if it wasn't for the fact that they're being slaughtered in huge numbers for Chinese "medicinal" products, i'd like to be reborn as a manta ray... tho i'd miss the stars

BBC Natural World - Andrea, Queen of Mantas

Afghanistan is as important to the security of the UK as Vietnam was to the security of America

why aren't countries competing to see who can do the most to alleviate the effects of climate change, rather than competing to see who can do least?

(maybe because they're reflecting the views of those they represent?)

RIP  Mercedes Sosa  (4th October 2009)

looking back though our history on those who have been tortured and killed for their beliefs, it's obvious that the 'morality' proclaimed by authorities is often little more than superstitions being used to control the people

according to UK army chief, UK forces will be in Afghanistan for 30 to 40 years -- did anyone ask the Afghanis about this?

how strange it is, that most people in most countries consider their own country to be superior to all others -- it seems to me that every country has its good points and its bad points, and these are changing all the time -- i used to want to go to the moon before it had half a dozen US flags stuck in it

Lest We Forget

once Tony Blair had pledged his support to George Bush's planned overthrow of Saddam Hussain, he had two months to come up with excuses to justify taking the UK into an illegal and immoral war

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/feb/03/iraq.usa

these are the people who lied -

* Tony Blair, the Prime Minister
* Alastair Campbell, the spin doctor
* John Scarlett, the Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee
* Sir David Manning, the adviser on foreign affairs

these are the people who pretended to believe the lies -

* John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister
* Gordon Brown, the Chancellor
* Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary
* David Blunkett, the Home Secretary
* Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary
* Admiral Sir Michael Boyce, the Chief of the Defence Staff
* John Reid, the Labour Party chairman

if there was such a thing as impartial international justice, they should all be charged as war criminals -- but might is right, and power fears neither legality nor morality

when it was finally accepted that the war in Iraq could not be won using weapons, the enemy was paid to stop fighting -- now Barack Obama and Gordon Brown are moving their troops to Afghanistan to waste yet more of the world's resources and end yet more innocent people's lives

"Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally, the common people don't want war: neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger."

- Hermann Goering, Luftwaffe Commander, Nuremberg Trials 1946
from "Nuremberg Diary" by GM Gilbert (Signet, New York, 1947)

what is needed for those being held in CIA prisons is not "fairer" treatment, but fair treatment

if i lived in a small village, and one day it was bombed by US planes and unmanned drones, and over 100 of my neighbours, men women & children, were killed i wouldn't think Barrack Obama was the best thing since sliced bread

the house martins are back again from Africa - their return always renews my confidence in the natural world -- i'm waiting to see whether they will nest again above my kitchen window, but fear that the gas boiler outlet, installed by local council workmen, which emerges a couple of feet away will probably frighten them off

i'll believe there's a serious economic crisis when the UK Government stops refitting its Trident nuclear subs (cost estimates range from £20 billion to £100 billion)

the USA's primary influence on 21st century morality so far has been to justify the use of abduction, torture, indefinite detention without charge, and a global network of CIA run secret prisons

this is the evil legacy left us by George W Bush and his sycophantic sidekick Tony Blair in their holy crusade to control the world's oil supply

BBC Radio 4 News gleefully covered the demise of The Pirate Bay.
They wish!
The Pirate Bay is dead? Long live The Pirate Bay.

the Tony Blair Faith Foundation

England's best known fantasist's latest attempt to spin the world

support globalization! give him your money!! and praise the lord!!!

if governments are so concerned about their citizens' health then perhaps they should fight less [ahem... fewer] wars rather than make laws about what people can eat, drink and smoke

at 1978 memory prices, my current hard disc storage (internal and external) is worth more than £50,000,000,000 -- although i'm even poorer now than then, i feel like one of the richest people in the world lol

Much of Albinoni's music was lost in the destruction of Dresden in WWII by vindictive allied air raids which destroyed Europe's most beautiful city

human society sees reformers as more dangerous than criminals

in January 2009, more cars were sold in China than in the US

i'm glad Jehovah didn't tell the Jews that where i live belongs to them - (it's bad enough he told the Normans and the Hanoverians)

the UK government's plans for identity cards is just one more step in its attempts to control the lives of its citizens -- how long will it be before all babies are chipped at birth?

for those who say if one has done nothing wrong then one has nothing to fear, think 'holocaust', think 'inquisition', think 'Hiroshima', think 'gulags', think 'cultural revolution', think 'witchcraft trials', think 'Irak', think 'Armenia', think 'Palestine'

yes we can... spend $1,600,000,000 to elect a president