Blood & Treasure

'under the weight of previous corruption'

Tom Watson lays out the Daniel Morgan murder case. Ellroy-on-Thames. Ah, the 80's. The age of opportunity.

getting the North right

So North Korea may have declared a moratorium on nuclear weapons development generally, and flinging missiles all over the place in particular. Here's what Good Friends, a small Buddhist charity which operates clandestinely in NK, had to say  (pdf) last week:

According to the sources the leadership’s policy direction is to accept China’s assistance for economic development while working toward peace through dialogue and cooperation with the United States.

Not a specific prediction, but not bad at all: it's exactly what a policy of 'working towards peace' would imply. And hey, it's better than Stratfor.

Trotsky on workfare

The very principle of compulsory labor service is for the Communist quite unquestionable. “He who works not, neither shall he eat.” And as all must eat, all are obliged to work. Compulsory labor service is sketched in our Constitution and in our Labor Code. But hitherto it has always remained a mere principle. Its application has always had an accidental, impartial, episodic character. Only now, when along the whole line we have reached the question of the economic re-birth of the country, have problems of compulsory labor service arisen before us in the most concrete way possible. The only solution of economic difficulties that is correct from the point of view both of principle and of practice is to treat the population of the whole country as the reservoir of the necessary labor power – an almost inexhaustible reservoir – and to introduce strict order into the work of its registration, mobilization, and utilization.

You'll note that this is much more systematic than Chris 'Lev Davidovich' Grayling's current plan to help out his Party's business mates by giving them free labour underwritten by the taxpayer. On the other hand, Leon and friends did pay his conscripts, at least nominally.

linguistic nuances

Dinner with a Russianist friend, who mentioned that US coverage of the Russian protests in December had optimistically translated the "Росси́я для ру́сских" being chanted by some protestors as "Give Russia back to the people."  This interpretation might be more convincing, he said, if several of the older groups of protestors hadn't also been flying - unidentified by the US media - the black-yellow-white flag traditionally associated with Russian nationalism and the Black Hundreds.

daisy, daisy, give me your answer do

The Sun siezes up, sputters incoherently. Enters wanking and grunting phase. Whatevere else it was, it was always coherent. We always knew what it wanted. In other news, Alan Rusbridger has Rupert Murdoch's cock in a jar on his desk. Yowzah.

the inner life of the tax advantaged

A Channel Islands based businessman claims he has been "gagged" by the richest woman in the world, a woman who fornicates wildly with her legal representatives and other men while acting on behalf of her ex-husband, an al-Qaeda paymaster with prior knowledge of the 7/7 attacks. Perhaps also he has been "tied down" by Superinjunctions, which among their many other drawbacks lend credibility to such reports.

stratback

So, is anybody else's impression of the Stratfor e-mail leaks that they just confirm that Stratfor is a waste of money?  I mean, one could ascertain this from reading any of George Friedman's books - The Coming War With Japan!* - but it's nice of Anonymous to make things so clear.

*Fantastic last line in its 1991 Foreign Affairs review: "One of the authors has published several works of fiction and the other is a national security expert at the Heritage Foundation."   Friedman actually doubles down on the threat of a future Japanese empire in The Next 100 Years. 

MGI watch: Yichang

Actually, more like a combination MGI/labour dispute. For the last six days, thousands of former employees of the giant state-owned engineering firm Gezhouba, which was the main contractor on the Three Gorges Dam project have been demonstrating in Yichang, a city in central Hubei, over pensions and health insurance benefits. The demonstrators - all apparently in their sixties and seventies - are apparently designed to bring traffic flow to a halt in a major central Chinese communications artery, which also happens to contain the company headquarters. Nobody moves till grandad gets his wedge.

Thus far, the authorities have not responded violently: perhaps because of the age of the protestors and perhaps because the protestors are making it clear that their gripe is exclusivley with Gezhouba, and therefore with that part of the central government responsible for it. Latest reports in Chinese state media say that teh company has offered some concessions, that the roads are partially open, and that the demonstrations continue.

annals of deviationism

Obviously, Daily Mail stories online are designed as clickbait. But this one is a dead straight exposition of contemporary government psychosis. Spineless capitalists are giving in to tightly knit groups of sinister leftists. The BBC is actually asking government ministers if they can’t see why people might object to mandatory labour for no money. Mimsy old mumsnet has been driven along in the radical frenzy. The police are being ordered to stop demonstrations before they actually happen.

Yes, indeed. Wreckers and saboteurs are at work. False consciousness stalks the land. The relevant economic organs are resistant to co-ordination. Media is failing to follow the line set by the Centre. The plan is in danger of being underfulfilled. The people’s security forces must act without delay. Maybe this is why the government is so fixated on the SWP. If you’re doing parody Stalinism, everybody looks like a comedy Trotskyist. 

best of a bad lot

Echt Obama idealism operative in overreach scandal. Don't you know who my poster's of?  I think you could use the same picture for the second term, except the caption would be DRONE. Impartial. Above the fray. Tactical information supremacy assured: death strikes an option. Night work a speciality. Openness required.