Modern Joseph goes Chinese
A little after the general election debacle, Joseph Muscat wrote that the Labour Party should have taken inspiration from what the Chinese were doing on the internet in the run-up to the Olympic Games – organising themselves to trawl through the international blogs and websites and post comments counteracting the criticism of China’s human rights abuses. He didn’t mean that Labour elves should be sticking up for China. He meant that they should have taken a leaf out of China’s book and maintained a strong elf presence in the ether.
By ‘Chinese’, I didn’t suppose Joseph Muscat meant Hu Jia, who blogged about land and environmental abuses, and ended up thrown into prison for “inciting subversion of state power”, a catch-all crime used to round up dissidents and those who use the internet to raise awareness of what’s going on in China. I don’t suppose Muscat meant, either, Yang Chunlin, who has been jailed for organising an on-line petition against the illegal seizure of land by government officials.
After all, Joseph Muscat didn’t think twice about citing Cuba and other repressive states as examples we should follow when allowing 16-year-olds to vote. So 16-year-olds can vote in Cuba, but they still end up with Fidel Castro and communism. They can vote, but they have no freedom. Our Joseph doesn’t see the inherent contradiction there. Telling us that we should follow Cuba’s example doesn’t strike him as odd.
Now Joseph Muscat has done something else which shows us just how limited his understanding is of life in a secular democracy in the west. He knows the motions, he makes all the right noises, he picked up the soundbites while in ‘Brussel’, but the fact of the matter is that he still doesn’t understand. It’s like somebody who learns mathematical formulae without grasping their purpose or proper application in the real world. Give this person an examination question and he’ll work out the answer using all the right methods. Ask him to apply that formula to a practical situation in the real-life workplace and he can’t, because he doesn’t understand how or even why.
Muscat seems to understand civil liberties and freedom of expression, in theory, but in practice he seems to have a little difficulty getting to grips with it. Let’s face it: if he really understood all that, his political party of choice wouldn’t be Labour, and Super One TV and radio wouldn’t have been his stomping-grounds before he hit the big-time and started hanging out with all the big cheeses.
So what’s new from Labour? Something quite typically Chinese, but the party buried its own embarrassing news beneath the even more excruciating announcement that Jason Micallef had been elected secretary-general once more. Read it, and believe it. Labour MEPs have to toe the line at all costs, discarding their personal beliefs on issues and parroting the party mantra even if they don’t agree with it and think that it’s wrong or just plain rubbish. If they fail to do this, the Labour Party will punish them, fining them €15,000. Yes, you read that correctly: it will punish them for not doing the Chinese thing, hoping that at least two of them are defiant enough to give them the wherewithal to pay Jason’s salary.
The Labour Party’s statute has from the beginning provided for the punishment of MEPs who maintain their integrity and vote or speak according to their views, even if those views are not consonant with the official party line. But under Joseph Muscat’s stewardship of the party, the statute was amended some days ago to put up the fine to an eyebrow-raising €15,000. The concept itself – punishing MEPs who are not party parrots – is eyebrow-raising in itself, of course.
No doubt, Muscat’s army of elves will now be out in force to say that it was the Labour Party conference that voted unanimously for this amendment to the statute, and that it’s not his fault. Baby, he had nothing to do with it, they’re going to tell us. Oh, really? It was in his power to scrap the original clause from the statute book, and he didn’t. It was in his power to stop this amendment from being put before the delegates for their vote, and he didn’t. For all we know, he was the one who proposed it in the first place.
It looks like the Labour Party, far from becoming more liberal, is gearing itself up to make its new international secretary feel right at home. Alex Sceberras Trigona, despite his overbearing prominence in the hated governments of Dom Mintoff and Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici, is really best remembered for wearing a naval cap with HMS Brazen emblazoned on it, showing off for the news photographers in the summer of 1986, when he was foreign minister, and for signing on Malta’s behalf a secret agreement with our friends the North Korean communists, this time behind the backs of the news photographers.
So there you have it. The Labour Party has found a way of ensuring that its MEPs always act in the party’s interest, even when they disagree and believe that the best interests of the country are not being served.
The Labour Party is totalitarian in its thinking, methods and application. It has a Vigilance and Discipline Board to process and punish party members who stray from the officially-designated paths. It has astronomical fines for MEPs who refuse to be Joseph Muscat’s hand-puppets. It has serious, really serious, problems handling the reality of freedom of speech, and displays the most astonishingly rabid anger and intolerance towards its most vociferous critics, myself among them. Now that they can no longer incite mobs to burn down some newspaper buildings and get the police to raid others, you can sense the barely controlled panic at the rise of the blogs, of the internet news sites, of the on-line comments boards, packed with people mocking the Labour Party and its leader, poking fun at Labour’s delegates and criticising Labour’s so-called policies. What to do? How to stop them? Libel suits? Character assassination on Super One and in L-orizzont? Unleashing secret weapon Manwel Cuschieri? Threats? Insults? Rousing the rabble to hatred? Doing the Chinese thing and shutting down the blogs? Somebody hacked into mine on polling-day, when traffic stood at an unbelievable 120,000 visitors, and put it off-line for as long as it took to shift it to another server. I have no doubt as to the preferred political party of the person or persons who did that. If the message coming out of the Labour Party is ‘if it doesn’t agree with us, fine it and if it laughs at us, shut it down’, then it’s no surprise the party’s supporters share this way of thinking. I’ve noticed that what the Labour Party hates most – what, to paraphrase the Spice Girls, it really, really hates – is not being criticised but being mocked. And that, I suppose, is why I have ended up in the No. 1 position on Labour’s hit-list. I laugh at them in public, and they can’t take it.
Let me remind the Labour Party of something. Members of the European Parliament do not represent their political parties. They represent the people who voted for them and put them there – just as with our own little parliament down home. The seat belongs to the MP. In the same way, the Euro-parliamentary seat belongs to the MEP. Whether he is elected on a party ticket or not is irrelevant. The seat does not belong to the party. MEPs, like MPs, must therefore speak, act and vote in what they consider to the best interests of those who they represent: the people who voted for them, and not a political party.
The Labour Party thinks nothing of demanding that its MEPs compromise their integrity or pay out €15,000 instead, because integrity hasn’t been the most highly rated virtue in the Labour Party since the early 1950s. I don’t remember the Labour Party ever being big on integrity. Do you? The interesting thing is that Joseph Muscat, the party leader who allowed this hideous amendment to go before the delegates, and perhaps even encouraged it, is himself an MEP. He hasn’t resigned his seat yet. He’s waiting, like Chicken-Licken of my childhood story-books, for the sky to fall on his head. So while still an MEP, he has arranged for the severe punishment of MEPs who step out of line. Hmmmm.
More and more people are beginning to think that Joseph Muscat is little more than a political hand-puppet himself. The man who appointed Joe Azzopardi of Xarabank to a committee for the ethical review of Labour’s media – the political equivalent of wearing a fake Rolex watch with empty insides (and probably over the shirtsleeve) to impress the folks at a job interview – has at the same time provided for the severe punishment of Labour MEPs who dissent.
Labour can never, ever get it right. The situation is verging on desperate.
This article is published in The Malta Independent today.
www.independent.com.mt
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prosit dear daphne you got it right . you are taking it so seriously that joseph is pointing out that cubas 16 year olds can vote . But you forgot to write that he is mentioning another 6 countries . But we know why you did so ux ? And by the way you should tell us wether you agree or not cause finally the issue that is important not cuba .
and another thing is that you are trying to put like with like to china . You did not do the same when our beloved president , your beloved tonio borg and your u turned minister went to libya . You could have easily made like with like with what the pn used to say in the 80 s about ghaddafi and what the pn did few days ago . I think ghaddafi is considered like kim il sung so it would have been easier for you to write about this instead of josephs like with like with the chinese country .
and dear daphne whose got the elves and whose got the string that get pulled from brussels ux ?
[Daphne – Can’t you read and understand simple English? No, I don’t agree with giving 16-year-olds the vote. I see no purpose in foisting early adulthood on 16-year-olds. If you give the vote to a 16-year-old, you might as well give it to a 14-year-old. Muscat may have mentioned another six counties besides Cuba. The fact remains that he mentioned Cuba. Only a partially lobotomised politician would do that. As for the other countries he mentioned, two of them are tax havens with more seagulls than people, another is the Isle of Man, and another is the Philippines. Very impressive. Tonio Borg is far from being ‘my beloved’, and whether he visited Libya or not is quite irrelevant. The essential point is that the government does not adopt Libyan attitudes. Joseph Muscat, on the other hand, feels quite comfortable doing so, and slapping a EUR15,000 fine on those who step out of line. I imagine that the fine is what he considers to be a socially acceptable alternative to clapping the dissenters in irons. The principle, however, remains the same. You are welcome to your chains. Just don’t expect the rest of us to wear them alongside you.]
It looks like Muscat only has a textbook knowledge of democracy. Hy must have read about it somewhere.
Likewise for ecnomics and management. He never worked in the private sector and he never applied for a job. His brief stint at Crystal Finance was a giveaway by his boss (then) at Super 1 to beef up his cv. He has no clue how to manage a company let alone the country. Like Mario Vella and the puppet master Sant, his PhD is an end in itself rather than a means to an end.
Normally a PhD is an achievement for the start of a professional career. For him it’s just a certificate to obtain the Dr. status like his mentor Sant, and then present himself for leadership with a complete package – title, smile, wave, trophy wife, tone of speech etc. Everything is artifical.
Substance? What is that? We need to ask the PR team to look it up.
[Moderator – Trophy wife?! Not to be a bastard about it, but Michelle (I love you all) isn’t quite Carla Bruni or Jerry Hall. And Sant, who says he dreamt of Bruni as he was going under anaesthetic, didn’t have a wife at all.]
“the statute was amended some days ago to put up the fine to an eyebrow-raising €15,000”
Unbelievable, how they treat their own like dogs.
Nothing to do with the blog…..just a few moments to think of Dr Karl Chicop. Perhaps few are aware that his condition is termed as “locked-in syndrome” You may google it or wikipedia. There is also a very informative site by another Maltese with the same condition http://www.mlongo.net
[Daphne – How terrible. When there was a lot of fuss about The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly, I remember not even being able to think about it because it was my idea of hell. Poor, poor Karl and what a permanent trauma too, for his family.]
dear daphne
first of all thanks for opting to show my comment ( cause lately you showed those messages that where convenient to you to show in my respect ) but with regards to your 15000 fine opinion i do not agree .
if you are disgusted with that part so it is very simple – DO NOT APPLY FOR THE POST .
and with regards to your simple english , and the fact that you do not agree why we should trust 16 year olds to vote now it makes me understand why certain students at university need their beloved MUMMY
[Daphne – How childish you are, Ramon. I seem to notice a common thread of infantilism in those people who post comments here to defend their beloved Labour Party. No sense of humour, no sense of irony, just kindergarten playground taunts. Can’t you make any mature arguments? I see you choose once more to make reference to that case of harassment and lying by Kurt Farrugia of Maltastar.com and the Super One cameramen, who were panicking and desperate because they had gone their to film their leader being wildly applauded by enthusiastic students and were perplexed when he was booed and counted down off the stage. So they said, ah, let’s blame Daphne, who’s in the audience. Pathetic. I suppose where you come from, 19-year-old young men are ashamed to be seen with their mothers and have nothing to talk to them about, but where I come from, they’re not and they make conversation, especially when they’ve just returned from living in a rather rough area of Liverpool (without their mummy…..). So I’ll make allowances for social and cultural differences and hope that your own problems with your mother are resolved. Mothers are people, and you might trying talking to yours occasionally instead of doing what so many young Maltese men from a certain background do – treating their mothers like a combination of maid, laundress and cook.]
I fully agree that 16year olds should not be given a vote. the majority simply dont care.
@ramon muscat
“if you are disgusted with that part so it is very simple – DO NOT APPLY FOR THE POST .”
that is exactly why MLP end up the the worst people possible. The best one (george Abela, Lino Spiteri etc) just leave because they cant voice their opinion.
modern Joseph.
Joseph should read more modern books on company organisations. I suggest – Thin on Top: Why Corporate Governance Matters & How to Measure, Manage, and Improve Board Performance by Bob Garratt.
The author pulls no punches as he explores the rising power of CEOs and why boards fail. The book reveals how many recent business disasters are due to ignorance, strategic incompetence, and personal cowardice at the board level, along with the rise of the “celebrity CEO.” (was he referring to the MLP? they have all the virtues.)
Daphne, in the world of freedom lovers and civil libertarians you are still in elementary school – just two or three notches above The Joseph and His party.
[Daphne – Your notions of freedom and civil liberties are stuck in the late 1960s, Kevin. We’ve moved on since then.]
Daphne, I so admire your tenacity. I would have given up such a long time ago trying to instill some sense and logic into these lejber minds. They lost the plot a long time ago, and they keep digging their own grave, deeper and deeper. They just cannot get anything right ! Pity for the rest of us because we are being denied a decent opposition.
CEO, ‘new management style’ etc etc ………….yeah right….issa naraw. :)
Well anyway, the 15000 euro fine is a joke, I am pretty sure that if any mep were fined they would simple reverse salute and become independent!
What will the poodle do? Take them to court? Insomma, he’d probably try:)
Diving bell, is this the same bell used by deep sea divers? If so, is ther a connection with the disease mentioned?
[Moderator – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diving_Bell_and_the_Butterfly%5D
For the record, some months ago Schulz and Daul (presiding over the PES and EPP-ED, resp.) submitted a proposal at the Conference of Presidents in the European Parliament to lower the voting age for the European elections to 16.
All the groups agreed to this and the Constitutional Affairs Committee (AFCO) had to prepare a report for an eventual motion in Parliament. It seems both europhile totalitarians and EU-critical decentralizationists believe they have the vote of the younger generations.
[Moderator – Either that, or its a pan-European conspiracy to force adult life insidiously on those who are not adults, eventually reaching the goal of allowing parents to wipe their hands of their offspring when they are 16.]
My “notions of freedom and civil liberties are stuck in the late 1960s,” Daphne?
Geesus what ridiculous perceptions you have! Talk about the unknown unknowns!
It would have made more sense to say I’m stuck in the 2020s.
[Daphne – Bit full of yourself, aren’t you?]
Daphne you slipped again. A male moderator probably wouldn’t pass that catty remark about Michelle. And Jerry Hall although she may be the envy of many women because of her figure and the way she carries her fifty years, isn’t exactly so attractive to most men I know, she reminds me too much of a horse.
[Daphne – Oh how wrong you are. As a woman in the public eye, I can assure you that the vast majority of catty, spiteful and personal remarks that come my way do so from MALE supporters of the Labour Party. They outnumber the catty and spiteful women by far. Women direct spite at other women out of jealousy. Men direct spite at women out of fear and hated, which is why they are so much more venomous. The remark about I-Love-You-All Michelle wasn’t catty. It was factual. Michelle Muscat is not a trophy wife because she is not (1) beautiful, (2) highly accomplished, (3) famous, (4) well-born, or (5) the much younger wife of a much older man.]
David S. – I can imagine the torture Karl Chircop is enduring.
I underwent a Caesarean, supposedly under general anaesthetic. Unfortunately, however, only the muscle relaxant worked – all else failed, leaving me aware and awake throughout the operation.
I remember desperately trying to make a movement – any movement (opening my eyes, twitching a finger) – simply to let the medical staff know I was aware and awake, but was unable to do so because of the muscle relaxant part of the anaesthetic. I even remember desperately trying to scream while being cut open, to cry even, but nothing … (It was all due to medical negligence, since had I been monitored – heart rate, blood pressure, etc – the medical staff would have noticed that something was amiss.)
I am mentioning my experience not because the proximate cause was like Karl Chircop’s (at least mine was temporary, although I live in fear of it happening to me again) but to give others an idea of what it is like to be in such a situation – trying to communicate, but hopelessly unable to do so. I wouldn’t want my worst enemy to experience any such thing.
My thoughts are very much with him and his family. I would rather be dead than in such a situation myself.
Here Daphne, chew on this: http://operationitch.wordpress.com/2008/08/22/martial-law/
Then, to avoid indigestion, wave it off as CT.
[Daphne – What exactly am I meant to chew on here, Kevin? This website looks as though it’s been designed by somebody from Soviet-era Hungary.]
#Darren – if you see the film ‘Extreme Measures’ (Grant, Hackman), look for the scene where Grant wakes up in a hospital bed, completely paralysed but fully aware of his surroundings. A terrible fate for anyone. Sincerely hope Karl makes it.
Darren: Bauby likened the heavy and oppressive sensation of being locked in to being in a diving bell while his mind fluttered light and free as a butterfly.
Ramon Muscat: If you approve of being punished for daring to express a political opinion that is contrary to your party’s, the solution is simple – MOVE TO NORTH KOREA.
What a non-sense article written by a blue-eyed person!!…pffff oh daphne!
[Daphne – My eyes are dark brown.]
its not the MLP that cannot stomach being mocked but its leader. he just think s he is perfection personified and will go to any lenghts to stop anyone who in any way criticises him. I know that at first hand. thanks to a red policeman and an even redder disgruntled magistrate.
Yes Daphne, “this website looks as though it’s been designed by somebody from Soviet-era Hungary.”
Now just wonder why it is so, instead of scurrying back to your pollyanna cocoon.
[Daphne – I don’t live in a polly-anna cocoon. The difference between you and me is that I stopped tilting at windmills round about the time I stopped dancing to Duran Duran.]
@ Daphne. According to my dictionary – Catty : saying spiteful or malicious things about somebody, especially in a subtle way. “I can assure you that the vast majority of catty, spiteful and personal remarks that come my way do so from MALE supporters……” But why would a male moderator want to be catty, spiteful and personal towards Miss Michelle Muscat? I understand that you get these kind of comments from Labour males and females because you write things which they don’t like. But I still find it hard to believe that those remarks towards M Muscat come from a man. Sorry you didn’t convince me. She is a trophy wife, and I’m being factual, remember ‘din thobbkom’ she is the love trophy :) I rest my case now as I’m about to watch a movie starring the adorable Monica Belluci, jekk trid nitkellmu fuq nisa sbieh, ejja ha nitkellmu.
[Daphne – Ajma jahasra, the blindness of Labour supporters to the reality of anything connected with Labour is quite unbelievable. So now Michelle is not just a trophy wife, but a love trophy. I can hear the giggles in the Brussels bars all the way from here. Please, don’t be ridiculous. As for Monica Belluci, you’re seeing straight there, I quite agree.]
What’s so wrong with lowering the voting age to 16? With all their talk about ‘liberating’ this country, the Nats are getting strangely iffy about this proposal. They would probably enjoy doing up their voting rolls by economic wealth like the way it used to be in Ugo Mifsud’s time. And are you suggesting that 16 year olds don’t know how to think?
[Moderator – The MZPN have come out in favour. Don’t you read the newspapers?]
One never stops dancing to Duran Duran. Never.
Ok so the MZPN have come out in favour. So why are you against it?
{Daphne – Excuse me? What on earth do the views of the MZPN have to do with mine?]
@Daphne. I can’t believe that you didn’t realise that my tongue was firmly planted in my cheek when I wrote that Michelle is a love trophy. you really went wide of the mark here. I’m sure you can hear my giggles too.
btw the film turned out to be quite boring, this is more fun :)
Yes Daphne, it may have something to do with my not having danced to Duran Duran. Those days I was dancing in Brezhnev’s Soviet Union and they were still at the Abba stage.
But please do clear the mystery – what are your thoughts, for example, on the US invasion of Iraq? Do you justify the lies that preceeded it? Do you justify the current lies against Iran and the US/UK/French build up in the Persian Gulf? Do you believe Russia bullied Georgia, or was it reacting to a US/Israeli-instigated act of genocide against a Russian population? Do you agree with the neo-con ‘islamo-fascist’ lie that supports the “war on terror”? Do you support the ‘war on terror’ in Europe? Are you preoccupied about the onslaught on civil liberties? Or are you not exactly aware of the rapid legislative changes in the US, UK and other European countries in their quest to set up police states? Or perhaps you believe their lies and think ‘islamo-fasists’ are everywhere plotting the fall of Western civilisation (I bet you believe Tower 7 fell in its own footprint due to sporadic fire).
And finally, have you any opinion on the Union’s military aspirations as stipulated in the Lisbon treaty? Does it matter to you whether your country is involved in these imperialist wars? Or would you rather stick to the Maltese polly-anna world, where Joseph rules over Tal-Laqx and Gonzi is saved by the Tal-Pepe, who are in fact god’s gift to the Maltese NeJxinn.
It’s your choice, of course, and you do a fine job within this choice, but if you ridicule others for their limitations… well, here’s your own medicine… but I’ll try and leave you lot in your peaceful slumber. After all, like Polly-Anna Daphne, I’m full of it.
[Daphne – For those who don’t know what Kevin means by ‘Tower 7’, herhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7485331.stme’s the most recent news. It’s between the conspiracy theorists who think that the tower was destroyed in a controlled demolition, and the scientists who studied the situation for seven years and decided that no such thing happened. Kevin, I am the diametric opposite of a conspiracy theorist, because I hold fast to the belief – usually proved right – that the most obvious explanation is almost certainly the correct one. It takes weeks of planning and days of wiring to bring down a skyscraper in a controlled demolition, so reason tells me that it couldn’t have been done in the few hours between the aerial attack on the Twin Towers and the collapse of Tower 7. Also, what exactly would have been the point?
The invasion of Iraq: I was all out in favour, and my reaction to the ‘lies about the weapons of mass destruction’ was so bleeding what? As long as they got rid of one of the most cruel and oppressive dictators of our time, whatever it took was fine by me. The unfortunate events that followed do not change that. They are two separate arguments. The strange thing is that it was the so-called liberals who argued most vociferously against the war, and by extension, for the hideous status quo to continue in Iraq. Liberals arguing in favour of a cruel tyrant…interesting.
Iran, Russia – what is it with you and tyrannical leaders? I’m not interested in what they claim is being done to them (more conspiracy theories) but in what they are doing to others, including their own people. I am horrified by the way people are forced to live in Iran – by their Iranian leaders, and not by America.
Assault on civil liberties? I don’t think as narrowly as you do. You have to put things in context. It’s a trade-off: I’d rather be checked a thousand times by airport security than blown up once by some maniac. I assume that you don’t complain about having to have a lock on your door and having to sleep with the windows closed because there are burglars out there. The same principle applies here, but apparently, you can’t see it.
The war on terror? Trust you to take a soundbite literally. Where exactly is this war? If you mean increased security, then yes, I’m for it. Unlimited freedom and unlimited danger go hand in hand, as epitomised in the pioneering days of the American West, and so many other historical real-life examples that you will come up with if you bothered to try. Society is organised around the principle that we give up some of our freedom in return for a safer life. It was ever thus, and people like it that way. The American pioneers had all the freedom they wanted, and that’s why most of them didn’t survive.
Unlike you, I view war as a necessary evil, which has fortunately been avoided in Europe for 60 years, thanks to the increased unity and homogeneity in Europe which you so despise. What would you have done in 1939 – let Hitler get on with it? I ask only because it’s you who seems to have a very narrow view of the world, seeing only the present reality and the latest ‘neo-con’ buzzword and refusing to put it all in the context of history and of basic human psychology. I’m a pragmatist, and so have little truck with nonsense theories and with people who expect real life to conform to them.
@Daphne
i disagree with you on two points: the Iraq War and the tower 7 conspiracy theory. The issue of the Iraq war is a very complex ethical question, too long to debate in this blog. Suffice it to say that I hold no truck with the lame reasoning of its getting rid of a tyrannical dictator. The USA had no such qualms when supporting equally nasty dictators in Latin America and, funnily enough, Iraq itself.
There are far more effective, efficient and less costly ways of dealing with political problems such a Saddam Hussein. And to support the Iraq war is to be naive in the extreme.
Equally naive is your statement: It’s between the conspiracy theorists who think that the tower was destroyed in a controlled demolition, and the scientists who studied the situation for seven years and decided that no such thing happened. Your blind faith in expert scientists is worrying in a journalist.
It was scientists who in the 40’s and 50’s said smoking was good for you. It was scientist who recommended that soldiers wear sunglasses when watching the atom bomb explosions on the Bikini atoll, with disastrous consequences too the poor sailors. Remember one should always follow the money.
Whilst not saying that the conspiracy theorists are right, the suggestion that the tower was destroyed in a controlled explosion is not so far fetched.
I agree that “it takes weeks of planning and days of wiring to bring down a skyscraper in a controlled demolition,” But who’s to say the explosives were already in place before hand?
You may ask why. Two reasons: 1. The building contained the largest HQ of CIA and secret services outside Washington. The second reason is that approximately six months before the Twin Towers tragedy, there was another attempt by AL Qaeda to bring down the twin towers, this time by placing explosions in the garage of the tower. That attempt failed. But would it be surprising to think that the CIA and Secret Services would think of methods that would ensure that the buildings they were in never revealed their secrets?
[Daphne – I’m sorry, Chris, but I beg to differ (hugely) even though I really enjoyed reading your comment here. There is one big hole in the conspiracy theory argument, and it’s the most important question that we should ask when trying to assess a situation: why? Why would the CIA want to blow up its own headquarters? Your answer that this was done to avoid the risk of terrorists infiltrating the building is not quite up to the mark: there are cheaper and less less dramatic ways of preventing access to the building: cordoning it off, for example. Have you ever tried getting through a cordon put up by the US military? And seven hours – the lapse of time between the attack on the twin towers and the collapse of Tower 7 was plenty of time for people to go in and get whatever they want in any case. Another point that interests me is the way the conspiracy theorists get so het up about perceived conspiracies. My attitude is that if the CIA wants to blow up its own headquarters then it’s free to do so. It’s not as though it’s being blamed on anybody else. And here, too, there’s another gaping great hole in your reasoning: precisely because it is not being blamed on anybody else, and precisely because the CIA can legitimately blow up its own headquarters if there is a real security risk, the CIA and the US government had nothing to hide if it was a controlled demolition. Why would they lie? Come on, be realistic.]
It is typical of the efficient way in which the Americans think that they would look at all possibilities. One possible scenario they may have considered is that terrorists would infiltrate the CIA tower after the building is evacuated by staff because of an explosion in a nearby tower, and get their hands on important information.
So they may consider losing the whole tower rather than risk a leak of that sort.
Far fetched? Perhaps. The plot for a movie? Maybe. But not impossible.
After all 7 hours is enough time to link all the pieces of a prepared demolition plan together. Dangerous maybe, but then there are people trained for dangerous situations.
And what was the reason that the BBC reported the destruction of tower 7 12 minutes before it happened, apparently tipped off by a local reporter. A coincidental piece of rumour. or a tip-off from someone in the know to a journalist to get the hell out of there? We will probably never know. But i don’t necessarily buy the official report. After all, remember the Shipman story!
Hi Daphne,
I agree with you 100 % on the tower conspiracy bull!
Not so sure about the Iraq war in that I was all for getting rid of Saddam Hussein by any means necessary (even though I still do not agree with executing him, no matter how much he deserved it), HOWEVER, I see a bit of hypocrisy in it in that there are several other cruel dictatorships and tyrants around the world but being that there is no economic interest in the region, nothing more than symbolic actions is taken against them)
Heavens, Daphne, you worry me! You really are in pre-elementary school – this quote says it all:
“It takes weeks of planning and days of wiring to bring down a skyscraper in a controlled demolition, so reason tells me that it couldn’t have been done in the few hours between the aerial attack on the Twin Towers and the collapse of Tower 7. Also, what exactly would have been the point?”
Of course it takes weeks to prepare – hello, anybody home?! (Here’s the then owner of the WTC Larry Silverstein saying they pulled it down – he later explained that by ‘pull it’ he meant ‘leave it’ : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBMa5bZFaRc)
Yes, the most obvious explanation is the correct one. Buildings don’t fall like that by fire, and steel does not melt uniformly for a gravity-speed free-fall – if it does melt, it would in fact melts at higher temperatures and not a dying black-smoke fire. And by the way, they spent zilch years studying the Tower 7 collapse and only lately did NIST come up with a soviet-style non-explanation.
If you don’t want to remain in the dark, watch this documentary (it’s in 9 parts): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-YqET96OO0 This documentary was spearheaded by MEP Giulietto Chiesa (Liberals) and the people interviewed are experts in their field (just as you like it). It might make you think. I can assure you that this is just a synopsis and all they say is backed by more evidence – from scientists, not government apparatchiks, Daphne! Then, if you still hold doubts, do your own research into why the US government has become so evil, but you’ll have to switch off the polly-anna antennae.
As for the rest of what you wrote, I really never expected you to be so naive – really, sooo friggin naive! I don’t want to insult you, so I’ll stop here. You are right, I am wrong – please do carry on, Polly Anna, I will not poke you with reality again.
Pragmatist my foot!
[Daphne – Oh for god’s sake, Kevin. I remember having conversations like this when I was 19, and even then they bored me rigid. I actually remember actively avoiding young men (boys?) who thought and spoke like this with the same dedication that I gave to avoiding nerds. What a lot of wasted energy. Even if, for argument’s sake, the CIA blew up their own building, so friggin’ what, to use your preferred expletive? And if it was their own building they blew up, what interest does anyone have in pretending that it was due to ‘natural causes’? Now if they blew up their own building and blamed it on Islamic terrorists, that would be different. But they didn’t. Usually, when somebody inserts the term ‘evil America’ into a discussion, I switch off completely, so consider yourself privileged. I bet you read adult comics for fun.]
The link to the 9-part documentary is incomplete – this is a link to the full docu – in 12 parts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_3-nvctLF8 (you’ll find Parts 2 to 12 on the right side).
[Daphne – Kevin, get the message: I’m not interested in YouTube videos about Evil America. I’m too busy with my Darth Vader comics.]
“Now if they blew up their own building and blamed it on Islamic terrorists, that would be different.”
duh!
Evil America, Evil EU… Boo! Hiss!
And No means No! If its to the ratification of an EU treaty.
But Yes means Maybe and Unfair and Morally Invalid! If it furthers anything with a hint of federalism or harmonisation.
Yawn!! You can be a fundamentalist and neurotically obsessed about a lot of things these days.
But that still won’t stop us trying to ride the gravy train and stamp our feet if we’re not allowed to be candidates on a popular party’s ticket in EP elections.
It takes a (self-loathing)liliputian to be so anally-retentive.