Hearts and Flowers
Aaaahhhhhh....
Does this strike anyone else as pathetic? Pathetic and yet believable. I mean, when has Tony ever shown any backbone? A couple of years ago Mandy convinced him that there were no more skeletons in his closet, but soon after Mandy was forced to resign for a second time. Blunkett seems to have convinced Blair that he'd learned his lesson and so was allowed back into the cabinet, only to resign for a second time. See a pattern evolving here?
Recent UK policy decisions become much clearer when you keep your mind open to what George is up to and Tony's little infatuation with all things evil. One example may be the use of torture.
The USA could easily be rebranded as The United States of Torture. When the US Senate recently voted 90-9 to ban the torture of prisoners held by the US military, Bush was outraged and indicated that he may veto the decision. The VP, Mr Cheney while insisting that the US doesn't use torture (no, really) said that it should at least be allowed to use torture if it wanted to.
Torture in the UK was abolished by James VI & I way back in the 17th century. That the UK may be turning a blind eye to it in the 21st century was first disclosed by Craig Murray, former ambassador to Uzbekistan, back in 2003. Mr Murray was removed from his post when he dared suggest that our new best mates in Uzbekistan may not be democratic trend setters. In fact he stated that the Uzbeki regime was a brutally repressive dictatorship. This offended Blair and so the ambassador was replaced. He lost his job for telling the truth. Because Britain is a trend setting democracy.
Last month the government asked the Law Lords for a ruling on the use of evidence in UK courts that was obtained under torture, albeit in another country. The flag waver for this was the normally publicity shy Eliza Manningham-Buller, head of MI5. Her evidence seemed to centre around the 'fact' that evidence obtained under torture had foiled the so-called 'ricin plot'. I commented on this 'ricin plot' at the time. What Ms Manningham-Buller failed to say in her evidence was that there was no 'ricin plot' at all - the trial collapsed. Apart from the evidence obtained under torture in Algeria, Morocco and Jordan there was no case. No ricin was found in the flat at the centre of the enquiry, the accused had no links to any terrorist groups; there simply was no plot.
Putting aside for a moment the obvious moral argument against torture, the ricin case showed the trouble with using torture. People will say anything to make it stop. If you're hanging from a meat hook by your wrists, which have been bound behind your back and you can feel your elbows and shoulders slowly dislocating wouldn't you want it to stop? If you'd not been fed or given water for a week prior to this wouldn't your defences be lowered? Yet Bliar wants judges in the UK to turn a blind eye to this sort of abuse and no doubt many worse examples. It is only a step away from the US policy of extraordinary rendition whereby a prisoner in US custody is removed to a third country and tortured there, away from the prying eyes of US & global human rights groups.
Is this the way we want our democracy to develop? Once the WMD argument fell apart were we not told that the invasion was all about human rights? Do we not lose all moral authority when we are shown to be as bad as 'them'? This isn't about beating terrorism. This is sadism. It isn't about justice. It's about vengeance. Bush must listen to his senate, Blair must listen to the Lord Chancellor. And we must all shout that this cannot happen in our name.
Prime Minister Tony Blair was so "seduced" by the "proximity and glamour of American power" that he failed to use his leverage with President Bush to slow the rush to war with Iraq, Britain's former ambassador to the United States has written in a new book.George and Tony sitting in a tree....
Does this strike anyone else as pathetic? Pathetic and yet believable. I mean, when has Tony ever shown any backbone? A couple of years ago Mandy convinced him that there were no more skeletons in his closet, but soon after Mandy was forced to resign for a second time. Blunkett seems to have convinced Blair that he'd learned his lesson and so was allowed back into the cabinet, only to resign for a second time. See a pattern evolving here?
Recent UK policy decisions become much clearer when you keep your mind open to what George is up to and Tony's little infatuation with all things evil. One example may be the use of torture.
The USA could easily be rebranded as The United States of Torture. When the US Senate recently voted 90-9 to ban the torture of prisoners held by the US military, Bush was outraged and indicated that he may veto the decision. The VP, Mr Cheney while insisting that the US doesn't use torture (no, really) said that it should at least be allowed to use torture if it wanted to.
Torture in the UK was abolished by James VI & I way back in the 17th century. That the UK may be turning a blind eye to it in the 21st century was first disclosed by Craig Murray, former ambassador to Uzbekistan, back in 2003. Mr Murray was removed from his post when he dared suggest that our new best mates in Uzbekistan may not be democratic trend setters. In fact he stated that the Uzbeki regime was a brutally repressive dictatorship. This offended Blair and so the ambassador was replaced. He lost his job for telling the truth. Because Britain is a trend setting democracy.
Last month the government asked the Law Lords for a ruling on the use of evidence in UK courts that was obtained under torture, albeit in another country. The flag waver for this was the normally publicity shy Eliza Manningham-Buller, head of MI5. Her evidence seemed to centre around the 'fact' that evidence obtained under torture had foiled the so-called 'ricin plot'. I commented on this 'ricin plot' at the time. What Ms Manningham-Buller failed to say in her evidence was that there was no 'ricin plot' at all - the trial collapsed. Apart from the evidence obtained under torture in Algeria, Morocco and Jordan there was no case. No ricin was found in the flat at the centre of the enquiry, the accused had no links to any terrorist groups; there simply was no plot.
Putting aside for a moment the obvious moral argument against torture, the ricin case showed the trouble with using torture. People will say anything to make it stop. If you're hanging from a meat hook by your wrists, which have been bound behind your back and you can feel your elbows and shoulders slowly dislocating wouldn't you want it to stop? If you'd not been fed or given water for a week prior to this wouldn't your defences be lowered? Yet Bliar wants judges in the UK to turn a blind eye to this sort of abuse and no doubt many worse examples. It is only a step away from the US policy of extraordinary rendition whereby a prisoner in US custody is removed to a third country and tortured there, away from the prying eyes of US & global human rights groups.
Is this the way we want our democracy to develop? Once the WMD argument fell apart were we not told that the invasion was all about human rights? Do we not lose all moral authority when we are shown to be as bad as 'them'? This isn't about beating terrorism. This is sadism. It isn't about justice. It's about vengeance. Bush must listen to his senate, Blair must listen to the Lord Chancellor. And we must all shout that this cannot happen in our name.
posted by phylos @ 12:43
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