9/11: One Year On

I find it interesting to re-read this and note just how quickly Dubya squandered the goodwill and sympathy generated by 9/11.





As milestones go, forgetting about tomorrow would probably rank about equal to forgetting about one's partners birthday the day after neglecting to buy them a present for the wedding anniversary in the eyes of many Americans. And in truth, it would be churlish to expect America to feel anything other than a sense of grief and loss 1 year on from the worst atrocity that they have ever suffered in peacetime. So before I even get started, I have to make it clear that I have nothing but sympathy for the families who were affected by September 11th. Nor do I wish to cheapen the impact of that dreadful day on the rest of the nation. What I do want to do, however, is address the mindset that now seems to be emerging in America; that is, that because they have suffered because of a terrorist atrocity, they have divine right to do whatever they please in order to get their pound of flesh. I'd also like to briefly examine the cynical manipulation by the American government of the grief and anger justly felt by many Americans in order to make confused and blundering motions of aggression toward whomever they choose, whilst attempting to silence any criticism or doubts over their (quite remarkably ill-thought out) policy by claiming that dissent is equal to treachery.

It is of course difficult to make any sort of substantial comment about America and American policy as a result of 9/11. After all, their government doesn't seem to be entirely sure what they are doing these days (do we invade Iraq? Do we go through the UN? Have we finished in Afghanistan? Answers on a post card to the White House, because frankly, I don't think Dubya has the first clue...), so trying to decipher the intent behind their clumsy words and murky thoughts is a labour that would rival anything Hercules did. However, certain things can be gleaned from the avalanche of misinformation, contradiction, and blind stupidity that has become the hallmark of the US government of late. Obviously, they want war against Iraq. The removal of an evil dictator who had some part in 9/11, plus freeing of an oppressed people is the reason that is being played to the gallery. Naturally, nobody but the blindest patriot believes this. The real reasons are a matter of speculation; oil, distraction from the economic corruption that has mired the government down, revenge on behalf of Daddy...any, all, or none of these could be true. The government has been doing it's best to convince the public of this by blandly repeating the mantra that Saddam is a real and immediate threat, whilst at the same time providing no evidence for this.

I find it extremely annoying that the US government has made such a botched job of this whole affair; nobody would grieve Saddam's passing as dictator of Iraq. Yet by refusing to provide evidence for the danger he poses (and surely there must be some; we're talking about a man who used to routinely order the mass murder of Kurds and Marsh Arabs living in Iraq), and by suppressing any political opposition to an invasion by painting support for an invasion as the only way to be patriotic, Dubya's government are showing themselves to be as politically astute and as media savvy as Prince Phillip on a visit to China. I think it's rather telling that on the same day that the CIA have announced that there is little evidence linking Saddam to international terrorism, a news item has surfaced purporting to be an interview with a former lover of the Iraqi dictator. Apparently he likes watching torture videos and dancing to Sinatra in his spare time. Shit, why don't they go the whole hog and announce that scientific evidence has been found that gives a clear indication that Saddam Hussein is the closest living relative of the Boogeyman. It would appear that America is trying to win the war of hearts and minds via the National Enquirer...

So, now that I've qualified what I want to say to the point of rendering it almost irrelevant, I may as well proceed. What has been happening in America in the last year? Has the US public good reason to be proud of the actions of their government over the last year? Well, we should have been forewarned by the fact that no-one seemed to give much of a damn about the fact that the result of the election was...well, it was bollocks. Indeed, I'm sure that in years to come, historians on the education board will set aside a lesson specifically to allow future generations of schoolchildren to have a bloody good laugh at the gullibility of the American public and the sheer audacity of the Republican party (they may be corrupt and ignorant, but if nothing else they must have balls the size of watermelons to say that there was nothing remotely questionable about the result). And, true to form, America really doesn't seem to care that it's government has managed to alienate the entire world (no mean feat when one considers the outpouring of sympathy a year ago). Why doesn't it care?

The cynic in me suspects that the reason they don't care about the opinion of the rest of the world because America is a nation in the grip of self obsession. Prior to 9/11, nobody in America particularly cared about the fact that their government was a huge sponsor of terrorism. At best, they were indifferent to the suffering and misery in South America, Afghanistan, and Africa as a direct result of American funding of terror. At worst, they contributed toward it themselves (as any IRA quartermaster would no doubt confirm, the good old US public made huge contributions to their cause). Only now that America has begun to reap what it has sown has the American public in general made the belated discovery that terrorism is bad.

Now that terrorism has become a domestic problem for America, Americans have to think about it. This was something that they never had to trouble themselves with when it was happening overseas (incidentally, I'm not suggesting that the American public is unique in this rather selfish approach to the world; as an Englishman I'd be hypocritical to do so...). However, the prevailing attitude regarding how to prevent another 9/11 shows an imperiousness that has not been seen since Victorian times. Their seems to be an assumption that America can do what it damn well pleases, just so long as whatever is done stops the terrorists from attacking America again. The fact that America is militarily stronger than any other nation reinforces the belief that they can do what they like without fear of retribution. Their government have obliged by telling the rest of the world what they want, then stamping their feet and wailing "If you're not with us, you're against us" if they meet with anything less than total compliance (and if we bear in mind that the UK is the only country to have offered unconditional support, that adds up to a lot of rattles being thrown out of Dubya's pram).

There is a name for this; it's called "Gunboat Diplomacy", and it's something that the American public seems to approve of greatly. Well, not wishing to piss on their chips, but the last empire to try gunboat diplomacy was the same one that invented it; the British Empire. As I recall from the history of our little empire, we too had something of a belief in our divine right to tell the rest of the world what to do. We too took advantage of having a better military than anybody else. And yet here we are, dancing to whatever tune that Dubya spits out. We're no longer the biggest kid on the block. And do you know why? Because, after all the resentment that built up towards the imperious attitude of the English, the rest of the world made damned sure that it brought Britain down a peg or two at the first available opportunity. In our case, that opportunity was the Second World War. After the defeat of the axis powers, the UN was formed with the idea that no one nation should be able to bully the rest of the world into complying with whatever fun packed scheme they had come up with during that particular week. Britain had to hand its empire back to the people who actually lived there.

The American public seems to believe, rather sweetly, that this could never ever happen to them. I've tried asking a couple of them to justify this belief and have been met with answers ranging from "We could conquer the world so no one will ever mess with us" (evidently this gentleman belongs to the school of thought that believes Vietnam and Somalia aren't worth conquering...), to "It won't happen" (I tried pressing the giver of that last answer for a reason why it will never happen; unless you count repeating "It won't happen" over and over in the hope that I'd go away as a reason, none was forthcoming). Of course, the last time it took a world war to make something like this happen. Will it take the same thing happening again?

Let's put it this way; during the cold war, the leadership of America had an upsettingly high proportion of fundamentalist Christians in its numbers. These are the people who believe that the Revelations portion of the bible was not in fact the work of a gibbering fool who had spent too long in the desert eating mushrooms, but was in fact the exact representation of God's will. Happily, the Russian leadership were altogether more pragmatic, eschewing a dogmatic belief in the end of the world in favour of a belief in the need for keeping their own people on a tight leash. So all we had was 45 years of arse clenching fear, and no war. This time round, the Russians have been replaced with Moslem fundamentalists; people who are to the Islamic ideals of love and justice what Dubya is to the ideals of intellect and statesmanship. They too have a hankering for an apocalyptic "end of the world" scenario. So it seems that both teams want one big, messy conflict between good and evil. And each has found in the other someone perfectly willing to oblige that desire. Frankly, my only hope is that Dubya can be stalled until the next election, because surely the US public wouldn't be stupid enough to allow him to steal a second election, would they?

Would they?

Mad or Bad

Maxine Carr and Ian Huntley are the Tabloid candidates to replace Ian Brady and Myra Hindley in the pantheon of evildoers. The fact that Carr was not much more than a battered and abused woman under Huntley's domination hasn't deterred those tabloid rags from trying to spur the whole nation into a self-righteous witch burning.




Summer is drawing to a close now, and just like every other summer that I can remember we find that the headlines are taken up with the death of children. Milly Dowler has found herself shunted from the pages. The dismembered torso of the child found in the Thames is barely mentioned. The baby who was left to drown in it's buggy in Wales has been all but forgotten. There is now a double murder that has horrified people like nothing that has been seen before (or at least, horrified like nothing that was seen before last summer). Just over 2 weeks ago, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman went missing. Their bodies, still officially unidentified, were found on Saturday last. Somewhat uniquely in this kind of high profile case, the suspects were identified and questioned before the enquiry changed from missing persons to murder. By all rights this should have been a cut and dried, open and shut case whereby the two murderers are reviled, condemned, judged, and sent down. Not that that would have been any comfort to the parents of Holly and Jessica, but it would at least have been something. Now it seems that matters are getting complicated.

The two people who were arrested, Maxine Carr and Ian Huntley, both worked at the same school attended by Holly and Jessica as teaching assistant and caretaker respectively. This alone sent a thrill of revulsion through me. Whilst I appreciate that (unfortunately) murder victims are generally killed by people whom they know, this seemed like a desperately horrifying betrayal of trust. People send their children to school every day on trust that they will be safe, and that the people employed by the school will care for them. It seemed to me that the school had employed the modern day equivalent of Myra Hindley and Ian Brady. It was assumed by many that the two would be charged, and that a sorry (yet, God help us, familiar) tale would be recounted at the inevitable trial.

Then, yesterday, there were a series of announcements that wrong footed everybody. Firstly we were told that Huntley had been charged with the girls' murder, but also that he had been detained under the Mental Health Act of 1983, and that he was being held in Rampton Secure Hospital. Then we were told that Carr had been charged. Not with murder, but with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. What are the implications of these decisions? Like everyone else, I can only speculate based on the limited and confusing facts available. I don't claim to have any special insight into what might be going on, but I would like to try and make sense of it.

Firstly, we have Huntley. As things stand, and assuming his guilt, he is the sole murderer of Holly and Jessica. I'm sure that I wasn't the only one who assumed that the girls had been murdered by a paedophile, but now I am no longer certain. The main thing that puts doubt into my mind is the fact that he is being detained in a secure mental hospital. There is also the fact that the girls' bodies have yet to be formally identified. Is this because he committed acts of such appalling savagery that a post mortem was unable to determine the cause of death? It's an awful thought, but I suspect that the truth is somewhat more mundane (or as mundane as a double murder can be). We've just had 2 weeks of hot and humid weather in England, and if one assumes that the girls were murdered not long after their abduction then their bodies will have been left to decompose during that time. Hence the inability to identify both them and the cause of death.

That is the first part of the fog that is obscuring the events in Soham. Huntley's detention at Rampton is another. Basically, under the MHA, 2 doctors must state in writing that they believe Huntley has a psychotic disorder which makes him a danger to himself and/or others. The doctors at Rampton have anything up to 6 months to assess him and find out what, if anything is wrong with him (apart, of course, from the fact that he has probably murdered two children). What must this man have told the police during questioning that led them to consider the possibility that he is not fit to stand trial?

There seem to be a few of possibilities here; one is that he is genuinely mentally ill. Another is that this is merely a ploy by Huntley to avoid standing trial. Finally, it may be that the police wish to utterly eliminate the possibility of Huntley using the Insanity defence at trial, and so they are having him assessed by the doctors best able to determine whether or not he is psychotic.

I wouldn't like to say which, if any, of these possibilities is the most likely. But I do know a little bit about Rampton, and I know that the people who are held there are (in the words of a consultant who used to work there) "really, truly, properly insane". So if we assume that his insanity is real and not faked, and if one recalls the TV clips showing a calm yet concerned Huntley saying that he feels so helpless as to what to do about the disappearance of the girls, not to mention the uniqueness of the police sectioning him before charging him, a picture does begin to emerge. It tends to suggest a man that has completely disassociated himself from what he did to such a degree that he believes utterly that he did not commit the crime.

I find this relevant because of the current archaic laws concerning insanity in a criminal case. To paraphrase the MacNaughton legal rules, to make use of a defence of insanity, Huntley will have to show that he did not know what he was doing or that he didn't know that it was illegal. I would assume that the doctors at Rampton are now trying to determine whether this is indeed the case.

Then we have Carr. As I write this, it would appear that she isn't a murderess. Rather she is a foolish woman who did a stupid thing to cover for the man whom she loves (or at any rate, believes that she does). At her first appearance at the Magistrates Court this morning, the usual rent-a-mob showed up to leech some of the high tension and emotion from the aftermath of this dreadful situation in order to fill their otherwise empty lives. Maybe if people like them expended more effort putting their own lives in order rather than using somebody else's tragedy to pass their time, then the world in general would be a better place, but I digress.

As you may have guessed, I have some sympathy for Maxine Carr. Only up to a point though, as she would appear to be responsible in part for prolonging the agony of Holly and Jessica's parents. Yet before anyone rushes to condemn her for protecting Huntley, I would say this; I have seen a lot of women stand by their men, despite the fact that their men are responsible for beating them, mentally and emotionally abusing them, destroying their self esteem, and generally reducing them to the level of a timid and unquestioning piece of chattel. If we're saying that it's Carr’s fault for allowing Huntley to do that to her (and again, I'm making the assumption that he did), then one may as well say that rape victims are asking for it, or that battered wives had it coming.

I would also point out that there is a degree of uncertainty about the events leading up to Huntley and Carr being questioned. Their are conflicting reports of what happened; some say that they handed themselves in voluntarily, others that they were taken by police from the home of Huntley's father. There is, at the moment at least, the possibility that Carr went to the police first, and Huntley's detention followed soon afterwards. If that is the case, and if the home circumstances of Carr and Huntley are as I suspect, then she is to be as much praised for her later courage as she is to be reviled for her earlier cowardice.

Of course, as I have said this is all merely speculation. We have the luxury of being able to examine such facts that are available and then draw our own conclusions. Though having written this, I am now beginning to see why it is easier to simply condemn the accused out of hand. To try and look at what happened, to attempt to see beyond the grief felt by those who loved the girls, or beyond the vitriol yelled by those who were strangers to them, raises uncomfortable questions about a society in which tragedy's like this can happen. Is it any wonder that we usually cast about for a scapegoat to explain the murderous behaviour of these people? Maybe it's our way of protecting ourselves from answers that we don't want to hear.

Fear is the mindkiller

For some reason, I was in a state of utter terror when I wrote this one. I like to think I hid it well....




Normally, when I write these things, I find that whatever it is that was on my mind and thus worrying me tends to recede into my background thoughts and leaves my brain free to consider such weighty matters as why it's really good that women wear skimpy clothing during summer. With my last rant, I hoped that I could ease off the paranoia about Dubya's dad starting a war by proxy. Not forget about it altogether you understand, I just wanting it to stop blazing white-hot streaks of fear across my cerebellum and allow me to get on with being a lecherous git. Of course, life is never that simple and so here I am again to add something more to what I wrote last time. Whether it's to make me feel better or to make you feel as uneasy about the future as I currently am...well, it's a little from column A and a little from column B. Anyway, regardless of that I think I've got reason to be unsettled. Now let me tell you why....

It's not exactly the world's best-kept secret that America wants to and is almost certainly going to attack Iraq. I've already talked about their possible reasons for wanting to do so, so I'll not retread that path. What I do want to talk about are the possible consequences of such a war. And you should really brace yourself, because I have one or two funny ideas about that. For the record, I don't mean funny ha-ha either.

Okay, so the current situation is that Iraq has, as it's leader, a murdering scumbag who treats the ethnic minorities of his country (Kurds and Marsh Arabs) as target practice. They are second-class citizens and they are vulnerable to whatever jolly little scheme enters Saddam's head. America wants to depose Saddam and replace him with a leader more to their liking. Iraq is a Muslim country. As I'm sure you know, Osama bin Laden's aim has been to unite the whole Muslim world against America. Thus far, he has failed in this. When USA attacks Iraq it is my belief that bin Laden will get his wish. And why do I think that? One word; Israel.

Israel has as it's leader a murdering scumbag who treats the ethnic minorities of his country (Palestinians and Israeli Arabs) as target practice. They are second-class citizens and are vulnerable to the whims of the fat nazi who runs the country. He's finally starting to show his true colours by trying to expel from Israel the families of any suicide bombers. This is illegal under the Israeli constitution, mirrors the actions of the Nazi Party in the 30's in it's methods to get rid of unwanted elements from the country, and is about the closest parallel I've ever seen for the saying "Shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted". Israel is not a Muslim country. America supports the government of Israel.

I hope it's becoming very clear what I'm driving at, but humour me by letting me spell it out. If America invades Iraq in a supposed war on injustice and terror whilst Ariel Sharon continues to follow his dreams of an ethnically pure Israel, and does so by continuing to bomb, shoot, and expel non-Jews from Israel, the Muslim world will NOT be happy. "So what?" you might think. And to be honest, I can see your point. The Muslim world seems to have been in an almost terminal state of unhappiness for as long as I can remember. And who can blame them? Their leaders are almost entirely composed of a small group of hyper-rich dictators. In general, the regime's they live under are oppressive, and Islamic in name only. Who's to say that the Muslim world won't do it's usual act of making a lot of unhappy noises before rolling over like good little lap dogs and keeping the oil flowing?

Maybe they will, and I hope that that is the case should America get it's war (because, for all my posturing, I like a peaceful life as much as the next man). But I can see trouble ahead. Most of the people of the Middle East have rather different opinions about the west in general, and America specifically, than their leaders. During the last Gulf War, Iraq fired missiles at Israel. Not one Middle East country supported Iraq. Yet their were people dancing in the streets in Egypt when they heard this news. This time around, not one Middle East country supports America (well...Kuwait and Quatar do. They are both tiny little Gulf States and their influence on the Muslim world is minimal). So if Iraq was to fire missiles at Israel this time, do you suppose that other Middle Eastern countries would be quite so restrained? Especially with fundamentalist Islam being so widespread at the moment?

Even if we assume that the Moslem governments act with restraint, who is to say that those same governments will stay in power? The likes of Egypt and Saudi Arabia have a big problem with right wing fundamentalist Moslems. Thus far, those governments have tried to keep a lid on the fundamentalists by being ever more oppressive and authoritarian. This can only work for so long because all you are doing is containing the pressure. One of the more popular fundamentalist mantras is that America is out to destroy the Moslem faith, and doesn't care about the injustices meted out to Moslems by ungodly governments who use their supposed faith to Allah as a cover for doing America's (or, if you like, the Great Satan's) dirty work. An attack on Iraq coupled with continued support for the butcher Ariel Sharon by America would give the fundamentalists (in their eyes) cast iron proof that this is indeed the case. And if their governments choose to do nothing about it? Then it is the sacred duty of every Moslem to defend his brothers. Lest you think that I'm being melodramatic, the Shah of Iran found out about the power of fundamentalism when he was sent running from the country he had ran as a dictator after the Islamic Revolution there in the 70's.

An awful lot of Islamic countries have authoritarian governments in power, with a populace who are content with their lot thus far, but whom are vulnerable to the sway of rather more radical Muslims. From Indonesia in the East through to Algeria in Africa and almost every country between those two fall into this category. What I am suggesting is that, by invading Iraq and ignoring the brutality in Israel, America is unwittingly providing the spark for a powder keg that covers half of the planet. Can you imagine the effect of a revolution occurring in most of these countries over the course of a few months? Just think of it; once one revolutions kicks off in one country, another would follow, and then another. Do you have that picture in your head? Okay then....can you then imagine how America would react to revolutions that would see unfriendly governments put into place in all of these (co-incidentally, primarily oil producing) countries?

It's not pretty at all, is it? If, as I suspect, the Islamic world explodes in a frenzy of righteous and fundamentalist ire, then America will be the big loser (well...Israel would probably be the bigger loser as it may well cease to exist within a few years of these events). I say this because the oil will stop flowing, and the American economy will nose dive. America will not take this lying down. They will fight to get back access to the oil that their economy needs. Hence we have America being directly opposed by Islam. Almost exactly the situation that bin Laden wanted and that Dubya said he would avoid in fact. The last time that America tried to stop a domino effect of countries replacing their leaders with governments unfriendly to the US was in Vietnam. Most of the rest of the world was sensible enough to let America behave like a bloody idiot during that conflict, and things are shaping up to be the same here. Or they would be, were it not for the fact that the west's economy is America's economy. If their's goes down the tubes, then so does ours. So will we just dumbly accept that? Nope. Would we side with Islam against America? What do you think?

Perhaps I'm being a little sneaky in making that Vietnam comparison; for what it's worth, I don't actually believe that America and the west would lose the potential conflict I've outlined. Then again, maybe I'm just biased. But even assuming a military victory for the west, what I do think we'd do is set the scene for decades of international terrorism where the targets would be any and everything western. It would be a situation not unlike the nightmarish Perpetual Conflict scenario that Hitler dreamed of when invading Russia (he hoped that the Slavs and Russians would continually wage low key terrorist war against Germany. This would keep Germany on it's toes and ready for battle at all times). If you want me to raise the paranoia stakes further still, then I'd draw your attention to the fact that China would probably stay out of any conflict between Islam and the west, thus leaving it all fresh and dandy whilst the two sides whittle each other down to nothingness. And would anyone care to place bets on what might happen then?
In the midst of all this knuckle whitening and excessive worry, about the only positive thing that I can draw from this is that, if we are facing WWIII in the face, then it'll probably not be in Europe again (after all, we hosted the last 2 so it's only fair for another continent to host this one. World wars should be like world cups; a different host nation for each one...) and it'll probably not be a nuclear conflict. This is probably an inappropriate thought for someone who has just spent a couple of hours writing an essay on why I think the world is teetering on the cusp of an epic shitstorm, but why can't we just be nice to one another? Ah well... here's hoping I'm wrong about all of this.

The Build up to Iraq

I supported and still support the war in Afghanistan. Iraq however is another matter entirely...


This is a rant that I rather hoped I wouldn't have had to write. You see, about a fortnight ago I sat down to write something about current affairs that was brimming with optimism. I didn't expect it to be hugely difficult; my personal and professional life are good, and I expected my general good mood to be reflected in what I wrote. Well, not to put too fine a point on it, I was wrong. That particular rant is still sitting in my Drafts folder gathering whatever passes for dust in a computer hard drive. And it's not like I didn't try; I started the damn thing 2 weeks ago and I've come back to it 8 or 9 times since. In that time I've managed to add one sentence. As I'm sure you can understand, this has caused no small amount of frustration; I've been banging my head against a brick wall trying to figure out a way to write down what I wanted to say. And now I've stopped trying. Why? Well, happy though I am with my life at the moment, it seems that I was rather foolish to think that this would allow me to obscure world events in the same fluffy pink fog that envelops one when one is personally very happy indeed. So I thought that I'd try a different angle; what in the hell is going on in the world that won't allow me to conclude a rant with the words "Hey, everything is going to work out just fine! Relax! Enjoy your life!"

Amazingly enough, the source of my deep-seated concern lies over the Atlantic in the personage of the US Government. (I was going to say a little something to stress that, despite my loathing of their current government, I'm not anti-American. However, seeing as the type of person who would scream at me for being some sort of Arab-loving, liberal, commie, subversive idiot would do so if I did anything less than praise the Land of the Free unconditionally whilst ignoring the catalogue of hypocrisy, arrogance, and political shortsightedness that has become the trademark of the Republican and Democrat parties...well, you'll excuse me if I'm inclined to think "Fuck 'em" and plough on regardless). The reasons why I am growing increasingly nervous are neither new nor particularly special to America. It's just that the possible consequences are enough to allow me to preserve my hard-won veneer of cynicism in the face of my actually being genetically indistinguishable from a pig in shit these days.

So, what the hell am I talking about? Astoundingly enough, bearing in mind that I'm talking about a government who's leader is widely regarded as heroic in his efforts to push back the boundaries of incumbent stupidity (and as he has Ronnie "Alzheimer" Reagan to compete with, this is no mean feat...) I'm talking about America doing it's level best to start another war. Apparently Afghanistan was merely an appetiser to those good old boys in the White House; all it did was give them a taste for blowing the hell out of little brown people attending wedding parties. The main dish is, of course, Iraq.

Here in the UK, we have been made vaguely aware that Dubya is trying to whip the nation into the kind of jingoistic fervour required to get popular support for a war. I say vaguely because the mainstream media, perhaps aware of the significance of the UK being drawn into a conflict that has barely any international support and that is almost certainly illegal under international law, has spoon-fed the great British public with stories of such huge significance as "Man Feels Queen's Arse" and "Big Brother’s Jade: Why I'm not a Minger". I don't mean to denigrate people for lapping up these stories (because I know I do), and I don't mean to sound as paranoid as I actually am, but doesn't it concern anyone that, whilst our attention has been distracted ("Hey, dumbass! Look at the pretty story! You looove Pop Idol...listen to Will wax lyrical about the significance of whatever sweltering turd he's inflicted on the charts! You think animals are cuuute...here, here's a story about some poor whales getting beached and nice people trying to save them, isn't that nice? Yep, the world sure is great folks, so don't you worry about a thing. And especially don't worry about what YOUR government that YOU allowed into power are doing, 'kay?") ,that nice Mr. Blair has all but choked on Dubya's dick in his eagerness to involve the UK in a war against Iraq? I mean Jesus Christ, one can almost hear the sucking noises on the rare occasions that Blair is on TV explaining how we're going to be backing America all the way.

Now then; why should anyone care that a war on Iraq seems to be imminent? Who cares if Saddam Hussein is toppled from power? What does it matter if America is choosing to fight the good fight and release the Iraqi people from virtual slavery? I'll deal with America's motivation for wanting a war in a moment, but firstly I have to confess; I'd love to see a change of regime in Iraq. I have a long-standing hatred of dictators and totalitarians and it would be a delight to see the moustachioed old bastard standing trial for the long, LONG list of atrocities that he is responsible for. However, these things have to be done in a certain way. When the first Gulf War was fought, it was fought with a UN mandate and an international coalition with America at it's head. There was a clear objective, widespread support from Iraq's neighbours in the Middle East, and whatever opposition to war that could be mustered was quickly marginalised due to it's impressive refusal to accept the facts and the reality of the situation. This war, if it is fought, will do so without reference to the UN, a coalition consisting of some gung-ho American and some reluctant British troops, no objective beyond "Saddam must Die!", and no support (in fact, there will probably be active opposition) from Iraq's neighbours. This time, it's not the opponents of war who have closed their eyes to reality.

Essentially, America is talking about ignoring the will of the rest of the world and doing what it wants because it believes it to be the right thing. Again, not necessarily a bad thing (as Winston Churchill discovered), but why exactly is the US government so determined to stick 2 fingers up to the world and behave in a manner not unlike the sports 'jock' stereotype that can be found in every bad American teen movie since the 70's? There are two schools of thought on this. One says that America is being true to the ideals of freedom and democracy on which it was founded, that it is acting in the defence of a poor and oppressed people and...I'm sorry, even as I was typing that I found myself chuckling. It's quite clearly a large and unmistakable pile of bullshit isn't it? The land of freedom and democracy has toppled democratically elected governments on a whim and, as a result, reduced the freedom available to huge swathes of people across the planet. They've done plenty to advance the cause of oppression (currently they're opposing an international agreement to end the use of torture by governments. There reason for doing so is that they don't want foreign observers allowed into US prisons. Way to stamp moral authority on your regime Dubya...), so all the protestations by Rumsfeld et al that they're doing this for apple pie and liberty sound rather hollow.

The other school of thought is a little fragmented, but runs thus; America is currently reaping the whirlwind caused by decades of corporate greed. The stockmarket is crashing, people's savings and pensions are being devalued to the point of worthlessness, and all the while a few CEO's are stuffing their cavernous pockets with money. Unsurprisingly, people are not happy about this. When they are not happy, they tend to register their disapproval in the time-honoured tradition of blaming the president for everything. Dubya's approval rating is falling (something that, after September 11th, no-one thought would happen for years) and he needs something that will send it shooting back up to election landslide levels. Happily, his Dad left unfinished business in Iraq, and so what better way to make people forget about their raped economy than a war with a country that coincidentally has huge oil reserves. What would help repair the economy better than a new supply of oil that would free America from it's need to keep it's Arabian allies sweet?

This sounds a little more believable, doesn't it? Perhaps a little too harsh in places (I can't bring myself to believe that their government is composed entirely of soulless monsters who believe in nothing more than their own self interest), but all in all it's a hypothesis that holds a lot of water. So that is what America is doing. It is willing to risk causing civil wars across the Middle East, a massive increase in terrorist recruitment, and a ruining of the economy that will make the current crash seem like a particularly nice dream involving 4 Playboy Playmates, some whipped cream, and a red snapper. All because a group of stupid white men want to cling on to their power and influence in America, and fuck the rest of the world if they don't like it. Yet the UK is supporting all of this. And I'll bet most of us didn't even know that we were.

It does seem that war is inevitable. It also seems that we in the UK are going to be part of it. If that does happen, then I'm patriotic enough to want 'us' to win; only a fool would wish defeat on his own country. But if I'm honest, I wish that Tony Blair would grow some balls and tell Dubya that we want no part of his attempt to win the approval of his Daddy and the American Public. We've supported his War on Terror, and that is all well and good. But we avoided the first Vietnam, so it would be nice if we could avoid their next one. Let's not support his War on Common Sense, eh?

Censorship

I have genuinely used the example in the last paragraph of this rant. Try it with a right wing friend; you'll laugh yourself sick at their reaction.



For some reason, I've found myself arguing with my friends about censorship recently. Seeing as I like few things better than a good and good-natured argument, I don't view this as a bad thing. Nor do I generally view it as a particularly noteworthy thing. But for some reason I've found the topic of censorship has tattooed itself onto my brain, and so it is that I'm sitting in front of a computer screen trying to put my thoughts in order about the subject. Hopefully it will provide an interesting read. I'm equally hopeful that it will help me settle on a firm opinion about censorship so that I no longer argue whichever point of view is the most likely to wind up the other person (What? Don't look at me like that; you know what I'm like...)

So then; is censorship a good thing or a bad thing? It has been with us since Roman times, where the office of Censor of Public Morals existed. It was, rather ominously for us, an office abused by successive Emperors who used the position to declare any point of view that conflicted with theirs as immoral. Unhappily, many countries use censorship in exactly the same way (Burma and Singapore spring immediately to mind, but just look at how often Blair or Dubya play the "moral high ground" card when faced with criticism.)

If, like me, you're a film, music, or literature buff, you'll almost certainly be inclined to say that it is a bad thing. The last 50 years has seen censorship of good films (A Clockwork Orange, though that was unusual in that it was Kubrick himself who ordered it's withdrawal from the UK. Numerous "video nasties" were also banned; The Evil Dead is my favourite among these.), good music (we are plagued with radio edits of songs in order to protect our delicate little ears from the trauma of hearing a swearword; why the hell we can't apply these same criteria to protect us from the anodyne shite that Stuttering Stanley of Pop Idol fame vomits out with alarming regularity I'll never know...), and good literature (Lady Chatterley’s Lover being the most famous casualty here).

However, you may just as easily be inclined to say that it is a good thing. I saw the Evil Dead when I was 8 and have been treated to a lifetime of nightmares about zombies ever since. Many of the video nasties that have now been freed from the thrall of the censors have turned out to be badly made and exploitative crap. I was as surprised as anybody to find myself thinking that I agreed wholeheartedly with the censors who wanted to ban Bad Lieutenant; it was the worst, most boring film I've ever seen. It consisted of a series of scenes that were designed to shock the viewer and...that's it. It's easier to find pirate treasure that it is to find the plot of this turgid lump of sensationalist rubbish. Obviously I'm being facetious when I say I wanted it banned, I merely wanted to stop watching it. Nevertheless, it is a film used by both the pro and anti censorship camps to justify why censorship should be increased or reduced. So who is right?

As we live in a relatively liberal western society (I'm talking only about Europe here; their are conflicting reports from the US that claim the current government are either the cultural equivalent of the Spanish Inquisition, or the last guardians of decency depending on your point of view.), there has been an increasingly relaxed attitude to censorship. Most people, if questioned, would probably say that censorship is not a good thing, or that censorship begins and ends in the home. To which the reply is "What about kiddie porn? If you don't believe in censorship at a government level then what is to stop this stuff being made?"

Well, sorry to rely on sophistry and nitpicking here, but I think that's rather a dishonest way to argue in favour of greater censorship. Child pornography is, first and foremost, a human rights issue. Children should not have to be forced into doing something that will be physically and psychologically damaging, and I'm pretty damn sure that I would want the government to do everything in their power to stop it's production (unless you live in Belgium, where it would appear that the government are the biggest consumers of child porn...). Again I must stress; that is not censorship, it is protecting the rights of the vulnerable.

Yet isn't that what censorship is about; protecting the vulnerable? Well, yes in theory that is exactly what it is for. But the fact is that our trust in the censors and that they will know what is best for us has been eroded considerably. I've already mentioned how Blair, and all politicians for that matter, use censorship for political reasons; the Brass Eye special concerning the media's hypocrisy in dealing with Paedophiles was condemned without having been seen because that is the sort of thing that middle england wanted to hear. But it's not just politicians that one should be wary of; it's not often that I will punch the air in delight at the news of someone's death, but that's exactly what I did when I heard that Mary Whitehouse had shuffled off this mortal coil. How DARE that self righteous bitch tell me that she knows what is best for me, especially when she never used to watch most of the programs she condemned.

Michael Grade described her as "a bully in the guise of a victim", and I agree wholeheartedly with the description. Not just of her, but of pretty much every self appointed censor. Whether they argue for censorship on religious grounds (such as those peace loving Christians who hurled abuse and threats of violence at people who committed the cardinal sin of going to see "The Last Temptation of Christ"), or for moral reasons (the simpering tits who constantly worry about the negative effects of any TV program racier than "Little House on the Prairie"), or simply for personal reasons (if there are any bigger morons in the world than the ones who signed the petition calling for the second Lord of the Rings film to change it's title from "The Two Towers" because they believed it was a clear reference to September 11th, then I have yet to be made aware of their existence), they are essentially trying to force their views on others. And if you don't accept their view, then you are the enemy and you are to be condemned for your sinfulness/immorality/insensitivity.

So what is it that I'm trying to say here? Well, I do believe that there are certain fundamental things that the government (or some public body) should concern themselves with in respect of censorship. Personally, I believe that anything that involves a lack of consent of one or more of the participants at any stage of the creation of a particular piece of work should fall under the governments censorship remit. As far as I can see, that takes care of the horror stories that certain pro-censorship advocates will have you believe we are on the slippery slope to (I have, and I swear to God this is true, heard someone say that if we were to revoke the blasphemy laws in this country then we will see an increase in things like snuff films because "sacrifice is always prevalent in a godless society"). Other than that...well, as far as I can see it's a matter of personal choice and parental control. I rather like organisations such the BBFC (who decide the ratings for films depending on suitability) because they are provide a useful guideline to parents who wish to ensure that their children don't watch anything unsuitable (such as The Evil Dead...). Yet even then, I don't think that their ratings should be anything more than guidelines, and not rules set in stone.

In short, my ideal is a world where the likes of Chris Morris can continue to produce programs such as Brass Eye and the people who dislike it will all remember how to change the channel of their television rather than writing foaming letters to their MP's demanding that the filth be stopped. If people want to be so egocentric as to believe that something that offends them must therefore offend everybody, then by all means let them carry on. Perhaps listen to them for a while, and even allow yourself a few cooings of sympathy. Then remind them that all they have to do is stop reading or watching whatever it is that is upsetting them and do something else. Failing that, you could always do what I do and start complaining bitterly to them that something that they like or enjoy is offensive to you. Trust me, there is nothing funnier than watching a tinpot 'moral guardian' being forced to argue against censorship when you complain to them about sexism in an Enid Blyton book.

More Drugs

Well, I've just returned from my holidays during which I spent a fantastic weekend at Glastonbury festival. Things are going well in both my love life and career. The friends I now have are about as dear to me as friends can be. And if that weren't enough, I've got 2 new playful pet cats. Bearing in mind how well things seem to be going for me right now, it would be churlish and ungrateful of me to work myself up into the state of indignation that I need to write these rants.

If there is one thing that has been getting up my nose recently, it's drugs. And unfortunately, I don't mean in a good way. After a year which has seen an MP (a conservative MP at that) calling for the decriminalisation of cannabis, the setting up of Amsterdam style cannabis cafes in the UK and, if reports of tomorrows announcement by the Home Sec David Blunkett are to be believed, the reclassification of cannabis as a class C drug (meaning that possession would no longer be an arrestable offence), I was beginning to think that perhaps the powers that be were starting to see that perhaps smoking a spliff wouldn't bring about the collapse of civilisation. As per usual, fate and the media have conspired to vomit out more bilious bad news for the express purpose of ruining my day.

The Tories (and one Labour MP) are saying that the cannabis trial scheme in Lambeth, whereby cannabis users are basically left alone in order to free up police resources so that they can tackle the problem of hard drugs, is a failure. They say it is a failure because "it encourages drug taking". I look forward to the next release from Tory central office, when I expect them to declare that legalised alcohol encourages drinking, cigarettes encourage smoking, and chocolate encourages lardy fat bastards. I mean, for fucks sake! Have the Tory leadership allowed their brains to lie fallow for the summer? It smacks of opposing an issue for the sake of opposing it, and it certainly shows their lack of political daring and acumen.

The reason I say this is because their major complaint is that some people are buying their cannabis from dealers who also try and sell them harder drugs. No shit Sherlock! Why, who would imagine in this land where free enterprise and profit have been worshipped by successive governments for 30 years, that a dealer would try and sell someone a drug that will mean more profit for him? However, rather than use this complaint as a platform to push for decriminalisation (to which most people are...well, not opposed to; only the Daily Mail brigade provide any objections and they rather spoil their case by talking reactionary old shit about cannabis and crack cause the same damage for most of the time) and thus increase their popularity among the young (a large and mainly untapped source of votes), they simply spew out the same tired lumps of froth about how all drugs are banned, and how cannabis is a "gateway drug" that leads on to harder drugs (question; how many people were drunk when they first tried drugs? Most of you? Hmm...and yet we never hear complaints of beer being gateway drugs do we?). Their best argument seems to be "Well, it's not that bad for you, but it leads you into other things that are!", and the only people it appeals to are a small and vocal minority.

And if that were not enough, I now find that Blunkett's announcement concerning drug laws tomorrow is not a bold statement by a political party intent on change. It is, in fact, the rather soggy underpants of a drunk and incontinent old tramp. Sure, cannabis is being reclassified as category C. However, the sentences for dealing cannabis are to be doubled. So what we are being told is that it's alright to use the drug, but you're not allowed to buy it. I hate to break this to anyone with an ounce of idealism in them, but we're not getting a country where personal liberties that don't infringe on the rights of others are being increased. No, if I'm optimistic we're getting a rather badly performed sleight-of-hand trick where we think our little freedom's are being increased, but in fact nothing is changing at all. If I'm pessimistic (and, depressingly, realistic), we're seeing the set up for the return of draconian and illogical drug laws, with the excuse that the half cocked, half arsed pilot scheme in Lambeth didn't work.

Of course, when it comes to draconian and illogical drug laws, we're still quite some way behind our friends across the Atlantic. In some states of the land of the free, possessing enough cannabis for a reasonably pleasant night in is enough to get your arse thrown in prison for 10-20 years. Just recently, the war against terror has given the blockheaded anti-drug propagandists in their government yet another excuse to sink their vampire fangs of guilt and fear into the neck of America. You see, now when you buy drugs you're not just committing a crime. Oh no, you're personally responsible for prolonging the war against terror because the terrorists are getting a lot of their funding from drugs.

To which my response is "Then fucking well legalise them all and make sure that if anyone is going to profit from drugs it's going to be the government!". However, as I accept that I'm in the minority in that respect, I'll move on. It boils my piss that these simpleminded fuckwits honestly believe that the average cannabis smoker is happy to hand over money that aids in the running of any criminal enterprise. Speaking personally (and for most dope smokers I've ever met in my life), I absolutely LOATHE having to go to some of the places I do in order to buy cannabis. This is almost certainly going to sound like an intellectual's fear of the working class, but I don't like going to a shitty estate to buy a quarter ounce from somebody who may do me the pleasure of burgling my house later in the week. I hated defending the little fuckstack's in court and I hate having to be all matey with them when all I want to do is get out in one piece. This is why I, like many other smokers of my slightly repressed and middle class ilk, prefer to get their dope via a friend who only deals to his friends. It's all very suburban isn't it? And the attempt to remind people like me just where the drug money may be going will not result in a flood of people throwing away their rizla's in a fit of self-loathing. It will result in people being more secretive about it for fear of being demonised by a bunch of morally dubious hypocrites.

Of course, I would be naive if I thought that the twinning of anti-drug propaganda with anti-terrorist propaganda was being done in the interests of reducing drug use in America. America, along with the rest of the western world, has been fighting a rather pointless War on Drugs for years. It's had next to no impact so far, and I don't imagine that the US government expects this latest trick to have much effect on anyone who wouldn't unquestioningly swallow whatever rancid pile of stinking old dog-smeg that they've collectively spunked out in any given week. What it will do is deflect attention rather neatly from another major US source of terrorist income and training; their government.

Was it drug cartel money that paid for Osama bin Laden's training by the CIA in the 80's? Or for Pinochet's CIA sponsored Chilean coup? Or for Dubya's attempt to depose the Venezuelan president a few months ago? (which shows that Dubya handles international politics like Joey Deacon handled a basketball...) Maybe it was drug money that paid for the School of the America's in Georgia, where the glut of Central and South American sadists and murderers who laughably call themselves the governments of their nations can learn the fine arts of torture and murder in the idyllic surroundings of the USA? No? Oh, that's right; it was the US government who sponsored and paid for every last one of those, wasn't it? The War on Terror is nothing more than the US reaping what it's Government has sown worldwide since the end of WWII. The Newer, more Improved War on Drugs is not much more than another way to try and distract attention from this.

Which is a shame, because I find it funny. No, actually I find it hilarious. Not the death of innocent people or the muddlesome war. Rather, it is the firmly held belief among some Americans that the imperialistic attitude that was the downfall of the Romans, the Persians, the Imperial Chinese, the Japanese, the British Empire...hell, every nation that has ever held sway over world events and opinion, is a perfectly acceptable one and that the rest of the world will just have to accept it that has me chuckling in that smug way that only a European can manage when discussing America. Of course, I'll have to wait a couple of hundred years to see if I'm proved right about that (though all recorded history is on my side), so in the meantime, would it really hurt anyone if I sat and had a spliff whilst I'm waiting?

The AA

One A stands for America, one for Afghanistan. Laboured, hackneyed, and a bit shit as a title. Much like this rant.




Well, what with the World Cup providing further reasons to laugh at French people until they cry, India and Pakistan eyeballing each other across Kashmir, and Big Brother ruling the airwaves, I've found my attention has been very successfully drawn away from that most epically boring yet unpleasantly important of issue's; the War Against Terror. In truth, it's been rather relaxing not watching the news and having at least one "Oh no, what has he done NOW?" moment whenever the US President hoves into view. But as John Gotti might have said (well...actually he probably said "Arrrggh...." and then choked slowly to death on his throat cancer, and good bloody riddance to him) "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer". So whilst it's a bit melodramatic (not to mention egotistical) to imply that Dubya is my enemy, he's certainly someone who causes me a lot of concern and so I like to keep up to date with what he's up to. If only so that my imagination doesn't run away with me trying to guess what amount of fuckwittage he's inflicting on the rest of the world...

But enough of my own little neuroses; what's been happening recently? Particularly in America (where the first terrorist atrocities of the war were committed) and Afghanistan (where the first shots of the war were fired).

The USA is of course the main prosecutor of the war against terror. Since 11th September there have been numerous developments (the most pathetic of which concerns those British people who wrote to complain about how the date was being expressed as 9/11 in the American fashion rather than 11/9 in the British; isn't it nice to know that in the wake of the worst loss of civilian life for year, people can still be as petty and xenophobic as ever. Almost makes one proud to live in the UK...), although you would be forgiven for missing them because apparently the media aren't interested in stories that don't involve big explosions or pitched battles. As I'm going to spend a bit of time criticising the US government for it's current stance, I suppose I should make one thing clear to silence the inevitable bleating of those right wingers who believe that any questioning of government policy concerning the War is tantamount to shopping for Semtex and changing one's name to Usama. I continue to believe that the US was fully justified in starting this war. Their country had been shat upon from a very great height and to expect them to sit back and do nothing whilst various debates concerning the morality of war raged on was unrealistic. Any claims that the US is acting like a bully toward Afghanistan are equally as disingenuous. Yes, the US is far and away superior to the Taliban in military terms. But I'm inclined to think that it's not America's fault that the nation responsible for it's woes is as developed as medieval Europe. What should they have done? Only sent in low-tech equipment to make it a fair fight? Most critics would say black if a US spokesman said white, and I wish they'd be honest about their own motivation for trying to discredit any and every American statement and action.

That said I'm now going to be unpleasant about American statements and actions. My personal bias comes from the fact that I believe the upper echelons of the Republican Party to be venal, corrupt, stupid old men. And as venal, corrupt and stupid goes George W. Bush is pretty much the pinnacle of achievement. There are numerous things that one could pick out to exemplify this, so let's start with the semi-regular terrorist alerts that are becoming a feature of American life.

Basically, it would seem that the many and varied intelligence agencies of America are somewhat embarrassed at having missed the fact that a major terrorist attack was brewing in early September. Because of this, they are now ready to warn the US public of imminent terrorist attacks on the basis of such evidence as "Well, the Golden Gate Bridge is pretty big and if I were a terrorist, that's where I would attack". However, it is interesting to note that these warnings only seem to occur when the government finds itself facing criticism. So are we seeing the FBI, CIA, NSA, and however many other alphabet agencies there are being over cautious? Or are we seeing a government who cheated their way to victory doing their level best to cheat further still?

Take, for example, the May arrest of Abdullah al-Muhajir. This American gentleman, formerly known as Chicago gang member Jose Padilla (incidentally, I did hear of someone who honestly believed that the airlines could once again be made safe by running double checks on anyone who looks like a Moslem, or who has an Islamic name; what a fucking boy genius he is! The fact that Al-Quaida has a huge amount of support in, for example, the Philippines or Indonesia where such names as Edilberto Adan are commonplace doesn't seem to have troubled him...) has been detained by the US on the grounds that he was part of an Al-Quaida plot to detonate a nuclear bomb in America. The evidence for this is...well, we don't actually know what the evidence is as he hasn't been before a court as yet, nor is he likely to. Instead, he's been handed over to the military where he will be held indefinitely.

Now again, I should make it clear that I would be a fool to disapprove of heightened security in America these days. And if this man was indeed planning something of this magnitude then the US is certainly doing the right thing in apprehending him. But even leaving aside the fact that the atrocity he is accused of planning is identical to that of the upcoming film 'The Sum of All Fears', holding a man in indefinite military custody when absolutely no evidence that he was involved in any such plot has been presented...well, isn't that just a little bit totalitarian? Why is the government so afraid of giving us a few little tidbits to satisfy the public that there was indeed such a threat? If nothing else, it would piss on the chips of people like me who enjoy nothing more than being given an excuse to criticise a blundering and stupid government led by a blundering and stupid man. There have been so many false alarms and exercises in misdirection by Dubya's government that there is more than a touch of the boy who cried wolf about this.

As we finish looking at America, it is also worth looking at Dubya's favourite soundbite, the Axis of Evil. He recently extended this group to include Cuba. For some reason, he chose to announce this in Florida, co-incidentally the state where his brother is running for re-election and where there are huge numbers of anti-Castro Cuban expatriates registered as voters. It's also the state that won the presidency for Dubya. When members of his own party are criticising Dubya for his cack-handed attempt to further demonise a country where, if you believe some Americans, is holiday home to all that is evil and satanic, it leads me to believe that perhaps Dubya isn't interested in pursuing the war against terror in order to safeguard the people who elected him. He's doing it to safeguard his re-election prospects. Not that that should be a surprise to anybody, but it's nice to have some tangible proof of this.

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan nothing very much happened. Well...that's not true of course, it's just that India and Pakistan held the potential for far greater fireworks, and so Afghanistan was ignored. But there has been much activity over there. Coalition soldiers have scoured the country and found approximately no Taliban or Al-Quaida troops (they're all in Pakistan, or perhaps even Kashmir by now...). So they've had to be content with blowing up the cave networks and ammunition dumps that were left behind. It might not be very exciting, but taking away the mountain hideaways is a fairly substantial step towards lasting stability in the region. After all, it's difficult to be a successful guerilla fighter if you can't run and hide after taking a few potshots at the army that vastly outnumbers you.In the meantime, the interim government has been busy trying to create a permanent and lasting democratic and transparent government. Naturally, for a country whose idea of human rights was, until recently, giving the condemned man a blindfold, there have been problems doing this. A tribal power struggle is going on behind the scenes as various clan leaders and warlords jockey for position in the new government. The former king has even had to go on record to say that he does not intend to reclaim the throne (and give a veneer of legitimacy to some very unsavoury people who would use him as a figurehead for their government).

Many commentators have used this power struggle as an excuse to look down their noses at the Afghanistani's, citing it as proof that they are nothing better than savages and should be left to their own devices. Hm, well yes I can see how it is unreasonable of them not to have developed the same level of transparency and efficiency in government in a few months when it took us in the west centuries to get from feudalism to democracy. How typically barbaric of them! And, as we have seen, the current American government isn't exactly something that should be aspired to. Who knows, maybe Afghanistan will create a government that really is democratic. And then America and the West can learn from them.