Two stories on successive pages in the newspaper today. The first makes you despair for what goes on in the seats of power and the other to restore a bit of the faith you lost reading the first story.
Story one is the Liberty medal being awarded to Tony Blair by the American National Constitutional Center for his role in "bringing liberty to people around the world".
Bill Clinton is to present the Award and said: "It was a privilege to work with my friend Tony Blair to help end 30 years of sectarian violence and broker a lasting peace in Northern Ireland (he never, John Major did) to stop the killing in and mass exodus from Kosovo (backed the KLF who started the killing and tried the same trick in Montenegro until told to stop by NATO), and to develop policies that would improve living conditions for people in both our countries (US & UK are bigger terrorist targets than ever).
For a Prime Minister directly responsible for more deaths than any other post-war Prime Minister, the award of another bauble from a country responsible for the most deaths of any post-war country, he must feel very proud.
The second story to restore my faith that we are not all mad is the five peace campaigners who caused £180,000 damage to an arms factory supplying Israel with military equipment and was cleared by the judge under the ruling that they had committed an offence to prevent a more serious crime.
The five's defense was that they had acted to prevent further Israeli war crimes after three weeks of Israel attacks on Gaza last January. A UN investigation later accused Israel of War Crimes in their Gaza attacks and the jury agreed that they had a lawful excuse and set them free.
Two stories with one that shows you can actually get away with murder if you are big and strong enough, get a medal for it actually, and the other that shows no matter how big and strong you may be, the small and powerless can sometimes stop you getting away with murder.
9 comments:
Hanz, this post is an excellent one and mentioning Blair does highlight the sick, incestuous relationship between the warmongering government of the U.K. and that of the warmongering U.S.
Of course, ironically, Obama was given the Nobel Peace prize and his answer was to further escalate war in the Middle East.
Then, by contrast, you showed how some decent human beings attempted to stop a U.K. arms supplier from sending America's ugly little protege, Israel, weapons so they could butcher even more Palestinians (surely Israel gets enough weapons from America already!).
The responses you get to this intriguing post will prove interesting and revealing!
Blair's award is the sort of sick stuff that you expect these days. It now couldn't be any clearer that he deceived parliament (not just over Iraq, but that's the most obvious one), he effectively ceded sovereignty over our armed forces by making private promises to another leader before gaining parliament's approval, he headed a government which drove this nation's economy into the ground on the back of unconstrained credit, he presided over the biggest attack on civil liberties since the days of Cromwell, he... (well, I could go on, but I haven't had my first coffee of the day yet)...
So yeah, let's give him a medal. Why not? As soon as he wears it, it becomes worthless anyway, so who cares eh?
As for the people who damaged the arms factory, while I don't necessarily want to see these particular individuals behind bars (like Blair should be) this does set a pretty interest precedent that you don't have to obey laws that you're not particularly enamoured with. Does this mean I now don't have to hide my pills down my socks when I go to gigs these days? Brilliant. I was getting a bit sick of powderising them...
(But OK, but if it's to do with 'preventing the greater crime', then I could say that the greater crime, in this case, is stopping me from doing whatever the hell I want to my own body... So, as I say, interesting ruling...)
hanz,
too me clinton was an ok president though i rarely (maybe never agreed with his logic). on most topics i veiwed him as unrealistic, idealistic and ignorant. i dont think he was mean spirited just misguided about how humans think and work. baroke insane odrama is a less capable version of clinton. im confident that if clinton had a congress dominated by democrats (like obama does) and was just one short of a fixed majority in the senate (like obama has) he would have achieved much more than obama has achieved.
so, im not suprised that clinton has the views of blair that he expressed. i also dont give a care.
concerning committing a crime to stop a crime. well, in some countries where the legal system is a farce (russia, china, cuba, argentina, almost all arabic nations, etc.) i understand and support truely well intended actions even if they are considered criminal - afterall it is the supporting argument for the american revolution (inusrrection day i think it is called east of the atlantic). BUT, in the UK, where the legal system actually works fairly well (no human system is perfect) the use of crime to achive an objective is not defendable. NOT.
in the usa i think most federal politicians in the democratic party are morons (at the state and local level they aren't as obtuse except in california, mass, chicago, and new york city). still, in general they use the law to change the law. so, while i think they are idiots, i respect their methods.
q
Hanz, could you post a link to the story about the arms factory please, I can't seem to find it
I do find the 'committing an offence to prevent a more serious offence' could become quite a much quoted excuse. It could be wangled into most things with a bit of imagination.
When this was mentioned way back q i didn't think they had much of a chance of succeeding, they still comitted a crime regardless and would be punished. I am very surprised but am happy for them.
Here you go Cody
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/30/activists-arms-factory-acquitted
hanz,
you picked an easy situation for your argument.
might not be so easy to defend if in the process workers had been killed or maybe someone unassociated with the manf plant like a 3rd party janitor, plumber, roofer, etc.
q
As the boxers almost say q, i can only deal with what's in front of me. These are the stories in front of me and these are my views on these stories.
how convenient...
q
Post a Comment