Blair's Book

[mæŋksmən]

PK - you might ponder a couple of things. One - you seem to be all alone in your worship of all things NuZanuLab - why might that be?

 

I'm actually a wish-washy, Grauniad reading, sandal-wearing Lib-Dem although I hate lentils. It's always a lot easier to be negative than positive in that the BBB's throw around their personal insults about Blair and Brown and to their shallow, bigoted little minds that's enough to condemn them. But because they haven't actually put anything up that you can refute with facts they think they're winning the "argument." They're spouting pure bollocks of course but that's what makes them shallow and bigoted.

 

 

PK - you might ponder a couple of things. Two - no-one else seems to be arsed to buy and then waste their time reading a copy - why is this?

 

I have found reading it is a long, long way from wasting my time. Fascinating stuff. I can only assume that unlike me most on here couldn't be arsed to actually add to their understanding of the modern political world. Face it, it comes across very obviously in the drivel they post that they don't know what they're talking about.

 

No more than pure bollocks.

 

Would reading mien kampf stop me thinking hitler was an arsehole.

 

he he, heres my appeal to emotion.

 

WOULD IT BRING ANY OF THE DEAD BACK.

[P.K.]

Dear me, only 216 posts late...

[La_Dolce_Vita]

What a strange and disconected from reality view of life you have. do you find this hinders you in everyday life and relationships?

Of course not. It means I form different relationships and has probably improved upon them.

[mæŋksmən]

Not really, its aknowledged that sometimes a little knowledge is dangerous, see pierre for example.

[Chinahand]

Well, to date I've found "A Journey" to be a very interesting read indeed.

 

So jimbms, LDV, spook, Chinahand, Lonan3, Terse, thesultanofsheight, macmannin, manshimajin, Albert Tatlock, Addie, TING, censorship, slinkydevil, ballaughbiker, pongo, Blitzbrione, Mr Sausages, mæŋksmən, the mo beats experience, MDO, Amadeus, Alias, gingerbiscuit, oldmanxfella, credente, Evil Goblin and Pierrot Lunaire has the book given you any insights into Blair himself? There's a lot in there I hadn't even considered before. Fascinating stuff. What's your opinion on what you have read in "A Journey" to date?

I'm not quite sure what you are expecting from the constituents of your long list - I've not read the book and I imagine it'll be a long time til I get round to it. I'm thinking of stating some modern British Politics with Thatcher & Sons - sorry PK but I see Blair's politics being very much in the mould Maggie created and so imagine this will give me an insight into the last 30 years or so of left right argy bargy! Maggie pulled politics one way, and the left have been totally unable to respond - to the point of, to quote Charlie Whelan, choosing a Tory as their leader! Brown tried to move the party back to a more traditional left wing stance, but the electoral result was the coalition.

 

Thatcher, Blair, Coalition - its interesting watching the pendulum swing - I also found some of the things Blair said in his TV interview about delivery of public services fascinating - he's a very non-statist politician which for someone who led a socialist party is very unusual.

 

Over Blair's most blighted legacy, I wasn't against the war and I'm still not certain that it was a bad thing - we'll have to wait and see. Iraq is still trying to see if a certain version of democracy works - if a reasonably peaceful bargain can be brokered between Sunni and Shia it will be an example for the Muslim world.

 

I found this report fits in pretty much to my views - I find the whole idea that there weren't ANY WMD programs etc facile and think if the US had withdrawn from the arena Saddam would have had to resort to belligerency simply due to the system he'd created.

 

Quite definitely UN weapons inspectors were in a farcical position - South Africa wanted to disarm and did so with one inspector and a 3 month period. Saddam didn't and was able to create such a web of confusion no one knew what was going on.

 

If sanctions had been lifted and he'd been left to it he'd have had chemical weapons ready to hit Terhan in short order - the bizare counterfactual is him trying to return to the Western sphere - lets pretend via a repochment with Israel of the Ribbentrop-Molotov variety. I am sure various Neo Con think tanks had scenarios with Saddam on the inside pissing out - it makes you shudder and I'm glad he's dead and gone and Iraq is having to learn how to compromise and generate real politics.

 

It aint easy, but maybe Blair in 50 years will be able to aswage some of his guilt.

 

Domestically Blair blew it and as far as I'm aware admits as such (he did in his TV interview anyway) - his reform agenda went nowhere and simply swelled the state as Gordon borrowed. Now the coalition has to reform public services and take a knife to them. Maybe it'll work, but it won't be nice and the Unions etc are itching for a return to the 1970s.

 

Politics will be unstable for a bit - that pendulum hasn't stopped moving, but I don't see much appetite for a general turn to the left - PK who's your pick for Labour leader?

[La_Dolce_Vita]

Thatcher, Blair, Coalition - its interesting watching the pendulum swing - I also found some of the things Blair said in his TV interview about delivery of public services fascinating - he's a very non-statist politician which for someone who led a socialist party is very unusual.

But it is the way a great deal of the Labour party moved. Away from Keynianist economic policy to 'Third Way' polirics. To me, the Labour endorsement of Third Way politics in practice (and in intention) just seems like using government as a tool to further private interests rather than seeing the State used ostensibly to improve the situation for workers.

[P.K.]

Over Blair's most blighted legacy, I wasn't against the war and I'm still not certain that it was a bad thing - we'll have to wait and see. Iraq is still trying to see if a certain version of democracy works - if a reasonably peaceful bargain can be brokered between Sunni and Shia it will be an example for the Muslim world.

 

I found this report fits in pretty much to my views - I find the whole idea that there weren't ANY WMD programs etc facile and think if the US had withdrawn from the arena Saddam would have had to resort to belligerency simply due to the system he'd created.

 

Well exactly. One issue I have with the Brainless Blair Bashers is how their minds are totally closed to the realities of Saddam and his WMD. Bigoted just doesn't even get close. Their mantra "No WMD's found in Iraq" is as meaningless as they are. It takes no time at all to move a perfectly legit and necessary chlorine plant over to Mustard Gas production. Which means (if you're not a Brainless Blair Basher who simply can't afford to figure it out that is) the REAL problem with Iraq was that Saddam and his merry men not only produced WMD but had the means and most importantly the WILL to use them. No amount of weapons inspectors were ever going to remove that willingness to use WMD on their perceived enemies so they had to go.

 

 

sorry PK but I see Blair's politics being very much in the mould Maggie created and so imagine this will give me an insight into the last 30 years or so of left right argy bargy! Maggie pulled politics one way, and the left have been totally unable to respond - to the point of, to quote Charlie Whelan, choosing a Tory as their leader! Brown tried to move the party back to a more traditional left wing stance, but the electoral result was the coalition.

 

I'm reading the book as slowly and as carefully as I can. Being trained to "speed read" can be an absolute curse and ruin the enjoyment of a good book. Have you any idea what a struggle I had with the first half of "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" - the slowest starting book ever? It was hell...

 

Anyway imho you're actually wrong about the left being unable to respond. Because as far as I can tell "the left" no longer exists. Blair realised that the Labour Party consisted of traditional Trade Unionist types such as Les Huckfield and the intellectuals who had become disgusted with the blatant inequalities in society and wanted to change it with Tony Benn as a classic example. These two halves of the party were not only out of touch with modern Britain but were also outdated by it. So he modernised the party to appeal to the middle ground without losing sight of which layers of society needed the most help. Basically "the left" as it was known has pretty much ceased to exist.

 

 

PK who's your pick for Labour leader?

 

Now that's a very difficult one but they need to sort it asap. The Ins for Fiscal Studies report should have enabled the opposition to give the coalition a right good kicking over their unequal budget and quite rightly. But it's in disarray. I used to vote Lib-Dem but because of Cleggy selling out to Cameron I probably wont vote for them again. As I have a social conscience I guess that just leaves me with Labour so my preference would be for David Milliband. If Ed gets it he will move it back to traditional (for that read unelectable) Labour values. So I hope David but Ed might shade it. If it's Ed he won't get my vote that's for sure.

[ballaughbiker]

As a potential BBB (in PK's mind anyway) can I point out, again, that we knew back in the early 90s that SH was gassing the Kurds, and did absolutely nothing about it. I worked with a Kurd in 1994 who told me what was going on and how some of his distant family had suffered. Whilst phosgene gassing is a WMD, that's not the threat was sold to joe public here as the wmd. The implication was that he definitely had 'something' (conveniently not specified) that could be on our doorstep in 45 minutes. Y'know in three quarters of an hour, he could be killing a million or two in, say, London. No wonder we (nearly all) said that's got to be sorted asap, yes go to war!

 

With hindsight anyone who cares to find out can (now) immediately see he simply didn't have the technology to do this and it was a ridiculous concept. However the UK gov, with popular support from a totally bamboozled public, gave TB the mandate to go to war. In typical new labour style the spin doctors then tried to make the threat look considerably worse than it ever could have conceivably been and it was only when they were shopped by David Kelly did most of joe public realise they'd been deceived. Whilst I'm not saying that I think the elimination of SH's regime is a bad thing, we didn't have the mandate (or UN support) to invade Iraq. The heady days of statues of SH being toppled are now replaced with realisation that we a 'legitimate' target for muslim extremists and will be for a generation. You can't say the same for France who had more sense and plenty of criticism at the time. Remember Freedom Fries at McDonald's?

[jimbms]

I think one question is that if iraq had been supplying oil to the USA and UK at favourable rates and then in turn buying the full quota of arms from them, would this war have taken place? Well a quick point to assist that answer would be to look at Iran, one minute the big enemy of the USA then they sell oil to them at a reduced rate and buy US arms and next minute the sun shines out of their arse and Irans biggest enemy get's shit on, oh and who is irans enemy, yep Iraq.

[P.K.]

As I have posted several times previously it takes about 45 minutes to prepare a binary battlefield weapon. This information was also published in Jane's Weapons Systems way back when ie it's been in the public domain for years. It's not news at all and it certainly wasn't news back in 2002 either!

 

A very good Aunty Beeb factual timeline on the so-called famous (not) 45-minute claim is here.

 

Now how many more times does this have to be posted up before the BBB's actually start to get a grasp of what it's like to be in the real world?

 

Oh, silly me...

 

 

The West needs a stable Middle East to function. Unassailable facts are that Hussein invaded two of his neighbours, used WMD on the Kurds and the Iranians and basically totally destabilised the whole region ie he had to go. Because of the thousands of Iranian casualties caused by Hussein's WMD in his invasion of Iran the Mad Mullahs determined that they would develop their own WMD's to ensure it would never happen again. So because Hussein wasn't removed sooner rather than later we now all face a proliferation nightmare. What's to stop Iran selling on nuclear weapons to Al Queda, the Chechens, N Korea??? The correct answer is "Well, fuck-all actually..."

 

 

Well exactly. One issue I have with the Brainless Blair Bashers is how their minds are totally closed to the realities of Saddam and his WMD. Bigoted just doesn't even get close. Their mantra "No WMD's found in Iraq" is as meaningless as they are. It takes no time at all to move a perfectly legit and necessary chlorine plant over to Mustard Gas production. Which means (if you're not a Brainless Blair Basher who simply can't afford to figure it out that is) the REAL problem with Iraq was that Saddam and his merry men not only produced WMD but had the means and most importantly the WILL to use them. No amount of weapons inspectors were ever going to remove that willingness to use WMD on their perceived enemies so they had to go.

[ballaughbiker]

Yes PK, there's no need to be so indignant, we all know you have said this before. More than once. However you seem to be repeatedly missing my point, also previously made, hence the need to put things another way in a vain hope that.... oh never mind.

 

No matters what the actual facts were on the day such as what the definition of a wmd was/ what the 45 minutes referred to/what he had the technology to do etc, the need to go to war was largely made by frightening the sh*t out of parliament and the general public into believing something different to these facts. It matters not what those facts are which you constantly feel the need to define, but that we were duped and we shall suffer for a generation for being duped. If all this was as you say, why did they feel the need to put so much pressure on David Kelly, who outed them, that he topped himself?

 

By the way, word association and alliteration (such as Brainless Blair Bashers) only make your points stronger in your mind but not in the "real world".

 

 

(Envisages PK now shouting at the screen in frustration and giving his kb a right hammering)

[Chinahand]

I think one question is that if iraq had been supplying oil to the USA and UK at favourable rates and then in turn buying the full quota of arms from them, would this war have taken place? Well a quick point to assist that answer would be to look at Iran, one minute the big enemy of the USA then they sell oil to them at a reduced rate and buy US arms and next minute the sun shines out of their arse and Irans biggest enemy get's shit on, oh and who is irans enemy, yep Iraq.

I'm not quite sure what you are claiming here Jim - the US refuses to buy Iranian oil, says any company in the world which invests in the Iranian oil industry will be subject to US sanctions - hence BP or who ever won't invest there as it will affect their US operations. The US has a arms embargo with Iran - yes good old Oliver North broke that embargo, with Reagan's knowledge, and supplied small quantities of stinger missiles to try to get US hostages freed but doing that was illegal and Ronnie (who doesn't make US law - separation of powers and all that) got in more than a little difficulty for doing it. It was a one off bribe totally insignificant to any balance of military power.

 

Congress has made it illegal for American businesses to operate in Iran - even to the extent of trying to stop scientists translating Iranian scientific papers. The arms embargo is very strongly enforced, and the US has attempted to cripple the Iranian finance industry even going as far as saying any bank which does deals with certain important Iranian banks will be subject to a total ban in its dealing with the US - that is a big deal for any bank - USD accounts are reasonably vital!

 

The Iranians don't view the US invasion of Iraq as being the US helpfully dealing with one of its enemies - quite the opposite they see it as part of a deliberate encirclement of their country - with Afghanistan the other half of the circle - by an aggressive enemy.

 

Maybe I'm not getting what you are saying, but Iran has been basically an enemy of the US since the revolution - prior to that it was an ally so if you mean pre1979 I'm missing the relevence of this to today's situation.

 

Iraq changed from being a weak ally - US had an embargo on direct support and an arms ban etc, but did provide logistics support during the Iran-Iraq war - to being a hard enemy with total bans on trade etc right up to the invasion. Sure there were breaches but the idea the US gave him WMD etc is really just a left wing fantasy.

 

Edited: after reading this I retract that - the US provided small samples of biological agents which were then used to grow weapon ready stocks. I'm not ready to say the US supplied them in order to be weaponized - they could have provided them to help researchers learn how to treat the diseases and prepare if they were used on Iraqi's, but to not monitor them and ensure they weren't used for WMD is frightful - as Senator Riegle says "I think that is a devastating record."

[P.K.]

(Envisages PK now shouting at the screen in frustration and giving his kb a right hammering)

 

Dream on BBB, dream on. I haven't shouted at anything or anyone for years....

 

I don't think we were duped at all. But maybe that's because some of us have a very good grasp of the way things really are and can immediately see things like the 45-minute claim for what they really represent. Although it wouldn't be the first time the press have "invented" their news and taken Joe Public for a bit of a ride now would it? I suspect, because I do not know, that Dr Kelly put a lot of noses out of joint by claiming the 45-minute nonsense was typical of the "dossier being sexed up" when the claim was actually very minor and pretty much common knowledge anyway. Even a plank like me knew what it was about from the outset. By their own admission they even "lost" 500-odd shells that were designed for binary (WMD) munitions! I also have no doubts whatsoever that given the chance Iraq would have developed or purchased the nastiest stuff it could with battlefield nuclear as their Holy Grail. Don't forget - it's not so much what they had but the fact THEY HAD THE WILL TO USE IT that is the critical bit here. Don't lose sight of that as imho it's by far the biggest reason why they had to go.

 

For someone who usually prefers historical novels of the inferior fiction variety I'm surprised at how much I'm enjoying Blair's book. I have very carefully got through about 100 pages so 600-odd to go. Fascinating stuff and thoroughly recommended.

[jimbms]

Chinahand, they do now but when the US illegally invaded Iraq they was hand in hand

[Chinahand]

Jim - no they weren't! The US distrusted Iran, did not want it to gain influence in Iraq and took action against Iranians in Iraq - arresting their diplomats etc. As Iran stepped into the vacumn the war created, the US acted to try and stop it and basically a proxy war started - with Iran training and funding the radical Shia's fighting the US.

 

Iran was not an ally in the war, did not sell oil to the US, but opposed US actions and was directly involved in fighting the US to gain influence. The US actively pushed back hardening its sanctions and covertly fighting Iranian influence.

 

I'd love to understand where you got the impression they were hand in hand - they both wanted to ensure the other lost influence and have fought each other, via proxies to weaken the other.