Straight To The Point

If you don't know, the WriteToThem website is a great tool for writing to your MP. You just fill in your details, write your letter, and they do all the boring stuff like post it.

However, I think MPs are getting wise to it, and have started writing "stock" replies to common points. I wrote to my MP, starting with a brief thank-you (one sentence) for voting against the 90-day thingie, but then went on to descibe my dismay at the Extradition Act 2003, which allows them to pick and choose UK citizens and extradite them to America without the usual legal hinderance.

To cut a long story short, my two-page letter simply described his reasons for voting against the 90-day amandment. No mention of any Extradition Act. I'll not be voting Conservative (not that I do anyway) if they won't at least acknowledge my views.

Just because you've bought a book, you don't automatically have the right to read it. More here...

Here's a few choice quotes from this interview with the head of CIA (Porter Goss), just to give you nightmares. He almost answered some questions!


INT: You know what water-boarding is though, right?
GOSS: I know what a lot of things are, but I'm not going to comment.
INT: Would that come under the heading? Would that come under the heading of torture?
GOSS: I don't know.

GOSS: "Let me put it this way, I'm not going to comment on any individual techniques that anybody has brought forward as an allegation"

GOSS: "Well, we are perhaps the gold standard by any measure in terms of human intelligence. You can argue it, but I think when you get through at the end of the day we are the preeminent human intelligence collection agency in the globe."

See the link for more.

US acknowledges Europe concern on 'secret prisons'. So they've acknowledged that there is concern? Who cares whether they "acknowledged that there is concern"? Not acknowledging it would be like denying the sky is blue (thought with CIA's way of changing the meaning of words that's not wholly beyond the realm of logic).

The point is, are they there? And if so, what the hell is going on?

As proclaimed by NewsMax (see the punchline at the very end). Well, that's alright then. Why didn't someone just say so? Let go ahead and use it on everyone.

SO MICRO$OFT has lied again when it said it was opening it's office standards. Unfortunately, those who didn't then follow the story may be under the assumption that Micro$oft was opening it's office standards. As if they would.

However, chances are that many organisations will not have discovered that Micro$oft aren't in fact opening their office standards, and will now view Micro$oft in a more favourible light by niavely assuming Micro$ost was actually going to be open. So by lying, it's helped their business.

Here are a few choice extracts from an article in the Washington Post:-

"We don't torture" means that we don't use worse tactics than CID -- except when we do. Waterboarding (in which a prisoner is made to believe he is drowning) and withholding pain medication for bullet wounds cross the line into torture -- and both have allegedly been used.

A Nov. 18 ABC News report quoted former and current intelligence officers and supervisors as saying that the CIA has a list of acceptable interrogation methods, including soaking naked prisoners with water in 50-degree rooms and making them stand for 40 hours handcuffed and shackled to an eyebolt in the floor. ABC reported that these methods had been used on at least a dozen captured al Qaeda members.

Consider the cases of Abed Hamed Mowhoush and Manadel Jamadi. Mowhoush, an Iraqi general in Saddam Hussein's army, was smothered to death in a sleeping bag by U.S. interrogators in western Iraq. Jamadi, a suspected bombmaker, whose ice-packed body was photographed at Abu Ghraib, was seized and roughed up by Navy SEALS in Iraq, then turned over to the CIA for questioning. At some point during this process, according to an account in the New Yorker magazine, someone broke his ribs; then he was hooded and underwent "Palestinian hanging" until he died.

What's the definition of a terrorist anyway? We (the "coalition") kill civilians, torture people, don't stick to the Geneva Convention. What's left to separate us?

What makes public sector workers so special that they don't have to retire at the same age as the rest of us?

Attorney General Lord Goldsmith has warned newspaper editors against publication of the memo describing George W. Bush speculating about a bombing raid on Al Jazeera world headquarters in Doha, Qatar and other Al Jazeera locations , citing the Official Secrets Act. It's obvious to see why they don't want this memo to be read, but it's just another example of government secrecy.

Look no further. I've posted the question here before "how come radio station only play signed bands?" I think the best answer I came up with is for convenience (i.e. only having one point of contact to sort out the legal issues with the bands). But, needless to say, there is a more sinister answer - they bribe the radio stations. Why should record companies have the monopoly on airplay?

So Bush wanted to bomb Al-Jazeera? It wouldn't have been the first time the colation forces had actually attacked media correspondants they didn't like.

So what was the point of the 90-day vote, when there are thousands of people already imprisoned for more than 90 days?

It now seems pretty much acceptable to use torture in America. Here the techniques used are described, and here the Wall Street Journal tells us why its okay. So this is what the world has come to?

The price of passports has gone up, as has the security behind them. Call me a cynic, but if this happens again and again, several times over, aren't we effectively left with an ID card?

According to this report, the United States has detained more than 83,000 foreigners in the 4-year-old war on terror, and roughly 14,500 detainees remain in custody, primarily in Iraq.

Probably not, as the Government will still try and push it through. However, when the ex-head of MI5 says they're not going to help, how can you argue against that? What precisely does the government want ID cards for?

So the pro-war brigade in America is coming out on the offensive regarding charges that it was wrong to go to war. Their reasons are simple

1) It's difficult (though not impossible) to argue against the fact the Iraq is probably a slightly better place since Saddam left.

2) It draws attention away from the fact that it's not the reasons we went to war that's the problem, but the dog's-dinner-of-a-way it's being fought.

A few recent highlights:-
Prison abuse
More deaths today
Illegal (for everyone except the American army) weapons being used.

Okay, it's a bit of a 6-trick (and counting) pony, but how often do they seem to alter the meaning of words just to fit their arguments?

They call it... Everyone else calls it:-

Enemy Combatant: POW
Legal Weapon: Illegal Weapon
Unpatriotic: Liberal
Not Classified as a Chemical Weapon: Chemical Weapon
Collateral Damage: Killing people on your own side
Acceptable Target: Civilian
Geneva Convention: A jokebook.
Enhanced interrogation: Torture

From the BBC:

Charles Clarke has ordered the extradition of Babar Ahmad to the US to face trial on alleged terrorism offences, the Home Office has said. Mr Ahmad, 31, a computer expert from Tooting, London, is accused of running websites that supported terrorists and urged Muslims to fight a holy war.

So now our government offers us no protection from America, when the American authorities want to charge us for crimes that we may have committed in this country, and have no direct connection to America on any way? Normally I can relax when I hear about the restrictions on freedom going on in America, knowing that I live in England. But what does this mean?

And I thought we didn't extradite to countries that used toture to interrogate prisoners?

[More:]

I Just noticed this on the BBC report as well:

The extradition order comes under UK legislation designed to speed up the extradition of suspected terrorists, which came into force in January 2004.

Under the act there is no requirement for the US authorities to present a prima facie case, although UK authorities must do so in seeking extraditions from the US.

It's all one-way traffic then.

.. because we made them legal!"

(or rather, we never made them illegal). Washington is not a signatory of an international treaty restricting the use of white phosphorus devices, so they're free to use them and still claim they're not using illegal weapons. Of course, they still denied using the weapons, but had to correct themselves when they got discovered (see the November 10th edit towards the bottom).

Maybe, but its a close-run thing with things like this happening. And it's not like we can trust coalition forces to tell the truth about what's going on.

Some people were held without charge for 13 days in Iran.

If Blair had got his way, in Britain they could have been locked up for 90 days!

Proving even more how ridiculous patents are, even Henry Ford had trouble.

To summarise, someone else patented the car, but had no intention of ever actually building one, just an idea to collect fees from those who did. It was only after a costly 7 year court battle that it was finally overturned. Is this what patents are for?

I noticed this quote in the Dover District's Biology Curriculum:

Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design. Note: Origins of life will not be taught.

(My emphasis added). Hmm, I wonder why that is? Maybe it's because students will be too busy laughing when they are told that they decended from Adam and Eve, who's children had incestuous sex with each other, who's children then had sex with all their cousins (and so on). Maybe there is a God - we'd have needed a miracle to stop us all turning out deformed.

This is all obviously ridiculous - even some sensible Christians know this.

At least one god thing came out of the ID vote in Kansas, USA. This quote from Lee Hildebrencht is a classic:

"It's a step in the right direction," the 69-year-old retired postal worker said, adding that he believed in the biblical version of creation. "How is it possible we're descended from apes?"

Yes. Almost as unbelievable as the theory that we're all descended from Adam and Eve and their pet talking snake.

I was just about to fill in the mountain of forms I received from Hastings to take up their car insurance, when I spotted something in the small print. It basically went along the lines of:

"For your protection, we reserve the right to automatically renew your car insurance at the end of the period unless you tell us not to."

"For my protection"?? Ha. This kind of thing just makes me angry. I only asked for one years car insurance, not a lifetime. What would it be like if every company we ever bought something from did this? Life's complicated enough without having to keep track of every single thing you buy and making sure your not going to be sold it again unless you contact the company again (which normally involves wasted time in a phone queue). Its another example of companies getting money out of people by deception. I'm sure they'd say something along the lines of "it's for your convenience". If so, why not ask me instead of inflicting it upon me?

In the end I went with Tesco. It took about 10 mins from start to finish, and was only about a tenner more.

Did you know that cabinet ministers receive £18,000 pounds when they leave the job, even if they resign or are sacked?

This means that David Blunkett has received £36,000 so far this year just for being sacked twice. This is on top of his £133,000 salary.

Even if George Galloway is guilty, what's worse - making money from selling oil, or making money from selling weapons?

Still, I'm sure he'll get over it (he's had practise) and we'll probably see him back in the cabinet again anyway. After all, this is Blairs government, where resigned over indiscretions is only temporary.

What if restaurants were allowed to copyright recipes?

If you look at all the free open standards in the world, the ones we take for granted - TV, the web, the telephone, electricity - what would the world be like if these were patented?