Category Archives: Military

Pussy versus Tiger

This was my first assessment when I looked at the Guardian regarding the article ‘Barack Obama and David Cameron fail to see eye to eye on surveillance‘. (at http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jan/16/barack-obama-david-cameron-surveillance-terrorists). As we see America slump more and more into the weak excuse it is on an empty wallet, it must have been quite the surprise for Prime Minister David Cameron, to go to the ‘leader’ of the free world, hoping for a decent lamb chop (which you actually can only get in either Australia or New Zealand) and he ends up having dinner with someone who prefers Purina as a meal.

You see, I am not buying his ‘civil liberty’ approach for one second. In an age where Google is demanding more and more privileges to access your mobile data, where Google search gets transparently pushed into your android phone on top of your functions. In that era HE is proclaiming ‘civil liberties’?

Where we see Facebook where we would have to consent to allow access to our religious beliefs and that of our friends for access to a game. What is this, ‘Gaming for Catholics’? Here we see discord on what is needed to keep the citizens safe?

I particularly like this part “As Cameron warned the internet giants that they must do more to ensure they do not become platforms for terrorist communications, the US president said he welcomed the way in which civil liberties groups hold them to account by tapping them on the shoulder“, tapping on the shoulder? Yes, with Bing, Google, Amazon and Yahoo all in America, he definitely wants the power of collection to be ‘unhindered’ for now. There is of course the thought that President Obama has no control and it is Google and Microsoft telling Congress how it will be for now, which means unmonitored access.

That part is also a requirement to keep the financial sector running uncontrolled until it is too late (a point which might have passed already).

So, is this all rambling? Let us look into the evidence!

The first part comes from the Trans-Atlantic Consumer Dialogue (at http://www.consumersinternational.org/media/1396104/tacd-resolution-on-data-flows-in-the-transatlantic-trade-and-investmemt-partnership.pdf), an organisation not too visible, but it is loaded with high profile participants (at http://tacd.org/about-tacd/whos-who/), the PDF had nothing really new to tell me, but this part is important “The actual extent of these data collection practices, whether they were lawful, or the range of activities involving companies such as Google, Facebook, and Yahoo are still unclear. Until the new US and EU joint group of experts tasked with examining privacy in the light of the National Security Agency’s PRISM Internet data program and related disclosures makes a report to the respective governments and the public, it would be unwise for the negotiators to address data and e-commerce-related trade matters at all. The public on both sides of the Atlantic deserves a full and frank discussion of what actually transpired, and what policies or safeguards should be required as a consequence“. Even though we were confronted with the Snowden fiasco, the massive part that is kept silent is what non governments are collecting, they have been collecting data every second, of every minute of every key press you made these last few years. Data that is valued, without oversight. So ‘yes’, as I see it, the President (or the Democratic Party) is very likely getting told that with oversight, the fat checks will disappear.

This is at the heart of the matter, David Cameron (and several others) needs to keep their civilians safe, whilst as I see it, America is about the bottom dollar at the expense of everyone’s safety. Should you doubt the latter part then consider the next bit “US trade policy requires radical reform, not only to the flawed certification process, but also to the secrecy of trade negotiations in general, the lack of accountability to the public, and Fast Track proposals that insulate trade agreements even from the scrutiny of Congress itself“, which we get from Electronic Frontiers Australia. So, as we see the push for ‘free trade’, how can there be ‘free trade’ without civil liberty? It seems that in the US ‘free trade’ is synonymous with corporate trade, specifically the corporate trade of big business. So as we see that areas are drowning in corporate oversight (by the corporations), we see the term ‘civil liberties’ being cast in a voice to keep big business out of oversight. So, how does your Purina taste today Mr President?

Now the intelligent person will state, what has one thing to do with the other? How did we get from some data discussion to the TPP? This would indeed be a decent question and my answer is that it is all linked. You see, the big data collectors can only continue if it is unhindered by policy. Google’s fortune comes from the data of millions each day. So once the data starts getting holes as the rights of those from the UK, the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany and Australia are set to boundaries, the collected data will show holes, which means the value goes down by a lot. Over 30% of the internet has business, which lands roughly 40% of ALL profits in the hands of US firms. I am precise in my statement here, US Firms! Not US government or the IRS, just US firms who will syphon billions via Ireland and like-minded places where taxability is at 0.1% (or some other ridiculously low number). If this oversight changes, so will the profits dwindle to a much lower percentage, now suddenly it will be a fair game for internet companies on a global scale, which is NOT what the US wants at all.

When we consider “The prime minister adopted a harder stance on the need for big internet companies such as Facebook and Twitter to do more to cooperate with the surveillance of terror suspects“, that fear will hit many and suddenly there are more holes in the collected data, downgrading businesses, the economy and heaven forbid, the DOW Jones Index, hence kitty goes into ‘UCLA’ mode.

But many in Europe are now a lot more awake, the events in Paris did that, when an actual terror attack hits a place like Paris, people suddenly notice and their fear for their safety spring into action, which is counter-productive for these US firms (as the terror attack is not happening in the US), corporate greed takes a front seat on what needs to happen, all under the guise of ‘civil liberty’.

As the president came with “In a sign of the concern in the US at the threat posed by extremists in Europe and in Syria and Iran, the president said disfranchised Muslims were one of the greatest challenges faced by Europe. “It is important for Europe not to respond with a hammer with law enforcement,” Obama said at a press conference with Cameron as he contrasted the way in which US Muslims had integrated and regarded themselves as wholly American“, really? How did Americans react on September 12th 2001? They couldn’t get the DHS started fast enough! In addition, let’s take a look at the Guardian in 2012 (at http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/dec/29/fbi-coordinated-crackdown-occupy), ‘Revealed: how the FBI coordinated the crackdown on Occupy‘. It seems that ‘civil liberties’ are not an issue, when profit (read: banks) are in play. If we accept the quote “The document – reproduced here in an easily searchable format – shows a terrifying network of coordinated DHS, FBI, police, regional fusion center, and private-sector activity so completely merged into one another that the monstrous whole is, in fact, one entity: in some cases, bearing a single name, the Domestic Security Alliance Council. And it reveals this merged entity to have one centrally planned, locally executed mission. The documents, in short, show the cops and DHS working for and with banks to target, arrest, and politically disable peaceful American citizens“, now apart from the Snowden issue, I regard the Guardian to be a good paper, this gives a clear view that ‘civil liberties’ is not an issue in the view of profit and in the view of those depending on thus stated profit.

So here we see the clearer view of Kitty (Oval Office) versus Tiger (10 Downing Street). David Cameron needs to get a handle on the terror fear which goes a lot further then ‘commercial interests’, he needs to actually address and deal with these fears, hence the need for data. In this matter he had to speak to the President, let’s face it, getting GCHQ to download Exabyte’s of data (whilst permission is pending), without a meeting first is just bad form. On the other hand we could ask that data set from North Korea, apparently that is where the top hackers are today (according to US officials).

 

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By the Jewish numbers

I have been thinking a lot in regards to the Jewish population. It all started when the numbers showed how small the fraction of Muslim extremists is. Was it like the fatwa pronounced against snowman in Saudi Arabia? I am not judging on that ruling, or on the reasoning there. It seemed so odd that one religion was such a large issue to some. You see, outside of Israel and the US, the Jewish population is less than 2% of whichever nation they are in, it is 1.9% in Gibraltar, because Gibraltar counts 600 people (excluding the monkeys), which gives us less than 12 people. It is likely just one family, perhaps even two. Why is this hatred against the Jews so intense? Perhaps the thought is sedition? Anyone who ever has a Shoarma (with garlic sauce) will decide to become Jewish?

A totally random reason, but what to think of this hatred? A level of hatred (or perhaps envy), that has existed in the minds of some people for such a long time. Let’s not forget that the total Jewish population is around 15 million globally, which is less than the Dutch population, giving us 0.19% of the global population, so what gives?

It is not just the events in France that have sparked an issue regarding the safety of Jews. When we look at the Atlantic, we see a different link (at http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/01/will-this-time-be-different/384322/) ,

A survey of French Muslims in 2014 found a community seething with anti-Semitism. Sixty-seven percent said “yes” when asked whether Jews had too much power over France’s economy. Sixty-one percent believed Jews had too much power in France’s media. Forty-four percent endorsed the idea of a global Zionist conspiracy of the kind described by the Holocaust-denying French Muslim comedian Dieudonne. Thirteen percent agreed that Jews were responsible for the 2008 financial crisis“. The quote is an interesting one. You see, statistics are at times like horoscopes, if the numbers fall flat, you can just ignore them. The last one on the financial crises is such a revelation, because the fact is not false (Marcus Goldman, the founder of Goldman Sachs is indeed Jewish, so is a slice of the top of Goldman Sachs), so even as this fact cannot be denied, the entire 2008 financial fiasco such a weird mention. Yes, the same involvement could be stated for the Lehman brothers. It was a twist of managed fates that kept Wall Street out of jail. Loads of the involved parties were not Jewish at all, the fact that national laws allowed for these events calls blaming the Jews even more in question. It is actually the mention “Sixty-one percent believed Jews had too much power in France’s media” that is central in all this. You see, these facts have bearing, but not in the way you might have ever considered.

If you look at different religions, we see that some are in unison, but for the most, people for the most remain at odds and in strife. The next is not a proven given, but it has shown to be correct. If we look at the old ages, we see that at times the Jews started in a place, in Munich (Germany) the first recorded name is ‘Abraham the Municher‘ in 1229, persecution through rumours and non-evidence has started from as early as 1285 (Source: Susanne Rieger), it took until the late 1700’s for levels of false persecution to diminish. When the Jewish population returned, it did so fairly quickly, and there is a weird situation linked to this. Wherever they moved to, the change was monumental.

Now the next parts are supposition and very speculative. It is my personal believe that the Jewish community is not one person, it is a united group. I have seen that the Jewish population at large is communicative almost in extremis ad infinitum. They debate and discuss everything with one another. What was then the Jewish area, now in Munich ‘the streets surrounding Gaertnerplatz in the trendy area of Glockenbachviertel are in increasing demand‘, which is a real estate quote! So as you consider my statement as reductio ad absurdum, than consider that this is not an isolated case. Amsterdam, Paris and many other cities in Western Europe have areas what was before the German culling through World War 2 to be amongst the most valuable real estates. This was not due to magic, witchcraft or crime. These people would buy a property and then take all effort to improve the house and to make the house a proper home, keeping it in perfect order. Where we would see rental properties fall into decline due to bad maintenance and greed driven choices, the Jewish houses would increase in value. In many cases (especially in Paris and Amsterdam) we see the proper optimised commercial use of any property, making it a long term asset. Now consider the Jewish population talking with each other, not at each other (as we see in many Christian places).

Weirdly enough, nowadays we share information open through social media, in those days the Jewish population did this using a Goose-feather, an ink jar and paper (aka actual communication). That trait got these people an advantage in banking, commerce and what is now regarded as media.

So is my speculation (based upon information read) so far out of synch with what might be? That is of course the question, which does not let the Goldman and Lehman family off the hook, but here we see an aggregated factor of growth that is exponential above many others. Is that the reason for the hatred? When someone internally ponders ‘the Jews’ are doing so much better then poor old lazy drinking me? If that is the view of some of these people, then perhaps they will consider getting educations and jobs instead of picketing against Jews (a subtle Westboro reference). Interestingly enough, in a Jewish family, everyone works (not unlike some Muslim families I know). That will in the end have an impact on the budget a family has and on the amount of debt that they can reduce.

Now we go back to some of the references, so even though some statements are true, are they still correct? That is the part no one can actually honestly answer. You see, they do not have too much power over the French economy, they are part of it, and many regard Natixis to be the biggest player in France, not a Jewish firm at all (as far as I can tell), so as we watch the quote of ‘found’ events, we see that in the cold light of day, against all elements the fact seemed true but they were not, neither were the facts correct.

The big issue here is anti-Semitism, by the numbers we see a correlation where bad economies seem to need scape goats, as these emotional attacks start, we must tactically acknowledge that for those people, attacking a group that represents less than 1% is an easy target, what is strange is how this can happen again and again, whilst the governments involved seem unable to stop such attacks until serious damage has already been inflicted. Yet, this is not completely correct either, when we see that in the French case it was actually a Muslim hiding the people under attack in the cooler, there we see that this one man Lassana Bathily, made all the difference in keeping the intended victims safe.

The issue goes further when we consider the Guardian article (at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/13/french-jewish-community-ponders-future-after-paris-attacks), where we see the following ““I’m tempted to go,” he said, referring to Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s invitation on Saturday to French Jews to “come home to Israel” to escape anti-Semitism in Europe“. I very much disagree with the sentiment for two reasons. The first one is that if the Jews leave and they all move to Israel, we as a people have failed them. I believe that people when united, can and will achieve a lot more then when they are segregated and divided. We must find a way to keep our people (in a local national sense) all of them regardless of religion safe.

Yet then again, we need to learn how to stop and how to counter such hatred. Part is seen in the analyses of the people regarding Charlie Hebdo. The Guardian article states: “Amédy Coulibaly took the first steps towards terrorism in prison, but what the three had in common was growing up on the margins of French society“, here we see part of the issue as Nazi Germany grew, and now we see similar patterns after the 2008 crash. ‘The margins of French society‘ is more than just a phrase, it is a global issue. As we see the stronger and longer exploitation through big business, we see an unbalanced shape of life, so unbalanced that the mass of the people is growing resentment and require the need of scape goats to focus, the reality is that their marginalised lives came from speculators, big business and the financial industry. Sides governments all over the world were unable (partially refused) to deal with, now we see the results and this is only the beginning. As we see the facts evolve on how these events also could be seen When we take the quote “At that point, the young Kouachi, known as Abou Issen in the group, didn’t seem structured in his thinking. “He couldn’t differentiate between Islam and Catholicism” and wasn’t well educated, said the source“, we see a pattern that we have seen before, radicalisation through confusion. It is not unheard of. What is more important is the person who was connected to Amédy Coulibaly, namely Farid Benyettou. When we take the NBC quote “Farid Benyettou was sentenced to six years in prison for recruiting young Parisians for al Qaeda, including Kouachi, but since his release from jail has been training to be nurse“, we must wonder why he had such a change. Has Farid truly changed, or has he taken a vocation, where his chance to find marginalised people has a much stronger chance on finding those ready to radicalise through a marginalised world.

This is a question, not an accusation!

You see, in the way the Jews are spread (thinly) over nations, Lone wolf attacks would be devastating towards diminishing the Jewish population. The authorities would have no way to counter it and until it deals with the elements of marginalisation, they might never succeed at all. That part is not just France, that is a global issue and we need to find a solution fast, because as the economy goes at present, there is every danger that the attacks in France are only the beginning. I truly hope I am absolutely wrong here, time will tell!

 

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Statistical defiance

There are mornings when you get the surprise of a lifetime. One version is when you are not actually awake; you look to your side seeing a smiling woman stating that she feels nice. Suddenly the phone rings and you wake up! In another version (where you are awake) you get of the subway, you see a ten dollar note. You see some worthy cause 20 feet down the road, easy come, easy go! You feel you did your civic duty and life goes on, the coffee you pay for after that with your own money still tastes a little better that morning. The power of Karma!

A third one is the one I saw this morning. It was on the Australian Channel 7 (Sunrise). The shining light was none other than Andrew O’Keefe. Whilst some dark haired woman from Melbourne was going on about vilifying the Muslim community, Andrew was not the voice of reason, but the voice of wisdom and insight. There is no denying that the Muslim extremists are getting a lot more attention, often through their violent doing but when we consider the acts of up to 50,000 people (the combined numbers of Al Qaeda, Islamic State, Hamas and a few others), it is almost less than a drop in the ocean of the 1.5 BILLION Muslims. How much vilification did we see for those bombing abortion clinics? Or how much light was shone on the ordeal that the Muslims in Burma face whilst getting prosecuted by Buddhists?  It seems that there is an unacceptable unbalance and Andrew O’Keefe made sure that this was stated!

Way to go Andrew!

I have no issue hunting down extremists, not just for the dangers to Christians, but for the equal protection of Jews, Muslims and other religions alike. We should also clearly see that Christians have had their own groups of extremists and in several places including the US. We seem to forget that part. There is a lot wrong with all of us as we condemn a group because of the rotten apples in their basket, even though this amounts to a little less than 0.003% of that population. It is like sending 300,000 apples back to an orchard, because one had a worm.

Now you will state, where one has a worm, more worms will be found. Yes, that is not a wrongful assumption, but at what point will the purchased shipment be actually unworthy of purchasing? The fact that we condemn the apples for one bad one, is no reflection on the apples, it is a reflection on us! That part is at the core of the problem. Yes, we need to hunt down extremists and yes, we need not be nice about it. We do however have a sworn duty to make sure that the innocents are protected; no matter what faith they adhere too. Let us not forget that the shot policeman in the Charlie Hebdo case was a Muslim himself, a French policeman who died defending the freedoms he believed in. His name was Ahmed Merabet, let his name not be forgotten! So, extremists will not care! They care for the false image of self, a demonic view that does not even exists, because any view of self will always lack objectivity. We do not care if it is a person staring at their own reflection, but when that results in the hunt and killing of innocents, they cross lines and we need to accept that there will be a consequence to that. However, vilifying others will never be a good or acceptable point. Andrew O’Keefe gave good light to that part.

So it turned out that I was watching a nice morning unfold! An outspoken clarity of events, one that had gone missing on many fronts for too long.

Yet, there is more, I think that last week was the straw that broke the camel’s back in several places. For this I need to take a step back to September 11th 2001, you see, my personal interpretation of those events might not be the ones you have considered. You see, I think that the attack never succeeded. It is my personal believe that the intent of Osama Bin Laden was different. I expect that yes, the towers were to be hit, yet his intent was that the towers would burn all day and all night, like torches over New York, keeping everyone busy and the symbol become torches of fear in the hearts of Americans. When the towers collapsed his intent of fear became a consequence or rage, we know what happened after that and those who saw Zero Dark Thirty know how they got him anyway. Hiding in Pakistan, scared of the eagles circling ever closer until he was removed from life. The events last week in France might become the same point. I do not think that Islamic State ever considered that a ‘mere’ cartoonist would bring millions into the street in sadness, but thereafter in acceptance of the need to hunt these people down. Now it is not just the US, now it is the collected members of NATO, the EEC and the Commonwealth. In addition, Islamic State is now losing its hidden internal ‘friends’ in many of the Middle Eastern nations. This would always have happened, for the simple reason that history has proven that terrorism will never work and will for the bulk of events have a counteractive effect, yet as the Islamic State was still trying to grow, these events are now the cause that not unlike OBL, these members will now be forced to hide as they are hunted by too many players. Those with similar agenda’s had outgrown their welcome for some time, but now there is a resolute acceptance that people are willing to concede that reasoning is no longer an option with such groups. The benefit is that this could spell an actual increase of security for places like Israel, as the pressure will push for the hunt to continue in Jordan and Libya by its own local ‘population’ could spell a change of weather. Where they expected to bring fear failed, they achieved to anger a group of people who were up to the #JeSuiCharlie point hoping for a civil solution, that time has now passed. Even though these people are massively against violence, they are now to some extent conceding that action needs to be taken.

The Guardian had a piece in ‘comment is free’, where I saw the following quote regarding the polarisation of debate regarding Charlie Hebdo: “By framing events in Manichean terms – dark versus light; good versus evil – an imposed binary morality seeks to coral us into crude camps. There are no dilemmas, only declarations. What some lack in complexity they make up for in polemical clarity and the provision of a clear enemy“. I do not believe this to be correct. It is not untrue as a statement, depending on who this is regarded to, but I think the game is as per yesterday changing. As we see the move of #JeSuisCharlie for freedom and against violence, that move seems to be showing a below the surface change, the acceptance to some extent that simple talks are no longer an option, these people are now willing to accept that professionals need to do whatever they need to do to get these acts of violence stopped, in whatever way will stop the killing of innocents. It was not just the act, part of this equation is a person who filmed from likely a smartphone what was happening, the filmed part is less than a minute, but as thousands a people saw the cold headed execution of a French policeman, we now see a film, not unlike the film of the Kennedy assassination (the Zapruder film) that those who see it are no longer asleep, the presentation is like a bucket of ice water. Just like I woke up from the fake dream of a beautiful woman being happy in bed next to me, they too get a realistic vision and less optimistic view. The view that what they believed possible (civil talks) can never be. The evidence is too raw and too direct. Whatever notion they had of acting whilst a population remained half-awake is no longer, the people will allow such extremists to be hunted, the damage of the fake fears through Edward Snowden is now getting undone, the resolution of the people wanting this resolved allows for it.

So, as we will see, a weird twist of fate on how one act suddenly calls our attention to the craziness of what we allowed to continue for too long, we will soon see a change of venue, the hunters will become the hunted. It is not just Paris, even though this is event shows a visible support against extremists into millions, the view gets additional power through the alleged execution by ISIL of Journalists Sofiene Chourabi and Nadhir Ktari from Tunisia. The support here is showing that there is more than just a show against violence, we are slowly seeing a change where the shift is not where ISIL is, but the fact that there is no one left not willing to hunt ISIL down, a different perspective, one they had not bargained for. The second benefit here is that there is every chance that the people will now also wake up towards the issues involving Hamas. Even as Hamas thought it was relatively safe after the European voting events, it now must content with the fact that they are now very likely to be seen as unacceptable as ISIL is. I spoke before about the options for Palestine, providing its excluded 100% of Hamas that reality is now, due to the visibility of #JeSuiCharlie a lot more likely. Because as the House of Hamas is less seen as acceptable on a global scale, they will react in ‘fear of self’ and unite with the people who would not find them acceptable in the first place. It all might work out for peace in the end, how statistically weird is that for a change?

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Comprehension

Yesterday has been a weird day for France, unlike here in Sydney; they had their dealings with terrorists. You see, I remain in the mindset that what happened in martin Place last month was a crazy person with a gun, the fact that he was a Muslim makes little difference. He was a mental health case with deadly intent, it got him killed, but only after he killed some of his victims. France is an entirely different kettle of fish. Here is the YouTube link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBGVwZyXYlQ (in French with English subtitles), I normally would not add something like this, but it is important to see the difference. This is not some hostage situation asking for a flag, this is almost military precision, it is direct, clean (pardon the expression), kill and get out! A policeman was on the scene and was executed without any consideration.

Here you see directly what Israel has faced on a daily basis; this is what the direct hatred of Jews looks like. Even though this is against a satirical cartoonist, the hatred of these extremists’ remains the same. The Guardian has an article by Jonathan Freedland that covers several parts of what bothers me. The article ‘Charlie Hebdo: first they came for the cartoonists, then they came for the Jews‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/09/charlie-hebdo-cartoonists-paris-killers-fascist-death-cult) gives us a few views. The quote: “They hated the cartoons, we say. Free speech was the target, we declare. They wanted to silence satire and gag dissent“, this was not unlike my view. I find satire enjoyable, but when you touch religion (any religion), some people tend to get a little off the balanced sane side. Some get abusive, some get a little violent, yet as far as I know, none will act to this degree (although opposites in the India – Pakistan debates might not agree with me). No matter what I think or believe, Charlie Hebdo was in a place with free speech and he was entitled to it. The best comparison I heard was from an American Journalist describing Charlie Hebdo as the French version of ‘the Onion’.

When we see the following two quotes we get to the real stuff: “Then on Friday, a siege at a kosher supermarket, four hostages confirmed dead, the murderers apparently linked to those behind Wednesday’s carnage” and “Perhaps the murderers are bent on killing people not only for what they do, but for who they are“, this is at the centre of a lot of issues behind the objections against allowing Palestine into the UN and other places. I and many others have no hatred for Palestinians however, we will not accept Hamas to be allowed at any table for the terrorist organisation that they are. And so long as Palestine will not disavow Hamas and as long as Hamas calls the shots, there is no future for Palestine as I see it. This is at the heart of the matter, so when you think of these poor poor Palestinians, watch the uncensored shooting in Paris and now realise that this is what Israel faced for many years now, with added rockets and nail bombs!

The next part is actually at the centre to what we tend to feel and also how our civilised minds should be feeling. “For Muslims, that has meant spelling out that these killers speak only for themselves. Note the speed with which a delegation of 20 imams visited the Charlie Hebdo offices, branding the gunmen “criminals, barbarians, satans” and, crucially, “not Muslims”“, this makes sense in regards to the next part “Of course they should not have to do it. The finger-wagging demand that Muslims condemn acts of terror committed by jihadist cultists is odious: it tacitly assumes that Muslims support such horror unless they explicitly say otherwise“, this makes sense. Perhaps we all remember the atrocities of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and white power groups against African Americans. We distance ourselves as Christians, because their acts are not those of Christians at all. They are at the centre of some agenda of hate that the boggles the usual civilised mind. Some cannot grasp the small mindedness of it. Yes, we all hate at times and we hate enough to kill, maim or harm, but that comes in defence of a rational against us, or our family when it is harmed. To blatantly hate is not within our power (it should not be), I will go one further, children when they are born do not have the capacity to hate; it is the one dark side that gets taught to us, which makes it so inexplicable to some.

Now we get to the parts that I do not completely agree with (even though what is stated is not wrong) “Wednesday’s deaths brought a loud chorus insisting that Charlie Hebdo was vulnerable because it had been left out on a limb. That was down, they said, to the cowardice of the rest of the press, lacking the guts to do what the French magazine had done“. The press has been many things (cowardly to some extent as well), when the press (globally generically speaking) started to cater to advertisers and circulation, many papers started to cater to the emotional reader “Flight MH370 ‘suicide mission’” (The Daily Telegraph, March 2014) and “Death Cult CBD Attack” (The Daily Telegraph, December 2014). It is only one of several papers, the public gets misinformed too often, too much innuendo. “Andrew and the under-age ‘sex slave’” from The Daily Mail, implying the Duke of York is just the most recent of revenue claiming headlines. When you rely on income in this way, we see the newspapers as they no longer are, they are no longer informing the people, hopefully setting their minds to a more informed stable position, we are left with groups of people getting angry on implied innuendo. It makes for revenue (but becomes non-informative). So how about we make it a little more clear? How about tax offices change that glossy magazines are not tax deductible as they do not qualify as ‘researchable materials’? The ATO states “Newspapers and magazines, you can claim a deduction for that part of the cost of newspapers and magazines that relates to your using them in researching a topic as an employee journalist“. When we remove glossy magazines and add the Daily Telegraph and sort minded groups on that list, perhaps they will clean up their act?

So as non-violent Muslims fear repercussions for emotional responses, we in general have a duty to shield them, but in my mind we have an equal need to hunt down these extremists. We need to become a lot less tolerant of hate crimes like we are seeing in Paris this week, but they must be held against the real threat, not the threat that some papers perceive to instil. So this is where my view slightly differed from Jonathan Freedland. The French issue should wake us up in other ways too. Not only should we regard the hate attacks Israel has been under for a long time, we need to notice that walk softly and ‘try to reason’ will not work. The policeman had little option but to talk the man into not shooting him, it did not work! I feel for his family, and for the family of other victims, but you all need to wake up now, terrorists are real, they are not some deranged Sheik with delusions of grandeur wanting a ‘Shadada’ flag in a chocolate shop. They are people with guns, with a tactical mind that tells them to kill that what they hate without hesitation or remorse, so as you keep on crying on ‘your’ privacy, whilst posting your ‘nightly’ achievements on Facebook, remember that limiting those who hunt these extremists, might get you or someone you know killed at some point.

Yet Jonathan’s gem is at the very end “Theirs is a dirty little war, a handful of wicked fanatics against the rest of us. And they must lose“, I could not have said it better myself, but with that comprehension comes a change to all our minds, not to our hearts! Our hearts must never embrace the acts and the violence needed; our minds must however accept that some need to do what they do to stop these people, preferably before innocent lives are lost. It must happen everywhere and it needed to start yesterday. So, as you ponder these ‘lost souls’ as they go Jihad in Syria, then also quickly realise that these people come back with the skill, the intent and the reasoning of the extremists that you saw in the YouTube video, so if you are a parent and you wave your hand to your little boy or girl as they go to school, you should realise that they might leave the house the last time that day. What are you willing to do to keep them safe?

I am not trying to quell you into emotion like the press so often does; I need you to comprehend what must be done by professionals to keep you and your family safe. Think it through and cast your vote! You need not act, you are not trained and not qualified to suddenly emotionally react to these extremists. Only the calm mind will know what to do and they must be given the option to win and to make sure that extremists lose, or we lose it all!

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Slander versus Speculation

There is a lot wrong in this world, we cannot disagree with that. Soon we might see rental prices go down in London, because of Superman (the New Ecstasy), yay to those needing an apartment, being free of drugs was never so nicely rewarded! So is this speculation, or slander?

We could debate my sense in taste (many have for decades), yet in the firm juridical ground, when can speculation be regarded as slander?

That part is more and more a question when we consider the US sanctions against North Korea. Oh, and perhaps we forgot to mention that Sony Is a Japanese firm (even though the crime was on US soil), giving additional spotlights to the reasoning of certain actions. Consider the following sources. First let’s take the BBC (at http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-30661973). Here we see sanctions against organisations and individuals. First there is “Jang Song Chol: Named by the US Treasury as a Komid representative in Russia and a government official“, then there is “Kim Yong Chol: An official of the North Korean government, according to the US, and a Komid representative in Iran” and last there is “Ryu Jin and Kang Ryong: Komid officials and members of the North Korean government who are operating in Syria, according to the US“. Now the article ends with the most hilarious of all quotes “White House officials told reporters the move was in response to the Sony hack, but the targets of the sanctions were not directly involved“.

So the White House is within this part confessing to the breach where they are targeting innocent civilians (of that crime at least)? Can anyone explain to me how this is anything less than legalised slander? Consider that if (not when, but if) they ever figure out who exactly was responsible for the Sony hack (the actual individuals involved), how the US government could be held responsible in any court of law for this. Consider this part (source was the APA of all places, at http://www.apa.org/about/gr/issues/violence/hate-crimes-faq.pdf). “Current federal law defines hate crimes as any felony or crime of violence that manifests prejudice based on “race, colour, religion, or national origin” (18 U.S.C. §245). Hate crimes can be understood as criminal conduct motivated in whole or in part by a negative opinion or attitude toward a group of persons. Hate crimes involve a specific aspect of the victim’s identity (e.g., race)“. If we clinically look at the facts, then these acts are a hate crime against North Korea.

Now, let’s be fair as well. Most will not care, I reckon that the North Koreans might not even care, but this act does remain a legal transgression!

Let me show you why (because without reason, there is nothing), part one is found in yesterday’s news in the Guardian (at http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jan/02/sony-hackers-may-still-access-computer-systems-the-interview).

Here we see the following parts:

  1. Sony Entertainment is unable to confirm that hackers have been eradicated from its computer systems more than a month after the film studio was hit by a debilitating cyber-attack, a report says

So not only has the hack occurred, it is very possible that the transgression and the damage is currently still ongoing, in addition, one of the most watched and scrutinised nations is still accessing Sony? Not one press agency is asking the questions that matter. For example, there was some visible Press Tour into North Korea (must have been around when Kim Jong-Un was elected big boss in 2011), when we saw some of the filmed events there, we saw North Korean officials in total disbelieve that a smartphone could take photographs and these people walked over Sony’s cyber security?

Now we get to the Chief Executive of Sony himself, his quote gets us the following:

  1. “It took me 24 or 36 hours to fully understand that this was not something we were going to be able to recover from in the next week or two,” Lynton told the Wall Street Journal

So this was not a mere grab for data, this is a system paralyses of sizeable renown, the hack was so complete, high paid executives could not get their minds around the events. So, are we still looking at North Korea? Basically this requires an evolved form of ‘stuxnet’, the hack was seemingly more complete then the stuxnet virus could achieve. We now have only three players left. Russia, China and whatever hacking organisation walks around within the US and its allied nations. How is North Korea anything else but a mere puppet for slander? Whilst some people are possibly hiding their lack of skills, and likely other people linked to all this are trying to cover up issues that have been ignored ever since the first hack of 2011 (the Sony PSN hack). By the way, I am using stuxnet as a comparison, I have zero knowledge how the transgressions was done, but we can all agree it was way beyond a normal level of sophistication.

Yes there is another scenario and I will get to that soon, North Korea is not off the hook yet!

You see we have been looking at the event, but not at the capital involvement that is two tiered at present.

  1. Sony’s network is expected to be fully operational within the next two months but hackers have so far released only a tiny fraction of the 100 terabytes of data they claim to have stolen“, so not only will it take months to repair security measures, the fact that the new fences are there are still no guarantee that the data remains safe.

When gets us to the first tier. Data! Someone streamed 100 Tb, which is more than just a number; it would require every PlayStation 3 on the planet to download up to 2Mb. The fact that this is not monitored, or that is got through to this extent, is a first view that this was no mere trifle event. And even though 100,000 Gigabytes seems small when compared to the PSN issues, it becomes interesting when we consider that the PSN had been hit more than once, but as those members did not all download, where did all this data get syphoned to?

Now we get to the one part that might be regarded as tier two. You see, it is not just the amount taken, which takes a good server park to store, it goes back to issues I discussed in regards to piracy and the parts I mentioned in my blog ‘For our spies only!‘ on September 26th 2014. There I stated “in the end this is NOT about copyright, this is about bandwidth“, the big players all knew it and they were all very concerned if such events would start to get measured and logged. Now someone casually walked away with 100,000 gigabytes of data?

Before I restate, it was not North Korea, let us take a look at another article by the Guardian in that regard. The title is ‘North Korea may have hired outside hackers for Sony attack, says US‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/30/north-korea-hackers-sony-pictures-cyber-attack) and it was written on December 30th. Now we must consider the following: “US investigators believe that North Korea most likely hired hackers from outside the country to help with last month’s cyber-attack against Sony Pictures, an official close to the investigation has said“. The operative word is ‘believe‘, they just do not know. As a speculation that would be my guess as North Korea does not have the skill needed for this, not even close. By the way, those hackers might want to get paid, how will North Korea do that, or perhaps that is beyond US oversight too, because it would be a sizeable amount for something this complete.

The next part is the part that opens the discussion ““The FBI has concluded the government of North Korea is responsible for the theft and destruction of data on the network of Sony Pictures Entertainment,” it said in a statement“. The first question: What evidence?  As stated before, North Korea is lacking in many ways, the fact that they hacked past Sony to this extent, whilst at present no guarantee can be given that the systems are secure at all, whilst North Korea has been watched 24:7 for a long time now gives rise to the demand of evidence showing the guilt of North Korea. So, they are seemingly better than the cyber divisions of both Russia and China? I am not buying it, in addition, the fact that the article implies that outside help was engaged for a hack this thorough leaves us with two thoughts.

  1. If true, where is the real balance of power in cyberspace, because this now implies that North Korea is a real player, even though no one (including people a lot more intelligent than me) have concurred that North Korea does not count when it comes to the internet and cyberspace.
  2. If false, what incompetence is the US hiding from us all and is that not the true crime?

Consider this quote (from the Guardian article too): “Some private security experts have begun to question whether Pyongyang was behind the Sony cyber-attack at all. The consulting firm Taia Global said the results of a linguistic analysis of communications from the suspected hackers suggested they were more likely to come from Russia than North Korea. The cyber security firm Norse said it suspected a Sony insider might have helped launch the attack

I cannot disagree with Taia Global, as this could be Russia hitting back at US sanctions, but that would be speculation on my side, I also very much agree with Norse. Consider that if someone walks into a bank vault and it is empty. There was no sign of break in, the doors were not forced. At this point the police and the FBI will initially look at ‘the insider’ plot. It makes perfect sense. To get past the Sony server parks to this degree someone was giving aid in some way. Initial passwords, the network structure, because if that was not the case there would be a lot more logging evidence to giver clear view whether North Korea was guilty (or not involved).

Mark Rasch hits the nail on the head with this quote ““I think the government acted prematurely in announcing unequivocally that it was North Korea before the investigation was complete,” said Mark Rasch, a former federal cybercrime prosecutor. “There are many theories about who did it and how they did it. The government has to be pursuing all of them.”” there is the crux, the mention of theries on who did it. Even if it is outside help, Russia would still make more sense, the Russian Mafia could be the front for cashing in on selling the data, they pay commission to the people ‘hurt’ through US sanctions, they are looking at the least likely suspect because of a comedy, one that I (and many others) had not even heard of before these events.

It is the last quote that is food for thought from Kevin Mandia of Mandiant “Mandia, who has supervised investigations into some of the world’s biggest cyber-attacks, said the Sony case was unprecedented. “Nobody expected when somebody breaks in to absolutely destroy all your data, or try to anyway, and that’s just something that no one else has seen,” he said

That part is not entirely true, I remember the DBase virus of 1988, I remember some people who had fallen victim to them, a garble parser that does not show until the virus is removed, it leaves your data garbled from that point forward. There was also a data virus in the 80’s. I forgot the specifics, but whilst most viruses would attack ‘.com’ and ‘.exe’ files, this one would attack data files, until that day a truly scary moment. So, it is not entirely unprecedented. Consider, if you copy someone’s data, the best sale is to sell it to the competitors, yet, what happens if the owner no longer has that data, does that not drive up the price? Yet, it is bad tactics, to copy in secret and resell it all makes perfect sense, the fact that these events happened, whilst Sony IT, the Cyber divisions of the FBI and others are not able to track the events is something very novel. It is a first to this degree, do you now understand why it makes no sense to accuse the one nation where we see this as their highlight: “Aug 6, 2013 – North Koreans hungry for tech skills are buying up used desktops on the black market, these desktops smuggled in from China have become a much sought-after item in North Korea“, this is the nation that thwarted one of the biggest cyber power players?

People please wake up. The question becomes what was real? I call my version insightful speculation. I have been involved in IT since the 80’s, this level of hacking requires serious system skills with in depth knowledge of all layer one components (hardware layer), if we ignore the inside job part, this takes North Korea out of the loop, it also removes a massive amount of hackers of the table too. It requires the skills we would require to see from people at the NSA and other high tiered cyber firms. From these facts I come to three options:

  1. The hackers are a new level of hacker with the ability to get past the security of nearly any large firm and government data system.
  2. Sony has been criminally negligent and the US is willing to ‘aid’ this Japanese firm for a price.
  3. A simple inside job (possibly even a disgruntled employee) with links to organised crime.

Please feel free to give me a valid fourth alternative.

 

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Last Clooney of the year

My idea of stopping my writing until the new year has truly been bombarded into a sense of that what is not meant to be, so back to the keyboard I go. One reason is the article ‘‘Nobody stood up’: George Clooney attacks media and Hollywood over Sony hack fallout’ (at http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/dec/19/george-clooney-sony-pictures-hack-the-interview), which I missed until this morning. So has the actor from ER become this outspoken because of his marriage to Human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin? Nah! That would be incorrect, he has been the champion of major causes for a long time, outspoken, thinking through and definitely a clever cookie with a passion for Nespresso!

The article kicks off with a massive strike towards to goal of any opponent “George Clooney has spoken of his frustrations with the press and his Hollywood peers at failing to contain the scandal around The Interview, which Sony has pulled from cinema release as well as home-video formats“. It goes a lot deeper then he spoke it does, perhaps he fathomed the same issues I have had for some time now, some mentioned in my previous blog ‘When movies fall short‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/12/15/when-movies-fall-short/), two weeks ago.

I will take it one-step further, several players (not just Sony) have been skating at the edge of competence for some time now, as I see it, they preferred contribution (revenue minus costs) regarding issues of security. It remains debatable whether this was intentional or just plain short-sightedness, that call requires levels of evidence I have no access to.

By the way, Mr. Clooney, you do realise that this topic has the making of an excellent movie, not unlike the largely unnoticed gem ‘Margin Call‘ with Kevin Spacey, Paul Bettany and Zachary Quinto.

The one quote I object to (to some extent) is “With just a little bit of work, you could have found out that it wasn’t just probably North Korea; it was North Korea … It’s a serious moment in time that needs to be addressed seriously, as opposed to frivolously”. You see, the inside job is a much more likely part. Yes, perhaps it was North Korea (requiring evidence), yet this would still not be the success they proclaim it to be without the inside information from disgruntled (or greedy) employees. In addition to the faltering security Sony has needed to ‘apologise’ for twice now (the Sony PSN hack of 2011), none of which was correctly covered by the press regarding this instance either. There was the press gap of November 2013, so we have at least two events where the press catered with silence, but at the price (read: reward) of….?

Yet the part: “He joins others who voiced their dismay at Sony’s decision, including Stephen King, Judd Apatow and Aaron Sorkin. Rob Lowe, who has a small role in The Interview, compared Sony to British prime minister Neville Chamberlain and his capitulation to Nazi Germany before the second world war“, is more than just a simple truth, it shows a fear of venue, cater to the profit. Chamberlain was from the old era and he failed to perceive the evil that Adolf Hitler always was. That view was partially shown by Maggie Smith in ‘Tea with Mussolini‘ too, yet the opposite was strongly shown in Remains of the Day, when Christopher Reeve as Jack Lewis states: “You are, all of you, amateurs. And international affairs should never be run by gentlemen amateurs. Do you have any idea of what sort of place the world is becoming all around you? The days when you could just act out of your noble instincts, are over. Europe has become the arena of realpolitik, the politics of reality. If you like: real politics. What you need is not gentlemen politicians, but real ones. You need professionals to run your affairs, or you’re headed for disaster!

This hits the Sony issue straight on the head. Not that the Gigabytes of data are gone, but that they got access to this data at all. IT requires a new level of professionals and innovator, a lesson that is yet to be learned by those having collected Exabyte’s of data. It is a currency that is up for the taking with the current wave of executives that seem to lack comprehension of this currency. Almost like the 75-year-old banker who is introduced to a bitcoin, wondering where the gold equivalent is kept. The new order will be about IP, Data and keeping both safe. So, it is very much like the old Chamberlain and Hitler equation, we can see Chamberlain, but we cannot identify the new Hitler because he/she is a virtual presentation of an identity somewhere else. Likely, a person in multiple locations, a new concept not yet defined in Criminal Law either, so these people will get away with it for some time to come.

Yet the final part also has bearing “Clooney was one of the Hollywood stars embarrassed by emails being leaked as part of the hack. Conversations between him and Sony executives showed his anxiety over the middling reception for his film The Monuments Men, with Clooney writing: “I fear I’ve let you all down. Not my intention. I apologize. I’ve just lost touch … Who knew? Sorry. I won’t do it again.”“, personally he had no reason to be embarrassed, when your boss spills the beans (unable to prevent security), do you blame the man or the system that is this flawed?

Why has it bearing? Simple, he shows to be a man who fights and sometimes fails. He states to do better, just as any real sincere person would be, a real man! By the way, since 2011 Sony still has to show such levels of improvement. A lacking view from the people George Clooney served in a project, so we should not ignore the need to look at those behind the screens and the press should take a real hard look at what they report and on where their sources are, that same press that has not scrutinised its sources for some time. When was the last time we asked the press to vouch for ‘sources told us‘?

Consider the quote “We cannot be told we can’t see something by Kim Jong-un, of all fucking people … we have allowed North Korea to dictate content, and that is just insane“. As I mentioned in the previous blog, with the bulk of the intelligence community keeping their eyes on North Korea, why is there no clear evidence that North Korea did this? Not just the US both United Kingdom and France have access to an impressive digital arsenal, none have revealed any evidence. Consider that the École polytechnique under supervision of French defence is rumoured to be as savvy as GCHQ, can anyone explain how those three cannot see clearly how North Korea did this? So, either, North Korea is innocent and just surfing the waves of visibility, or the quote by George Clooney in the Guardian “the world just changed on your watch, and you weren’t even paying attention” would be incorrect. The quote would be “the world just changed on your watch, and those in charge do not comprehend the change“. In my view of Occam’s razor, the insider part is much more apt, the other option is just way to scary, especially as the IT field is one field where North Korea should be lacking on several fronts.

I will let you decide, have a wonderful New Year’s eve!

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Fur ball?

OK, I thought I was done for the year, you know, the last article when I threw a little lob ball in a less serious approach to reporting events. However, that part threw me a little fur ball, almost like coughing up the Cheshire cat.

It all started with the Jerusalem Post today, at least that is when I noticed the message. The title states: ‘Israel expects world community to oppose Palestinian efforts at UN, Netanyahu says‘ (at http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Israel-expects-world-community-to-oppose-Palestinian-efforts-at-UN-Netanyahu-says-386058), true, there are issues with the entire UN debacle to some extent; my emphasis is regarding the use of ‘some’. You see, as much as I oppose the entire anti-Semitic approach towards Israel. Having a strong anti-Palestinian view seems equally wrong; however, Palestine has created this issue whilst condoning whatever Hamas did to the largest extent, which is completely unacceptable either, none of those actions make sense. The quote “Israel will oppose conditions that will endanger our future” is very much central into this. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is very correct in that statement. Hamas has always and remains ‘dedicated’ to wiping out Israel, which beckon the thought why the EEC courts would rule against giving Hamas the ‘terrorist’ label. We could argue and speculate on how this is even acceptable. Did this grow out of fear on the Islamic state presence in both Gaza and Sinai? The fact that they are growing in Libya and even in other parts of North Africa is a nightmare scenario coming true (at http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/nov/27/islamic-state-opening-front-in-north-africa/). There have been unconfirmed reports of Islamic State in Algeria, but if so, if they could start getting any level of hold in Morocco, then they are just a footstep away from Spain. That should scare the EEC plenty, they have no funds left to manage any event, and giving up Israel means that they get a little time to ‘clean up’ their border issues. This would be a step that is delusional in many ways. You see, Israel remains essential to balance in the Middle East. The Economic Judges took little notice of that part of the equation; just on the formality of what a terrorist is, (apparently blowing up Sbarro filled with civilians is not a terrorist act). By the way, did anyone notice how there dos not seem to be any paper explaining the formality in that legality? Just the fact that is was ‘a formality’.

The second quote is the one that seems to be a little debatable: “Netanyahu said that Israel and western civilization were under attack from Iran and Islamic radicals, and that this attack also included Palestinian efforts to impose a solution that would endanger Israel’s security and place its future in danger“, one part should be (as I see it): “under attack from extreme supporters within the Iranian government and Islamic radicals“, which would be more correct. I do not believe all Iranian (at present) are like that, yet open support from Iran towards Hamas has been seen, these military elements seem to get some political protection, which proves my point (to some extent), yet I am not certain (or there is at least a decent level of doubt) that it does not blanket all political Iran as I see it. The fact that President Obama announced the possibility of an American Embassy in Tehran is not a bad thing, but these developments should be closely watched, because there is an issue. It is not the fact that this meeting was with Indiana Governor Mike Pence. The act that he is a Republican and that this meeting was absent of Democratic heavy weights might be fuel for speculation were the current Democratic administration stands. Especially as the White house was unwilling to confirm or deny it stance towards Israel. This has all the makings of a political issue that should be a moral one. Israel remains under siege from rockets on a nearly daily basis, it seems that people forget how the US reacted when there was some demolition going on in New York close to the corner of West Street and Liberty street. Let us not forget that this was ONE event. Israel has remained under attack for decades. Israel now has two generations under attack from rocket fire. These events cannot be compared, but perhaps the Americans can remember their anger on September 12th, which is the feeling Israel has had for a long time. It wants to survive plain and simple. It’s neighbour will continue to attack Israel, whilst Israel wants to survive, yet, in fairness, I must look towards the other side too. I believe there can be a Palestine WITHOUT Hamas. That is an option, but Hamas does not want it, it wants to lead and to do that, it must remove Israel. It is not a puzzle, it is a simple equation, one denies the existence of the other solution, so I must side with Israel and as such, as long as there is Hamas, there can be no Palestine. A situation now worsened with the existence of Islamic state in that area.

There is another view that I must bring forth. I am not sure if I can agree with it as there are a few parts that touch on items I never looked at (it is not a small document at http://www.academia.edu/5145129/Gunning_-_The_Conflict_and_the_Question_of_Engaging_with_Hamas_in_EUISS_CP124_European_Involvement_in_the_Arab-Israeli_Conflict), but it has views that are not invalid. As such, I call to attention to the following part “They could, for example, spell out the rewards that would be forthcoming for a new unity government that would share responsibility for delivering basic services and the rule of law in both the West Bank and Gaza“, this is found on page 41. I am not stating that this is happening, but when we consider the events, it is not that far a stretch to see that this might be part of a path that the EEC is currently treading. If so, they will soon see the other side of a terrorist organisation. It remains nice and talkative as long as steps in their direction are made; when that stops when THEY need to show progress there will be delays, miss-communication and other events. Then those big business judges will see innuendo towards ‘give us the rest or else‘, then what? When THEIR ego is in play, what will they decide then? Let us not forget that they are gambling with the existence of the state of Israel. When they are told, there are 10 solutions to this and ‘no’ is not an option, whilst they contemplate what the other 8 options are, when they suddenly realise it was a binary question with a ‘no’ and a ‘yes’, the other 8 solutions never existed in the first place, then what? They might not have pulled the trigger, but they are skating towards the end of Israel for the simple comfort of mind that never existed. You see, terrorists are extremists, they only cater to the view of ‘self’, with no regard of any other view. Israel is trying to survive, plain and simple, a war that continued from 1945 onwards.

Yet, there was also a spark of visibility (in other areas), that gave me pause to consider other dimensions. Not in regarding to what goes boom, but in another direction. In the same way that we look at the EEC decision of Hamas, there is a Jewish issue that the Jerusalem post shows, which gives us another part of this cloak. It is seen at http://www.jpost.com/Israel-Elections/Rabbi-Meir-Mazuz-responds-to-Rabbi-Cohens-attack-on-Yishai-385989. As we see a needed separation of politics and Law, we see an equal need to separate state from church (as many have always seen it in the US and other places). The quotes were “Rabbi Shalom Cohen, he should be well, is a great Torah scholar, a righteous man and a great intellectual, but he does not come down to the people and, therefore, he does not understand the common people”, “He has never held public office and served most of his career as a rabbi in yeshiva and a yeshiva dean, not as a halachic arbiter dealing with the questions of Jewish law that are brought to senior rabbis for a ruling” and “Mazuz seemingly referenced one of Cohen’s recent outbursts in which he said during a prayer service at the Western Wall for the welfare of IDF soldiers during Operation Protective Edge that Israel did not need an army because “It is God almighty who fights for Israel.”“. Now I am not debating the issues as they are, I feel not qualified to do so, but there are issues as they have always been in almost any religion. I would not elect a Rabbi to political office, for the same reasons I would not vote for the election of a Catholic in that same category, each having a slight radical, absolute view. A woman’s ‘right to choose’ abortion would end pretty much immediately, also, there would be a diminished view for defence and an increase or humanitarian needs and diplomacy. Yet, Diplomacy without military power could be regarded as either pointless, or useless. Diplomacy requires a stick to fight with when ‘the’ word is ignored. It is counterproductive when we know that the stick remains ignored and the diplomatic view is ignored completely when we know that there is no stick in the first place. This is the damage that Julian Assange created, which too many ignored. The anti-American league had a field day when they saw WHERE the US had made commitments, knowing where the stick was, toppled many American diplomatic endeavour, whilst they remained in the dark where the other sticks were. That view is only emphasised when we see the Jewish elections. How can the people be served without their military need for defence? Is that not counter to the Torah? If we know that the IDF abides by what is seen as “The Torah establishes the boundaries of what is permitted and forbidden in war for both individual and for society“, which gives us how Hamas waged war, yet the ‘legalised’ view of the EEC disregarded that overall view and reacted to, what I regard to be an economic view of judgement, which gives us the escalating issues. The added incentive here is that no one has actually give any visibility on how the ruling was made, on what legal premise is was founded, is this not strange too?

So, as we consider on who makes rulings on how judiciary choices are made, we must consider that the players have their own agenda. Whether we should consider how the law is seen (by some) and when we see how economies ad terrorists make decisions, in a morally biased way how, is any of it regarded as legal? Is there a boundary between those who fell from a rocket and those who fell through economic ‘treason’? How does that reflect differently on the victim? There is a famous quote we see Lee Marvin make in the movie ‘The Big red one’ (one of my five all-time war movies). There he states “We don’t murder; we kill“, I am certain that it did not matter to the one whose live we end, only to our own morality to pull the trigger. A morality a terrorist or a stockbroker for that matter does not seem to have.

You see, the sniper kills (or murders) for the protection of others, the terrorist and stockbroker acts for the wealth (or survival) of self at the expense of (all) others, elements of the same sides of two different coins.

So as the fur ball coughs up a Cheshire Cat, we must worry for the future, we all seem to disregard certain values and adhere to choices of our own survival, even if that requires us to realign our morality, just the slightest. As Saruman the White becomes Saruman of many colours, we see the fading of white, the finding of what was actually right and we lose ourselves into a world where we remove the fences that were there to protect us all. What happens next? I do not know, or even pretend to know, but I do worry, because 2015 is likely to be a year of turmoil, a year where we had to focus on a better economy, a side that might be pushed aside for whatever escalation comes next.

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Grinch anyone?

It is always nice that we can go on and on about the Grinch who stole the bankers bonus, or how the Hogfather looked at the vegetarian and how he believed it was all for the good of the pork chop. No!

None of that!

Today is the one day where we see people trying to be nice (the attempt at times is entertaining to watch). There is a fair amount of people doing good things, being extra nice. For example, there is a Miss (or Mister) Goody two shoes who opened the front door to Hotel Gitmo (at http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2014/12/oops-u-s-offers-5-mil-reward-al-qaeda-terrorist-released-gitmo/) and now, they are willing to pay 5 million to get one of their previous guests back. For those working at a Wal-Mart, it is rumoured that the money will be available in food stamps would you prefer it. So as Ibrahim al-Rubaysh is enjoying Christmas cheer (somewhere else), he is sorely needed in Hotel Gitmo, because he did not make his bed and that was a condition for a free stay at this hotel. By the way, it is said that he did not make his bed in Yemen either and that the sewage system is all blocked up because of it. Christopher Robinson whispered that to me whilst sharing a sandwich with hunney with me. Yet, our Christmas spirit might still be under scrutiny, at least that is how it is stated in the US. If we believe the source (at https://www.intellihub.com/new-resistance-film-expose-dangers-roundup-food-water-around-us/), then there is a new Christmas movie called ‘A new resistance‘, no it is nothing like Castle Wolfenstein and those bad German people who enjoyed getting shot, it is about a perfectly ‘harmless’ weedkiller, which is now showing to be not so safe or innocent. It is now stated that Glyphosate is not the safe product experts claimed it to be for 50 years. So, if you get sick, you will just have to drink the safe bottled water that rich people drink. If not, you get sick even more and you die! By the way, these rich people also drink a bubbly form of mineral water called Crystal. I never tried it, but it is stated to be the yummiest!

So as we got towards the Christmas cheer, the holy days, our bible (if you have one) or just be with your family one more time, then take a few seconds to contemplate what you will do in 2015. It is a scary world out there and I for one will consider what should be done and what I am able to do.

I have always believed in the words of Lord Baden Powell and for the most I always tried to live with that approach in my heart: “Leave this world a little better than you found it!

I know, that for the most I have done just that, if you the reader can do that too in the balance of things, not next year, not next week, but just now, then this world will soon be a pretty magnificent place to live in. You see, you don’t have to fix it all, just leave it a little better, on the balance of all, it will fix everything one item at a time.

So, if this is my last story of the year I wish you all a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year and we will continue this all in 2015.

PS, just to leave on a crazy note: If you haven’t figured out the most desirable moment (or person) for 2014, you have one week left to figure it out! So get to it!

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If it is your child?

This is the thought that is foremost on my mind as I was reading the article ‘EU court says Hamas should be removed from terror list’ (at http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/12/17/us-eu-hamas-courts-idUSKBN0JV0S020141217), when we read the quote “The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas should be removed from the European Union’s terrorist list, an EU court ruled on Wednesday“. I wonder if Israel would be willing to give housing to the children of these court officials, preferably in an area between Nir Oz and Ein Habsor, you see, these children would have an additional 32% chance of getting killed by Hamas rocket fire. I feel certain that the European court judges are truly dedicated to prove that during the coming year that Hamas is not a terrorist organisation and they should be willing to sacrifice their own children in the process, seems fair doesn’t it (especially as at present the second generation of children are now under daily threat of fire)?

If there is an unfortunate accident, we can send flowers stating that it was a mere industrial accident and we will be so sorry for their loss!

But that is not the reality, it seems that the thousands of missiles shot at Israeli citizens is just a simple show of… affection? So, when people try this in places like Strasbourg, will the 275,000 people consider it a sign of affection, or will they call it an act of terror? If we see the fallout in Martin Place, Sydney, where we watched a mere crazy person with a gun take hostages, where fatalities were found, the un-relentless reaction to innocent Muslims have not been in small numbers, how will the reaction be when we use the Hamas numbers? Some sources (unconfirmed) states that over 160 rockets were fired into Israel in August towards the Eshkol region (a decent reason to house the children of these judges there for a while), how would the people of Strasbourg or Sydney react at that point?

Israel has been faced with these attacks for years, the people in the EU court know that too, so how is it possible to use legislation to scrap Hamas from the terror list. Can we remove the Taliban or Al-Qaeda from that list too? I mean Al Qaeda only hurt two buildings and what are two buildings between two potential economic alliances? A building can be rebuilt, can’t it?

If this level of sarcasm upsets you (which it should), then consider how Israel feels as a terrorist organisation is removed from the terror list, For if Hamas does not need to be on that list, then neither should the Taliban (just ask the Pakistani parents who lost 132 children) and Al Qaeda (numerous family victims).

So, why was this step taken in the first place?

Is that not at the heart of the matter? These rulings happened in a time whilst Hamas is firing rockets into Israel. The question becomes now why this step was taking in the first place?

The reasoning is unclear, yet when we consider the text “The text was a compromise, representing divisions within the EU over how far to blame Israel for failing to agree peace terms“, it is questionable what the reasoning is. When we consider the cease fires in the past, they have always been broken by Hamas again and again.

When we consider the following text “Hamas says it is a legitimate resistance movement and contested the European Union’s decision in 2001 to include it on the terrorist list“, we must also consider the following:

  1. Hamas has intentionally been shooting hundreds of rockets aimed at a civilian population.
  2. Hamas has broken nearly every cease fire.
  3. Hamas has fired over 4,000 rockets into Israel in 2014 alone.

So, as Hamas is pleading for all kinds of aid, we must question how they are running out of materials for food and medication, whilst having enough money to buy explosives and materials for purchasing/building rockets. This has been going on for a long time, yet the European commission has stated now that Hamas is no longer a terrorist organisation. It gets to be a lot more fun (read hilarious), when we consider the following article from August 2014 ‘UN: Israel’s Refusal to Share Iron Dome with Hamas a War Crime‘ (at http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/19462/un-israels-refusal-share-iron-dome-hamas-war-crime/#4wYsjW25C8K9ZtWq.97), so not only is Hamas not a terrorist group, we should ‘share’ top tier technology with them so that their enemies can find a way around it? How is this even a sane idea? Remember, this is a group of people, hiding in schools and other locations that they share with civilians and they are firing missiles from public locations. Her quote “Pillay said that Israel’s actions in Gaza do not “absolve” Israel from what she deems legal violations“. When exactly would we, in general supposed to share technologies with those who attack us. I clearly remember Germany not sharing Enigma and the allies not sharing their radar technologies, perhaps that was a crime too? In that statement we also see “As of 2012, Iron Dome has a 90 percent success rate“, which implies that up to 400 rockets would not have been stopped, which had an impact on civilian casualties, would that not be a terrorist action?

But back to the European court, because the actual issue is still not dealt with. You see, they are bickering on ‘terrorist’ and ‘resistance’. In my personal view, Hamas might have been a resistance movement if they had attacked military objects, but I have some questions regarding these ‘European decision makers’. Perhaps they had forgotten, or people had hastily overlooked the events of Thursday August 9th 2001. Someone from Hamas went into Sbarro with a nail bomb and blew itself with 15 others up, 130 got injured, in addition public transportation was targeted (busses) and they were bombed in similar ways. The list goes on and on for a long time. So how are they not a terrorist group?

Perhaps it is about this part “It said if an appeal was brought before the EU’s top court, the European Court of Justice, the freeze of Hamas funds should continue until the legal process was complete“, yes, perhaps it is about the Hamas funds that are frozen, how much is that in total? It does go deep into the millions, yet how many millions does not seem to be openly registered anywhere (in any reliable way). In my view, this escalation can only go into one direction, Hamas will act out, sooner rather than later, if it brings enough Israeli casualties, it will shift a massive demand for the unjust extermination of Palestine’s on a near global base, whatever excuse used, the option “a legal ruling of the court based on procedural grounds”, will be cast aside by many nations, not just Israel. What follows could have been prevented; one must wonder how this came about in the first place.

It is my direct personal fear that these events are not about ‘procedures’ but on the need of ‘wooing’ whomever is speaking on behalf of Hamas and in regard to what they are offering to certain parties out of sight. This is all pure conjecture from my side, there are no hidden files and there is no one whispering secrets in my ears. With ISIS/ISIL in the mix within Gaza, the waters are about to become a lot more murky, in that regard is it not interesting that this procedural verdict had been passed too?

For the benefit of whom becomes the question? I wonder if we get the answer when it is too late.

 

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Allegiance!

This story took some time; I had to rewrite it after going all misogynistic on Lisa Wilkinson’s ass (almost literally). You see, in hindsight (pun intended), it is all entirely my own fault. I got emotional about emotions, which is pretty fatal at times. I made the number one error, I took at face value what I should not have, we all do this in time, we will all remain to make that mistake, it makes us human. You see, I considered Lisa to be her own brand of Journalist as we see the aftermath of the Martin Place events, which was the biggest error of all. She might have been a journalist at some point, but now she is an entertainer, her reading the news does not make her a journalist, she is reading events on the morning show. So when my stomach turned on her over-emotional dragging event of interviews of the relative of victims, I took out my own dictionary and the initial (never published) article was the result. And in that light, let’s be clear that Karl Stefanovic is not innocent either, he might not have said the words, but sitting next to her, we get that what hits both goose and gander.

Yet, like some, I was able to rectify my views before the damage was done, but it is important to mention the events none the less, because it should affect you the reader too.

You see, we all have an allegiance, and we forget that the Channel Nine Morning Show only has allegiance to the ratings and the advertisers, no matter how they pour that batter, it is all about the money, which takes, as I see it, journalism out of the equation.

So what was this about?

Well, there was a hostage situation in Sydney, which is now taken out of proportions by pretty much any party who gets a say in the word. There is a dangerous precedent here and as I see it, the jo0urtnalistical branch is not standing up to give fair and balanced information. That is weirdly enough done by Russel Brand in ‘Russell Brand The Trews (E212)‘ (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ8ZYAvWTxo). When we start relying on comedians to give us actual news, you know that we are all in trouble!

The only issue that Russel got wrong is the response that Rupert Murdoch had, you see, I saw the disgust all over the net, but THIS is the cost of doing business, this is the face of revenue. In addition we see the headlined from the Daily Telegraph and other papers. Headlines are all about the masses who do not read. Now we see issues on bail laws and on hate sheikh. Yet, these places of publication are no longer about true journalism, this is about product that is for sale and it is a lot easier to sell it to an emotional mass, then to a level headed person.

Now, we see how emotions can be used for good, if you doubt that then look at the sea of flowers in Martin Place. People feeling for the victims, it is clean, it is pure, but it needs there, the press is pushing this into new directions. The interview of the partner of the victim was simple exploitation, it might work out for the victim’s partner, and that is fine by me, but I doubt whether he has any personal agenda here, he is getting over a shocking event and within 2 days the press was all over him for a story, which was all presented in the ‘awwwww’ voice of Lisa Wilkinson and that truly got my emotions rolling in a very negative way.

Yet, it does not stop there; there is a lot more, which is why Russel’s video news is such a gem to see. Around 1:50 we see a summary, the man was instable, other decent sources state that he was a self-styled Muslim Cleric, we see the Australian stating ‘he claimed he converted from Shia to Sunni Islam‘, in light of the news, I find any newspaper to be less reliable, but there is a clear issue, why was he painted ‘a terrorist’? It seems Russel had the same question marks I have, but I will take that road further down this story, where I will present the views and you can happily agree or disagree.

You see, here we get the first issue of allegiance. For this we need to look at ‘The silent minutes of the Lindt Cafe siege that beg many questions‘ (at http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/the-silent-minutes-of-the-lindt-cafe-siege-that-beg-many-questions/story-fnl2dlu7-1227161245948). You see, there are many question, but we are asking them in the wrong direction, which links to another article on 10 ‘failures’, which begs many issues to question, mostly the values of the reporter. The first one I have an issue with is ‘FAILED: SAVED FROM EXTRADITION‘, Iran has been seen as a place of inhumanity for a long time and Australia was not sending a person back on the alleged crime of Fraud, into the hands of the Iranian justice system, which has been regarded in more than one instance of being pretty non-existent, but now suddenly it is good enough to extradite a person for? It seems a little double standard to me. ‘FAILED: DROPPED OFF WATCH LIST‘ is the second one. The events in Martin Place were not a terrorist action, not by the standard we need to ‘hold’ terrorism, a hostage situation is an act of terror for the victims, but it is about the agenda of the transgressor. In that light there are two actual groups; Man Haron Monis is part of neither, as I see it.

Let’s take a look at these two groups for the clarity of it all. There is the aligned lone wolf and the non-aligned lone wolf. Now, here is the dangerous quote, by considering, a terrorist to be sane and balanced. They are seen as sane and balanced, as he/she is regarded by the people around them in their day to day dealing with them. They might not be noticed at all, until the penny drops and they go all out and all radical, often these people will have a decent degree, they are educated, but they will not conform to any ‘set standard of life’. In that regard Horst Mahler might be the most famous one of the lot, a man with legal degrees, Social democrat, socialist, he went from extreme left to extreme right, from Rote Armee Fraktion, he changed lanes towards the teachings of Mao towards the NPD. One could argue that it was his need to be in the spotlight, I believe that as his view on the world changed, so did his alignment. It is not clear whether his view in regards to the holocaust denial is anti-Semite in its foundations, or whether this view has other foundations, this article is not about that part and it would take a long time to go over the alleged evidence. In all this, we get a tainted picture form the press at large, in those days, the RAF called the press at large unreliable, what they attacked and what was ‘denounced’ as any truth in regards to the attacks on the Axel Springer press empire, is now to the larger extent known to be an absolute truth, a view that is only enforced by the acts of Rupert Murdoch and his empire of revenue building proclamations of events for profit.

So this non-aligned lone wolf could group with others, but as a singular person he/she is often a lot harder to track and even harder to stop. Even today, the intelligence branch is lacking options to find that person, the issues on data collection that is now being stopped to some extent will only make it near impossible for people to be protected from these attacks.

The second group is the aligned lone wolf. Now we can look at lone wolfs of ISIL, ISIS, Al Qaeda, but also Aryan, KKK and even the IRA. In some cases events by a single person, who idolised a larger group acted out. Even though we see those people as part of that organisation, it is not always a truthful link. Yet as I see it, they ‘believe’ that the view of such a group is the righteous one and as such they act out. This group is easier to spot, but it still requires access to large amounts of data to see whether these people are indeed lone wolves. The additional problem is the lack of data, these people tend to keep a lower profile and as such there is less direct data linking them, most data will be ‘indirect’.

Man Haron Monis is not part of either. He has been seen as self-proclaimed, should be seen as attention seeker that is acting out. The fact that he is painted as a terrorist only makes matters worse. If we paint any person with serious mental health issues with the T-word, we will not get anything done and whatever budget we think we need, will be regarded to be short by 1000% and still not yield resolutions, interestingly enough, I am now seeing a SMH article confirming this view (at http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/sydney-siege-man-haron-monis-humanitarian-and-terrorist-20141219-12ajn5.html). So the second claim ‘FAILED: DROPPED OFF WATCH LIST‘ was more than correct ASIO has other fish to fry, this was a police matter to some extent and until he did something wrong, there was nothing to hold against him.

So back to the list, I am not going to go over all ten, some are too ludicrous to voice, yet this one ‘FAILED: GIVEN LEGAL AID‘ is an issue, You see, in Australia we have legal aid, which is there for all of us, which included him and tax payers pay that bill, for all who need legal aid, so get over it already. By the way, the press at large have been hammering on too little legal aid for a long time, which makes this ‘failure’ valued at the going price of ‘a sizeable giggle’.

The one that really matters is the one they left for the last ‘FAILED: INFORMATION NOT SHARED‘, it is not an issue! Some data is not to be shared and it is safe to say that the press is the least reputable source to claim what needs to be shared (reason to follow shortly).

ASIO and ASIS will have data they do not share, it puts people at risk and it puts operations at risk. We only need to look at the case of Phillip Arantz to see the operational need of not sharing data, which goes into two directions, data that could end up being suppressed and data that could end up being exploited, both would be disastrous for both ASIO and ASIS. In light of Philip Arantz, was Police Medical Officer, Dr A. A. Vane ever held to account by law or by the press? Seems that the press was visibly absent, one could argue that additional investigations would be valid regarding the Crown Employees Appeal Board, there too, a lack of press visibility. At his death the SMH placed 533 words regarding his life, now compare that to the tens of thousands of words a loon with a gun in a coffee shop got, so information should not be shared, as we cannot trust where that information ends up (or not ends up).

As we move back into allegiance, we need to see that the hardest part is that exploitation works two ways, it gets power from events we see as good, like #illridewithyou where the people are acting out to protect the Muslim community form being unjustly attacked and the interviews we see on how sorry we all feel, yet in that second instance we see that there is almost no news given regarding the 132 Muslim children slaughtered by the Taliban in a real terrorist act. How interesting that this news was hardly reported on. Yet, allegiance goes a lot further and is not just about terrorism. You see, allegiance is more and more about big business and advertising.

Whether the story is painted in light of ethicality as we see in FIFA, we must question why certain events are brought forward to such an extent. Consider the updated article ‘FIFA ethics investigator Michael Garcia resigns in relation to World Cup bidding process report‘ (at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-12-18/fifa-ethics-investigator-michael-garcia-resigns-in-relation-to-/5974852). I wrote about it a few times, when it all started ‘Sacking the editor?‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/11/14/sacking-the-editor/) and  ‘Any sport implies corruption!‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/03/19/any-sport-implies-corruption/), now we see that the ABC reports on the following parts “Garcia says he lost confidence in the independence of the ethics committee’s adjudicatory chamber following a statement issued by Eckert, based on Garcia’s still-secret report, in November” and “Garcia, who formerly served as chief federal prosecutor in Manhattan, had appealed against Eckert’s statement, saying it contained misrepresentations, but that appeal was ruled inadmissible by FIFA on Tuesday“, so we get intentional misrepresentation as stated by one person. The fact that this report is kept a secret is also a problem, especially in light of the claims by the Sunday Times, who still needs to be held accountable for their statements. We see all matters of allegiance, but allegiance to whom, or to what. Not unlike many, we want to know what is done to us. In a video statement by Joseph “Sepp” Blatter (at http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/dec/19/fifa-agrees-publish-michael-garcia-report-world-cup-bid-qatar-russia), we see at 1:54, where we hear ‘football is still the game of the world‘. Is it? It seems more and more that football is big business because many watch it. That has been at the centre of all this and as we see statements of misrepresentation by FIFA and the press at large, we must ask ourselves, what games are they playing? That light becomes a lot brighter when we consider the independent article (at http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/first-coca-cola-now-sony-as-sponsors-turn-their-backs-on-fifa-is-it-finally-game-over-for-the-qatar-world-cup-9882688.html), it seems that the issue (as I reported in my previous blog), diluted return per advertisement as the world cup would be held in Winter, because of temperatures, we see a shift on how some ‘threaten’ to walk away. You see, the stance of Sony is quite nice, but when they are confronted with the danger that FIFA 17 and onwards not getting released on PlayStation as EA could be confronted with Microsoft demanding exclusivity for FIFA games, should they start sponsoring, how many soccer fans would bail on their PlayStation? Let me be frank, there is no evidence that this will happen at all, but is that risk so far-fetched? FIFA games have been going strong since before 1998 on many systems, if PlayStation becomes the one ‘leave one out‘, their advantage will be truly gone and they currently do not have that much advantage left.

So here we see the picture of allegiance, that what we perceive to be (journalists towards their audience) and what it actually is (journalists adhering to the need of big business), yet in that same light we are a slave to the allegiance of our own emotions, that what we fear it is (the ISIS flag in a coffee shop with people under threat of death) and what is actually shown (a black flag with letters we cannot read).

News_GoogleSearch

 

 

When we see that articles are used, and changed (as we see the Google search), then to read the text not to include that part, we see, as I see it, an intent to misinform the public. The press deciding to rely on the push-button called fear to change public opinion, whilst any proper journalist would have correctly reported on the fact that a Shahada flag (the one that was used, apparently comes in two versions, black with white letters and white with black letters, a simple view of contrast. The text is “There is no god but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God“, a simple religious expression, a very Muslim expression. Most of us Christians have so many flags, is it that far-fetched that the Muslims would have a flag? And as we misuse our flags, is it not conceivable that one deranged Muslim would misuse the Shahada? Why was this not clearly mentioned in so many articles?

As I see it, allegiances are here, to some extent they should be here, but the one the press seems to invoke is a dangerous one, especially as they are not held to any account for the proclamations they make in light of ‘the people have a right to know‘, to some extent they do, yet they also have ‘a right to not be misinformed‘, a part that many players remain silent on.

Where do you stand, and what is your allegiance?

 

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