HERE is what Bisher al-Rawi, a British resident released from Guantanamo 2007, said about Binyam Mohamed, another British resident himself released after six years of detention and torture in Gitmo earlier this week. He is speaking about Binyam Mohamed's concern for justice,
He is so British -- I mean so British! The way he stands, the way he talks, his painstaking use of logic. He's such a gentleman. And he is knowledgeable and he stands up for his rights in a really British way. Like with S.O.P. This is something the guards have. It is called Standard Operating Procedure -- S.O.P. And the funny thing about this Standard Operating Procedure is that it changes every day. Every day you have new Standard Operating Procedure. And Binyam, he draws attention to this and insists on his entitlement to be treated the same way as the Standard Operating Procedure dictated the day before. And they hate him for this. But he's just being British.
Touching that Bisher al-Rawi should associate the British with standing up for justice and human rights, particularly given his own and Binyam's experience. I fear the perception is more a matter of style than substance. The British ruling class has been lying and plundering with a deferential smile for centuries. I watched an interview with my friend Harold Pinter last night, where he described how charming 'these people' could be at dinner parties, or with their families and friends. Then in their working lives they would be involved in the most brutal and apalling mayhem. What he was interested in, Pinter said, was observing them when they were alone. He tried to imagine Henry Kissinger sitting alone in a room on a wooden stool.
With me it's Blair. The Pipsqueak Bombadier. Here is a trully British monster. I try to imagine him standing before a war crimes commission. He's an ignorant and vaid man, who I'll concede was led up the garden path by far more devious minds, so I would be disappointed to see him shot. I submit to the forthcoming commission that Blair be exiled and confined to Sark, in perpetuity. There he might reflect on his bloody hands, and perhaps compare himself with Napoleon.
An excellent resource for the story of the British residents abandoned by our government in Guantanamo, and other sites of America's Secret Gulag, can be found at the site of British historian and journalist Andy Worthington
Rather than being proud of being British, I'm wary of so much as carrying a British passport. With some technicalities smoothed out I could get and Irish one, though my main hopes lie in Scottish or Welsh independance. There are at present only distant aspirations for Cornwall and the Isle of Man. I'll be first in the queue at the Scottish Consulate in Manchester for the new dark blue saltaire emblazoned passport, though I suspect I might be trampled in the stampede.
He is so British -- I mean so British! The way he stands, the way he talks, his painstaking use of logic. He's such a gentleman. And he is knowledgeable and he stands up for his rights in a really British way. Like with S.O.P. This is something the guards have. It is called Standard Operating Procedure -- S.O.P. And the funny thing about this Standard Operating Procedure is that it changes every day. Every day you have new Standard Operating Procedure. And Binyam, he draws attention to this and insists on his entitlement to be treated the same way as the Standard Operating Procedure dictated the day before. And they hate him for this. But he's just being British.
Touching that Bisher al-Rawi should associate the British with standing up for justice and human rights, particularly given his own and Binyam's experience. I fear the perception is more a matter of style than substance. The British ruling class has been lying and plundering with a deferential smile for centuries. I watched an interview with my friend Harold Pinter last night, where he described how charming 'these people' could be at dinner parties, or with their families and friends. Then in their working lives they would be involved in the most brutal and apalling mayhem. What he was interested in, Pinter said, was observing them when they were alone. He tried to imagine Henry Kissinger sitting alone in a room on a wooden stool.
With me it's Blair. The Pipsqueak Bombadier. Here is a trully British monster. I try to imagine him standing before a war crimes commission. He's an ignorant and vaid man, who I'll concede was led up the garden path by far more devious minds, so I would be disappointed to see him shot. I submit to the forthcoming commission that Blair be exiled and confined to Sark, in perpetuity. There he might reflect on his bloody hands, and perhaps compare himself with Napoleon.
An excellent resource for the story of the British residents abandoned by our government in Guantanamo, and other sites of America's Secret Gulag, can be found at the site of British historian and journalist Andy Worthington
Rather than being proud of being British, I'm wary of so much as carrying a British passport. With some technicalities smoothed out I could get and Irish one, though my main hopes lie in Scottish or Welsh independance. There are at present only distant aspirations for Cornwall and the Isle of Man. I'll be first in the queue at the Scottish Consulate in Manchester for the new dark blue saltaire emblazoned passport, though I suspect I might be trampled in the stampede.
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