Straight To The Point

So Iran has 15 of our soldiers and at the moment there's not a lot we can do about it. Here's a few thoughts:-

* I think we've made our own bed by aligning ourselves with America. And now we're wondering why the international community won't help us?

* I'm not surprised Iran is a bit annoyed. Us saying to them "we can have nuclear weapons but you can't" is unlikely to bring out the best in a country. Why do we think that we're the countries who should be allowed them?

* Guantanamo Bay: If America can hold prisoners for years without trial, how can we complainif Iran does the same thing?

One thing that really annoys me are organisations with completely misleading titles. Like "Accuracy in Media" - ("For Fairness, Balance and Accuracy in News Reporting). Then take a typical report:

AL-JAZEERA PROMOTES GLOBAL TERRORISM

In the same way that Al-Jazeera television has complicated the prospect of a U.S. victory in Iraq, the channel has dramatically increased the Islamic terrorist threat to Israel, helping to produce the war with the Hezbollah terrorist group.

The U.S. and Israel will not be able to win this global war on terrorism unless the role of Al-Jazeera in radicalizing Arabs and Muslims throughout the world is recognized and addressed.

Where's the fairness and balance there?

(From the BBC):

The death of a UK soldier when a US pilot fired on his convoy in Iraq was unlawful, a coroner has ruled.

The Ministry of Defence apologised for a delay in releasing film from the US A-10 plane. It was "very sorry for confusion and upset" caused by the handling of the US cockpit tape. An MoD spokesman said: "This inquest has highlighted the need for a more coherent approach to the management of documentation and evidence."

What??? No! If anything, this has highlighted the fact that the MoD is full of lying bastards who haven't got a shred of honesty or decency among them and couldn't tell the truth if the war on terror depended on it because they are too busy working out ways to waste their billion-pound budgets. Lets just hope no children are watching and might get the idea that this is the way they should act. Respect your elders, kids! Even though most of them are cretins.

(From the BBC) The BBC has apologised for faking the results of a competition on children's programme Blue Peter last November.

I must admit, this has surprised me more than any of the other revelations that TV phone-ins are either rigged or fake. What really galls me is the "casualness" with which lying and deceit has become so acceptable.

How can we expect children to become good citizens when all around them people in power are abusing that power: BBC officials are faking phone-ins; politicians are doing all they can to circumvent the law; concepts such as "sharing" has become bogged down with copyright laws, and injustice is rife. Just browsing the news today, I can see:

* Three men who spent years in jail after being wrongly convicted of murder will have to pay for their prison board and lodgings. [Why promote justice when justice is an ass?]

* The BBC has announced it is suspending its online education service, BBC Jam, pending a review. It follows complaints from commercial online companies; They say the service, designed as a learning resource for children aged five to 16 in support of the national curriculum, damages their businesses. [Oh no! Education is getting in the way of business!]

* Britain's commitment to fighting bribery is to be investigated. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's move is prompted by the UK's decision to drop a probe into defence firm BAE Systems. [Bribery is okay as long as profit is to be made!]

And this is just today. Sad.

Someone has put together an excellent gallery of all the mis/dis/noninformation it presents. It touches on something I've blogged before - news media adding question-marks to their headlines. It's ridiculous; it screams "We don't know the facts, but we'll print anyway and you'll believe it!"

BBC / Yahoo News

Hopefully this will be a snowball the gets bigger and bigger.

(From the BBC)

* 578 council employees were paid more than £100,000 in 2005-6.
* The highest earner was Tom Scholes, chief executive of Renfrewshire Council in Scotland, who received £233,029
* Second was Kent chief executive Peter Gilroy - who earned £229,999
* The total wage bill for those on the list was £72 million - compared to £53 million for those in the same earning bracket in 2004-5.
* That represents a 35% payrise.

How can it be justified that the Government can use our (the taxpayers money) and not tell us how much and on what?

(From Kable) The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) has signed a secrecy clause with Microsoft which prevents it from disclosing the prices schools are paying for software licences.

What possible reason could there be for keeping it a secret how much they are paying Micro$oft? And why is this exempt from "open government"? What's to stop the Government buying, say, a new nuclear defence system, and then saying "we can't tell you how much it cost due to a non-disclosure agreement."

We'll just have to take Becta's word for it that "its licensing agreement with Microsoft establishes significant savings for schools across the UK", as it's confidential how much has been paid.

Does anyone still believe anything the MoD says? The MoD consistently lies, whether it's about Gulf War syndrome or the existence of videos showing friendly fire incidents, and in this case there's no reason to believe it's not lying again.

One thing the American government has never learned is that other countries don't like being interfered with, whether it's bringing down Governments, telling other countries that they shouldn't have nuclear weapons, or just wanting to change another countries law. This is the primary cause of anti-Americanism in the world, but the US Govt will still convince itself that the reason they are hated is "because of our freedom".

But they are at it again. This time it's telling Canada to strengthen its copyright law. And, as with all arguments about piracy, the numbers quoted are ridiculous:-

"It really does cost the Canadian economy a huge amount every year, estimated to be from some 10 to 30 billion (dollars) per year" - US Ambassador David Wilkins

Let's take the average of that quote, 20 billion dollars. The population of Canada is 30 million, so each Canadian is pirating just of $650 dollars worth of material every year? They obviously like their films and music...

You may not be particularly pleased to hear that, just as the Government is trying to cut road cnogestion by charging motorists more, it turns out that the railways may not be able to cope if motorists decide to start using public transport. The Governments message? "Don't travel at all".

What is the point of congestion charging when you don't have a choice other forms of transport? It's typical of the Government's arrogance to tell people they shouldn't travel unless neccessary.