New details emerge in UK terror plot- The Times of India

New details emerge in UK terror plot- The Times of India: "LONDON: On August 9, in a small second-floor apartment in East London, two young Muslim men recorded a video justifying what the police say was their suicide plot to blow up trans-Atlantic planes: revenge against the United States and its 'accomplices,' Britain and the Jews.

'As you bomb, you will be bombed; as you kill, you will be killed,' said one of the men on a 'martyrdom' videotape, whose contents were described by a senior British official and a person briefed about the case. The young man added that he hoped God would be 'pleased with us and accepts our deed.' "

Interesting thing is that if you try and get this information from the UK, it is blocked. Something to do with legal obfustication I suppose. The Indian media does not seem to have the same problem. I think it is a little weird that I cannot read something about my own country's problems but can get it 'through the back-door'. Another example of an Indian call-centre I suppose.

Goin' To School

Grouchy Old Cripple: Goin' To School:
Class available for adults.
"Class 1. How To Fill Up The Ice Cube Trays --- Step by Step, with Slide Presentation.
Meets 4 weeks, Monday and Wednesday for 2 hours beginning at 7:00 PM."
Some suggestions for those of us who never really figured out this living alone business.

Shot at Dawn - further thoughts

Pardons for 'cowards' condemned - Newspaper Edition - Times Online: "The decision by the Government to pardon Private Harry Farr and the other 304 soldiers executed for cowardice and desertion in the First World War has been attacked by a leading psychiatrist."
Somewhat gratifying to see that my opinion has the support of someone far better qualified; just wish I could get paid for my drivel.

Can't park there love

Rio man saws woman in half over parking dispute - Yahoo! News UK: "RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (Reuters) - A street parking attendant in Brazil's crime-ridden city of Rio de Janeiro was charged with sawing a woman in two over a parking space dispute, police said on Wednesday."

She should have driven off before he wrote the ticket!

Public Service Announcement

The right to determine one's life has attracted a good deal of attention over the past couple of months. I have a fear that I shall end my days plugged into a 13 amp electrical socket like some condom vending machine. From that background I have devised a form of living will. Short but, I think, all encompassing.

I have made this declaration at a time when I am of sound mind and after careful consideration. I understand that my life may be shortened by the refusals of treatment in this form. I accept the risk that I may not be able to change my mind in the future when I am no longer able to speak for myself, and I accept the risk that improving medical technology may offer increased hope, but I personally consider the risk of unwanted treatment to be a greater risk. I want it to be known that I fear degradation and indignity far more than death. I ask my medical attendants to bear this in mind when considering what my intentions would be in any uncertain situation.

If the time comes when I can no longer communicate, this declaration shall be taken as a testament to my wishes regarding medical care.

If it is the opinion of medical care team that there is no reasonable prospect of my recovery from severe physical illness, or from impairment expected to cause me severe distress or render me incapable of rational existence, then I direct that I be allowed to die and not be kept alive by artificial means such as life support systems, tube feeding, antibiotics, resuscitation or blood transfusions: any treatment which has no benefit other than a mere prolongation of my existence should be withheld or withdrawn, even if it means my life is shortened. I already have a Do Not Resuscitate directive in my medical documents and on a MediAlert-type tag that I wear. I accept basic care however and I do request aggressive palliative care, drugs or any other measures to keep me free of pain or distress, even if they shorten my life.

I wish the following person to be consulted in the event of uncertainty about my wishes. My wife, Catherine Norma Wood (nee Robinson)

Written by me, John Samuel WOOD, born 15 August 1933. http://snipurl.com/kyyi

There may be some who think they would find comfort in this sort of thing but have shrunk from the sort of soul search that goes with it. Feel free to copy. There may also be readers who can find a potential problem with the wording - comment away please.

Win Win Warfare

How Israel won on the battlefield against Hezballah and lost in the media and why it's important to America: "This was perhaps both the most cynical and barbaric disregard for innocent civilian lives of all of Hezballah's and Iran's strategic choices. It was also the most successful. It was predicated not on its knowledge of its enemy (Israel) but its true genius lay in its knowledge of the press. The calculus was simple: launch a rocket from within a civilian population; if you kill Jews that's a victory. If the Jews hit back and in so doing kill Lebanese civilians, that's a victory. If they don't hit back because they're afraid to hit civilians, that's a victory. Now repeat the process until you kill so many Jews they have to hit back and in so doing kill more Lebanese civilians. That's the ultimate victory, because they know that in striking just those chords exactly what music the press will play. The awful truth, which the Western Press was manipulated to ignore or downplay, was that Iran, through its terrorist operational arm Hezballah, had invaded Lebanon from within. Hezballah did not protect Lebanon, they occupied it and they used those Hezballah occupied territories to launch Iran's offensive in response to the West's ultimatum to cease development of nuclear weapons."

That comes from an assessment by a IDF officer. Israel is now facing a much more sophisticated enemy. HB is not a rag tag terrorist organisation. It is a trained - and skilfull - Army that uses terrorist methods.

This you have to see!

The stud is 24 years old. She is, allegedly, 84 years of age. The music is dire - turn volume way down before going to see what I am writing about

My real interest is just what they get up to in private - and how?

Catch 22

I was thinking of something today as a "Catch 22" situation and realised that I had lost the full definition. When the novel was new, it was a rite of passage to have read it and be able to engage in the circular reasoning that is typifies.

This is a public service. "Catch 22" is repeated here for those who may never have explored it or whose memory is getting a bit fuzzy at the edges. Let us hope that that tosser B Liar never discovers it or we will be off down more of his avenues of fractured reasoning.

There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to.

Centers on Air Force procedure during WW2 that one was rotated after a certain number of combat missions. After having flown the stated number of flights, one could claim the rotation. If one did not claim, active service flights continued.

NiceNice from TalkTalk

I spoke about my frustrations with the ISP people TakTalk and the ongoing problems.

Writing to the Head Honcho seems to have worked. Received today a letter apologising for all the annoyance. Best bit was that they have waived the £70 'disconnection'

Tell me please!

Where was this poster maker when I needed him?

Bogey-man exposed

English Russia » Photos made in Moscow subway

Are these inhabitants of a country of whom we were so scared that we went to extraordinary lengths to keep them, at least, quiet.

The London Underground - when last I had to enter the bowels of that hell on earth - may lack the grandiose architecture but the worst we seem to endure is Boy George or Adam Ant clones.

The heat goes on..

A TANGLED WEB: IGNORE THE AID DONORS...: "Millions of dollars are apparently 'urgently needed to help Lebanon back to its feet after its bombardment by Israel, aid agencies have urged international donors.'

Governments and international organisations are gathering in Sweden to pledge money to rebuild the country, with $500m (£260m) the target. Oxfam said the bombing campaign had ruined Lebanon's agricultural sector.

I just love the bias in that first sentence, taken from the BBC news site.

First of all, the inference that Lebanon was bombarded by Israel. Wrong. Those parts of Lebanon that were being used by the terrorist group Hezbollah were bombarded by Israel, and rightly so. The fact that Hezbollah cowards dug in around civilian structures is a problem of Hezbollah's making."

Just one of the bits floating around now which ignore the current situation and retreat back to long-held prejudices. The most recent events have been overeshadowed by this sort of diatribe more suited to the playground of a primary school.

The problem I see is that whilst this dinosaur attitude pertains, there will be no progress on the Israel/Palestine problem. I still cannot think that there will be any great advance - one is never going to see eye to eye with, for example, someone who denies them their very right to live in peace to the extent of calling for them to be wiped off the face of the earth. There has to be some solution short of total resolution that brings peace and stability there.

No - I don't know what. If I had that sort of intellect, I'd be sitting where you are at the time you read this. Sure as hell, rhetoric like my quoted site will do nothing positive.

1st edit - read this to see how corrosive this attitude can be

2 Egyptians Use Shoehorn to Dig Tunnel Under Russian Border - NEWS - MOSNEWS.COM

2 Egyptians Use Shoehorn to Dig Tunnel Under Russian Border - NEWS - MOSNEWS.COM: "Two Egyptian citizens have managed to violate the Russian state border by digging a tunnel under the barbed wire fence with a simple shoehorn. After getting lost on the territory of Poland the Egyptians performed the trick for the second time and got back to Russia to face arrest. "

What comment is needed!

A TANGLED WEB: First past the Post

A TANGLED WEB: First past the Post: Looks as if I have a doppelganger out there?
"We all know that we could do a better job than the bunch in power; that’s human nature! But please, please, someone tell me that there are trustworthy politicians somewhere, who will put themselves forward so we can elect a crew who at least can keep their bloody promises to a waiting electorate?"
More stregth to his elbow say I.

The First Post : Return of the failed statesman

The First Post : Return of the failed statesman.
This about sums it up for me. Sad and disgraceful but there should really be enough who were able to see just what a untruthful fraud anything-for-a-result charlatan he really is.
Sad thing is that I do not see anyone - Socialist or Conservative - that stands any chance of returning things where my country has the status it deserves.

What is going on there?

The Neworlens saga rolls on. At the time, I considered it to be such an overwhelming natural event that no sort of planning or real-time rescue operation would have achieved much. Then came stories of clear incompetence and naff protection from levees. I soon realised that I was so far out of the loop on information that it was not possible to have any hard and fast opinion on during- and post-Katrina events. It was also about this time that I came across the vast 9/11 Conspiracy empire and that grabbed most of my spare time (and a lot more since). Here, my interest lies in the way that facts are interpreted and seemingly unconnected events are used to support what seems to be a genuine belief amongst a lot of people that not all is known. Not all written in BLOCK CAPITALS, underlined a couple of times and written in green ink. One of the things I concluded about the flood was that all would be set to rights.

I see America as a nation with vast resources of material, money and sheer human drive towards the achievement of goals. I had always considered that what USA wanted, USA got. Not always by the neatest and most polite way but still, at the end, the aim was met. This came from being lucky enough to have been let loose from the Corporate waistcoat on my American visits but also from working with a US oil company at a time when the British North Sea exploration and recovery was at its height. My favourite line from my VP was “Throw money at it John” when a really tough problem arose. My own government has this money-tossing syndrome (NHS computer service anyone?) but they seem to take the moola directly to the drain without ever pouring it over the problem.

So, I am baffled when I see the TV reports reflecting the state of Katrina-land today. We saw pictures of circumstances that Saddam Hussein might have engineered in Iraq pre-2003. Here, surely, was something big enough for Dubya to make a major impact on his (apparently – I’m not going to get into that discussion) dwindling support. All it needed was money thrown at it with some good supervision. Yes – I have heard of corruption but we knew of the venal nature of the locals just a few days after the water came up so should have been ready to stop recovery money being siphoned off.  I don’t see it as a ‘poor deprived blacks again’ scenario as the failure to do much/anything seems to cut across racial divides. Doubtless, there have been victories somewhere but I saw Neworlens as exactly the situation that America, to my mind, dealt with. Sheer brute force deployed to a clear end game.

I’d like to be able to tie down an opinion and cause for the situation as it is reported today. I reckon other things will get in the way. I’ve just started planning for our 50th Wedding Anniversary in July next year and that should keep me amused. Seems a shame that inhabitants of a great country don’t have a better life though……………..

UN Forces?

Just as the political correctness crowd have changed our Police Force into Police Service, my guest blog indicates to me that we should change UN Forces into UN Services. Don't want any of that nasty old suggestion of force being used do we?

Wonder if the Coffee Onan will visit during his Lebanese jolly?

TODAY'S GUEST BLOG
Just to show what the blind eye does not see

I think he's got it!

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a TV interview aired Sunday that he would not have ordered the capture of two Israeli soldiers if he had known it would lead to such a war.Hezbollah guerrillas killed three Israeli soldiers and seized two more in a cross-border raid July 12, which sparked 34 days of fighting that ended Aug. 14. Five other Israeli soldiers were killed as they pursued the militants back into Lebanon."We did not think, even 1 percent, that the capture would lead to a war at this time and of this magnitude.

So, it seems that even Islamic terrorists/leaders of freedom fighters (dual description so as to not offend the bleeding heart-ists), can learn.  Al  I hope is that the forces of law and order can also see the light and react to any threat with the highest possible level of aggression. None of this ‘minimal force’ or ‘negotiation’ rubbish. Hit them hard and hit them often seems to work.

In lieu of blogging

During my enforced absence from the blogging action I sustained myself with trying some creative writing. There are many resources that will assist in this – mainly classes at night school or directed learning by post. I did not think I wanted to go down these routes. After all, I’d written police reports for years, drawn up business proposals and handled complicated business correspondence. My vocabulary seemed adequate.

I chose to write about a group of women Quilters. This is a sub-class of posh ladies who gather together and make quilts. They contain the sort of female that one might find at a Womens’ Institute. For American readers, think Junior League members.
I had an insight into their world as my wife is a Quilter and assiduous attendant at the gatherings of a local coven as well as travelling on visits to other Ladies Who Quilt.
My unique selling point however, was to write about a Quilt group as a gathering of lesbians. The meetings were a cover for their conduct. I saw their association and friendships as the sisterly representation of the lesbian ethos. No nasty physical stuff really. I quite enjoyed drawing up the plot list and characters I thought would be involved. We showed the early work to a selected few whom we thought might see the joke and it went down well. I’m going to continue and might even get into publishing it. It has struck me that the gay boys Brotherhood has penetrated (if I may use that word) the TV soap world but so far no one has chanced their arm with lesbian themes so there might be some interest there.