jeudi 1 octobre 2009
Iran and that bomb
If I were the leader of Iran, though a member of CND, I would feel obliged to construct a nuclear missile or two - just to fit in with the neighbourhood...and when the expected regime change comes about, the Shah the second will be supplied with all the materials necessary to build a hundred, all courtesy of the International Community n'est pas.
samedi 19 septembre 2009
Journalism at its best
OK, it's only from the Telegraph but the last sentence here is a jewel... "The Royal Household currently receives £15million a year to keep up the royal residences, including Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle, but needs about an extra £4million a year for the next decade to cover essential works – a rise of almost 30 per cent.
The request for more money for the palaces is likely to be controversial at time of cutbacks in the public sector."
I wonder how long it took for the writer to work that out?
The request for more money for the palaces is likely to be controversial at time of cutbacks in the public sector."
I wonder how long it took for the writer to work that out?
dimanche 13 septembre 2009
Fail-outs
The way the rich have money tied up and sussed out is quite sopmething to behold. For many of us, the lack of money might be felt as something of a personal failure. That somehow all these shody cheap goods I am surrounded by, the old clothes and scuffed worn out shoes are a manifestation of one's own personal lack of fit with the best of all possible worlds in which we are fortunate enough to live and breath...if not participate to an optimal degree.
Occassionally though, and more often of late, reality shatters these delusional modes of self-pitying false consciousness. Yesterday in the Observer, we read of tax breaks for rich people and their pensions. So that's where the money goes! Today we read that the Treasury is going to bail out tax haven 'countries' such as Jersey and the Caman Islands so these countries can carry on assisting people to commit fraus on the British tax payer of 25 BILLION pounds - the entire education budget. So we pay to get ripped off.
This whole money scam alone warrants rioting in the streets before one starts on any of the more gross injustices the bastard system revels in.
Occassionally though, and more often of late, reality shatters these delusional modes of self-pitying false consciousness. Yesterday in the Observer, we read of tax breaks for rich people and their pensions. So that's where the money goes! Today we read that the Treasury is going to bail out tax haven 'countries' such as Jersey and the Caman Islands so these countries can carry on assisting people to commit fraus on the British tax payer of 25 BILLION pounds - the entire education budget. So we pay to get ripped off.
This whole money scam alone warrants rioting in the streets before one starts on any of the more gross injustices the bastard system revels in.
jeudi 10 septembre 2009
Racism in context
Everyone's heard of the argumentative technique of 'not taking things out of context', 'understand this in its context' and 'no context no understanding' etc. but in the end how much context do you need to understand something, and isn't there, sometimes, an extraordinary amount of context a priori in a situation that the rolling out of the context argument looks like you're apologizing and covering up for the deed in question?
Take Brice Hortefeux, the French Home Secretary, (please do he's a cadaverous creepy bastard you could use as a prop in some amateur dramatic thing) who has sparked off a huge row in France about some racist comments he made at the ruling party' (the UMP's) summer university festival.
The video is quite clear - he says of the gentleman of North African origin, as if the chap isn't there at all, 'This one's ok, it's when there's a lot of them that there's trouble.'
It's as blatant as that. Any form of racism is a punishable offence in France and Hortefeux's job is under threat from this revelation. I say revelation and not 'lapse', because this remark illustrates the crude racial thinking at the centre of the French ruling party. Hortefeux himself is a close friend of Sarkozy (there is no way he could have got so far politically without extensive support) and so far is being backed up by the little posionous bastard. Thus we can legitmately deduce that this 'thinking' is quietly shared, and often overtly applied, by the party itself.
Yet in the media, the context excuse is relied on to support the Interior minister. Usually, one uses this argument to understand an apparently crptic or ambiguous comment by a philosopher say. "What is known is not seen, what is seen is not known." is a strange sounding quote out of its context. If one says , "It's from The Republic." the phrase becomes less 'alien' and one can begin to say things about it. This Hortefeux remark - well, it's happening right now on screen - there is no context fromo which it is being taken and the remark itself is clear - he definitely meant 'Africans' or 'blacks' or some other rancid term that drifts about in the arid stink of his tiny mind.
Sometimes, you have to understand a little less and condemn a lot more with these people. The UMP types, obviously.
Take Brice Hortefeux, the French Home Secretary, (please do he's a cadaverous creepy bastard you could use as a prop in some amateur dramatic thing) who has sparked off a huge row in France about some racist comments he made at the ruling party' (the UMP's) summer university festival.
The video is quite clear - he says of the gentleman of North African origin, as if the chap isn't there at all, 'This one's ok, it's when there's a lot of them that there's trouble.'
It's as blatant as that. Any form of racism is a punishable offence in France and Hortefeux's job is under threat from this revelation. I say revelation and not 'lapse', because this remark illustrates the crude racial thinking at the centre of the French ruling party. Hortefeux himself is a close friend of Sarkozy (there is no way he could have got so far politically without extensive support) and so far is being backed up by the little posionous bastard. Thus we can legitmately deduce that this 'thinking' is quietly shared, and often overtly applied, by the party itself.
Yet in the media, the context excuse is relied on to support the Interior minister. Usually, one uses this argument to understand an apparently crptic or ambiguous comment by a philosopher say. "What is known is not seen, what is seen is not known." is a strange sounding quote out of its context. If one says , "It's from The Republic." the phrase becomes less 'alien' and one can begin to say things about it. This Hortefeux remark - well, it's happening right now on screen - there is no context fromo which it is being taken and the remark itself is clear - he definitely meant 'Africans' or 'blacks' or some other rancid term that drifts about in the arid stink of his tiny mind.
Sometimes, you have to understand a little less and condemn a lot more with these people. The UMP types, obviously.
lundi 7 septembre 2009
Disintegration
The political terminus in which New Labour is trapped and is slowly rotting away, is the direct summation of all it stood for. The heady days of 1997, which no one really believed in, were a play people joined in with, a collective concealment of what Blairism actuall meant, an unstated anxiety (for those who felt they were on the 'winning side') that nothing was really going to change. The deal Blair struck with the party - I'll win you power, you accept what I say - was always a fool's bargain. By 97 anyone would have defeated the Tories - even Kinnock - and the time since has been a vast wasted opportunity. Maybe that was the point - to show that even after the dreadful Major years that political optimism must be recrushed. That nothing must disturb the 1979 settlement, even when its political dynamic closes down, as it did 12 years ago, and even now, as its economic underpinnings fall apart.
The 2010 general election is already a pointless foregone conclusion. The system will be fortunate to emerge from the debacle looking just hopelessly out of touch with the British electorate. Chances are, the Tories will win a big majority, but with less votes than they received in the 1997 anihilation. How long a political system function in such a context? How long before politics returns...
The 2010 general election is already a pointless foregone conclusion. The system will be fortunate to emerge from the debacle looking just hopelessly out of touch with the British electorate. Chances are, the Tories will win a big majority, but with less votes than they received in the 1997 anihilation. How long a political system function in such a context? How long before politics returns...
vendredi 21 août 2009
Is the Guardian a secret admirer of the BNP?
"Two people have been charged with leaking the names and details of the entire British National party membership.
The list, which identified thousands of people linked to the far-right party, was posted on the web in November 2008. Information included addresses and other contact information such as mobile phone numbers and the names and ages of children in a family membership.
Dyfed-Powys police said a 27-year-old man and 30-year-old woman were charged under the Data Protection Act after a joint investigation with the Information Commissioner's Office. The pair lived in the Nottingham area at the time of the leak.
The fallout included the outing of police, lawyers, teachers and church figures as BNP members, with some complaining the leak exposed them to the risk of dismissal or disciplinary action. Some included on the list, which ran to 13,000 names, complained they had been mistakenly included after only asking for information on the party. Others said they were no longer members.
In one entry of a woman believed to be a serving police officer from Wirral was the note "Discretion required re employment concerns – police officer", along with the names and ages of her children.
The BNP leader, Nick Griffin, claimed at the time to know the identity of a person who had leaked the information, calling them a hardline senior employee who disagreed with the direction of the party and left the party in 2007. The party called in the police and obtained a high court injunction to stop the list being published but was forced to admit it was relying on the Human Rights Act, which it opposes, to protect members' privacy.
The party said the leak was "malevolent and spiteful" but the list was not up to date and only included names of members up to 2007.
The BNP goes to considerable lengths to conceal the identities of members, including dividing lists between different people and encrypting and password-protecting email attachments.
The two people charged are due to appear in Nottingham magistrates court on 1 September."
It's not just me - this report is too sympathetic to the boneheads. Take the bit about the list not being up to date. It's as if the writer wants to illict feelings of sympathy for the goons on the list. It's been like a lot of other reports from the paper that treat the organisation as if it deserves being treated seriously.
The list, which identified thousands of people linked to the far-right party, was posted on the web in November 2008. Information included addresses and other contact information such as mobile phone numbers and the names and ages of children in a family membership.
Dyfed-Powys police said a 27-year-old man and 30-year-old woman were charged under the Data Protection Act after a joint investigation with the Information Commissioner's Office. The pair lived in the Nottingham area at the time of the leak.
The fallout included the outing of police, lawyers, teachers and church figures as BNP members, with some complaining the leak exposed them to the risk of dismissal or disciplinary action. Some included on the list, which ran to 13,000 names, complained they had been mistakenly included after only asking for information on the party. Others said they were no longer members.
In one entry of a woman believed to be a serving police officer from Wirral was the note "Discretion required re employment concerns – police officer", along with the names and ages of her children.
The BNP leader, Nick Griffin, claimed at the time to know the identity of a person who had leaked the information, calling them a hardline senior employee who disagreed with the direction of the party and left the party in 2007. The party called in the police and obtained a high court injunction to stop the list being published but was forced to admit it was relying on the Human Rights Act, which it opposes, to protect members' privacy.
The party said the leak was "malevolent and spiteful" but the list was not up to date and only included names of members up to 2007.
The BNP goes to considerable lengths to conceal the identities of members, including dividing lists between different people and encrypting and password-protecting email attachments.
The two people charged are due to appear in Nottingham magistrates court on 1 September."
It's not just me - this report is too sympathetic to the boneheads. Take the bit about the list not being up to date. It's as if the writer wants to illict feelings of sympathy for the goons on the list. It's been like a lot of other reports from the paper that treat the organisation as if it deserves being treated seriously.
mardi 4 août 2009
BNP give them a name
Should we call BNP members 'scum' 'boneheads' and '[fill in your own insult here]'? On the whole we at REL think that "Yes you should." and not only that. You should also dream up further insulting descriptions lest one forget that you are dealing with (in however an abstract and remote way) the absolute pits of the political universe.
Over at the Tomb, Lenin highlights a piece in the increasingly wobbly Guardian that ends with a quote from a BNP goat fucker, at the end of the article, that gives the impression that the left is somehow responsible for the increase in right wing violence against anti-fascists. One must be clear, the only way to deal with nazism is by total brute force. Alas, working class people turn fascist as well since our political culture is so corrupt. You can reach out and try to turn them away, but face it, they are part of a violent extremist tradition with its roots on the glass strewn streets of 1920's and 30's Germany. If they raise their shrunken heads, then they must be treated as legitmate targets. They have to be crushed with bats, sticks and whatever comes to hand - it's pointless to try to be an anti-fascist and a pacifist.
Thankfully, the BNP are merely a tic crawling over the surface of things and there are far more important things to worry about. Buggering No-mark Party. They'll perish.
Over at the Tomb, Lenin highlights a piece in the increasingly wobbly Guardian that ends with a quote from a BNP goat fucker, at the end of the article, that gives the impression that the left is somehow responsible for the increase in right wing violence against anti-fascists. One must be clear, the only way to deal with nazism is by total brute force. Alas, working class people turn fascist as well since our political culture is so corrupt. You can reach out and try to turn them away, but face it, they are part of a violent extremist tradition with its roots on the glass strewn streets of 1920's and 30's Germany. If they raise their shrunken heads, then they must be treated as legitmate targets. They have to be crushed with bats, sticks and whatever comes to hand - it's pointless to try to be an anti-fascist and a pacifist.
Thankfully, the BNP are merely a tic crawling over the surface of things and there are far more important things to worry about. Buggering No-mark Party. They'll perish.
UK values
The Home Office is pondering the idea that immigrants (not 'ex-pats' as retiree Brits living abroad call themsleves) who protest against the war or at homecoming parades of soldiers should face visa and passport penalties. The specific UK value here, presumably, being the unqualified and open ended support for 'Our Boys' in far away butchery of foreign nationals.
One does not even have to resort to the 'slippery slope thin end of the wedge' type argument here - this is straight forward police state tactics. In the name of spreading democracy abroad 'we' must supress it at home.
In the context of the BNP getting a broader press, this idea (one that for the Tories does not go far enough...) will give the nazis confidence that their ideas are becoming mainstream, thus a further pox on this dying government for dredging this putrid idea into the daylight.
One does not even have to resort to the 'slippery slope thin end of the wedge' type argument here - this is straight forward police state tactics. In the name of spreading democracy abroad 'we' must supress it at home.
In the context of the BNP getting a broader press, this idea (one that for the Tories does not go far enough...) will give the nazis confidence that their ideas are becoming mainstream, thus a further pox on this dying government for dredging this putrid idea into the daylight.
dimanche 12 juillet 2009
They walked in line
The current upsurge in imperialist terrorism in Afghanistan has caused the deaths of 15 British soldiers in just under two weeks. Whilst evidence is sketchy, it has to be assumed that the loss of innocent Afghan civilian lives is far higher and that details about the criminal actions of the illegal occupying forces is being deliberately withheld from the wider world, in order to wring as much diversionary potential from these deaths. The work of the nominally liberal press has been stirling as usual with the Observer uncritically vomiting up MoD statements and government propaganda. What is pitiable though is the 'left wing' Labour MP calling for monies to be diverted from Trident to the repression of the Afghan population.
It is reasonable to assume, also, that the increase in occupation offensives is tied to the economic crisis facing the British and American regimes. From a day to day policy objective, the deaths play a (small?) role in emotionally blackmailing and corralling the home populations into quietude about their own social and economic greivances. It cannot be too long before striking public sector workers are maligned for downing tools whilst 'our brave boys and girls are risking their lives for our freedom.' It does, clearly, sound ridiculous, but some mouthpiece for the MoD in the above report stated that costs should not matter since 'we' didn't count the cost when we were fighting Hitler. From wider economic objectives, the war is a way of encircling Iran and ensuring China is hemmed in and prevented from intervening in the resource land of the Middle East in the medium to long term future.
We are warned, chillingly, by the current war criminals Brown and Obama, that there is a long difficult Summer ahead. They are saying, of course, that further losses are expected and as far as they are concerned dearly hoped for.
It is reasonable to assume, also, that the increase in occupation offensives is tied to the economic crisis facing the British and American regimes. From a day to day policy objective, the deaths play a (small?) role in emotionally blackmailing and corralling the home populations into quietude about their own social and economic greivances. It cannot be too long before striking public sector workers are maligned for downing tools whilst 'our brave boys and girls are risking their lives for our freedom.' It does, clearly, sound ridiculous, but some mouthpiece for the MoD in the above report stated that costs should not matter since 'we' didn't count the cost when we were fighting Hitler. From wider economic objectives, the war is a way of encircling Iran and ensuring China is hemmed in and prevented from intervening in the resource land of the Middle East in the medium to long term future.
We are warned, chillingly, by the current war criminals Brown and Obama, that there is a long difficult Summer ahead. They are saying, of course, that further losses are expected and as far as they are concerned dearly hoped for.
jeudi 9 juillet 2009
Genocidal maniac
British politics continues to go rotten. A small mordant sign of this drifts over our sickened gaze this morning in the wretched Guardian. That microbe Griffin of the Boneheaded Freak Party has called for boats carrying immigrants from Africa TO BE SUNK. Read that again and let the implications sink in. He's calling for the cold blooded murder of desperate people who are so poor they see no other option than to risk their savings and their lives to escape terrible economic and social conditions that ultimately, the west is responsible for.
But one expects that from this speck of human waste, this fleck of ratshit this slimed coward. What is depressing is that the weasely guardian describes his 'proposals' (proposals! - the correct term would be incitements or 'death threats') as "controversial". Controversail, once was attached to ideas like 'tax rises for the rich' or 'supporting secondary picketing' or 'abolishing the monarchy' or to pop stars who shot their mouths off.
Calling for the murder of people is not controversial - its criminally insane. It's clear, though, that the prediction about the BNP once in power making a total shit-fuck of it's time in the limelight is coming true.
But one expects that from this speck of human waste, this fleck of ratshit this slimed coward. What is depressing is that the weasely guardian describes his 'proposals' (proposals! - the correct term would be incitements or 'death threats') as "controversial". Controversail, once was attached to ideas like 'tax rises for the rich' or 'supporting secondary picketing' or 'abolishing the monarchy' or to pop stars who shot their mouths off.
Calling for the murder of people is not controversial - its criminally insane. It's clear, though, that the prediction about the BNP once in power making a total shit-fuck of it's time in the limelight is coming true.
dimanche 5 juillet 2009
Thinking the Unthinkable
When economies go 'wrong' (in a functional not a moral sense...) the scum at the top demand instant solutions along the lines that everything must be considered and there should be no sacred cows. It's lies and propaganda of course. Here's some insect from some bean counting collective in a report from the increasingly rancid Observer "In a blistering attack, Steve Bundred, chief executive of the Audit Commission, says he has not heard any politician admit that "severe pay restraint" is one of a number of measures necessary to rebalance public finances, which could also include job cuts. "Nothing should be off limits," he warns."
One theing that won't be thought, one sacred cow that won't get sacrificed or be off limits is a serious tax raise for those who have done very nicely out of the last 30 years of neoliberalism. The rise to 50% for top earners was just a sop. The government should - alas by now we should say 'should have' - phased in a progressive tax regime years ago. Now we're going to have to pay for the bank bail-outs and bonuses to keep those snouts in the manner to which they have become accustomed.
In response, the resistance should reinterpret this Bundred wanker's words, nothing should be off limits when it comes to the fightback. If anyone can fucking well rouse themselves......
One theing that won't be thought, one sacred cow that won't get sacrificed or be off limits is a serious tax raise for those who have done very nicely out of the last 30 years of neoliberalism. The rise to 50% for top earners was just a sop. The government should - alas by now we should say 'should have' - phased in a progressive tax regime years ago. Now we're going to have to pay for the bank bail-outs and bonuses to keep those snouts in the manner to which they have become accustomed.
In response, the resistance should reinterpret this Bundred wanker's words, nothing should be off limits when it comes to the fightback. If anyone can fucking well rouse themselves......
mercredi 1 juillet 2009
Business as Usual
The Iranian turbulence has died down, the middle class 'revolt' has fizzled out and the MSM has moved on. A curse on all the ruling factions in Iran and all power to the working class, says the cleaner here at REL offices. She also notes that the papers have been less active in their coverage of the Honduras coup and the in your face corruption carnival that is the Afghan Presidential election and that she's going to go on strike.
dimanche 28 juin 2009
Has somebody died?
There mut be millions of words being written about Michael Jackson right now. This is the most ridicluous I've read so far. From k-punk, who we can forgive almost anything, but even so : "And if you asked me to choose between Off The Wall and the entire back catalogue of the Sex Pistols and the Beatles, there would be no contest."
!!. The argument being that The Beatles were like passé by the early eighties. And Michael Jackson, the vampire's vampire!
!!. The argument being that The Beatles were like passé by the early eighties. And Michael Jackson, the vampire's vampire!
samedi 27 juin 2009
How wrong we were
We said the Iraq war was mainly about oil. They said WMD and democracy. Here's what the NYT says in an article that appeared on Friday. Under the headline, “Warily Moving Ahead on Oil Contracts,” a Times correspondent reports from Baghdad: “When Iraq puts development rights to some of its largest oilfields up for auction to foreign companies on Monday, the bidding will be a watershed moment, representing the first chance for petroleum giants like ExxonMobil to tap the resources of a country they were kicked out of almost 40 years ago.”
jeudi 25 juin 2009
The Iranian diversion
Anything to take people's minds of the horror perpetuated in our names. Sixty people were obliterated by another drone attack in Pakistan and nobody in the West really gives a flying f*ck, diverted as they are by some stooge rallies in Tehran. What does Zizek have to say I wonder? Not that you'd really bother reading what that fraud has to say!
This is why events unnerve me
This on youtube - that deathly archive - a video someone took driving through Manchester in the early 1980's interspliced with other evocative shots to New Order's 'Ceremony'. The time that has past since...
Better news
With current events in Iran only splitting (what's left of) the left further (see the response to Zizek's awful letter on the subject, for instance) it's good to see there is life in the class war in Britain. Seumas Milne's article in The Guardian argues that when workers stand up to their employers, they tend to win and that passivity and inaction lead to wage cuts and redundancies.
He writes "It's now become obvious that only by defying or ignoring the anti-democratic legislation bequeathed by Margaret Thatcher – which outlaws, for example, all solidarity action – will there ever be the political will to ditch or replace it with something more reasonable."
It's about time someone in the MSM said as much.
He writes "It's now become obvious that only by defying or ignoring the anti-democratic legislation bequeathed by Margaret Thatcher – which outlaws, for example, all solidarity action – will there ever be the political will to ditch or replace it with something more reasonable."
It's about time someone in the MSM said as much.
mardi 23 juin 2009
Meanwhile the war goes on
Whatever the outcome of the Iranian elections (REL prediction - the story will fizzle out this week) the military encirclement of Iran tightens. The British army has just launched a raid "on a Taliban stronghold in southern Afghanistan." Cheer on those brave troops.
Keep Britain wanking
Sorry, but, well - it really does deserve that -http://www.keepbritainworking.com/supporters.aspx
The website has that Ikea Orwellian feel to it. The TUC, the LibDems and Boris Johnson all say how important the site is to battling the country through the slump. There's even some 'propaganda' [sic] postcards for sale...slogans taken from the second world war. Not 'chilling' just sad, really really sad.
The website has that Ikea Orwellian feel to it. The TUC, the LibDems and Boris Johnson all say how important the site is to battling the country through the slump. There's even some 'propaganda' [sic] postcards for sale...slogans taken from the second world war. Not 'chilling' just sad, really really sad.
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