A Saudi Arabian national arrested in Afghanistan by the Americans, as a Taliban leader and terrorist, imprisoned by them in Gitmo, (however dodgy his being held there without trial - NOT OUR BUSINESS) returning to the UK, where he is in line for a £1million comp. payout from the UK taxpayer - that's you and I, folks - because he has leave to remain in the UK, because his wife holds a UK passport.
The whole return landing covered live on TV from Biggin Hill!
THE WORLD HAS GONE MAD.
Last edited by: Roger. on Fri 30 Oct 15 at 13:33
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Tell you what Roger, go and spend 14-15 years in Guantanamo Bay. I'll arrange the million quid for you when you get out.
OK? Would that make you happy?
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I didn't say it was right that he spent time in Gitmo - I said it is not right that the UK taxpayer should pay his compensation.
If he had been in a British run clink and suffered 14 yeas incarceration without a trial, it would be a different matter entirely.
So - the Yanks should pay, if compo is due.
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>>the Yanks should pay, if compo is due
Maybe - I don't know if there a case of collusion between the UK secret services and the Merkins re his incarceration and likely torture/interrogation - presumably that's where any claim against the UK would stand.
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But you didn't say that, did you? You shouted THE WORLD'S GONE MAD.
Why do you think the government might give him money? Hint from the left wing rag, the Daily Telegraph:
"The pay-outs have helped avoid damaging litigation which could have dragged the British security services through years of allegations, centering on alleged collusion in torture of detainees at the "Gitmo" base. "
It's a money saving, face-saving, security services saving measure. But you carry on and paint it like some Christmas present if it pleases you.
This is the real world, not some fantasy planet. The world has not gone mad. It's madness level is at just about the same level it's always been.
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I recall a previous Gitmo detainee was returned to this country, given around a million quid compo and subsequently bug-erred off to Syria.
Wonder what this one will do?
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>> I recall a previous Gitmo detainee was returned to this country, given around a million
>> quid compo and subsequently bug-erred off to Syria.
The gent born with the obviously Muslamic name of Ronald Fiddler?
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I presume the scowly is for my dreadful apostrophe abuse, for which I apologise and can only explain it away by the fact that I can't type for toffee.
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>> I presume the scowly is for my dreadful apostrophe abuse, for which I apologise and
>> can only explain it away by the fact that I can't type for toffee.
>>
Can't type OR get a grip on reality. You might just want to lighten up on Roger you bleedin' heart Liberal.
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Jesus, you lot don't get it, do you? Our government, under Blair, was collusive with the US in the torture and rendition of people like this, Ken Clarke realised this and put these payments in place to shut them up and save us even worse grief.
There is no "The US should pay" option, we and they are one and the same thing in this case and the government don't want this brought out in court.
Would Roger and the Silent Green Thumb Gang care to elucidate on the REAL WORLD alternative way to deal with this situation?
We're in it up to our eyes as a nation, why do we think the Chilcot Inquiry is taking so long?
Wake up for chrissakes and put the UKIP glasses down.
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"Wake up for chrissakes and put the UKIP glasses down."
ISTR that those looking through the UKIP glasses felt that it wasn't our business to get involved in foreign squabbles in the first place. With hindsight, I have to admit that the Kippers were right.
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I'm sure you credit the LibDems in even more glowing terms in that case. Glad to hear it. I agreed with Nick, too.
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"I'm sure you credit the LibDems"
Sure, they got that bit right .......... but can you think of anything else? The electorate certainly couldn't.
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Lots as it goes, but let's not de-rail Roger's fascinating analysis of geo-politics. I'm sure we're yet to hear the best of his views.
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>>Would Roger and the Silent Green Thumb Gang care to elucidate
They're mowing a lawn opposite right now. I'll pop across and have a word.
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>> Jesus, you lot don't get it, do you? Our government, under Blair, was collusive with
>> the US in the torture and rendition of people like this, Ken Clarke realised this
>> and put these payments in place to shut them up and save us even
i think most people would be miffed because we've played a small part in it and pay him a huge amount of money seemingly at the drop of a hat. The Usa played a very large part and they give him nothing nor even a sniff of anything to come. Bound to annoy people.
Of course theres more to it, but still not ideal and easy to see why people would be annoyed.
Last edited by: sooty123 on Fri 30 Oct 15 at 16:37
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I wondered what all the commotion was at lunch-time.
Went past the airport at just before 1pm and it was absolutely packed out with TV/Satellite vans all parked at the end of the runway, no idea why they picked there as the passenger terminal is at the side, I would have thought that all they could have seen was the aircraft landing.
Until I heard the lunchtime news I thought an important WW2 plane(s) were landing.
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>> i think most people would be miffed because we've played a small part in it
>> and pay him a huge amount of money seemingly at the drop of a hat.
While we may have been a bit part player in the overall Afghan thing the issue here is what part Uk played in the specifics of Shakeer Ahmed's detention. Government doesn't just roll over in face of these claims; somebody takes a very long hard look before signing off £1m in compo. And while a million is a massive sum too any of us when you add up loss of income and other compensatory factors over 15 yrs it doesn't take long to get there.
>> The Usa played a very large part and they give him nothing nor even a
>> sniff of anything to come.
The US will be compensating its own people.
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Weak people in uniforms inflict things like this, but those responsible are their incompetent managers.
I may have misunderstood the report of the first item on the wireless while I was driving home this afternoon, but I thought it said that the woman had 'put the nut on' about 8 times previously, which is why she went to prison.
It reminded me of a male colleague at work maybe a dozen years ago, who announced one day that from that day onwards he would be living as a woman - which she did.
The men without exception to my knowledge were OK with it, but some of the women were very hostile and there were a lot of complaints about her using the female toilets. It made me wonder how well Ms Hudson would be received in a women's prison.
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>> I may have misunderstood the report of the first item on the wireless while I
>> was driving home this afternoon, but I thought it said that the woman had 'put
>> the nut on' about 8 times previously, which is why she went to prison.
No particular argument about prison other than the general one about short sentences being ineffective. Point was about someone who very clearly looks and identifies as female being in a male prison. It goes beyond incompetent and into the realms of vindictive.
>> It reminded me of a male colleague at work maybe a dozen years ago, who
>> announced one day that from that day onwards he would be living as a woman
>> - which she did.
We had same. The person concerned was a Quango member (Ministerial appointee) and did the full transition including surgery. One colleague predicted the sort of reaction from women Manatee describes but SFAIK it didn't happen. Pretty certain the female staff were unconcerned and while I was less likely to be party/peripheral to female members conversations I saw nothing other than supportive appraoches.
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While we may have been a bit part player in the overall Afghan thing the issue here is what part Uk played in the specifics of Shakeer Ahmed's detention. Government doesn't just roll over in face of these claims; somebody takes a very long hard look before signing off £1m in compo. And while a million is a massive sum too any of us when you add up loss of income and other compensatory factors over 15 yrs it doesn't take long to get there.
Therein being the problem, many people won't know the ins and outs of it all. As i said 'seemingly' paying the money at the drop of a hat. This is the first I've heard of it on here, I've not seen it reported so i don't know the details.
>> The US will be compensating its own people.
If i remember the phrase correctly, whataboutery.
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>> Jesus, you lot don't get it, do you? Our government, under Blair, was collusive with
>> the US in the torture and rendition of people like this, Ken Clarke realised this
>> and put these payments in place to shut them up and save us even worse
>> grief.
Mrs B's cousin Rose was with us over weekend for The Lad's 21st and reminde us of her post Uni peregrinations.
Around 1977 she set off overland to Oz but only got as far as Afghanistan. She recalls being invited to a wedding in Kandahar where she was both welcome and, as British woman in her twenties, felt entirely safe. The Brits, for all the colonial history, were regarded as honest and well meaning. The Yanks OTOH......
We're now regarded as US poodles.
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"We're now regarded as US poodles."
Quite - I can't understand why so many want to come and live with us. We're horrible, absolutely dreadful!.
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Curiously, the Daily Mail, a 'voice of sanity' for those of a righty tighty persuasion, seemed to headline Shaker's release as a victory for freedom....
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Sun 1 Nov 15 at 22:26
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"Curiously, the Daily Mail, a 'voice of sanity' for those of a righty tighty persuasion, seemed to headline Shaker's release as a victory for freedom...."
I thought that righteous Grauniadistans didn't read that carp, Brompt ......... you're as bad as NoFm, you really are! Tcha!
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>> I thought that righteous Grauniadistans didn't read that carp, Bromp
One needs to know how the enemy is thinking and thus I end up reading the Mail's website.
In his case though it was the paper version in customer ahead's trolley at Aldi (Northampton Jimmy's End Store)
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>>
>> In his case though it was the paper version in customer ahead's trolley at Aldi
>> (Northampton Jimmy's End Store)
>>
That's all right then. We accept that you didn't inhale.
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"One needs to know how the enemy is thinking and thus I end up reading the Mail's website."
I guess we should be grateful to Brompt for checking out the DM so that he can warn us about its corrupting content. A bit like those worthies (MPs, judges etc) who watch porn films in order to protect the public from moral harm.
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>> "One needs to know how the enemy is thinking
Blimey, he can't leave that old class war thing alone for a minute.
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"Blimey, he can't leave that old class war thing alone for a minute."
I confess that I used to be like that - when I was a student. Though I was born in a place some miles to the left of Brompt, 40 years more of life taught me to be rather more of a realist.
I now tend to judge issues on their individual importance rather than from a left/right standpoint - hence voting at elections becomes very difficult. At the last general election, I tested myself on the Telegraph's 'How should I vote?' calculator. At my initial attempt, I came out as UKIP - but I had omitted to save the result and so tried to repeat the test. Next time I was 58% Tory, 56% UKIP, 55% Labour and 42% Libdem. Not a lot of difference between them, really, and I'm sure that I'm not the only one facing similar difficulties!
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For general elections you can narrow the field a bit by eliminating UKIP as an option, on the basis that they will never get anywhere near power. Then just ask yourself what's your most important issue - for me it's the economy which eliminates Labour immediately. I've never found it hard to decide who to vote for in a GE.
Other types of elections, run with a proper electoral system, fill your boots of course if you fancy the look of Nige.
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There is not enough of a difference between the parties. There's hardly a cigarette paper between them on individual issues, and such differences as do exist all cancel each other out in the larger picture.
Perhaps Corbyn will move Labour sufficiently sideways to not only allow a substantial gap between the main parties, but also allow more room for the LibDems to maneuver in.
Once they are not all nit picking the details on same issues on the same narrow path, it may become simpler to choose overall.
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>>One needs to know how the enemy is thinking and thus I end up reading the Mail's website.
I wasn't aware that politically the Mail particularly leaned one way or the other.
The Mail, in common with most newspapers, is expert at appealing to its target audience. And that would seem to be judged by subject matter and standpoint rather than political affiliation.
Even then the issue is not really those who enjoy the Mail and find it entertaining, it is those that take it to be a serious newspaper capable of objective reporting.
It is without doubt ill-informed, misinforming, LCD s***e but I feel that its readership split is horizontal rather than vertical.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Mon 2 Nov 15 at 12:05
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"The Mail, in common with most newspapers, is expert at appealing to its target audience."
Which, in a perverse sort of way, seems to be Brompt and NoFM. The Mail really must have some clever marketing people ;-)
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You've mentioned before about me reading the Mail; I cannot quite make up my mind if you are a little slow or simply it passes for wit in your own mind.
However, in case reality is of interest, I rarely read the Mail. I don't avoid it, certainly not to the extent that Al does, it just doesn't often interest me. I find it overly simplistic in the way it reports, and it relies on a sensationalism that doesn't appeal to me, in fact often annoys me.
I do feel that it, and its readers are representative of much that is wrong with society at this time, and thus use "The Mail" and references to its "readers" as euphemisms for the entire range of pitiful tabloid press and its equally sad adherents.
Clearly a subtlety too far for you, which I guess shouldn't surprise me. If you wish to insist on believing me a fan then by all means do so if it helps you get through the day but you should avoid inappropriate feelings of adequacy where possible.
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>> I wasn't aware that politically the Mail particularly leaned one way or the other.
You are joking??
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I think he's right. It just seeks to stir up outrage. It's just a professional trolling operation.
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>> I think he's right.
Historically it's always been firmly Conservative. Exception in Feb 74 when it suggested a Con/Lib coalition and some sources suggest it favoured Blair in 2001. Further back, when Northcliffe and Rothermere were personally at the helm, it took up more right wing solutions, attempting to undermine Baldwin in the thirties and later flirting with Moseley - Hurrah for the Blackshirts etc.
Vehemently anti Labour from the word go. To that end it's been willing to post dubious smears from the Zinoviev letter through '10 Labour Lies' in 79 (pretty well all of them were true) to the Ralph Miliband stuff two years ago.
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And if we needed any more indication of the Mail's line, when do you think this was published:
i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/11/03/00/2E0D2C0700000578-0-image-a-18_1446512382764.jpg
its a cartoon involving pygmies in loincloths and shrunken heads.
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"its a cartoon involving pygmies in loincloths and shrunken heads."
Goodness gracious, thank you for the warning, Brompt, I don't think I could stand a cartoon that featured shrunken heads. I won't look - I would find it too upsetting!
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>> And if we needed any more indication of the Mail's line, when do you think
>> this was published:
>>
>> i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/11/03/00/2E0D2C0700000578-0-image-a-18_1446512382764.jpg
>>
>> its a cartoon involving pygmies in loincloths and shrunken heads.
>>
As its about Tom Jones announcing he thinks he is black (happened in the last 48 hours) then ditto the cartoon is of the same vintage,
Of course the truth is, Tom Jones never said he thought he was black in the way the mail suggested.
boyo
Last edited by: Zero on Tue 3 Nov 15 at 21:50
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>>And if we needed any more indication of the Mail's line,
As with all print media, The Mail would not publish something which constantly decreased its readership. Rather it strives to print stuff that maintains or even increases its audience.
You don't need to control the media, you simply need to educate the audience.
However, it may be that controlling the media is easier.
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"However, it may be that controlling the media is easier."
It would help if some people controlled their bizarre urge to be offended and stopped looking at the wretched Mail.
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>>It would help if some people controlled their bizarre urge to be offended and stopped looking at the wretched Mail.
In my own case I can't say the Mail particularly offends me, although I don't think its to be admired, it is simply usually not very interesting. - At least not to me, quite clearly most of the rest of the country is just fine with it.
It is the readership, as a group, that concerns me.
If you go back over old copies of The Sun, Mirror, Mail, People, NOTW and others over the years it is remarkable how public interest seems to have changed.
And not in a good way.
I was asking my Father about a week ago if he felt that the electorate was generally more oblivious now than it was 50 years ago. He felt that whilst it was generally better educated, it has become much less aware of significant issues and much more interested in tittle tattle.
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The quality of popular 'culture' is dismal and like water the more there is the faster it seems to flow downhill. So many people waste their time and opportunities consuming utter drivel. I honestly think it has got worse in the level it is pitched at, and a large number of people must be happy to take in the dumbed down fodder or it wouldn't exist.
I watched a bit of something called Gogglebox earlier, while waiting for the boss to come home (she is more cultured than wot I am). Once will be enough. The program itself was bad enough (watching people watching TV) but what some of them were watching and their responses to it were truly depressing.
They say the immediate post-war food diet, limited by austerity, was far healthier than today's. It occurred to me that the hoi polloi were better served intellectually in the 1980s when they had four TV channels to watch and there was no room for Get Me Out of Being a Celebrity (or something like that).
I can just about remember the Mirror being a good paper. It carried the news, it used simple accessible language (famously a reading age of 12 I think), it didn't get into great depth but it was actually a newspaper.
I have asked myself whether I am just suffering from nostalgia and Meldrewitis, but I don't think so. I really has got worse, hasn't it?
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>> I really has got worse, hasn't it?
I think so.
Take the BBC for example.
Its news these days is a load of populist nonsense. It has lost the entire concept of objective reporting. However, if one looks at old newsreels, then aside from a certain jingoism, it tended to be a great deal more objective, more straightforward and a great deal less sensationalist.
If one compares the Radio Times today with a 50 yr old edition, then aside from the expected changing taste, technology and potential, the actual content is so much "dumber".
If one wants to learn about an incident objectively, then what do you read? As far as I can see its "absolutely everything you can and take an average because most of it is rowlocks".
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Here's the listing for November 3rd 1965. I think on balance I prefer today's.
genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/bbcone/london/1965-11-03
BBC 2 looks a bit heavy going.
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What? A couple of kids science programmes, the Flowerpot Men, Animal Magic and the cracking Up The Junction (bet they censored the coat hanger scene) in the evening? Super. I'd watch that today and think my licence fee well spent.
Last edited by: Crankcase on Wed 4 Nov 15 at 06:17
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"Up the Junction" and lots lots more now available to purchase at the new BBC store.
store.bbc.com/up-the-junction
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Thanks for that CG.
It's an obvious point but I feel we've already paid for this and the archives ought to be public.
We're not good at this in this country. I had some frustrating conversations with the British Library who want to charge for access to everything, as is endemic here, whereas their French counterparts gladly make everything free, even to non nationals.. Same applies to all sort of "stuff" that really ought, in my view, be freely, easily and publicly available.
Just because there is a cost associated with making it available that doesn't mean you and I should necessarily directly bear it. Money isn't all a society should be about, but if I'm not careful I'll end up talking about the bourgeoisie and then where will we be?
At least most major museums are free again now. I take considerable joy in being able to nip over to the Fitzwilliam museum in Cambridge in my lunch break sometimes and have a quick revel in it all.
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>> I take considerable joy in being
>> able to nip over to the Fitzwilliam museum in Cambridge in my lunch break
I hope you keep your shoelaces properly fastened now.
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Oh ho :)
Tweren't I guv, but they did a fantastic job on the repair.
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It's an obvious point but I feel we've already paid for this and the archives ought to be public.
Not quite. Yes the licence fee paid for the original production and what ever broadcast rights applied at the time. What it often didn't pay for was repeats on other media, so work has to be done to gather the necessary permissions. Incidental music is often a right pain as the work is often subject to separate copyrights and can be 75 years of longer these days.
I'd not be too surprised if some countries just ride roughshod over the rights issues, but it's not fair to blame the BBC here. Somebody has to pay somewhere!
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>>
>> I'd not be too surprised if some countries just ride roughshod over the rights issues,
>> but it's not fair to blame the BBC here. Somebody has to pay somewhere!
>>
I guess I was trying to make a wider point about how society views these things, such that we wouldn't, or shouldn't, be in the situation that the BBC didn't automatically structure the original deal like that, if that makes sense.
If institutionally we were all geared towards "this will be available to the end user at no direct cost someday" right from the start we'd be nearer the Utopia I'm imagining.
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>> "Up the Junction"
Ah yes. Everyone who harks on about the good old days, and how the Uk has gone to the dogs should be sent a copy of this. Along with Cathy Come Home.
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Ok, well having had a poke about the internet and discovered that not only is there no support for my point of view on a quick Google, but that there isn't even a discussion about such a weird idea as public philanthropy in this context and I'm as ever in the wrong century, I had a grudging look at this BBC store thing.
Horizon please, I fancy seeing some of those wonderful old Paul Vaughn episodes from the seventies. No, we only have a few episodes that have been available for ages anyway, and they're the rubbish ones from the last couple of years.
Ok. Connections then, that James Burke was always good fun. No. Not at all. Sorry.
How about The Ascent of Man? No.
Civilisation? Come on, you MUST have Civilisation? No.
Monitor? No.
I'm giving up for the moment. Five failures out of five.
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" so far has 7,000 hours of material on it, but there are plans to add more from an archive of four million items."
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>> Along with Cathy Come Home.
A world we seem to be sliding back to......
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>> A world we seem to be sliding back to......
As evidenced in Ken Loach's latest project:
www.theguardian.com/film/2015/nov/23/ken-loach-benefit-sanctions-jeremy-corbyn-food-banks
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Today's headline news. - Alanovich
