U.S. tells Syrian de-facto ruler he's no longer a terrorist.

 

U.S. officials have met with the de-facto rulers of Syria, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham(HTS), and told its leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani that they have dropped the $10-million-dollar reward for information leading to his capture. Barbara Leaf, a top State Department official for the Middle East, said "it's a little incoherent, then, to have a bounty on the guy's head."

Until recently the HTS leader, who was a former member of al-Qaida, was considered a terrorist by the U.S. HTS was one of a number of Syrian rebel and terrorist groups that brought down the regime of Bashar al-Assad. Upon taking control of Syria, al-Jolani declared it a great victory for the Islamic nation whatever that is. Britain has declared HTS a proscribed organisation but both the Labour Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer-oid and the Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner, have welcomed the overthrow of Assad by Syrian rebels and designated terrorist groups.

President-elect Donald Trump, who will take control of the White House on January 20, says he's not interested in getting involved with a fight with Syria. A Trump official recently described Peter Mandelson, who has just been appointed the British Ambassador to Washington, as a "moron". The Labour Government’s National Security Adviser, Jonathan Powell, believes that it's the job of the British Ambassador to Washington to get as far up the arse of the White House as they possibly can, so Mandelson will be well qualified for that job.

In Damascus, demonstrators were seen chanting, "No to religious rule”, and "we want a democracy, not a religious state." The caretaker government in Syria have been urged to respect the rights of all Syrian's and in particular Syrian women. Abu Mohammed al-Jolani was filmed recently telling a female journalist to get her head covered, raising fears that he's intending to introduce Islamic rule.

Labour renege on promise to introduce Scottish-style right to roam.

 

Labour's Tory-lite, Prime Minister, free gear, Sir Keir Starmer-oid, is known for his ability to turn on a dime and for broken promises and pledges. When Labour was in opposition, it promised a Scottish-style right to roam in England.

There's currently a right to roam over just 8% of English countryside. The Dartmoor National Park is said to be the only place in England where you can engage in wild camping and that's under threat. Labour's previous shadow environment team led by Jim McMahon, had committed to a Scottish-style right to roam where there would be an assumed right to walk round the English countryside. A Labour Party spokesman has now said: "Let me be clear that under Keir Starmer's leadership, Labour has never committed to a Scottish-style right to roam."

What many people forget is that it was mass trespass and civil disobedience in 1932 by Manchester ramblers like Benny Rothman, that gave people the right to walk in the Peak District and which led to the formation of the Peak District National Park. Benny and other ramblers were imprisoned for the trespass and risked being beaten up by thugs employed by the Duke of Devonshire. Benny Rothman served four months in jail for leading the Kinder trespass.

Can you tell the difference between a terrorist group and a liberation movement?

 

This is a question from my Christmas quiz. What's the difference between a 'terrorist group' and a 'liberation movement'? 

The proscribed terrorist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), have just deposed the Syrian leader Bashir al-Assad in Syria. Both the Labour Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, have welcomed the overthrow of Assad by Syrian rebels and terrorists.  

John Sawyer, a former head of MI6, recently told Sky News that the government should review its proscription of HTS because it had cut ties with al-Qaida over the past decade. Sawyer argued that it would be "rather ridiculous" not to be able to engage with the rebels who had taken control of Syria because of the group's proscription. Sawyer said: 

"I think Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the leader, has made great efforts over the last ten years to distance himself from those terrorist groups and certainly the actions we've seen of HTS over the last two weeks have been those of a liberation movement, not a terrorist organisation."

A person commits an offence under s.12(1) A of the Terrorism Act 2000, if they express an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation and in doing so is reckless as to whether a person to whom the expression is directed will be encouraged to support a proscribed organisation. 

I know of a number of people, journalists and political activists, who have been charged and arrested under section 12 for comments and opinions they have expressed on social media in relation to the Israeli bombardment of Gaza. 

The British government have designated HTS a proscribed organisation and its leader, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, is considered a terrorist with a price on his head. In expressing support for HTS and al-Jolani, is John Sawyer committing an offence under s.12 of the Terrorism Act 2000?

 

Britain's obsession with social-class.

 

In England they talk a lot of cant and humbug about social class. England always has been a very class divided and snobbish society, but you will find that many politicians and the elites that run this country, will often try to deny this in public because inequality has to be justified. We're told that people get on because of their ability.  

Prince William has been seen selling the Big Issue and campaigns against homelessness to justify his privileged lifestyle. The Royal Family have numerous under occupied homes but I don't think that they will be opening them up to house the homeless. We've been told that Britain is now a classless society and that all political parties are utilitarian in that they want the greatest good for the greatest number. They will tell you that Britain is a meritocratic society and that it isn't where you come from that matters but where you're going - worth not birth, they will say.

Only around 7% of people who live in Britain, have ever attended what are called public schools, but you will find them disproportionately represented in most of the top jobs in the country such as in the judiciary, government, civil service, journalism and the legal profession. Many of Britain's Prime Ministers have been drawn from one public school called Eton.

There was probably more upward social mobility in the 1950s and 1960s, but this was linked to the vast expansion of the state and the economy after the war. People were needed to fill the jobs in the NHS, education and in government services, and there weren't enough middle-class people to fill them. In today's Britain, the social bank of mum and dad opens as many doors as the financial bank of mum and dad. The social class into which you're born, will very much determine your outcomes in life.

The TV historian, Dan Snow, who married Lady Edwina Grosvenor, has called himself a "Nepo Baby" because he says people believe he owes his success in life to nepotism. The writer and Guardian journalist, Polly Toynbee, has frequently said that her success in life was helped by having the name Toynbee and a famous father and grandfather. White privileged old Etonians, like David Cameron and Boris Johnson, owe everything in life to the social class that they were born into and family connections. Cameron and Johnson will never need to use a jobcentre.

 

Britain joins CPTPP

 

Britain left one trade bloc called the E.U. and has just joined another one called the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). It wasn't long ago that the British government were trying to join the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

 In 2016, many British voters voted to leave the E.U. having been persuaded that they were taking back control of their country and its borders. Although it's not mentioned in this article, the CPTPP agreement contains the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provision that allows corporations to sue states if government policies are seen as likely to affect future profits. This might arise from concerns about environmental protection or human rights. A tobacco company might invoke the ISDS if they thought a ban on tobacco advertising was likely to have an adverse effect on profitability. A company might sue the British government if it had a ban on the use of certain chemicals used in food production.

Are we really a society of self-interested individuals pursuing our own personal greed?

 

Lionel Barrymore 

Frank Capra's 1946 film called "It's a Wonderful Life", is a Christmas classic and one of my favourite films.

The Russian-born American writer Ayn Rand, who wrote the pro-capitalist dystopian novel called 'Atlas Shrugged', told the FBI that Capra's film starring James Stewart, Donna Reed and Lionel Barrymore, was communist propaganda. Rand had worked in Hollywood as a scriptwriter and had written the Hollywood guide to making pro-capitalist movies - a sort of Ten Commandments. When the film was initially released it wasn't a great success and Capra lost money on it. Some of the actors didn't even watch a screening of the film. I believe that Donna Reed didn't watch the film until the 1970s. Nor was the film made as a Christmas classic even though the action takes place on a Christmas Eve, in a place called Bedford Falls.

One of the things that fascinates me about this film is its moral strain. James Stewart, plays George Bailey, who runs a small savings and loans bank, whereas, Mr Potter his rival is portrayed as a scheming rapacious self-interested capitalist. Bailey, who faces financial ruin when some money goes missing and then contemplates suicide, isn't really an anti-capitalist, but he's a community minded person who wants to good by his neighbours. He possibly believes in a kind of ethical or moral capitalism. As a businessman, Henry Potter is far shrewder and shows far more business acumen than Bailey. Potter's mantra would be “fair is foul and foul is fair.” Yet in spite of his shortcomings, it's George Bailey that we all warm to and who we empathise with and Mr Potter who we generally despise. Bailey is rescued from oblivion by his guardian angel called Clarence and by the generosity of his neighbours in Bedford Falls who donate money to keep Bailey's bank solvent.

There's no doubt about it that this story and the film itself, was inspired by ‘A Christmas Carol’, by Charles Dickens. Ayn Rand despised altruism and compassion and saw selfishness and self-interest as the only true virtue. She railed against state welfare systems, yet in later life, as her health declined, she finished up on social security and Medicare.

There are those who would have us believe that we're all self-interested individuals pursuing our own personal greed and interests like Mr Potter. If that was the case, then why we do we have lifeboat volunteers or a RNLI that is funded and financed by public donations and why do people donate to charities? A society that's made up of an aggregate of self-interested egoists, is no society at all. No matter how much it pains free market capitalist crackpots like Ayn Rand, there always will be acts of altruism and an inner decency that resides within most human beings and that's why some many of us can identify with the fictional character of George Bailey.

When America shouts Britain jumps.

 

Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery

Field Marshal Montgomery said the first rule of war was don't invade Russia. Who in their right mind would do that? If you know anything about military history, you would know how pointless that is. You can't encircle the country or invade it without enormous logistical challenges and I don't believe that many Russians feel that they're really under threat from of an invasion by NATO forces.

I once saw Vladimir Putin being interviewed by Tucker Carlson who asked him if NATO expansionism towards the East had led to Russia invading the Ukraine. He laughed at that and dismissed it out of hand. He gave Carlson a lesson in Russia history as he sees it. Putin as a Russian nationalist, doesn't recognise the Ukraine as an independent country and he's a revanchist, who is reclaiming lost Russian territory. They've all got enough nuclear missiles to destroy one another so they don't have to invade any country.

Putin has now got his best mate in the White House. Putin is one world leader that Donald Trump doesn't take the piss out of. As for the British government, its raison d'etre is to get as far up the arse of the White House as it possibly can. When the Americans shout, they jump.

Russia offers asylum to Bashir al Assad.

 

HTS leader- Abu Mohammed al Jalani

The Syrian President Bashar al Assad has been given political asylum by Russia. It's believed that the former Syrian President and his family are now in Moscow. I wonder how much of the countries money and resources they've took away with them.

The country appears to be under the control of the Sunni Islamist militant faction called Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS), but this is only one of a number of insurgent factions who are fighting for power and control in Syria. Will the downfall of Bashar al Assad create a power vacuum in Syria as it did follow the downfall of Saddam Hussain in Iraq? It also led to a bloodbath between Sunni and Shia Muslims. HTS leader, Abu Mohammed al Jolani, described the fall of Assad as a "victory to the Islamic nation." I'm not sure what the Islamic nation is or if such a thing exists.

In August 2013, a Conservative government motion calling for British military action in Syria to support the 'moderate' insurgent rebels seeking to overthrow Bashar al Assad, was defeated in the House of Commons. The Conservative Prime Minister, David Cameron, was disappointed with the vote but said: "It's clear to me that the British parliament...does not want to see British military action." I think that many British MPs were reluctant for Britain to take military action in Syria, because they felt wisely, that they didn't know who they were really backing, or what Britain was really getting dragged into. They must have also asked themselves who or what was going to replace the regime and dictatorship of Bashar al Assad whose family have been running Syria since 1970, with the support of the Alawite sect.

One of those supposed moderate insurgent Islamic groups that were seeking to overthrow Bashir al Assad and which David Cameron was keen to supply with British arms, later morphed into ISIS. Most of the victims of ISIS weren't westerners, but Muslims. Time will tell whether Syria returns to some kind of stability or descends into chaos and civil war.

 

Are customers being ripped off at Tesco?

 

Tesco have a two-tier pricing policy in their supermarkets. There is one price for Tesco club card holders and another price for non-club card holders. When you pay at a checkout at Tesco, if you can find one that is staffed and available, you will always be asked if you're a Tesco club card holder.

You will notice how much more exorbitantly expensive goods are in Tesco and this is because you're subsiding the cheaper goods of club card holders. I can't believe that the competition and marketing authorities in Britain allow Tesco to get away with this. It really is much cheaper to shop elsewhere where you're not subsiding the food of loyalty cards holders. Many older people don't like using self-service tills and don't use smart phones, so they get ripped off by supermarkets like Tesco.

Trump lawyers ask judge to quash convictions.

 

Donald Trump

Lawyers for President-elect Donald Trump have called on a judge to throw out his hush money criminal conviction. In documents submitted to the court, they argue that continuing the case, would "present unconstitutional disruptions to the institution of the Presidency." They also referred to President Biden's recent decision to pardon his son, Hunter Biden, on gun and tax evasion charges.

Last week, special counsel Jack Smith told courts that he was withdrawing two federal cases against Trump - one charging him with hoarding classified documents and another charging him with scheming to overturn the 2020 presidential election that he lost. He cited longstanding Justice Department policy that shields a president from indictment while in office. Trump cannot pardon himself from the hush money convictions because it is a state case.

Trump nominates ex-jailbird as U.S. Ambassador to France.

 

Charles Kushner

What a cesspit politics is these days. They're all like pigs with their snouts in the trough. Donald Trump's team of nominees for government jobs looks more like a rogue's gallery by the day.

President-elect Trump has lambasted "crooked" Joe Biden for his decision to give a full unconditional pardon to his son, Hunter Biden, who was facing serious jail time for gun crime and tax evasion convictions. Having declared that he wouldn't interfere with the judicial process, Biden suddenly changed tack and said the charges against his son were politically motivated.

On Saturday, Trump nominated his son-in-law's father as U.S. Ambassador to France. Charles Kushner is an ex-jail bird, property tycoon and disbarred attorney. In 2005, he pleaded guilty to 18 counts of illegal campaign contributions and tax evasion as well as witness tampering, and received a 2-year jail sentence. Trump pardoned Kushner in 2020, stating that he "has been devoted to important philanthropic organizations and causes." Kushner donated $100,000 to a pro-Trump group in 2015, and $1 million to a pro-Trump super Pac in 2023. Another family member, Massad Boulos, has been appointed to serve as Trump's senior adviser on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs. Billionaire Boulos, is the father-in-law of Trump's daughter Tiffany.

When Trump takes office on January 20, 2025, he will be the first sitting U.S. President to be a convicted felon. Before the U.S. Presidential election in November, Trump was convicted of 31 counts of falsifying business records in order to conceal a hush money payment to the former porn star, Stormy Daniels.  None of these charges and convictions, which Trump also claimed were a stitch up and politically motivated, damaged Trump politically.

Here in Britain, mainstream party politics is just as corrupt, squalid and sleazy. The former Conservative Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, nominated friends and family for peerages. He put his brother Joe in the House of Lords and even nominated his father Stanley Johnson, for a knighthood. During the COVID pandemic, Johnson's government awarded millions of pounds of dodgy government contracts to VIP Tory donors and cronies.

When in opposition, the self-righteous Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer-oid, promised to clean up British politics and to end the sleaze if Labour came to power. Having berated Boris Johnson about who paid for his wallpaper in his Downing Street flat, Starmer-oid and his wife, Lady Victoria sponger, were found to have received free gear and freebies amounting to tens of thousands of pounds, from wealthy Labour donors like Lord Waheed Alli.

Labour's obsequious Business and Trade Minister, Jonathan Reynolds, actually said that freebies like free tickets to Glastonbury and Taylor Swift concerts, were not perks of the job of being in government but were part of the job of being in government. Reynolds denied any knowledge of a Labour Party gimmick to charge people £30,000 to have breakfast with him at the Ivy Restaurant in Manchester. It was dubbed by the press, "cash for croissants." His wife, Claire Reynolds, who is not an elected politician, was recently appointed political adviser to Sir Keir Starmer-oid in Downing Street. Like her husband, Claire Reynolds is also a former Tameside Labour councillor.

Biden pardons son on gun and tax charges.

 

Hunter Biden

Nobody is supposed to be above the law in America, but that doesn't seem to apply to President-elect Donald Trump or Hunter Biden, the son of U.S. President Joe Biden. Hunter Biden was facing jail time for gun and tax charges, but he's now been given a 'full and unconditional' pardon by his father.

Although Hunter was given a trial before a jury, found guilty of the gun charges, and pleaded guilty to tax evasion charges, Joe Biden says the charges brought against his son were politically motivated. Donald Trump claims that every charge brought against him was politically motivated.

American voters have just put Trump in the White House despite having been convicted of 31 counts of falsifying business records in order to pay hush money to a former porn star called Stormy Daniels. Trump will take office on January 20, 2025, and is expected to pardon many of the rioters who stormed the Capitol Building in Washington, on January 6, 2021. Any charges brought against Trump are now likely to be held in abeyance or dropped because no U.S. President has ever been prosecuted while in office.

President-elect Trump has just appointed Charles Kushner as U.S. Ambassador to France. His son, Jared Kushner, is married to Trump’s daughter Ivanka. In 2004, Charles Kushner pleaded guilty to filing false tax returns, retaliating against a witness and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission. In 2020, Trump pardoned Charles Kushner who is also a real estate developer.

Are Britain's jobcentres fit for purpose?

 

Over the years, UK Government efforts to get the long-term unemployed back into work have not been a great success. People that I've spoken to who have been on DWP courses aimed at getting them off benefits and back into work, have told me that training providers have often told them that they find it harder to get well qualified people back into work than people with no qualifications.

Some years ago, an unemployed man that I knew, told me that his jobcentre work coach had advised him not to disclose his university qualifications in business studies and economics, because it might be scaring off potential employers. He refused to do so, and contacted the newspapers. This was at a time when Tony Blair was spouting on about "Education, Education, Education."

I know of one person who is long term unemployed who has a science degree, two science masters' degrees, and spent three years studying for a PhD and she still can't get a job. She tells me that her local jobcentre offer her cleaning and packing jobs.

Another problem with so-called back to work training, is that the courses tend to be motivational and of a one size fits all type. They involve a lot of psychobabble and bullshit. They're basically trying to shove square pegs into round holes and people into dead end low paid unskilled jobs. People were frequently bullied into working for no money in order to keep their state benefits. Under Tony Blair's Flexible New Deal, the unemployed were told, "Work or lose your Benefits." Employers soon realised that the jobcentre was providing a load of free labour and they didn't have to pay anyone.

One of the biggest employers is the UK government, but I'm pretty sure that to this day, the DWP don't advertise their vacancies in the jobcentres. I think this also applies to other government departments.

Negative comments about the unemployed made by politicians often make it more difficult for people to get back into work. Boris Johnson used to talk about 'feckless Brits on the dole', but the Johnson family are so well connected that they have no need for the Jobcentre. They can always find someone to give them a leg up. Some employers don't advertise vacancies in the jobcentres because they take the view that most claimants don't want to work and are only applying for the job in order to retain their state benefits.