Saturday 28 February 2015

MH 370 and observations on a Guardian Article


The article by Jon Ronson here: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/28/flight-mh370-malaysia-missing-one-year-on-jon-ronson?CMP=fb_gu#comment-48217200




1. A lot of words to tell us what? That these people, despite their efforts and personal loss, they have discovered virtually nothing of substance, and know no more now than when the plane initially disappeared? From the article it is difficult to gain anything of substance and it merely concentrates on human attitudes and feelings, which advances the inquiry not at all. The video, despite being well intentioned, is emotive and uninformative. The crowd funding target of five million dollars appeared fanciful and proved so to be. Even so, there is no indication whether the $100,000 actually raised was used effectively. Employing private investigators with the money actually raised? Where is the report of their discoveries or was the money completely wasted? And the Chinese relatives not interested? That would appear an insensitive and inaccurate assessment particularly in the light of reports that the Chinese Government took active steps to stop demonstrations and protests demanding more information.

2. I find the persona and actions of at least one of the subjects very troubling and not only because he shares the name of the "Mission Impossible" character played by Tom Cruise in the Hollywood film of that name. "Ethan Matthew Hunt (born August 18, 1964) is a senior field operations agent for the IMF, an elite, top-secret espionage and covert operations agency that handles dangerous and highly sensitive international missions that have been deemed "impossible"." (Wikia) Should we regard this as a curious co-incidence, or a rather sick joke on those who have lost family and friends. Jon Ronson might at least have got to the bottom of that mystery within the far greater one, but no, we are left wondering about that as well.

3. As if this was not reason enough to be wary of "Mr Ethan Hunt", there are other troubling questions revealed, but not questioned, in the article. What sort of successful businessman would expect to raise $5 million by "crowd funding", and this without any clear strategy or safeguards to prevent its misuse? We learn Mr Hunt describes himself as an 'experienced private investigator' but to this we must also add 'time in the military, manager of fitness centres and someone who had run software companies." He currently owns a 3D printer business in China itself, which 'sometimes employs a hundred workers'.

4. Apart from the incongruent nature of these skills and activities, there is no attempt to explain how he came to be in China or the Chinese Government's attitude to him, which appears to include acting as debt collector using very questionable and invasive tactics. Does he really have the Chinese police in his pocket as the article suggests? At least Mr Ronson could have done us the favour of looking into these claims and throwing some light on them, particularly his precise role in the military and whether the other claims hold up under scrutiny. This is not merely academic given his central role in a rather dubious organisation that apparently has revealed nothing more than what was printed in the press.

5. Then there are other rather strange co-incidences and indicators surrounding this gentleman: he just happened to be on a flight from Dubai to Paris at the time. Given the well-know reputation of these places, it would have been helpful to know precisely why he was in both at the time. Was it in connection with managing fitness centres, software companies or his 3 D printing business? Or was he in his 'private investigator' mode? Or was he just having a two-centre city break?

6. Then there is the fact that he is an Australian from Perth and that this country and this city were both to become high profile actors in the subsequent events. It would have been helpful to have been told if the connection was an historic and disconnected one, or if indeed it was still very active and close, or if he was still employed in any capacity by the Australian Government, which we have all noted has taken a much higher profile in terrorist matters generally of late.

7. Then there is the fact that he operates in China to which the doomed plane was heading, and in an area of computer technology for which at least twenty of the passengers worked. Does this not raise a few questions in the mind of the journalist that he could have posed to Mr Hunt?

8. Despite Sarah Bajc being all over the news, and his own determination to help her, it takes him eight weeks to do so - hardly the sign of a 'highly skilled investigator'. When he does eventually speak to her he says 'I strongly believe that the truth is not out there.” Note, NOT out there. What he really meant by this is never explained.

9. Then there are other comments that ring alarm bells (in my mind at least) beginning with the fact that he watched CNN all day in his Paris hotel. What only CNN? This might appear unusual in an investigator seeking the truth from all angles or was he only interested in just one? Then there is this little passage '“She couldn’t run away. She knew I could go there at any time. With people. That’s what they do in China. They take 10 people and go and beat you or steal things. I used that mentality. I’ve done it a few times and it works perfectly.” “It sounds like this is fun for you,” I say. “Yeah, absolutely,” he says. “China is a bit like the wild west. Seriously.”'

10. Apart from the fact that the Chinese Government was apparently allowing him free reign to harass its citizens, it rather indicates his heavy arm tactics. Indeed later in the article he's quoted as saying: “I won’t back away from a fight. I don’t mean a fisty-punchy fight. I’m very skilled at hitting people and I know when I hit them, they’re going to get hurt. I don’t like that.” It certainly indicates a certain attitude and skill-set not normally associated with 4D printing. This is reinforced by a reported second incident in which the suggestion is made he threatened women and children to get a public retraction and apology.

11. Lastly, it would appear he has two targets for his tensioned bow: one, an unreliable and secretive Malaysian Government; and two, the suggestion some would regard as quite irrational and extreme, that President Putin of Russia was somehow implicated by virtue of the fact that MH17 was also shot down, significantly failing to mention this was almost certainly by the Ukraine/West NOT Russia or the separatists. He says, “Putin is seriously trying to provoke the west into going to war with him. For him a war would be fantastic.”

12. We cannot but fail to notice that both these lines are straight out of the current American/Israeli/European propaganda text book. That he should channel both is more than a little worrying given that his profile, attitude and business all suspiciously fit the traditional model of an agent, even if in fact he isn't.


13. Before leaving the subject and article, perhaps we might note that if the loss of the plane was a clandestine government or terrorist operation, it might be very useful to have an internet campaign purporting to be privately investigating the circumstances, seeking cash and information from any quarter. What better way would there be to ascertain leaks in security or individuals that might pose a risk to a sophisticated hi-jack and cover-up? If Mr Hunt's efforts are all there is to justify the campaign, and the contents of the article its only results, more searching questions should be posed as to the lines of enquiry followed and the true purpose of it. As an uninformed and useless investigator, even I might have begun by accurately documenting the detailed reports of a plane flying low over the Maldives, which to date no one appears to have done!END.

Friday 20 February 2015

Bush on Kennedy. – Tim Veater

Bush on Kennedy – “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him” by Tim Veater.

It has been reported from Dallas (oh the irony) George W. Bush has eulogised the
life and work of John Fitzgerald Kennedy on the fiftieth anniversary of his
assassination. He is quoted as describing the events of Nov. 22, 1963, as a
“dark episode” in American history, adding “Kennedy dedicated himself to public
service and his example moved Americans to do more for our country.” Bush, who
lives in Dallas, said, “the 35th president believed in the greatness of the
United States and the righteousness of liberty – and defended both”.

Anyone who has followed the events of that portentous day, and those that
preceded it and came after, might be excused a sardonic smile. (Surprise, given
the events of the last fifty years, are simply not permitted!). However the day
a Bush sings the praises of a Kennedy, and particularly these Bushes and
Kennedys, has probably never been equalled in literary imagination since Brutus’
famous speech on the death of Caesar as recounted by Shakespeare:

“There is tears for his love; joy for his
fortune; honour for his valour; and death for his
ambition. Who is here so base that would be a
bondman? If any, speak; for him have I offended.
Who is here so rude that would not be a Roman? If
any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so
vile that will not love his country? If any, speak;
for him have I offended. I pause for a reply.”

Ah! The ace card of patriotism – “the last refuge of the scoundrel” as Samuel
Johnson coined it. Who would dare impugn the reputation of the state to do
deadly deeds against its own? Yet Brutus did indeed plunge the dagger into
Caesar’s breast.
 As Mark Antony put it:
O, what a fall was there, my countrymen!
Then I, and you, and all of us fell down,
Whilst bloody treason flourish’d over us.
O, now you weep; and, I perceive, you feel
The dint of pity: these are gracious drops.
Kind souls, what, weep you when you but behold
Our Caesar’s vesture wounded? Look you here,
Here is himself, marr’d, as you see, with traitors.

America is a great country and its citizens are justly proud of its
achievements. Such is the degree of patriotism that anyone suggesting the
possibility of treachery is immediately labelled a conspirator or worse. Even
after fifty years, the Institutions of the American State, have remained largely
impervious to the monumental pile of evidence that points not only to a detailed
and intricately planned conspiracy to kill the President, but active involvement
of the highest echelons of State administration itself.

The Warren Commission set up to inquire into events and produce the conclusion
that Lee Harvey Oswald was the assassin and worked quite alone and without
assistance of any kind, can now be seen for what it was, a fix. Yet the fudge
has remained incredibly resistant to attack, despite the circumstances of the
event, the multitude of witnesses uncalled to give evidence or who’s statements
were altered, evidence was tampered with, State laws ignored, photographic and
other evidence denied, an autopsy interfered with, Oswald’s extraordinary
background and claims he had been set up before being shot by a known Mafia
boss, the disappearance or death of a swathe of people involved, the way a
subsequent prosecution by the New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison
(subject of Oliver Stone’s famous film) was obstructed at every stage by state
functionaries, forensics that flatly contradicted the official story – the so
called “magic bullet”, recorded deathbed testimony by E
Howard Hunt (see http://www.rense.com/general76/hunt.htm ), one of the
Watergate break-in team and a CIA operative in Dallas on the day and possibly
one of the shooters. And so we could go on. That the Warren Commission would
report as it did is hardly surprising. It had on it the ex-Director of the CIA,
Allen Dulles, who Kennedy had sacked only a couple of years before and was known
to hate them.

Worryingly we have seen many of the characteristics of the Kennedy assassination
and subsequent Warren investigation replicated in the 9/11 Commission.
Significantly in neither was a systematic criminal investigation instituted or
criminal convictions obtained. A list of alleged conspirators is so extensive as
to be mind-blowing. (see http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/09/409701.html )
Clearly the Kennedy assassination was carried out without the President’s
knowledge and consent. Could 9/11 have been similarly effected or was Bush fully
cognizant? Bizarrely he didn’t hasten away when told in the classroom but then
went completely incommunicado in Air Force One – effectively a Commander in
Chief out of touch! Meanwhile his Secretary of Defence Rumsfeld is seen playing
the hero on the lawn outside the Pentagon. You really could not make it more
bizarre could you?

So getting back to Bush junior’s “damning with faint praise” soliloquy, a much
more personal question hangs in the air. Did his father have any knowledge of or
involvement in Kennedy’s death? If he did, we would have the highly unusual and
frankly sinister situation of two Bush family members, father and son, both
Presidents of the United States, with deep and enduring interests in oil and the
Gulf, instituting aggressive wars against Iraq, and connected, even if
peripherally, in two of the most infamous incidents of U.S. domestic history of
the last half century.

Many world events wash over us unremembered. Some have a certain iconic power to
remain embedded in the memory. For anyone over the age of ten at the time,
Kennedy’s assassination is such an event. It is almost apocryphal that there is
not one in the world who cannot remember where they were and what they were
doing on that November day. With one notable exception apparently. George H.W.
Bush, with a first class intellect, when asked where he was when Kennedy was
shot, replied vaguely that he was “somewhere in Texas.”
(See http://www.wnd.com/2013/09/did-george-h-w-bush-witness-jfk-assassination/#SSrq0UQMgB5rFF2p.99
)

Detailed subsequent research has provided a possible explanation. First he was
at the time employed by the CIA, and second he was in Dallas on the day! (See
http://www.wnd.com/2013/09/did-george-h-w-bush-witness-jfk-assassination/ ) Now
how would you forget that? To forget working for the government and being
present at the scene of the crime (by his own admission he wasn’t anywhere else
that he could remember) is rather suggestive of something untoward. Bush’s name
was found in the papers of George De Mohrenschildt, one of Lee Harvey Oswald’s
CIA handlers and is referred to in other documents that place him in Dallas on
the day of Kennedy’s murder. Richard Nixon later hand-picked him as Republican
National Committee chairman, in which role he constantly covered-up and
stonewalled for his boss about Watergate. In 1975 he was appointed Director of
the CIA by President Ford but only remained in it for a year later becoming
Ronald Regan’s running mate and winning the Presidency
for himself in 1988.
Larry Chin
Online Journal Associate Editor of rense.com in “Hunt’s Deathbed Confession
Reveals JFK Killers” (http://www.rense.com/general76/hunt.htm )makes the
assertion:

“Beyond any reasonable doubt, the US government murdered John F. Kennedy. There
are people still alive today who were involved directly and indirectly
implicated. Some are probably even serving in positions of high influence. Some
still have never been identified or touched.” The precise involvement of Bush
Senior has never been disclosed but multiple sources suspiciously indicate there
was at least some.

In similar vein, it is now clear beyond peradventure, 9/11 replicated elements
of the Kennedy killing in terms of a dangerous internal cabal that has never
been brought to justice because evidence has been destroyed and a police
investigation has never been instituted. And all this when the diffident Bush
Junior was President.

Well I never did!

ANTONY: “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar.” END.

When is State Intervention in Child-Related Matters Justified ? The UK’s proposed “Cinderella Law”. Tim Veater.

 When is State Intervention in Child-Related Matters Justified ? The UK’s proposed “Cinderella Law”. Tim Veater. 
Further to the article by Julia Gasper here (http://inquiringminds.cc/uk-thought-policing-julia-gasper)
I was recently forwarded a video, painful to watch, of a small Asian child being
mistreated by presumably his (?) mother that will appal any parent or
right-minded person. It may be viewed here (1) but it comes with a warning not
to watch it if you may be disturbed by such things. It is to be hoped in
passing, that its circulation is justified in order that this woman will be
identified in due course and the child protected from further cruelty. It is a
shocking example of child abuse from which every child should, by every means
possible be protected.

This is not an easy task, for seldom is the abuse public. If and when it is, I
believe we all have a moral duty to intervene despite a natural reticence to do
so. However signs of abuse, either physical or emotional, usually are public,
and particularly to those with professional skills in the nursery and primary
education sectors, and to medical staff, if the child appears in casualty or
doctors surgery.

“Abuse” has a number of definitions and applications, the most important here
being “Treat with cruelty or violence, especially regularly or repeatedly;
assault (someone, especially a woman or child) sexually;
use or treat in such a way as to cause damage or harm; speak to (someone) in an
insulting and offensive way.” (OED)

Latest figures suggest about three children die every week from extreme abuse or
neglect and of course this is indicative of a much bigger underlying issue
issue. (2) “Problem families” are well known to Social Services Departments,
where neglect or abuse may be more likely but not exclusively so. Intervention
against this group may be more common for historic social reasons, whether truly
deserved or not although the phenomenon of family break-down and break-up has
extended the reach of social services departments into the middle classes, if
children are part of the subsequent dispute. Working class families may attract
disproportionate attention from the authorities because it is easier to do so.

No one can blame social workers for not intervening if unaware. What is frankly
inexplicable and inexcusable is inaction to save or protect a child where
unassailable evidence is presented. A number of notorious cases are reviewed
here (3) where an obvious professional failure was observed.

Social workers walk a precarious tight rope between intervention and
non-intervention and neither are free of pitfalls. A child removed unnecessarily
can be as bad as not doing so when required, so a high bar should be rightly set
before the role of the parent is usurped by the state and its organs. Bad
practice in both cases has been demonstrated in recent years, that is where
officialdom failed to act where it undoubtedly should have, or acted
unnecessarily where it shouldn’t, not helped by the secret character of the
family courts as recently criticised by Lord Justice Munby in a specific
case.(4)

There is no room here for personal vendettas or private agendas or for current
trendy obsessions around sexual orientation or gender.  Unfortunately there are
those in society who perversely use the extreme case to make their own far less
convincing one and to advance a very narrow agenda. The proposed “Cinderella”
legislation and the groups pushing it appear to be but a latest example with
sinister overtones. (5)

Norms of attitude that have served quite well for generations are being
hi-jacked and subverted for, it would appear, politically correct social ends. A
process of slipping through legislation that is neither justified or required
under the umbrella of emotive reasoning that is hard to challenge, appears to be
an increasingly common and disreputable tactic. It was tried with the police
power to detain and succeeded in relation to controlling dissent prior to
elections. We see that communities are to be bribed to accept infringements over
trespass law to allow fracking to go ahead unhindered. No doubt we could cite
many more. Such an approach needs to be robustly challenged and resisted.

We want good parenting and we want the state to intervene if a child is truly
being harmed or endangered but we want it to stay clear from families just
coping with the normal psychological stresses and strains. To achieve this the
criteria of “harm” needs to be strictly defined to prevent unnecessary
interference into family life. Broad unspecific, all encompassing ones entail
real dangers for society, the family unit and most particularly the children
themselves. Why? Because the state has proved to be an indifferent, unreliable,
even abusive “parent” itself.

Childhood has always been a hazardous time. Pre-19th Century children took their
chances determined by their parent’s economic and social status and environment.
(6) With industrialisation the role and fate of children became a big social and
political issue particularly as regards their education and occupation –
affecting particularly the poor of course. The 18th Century saw Hogarth’s Gin
Lane, (7) the 19th Century Bentham/Chadwick Poor Law reform, (8) Sadler and
Dickens (9) and many others pleading for child protection. The period sees the
appearance of philanthropy by people like George Muller in Bristol and Barnado
in London to whom literally thousands of children in the last two centuries owe
their survival. (10) Perhaps it should be noted in these days when it is
fashionable to mock and criticise religion in general and Christianity in
particular, that these and other invaluable initiatives were born of sincere and
deep belief. It is not clear whether they would have h
appened without it.

One in five children generally did not survive the first five years and rates of
death for orphans were  were much higher. Orphans became a financial liability
on the vestry and this led to thousands being packed off to the factories of the
north as soon as physically possible, leading to all the social evils it
entailed, despite the many enlightened initiatives by Wilfred Owen and others.
(11)

Ah you may say that was a long time ago, surely you cannot hold the State
accountable for such ancient failures? But wait, how about the mass export of
children to Australia in the 1950’s detailed here, (12) or how even into the
nineteen sixties children were forcibly removed from unmarried mothers and never
seen again, or how governments turned a blind eye or were actively involved in
the sexual abuse of children in state or church run children’s homes, the
details of which are still emerging? (13)

For further proof as to the relative failure of State v. Conventional Family on
the child-rearing front we may look no further than the state prison system, in
which there are now at any one time nearly one hundred thousand persons
ensconced. (97,000) This figure is an all-time high and about five times as many
as the figure throughout the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s despite increasing affluence
and a 10% increase in population. (14)

Amazingly in a recent study, despite  just one per cent of children in the care
system, more than a quarter (27%) of those in prison were in care as children
and over HALF of  all prisoners under 25, had been in local authority care. (15)
This would appear to suggest that rather than getting better, things are getting
worse. According to the NSPCC, in 2013 there were 92.000 children “in care” in
the UK. Of 28,850  of the children who started to be looked after in England
during the year 1 April 2012 to 31 March 2013, 56% were because  of abuse or
neglect. (16) This is an historically high figure, influenced no doubt by the
baby Peter Connolly case.

So what may we conclude from all this? The state has an atrocious record on
outcomes, where it intervenes to “protect” children/ It therefore should always
be regarded as a solution of last resort. The state should only intervene where,
beyond peradventure, this is in the interest of the child. Given the above
figures (and we haven’t even considered accidents, disappearance, self harm,
suicide, drug and alcohol abuse, social and psychological problems) the bar has
to be set high for the removal of a child and should never stray into marginal
areas of faith, belief or attitudes.

Conversely local authorities must always intervene robustly where a child is
seen to be injured in suspicious circumstances or otherwise abused by adults,
again where it has historically failed miserably.

Social Workers and Police cannot right all the ills of society, the prevailing
ethos of which we are all responsible for and for which many of the family
problem issues can be attributed. They can however apply common sense and
humanity to a difficult area. act when there is real need and keep out when
there isn’t, within a culture of as much openness consistent with the need to
protect the persons concerned.

“Institutions”, even including educational ones, have been proved positively
hazardous in many cases and have to be either avoided or treated with the
caution they deserve. The fact that boarding schools can work well and produce
sensible, balanced adults, should encourage us to be optimistic. Whether Mr
Gove, fortunate enough to be adopted by a good family when still a small child,
and now entrusted with the education system of the country, is evidence of
optimism or pessimism for the future, has not as yet, been definitively
determined.

Having and bringing up a family can be a messy ill defined business. We can all
wish we had done better. However what is statistically and socially clear, that
even imperfect families do better at rearing children than does the state. The
state therefore is a safety net not a preferable option. That does not mean it
should not strive to do better but the main emphasis should be directed towards
stable family structures and discouraging procreation in their absence.
Parenting knowledge, attitudes and skills should be part of the education
process, with an emphasis on attachment and commitment rather than transient
self fulfilment sexually or otherwise.

Children need love and attachment to a family for emotional stability even if
they later choose to reject it, something an amorphous government agency can
never provide. END.

REFERENCES.

1. Violence to small Asian child. Warning! Do not watch if easily upset by such


According to this report, in the 17-month period to the end of August 2008 local
authorities in England notified Ofsted of 424 serious incidents involving the
deaths of 282 children. This equates to 199 annually, or almost four children
each week. Since publication of this report, Ofsted has clarified that 210 of
these deaths, i.e. three each week, were actually attributable to abuse or
neglect (Gilbert, 2008).  This is still higher than the NSPCC’s estimate of at
least one child a week, but it must be borne in mind that the figures stem from
very different, albeit complementary, sources of data and are in fact not
contradictory.






8.  Edwin chadwick and Poor law reform http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Chadwick

9. Michael Thomas Sadler and factory reformhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Thomas_Sadler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadler_report  For Charles Dickens see:


12. Child migration to Australia and South Africahttp://www.childmigrantstrust.com/our-work/child-migration-history



UK Population Graph: http://chartsbin.com/view/28k