Saturday, October 18, 2008

[quantum of solace] and the search for revenge


Why is it that most of us appear to like the Bond franchise and continue to anticipate the next offering, however bad or good it is? does it say something about human nature or is it the escapism?

The Quantum of Solace extension of the Casino Royale story is dark, it's about revenge and it's about Bond finding a quantum of solace in his pain over the death of Vesper, whom he truly loved.

It is also explicit about "Them", the ones this blog has railed against since its inception, the story of which is only now reaching the mainstream. I do feel some vindication in that, as the baddies topple governments in the film with the reminder, "This organization has people everywhere," a similar thing is in operation in real life.

"If they're everywhere, how come we've never heard of them?" asks M.

Precisely, Dame Judy, precisely.



Finally, the film is a grand statement on the futility of anger and revenge. Romans 12:20 again:

16; Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits.
17: Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men.
18: If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men.
19: Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.
20: Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.
21: Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.


First reviews here.

[who to listen to] one of the traders or not


This man, Simon Cawkwell, is making a killing on the crisis and has his views on the immediate future:

He may be a gambler through and through, but he says even he would never have attempted the "mad gamble" of the British Government over the past decade. He reserves particular criticism for Prime Minister Gordon Brown's actions in his time as a finance minister, blaming him for making cheap credit too easily available.

"People have been deceived on a massive scale," he says. "Brown knew about all of this. It was a mad gamble to keep on expanding credit forever but you cannot expand credit forever." He foresees deep problems ahead. "I expect massive unemployment. There will be deep impoverishment and bankruptcies," he says. "I really think it can lead to a civil unrest. It is really very serious. We're talking about people whose lives are shattered."

But, if the worst comes to pass, Cawkwell can see only one outcome for him personally. "I shall make a good deal of money," he says.

How much weight to place on his words? Well, he's in the market and so knows it from the buyer/seller point of view. I wonder how much he knows of the political agenda though? I mean the real agenda, the loony "hidden mysteries" stuff which I have looked into. I think he wouldn't know much of that - pragmatists can't get their minds round such seeming craziness.

Either way, his prediction and the loony agenda happen to coincide for the present.

Friday, October 17, 2008

[thought for the day] friday evening






... Nil desperandum.

[wag culture] les spills the beans

"In the past we became a bit of a circus … in terms of the whole WAG situation," Ferdinand said.

"It seems like there was a big show around the whole England squad. It was like watching theatre unfolding and football almost became a secondary element to the main event. People were worrying more about what people were wearing and where they were going, rather than the England football team.

That then transposed itself into the team."

[the new order] reasons to stay shtum




The idea in this post is to move from Almost Believable scenarios down to Bizarre and Almost Crazy scenarios by the end and to stretch the boundaries of credulity. My opinion on all this? Much easier to accept the early articles and much harder to fully accept the latter but none of it is without truth, IMHO.

On the grounds that it is better to have read something through than to have turned one's head away, here we go:

There is evidence that the banking crisis has been known about for a long time and did not arise simply through innocent incompetence.

There is also evidence that, far from the nationalization and the rescue packages being a knee-jerk reaction, they were quite cynically thought through a long time ago and are here to stay, at least in some form or other.

The type of people who go to the investment banker cocktail parties are not a great deal different in temperament to those involved in the “positive job discrimination” promoting people of a certain ilk into key positions, thereby perpetuating the type.

The nature of the people involved is illustrated in this link.

Sooner or later, when discussing people of a certain ilk being placed in key roles in both the public and private sectors, one has to mention Common Purpose. In this post, the comments are more illuminating than the post itself.

Reading more widely and digging deeper, which the investigative blogger tends to do, the breadth of the problem of these sorts of people spreading their tentacles across society is seen in pushes for Total Information Awareness and other infrastructural moves.

One recurring theme in all this is the interconnectedness of the people involved - the networking and the way the same names keep popping up is illuminating.

If this was just a question of a bunch of ambitious, error prone non-comps blighting our lives, it would be terrible but not nearly as terrible when the law is invoked to enable their craziness.

This is particularly so when the principle of arbitrary interpretation is applied, i.e. "You are a criminal because I interpret the law that way and my friends in high places agree."

When this principle is extended to citizens’ juries, in which incumbent CP types, in regions such as the South-West and in particular Bristol, both determine the composition of those juries and then administer guidelines on how to act, based on the CP interpretation of right and wrong, then this is like a Nuremberg show trial.

Even more worrying is that the principle of arbitrary surveillance and arrest is worldwide, e.g. in the US, in Europe and in the UK. In the UK, they have 28 days to do what they want to you but remember it almost became 42 days but didn't, thanks be to the Lords.

One way of dealing with the dissident, recalcitrant, seditious insurgent, as a totalitarian state would describe a caller for free speech and the right to dissent, is to go in for a bit of group stalking - most effective and almost impossible to pin down. Here and here. Most stalking is one-on-one, male on female but there is also this worrying group thing, where the aim is to silence a dissenting voice or one who would expose you or maybe even someone who disagrees politically.

More insidious is the welcome awaiting someone unfortunate enough to be "detained". One has to smile at the hullabaloo over waterboarding when the real thing is so much worse. Here and it continues here. Woodrow Wilson spoke of the network being interlocked and insidious and I've seen no evidence it isn't. Professional guilds are an accepted entity and sections of them, at the highest level ,are likely to be of a similar mind and global in scope.

That's why a psychiatrist from one country, who has operated in another, can be criminally charged in a third.

And it is not an isolated case - it is only one of the rare ones which found it to trial. Worse is the sustained, long term experimentation which has gone on in the security environment for decades, was formerly denied but is now mainstream knowledge.

One could stop the investigation here and conclude that it was just mind games but are you actually aware of what they entail, these mind games?

Naturally, there are those who have reason to dismiss this out of hand, even to working towards the acceptance of the False Memory Syndrome as a recognized psychological phenomenon. The problem with this is the testimony of a considerable number of "victims" who recount similar stories and one account from a "former perpetrator", whose testimony I'm still searching the web, trying to find the definitive rebuttal.

All the above may be true, it may be fantasy. One thing I know is that there are people who now have arbitrary power of arrest and I, for one, do not fancy what might happen, once inside. Nobody outside need ever know.

Have you ever heard of Mr. Buttle?

[which was more fun] 20s or 50s

Comparing two eras - if you had to be transported to one or the other, which would you choose?  

1925



1955

[using technology] a modest proposal for real time democracy


Not my original idea:

1. We all have either a device attached to the tele or we use the Black Berry or we use our mobile and our National Insurance number gives us ID which enables us to vote at any time on a number of legislative proposals.

2. All the pollies have been sacked, political parties disbanded and the civil service trimmed down to its new executive function of feeding proposals in and administering them as and when they arise.

3. Proposals are mooted by any member of the public [maybe one per month] and go onto a database. Then, a sort of mailticker thing operates where they are added to the list as they come in and people can vote on them. We can view them on the tele screen or on the phone or wherever, at any time.

4. A simple majority passes the proposal with no quorum required, following a two week deliberation period. The question of frivolous or repeated proposals would self-actuallize and only serious, documented items would get the consideration they deserve.

5. If people wanted some kind of background to vote on, there'd be a comments thread with subfolders and so on, with finally a Yea folder or Nay folder where you or I, who had been sitting on the couch discussing this issue, could switch on the mike and feed it in to the little box. Voom - it's in the folder for someone in another part of the country to listen to if they wish.

6. Once a proposal passes, the civil service implements it in the light of other similar proposals on the issue. Example - the Iraq President gets lippy; someone proposes we nuke him. It wouldn't pass but if the majority wanted, well, we'd nuke him.

7. It would have the eventual effect of raising the political consciousness of ordinary people to issues affecting their life, government wastage would be reduced to negligible proportions, the pollies couldn't ruin things, freedoms would be protected and the people who were most interested would run things but not within a formal structure like a party.

8. Another advantage would be to make government well nigh unworkable and proposals slow to implement. Good - they should be well thought out first. You might say - hey, what if the army is needed for an emergency? Well, someone would propose it and the military commanders would do the rest - it's not the job of government. It would prevent high-ups having their little spurious war.

9. All right, you say - it might be a nice idea but there's fat chance of those in power giving it up that easily. Well, that's true. For now.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

[thought for the day] thursday evening


In the light of the Menezes' killer defence that, as they had failed to receive the order to kill, then they took that to mean permission to use their own judgement on the matter, that's a bit of a worry for the average cit.

One person I would not wish to be named in such a highly charged atmosphere and with officers following that policy, is Will, as in "Fire at Will!"

[george w bush] what will history say


A Republican view

* He'll be remembered as the President who, despite terrorist attacks, preserved civil rights, kept the economy strong through tax cuts, made the tax system more progressive, and finally fought back against the terrorists.

* He'll be remembered as the first president to try to bring us together after the divisive Clinton years and the President who rebuilt the military.

* He'll be remembered as the President who presided over the fastest, biggest aid package ever after Katrina.

* He will be remembered for liberating 50 million Muslims who spent their lives under murderous regiemes. He protected us from future attacks that we believed were just around the corner.

* Bush lowered taxes and tried to impose his will on a democratic marority house and senate

A Democrat view

With Ronald Reagan we remember:

* The Cold War
* The Berlin Wall
* The assassination attempt
* The Iran-Contra scandal
* Reaganomics
* Nancy’s “Just say ‘no’” policy
* Grenada
* Booming 80's economy resurgence


With George Herbert Walker Bush we remember:

* “Read my lips, no new taxes”
* Desert Storm
* Dan Quayle misspelling ‘potato’
* The fall of the Soviet Union
* Americans With Disabilities Act
* Panama / Noriega
* Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I)


With William Jefferson Clinton we remember:

* Monica Lewinsky
* A thriving economy
* Somalia
* NAFTA
* DMCA
* Serbia / Kosovo
* The Branch Davidians
* Elian Gonzalez
* Soaring public opinion
* Low unemployment


So what will we remember of George Walker Bush?

* September 11, 2001
* The Patriot Act
* The Afghan War
* The Iraqi Quagmire
* Torture
* Water Boarding
* Abu Ghraib
* Falsified intelligence
* Suppression of climate science
* Sinking economy
* Soaring gas prices
* Sinking public opinion
* The Katrina debacle
* Cheney shooting someone in the face
* Wire Tapping
* Loss of Habeas Corpus
* Veto of stem cell bill
* Inflation
* Rising unemployment
* Firing of U.S. Attorneys
* Alberto Gonzalez
* Scooter Libby
* Enron
* Tyco
* Blackwater
* Faith Based Initiatives

Source

[kate middleton] must she await her fate

Courtesy http://www.katemiddletonfans.com/


This post a year and a half ago, perhaps surprisingly, perhaps not, has now moved up to be my most accessed, so it's clearly not just the Brits who are interested:

Кейт Миддлтон , совсем недавно воссоединившаяся со своим женихом Принцом Уильямом, уволилась с поста байера аксессуаров для сети бутиков модной марки Jigsaw, завершив тем самым свою лишь недавно начавшуюся карьеру в моде.

The Russkies clearly see her as a fashion icon. Also, how did she drive on a phone, instead of in a car? Some saw her as a little dowdy but is she a very naughty girl? Either way, she will now have to wait eight years if she is to be the new Princess.

The good news though is that gays prefer Harry to William so she is fairly safe that way, apparently. Now, as for the split between her mother and the Palace:

Relations between the Middletons and the Royal family suffered last year when it was claimed that Mrs Middleton had used the word "toilet" and uttered the phrase "pleased to meet you" on meeting the Queen.

... that seems to be over. However, just to make sure you don't fall into the trap that Middleton Snr did, Mary Killen gives some added advice:

"And did you know that the word 'meal' is meant to be very common? You should always say 'lunch', 'dinner' or 'breakfast'. And there are very small, subtle distinguishing factors, like never reading a novel in a drawing room. If you read a coffee-table book, that's fine, because everyone knows it's a short-attention-span thing. But a novel makes you unavailable."

She goes on:

"I know people who think tomatoes are common; they won't have a tomato in the house. Another indicator is marmalade. Thin, runny, hand-made marmalade is a sign of being upper class, whereas firm, gelatinous marmalade is common.

So don't be plebs, people and before passing the bottle across the table to your fellow dinner guest, be sure to wipe the [bottle] neck first - it's gauche to swig from an unwiped neck. Kate would be horrified. Finally, latest news seems to be:

It’s been reported that Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie refused to make space in the front row of a fashion show for Pippa Middleton, Kate’s younger sister. After some embarrassment, she found a seat elsewhere.

Thought you were all dying to know that.