Labour candidate Busharat Ali fakes protest photo

Lib Dem Voice – Are Labour faking photos in Bristol?

Looks like a slam-dunk to me.

UPDATE – There’s something about inept photo manipulation that really doesn’t sit well with me, so I popped by Busharat Ali’s online photo album, borrowed a snapshot, and made a version of the offending image for Mr Ali that is of far superior quality. He is welcome to use it for campaigning purposes.

Busharat Ali

UPDATE – Ahahahahahahahaha! You’ll want to check out Busharat Ali’s campaign videos on YouTube here and here. The supers on the ‘Working for Bristol’ video will have you in stitches. The second video has only one super, the URL of his website, and they even managed to muck that up!

UPDATE (27 April) – The videos were removed last night, but a mirror of both can be found here.

UPDATE (30 April) – I’ve found two more Busharat Ali campaign videos on Google Video here and here.








Posted in Photoshopping | 12 Comments

A doozy from Dale

Iain Dale’s Dairy – Explain yourself, Iain

I’ll remain calm and measured as I point out at incitement to murder is a criminal offence… I wouldn’t want to upstage everyone’s favourite drama queen.








Posted in The Political Weblog Movement | Comments Off on A doozy from Dale

‘Guido Fawkes’: yet another mass-deletion of comments

Guido 2.0 – Paul Staines is a fact-murderer!








Posted in The Political Weblog Movement | Comments Off on ‘Guido Fawkes’: yet another mass-deletion of comments

Headline of the year

Mark Thomas – ‘Tony Blair is a cult’

Applause for that… and this:

Indymedia – Mass lone demo breaks Guinness Book of Records








Posted in The War on Stupid | Comments Off on Headline of the year

Certainties

BBC – ‘No guarantee’ in terrorism fight: The government “cannot guarantee 100% success” in its fight against terrorism, the home secretary says. John Reid said he could only promise “100% commitment” from police, security services and the Home Office as it shifts its focus to security.

I can offer Reid a certainty… he can be absolutely sure that cynical manipulation of the terrorist threat will only exacerbate the problem:

Independent – Anti-terrorism leaks blamed on spin doctors: Tony Blair is resisting demands for a full inquiry into accusations that lives have been put at risk by leaks from Whitehall about police anti-terrorism operations. Peter Clarke, deputy assistant Metropolitan Police Commissioner, provoked uproar when he denounced “misguided individuals who betray confidences” about raids on suspected al-Qa’ida sympathisers. Mr Clarke, the country’s most senior anti-terrorist police chief, suggested that those responsible were trying to “squeeze out some short-term presentational advantage” by giving secret information.

When Jo Moore watched desperate people leaping to their deaths from burning towers, her first thought was about burying bad news about councillors’ expenses.

When the police wanted to make a case for crippling Brian Haw’s ongoing protest, they made the absurd claim that terrorists could hide bombs in his encampment.

Major anti-terror operations appear to have been botched not once but twice by those seeking political advantage and there has not been an investigation into either affair.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

It erodes public trust, it creates operational difficulties, and it even creates more terrorists… especially when you use terrorism as a pretext for invasion of another country (more), immediately releasing small arms and explosives before swiftly moving on to produce excellent recruitment material for every trigger-happy dipshit in an already-unstable region.

Oh, and don’t think for a second that getting rid of Blair or even bringing the Tories in will mean an end to it….

Bloggerheads – The New Conservatives: Parallels and Realities: The Conservatives are quite adept at riding upon the level of distrust borne from what has happened in Iraq (and many other callous manipulations of the ‘war’ on terror) without acknowledging their often willing role… And this is what makes Paul Staines so very, very useful to the Conservatives; with what is widely perceived as a ‘take them all down’ attack in a time of unprecedented distrust and distance, ‘Guido’ can pick off individual targets and/or ensure that money this, peerage that or cocktail sausage in the other is what officially brings about their downfall… and not Iraq, torture or the manipulation of fear to further a political agenda. I’m sure you can guess why this would be a desirable development for them.

UPDATE – That Home Office reform plan in full.








Posted in The War on Stupid | Comments Off on Certainties

Some notes on the Newmania / Paul Newman ‘scandal’

Islington Tribune – ‘Roadkill’ jibe sparks storm: Islington Tory Paul Newman should have known that jokes on the internet can backfire. Mr Newman, 42, maintains he was referring to his colleagues in Mildmay when he contributed what he thought was a witty riposte on a blog by national Tory pundit Iain Dale. However, Islington Lib Dems seized on the comments. Mr Newman, who works in insurance and is vice-chairman of Islington North Tories, wrote: “I have to confess that the denizens of Mildmay are almost bestially stupid. There is not a lot you can do with them… they live from roadkill and sleep under newspaper.” He was, he says, referring not to the residents of the ward, but to his own political colleagues and their inability to deliver documents on time.

Linkage:

Liberal Democrat Voice – “Almost bestially stupid”: top Tory’s verdict on Islington residents
Islington Newmania – Anyway back to me …
Sword in the Lake – Newman Offers “Galloway” Defence
Islington Newmania – Bovvered I am not

1. It is my own personal opinion that Mr Newman is a partisan arse of not-quite-the-highest order, but…

2. This has a whiff of the Jody Dunn affair about it (relevant blog entry archived here), and the Lib-Dems involved should know better.

3. If you read the relevant comments in sequence/context (1, 2, 3*) it’s pretty clear that Newmania is indeed talking about his Conservative colleagues and not the residents of Mildmay in general.

4. There are many far more interesting/damaging comments posted under the name ‘Newmania’ on a variety of British political blogs, but not all of them can be guaranteed to be from Paul Newman…. especially on blogs like Iain Dale’s. Dale is desperate to keep his comment numbers up (it’s a measure of popularity dontchaknow), and so has returned to regular use of the system that allows anyone to post under any name, and even pose as other Blogger users if they wish. And, because Paul Newman does not use a profile image, under these conditions (i.e. on a Blogger-based site where anyone can comment, not just registered users of Blogger), *no* comment by ‘Newmania’ can be confirmed as authentic without he or the relevant blog author confirming it. A handy situation for sock-puppeting nitwits and any genuine profile user who wishes to enjoy a level of plausible deniability.

5. Hooray for the playground-level taunts and insults currently being thrown about by Paul Newman’s supporters. You actually have a case to make, and you’re wasting time and effort calling people names? WTF is up with that?

6. Efforts have been made to avoid tarring all Conservatives with the same brush during the recent Bit Of Necessary. Perhaps Paul might consider the possibility that the actions of one or two Liberal Democrats fall a little short of establishing a ‘Fib Dem’ theorem.

7. Paul, when Catherine Tate’s character Lauren Cooper insists that she ‘ain’t bovvered’, she actually reveals how bothered she really is (and/or, in some cases, presents a clear example of a rather reckless dismissal). Please try to use this catchphrase correctly in future.

8. You can look forward to more of this as the council election campaigns heat up. Keep a sharp eye out for the following from all sides:
a) This kind of cherry-picking
b) Anonymous weblogs that go live with smears and false claims that campaigners dare not publish in local literature
c) Similar abuse of weblogs that allow people to comment or otherwise submit material anonymously
and/or
d) Co-ordinated sock-puppet attacks on anyone who dares to blog with any level of transparency/integrity.

I did try to warn you about the latter elements. Oh, and if you think this is fun, just wait until the next general election.

[*Psst! Iain! Individual comment permalinks do come in handy on long discussion threads… please sort it out.]








Posted in The Political Weblog Movement | 4 Comments

So what’s new?

Some fresh questions for Iain Dale, a design/mission update to Guido 2.0 and the fresh search results displayed below.

Warning – This is not as easy as it looks.

Note – Both parties were given many, many weeks to deliver just one straight answer or perhaps even an honest, measurable response to my concerns… and both either failed or refused to deliver. Repeatedly. All that came back to me was a torrent of abuse from the same anonymous bullies I complained about in the first place. If Iain and Paul are looking for sympathy, they’d best look elsewhere.








Posted in The Political Weblog Movement | Comments Off on So what’s new?

“Good buyer, prompt payment, kept to himself…”

I’m sure you simply can’t get by without knowing that Cho Seung-Hui not only bought some Walther P22 magazines via this eBay profile (blazers5505), but also a collection of rubber duckies.

So far there is no word of the buying habits of those behind the Baghdad bombings, but surely it’s just a matter of time…

Cho Seung-Hui

(Picture posted to B3ta.)

PS – Somewhere on campus, the only buyer to give Cho Seung-Hui negative feedback is telling fellow students of his ‘narrow escape’; “Opted for local pickup. But didn’t respond to email to make pickup arrangement.”

UPDATE – CrimeBlog follows the vapour-trail.








Posted in Humanity | 1 Comment

Freedom of speech

Yes, this is a cause for concern… but so is this.

Hint: Try not to be thrown off by the common subject matter.








Posted in The Political Weblog Movement | Comments Off on Freedom of speech

More cheap tricks from the locals

More fun with the local Tories, who have hijacked another campaign in their desperate scramble for votes.

Perhaps I should be a teeny bit grateful that they’re at least wary enough to avoid this tired old routine.

(For those who missed it, the local Tory ringers saga can now be accessed via this category page on the Anne Milton weblog. Start at the bottom and work your way up.)








Posted in Anne Milton | Comments Off on More cheap tricks from the locals