HEMP - REDISCOVERING THE WONDER DRUG

SPINELESS LABOUR MPs? -YOU BET THEY ARE

For most of my life i have regarded the Daily Mail as a reactionary, right wing shit stirring rag nut now, when I am certainly old enough to know better I must confess I am beginning to agree with its stance on many issues. The warning signs have been there for a while now. As a life long Private Eye reader I tended to rely on Lord Gnomes organ for for both news and laughs. After all, the Guardian which i grew up to associate with detailed news coverage and balance lost its credibility for me in the 80s when it grassed up a Cruise Missile whistle blower to Inspector Knacker after only a little pressure from the Government. More recently the BBC has lost its credibility following the Kelly affair as it too caved in on a variety of issues, surrendering its independence for the sake of a Guaranteed license fee money supply which the Government has now reneged on.

Today, I read the Mails article on Gary McKinnon, the low grade hacker and Aspergers sufferer whose only real problem was his obsession with UFOs and suspicion of American Military and Governmental cover up. Armed only with a bog standard computer and on a dial up link he apparently managed to access a wide variety of military and Pentagon web sites and computers. Of course his job was made easy because many of them did not even have an active password to protect them. This was far too embarrassing for Uncle Sam, particularly following the 911 attacks and the widespread paranoia so McKinnon has been charged with every offence they could find from causing "tens of thousands of pounds worth of damage to Government defence systems." (this would be most unlikely as all he did was look, he wasn't messing with code) to crapping on the White House Lawn, or so it seemed. What a travesty of justice there is in this world when the McKinnons of this world suffer so yet scumbags like W Bush and Tony Blair walk free.

There is of course a million to one chance that he did stumble on some officially hidden pictures of UFOs which would blow the Yanks out of the water after years of cover ups and conspiracy theories from professional Ufologists, but somehow i think not. I became interested myself in UFOs in the early 70s and read all the books and soaked up all the theories. It quickly became obvious to me that the vast majority of UFOs were actually misperceptions, another large chunk were apparently new Air Force hardware being tested and another large chunk were actually things such as Earthlights. The small number of genuinely mysterious and unexplainable sightings were it seemed to me electro-magnetic in nature. They could move and manouvre at incredible speeds and seemed to have no mass. They were able to leave behind even the fastest and newest US jets and rockets and many though not all, did not even show up on radar.

There are some genuine mysteries even mentioned in the US Air Force official Blue Book investigation and these are always worth reexamination using the latest tech and data. But, the real secret that was kept from the public was not what they were or were not but rather that the Air Force simply did not know, and, having decided that they did not present an immediate threat to national security they decided on a mums the word policy and the UFOs and those who chased them were usually debunked and humiliated, irrespective of their individual reliability and expertise. McKinnon, unlike the flying saucers he sought was comparatively easy to find and therefore a convenient scapegoat for the Americans total computer incompetence.

As many have said of him. He did a valuable service to the USA by exposing the holes in their computer systems big enough to fly a Mother Ship through. Aspergers Syndrome is a disability and to desire to sentence him to decades in the clearly vicious and inhumane penal system is a travesty of Justice.

Many people have campaigned to have McKinnon set free or at least charged with a minimal offence and maybe given help rather than a prison sentence and until recently many MPs apparently agreed and wished to see him not sent sent to the USA where justice costs even more than it does here and is probably completely outside the means of this rather ordinary man. Worst of all is to see this bunch of MPs turn from democratic believers in justice and freedom to a bunch of weak lilly livered cocksuckers and arslickers as soon as the PM, or the Home Sec or the Chief Whip clicked his fingers. What a bunch of shits they are. Possibly to fight McKinnons corner would actually expose them to some real work or principals, all of which is thin on the ground in Westminster nowadays, where the real task is to trouser as much dosh as they can in expenses, or to accept money and privileged from organisations which directly conflict with their offcial positions, like for instance that little lickspittle, Andy Burnham.

As a life-long labour voter i find i can no longer even contemplate voting for any of them with only a handful of noble exceptions. They have let down the Party system which was never in good health anyway, and the rest of the country who believed in democracy. Worst of all they have let down the poorest in our society, the ones who really needed some help and who stayed loyal to Labour through the darkest days of the Thatcher reign. All of this was wasted as the poor, the disabled, the sick and the elderly were sold down the river. Shame on Tony B Liar, Gordon Brown and the rest of the rag-bag or opportunists and bottom feeders.

I only wish i had met Gary McKinnon some years ago, possibly i would have been able to divert him from flying saucers and conspiracies to some genuine leading edge research into EM phenomena like the Meadon Vortex, or Plasma. Perhaps i could have give him a copy of John Keele's excellent book, "Operation Trojan Horse" which explains the whole gamut of UFOs, and other varied occult phenomenon in a very readable yet concise fashion. It could save you and many others on this path a lot of time and brain cells.

SLOW FOOD INTERNATIONAL

Slow Food is a non-profit, eco-gastronomic member-supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of local food traditions and people’s dwindling interest in the food they eat, where it comes from, how it tastes and how our food choices affect the rest of the world.To do that, Slow Food brings together pleasure and responsibility, and makes them inseparable.Today, we have over 100,000 members in 132 countries.

OH WHAT AN UGLY WAR!

I was one of the many millions in this country who opposed the Iraq war and of course the Afghanistan war. I was never convinced that Sadam Hussein was more than a minor irritant. Vicious, brutal and power mad he may have been but he was only ever in the second division when it came to dictators and despite his many faults, many of the Iraqi people liked him. His kind of "strong leadership" is popular in much of the Middle East or at least they often profess to do so. And anyway, lets not forget, he was the West's boy. We put him there, we armed him and kept him there. When he went to war against Iran he used weapons of mass destruction that we in the West had provided against Iran. Little wonder that there is such suspicion of the current motives of the UK by the Iranian leader, the Man inna dinner jacket. Tens of thousands of Iranians were killed by weapons supplied by the USA and Britain.

I have never perceived any real Glory in war. Death, mutilation, starvation, refugees, innocent bystanders, cruelty humiliation and torture for sure, but no glory and as usual, the first victim of the war was truth. And if ever lies were a weapon of mass destruction then Tony B Liar was the very effective delivery system. We all saw him posturing in Parliement, then posturing with W Bush and even eventually, posturing and posing for photo ops with "our brave boys" out in Iraq. For me and many others this was the final straw from Blair. He had let down the Labour party and all those who remained loyal during the lean times the Beast Thatcher, then when in power he had let down all those who had voted for him, making the mistake that this time, this politician would be different. Alas it was not to be, he carried on with Thatchers policies of privatisation and market freedom, and paid only lip service to the Environment. Talk is cheap and never cheaper than when he lied in order to go to war to help his Champanzee friend Bush.

Now before you get the wrong idea about me, i must stress that i am not a Peacenik. I have had several soldier friends and i have always respected them for their courage and the difficult choices they made. I believe that we should have an Army because who else would defend us if we were attacked or threatened. Certainly not the likes of Bush unless we had oil of course. And if we have an army, we should train them well in peacekeeping as well as warmaking. We should clothe and equip them to the highest standerd possible and we should not send them into danger for trivial reasons.

Sadly we have let them down, or at least the likes of Blair and Brown have let them down. We sent them into battle in Iraq for no reason other than a pack of lies and exaggerations. We skimped on body armour and all kinds of weaponry. We over stretched them individually and regimentally. We expected miracles when we knew they were only flesh and blood. We sent them against an invisible enemy, strong and secure in its own territory and then feighned shock and surprise when they were injured and killed in their hundreds. Shame on you Blair the warmonger and Brown the apologist

You cannot win a war against a people who you have invaded and overun even when people are killed by the hundreds of thousands. Sooner or later they will repay the complement and gain strenghth and allies who will join them in their hatred and quest for vengeance. Bush and Blair and their ilk have made the USA and the UK hated in the middle east and lowered our reputation in many other parts of the world and made us a target. And all for the sake of oil which does not belong to us.

It would be nice to think that now we and the Americans are leaving Iraq, the country could get back to normal but I have my doubts. And now that are concentrating all our force on Afghanistan we will only compound our mistakes. Britain tried long ago to subdue Afghanistan and despite our power and weaponry we failed abysmally. Even the monster that is or at least was the Russian Red Army, the biggest military power in the world could not bring them to heal. How can we in the UK or the USA think that we have the secret which the previous invaders lacked? How can we think that we can ever really win? Its time to get out now, not next year but now.

BAD PHORM

An email from my Leeds correspondent alerts me to a morsel of good news as published on the BBC News Web Site. UK internet service provider TalkTalk has pulled the plug on its agreement with online behaviour tracking firm Phorm.
It follows news earlier in the week that BT had no immediate plans to use the service.

Phorm has developed technology which collects information on web use in order to better target adverts but it has proved extremely controversial.
The loss of its key partners saw Phorm's shares tumble by more than 50%.
TalkTalk's plans were not as advanced as BT which had undertaken three trials of the technology.

"The directors note that this relationship had not extended to any form of trial in contrast to BT and some international internet service providers," a statement from Phorm read. It also noted that "privacy was not a factor" in BT's decision to pull the plug on the technology. (Yeah Right!)

Surprise surprise, Virgin Media, which also expressed interest in the system, was still reviewing it, according to Phorm. Phorm is also currently trialling its software with South Korea's largest ISP and is in discussion about the use of the technology with ISPs in 15 other countries.

I first came across this outfit a couple of years back when BBC's "You and Yours" carried an item about them and their activities. There was much concern amongst some journalists and technorati that although this info gathering technology was theoretically anonymous, it could actually be used to gather much more than merely marketing info. As if we needed any more surveillance in this septic isle.

As i was just switching from the rapidly sinking AOL to BT i was concerned that I was literally leaping from the frying pan into the fire. I contacted BT by phone and spoke to a few of their staff, none of whome claimed to know anything about Phorm or its activities. I did warn them that if they went ahead with plans to use it for info gathering it would be Sayanora from me and probably many more of its customers. They of course promised to get back to me but never did. (Bad Buggers, BT),

I can only surmise that their plans were greeted by much opprobrium amongst their customers and that this outweighed the perceived beneifts. No doubt it would have course also fallen fowl of the Credit Crunch as BTs plans to dump 10% of its staff this year confirms. A funny name Phorm, seems that they have left the F Off, and glad I am that they did.

MORE SPIN ABOUT ID CARDS, VOLUNTARY MEANS YOU WILL HAVE TO HAVE ONE

The ID scheme has NOT been shelved, cancelled, or even significantly changed ** Once more government spin has triumphed and much of the media has got it wrong. The new Home Secretary Alan Johnson has not made any significant changes to the scheme. Compulsion by stealth is still the order of theday, just as it always was. Someone joining the ID scheme 'voluntarily' will still be placing control of their identity in the hands of the IPS for life. The Home Office line remains the same.

No compulsion (as the Home Office defines it) was going to be applied until almost everyone had 'volunteered' and then it was only a matter of rounding up a minority of resisters and marginalised people. The Home Office's idea of "voluntary" is not the same as yours and mine. Since 2004 the scheme was (and it still is) to proceed by "designating" one-by-one under the Identity Cards Act 2006 other documents issued byofficial bodies -- in the first place passports.

Once a document has been designated, you won't be able to apply for one without also applying to be entered, for life, on the national identity register. If you don't agree to be registered it won't be that you are refused (say) a passport; you'd have voluntarily decided not to apply. There's no compulsion to have a passport. It is useful for travelling. But you aren't compelled to travel. Or (say) to drive. Or to work as a security guard. Or with children. Or in healthcare. To get parole from prison. To practice as a lawyer. ...Any official licence, registration certificate or permit can be designated, and -- in the home office's skewed logic -- handing control of your identity to the Home Office's Identity and Passport Service will still be entirely voluntary.

That they were due for a confrontation with the air side worker's unions over designating new passes at Manchester and City Airports is an illustration of just how voluntary "voluntary" really is. But the fact they have now ducked that fight for political convenience suggests saying no does work - if you say it loudly enough. ---

It is still not too late for MPs to derail the scheme by repudiating theregulations due to be debated next week and detailed in the last newsletter. Only one of those statutory instruments has been dropped. If you have not done so already, please contact your MP: http://www.writetothem.com

(NO2ID's lobbying guide, written for us by the former assistant of avery distinguished retired minister, is brusque but absolutely to the point: http://www.no2id.net/downloads/print/NO2ID-HowtoLobby.pdf ) Peers will also have a vote on this; so if you happen to know one (or be one), then it would be a good idea to alert friends in the Lords nowthat the matter is soon to come up.

GOVERNMENT THUGGERY VERSUS COMPASSION -- NO CONTEST

It's not every day, and in fact very seldom indeed that i find myself agreeing with Ann Widdicombe. But today was the exception to the rule. She took exception to the fact that Ronnie Biggs, now 79, in very poor health and unlikely to see many more summers, will not be paroled despite a recommendations from the Parole Board that he should be. Biggs, who is suffering from pneumonia after breaking his hip in a fall, said that "they would seek a judicial review of the Justice Secretary’s decision as soon as possible. " Biggs, who will be 80 next month, has suffered a series of strokes and is unable to speak. He communicates through gestures and by spelling out words with an alphabet board. He is fed through a tube in the stomach and can walk only a few steps unaided.

Mr Straw wrote yesterday to Giovanni di Stefano, who represents Biggs, setting out his reasons for rejecting the parole board's recommendation that Biggs be released. Whitehall sources said that it was unusual for a minister to refuse to accept a parole board’s recommendations for a prisoner serving a fixed term. Mr di Stefano was shocked by the decision. “All the preparations were in place for him to be released,” Mr di Stefano said. “It is a cruel and unusual punishment for him not to be released. Mr Biggs legitimately expected that the parole board’s recommendations would be adhered to.”Straw’s decision was also criticised by a probation leader, the former Prisons Minister Ann Widdecombe, and prison reformers. Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of the probation officers’ union, said: “It’s difficult to see how he poses a threat to anyone apart from politicians.”


Ms Widdecombe said: “The prisons are bursting at the seams. The courts are being urged to let burglars go free, but one fairly doddery and very frail old man is being kept in prison. If you have got a prison place, for goodness sake use it to lock up someone who is genuinely a risk to the public.”

I would suggest a few names from this Government who are a greater risk to the public than Ronnie Biggs and Jack "Judge Dread Straw is certainly one of them. Ten years back, i was smuggled into the opening ceremony of the M65 motorway by TV journalists. I was an anti-motorway campaigner and no doubt the TV boys thought that the several hundred police lining the motorway was a grave threat to both the Peach and Jock Strop and hoped that a veteren Greem campaigner would at least add a little balance to what would otherwise be a gungh ho Petrol Fest led by Jack.

I waited patiently till jack had delivered the usual speech about how the motorway would would bring jobs and inward investment and then had the temerity to ask our Jack a question. Before another word could be spoken I was pushed violently to the floor by Government employed thugs. Even the pro-motorway big wigs in the audience were shocked by this and some of them came to my aid when i squared up to my assailents.

The Blair Government had just been elected for its first term and i told the assembled journos that this was a worrying portent of what New Labour would bring. Until that time, in all my years of Green campaigning i had never once experienced any violence from the police or anyone else, even during the Thatcher years.

Not for one moment would i condone robbing trains or using violence but stepping back and looking at the bigger pictures, i see a government and its corporate cronies who have stolen vast sums from both the private and public purse and then come back for more. Even so i at least thought the death sentence had been abolished in this country, that was until Blair and Straw released their Rottweilers.