Madame Jean Palfrey was calling Slick Willy's phone ...????

From the dcphonelist site .....

From the "official " records ....

according to this site here and here... although we must say that that Penn Avenue list looks a bit cut and pasted...789-1234 Hmmmm... but then most horny pols would need an easy number to remember when handing it out to hookers. However googling it gives the Hyatt Park Hotel which seems a great deal more likely.

Strange ...someone seems to have an idea to smear Bill about sex ..which seems to be a fairly pointless exercise.

Courtney Coventry and the Labour Lord Levy's curious offer - Amazing Pictures !!

My very good (and very beautifuland talented) friend Courtney Coventry has asked me to publicise her smashing new website which includes amongst many other fascinating documents her statement to the PC Plod;

"...Lord Levy then proceeded to push further and said that given the right amount he mentioned 500000 pounds and 300000 pounds he would make sure “Tony” would have John put on the honors list. We were more than a little taken aback but before we could fully register what had been said Lord Levy called Mr. Blair over and said that we were going to make a substantial donation to the party and then added that he was sure we could arrange an honour for services to the party. Mr. Blair looking a little embarrassed nodded and smiled..."

Fascinating also to read about the handy Jane Hogarth, head of corporate relations and fundraising, and close co-worker in extortion with Lord Levy, who took voluntary redundancy in June last year ... also the truth about those porn films, Hugh Hefner's mansion and THOSE drug fuelled parties.

Also fascinating to Labour Party Archivists (and maybe a few activists) to see the invite to the Manchester Labour Party Conference last year for my very dear friend in the name of Darren Milner, the corporate relations manager, signed by his sidekick the glamorous, raven haired Sairina Ramakrishnan, both sadly no longer with the Labour Party.

..also Plod's arrangements to fly the bubbly babe into London From Nice ... bang there goes another few quid.

Set Smoot Free !!!!!

You have feel sorry for Smoot. That's 43 year old Kevin Andre Smoot, of The Woodlands, Texas, yesterday waived indictment and pleaded guilty to making a false statement and violation of the Anti-Kickback Act .

He 's going to be sentenced on December 14, 2007, in Rock Island, Illinois, and faces ;

1. Maximum statutory penalty for violating the Anti-Kickback Act - 10 years in prison, and a fine of up to $250,000.
2. Making a false statement, up to 5 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

Sheeeeeit!! that's 15 years and half a million bucks ! He must be some mean guy!

Well Kevin was the Managing Director of EGL Houston office , a freight forwarding company. (Eagle USA Airfreight opened their first freight terminal in Houston in 1984)

The US Army has a program and it has an acronym LOGCAP (Logistics Civil Augmentation Program) whwreby civialian services augment the military and in December 2001 1 LOGCAP III was awarded to KBR (which was Kellogg, Brown Root a subsidiary of Halliburton).

EGL had a contract with KBR to ship military cargo to Iraq. (EGL (a FORTUNE Most Admired Company 2006and 2007) were taken over in May 2007 by CEVA Group Plc (formerly TNT Logistics) which is in turn CEVA is owned by affiliates of Apollo Management VI, L.P., one of the leading private equity investors in the world. )

Whilst administering this contract Smoot accepts providing gratuities / bribes / kickback to a total of US $25,337 to KBR workers on 90 separate occasions between early 2002 and the spring of 2005 (say 3 years = US7-8,000 a year). he also authorizeed a subordinate at EGL to provide an additional $8,500 in perks.

The perks included meals, drinks and golf outings, as well as rodeo, football and baseball tickets says United States Attorney Rodger A. Heaton in a Press release.

The other charges realte to , Christopher Cahill, who was higher up than Smoot in EGL and served as regional vice president for the Middle East and India for EGL who was stationed at its regional office in Dubai. In August last year he pleaded guilty to inflating invoices for military shipments to Baghdad through EGL’s s subcontract with Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) under the LOGCAP III prime contract - he got 30 months in jail.

Cahill’s scheme was to inflate invoices by adding a risk surcharge of $.50 for each kilogram of freight transported to Baghdad. Cahill added the surcharge after learning that an EGL competitor was seeking war risk insurance to resume air cargo flights into Baghdad subsequent to cargo plane of a competitor had been shot down in Iraq in November 2003. At the time, however, Cahill knew that the air charter company EGL had contracted with to perform the air cargo flights had not instituted such a fee.

Smoot admitted that at the time he was interviewed, (by Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS), )on or before November 2004, he knew the war risk surcharges were not legitimate and that as of March 2005, he knew that Cahill had caused false documents to be created to conceal the fraudulent nature of the war risk surcharges.

From November 22, 2003, through July 20, 2004, EGL performed approximately 379 air cargo shipments of military goods from Dubai to Baghdad under EGL’s subcontract with KBR. The total amount of the EGL invoices was approximately $13.26 million including $1.14 million in fraudulent war risk surcharges.

The increased profits from the war risk surcharge were initially credited to EGL regional office but were later credited to EGL' s Houston headquarters ultimately resulting in an increase in the incentive bonus paid to Smoot for fiscal year 2004.

So Smoot has been glad handing some of the KBR guys in the loose change that lubricates business throughout the USA and the free world and he rode with a scheme by a superior to inflate bills for the military - which helped pay his annual bonus.

Now on the scheme of thieving that went on in Iraq, this is not even petty cash.... US$Billion s have been lost at the Pentagon, dollar bill packs used as footballs...In 2003, the Congress appropriated nearly $21 billion to the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund (IRRF) reports of theft, dishonesty, waste, mismanagement, delay, influence and corruption peddling are stacked a mile high by Stuart W. Bowen Jr., who runs the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) of whom Representative Henry A. Waxman of California said “What is clear is that he has done a superb job uncovering waste, fraud and abuse in Iraq.” ... now the White House has now tried to shut him up.

Smoot isn't a crook. Smoot gave kickbacks. Smoot lied. Smoot 'fessed up.

Set Smoot Free !

UPDATE 23rd July 2007 12.00EST Well, Well, Well Kellogg Brown Root in Houston have just been rootin' around our story about Kevin... Starting a Set Smoot (and the KBR 5) Free Party ?

There's a big tide arisin'

This is the BBC chart for closing prices of Commodities on World Markets last night.. click chart to enlarge

Ho tels in Washington DC

The Consumerist ran the numbers on Madam Jeane Palfrey's list with a batch program with a free online reverse number look up service (you enter a phone number and it gives you an address) sorted by call volume, then extracted all the hotel results....

1. Marriott: 489 (18 numbers)
2. Hyatt: 168 (6 numbers)
3. Hilton: 151 (5 numbers)
4. Holiday Inn: 132 (5 numbers)
5. Ritz-Carlton: 118 (4 numbers)...etc.,

Fir those who like this sort of thing, Senator Vitter and his wife Wendy in a fetching low cut leopard print dress explain what a great guy he is ...go here

Did you know the name Wendy was invented by J M Barrie and first used in Peter Pan ? The full name of course was Wendy Darling.

Putin kills the Ahtisaari Kosovo Independence Plan at UN Security Council - for now.

Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin (pic) called the UN Kosovo plan a "closed chapter" as the draft resolution on Kosovo's future was withdrawn from UN Security Council debate today. He called the UN Kosovo plan a "closed chapter" ,as without using the word "veto" he explained that .."Our attitude to the [UN envoy Martti] Ahtisaari plan is known. "

"We have ensured that the negotiations continue; we have ensured that a resolution unacceptable to Russia and Belgrade was not approved," Churkin said.

"We are not delaying anything; we are preventing a solution... which in our view would have been detrimental to international law and to the stability of the Balkans."

The cosponsors of the resolution now plan to continue talks in the Contact Group on Kosovo, within which the U.K., France, Italy, Germany, the United States and Russia will meet in Vienna on July 25.

Blair's Legacy - an essential analysis

Delusions of Honesty by Theodore Dalrymple in the City Journal

Tony Blair’s domestic legacy: corruption and the erosion of liberty... an excellent , wity and acid analysis of the this amazing "straight kinda guy".

Blair’s resignation announcement was typical of the man and, one must admit, of the new culture from which he emerged: lachrymose and self-serving. It revealed an unfailing eye and ear for the ersatz and the kitsch, which allowed him so long to play upon the sensibilities of a large section of the population as upon a pipe.

THEODORE DALRYMPLE is a doctor and author of "Our Culture, What's Left of It: The Mandarins and the Masses."

Watson + Crick DNA / LSD / X rays and Serendipity in Science

"So Farewell Then" a recently published memoir by Wendy Cook, Peter Cook's first wife and mother of his children ,is a remarkably balanced book about life with this enormously talented but eternally selfish man, who every day got up and did exactly what he wanted to do, and fuck everyone else.

There are many new, entertaining anecdotes and stories that afford an insight into this mercurial rogue and the band of 60's and 70's troubadors and hangers on - many a name is dropped, along with some fascinating hints about how to make a really good vichysoisse and the correct way to knead a Mallorcan bread bun.

One story that strikes and resonates concerns Francis Crick, co-inventor of the structure of DNA with James Watson (see pic) - Wendy's lifelong friend Ros Myers, from her days at the Slade had "taken up" with a haematologist at Cambridge Dr John Smith. As a result

...." there were "many friends" and outrageous parties often at the house of Francis Crick, whose ground breaking work on DNA,, with James Watson, had set him apart from other mortals. It was interesting to witness such a brilliant man behaving in such a puerile manner at social gatherings, for example often looking up the au pairs skirt."

In researching some of the history of drugs and the activities of Richard Kemp and his girl friend Christine Bott, whose pioneering development of domestic scale LSD manufacturing was so rudely interrupted in Operation Janet a curious claim was unearthed about Francis Crick.

In an article in the Mail on Sunday on August 8th 2004, just after Francis Crick died Alun Rees published an article in which he relates that Nobel Prize genius Crick was high on LSD when he discovered the secret of life , which is a fascinating footnote note on Francis Crick's role in the history of Richard Kemp and his magical chemistry set.

Francis Crick was, (like many at the time) intrigued by the books of Aldous Huxley, The Doors Of Perception and Heaven And Hell which detailed his experiments with botanical hallucinogens such as , mescaline the active ingredietnt of peyote (both tedious and worth reading only for their historical inetrest) . Crick helped found Soma (the universal state provided sedative in Huxley's Brave New World ) and signed a famous letter to The Times in 1967 calling for a reform in the drugs laws.

Apparently Crick was familiar with American writer David Solomon, a supposed friend of East Coast hippie LSD guru Timothy Leary who had come to Britain in 1967 on a quest to discover a method for manufacturing pure THC, the active ingredient of cannabis. This threw together Solomon and Richard Kemp a clever biochemist and thus was founded the original illicit LSD manufacturing business.

Rees explains that ....

"Dick Kemp told me he met Francis Crick at Cambridge. Crick had told him that some Cambridge academics used LSD in tiny amounts as a thinking tool, to liberate them from preconceptions and let their genius wander freely to new ideas. Crick told him he had perceived the double-helix shape while on LSD."

Rees goes on to explain that after hearing this from Kemp he visited Crick at his home, Golden Helix, in Cambridge."He listened with rapt, amused attention to what I told him about the role of LSD in his Nobel Prize-winning discovery. He gave no intimation of surprise. When I had finished, he said: Print a word of it and I'll sue."

It is worth remembering that these supposed routine uses of LSD were taking place in 1952/3 the top secret CIA 10 year MKULTRA studies were approved by the DCI on April 13, 1953 .

Rosalind Franklin and her X rays

The truth of course is a litle more mundane. Briefly, Maurice Wilkins was working in John Randall's laboratory at King's College, London and was joined in working on X ray diffraction crystalography of deoxyribonucleic acid, DNA by Rosalind Franklin.

Whilst colleagues, Wilkins behaved in a (then) typically male authoritarian way MCP or male chauvinistic pig - a phrase that seems to have died) and Franklin resented this ( she was also an elite, wealthy, Francophilic Jewish, proto- feminist given to theatrical tantrums), so there was a degree of friction between them. Although disputed it appears that Wilkins showed Watson one of Franklin's crystallographic portraits of DNA. (above)

Sight of these X rays , which J. D. Bernal called , "the most beautiful X-ray photographs of any substance ever taken." were seized on by both Watson and Crick who fitted the jigsaw puzzle together from the prior work of many others, not least Erwin Chargaff who identifed the equivalence of the the Purine and Pyrmdine bases, Linus Pauling's work (his son Paul worked with them_ and of course Avery whose work had shown that it was DNA that transmitted genes in vivo, proven in the famous "Waring blender experiement" of Hershey & Chase.
In an unorthodox fashion their stunning and original insight was published as a letter in Nature in 1953 - "A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid" by J D Watson and F H C Crick. Nature 1953, 171:737-738 .. and the rest as they say is history.

Franklin died of ovarian cancer in 1958 at the age of 37, 4 years later Crick, Watson and Wilkins shared the Nobel prize for their work on the double helix structure of DNA.

Did Crick resolve the puzzle of DNA when under a drug induced haze ? We will never know, it is a fanciful theory but one which can never be resolved. What is certain is that the structure of this most fascinating molecule relied upon Watson's sneak preview of Rosalind Franklin's X-ray - No 51.

What is also certain is that the structure would have been resolved others then working in the field - what is also certain is that those two dined out on it for the rest of their lives, so perhaps ading a soupcon of LSD made the telling of the tale a little more exciting -- and thereby contradicting Einstein's remark, "that a scientist makes science `the pivot of his emotional life, in order to find in this way the peace and security which he cannot find in the whirlpool of personal experience."

PS It is interesting to note that Franlin's subsequent elucidation of the structure of the yellow Tobacco Mosaic Virus Her elucidation of the structure of the tobacco mosaic virus could have resulted in a Nobel prize but her junior collaborator on the project , Aaron Klug, did and he cited Franklin as his greatest mentor in his Nobel-prize speech . In accepting their Nobel prize, neither Watson nor Crick mentioned their indebtedness to Rosalind Franklin.

"Rosalind Franklin was a very intelligent woman, but she really had no particular reason for believing that DNA was particularly important. She was trained in physical chemistry. I don't think she'd ever spend any length of time with people who thought DNA was important. And she certainly didn't talk to Maurice [Wilkins] or to John Randall, then the professor at Kings".

James Watson quoted in Nature, 302, 21 (April 1983): 653. April 1983.

There's a myth which is, you know, that Francis and I basically stole the structure from the people at King's. I was shown Rosalind Franklin's x-ray photograph and, Whooo! that was a helix, and a month later we had the structure, and Wilkins should never have shown me the thing.

I didn't go into the drawer and steal it, it was shown to me, and I was told the dimensions, a repeat of 34 angstroms, so, you know, I knew roughtly what it meant and, uh, but it was that the Franklin photograph was the key event. It was, psychologically, it mobilised us..."

James Watson, Center for Genomic Research Inauguration, Harvard. September 30, 1999.

"One 35 years old, with the looks of a fading racing tout. . . an incessant falsetto, with occasional nuggets gleaming in the turbid stream of prattle. The other, quite undeveloped. . . a grin, more sly than sheepish. . . a gawky young figure." Crick and Watson, he said, looked like "a variety act." Erwin Chargaff


Further reading
Rosalind Franklin and DNA by Anne Sayre

The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA James Watson

The Third Man of the Double Helix: The Autobiography of Maurice Wilkins

Rosalind Franklin : The Dark Lady of DNA B renda Maddox

Picture of the famous Franklin X ray : Sodium deoxyribose nucleate from calf thymus, Structure B, Photo 51, taken by Rosalind E. Franklin and R.G. Gosling. Linus Pauling's holographic annotations are to the right of the photo. May 2, 1952

Linus Pauling and the Race For DNA - A documentary history.
A superb presentation of the history (if at time absurdly melodramatic) of the way the structure of DNA was finally resolved.Original papers, letters.

Zimbabwe - Meg lays down the law

Meg Munn Labour MP for Sheffield (Heeley)48, Co-operative leader and Methodist, received a little known boost to her career on 28th June when she was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Foreign & Commonwealth Office and ......no doubt is accompanied by her researcher husband Dennis Bates.

She spoke yesterday in the House of Commons about Zimbabwe. (Link to speech which is being reproduced at Embassy sites worldwide - this is the Moscow Embassy site) It may be noted that neither the boy David nor his Shadow Hague were present. Bossy Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab) was at least anxious to ask where the missing youthful Foreign Secretary was .. apparently dealing with Russia ... "in which he liaised with the Opposition" , explaining both their absences.

It is a speech that is essential reading (if only for the fact that it is the first debate on Zimbabwe for 3 years) ... it concludes ...

We maintain a network of consular correspondents to ensure we keep in close touch with our nationals in other urban and rural areas. We have a comprehensive and regularly updated contingency plan that covers the 12 000 nationals registered with the British Embassy, including the elderly and vulnerable.

The country and people of Zimbabwe are being driven into the ground by the policies of a corrupt and brutal regime. Zimbabwe can recover, but only if the policies are in place to permit it. The UK stands ready to help substantially with Zimbabwe's recovery. I know that many of the Zimbabwean diaspora are anxious to return to Zimbabwe and play their part.

That will only happen with a major change of direction, and a change of policy. We do not believe that Robert Mugabe is willing or capable to change. Nor - more importantly - do the people of Zimbabwe. We will continue to do everything we can to ensure that their voice is heard, so that Zimbabwe can enjoy new leadership and a new start.

Call me old fashioned but talk of " regularly updated contingency plan (s)" and " Zimbabwe can enjoy new leadership and a new start." sounds awfully like something is underway .. especially as "We do not believe that Robert Mugabe is willing or capable to change."

Watch this space .... as Didymus Mutasa clears out the last of the white settlers from their farms. Eviction notices effective September 30th have been issued by , signed by the Didymus Mutasa, the Minister of Lands, Land Reform and Resettlement.

It may of course be all empty words, signifying nothing, but maybe Gordy is going to effect real change. let's hope so. The debate was watched closely throughout Africa .. let us hope that they anxious listeners are not betrayed yet again.

Africa's drugs gateway to Europe

On the 13th July Lord Patel reported on the way West African states, especially Guineau Bissau have become the new staging post for cocaine from South America to Europe and the US. West African narco / people trafficking attracts US presence in Guineau Bissau

Channel 4 had an excellent and hair raising film tonight by Jonathan Miller which you can view here " Africa's drugs gateway to Europe" - you can download this with Real player.

Pic is a still showing the Minister of the Interior who is (allegedly) the principal organiser, who Jonathan Miller interviews along with the Chef d'Armada or head of the Navy, a sorry mess of old coastal fishing boats. Scary.

Sao Paulo crash, plane and 170+ bodies ...but not at Pentagon , Shanksville on 9/11 - Laws of Physics suspended that day ? Amazing pictures

Bystanders watch as workers lift onto a truck a section of a TAM airlines Airbus A320 that slid off the runway of Congonhas airport at Sao Paulo and slammed into a gas station and cargo terminal July 18, 2007.

Reuters report - Scores of bodies pulled from Brazil plane wreck Thu Jul 19, 2007 3:55 AM. Rescue workers in Brazil pulled burned bodies from smoking wreckage and collapsed buildings on Wednesday after about 200 people were killed in the country's worst air disaster - rescuers wearing masks put bodies in refrigerated trucks bound for the morgue. Dental records and jewelry were being used to identify victims.

By late afternoon, firefighters had found 170 bodies. Three severely injured victims had been rushed to hospital but then died, raising the official toll to 173 - Rescue teams found the cockpit recorder in the wreckage.

Now an Airbus 320 is approximately the size of a Boeing 757 - 200 it smashed into a gas station and there was a blazing petrol driven inferno for a long time, Compare this result with Flight AA77 that smashed (?) into the Pentagon on 9/11.

No bodies, no plane even... compare and contrast the Shanksville crash ... no bodies, no plane even.Go here for comparison pics and detailed analysis

Also fascinating "multiple finds" of the "Black boxes" of Flight 77 at the Pentagon here e.g

At around 3:40 a.m., investigators at the Pentagon recover the two "black boxes" from Flight 77. [Washington Times, 9/14/2001] These boxes are the plane’s flight data recorder and its cockpit voice recorder. [BBC, 9/15/2001] According to Arlington County spokesman Dick Bridges, members of the FBI’s evidence response team found them. [PBS, 9/14/2001; Washington Post, 9/14/2001] But some news reports claim they were found by two Fairfax County firefighters, Carlton Burkhammer and Brian Moravitz, as they combed through debris near the impact site. [Washington Post, 9/19/2001 HYPERLINK "http://www.911digitalarchive.org/crr/documents/1010.pdf"; Newsweek, 9/28/2001] And Allyn Kilsheimer, a structural engineer who helps coordinate the emergency response at the Pentagon, later claims he’d "found the black box," which, he says, he’d "stepped on… by accident." [GW Magazine, 3/2002; Popular Mechanics, 3/2005] According to Dick Bridges, the two recorders are discovered "right where the plane came into the building." [Associated Press, 9/14/2001] But the American Society of Civil Engineers’ Pentagon Building Performance Report, released in 2003, will claim that the flight data recorder was found "nearly 300 ft into the structure." [Mlakar et al., 1/2003, pp. 40 HYPERLINK "http://fire.nist.gov/bfrlpubs/build03/PDF/b03017.pdf"] Washington FBI agent Christopher Combs says, "Somebody almost threw [the black boxes] away because they didn’t know what they looked like." [Disaster News Network, 10/30/2002] The boxes are taken to the National Transportation Safety Board’s office in Washington, but are reclaimed by the FBI later on in the morning.

See the FBI pic of the sadly damaged Voice recorder - truly amazing picture!

Zimbabwe - the death throes of Mugabe

President Robert Mugabe's government introduced a blanket of price controls on June 26th. The combination of a shopping spree and a refusal by food traders to sell at loss making prices has emptied shop shelves.

An unlikely voice for US Aid policy White House spokesman Tony Snow announced today that the United States would provide 47 400 tons of additional food assistance, which he said would help an additional 500 000 Zimbabweans.

In a speech the President said that Britain had been trying to bribe the Army to overthrow him - which is probably true.

How soon before a sleek Lear jet whisks off Mugabe and his chum Mengistu off to a relaxed retirement in ... Libya ?

Putin, Uzhgorod and your gas central heating this winter

President Putin is enjoying riding a new nationalistic wave - his foreign policy moves are backed by strengthening monetary and economic power based on energy and raw materials and a new found detente with China.... and massive popular support.

Putin's world sees his world -

1. Stretching as a sphere of influence to the Balkans

2. He is very concerned to quell the territorial conflicts on its own southern and south-eastern borders - to which an in dependent Muslim backed Kosovo would be seen as a precedent and encouragement to the southern republics.

Martti Ahtisaari, plans for Kosovan independence and the security duties taken over jointly by the European Union and NATO means a further expansion of the West -- an expansion that he will hinder, change, and stop at all costs.

3. Putin is deliberately following a broader strategy of confrontation because he wants Russia to regain its place in the world as a foreign policy heavyweight. The strict refusal to extradite former KGB agent Andrei Lugovoi fits perfectly into Putin's strategy of showing off Russia's return to power to the West.

It is a simple matter to connect the dots from the threat of using the 'energy weapon' against Ukraine, Georgia, Byelorussia to the Russian position on Iran and Kosovo, to the sabre rattling over the unwanted US missile shield and Moscow's freezing of the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, to the obstruction strategy when it comes to the Litvinenko investigation.

A relapse into the "Cold War" which Putin is enjoying and where the UK are holding up the murder of "British Citizens" like Litvinenko and his radioactive and beautiful wife as a matter of major concern. We now have the comical spectacle that the thief, money, launderer and international terrorist and criminal fugitive Boris Berezovsky - another "British Citizen" appearing on our TV's as an injured party, the target of murder plots (unsurprisingly) - but defended by our Government.

Perhaps we should pay a lot of attention to what happens to the Druzbha (Friendship) pipeline from Russia to Europe as it passes through Uzhgorod (larger map here) and thereabouts this winter - after all there was a little wobble on May 7th this year when an unexplained blast occurred at 1125 GMTand destroyed a 30 meter section of a main gas trunk pipeline to Europe, near the village of Luka in the Ukraine south of Kiev.

Does the boy David really understand what is going on ?

Березовский потратил на дестабилизацию России $400 млн - Boris Berezovskt tells Itar Tass he has spent US$400 million in trying to overthrow Putin.... now imagine if someone claimed (fromm the scantity that London and HMG affords) they were spending that to overthrow President Bush , Mushariff, Chancellor Merkel, Maliki.

HMS Richmond - taking up the White Man's Burden

HMS Richmond a Type 23 Duke Class frigate , launched in 1993, left Portsmouth in May 2007 after a major refit making her one of the Royal Navy's most advanced warships with vertical launch Seawolf missile system ,a 4.5 inch gun and Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and enhanced aviation facilities to accommodate the 3 man Merlin helicopter - which has sufficient fuel for a radius of operation of over 200 nautical miles and a comprehensive communications fit that includes a datalink so the flight crew and the ship will know where they are at any time - in theory they can't get fucking lost.

She steamed into the Northern Arabian Gulf yesterday, Tuesday 17 July 2007, to take over Iraqi oil platform protection duties from HMS Cornwall who famously lost their boats and crew to the Iranian Navy in a recent major sea battle in the Shatt al Arab.

Richmond's Commanding Officer, Commander Piers Hurrell said:

"My team has worked extremely hard to get Richmond to this position and I amdelighted to be continuing the crucial work that the Royal Navy in conjunction with our Coalition partners is conducting in the region."

Which presumably means , no smoking , no iPods or giving away MOD property to lightly armed Iranian patrol boats.

She is due to return to Portsmouth in December 2007. ... hopefully with all hands aboard.

Brief history lesson about HMS Richmond

It is to be hoped that they fare better than the original HMS Richmond which after leaving Charles Town, was part of the British fleet bringing aid to General Cornwallis at York Town and met the larger French fleet that had been standing off York Town in the York River.

The Richmond performed duties of a frigate during engagement with the larger French fleet. Subsequently the Richmond and H.M.Frigate Iris were dispatched back to where the French fleet had been anchored in the York River.

Since the French fleet did not have time to raise their anchors, they still lay on the river bottom connected by their heavy cable to floating buoys on the surface where they could be retrieved upon returning.

The assignment of the Richmond and the Iris was to cut the buoys away depriving the large French Ships Of The Line from these anchors. In a river current having a rip tide, this could cause them problems depending on the size and number of spare anchors each still had on board.

While cutting the buoys loose, both the Richmond and the Iris were trapped in the narrow river by the returning French fleet, resulting in the Richmond and the Iris being captured by de Grasse's fleet on 11 September, 1781.

UPDATE 20th Jult 2007 new Armed Forces Minister Bob Ainsworth paid his first visit to Iraq yesterday.

Mr Ainsworth flew into Basra to get a briefing on British operations in South Eastern Iraq from senior British and Iraqi officers and then met personnel from all three services. He went on board HMS Richmond, currently patrolling to protect Iraq's oil platforms in the North Arabian Gulf.

" ......there are more escort services than there are McDonald's in D.C. "

Larry King interviewed Montgomery Sibley, Jeane Palfreys lawyer and Larry Flynt (CNN transcripts now available) on Larry King Live - although these days Larry King looks like he has just been dug up.....

KING: Montgomery, are you shocked?

SIBLEY: Well, I'm shocked about two things, if I might, Larry. Please understand that this is one escort service out of approximately 60 in the Metro D.C. area. And indeed there are more escort services than there are McDonald's in D.C.

He then spoke to Larry Flynt the editor / founder of Hustler a Family Values Homemaker magazine...

FLYNT: We'll cooperate with Jeane in any way we possibly can. But I want to point something out very important. (inaudible) lied on TV when he apologized to the nation. He...

KING: Lied how?

FLYNT: ... well, he's using his wife and kids as a shield and said what happened. Those rumors out of Louisiana where he had a small brothel of hookers. That was not true. Well, it is true. I'm working with the major Louisiana media down there.

KING: You say he had a brothel of hookers in Louisiana?

FLYNT: There's been about five we've been able to track down so far. So you see what happens when you're a guy like him and you're not completely honest, see, he didn't even have to bring that up. And now that he's brought it up, everybody is all over it, including us.

Dontcha just love the smell of hypocrisy in the evening shows ?



For those who love this sort of thing however try here and here

Some folks have got very interested in an ex US military chappy who works / worked recently for a spooky San Diego outfit called Science Applications International Corp., SAIC (website) " ....in Iraq helping protect and support our men and women in uniform, SAIC is there." who uses a number 703 836 0522 which appears on Madame's lists (check here dcphonelist.com....

But see comments below.

Gives evidence to House Intelligence committees....about jihadists on the Internet.

No to SUV's - Amazing pictures

SUVNO is an Italian site that has extensive links to the damage that SUV's do to the environment and to kids .... Take a look.

RAF Tornado jets shoot down Russian "Bears" - Cold War gets hot *

Well our political Lords and Masters and the Military (not to mention the Lady Dame Jane Pauline Neville Jones Fan Club, are serious in stirring up anti-soviet Cold War misery - Richard Beeston, Diplomatic Editor of Rupe's Rag The Times has a story our OnLine in the last half hour RAF scrambles to intercept an old Cold War adversary and get ready for a shootout.

RAF fighter jets (Two ageing Tornado fighters, part of the RAF’s Quick Reaction Alert, took off from RAF Leeming, in Yorkshire) were scrambled to intercept two Russian strategic bombers heading for British airspace yesterday, as the spirit of the Cold War returned to the North Atlantic once again - please note the Typhoon's are not yet operational after 18 years development and squillions of pounds of development....well they sort of are ready but they haven't been proven to be able to fire missiles, hit the target and then get back to base .. er .. safely - see pic.

The shootdown incident, (Richard chillingly tells us) described as rare by the RAF, served as a telling metaphor for the stand-off between London and Moscow over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko.

While the Kremlin hesitated before responding to Britain’s expulsion of four diplomats, the Russian military engaged in some old-fashioned sabre-rattling.

Two Tu95 “Bear” bombers were dispatched from their base on the Kola Peninsula in the Arctic Circle and headed towards British airspace.........

Strangely Richard didn't tell us about Vyechslav Zharko who the HM Embassy in Moscow was trying to recruit etc etc .... slipped his mind no doubt.

* Toni - Check this before we publish

Telling metaphor for the stand-off between London and Moscow over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko. ...hmmmm we send up two ageing jets to have a shufti at two ageing bombers and that's a metaphor for someone being slipped a mickey finnin his Mayfair hotel Typhoo ? ...Typhoons no can't be that. Hmmmm. Telling metaphor.

** Toni check the meaning of metaphor

Mein Kampf - german Academic calls for re-publication

Hitler's 'novel', Mein Kampf (Hutchinson, 1939) was written in 1924, (actually published in 1923) nearly a decade before he came to power, but is a remarkably accurate prospectus of his intentions, not so much in terms of finite political and social aims as of the precise psychology he intended to impose on the German people and its European vassals. For this reason alone it is one of the most important books of the 20th century, and well worth reprinting, despite the grisly pleasures its anti-semitic ravings will give to the present generation of racists. How far does Hitler the man come through the pages of this book? In the newsreels Hitler tends to appear in two roles - one, the demagogic orator, ranting away in a state apparently close to neurotic hysteria, and two, a benevolent and slightly eccentric kapellmeister sentimentally reviewing his SS bodyguard, or beaming down at a picked chorus of blond-haired German infants. Both these strands are present in Mein Kampf - the hectoring, rhetorical style, shaking with hate and violence, interspersed with passages of deep sentimentality as the author rhapsodises to himself about the mystical beauty of the German landscape and its noble, simple-hearted peoples.

Part of the review by J G Ballard Alphabets Of Unreason published in New Worlds, Number 196, December, 1969.


When Hitler died 8 million copies of Mein Kampf (My Struggle) had been sold. The book, bought by the state and given out to newlyweds in the Third Reich, made him personally very rich. 6 million copies had been issued to couples by 1942. It was aboast of Hitler's that Mein Kampf had the largest sales of any book worldwide, apart from the Bible. His royalties were said to exceed US$1 million a year.

Officially, the book cannot be bought in Hungary, Israel, Latvia, Norway, Portugal, Sweden and Switzerland, but is readily available in Russia, Romania, the United States and the United Kingdom.

In 1933, Eher Verlag bought the world rights for Mein Kampf, and sold it on to other publishers for translation. In Britain, it ended up as part of Hutchinson's list. In 1939, Hutchinson commissioned a Jewish emigre Ralph Mannheim to translate the book, a choice of translator not approved by Berlin.

After the war, Mein Kampf went on to Hutchinson's backlist, but was reprinted in 1969. Richard Cohen, Hutchinson's trade publishing director in 1985, recalls the difficulties publication raised. "The questions we faced at Hutchinson were: what were a publisher's responsibilities when confronted with such a book, and should we do anything to increase sales?"

The moral dilemma was solved by describing the book as "Vile" on the dust jacket. Today's version, now published by Pimlico, still calls it an "evil" book.

Hutchinson was bought by Random House, and in an ironic twist were in turn bought by the huge German conglomerate Bertelsmann. It was an irony not lost on Cohen: "Thus Hitler's racist tract, unavailable in German bookshops, will be published throughout Britain and the Commonwealth by a German company."

In the UK, royalties went through the Curtis Brown literary agency, which, from 1976, transferred the money to a charity whose name the agency refused to reveal.

Eventually it became known that the German Welfare Council has been absorbing the royalties since 1976 who claim they distributed the cash to German Jewish refugees and, now that so few remain alive, "the trustees have decided that the funding is no longer appropriate". The balance of funds was apparently returned to Random House.

The edition still sells and is also available from Amazon

Here is a screen shot today of what browsers buy after they have looked at the page for Mein Kampf..... make of the figures what you will.

It is commonly believed that publication of Mein Kampf in Germany is illegal (there are of course many million copies extant from before the war). The copyright (part of Hitler's estate) is held by the state of Bavaria, which took over the rights of the main Nazi party publishing house Eher-Verlag -- including the rights for "Mein Kampf" -- after the end of World War II as part of the Allies' de-Nazification program. It is a paradox that Adolf Hitler, who had apparently neglected to officially register his change of residence from Munich to his Alpine retreat, the Eagles Nest in Obersalzberg, and to Berlin, and so was registered as a resident of the Bavarian capital of Munich.

Eher Verlag , the Nazi Party's central publishing house, also had its registered office in Munich, so now by chance the state government owns the rights to Hitler's anti-Semitic tirade.

As copyright holder, the state has since refused to allow the book to be published, on the grounds that it would promote right-wing extremism. The German Foreign Ministry has also repeatedly recommended that the book not be published, for fear of damaging Germany's image abroad.

They also attempt sedulously to prevent unauthorised publication in other countries. A rather seedy Polish publisher cum second hand car dealer Marek Skierkovsky (he has no ffice address, no telephone and no website) attempted to cash in on the Auschwitz memorials with an edition in 2005.ISBN number 83-921822-0-0. At 208 pages, he planned to sell it for 29 Zlotys (just over €7).

Article 256 of the Polish criminal code calls for a maximum sentence of two years in prison for anyone who "promotes a fascist form of government." However when Bavarian Finance Minister Kurt Faltlhauser sent a letter to the German foreign minister, asking him to exert his influence ... Skierkovsky simply got a bit of a grilling from the local police.

Bavarian Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber (retires Sept 2007 - opponent of Iraq invasion) pulled rank and wrote a letter to his chum Czech President Vaclav Havel, asking him to look into a small Czech publishing housewhich had a published a few thousand copies - but it appears his intervention was too late.


Until 1999, however, an English translation of Mein Kampf was the second-ranked bestseller on Amazon.com's German website before complaints from the German government and the Simon Wiesenthal Center led Barnes & Noble.com (part owned by Bertelsmann) to block German sales.
Amazon agreed to stop selling through its German site last November.

There have been irregular suggestions for re-publication in Germany.

Professor Eberhard Jäckel professor of History at the University of Stuttgart,has long supported a scholarly publication but as his book Adolf Hitler, Sämtliche Aufzeichungen published in 1984 contained forged documents made by Konrad Kujau, who also forged the Hitler Diaries which Jäckel authenticated ; his voice has been ignored.

But now Horst Möller, director of the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich, in an interview published yesterday in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung proposed publication in the form of an academic edition with comprehensive footnotes.

"As long as 'Mein Kampf' is not available in a carefully annotated edition,
there will be no end to the oft simple-minded speculation about what is actually
in the book. An academic edition could break the peculiar myth which surrounds 'Mein Kampf.'" .

The monopoly of the state's ownership will however automatically evaporate under International agreements on Copyright of Authors in 2015, 70 years after Hitler's death.

"There will be enough publishers who will want to sell it then with the inevitable sensationalism," said Möller, who argues that it would be better to produce an annotated edition which explains why Hitler was wrong now, rather than wait for a flood of uncommented commercial editions.

It is a book of tedious intensity with some extraordinary illustrations - it is essential reading for anyone attempting to understand the wellsprings of the movement which steered a nation on the road to madness, led my a madman.

It is not without it's lessons today when so many madmen run the world.

Here is a nice illustration of the state of the D mark against the US$ at the time when Mein Kampf was first published in 1923.


The top picture is interesting in that it is one of the editions by Hutchinson published in about 1940 1in 18 parts complete editions can be bought today for £138

Guradian - first with the very, very old news

Felicity Lawrence writes in the Guradian today ..."The miracle of cheap fresh food depends on illegality". Breathlessly she tells us that Midlands fruit and vegetable packers Bomfords went bust ...er... well not quite Felicity they went into administration .. and that the the Gangmaster Licensing Authority inspected Bomfords.

What she fails to mention is that the Gangmaster Licensing Authority on March 8th 2007 busted several labour gangs in dawn raids on Bomfords just a month after the new labour laws came into effect for agricultural workers.

Subsequently Bomfords called in Deloitte , Birmingham, as Administrators on June 22nd ....
Lord Patel provided all this information at the time and related the firm's cash problems to the previous arival of the GLA gangbusters.

1. Lord Patel gave a breakdown of the GLA, the new laws on labour only subcontractors in the food industry and the new Chairman Paul Whitehouse's plans in November 2006 Chinese Cockle Pickers - new laws and prizes all round

2. Lord Patel detailed the raids on 7firms of Gangmasters at Bomfords on Thurday March 8th 2007 in a detailed post the following day "Ex Sussex Chief Constable Paul Whitehouse in gang busting mode at the GLA" (they were lucky when he was CC at East Sussex Police his men used to shoot naked unarmed men in bed, dead, in dawn raids)

3. Lord Patel also reported in detail on June 26th 2007 of the calling in of Deloitte's as administrators by Bomfords on June 22nd 2007 as a consequence .."Gangmaster gangbustin' raids lead to business failure to Bomfords ... supplier to UK supermarkets of salads .. more to follow ? Prices to shoot up ?

4. Lord Patel also forecast that Tesco's et al would know nothing about as he put it...
In his role as Gypsy Petulengro he forecast that ...

No doubt the administrators and new owners will take note of the requirements for employing casual agricultural labour through gangmasters .... this may result in higher prices for your radishes and lettuces in Waitrose ,Sainsbury's,Morrison's, Asda , Tesco and Somerfield etc., this week.

Exploiters of immigrant labour who provide shit jobs, with shit "accomodation", shit working conditions however distant from the gangmasters will take note. Major retailers cannot continue to sit in their boardrooms and allow exploitation of workers supplying their stores.

Gypsy Petulengro tells Lord Patel that the spokespersons of the major supermarket groups when (or if asked by the major media outlets) about the impact on salad crop prices will deny all knowledge of exploitation , breach of HSE, minimum wages etc., etc., ..they are however happy to crow about their massive sales ...

Darling Felicity obediently parrots what Tesco told her......Tesco says it audited after the GLA operation and took action on any "non-conformities".

"There is no suggestion that excessive wage bills or cashflow problems caused by Bomfords' customers were a contributing factor," says Tesco.

Now what was it that nice journalist Mr Michael White sometime associate Editor and Political Editor of the Guradian said about Bloggers on Newsnight that.." they only make comments ? News is provided by Newspapers......."

Alastair Campbell is supposed to have famously hit him once when he joked about Captain Bob.Bob.Bob.... evidently didn't hit him hard enough to knock any sense into him, the sneering twat. It was a year ago exactly that he wrote in the Guradian "As I get older my own sympathies are shifting back to where they started - with Israel as the regional underdog," ... pity he doesn't shift himself there.

But then of course Lord Patel doesn't runs ads every day in his newspapers from Tesco's, Sainsbury's , Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Somerfields, Asda .... etc., etc.,

...but then we should have sympathy with the Guradian journos, it can't be easy working for a rag that shops Whistle Blowers who breach the Official Secrets Act.

..but then why would Felicity Lawrence author of "Not on the Label : What really goes into the Food on Your Plate " want to soft pedal a hard story about Tesco's for ? No wonder Tesco's stock her book under ENTERTAINMENT

e mail felicity.lawrence@guardian.co.uk if you have any views about her fascinating articles you want to express to her.

Carbon Offsetting - how everyone in the media is discovering what a fucking fraud it is

Channel 4 have a Dispatches program tonight exposing the fraudulent "carbon offset" bizniz which Lord Patel has been doing for a long time -see all these posts.

It is called The Great Green Smoke Screen Channel 4 News science correspondent Tom Clarke dissects the many 'solutions' to global warming being marketed to onsumers, from tree-planting and carbon offsetting to green energy tariffs, and reveals how attempts to buy our way out of climate crisis may (good weasel word here - don't commit yourself Tom) be making things worse.

He is not the only one.. this is a good place to start ...

"Carbon Trading: A Critical Conversation on Climate Change, Privatisation and Power" a product of the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation.Which they call their Development Dialogue 2006:September, no.48 You can download (PDF alert) the whole 350 odd pages or (recommended) 6 seperate chapters.

OR

Better still obtain a free copy by e-mailing Kajsajsa.overgaard@dhf.uu.se or (in Britain only) larrylohmann@gn.apc.org or secretariat@dhf.uu.se or Fax: +46-18-12 20 72

This is how they outline the plot in an arch and quaint fashion but does give you an idea of the content - read and judge for yourself.

Chapter 1 A new fossil fuel crisis/ In which the growing climate crisis is traced mainly to the mining of coal, oil and gas; the dangers to survival and livelihood are outlined; the political nature and implications of the problem explored; and reasonable and unreasonable solutions sketched.

Chapter 2 ‘Made in the USA’ / A short history of carbon trading In which the surprising story is told of how corporations, academics, governments, United Nations agencies and environmentalists united around a neoliberal or ‘market’ approach to climate change emanating from North America.

Chapter 3 Lessons unlearned / In which carbon trading, contrary to slogans about the universal eff ectiveness of markets in dealing with environmental and social problems, is shown to be ill-suited to addressing climate change. The experience of the US in pollution trading is demonstrated to be an argument not for, but rather against, making carbon markets the centrepiece of action on global warming.

Chapter 4 Off sets / The fossil economy’s new arena of conflict In which it is shown how projects designed to compensate’ for continued fossil fuel use are helping to dispossess ordinary people of their land, water, air – and futures.

Chapter 5 Ways forward / In which the claim that ‘there is no alternative’ to carbon trading is dissected and set aside, and emerging alliances for a more democratic and effective climate politics are explored.

Pollution trading the authors have belatedly recognised is a completely new idea, foisted on the world by a small circle of neoliberal institutions in the US. Surprise - Surprise !! Pollution trading’s main appeal is that it promises to save make money for the rich over the short term.

As a pollution control policy, it is sure to fail..... ahem .. in Europe where it HAS been tried ...it has FAILED ... the ETS market closed on Friday at just 12 cents, the lowest ever....having made a lot of traders, lawyers, accountants, banks very rich on the way and many credulous investors much poorer.All credit to media lens for finally realising what twats they have been all these years as the wool has been ever so gently pulled over their eyes... quite how difficult is it to deprive children of their candy ?

Pssssst.... want to stop somebody doing something? - tax and regulate, admittedly it has limited itility eg. European fuel taxes cf USA ... but of course it depends what you do with the taxes you raise.. the European Gubments just piss them up against the wall.

Anyway read the report - 350 pages but it's big type on artfully landscaped pages and the text boxes a la US textbooks makes reading easier ... the Bibliography is excellent. See also ....See also "Obscenity' of carbon trading" by Kevin Smith in the BBC Green Room , he is a researcher with Carbon Trade Watch, a project of the Transnational Institute which studies the impacts of carbon trading on society and the environment.Also by him "Stern Words While in Europe They are trading Hot air" also at (http://www.thepolitician.org/)

"Labour MP Gerry Steinberg described the scheme as a ‘mockery’ and an ‘outrageous waste of public money’.""A massively generous allocation resulted in windfall profits for some of the UK’s most polluting companies, to the collective value of £940 million according to Franck Schuttelar, an analyst at the energy-trading firm Gaselys

.""Waiting yet more years to learn further lessons from the next round of
ineffective emissions trading is a luxury we don’t have."

See also his "Carbon Cop outs" - He is also co-author of The Carbon Neutral Myth: offset indulgences for your climate sins, forthcoming in January 2007.See also Climate Fraud and Carbon Colonialism: The New Trade in Greenhouse Gases (pdf alert)by Heidi Bachram CAPITALISM NATURE SOCIALISM VOLUME 15 NUMBER4 (DECEMBER 2004)
"The changes necessary to avert climate catastrophe are simple enough, namely, a switch away from fossil fuels and to renewable energy like solar and wind, along with a reduction in energy use generally."

You can watch Channel 4 Live on the net anywhere by going here and logging in.

An infuriating program with a few nuggets of information and a lot of footage of the telegenic reporter sitting at a laptop loking puzzled.

It has been said before ... carbon offsets are the equivalent of the mediaeval church selling indulgencies - if you don't know what they are Google it.

There is one effective way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions - and New Zealand have recently introduced it. An energy tax. Not the complete answer, not the only answer but a good start. Carbon trading just fills the wallets of financiers and their lawyers, advisors, consultants, and PR boosters. They found their top shill in the hapless, hopeless, chinless Margaret Beckett who thankfully appears to have gone to that great Caravan in the sky.

Energy Wars hit Mexico - EPR attacks Gas / Oil pipelines - serious economic damage

There has been little comment about 4 blasts which broke 36" (91cm) pipelines carrying natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, crude oil and gasoline over the past week in Mexico. The Popular Revolutionary Army, or EPR, has claimed responsibility for the attacks to state monopoly Pemex's pipelines and said this was .."the beginning of a "national campaign of harassment against the interests of the oligarchy and this illegitimate government."

In its statement, the EPR linked the explosions to an ongoing political battle in the southern state of Oaxaca, where teachers and leftist activists have been demanding the resignation of Gov. Ulises Ruiz since last year.

The EPR said its campaign of "harassment" would continue until President Calderón and Gov.Ruiz delivered two named comrades "alive" following their disappearance May 25 in Oaxaca.

Victor Lopez head of industrial group Canacintra told Reuters "There are more than a thousand, nearly 1,200 companies, that have been greatly hurt because of the lack of (gas) supply," which has affected companies such as Honda Motor,(Guadalajara) Nissan Motor Co.(Aguascalientes) and General Motors. Mexico's major glass manufacturer, Vitro, said on Wednesday it had halted operations at two of its plants, meaning $800,000

It is the major industrial areas in central states like Aguascalientes, Guanajuato, Jalisco and Queretaro. ...and repairs are taking there time.

Pemex said on Thursday it had restored natural gas supply to the central city of Queretaro and hoped to restore supply in Jalisco and the city of Guadalajara by midnight.

"Workers at Petroleos Mexicanos connected a bypass to the Mexico-Guadalajara natural gas duct and began tests," the company said in a statement.

Mexico has deployed soldiers and federal police to protect Pemex's oil wells and pipelines from further attacks.

There was a massive explosion at 8.55 am on Friday July 30th 2004 at the Ghislengien Industrial Estate in Belgium, 16 people died immediately several suffered a lingering deatah by burns and over 200 people were injured. see THE BIG BANG THEORY – The Bigger the Bang, the Louder the Silence

Europe increasingly relies on natural gas - much of it from Russia (see previous story) , who have shown how they use it as a weapon , the Mexican guerillas have have taken a more direct way of affecting national governments.

UK expels 4 Russian spies - but pretend we don't have any, lies, deception by Foreign Secretary - Press act as Chorus

Brent crude hits US$78.58 up $1.72

On the July 7th Lord Patel posted "Sasha is not quite in his right mind.” - MI6 told their Moscow spy - more fairy tales from the land of Litvinenko, which broke the news that the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) had instituted criminal proceedings (6/7/07) under the Criminal Code Article 275 (which includes espionage) against Vyacheslav Zharko, a former officer ( 4 yrs experience with rank of Major) of the Russian tax police, throwing (it is said) some more light and probably many more shadows on the Litvinenko affair.

Vyacheslav Zharko admitted he had been recruited by the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS or MI6) when he voluntarily surrendered in June to the friendly FSB. He claims he was receiving about 2,000 Euros in cash monthly (which apparently he did not declare for tax purposes !) for writing surveys for the British side “fishing out information from various Internet sites.” It was only when he realised what a small fish he was, in a big game he decided to "come clean".

His action in surrendering himself followed on from May 31st news conference given by Andrei Lugovoi, (accused by the UK Crown Prosecution Service on May 22 of murdering former Russian security officer Alexander Litvinenko) who accused Russia's fugitive, London based tycoon Boris Berezovsky of working for British intelligence. (Pic K.Pravda)

In an interview published by the Komsomolskaya Pravda daily on Saturday 7th July he said that a man calling himself John Callaghan, (who he says was first secretary of the British Embassy in Moscow and is regarded a career intelligence officer) and one called Paul (AKA Antonio Alvaresde Idalgo****, also AKA Pablo Miller, who worked in Tallinnin 1999 (1st Sec. british Embassy and involved in a criminal case opened against Lieut. Col Valery Ojamae, who was sentenced to seven years in jail in 2001 for high treason," - following a spy row in August 1999 in which Russia and Estonia each expelled two diplomats from their countries. ) he also met him variously met him in London, Istanbul, Helsinki and Cyprus.

“The Britons later also confessed to me that they were intelligence officers and John Callaghan told me that he was working under the cover of the Embassy in Moscow and took part in general operations, for instance, had
once photographed secret documents in a restaurant WC,”

....he also named a Ken Philips who he says also worked in Moscow and now he is an intelligence officer in the British Embassy in Istanbul. Apparently these FO johnnies gave him a fancy mobile phone they would use to call him - but which was for receive only purposes.

Amongst his claims Zharkov says the Brits could not eliminate the possibility that the FSB had recruited an agent in the British embassy and “asked me if I could using my connections in security services to track down the ‘mole.” They also asked him to find out if “specific connections of certain non-governmental organisations could come under control of Russian security services.”

Whilst Lord Patel has many and various sources as has, let us say the HM Embassy in Moscow - this story was widely available on the newswires by Novosti

Now apart from a small report in Bahrein and Australia - this story was ignored, although it was a story that made headlined in Russian language newsapers. Do a Google news search, search the BBC ...nada. .. nothing ... zero .. nul point.

Now today bright eyed and bushy tailed our boy Foreign Secretary David Milliband has expelled 4 Russki diplomats (spies in Diplospeak) and looking angry said " a range of issues was under review." This is (apparently) in response to Moscow's refusal to extradite the prime suspect in the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, the ex (?) KGB officer Andrei Lugovoi, to face trial in the UK for his nurder ...naturally he denies involvement.

The Council of Europe European Convention on Extradition 1957, provides Russian to refuse the extradition of a citizen. Whilst the UK has the right to request that Mr Lugovoi be tried in Russia, but the UK's director of public prosecutions Sir Ken Macdonald, has already turned down the offer.

Now quite why the Press have not repeated these allegations of Zharkov or tested their truth by asking the Foreign office, Downing Street etc., we leave to the reader to speculate about.

But it sounds like a diplomatic tit-for-tat in which the British public are being misled, misinformed and (as per fucking usual) being sold a lot of bollocks.

"Deepening political crisis between the UK and Russia" Eddie Mayer BBC 4 Radio News at 5.34 BST.

****Identified by Sergei Skripal, a former Russian colonel sentenced August 2006 to 13 years in prison for spying for Britain. (BBC)

Flight 93 debris field over Shanksville area on 9/11

This was posted on Google Video on April 18th 2007 - footage of news that was never repeated. Clearly there is a widespread debris field over several miles. Something else that has gone down the memory hole.

Senator Vitter and his family - Happy American Families

TPMtv have a compilation of archival news/campaign ads of Senator Vitter

"Marriage is the single most important institution in history" ... watch him say it to the Senate. ... here is a still... maybe he is trying to tell us something with his hands.

Go here to view at Veoh ...the embed doesn't seem to work... very entertaining, if toe curling when the kids endorse their Dad's run for the Senate.

Also a composite of his ads running for Senator featuring the wife who is going to cut his dick off...over at Google Video

"This", says Larry Flynt, "is payback time and payback's a bitch"