Straight To The Point

Death isn't the only outcome for a soldier or civilian in Iraq, but you would think so given that the number of deaths is the only thing that seems to be reported.

More pictures here, until the US Government bans them. How can it claim to run a democracy when it prevents it's population from knowing the truth?

(From The Guardian) - For every 200 police officers who are caught speeding or jumping red lights last year, only 1 was punished. There were 90,480 offences captured on film. This compares to 80% of ordinary motorists. Only a quarter were on an emergency call.

So while the police are preaching to us about the dangers of speeding, and fining people who go 2mph over the speed limit, they are quite happy to break the law themselves and escape with no punishment.

Perhaps the most shocking figures were those of Thames Valley Police. More than 4,000 of its police cars were captured on camera speeding or jumping red lights, but not one officer was issued with a fixed penalty ticket. They were quashed by senior police who have the discretion to make tickets disappear.

Figures were unavailable for 15 of the 43 police forces nationwide.

Of course it was - because the people were given duff information. WMD's? 45 minutes? What do we believe now?

The gall and greed of Paul Wolfowitz, President of the World Bank, is astounding. After his role in securing a pay rise for his partner, Shaha Riza, who used to work at the bank, he and his lawyer are arguing:-

* "Mr Wolfowitz will not resign under this cloud," - Er, people don't normally resign when things are going well do they? It's because of this cloud that he should resign.

* It was reported that he wanted the board to agree to accept some of the blame for the scandal relating to his girlfriend's pay rise. - The only mistake the board made was putting him in charge in the first place.

* "You still have the opportunity to avoid long-term damage by resolving this matter in a fair and equitable way that recognises that we all tried to do the right thing," Mr Wolfowitz said in a statement. - The world bank is trying to do the right thing and get rid of him. What's the "right thing" that Paul ever did?


Why can't people accept that they were wrong and get rid? Why do they have to go down fighting, throwing baseless accusations at everyone else?

You must have read/seen it. And I can understand why he got angry - what else was he supposed to do? The Scientologist "robot" that was talking at the Panorama Reporter didn't even seem to need to breath: it was just a long constant stream of biased self-opinion and unconstructive criticism. Even when the reporter was shouting at him, he didn't even stop or blink or breath. If the reporter hadn't done what he did, he'd still be listening to him even now.

If he's atypical in that he doesn't think that one of the major causes of 9/11 was because America has been interfering in the Middle East, then there's no hope for ever stopping the self-propogating "war on terror". Thankfully Ron Paul has some common sense: "if we think that we can do what we want around the world and not incite hatred, then we have a problem."

(From Harpers) Surely all of them can't be terrorists? Anyway, I'm sure this won't incite any of them to try and exact any revenge on the West...

On the face of it, Tesco's idea of putting a label on all products showing the percentage of RDA that the product has, in 5 broad categories, like "salt", "fat" etc...

However, the devil is in the detail. I noticed that on the side of their baked beans, the wording actually says "one quarter of this can will provide you with...". One quarter? Who has one quarter of a can? And for a double-whammy, the salt content was 22% of RDA in just that quarter of a can! So when I have beans on toast (with the whole can), the beans alone are 88% of my RDA of salt. Along with the salt in the bread, that's well over 100%.

In Tesco's defence, Heinz and Branston had just as much salt in their beans. However, no more beans on toast for me.

1. A police state and the threat of ID cards.
2. A continuing massacre in Iraq.
3. The smell of corruption.
4. A violent gun-heavy society, including the police.
   
5. The blur between guilt and innocence (ASBOs).
6. More chance of being attacked by terrorists than before.

Finally I'll be able to go to the pub and come out and not have to put my clothes straight into a washing machine, thanks to the smell of stale nicotine that permeates every thread.

Hopefully soon after that, the ban will be extended to cover the outdoors, then ignorant smokers will be forced to throw their stubs onto their carpets rather than the road or pavements.

Hey smokers! Just because the cigs cost you a fortune, they still count as litter when you throw it out your car window.

(Update - I re-titled this article cos Jim Gamble is defending the ruining of peoples lives).

These days, everybody has heard of credit card fraud. Except the police investigating child pornorgraphy.

According to the BBC, Lawyers and computer experts have told BBC Radio 4's The Investigation that many of those arrested may have been innocent victims of credit card fraud. Many were investigated purely because their credit card had been used. Nothing was found on their computers.

Didn't it strike the police that people who download child porn might also be the less-than-perfect individuals who might indulge in credit card fraud? Surely these people aren't stupid enough to use their own credit card.

Jim Gamble, chief executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre and former head of the national crime squad, defended the record of the operation and told the programme that more than 90% of the individuals tracked by police had pleaded guilty. Translation: "Only 10% of people may have been innocent, so it's not that bad. But I'm only guessing". Apart from the fact the about 60 people have committed suicide as well. No doubt Jim would say that's because they knew they were guilty.

UPDATE (From the BBC article):
If you were falsely accused of purchasing child pornography, and were given the choice of admitting guilt and accepting a caution, or be exposed in the publicity of a trial, what would you do?

"One of those cases was Richard's. He was arrested in the Midlands for a single credit card transaction. Richard did use adult pornography, but no child pornography was found on his computers.

He maintained his innocence, but did not want to expose himself to the publicity of a trial where his friends and family would find out about the allegation.

So, like 600 others in the Ore enquiry, he accepted a caution. This meant admitting his guilt and being placed on the sex offenders register.

"The prospect of a trial with all the publicity in the local paper and your name being known was much more frightening than accepting the caution," he says.

Also, it gets worse:

David Campbell is a solicitor who has dealt with around a 100 Operation Ore cases. "I've had clients who have had to agree not to live at home, not to have access to their children - there was no evidence to prosecute them or that they were a danger to their own children," he says.

Still, Jim "Thicko" Gamble see's nothing wrong with this:

The police admit they have made mistakes, but Mr Gamble stands by what Operation Ore has achieved.

He says: "Let people who are paid to make those judgements, who are trained to make those judgements, make a finding. Thus far, the findings have been massively in our favour."

Isn't there some phrase along the lines of "Better for a guilty man to go free than imprison an innocent man."? Maybe someone should give Jim "Scarily he was formerly head of the national crime squad" Gamble a clue. And then ask him why he joined the police in the first place and didn't just become a bouncer or something if he just wanted to ruin peoples lives.