Nick Clegg, the antithesis of honesty; and the EU, the David Brent of the global governance structure

When politicians whine about the sharply declining trust in them and politics generally they have only themselves to blame. Another case in point underlining this has emerged today.

Those who watched or read reports of the EU membership debates, between Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage, will be well versed with Clegg’s claim in the first debate that only 7% of UK laws originated from the EU.

Before the second debate, the factcheckers were rushing forth to explain that Clegg had misrepresented the detail taken from a House of Commons publication by only using the figure for Primary legislation.  It was not so much a sleight of hand as an outright attempt to deceive the audience.  He had ignored all secondary legislation and various regulations and other instruments arriving here from Brussels for implementation, that all add to the laws we are bound by.

In the second debate Clegg again used the 7% figure, this time in context explaining it related to ‘Primary’ legislation.  However he played down the secondary legislation and other instruments to give the impression the amount of it was so trivial as to be negligible.  He wanted to convey a false impression that the EU barely impacts laws enacted in the UK, because it suited his purpose in the debate.

If trust in Clegg was shaken among those simple souls who had any in him in the first place, it must surely be laid to utter waste today if they see what has been dug up by EU Referendum.

There we see an article written by Clegg for the Guardian in 2003 when he was an MEP, riding the EU gravy train and indulging his rampant pro-EU obsessions.  In it he tells the readers this (emphasis mine):

MEPs are parliamentary giants. Don’t snigger. There are many legitimate criticisms to be made of the European parliament, but irrelevance or lack of importance, the stock accusations, are laughably wide of the mark.  Probably half of all new legislation now enacted in the UK begins in Brussels. The European parliament has extensive powers to amend or strike down laws in almost every conceivable area of public life.

How curious that in 2003, when Clegg wanted to talk up his importance as an MEP, he was saying that over 50% of legislation enacted in the UK is handed to us from Brussels.  Yet in the debate with Farage in 2014, he wanted voters to think it is a mere 7%.  Well actually it isn’t curious at all.

It is just another example of the contempt with which voters are treated by dishonest politicians who lie to serve their own interests at the expense of ours.

Global Governance – the new elephant in the room?

As Richard points out in the EU Referendum piece, on both occasions Clegg’s claims still misrepresent the truth.

In reality the EU is not the origin of all the >50% of legislation enacted here.  The reality is a substantial amount of law that is enacted in the UK originates above the EU in the global governance pecking order.  Little Europe is just an extra in the cast of the Game of Governance.

The fact is the EU is a sub-regional entity. Perhaps it should be accurately described as the EUSRE.

It is locked in an outdated mindset, based on a structure of centralised control that is only made almost bearable for some because of its internal market.  Setting aside the unnecessary, anti democratic and stifling political control, even the membership benefits of that market may be overstated.

The EU is not a global power, it is a mere middle manager, the David Brent of the global governance business.  Full of its own self importance it passes on orders, churns out demands and instructions, tries to make itself liked by buying cheap coffee for the kitchen and secures the favour of suck ups desperate to have a similar sense of importance.

Although it convinces itself of its essential necessity, if it wasn’t there it wouldn’t be missed. There would just be one less substantial salary and significantly less bureaucracy.  Increasingly the decision making happens above the EU’s head.  More and more with each passing year, the EU’s role is cemented as that of errand boy.

The EU’s member states are thus deprived of a seat at the real ‘top table’ where negotiations take place and decisions are made, at the global level.  Only through independence will EU member states ever be able to speak with their own voice and stand up for their national interests in the globalised world.  This is what the UK should aspire to.  Being in the EU is not, as the likes of Cameron, Miliband and Clegg have it, in Britain’s interest. It is a hindrance. It holds our country back.

Instead of the UK talking with the directors and playing a role in formulating the rules, membership of the EU condemns us to a low-brow life as a minion in David Brent’s reporting line.  It’s time our politicians recognised and admitted that, our media grasped and explained it and voters took a stand to resolve it.

A knowingly untrue media narrative

Time to ease back into blogging after a bit of a rest.  The BBC is once again playing political agendas rather than simply reporting the news today, on the subject of banker bonuses.

Whether you like the Tories or not, the fact is the BBC is biased against them and will score cheap points at every opportunity.  This would be more acceptable if the BBC did the same with Labour and the Lib Dems, but they don’t.  The corporation is content to align itself with parties and causes it identifies as sharing the BBC’s ‘progressive’ worldview.  Hence the pathetic effort to ’embarrass’ George Osborne today.

Due, we are told, to EU rules, banker’s bonuses are capped at 100% of salary.  However, the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is applying to UKFI as representatives of the majority shareholder (the taxpayer) to be allowed to set a bonus level for staff of 200% of salary.  The BBC this morning has described this action as ‘trying to get around the rules’.  However the reality is this is strictly within the EU rules.

Banks are allowed to set bonuses at 200% of salary with shareholder permission.  All RBS is doing is seeking that permission.  A guest speaking on Radio 4’s Today programme made this clear, and rebutted the claim by the BBC that RBS is trying to get around the rules and that George Osborne is being put in an embarrassing position by being asked to approve a 200% of salary bonus figure.

Yet in the news headlines at 8.00am, some time after the guest speaker had corrected the false assertion, the BBC once again reported the story as RBS trying to get around the rules.  The facts and the reality have been deliberately ignored by the public service broadcaster because the truth did not fit with the narrative it wanted to portray for political reasons.

The same has been true with the recent nonsense about EU reform and various ‘ideas’ being spouted that, despite completely setting aside what is possible and permissible within the EU, are given airtime as if they were genuine alternatives to leaving the EU.

This casual bias and partisan propagandising is not permitted as part of the BBC charter, but it continues without official challenge.  It does not serve the public, it manipulates the public and such blatant dishonesty demonstrates the contempt in which the public is held by the BBC.  It is another example of why we cannot trust the media in this country.

The most potent weapon in the media’s arsenal deployed against the public

On Radio 4’s Today programme this morning was an interview with former Sun editor, David Yelland.  He was talking about his views on press regulation and the Royal Charter, attacking the press for their reaction to the output from the Leveson inquiry.

While it was an interesting take on matters, focused on the Leveson Anniversary Lecture he is delivering today at the Free Word Centre and covered in the Guardian today, one small snippet of his speech that he shared on air stood out as being an invaluable insight from a heavyweight media insider:

One of the most potent weapons a newspaper has is to totally ignore an issue or a story. People attack papers for what they print. But what they don’t print is often the bigger story.

This is essential for people to understand.

For campaigns such as those concerned with leaving the EU, challenging climate change orthodoxy, demanding democratic reform, exposing abuses and failings of the establishment and so on, this  bias by omission is all too familiar and occurs all too frequently.  Another example of it has surfaced today.  It is invariably a weapon deployed in the interest of the media itself – but most frequently in support of agendas in the interest of the political class (which the media relies on for stories) and the rest of the establishment.  This cosy little stitch up, by and for people who consider themselves important, is designed to keep people in ignorance and conceal truths that are inconvenient to the establishment.

While this and many other blogs have often pointed at instances of bias by omission in favour of the establishment, very rarely does a member of it break ranks like this and admit the truth in such a transparent and matter of fact way.  Yelland reinforces the reality with another observation, thus:

[…] Whether they are mad or just lack self-awareness, the fact is editors and proprietors in this country see themselves as the small guy, the powerless man struggling against the establishment. What they fail to grasp is that they have become the establishment themselves. They are the powerful, and others are the weak.

He also confirms the pack mentality and derivative nature of the media – which while focused in this instance on the reaction to Leveson, equally applies to just about every major issue covered (or ignored) by this country’s press:

The press has done itself no favours in the biased way this entire matter has been reported, when it has been reported at all. Few papers have dared differ from the fundamental response to the great mess that caused the Leveson inquiry in the first place. There is a party line. And nearly everybody follows it.

The media cannot be relied upon.  Every story that is published needs to be viewed through a filter where one should ask themself; why has this story been covered, whose interest is being served, what is the other point of view, how and why were those providing comment selected, and what information has been excluded from the story?

It may seem cynical to do this, but it is the only way to shield oneself from the cynical manipulation to which the public is subjected by the press, be it broadcast, print or electronic.

Cowardice

David Cameron has today marked himself down as a coward yet again.

Following the CBI’s ludicrous assertions about UK membership of the EU being worth £3000 for each household in the country, Cameron has gone to the organisation’s annual conference to praise as ‘very positive’ their report which called for the UK to stay in the EU.  The Telegraph is reporting his comments.

Anyone can bandy figures around in the way the CBI is doing.  But when one scratches below the surface of what the figures include, it is easy to see this was a desperate attempt to service the vested interests of the CBI’s corporate membership.  Perhaps EU membership is valuable to corporates for the way it enables them to choose where they pay tax so they maximise profits. But these profits do not filter down to UK households.  They leave the UK economy and are sent overseas to the overseas bases of uber-investors.

Anyone Europhile can do a Cridland and go on radio and TV and say that alternatives to membership, such as Switzerland and Norway, aren’t as beneficial as membership, so long as they don’t have to back up their assertion with evidence.  Switzerland is not a good model because although they are independent they have to negotiate every deal they have with the EU.  And the problem with that is?  Norway is not a good model according to Cridland because, well, the only rationale he can come up with is the ‘influence’ lie that has already been comprehensively debunked, but is ignored by our biased media.

And as for that tired old canard that we export half our output to the EU, that too is a deliberate distortion.  That 50% figure includes goods destined for non-EU countries that only transit through other member states.  The lie has long since been exposed, but it continues to be retailed by the likes of the CBI and the BBC, as part of their political motives for keeping the UK in the EU.

But back to Cameron.  He has spent all his time as Conservative Party leader telling the UK what he wants.  That included saying he doesn’t want a referendum on EU membership because he feels membership of the EU is the right thing.  But having been painted into a corner he has had no option but to promise a referendum – so long as the Conservatives are elected into office in 2015.  Only now he talks of seeking ‘consent’ for the UK to stay shackled to Little Europe – a consent he previously said wasn’t required.  How times change.

The bullshit that emanates from Cameron’s mouth is the most putrid kind.  He told the CBI:

Be in no doubt that in the end you cannot stay in these organisations, give up quite a bit of your national sovereignty, unless you take the British people with you.

The British people were told about a Common market, about an economic area, so much has changed about this organisation and so little consent has been granted.

It is time to make those arguments, seek that consent and as Prime Minister of this country that is exactly what I am going to do.

It is an accepted fact that the British people were lied to.  The project is and always has been political union.  The economic argument, the supposed free trade area, was a seemingly acceptable by product which has fraudulently been advanced as the end in itself.  The ‘organisation’ as Cameron puts it has changed, but only in the way it was always intended to do so.  It has simply continued its objective of ever closer union on a path to becoming a single political entity.

Cameron doesn’t even have the guts to admit the truth, in much the same way he doesn’t have the guts to admit that in effect the UK no longer has sovereignty.  We no longer control our laws and we no longer control taxation of entities on these islands.  Without control of these essential pillars of governance, this country cannot consider itself in any sovereign.  We have not given up quite a bit of national sovereignty.  We have ceded control of that without which we cannot claim to be an independent nation state.

Cameron is deluded at best, an appalling liar at worst, if he honestly thinks he can reform how the EU works in advance of a referendum where the changes will be put to the British people.  He has more chance of pulling a living dodo out of his arse.  The whole premise is based on a lie.  No matter what happens, Cameron is going to declare that he has achieved reform and the likes of the CBI will be right there agreeing with him and spewing more lies – without any challenge from the sick-inducing media which is utterly biased in favour of the EU.

It’s not just Cameron and the CBI that are deserving of white feathers.  The BBC deserves one for its prominent coverage on all its radio and TV news of the CBI’s laughable findings that my household and yours are each better off by £3000 every year as a result of EU membership and that CBI members believe the benefits outweigh the costs.  Compare that to the almost zero coverage of the contrary view from Business for Britain that more business leaders now say the costs of EU membership outweigh the benefits – and that despite Business for Britain wanting to remain in the EU!

Ed Balls also deserves – among other things – a white feather.  This supposed economic genius tells us that there is ‘no future for Britain to walk away from our biggest market’ when the EU is not a market, it is a political construct.  He knows the difference, but is part of the agenda and hasn’t the balls to tell the truth.

We are surrounded by lies and deception and spin.  And we are nowhere even close to a referendum fight yet.  We have been sold out by cowards who do not have the guts or honesty to admit that the only question that matters and needs to be addressed is this…

Who should run Britain?

Nothing else matters.  Everything else can be dealt with.  The fight we are in is only about this single, essential matter.

Should the British people run Britain, or should we do what suits the narrow interests of the political climbers and the money grubbing corporatists, and leave the EU to run Britain?  It is all about sovereignty.  Do we rule ourselves or submit to rule from abroad by people whose interests undermine ours?  It is the honest question that Cameron, the CBI, the BBC and Labour dare not ask.  They are cowards.

Tax sovereignty – ducking and diving

On the day that Alex Cameron QC became the first barrister to be recorded and filmed in an English law court, giving an eloquent and gently earnest display before the Court of Appeal in an effort to secure a reduced sentence for his counterfeiting client, Kevin Fisher, Alex’s brother and Prime Minister David Cameron, gave an equally eloquent if rather more earnest display at the summit of the Open Government Partnership on the subject of tax avoidance and tax evasion.

Ultimately, despite their lofty positions, neither Cameron demonstrated sufficient grasp of the law and relied upon arguments that are completely flawed in the hope people would be taken in by them.

Alex failed to convince the Appellate bench that seven years for his client’s role in what is thought to be the largest ever plot to make fake pound coins in the UK, was unduly harsh and the appeal was thrown out.  David?  Well, let’s pick up Richard’s summary…

What Mr Cameron cannot do, of course, is admit that he has no strategy whatsoever “to keep corporate taxes coming in”. He cannot admit to the essence of this paper on the Thin Cap Group Litigation, a case which makes it very clear that the EU’s three freedoms – capital, establishment and services – prevent any action on the part of national governments to prevent corporates offshoring their tax liabilities.

The government cannot possibly admit that the losses of such huge sums lost to the taxman are attributable to EU treaty law. Apart from anything else, it would destroy Mr Cameron’s carefully fabricated claims about the benefits of EU membership.

Perhaps the truth of it is that both Camerons understand the law very well indeed.  But both of them, in their roles, deployed a mixture of smoke and mirrors, distraction and misdirection in an effort to conceal the reality of the situations from the judges and the British people respectively.

The Camerons, in their separate roles, are simply ducking and diving in a way that would put Del Boy and Rodney to shame.  What we have are an extremely wealthy and privileged version of the Trotters, in wigs, gowns and sharp suits.

In very calculated fashion, David Cameron is trying to confuse people, by linking tax avoidance, which is perfectly legal and acceptable, and tax evasion, which is not.  By appearing to clamp down on evasion, and further linking it to ‘money laundering’, he is trying to convince us that he getting to grips with public concerns.

But what has been concerning the public is tax avoidance, thanks largely to the demonisation efforts of various parliamentarians and media entities.  They see money being earned by huge corporates.  They see the revenues exceeding the costs.  Then they see little or no corporation tax being paid on the profits made here, because the corporate is structured to pay royalties and levies to another part of the company based elsewhere in the EU – where only then are profits taxed, by that nation’s authorities, with those tax receipts going into that nation’s revenues rather than ours.

The reality is, as part of the European project’s objectives of eroding borders and creating a de facto single state, several freedoms were enshrined.  These stop nation states from interfering with a company setting up entities anywhere in today’s EU, moving its money around the EU as it sees fit, and making payments (such as royalities and charges) between its various branches within the EU.

But on this reality, on this explanation as to why Amazon, Google, Starbucks etc, can make large profit on their activities in the UK without the UK Exchequer being able to tax it, David Cameron is doggedly, relentlessly and utterly silent.  It is the truth that dare not speak its name.  It destroys most of his argument about the economic benefits of EU membership – which are used as justification for accepting the erosion of sovereignty, the erosion of what little democracy we had, and submission to the will of unelected and unaccountable foreign structures and bureaucrats that make our national parliament and local government nothing more than an executive of the EU machine.

Multinational corporations may benefit, but it does little for the UK taxpayer.  That isn’t something that plays well with ordinary people, who are expected to bear all the pain and sacrifices that have to be made to ensure the corporations and their political friends can enjoy the fruits of regulation they make in their own interest.  That’s an admission Cameron will never make.

Trust in the police is not damaged, it’s broken

Inspector Ken MacKaill, of West Mercia Police; Detective Sergeant Stuart Hinton, of Warwickshire Police; and Sergeant Chris Jones, of West Midlands Police are the three Police Federation representatives who gave a false account of the meeting they held with Andrew Mitchell over the so called ‘Plebgate’ affair.

Yesterday they collectively flicked Mitchell and the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) a middle finger, with a non-apology over their disgraceful, politically motivated actions when they knowingly lied while giving their version of events, in a press conference they called for the sole purpose of demanding that Mitchell resign.

We acknowledge the investigation’s criticism relating to our poor judgement in talking to the media following the meeting with Andrew Mitchell, for which we take this opportunity to apologise.

We would like to emphasise (as we did to the investigation) that in no way did any of us ever plan or intend to mislead anyone about what occurred during this meeting or otherwise.

Their ‘apology’ was only for talking to the media.  They have refused to apologise for their conduct and their attempted deception.  In effect, they are saying ‘Yes, we lied, what are you going to do about it?’  Now it is time these officers had the book thrown at them.  They do not deserve to carry a warrant card.  They have been shown to be dishonest.

Any person convicted of an offence on the contested evidence of any of these three officers, would seem to have sufficient grounds to appeal their conviction.  The fact is Mackaill, Hinton and Jones lied.  This has been proved by the secret recording made by Andrew Mitchell.  There is no escape from this fact.  They have demonstrated that their word as police officers cannot be trusted.  They thought they could get away with lying about the discussion they had with Mitchell, a Cabinet Minister.  So what else have they thought they could get away with in dealings with far more lowly people?

The public cannot have confidence in these officers – or their Chief Constables who are content to keep them in positions of power they have already shown they are willing to abuse.  They have no credibility.  They have no integrity. The public deserve better.

The fact that Mitchell took a recording device into the meeting before he had any certainty that these officers would lie, demonstrates he already had no confidence that they would tell the truth.  If a Cabinet Minister is that suspicious of police, what message does that send to the rest of us?

At the same time the IPCC was, for once, telling it the way it is regarding the conduct of these three officers, there was another officer giving evidence into his shooting of Mark Duggan.  An officer who, despite claiming he clearly saw a gun in Duggan’s hand, thus prompting him to fire, seemingly did not see that gun nestle some 10-20ft away, over a fence, from the scene of the shooting.

That officer’s evidence was contradicted by the previously silent cab driver, who told the court Duggan was trying to flee.  In years gone by I would have accepted the officer’s evidence, relying on honesty and integrity.  Today, not a chance.  Not without irrefutable evidence to back up his assertion.  From Hillsborough to de Menezes, dishonesty has become a stock in trade for too many officers, confident their colleagues will close ranks to shield them.

While minor in comparison, one consistent behaviour of many police officers up and down the country has reinforced my opinion.  Namely, their dogged refusal to act on complaints of criminal actions by bailiffs.

Despite the law being clear that bailiffs cannot practice unless they are appropriately certificated by a judge and remain so, despite the law being clear that bailiffs are not allowed to misrepresent their powers to debtors, despite the law being clear that bailiffs must not threaten or intimidate debtors and despite the law being clear that bailiffs may only levy certain charges above the debt as set down in a schedule, not one bailiff who has broken the law pertaining to these rules and had a debtor file a complaint against them with police, has been arrested and prosecuted.  This despite hundreds if not thousands of people having been victims of such criminal abuses.

That fact, moreso than any lie by a few bent coppers with an axe to grind about changes to police pay and conditions, demonstrates that trust in the police is not merely damaged, rather it has been completely broken.  Broken because the police are selectively refusing to uphold the law when they consider the offender is on their side and the victim has it coming to them.

Perhaps this explains the determination of the Chief Constables of Mackaill, Hinton and Jones’ respective forces to not bring disciplinary action against these untrustworthy officers.  Policing has become partial.  Its supposed independence abused for self serving ends.  Senior police officers repeatedly speak of policing by consent, but what far too many people in this country are experiencing daily is policing with contempt.  The bobby on the beat has been replaced by the paramilitary plod – separate from the community and viewing it as an enemy to be suppressed.

We cannot accept this any longer.  It is time to make a stand.

Royal Mail privatisation: The charade continues

The broadcast arm of the Guardian reported late last night that Labour’s shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna has confirmed the party will not promise to re-nationalise Royal Mail after it is privatised.

Well, duh!  But wait, the rationale for this statement of the bleeding obvious seems to be something other than the actual reason why Royal Mail cannot be re-nationalised, as Umunna’s comments make clear…

I have been very clear that we are not in a position to pledge to renationalise Royal Mail if we get into government in 2015.

I do not know how much Royal Mail shares will be trading at in May 2015, so I do not know how much it would cost to renationalise.

No credible future business secretary would therefore make such a pledge.

For the love of all things Holy…

No credible future business secretary would claim the reason for the inability of a UK government to re-nationalise the Royal Mail is financial rather than political as it would break the UK’s obligation under the EU’s Third Postal Directive.  But that is what the useless Umunna has done.  All eyes are being averted from the EU elephant in the room.

This tells us all we need to know about:

1. The incompetence or lack of honesty of party political hacks like Umunna, who seek ‘power’ by way of election to Parliament in Westminster yet know nothing of how we are governed
2. The incompetence or complicity of the BBC in ignoring the EU elephant in the room and pretending the Royal Mail privatisation could simply be reversed if Labour could afford to

Yet many people will take the Umunna and BBC drivel at face value, believing this is the Tories reviving the sale of family silver to their rich friends in the markets – just as intended by the BBC which has an agenda of seeing Labour win the next election.

It’s not just the Tories who deserve to be given a kicking for this EU Directive coming into force.  All main three parties are to blame for giving up almost all political control of this country over many years.  While the BBC has done its part for the establishment, helping to keep people distracted from the elephant in the room with biased reporting and omission of the truth.

A plague on all their houses.

Mainstream journalists have “a powerful reputation for accuracy” and bloggers are “no more than electronic versions of pub gossip”

Time and again that deluded tool of special interests, Lord Justice Leveson, will eat those words in return for his rank ignorance and opinionated myopia.

There is nothing that destroys the trust people have in a movement, or its credibility, or indeed undermines its objectives, as comprehensively, as being shown to be wilfully spreading inaccurate or knowingly false information.  But that is exactly what the Daily Express stands accused of today.

As Richard explains on EU Referendum, leading Eurosceptic journalist Christopher Booker, was approached by a newspaper who asked him to write a ‘robust’ commentary on the ‘plan’ by the EU Commission to ban the Union Flag from British meat packs.  Booker, along with Richard who often provides much needed forensic research expertise, soon discovered there is actually no such plan and went back to the newspaper concerned to tell them there was no story – foregoing what likely amounts to a four figure fee in the process.

This was after the Daily Express had contacted the European Commission about this ‘story’ only to be told it was not true.  Rather than dropping the piece, having been unable to deliver the narrative it wanted, the Express had commissioned John Ingham to write an article about this non existent plan the Express published despite the editorial team knowing it to be false.

An absence of fact checking is bad enough for the financed and resourced legacy media, but publishing a story for which they have been told there is no evidence and no basis in fact, is reprehensible.  This lack of integrity, this unprincipled behaviour, is damaging to the Eurosceptic cause.  If the Express knowingly published this story having been told it is false, how many other times have they done the same thing?  How much more false material is there waiting to harm the case for withdrawing from the EU?

As if this isn’t bad enough, it seems this false story has elicited outraged commentary from people whose very job necessitates them to sort fact from fiction using vast resources available to them.

Yes, that’s right.  UKIP’s seemingly infinite capacity for failing to do detail and instead shooting from the lip, has seen Paul Nuttall MEP, the party’s Deputy Leader, quoted on the UKIP party website as saying:

The EU is has launched this horrible offensive against national identity and scrapping appearances of the national flag is a way of doing that.

Consumers look for simple symbols like that when they buy meat to know they are buying British. We already have food supply chains that are far too long and British shoppers have lost faith in supermarket stock since the horse meat scandal.

Now I wouldn’t be surprised if shoppers instead are faced with the ring of stars logo instead. Well the general public are losing faith rapidly in the EU and will be seriously offended by these latest moves.

Really it makes more sense to be offended by something real rather than imagined, but hey ho.  With UKIP offering official comment that condemns plans that don’t exist, perhaps the faith the general public will lose will be in what the party has to say on EU matters.  On reflection, despite my regular complaints that UKIP is failing in its role by not using its platform to counter Europhile FUD, it is probably a blessing that its spokesman and MEPs stay silent on such EU related matters.  They should stick to filling vacant parish council seats until they can get their act together.

By knowingly publishing a false story the Daily Express is making fools of its readers and treating them with appalling contempt.  Rather than bolster the Eurosceptic cause they may well have done the opposite. So much for the mainstream media’s ‘powerful reputation for accuracy’.  It was a blogger who flagged up the media’s error and demonstrated integrity by setting the record straight.  Electronic pub gossip, or reliable and accurate guardian of the truth, m’lud?

The only way to defeat the Europhiles and their campaign of FUD is with the truth, with facts and with evidence.  The Express is therefore not an ally of our cause, but a ticking time bomb that could blow it apart.  The paper’s editors and journalists need to shape up or sod off.  We don’t need or want what they’re bringing to the table.

Obama’s staggering hubris

The sheer arrogance on display from President Barack Obama, in a pathetic attempt at self justification over his stance concerning Syria, is absolutely staggering.

Since last year, Obama has been (in typical American fashion) working to an American agenda on Syria.  His pisspoor attempts to grandstand on heavyweight foreign affairs matters, to compensate for what could be generously described as disastrous performance on the world stage, led to him talking tough to al-Assad and setting a ‘red line’ on chemical weapons.

The Telegraph is reporting Obama’s comment that the world needed to show the Syrian regime that they could not use chemical weapons with impunity.  The paper goes on to explain that Obama defended his assertion that ‘a red line’ would be crossed by the use of such weapons, arguing that he was simply emphasising accepted international laws.  But then Obama elevated himself from President of the United States to self declared spokesman for the entire world when he said:

First of all, I didn’t set a red line.  The world set a red line.

So when I said that my calculus would be altered by chemical weapons, which the overall consensus of humanity says is wrong – that’s not something I just made up. I didn’t pluck it out of thin air.

My credibility isn’t on the line. The international community’s credibility is on the line.

I try to avoid the use of profanity on this blog, but what a load of utter bollocks.  One drawback of being the American President is that a lot of what you utter gets reported.  This can prove rather inconvenient for the President when he takes off on one of his flights of fantastic delusion and denies his own words – which as you can see from his comments last year on this infamous ‘red line’, made on 19/20 August 2012, he has done.  The Washington Post is the journal of record here…

We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized. That would change my calculus.

That would change my equation. . . . We’re monitoring that situation very carefully. We have put together a range of contingency plans.

The use of the Royal ‘we’ to describe the American position, followed by evidence that the red line is his calculus, his equation.  The world didn’t set a red line, Obama did.  He made no reference to speaking for the world, because he doesn’t.

The red line is Obama’s alone.  Therefore it is his credibility that is on the line – and that is why he is now pretending he was speaking for the world, rather than the bubble inside the Washington Beltway.   Obama is telling a naked lie and exhibiting hubris of staggering proportions.  It is the sign of a meglomaniac and someone who is irrational.  Obama was the choice of the American people, but from an external perspective what an appalling choice they made.

The President of the United States has demonstrated he has no credibility.

And it’s no better for the Russians either.  President Putin seems to have developed a serious case of amnesia about countries who launch a military attack on another country without UN approval, as these comments, translated on BBC 10 o’clock news tonight, make clear:

In line with international law only the UN Security Council can sanction the use of force against a sovereign state.

Any other pretext or method which might be used to justify the use of force against an independent sovereign state is inadmissable and can only be interpreted as aggression.

Just to refresh Vladimir’s memory…

The most powerful rebuttal yet to David Cameron’s deceitful ‘Norway Fax Law’ claims

If, dear reader, you read nothing else this week, please click on the image below and take a few minutes to read the most powerful rebuttal yet to David Cameron’s claims – also made by others such as Nick Clegg, Roland Rudd, John Cridland and others – that Norway outside the EU has to accept EU laws without having no say over them.

The rebuttal of Cameron’s falsehoods and description of the reality for Norway comes not from a mere observer, but the State Secretary at the Norwegian Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, Anne Beathe K. Tvinnereim.

Tvinnereim not only shoots down Cameron’s claims with factual reality, she also corrects the previously reported pro-EU motivated claims of Norway’s Foreign Minister, Espen Barth Eide.  While the pro-EU sycophantic UK press – particularly the BBC – uncritically reported Eide’s claims that Norway has no influence over EU laws (most of which originate at global level where Norway represents itself and has direct influence), it transpires they were challenged in Norway itself and were a personal opinion not reflected by the majority of Norwegian people.

For the reality that Cameron, Clegg, Cridland, Rudd and other EUphiles pretend does not exist, so they can keep the UK trapped in the political clutches of the EU, click on the image above to read the whole piece.

News management in return for political patronage

Is it the journalists?  Is it their editors?  Or is it the media moguls who own the news media?  Wherever the responsibility resides, the fact is the British press ignores stories that undermine the agenda of the political class.

There is no contradiction between the press turning a blind eye to inconvenient realities on essential matters such being able to leave the EU but still enjoy access to the single market, or the global organisation origins of the myriad of regulations that flow to us via Brussels, and journalists scuttling through the sewers to get stories that undermine or wreck the careers of individual politicians, or the election prospects of particular parties.  It is understood in such circles that while some of the actors are expendible and faces might occasionaly change, the collective objectives are shared throughout the establishment and are therefore untouchable.

If the British press were genuinely committed to transparency and ensuring the people can know and understand what the political class is doing and how it is doing it – i.e. reporting the facts regardless of views and objectives of the respective hack, editor or owner, the press would readily publish stories that debunk the lies and misrepresentations that are continually reported without question, challenge or scrutiny.

This is why, despite definitive and absolute knowledge that journalists at a number of heavyweight publications and news organisations have read blog posts and detailed evidence that catagorically refutes David Cameron’s ludicrous  ‘Norway fax law’ and ‘top table’ claims; and John Cridland of the CBI’s argument that leaving the EU would damage UK commerical and employment interests – even though leaving the EU is political and what matters commercially is the economic issue of maintaining access to the single market – those journalists, their editors or the moguls who own the publications, ensure the story is never published in the news and editorial sections.

Revealing such information – while of vital importance to ensuring the people of this country understand the options open to them and beneficial alternatives that are available concerning the way this country operates and is governed – is detrimental to the interests of the politicians and the parasitic media that feeds off them in return for patronage in the form of career moves, access to the ‘big beasts’ and the occasional scoop that drives readership and therefore advertising revenue.  So it is simply omitted from the record. The chums continue to rub along together, pissing out of the tent on the rest of us while just about tolerating each other within it.

Instead, such news and information is consigned to the comparatively small readerships of columns by fearless journalists such as Christopher Booker and Mary-Ellen Synon, polemecists such as James Dellingpole, or blogs such as EU Referendum, The Boiling Frog, Witterings from Witney etc.

Concealment of the truth in this way is nothing less than a carefully coordinated and orchestrated deception.  The British public is being lied to because the truth is being withheld from ‘the record’.   This demonstrates the news  in this country is not honest.  The media has no integrity.  It cannot be trusted.  It is riddled with agenda and vested interest.  It does not reflect reality.

Disturbingly this will be news to some readers here.  But hopefully, as this deception becomes increasingly recognised and understood, more people will consider what the read and hear through the prism of scepticism, asking themselves how the story worked its way into the arena, who benefits from what has been published or broadcast, and what else is likely to be known but is going unreported.  Those same people may even then be minded to dig for more information and read reports that are cited from themselves to see if the media coverage reflects reality.  Getting to the truth requires effort.  Never moreso than today.

Spread the word and encourage others to look beyond the headlines and seek out what the establishment would rather we did not know.  They can begin here.

So Farage wasn’t clear on Isle of Man ‘offshore’ status yesterday?

On Channel 4 News, yesterday, 21 June 2013, Nigel Farage feigned ignorance about whether the Isle of Man is actually offshore, declaring:

Well, it is difficult to define whether it is off-shore or not.

How odd.  It was all so clear to him on 21 May 2013 when he spoke in the European Parliament about legal tax avoidance and how EU employees manage to pay next to no tax at all due to the frauds allowed by the EU.  He made clear the distinction (from around 25 seconds in on the clip below) between the UK and the entities of the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and the Cayman Islands as he spoke of the wedge being driven between them in regard to taxation policies.

Perhaps when he was talking to Michael Crick, Farage was suffering from some form of amnesia.

No doubt he has one of those ‘cheeky chappie’ explanations that will make it all clear.

Farage’s desperate bluster reveals an underlying dishonesty

He has worked as a commodities trader in the City.

His employers have included investment banks and brokerages such as Drexel Burnham Lambert,  Credit Lyonnais Rouse, Refco and Natexis Metals.

As a commodities trader for these investment houses, the sort of work he would have done includes:

• monitoring international market performance;
• providing investment advice and market recommendations to clients;
• trading on behalf of clients;
• liaising with transport, shipping and insurance companies;
• devising ‘hedging strategies’;
• visiting international suppliers;
• meeting with clients;
• interpreting market reports;
• negotiating price, specification and delivery details;
• investigating new business openings.

Yet tonight on Channel 4 News the UKIP leader, Nigel Farage – while trying to brush off the revelation that despite speaking out against tax avoidance strategies he himself had set up an offshore trust fund to minimise tax liability – tried to give the impression that he did not know the Isle of Man is an offshore jurisdiction by asking if the Isle of Man is offshore.

With his career history, this goes way beyond stretching the bounds of credibility.  Farage may think he is being clever by attempting to play the ignorant simpleton card.  But this isn’t average guy who could be forgiven for not understanding that the Isle of Man is a self governing entity that is only a Crown dependency and therefore in no way part of the UK’s tax jurisdiction.  This is a man who needed to understand investment strategies and tax implications of the deals he was executing as part of his job.  In fact, it is highly likely he had to advise clients about the tax implications of the trades they were making.

Farage has moved beyond hypocrisy for his ‘do as I say not as I do’ stance on perfectly legal and responsible tax avoidance, and on to dishonesty for his pathetic attempt to make it look like he didn’t know what he was signing up to when opening the trust.  It also stretches the bounds of credibility that his financial adviser failed to explain the reason for basing the trust in the Isle of Man was precisely because it is offshore and therefore UK rates of tax would not apply.  Further, if he didn’t think or believe the Isle of Man was an offshore jurisdiction, why his comments earlier today about having ‘felt uncomfortable’ about the trust in the first place?

Without any other revelation of the many that could emerge about Farage, this incident and the dishonest way he has attempted to bluff his way out of it, calls into question his character and integrity.  Farage can certainly no longer set himself apart from the mendacious politicians in this country and portray himself as a breath of fresh air.  He has shown himself to be every bit as slippery and unreliable as the rest of them.  He has now been condemned by his own words.

UKIP needs to remove this man before his taint spreads to envelope and damage the party and the prospects of the wider Eurosceptic movement.

Blinkered… bloody-minded… and justified

It is a strategy of such ingenuity, such cunning and such extraordinary brilliance it could only be described as a stunning masterstroke.

There can be no doubt that the development of the strategy took hundreds of hours of painstaking planning, discussion, re-working and collaboration with interested parties to bring to fruition.  One can only stand, applaud and marvel at the sheer élan to which we are bearing witness.

So take a bow Ed Davey, no mere Energy Secretary, but an intellectual colossus making arguments of such unassailable depth and citing empirical evidence of such weight that every sceptic of the orthodoxy of climate change should declare their complete and unconditional surrender and endorse Davey’s factual reality.

What else can we do?  After all, Davey has deployed an argument so substantive as to be beyond contestation by mere mortals.

He has argued in powerful terms that we are guilty of being ‘blinkered’ and bloody minded, that it is we who have been undermining science for political ends, that it is we who have turned the issue of climate change into a political football and that it is we who have an uncritical campaigning platform in the media to be used by individuals and lobby groups.

No, really.

It takes a special kind of thick-skinned arrogance to be able to take the full range of accusations levelled against the government, for refusing to examine or consider scientific findings that challenge the extent to which man and carbon are allegedly influencing the climate, and level those at sceptics instead.

Moreso to attempt to deflect attention from the BBC, Guardian and Independent in particular, which uncritically report every alarmist claim – however ludicrous and unscientific – as fact and truth in support of the warmist agenda while ignoring anything that contradicts them including scientific findings, and denouncing ‘right-wing’ newspapers who very occasionally allow sceptics to point out where predictions made with a high degree of certainty have failed to materialise, and models have failed to reflect actual observations we see around us.

As for citing the sceptics for supposedly using climate change as a political football, it is downright dishonest to pretend that anyone other than the politicans have used climate change in such a way.  The topic has been booted back and forth in a metaphoric arms-race between the parties to impose climate change related taxes on businesses and households (overt and hidden extra costs on energy bills, air passenger duty, petrol prices, recycling rules, closure of power plants etc).  It has been exploited to force expensive ‘solutions’ on us that create far more of an environmental hazard (lightbulbs, wildlife killing and illness inducing windturbines), outlaw ever more things to limit choice (restricting the kind of boilers that can be used).  And it has been used as an excuse to pledge ever more money – with a significant sum heading overseas – to tackling a phenomenon that is barely understood, the source of which is still unproven, and which consistently fails to result in the catastrophic outcomes predicted.

If challenging all this is construed as blinkered and bloody minded by the likes of Davey, it is also without any shadow of a doubt  completely and utterly justified.

Davey is not just lazy, uncritical, dogmatic and ignorant.  With his quasi-religious zeal and immunity to reason, this swivel-eyed climate change loon’s attempt to stifle dissent and keep the bandwagon rolling on in spite of evidence that challenges it, is downright dangerous.

Open Europe displays its europhile Closed Mind

Returning home this evening I intended to draw attention to a piece in the Barclay Brother Beano.  However Richard has done it justice already, so rather than spend time recreating the story with slightly less panache, here is how Richard sets the scene on EU Referendum…

Unable to fight his corner even on his own blog, after the assertions he made on Norway were challenged, Mats Persson of Open Europe has scuttled off to his Telegraph clog, repeating his propaganda in the hope of reaching a more gullible audience.

However, while desperate to support the Cameron line that Norway, within the EFTA/EEA matrix has “no say” over the framing of EU rules, Persson has been forced to concede that Norway does indeed have some input on the framing of laws. All he will grudgingly allow, though, is that “Oslo has exceptionally limited ability to influence them”.

There’s more where that came from, once again exposing Persson’s shallow and ill-informed assertions for the misleading rubbish they are.

The comments section under the post in the Beano are a joy to behold as they almost universally rip little Mats’ argument to shreds.  Christmas may have come and gone but one Persson is still working as Cameron’s EuroElf.  However the goodies coming out of the sack are shoddy imitations and already broken before they have been opened.

Proof that Norway has influence in the regulatory process from outside the EU

By now readers will be familiar with the scare tactics being employed by various political and institutional figures.  The current line of attack is the false claim that unless the UK remains in the EU it will have no influence over trade and commerce issues in the single market and would be subject to ‘fax democracy’.  Some of the recent quotes include:

I don’t think it’s right to aim for a status like Norway or Switzerland where basically you have to obey all the rules of the single market but you don’t have a say over what they are.
–  David Cameron, Prime Minister

———-

The EU Federalists have already written the script for the UK’s new relationship as an “associate member”.  We will be subject to all the regulations and costs of EU membership without any influence or voting rights.  That is roughly the deal Norway currently has.
–  Tim Ambler, Adam Smith Institute

———-

Either way the idea is for the UK to effectively be given access to the single market but with little say – like Norway but with some twists and without the EEA-wrapping.
–  Open Europe Blog, Tory front organisation

Setting aside the fact Norway and Switzerland’s situation has only been held up as an example of what the UK could achieve outside the EU and that no one has argued it is the only option, the fact is the assertions of Cameron, Ambler, et al are false.  Norway does have influence in the regulatory process.

More than that, at times it actually shapes regulatory frameworks that the EU later finds itself adopting.  Evidence of this has already been provided on EU Referendum.  But to further reinforce the point Richard has provided details of yet another example that explodes the lies and deceptions contained in the quotes above that the media is all too quick to publicise in an effort to scare eurosceptic voters away from supporting the idea of withdrawing from the EU.

The lies of Cameron and co are designed to one end, to keep the EU in control of the UK.  We are bound into a developing political union which is not required to achieve free trade or access the single market.  But the vested interests of the political class demand that the EU becomes the government of the member states against the wishes of voters, so the lies are told and repeated without challenge by the craven media which is desperate to keep ‘access’ to the politicians.  That’s how the game works.

The supposed listening Prime Minister

David Cameron and his Cameroon Tories are very fond of telling voters that the Conservatives are ‘listening’ to them.

One wonders if Cameron will be listening to one of his Witney constituents who has published a robust and uncompromising open letter to Cameron, accusing him of lying to the general public when he stated of the UK’s future:

I don’t think it’s right to aim for a status like Norway or Switzerland where basically you have to obey all the rules of the single market but you don’t have a say over what they are.

Witterings from Witney’s accusation is well founded even if the language is somewhat unparliamentary. But who couldn’t excuse his frustration?

The only way to challenge false assertions is through attention to detail and citing evidence that proves the assertions are untrue. Witterings does this with finesse as he tells Cameron:

Where the rules of the single market are concerned you are fully aware that your statement belies the way most single market legislation is made. It is well known that most proposals, by the time they reach the Council for a vote, are already cast in stone and thus unable to be changed; consequently the voting issue is the last and least important part of the process. Not least, a huge amount of technical legislation is formulated at a global or regional level, in bodies such as UNECE (on which Norway is represented) and then handed down to the EU institutions as “diqules” which cannot, in substance, be changed. Thus Norway, for example, has a considerable say in the nature of regulation, long before it gets anywhere near the EU.

Witterings adds more solid evidence for good measure that you can see by visiting his blog. It would be a delight to sit down with some popcorn and watch Cameron twist and turn, bandy weasel words and obfuscate furiously in an effort to qualify his assertion in a forlorn effort to make it fit with this powerful contradictory evidence. However it is more likely Cameron will not ‘listen’ as he claims and instead remain in the ‘transmit’ mode that seems to infect politicians who play their idiotic games inside the Westminster bubble.

As such this blog (and I hope, you, dear reader) will do its bit to spread the word about these false claims and point to the truth until even the media cannot ignore it any longer and are forced to put Cameron and his ilk on the spot about these falsehoods in front of a large audience.

His masters’ man

Profoundly disappointing, but unsurprising, to see Andrew Gilligan using his platform at the Telegraph to perpetuate a demonstrably untrue assertion about the kind of relationship the UK would have with the European Union if we managed to leave.  Gilligan is, after all, his masters’ man.  He takes the Barclay Brothers’ coin and follows their pro-EU lead, as he shows with the following comment:

Yet the British impetus for full withdrawal may be dangerous: in the modern world, the very idea of “UK independence”, as promoted by the eponymous Eurosceptic party, is surely an illusion. Even if we left, given the amount of trade we do with the EU, we would still have to follow most of its rules – while no longer having any role in setting them.

This is the same fallacious tosh knowingly spun by the Norwegian foreign minister last week in spite of the reality he is completely aware of.

For a journalist who boasts a reputation for ‘investigative’ ability, Gilligan has failed to investigate the truth before doling out the sort of lie that helped Edward Heath Harold Wilson secure his EEC referendum victory (Apologies – in my rush I conflated the 1975 referendum with Heath’s 1973 parliamentary action).  Members of the EEA/EFTA do have a substantial say in the trade rules.  To suggest otherwise is an outrageous lie.

The tactics of the europhiles remain the same.  The truth is not their ally, but something to be concealed from the populace.  Instead of matters of substance on the subject of EU membership we are subjected to a narrative of superfluous nonsense, which Gilligan resorts to at the end of his article to underpin the europhilia that inspired it:

On that day in 1973 when we joined, an opinion poll asked the British people whether they wanted to see in their country Common Market “customs” such as “regular wine with meals”, “more pavement cafes”, “more shops open on Sunday”, “pubs open all day” and “coffee and a roll for breakfast, not bacon and eggs”. The poll respondents said no to all these dangerous foreign innovations (apart from the wine), but now, of course, along with Polish waitresses in London and British pensioners in Spain, they are standard parts of national life. For all our professed hostility to the EU, we are in some ways far more “European” than we were.

To expose how shallow the justifications for EU membership truly are, there’s two questions that eurosceptics should continually keep asking the europhiles to answer:

• Why does it require the surrender of control of our country, identity, money and self determination to an unelected and unaccountable power overseas to realise any supposed benefits?
• Why can’t benefits be achieved through cooperation and agreements, without rule from Brussels?

Norwegian Foreign Minister lies about EEA to help British ‘in’ campaign

There is only one kind of person who is even more enthusiastic about the EU than the legion of EUrocrats, and who will say anything – even blatant lies – to advance its agenda.

That person is a furiously frustrated member of the political class who is a wannabe EUrocrat, but is trapped outside the doors of the Brussels/Strasbourg gravy train by the voters in his/her country who are determined to remain independent.

One such EUthusiast is the Norwegian Foreign Minister, Espen Barth Eide.

Like the rest of the political class in Norway, Eide is desperate to take his country into the EU.  Although Norwegian voters continue to return socialists to office in Oslo, they savour their independence and do not want to be part of the EU.  It is a classic political class/electorate disconnect.  The political class see they can do nicely out of the EU, the voters see it will be a bottomless pit into which they will be required to pour their money while at the same time giving up tcontrol of their own laws and regulations.

As an EU wannabe, Eide is keen to suck up to the EUrocrats at every opportunity in the hope of some financially lucrative reward later down the line.  This explains why Eide lied shamelessly in an effort to con Britons into thinking that leaving the EU and becoming part of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA) – which along with the EU makes up the European Economic Area (EEA) – would strip Britain of any remaining influence in Europe and lead to ‘regulation without representation’.

Eide knows it’s a lie.  The EU knows it’s a lie.  And thanks to this clinical dissection by Richard over at EU Referendum, you too can now see for yourself that it’s a lie.

It’s interesting to note that the BBC was very keen to promote these lies.  Where was their fact checking?  Where is the evidence of their duty to impartiality and accuracy? This is another glaring example of the ludicrous nature of Lord Justice Leveson’s assertion that mainstream journalists enjoy a “powerful reputation for accuracy”.

Clearly Leveson’s cocksure comments were just another steaming pile of establishment-generated bullshit.  Once again it has taken the blogosphere to uncover the truth and publicise it in the face of concerted political and media deception.  Let the good Lord Justice hold a lucrative enquiry into that and force the BBC to be held to account. We won’t hold our breath for that to happen.

David Cameron’s ‘fax democracy’ lie nailed by the facts

If you read about this…

Then please do take a few moments to read this by Witterings from Witney, followed by this from Richard at EU Referendum.

It might not please some of the Cameroon true blue Tory partisan party animals but the truth, rather than Cameron’s shameful lies, should be told.  When you see the scale of the deception you have to ask what other lies are being told.

Similarly it might not please some of the Farage fan club in UKIP but the content of those two blog posts, rather than tweets such as the one below a day after the lies were told, is how you tackle and defeat Europhile untruths.  It makes one wonder whose side he’s on.