How to create and convict a terrorist

Tony Blair and various ministers in his government - like John Reid or Ruth Kelly recently - have repeatedly warned against the radicalisation of Muslims. They have good cause to worry: radical Muslims ask uncomfortable questions, want to hold the government accountable, cannot be taken for granted as Labour supporters and might even take part in direct action, like the boarding of a US transport plane in Perth by the "people's weapons inspectors". It is for this reason that the government must portray any Muslim not towing the party line as a potential or actual terrorist. To be credible in the manufacture of this terrorist threat there has to be, of course, the occasional proven case of imminent danger followed by arrests, charges and, hopefully, convictions.

The explosive baby milk scare at Heathrow was such an event. People were either scared or inconvenienced to drive home the message, Muslims were rounded up at the middle of the night and arrested, and some were charged with terrorist-related charges. Convictions, unfortunately for the government are a little less easy to come by. The police may be a willing political tool these days, but the judiciary by and large is not yet. Scathing remarks by John Reid and others about judges and the human rights act have not helped either to make this relationship any better.

In this context it must be remembered that out of the over 700 Muslims arrested under anti-terrorism legislation less than a handful have been convicted of offences under those laws. Most of the other very few convictions obtained at all were for unrelated matters which came to light in the course of the investigation, like visa violations, for example. Nobody has yet been convicted with any hard first-hand evidence about a successful or foiled terrorist plot. The only way to convict anybody under terrorist laws is by circumstantial evidence: maps, books, videos and the like which are said to be useful to a potential terrorist.

I can predict already that nobody will be charged with possession of any of the ingredients to produce liquid explosives, just like the Ricin of past scares was never found nor the alleged bomb making factories consuming large amounts of fertiliser (by the way, what happened to bird flu, that other threat to keep us worried and run to the government for protection?). To produce liquid explosive requires sophistication, hours of patience and ambient temperatures well below freezing. No judge will believe the argument that anybody was about to board a plane with a couple of innocent liquids in order to turn them into explosives during the first six hours of a transatlantic flight whilst blocking the loo for everybody else. The security personnel at the airports weren't afraid of suddenly igniting liquids either; else they would not have had everybody poor their drinks, aftershave, sun lotion etc. into one and the same container before boarding.

Already we are hearing a lot about martyrdom videos instead. Those people were watching X-rated material and were so inspired that they could hardly wait to blow themselves and everybody else to pieces. On that basis it is easy to convict anybody, and I hope judges and juries won't buy the nonsense. The people protesting against US planes with weapons for the Israeli onslaught against Lebanon refuelling on UK soil would have had maps of the airport perimeter fences to help them gain access. Thus they could be made out to be potential terrorists, rather than anti-war protesters. I remember not long ago a spam email entitled "how to create a dirty bomb" or similar, which I bounced back through my spam blocking software, just in case. Others, however, might just have downloaded the file to their inbox or even opened it before deleting it as spam, in which case their computer will show after analysis by special branch that they once had a bomb making manual on their hard drives.

Incidentally, a lot of spam originates from Israel, much of it sent with the hijacked addresses of Muslim organisations in the "from" field, maybe in order to discredit them. As for martyrdom videos, I received a DVD entitled "Martyrdom encounters" in the post, so I am pretty sure most other people linked to Muslim organisations would have got one too. It contained daft al-Qaeda propaganda and was so boring that I threw it away. However, it was lying around in my pile of junk mail to be sorted for many months before I took a first glance at it. The likelihood is that if one of those was found in the house of a Muslim when searched by Special Branch, the owner would not have viewed it yet, or he would also have thrown it straight on the garbage heap. But it is enough to make the connection.

Whilst generating, and then riding the waves of, hysteria the job of implicating people through circumstantial evidence has become a great deal easier. There is no need anymore, to plant real guns in people's houses. A spam mail and an unsolicited DVD in the post will do the trick. And if this does not suffice in the end to charge and convict them under terrorist legislation, then most people can be caught on something else, like unlicensed software running on their computer or a pirate copy of a DVD. This serves to prove that they were criminals after all and therefore dangerous and the night-time raids of their premises justified.

Meanwhile, Muslim organisations and leaders are being asked to do more to prevent members of their community from being radicalised, in other words to tow the official line unquestioningly. Yet if they do, they will only be increasingly out of touch with their own following, who are becoming more outspoken. It will take quite a while still before the cover is lifted on the unsavoury fear-mongering perpetrated by our government. Ryanair's threat to sue for compensation indicates that ordinary people are becoming fed up, too. When the full picture of manipulation eventually emerges, the witch hunts of the Dark Ages will look amateurish in comparison.

The prime minister is gone, long live John Reid!

Leaving aside the question whether there was credible intelligence about a potential baby milk explosion plot to light up the sky with the burning debris of up to ten jumbo jets – after all we've had plenty of dodgy intelligence since the Iraq invasion when political demands started to direct the security forces as to what was expected of them – there is a nagging suspicion in my mind that the way the disruptive Heathrow exercise was carried out was actually intended to further somebody's political career: John Reid, ex Northern Ireland and later defence secretary, sweeping reformer at the home office, and would-be occupier of No. 10.

With Tony Blair out of the country and John Prescott too humiliated already to make more than a cursory appearance (whilst officially remaining in charge), this was Reid's unique and only chance to demonstrate how he could aptly take the reins at a time of national crisis, chair meetings, hold news conferences, proudly declare that the police and security services were giving 100%, so we all had to make some sacrifices for our own good, and – most of all – make the name Gordon Brown sound like something from the distant past.

We better keep a close eye on this rising star of British politics who seems to emerge strengthened and unharmed from every encounter or adversary. Unlike Kennedy, a drinking habit did not halt the career of this imbiber of Scottish whisky, now a self-declared tea-total who also gave up chain smoking. A find of cannabis at his home did not make him unfit for being given the portfolio for the Home Office, in charge of law enforcement, which he soon afterwards declared unfit for purpose. His friendship with Serb war criminal Radovan Karadzic, still on the run from the international court, did not prevent him from becoming defence secretary nor does it dent his current image as the uncompromising eradicator of terrorism past, present and future. The man clearly is a survivor.

Noticeably absent from his brief official biography at the government's own website is the fact that before joining the Labour Party Dr John Reid previously belonged to the Communist Party of Britain who at the time supported the Stalinist oppression and loathed Refuseniks like Alexander Solzhenitsyn. He didn't have to change too much in order to serve under New Labour leader Tony Blair since he too is in favour of centralised government and more power for the state. Like Blair he is a member of Labour Friends of Israel, thus qualified for high office, and as an added bonus his new wife is Jewish, according to Wikipedia. This Brazilian-born film director made her debut with a titillating raunchy film about a girl's sexual experimentation in a quest for her identity as soon as her mother dies.

On balance, then, comrade Reid is cut out and destined for greater things. Britain's new charismatic leader is ready to take on the country, demand their undivided loyalty and to give up their freedoms in exchange for extending his protection, and he will rule over us with an iron will and fist. The days during his youth when he admired Stalin may not have been without purpose after all.

Heathrow: what a difference a day makes

I had to cancel a business meeting in London today since a party coming from abroad could not make it into Heathrow. With some time to spare I am pondering the consequences of this latest "anti-terror scoop" by the British security forces under the direction of American agencies. Those consequences are potentially far-reaching. No doubt, pertinent questions will be asked in due time, and already a BBC commentator on their morning news programme hinted at the possibility that this whole operation of closing down Heathrow airport had US origins by making the connection between a couple of flights from the UK to the US who had previously been returned and refused permission to land. He also voiced some disquiet about the American law enforcement and intelligence agencies imposing serious restrictions on other countries whilst being unable to get their own house in order with the communication between the FBI and the CIA, for example, being appalling and suffering of the same failures as those pointed out during the half-hearted enquiry as leading to the inability to prevent 9/11 from happening.

I doubt, however, whether the British public put the blame for this onto the Americans. They probably believe that the British security forces had credible cause to move in, and they will simply get scared of flying even more. It is the airlines and airport operators who will probably start asking some uncomfortable questions from the UK government, but will be rebuffed with the usual "public safety is paramount" mantra. Knowing all too well that the numerous competing spy agencies could easily plant a life item at an airport or in an aircraft to reinforce the point, should the airlines not cooperate willingly, they will probably shut up and put up.
The Heathrow operation is likely going to invite a flood of conspiracy theories as the knock-on effects will become more evident. It is certainly too early to speculate on potential interconnections, but there are a number of interesting factors. To start with, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon is out of the news for a while and the Muslim terrorists are the bad guys again. If anything, this is a useful by-product of the terror alert.

Of greater consequence, however, are the economic effects. Already the shares of BAA and major airline operators have fallen by an average of 5%. People will be scared of flying and the industry is likely to suffer for some time, as will all the other industries relying on air travel. I doubt people will happily give up their mobile phones, laptops and handbags before boarding a commercial flight with only their passport and cash in hand, wrapped in a see-through plastic bag. Most flights carry people on non-essential journeys, enticed towards a holiday destination by cheap ticket offers.

The airline industry has been heavily subsidised, and those more familiar with it knew that this could not be sustained over the long term. Maybe a security scare will be a convenient scapegoat for the collapse of an industry which was going to falter anyway, particularly with the rapid rise in fuel prices. Smaller operators will fold, larger operators will be able to consolidate and create a monopoly. Ordinary Brits might no longer be able to escape the dreary English weather (although it is changing) and mediocre lifestyle (which hasn't changed so much) by flying to Spain for the price of less than a train ticket to a domestic destination. The British government won't be too unhappy about that. Those holiday makers made Spain rich and turned up their noses at the backwardness of England, which started to become a haven for migrants from Eastern Europe. Spanish companies bought up British companies, including the major airport operator BAA. "Serves them right" is what many British politicians and civil servants might think when they see their shares go down.

But I doubt that this is about inter-European rivalries. When it all plays out, I think it has more to do with the utter disregard the US administration has for its junior British partner or "poodle". The US economy is in shatters, China is in the ascendancy, the American military might is being dented in Iraq, Afghanistan and more recently in the Middle East, where Israel has been unable to deliver the short and sharp victory they had hoped for. These are the dying days of Empire. The Brits thought they could ride the waves, as they always did, and make a handsome profit in the oil and reconstruction deals resulting from the American war adventures, whilst jealously safeguarding their financial independence against both the Dollar and the Euro. Just before the Heathrow raid, the pound was almost going to buy two dollars, and various European and other Central Banks were switching some of their reserves. This latest knock on the British economy will level the playing field again. In the long-term, however, I think it will have a paralysing effect on both sides of the Atlantic.

I spoke of the dying days of Empire, and the typical pattern of decadence and decline after having reached the peak is nothing new to students of history. The capacity to self-destruct does not fail to amaze me, however, when mighty powers sacrifice their long-term future on the altar of short-term gain.

Customers are not Kings, but Prey

Consumers are supposed to be what drives the economy, and to make sure that they are not taken advantage of we have advertising standards and consumer protection laws. In reality, however, they are free game for unscrupulous traders wanting to maximise profits. Because our twisted monetary system ensures that there is not enough spending power to buy the goods we produce, consumers have to be enticed into parting with their cash or, more likely, the money they don't even have. The trader will not only sell you the goods but also the finance, both at inflated prices. Store cards with exorbitant interest rates and "interest-free" offers which revert to usurious retrospective loans if not repaid on the dot abound on the high street.

As the high street is finding it increasingly difficult to survive in the face of online competition, advertising and marketing strategists also turn their attention to online customers. Here too, the free offer with strings attached is a convenient ploy to rob shoppers of the cash they don't have and can't afford spending. When consumers are conned into signing up to a deal too good to be true it is often blamed on the rogue elements in the industry, insinuating that respectable companies would not behave like that. Yet it is the allegedly respectable companies who keep the cowboys in business with the latter serving as a bait for the former.

Here is an example: A Chicago based company "I-Deal Direct, Inc." is pulling in unsuspecting customers for British High Street businesses. Under the UK domain name "ConsumerSavingCentre.co.uk" they do not offer savings but entice the public to gamble away their money by chasing an illusive "free offer". The scam starts with a popup asking you to vote whether you support Tony Blair or not, and given the strength of feeling about his incompetence and dishonesty, I am sure plenty of people will voice their opinion. You are then directed to a "free laptop" offer and assured that you will get a high-spec laptop for nothing provided you meet all the conditions, which means to "complete" a number of sponsored offers. The sponsors, it is said, cover the cost for the laptop, but don't fret, I doubt whether the actual laptop has cost them a penny yet since it is highly unlikely that any have ever been dispatched.

Completing an offer means signing up for a payable service or free trial offer, the latter only being free, of course, if you remember to cancel your subscription on time. As with the interest-free finance by high street stores mentioned above, the hope is that people forget and then pay through their nostrils. On the cleverly designed ConsumerSavingsCentre website you are asked to complete first 2 "Silver offers", then 2 "Gold offers" and finally 1 "Platinum" offer – that is a total of 5 potential purchasing contracts. It is said that the sign-up information from sponsors will be recorded and within some 4 weeks you would be notified of your "approved" status by way of a certificate. This you must print out and post to Chicago within 60 days, and 6-8 weeks you should have your laptop. You wish!

If you make it to the final page of offers, you will find that unlike the previous ones which had a "Next" button, this one only has a "Previous" one, plus a link to "Other Bonus Offers" for those stupid enough to carry on wasting their time and money. Should you wish to send the company an email, you can do so via an online form, but the email will bounce back as undeliverable. They hope that you are trusting and won't find out, however, by waiting and forgetting, as their terms and conditions state: "We will not respond to inquiries regarding offer status until 30 days after you have attempted to complete an offer."

Whilst this kind of operation has the same sort of impropriety attached to it as the scam emails you might find in your inbox (telling you that you have won the lottery but must first pay some money to release your funds, or the endless variations of the "Sir, I am the widow of the late leader of the Banana Republic of Gotcha and have more money than I would ever want to have, so why don't you send me all your bank details plus authorisation, and I will share my wealth with you"), there is a major difference. This unsavoury scheme is supported by sponsors who all claim to be respectable businesses abiding by a proper code of conduct. Here is the hall of shame for the fraudster scheme described earlier:

Screen Select DVD rentals, Vodafone, Blockbuster Movies, Lloyds TSB Insurance, uSwitch.com (a service offering a helping hand in switching to a different household energy provider), Zurich insurance, TalkTalk, Ebay, JackPotJoy, The Phone Spot, Bingos.co.uk, Betfair.com, AOL Broadband Silver, One Stop Phone Shop, GameAccount.com, The Biggest Looser Club (no, this is not a hint about where you end up if you hunt for free offers, this one is about losing weight!), Totesport.com, Audible.com, Hotels.com UK, Weightwatchers, and Screentrade.co.uk.

A complaint to Trading Standards, the UK watchdog or regulatory body resulted in the polite reply that the matter would be further investigated but that there was no obligation on their part, to report back on the issue. Legally, if you have fallen for the prank, you have not parted with any money or bought any goods from ConsumerSavingCentre, therefore you cannot be afforded any protection since your consumer rights cannot seriously have been infringed. That Trading Standards would take any action on their own accord is highly unlikely since their funding is tiny compared to that of the heavy-weight businesses trying to land a catch through illegitimate practices. When it comes to greed and money there is no such thing as high morals. Mainstream businesses might prefer for some front company to do the dirty work for them, and they will pay them handsomely provided they produce profitable results, by hook or by crook.

New Labour and the BNP are two sides of the same Zionist coin

What do the British prime minister and the leader of the British National Party have in common? Their unconditional support for Israel and loathing of any Muslim wanting to retain more than a token adherence to his faith. Bad enough, that New Labour served international capital and bankers better than the Tories under Margaret Thatcher, their domestic and foreign policies are now no longer distinguishable from that of BNP leader Nick Griffins. Should Labour ever manage to shed this disgraceful legacy, which is doubtful, Tony Blair might find a new political home with the BNP.
Sir Rodric Braithwaite, a former senior ambassador, claimed Mr Blair's "total identification'' with US policy had wrecked Britain's influence abroad and increased the likelihood of terrorism at home, calling for the prime minister to resign immediately. According to the New Statesman magazine, Mr Blair was informed in advance of the Israeli attack on Lebanon, but did nothing to stop it. He has consistently refused to condemn Israel's actions as disproportionate and instead focused during his US tour on waffling on about refining the war on terror by empowering and mobilising moderate Islam, a euphemism for the accelerated secularisation of Muslims in the West.
Blair's sell-out to Israel and the Zionist agenda should not come as a surprise. Labour was moved into government through the strategic help of Peter Mandelsohn, the fundraising efforts of Lord Michael Levy, and the media propaganda of the Sun newspaper owned by Rupert Murdoch – all of whom are Jewish supporters of Israel. Zionist lobbying power in the UK is no less effective than in the US. Recently, it has also turned its attention to the British National Party which, under the leadership of Nick Griffin, has identified Muslims as their common enemy. Since Muslim-bashing is the respectable face of racism, it allows the BNP to gain mainstream credibility by abandoning its more xenophobic message from the past.
"I support Israel 100%" writes BNP chief polemicist Lee Barnes with Griffin's blessing. "In fact, I hope they wipe Hezbollah off the Lebanese map and bomb them until they leave large greasy craters in the cities where their Islamic extremist cantons of terror once stood." He then turns on the British media: "The fact that the British media has become the European propaganda wing of Hezbollah and churns out endless montages of wounded children, old men and women whilst never showing any footage of dead Hezbollah terrorists, blown up Hezbollah weapons dumps and footage of bombed Hezbollah camps should get some people thinking", he whines, and claims that the reports from the BBC and other British Media are openly anti-Israeli.
According to Barnes, "Israel is the only living organic nationalist state on the planet." In his assessment "Israel have adopted one of the most restrained invasions in world history… The media , and the pet politicians of the New World Order that are also calling for a ceasefire, are all stooges of the United Nations, the European Union and the rest of the International Elite that regard Nationalism and nation states as historical anachronisms that must be wiped out. All true nationalists should be supporting Israel in this struggle not attacking them for rejecting the orders of the New World Order."
This erroneous and selective reading of history misses not only the point that the state of Israel was founded on terror, including the blowing up of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem and the kidnapping and slow hanging with piano wire of two British army sergeants under the British Mandate, ordered by Irgun terror gang chief Menachim Begin, later Likud leader and Israeli prime minister. The British showed a lot more restraint than the Israelis just did when their soldiers were taken, and the BNP should change the first letter  in its name to an I for Israel.

And, of course, Israel is not a nationalist state, that is it is not a state content to remain within national borders. It is the driving force behind the globalisation and "One World" movement. Ben Gurion once observed that the UN was a Jewish ideal and dreamt that Jerusalem would be the seat of the Supreme Court of Mankind. One world government with the Zionist entity at the helm to judge amongst the gentiles is what Israel sets out to establish, to restore the temple and take the Temple Mount back from the Muslims. The Israel envisaged by Theodor Herzl included Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Syria. The reshaping of the Middle East is only the continuation of a plan laid out long before the official establishment of the state of Israel. We are indeed seeing the "birth pangs" of a new Middle East and world order, as the American secretary of state put it. The Iraq war and the coming war against Syria are being conducted in the interest of Zionist domination.

Now before those subservient to Israeli interests try and convince their populace that an international court of justice administered by enlightened Jews in Jerusalem is not such a bad idea in order to bring peace to the world, they better familiarise themselves with the racist "supermensch" ideology of the Zionists. According to Rabbinical law the life of a Jew is infinitely more precious than that of a gentile, and when it comes to safeguarding Jewish interests, particularly in war, there are no innocents according to the Yesha Rabbinical Council in Israel. Before accepting the Pax Judea the Zionist apologists better read Alan Dershowitz's elaborate argumentation why non-Jewish civilian casualties, even of children, don't really count. They have been asked by the Israeli Defence Force to leave and not stand in the way, so if they are still there and get hit, they have collaborated with the enemy and brought their fate upon themselves.

Zionist end-time Christians in America hope that by supporting Israel they will hasten Armageddon. In their unholy alliance with the Zionists they think in the back of their minds that they will, of course, convert all remaining Jews or get rid of those who refuse. Their Zionist partners in this pact expect them to submit to slavery under their Noachite laws. Muslims, from their prophecies, know that the false Messiah, the Dajjal, will emerge on the road between Syria and Iraq. The time cannot be far off.