Drink on Emirates flight and go to jail

Ellie Holman: criminal drinker. pic: The Guardian

A woman detained in the UAE after drinking wine on an Emirates flight has been released.

Ellie Holman from Kent was arrested after accepting a complimentary glass of wine on her flight to Dubai.  She says she was mistreated while in custody: she and her daughter were refused permission to go to the toilet for some time.

She was finally freed “on Sheikh Mohammed’s orders” and told she was welcome to go back to the UAE at any time.

Such mistreatment eh!  She’s not allowed to go to the toilet!  In the meantime, local criminals are getting flogged for alcohol consumption.  And that’s far from the worst that can happen: for some crimes you can expect to get death by stoning.

Maybe pampered tourists who cry when they can’t use the toilet should go on holiday somewhere else?  Maybe by going to the UAE and other countries under Sharia law, they are tacitly encouraging these medieval punishments? Then again, maybe not.  If you want to go to the UAE and expect to be immune from the local laws, you’ll probably be okay.  Western tourists aren’t usually punished for these crimes.  Or at worst expect to be deported.  Locals can expect the full fury of the law.  But that doesn’t matter, does it?  As long as you can enjoy a drink without any inconvenience…

OMG! How dare women go to the beach with their clothes on?

As everyone knows, people go to the beach to leer at scantily-clad folk, or to be leered at while scantily-clad.  So how dare anyone go to the beach without flashing their bits at everyone?

The burkini is obscene and shouldn’t be allowed anywhere!  At all!

Wow, that burkini is really offensive!  It’s got a hood.  And it covers the woman’s legs.  How obscene…

Ok, so burkinis look stupid.  But lots of clothes look stupid, should they be banned?  Like those caps with cupholders so you can drink through a straw without having to carry the can in your hand.  Shall we ban them too?

Spot the dickhead

(Actually, maybe we should ban the cup-holder cap.  And French people.  If we just banned France and fizzy pop, all the world’s problems would be solved, in one (two?) fell swoop.

Now, if you wear clothes on the beach, it’s absolutely appropriate for the police to come and make you strip.  In public.  At gunpoint.

I know France is all tense and stuff after the terrorist crap going on there.  But when terrorists attacked the London Tube did the British government ban hijabs and turbans and white baggy trousers?  Answer: No.  Cos although the Brit government is really really stupid, reactionary and anti-human rights, it wasn’t that  really really stupid, reactionary and anti-human rights.  (I hope our present government hasn’t got that stupid yet…).

 

Oh yeah… don’t forget that the thought police know what you’re thinking:

Psi-Judge Cassandra Anderson: the acceptable face of thought crime control…

 

 

What’s the EDL gonna do now?

Last week, co-founders of the English Defence League Tommy Robinson and Kevin Carroll quit the organisation, claiming they no longer wanted to be associated by the Nazi thugs who have joined the EDL. While I find their stated reason to quit being the top boys of the League as disingenuous/an obvious pack of lies, the resignations are interesting in themselves. They are indicative of the signs that the EDL are splintering and losing support. If we ignore the fluke upsurge of interest caused by the murder of Drummer Lee Rigby, killed by “Islamist extremists”,  interest in the EDL is waning, with too many mainstream members unhappy with the violence that seems to come with their demos.

Unite Against Fascism is confident that its actions are putting the EDL on the back foot. “The EDL were growing exponentially until they were met by a greater force,” said Weyman Bennett, joint secretary of UAF. “They would come with a few hundred and we would have a few thousand who didn’t want them in their town, and they didn’t know what to do.”

Eric Randolph, writing in the Independent, writes the opinion of a recently retired officer with the National Domestic Extremism Unit, that the English Defence League is likely to splinter into smaller regional units with some supporters shifting to more extreme movements. A terrorist-styled cell structure that will keep most members safe even if other cells are compromised. It’s a tried and tested approach that has helped extremists distance themselves from other cells that might have done something bad.

The same former cop says:

“The EDL may survive as separate regional organisations. Most of its activity was at a local level anyway. But prior to the murder of Lee Rigby, it was already seeing a marked decline. One of the reasons was the personal antipathy of regional leaders towards Tommy Robinson – he was not terribly well liked but was accepted as the best leader because he had a certain amount of charisma and cunning.”

The Domestic Extremism Unit is by no means suggesting that a power struggle within the EDL might lead to terrorist or other attacks on the public. They do admit there’s a slight risk of terrorism by right-wing extremists but add: there is a “risk of terrorism” but that’s  limited to individuals or very small groups that are not terribly sophisticated”.

“There have been about 15-18 arrests of people with terrorist paraphernalia and the wherewithal to put them together. Often they have bought the components, but haven’t actually put them together. They see the race war as a matter of time, and want to be prepared.”

Big brave EDL supporters pick on a young Muslim woman.

As for Tommy Robinson, he plans to continue talking about the dangers he thinks go hand in hand with Islamism. “I have a passion to combat Islamist ideology and I want to lead a revolution against that ideology, but I don’t want to lead a revolution against Muslims.”

Of course, some wonder what has brought this change in Robinson.  The EDL have always had a problem with Muslims. I reckon we should keep an eye on Robinson.  Leopards’ spots don’t change overnight.  And of course it will be interesting to see what the EDL do now.

“Vote Labour for war against Iran!” says Blair

Saturday 30 January 2010

Tony Blair has been accused of trying to make war with Iran an election issue, after he mentioned Iran and its evils 57 times during his evidence to the Chilcot Inquiry on Iraq yesterday (29 January 2010).

Blair claimed that western powers might soon have to invade Iran because its Islamic regime now poses the same threat to peace as Saddam’s Iraq did seven years ago. He warned that the international community must be prepapared to take “a very hard, tough line” with Iran, a country “linked up with terrorist groups”, to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons. He even claimed that if he hadn’t toppled Saddam in 2003, Iraq and Iran would probably be locked in a race for nuclear power.

Sir Richard Dalton, a former British ambassador to Iran, said on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme that Blair’s claims had put the issue on the electoral agenda, and that political parties now needed to make it clear that war was not an option. “We need to be much clearer, as voters, with our politicians and with our candidates that we expect a different behaviour and a greater integrity in our democracy next time.”

One of Blair’s complaints about Iran was that its government had fomented the insurgency in Iraq. He claimed that Iran, which follows Shia Islam, had supported al-Qaida, despite it following the rival Sunni branch of the faith, because they both had a common interest in destabilising Iraq. He is trying to put any blame for the failure of his policy on Iraq at Iran’s feet, as well as establishing some sort of non-existent link between Iran and Al-Qaeda to justify a new war. Dalton, a former employee of Blair and an expert on the region, has dismissed this as rubbish. Now we must hope that no one else listens to the former prime minister.

I saw an interesting question posted on the Guardian site by a reader called “Eleusis”: how can Blair continue in his role as UN peace envoy to the Palestinian Territories and Israel after his shocking public war mongering? Unfortunately, I don’t think Blair will have the slightest problem reconciling these conflicting ideas. Blair is two-faced and can perform amazing contortions. Should be in a bloody freak show…

Now is a good time to tell you about the campaign to arrest Blair for war crimes. George Monbiot, a journalist writing on British and international politics and current affairs, has set up the site www.arrestblair.org as a focal point for the campaign. In 2008 Monbiot attempted to make a citizen’s arrest of John Bolton for his role in planning the war against Iraq, and gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell tried to arrest Zimbabwe leader Robert Mugabe. Of course neither attempt came to anything; but the citizen’s arrests attracted a lot of media attention. This inspired Monbiot’s Arrest Blair campaign. Monbiot wrote in yesterday’s Guardian:

So today I am launching a website – http://www.arrestblair.org – whose purpose is to raise money as a reward for people attempting a peaceful citizen’s arrest of the former prime minister. I have put up the first £100, and I encourage you to match it. Anyone meeting the rules I’ve laid down will be entitled to one quarter of the total pot: the bounties will remain available until Blair faces a court of law. The higher the ­reward, the greater the number of ­people who are likely to try.

At this stage the arrests will be largely symbolic, though they are likely to have great political resonance. But I hope that as pressure builds up and the crime of aggression is adopted by the courts, these attempts will help to press ­governments to prosecute. There must be no hiding place for those who have committed crimes against peace. No ­civilised country can allow mass ­murderers to move on.

There seems to be quite a bit of support for the idea: at the time of this writing, the bounty pot stands at £10,045.99. And that’s after just a couple of days. In time this pot will grow much bigger – especially after a few arrest attempts have been made and media coverage spreads the word. A fine idea!

There are a few rules – for instance the arrest attempt must be non-violent and it must be covered by a “mainstream” media outlet of some kind – and also a few tips on how to perform the citizen’s arrest. It’s very very important you don’t give the impression that you are trying to physically attack Blair in some way as he goes around with armed guards.

According to http://www.arrestblair.org there is a film crew who would like to follow someone planning to make the arrest. And the campaign also has a Facebook page. If anyone wants to give it a go, I support you wholeheartedly. And if you like the idea but (like me) don’t have the balls to actually do it, you could always donate some money to go into the bounty pool. Check the front page at www.arrestblair.org for details on how to donate. Good luck!

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