The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of Public Relations

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Lobster Issue 44 (Winter 2002/3) £££

[…] Before long, Bernays was helping Israel to lobby the US military and recasting India as a worthy recipient of $1bn-worth of aid. He became the propaganda master mind in overthrowing Guatemala’s elected government on behalf of the United Fruit Company (who were worried that the country’s socialist regime would harm profits). Mind you, Bernays […]

The Road to 9/11

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Lobster Issue 54 (Winter 2007/8) £££

The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America Peter Dale Scott London and Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007, prices in the UK from £16.95   The first third of this book, 120 pages or so, is part parapolitical and part deep history of America from Nixon to Ronald Reagan’s first election … Read more

Letter from America. Rand Corporation. Kennedys. Pentagon. Oklahoma. Garrisonia

Lobster Issue 31 (June 1996) £££

[…] 2 Though I still don’t buy Walter Bowart’s Satan’s Slaves Meet Black Helicopters thesis, the winter 1995 issue of Unclassified offers one of the footnotes Bowart’s Operation Mind Control 2 cries out for, an article about a CIA-sponsored paedophile group called ‘The Finders’. The tale is bizarre, but it contains names, dates and documentation […]

Edward Heath made me angry

Lobster Issue 48 (Winter 2004) £££

[…] account. Christie knew a couple of the AB people slightly, his circle butted onto theirs at a couple of places, and you can imagine how the SB/MI5 mind viewed that. Just to make sure, they planted the detonators ‘found’ in his car. It appears, indeed, that, with the exception of Christie (who was acquitted) […]

An Unbiased Watch? the police and fascist/anti-fascist street conflict in Britain, 1945-1951

Lobster Issue 35 (Summer 1998) £££

The history of the police, fascism and anti-fascism in Britain, is dominated by three very different interpretations. First, there is the argument that the police acted as a constraint against fascism: intervening against fascist groups as the need arose. Second, there is the opposite view: that the police were a hindrance to anti-fascists, acting always … Read more

Re:

Lobster Issue 52 (Winter 2006/7) £££

Iraqi documents Iraq on the Record (<http://democrats.reform.house.gov/IraqOnTheRecord>) is a searchable collection of over 200 specific misleading statements made by Bush administration officials about the threat allegedly posed by Iraq. The collection would be even larger if it also included statements that appear mistaken only in hindsight. However, if a statement was ‘…an accurate reflection of … Read more

The Party of Business and the Business of Parties

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Lobster Issue 44 (Winter 2002/3) £££

[…] are presumably all institutionally incorruptible, although I wonder if that dream would stand up to close examination. (3) ‘New’ Labour is as yet only a state of mind – the Labour Party remains the Labour Party, warts and all. It is right that these warts be exposed, for the slow pace of reform may […]

Who’s afraid of the KGB

Lobster Issue 6 (1984) £££

As a number of people have pointed out, in the first 5 Lobsters – something like 100,000 words – there has been hardly a mention of the Soviet and Soviet satellite intelligence activities. There are reasons. No-one has offered us anything on this subject, and neither of us (ie Ramsay/Dorril) know much about it. What … Read more

Recent JFK (and related) literature

Lobster Issue 31 (June 1996) £££

BROWN, Walt. Referenced Index Guide to the Warren Commission. Wilmington (Delaware): elmax, 1995. 303 pps. An essential work of navigation for anyone sailing the seas of the Report and the Hearings and Exhibits. Supplements rather than replaces the search facilities on the Warren Commission CD-ROMs. COLLOM, Mark, and SAMPLE, Glen. The Men on the Sixth … Read more

A vote in the can is worth two for George Bush

Lobster Issue 48 (Winter 2004) £££

The apparent re-election of George W. Bush as US President seems to have its roots in a mechanical failure. On 12 March 2004, a car went out of control on a busy highway and propelled itself in front of an 18-wheeler. The driver – an African-American clergyman called Athan Gibbs – was killed outright. Gibbs, … Read more

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