Time for a debate on the system of private donations to party funds, public schools and Oxford University that creates vile politicians like George Osborne, David Cameron and Iain Duncan Smith

Some might say that Chancellor George Osborne's use of the Phillpott case to try to justify taking benefits from the most vulnerable people in the country is a lot like when Bush used 9-11 as an excuse to invade Iraq, or when Hitler used the burning of the Reichstag to seize power and carry out the Holocaust - and if that seems like an outrageous statement to any of Osborne's supporters you'll now know how the rest of us feel about Osborne trying to use a psychopath’s crimes to take from the poorest and most vulnerable people in the country (1).

His attacks on the welfare state are morally wrong as they take from the most vulnerable people in the country while cutting taxes for the wealthiest and allowing tax evasion by them, big banks, or big firms through UK government approved tax havens in UK dependencies like the Channel Islands.

On top of that they are economic stupidity, especially in a recession, as people on benefits will spend every penny as they’re struggling to get by, boosting demand in the economy. By comparison tax cuts for the wealthiest will often lead to them saving more money, or transferring it to investments in other countries. So common sense and justice would suggest the government should be increasing taxes on the highest earners, closing down tax havens in UK dependencies and increasing benefits. Instead they’re doing the opposite.

So it’s time we had a debate on the systems of public schools and Oxford University, along with big private donations to political parties from billionaires big banks and big firms, that create vile politicians like David Cameron, Iain Duncan Smith and George Osborne who attack the poorest to cut taxes for wealthy donors to party funds – and who try to use the deaths of children at the hands of a lunatic to try to justify this.

Philpott would have been a violent, manipulative and “vile” man whether the welfare state existed or not. George Osborne would also probably be a vile man whether private donations to party funds were allowed or not, but he might not be Chancellor of the Exchequer and he , Cameron and Duncan Smith might not have the power to take from the poorest to give to the richest.

There are plenty of sociopaths who have got to much higher positions than Philpott ever attained – for instance Roger Carr, the head of Centrica, who was given a knighthood for supposed services to the public in 2010 while his energy company is one of those which has been shown by studies by Manchester University to systematically over-charge customers over years. So we have a system where organised theft results in knighthoods.

Tony Blair, who got tens of thousands killed for nothing and ordered British forces to co-operate in US-led torture is similarly rewarded with a paid position as a UN envoy – and his bodyguards and their hotel rooms and flights are paid for at public expense while he works for the dictators of Kazakhstan (where protesters are shot dead) and Kuwait among others as a public relations adviser (4).

Time for a debate on the system that rewards these sociopaths with not just thousands a year but tens of millions and which allows them to gain positions of power so easily.

(1) = guardian.co.uk 04 Apr 2013 ‘Mick Philpott's benefits 'lifestyle' should be questioned, says Osborne’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/apr/04/mick-philpott-benefits-lifestyle-questioned

(2) = BBC News 31 Dec 2010 ‘New Year Honours: Broughton and Carr business knights’,http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12093737

(3) = Guardian 02 Dec 2011 ‘Big six energy firms face fresh accusations of profiteering’,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/dec/02/energy-firms-accusations-profiteering-electricity

(4) = Independent 29 Dec 2011 ‘Bullets, beatings and Blair's brutal friend in Kazakhstan’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/bullets-beatings-and-blairs-brutal-friend-in-kazakhstan-6282490.html

Why Galloway is right on Afghanistan and the three main parties’ leaders are wrong

The BBC and Channel 4 News seemed to have exactly the same questions for George Galloway after his victory in the Bradford West by election, including whether he would condemn attacks on British troops by Afghan insurgents.

Galloway’s response was that since British troops are occupying Afghanistan they are bound to be targeted by Afghans, just as if foreign forces were occupying Britain, some British people would be attacking them.

This view is backed up by US intelligence analysis which found that over 90% of the people NATO forces are fighting in Afghanistan are neither Taliban nor even religiously motivated, but fighting for control of territory or mining or smuggling routes, or angry at foreign forces occupying their country or valley. (1)

A study by the US Bureau of Economic Research also found that the number of insurgent attacks on NATO forces is directly related to the number of Afghan civilians killed by NATO forces - with many insurgents having joined the insurgents after civilians in their village were killed (2)

So condemning the attacks on British troops makes no difference whatsoever - it's an empty gesture. Bringing them home might actually save some of their lives though.

This BBC and Channel 4 both seem to believe that this view is beyond the pale because it’s a different one from the leaders of the three main UK political parties, but in fact it’s entirely rational and based on the facts as established by even US intelligence and the US government.

A few weeks before that David Cameron was with President Obama claiming that the war in Afghanistan is about preventing another September 11^th and protecting people back in Britain and the US from terrorism (3).

This ignores the fact that the September 11^th attackers trained in Germany and the US, not in Afghanistan – and that at no point in a ten year long war have NATO or the Karzai government’s forces controlled all of the territory of Afghanistan. There will always be areas in the mountains of Pakistan and Afghanistan where terrorist groups could train. So there is no reason to think that the war in Afghanistan could ever reduce the terrorist threat and plenty of reason to think it will increase it by having non-Muslim forces ending up killing Muslims, including civilians, in a predominantly Muslim country.

Since 90% of the people NATO are fighting in Afghanistan aren’t Taliban either, the war can’t be mainly about stopping the Taliban either. The fact that our governments have no problem with continuing to arm and fund dictatorships or military regimes in Yemen, Bahrain, Saudi and Egypt as they kill and torture unarmed protesters shows how much they really care about promoting democracy or human rights.

Since 90% of the people NATO are fighting in Afghanistan aren’t Taliban either, the war can’t be mainly about stopping the Taliban either. The fact that our governments have no problem with continuing to arm and fund dictatorships or military regimes in Yemen, Bahrain, Saudi and Egypt as they kill and torture unarmed protesters shows how much they really care about promoting democracy or human rights.

This does not make all the sacrifices of their lives by British troops in Afghanistan meaningless. They gave up their lives believing they were stopping Afghanistan falling back under the rule of the Taliban – and maybe they did. Certainly far more girls have been able to go to school in Afghanistan in areas controlled by NATO and the Karzai government than could under the Taliban – and there have also been some horrific murders of schoolgirls by the Taliban – but many of our allies in Afghanistan are as brutal or as fundamentalist as the Taliban are – and most of the people our forces are fighting are not Taliban at all.

(1) = Boston Globe 09 Oct 2009 ‘Taliban not main Afghan enemy’, http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2009/10/09/most_insurgents_in_afghanistan_not_religiously_motivated_military_reports_say/

(2) = BBC News 24 Jul 2010 ‘US military curbs 'reduce' Afghan attacks in some areas’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-10746832

(3) = Independent 15 Mar 2012 ‘David Cameron pays 9/11 tribute at Ground Zero ’, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/david-cameron-pays-911-tribute-at-ground-zero-7573770.html

The failure to charge Trayvon Martin's killer shows racism is still endemic in the Southern states of the US

Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17 year old black boy, was shot dead by George Zimmerman, a latino member of an informal neighbourhood watch group in Florida earlier this month. Police and prosecutors in Florida have so far claimed there is insufficient evidence to charge Zimmerman with any crime.

Zimmerman phoned 911 to tell the police that he thought Martin was acting suspiciously (Martin had bought a drink and some sweets from a shop and was walking home). He says he followed Martin in his truck, got out of it when he couldn’t see where Martin had gone – and that Martin then jumped him from behind as he walked back to his truck and was punching him, leading Zimmerman to fear for his life, at which point he shot Martin twice in self-defence.

This story seems unlikely given that Zimmerman was an armed man, while Martin was an unarmed boy. The fact that Martin was 6 foot 3 inches tall and weighed 140 pounds, while Zimmerman is 5 feet 9 inches tall and weighs 250 pounds may make things marginally less clear cut.

Three witnesses – people who lived on the street Martin was killed on – say they heard what sounded like a boy crying in fear for help and begging for his life, followed by two shots.

While Zimmerman’s story sounds far fetched, some say a ‘Stand Your Ground’ law passed by the State of Florida would mean that if his story was true he could be argued to have been acting within the law.

The relevant section of the law reads ‘A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.’

However, looked at from Martin’s likely point of view, even if Zimmerman’s story was true, Martin might be the one who had the right to defend himself with any means he thought necessary if he thought his life was in danger – which he reasonably could when approached by a man who had been following him and who was armed with a gun.

The current and former members of the Florida state legislature who drafted the law say that Zimmerman can’t use it as a defence whether his version of events is true or not as he was told by the 911 operator that he did not need to follow Martin as police officers were on their way.

What is completely unacceptable about this case is that Florida police and prosecutors have so far refused to bring any charges against Zimmerman. Their claim that there’s insufficient evidence even to bring charges seems far fetched given the three witnesses who heard the events combined with phone call recordings of Zimmerman’s 911 call and Martin’s phone call to his girlfriend.

Zimmerman’s 911 call is on youtube here – at 1 minute 39 seconds he tells the operator ‘They always get away’. At one minute 52 seconds he can be heard saying “fucking coons”.

 It is inconceivable that if the dead boy was white or latino and the killer was black that the police would not have arrested and charged them by now. Unless Zimmerman is charged the message sent to Americans – and to the rest of the world – will be that the Southern states of the US have not really changed since the segregation and lynchings of black people by the Klu Klux Klan in the past – that twenty-first century America is still a country of white supremacists in which black people can be killed without consequences. If that message is sent, expect a big fall in tourism to Florida and the rest of the US.

George Zimmerman’s father Robert has claimed in interviews that there had been repeated burglaries by black youths in the neighbourhood – but he also claimed before the 911 recording was released that Zimmerman had never followed or confronted Martin at any point – something contradicted by his son’s own account to the 911 operator ; and even if there were these burglaries there was no justification for killing Trayvon, though Zimmerman also said in the 911 call that Martin was putting his hand to his waist-band and was holding something (this turned out to be a can of iced tea and a packet of skittles (sweets)).

Even if Zimmerman did believe Martin was a burglar ‘casing’ houses, as he suggested in the call, this would still mean Zimmerman is a dangerous man, prone to suspecting people based on little or nothing and to follow them armed with a gun which he is very willing to use.

For a comprehensive summary of the facts of the case and links to the various mainstream media in Florida and the US reporting them, see this link.

To sign the Martin family’s petition to the Florida police and legal authorities demanding that Zimmerman be charged and tried for Martin’s death click this link