Sim-O

Or was it never there to start with?
Our beaurocracy is full of either spies or incompetent twats.
The Times:

Secret files on the al-Qaeda threat and the Iraqi security forces were left on a train by a senior intelligence official, the Cabinet Office said yesterday. Last night the department said that the man at the centre of the investigation into the loss of the documents had been suspended from his job.
…
the report, commissioned by the Foreign Office and Home Office, was classified “UK top secret” and each page was marked “For UK, US, Canadian and Australian eyes only”.

Top secret files, left in a train station. Gormless official suspended.

What the fuck was this muppet doing with ‘Top Secret’ documents out of his briefcase, never mind letting them out of his grip, in a fucking train station? Not exactly the most secure of areas, is it?

And suspended? What the fuck? There should be no excuse for this kind of thing. No reason to let the file out of his hands, no reason to be reading a ‘Top Secret’ file in a public place (never heard of ‘reading over someones shoulder’?) because there should be no reason for the file to be out of the HO lackeys’ briefcase.
The HO bod should be instantly dismiss for gross incompetence or extreme stupidity, not fucking suspended, presumably whilst the incident is ‘investigated’. WTF is there to investigate? He put it down and forgot about it. There, it’s been investigated, now sack the fucker. He won’t be out of work long, I hear McDonalds are always hiring.
Fucking suspended, I ask ya?

Update:
The Times:

Under a code drawn up for Whitehall and Intelligence services officials can only remove intelligence documents from Government departments if they seek authorisation and then follow a strict protocol.

The code allows the documents to be taken on public transport but they have to be kept inside a locked briefcase at all times. The briefcase has to have both a lock and two straps which must be used. The key should be carried in the owner’s pocket and the case must be held in the hand rather than put on a luggage rack.

How the fuck can ‘intelligence’ people, be so fucking stupid?

What’s the point? Just what is the point in trying to do or get anything done when you’re battling an organisation that does this?

Via DK

blah blah blah

BBC:

Sir Ian Blair called for a change in policy by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and urged it to increase the number of prosecutions.

In reply the CPS said it pressed charges when it was offered sufficient police evidence, and said Sir Ian had “totally” misunderstood the law.

‘Totally misunderstood the law’!? He’s the top cpper in the land! What fucking chance have the rest of us got?

With all due respect, Sir Ian, Fuck off.

[Kate Moss] escaped prosecution because police were unable to prove what substance she was allegedly using in a west London recording studio.

There it is Ian, the need for proof. Part of the basics of getting a prosecution in this country. You cannot prosecute someone on the evidence of a photo alone. Photos do lie.
Could you tell the difference between a spliff made with weed and one laced with speed from a photo? Could you distinguish between picture of a line of coke and a chopped up ecstasy pill? I couldn’t and I’ve done bucket fulls of the stuff.

The other main thrust of this is, who decides who a celebrity is? Who decides when the next level of celebrity has been attained so we know how much proof is needed to bang them up? You, Sir Ian? I fucking hope not.

Nevermind what implications it would have for other types of images that depict stuff that is illegal but never happened.

Celebrities are ordinary people. most of them twats, but still just people and should be treated equal before the law with regards to the level of proof required to secure a conviction.

Wikileaks:

British Telecom “Phorm” report: PageSense External Validation Report by BT Retail Technology, dated 15 Jan 2007. 52 scanned printed pages with occasional pen highlights, 17Mb.

The internal British Telecom report shows that the carrier committed at least 18,875,324 allegedly illegal acts of interception and modification during its controversial covert “Phorm” trials.

» Read the rest of this entry «

This idea about having a big piss up on the circle line tube train was a good idea, in theory. But it was always going to end in tears, wasn’t it? It was to be expected that some peole would get so lashed that that they would end up spoiling it for everyone else by puking and fighting and general twatish behaviour.

But how the fuck could anyone blame Boris Johnson for coppers get assaulted or tube staff getting spat on?
The Times:

Six Tube stations were closed as thousands of people partied on the Circle Line. There were 17 arrests after four Tube drivers, three other members of staff and two police officers were assaulted. Around 50 staff were said to have been verbally abused or spat at.
…
Bob Crow, the [RMT] general secretary, said: “Johnson should apologise personally to all those who were assaulted and abused last night thanks to a half-baked gimmick designed solely as a publicity stunt and without a moment’s thought for the people told to implement it.

“We warned that it could put our members at greater risk of assault, but there is no comfort in being proved right when Tube workers have been injured and abused.”

What the fuck is he on? That’s the same logic that a rapist uses to justify his actions “she was asking for it, wearing that short skirt”.
Why aren’t you blaming the fuckers who did the spitting and assaulting, Mr Crow? Didn’t they have a choice as to the matter? Were they pressed ganged on the tube that evening? Were they forced fed booze until they lost control? No they weren’t.

They made the choice, they get the blame.

Via Mr Eugenides

Electronic Intifada:

Haaretz.com, the website of the Israeli newspaper often cited as an example of Israel’s liberal, critical media carries paid advertisements from a website openly advocating the total destruction of the Palestinian people, the murder of large numbers of Muslim civilians, the assassination of the family members of Arab rulers, and the use of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons against dozens of countries.

via Lenin, and JSF.

Continuing my extensive coverage of the American elections, I bring you the news that Barack Obama is the Democrats nominee for the presidency.

Either way this was going to be an historic election, with a black man and a woman battling to become a ‘first’ blah blah blah [yawn]…

What starts in America always ends up here.
CNET News:

[Billboards] are still a relic of old-world media, and the best guesses about viewership numbers come from foot traffic counts or highway reports, neither of which guarantees that the people passing by were really looking at the billboard, or that they were the ones sought out.

Now, some entrepreneurs have introduced technology to solve that problem. They are equipping billboards with tiny cameras that gather details about passers-by–their gender, approximate age, and how long they looked at the billboard. These details are transmitted to a central database.

Behind the technology are small start-ups that say they are not storing actual images of the passers-by, so privacy should not be a concern. The cameras, they say, use software to determine that a person is standing in front of a billboard, then analyze facial features (like cheekbone height and the distance between the nose and the chin) to judge the person’s gender and age. So far the companies are not using race as a parameter, but they say that they can and will soon.