63% Want UK Forces Out of Afghanistan

Perhaps showing people have a better understanding of war and remembrance than our bloodthirsty leaders.

Public support for the war in Afghanistan is falling, while more than 40 percent do not understand why British troops are fighting there, a poll released on Remembrance Sunday showed. Some 64 percent agreed that “the war in Afghanistan is unwinnable”, up six percent from July, while 27 percent disagreed, down four percent. Ten percent said they did not know.

Similar numbers said British forces should be withdrawn as quickly as possible, with 63 percent agreeing and 31 percent disagreeing. Some 54 percent felt they had “a good understanding of the purpose of Britain’s mission in Afghanistan”, with 42 percent disagreeing.

“Overall there is the sense that Afghanistan is becoming for (British Prime Minister) Gordon Brown what Iraq became for (his predecessor) Tony Blair,” said Andrew Hawkins, chief executive of pollsters ComRes. “More than four in 10 don’t understand Britain’s mission; support for the British presence there is ebbing away, and a majority have responded to the presidential election very negatively indeed. The results suggest that the impact of the war must be having an impact on Labour support, since it is that party’s core supporters who are most strongly opposed to it.”

Meanwhile 52 percent agreed that “the levels of corruption involved in the recent presidential election show the war in Afghanistan is not worth fighting for.” Thirty-six percent disagreed. “This is potentially devastating for the government’s case for war,” said Hawkins. ComRes surveyed 1,009 adults of different ages and social classes across Britain for BBC television’s “The Politics Show”.

9 Out of 5,000

Scotland Yard faced calls for an “ethical audit” of all officers in its controversial riot squad tonight after figures revealed that they had received more than 5,000 complaint allegations, mostly for “oppressive behaviour”. Details of all allegations lodged against the Metropolitan police territorial support group (TSG) over the last four years reveal that only nine – less than 0.18% – were “substantiated” after an investigation by the force’s complaints department. (ht2 Harpymarx)

The TSG (who killed Ian Tomlinson) were what the SPG became (the group who murdered Blair Peach) and clearly they have absolute support from the Met who work to keep them utterly above the law, this sketch is 30 years old yet again I post it because…nothing has changed

And please read on to see how the Met protected serial torturer and racist (and former Royal Marine, attempt to be surprised) Mark Jones even when another officer acted as whistleblower (noticeably the jury chose to believe Jones rather than Pc Amechi Onwugbonu) to the assault on several teenagers, one of whom Jones called an ‘Arab cunt‘.

Predictable

Apparently people are still confused that war involves murder and insanity. Luckily morons, racist and imperialists can hang their denial on ideas of tribal loyalty because -their- god forbid they realise that if this is what a professional dealing with combat trauma does, then the ongoing wars in service of the ruling class’s ambitions might be seen for the civilisation destroying cancer they are. Of course it might be unkind to note that the death rate for civilians in this action were considerably less then the military ever manage while on official operations. And the horror of misapplied geography, if he had expressed his homicidal feelings while in theatres of combat on men, women & children unfortunate enough to be living in a country our governments caused to be invaded he would be doing his duty. That he saw his colleagues as targets and not Afghans & Iraqis is a failure of propaganda, military healthcare and a symptom of institutional racism in imperial forces. Hasan clearly was a stupid and venal man, he chose to volunteer his labour for an enterprise he knew to be wrong and allowed it to destroy him and in turn others. Did he target, in a deranged vengeance, those he knew or suspected of murdering civilians overseas? He was in a position to have knowledge of such things. Certainly few would dare sugest such a thing as this is our side and the von Stauffenbergs and Inglourious Basterds are heroes real and imagined when they kill ‘them’ and our tribe could never be evil like ‘them’. So the soldiers are victims and the killer is a totem for everything the warfare state wants to project onto him. Rather they are all victims, just as any nation is that is stuck with a voracious, privileged and entitled imperial ruling class on the make, that has taught its numbed disenfranchised citizens to eulogise the strengths of its military and corporations. And a workplace shooting that screams a direct connection to the violence at the heart of a culture of imperialism will be seen as anything but, in fact will be used to justify even more killing. And the wars grind on, anointed with a peace prize.

Friday! Zachary Murray & Erika Fontana- The Adventures of Lil’ Cthulhu

It’s never too early to corrupt young minds! (ht2 Dangerous Minds)

Candle In The Wind

It is very apparent there is an underlying intermittent fault on my phone line that after years has never been repaired, so in times of high wind (like now) my connection is tenuous, flickering on and off. Intermittent faults are the most tedious to diagnose and solve thus BT Open Reach are in no rush to even acknowledge it. Anyway that’s why I have no idea if this will even publish or when I can read and blog. That and now reports of inlaws electricity down the road going as this wind keeps up, so, sorry but a privatised telecoms infrastructure means this wee corner of the web is a bit wobbly right now. However in short order-

developing countries lose $160 billion they are owed through tax dodging by huge multinational companies every single year

Govt. funded (and part of the Prevent front for domestic surveillance of Muslims) Quilliam Foundation -illegally- files no tax returns

WooHoo Italy, but note just like the USA senior figures are now immune from prosecution.

And US lawyers are pro money laundering!

Woohoo Argentina, putting former leader Reynaldo Bignone on trial for kidnapping, torture and murder of 56 people at a military base. Yet again Latin America showing the rest of the world some moves we would do well to copy.

Our allies are killing us, gee do you think the Afghan war is perhaps not being portrayed honestly in our media?

Goldman Sachs were offloading their dodgy debt to suckers outside the US for years.

IMF keeps the neoliberal flame burning, this ‘crisis’ which as the above shows was no crisis it was easily foreseen is being used to further the ideology of the elite.

Everyone’s talking to Burma, amazing how a big pipeline puts things in a new light.

And there are short bursts of twittering twitter.com/TenPercent

PS. and of course fellow ‘domestic extremists’ remember remember the 5th of November! (or as some call it 5/11!)

Stop Fascists in Wrexham

EDL/WDL are saying they will hold a march in Wrexham on November 21st, this is what went on in October in Swansea

Oct 18 2009 by Catherine Mary Evans, Wales On Sunday:- THEY denied being fascists ahead of their first Welsh march – but at yesterday’s Welsh Defence League protest against Islamic extremism onlookers were confronted with scenes of jeering men giving Nazi salutes.

There was then a stand-off between the two sides for over an hour, with the increasingly agitated EDL surrounded by hundreds of chanting anti-fascists. Any pretence of respectibility soon disappeared, as they engaged in football chants and Nazi salutes. At 5pm, they were marched away by the police much to the delight of the masses of anti-fascist activists and after a swift celabration away from the area of conflict, everyone dispersed without any violence and with the EDL humiliated. It was a great day for Swansea as many of the protesters were young and on their very first protest. South Wales Police also deserve praise for their sensitive handling of the event but above all, it was a statement by the people of Swansea that their Muslim Welsh community was not going to be intimidated by a bunch of pumped up football hooligans.

Wrexham Communities Against Racism are organising a counter movement. From Proper Tidy in comments- Public Meeting Wednesday, Wrexham Lager Club 7.30pm 1 Union Road Wrexham (right by the train station) – all welcome!

New Chief

North Wales Police has a new chief constable, Mark Polin, who says things like this-

“An unorganised mind environment is not for me I’m afraid.”

This will be interesting.

Update: A Q& A in the Daily Post, he comes across as a conservative on thedrugwar inc. unlike Brunstrom’s progressive attitude.

USA Tops Financial Secrecy Index

Which means it is the leader in the elite’s class war against 99% of the people on planet Earth. Financial Secrecy Index.

Fraud Accomplished

So how do you tell a soldier to be the last to die for a lie? I actually laughed like a gallows when I heard this on the radio, even if you accept the purpose of the war is to install democracy (and you really shouldn’t because that’s a big fat lie) but if you so choose to to keep your simple mind clear of worries with that fiction… well even that lie is absolutely exposed now. ‘Our partner’ in Afghanistan is not legitimately elected, he conspires with warlords, fundamentalists and his CIA employed brother to hold onto power, power that was first bequeathed to him through the back room deals of neocon Bush chum Zalmay Khalilzad. It’s the imperialism stupid.

Hamid Karzai has been declared president of Afghanistan, after election officials scrapped a planned second round of voting. The announcement comes a day after Mr Karzai’s sole challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, pulled out of the race. Dr Abdullah, who had demanded the removal of key poll officials, said the vote would not have been fair. The first round had been marred by fraud. Key Nato allies of Afghanistan have congratulated Mr Karzai.

A number of international figures, including US Senator John Kerry, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, had been involved in persuading Mr Karzai to accept a run-off.

However, Mr Brown on Monday said he welcomed the commission’s decision. A spokesman said the PM had “spoken to President Karzai to congratulate him on his re-election” and the two men had “discussed the importance of the president moving quickly to set out a unifying programme for the future of Afghanistan”.

The US administration, through its embassy in Kabul, also hailed the commission’s move, which it said conformed to “its mandate under Afghan law”. The statement added: “We congratulate President Karzai on his victory in this historic election and look forward to working with him.”

Desaparecidos

The excavation of a mass grave on a Granada hillside where the poet Federico Garcia Lorca was murdered during the Spanish Civil War has reinforced calls for the area to be investigated. “Lorca was just one of 4,000 executions on a roadside just a kilometre long,” says Juan Antonio Lopez Diaz, a Granada University professor. “There are so many bodies there that pine trees were planted just to stop them being uncovered by rainfall erosion.”

After years of debate, digging finally began last week at the mass grave where half a dozen men, possibly including Lorca, were killed and buried on 18 August 1936 by hitmen from General Franco’s right-wing Nationalist forces. A huge white tent has been erected, surrounded by a two-metre high metal fence, to ward off the media during the two-month investigation.

There are no such restrictions on area less than a mile away known simply as “the ravines of Viznar”. This is where mass executions of hundreds of other sympathisers of the doomed Spanish Republic were summarily executed.

“We had our desaparecidos [disappeared] way before the term became famous during the 1970s South American dictatorships,” Diaz Lopez added. “During the war in Granada anybody with even the slightest connection to the ‘wrong’ side risked illegal execution. And that went on well into Franco’s regime.”

Inhospitable

There are a number of other post-conflict issues in Gaza that need to be addressed. The land is dying. There are toxic deposits from all the munitions that have been dropped. There are serious issues with water—its depletion and its contamination. There is a high instance of nitrates in the soil that is especially dangerous to children. If these issues are not addressed, Gaza may not even be habitable by World Health Organization norms.

Desmond Travers, one of the four members of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict

Carnival of Socialism- Halloween Special!

Soil yourself in abject terror! For while the Godly forces of good, common sense neoliberalism feed public wealth into the hands of kindly capitalists to keep their financial houses going EVIL lefties gather and plot such horrors as -Healthcare, Welfare, Social Justice, Peace and Human Rights. Come with me on a terrifying journey into the heart of darkness of this global conspiracy that threatens bankers’ multi million dollar bonuses, every friendly arms dealer’s priceless collection of snuff porn and threatens the very business of Earth upon which we depend with its dangerous ideas of ecological ‘facts’. And remember if you hear a whisper from behind you of ‘People Not Profits’ run as if your very life depended on it and never, ever look back for no-one can gaze upon the face of Satan and live!

Hark but who is that stumbling through the graveyard, it is Zombie Lenin and rustling through the eaves the wind whispers debates of democratic centralism, Louis Proyect muses about John Molyneux on party democracy, previously Harpymarx had thoughts and discussion. While David Semple gets all Five Point Plan-y. And The Soul of a Man Under Capitalism.

Quick run to the television and turn it off, like Halloween 3 The Season of the Witch or Pulse,there is a dangerous signal coming from it- Equal Rights for Palestinians! Don’t whatever you do visit Jews Sans Frontieres and write a letter in support of The Daily Show!

But be careful that letter doesn’t get into the hands of The Postman (well it terrified me at least), in fact any Posties, male or female may be filthy trade unionists, attempting to serve the public instead of help corporations make greater profits as is our Holy Duty. Socialist Worker went to a depot Socialist Unity had A Striking Postal Worker speak out! A Very Public Sociologist had the Socialist Party’s leaflet- Victory to the Postal Workers!

And then more co-operation, or should we call it what is- conspiracy! Like an invading hive minded alien presence the Green Party and Respect won’t pointlessly fight each other-

…the fact that both Caroline Lucas and Salma Yaqoob have indicated that if both were elected to Parliament they could work closely together was extremely persuasive. Salma’s support for Green candidates in the North West and West Midlands at the recent European elections trumped concerns that others in Respect campaigned against us.

The Green Left welcome it, Oh Noes!!!! Will divide and rule fail to stem this tide? They’ll start admiring human dynamo Evo Morales next and his Ten Commandments (of evil!). And like a Cannibal Holocaust even noble coups are not running to plan anymore but the odd resolution is…odd and *Gulp* lefty subversives are showing the IMF they can run countries better than neoliberals! (But hey Hugo, better to be a character in Michael Moore’s jokes than hang with Ahmadinejad). And here’s Matt Sellwood Green Parliamentary candidate for Hackney North and Stoke Newington further showing how green lefties work (at work)! Quick buy a Hummer now and eat lots of meat before they save the planet from us!

What of the Haunted House of Horrors of Afghanistan? Have demons possessed our brave boys™ they admire and agree with war resistor Joe Glenton, it’s a liberal conspiracy!. And like a bad sequel what have we done to Pakistan? Analysis by Muhammad Idrees Ahmad. And Poppies, Third Estate, Harpy, Me.

Luckily our wise leaders have ensured the dangerous masses are correctly labelled, Domestic Extremists and given top assasin propagandist a job protecting the Thick Blue Line.

Now beware a Marxist Zombie, muse on Feminism and Vampires and while Manchester saw off the EDL, Wrexham needs you or canvas for John McDonnell.

And finally beware lefties with allen keys this night…

The Bigger Picture

While some US liberals are rejoicing at the findings of this Pew poll that Fox news is seen as the most ideological network,

A larger point may be being missed, therefore I have helpfully added a corrective-

Forest, trees, you get the picture. Gotta love the ‘Neither’ answers.

Friday! Efterklang- Mirador

Currently touring the UK, this video is by Hvass & Hannibal who have done all the band’s recent artwork.

Science Defeated By Drug War Hysteria

The UK’s chief drugs adviser has been sacked by Home Secretary Alan Johnson, after criticising government policies. Professor David Nutt, head of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, criticised the decision to reclassify cannabis to Class B from C. He accused ministers of devaluing and distorting evidence and said drugs classification was being politicised.

Well I told you so ‘Which means they will be ignoring this yet again‘ almost two years ago. But really I do love well paid professionals who are all surprised when New Labour turn out to be scumbags, What no WMD, well I never! To be honest I think they know but I refer you back to the ‘well paid’ bit. The consultation scam is a fig leaf over our lack of democracy and a great employment program for those involved, and that -very apparently- is all it is.

So in the absence of …erm science what shall we have inform drugs policy now we are going down the faith based route? (Faith in reactionary establishment hypocrites that is). How about Jeremy Kyle throwing darts at tabloid stories to decide things ‘He’s scored a double red top, The Suns says lock up these evil drug fiends. Home Secretary… he say Yes!‘ Or class it up a bit (a tiny tiny tiny bit) when Cameron comes along and have Noel Edmonds picking ideas out of little cases while Simon Cowell decides sentences all the while smirking at all the drugs he has *never* taken. This is as ridiculous as government by fundamentalist Christians who reject evolution and have creationism taught in schools, when will we ever have an adult, informed drug policy as opposed to a quasi mystical fear that keeps authoritarians in salaried employment (and banks liquid), authoritarians who -as I am sure many of us have observed- use drugs too.