Saturday 19 September 2009

The Laws of Attraction

Thursday 21st February in the eleventh month of my sixty eight year is described as itty bitty and where responded to mood and circumstance rather than took control according to plans and objectives, The day began with the discovering of the missing fork, an eating utensil and not a gardening implement.

I have a three lots of forks, 24 hallmarked silver and provided by my aunt when there were eight of us sitting down to Christmas dinner, and which I never now use because they require attention, and where there is no market for such silverware because of the additional work they bring. I have several everyday use forks which are functional and then I bought myself an inexpensive and stylish set of four and deciding to only wash up once a day I sometimes have all in use, some waiting to be washed other dying from washing, so I noticed there were only three and searched the kitchen, the day room and the work room lounge without success. It would turn up sometime and yesterday it did.

I use card, white card because it is cheaper than coloured card and I buy card in bulk because my supplier used to have offers of two reams for one, and I store in three places, firstly in the first floor work room and secondly at the foot of the stairs where 50 reams of 250 cards can be stored in two stacks against the side of one of two units in this part of the hallway, either side of the radiator and which house volumes of development work from the first to set 162. I also keep here the 101 framed photos and the 101 fact cards which are part of project 101 in Black and White the name a printed biographical notebook and which is housed in black and white boxes of nine, three, three and nine, the year of my birth. It is the intention to print a second biographical note books called Sixty Five in Black and White if I am able to complete the project of one card, some twenty thousand volumes and six hundred thousand cards representing each hour of my life to that date. It is not an end, but a means to an end.

I like to keep the stack of unused card in the hallway to a good level as it provides a small surface on which to place items such as incoming or ongoing mail, and to maintain such a level I bring down with me card from the first floor and when the number reams in stock falls to below 100, 25000 cards about six months work at present work rate I begin to look out for another sale. The third location is on a unit in the ground floor work room.

This is on top of two storage bookcase units where there correspondence paper, photo card, pens and paper clips and the like paper, where there is usually a minimum of one opened ream and up to five, 1250 cards and then in a black metal trolley by my work desk there is a ream or two to replenish those in the printer. Yesterday morning as I printed out some work, the printer/computer advised it needed a refill and there was no card on the trolley shelf, or on the unit, so I thought it was time to bring some more downstairs and lo there was the missing fork with a knife on top of a unit under which were stacked reams of card. I tried to remember the circumstance in which I had gone upstairs with a knife and fork in my hand, put them down and forgot.

It would have been evening meal time while food was in the oven and I had collected the utensils to take into the work lounge to eat the meal in front of the telly and then remembered that I was getting short of card and taken them with me without thought and then put them down when deciding to bring down a supply, probably two lots of three and then the timer sounder, or decided to go to the toilet, which is on the half landing, and forgot I had ever had them in my hand. I tend not to use the knives of the new set because while they look good they are not as effective as the range of everyday knives, two lots of steak knives, and two lots of other knives, including two sizes of white bone handled knives which have additional purposes to their main use of putting something on bread slices or rolls, to scratching my back or spreading glue around the edge of thin photo paper to stick to white card for the artman signature card, or remodelling the glitter glue if it squirts out while signing. Thus the mystery of the missing fork was solved yesterday morning.

Because my mind continues to be fertile I tend to focus on what interests rather than on what I should and need to do. A different order of forgetfulness arose this lunchtime after I switched on the Parliamentary channel to listen to the Home Secretary report on the enquiry into how a new Muslim elected Member of Parliament was bugged on the authority of the Chief of Police for his area while visiting a constituent who was in the maximum security prison. This was then followed by an explanation by the present Foreign Secretary why the former Foreign secretary and Prime Minister had repeatedly significantly misled Parliament, the media and the nation in stating categorically that at no time has the USA used British owned lands, waters or airspace for the kidnapping of suspected terrorists to be taken and tortured at Guantanamo Bay, despite allegation that this had taken place. More on these two after I have watched a film and written three communications.

The film can be quickly dismissed. The only aspect of the Laws of Attraction is the title because is concerns two lots of high class and expensive divorce lawyers who in the USA appear to work on their own, and who are unscrupulous rivals in their practice but really fancy and fall in love with each other. It has no redeeming features except designed to appeal to American Irish who retain the worst kind of beliefs about what their ancestral homeland is like. I managed two of the communications after a long phone call and lunch of a king prawn salad with two slices of brown bread, my fare for the next three days having bought three of the £1 special offers before the end of the use expiring date. It was as I return home from the supermarket that Five Live switched over to the statement by the Home Secretary and I eat the salad during the subsequent brief questioning on the live Parliament channel. The Home Secretary had been under fire to produce the report of an inquiry launched after it was disclosed that a new Member of Parliament who may or may not be a Muslim had conversation with an inmate of a security prison recorded without his prior knowledge or consent. The report had been completed in only some two weeks and it was quickly evident that the facts were such that the Government felt confident it could disclose them and bury the particular while dealing with promising to deal with some general issues arising.

The Home Secretary commenced by explaining the difference between those decisions which are for Home Office Ministers on information provided by their staff and those where the Chief Constable and his top assistants can authorise without reference to the government. She then explained that that the inquiry had confirmed that the target of the surveillance had been the inmate and not the Member of Parliament and that when the Order was signed the individual was not a Member of Parliament and therefore not excluded from a covert operation which is said to apply to Members of Parliament, Lawyers and the Clergy. It was said that while senior police officers involved with making the Order had not known that the man was a candidate and then a successful candidate that five junior officers and, obviously when they listen to the tapes they would have discovered that he visited as a Member of Parliament.

I believe it is wise not to comment further other than to relay the way which the BBC in its notes explained the nature of the extent to which we in the UK have become the most watched and listened to in Western Europe. Intrusive surveillance involves the presence of an individual on private premises or in a private vehicle. The BBC note restricted this to residential properties but in my view it should apply to an premises or vehicles which are not open public buildings or vehicles. Such surveillance includes the holding of a device or probe. It therefore involves one or more human beings directly and this may be carried out in legally defined circumstances. Direct surveillance is where the individual is followed around and their movements and overheard conversations are recorded using voice recorders and cameras. Covert surveillance is where those undertaking the surveillance are undercover, disguising the official identity and fitting into the environment of the person or persons under surveillance and Intercept surveillance with involves any communications such as phone, faxes, internet, letters, packages and parcels. These methods are recognised to be the function of the police, customs and the security services and where the direct involvement of Politicians should be severely restricted to defining policies and practices because of the risk of use for party political and personal purposes. Clearly Lawyers, Clergymen and Members of Parliament should not be excluded from such surveillance if there are grounds for believing that they have committed or are about to break the law.

It was fortuitous that immediately following this statement and before the House considered the renewal and amendment to legislation of security measures in the face of International Terrorism, that the Foreign Secretary, and Member of South Shields came hot foot to disclosed that inadvertently, his predecessor who say alongside him, and the former Prime Minister had repeatedly lied to Parliament, the Media and Public over what is officially described as extraordinary rendition by the United States over or within British Territory. Extraordinary Rendition is the fancy name thought up to misrepresent the kidnapping of individuals by the US government, its security services and military of terrorist suspects without legal process in order to take hem to Guantanamo Bay or elsewhere where they can be tortured into confession and for information because torturing is no permitted within the United States. The British View across of the Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat Parties is to up hold our standard that torturing under any circumstance and anywhere is wrong, and that we maintained this standard through the Second World War even when we came close losing. If torturing does take place, and it has taken place it is not authorised and therefore illegal and those involved will be appropriate published, The potential crime which the Foreign Secretary came to Parliament to admit to was not that in fact there had been two cases of extraordinary rendition using an American base on British soil in the Pacific but that the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary had unintentionally lied. If evidence is ever provided that a Government Minister intentionally lies to Parliament that is the end of their political career and public status with the most celebrated case during my lifetime that of John Profumo. The case against Tony Blair in relation to the Iraq dossier and statement to the Parliament has not been proven. Thus the Foreign Secretary had no alternative but to admit the new situation to Parliament and to relay the profuse apologies of the USA government who are reported to have said that this was an administrative failure which had only recently come to light.

The Foreign Secretary, no doubt with Prime Minister's approval had the sense not to leave the situation as it is but to insist on providing the US with a detailed list of all flights about which there has been substantial evidence that kidnapped individuals were being transported over and onto British Territory and to seek assurance that there has been no other administrative oversights. It will be evident that the US administration will have a record of every individual who has been transported for holding and torturing at Guantanamo or elsewhere and that there will be a record of their movements unless these were deliberate not kept or have been destroyed. I sense that with departure of Tony Blair and President Bush, and with the possibility that someone other than a an establishment approved candidate is elected President that there is anxiety that the true facts will emerge. By establishment approval I refer to Mrs Clinton who will no doubt have the support of state agencies, the military, the secretary organisations, capitalist big business and the criminal organisations as not someone who will rock the boat too much especially after their first 100 days, whereas the Republican candidate has expressed some worrying radical opinions and Mrs Clinton’s main rival for power is an unknown in the mould of Tony Blair. He could go the way of Tony Blair or become another American martyr should he threaten to put his words into practice, such is the nature of contemporary government and Society in the New World Order. The other thought is that the special relationship has been further exposed for its reality. At present the American dollar still rules but does anyone know the name of Chinese bank notes? Yuan. Jiao or Mao's and Fens!

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