister probably thought that what he said was true — that there was no secret, internal wink. Today I have lost confidence even in that. Small things as much as large have formed my view. What kind of a man would walk out of the Chamber as his former ally, Frank Field, rose to offer a patently heartfelt explanation of his reasons for standing down? Knowing what we do today about Mr Blair, would he still get the benefit of our doubt over the Bernie Ecclestone affair? What kind of a man would employ Alastair Campbell as his mouthpiece to history? What kind of a man would have given journalists on a plane to China the clear and false impression that he had had nothing to do with the outing of Dr David Kelly? What kind of a man makes Silvio Berlusconi his friend and incurs a personal debt of gratitude to that bad, bad man? What kind of a Prime Minister neglects the courtesy and gratitude owed to his man in Washington, Sir Christopher Meyer, quitting early after heart trouble? What kind of a man leaves friends as different as the late Roy Jenkins, Paddy Ashdown, and his own Chancellor privately despairing that they can ever rely on the Prime Minister’s word again? And what kind of a man dispatches his “personal envoy to the Middle East”, Lord Levy, to drill vast sums of money from little-known tycoons with hopes of taking life peerages, and hushes it up? We may never discover what so discreet an operator as Lord Levy has said to these people but we know something they wanted from Tony Blair, and we know something Tony Blair wanted from them. Did more need to be said? Another thing we know is that the Prime Minister recognised that if a gift were declared then the chain of events would be judged disgraceful. So the money was hidden: hidden even from his own party treasurer. Now his treasurer has blown the whistle, and his treasurer’s wife, the Solicitor-General, has arranged a separation not from her husband, but from much of her ministerial portfolio. Love, then, is not dead; but if Ms Harman’s Chinese wall is appropriate now, why not when the PM appointed her? And if Mr Blair believes now that the funding of parties needs reform, why not earlier — in his recent manifesto, for instance? You know why. He never meant to put matters right. He has been caught out. The genius Mr Blair showed this week in extricating himself from this latest corner was breathtaking. If a burglar, caught red-handed, should by effrontery and oratory make from the dock so stirring a call for the fundamental reform of the Theft Acts that the whole court were distracted from the charge and persuaded to “move on” . . . then the tour de force would hardly be more impressive. Our PM has the magician’s knack of drawing the eye away from the trick. Should a fraction of his talent for getting himself out of trouble be deployed in some wider national purpose, Britain would probably have conquered the universe by now. He reminds me of those schoolboys whose form masters report that if they devoted to their homework half the dedication they devote to getting out of doing it, they would be the envy of the school. But he already is. Tony Blair has lived before. Dickens has recorded the life in David Copperfield. The character is Copperfield’s one-time school-friend and (until he betrays him) hero: the engaging, handsome and popular James Steerforth. Read the book. It is occasionally reported that some poor woman falls in love with a professional fraud and remains his wife for years without realising what she has married. The British electorate are such a woman. Mr Blair’s misdeeds are persistently overlooked, and his excuses credited. By the time we wake up he may have torn his party and its programme apart. Close colleagues and Labour MPs mostly know already what he is. Forget the bleatings of the hard Left, the Tories and the likes of me: it is Tony Blair’s political allies who should now act. They must accept that he is no longer an asset to the new Labour cause and that, if they do not cut him loose soon, he may drag a whole brave political project down with him. There is not much time to lose.<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,6-2091566,00.html">www.timesonline.co.uk/art...66,00.html</a> I don't doubt Parris is a regular reader of Rigorous Intuition. I could have written that myself, had I the talent of Mathew Parris.

by **blanc** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 2:50 pm

I especially liked "but let me put my own opinion delicately".

by **antiaristo** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 5:21 pm

blanc, I'm glad you noticed that bit. I liked it as well <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/laugh.gif ALT=":lol"> On the documentary, anything you can remember would be interesting. The BBC are meticulous whenever they cover issues of controversy. On Aitken, a few things strike me. I know nothing about the ra side. That is all new to me. But I do know he has travelled a similar path to the Vampire of Finance, and covered the nexus of money and television. There used to be a merchant bank called Aitken Hume. It was run by Jonathan and his brother (can't remember his name). I seem to remember they got caught up to no good and I think the bank was absorbed into a larger group. Then of course the Aitken brothers were the power behind TV-AM in the early 1980s when "Breakfast TV" was first launched. The "talent comprised Anna Ford (just jumped ship from the BBC), David Frost (likewise, now with al-Jazeera), Bill Rogers (part of the "Gang of Four" that founded the Social Democratic Party) and PETER JAY. That same peter Jay that was Jim Callaghan's son-in-law and British Ambassador to the USA. Small world, eh?

by **blanc** » Sun Mar 19, 2006 8:14 am

Hmm I am away from my usual place and having to rely on memory. Aitken related arms companies metamorphosed fairly frequently. in the case i am concerned with, (not precisely that which got outed by the Guardian - see their archives) the firm in the form it was at the time seems to have vanished in the ether, yet it was known to have a couple of very real huts in deep countryside, and personnel on the payroll, in the uk. SIPRI with hard boiled world weariness told me that there were so many arms dealing firms skirting the embargo on trading with saddam that it was not necessarily significant that they couldn't help me. the guardian seems to have kissed and made up with Johnno. I'd still like to know what happened about the story that he had after all got plenty of dosh in swiss bank accounts at a time when he had claimed he couldn't pay their damages because he was terminally hard up. any one have this info? I lost the original cutting. as far as the documentary goes - there was supposed to have been an internal investigation into the coup plot. no-one disciplined - unsurprisingly; presumably such conversations as Mountbatten may have had with QM are now pickled with her. Harold had not been informed about the 'exercise' at heathrow. the reference to grosvenor square demo had my antennae dancing. again, somewhere at the back of my mind is the thought that I read that Aitken was with a bunch of other spooks partying, observing and filming events. you should read up on ra - I believe that there is enough evidence to strongly suspect that it is being used (via criminal connections) by those in power to target and take out anyone who might be a threat. one thing the documentary demonstrated was that the security services were basically very incompetent - acted on pretty slight suspicion against innocent people, rather than looking for real evidence of infiltrators or agents. I was briefly present at one grosvenor sq. incident. Now I look back over what i saw happen, it looks more and more staged. it made the press at the time as a poor- police- having- to- deal- with- unruly- mob story, but that bore no relation to what I saw. its not nice to bandy around specific accusations of direct involvement in ra crimes by even such disagreeable personages as Aitken and the Archers, and I don't intend this, unless significant evidence turns up. it is rather that |i notice that in accounts by survivors which name other people as perpetrators, those people have quite specific links with a couple of more public persons who have well documented dubious histories, see above. secondly, some survivor accounts DO name some powerful people. (notably the x's in the Dutroux case) altogether it looks like a jigsaw with lots of pieces not in place, but shaping up to a recognisable form.

by **antiaristo** » Thu Mar 23, 2006 10:28 pm

Some more connections. This time modus operandi. From upthread <blockquote>Quote:<hr>The Labour Party spent 18 million pounds in winning the last General Election. Of that sum fourteen million came in the form of "commercial loans" from wealthy individuals. More than seventy-seven percent of the total! It all came via Lord Levy, fundraiser extraordinaire, and Mr Blair's personal Envoy to the Middle East. This is all about the Blair/Brown "party within a party" which controls the heaving hulk of the party of organised labour. This is illegal fundaraising, bribes, if you wish. But the British Media is pulling the same stunt used by Bush when he invented "illegal combatant". They are calling this money "commercial loans". They are trying to pretend this is the same as going to the local bank and securing an overdraft. It is no such thing. Just because a "loan" carries a notional rate of interest, that does not make it "commercial".<hr></blockquote> From the Guardian letters today <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Letters No glossing over Guantánamo truths Thursday March 23, 2006 The Guardian Colleen Graffy alleges that the happy bunch in Guantánamo have their habeas corpus rights ensured along with ability to attend what she refers to as "combatant status review tribunals" where they can challenge their designation as "enemy combatants" (Response, March 22). An additional bonus is that every year, of which there are now many, they can also pop along to the "administrative review boards", which she says are "similar to a parole board"; which is strange since we thought the purpose of a parole board is to consider applicants for release, whereas most Guantánamo prisoners face no prospect of this . The trouble is that none of these things conform to any recognised international law or conventions. There is no legal basis for Guantánamo, no ability to confront secret evidence, no automatic rights to any legal process, no family visits. Don't worry, Graffy tells us, they don't wear orange suits anymore and can read Agatha Christie and Harry Potter in Arabic while being force fed with little tubes that don't hurt at all. We know all this because, "unlike Victoria Brittain and the UN special rapporteurs" Graffy has actually been there. As US deputy assistant secretary of state for public diplomacy you bet she has. David Wilson Lindsey German, Convenor, Stop the War Coalition Andrew Murray, Chair, Stop the War Coalition Haifa Zangana Prof Steven Rose Prof Sebastian Balfour I have never been to Guantánamo. I have never been in jail either. I have, however, been a soldier for nearly 20 years, in Her Majesty's Royal Regiment of Artillery. In that time, I attended lectures, presentations and talks about the consequences of encountering civilians, refugees and guerillas in combat. On no occasion, did I ever hear the phrase "illegal non-combatants". On no occasion did I hear that such persons, or anyone else, could be held overseas, incommunicado, in a place described by your own country's supreme court as a stateless land. On no occasion did I hear that detainees could be tried without legal representation. Lastly, and worst of all, on no occasion did I hear that prisoners of war could be denied the right to be seen by the Red Cross, unsupervised, as demanded by the Geneva convention, to which the US is a signatory. Daniel Tanzey Thornton Cleveleys, Lancs<hr></blockquote> <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,,1737141,00.html">www.guardian.co.uk/letter...41,00.html</a>

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Re: Treason Felony Act and the Crime of Aggression

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