Bastards.

Independent – US issues threat to Iraq’s $50bn foreign reserves in military deal: The US is holding hostage some $50bn of Iraq’s money in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to pressure the Iraqi government into signing an agreement seen by many Iraqis as prolonging the US occupation indefinitely, according to information leaked to The Independent.

I can’t possibly improve on RickB’s headline, so I won’t try:

Ten Percent – The Rape of Iraq: Bribed With It’s Own Money








Posted in George W. Bush | 7 Comments

Giles Chichester: so much for David Cameron’s ‘enforcer’

Guardian – Tories’ Brussels enforcer quits over half-million in expenses: Giles Chichester, who three months ago was charged by David Cameron with the role of ensuring that Tory MEPs were behaving scrupulously, stood down in Brussels after being found, over the past 12 years, to have transferred the funds, which came from MEP’s allowances, to a company of which he was a director. On Wednesday, Chichester had resisted quitting his post, though he confessed to a “whoops-a-daisy” moment, stating that he had failed to understand the rules…

Sorry, but if you’re the guy in charge of making sure that others understand and follow the rules, you can’t break the rules and then say “whoops” and expect to get away with it.

And what fun it is to watch David Cameron charging around in the hope that his velocity alone will cast the egg from his face.

(I know it’s a show, because on a number of occasions Cameron has offered Anne Milton a free ride on clear wrongdoings – example – just because it didn’t look like it would cost him anything at the time. No fuss = no action.)

[Psst! Watch the Conservatives’ top attack blogger calling for calm. The partisan twit.]








Posted in Tories! Tories! Tories! | 3 Comments

Plan to arrest Bush when he visits the UK gathers momentum

Get Reading – Reading magistrates asked for Bush arrest warrant: A peace campaigner from Newtown will tomorrow ask Reading magistrates for a warrant to arrest George W Bush. Peter Burt, of Biko Court, is taking his case to court to try to get the American president arrested for war crimes. Mr Burt, of Reading Peace Group, plans to outline the offences that ‘Dubya’, left, has committed and the international laws that he has broken, including the invasion of Iraq, the bombing of Afghanistan and the abduction, illegal detention and torture of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. He said: “The historians of the future will mention the name Bush in the same breath as the names of Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and other great criminals who have committed the most appalling crimes that humanity has known. “I will be asking Reading magistrates to stand up for international law by issuing an arrest warrant so that George Bush can be held to account for his crimes in the International Criminal Court.” Magistrates have the power to issue an arrest warrant under section one of the Magistrates’ Court Act 1980 if information about a suspected offence is laid before them. ‘Laying an information’ is usually done by the police or other law enforcement agencies but it can also be done by a member of the public.

And getting back to the crime in progress…

Independent – Revealed: Secret plan to keep Iraq under US control: A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November. The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to The Independent, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq. Iraqi officials fear that the accord, under which US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity from Iraqi law, will destabilise Iraq’s position in the Middle East and lay the basis for unending conflict in their country. But the accord also threatens to provoke a political crisis in the US. President Bush wants to push it through by the end of next month so he can declare a military victory and claim his 2003 invasion has been vindicated.

[Psst! First round of invites for Operation Manticore go out this afternoon.]








Posted in George W. Bush | Comments Off on Plan to arrest Bush when he visits the UK gathers momentum

A tart card seen in London yesterday

This just in… Belinda Carlisle is a pre-op transsexual. Apparently.

Belinda Carlisle tart-card

Hey, there’s an easy win for Boris… cleaning up the tart cards! Just imagine the defiant last-ditch party that would provoke.

:o)








Posted in Consume! | 4 Comments

Looking for lovin’ in all the right places

According to this article, Leah McLaren thinks that the typical English male “is either a repressed homosexual, a drunkard whose alcohol intake renders him incapable, a boarding school product deprived of his mother’s love too early in life, or simply a woman-hater.”

But a quick scan of that article, the original article and/or her Wikipedia page reveals that she formed this opinion while hanging around right-wing tabloid and City types.

Not that I’m mentioning any names…








Posted in Normal People | 11 Comments

George W. Bush: a boy and his bubble

Ten Percent has reminded me via a link to an old article that Scotland Yard only pressed for partial closure of London’s mobile phone network after Bush was told he wasn’t allowed to use his shiny black helicopters that block mobile phone signals.

In the end, he had to make do with a shiny black truck that followed the motorcade, blocking mobile phone signals.

(FFS! The rest of us get by with tinfoil.)

His bubble got a lot smaller as a result.

Seeing as many of the world’s problems with this administration stem from Bush insisting that he spend his entire life in a bubble so sterile that not even information can pass through, I saw this as a good thing.

In fact, I dared to hope that Bush’s bubble had finally become so small that he could actually see reality from where he was sitting.

Of course, Blair had to f**k it all up by creating a fantasy-land for him in Sedgefield (building Britain’s very first official free speech zone in the process) but Brown is not likely to be (a) that stupid and (b) under anywhere near as much pressure… especially after today.

The race for the White House is on* and McCain has begun by running a mile from Bush.

(*Don’t tell Hillary… she’s in a bubble of her own.)

[Psst! Items of interest here for Scotch and Ten Percent. The first round of invites for Operation Manticore are going out tomorrow latest.]








Posted in George W. Bush | 2 Comments

“Would you believe Tuesday?”

Sorry about the delay. I was all set to go at a few minutes to midnight last night, but there was a rebuild problem. Looks to be clear now.

Operation Manticore is go. I repeat; Operation Manticore is go.

The back-end should be fully secure and ready to roll for the first round of invites tomorrow.

Cheers all.

UPDATE – Oh, and thanks to the former commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchezdo, we have a fresh eye-opener for the few remaining Bush-lovers:

“Kick ass! If somebody tries to stop the march to democracy, we will seek them out and kill them! We must be tougher than hell! This Vietnam stuff, this is not even close. It is a mind-set. We can’t send that message. It’s an excuse to prepare us for withdrawal. There is a series of moments and this is one of them. Our will is being tested, but we are resolute. We have a better way. Stay strong! Stay the course! Kill them! Be confident! Prevail! We are going to wipe them out! We are not blinking!” – George W. Bush (source)

1. Bloody hell. What a hero.

2. Come to think of it, we could do with a march to democracy over this way…

(reaches for weapon)








Posted in George W. Bush | 2 Comments

Circle Line and Tube parties today/tonight

This became an irretrievably stupid idea from the moment the newspapers started to cash in on it.

(Both London freesheets had it on their front page yesterday, and it’s in several nationals today.)

My advice to you if you’re planning on a day or night out in London today is to avoid the underground system. You certainly shouldn’t put yourself in a position where you need to rely on it.

[/pooper]

UPDATE – Alternatively, you could throw caution to the wind and have a drinking competition.

[/eyeroller]








Posted in Consume! | 6 Comments

Linkdump ahoy!

1. Joseph Obi is on the warpath.

The attack on Louise Redvers is particularly appalling… and actionable. Sadly, The Obi One has yet to reveal what he’s really angry about (i.e. what triggered this greatly delayed outburst).

2. Thank you, Gordon.

(That is what you’re fishing for, yes? Next time, try to take the lead before you’re backed into a corner, eh?)

3. Independent – Clive Stafford Smith: Why has the Government forsaken Binyam Mohamed?: Why would the British Government refuse to disclose this kind of critical information? Here, we are left to speculate, since they won’t give an explanation. Sadly, the most likely reason is that there is much more evidence that they would rather remained hidden – such as proof of systematic British co-operation in the US rendition process.

If you’d like a hint as to the most likely outcome, here it is; Jack Straw still holds a cabinet position.

4. BBC – Blair ‘to devote life to faith’: Former prime minister Tony Blair has promised to “spend the rest of my life” uniting the world’s religions

Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Oh, do excuse me. That’s unforgivably rude. I should kn*…. Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

5. Emptywheel – George Bush Authorized the Leak of Valerie Wilson’s Identity: Scottie McC doesn’t know it yet. But that’s basically what he revealed this morning on the Today Show…

See also: Scott McClellan on Countdown with Keith Olbermann. Oh, and Matthew Norman’s description of Bush as an “an arrogant, self-deceiving fantasist” reminded me of this little item.

6. LayScience and Septicisle on the recent Standpoint nonsense.

(Speaking of right-wing magazines, someone has a tough job ahead of them.)

7. I had four beers last night, and I’m seriously considering breaking my curfew on Saturday night so I can see a movie with the missus.

I’m a bad boy…. but you ain’t seen nothing yet:

8. Manticore. Monday.

SPECIAL BONUS LINK: An incredible timesaver for 98% of the remaining* regular contributors to Iain Dale’s website. (*Most of the sensible people have grown tried of being ignored, censored, abused by anonymous cowards or told to “piss off” by the great man himself.)








Posted in Christ..., George W. Bush, Gordon Brown, It's War! It's Legal! It's Lovely!, The Political Weblog Movement, Tony 'King Blair, UK Libel Law | 5 Comments

Scott McClellan

Scott McClellan on Bush and the selling of the Iraq war:

In Iraq, McClellan added, Bush saw “his opportunity to create a legacy of greatness,” something McClellan said Bush has said he believes is only available to wartime presidents.

The president’s real motivation for the war, he said, was to transform the Middle East to ensure an enduring peace in the region. But the White House effort to sell the war as necessary due to the stated threat posed by Saddam Hussein was needed because “Bush and his advisers knew that the American people would almost certainly not support a war launched primarily for the ambitions purpose of transforming the Middle East,” McClellan wrote.

“Rather than open this Pandora’s Box, the administration chose a different path — not employing out-and-out deception, but shading the truth,” he wrote of the effort to convince the world that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, an effort he said used “innuendo and implication” and “intentional ignoring of intelligence to the contrary.”

Andrew Sullivan on the above:

If this is true, if the president intentionally ignored data refuting the existence of Saddam’s WMDs, he should be impeached.

Also…

Scott McClellan on the “liberal media”:

If anything, the national press corps was probably too deferential to the White House and to the administration in regard to the most important decision facing the nation during my years in Washington, the choice over whether to go to war in Iraq.

The collapse of the administration’s rationales for war, which became apparent months after our invasion, should never have come as such a surprise. . . . In this case, the “liberal media” didn’t live up to its reputation. If it had, the country would have been better served.

Karl Rove on Scott McClellan:

“It shows how out of the loop he was,” Mr Rove, the man once known as “Bush’s Brain”, said on Fox News where he is now a commentator. “This doesn’t sound like Scott, it sounds like a left-wing blogger. I don’t remember him speaking up [about the concerns laid out in the book] at the time.”

Ooooooh, get her.

Videos and extras over at Crooks and Liars.

[Psst! The more I look at the likes of Iain Dale and Paul Staines (aka ‘Guido Fawkes’, aka ‘Mr Anti-The-Current-Establishment’), the more I’m reminded of the role played by people like Karl Rove and Scott McClellan in the selling of a stupid president and his stupid war. Dale especially. His pockets are lined with Ashcroft cash, so even if he isn’t officially a professional liar for the Tory party, he may as well put it on his CV.]








Posted in It's War! It's Legal! It's Lovely! | 1 Comment