It is still possible to find an interesting Penguin Special that appeared in 1958. British Economic Policy Since the War, by Andrew Shonfield, then Economics Editor of The Observer, remains a striking piece of work. Among his conclusions were: that the maintenance of a separate Sterling Area, giving the comforting feeling and appearance of great … Read more
[…] do we know the caller was referring to the assassination? We don’t. It is difficult, however, not to conclude it was the assassination the caller had in mind, particularly when one considers the timing of the call – twenty-five minutes before the shooting. Could there have been another event on that day intended? I […]
[…] that someone’s lying, or they may simply have been produced by fallible human beings. You start out by doubting the official story, but you keep an open mind and apply the same sceptical standards to all the alternative versions. Debunking an error is an endless process, even if you believe you’ve seen a white […]
[…] the siting of US missiles around Russia in his capacity as Poland’s Foreign Minister. Mention Poland in British politics and the name Denis McShane MP springs to mind. The son of a Polish émigré, McShane was, like Sikorski, deeply involved in Solidarity there before he rose to prominence in international relations, in his case […]
[…] I have left each quote unidentified except by a number. The reader may thus speculate on who said or wrote what. (Readers seeking clues should bear in mind that Mosley’s comments were made in the context of the Depression and the existence of continental Fascist powers). The quotes can be identified by using the […]
[…] from the meta-group, with passports from Venezuela, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Germany. Between them they allegedly enjoyed excellent relations with: 1) Ayman al-Zawahiri, the acknowledged master mind of 9/11 and senior mentor to Osama bin Laden. 2) Soviet military intelligence. 3) the FARC, the Colombian revolutionary group that has become increasingly involved in […]
[…] you get some actors?’ (There were two sitting in the room, drinking tea.) No: Loach wanted us to improvise it. So in front of some professional actors, mind, we spent an excruciating 15 minutes trying to improvise a dialogue about the 1970s, pretending to be a British Army officers engaged in a cabal. We […]
The Secret of Bryn Estyn: The Making of a Modern Witch Hunt Richard Webster Oxford: The Orwell Press, 2005, £25 This is an account of the various child abuse and satanic abuse cases that developed across the UK from the mid ’80s onwards. At the phenomenon’s peak, around 1995, many police forces were carrying […]
[…] of the British state; and on the dominance of London and Roseland (rest of the south of England); and on nationalism and identity. Nairn has a powerful mind, a wide knowledge rooted in Marxism, and wonderful savage rhetoric. Here are some quotations. You could almost pick quotes at random; much of it is like […]
[…] picture was extremely fuzzy – presumably taken with a long lens – and it is impossible to tell whether the two women are 20 or 50, never mind whether they were attractive or not. Livingstone states in his column: ‘The spy master Peter Wright, of Spycatcher fame, makes no mention in his book of […]
