CIA ran secret prisons in Europe

The Gaurdian has seen a report from the Council of Europe that claims the CIA ran secret detention centres in Europe where they could employ "enhanced" interrogation techniques against terrorism suspects:

The CIA operated secret prisons in Europe where terrorism suspects could be interrogated and were allegedly tortured, an official inquiry will conclude today.

Despite denials by their governments, senior Polish and Romanian security officials have confirmed to the Council of Europe that their countries were used to hold some of America's most important prisoners captured after 9/11 in secret.

(http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2098266,00.html)

These European detention centres were operated "directly and exclusively" by the CIA, according to the inquiry's head, not proxies in far off places. Detainees in these secret camps were denied "access to the Red Cross [protected under the Geneva conventions] and many were subject to what George Bush has called the CIA's "enhanced" interrogation, which critics have condemned as torture." The American government is again directly implicated in torture. But the shame doesn't stop there.

NATO states also formally agreed to allow planes carrying suspects to cross airspace, as part of the "extraordinary" rendition programme, which is the clever idea of out sourcing torture to other states which aren't as scrupulous as our leaders like to claim they are:

The council has also established that within weeks of the 9/11 attacks, Nato signed an agreement with the US that allowed civilian jets used by the CIA during its so-called extraordinary rendition programme to move across member states' airspace. Its report states: "We have sufficient grounds to declare that the highest state authorities were aware of the CIA's illegal activities on their territories." The council's investigators believe that agreement may have been illegal.

If the report is accurate, then European political leaders been complicit in torture and perhaps murder, and made their citizens unwitting accomplices. The consequences of this will be borne by the long sufferring people of Europe, who will find themselves the targets of yet more rage and hatred. As a Brit, I was disgusted to hear that the government of my country has been helping the USA run its illegal detention and torture program. Those who were involved in this, or merely complicit, need to be named - people have the right to know what is being done in their name. But the whole thing is carried out in secret - the governments of Poland and Roumania still deny that this happened. We know our leaders lie and cheat, but there has to be an understanding that there are some things they don't do in our name - and massive violations of human rights are one of them. Why are people surprised that the West is hated? Reading things like this, I hate us, too.

More Crap About Climate Change

Following the U.S. Senate's vote today on a global warming measure (see today's AP article: Senate Defeats Climate Change Measure,) it is an opportune time to examine the recent and quite remarkable momentum shift taking place in climate science. Many former believers in catastrophic man-made global warming have recently reversed themselves and are now climate skeptics. The names included below are just a sampling of the prominent scientists who have spoken out recently to oppose former Vice President Al Gore, the United Nations, and the media driven “consensus” on man-made global warming.

(Source)1

From the website of US Senator Jim Inhofe (Republican - no surprise, Oklahoma).

The article, by one Marc Morano, claims that a consensus is building against anthropogenic global warming. He names thirteen experts who have seen the light and recanted. The list is:

1. Dr. Claude Allegre
2. Bruno Wiskel
3. Dr. Nir Shaviv
4. Dr. David Evans
5. Dr. Tad Murty
6. Dr. David Bellamy
7. Dr. Chris de Freitas
8. Dr. Reid Bryson
9. Hans H.J. Labohm
10. Tim Patterson
11. Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski
12. Dr. Ian D. Clark
13. Dr. Jan Veizer

The article gives brief summary of the alleged opinions of each of these parties. Reading through the list, alarm bells started ringing when I got to number six, David Bellamy. This prompted me to have a look at some of the others.

A bit of google balsting has shown that the article by Morano is everywhere on the internet, reproduced on denier and conservative websites to much jubilation. It needs to be examined sceptically, because I don't think it is an honest article.

I'll start with the easiest one, the entry which made me suspect the article was crap - DAVID BELLAMY. David Bellamy is a splendid chap, a wonderful TV personality and, for years a great campaigner for the protection of the natural world. He 'came out' as a global warming sceptic in 2004, so his inclusion on this list as a newly converted sceptic is a bit puzzling. Further, Bellamy announced in 2005 that he was going to "draw back from the debate on global warming" (2) when the claims he made were questioned the claims he made were called into question.(3)

I wouldn't count Bellamy as an evil lying bastard, he got it wrong and did the sensible, honourable thing, which is to admit as much and shut up. So he's off the list. It is - shall we say - surprising that he was ever on it, given that the list was compiled in 2007 and Bellamy's departure from the scene was in 2005.

So, with Bellamy gone, that leaves 12 ...

CLAUDE ALLEGRE

The source article describes Allegre as "a top geophysicist and French Socialist" which is presumably meant to show climate scepticism crosses all politcal and national boundaries. Even French socialists and American Republicans can stand shoulder to shoulder on this issue.

Allegre, was 'one of the first scientists to sound global warming fears 20 years ago'(4) but 'now says the cause of climate change is "unknown" and accused the “prophets of doom of global warming” of being motivated by money'(5). Unlike the noble Senator Inhofe, who was only second on the list of senators who had their 2002 elections funded by oil and gas interests.(6)

Allegre also grumbles that "the ecology of helpless protesting has become a very lucrative business for some people" and advises us to be cautious in our assessment of cliamte change. This all in an article in LÉxpress, titled The Snows of Kilimanjaro.(7)

Reading the article, I'm not sure it is the recantation Morano claims it is. Allegre is discussing the changes witnessed on Kilimanjaro, and is stating that these changes are not caused by anthropogenic global warming, but local, non-anthropogenic, climate change:

The gradual retreat of the snows of Kilimanjaro is often imputed to local phenomena, the main one of these being desertification in East Africa. In a recent issue of Science magazine, French researchers have shown that this desertification was in a large measure due to tectonic activities responsible for the gradual uplift of the African continent, thereby inducing a reorganization of atmospheric circulation. Greenhouse effect plays no significant role in these processes. (8)

Which is fair enough. Every cold winter does not prove global warming isn't happening. Every example of local warming doesn't prove it is. Attributing every variation in climate to global warming when the science does not support it is wrong and plays into the hands of the global warming deniers. That is his point.

Further, the Morano article claims Allegre 'now says the cause of climate change is "unknown"'(9), but this is not so based on the Kilimanjaro article. Referring to recent erratic weather patterns in France, Allegre states 'The cause of this climate change is unknown,'(10) which is clearly referring to the specific instances cited, i.e. the infamous heatwave that blighted Europe in 2003 or what he calls the "Rotten summer."(11)

Allegre actually states, as far as I can judge, that he accepts anthropogenic warming is occuring:

But the exposure of man's responsibility as regards global warming allows us to sit idly by (the effect of the measures advocated will be felt only in half a century!). On the other hand, the crusade against extreme theories can be led with tangible results!(12)

Put plainly, Allegre is not, on the strength of this article, denying the existance on anthropogenic global warming. He is, as Morano says, lambasting alarmists, but his definition of an alarmist is probably very different from Morano's.

Incidentally, the Morano article also cites a profile in Canada's National Post as further evidence of Allegre's new-found scepticism. It doesn't offer much new - it cites the same LÉxpress article, though it uses quotation more honestly and describes Allegre's position not so much as that of a a climate change denier (though it is part of a series called The Deniers), but as someone fustrated at the hysteria that has congealed around global warming:

Dr. Allegre especially despairs at "the greenhouse-gas fanatics whose proclamations consist in denouncing man's role on the climate without doing anything about it except organizing conferences and preparing protocols that become dead letters." The world would be better off, Dr. Allegre believes, if these "denouncers" became less political and more practical, by proposing practical solutions to head off the dangers they see, such as developing technologies to sequester C02. (13)

(http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=2f4cc62e-5b0d-4b59-8705-fc28f14da388)

So, unless someone can provide more conclusive evidence of Allegre's recantation, he's off the list. So we're down to 11 ...

BRUNO WISKEL

Morano describes Wiskel as a "Geologist ... of the University of Alberta"(14). It is a cheap shot, but, at the end of the day, is climate change in the late 20th century really part of geology? Unless, of course, climate change is caused by geological factors, which I haven't heard so far.

There isn't much information available online for Wiskel. He did write a book called "The Emperor’s New Climate: Debunking the Myths of Global Warming", but without knowing what is in that book, what can we say? The title is suggestive: "Debunking the Myths of Global Warming" hints that the author isn't denying that global warming is happening. Otherwise, the title would be "Debunking the Myth of Global Warming". Notice the difference? Incidentally, on climate change denier websites, the book is almost always referred to as "The Emperor's New Climate: Debunking the Myth of Global Warming". Sad.

But with little information on Wiskel's stance, all I can say is he seems a really hoopy frood(15), designing energy efficient homes and advising people on how to live a sustainable life style. His criticisms seem to be directed more at the way people are responding to climate change - by trying to balance out their lifestyles, rather than modify them - rather than claiming it isn't happening. For what it is worth, here's what I found on Wiskel and his book. (16)

That's right. One lousy review. Clearly, Wiskel lives by his principles and does not maintain a website. For that, I salute him, whatever his views may be. Like I said, a hoopy frood. But without further verification of his position, he's off the list.

So, that's down to 10 ...

1 - "Climate Momentum Shifting: Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man-made Global Warming - Now Skeptics," by Marc Morano, May 15, 2007. (http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=927b9303-802a-23ad-494b-dccb00b51a12)
2 - "In an adverse climate," letter by David Bellamy to The Times, May 29, 2005 . (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/article527565.ece)
3 - "Junk science: David Bellamy's inaccurate and selective figures on glacier shrinkage are a boon to climate change deniers," by George Monbiot, May 10th, 2005. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1480279,00.html)
4 - Morano, Op. Cit.
5 - Morano, Op. Cit.
6 - The Centre for Representative Politics, http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.asp?Ind=E01&Cycle=2002&recipdetail=A&Mem=N&sortorder=U.
7 - "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," by Claude Allegre, September 21, 2006. Published in L'Express, reproduced here: http://blog.nam.org/The%20Snows%20of%20Mount%20Kilimanjaro.pdf.
8 - ibid.
9 - Morano, Op. Cit.
10 - Allegre, Op. Cit.
11 - Ibid.
12 - Ibid.
13 - "Allegre's second thoughts," by Laurence Solomon, Financial Post', March 02, 2007. (http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=2f4cc62e-5b0d-4b59-8705-fc28f14da388)
14 - Morano, Op. Cit.
15 - A "Hoopy frood" is a term originating in the Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by sci-fi writer and
environmentalist Douglas Adams. It translates, from galactic slang into English, as "A really together guy, a really amazingly together guy." (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=A+really+hoopy+frood)
16 - "This Environmentalist’s View of Climate Change Isn’t What You’d Expect," review of The Emperor's New Climate: Debunking the Myths of Global Warming, published in The Pegg, November 2006. (http://www.apegga.com/members/publications/peggs/Web11-06/climate_change.html)

C4 to Screen Image of Dying Diana

Channel 4 defends Diana crash photos

Staff and agencies
Monday May 28, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

Channel 4 today insisted it will broadcast as planned a programme
about the death of Princess Diana including graphic images of the car crash that
killed her, despite calls for it to be cancelled.

The programme, The Witnesses in the Tunnel, to be shown on June
6, includes a series of pictures of the immediate aftermath of the crash in a
Paris underpass on 31 August 1997, The Observer reported yesterday.

One photograph shows Diana receiving oxygen from a French doctor,
Frederic Mailliez, who had been travelling in the other direction and who had
not yet realised the identity of his patient. It shows that the princess was
thrown forward into the footwell behind the driver's seat. At the front of the
car a passing student is shown trying to help Trevor Rees-Jones, Diana's
bodyguard.

There are other graphic images of the inside of the car, although the face
of the dying Diana is blanked out.

(http://www.guardian.co.uk/monarchy/story/0,,2089780,00.html)

This is absolutely disgusting. I can't believe, ten years after her death, TV programs are still being made about this woman, column inches in newspapers devoted to her and valuable blogspace being filled up with inane ramblings about her.

This is a list of things that are more important than Dianna, 10 years after her death. Please note it is not exhaustive, it is just the first few things off the top of my head.

1. Climate change
2. Poverty
3. Disease
4. War
5. Crime
6. Religious fundamentalism
7. Corruption
8. Ignorance
9. Deforestation & species extinction
10. The 'chavification' of the culture.

Point is, ten years ago, before Dianna was killed in a car crash, no, not assasinated by MI5, MI6, Mossad or Al Queada, working singly or together to prevent a Muslim ascending to the throne of Britain, when she was killed in a car crash because her driver was blind drunk and she was too thoughtless to put on her seat belt, THE LIST WOULD HAVE BEEN EXACTLY THE SAME.

The only important aspect of this story is that it shows Channel 4 is continuing to find new ways to prove no-one ever lost money under-estimating the taste of the British public. Even within my memory, there was a time when Channel 4 was good - Boys From the Black Stuff, GBH. But somehow, since the mid 90s, it seems to have re-written its mission statement, and now thinks its purpose is to make Channel 5 look good.

I mean, what are we to make of this statement (from later on in the Guardian article):

"Channel 4 today said ... Only one image shows the occupants of the car after
the crash and it has been appropriately obscured to avoid any unwarranted
intrusion into their privacy or that of their families."

WTF? How can they claim that they are avoiding "unwarranted intrusion into their privacy"? We know who the people in the crash are. So their privacy in this case is non-existant. As for 'unwarranted', can Channel 4 please explain what public good is served by this? None, so it is unwarranted.

They might argue they are following their remit to challenge and shock viewers, but, really, if they wanted to there are a million more worthy ways of doing it. If they want to show snuff, why not show some kid dying in Darfur or Eritrea, or the children's ward of an African AIDS hospice - which would be a far more appropriate tribute to dopey Dianna, wh'se sole useful to contribution to public life was to say "Err, AIDS is sad and landmines are bad." Instead, they've gone for the most predictable, easy and obvious way of generating publicity and public attention. It is mailto:F#*@!g depressing and Channel 4 should be shot for it.

'Christian' Malfeasance

First of all, a positional statement. I am not anti-Christian. I'm not a Christian myself, though I was raised one. Nowadays, I style myself an athiest and regad all faiths with bemused tolerance, aslong as they do the same to me and each other. I don't resent the church (I wasn't a Catholic, after all) or feel the need to attack it. I admire many people who are Christians, and admire many major church figures. One of the best things about being a non-Christian is that I can admire the excellent things said and done by people such as the Arch Bishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, an almost painfully decent person, and Bishop John Shelby Spong, even though they don't agree themselves. I'd rather have a conversation with either of those fundamentally decent human beings than with the painfully obnoxious athiest Richard Dawkins.

I'm saying this because I think I'm going to be saying some very unkind things about people who style themselves Christians. I don't want decent, run of the mill Christians to think I am criticising them.

Anyway, to the matter on hand. I came across a story the other day. an American father was unhappy that his daughter was being shown pamphlets attacking Islam, distributed in class by an avowedly Christian organisation trying to warn young minds about the wickedness of the followers of Mohammed:

Teen's Dad Says 'Anti-Muslim' Literature Handed Out in Class Isn't Freedom of
Speech
Friday, February 23, 2007
By Liza Porteus

The father
of a North Carolina ninth grader who was given "anti-Muslim" literature in class says the material handed out is not an issue of free speech, but of slander and defamation.

"First of all, it slanders, things like, Mohammed is a 'criminal,' is 'demon possessed' ... that just made my blood boil," said Triaq Butte, whose daughter, Saira, participated in a ninth grade orientation seminar at Enloe High School in Wake County, N.C., where the material was distributed.

Butte is a non-practicing Muslim; he said his wife is Christian and his children are taught to accept and respect all religions.

"So for a person like me to feel like that — I've never been to a mosque — to feel like that … for me to feel such hideous attacks, they were not just pointing out failures or weaknesses in Islam or Muslims, they were just attacking."

A representative from the Kamil International Ministries Organization, a Christian group based in Raleigh, was invited by a teacher to come and speak to the class. He handed out literature that compared the teachings of Jesus with accusations against the Prophet Muhammad.

(http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,253824,00.html)

First of all, respect to Mr Butte, who had the wherewithal to complain about something that offended him even though it did not affect him directly. "First they came for the communists," and all that.

Second, why does Fox describe him as a 'non-practicing Muslim'? Isn't a non-practicing Muslim, um, not a Muslim? So why identify him as such? It seems pathetically petty, and suggests either they're trying to undermine him (unlikely) or suspect their readers, seeing the Arabic name, will immediately assume he's a fully fired up Jihadist. Which is very sad.

But these are preliminaries. What really bugged me about this was precisely what bugged Mr Butte, namely, the approach taken by the Kamil Institute. As I said earlier, I am tolerant towards all faiths, as long as their followers don't set out to hurt other people or get too loud in their evangelism. The Kamil Institute, however, is not an organisation that promotes Christianity. Its purpose is to denigrate Islam. This, from its website:

Kamil International Ministries Organization is dedicated to teaching the truth about Islam. We love Muslims but we believe that Islam is not a Divine faith, Muhammad was not a prophet from God and the Koran is not the Word of God. Our mission is to raise an awareness of the danger of Islam among Christians and equip them to share Jesus with Muslims. We will be glad to impart historical and factual information about Islam.

(http://www.kimo4jesus.org/)

This is on the front page of their website so they don't even think there is anything wrong with what they are saying or doing. Put plainly, this is not a Christian organisation, i.e. one that promotes Christianity. It is an anti-Islamic organisation. As such, it should not be propogating its world view in schools. Unless, as balance, the school were to invite Mullah Omar to make a similar presentation.

David Irving's Trip to Poland III

Still at Auschwitz-Birkenau ... Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes come from Irving's website, http://www.fpp.co.uk/docs/Irving/RadDi/2007/020307.html and were retrieved on Sunday, the 20th of May 2007.

Reading Irving's diary entry, I an struck anew by the arrogance and pomposity of the man. He likes to present himself as a calm neutral observer, objecytivity personified. Everyone else is a seething rabble of confusion, deception and ignorance. Irving seems incapable of realising, even in the measured, editable form of a diary entry, how often his prejudices and nastiness bubbles through the facade he attempts to present.

I mentioned the 'Werewolf' incident in the last post I wrote on Irving. Later on he refers to the Holocaust survivor as the Russian's "tame Holocaust survivor". He reports "several columns of Israelis marching around the site, carrying blue and white flags as though they are an occupying army." Later on, at Majdanek, he desscribes how a reconstructed wooden gas chamber was damaged when a candle left by "worshippers" set it on fire. He seems to have no idea how grotesque and revealling his word choices are. Unless, of course, he is playing to a different gallery altogether.

He bemoans the fact that "The Poles and others have wrecked the document that this site could have been, by their keenness to generate money and propaganda. They have slapped a vast monument of paving slabs and memorials between Kremas II and III, concealing whatever evidence they might have revealed. They have conducted little if any archeological research, "digs", to get at the truth." This is bizarre. A man who stated "Eyewitness evidence is a problem for psychiatrists" (http://codoh.com/mediamad/uchi/uchirv2.html), disputes the meaning of orders and reports relating to the Holocaust and ignores every piece of evidence that demonstrates that mass murder was carried out in the death camps, using gas chambers as the principal means, expects us to believe that he would be convinced by any evidence that might remain unearthed at Auschwitz. What nonsense. Confronted with new evidence, he would simply deny it.

Which brings me onto a nagging question surrounding Irving's trip to Poland. While there, he is accompanied by various historians, experts and media organisations. A Russian film crew work with him at Auschwitz, and SkyTV are also there. Why are these people making the mistake of giving Irving the publicity he craves, and confirming his belief in his own importance. True, his self-importance is probably unshakeable, but he shouldn't be encouraged. By engaging with idiots, it gives their idiocy a hint of respectability and credibilty, and of course, the publicity to repeat their nonsensical views. I suppose I am doing the same sort of thing here, though.

At Belzec, Irving laments the fact that Belzec

... has been wrecked, even more comprehensively than Auschwitz, by the construction by the American Jewish Committee of a
monument the size of four football fields -- and by a 'field of lava' ...
The lava field is quite impossible to walk across, a kind of moonscape, with a
concrete passage from the gate to the monument, a half-size imitation of a
Wailing Wall, at its far end. The monument covers all six mass graves, says
Mike.

We are expected to remember his complaint about the impossibilty of carrying out a prpoer archealogical dig, to retrieve evidence - as if more were needed. But note that Irving doesn't say this directly, because in fact, Belzec was thoroughly excavated before the monuments were constructed:

From late 1997 until early 1998, a thorough archaeological survey of the site was conducted as there was no memorial yet at the site. The survey was headed by Andrzej Kola, director of the Underwater Archaeological Department at the University of Torun, and Mieczyslaw Gora, senior curator of the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology in Lodz. The team identified the railway sidings and
remains of a number of buildings. They also found 33 mass graves, the largest of
which were 210 by 60 feet. The team estimated that they had found 15,000 unburned bodies, and "The largest mass graves ... contained unburned human remains (parts and pieces of skulls with hair and skin attached). The bottom layer of the graves consisted of several inches thick of black human fat. One grave contained uncrushed human bones so closely packed that the drill could not penetrate."

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belzec#Remains_of_the_camp)

Perhaps Irving knows this, perhaps he doesn't. Perhaps he wants us to
think that the camp is unexcavated and the earth beneath the 'Sea of lava' is
crammed full of unearthed evidence. Or perhaps Irving, in his blind arrogance, thinks he'll be able to find something everyone else has missed. Or perhaps he wantsus to think it is all part of a conspiracy, the memorials strategicallyplaced to ensure that no-one an ever find the lack of evidence beneath.

Irving and his long-sufferring companion Alan move on to Sobibor. "Not an unattractive place to die" remarks Irving of the site, which might be true if you had chosen to recline on your death bed, in the sun, with your family and pets around you and a string quartet to sooth your final moments. And if, sixty odd years ago, someone hadn't built an extermination camp on the site, which would rather spoil the ambience, one would hav thought.

Irving doesn't have much to say about Sobibor, beyond describing the litter strewn about the site and noting that "Here as elsewhere, according to conformist history, the Nazis did a thorough job of erasing all trace that they had ever been here". Again, the need to add the qualification, the "according to conformist history" that gives him away. It isn't conformist history, it is history. It is an account of the past based upon evidence. If it isn't that, it isn't history. Therefore, Mr Irving's views aren't history, as they are at odds with the evidence. Absurdly, a few lines later, Irving points out that "The whole site reveals no forensic evidence of homicidal activities, to supplement the relatively strong documentary evidence which exists." Well, it wouldn't, if the Nazis had gone to great efforts to cover up the traces of thier activities here.

His companion, Alan, "says he picked up bone fragments on earlier visits, but I doubt he has the forensic knowledge to recognize such things." Why ever not? It doesn't take much "forensic knowledge" to recognise a bit of bone - or is Irving suggesting the woods of Sobibor are strewn with cunningly faked bone fragments so artfully done that they will deceive all but the trained (Irving's) eye? Anyway, the long-sufferring Alan didn't need forensic knowledge - he just needed to find the fragment and lug it off to someone else with that knowledge.

His final visit, to Majdanek, provides nothing new. Irving bemoans the reconstruction work that has been carried out, notes blue stains in the gas chambers and contemplates 'doing a Leuchter' and helping himself to a sample, but refrains. This is tha last camp he visits, leaving Poland for Austria and noting with smug satisfaction that Austrian TV cameras are waiting to film him when he arrives.

Mars to Start Using Animal Rennet in Chocolate

I suppose Mars should be applauded for being open about this:

Some of the UK's best-selling chocolate bars, such as Mars and Twix, will
no longer be suitable for vegetarians.

Also affecting brands such as Snickers and Maltesers, owner Masterfoods
said it had started to use animal product rennet to make its chocolate products.

(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6653175.stm)

But the applause is very muted, to say the least. Why does mars feel it necessary to meddle with something that is working quite well thank you? As a vegetarian, chocolate is my trump card. When I go to a restaurant and can't find anything appealing on the savoury part of the menu, I can raid the sweets menu with a clear conscience.

It is a very strange decision, really. I suppose it must boil down to economoics. In the strange world we live in, it must be cheaper somehow cheaper to raise a cow, impregnate it, feed it through its pregnancy and then slaughter its calf to get the enzymes in its stomach, than to grow some goop in a petri-dish. But how can it make economic sense to alienate a significant part of your market, by making your products taboo to them?

Masterfood made a funny statement - as in funny strange, not funny ha ha - claiming that "a less strict vegetarian should enjoy our chocolate". I'm not a militant vegetarian, but what is a "less strict vegetarian"? A non-vegetarian?

Dairy products have always occupied a gray area, as we all know what the milk was intended for, and what has happened to the intended recipient. But I think even the least strict vegetarian will find the use of calf rennet in chocolate too much.

Robert Fiske: Blair's Lies and Linguistic Manipulations

Fantastic article by Fiske:

Robert Fisk: Blair's lies and linguistic manipulations

My Dad used to call people like Blair a 'twerp'. But I fear he is a vicious little man
Published: 19 May 2007

By great good fortune, I studied linguistics at Lancaster University. Indeed, I read the books of Noam Chomsky, many years before he became a good friend of mine; to be honest, when I read his work, I thought Chomsky was dead. What a pleasure, therefore, to discover that he shared my world - and my views on Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara.

But I have to admit a moment of regret this weekend. Lord Blair is going from us. His self-serving memoirs will, of course, remind us of his God-like view of himself (and, heaven spare me, we share the same publishers) but I doubt if Chomsky's "foregrounded elements" will save him. A "foregrounded element" was something unusual, a phrase placed in such a way that it warned us of a lie to come.

Take George Tenet, the CIA Ernest Borgnine lookalike who sat behind Colin Powell when the US Secretary of State was uttering all those lies about weapons of mass destruction in February of 2003. It now turns out that George is mightily upset with the White House. He didn't refer to evidence of WMD as a "slam dunk", he says - a basketball phrase which I don't need to explain. He was talking about the ability of the US government to persuade the American people to go to war based on these lies. In other words, he wasn't lying to the American president. He was only lying to the American people.

I was struck by all this last month when I came across one of Blair's lies in my local Beirut paper. Sandwiched beneath a headline which read "Saudi reforms lose momentum" - surely one of the more extraordinarily unnecessary stories in the Arab press - it quoted our dear Prime Minister as saying that he was very angry that a review committee had prevented him from deporting two Algerians home because their government represented a "different political system". The "foregrounded" element, of course, is the word "different". This is the word that contains the lie. For the reason why the committee declined to return these men to their country was not - as Blair well knew - because Algeria possesses a "different" political system but because the Algerian "system" allows it to torture to death its prisoners.

I have myself interviewed Algerian policemen and women who have become perverted by their witness of torture: one policewoman told me how she now loves horror films because they remind her of the repulsive torture she had to watch at the Chateauneuf police station in Algiers - where prisoners had water pumped into their anuses until they died. I still remember the spiteful and abusive letter that the Algerian ambassador to London wrote to The Independent, sneering at Saida Kheroui whose foot was broken under torture. She was a "terrorist", this man announced. This is the "different" political system that Blair was referring to. Ms Kheroui, by the way, never emerged from prison. She was murdered by her torturers.

Blair knows that the Algerian security forces rape women to death. He knows this. So how does he dare lie about the "different" political system which allows police officers to rape women? We Europeans now make a habit of lying about this. Take the Belgian government. It deported Bouasria Ben Othman to Algeria on 15 July 1996 on the grounds that he would not be in danger if he was returned to his country. He died in police custody at Moustaganem. A "different" political system indeed.

And now I have before me Blair's repulsive "goodbye" speech to the British people, uttered at Sedgefield. Putting the country first didn't mean "doing the right thing according to conventional wisdom" (Chomsky foregrounded element: conventional) or the "prevailing consensus: (Chomsky foregrounded element: prevailing). It meant "what you genuinely believe to be right" (Chomsky foregrounded element: genuinely). Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara wanted to stand "shoulder to shoulder" with Britain's oldest ally, which he assumed to be the United States. (It is actually Portugal, but no matter.) "I did so out of belief," he told us. Foregrounded element: belief.

Am I alone in being repulsed by this? "Politics may be the art of the possible (foregrounded element: may) but, at least in life, give the impossible a go." What does this mean? Is Blair adopting sainthood as a means to an end? "Hand on heart, I did what I thought was right." Excuse me? Is that Blair's message to the families of all those dead soldiers - and to the families of all those thousands of dead Iraqis? It has been an "honour" to "serve" Britain, this man tells us. What gall.

Yes, I must acknowledge Northern Ireland. If only Blair had kept to this achievement. If only he had accepted that his role was to end 800 years of the Anglo-Irish conflict. But no. He wanted to be our Saviour - and he allowed George Bush to do such things as Oliver Cromwell would find quite normal. Torture. Murder. Rape.

My Dad used to call people like Blair a "twerp" which, I think, meant a pregnant earwig. But Blair is not a twerp. I very much fear he is a vicious little man. And I can only recall Cromwell's statement to the Rump Parliament in 1653, repeated - with such wisdom - by Leo Amery to Chamberlain in 1940: "You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go."