Sim-O

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to launch a full enquiry into the circumstances of Ian Tomlinson’s death seperate to the IPCC investigation.
…
Due to the new evidence being shown in the press of the circumstances of Ian Tomlinson’s death we urge the Prime Minister to step in now to immediately bring the truth to light.

Go on then. What you waiting for?

Oops! I forgot… Via

Well. That’s it then. No more denying it. The Police are vicious bastards.

I’ve probably knew it all along but been able to block it or excuse it. But now, fuck ’em.

What’s changed? When previous instances have happened there have been circumstances that, well…

A bloke and his mate are looking in a Jewelry shop window and get handcuffed and accused of attempted robbery.
Well, maybe the bloke got lippy, didn’t comply with resonable requests by the officers to, I don’t know, turn out his pockets or something, so the officer has to take charge of the situation and bring things to a head in a way so the officer comes out on top, and not the other way round.

Then there’s the house raid that goes a little wrong and one of the occupants, who is innocent as it happens, ends up getting shot.
Well, the information the coppers had meant that firearms were appropriate for the raid, and when a raid gets started there is lot of noise and confusion, everyone is hyped up and it’s usually dark as they are carried out in the early hours of the morning. It’s quite scary, even for the officers. I know, I’ve seen them on telly.
It’s surprising, really, that more people hurt. All it needs is the suspect to not put there hands up, or make a wrong move and, well…

Or there’s the suicide bomber that wasn’t. Armed officers, in a stressful situation, the tube full of people. OK, so there were errors made. Would you have done any better?

The thing is, with all those examples, we weren’t there. It doesn’t matter what witnesses say, you’re own mind can add little caveats, little excuses, that still leave the rozzers The Good Guys.

What happened at the G20 shattered that completely.

The assault was unprovoked, cowardly and on film.

As you can see, Ian is strolling along with his hands in his pockets, the fuzz come up behind him, a dog sniffing him, and then he gets a whack on the back of the legs and an almighty shove to the ground.

Why? What purpose did it serve? Ian wasn’t giving them abuse, the coppers could see his hands were in his pockets, so he wasn’t gonna be able to do anything before they could get to him, and he wasn’t giving them abuse. It was just malicious.

The police are supposed to protect us. It’s one thing getting the baton out when you have a crowd of angry soap-dodgers pushing against you and spitting in your face…Fuck it! I’m doing it again!

The game has changed. Why the hell else are coppers leaving off a letter or number from their lapels? ‘If you’ve got nothing to hide…’ applies to them too. Why else were the police telling people in the Climate Camp to delete photos of plod or have their cameras seized? Was the Climate Camp full of terrorists, was it?

This isn’t about the big things, like 42 days detention or the UK governments complicity in torture, this is about the little things that the police feel they can get away with.
The institutional bias in favour of the police when things go wrong, even when the investigation has only just begun…

A lie can be delivered by innuendo. The so-called “Independent Police Complaints Commission” – whose investigations in this case are being conducted by the City of London Police – had put out a statement saying that “it appeared that Mr Tomlinson had contact with the Police.” If we had not seen the video, what image does that conjure up in your mind?

The justification for tactics…

John O’Connor, a former Flying Squad commander, defended kettling in extraordinarily totalitarian terms, saying that

…using these tactics in a non-selective way does cause inconvenience to persons who are legally trying to make their point, but it is effective in controlling the troublemakers.

The same could be said of subjecting the entire population to house arrest or amputating the limbs of anyone not in the police. Certainly, what he says is a clear admission that kettling does not ‘facilitate peaceful protest’.

Do I need to spell out what message is that sending to the ordinary plod on the beat? The modern policeman already wears a quasi-military uniform, with their stab vest and utility belt. They do work under some tremendous pressures, and you can excuse them with that and the adrenaline and all sorts of other reasons, but that is what training is for. If a copper goes loses it, makes an error of judgement or gets power crazy and attacks an innocent person, he either needs to be fired or retrained. As well as prosecuted.

The example needs to be set from the top and that is what is missing. Last word goes to Craig Murray…

We have reached the stage in the UK where we need a revolutionary change. We have to sweep out the old order of corrupt politicians whose one guiding principle is to keep their own snouts in the trough: of City bankers who are multi-millionaires from their bubble scams and whose lifestyles and jobs the ordinary people are now supporting by a massive tax and debt burden, while nobody guarantees the jobs of those ordinary people who fund it all.

We have to realise that the end of the centuries old prohibition of torture by agents of the state is of a piece with the freedom of the police to maintain the system of power by fatal force, in both cases without consequence. You cannot separate this brutalisation of power from the illegal war that killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, and thousands of our own soldiers, on the basis of a lie but really to secure oil.

The whole system stinks from the head like a fish. And people are starting at last to understand where the smell comes from.

More links here.

Guardian: Video of police assault on Ian Tomlinson, who died at G20 protest.

Would the phrase ‘police state’ be overdoing it?

BBC…

Online advertising firm Phorm is pressing ahead with plans to launch more than a year after it first drew criticism from some privacy advocates.
…
“We have been supported or endorsed by all of the leading stakeholders,” Phorm chief executive Kent Ertugrul told BBC News.

“Ofcom, the Information Commissioner’s Office, the Home Office, leading privacy advocates like Simon Davies, the advertising industry and publishers have all backed our service,” he said.

All the major stakeholders except the people who will be effected the most: the internet using public.

And who’s this Simon Davies bloke? Never heard of him. he might have got this award or done whatever, but he can’t be that much into privacy if he’s ok with Phorm.

Kent Etugrul of Phorm…

I am surprised by the fact, after it has been repeatedly explained how the technology works, they seem to be very keen on misunderstanding what it does

No, people know what it does, and even how it does it. And that is the problem. It is opt out. A fucking awkward shitty opt out that one will have to opt out of every time ones cookies are cleared.
Even when someone has opted out, their movements on the web still go through Phorms equipment, there is no way to bypass Phorm. The user is still dependent on Phorm and its’ technology doing the right thing and not recording their movements.

Phorm and privacy? My arse.

Word comes from Craig Murray that the British embassies in the EU are to start getting support for Tony Blair to be the made the first permanent president of the EU.

Maybe I should’ve used the proper word there: appointed. ‘Made’ could mean elected by the people he would be president of.

As Craig eloquently puts it…

For anyone to occupy the position of President without a popular election would be very, very wrong. But Tony Blair? It is simply an appalling thought.

Why would anyone want a war criminal as president?

Horrifyingly, it appears that Blair may well be able to get a majority of EU member governments prepared to support him. That is despite his record as Bush’s poodle in launching illegal war, as one of the chief architects of the banking bubble economic disaster, and as the Middle East Peace Envoy who held the ring for Israel’s murderous assaults on Lebanon and Gaza.

I’m in two minds about the EU. It could be good, but at the moment the unaccountability and the bureaucracy, well, it seems like it is being run for the commissioners and the MEPs benefit, not the citizens of the EU.

In typical EU fashion, even the term is a bit ambigous: Permanent President.
Do they mean ‘for life’? Would they do that? What other meaning could the EU mean? The presidency at the moment is on a 6 month rotating basis, with the national leaders taking up the role. The occupant of the new style post of president would be full-time, rather than part-time, but still not permanent. Surely?

Either way, for the EU to have Blair as an unelected permanent El Presidente would lose what little credibility it has. And that isn’t a lot.

I’ve been with my company a few years now and seen a sword in the various display cabinets about, along with various awards for various corporate things, but only today looked to see what it’s actually for.

It is a Sword of Honour, awarded by the British Safety Council…

The Sword of Honour is the most prestigious international health and safety accolade that a company can receive, and it is designed to encourage and reward organisations that work to best practice. Inaugurated in 1979, every year only 40 swords are awarded world-wide, so winners can be assured that they are elite organisations that boast first class health and safety for their employees.

That’s all good and well, but didn’t anyone notice the irony of awarding a pointy implement, that has the sole purpose of killing people to companies for keeping people safe?

The quote in the title is Jacqui Smith talking about the NHS Database.

Do not believe it. What the Tories started in 1992, Labour have embraced used it extensively. That ‘it’, is Private Finance Initiative.

The latest PFI is to widen the M25. And seeing where the money is coming from is like playing Find the Lady.

George Monbiot…

The government, as usual, is telling us as little as it can get away with. But the Department for Transport has admitted that, to make the project viable, it might have to bail out the M25 consortium(12). Some reports suggest that to make sure the consortium remains solvent during the construction phase of the contract – which is worth £1280m(13) – the government will have to lend it £400m(14,15). The European Investment Bank has already pledged £500m(16), which is also taxpayers’ money. This private finance initiative scheme doesn’t require much private finance, or initiative.

If the government underwrites the scheme, the greater part of the risk will fall on taxpayers, negating the entire rationale of PFI. But, citing higher lending risks during the recession, the banks backing PFI infrastructure projects have increased their margins, in some cases by 500%(17). The government will lend or promise to lend cheap money to the banks, which will then charge us, through the consortium, crushing rates of interest for the use of our own cash.

Weird enough for you yet? Well one of the banks reported to be backing the scheme is RBS. The taxpayer now owns 58% of it. This is likely to rise soon to 95%(18). If the government underwrites the M25 expansion, it will in effect be bailing out RBS twice then charging itself for the privilege – and for the bankers’ fees, including salaries and bonuses. RBS – in other words you and me – already has £10bn invested in PFI schemes in this country(19), for which we are paying extravagant rates. If you have come across a state spending scheme madder than this, please let me know.

It’s a fucking road. The government doesn’t have to make a profit out of making it or the upkeep of it, so why can’t it just build a fucking road?
If company A can build a road and make a profit, the government should be able to match the price and build a better road or build the same road cheaper.

The governments, and not just Labour as this was started in 1992 and won’t stop if the Conservatives get back in, fucking us over, trying to i) blag the books to make themselves look good and ii) ensure employment when they retire/ get voted out.

It makes me shit-fucking-kicking mad.

D-Notice…

From the Scotsman:

SCRAPPING plans for a national identity card scheme would cost £40 million, Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, said yesterday.

In an attack on the Conservatives, who have pledged to abolish the scheme, Ms Smith said doing so would “not free up a large fund of money to spend on other priorities”.

Is it me or or Labour resorting to blackmail in an attempt to enforce their ID card plans? In any event, it’s still a bit less than the billions they plan to waste of the bloody things.

Too expensive to scrap? Contracts haven’t been awarded yet, so unless the government are paying people to ask for jobs.

Rest assured though, the government always tries to get value for money…

[Jacqui Smith] She told MPs two contracts would be awarded next month,

adding: “As is normal, these contracts have been written to protect the public purse.

As is normal? Er, What about passports, the NHS Database, and Private Finance Initiatives in general?

Cannabis NI…

Dont be using empty coke cans for ashtrays. Breaks your heart when ya drop your j in :(

Bloggerheads…

Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve all seen the recent/sudden downturn in the quality and reliability of mainstream news and comment, coinciding with alarming outbreaks of carelessness and sheer malice in some places.

We’ve got at least one rogue publisher (Richard Desmond) thumbing his nose at the PCC, and while every news outlet is begging us for chunks of our private lives that they can publish for profit (with or without our permission), no bugger will answer our emails or address our concerns when something that is clearly false has been published, and no effort has been made to remove, correct or (Dog forbid) alert readers to the error. Meanwhile, pretty much the same applies to the (blissfully) few ‘leading bloggers’ who claim to be challenging the establishment.

The only news outlet that’s in any way compelled to answer is the BBC, who find themselves crippled since Andrew Gilligan shot off his fat gob, and under constant attack by the same parties described in the previous paragraph (i.e. those who demand accountability of others, yet think themselves above it).

Clearly the time has come for us to form organised squads and start hitting people with sticks.

If you’re of a mind to do something positive and powerful about outright lies in the media, I invite you to join the Media Watch Rock-a-Hula, now in progress.

C’mon, guys. It;s time to clean up Dodge.

A free press is supposed to be the sign of a healthy democracy. We might have a free press but that doesn’t mean it is doing it’s job.

A newspaper is supposed to tell the truth, expose the corruption and duplicity of the ruling classes. What we have at the moment is a press that tells us what the propriotor wants us to know or how we should think. The press should be on the side of the common man but it isn’t. It is on the side the vested interest and the ruling classes.

there are roles that pretty much anyone can play.

Yes, even you.

You could easily be that one person in a thousand with the right expertise, contacts, access or influence required to get a specific job done quickly, and if not, someone has to carry the pitchforks and kerosene.

Me? I’m a pitchfork and kerosene bloke. What are you?