[poll] old poll finished, new poll up

Result of previous poll on "Who'll be Prez?"

Obama 82%
The Lizard Queen 2%
Giuliano 11%
McCain 0%
A dark horse 5%
[55 votes total]

New poll: Regarding 7/7, did Tony Blair:

Know before
Not know before
Had a fair idea

Please leave your vote in the right sidebar.

[tony blair] honest, upright leader we can all count on

Paul Linford is showing surprising horror at what has been quite obvious for some time from a close scrutiny of the documentation. Under the heading "Be afraid...be very afraid", he states:

My attention has been drawn to an excellent but extremely disturbing post on Rachel from North London today predicting some potentially shattering forthcoming revelations with regard to the use of intelligence prior to the 7/7 bombings.

Meaning perhaps that Blair was involved? No Paul, that could never be - Tony is an honest, decent man who never lies. Here's evidence he never lies:

1998 Hansard:

Mr. Gill: To ask the Prime Minister which members of his Government have attended meetings of the Bilderberg Group. [34298]
The Prime Minister [holding answer 16 March 1998]: None.
30 Mar 1998 : Column: 377

Very interesting:

Tony Blair From Elitewiki
Current OccupationPrime Minister, United Kingdom, 1997+Patron, Westminster Foundation for Democracy 2005
Previous Occupation Shadow Home Secretary, Labour Party 1992 - 1994 Shadow Secretary of State for Energy, Labour Party - 1988
Political ActivityParticipant, World Economic Forum 2005 Attendee Bilderberg 1993 April 22nd - 25th

Also interesting:

1991 Conference, Baden-Baden, Germany, 6-9 June

United Kingdom -
Gordon Brown (Opposition MP - Parliament)
Lawrence Freedman (Professor)
Christopher Kgg
Andrew Knight (Editor - News International)
Lord Roll of Ipsden (Conservative Politician, Warburg Banker)
John Smith (Leader of the Opposition)
Patrick Wright (Head of Diplomatic Service)

Captain, oh my Captain, Tony. I shall sail with you into oblivion. [Hat tip: Martin]

[blogfocus wednesday] twelve true tales of today

1 Matt must indeed be An Insomniac to be in so many places at one time. Here he gives a very neat little justification for meat eating, not that I needed any encouragement:

Cutting costs ultimately means a drop in the quality of living conditions for livestock – lower quality food, less room, more chemicals to speed up growth, etc. The consequences of this will be that smaller producers will be squeezed out of the market, as large scale industrial farms can afford to put out cheaper (if lower quality) meat and withstand market pressure better. So convincing people to become vegetarian, whatever its symbolic value, will favour industrial farming methods and lead to worse conditions for livestock.

2 Welshcakes, cuisine blogger extraordinaire at Sicily Scene, writes of Modica and in doing so, says much about Sicily itself:

Modica has a lovely and charming theatre, the Teatro Garibaldi and for years when I first used to come here I was frustrated because I could never get inside: it was always in restauro. Finally it was restored to its former glory but in 2001 the new roof fell in! Miraculously, no one was injured. Now six of those involved in that restoration project have received suspended prison sentences. I should add that the theatre is now functioning again and if you are in Modica it really is worth a visit.

3 Westminster Wisdom certainly comes out with the good oil on whatever issue he tackles, usually historical but this time it's the Scooter Libby question:

Libby's fall though has prompted people to raise some more provocative questions about the longterm in the United States. Jonathan Martin thinks that it makes it very difficult for the Republicans in 2008, Frank Luntz is speculating about the long term future of the Republican party itself. Personally I think that's overblown- the damage will be to Bush and to this administration, it might make it harder for a Republican but I still think their candidate will have a chance in 2008 besides a lot may change by then.

Another nine bloggers here.

[international women's day] march 8th in russia

Age cannot wither her nor custom stale
Her infinite variety; other women cloy
The appetites they feed but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies.

[Will the Bard 1607]

You can try. You can try your level best to inure yourself against women, to self-containedly lose yourself in books and blogging, to strive for self-sufficiency but when once woman comes close and fixes you with those eyes and does this little thing and that little thing and licks her lips - there is no defence. When she surrounds you with her companionship and you see how dire life would be without her, you're gone. Unless you're a fish.

[rape ad] dolce and gabbana belatedly withdraw

I was searching around for a nice story to counterbalance my current shocking mood and the raft of grim posts I've posted in the last two days. Didn't have much luck - I came across this instead:

Italian designers Dolce & Gabbana will withdraw an advertisement that shows a man pinning a woman by her wrists after widespread criticism. "We have decided to cancel ... the advertising image that has caused such repercussions within human interest groups and individuals," Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana said in an emailed statement. "We were looking to recreate a game of seduction in the campaign and highlight the beauty of our collections," the designers said.

Let's have that again: "We were looking to recreate a game of seduction in the campaign and highlight the beauty of our collections."

Seduction? Beauty? Are these people sane?

[garuda crash] imagine you were in it

Have you ever imagined yourself actually being aboard a plane when things like this happen?

Passengers on a Garuda plane in which dozens of people are feared dead have told of panic and screams as people tried to escape the flaming wreckage. Dozens of people were killed when the aircraft crashed and burst into flames after landing in the Indonesian city of Yogyakarta.

Dien Syamsuddin described the moment when the plane crashed, saying it landed heavily before overshooting the runway by about 300 metres.

"The aircraft was swaying and there was maybe something wrong with the engine. (The landing) was very hard the first time and the second time, the aircraft was outside the boundary of the airport. The lights on board went out and the cabin filled with smoke after the plane came down heavily. I felt the emergency exit was empty, nobody there, behind me there was also screaming. That was all I can tell."

Ruth Bamggadan said she was sitting near the emergency exit when the plane came to rest.

"One of my colleagues, she told everybody to stay calm and leave their belongings. People were panicking, it was really chaotic. Some people were helping the older ladies but we were really close to the door so we had to get out first. After I get out of the plane an explosion started. I think it is from the right side of the plane because we get out from the left side and the left side there are no fire yet at the moment.Then some explosions come again and I didn't see the whole flames.''

One of the crashes I always come back to is the Tenerife crash between KLM and Pan Am. It keeps coming back to haunt me because I know every detail of it. We're always just 'that' far away from it. The closest I came, apart from turbulence and steep drops, was at Heathrow in 2000, when the BA plane suddenly dropped 5 000 feet, as it was circling, on orders from the tower. We all saw the other plane out of the windows, so the pilot came on to the intercom and said:

"You've probably seen our neighbour over on the starboard side. Don't worry, he's on a different flight path to us."

Er, yeah.

[fragility] one click and your blog is gone

This has been blogged on by many, the poor man:

Earlier this month, Abdel-Karim Suleiman, a 22-year-old former law student at al-Azhar Islamic university, became the first Egyptian jailed for his blogging when he was handed a four-year prison sentence. The case against Suleiman, a Muslim and a liberal who uses the name Kareem Amer on his blog, was based on a complaint by al-Azhar University about eight articles written since 2004.

Suleiman accused the conservative Sunni institution of promoting extremist thought and described some companions of the Prophet Mohammed as "terrorists". He also compared President Hosni Mubarak to the dictatorial Pharaohs of ancient Egypt.

Could it have been otherwise for Suleiman in such a regime? But before we start to congratulate ourselves that it could not be so in our own increasingly oppressive regime, it only takes one click and you're blocked, mate. Or something more draconian - Blogger gets shut down in one blow. What have we left? The telephone? The e-mail?

I always operate on the basis that each time I go to my site, it's just not going to be there. Of course, that's a completely different thing to being thrown into prison for having an opinion.

[blogfocus] tomorrow evening, wednesday

Starting yesterday, unfortunately, they've put an extra three hours a day on me for the next three weeks and something has to give. The way round it is to run a slightly shorter Blogfocus tomorrow but this evening I simply can't, sorry - I have to prepare for these people tomorrow. I'll try to get a post up later and another tomorrow morning. Bear with me, please.

[diana] … and one last thing, if I may

There are three fundamentally illogical positions taken by the 'it was simply an accident' devotees:

1] The Butler-Sloss position is not illogical in itself but it has the greatest gall if it hopes to be taken seriously. You can't blame her for doing as she has in defending her department but the notion that it was in any way a fair and impartial analysis or an impartial decision is a hoot. Hence the jury hearing, which in itself is capable of being rigged.

This is exactly like Tony doing his own investigation of cash-for-honours, then gravely announcing to the country his personal self-exoneration, announced by the most impartial and venerated commoner in the realm - namely himself.

2] The second illogical position is for someone to say: "Well, I don’t believe in all that conspiracy theory stuff. Let's just move on. Everyone's sick of it."

Well, you'd be pleased to know that this blog is also dead against conspiracy theory. The evidence in the last post was all on the record [though parts of it have subsequently been expunged by person or persons unknown] and the worst that can be said is that it is circumstantial. But it's certainly not theory. Those people really did see and say those things.

3] The third illogical position is to read but not comment, then post a counter argument without addressing the issues in this one or refuting the evidence. As if this article had never been written, in other words. When someone writes that black is white, when everyone can clearly see it's black, then either the person who wrote it is not completely au fait with the evidence or else he or she has an agenda.

This Diana thing might have been the fault of the paparazzi, it might have been the fault of Henri Paul, it might have been the sheer incompetence of officials but one thing it most certainly was not - it was not an accident.

[diana] when these are answered, we may move on

About the only PC term this blog would concur with is 'closure'. Like Hamlet's ghost, ofttimes the business is unpleasant and all anyone ever desires is to lay the matter to rest but a soul can never rest until justice is finally done.

I am no ghoul. I have not the least desire to rake over old coals. However, to gloss over clear anomalies in the name of 'moving on' when it is as clear as day that we can't move on under the current circumstances, this is plain wrong.

So, at the risk of my readership, I re-present some unanswered points:

Tony Blair's plane

The RAF crew which flew Tony Blair from his Sedgefield constituency to London to greet the Princess’s repatriated body had been on continual standby to make the flight from two days earlier.

Sir Robin Janvrin was based in the equerries' room, where he also fielded incoming messages. He was on duty because his superior — the Queen’s private secretary, Sir Robert Fellowes, had taken a weekend's leave.

Two senior MI6 gave evidence to Lord Stevens, then later produced tickets and documents dating from 1997 which prove they were not in Paris that weekend. One was in the South of France with his wife and in-laws. The other was taking a short trip to Greece.

A middle-aged, English wireless operator at the embassy in Paris came on duty in the early evening of August 30, expecting his night shift to be routine, sending encrypted phone calls and messages from the embassy via UK listening stations …

Article continues here.