Uh-oh: once again, public opinion should be against the man whose policies caused the deaths of untold thousands of benefit claimants.
After his persecution of people who are sick, disabled and unemployed at the Department for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan Smith simply has no right to criticise other nations for causing deaths.
He has criticised the decision to invite the Chinese government to the Queen’s funeral, saying it was “extraordinary” that the “architects” of genocide against the Uyghur minority had been invited.
But there is a strong diplomatic reason to do so. Here’s Professor Tim Wilson:
Prof Wilson thinks Vladimir Putin should be invited as well, and it’s a good idea; get him here and we can quietly suggest face-saving ways to end the war in Ukraine, for example.
Now Boris Johnson is no longer in charge and is unable to derail peace proposals, we might actually make some progress.
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Here’s an insight into the way your Tory overlords behave.
Priti Patel went on a video chat with what she thought was a group of Conservative supporters. You can see it on Skwawkbox. No doubt she was expecting a few carefully-vetted questions for which she could provide some carefully-rehearsed answers.
What she got was a group of “Kill the Bill” protesters, angry at her Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that is intended to criminalise public protest in the United Kingdom. I don’t condone their behaviour because, to be honest, they went rampant on the text chat in a way that wasn’t likely to do their cause any good.
What the incident demonstrates, though, is the polarity of thought in the upper echelons of the Conservative Party.
The chat’s host apologised for the incident, stating, “I’ve no idea how these leftists got in on the call.”
“Leftists”? How do they know?
The simple fact is that Patel’s Bill will outlaw protest by people of any political denomination: left, right, up, down, centre (wherever that is) – they’ll all go to jail for raising a finger, if she has her way.
But people with a legitimate right to question her policy were put down as “leftists” by the chat host.
One may conclude that this person is as much a fascist as Patel herself.
Perhaps everybody taking part (other than the protesters) is of the same persuasion.
The question we, as ordinary citizens of the United Kingdom, have to ask is:
Do we want these creepy ghouls to have authority over us?
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Keir Starmer: like Priti Patel, he seems to support terrorism rather than condemn it.
It didn’t take long, after Priti Patel announced that the UK was to proscribe the political organisation that forms the government of Palestine, for the attacks on Jeremy Corbyn to start landing.
Here’s some ‘Mercan called Jackson Wolf Pincus demonstrating the kind of ignorance we have come to expect from people of – shall we say – a certain persuasion:
Hey man, as someone from Tacoma who lives in the UK I beg you to simply shut up about stuff you have no idea about, because you are making the side look bad.
Rather than shut up, though, Jackson doubled down – prompting a well-deserved put-down as follows:
Has anyone else noticed that Jews who support apartheid and ethnic-cleansing invariably hate Jeremy Corbyn, and Jews who oppose apartheid and ethnic-cleansing like him?
It's almost as if Corbyn appeals to Jews who aren't massive racists. https://t.co/PpMFoSoyeM
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush 🟨🟥🥀🇵🇸 (@WarmongerHodges) November 21, 2021
Yes indeed, it does seem the case that Jeremy Corbyn’s pacifist, anti-terror stance appeals both to supporters of Palestinian self-determination and to non-racist Jews (and you should bear in mind that many people are both).
The Hamas story also led to debate about whether Patel’s decision was justified, or if other organisations or governments might deserve similar treatment.
The government of Israel, perhaps?
Can't seem to find the Hamas equivalent for the funding that goes to many of our MPs by the Apartheid States supporters in the UK?
It’s an accurate criticism. There’s a very clear paper trail that leads from MPs – on all sides of Parliament – to the Israeli Embassy and that nation’s government. Many of our MPs appear to be in that government’s pocket.
Among them is Keir Starmer, the Labour Party leader who persecutes both Muslims and left-wing Jews, sparing his sympathy only for those who echo his wholehearted support for apartheid Israel and its violence to the Palestinians it holds captive.
So it should be no surprise that Starmer has whipped Labour MPs to support Patel’s proscription of Hamas. He wants to make sure Palestinians know that the UK supports Israel against them, no matter which party is in power, never mind the fact that Labour is supposed to support self-determination for both Israel and Palestine, and never mind the fact that Labour’s sovereign decision-maker – the party conference – voted to condemn Israel in September.
Many people, it seems, believe Starmer is right to support Israeli atrocities. Perhaps they don’t understand what is really going on.
If you know such people, show them this:
Gaza:
4 hours of electricity per day. 97% of water is contaminated. 50% of children express no will to live. 70% of children suffer from PTSD. 70% of children experience regular nightmares. 70% of young people are unemployed. 60% of babies are anaemic.
Let’s focus down onto Palestinian children. Many of us have kids, right?
How would we feel if our children were treated in the same way as those in the thread below – bearing in mind that Keir Starmer supports, to the hilt, everything that has happened to them?
Thread: 2021 is already the deadliest year for Palestinian children since 2014. @DCIPalestine had documented the killings of 78 Palestinian children at the hands of Israeli forces and civilians. This #ChildrensDay, we’re sharing their names, faces, and stories.
On May 5, Israeli forces shot and killed Said Yousef Mohammad Odeh, 16, in Odala. He was struck with live ammunition in the back near his right shoulder and pelvis and both bullets exited from the front. Said was a rising soccer star. https://t.co/1YayjWQoqTpic.twitter.com/46d4WuAj9v
An Israeli airstrike in Beit Hanoun on May 10 killed Hussein Muneer Hussein Hamad, 11; Ibrahim Abdullah Mohammad Hassanain, 16; Ibrahim Yousef Attalla al-Masri, 11; Marwan Yousef Attalla al-Masri, 6; Rahaf Mohammad Attalla al-Masri, 10; and Yazan Sultan Mohammad al-Masri, 2. pic.twitter.com/nqNK1vkjtw
Israeli forces shot and killed Rashid Mohammad Rashid Abu Arra, 16, with live ammunition in the northern occupied West Bank on May 12. https://t.co/yv5rIPiTAw
Israeli forces shot and killed Bashar Ahmad Ibrahim Samour, 17, in Abasan Al-Jadida in the southern Gaza Strip. He worked as a farmer near the perimeter fence and was connecting irrigation piping when he was shot with live ammunition by Israeli forces. pic.twitter.com/DmqNkMh0UA
On May 13, an Israeli drone-fired missile killed 17-year-old Khaled Imad Khaled Qanou in Beit Hanoun, in the northern Gaza Strip. https://t.co/YdFb4LL4yf
Israeli forces targeted residential areas in Al-Bureij refugee camp on May 13, killing Ahmad Rami Mahmoud al-Hawajri, 13, (pictured) with a drone-fired missile and 13-year-old Lina Mohammad Mahmoud Issa with an airstrike from an Israeli warplane. pic.twitter.com/Zqf6gV0Mzu
Israeli warplanes fired at least 20 missiles at a densely populated neighborhood in Beit Lahiya on May 13. The Israeli attack killed 4 brothers: Ismail, 7; Amir, 6; Adham, 4; and Mohammad Rafat Mohammad Tanani, 2, as well as the boys’ parents. https://t.co/YdFb4LL4yf
On May 14, two Israeli missiles hit Mahmoud al-Attar’s home in Beit Lahia, killing Amira Mohammad Mahmoud al-Attar, 6, and her two brothers, Islam Mohammad Mahmoud al-Attar, 8, and nine-month-old Mohammad Zain Mohammad Mahmoud al-Attar & their mother. https://t.co/YdFb4LL4yf
An Israeli airstrike killed 4 of Alaa Abu Hatab's children, Yamen Alaa Mohammad Abu Hatab, 5; Bilal Alaa Mohammad Abu Hatab, 9; Yousef Alaa Mohammad Abu Hatab, 10; and their sister, Miriam Alaa Mohammad Abu Hatab, 7. Their mother, Yasmeen, was killed alongside her children. pic.twitter.com/0jmxlfLXEy
Israeli warplanes launched dozens of airstrikes around 1 a.m. on May 16 on Al-Wehda street in Gaza City, targeting residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. DCIP documented 18 Palestinian children killed in the Israeli aerial attacks. https://t.co/09C6y8XfJH
Brothers Adam, 3, and Zaid Izzat Mu’in al-Qawlaq, 8, were also killed in the May 16 Israeli attack on Al-Wehda street, alongside Hana, 14, and her brother, Ahmad Shukri Ameen al-Qawlaq, 15; Dima Rami Riad al-Ifranji, 15, and six-month-old Qusai Sameh Fawwaz al-Qawlaq. pic.twitter.com/hRACO5ioGe
Mohammad Khalil Younis Mohammad Freijat, 14, was struck in the head with Israeli-fired live ammunition on May 12, in Hebron’s Bab Al-Zawya neighborhood while shopping with his friends. He died from his injuries in Hebron 4 days later on May 16. https://t.co/93dC4wqFLS
On May 17, an Israeli drone-fired missile strike killed Yousef Rafeeq Ismail al-Baz, 13, on the spot, around noon, and critically injured the boy’s 16-year-old brother, Ramadan. The al-Baz family home was directly struck by the missile. pic.twitter.com/yrw8YNZamy
Israeli forces shot Islam Wael Fahmi Dar Nasser, 16, in the head with live ammunition on May 18 in the village of Bil'in. He was killed during a demonstration as Israeli forces confronted Palestinian protestors in the village near. https://t.co/ITiAfHKT4p
On May 17, Israeli forces shot and killed 17-year-old Zuhdi Muhannad Zuhdi al-Tawil in occupied East Jerusalem after he allegedly committed a stabbing attack at a light rail station. https://t.co/RnllcmMJMQ
A few days later in Beita, on June 16, Israeli forces shot Ahmad Zahi Ibrahim Bani-Shamsa, 15, in the head with live ammunition. Ahmad, left, and Mohammad, right, who was killed five days earlier, were friends. https://t.co/nPzs7GiINzpic.twitter.com/Xh86QdRaXR
Mohammad Mo’ayyad Bahjat Abu Sara, 11, was shot and killed by Israeli forces around 3 p.m. as he sat in his father’s car near the entrance to the town of Beit Ummar located north of Hebron. https://t.co/idZAWWHRaW
Imad Khaled Saleh Hashash, 15, was shot and killed by Israeli forces on August 24 as he stood on the roof of his home watching as Israeli forces conducted a raid in the Balata refugee camp located southeast of Nablus in the occupied West Bank. https://t.co/9QaEtDrKAz
Amjad Osama Jalal Abu Sultan, 14, was shot and killed by Israeli forces around 10 p.m. on October 14 after he allegedly lit a Molotov cocktail in Beit Jala, west of Bethlehem near Route 60, a main north-to-south route in the occupied West Bank. https://t.co/h7JdoLAeUT
On November 18, an armed Israeli civilian shot and killed 16-year-old Omar Ibrahim Ayoub Abu Assab after he allegedly attacked two Israeli paramilitary border police officers in occupied East Jerusalem. https://t.co/7k2akcRV79
It’s a catalogue of terror – and one that is incomplete because I am sure there are many murders that are hushed up by the Israeli authorities.
Keir Starmer supports this terror, and so does Priti Patel. Remember that she was forced to resign from Theresa May’s cabinet after trying to run her own policy on Israel, using public money, during and after a visit to that country to meet top politicians there, while claiming to be on holiday.
Nobody should excuse deaths and other harm that Hamas or other Palestinians have caused. Blame for the Israel-Palestine conflict lies on both sides.
But when one starts bandying around words like “terrorist”, one should apply it fairly.
Looking at the way Israel forces Palestinian people to live, and the disproportionate number of deaths and injuries suffered by Palestinians in comparison to Israeli, it is clear that Palestine is not the only country run by terrorists.
What does that say about its supporters like Starmer and Patel – and all those UK politicians who have taken money in return for their support?
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Shot dead: Scamp’s reward for being a playful puppy who acted according to her nature.
There’s a big push to end the ban on hunting with dogs at the moment, because we have a Conservative government with a huge majority and Tories love cruelty to animal.
Today we found that this cruelty extends even to the dogs, with the filmed murder of a young hound – apparently for being too much trouble for her handlers.
It seems they got tired of having to chase her back in, after being allowed out into the exercise field with the rest of her pack.
So they shot her in the head.
The revelation comes after secret filming showed hounds at the Duke of Beaufort’s Hunt in Gloucestershire being shot dead at kennels (be warned: if you visit the site you will see footage of this happening).
It seems hounds can be killed, legally, if they are too old to hunt, or are ill or injured. The Hunt told ITV that hounds are humanely euthanised if they cannot be rehomed – and most can’t because they are not house-trained and are used to a pack environment.
But the footage appears to show one hound being shot simply for being playful and enjoying life.
Here’s the story:
*PLEASE READ* The truth behind the poor hound that appeared to be ill in the hound shooting footage. Poor Scamp was killed for being too lively and wanting to play. Her punishment was a bullet to the head for having too much fun. Please RT pic.twitter.com/ki8qEPHNgh
The RSPCA has responded to the footage (after being challenged on it, on Twitter) – but only to say that it has handed Hunt-related prosecutions to the police and would appreciate an investigation:
This footage is extremely distressing and we want to see as many hounds as possible rehomed and given a second chance at life. The RSPCA agreed to hand over any hunting prosecutions to the police in 2016 and so we would welcome a full police investigation into this incident.
There was no indication that the RSPCA had bothered to bring the incident to the attention of the police – an act that would have had greater weight than if any ordinary member of the public did so. Asked if it would take such action…
Are you going to insist the police investigate and prosecute? A yes/no answer is all that's needed, no other commentary. thanks.
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Keir Starmer: another foot-in-mouth moment for a failing Labour leader.
Once again we see Keir Starmer siding with the Tory government on an issue where they are both wrong.
He wants Geronimo the alpaca to be euthanised because of four-year-old test results for bovine tuberculosis – because that’s what Boris Johnson’s government wants. Starmer has no ideas of his own.
Geronimo was imported from New Zealand to a farm in South Gloucestershire in 2017, after being tested four times for bovine TB. Those tests came back negative.
But when he arrived, owner Helen Macdonald agreed to allow him to be tested with the Enferplex blood test, a voluntary test as part of national surveillance of the disease.
That test produced a positive result, as did a further test in November that year. But there are long-standing concerns about the accuracy of the government’s preferred tests, which have not been allayed by protestations that they are 99 per cent reliable.
Ms Macdonald reckons the tests produced false positives because Geronimo had been ‘primed’ by being injected with bovine tuberculin.
It is not clear to This Writer why this happened. Was it done as part of the New Zealand tests?
The government decided that Geronimo should be euthanised after the 2017 tests but this has been delayed because Ms Macdonald has resisted it in court.
She has just lost her final appeal in the High Court, and the government is expected to carry out its death sentence on the eight-year-old alpaca within 30 days.
This is what’s bothering me: while it is perfectly normal for it to take years for bovine TB symptoms to make themselves felt, it has now been four years since Geronimo’s first positive test.
Shouldn’t he be showing one or two such symptoms by now? (He isn’t.)
And: why is the government so reluctant to give Geronimo another test? Surely it would have been less expensive than all these legal shenanigans? (Believe me – I know how expensive court proceedings can be.)
Given all that, I wonder why Keir Starmer has got involved on the government’s side – or, indeed, at all.
It certainly hasn’t done him any good, as the comments from members of the public show.
Starmer said, “It’s always tragic when it happens. I don’t think we can make an exception in this case.”
His words provoked the following responses:
We finally have a policy from Keir Starmer. It's taken about 15 months but he has stated that he is in favour of killing an alpaca.
More damning still is the – accurate – claim that Starmer could be taking action to oppose the government on other issues, but has chosen instead to support it over Geronimo:
When LOTO speaks up about an alpaca, but not Deportation flights…#DemandANewNormal
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James Cleverly: He was once described as “the Tories’ go-to eejit when they need someone to tweet absolute nonsense or defend the indefensible”. Now it seems he’s not even bothering to say anything at all.
Here’s another story that should be all over the BBC’s prime-time news but, for some reason, seems to have been missed by the mostly-Tory news team there.
The information comes from Declassified UK, an independent investigative site run by Matt Kennard and Mark Curtis. This Writer follows Kennard on Twitter and I am impressed by the information he provides and the opinions he puts forward. Therefore I think his site is trustworthy.
Here’s what it says:
Middle East Minister James Cleverly may be breaking the Ministerial Code by failing to answer questions put to him in the House of Commons. The Code demands that ministers have a duty to “be as open as possible with parliament” and to “give accurate and truthful information”.
The questions were about whether military equipment from the UK was used in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in May – which killed 66 Palestinian children.
The best response anybody appears to have received – to 14 questions that Declassified has identified – is that the UK “takes its export control responsibilities very seriously”. That is not an adequate answer.
There is an obvious conclusion to be drawn from this – and I’m sure you don’t need me to spell it out for you.
But Cleverly certainly won’t spell out the facts for all of us unless he is forced to do so.
And, given the huge prominence the Israel-Palestine conflict received in the news during May, the absence of such pressure from mainstream media outlets like the BBC is deeply disturbing.
Britain’s Middle East minister James Cleverly is regularly refusing to provide answers to written questions posed to him by members of parliament, especially on UK arms exports to Israel, contravening House of Commons rules.
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Clapham Common: police ‘failed to understand their legal duties in respect of protest’. That seems accurate – don’t you think?
Has the UK’s principle news outlet – the BBC – reported this in any way at all?
The report speaks for itself:
Police breached “fundamental rights” in their handling of the Sarah Everard vigil in London and Kill the Bill protests in Bristol, a parliamentary inquiry has found.
The Metropolitan Police and the Avon and Somerset force committed “multiple failings” in their response to the two events, according to the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Democracy and the Constitution (APPGDC).
Their report claims that both forces wrongly applied coronavirus lockdown laws and “failed to understand their legal duties in respect of protest”.
It also suggested that officers taking action against protesters – as opposed to engaging with them before the event – “may have increased the risk of COVID-19 transmission” at the Sarah Everard Vigil in Clapham, southwest London.
Officers in Bristol “failed to distinguish between those protesting peacefully and those engaging in acts of violence”, which resulted in “excessive force” being used, it added.
Both police forces mentioned in the report have rejected its findings, meaning nothing will be done to improve policing.
It comes just days before Boris Johnson and Priti Patel’s draconian Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill returns to the Commons with its proposals to make protest events like those on Clapham Common and in Bristol almost entirely illegal.
The findings have led to proposed amendments to the Bill, including abandoning some of the new proposed powers – as they are “unnecessary” and have placed police in an “unfair position” – and suggesting a special code on how to police protests.
The inquiry’s chairman, Labour MP Geraint Davies, said: “The police must not become the enforcement agency of the state against those who choose to publicly and collectively call for change – political, economic, social or environmental.
“Parliament must protect our freedoms and reject attempts to increase police power and restrict our right to peaceful protest.”
And yet the news media are strangely unwilling to report on this.
If the public don’t know about it, they can’t support the proposed changes, or the criticism of the police forces, meaning they can carrying on doing exactly whatever they want, and Johnson will be able to curtail our freedoms in any way he pleases.
Are you happy for that to happen?
If so, then you don’t have to do anything. Just sit back and let him strip you of your rights and freedoms. It will hurt – but not until you have a reason to complain and then find out that you aren’t allowed to.
If not, then it’s time to stand up for yourself. You can start by simply making sure all your friends see this article. Or is even that too much because you’re worried about what they’ll say?
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Police at one of the Easter Saturday ‘Kill the Bill’ demonstrations: who do you think is being more violent here?
Dozens of demonstrations against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill took place across the UK on Saturday (April 3).
I held off reporting on them because I wanted to see how the national media covered the protests first.
Remember my article on how the media try to turn the public against ordinary people by slanting their stories, from a few weeks ago? Here’s a reminder:
First the press [respond] … by reporting it in ‘passive voice’. Reports stated ‘clashes occurred…’ or ‘clashes between protesters and police’. Words carefully chosen to not indicate who had started the clashes (the police) and who had been on the receiving end of the majority of the violence (those attending…)
They will report on any police injuries ‘six police received medical attention due to the protest’ they might say… It is very rare that figures are collected for how many protesters were injured, and the assumption may be that this means that number is zero, and the police were thus on the receiving end of more violence than they dished out.
Many news outlets chose to term everyone present as ‘protesters’.
Politicians… chime in condemning the ‘violence’ caused by ‘protesters’.
Now let’s have a look at some reports from the police and the mainstream media.
At least one officer has been injured after clashes between police and demonstrators at a "Kill the Bill" protest in central London.
Today’s policing operation is still ongoing and arrest numbers may rise, but at this time, 26 people have been arrested for a variety of offences. Ten police officers received injuries during the operation; none of these are believed to be serious.
— Metropolitan Police Events (@MetPoliceEvents) April 3, 2021
Two police officers were sent to hospital in Bristol after a protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. https://t.co/k2XBJix758
— Twitter Moments UK & Ireland (@UKMoments) March 22, 2021
How many members of the public were injured?
Manchester Kill the Bill march ends in disorder as fight breaks out amongst crowd and police swarm on protesters sat on tram trackshttps://t.co/OGsFMdegHz
Agents provocateurs? Police plants? We’ve seen evidence of those in recent demonstrations.
Members of the public saw matters from a different angle – such as the following, showing a policeman very clearly kneeling on the neck of a member of the public. Shades of George Floyd?
A slightly clearer angle of this incident, sent to me by someone else, that appears to show a police officer with his knee on the neck of a #KillTheBill protester in Parliament Square. pic.twitter.com/wCeCSMj4gU
The best that could be suggested is that the Met’s spokespeople may have been accidentally looking at a different incident in which somebody was indeed kneeling on a person’s back. Of course, this would imply that they make a habit of attacking members of the public in this way. Not a good look!
And their images of protests around the UK were similarly divergent from the impression being pushed by the police and the press:
— The Churchill Project (@WinstonCProject) April 3, 2021
The ‘Kill the Bill’ protests (which are about terminating the Police Bill, not the ‘Old Bill’ which is a colloquial name for the police themselves) have been supported by opposition MPs like Jeremy Corbyn…
Mr Corbyn said the bill would prevent protest without police approval.
Speaking in Parliament Square in central London, Mr Corbyn invoked figures such as the suffragettes and Nelson Mandela as he urged the crowd to oppose the bill.
“Stand up for the right to protest, stand up for the right to have your voice heard,” he said.
“I want a society where it is safe to walk the streets, where you can speak out, you can demonstrate and you don’t have to seek the permission from the police or the home secretary to do so,” he said.
… and Zarah Sultana:
Our rights were won through protest, from the right to vote to anti-discrimination laws.
The Tories know there’s power on the streets. That’s why they’re attacking the right to protest.
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Attack: this image from the Bristol Post was captioned “Bridewell police station under siege” but the only violence I see is by a policeman attacking a woman with a truncheon and a stick. What do you see?
It takes only one comment like this to reverse the narrative completely – and here it is, in two tweets:
2/2 Every step of the way police escalated. Every step of way they knew that is what they were doing, but were just perhaps bit surprised at how many of the crowd were willing to go from a sit down protest to fighting back rather than allowing police to attack them with impunity
Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees may find himself on the receiving end of some very sharp reactions after he supported the police without waiting for the other side of the story!
He said: “Smashing buildings in our city centre, vandalising vehicles, attacking our police will do nothing to lessen the likelihood of the Bill going through. On the contrary, the lawlessness on show will be used as evidence and promote the need for the Bill.
“This is a shameful day in an incredible year for Bristol.
“We have had numerous protests. Our police, city representatives and I have been able to point out with pride that we have faced these moments of conflict without the physical conflict that others have experienced. Those who decided to turn today’s protest into a physical confrontation and smash our city have robbed us of this.”
What will he have to say if it turns out to be true that the police are “those who decided to turn [the] protest into a physical confrontation and smash [the] city”?
Considering the way the police in London treated a peaceful vigil on Clapham Common; or the way a drunken policeman assaulted a woman on her way home from work and walked free from court after admitting it; or the fact that a policeman is accused of kidnapping and murdering another woman who was on her way home from work…
Considering all the allegations of racist behaviour notched up against the police – not just last year during the Black Lives Matter protests but going back through the decades…
Considering this…
For those of you condemning the apparent violence in #Bristol and muttering darkly about the #PolicingBill being pushed through, remember Orgreave and how that was reported.
[The Battle of Orgreave, during the Miners’ Strike of 1984-5, was reported as happening because picketers attacked the police when in fact it was the police who attacked the picketers; reporters edited their footage to create a false story.]
Considering all of the above, it seems far more likely that the police were responsible for the violence in Bristol last night, rather than a few hundred people who were, at the time, sitting down.
If those people defended themselves, this is no reason to condemn them or their protest for descending into violence. Everybody has the right to defend themselves against unprovoked violent attack, no matter whether the attacker is in a uniform or not.
If Bristol’s police were ordered to turn this event into a riot so their political leaders could use it as justification for the draconian Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that will permit them to inflict brutal oppression on innocent people, then the plan appears to have backfired.
The peaceful protest was mostly over by the time they came out from the Bridewell. From a high point of around 3,000 people, their own figures say only around 500 were left when the violence began.
The others, having made their point, had gone home. No matter who started the violence, they have been smeared by the police claims.
And observers elsewhere have demonstrated that they are unimpressed by the protestations of the police and politicians – pointing out the future of protest under the Police Bill:
Let's be clear the mob you should fear isn't the one on the streets of Bristol but running the government. #Bristol
— John Smith (son of Harry Leslie Smith) (@Harryslaststand) March 21, 2021
The Tory bill means peaceful protesters face 10 years in jail.
PEACEFUL. PROTESTERS.
TEN. YEARS.
Yet centrists say people are wrong to get angry about it.
It just beggars belief.
We might never get another chance – yet here they are telling us to just be nice and get along.
Let's be real, nothing would be happening in Bristol were it not for police attacking the vigil for Sarah Everard last weekend, or the government trying to push through a bill which restricts civil liberties.
You don't keep the peace by clamping down on peaceful protest.
At the end of the day, there is a big question to be answered – and it’s one that would not even be considered if the police had not made themselves the puppets of Conservative governments many times in the past:
Or did you organise this in advance in order for the police bill to get through the house. https://t.co/jfpZ7MCv3t
It is impossible to condemn the people for the Bristol ‘Kill the Bill’ riot when we know it is entirely possible that it was engineered by Priti Patel and the police.
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This article was going to be a call to arms – but now it seems the pressure is off after Coca-Cola announced it has put plans to shoot foxes at its Sidcup factory “on hold”.
Of course, that doesn’t mean the multinational drinks firm won’t kill large numbers of the animal by other means, but at least it signifies that bosses are willing to discuss what can be done.
Residents launched a passionate “Stop the Cull” campaign after they discovered a plan for the mass killing of foxes – to take place today, February 11 – on the Cray Road, Sidcup site.
They pointed out that at this time of year it would mean the targeting of pregnant vixens.
This Writer is not particularly fond of foxes as, in large numbers, they can become pests.
But I have always opposed fox hunting (and any blood sport) and killing animals because they interfere with industry is unacceptable because it ultimately leads to the mass extinctions we are causing across the world.
Coca-Cola has released a statement, quoted in some news outlets as follows:
“Unfortunately foxes can, on occasion, cause damage and we have found the need to keep their numbers under control at our Sidcup site.
“We have taken on board people’s feedback and understand their concerns.
“We have put these control measures on hold at our Sidcup site and we are now reviewing what other options are available.”
Campaigners favour a humane, non-lethal fox management service called Fox-a-gon and it is to be hoped that the firm will take that into account.
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
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