Halfapenguin.com
qcci

I know i'm a bit late on this, mainly because i only watched the countdown podcast this evening. I've tried to maintain an interest in US politics, but its difficult to do when you are on the other side of the ocean. After coming here i've tried to make up for lost time, but even then my first real exposure to John McCain was in the Iowa debate. I saw someone who made my skin crawl, he honestly struck me as someone "scary beyond all reason", and when he finally rose to the republican leadership i found my inital gut reaction confirmed time and again. But i didn't have the historical depth to know enough about his history, beyond his status as a Viet-Cong prisoner of war and his rather slimy entry into US politics. Comments like a hundred years in iraq, and lack of any knowledge about the world outside his bedroom, his attitudes to people who disagree with him, all helped confirmed my feeling that this is the president we were warned about. The one that would be so insane as to press the button. Then came the "its not important" comment, and after all the attempts to defend the indefensible, Keith Olbermann delivered this commentary. Part 2 Honestly, countdown can at best be called infotainment, it would not be considered news anywhere in Europe, but Keith Olbermann does sometimes channel the person he attempts to emulate. He may not be Edward R. Munrrow, and the republican party is far more calculating and intelligent than Joe McCarthy, but if enough people listen to him, they might start thinking again.

Nope, I haven't gone New Labour, I'm voicing my support for one of my heroes, Tony Benn, who is considering coming out of retirement to return to Parliament. Sourced from the BBC

I came across this brilliant short film on the internet

...can't screw up so easily. Apparently the Metropolitan Police have said that if a prosecution is successful, they will be unable to do their jobs. So they are saying if they got caught wrongdoing, they wont be able to continue wrongdoing. Charles de Menezes was an innocent victim of the ever increasing incompetence and corruption of the British Police Forces, ever since they were politicised by the Labour Government. The detail watching the apartment block, went on a break, without arranging cover. This resulted in a knock on effect ending up with the armed response unit conducting a "Mafia Style" execution of an innocent man. Now the armed police may have been under extreme pressure, but their actions lack both wisdom and intelligence (wouldn't a suicide bomber take the care to have a deadman's switch). It would be bad enough if that was where the wrong ended, but in response to the truth coming out, there was a deliberate attempt by the Metropolitan Police to cover up their gross incompetence and brand Mr de Menezes as a likely terror subject, so they could be justified in executing him. The police needs to be brought to heel, since they don't seem to be capable of acting as civilised humans at the moment. For generations we have had a police force to be proud of, now it looks like we are trying to emulate the excuse for police that the US government employs.

Apparently, we aren't going to just have to avoid cameras on the street, but above the street, in the sky. again military technology is being used against us. I was totally panicked by the thought that higher up the chain of command is needed for access and abuse of this information, because guess who's up at the top, some pillar of moral authority, or the second biggest criminal on the planet? Sadly given the general inability of the British people to actually have an opinion about something important... Not to worry, soon you'll have Eric's nightmare to contend with, me I'm heading to a country where at least on paper privacy is an essential right!