Dictator Johnson Unites Country Against Him

On Wednesday there were demonstrations against BoJob’s proroguing of parliament the same day as he, or rather, the West Country’s answer to the Slender Man, Jacob Rees-Mogg, persuaded the Queen to sign his wretched order. Even more followed on Saturday, with people marching up and down the country holding banners and placards, making it very clear what Johnson is: a dictator.

Jeremy Corbyn spoke to protesters in Glasgow denouncing BoJob’s decision. The Labour leader also issued a tweet thanking everyone who had taken to the streets both their and across the country, and pledging the Labour party to oppose BoJob’s attack on British democracy and stop a no-deal Brexit.

In London, demonstrators marched on Buckingham palace to make their feelings very known about the Queen’s decision to give in to his demand to assume authoritarian rule. The were also demonstrations in Hereford, Staffordshire, Nottingham, Oxford, King’s Lynn, where the local radio station for West Norfolk, KLFM 967 came down to cover the demo; and in Trafalgar Square in London.

Please see Mike’s blog for the images peeps posted on Twitter of these demonstrations: https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2019/08/31/britons-take-to-the-streets-across-the-country-to-stopthecoup/

One of the most sharply observed was the banner at the beginning of Mike’s article, showing BoJob wearing a swastika armband and Nazi officer’s cap, flanked either side by the evil clown from Stephen King’s It, with balloons above them showing his and Rees-Mogg’s heads. This bore the slogan ‘Before 1933 People Thought Hitler Was A Clown Too…’. Yes, they did. One of the characters in Bernardo Bertolucci’s cinematic classic, The Conformist, makes that exact same point. The film’s about a man, who becomes a Fascist assassin after believing he has shot and killed the paedophile, who had attempted to assault him. In one scene, one of the characters reminisces how, when he was in Germany in the 1920s, there was a man, who used to go round the beer halls making speeches and ranting. ‘We all used to laugh at him’, the character recalls, and adds that they used to throw beer glasses at him. He then sombrely concludes ‘That man was Adolf Hitler’. And before he came to power, some Germans used to go to his rallies just for the fun of seeing who he would abuse next. Presumably this was in the same manner that people used to tune in to the genuine comedy character, Alf Garnett, although Garnett was very definitely a satirical attack on racism and the bigotry of working class Conservatism. Another banner made the same comparison with the Nazi machtergreifung: ‘Wake Up, UK! Or Welcome to Germany 1933′. Again, this is another, acute pertinent comparison. Everything Hitler did was constitutional, as was Mussolini’s earlier coup in Italy. Democracy collapsed in those countries because of its weakness, not because of the Fascists’ strength. And they were helped into power by right-wing elites in the political establishment, who believed that including them in a coalition would help them break a parliamentary deadlock and smash the left.

Zelo Street also covered the demonstrations against Johnson’s attempt to become generalissimo. The Sage of Crewe noted that not only were people marching in London, and large provincial cities like Leeds, Sheffield, Nottingham, Bristol, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Newcastle, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Brighton, but they were also occurring in middle ranking towns like Shrewsbury, Bournemouth, Cirencester, Lichfield, Stroud, Colwyn Bay, Clitheroe, Oxford, Swindon, Middlesborough, Exeter, Southampton, Derby, Weston-super-Mare, Falmouth, Bangor, York, Poole, Leamington Spa. Cheltenham Spa, Chester and others. ‘Places that do not usually do protests’. And the protesters are not, whatever BoJob’s focus groups say, going to vote for him.

https://zelo-street.blogspot.com/2019/08/stop-coup-people-speak.html

I doubt that the demonstrations will personally have much effect on Johnson himself. He’s a typical Tory, and so has absolutely nothing but contempt for popular protest. However, the march on Buckingham Palace may have made an impression on the genuine guardians of the British constitution. The monarchy is supposed to be one of Britain’s central institutions, like parliament. Prime ministers come and go, but the monarchy is a central pillar of the British constitution. And its guardians in the British establishment may not take kindly to Johnson dragging the Queen down with him. There may also be some hope in that it was popular demonstrations and dissatisfaction with an unjust policy – the poll tax – that culminated in the removal of Thatcher. I hope it isn’t long before BoJob goes the same way.

 

 

 

Blissex on the Bombing of Libya and British War Crimes in Iraq

On Friday I put up a piece questioning whether we were also involved in running death squads in Iraq, like the Americans had under General McChrystal. Blissex, one of the many great commenters on this blog, added the following information. He writes

Things are more complicated yet simpler than that, for example an UK military commander objected:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/chilcot-inquiry-black-ops-in-iraq-caused-split-between-us-and-uk-7130996.htmlhttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/chilcot-inquiry-black-ops-in-iraq-caused-split-between-us-and-uk-7130996.html
“Some senior British officers were unhappy at what was going on and the involvement of the UK’s SAS and the SBS. “Why are we helping to run Latin American-style death squads?” One British commander, himself ex-SAS, demanded to know. The SAS were, on at least two occasions, barred from carrying out such missions in the British-run south of the country.
Questions were asked about how information was being obtained from suspects in Balad. There was an unofficial inquiry into the treatment of prisoners at the base, although no evidence was found to implicate Maj Gen McChrystal. …
But the reverberations from special forces operations in Iraq continued. Six years later Maj Gen McChrystal, by now a four star general and commander of international forces in Afghanistan, had received a complaint from the UK’s director of special forces (DSF) for speaking about operations carried out with the SAS and SBS in Iraq and Afghanistan. Meanwhile an SAS lieutenant colonel, who had served with distinction under Maj Gen McChrystal in Iraq, was told to stay away from the Regiment’s headquarters in Hereford.”

Also on the wider picture:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/09/28/brexits-irish-question/http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/09/28/brexits-irish-question/
“Now, the empire is gone and the UK is slipping out of England’s control. Britain’s pretensions to be a global military power petered out in the sands of Iraq and Afghanistan: the British army was effectively defeated in both Basra and Helmand and had to be rescued by its American allies.”

Andrew Marr, “History of modern Britain”:

“Britain’s dilemma from 1945 until today has been easy to state, impossible to resolve. How do you maintain independence and dignity when you are a junior partner, locked into defence systems, intelligence gathering and treaties with the world’s great military giant? … At other times her dependence has been embarrassing, in big ways such as the Suez fiasco; and small ways, such as the American refusal to share intelligence assessments in Iraq, even when the raw intelligence was gathered originally by British agents and passed on.”

He also stated that while Obama and Killary were behind the bombing of Libya, the real people pushing for war were Sarkozy in France and David Cameron in Britain.

«Killary was Obama’s Secretary of State when he sent the bombers in to level Libya and aid the Islamist rebels in overthrowing Colonel Gaddafi.»

Oh she and Obama were/are warmongers, but the insanity is that the libyan stupidity was strongly initiated by N Sarkozy, with D Cameron’s support, and B Obama tried to talk him out of it, even if eventually went along.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/#8https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/#8
“When I go back and I ask myself what went wrong,” Obama said, “there’s room for criticism, because I had more faith in the Europeans, given Libya’s proximity, being invested in the follow-up,” he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/12/barack-obama-says-libya-was-worst-mistake-of-his-presidencyhttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/12/barack-obama-says-libya-was-worst-mistake-of-his-presidency
In March, Obama made a searing critique of the British prime minister, David Cameron, and the former French leader, Nicolas Sarkozy, for their roles in the bombing campaign they led in Libya.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2016/03/17/david-cameron-did-make-a-mess-of-libya–thats-why-obamas-comment/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2016/03/17/david-cameron-did-make-a-mess-of-libya–thats-why-obamas-comment/
I remember quite clearly the deep reservations senior American officers and officials had at the time about the enthusiasm displayed by Mr Cameron and French President Sarkozy for overthrowing Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
While the Americans had no great affection for Gaddafi, they just could not see why, after all the controversy surrounding the recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the European leaders wanted to start another conflict. “We just don’t get it,” a senior US general told me at the time. “Gaddafi just does not pose a threat to us.”

So elements of the SAS and British special forces were involved in assassinations in Iraq for the Americans, but they were not popular and important sections of the British administration were against their use. As for Cameron and Sarkozy, I wonder if hankering after British and French imperial greatness was also a factor in them demanding Gaddafi’s overthrow. The French are supposed to be recolonizing all over Africa, and it’s also possible that Sarkozy may still harbour resentment towards African and Arab independence movements because of the horrors of the Algerian independence movement. As for David Cameron, the British aristocracy and upper classes, as George Orwell pointed out, are bred for war and get a real thrill out of it. It wouldn’t surprise me if Cameron, and Boris as well, want to be seen as great war leaders, like Winston Churchill. Both Britain and France have been savagely hit by Islamist terrorism, and so I think that a desire to launch a fresh attack on the Middle East to teach Muslims a lesson was also a major factor. Gaddafi’s regime was accused of the Lockerbie bombing, although Private Eye has maintained that the real culprit was probably Syria, but we needed their support for the Gulf War against Saddam Hussein under George Bush snr. Gaddafi did sponsor terrorism, but they were used against other Arab and African leaders, and he kept them on a very short leash domestically.

As for the quotes Blissex provides about Britain trying to reclaim its imperial role by riding on America’s coat-tails after the Second World War – I completely agree. And the Special Relationship has always worked to America’s advantage, and very much against ours.

Vox Political on Labour and Green Candidates Left Off Postal Vote Forms in Hull

Mike over at Vox Political has posted this piece, Labour and Green candidates left off postal ballot papers. It seems that the name of Labour’s candidate, Karl Turner, and his Green Party rival, Sarah Walpole, were -ahem- ‘inadvertently’ left off 480 postal ballots for the Hull East constituency.

Mike’s article begins

High-profile Labour MP Karl Turner’s name has been omitted from 480 postal ballot papers in his Hull East constituency due to what the local council is calling an “inadvertent mistake”.

Yeah, right.

If that is the case, why were Mr Turner and Green candidate Sarah Walpole only missed off the papers for people who registered to vote after April 1? Doesn’t that imply that somebody removed their names deliberately?

Hull City Council had better check every single ballot paper it is preparing for election day, to prevent any further “inadvertent mistake”. Mr Turner was elected with a majority of more than 8,000, so the potential loss of 480 votes was unlikely to affect him. The loss of who-knows-how-many votes on the day might be a different matter!

Mr Turner told the BBC the mistake was “concerning” because people were “being denied the right to vote and take part in the democratic process”.

He added: “I have had calls from people in East Hull who are going on holiday this week and are angry that they are unable to vote. I have asked Hull City Council to urgently look into the matter and review their processes surrounding sending out ballot papers.”

The campaign is moving from desperation into criminality now, it seems. This Writer does not believe for one moment that those ballot papers were altered by “mistake”.

Mike also expects other instances of electoral fraud, or their exclusion of opposition voters. Such as the closure of the polling stations in some areas on the stroke of 10 O’clock. Mike points out that this was done to prevent the election of Labour or other opposition party candidates, as the Tories always ensure that their supporters vote early.

Mike also reports that a council van, containing 70,000 ballot papers, was stolen in Hastings and East Rye. This is also supposed to be incidental to the theft of the van, but the local council is putting measures in place to guard against fraud.

These aren’t the only incidents of possible electoral fraud by the Tories, or parties unknown. One of Mike’s readers, Reecemjones, has posted this comment about the incident:

Thanks for reporting this. I can confirm this has happened for the constituency of Hereford and South Herefordshire. My postal vote paper only mentions that the Conservative Party, It’s our County and the Lib Dems as standing for it.

Yet when I check out the actual candidates running…
https://yournextmp.com/constituency/65582/hereford-and-south-herefordshire/

Mike’s article can be read at http://voxpoliticalonline.com/2015/04/30/labour-and-green-candidates-left-off-postal-ballot-papers/

Private Eye on Failure of Care at More Care Hospitals owned by American Private Equity Firms

I blogged yesterday on the scandalous conditions and abuse of patients at Winterbourne View, a residential hospital run by a private equity firm. Looking back through Private Eye I found more cases of neglect and abuse of people with learning difficulties in care homes run by the Priory Group, owned by Advent International, another private equity firm. This article was published in their 27th July-12th August edition last year.

‘Care Homes

Priory Engagement

The Priory group and its Craegmoor subsidiary boast that they “transform lives”. but they seem less happy to see their brand on their ever expanding care home portfolio when things go wrong.

When the Care Quality Commission’s unannounced checks revealed shortcomings in facilities for the learning disabled, no criticism was levelled at “Europe’s leading specialist care provider” to tarnish its self-proclaimed “unrivalled reputation”. That is because two of the group’s homes criticised by the CQC for failing to protect the safety and welfare of its young residents, Lammas Lodge in Hereford and Melling Acres in Liverpool, are registered in the name of Parkcare Homes, which took all the blame and bad publicity in the specialist media.

In September last year, following an anonymous tip, inspectors found residents at risk of abuse in Lammas Lodge, a home for young adults. There were not enough staff and what staff there were, inspectors found, were not properly trained to meet residents’ complex needs. There were six major areas of concern, including care and welfare, medication and safeguarding. The home, which was warned it must improve or face closure, has since been given a clean bill of health by the regulators.

Not so Melling Acres, where inspectors reported major concerns in May about the care and welfare of its seven residents – care plans were poor, with scant information about physical health needs, there were limited activities and a lack of advocacy to enable people to express concerns about their care.

The Priory Group and Craegmoor are owned by the American private equity firm Advent International, whose continuing expansion into the industry (it has recently acquired 11 Harbour Care homes on the south coast) is causing some concern.

The collapse last year of Southern Cross showed that care homes, private equity and poor financial and care regulation can lead to a toxic cocktail for the people in care. Sale and leaseback deals on the care home property portfolio itself enabled profits to be creamed off by Southern Cross’s private equity owner, Blackstone, before the credit crunch meant Southern Cross could no longer afford its landlords’ rising rents.

As Eye readers may recall, Philip Scott – the former Southern Cross chief executive who was in charge during the boom years but bailed out, selling his personal stake for £11m just before sales started to plunge-went on to become CEO at the Priory Group. Interestingly, he has this month announced he is to quit.

Is history about to repeat itself? The group has recently reduced its earnings forecast by 7 per cent, blaming the squeeze on NHS budges for a fall in patients. Will Scott retain his equity stake in the group-and will he continue to rent various care properties back to the Priory Group via his property companies? Watch this space.’

I’ve no doubt that there are care homes excellently run, where their patients are comfortable and well-looked after. The combination of private equity firms, which are primarily interested in making a quick, big buck, and residential and care homes is too vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, however.