You Know When?

You know when a biker travels past and the travesty he's riding upon- in reality this is a double travesty- sounds as though it's dragging a sizeable item of furniture along the road behind? You know, also, that almost everyone within earshot is reacting with a variation upon the same anti-biker thought? You know, also, that the local police really don't care and won't act, or even seem to notice, right?

You know when you and others have just watched a chap, in perhaps a raincoat, load the prepared lining of his coat with the alcoholic spirit of choice? You know, also, that there's a fair to reasonable chance that none of the observers is going to do anything that might aid with his apprehension? You know, also, that certain members of the constabulary have said that, if you stand and do nothing then you're complicit in the crime, right?

You know when you're voicing objections at the voting intentions of your local councillors who, at the behest of israeli lobbyists, are continuing to support and arm a Genocide? You know, also, that a contingent of police officers, along with several off-duty nightclub bouncers, are likely to arrive within twenty minutes? You know, also, that these same officers might just deign to issue a crime number- insurance purposes only- if your home was, overnight, stripped of all your earthly possessions, because they claim to be snowed under, right?

You know when you press the 'crossing button' at a pedestrian crossing and cars from a distance of (a measured) mile away are able to pass before the lights turn red? You know also that there's a more than fair chance that at least one more vehicle is going to jump the red light, slicing into your begrudged five seconds in which to cross? You know, also, that, should you not have cleared the road within your allotted five seconds, there's a chance you'll draw the ire of one of the 'inconvenienced' motorists, right?

You know how the European Union continues to ban dangerous chemical (13 more in the last 12 months), formerly deployed by farmers, whereas the UK (0) does not, at the behest of farming lobbyists? You know, also, how it's now possible to stroll past Buddleia after fully-bloomed Buddleia with barely a white butterfly between them, right?

You know how so many of those sports that were once viewable free-to-air have since been squirreled away behind the Sky-et-al pay-wall, at the behest of sports company and sports channel lobbyists? You know, also, that more and more of these 'missing' sports comprise UK teams representing UK nations, at home in the UK, right?

You know how two generations of working adults, and counting, have been unable to afford to a mortgage, increasingly, also, afford the monthly rent upon the place where they currently reside (live, if they're more fortunate)? You know this state of affairs is at the behest of landlord lobbyists and those with significant 'investment' property portfolios? You know, also, that many of the older generation of home-owners are still driven to blame the struggling younger adults for not saving sensibly, as they once did, at the behest of the CEOs of the MSM outlets where they access their highly selective news, right?

You know how the CEO of your local water company gets another £million annual bonus, even though your rivers and coastlines are swimming under water company released raw sewage? You know, also, how the share-holders always get a meaty dividend, even though the responsible water company is pleading poverty and is going to hike your bill accordingly, at the behest of water company lobbyists, right?

You know how the greatest volume of measured pollution in your rivers is the product of farming 'run-off,' and that still 'your' government drags its heels, at the behest of the farming lobbyists? You know, also, how the BBC (Farming Today) paints this same farming community as if it behaves as an honourable 'Guardian to the Countryside,' even though this cohort continues to spread this run-off thus, also, seriously depleting your insect populations, right? And that this, what has been described by environmentalists as an, 'Insect Apocalypse' continues to decimate bird and other creature populations, right?

You know how the rogue state of israel has murdered more journalists than were killed during the U.S. Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War (including the u.s.’s assaults on Cambodia and Laos), the Yugoslav Wars, the War in Afghanistan, and the ongoing Ukraine War combined, lied about and covered-up for by israeli lobbyists? You know also that a recent 'error' resulted in omitting to turn off the transponder on an RAF flight circling for hours over Gaza, from Akrotiri in Cyprus, and that during this time another five journalists were murdered by the iOF? You know also that RAF gathered information is handed over to israel and that the Foreign Secretary david lammy either does not know or will not say what the data is being used for, right?

You know that an international best selling author (Sally Rooney), who has expressed a wish to donate funds from her work with the BBC (Normal People), towards helping to stop the ongoing Genocide, conducted by israel? You know, also, that if you hold up a sign expressing opposition to the Genocide, with the words, 'Palestine' and 'Action,' that the British state will attempt to arrest you, at the behest of the state of israel, as it is attempting to do with Sally Rooney, right? You know, also, that the UK Foreign Office consults with the israeli embassy, over who to target during another spate of 'arrests,' right?

You know how you may be desperate to remove a UK PM who has a protected right to utter more proven lies to the nation than truths? You know, also, that fellow MPs do not have a right to call out those lies, even though the nation and its MPs have repeatedly witnessed the distracted PM uttering these same lies? You know, also, that when the General Election arrives and the proven liar and his cohort are voted out, how the replacement cohort, in double-quick time, proves to be no better and often worse, right?

You know when someone, or someones, dangles food as bait, then uses starving children as target practice when they beg for the meagre sustenance being dangled, right? You know, also, when hospitals, doctors and journalists are deliberately targeted party to further and ever greater killing sprees? You know, also, when someone contemplates then states that this armed-to-the-teeth military nation (israel) “has the right,” to cut off food, water, electricity to the whole population of another region (Gaza), right? You know, also, that when the resulting crisis develops into a famine and that the majority of the world regards this situation as a live-streamed Genocide, right? You know when ‘your’ Government and ‘your’ Prime Minister continues to funnel military arms to the nation committing these War Crimes upon another- the nation it has been illegally occupying for decades- and then classifies anyone who opposes the Genocide, as terrorists, right?

You know when journalists work to expose this Genocide, only to discover that a national broadcaster (BBC) refuses to broadcast the unearthed facts, right? And, you know when this national broadcaster verbally attacks journalists, doctors, aid-workers and international experts on conflict, undermining the facts of a burgeoning Genocide, at the behest of disingenuous actors, before any of these witnesses are allowed to speak about multiple War Crimes, right?

You know how Foreign Secretary david lammy's second 'tut' ('tut-tut'), after israel is filmed conducting a 'two tap' (war crime) military operation, resulted in him having to apologise to tzipi hotovely (israeli ambassador), because the sound, allegedly, caused her to smudge the ink on her 'congratulations to israel' card, right, that lammy's meekly worded letter, enquiring whether more arms are going to be required to continue the Genocide, was deemed anti-semitic, lest it should paper-cut her bloodied fingertips, right? You know, also, that hotovely's pet name for lammy is 'lappy,' (lapdog) right? You know, also, that there's one heck of a lot of israeli lobbyists, threaded through UK society, preventing society from more openly discussing israel's Genocide upon Palestinians and israel's pariah statehood, right?

Well, that's your democracy, that is, disappearing down the toilet at the behest of multiple lobbyists, threaded throughout society, industry and government, many of whom are working, front, foremost and in turn, at the behest of overseas companies and other foreign interests, one of whom (israel) is conducting a Genocide! You know israel is the worst of these, right?

That's your 'democracy,' that is! And there's a word this type of unaccountable behaviour, and we all know what that is, don't we? F!

‘Gaza: Doctors Under Attack.’

In light of the BBC's cowardly subservience I felt obligated to write to complain about the decision not to air ‘Gaza: Doctors Under Attack.’ In all likelihood the decision was not made by the BBC, and that lies at the root of the issue. UK audiences, in significant part, have come to expect such cowardice on the part of the Corporation. The unfolding Genocide must, at some point, come to fuller light and when it does the BBC will find itself very much on the wrong side of history. Let us hope that the BBC and Starmer's Government are not permitted to tarnish the entire nation alongside!

Dear BBC

I have a complaint and, pertinent to that complaint, it is one that I know, almost for certain, will be ignored, likely, along with thousands of other complaints on the same subject.

It saddens me for multiple reasons, not least being that I feel I am watching a BBC in front of and beside which I grew up, being seriously denuded to the point where I now feel compelled to answer my granddaughter’s (12 years old) increasingly probing questions along lines, that I believe the Corporation to be no longer worthy of the descriptor, ‘reliable news outlet.’ I must be honest here and point out that this belief is hardly one that has recently been formed. I will not waste your time with the history of my reasoning.

My complaint concerns the recent decision of the BBC not to broadcast the documentary ‘Gaza: Doctors Under Attack.’ Admittedly, I have not yet viewed the footage myself, although I know that when I do, which I will, there will be nothing to suggest that the program is in breach of any (so called) impartiality code, unless historical fact must now itself be considered impartial. Further, precisely as did the featured doctors, I felt I already knew that the program would be pulled.

I had hoped for a better outcome with the earlier pulled documentary, ‘How to Survive a Warzone,’ which I have watched, twice. I would imagine that there is every chance that some, if not all, of the featured children are no longer alive, perhaps snipered by a UK supplied bullet, blown apart with UK enabled munitions, or else having since starved to death! Of note, the family connection of the opening narrator to a Hamas administrative officer in no way diminishes either the footage or the mounting evidence that Israel is pushing to Ethnically Cleans the Gaza Strip. Was any of the footage seen as questionable, or was it just the children? Has it not occurred to any of those BBC client journalists that a ‘Hamas run Health Service,’ as the BBC insists upon prefixing any mention, might be the necessary consequence of a land under oppressive occupation? The latter part (under occupation), by comparison, being a fact that the BBC seldom if ever sees fit to remind its viewers.

I was more suspicious that the program would not be aired when I chanced upon Dead Ringers, Friday 13th July. I recognise that the BBC will likely claim that Dead Ringers is a satirical show but still it was shocking to hear quite how easily the efforts of the Freedom Flotilla, and especially Greta Thunberg, could be reduced to sniggering from the sidelines by those ‘brave’ script writers. A 22 year old prepared to risk belligerent interception, possible missile attack, possible death, in international waters by a rogue state! Did the brave script writers, peeping from behind their desks, thousands of miles distant, not want to acknowledge the point that Israel, was almost certainly behind the earlier missile attack in Maltese waters (International airspace)? A 22 year old who, in one act, did more to highlight what is increasingly likely to be determined a Genocide, than that whole ‘landlocked’ raft of scriptwriters at ‘Dead Ringers.’ History will at least record Greta Thunberg as having been on the right side of history, scant consolation.

That the BBC is unreliable as a news outlet is increasingly there for those who choose to see and to hear. But it is worse than that, the Corporation is now fallen to ‘reliably unreliable!’ Gary Lineker, since dismissed for what, honesty? Mr Clive Myrie may boast about ‘honest journalism’ being his reason for getting out of bed in the morning but that ship has long since sailed. Am I not correct in pointing out that Gary Lineker- the same Gary Lineker- interviewed Ukrainian footballer, Oleksandr Zichenko, some time back in 2022, to great acclaim and absolutely no calls for his dismissal? Interview is linked for your reference, still up on the BBC website I believe. So what could possibly be the difference? It cannot be about the invasion of a foreign soil, nor about an occupation, certainly not about the ICJ and the ICC being prepared to use terms such as ‘Ethnic Cleansing’ and ‘plausible Genocide,’ nor can it be about the numbers of medical staff murdered, nor teachers, nor children, nor the number of hospitals targeted, nor the vast number of perpetrators of ‘War Crimes’ posing for the camera as they commit their acts! So, what plausible difference can there be? Could it be one of racial priority? If not, please do illuminate!

The Centre for Media Monitoring has recently undertaken a very thorough forensic investigation into BBC coverage of the Israeli slaughter of Gazans- it would be naïve in the extreme for me to refer to events inside the Strip as a ‘conflict,’ one wonders why the BBC so often does so. For reference I have included a link to the report.

The Lancet has also undertaken a thorough investigation, this one into the actual numbers of Gazans murdered by Israel. At its release the number executed or otherwise murdered stood at 186,000. When we consider that over two million people recently lived in this tiny space, and we then make the effort to view even a fraction of the available footage of the killing, 186,000 seems a very conservative number! Incidentally, half of that number is likely to have been children! Were the authors of this investigation in any way consulted before ‘Gaza: Doctors Under Attack’ was dropped? Again I have provided the link to the report.

The BBC (I would have to write) pretends to care about things such as ‘impartiality,’ ‘verification,’ ‘integrity’ and ‘journalistic standards’ but reporting upon a plausible Genocide (as found by the ICJ) is not an event that necessarily requires a deal of impartiality. I have no doubt that the ‘other side’ to this Genocide could be unearthed, no matter how deranged, otherwise there would be no plausible Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing being conducted. But, please for context, and by comparison, consider a) how does the BBC choose to cover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine? or b) China’s treatment of the Uyghur population?

Israel’s murder of tens of thousands of children seems likely to rise to hundreds of thousands now that the nation undertaking the Genocide (Israel) and the nation providing the greatest number of munitions (USA) have teamed up in order to practice their weapons upon starving Gazans. Surely, it must be one of the worst of War Crimes, to murder, sniper and obliterate innocent children! So, on which side of history does the BBC wish to find itself? How will it wish to cover the clean up? Or the rebuilding of whatever substitutes for what was a whole Gazan population?

Because the BBC elects to make complaints difficult- undoubtedly, it must receive a fair few!- I did not add the links, which was an oversight on my part, brought about through a fair bit of hoop jumping. I have corrected that omission here:
Links:
Lancet on Gaza deaths: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38976995/
Centre for Media Monitoring: https://cfmm.org.uk/bbc-on-gaza-israel-one-story-double-standards/
Gary Lineker in conversation with Oleksandr Zinchenko: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtFbMAicuPA


Additionally, I have here ventured some suggestions regarding omissions on the part of the mighty Corporation, listed below:
• What actually happened on the 7th October 2023, when numbers of Hamas fighters attacked Israelis in Southern Israel? How many Israelis are thought to have been killed by Israel and the IDF, under the Hannibal Directive? Were any Israeli babies found to have been beheaded or put into ovens, as reported by the BBC amongst many others? What evidence of rape has been unearthed?
• How do the messages to the Israeli population (in Hebrew) differ from those delivered to the outside world (in English)? Incidences of Genocidal rhetoric and intent for example, which ministers may have urged further/greater War Crimes?
• In light of concerns about Iran working towards nuclear capabilities, at what stage is Israel’s nuclear program? Does Israel have nuclear weapons?
• In light of the frequent use of terms such as anti-Semitism, various tropes and blood libel, which would necessarily encompass this suggestion, what is the power of the Israeli lobby in the UK? In Parliament there may be counted Labour Friends of Israel, Conservative Friends of Israel and Liberal Friends of Israel (Commons and Lords). What overlap is there between the Board of Governors of the BBC and the Jewish Chronicle? Investigate the immense sway of numerous NGOs and other hidden funding organisations. Who are and who appointed members of the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism. This is our democracy we are forever being told!
• It is often said that the housing system is broken and has been for years, so who is lobbying to keep it so? Who funds the lobbyists? Which Lords and MPs are being lobbied? Which MPs are significant property holding landlords? Who is forever delaying justice for the survivors of Grenfell?
• Teresa May quashed it but why no Orgreave enquiry? Is it true that the BBC reversed footage of the significant police-miners clash, in order to wrongly present the event as if the miners charged the police rather than the other way around?


We are not supposed to suggest as much, lest we get accused of peddling an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory but it is difficult to believe that something far bigger is not driving this.

A Fictional Globe

It is said that all governments indulge in propaganda, whether they be the good or the bad ones. So, to simply know that your government lies to its population does not necessarily mark it down as being a bad one. But seriously, should this ever be considered a reasonable state of affairs?

Perhaps instead, so as to comply with modern-day western neoliberal expectations, must we now consider the above as if through a tailored prism? Maybe this alone is one highly significant reason that so many younger citizens choose to escape to those other (cyber) places, from whence governments may be banished? The prism of their escapism may serve after a fashion, but we cannot eat there, or hug, or empty our bladders. So instead we are cursed, mostly, to observe reality through the cut-diamond prism of those who we should truly despise. Or fear. Likely both!

The Tory-Brexiteer Daily Mail- now separated through the decades, from its unholy fandom of Hitler's Fascists- and the Mail on Sunday unashamedly espouse the more alt-right factions of the Tory Party. The phone-hacking Daily Express and the Sunday Express, now slipped free of the reins of high-prifile Tory Richard Desmond, fall under the ownership of the mysterious and ginormous Reach plc. Rupert Murdoch's Sun and Sunday Sun fall under the massive umbrella of News UK Independent. This unholy trinity of falsehood make up a significant bulk of the UK's tabloid sales. All are unashamedly Tory supporting. These 'news' outlets have no interest in pulling back the curtain.

Pretending greater respectability, under the guise of broadsheet or recent-broadsheet, are the Daily and Sunday Telegraphs, both owned by the Tory Brexiteer Sir Frederick Hugh Barclay, as is the alt-right comic, The Spectator, effectively through a 'tax-conscious' Jersey Company, Press Holdings. The Times and the Sunday Times reside within the mega-media-group, News UK. Here we enter the dark world view of Rupert Murdoch- if we care to turn over further stones here also resides arch-phone hacker (CEO) Rebekah Brooks. Again, both 'collectives' routinely align themselves at the right-hand corner of the UK's increasingly undemocratic Conservative Party. The landscape may well have been seeded with more florid vocabulary but the search for truth is likely to prove just as barren.

The Financial Times terms itself as liberal-leaning, owned by the Japanese 'holding company,' Nikkei. The Daily Mirror defines itself as a Labour-aligned news outlet, curiously owned by the same umbrella group as the Daily and Sunday Express, Reach plc. The Guardian and the Observer, effectively one and the same news outlet, is now owned by the Guardian Media Group, or the Scott Trust, which became a limited company in 2008. The paper's glory days rather came to an abrupt stop with the resignation of Alan Rusbridger in 2015. Prior to this it could rightly lay serious claim to being amongst the best of the UK's somewhat meagre pool of genuine investigative journalists. Sadly, with the rise of a certain Jonathan Freedland- he cannot act alone- the paper's trajectory has done a full 180! The Independent, which now espouses more Liberalism than its former Labour 'boasts,' is owned by a conglomerate of wealthy business types: the Russian Lord Evgeny Lebedev (dubious honours care of Boris Johnson), Sultan Muhammad Abuljadayel and Justin Byam Shaw. Quite naturally, the truths we are afforded must first satisfy the whims of this elite.

I think it would be only fair to suggest that, if one were ever hopeful of unearthing anything approaching honest and well-sourced investigative journalism amongst the corporate media, the latter group would be the most likely place to start digging! But first one should thoroughly research the outlet's ownership and set one's expectations low. And, unless one is searching also historically, say prior to the departure of Rusbridger, one might save some time by avoiding the Guardian or the Observer.

Of course, there is also the post-glorious BBC to keep any transgressor upon his or her toes! We reference specifically the BBC here because it is the BBC, a public service broadcaster, that is to say, 'in the service of the public! The BBC's recently (2008) appointed director-general is one Timothy Douglas Davie. Davie stood for election as a Conservative councillor for Hammersmith in 1993 and was the deputy chairperson of the Hammersmith and Fulham Conservative party in the same decade. So, no conflicts there then! The Corporation's political editor, since 2015, has been one Laura Kuenssberg. Kuenssberg curiously identifies herself as a journalist. In her given role she has mastered the art of corner-cutting the BBC's formerly-honourable tradition of news 'verification via two independent sources.' Perhaps these days more accurately we should think of her as a retweeter. Such niceties as verification do not really feature in her 'journalistic code.' Entirely as does her ITV 'colleague,' Robert Peston, these days Kuenssberg sits at the forefront of 'breaking retweets,' comfortably inside the exclusive Commons circle of rogues. She may be required to seriously self-censor, but she's mighty quick on the draw, backed up pseudo-admirably by the likes of Andrew Marr, and formerly by Andrew Neil. When I used to get out more those I met in foreign climes would cite the BBC as being a global news role model! I wonder if those people would feel the same in 2021?

One could pretend to wonder quite what the thought processes were at the Monopolies Commission when 'GB News'- Andrew Neil's new misinformation factory- and Murdoch's 'News UK TV' were both ushered so cursorily past the panel. Maybe they'd identified a gap in the market for a couple of alt-Conservative units? Andrew Neil would have it that the BBC is far too left wing. In a far from candid assessment of his values, he regards himself as eminently reasonable. The significant chunk of his pseudo-journalistic trajectory has been as the behest of Murdoch. From his non-scientific background he has espoused climate-change-denial. And there in a nutshell, right there, is what we should regard as a telegraphed warning?

The UK's MSM or perhaps the corporate media, at its best, selectively reports, ostensibly, for the UK market. That is to say, it reports on behalf of the market, that part of the market by which it is owned. Although it is not really often openly discussed, it must be recognised as having a particular vested interest at home. But, in these times of increasingly international commerce it might also be recognised as having significant interests beyond our shores. Here the lines become far more variable. Variably and often conveniently blurred!

Ranging widely between 'occasionally' and 'frequently,' heavily dependant upon the nation in question, it may appear as if our 'more liberal' news outlets, specifically those that do not self-identify as 'politically Conservative,' may be 'better' given to the 'honest' reporting of foreign news events than they are to the 'honest' reporting of home news. Over there, upon distant shores, we are (sometimes) shown the world as it 'more truly' is, tooth and claw! Of course, anyone with even half an eye upon the current international Palestinian and Israeli news, will realise that this is most definitely not the case with all other nations. More's the pity! Such overseas news as this may often be presented as 'complicated,' but really it isn't! Or not in the manner suggested. Often it's only 'complicated' through the given fact that there may be a century of falsehood to unpick, prior to addressing the current situation, that and the given convenience of requiring such a label as 'complicated,' behind which to hide the atrocities.

Within the BBC and within the Guardian one is certainly never permitted to hint that anti-Semitism has been weaponised. Anyone who has troubled to run a cursory eye over the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism- more so the 11 illustrations, 7 of which equate criticism of an increasingly apartheid Israel state with anti-Semitic comment- cannot help but recognise the duplicity of the words. Kenneth Stern, the man who drafted the original document, has argued that it is no longer fit for purpose. Almost nothing has so 'admirably' demonstrated this to be the case than has the weaponisation by Sir Keir (Keith) Starmer, given free rein by a corporate media to deplete the Labour Party of any remaining semblance of purpose (socialism). The ultimate statesman, Nelson Mandela, was seldom driven to greater ire than when he was required to address the issue of Israel's treatment of the oppressed Palestinians. Gandhi himself was an anti-Zionist! Both these individuals would be cast into the wilderness by today's values!

But, if the means of information dispersal has been bought and filleted then it speaks with the words it is given. No longer is it required to search out those inconvenient truths! No longer is it expected to unearth those awkward facts! We may well shrug our shoulders and sigh. If we are 'older' likely we have long since written off much of the laughingly termed 'free press,' perhaps also we will have witnessed just too many of those 'Fiona-Bruce-Andrew-Marr-John Humphries-Emma-Barnett-John-Ware-BBC' moments to have swallowed the Andrew Neil-"Lefty" guff! But, medical journals too- the British Medical Journal- surely not? One may have to dig a little deeper but, without proper and free independent investigative journalism, one shouldn't be that surprised. In order to get through to the roots of the following example of 'self-censoring,' albeit 'lobbied self-censoring,' one might want to access the link provided by the fourth comment, which helpfully provides access to the original uncensored letter (at the time of posting). Most people will be oblivious to this sort of propaganda; very few have the energy, the time or the determination to dig!

So, what of the Labour Party, those warriors of the oppressed? What of their battle to cut through the injustice and to better inform the world? John Mann (Labour MP and ardent Zionist) was filmed shouting at Ken Livingstone, permitted (by the corporate media) so to do. What are the chances of those cameras having been there? Of course neither Mann nor corporate media was there to properly investigate the finer nuances of any truth. John Mann elevated to the House of Lords by Tory PM Boris Johnson, Advisor to the current Tory Government on anti-Semitism. What are the chances of that? No need to do the research, Lord Mann, somebody else will be pulling those strings! Expenses scammer Ian Austin (Labour MP and Labour Friend of Israel) filmed stating that voters should support the Tories at the 2019 General Election, elevated to the Lords by Boris Johnson. What are the chances of that? Massive arms to Saudi Arabia supporting John Woodcock (investigated Labour MP and Labour Friend of Israel), endorsing the Tories at the 2019 General Election, elevated to the Lords as Tory Government Advisor on Violence and Disruption, by Boris Johnson. What are the chances of that? Obviously he won't be required to 'investigate' the uncomfortable truth of the death, destruction, 'violence and disruption' of those Saudi weapons upon the people of Yemen. Rabid huntsfan and Brexiteer Kate Hoey (Labour MP), friend of Farage, elevated to the Lords by PM Johnson. What are the chances of that? Sir Kier (Keith) Starmer, busy dismantling the labour contingent of the Labour Party. The BBC, the Guardian and the corporate Media, in general, almost without voice on the validity of Labour expulsions. What are the chances of that? Where next for Starmer? Clearly he won't be leading a gutted Labour Party to any kind of election victory. But, on a personal level, could that be the House of Lords beckoning yet again?

Why, it's almost as if all those former Labour MPs have far better served their chosen cause by simply pretending to espouse Labour values? They'd have vanished into the deep blue fug inside that swamp of their own ilk. In future, we should be prepared to look more closely for the conflicting affiliations, within those politicians with whom we 'choose' to invest our vote? Look rather for that which conflicts!

If we believe the BBC and the corporate media we should take it as gospel that the Labour Party, certainly the BBC, take anti-Semitism very seriously. Wasn't it Deputy Angela Raynor herself who announced to the world that, 'the party would suspend thousands and thousands,' if that's what it would take? Certainly that was a great many more than the EHRC report into anti-Semitism found, some thousands and nine-hundred and ninety-eight more... if one is prepared to read the text rather than to passively permit the corporate media to misdirect it upon our behalf.

Author and wordsmith Michael Rosen almost died during the worst days of the Covid pandemic. We can't even know officially what it was that nearly killed him because he was still in an induced coma more than 28 days after a first positive diagnosis of the virus. Fortunately for us all the coroner was spared the dilemma of quite what to put upon his death certificate. Such is life upon the fictional globe! Anyway, that same Michael Rosen was 'yet another' victim of those vile Labour anti-Semites, when it was found that his children's novel, 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt,' was doctored in a publicity shot of Jeremy Corbyn reading to some school children. A vile anti-Semite had superimposed, 'The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,' upon the cover. Certain expulsion! Or so one could be forgiven for believing.

For reasons best known to the BBC the tweeter of the image has not been named. For reasons better known to the leadership of the Labour Party this university lecturer and Director of Labour Against anti-Semitism, one Dr Pete Newbon, cannot be named or disciplined. For reasons better understood by the Jewish Chronicle- example of the rag's intent here- and Hope not Hate these vociferous defenders of their faith have reasoned that it is best not to even acknowledge that such an incident has taken place. From the far more honourable perspective of understanding the nuances of language, Michael Rosen has not even requested that the university dismiss the offending lecturer, yet it has not prevented certain factions (again) labelling him as 'the wrong kind of Jew!' He's reasonably famous, so is he worthy of a news story, BBC?

With the reporting of news generally perhaps it is a perception borne of (my) age but still it is a perception of nationally embraced indifference! Observing the whirls of litter that frequently punctuate any short or lengthy drive one can so easily assume that too many individuals have become indifferent. Observing the growing numbers of speeding scooters weaving through our busy pavements one can so easily assume that there is an air of indifference. The local councils that have permitted this invasion? Indifferent, eyes instead transfixed by the money! Whether passively accepted or else embraced, indifference appears to be the current mode of convenience.

Just as people- just enough of them to serve- have become indifferent to open corruption. Indifferent to the increasingly blatant abuses of power by our so-termed politicians. Not all of them, maybe, but far too many to enable any sort of democratic accountability. Indifferent to the mistreatment of the nation's NHS and its Covid-depleted staff. Indifferent to the blatant nepotism that runs, end to end, through our society. Indifferent to poverty! Indifferent to inequality! Indifferent to slum housing! Indifferent to homelessness! Indifferent to growing food-bank use! Indifferent to it all! Not everyone, but enough to serve. Until the affects ever become personal, of course! To dance so dextrously, around this narrative, around the facts, requires a spinelessly compliant corporate media.

Not so long ago we watched on as over seventy people burned to a crisp in a residential tower block. Yet, within a few months, there was already a growing wider-indifference to the selectively reported fact that the inquiry would be rigged! How many towers in the UK have yet to be modified so as not to fall into the very same and 'cheapest option' category, or to become the next potential human furnace?

Many of those who are culpable, complicit, are dying in comfortable old age, inequality writ large! Of course the Grenfell Inquiry isn't armed to identify those people. Which ministers were complicit in legislating so that the panels that other countries would not deploy could still be deemed fine for the UK, some of the UK? Who lobbied to have the red tape removed? Who cut those corners and consequently the costs? And so it will be with the massive chumocracy that has made hay during this pandemic. All the usual boots duly filled!

Food banks have proliferated, poverty is has not been just the preserve of those foreign shores for decades now. So, the pretence that something will be done has been shiny-wrapped in the term, 'levelling up.' Never mind that it means nothing, it doesn't need to, there's nobody to properly report upon the fact. If one wishes to better understand the grasp that this government has upon inequality listen to them gleefully announcing that, ' nobody in the country should be expected to have to pay more than (a paltry) extra £55 a month, in order to have their home made safe.' So, when they talk about 'levelling up' are they, at some subliminal level, referencing the direction of those potential future flames?

Earlier in 2021 a hundred-year-old man who, armed to the teeth, liked nothing better than to help deplete the planet of some of its alternative species of larger mammals, or to blast holes into some of the globe's rarer birdlife, died in unimaginable luxury, surrounded by unimaginable wealth and privilege. If one were a tad slow with the TV remote one might be forgiven for having seen and observed him sycophantically being elevated as someone of almost godly talents and insight. That the citizens of the UK should unquestioningly revere the ground upon which treads the royal foot, that it should regard as fair play the divvying up of our landmass such that the remarkably extended royal family regards all the best bits as its private playgrounds, whereupon so many of those creatures are routinely slaughtered, is surely bizarre beyond fathoming! The idea that, at some time in a dim and doctored past, one heavily armoured ego fought another heavily armoured ego in order to determine who should henceforth regard the UK as personal possession seems more akin to a fictional globe than to any semblance of reality!

Allegra Stratton, for those who do not know and until very recently, held the role of Downing Street Press Secretary. Now, if we accept (and we should) that such a role is likely to involve an element of remodelling of the news, surely it is also reasonable to acknowledge that such a character should never be entrusted with the conveyance of undoctored fact? Instead consider, she has formerly worked for the Times, the New Statesman, the Independent and the Guardian newspapers. In 2012 she was the political editor of the BBC's Newsnight. In 2015 she left the BBC to join ITV News, as national editor, also co-presenting Peston on Sunday. Not until 2020 does she start in a role in which one would expect her political allegiances to emerge, before moving on to Downing Street Press Secretary. Just one glimpse at her alt-right tendencies, when she misrepresented and humiliated a single working mother as an unemployed (yet another 'undeserving') benefits claimant (Newsnight 2012) should really have served as due warning that Allegra could not be entrusted with the conveyance of actual news. Alas, her deep blue affiliations merely seem to have opened yet grander doors! Currently she is 'entrusted' with the role of spokesperson for the COP26 conference in Glasgow. 'Climate change!' Isn't that far too serious to be ceremonially wrapped up in falsehood? Where are the alarm bells? Where are the journalists?

I am reminded of a 2016 interview that the BBC's Andrew Marr conducted with Noam Chomsky, where Chomsky laid out for the interviewer the reality that the interview would more than likely be being conducted by somebody else entirely if not for the fact that Marr was prepared to routinely operate with a large slice of 'self censorship.' There has been no evidence to suggest that Marr has opted for journalism over self-censorship in the intervening years. It's an uncomfortable truth to swallow, to be confronted with the understanding that those journalists who best exercise the 'correct' degrees of self censorship are the ones who are permitted to rise to the 'top,' insight into Andrew Neil's pseudo-belligerence, if not so much his current trajectory!

Given the glut of crises bearing down upon the planet it is surely almost impossible to select which is most urgently in need of championing. But, if it was possible, I think it more than likely that we'd find ourselves on the opposite side of the barricades to the machine of the UK state.

The UK has shipped over £400 millions in arms to Israel since 2015- Hell, those are UK-crafted weapons being used to flatten Gaza and to kill innocent Palestinians and to destroy their homes and livelihoods, the colonial-settler's response to the sporadic resistance of the oppressed- and yet still the UK's corporate media would have us believe that there is some sort of 'war' going on. The United Nations recognises the inherent right of a colonised people to defend itself from an occupier and yet, according to the Board of Deputies and other currently Zionist organisations, one should not be permitted make the observation that much of the land that is now termed 'Israel' has become so at the wrong end of a loaded gun. In 1948, 1956 and 1967, yet again, Israel has used its military might to invade and to grab huge swathes of Palestinian lands, still regarded as an illegal occupation in the eyes of the UN and much of the world. Israeli incursions have barely stopped ever since. Every time yet more Palestinian homes are bulldozed for the colonisers, or Palestinian lands are bombarded by US and UK arms- Israel 'defending' itself from the land it invaded?- only if absolutely-cornered and relentlessly-pressurised, for long enough, will the corporate media deign to misrepresent the troubles at all.

The hyper-one-sided bloodshed may be relayed to the UK population as 'complicated' Middle Eastern issues,' or 'a war!' Hezbollah will be routinely written up as the terrorists, whilst the Israeli Defence Force as 'driven to retaliation' or 'conducting reprisals.' The fictional globe can so often be a very bloody one, particularly in the Palestinian Homelands. In recent days even the Guardian has found itself upon awkward grounds and yet it still pastes over the facts with misapplied labels like 'War!' 'retaliation' or 'reprisals.' Likely many of the complicit journalists are uncomfortable with the degrees of self-censorship required. The alternatives are that somebody else entirely may be found to pen those column inches!

When we're discussing arms sales it's really not as simple as Britain's economic standing in the global economy in 'the immediate'! There are long-term consequences, as with slavery there are not two sides to this issue. The military, which includes the police, are not simply uniformed citizens of the same community as are we. Military contact points and displays are not benign, armistices day is no longer about the veterans of World Wars One and Two, although the corporate media would have us believe so. Our poppies are no longer providing for those who fought in black and white footage, in the trenches of a century ago. I just so happened to switch on to the BBC's 'Sewing Bee' on the 19th May, not really my choice, and very soon I changed channels to something else- I no longer recall what. But, before I did so, I chanced to catch the programme's theme, to refashion army surplus clothing into civilian every-day items, military camouflage upon the high street. It was innocently watched by many, no doubt, but seriously! Blurring or softening the lines between military tool of the state and that of an unquestioning civilian population?

Priti Patel and her tabloid following may hate those refugees: maybe, in the interests of honesty, we should step back for a moment's reflection to consider, which nation had a very major hand in creating them in the first place?

Whether it be the Hillsborough cover-up or maybe the latest reported major miscarriage of justice, the postmasters IT dispute with the Post Office, there is just such a gulf widening between the real and the fictional globe! As it happened, and in real time, it was possible to watch the postmasters being wrongly accused and wrongly imprisoned, as the first accusations were being made, and to sense that something highly unjust was taking place before our eyes. Even now the wheels of the system that was so quick to condemn appear to have slowed to a virtual stop, rather than to swiftly redress this miscarriage of justice for those that have not since died! How much longer for the Grenfell's deceased and displaced? How much longer for the miners of Orgreave? Maybe our great-great-grandchildren will one day learn the depth of the cover-up concerning the predator that was Jimmy Savile *. Maybe, in the interests of not whitewashing history, we should have another statue erected to the man, perhaps during one of the many touching moments of comradery with Mrs T? Obviously we'd also need a small and unobtrusive plaque, just a small covering note, as 'twere, something easily hidden, so as not to compromise the aspect.

In a moment of high drama, journalist-blogger Roman Protasevich was recently abducted from an illegally diverted aircraft, by Belarusian KGB agents. Quite rightly, the western corporate media were all over it like a rash, 'holding truth to power!' Journalism! We can't have unaccountable governments just making it up as they see fit! But, hold on, weren't these same journalists all falling into obedient line recently, when it appeared to those with half an eye to see that the United States was gearing up to do much the same thing, with the complicit help of the UK? Even the filleted Guardian, and the BBC, were preparing to pretend that there wasn't a time when the same Guardian 'newspaper' was happily championing the very same Julian Assange? Surely it must be a remarkably Orwellian western world that can so readily rise up in outrage over one incident, whilst so wilfully pretending that the greater crime isn't taking place at one and the same moment in time! Both are clear instances of extraordinary rendition, albeit one still pending. If in doubt ask Jack Straw or Tony Blair, at least get a quote from two men who should know better than most. The United Nations and the ECJ have stated that Assange should immediately be reunited with his freedom, why the corporate media silence?

Or the 264 page 'Sewel Commission' on race and ethnic disparities, commissioned by PM Johnson? Tony Sewel himself, hand-picked by the Prime Minister- Sewel, who's own 'helpful' opinions were already in the public domain? Government marks its own homework! As many more open lecturers and teaching staff have likely relayed to their pupils, "If you're going to cheat don't get caught!"

If only the UK Government could somehow mesh 'our' military and 'our' governmental manoeuvrings? Under the 'watch' of a spineless corporate media it might just slip past enough of the population? Hell, we already know that our PM and our various ministers of state habitually and routinely lie to the electorate, what's the fuss? It's slowly but surely becoming almost white noise now. Enter Lord Geidt, appointed by Johnson, with a list of military honours as long as your arm, formerly the queen's own Private Secretary, 'alleged' former military clean up man. Will it wash? Will it even matter?

Hancock, who, as Health Secretary, did award NHS contracts to his own sister, who did have a 15% interest in one of the companies (shredding documents!), was adjudged guilty of a "minor technical breach." A curious rewording of something, which might formerly have been regarded as corruption and a sacking offense! Lord Geidt will not be taking "any further action," Geidt said that the 'good' name of Hancock had not been damaged, it should in no way "impugn" Mr Hancock's 'good name.' I think we'll be the judge of that! He elaborated that although there had been 'no conflict of interest,' there was a 'danger' that it could have 'looked like one.' Are we now completely through the looking glass?

PM Johnson, who did spend a prince's ransom of magic money upon refurbishing his official Downing Street flat, without officially bothering to care how it was to be paid for, Lord Geidt has declared to have acted "unwisely." Again he was happy that 'no reasonably perceived conflict' had arisen, and that the ministerial code had not been broken. Geidt said that Johnson knew 'nothing' of the payments made by Tory peer David Brownlow, and who are we to question such military wisdom? But, before we close, just for a moment consider what the UK's corporate media would be penning, if this had happened in any Central African or Central American Republic.

It would seem that the 'protective ring' that Matt Hancock, Health Minister, had thrown up, formerly around care homes, has finally and very belatedly begun to work its magic.

Jimmy Savile comment observed care of Stewart Lee.

The Rise and Fall of the Labour Party.

It seems likely now, with Sir Keir Starmer 'rightfully' at the helm of the Whigs, that the nation shall indeed sleepwalk from 'Too soon to talk about it!' and seamlessly onward into 'People just want to move on!' Nothing to see here!

And, of course, it will, in a sense, be true because the bodies will either have been buried or cremated, as faith, family, creed or preference will have dictated. Should, in due course, the true numbers ever happen to bob back to the surface, it is unlikely that they will (as a more honest reflection) be recognised as such, or that they will, perhaps, ever be universally acknowledged at all! For those who paid closer attention at the time I think that there is more than a fair chance that this part of the nation may be left reeling for years, if not decades, yet to come! Their past and that of the air-brushed nation may soon diverge to such an extent that it will appear as if they occupy entirely different planets... neither of which will be thinking in terms of the longer haul! Perhaps more statues to questionable deeds shall arise! 

Highly pertinent to the creative-accounting of those lives cut short, it has too often gone unchallenged that the figure has been swollen through Covod-19 having harvested majorly from amongst ailing and aged populations. Perhaps rather more should be being made of the vicious nature of this virus, also that of this government, additionally reaping many young and/or BAME citizens, rather more should be made of the fact that there have been thousands who were far removed from being in the last throes of life, many individuals with decades of grandparenting and/or other senior activities formerly stretched out before them! Rather more should instead be made of the pitiful failings of 'our' one-dimensional government.

Arranged in our pseudo-society like some sort of covert, yet vastly more extensive, take upon Dante's 'Circles of Hell,' it is fair to say that we are shocked! We have viewed the monster from many angles and perspectives, in numerous contexts and within many timeframes, but still we are shocked! Shocked at the depth, the sheer size of it, but also at the brazenness of the creature. We knew that our democracy was deeply flawed, but we thought, or hoped to pretend, that it was still there, perhaps disguised or otherwise obscured.

Keir Starmer's contrivance has instead thrown open the larder to reveal that the empty shelves have been repurposed as kindling and the space inside refashioned as a downstairs staff toilet!

So, and in double quick time, Sir Keir has moved to crush the former Shadow Education Secretary, Rebecca Long-Bailey. What did he call her retweeting of Maxine Peake's interview in the Independent Newspaper, "... the sharing of (what was, in his opinion) an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory."?

With a great many of the UK's former journalists and neoliberal attack-dog replacements these days managing to, so often, substitute opinion pieces for genuine journalism the receding attention-span of the sheeple element, almost inevitably in the end, simply reclothed itself as cannon fodder! Several higher profile Jewish figures, in any terms other than the illusory, have done a great deal more harm to their cause! Far too many hard-working democrats have been falsely targeted, such that a whole fleet of red buses has not yet proven to be enough.

If the aforementioned Israeli/Zionist cause is to seriously address and reduce anti-Semitism, as we want it to, then certain characters and other interests really should, instead, be endeavouring to clarify the 'offence,' rather than deliberately clouding of the issue. Whereas, they appear to have opted for, and imposed, the iron fist of  'trial without jury,' absolute power! Yet, as history teaches, 'absolute power corrupts absolutely!' Margaret Hodge could likely quote the words, in her dulcet tones and her sleep, to whoever, concealing the merest trace of the irony involved. A question to those like Ms Hodge: 'If any bystander is presented with the real life image of an innocent family, looking on as their family-home is bulldozed from their land by an unaccountable oppressor, who is then instructed that they may not protest under pain of violence or death,' is that bystander then more or less likely to want to condemn the act in the most forceful of manners?'

The Labour Party's adoption of IHRA definition of anti-Semitism isn't so much the issue, but the precise wording of some of the eleven attached examples is. Observers can draw their own conclusions as to whether it was one God-almighty omission in the former Public Prosecutor's much lauded 'forensic' armoury, or else evidence of something far darker, that has 'equipped' him so woefully with his 'grasp' of genuine anti-Semitism. Likely, his 'understanding' has been fashioned ostensibly through the Labour Party's eventual capitulation to certain Israeli/Zionist lobbyists.

So, having drawn the one-and-only reasonable conclusion, we collectively feel our stomachs rising up into our chests, as the Labour Party plunges back into the depths of that familiar abyss that saw the nation obediently wagging its tail in slipstream to the US's illegal war in the Middle East! The five year awakening has been crushed... but not apparently yet quite thoroughly enough! 

Sir Keir's ride will be an easier one than was his predecessor's, but the man otherwise presents as a fool, unless he is knowingly preparing the ground for the Party to once again betray its roots, and thus the greater part of the British electorate! Is he expecting us to believe that his 'house trained puppy' will soon have free rein returned... 'Once upon a time, etc, etc... ?' Marvel at the man, look he has the Sun Newspaper, the Times and the Sunday Times (News Corp and Murdoch), the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday (Lord Viscount Rothermere), the Daily and the Sunday Telegraphs (Barclay Brothers), the Express (Richard Desmond- hasn't he featured somewhere recently?), the Evening Standard (editor George Osborne) and the 'i' newspaper eating out of his hand! The 'i' was recently bought up by the owners of the Mail; apparently the Monopolies Commission 'considered' that there was no undue concern regarding the democratic bias of the UK's Main Stream Media. Curious! Perhaps we should have been looking, instead and more closely, at the constituent parts of the Monopolies Commission?

Recent events have all too painfully demonstrated just how easily cyber-money will again and again outflank cyber-democracy. And, anyone who hasn't been in an induced coma can't fail to have noticed the funding threats that have repeatedly been levelled at any hints at more diligent reporting by the often woeful BBC political team, or Channel 4. Like any spoilt only-child, who is used to always having its own way, the Israeli/Zionist Lobby has sated itself for far too long upon the anti-Semite card to give it up now! But the world still is not so blind as they would hope it to be!  

Perhaps Rebecca Long-Bailey's concern for the welfare of the nation's children was just too much for Sir Keir? One might have hoped that his former forensic skills would have equipped him better, but no! Because, despite his words, it is unlikely that the Leader of the Opposition really possesses quite such a slender grasp of what it is that genuinely constitutes anti-Semitic thought and/or language. Far more likely he is onside with 'Boris's Back to Schools!' Hang the consequences, appease the media!

Stephen Bush of the 'Newstatesman' is inclined to toe the anti-Semite line. He professes to favour Rebecca Long-Bailey's witch-hunt and crucifixion, tenuously dependent upon the continued absence of that one final link in the chain of evidence. He maybe realises that any retrospective and later unearthings will likely, as so often, be far easier to sweep under the proverbial. Maxine Peake, certainly has a more extensive insight into the methods of the Israeli Militia than does Starmer, Stephen Bush or, for that matter, Rebecca Long-Bailey. But, what the former Shadow Education Secretary does possess, over and above the other two, is a demonstrable burning desire to confront the ongoing ethnic cleansing head on!

Without the final mislaid piece of the jigsaw Maxine Peake's since-retracted contention may be labelled as 'an error,' not 'a conspiracy.' The reasons for her retraction may be that simple. If indeed it was an error? Maxine Peake is but one of many artists to have made the effort to find out, and any link is surely but a breath away from being made. Maybe, instead then, she recognised its nearness and was lured by the weight of circumstantial evidence? Curiously, Sir Keir himself, whilst cowing to the Israeli/Zionist lobby, has failed to ignite, also, a certain weight of opinion from within the Jewish community. In citing any support he may have from one Jewish quarter he has been highly selective.

Within 'his own' party the Jewish Voice for Labour has long since come to recognise that the term 'anti-Semitism' has been weaponised, rarely more so than by some of those within its 'own community.' Maybe it is here that lies a far greater weight to any conspiracy theory than that being levelled at Maxine Peake, and by association Rebecca Long-Bailey? So, the case currently hinges upon the questionable absence of testimony, that the act of kneeling upon a neck was ever demonstrably transferred, the causal link, as a suggested method of restraint, from an Israeli to a US militia? An oversight of a single missing piece within one massive image of internationalised suppression! The contention remains highly plausible, but has yet to be established as a indisputable fact. Yet! Whilst the weight of inferred 'fact' more than heavily outweighs evidence to the contrary this is not quite enough... unless, of course, the purpose is to condemn anyone who dares to speak out of turn.

Clamouring to be heard in the British Main Stream Media, we are encouraged to believe, are characters from all political sides... but not really. Nowhere is the voice of the actual oppressed! Nowhere is the voice of Palestine! Likely another knee has intervened! But Ahmed Masoud has figuratively crawled under the razor-wire to proffer her perspective, care of Jewish Voice for Labour. Ahmed writes with the eloquence of free voice, about her state that is not permitted to be a state. She references the border control and the Israeli denial of the existence of a Palestinian airport or even a coastal port, of a denial to freedom of expression, or to travel. Ahmed perfectly manages to place the missing piece of the jigsaw in proper perspective. Likely, in the new Labour Party, she would be labelled by some an anti-Semite.

Although the 'public jury' is not being invited to discuss the circumstantial evidence, that the Israeli militia regularly deploys the use of state knee upon the oppressed neck, this much is known and well documented. Neither is the jury being required to ponder overly upon whether the US Minnesota Police has deployed the weight of state knee upon the oppressed neck- much of the seven minutes and forty-six seconds of George Floyd's killing, and the transcript of his final words, have been viewed and read by millions, by those who can bear to do so! The evidence here is incontrovertible!

Whether the practice is written into Minnesota Police Regulations is perhaps more difficult to source, although even this much is traceable (archived), '5-300 Use of Force.' The section specific to Mr Floyd's killing, '5-311, The Use of Neck Restraints and Choke Holds.' makes for chilling reading and may conjure deep emotion!

So, within the web, we find ourselves still searching for that one final gossamer thread, Amnesty International- itself frequently the target of the Israeli/Zionist lobby- has for years been knocking at the door. But when, and if, they ever do unearth the evidence those who have been paying attention will doubtlessly expect little to change. I doubt, for example, that any public display of contrition will be expected from Sir Keir. Fans of Rebecca Long-Bailey- RLB herself- will not be holding their breath for a reinstatement. The Daily Mail, the BBC, will not be using the findings to head their selective news programmes!

Thanks to the efforts of bodies like Amnesty International we can establish that thousands of US Police have received training from the Israeli Militia. At least a dozen US States have worked with the Israelis upon methods of suppressing its peoples'grievances. They have unearthed instances of unlawful killings by Israeli forces, extrajudicial executions and torture. What they have thus far failed to find is the simple statement urging attendees of Israeli seminars, to apply the knee of suppression to the neck of the suppressed. Yet!   

Jonathan Cook (British journalist), the sole foreign correspondent to have based himself within Nazareth, perhaps brushes as close as any to the truth of Maxine Peake's since-retracted contention, that Minnesota Police Officers were introduced to the concept of pressing the knee into the neck of another via the Israeli militia. Jonathan Cook cites, also, the recently leaked 860 page internal report into Labour's weaponising of its dealings with anti-Semitism. The details make for damning reading, which the British media is unlikely ever to properly analyse (in public). Sir Keir will not wish to dwell upon the issue and will, no doubt, be seeking support from certain elements of the MSM in suppressing or otherwise downplaying any findings. Cook brings the idea back to the argument that the Israeli/Zionist lobby is far more guilty of anti-Semitic action than have been many of those long since thrown under one of Boris's (now also Keir's) buses!

Cook contends that Starmer has deployed the one oft-quoted Maxine Peake line, in order to deflect from the well-documented roll that Israel has played in exporting what is referred to as 'counter-terrorism' measures, techniques that have been in evidence and that have been increasingly documented since the early 1990s. A timescale that easily predates the 2012 appended to the archived Minnesota Police document. That the technique is used by Israeli militia is known, that the Minnesota Police Force (at least 100 officers) attended an Israeli conference in restraint techniques and anti-terror tactics (Israeli consulate in Chicago) is known, the second such conference. Cook notes that the Global Militarisation Index has sat Israel at the pinnacle for thirteen consecutive years and that Haaretz newspaper refers to the Israeli state as the "go to nation," for others wishing to improve and 'perfect' their techniques. He contends (correctly) that in, at figurative gun-point, signing up to an additional spurious ten point pledge, Labour has now effectively handed over the reins of control to forces outside of the party and outside of the movement.

But he has not yet located the written, or accessed the recorded, words sourced from an Israeli, conveyed to a US militia. Yet! 

The Right Honourable Member for Islington North will now disentangle himself from his Main Stream Media crown of thorns and again don the clothes of the least racist member of The House. The real racists will heave a sigh of relief and normality will again reign!

'Leaner, meaner, greener (but not environmentally)!'

You can have that one for free, Boris, or Sir Keir.

Terrified of Socialism!

With the prospect of 'Getting Back to Normal,' seeming to slip further from the UK's and certain other government's grasps, we should all find the time to consider the two bookends of the current global worry. First we should think seriously about what got us to where we are now. Then we should more seriously consider the route that we might take from here on in! Or, we could maybe address the two, as co-dependents of the whole sorry affair! To dust off and use the government's most recent catchphrase, in order ".. to help us to bounce back!"



As a lifelong socialist I've become increasingly morose with regards to humanity's (UK) likelihood of ever turning the corner and electing to tread the more benign route. But dare we just to hope? 

The powers that be are demonstrably desperate, beside themselves, tearing their hair out... to quickly, 'get back to normal.' As every single day currently sets us further from their oft-hailed solution to everything. And, it terrifies them! Them and their thoroughly discredited 'market!' Apply another patch, why don't we?

Boris Johnson's daily 'togetherness'  fudge, Rishi Sunak's splashing of the 'whatever it takes' cash, Skin-deep Patel's manufactured social conscience! Lord alone knows what is being fed to the masses in the US, all are but a plastered on facade! Already, the gypsum has begun to chip, the exposed angry red sinews now visibly straining to turn back the tide!  

Just under seventy-two hours previously we had determined that we would step outside and clap and cheer for our NHS. Even if the local response was lukewarm, we dared to contemplate- there are just so many empty second homes here- we reasoned that our noise alone would draw some sort of attention. But no, rising from our chairs in readiness, already the streets and balconies were full- the occupied ones- the air a-rippling with the sound, the response heartening! It was difficult not to cry, so we did, a little. It was dark, probably nobody noticed, likely others were crying also, crying or cheering, or both, whooping, banging kitchen items! The response was perfect! Exactly as it should have been! Heartening!



Heartening, as has been the response to requests for NHS volunteers, as has been the effort of food manufacturers to feed the overstretched doctors and nurses and other NHS staff. The buses are running reasonably efficiently, although mostly empty... obviously! Schools are staying open for the children of NHS staff, again mostly empty. Supermarket staff and other food distributers are out and facing the invisible threat, constantly compromising their social distancing 'guidelines,' never more so than when the over 70s make the early rounds. Homeless people are being housed. Refuse is being collected. Unemployment allowances have risen! Suspended competition between supermarkets- Socialism- will the puffed-up Cheesy Wotsit ever talk down to us again? Sensibility is screaming out for more Roosevelt and less viral hot air! More Attlee, rather less Churchill! 

Boris Johnson is 'so proud'... sort of... but theatrically so, don't you think? Look into Matt Hancock's eyes, I thought he was simply out of his depth (which he is), but it's a sort of fear! Rumour has it that Dominic Cummings has recognised the fear and has prescribed them both two of the very mildest doses of the virus yet seen, rumour has it!



The UK Government, "so very proud" of the public response, has meanwhile missed the deadline for an EU scheme, to source lifesaving ventilators. Initially, it was an old Empirical call to arms of "going it alone," instead "no longer a member, we were" "making our own efforts," adapting vacuum cleaners! But then the buffoon, upon being accused of "putting Brexit first," quickly reverted to type with the lie of "Owing to an 'initial communication problem,' the UK did not receive an e-mail from the EU, asking it to participate." Boris and Team Deception yet again counting on those certain factions of the country not knowing, or caring really, that Matt Hancock, prior to the deadline, specifically mentioned the scheme during BBC's Question Time. Fill the Cabinet with a bunch of well-practiced liars and it's hardly surprising that all the parts end up on different pages. But the deceit won't slow the Coronavirus. Instead, it'll assist and cost even more lives. 20,000 is the current government 'calculated' loss, in order to save the economy! Perhaps unavoidable now, but one wonders what figures might have been. That's quite a few casualties who won't be bouncing back! 

The nation now has regional Gold Commanders, helping to cooperatively coordinate the fight. Either this is socialism, or we're fighting the virus with prefixes.

The good old United Kingdom has rallied to the call! And it terrifies them! Prince Charles is self isolating in a wing of the Balmoral Estate and, this time, I strongly sense that I'm not the only soul not to give a damn! The national NHS applause warmed the TV screens! But footage of Downing Street and some royal castle, somewhere or other, sort of spoiled the general feel of togetherness, don't you think? Together, for a heartbeat, but eager to get back to differently socially isolating once again.



'Worryingly' it's the socialism issue, again raising it's 'ugly' head! And, we though the Daily Mail, Piers Morgan, the British MSM, and two decades of increasingly spiteful Tory rule had buried it for dead! And yet, here we are again!

The globe is in crisis, variably so. And, the measures that seem to be dealing best with the issue are all socialist measures. Sharing, pulling together, rallying round! We haven't all fought two world wars, that was the generation of our grandparents and great grandparents, as if we need constantly reminding. If we're old enough, just maybe, it was our parents' generation. They were the ones who actually fought the world wars, we didn't!

The threat is very different this time around, but many people are responding similarly, as you might hope of humanity! Just so long as they don't want to 'over respond,' eh Johners? Because, it's all very well the UK gathering at the appointed time, upon their doorsteps and balconies, but heaven forbid that they might also want to ensure that the NHS is better equipped next time round! Whisper it, so Trump upon his golden throne- more orange really- does not hear, "Why, this is socialism!"

Housing the homeless? Ensuring that those without work or too sick or otherwise unable to work are looked after? Volunteers, pulling together to ensure that everyone's chances of survival are enhanced? Socialism! 



Consider a drawn parallel- not the daft and boastful one that we've fought two world wars- instead this one of a potential global annihilation of human life, one that might open people's eyes to the necessity to far better look after one another? When this battle's over- assuming that the virus doesn't attain some sort of more permanent dominion- why shouldn't the people who pulled together want to continue pulling together? Liveable unemployment benefits, sickness pay, shared responsibility for shared rewards, a ready and working NHS for the whole nation, free at the point of delivery! Why not? Socialism, why not? 'All in it together,' for real! Why not? 

Curiously, the contagion is now almost (formerly) biblical! For those, like myself, who are loath to accept such a diagnosis, biblical pertaining to the Bible an' all that- mine was instead more a reference to scale- we might instead think of our planet (almost) as a single living entity. Sometimes, certain marine biologists refer to the Great Barrier Reef as a single living organism, each part thereof highly interdependent of each other part, well, we could think of the earth, that precious shining jewel, as an interdependent single organism (oxymoron), always seeking to balance itself. A greater intelligence might instead reappraise our far too compartmentalised diagnosis. After all, are we not in body, in complexity, a teeming mass of microorganisms, ideally all striving to attain that tenuous balance that equates to a thriving human entity?

Brimming with life, which undoubtedly it is- although not quite so brimming of late- the planet would quite naturally evolve. Wholly alive it might seek out, identify and fight contagion! As a living organism, wanting always to thrive, what might it identify and line up for rectification or cleansing? Over what kind of timescale? Coronavirus? Or humanity? Which is currently causing the greater damage? Humanity or Coronavirus?

If the antibodies, for want of a better analogy, are able to more accurately pinpoint the contagion, where or what would they better target? The human infection is quite widespread, atmospheric pollution, corruption of waterways and oceans, plastic and other pollution, destruction of habitat, extinction of species, disregard and contempt even for its own species, despite it's self proclaimed 'superior intelligence,' resources wars, discrimination, greed! Any greater being might easily draw a very different perspective upon the human species than we appear to have done.



If we acted collectively, and in my analogy, to prioritise greater numbers of our species over the economy- this actually might demonstrate a higher intelligence. We would have to be honest. No longer could we use our MSM to lie or to evade, not to a viral antibody. We would surely have to pinpoint the human contagion element to capitalism, although it has now cancerised in terrifying timescale, into neoliberalism. To save the human planet target instead neoliberalism! Surely every bit as true in real time as it is analogically!

Unless I am the next Messiah, and I know that I am not- heaven yet again help us- surely I cannot have been the only living soul who thought, as the first signs arose in Wuhan, as the virus was identified and recognised as being immune to all current vaccines, why the Hell is the world not treating this as a potential global issue? Why is the globe not locking down and funding the treatment and restriction at source? At the very least think about restricting air travel!

The issue, the answer, was, of course, neoliberalism. The globe was incapable of acting in unison! The globe was busily competing with itself instead to undermine health, to monetise health, to privatise health! Don't let it harm the economy, and the fireside illusion of eternal economic growth! Oh, and perhaps we could save a few lives, give the privatised pseudo-health services some financial justification?

I thought it yet again, why aren't we collectively locking this down and saving more lives, as holidays to Italy, all too frequently adjacent to the newest hotspot, continued to prioritise instead 'the economy!' Save lives, treat the epidemic at its source, now multiple sources, I hoped.

I thought it again, as BJ talked incessantly about protecting the economy, and the first Coronavirus outbreaks began to chickenpox the UK. Even as the space behind his eyes more brightly spoke of the deceit, as the UK's vetted science team were being called upon to field and repurpose the PM's words with ever greater frequency. Treat the damn (now) pandemic cooperatively, fund the fight collectively, I pleaded at the radio or the TV, not always politely!



Now, almost 72 hours since the nation loudly applauded our NHS, the government is again fudging at the fore! Already our gratitude to our health workers has been semantically repurposed, in the words of the latest spokesperson, the Business Secretary, Alok Sharma, elusive as morning mist, "acting on scientific advise," to "save lives by staying at home and social distancing, unless we have to go to work upon crowded tube trains and not social distance." Clear as Johnson! Now we learn that we weren't at our doorways and windows, at our balconies and in our front gardens, cheering the NHS, not exactly. What we were instead doing was helping to, "keep the economy going, readying the nation to bounce back!" Oh, and to perhaps save lives in the process. Who knew, we were there more for Richard Branson and Mike Ashley. Standing together, we minions, and Piers Morgan, for the betterment of the economy. Sharma's words deftly slipping through the net of questions from the likes of The Mail and The Sun. Back on point?

But, properly on point, the nation has again been driven to revert to a socialist ideology and has repurposed The Excel Centre, as the NHS Nightingale Hospital, a 4,000 bed, specifically Coronavirus treatment, facility- adequate ventilators not withstanding. Presumably named in honour of Florence Nightingale? Undoubtedly not referencing the nation's destruction of Kent's premier Nightingale site, at Blean Woods. "Standing shoulder to shoulder," for "our businesses (first mention) and our people (trailing in second)" On point!

This challenge is different though, and the UK government is (almost) palpably fearful of properly addressing the neoliberal contagion with socialist principles. The challenge is no longer 'just' an ostensibly unseen island of plastic whirling out of sight, out of mind. It's not spiralling inequality, pat the island-hugging 'entrepreneurs' on the back and cross our fingers. It's not almost imperceptibly dulling our skies, that slightly grey film, thickening daily and dulling the sun. It's not big-wig smiles and cosy chats about eternal economic growth. It's not the ongoing mass extinction, where we can just switch over to one of the Sky Sports Channels.

Although, think on it, it might just be part of the latter.

Socialism, by any other name!