Karma in its most overt form

Tiger Woods and his many skanks.

All the Olympic sprinters and their designer doping kits.

That Hans Ritter UN weapons inspector chap who just got busted trying to seduce what he thought was a kid.

Why do they do it? What makes them think they're going to get away with it?

Ego is obviously one reason. (Because I can.)

That at least accounts for the first skank, the first steroid injection, the first - um - inappropriate internet contact with a minor.

But why keep doing it (whatever it is)? Why not quit the cheating (or whatever) once you've tried it and satisfied the curiosity?

Perhaps the answer lies in Mr Ritter's back history. This is not the first time he's been found trying to arrange sex dates with minors, it seems. In fact, he's been at this crack for years.

He's no moron. He almost-singlehandedly took on the Bush Administration at one point. So what made him think he could possibly get away with continually behaving like he has?

Probably the same reason that made Ben Johnson and the other sprinters keep taking the 'roids, even though they have to undergo regular and unannounced drug tests.

The same reason Tiger kept chasing hoochie-mama skirt even though there was a press pack never far away.

Because they got away with it once, that first ego-driven, curiosity-spiked time. But they don't think 'God, I was lucky to get away with that. Better not risk it in future, since I've so much else to lose.'

These people believe they are so intelligent, so smart, and so powerful that they will NEVER be caught. Having got away with it once, they are almost compelled to repeat, because they genuinely believe they won't be caught.

Which makes them get sloppy, which gets them caught.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how karma functions in its most overt form. What the ego drives us to do, the ego ensures we make amends for.

Enough to make a Jackal puke

Dan Kennedy, writing in the Guardian, is spot on.

US Vice-President Dick Cheney, the real power in the White House during the Bush presidency, is attempting to claim that the invasion of Iraq has worked out well.

Not well for Saddam Hussein, obviously, who was caught hiding in a cellar some five years ago and subsequently executed rather than sent to the War Crimes Tribunal at The Hague.

And not well for the people of Iraq, unless one considers the faint autonomy of some of Kurdistan to be worth it.

Of course, the invasion and occupation of Iraq went really well for Dick Cheney himself, as he was able to transfer large amounts of US tax dollars into the hands of his old pals at Halliburton.

Increasingly, as one listens to the whining of Tony Blair about his anguish over the war, or indeed scoffs at corrupt old Bertie Ahern as he pleads to be considered the great peacemaker of Ireland, I have come to realise that the place to hurt these people is in their legacy.

Blair's not stupid, and now realises that his legacy will be ever ruined by his involvement in Iraq. Ahern is rather stupid, but his arrogance and ego demand that history credit him with things he had at best a tangential involvement in (peace in the North of Ireland and the boom economy), rather than the things he was up to his greasy little neck in (endemic Fianna Fail corruption, clientelism and gombeenism).

Cheney is also concerned about the legacy. And he remains in cynical denial about the wrongs he has committed.

His only out now is to try to persuade the rest of us to see things from his twisted point of view - a point of view which says that it doesn't matter if there were no weapons in Iraq, it doesn't matter if hundreds of thousands died needlessly, and it doesn't matter about America kidnapping and torturing people in third countries.

As Dan Kennedy says in his excellent commentary on Cheney's delusions, it is enough to make a jackal puke.

State of the union address translated

Why am I up so late? Good question. Blame the damn birds.

Actually, I'm watching Bush's final State of the Union address. (Link to full text.)

This is a depressing experience I wouldn't recommend to all but the hardiest of souls.

So to spare the more delicate among you, let me bring you some relevant excerpts, complete with translations into English:

"In the long run, Americans can be confident about our economic growth. But in the short run, we can all see that growth is slowing."
- Oh. Y'all noticed the recession, huh?

"Members of Congress should know: If any bill raising taxes reaches my desk, I will veto it."
- I need all the money I can get for my exceedingly expensive war and to stave off the worst of the forthcoming economic collapse. So let's keep borrowing!

"Thanks to the D.C. Opportunity Scholarships you approved, more than 2,600 of the poorest children in our Nation's capital have found new hope at a faith-based or other non-public school. Sadly, these schools are disappearing at an alarming rate in many of America's inner cities. So I will convene a White House summit aimed at strengthening these lifelines of learning."
- Let's teach more kids about intelligent design, everyone. And while we're at it, we can cut funding for state schools.

"The United States is committed to strengthening our energy security and confronting global climate change. And the best way to meet these goals is for America to continue leading the way toward the development of cleaner and more efficient technology."
- Fuck Al Gore. We had to sign that Green crapola in Bali. But in the meantime, at least we've got Iraq to milk dry of its oil.

"Every Member in this chamber knows that spending on entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid is growing faster than we can afford. And we all know the painful choices ahead if America stays on this path: massive tax increases, sudden and drastic cuts in benefits, or crippling deficits."
- Fuck the poor and sick too. We can't afford that shit. We're at war remember? Make that wars, actually. So let's axe the handouts.

"We are engaged in the defining ideological struggle of the 21st century. The terrorists oppose every principle of humanity and decency that we hold dear. Yet in this war on terror, there is one thing we and our enemies agree on: In the long run, men and women who are free to determine their own destinies will reject terror and refuse to live in tyranny. That is why the terrorists are fighting to deny this choice to people in Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Palestinian Territories. And that is why, for the security of America and the peace of the world, we are spreading the hope of freedom."
- The people of Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Palestine are all terrorists. And we have to fight them, because they're this century's Soviets.

"One of the most important tools we can give them is the ability to monitor terrorist communications. To protect America, we need to know who the terrorists are talking to, what they are saying, and what they are planning. Last year, the Congress passed legislation to help us do that. Unfortunately, the Congress set the legislation to expire on February 1. This means that if you do not act by Friday, our ability to track terrorist threats would be weakened and our citizens will be in greater danger. The Congress must ensure the flow of vital intelligence is not disrupted."
- You can't give citizens their privacy and civil liberties back after you've taken them for no reason. So let's keep bugging the people.

America is opposing genocide in Sudan and supporting freedom in countries from Cuba and Zimbabwe to Belarus and Burma."
- Only we're doing it really quietly, because none of them have oil we want.

"America is a force for hope in the world because we are a compassionate people, and some of the most compassionate Americans are those who have stepped forward to protect us."
- We express our compassion through military force and imperial occupation, which is why we're so popular all around the world.

That's the state of the union, folks. Teetering on the verge of economic collapse, eradicating secular education, scrapping welfare and health for the poor, fighting Muslims because the country needs an enemy, and bugging their own people.

Nice work, George.

P.S. Here's a beautiful Youtube edit of last year's speech. All you're meant to take away from the entire address in a minute flat.

2007 Predictions

I suppose I am a little tardy rolling out my predictions a fortnight into the new year, but I really did want to chew them over first. Last thing I need is to have you all on my back come December going ner-ner-ner-ner-ner! at me for getting it all wrong.

So here are my predictions for 2007, carefully considered and guaranteed to come true or your money back.* Get down to the bookies now!

Mystic JC gazes into his crystal ball and sees:

1. The NI elections will see a bump in the SDLP vote, but not enough to overhaul Sinn Fein. Both parties will hail their performances as a success. The UUP will similarly close on the DUP and both parties again will claim public support for their strategies. Ian Paisley will then find further nit-picking reasons not to enter power-sharing, and the whole process will end up on ice again, and Northern Irish citizens will still be denied democracy.
2. More American troops will enter Iraq, which will deteriorate further, if that is indeed possible. The US government will blame Iranian influences within Iraq for the upsurge in violence and, with the support of Tony Blair, though without British troops, will attempt to overthrow the Ahmedinejad regime.
3. The destruction of Afghanistan will continue apace, in media silence and to no particular outcry from the Western world. Al-Qaeda will retain a presence there, and British and American troops will start to leave in order to free up manpower for Iraq, and later, Iran. Opium will flow out of the place, children will starve, women will be suppressed and many people will die needlessly.
   
4. Fianna Fail will be returned to power in a bad-tempered election marked by the emergence of negative campaigning for the first time in Ireland. Expect particular trouble in the Dublin Central constituency, where Bertie the cheque signer faces off against the fashion wing of the Republican movement, Mary-Lou.
5. However, the PDs will not be returned to power, leaving McDowell in control of himself only in the Dail, as Mary Harney, Mae Sexton and the rest all bow out ungraciously. The PDs will be behind Joe Higgins' Socialists in parliament after they secure a second seat.
6. The Shinners will boost their number of TDs, but not so much as to create a hung Dail. Bertie will make up the numbers of his government with randomers like Jackie Healy-Rae as he did previously.
7. Enda Kenny will face a leadership challenge, as will Pat Rabbitte. Enda may survive his, but Pat will not. Expect to see Brendan Howlin in charge of Labour by year's end.
   
8. Tony Blair will finally get thrown out of Number Ten, to be replaced by Gordon Brown after a late party leadership challenge from John Reid and some other numpties. 'New' Labour will continue to ignore the needs of the British working class despite the figurehead change, and will continue to leak support to the Tories. The BNP, Respect and Scots and Welsh nationalist votes will all inexorably rise.
9. The Basque peace process will collapse, leading to further sporadic bombings and violence. Shinners will wring their hands about it and talk about the need for dialogue.
10. Conflicts will flare across Africa, in Sudan, Somalia, and along the Western coast. But that happens every year, so that's not really much of a prediction, I admit.
    
11. Manchester United will win the Premiership, leading to the 'mutually agreed' departure of Jose Mourinho from Chelsea. In a fit of pique, he will take Frank Lampard with him to Real Madrid. Whoever wins the Barcelona-Liverpool tie will win the Champions' League.
12. There will be a major spike in oil prices again.

That's your lot! Thanks for listening. Remember, I'm on 5% of all winnings, which can be remitted to me in used notes of either Euro or Sterling (no soft currencies like the dollar, which is going down further this year than a deep-throating hooker). Non-consecutive numbers please.




*Guarantee dependent on acts of God, and of people who think they're God, like Georgie Bush, Tony Blair, Jose Mourinho, etc.

The lies they tell part two

(of an occasional series)

On September 2nd 2004, George W. Bush received the presidential nomination of the Republican Party for the second occasion, in order to run as incumbent, a race he won.

At the time, under his orders, US military forces had been present in Afghanistan for almost three years, since just after the tragedy of the Twin Towers.

In his acceptance speech to his party, he told them:

" Our strategy is succeeding. Four years ago, Afghanistan was the home base of Al Qaida... Today, the government of a free Afghanistan is fighting terror."

And:

"In Afghanistan, terrorists have done everything they can to intimidate people, yet more than 10 million citizens have registered to vote in the October presidential election, a resounding endorsement for democracy."

And:

"So our mission in Afghanistan and Iraq is clear. We will help new leaders to train their armies, and move toward elections, and get on the path of stability and democracy as quickly as possible. And then our troops will return home with the honor they have earned."

And also:

"Our men and women in uniform are doing a superb job for America. Tonight I want to speak to all of them and to their families: You are involved in a struggle of historic proportion. Because of your service and sacrifice, we are defeating the terrorists where they live and plan, and you're making America safer. Because of you, women in Afghanistan are no longer shot in a sports stadium. Because of you, the people of Iraq no longer fear being executed and left in mass graves."

Today, the Observer newspaper has revealed how famine in large areas of Afghanistan has forced families into selling their children in order to survive.

Afghani heroin now provides 90% of the world's supply, poisoning people in Ireland, America and everywhere. Under the Taliban, opium production was banned, and in the year America invaded, 2001, Afghanistan regained its position as the world's biggest supplier of opium almost immediately.

Newborn twins died today in a bomb attack in the Khost province of Afghanistan. Attacks on civilians by Islamic extremist insurgents against the American-led occupation are expected to increase again once the weather warms up in Spring.

However, even coalition forces admit that they are losing the population to insurgent support because of the amount of civilian deaths they are responsible for. So high is the level of murder of innocents by coalition forces, that it has led to calls in Canada for an immediate withdrawal of their troops.

The murder of babies, the sale into sexual slavery of girl children, the beheading of schoolteachers, the massacre of civilians by all sides, the roaming bands of insurgents in control of large swathes of the country...

The strategy is not and never was succeeding. The country is deteriorating into a worse state than either the Taliban or the Soviet occupation ever created.

Afghanistan is anything but a resounding endorsement for democracy.

The troops who have caused such a high toll of death among the civilian population of Afghanistan have accrued no honour whatsoever.

Criticising my authority is CLASSIFIED!

And the Big Brother state creeps ever closer in America.

The latest move in the war on liberty is Georgie Boy's attempt to declare criticism of his policies in Iraq as classified material.

When a former CIA analyst, who was once a senior member of Bush's administration and a director of the US national security council, attempted to let Dubya know he'd repeatedly ballsed up chances to get along with Iran, his report was declared top secret and the White House threatened to sue him if he went public.

However, being former CIA, Mr Flynt Leverett (devastating spy name he has too, don't you think?) had already cleared his report with them and knew it wasn't classified in the slightest. So Georgie's boys were spoofing. Again.

Perhaps he'll seek to sue the Pentagon next, after their own latest report revealed that the American occupation in Iraq is going to hell in a handbasket.

There's more than one holocaust being denied

I've been thinking all week about the Iranian conference on the holocaust, and all sorts of things are disturbing me about it.

Obviously, there are the initial concerns about holocaust denial in general. Western media coverage has been vociferous in its condemnation of the motley crew of white supremacists, rogue rabbis, neo-Nazis and other dubious types who gathered in Tehran to 're-examine' the holocaust.

I share the concern that so many varied interests would seek to deny the mass murder of millions of people. It is certainly deeply worrying to see so many bizarre fellow travellers gathered together with the intention of casting doubt on the historical veracity of the holocaust.

But there are plenty of other things to get concerned about in relation to this conference. The first would be the erosion of the concept of journalistic objectivity. When BBC correspondents happily say that one must 'take sides' when reporting a story, I get very worried about whether even good old Auntie Beeb can be relied upon to provide objective reportage rather than propaganda anymore.

The result of this lack of objective reporting is that we in the West fail to either understand why this conference was convened, nor what it's ultimate purpose is.

In one sense, it is a knee-jerk response to the 'freedom of speech' defence offered by Danish newspapers and others after they published derogatory cartoons about the prophet Muhammed which were deeply offensive to Muslims worldwide.

And in that regard, one is forced to ask, in what way has the West's adherence to the Holocaust come to resemble an article of religious faith? We have laws in countries like France and Austria that send people to jail for questioning the holocaust, just as we once had laws on heresy.

Whether these laws genuinely impact upon the ability of historians to examine World War Two is debatable, but there is no doubt that they act as a genuine infringement upon the concept of freedom of speech.

Then there is the issue close to Iranian President Ahmedinejad's heart - the formation of Israel in Palestine following World War Two. Like so many Muslims, especially his Arab neighbours, Ahmedinejad is outraged by the continuing atrocity committed on the Palestinian people by the Jewish state.

His analysis traces the formation of the state of Israel to European guilt at how the Jewish population of Europe was treated during the 1930s and 1940s, and he has asked in the past why a Jewish homeland could not have been created in Europe instead of on Palestinian lands following the war.

And that, unlike querying the historical veracity of the holocaust, is a fair question to ask. But the West's continuing Holocaust guilt ensures blind loyalty to the Zionist state, so that our media tends to ignore or seek to justify Israeli atrocities committed against the people whose homes, lands and lives they stole and continue to steal.

There is little doubt that the Iranian President would wish to see the eradication of the state of Israel. He has said as much in the past. But despite how Israel and their US supporters would like to spin it, this is not the same as calling for a second holocaust. Basically, Ahmedinejad's position is that the Jewish homeland should not be located on land stolen from others.

The whole issue of holocaust denial is more complex than many in the West realise. Thanks to continued Israeli and general Jewish insistence that there was only one holocaust (usually with a capital H for added effect), we are generally left in ignorance about other genocides which were equally horrific, such as the Turkish holocaust against its Armenian minority which inspired the Nazis, or indeed the Naqba which Zionists perpetrated upon the Palestinian people.

Intriguingly, the official Israeli position in relation to the Armenian holocaust is that it didn't happen. Why is this their position? Because secular Turkey is one of their few friends in the entire region, and because Turkey itself still has laws to lock up people like this year's Nobel laureate in literature Orhan Pamuk for 'defaming Turkey', when they highlight this atrocity in Turkey's history.

So Israel itself is happy to deny a holocaust despite posters about it littering every wall in the Armenian quarter of the old city of Jerusalem. But they aren't very happy when the holocaust which led to the foundation of their own state is queried in Iran.

To my mind, the coverage this Tehran conference has received is deeply suspect and disingenuous. The howling headlines in usually sober British broadsheets must be seen in the context of George Bush and Tony Blair's phoney war with Iran, as well as the erosion of impartial reporting.

Blair is off to Turkey at the moment, in an attempt to patch up relations which have gone frosty as the EU backs away from Turkish accession. Will this great warrior against holocaust denial raise the issue of the Armenians with his hosts? Of course not.

And while George Bush seeks to make a case for the invasion of Iran due to a potential nuclear weapons capacity, a case as spurious as the one made against Saddam's Iraq, will he also invade Israel, after Ehud Olmert admitted accidentally to his country's nuclear capacity? Of course not.

We are utterly right to condemn those who would seek to deny the deaths of six million people in the last century in Nazi death camps. They are inhumanly wrong.

But if we cannot understand the reasons that underpin the hosting of this conference, we will inevitably find ourselves watching from the sidelines as America and Britain jihad across the entire Muslim world in order to placate Israel's unending imperialist quest for an Eretz-Israel cleared of its indigenous population and surrounded by weak or occupied Arab states.

The evil that men do

It's not been a great week for world peace so far, when all's said and done.

On the down side, mass-murdering rightist nuthouse General Pinochet kicked the bucket without ever going on trial for overthrowing the Allende regime and subsequently 'disappearing' tens of thousands of people during his reign of terror.

Ethiopia's former psycho leader Mengistu Haile Mariam was found guilty of committing genocide during his 'red terror' regime that led to mass famine in the country. But since he's hiding out in Zimbabwe with his old pal Mugabe, there's little chance of him facing prosecution either.

Then, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert let slip the Middle East's worst-kept secret - the weapons of mass destruction reside in the Negev Desert under IDF control, not in Iraq at all.

And while mass murderers like Mugabe, Mengistu and others continue to roam free from harm, the might of the West remains pointed at the poor, beleaguered people of Iraq, dozens of whom died in the latest round of bombings.

When will we ever see the West intervene in a genuine tragedy? It was aid agencies who responded to the Tsunami, to the Ethiopian famine. When a bitter little genocide breaks out in Africa, it is the African Union we send in to resolve it, not our own troops.

Countries like West Papua, currently and viciously occupied by Indonesia, Tibet, all but devastated by the Chinese, or Burma, controlled by a murderous junta, could all do with some regime change, but you won't see Tonee or Dubya arranging an invasion in any of those places.

The evil men do is compounded by the lack of action of others. For a petty tyrant like Mengistu or Pinochet to succeed and survive, they require if not the overt support of the West, then at least their tolerance for the regime to continue.

As our governments act to destroy Iraq for at least the fourth time in a single century, it might be pertinent to remind them that their self-appointed roles as global police are not mandated by the UN, and that it is the job of police to protect everyone, and not just their own oil interests.

If they truly wish to spread democracy, let them over throw al-Saud and his Wahhabist state that bred the 9/11 killers. Let them restore democracy to the poor people of Zimbabwe, so tortured by their own maniacal leadership.

If they wish to rid the Middle East of weapons of mass destruction, let them disarm and cease providing support to Israel, whose nukes reside, according to that brave whistleblower Mordecai Vanunu, at Dimona in the Negev.

Remember, Israel has always refused to permit weapons inspections of the Dimona site, and locked Vanunu up for decades for telling the British media about their sordid little secret.

So, why no American invasion of Israel, which is also in breach of a series of UN resolutions? After all, much sketchier evidence (let's say, none whatsoever) was used to justify the current atrocity in Iraq.

If they want peace in our time, let them quit starting all these disingenuous wars that their own people object to. Let them instead turn their attention to the scores of mass murderers that, like Pinochet and Mengistu, manage to retire without punishment.

Of course, to tread down that path would mean to bear close scrutiny for their own war crimes in Afghanistan, in Iraq. It would tempt people to seek to bring Blair and Bush to account for the murder of civilians.

And that would never do.

As I said, it's been a bad week for world peace, and it's only Tuesday.

Man down

And the first casualty of the Republican Party's dismal performance in the US elections appears to be Donald Rumsfeld.

Couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke.

Now, will someone please charge him with war crimes and ship him to The Hague to make my joy complete?

This sudden move seems to imply that George Junior reckons it is Iraq that has seen the House and probably the Senate too fall to the Democrats.

Which just shows he really is as thick as people say, since it's clearly the falling house prices, spiralling budget deficit and rising unemployment. In other words, it's still the economy, stupid.