John Simkin

Does anyone know the name of the man who in 1755 designed a constitution where every man over 25 had a vote. It has been claimed that it was the first democratic republic of the modern age. His enlighted system of government found admirers among the radicals of Europe. The same was true of America and the following states named towns after the man who introduced representative democracy: Pennsylvania, Colorado, Indiana, Oklahoma and Wisconsin.

What was the name of this man and where was this representative democracy? More importantly, who destroyed the first attempt at this experiment in democracy.

Here is a clue. Although this man inspired the French Revolution it was the leaders of this revolution who brought an end to this experiment in representative democracy.

Does anyone know the name of the man who in 1755 designed a constitution where every man over 25 had a vote. It has been claimed that it was the first democratic republic of the modern age. His enlighted system of government found admirers among the radicals of Europe. The same was true of America and the following states named towns after the man who introduced representative democracy: Pennsylvania, Colorado, Indiana, Oklahoma and Wisconsin.

What was the name of this man and where was this representative democracy? More importantly, who destroyed the first attempt at this experiment in democracy.

It is believed that Prince Andrew may be forced to claim diplomatic immunity to avoid questioning by the FBI. Jeffrey Epstein's phone book had the home numbers of three senior British politicians, Lord Mandelson, Michael Heseltine and Shaun Woodward. Lord Mandelson’s entry features ten numbers, including direct lines, home numbers, a fax and mobile details for his partner, Reinaldo.

There is a third person in the cropped photograph above. She is Ghislaine Maxwell, daughter of Robert Maxwell. On 5 November 1991, at the age of 68, Maxwell appears to have fallen overboard from his luxury yacht, the Lady Ghislaine, which was cruising off the Canary Islands. The official ruling was death by accidental drowning. Some commentators have alleged suicide, others that he was murdered.

It was later alleged that Maxwell was an agent of MI6. Shortly before Maxwell's death, a former Mossad officer named Ari Ben-Menashe had approached a number of news organisations in Britain and the United States with the allegation that Maxwell and the Daily Mirror's foreign editor, Nick Davies, were both long time agents for the Israel intelligence service, Mossad. Davies apparently is a close friend of Prince Charles. Ben-Menashe also claimed that in 1986 Maxwell had tipped off the Israeli Embassy in London that Mordechai Vanunu had given information about Israel's nuclear capability to the Sunday Times, then to the Daily Mirror. Vanunu was subsequently lured from London to Rome where he was kidnapped and returned to Israel, convicted of treason and imprisoned for 18 years.

Jeffrey Epstein is a member of the the Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations and supports the Friends of Israel Defense Forces. Is it possible that Mossad run pedophile rings?

Virginia Roberts, pictured above, claims that she was aged 15 when she was "given" to men ranging in age from their 40s to their 60s.

In June, 2008, after pleading to a single state charge of soliciting prostitution, Epstein began serving an 18 month sentence.

Below is a picture of Epstein with one of his young girlfriends.

Prince Andrew of York, the Queen’s second son, has been in the news recently because of his business relationships with dictators in Tunisia, Libya and Kazakhstan. His defenders point out that he developed these relations while serving as the UK special representative for international trade and investment.

However, another story emerged yesterday that could turn out to be far more damaging. It seems he is a close friend of Jeffrey Epstein, a billionaire US financier who served a prison sentence for soliciting an underage girl for prostitution. These girls were invited to Epstein’s home to be “massaged”. Virginia Roberts claimed that she was sexually exploited by Epstein and his friends. She also claims that she met Prince Andrew at Epstein’s home where he allegedly “enjoyed regular massages”. Roberts has supported her story with a photograph of Prince Andrew with his arm around her waist.

There has been rumours for some time that some members of the royal family have unusual sexual tastes. These stories have been suppressed by the arrest of people who have been accused of trying to blackmail members of the royal family. This was assumed to involve another of the Queen’s sons. Maybe, it has been a diversion and the real culprit is Andrew.

Article in today's Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/03/sirhan-sirhan-denied-parole-robert-kennedy-shooting

A California board has denied parole for Robert F Kennedy's convicted assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, saying after a four-hour hearing that he hadn't shown adequate remorse or understanding of the severity of the crime that was mourned by a nation more than 40 years ago.

Sirhan, now 66, spoke at length and expressed sorrow, but said he doesn't remember shooting Kennedy or five other victims in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, where Kennedy stood moments after claiming victory in the California presidential primary.

"Every day of my life, I have great remorse and deep regret," Sirhan, a Palestinian Christian immigrant, told a panel of two parole board commissioners at Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga.

The panel chairman, Mike Prizmich, and the deputy commissioner, Randy Kevorkian, told Sirhan he must seek further self-help courses, come to terms with the 4 June 1968 shooting in which Sirhan emptied a pistol in the hotel's crowded kitchen, and show evidence of his improvement by his next parole hearing, which would be in five years.

"The magnitude of this crime is one that a nation mourned over, and from that day on, politicians changed the way they interacted with people," Prizmich said.

He noted the impact on the Kennedy family, which had endured another tragedy five years before with the killing of President Kennedy.

At that point, Sirhan interjected. "That's not my responsibility," he said.

The chairman cut him off.

"In this way, interrupting me indicates a lack of control of yourself," he said.

Sirhan, with graying hair and a missing front tooth, appeared cheerful as he entered the hearing room. He was talkative, bidding the commissioners "good afternoon", a departure from his previous 12 parole hearings, where he rarely spoke and sometimes didn't even appear.

Sirhan emphasised he's a practicsing Christian who attends services every Sunday. He said he was put in solitary confinement at the Central California prison after he became a target of hatred following the September 11 terror attacks in 2001. Fellow inmates thought he was a Muslim, he said.

He pleaded with the panel to give him a release date, saying he was willing to accept the possibility of deportation to his native Jordan. He said no one in his family is involved in politics and he suggested he wouldn't be either if he was released.

"I want to live, get lost in the woodwork and live out my life with my community," he said.

But Prizmich said he wasn't impressed with Sirhan blaming others for all of his problems.

"You have made statements that someone set you up, the CIA set you up, the DA set you up. Everything that occurred in a negative way to you, you say it was someone else's fault," he said. "We believe you minimise your conduct."

Sirhan was originally sentenced to death over objections by Kennedy family members who said they wanted no more killing. The sentence was commuted to life in prison when the US supreme court briefly outlawed the death penalty in 1972.

Just Powell's belated CYA.

The problem with exposing political conspiracies is that it is always too late to do anything about it.

Having partly grown up under Labour in the late 70s and throughout Maggie Thatcher's Tories in the 80s, I can attest I have never liked Labour. "Incompetent" is the kindest word I use against them. Their latest foray into leadership of the country since 1997 only confirms that to me - yet another budgeting FUBAR. Their education policy is ... erratic, at best. Foreign policy an unmitigated disaster. Health and policing policies saw less actual people doing the job, and more filing paperwork for increased salaries. Transport policy I can't really comment on, but seems the same mess it's always been : first sign of snow in the UK, and everything grinds to a halt.

Suffice to say - the sooner the entire Labour party are arrested, charged and tried for treason, crimes against the people, fraud, embezzlement, and acting in the best interests of foreign powers (namely EU and USA), the better the UK will become.

What is now the Lib-Dems used to be two parties that were considered something of a joke. They merged, not because of similar policies overall, but for declining membership and fiscal contributions. Can they do a better job? It's hard to see how they can do worse than the last two Labour governments - Bankrupting, and near-bankrupting the UK.

Tories are, historically, better for the UK - cleaning up Labour's messes, then losing the plot somewhat and making new ones. Tory policies, especially financial/economic ones, are what Labour "borrowed" and used to get elected in 1997, only to throw them out early in the new millennium.

Now, I've nearly always lived in mostly deep-Labour seats, and pretty useless voting against them in those areas - so I've never really voted. I can't see me ever voting Labour in anything. They're just too much anti-everything I believe a UK political party should be.

I am the first to condemn some of the short-comings of the last Labour government. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were definitely under the control of big business and the city. This resulted in a regime that allowed the wealthy to pay low-rates of taxation. The large corporations were allowed (encouraged) to exploit tax loopholes and the lack of regulation was clearly partly responsible for the financial crisis.

However, I am appalled that government ministers continually justify the ideological cuts in public spending to the policies of the Labour government. Although Brown clearly made serious mistakes as chancellor he was no way responsible for the world’s banking crisis. In fact, by arguing for the major countries to increase public spending helped to stop a world depression that would have been as bad as the 1930s. The main problem stems from the deregulation that took place in the United States.

Bailing out the banks was a very expensive business but in the long-term this money will come back and this will considerably reduce the national debt. The government continually argues that the public spending cuts are necessary because of the high-level of national debt. What they don’t tell you that our level of debt is lower than almost OECD countries. When cabinet ministers go on about how much they are having to pay off in interest (less than 3% of GDP), they don’t explain that it was higher under Tory administrations: Margaret Thatcher (5.15%) and John Major (3.8%).

Labour borrowed less and repaid more debt than previous administrations (borrowing was roughly 50% less under Blair/Brown than it was under Major; more than twice Thatcher’s debt repayments were made).

A major cause of the national debt is the low overall tax-take (36% compared with the EU average of 40%). The previous Labour government was partly responsible for this by continuing with the policy of Thatcher/Major of low-rates of taxation on high-earners.

In a survey carried out in 2008 in the US by Pew Research, 91% of those interviewed claimed they were middle-class. In sociological terms, only 45% of people in the US are members of the middle class with 54% being members of the working-class or under-class. Less than 1% of the US population is considered to be members of the upper-class.

In a study in 2005 only 2% of Americans described themselves as "rich", 31% thought it very likely or somewhat likely they would "ever be rich". The latest official statistics show that just 1% of Americans own 42.7% of all financial worth. The next 19% own 50.3%. In other words, the bottom 80% own only 7% of all financial worth.

There appears to be a difference between people's perceptions of reality and the facts of the situation. It seems that the US population has bought into the myth of the "American Dream". It shows the power of the mass media to develop a false political consciousness. It also explains why the US electorate votes mainly for two political parties that support the status quo.

I am interested to hear from American members whether the political situation will ever change in the foreseeable future.

Well, for one, if you compare the worst off in America - those below the middle class and even those below the poverty level, they earn ten times as much as most of the people in the world, so they certainly are better off.

That it is true if you are happy to compare the US to the undeveloped world. However, you do very badly if you compare the US with the developed world.

I am the first to condemn some of the short-comings of the last Labour government. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were definitely under the control of big business and the city. This resulted in a regime that allowed the wealthy to pay low-rates of taxation. The large corporations were allowed (encouraged) to exploit tax loopholes and the lack of regulation was clearly partly responsible for the financial crisis.

However, I am appalled that government ministers continually justify the ideological cuts in public spending to the policies of the Labour government. Although Brown clearly made serious mistakes as chancellor he was no way responsible for the world’s banking crisis. In fact, by arguing for the major countries to increase public spending helped to stop a world depression that would have been as bad as the 1930s. The main problem stems from the deregulation that took place in the United States.

Bailing out the banks was a very expensive business but in the long-term this money will come back and this will considerably reduce the national debt. The government continually argues that the public spending cuts are necessary because of the high-level of national debt. What they don’t tell you that our level of debt is lower than almost OECD countries. When cabinet ministers go on about how much they are having to pay off in interest (less than 3% of GDP), they don’t explain that it was higher under Tory administrations: Margaret Thatcher (5.15%) and John Major (3.8%).

Labour borrowed less and repaid more debt than previous administrations (borrowing was roughly 50% less under Blair/Brown than it was under Major; more than twice Thatcher’s debt repayments were made).

A major cause of the national debt is the low overall tax-take (36% compared with the EU average of 40%). The previous Labour government was partly responsible for this by continuing with the policy of Thatcher/Major of low-rates of taxation on high-earners.

Elections have consequences, and last November, the majority who voted in Wisconsin cast votes resulting in the removal of their own advocacy. I guess they were complacent in doing this because, after all, the bottom 80 percent in the U.S. still own 12 percent of total private wealth, so why should they worry about what they are actually voting in favor of, yet?

My figures are slightly different from you. In 2007 official statistics show that just 1% of Americans own 42.7% of all financial worth. The next 19% own 50.3%. In other words, the bottom 80% own only 7% of all financial worth. I would imagine that the US is the most unequal society in the world.

A friend of mine has just returned from a three week tour of Cuba. Every day the guide gave the visitors handouts about the history of Cuba. My friend said that when they visited the Bay of Pigs, the guide discussed the possible connections between the invasion and the assassination of JFK. In the handout that day, they referenced the Spartacus Educational website as one of their information sources. If they know about my website, then you can rest assured that the Cubans are also reading this forum.

His crimes are detailed here:

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKposada.htm

A discussion of his crimes can be found here:

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=6539

It is also worth considering his friend and comrade, Orlando Bosch:

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKbosch.htm

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5182

Email from Steve McCourtie:

I recently visited the "Spartacus Educational" website and noted your biography of John F. Kennedy. I am writing you in the interest of factual accuracy, which is the keystone of credibility. The most stirring line of John F. Kennedy's 1961 Inaugural Address, "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country," echoed similar exhortations made by many others. JFK excelled at delivering inspiring speeches. However, he was not very diligent at attributing the origins of many of his most memorable phrases. The “Ask not what your country …” line was very effective when JFK included it in his 1961 speech; it was also effective when first used in a speech more than 2,000 years ago. Anyone crediting/associating JFK with the line should at least add an asterisk (or a footnote) with the following information:

*Researchers attribute the quote to Roman statesman and orator Cicero (Marcus Tullius Cicero), who used it during a speech in 64 BC; however, some scholars believe Cicero borrowed it from Junvenal (Decimus Junius Junenval), a Roman poet.

Cicero’s speech was – of course – not in English, so translations vary.

Others who used similar quotes:

Captain Felipe Arrellanos (a character in the Walt Disney TV series, “Zorro,” played by George N. Neise) in the episode "Invitation to Death" broadcast during the 1958-1959 season, giving a patriotic speech defending Spain in which he asks "Is this the time for us to be asking, ‘What have you (Spain) done for us?’ We should be asking ‘What can we do for you?’" Was John F. Kennedy paraphrasing/quoting from a “Zorro” scene?!?!?

Khalil Gibran, a poet and author of Lebanese heritage, who published a work in Boston titled "The New Frontier" in 1925: "Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in a desert."

Warren Harding in 1916 at the Republican convention echoed a similar statement: "we must have a citizenship less concerned about what the government can do for it and more anxious about what it can do for the nation." The line is on display in Harding's own handwriting at his Marion, Ohio, home.

Oliver Wendell Holmes stated, "Recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for our country in return" during an 1884 Memorial Day speech.

Joe Lieberman, John McCain and William Burns, the state department’s top Middle East official, visited Tunisia last week for meetings with Mohamed Ghannouchi, who became prime minister after the overthrow of Ben Ali. The three men were pressing for Ghannouchi, a former colleague of Ben Ali, to form a new centre party that will stop the secular left and the Islamists from gaining control of Tunisia.

This diplomatic move was ill-judged and following protest marches of last week, Ghannouchi was forced to resign from office yesterday. As Radhia Nasraoui, a lawyer who heads the Association Against Torture in Tunisia, commented: “After suffering under a presidential dictatorship and de facto one-party rule, most leftists and Islamists are calling for a parliamentary system.”

Joe Lieberman, John McCain and William Burns, the state department’s top Middle East official, visited Tunisia last week for meetings with Mohamed Ghannouchi, who became prime minister after the overthrow of Ben Ali. The three men were pressing for Ghannouchi, a former colleague of Ben Ali, to form a new centre party that will stop the secular left and the Islamists from gaining control of Tunisia.

This diplomatic move was ill-judged and following protest marches of last week, Ghannouchi was forced to resign from office yesterday. As Radhia Nasraoui, a lawyer who heads the Association Against Torture in Tunisia, commented: “After suffering under a presidential dictatorship and de facto one-party rule, most leftists and Islamists are calling for a parliamentary system.”

The hard-line Republican governor, Scott Walker, has pledged to remove collective bargaining rights from public sector unions and cut local government workers’ health benefits and pension entitlements.

Polls carried out last week showed 53% were against cutting benefits and pay for government workers and 61% opposed to removing collecting bargaining. This is not surprising as collective bargaining is an important aspect of a free society. As far as I am aware, it has only been removed in communist, fascist or military dictatorships.

In a survey carried out in 2008 in the US by Pew Research, 91% of those interviewed claimed they were middle-class. In sociological terms, only 45% of people in the US are members of the middle class with 54% being members of the working-class or under-class. Less than 1% of the US population is considered to be members of the upper-class.

In a study in 2005 only 2% of Americans described themselves as “rich”, 31% thought it very likely or somewhat likely they would “ever be rich”. The latest official statistics show that just 1% of Americans own 42.7% of all financial worth. The next 19% own 50.3%. In other words, the bottom 80% own only 7% of all financial worth.

There appears to be a difference between people’s perceptions of reality and the facts of the situation. It seems that the US population has bought into the myth of the “American Dream”. It shows the power of the mass media to develop a false political consciousness. It also explains why the US electorate votes mainly for two political parties that support the status quo.

I am interested to hear from American members whether the political situation will ever change in the foreseeable future.

I think Powell was set up by Bush and his cronies. There are numerous reports that he wasn't part of the Bush-Rummy-Rice-Chenney etc inner circle. He even seems to have been to a certain extent less in the loop than supposedly less senior neo-cons (Libby, Wolfowitz etc). I think they chose him because they wanted a respected moderate to help sell their war plans. He was the only member of the national security leadership I respected. He should get enough courage to blame those at the top.

Powell, like most members of Blair's cabinet, seemed unwilling to ask awkward questions in the run-up to the war. One notable exception was Robin Cook, who was willing to destroy his career in an effort to prevent the war taking place.

Colin Powell, the US secretary of state at the time of the Iraq invasion, has called on the CIA and Pentagon to explain why they failed to alert him to the unreliability of a key source behind claims of Saddam Hussein's bio-weapons capability.

Responding to the Guardian's revelation that the source, Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi or "Curveball" as his US and German handlers called him, admitted fabricating evidence of Iraq's secret biological weapons programme, Powell said that questions should be put to the US agencies involved in compiling the case for war.

In particular he singled out the CIA and the Defence Intelligence Agency – the Pentagon's military intelligence arm. Janabi, an Iraqi defector, was used as the primary source by the Bush administration to justify invading Iraq in March 2003. Doubts about his credibility circulated before the war and have been confirmed by his admission this week that he lied.

Powell said that the CIA and DIA should face questions about why they failed to sound the alarm about Janabi. He demanded to know why it had not been made clear to him that Curveball was totally unreliable before false information was put into the key intelligence assessment, or NIE, put before Congress, into the president's state of the union address two months before the war and into his own speech to the UN.

"It has been known for several years that the source called Curveball was totally unreliable," he told the Guardian . "The question should be put to the CIA and the DIA as to why this wasn't known before the false information was put into the NIE sent to Congress, the president's state of the union address and my 5 February presentation to the UN."

On 5 February 2003, a month before the invasion, Powell went before the UN security council to make the case for war. In his speech he referred to "firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails … The source was an eyewitness who supervised one of these facilities". It is now known that the source, Janabi, made up the story.

Curveball told the Guardian he welcomed Powell's demand. "It's great," he said tonight. "The BND [German intelligence] knew in 2000 that I was lying after they talked to my former boss, Dr Bassil Latif, who told them there were no mobile bioweapons factories. For 18 months after that they left me alone because they knew I was telling lies even though I never admitted it. Believe me, back then, I thought the whole thing was over for me.

"Then all of a sudden [in the run up to the 2003 invasion] they came back to me and started asking for more details about what I had told them. I still don't know why the BND then passed on my information to the CIA and it ended up in Powell's speech.

"I want there to be an inquiry so that people will know the truth. So many lies have been told about me over the years. I finally want the truth to come out."

Powell has previously expressed regret about the role he unwittingly played in passing on false information to the UN, saying it had put a blot on his career. But his latest comments increase pressure on the intelligence agencies and their former chiefs to divulge what they knew at the time and why they failed to filter out such a bad source.

George Tenet, then head of the CIA, is particularly in the firing line. He failed to pass on warnings from German intelligence about Curveball's reliability.

Tenet put out a statement on his website in response to Curveball's admission. He said: "The handling of this matter is certainly a textbook case of how not to deal with defector provided material. But the latest reporting of the subject repeats and amplifies a great deal of misinformation."

Tenet refers to his own 2007 memoir on the war, At the Centre of the Storm, in which he insists that the first he heard about Curveball's unreliability was two years after the invasion – "too late to do a damn thing about it".

In the light of Curveball's confession, politicians in Iraq called for his permanent exile and scorned his claim to want to return to his motherland and build a political party. "He is a xxxx, he will not serve his country," said one Iraqi MP. In his adopted home of Germany, MPs are demanding to know why the BND, paid Curveball £2,500 a month for at least five years after they knew he had lied.

Hans-Christian Ströbele, a Green MP, said Janabi had arguably violated a German law which makes warmongering illegal. Under the law, it is a criminal offence to do anything "with the intent to disturb the peaceful relations between nations, especially anything that leads to an aggressive war", he said. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment, he added, though he did not expect it would ever come to that.

Curveball told the Guardian he was pleased to have finally told the truth. He said he had given the Guardian's phone number to his wife and brother in Sweden "just in case something happens to me".

Further pressure on the CIA came from Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell's chief of staff at the time of the invasion. He said Curveball's lies raised questions about how the CIA had briefed Powell ahead of his fateful UN speech.

Tyler Drumheller, head of the CIA's Europe division in the run-up to the invasion, said he welcomed Curveball's confession because he had always warned Tenet that he may have been a fabricator.

Tenet has disputed Drumheller's version of events, insisting that the official made no formal warning to CIA headquarters.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/16/colin-powell-cia-curveball/print

Colin Powell, the US secretary of state at the time of the Iraq invasion, has called on the CIA and Pentagon to explain why they failed to alert him to the unreliability of a key source behind claims of Saddam Hussein's bio-weapons capability.

Responding to the Guardian's revelation that the source, Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi or "Curveball" as his US and German handlers called him, admitted fabricating evidence of Iraq's secret biological weapons programme, Powell said that questions should be put to the US agencies involved in compiling the case for war.

In particular he singled out the CIA and the Defence Intelligence Agency – the Pentagon's military intelligence arm. Janabi, an Iraqi defector, was used as the primary source by the Bush administration to justify invading Iraq in March 2003. Doubts about his credibility circulated before the war and have been confirmed by his admission this week that he lied.

Powell said that the CIA and DIA should face questions about why they failed to sound the alarm about Janabi. He demanded to know why it had not been made clear to him that Curveball was totally unreliable before false information was put into the key intelligence assessment, or NIE, put before Congress, into the president's state of the union address two months before the war and into his own speech to the UN.

"It has been known for several years that the source called Curveball was totally unreliable," he told the Guardian . "The question should be put to the CIA and the DIA as to why this wasn't known before the false information was put into the NIE sent to Congress, the president's state of the union address and my 5 February presentation to the UN."

On 5 February 2003, a month before the invasion, Powell went before the UN security council to make the case for war. In his speech he referred to "firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails … The source was an eyewitness who supervised one of these facilities". It is now known that the source, Janabi, made up the story.

Curveball told the Guardian he welcomed Powell's demand. "It's great," he said tonight. "The BND [German intelligence] knew in 2000 that I was lying after they talked to my former boss, Dr Bassil Latif, who told them there were no mobile bioweapons factories. For 18 months after that they left me alone because they knew I was telling lies even though I never admitted it. Believe me, back then, I thought the whole thing was over for me.

"Then all of a sudden [in the run up to the 2003 invasion] they came back to me and started asking for more details about what I had told them. I still don't know why the BND then passed on my information to the CIA and it ended up in Powell's speech.

"I want there to be an inquiry so that people will know the truth. So many lies have been told about me over the years. I finally want the truth to come out."

Powell has previously expressed regret about the role he unwittingly played in passing on false information to the UN, saying it had put a blot on his career. But his latest comments increase pressure on the intelligence agencies and their former chiefs to divulge what they knew at the time and why they failed to filter out such a bad source.

George Tenet, then head of the CIA, is particularly in the firing line. He failed to pass on warnings from German intelligence about Curveball's reliability.

Tenet put out a statement on his website in response to Curveball's admission. He said: "The handling of this matter is certainly a textbook case of how not to deal with defector provided material. But the latest reporting of the subject repeats and amplifies a great deal of misinformation."

Tenet refers to his own 2007 memoir on the war, At the Centre of the Storm, in which he insists that the first he heard about Curveball's unreliability was two years after the invasion – "too late to do a damn thing about it".

In the light of Curveball's confession, politicians in Iraq called for his permanent exile and scorned his claim to want to return to his motherland and build a political party. "He is a xxxx, he will not serve his country," said one Iraqi MP. In his adopted home of Germany, MPs are demanding to know why the BND, paid Curveball £2,500 a month for at least five years after they knew he had lied.

Hans-Christian Ströbele, a Green MP, said Janabi had arguably violated a German law which makes warmongering illegal. Under the law, it is a criminal offence to do anything "with the intent to disturb the peaceful relations between nations, especially anything that leads to an aggressive war", he said. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment, he added, though he did not expect it would ever come to that.

Curveball told the Guardian he was pleased to have finally told the truth. He said he had given the Guardian's phone number to his wife and brother in Sweden "just in case something happens to me".

Further pressure on the CIA came from Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell's chief of staff at the time of the invasion. He said Curveball's lies raised questions about how the CIA had briefed Powell ahead of his fateful UN speech.

Tyler Drumheller, head of the CIA's Europe division in the run-up to the invasion, said he welcomed Curveball's confession because he had always warned Tenet that he may have been a fabricator.

Tenet has disputed Drumheller's version of events, insisting that the official made no formal warning to CIA headquarters.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/16/colin-powell-cia-curveball/print

Colin Powell, the US secretary of state at the time of the Iraq invasion, has called on the CIA and Pentagon to explain why they failed to alert him to the unreliability of a key source behind claims of Saddam Hussein's bio-weapons capability.

Responding to the Guardian's revelation that the source, Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi or "Curveball" as his US and German handlers called him, admitted fabricating evidence of Iraq's secret biological weapons programme, Powell said that questions should be put to the US agencies involved in compiling the case for war.

In particular he singled out the CIA and the Defence Intelligence Agency – the Pentagon's military intelligence arm. Janabi, an Iraqi defector, was used as the primary source by the Bush administration to justify invading Iraq in March 2003. Doubts about his credibility circulated before the war and have been confirmed by his admission this week that he lied.

Powell said that the CIA and DIA should face questions about why they failed to sound the alarm about Janabi. He demanded to know why it had not been made clear to him that Curveball was totally unreliable before false information was put into the key intelligence assessment, or NIE, put before Congress, into the president's state of the union address two months before the war and into his own speech to the UN.

"It has been known for several years that the source called Curveball was totally unreliable," he told the Guardian . "The question should be put to the CIA and the DIA as to why this wasn't known before the false information was put into the NIE sent to Congress, the president's state of the union address and my 5 February presentation to the UN."

On 5 February 2003, a month before the invasion, Powell went before the UN security council to make the case for war. In his speech he referred to "firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails … The source was an eyewitness who supervised one of these facilities". It is now known that the source, Janabi, made up the story.

Curveball told the Guardian he welcomed Powell's demand. "It's great," he said tonight. "The BND [German intelligence] knew in 2000 that I was lying after they talked to my former boss, Dr Bassil Latif, who told them there were no mobile bioweapons factories. For 18 months after that they left me alone because they knew I was telling lies even though I never admitted it. Believe me, back then, I thought the whole thing was over for me.

"Then all of a sudden [in the run up to the 2003 invasion] they came back to me and started asking for more details about what I had told them. I still don't know why the BND then passed on my information to the CIA and it ended up in Powell's speech.

"I want there to be an inquiry so that people will know the truth. So many lies have been told about me over the years. I finally want the truth to come out."

Powell has previously expressed regret about the role he unwittingly played in passing on false information to the UN, saying it had put a blot on his career. But his latest comments increase pressure on the intelligence agencies and their former chiefs to divulge what they knew at the time and why they failed to filter out such a bad source.

George Tenet, then head of the CIA, is particularly in the firing line. He failed to pass on warnings from German intelligence about Curveball's reliability.

Tenet put out a statement on his website in response to Curveball's admission. He said: "The handling of this matter is certainly a textbook case of how not to deal with defector provided material. But the latest reporting of the subject repeats and amplifies a great deal of misinformation."

Tenet refers to his own 2007 memoir on the war, At the Centre of the Storm, in which he insists that the first he heard about Curveball's unreliability was two years after the invasion – "too late to do a damn thing about it".

In the light of Curveball's confession, politicians in Iraq called for his permanent exile and scorned his claim to want to return to his motherland and build a political party. "He is a xxxx, he will not serve his country," said one Iraqi MP. In his adopted home of Germany, MPs are demanding to know why the BND, paid Curveball £2,500 a month for at least five years after they knew he had lied.

Hans-Christian Ströbele, a Green MP, said Janabi had arguably violated a German law which makes warmongering illegal. Under the law, it is a criminal offence to do anything "with the intent to disturb the peaceful relations between nations, especially anything that leads to an aggressive war", he said. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment, he added, though he did not expect it would ever come to that.

Curveball told the Guardian he was pleased to have finally told the truth. He said he had given the Guardian's phone number to his wife and brother in Sweden "just in case something happens to me".

Further pressure on the CIA came from Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell's chief of staff at the time of the invasion. He said Curveball's lies raised questions about how the CIA had briefed Powell ahead of his fateful UN speech.

Tyler Drumheller, head of the CIA's Europe division in the run-up to the invasion, said he welcomed Curveball's confession because he had always warned Tenet that he may have been a fabricator.

Tenet has disputed Drumheller's version of events, insisting that the official made no formal warning to CIA headquarters.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/feb/16/colin-powell-cia-curveball/print

Doug, you seem to have missed the article by Nick Davies published on the 23rd February. The Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) have insisted on the publication of private meetings between senior police officers and leading figures in Rupert Murdoch's organisation during the phone-hacking investigation.

A month after the arrest of News of the World's Clive Goodman, Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Paul Stephenson, had a private dinner with the newspaper's deputy editor Neil Wallis. This took place at the time when Assistant Commissioner, Andy Hayman, the lead investigator in the case, decided not to interview any NoW employee other than Goodman, despite evidence that several journalists at the newspaper were involved in phone-hacking. After he retired, Hayman went onto work for Murdoch.

Since the investigation began Paul Stephenson had a series of dinners with Murdoch's chief executives. These continued after Stephenson was appointed as Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police.

In July 2009, Assistant Commissioner John Yates, was asked to reopen the investigation, following revelations in the Guardian about the case. Later that month Yates and Stephenson had a private dinner with Rebekah Brooks, former editor of the NoW and the Sun and now a senior executive with News Corporation.

In November, 2009, Yates had a private dinner with the NoW's new editor, Colin Myler and the crime editor, Lucy Panton. Soon afterwards, despite several new revelations in various newspapers, including the New York Times, Yayes decided to close the inquiry.

Commissioner Stephenson continued to have regular dinners with senior executives at News Corporation. The last of these took place in June, 2010. Two months later, despite the best efforts of Stephenson and Yates to cover up the story, it was announced that a new investigation into phone hacking was to take place. This time it was to be led by Assistant Commissioner Cressida Dick. Because of the court-rulings quoted above, this time I think the investigation will probably lead to further arrests. This should include the arrests of Stephenson, Hayman and Yates for the perversion of justice - but unfortunately, such is the power of Metropolitan Police, this will not happen.

I wonder what would have happened if it was discovered that senior members of the Metropolitan Police were having private dinners with criminals they were investigating? Or maybe they do that as well.

John Burns, the sixteenth child of Alexander Burns, a Scottish fitter, and Barbara Smith, was born in Lambeth on 20th October, 1858. His father deserted his mother and his mother took in washing and the family moved to a basement dwelling in Battersea. John attended St Mary's National School but left when he was ten and after a series of short-term jobs was apprenticed as an engineer at Mowlems, a major London contractor.

In 1879 Burns joined the Amalgamated Society of Engineers and found employment with the United Africa Company. Horrified by the way the Africans were treated, Burns became convinced that only socialism would remove the inequalities between races and classes. He returned to England in 1881 and soon afterwards formed the Battersea branch of the Social Democratic Federation (SDF). One of the first people to join was another young engineer, Tom Mann.

Burns developed a reputation as an outstanding public speaker. One member of the SDF described him as "a sort of giant gramophone". According to his biographer, Kenneth D. Brown: "The language Burns used at this time was often cited later as evidence of his revolutionary aspirations, but he was sometimes tempted into excesses because he so revelled in his ability to inspire adulation in a crowd, and many of his words were subsequently taken out of context. Fundamentally, he never wavered in his conviction that social change was the priority, the method of achieving it a secondary consideration. Even before his imprisonment he had shown signs of disenchantment with the SDF's chronic internecine bickering and its desire to engage in class warfare in the House of Commons, rather than seeking some tangible benefits for ordinary people."

Burns was elected to the executive council of the Social Democratic Federation. Some members of the Social Democratic Federation disapproved of the dictorial style of the SDF leader, Henry M. Hyndman. In December 1884 William Morris and Eleanor Marx left to form a new group called the Socialist League. Burns remained in the SDF and in the 1885 General Election was their unsuccessful candidate in Nottingham West. However, his 598 votes dwarfed the total of 59 cast for the two SDF candidates in other constituencies.

The Social Democratic Federation organised a meeting for 13th February, 1887 in Trafalgar Square to protest against the policies of the Conservative Government headed by the Marquess of Salisbury. Sir Charles Warren, the head of the Metropolitan Police wrote to Herbert Matthews, the Home Secretary: "We have in the last month been in greater danger from the disorganized attacks on property by the rough and criminal elements than we have been in London for many years past. The language used by speakers at the various meetings has been more frank and open in recommending the poorer classes to help themselves from the wealth of the affluent." As a result of this letter, the government decided to ban the meeting and the police were given the orders to stop the marchers entering Trafalgar Square.

Henry Hamilton Fyfe was one of the special constables on duty that day: "When the unemployed dockers marched on Trafalgar Square, where meetings were then forbidden, I enrolled myself as a special constable to defend the classes against the masses. The dockers striking for their sixpence an hour were for me the great unwashed of music-hall and pantomime songs. Wearing an armlet and wielding a baton, I paraded and patrolled and felt proud of myself."

The SDF decided to continue with their planned meeting with John Burns, Henry M. Hyndman and Robert Cunninghame Graham being the three main speakers. Edward Carpenter explained what happened next: "The three leading members of the SDF - Hyndman, Burns and Cunninghame Graham - agreed to march up arm-in-arm and force their way if possible into the charmed circle. Somehow Hyndman was lost in the crowd on the way to the battle, but Graham and Burns pushed their way through, challenged the forces of Law and Order, came to blows, and were duly mauled by the police, arrested, and locked up. I was in the Square at the time. The crowd was a most good-humoured, easy going, smiling crowd; but presently it was transformed. A regiment of mounted police came cantering up. The order had gone forth that we were to be kept moving. To keep a crowd moving is I believe a technical term for the process of riding roughshod in all directions, scattering, frightening and batoning the people."

Burns and Robert Cunninghame Graham were put on trial for their involvement in the demonstration that became known as Bloody Sunday. One of the witnesses at the trial was Edward Carpenter: "I was asked to give evidence in favour of the defendants, and gladly consented - though I had not much to say, except to testify to the peaceable character of the crowd and the high-handed action of the police. In cross-examination I was asked whether I had not seen any rioting; and when I replied in a very pointed way 'Not on the part of the people!' a large smile went round the Court, and I was not plied with any more questions. Cunninghame Graham and Burns were both found guilty and sentenced to six weeks' imprisonment.

Burns was now a well-known labour leader and in the elections for the newly created London County Council, he was elected to represent Battersea. Burns worked very closely with John Benn and together they managed to get a motion passed that stated that in future all Council work should only be awarded to those contractors who agreed to observe trade union standards on wages and working conditions.

In June 1889 he left the Social Democratic Federation after a disagreement with the party's leader, H. Hyndman. Like his friend, Tom Mann, Burns was now convinced that socialism would be achieved through trade union activity rather than by parliamentary elections.

When the London Dock Strike started in August 1889, Ben Tillett asked John Burns to help win the dispute. Burns, a passionate orator, helped to rally the dockers when they were considering the possibility of returning to work. He was also involved in raising money and gaining support from other trade unionists. During the dispute Burns emerged with Ben Tillett and Tom Mann as one of the three main leaders of the strike.

The employers hoped to starve the dockers back to work but other trade union activists such as Will Thorne, Eleanor Marx, James Keir Hardie and Henry Hyde Champion, gave valuable support to the 10,000 men now out on strike. Organizations such as the Salvation Army and the Labour Church raised money for the strikers and their families. Trade Unions in Australia sent over £30,000 to help the dockers to continue the struggle. After five weeks the employers accepted defeat and granted all the dockers' main demands.

Kenneth D. Brown has argued: "While he negotiated skilfully with intractable employers and organized picket lines tirelessly, Burns's major contribution was his oratory which sustained the strikers... The long-drawn-out stoppage and its successful outcome made Burns an internationally known figure. Everywhere his support was coveted to boost the ensuing surge of trade union organization and in 1890 he was elected to the parliamentary committee of the TUC. Burns's moderation in conducting the dock strike earned it considerable sympathy from the wider public and did much to dispel the militant reputation he had acquired in 1886 and 1887."

Henry Snell pointed out: "John Burns was one of the Social Democratic Federation's best speakers. He was then about twenty-five years of age, and in the full strength of his manhood. His power as a popular street-corner orator was probably unequalled in that generation. He had a voice of unusual range, a big chest capacity; and he possessed great physical and nervous vitality. His method of attracting a crowd was, immediately he rose to speak, and for one or two minutes only, to open all the stops of his organ-like voice. The crowd once secured, his vocal energy was modified, but his vitality and masterful diction held his audience against all competitors." Tom Mann added: "He had a splendid voice and a very effective and business-like way of putting a case. He looked well on a platform. He always wore a serge suit, a white shirt, a black tie, and a bowler hat. Surprisingly fluent, with a voice that could fill every part of the largest hall or theatre, and, if the wind were favourable, could reach a twenty-thousand audience in the parks, etc."

However, Beatrice Webb was not impressed with John Burns: "Jealously and suspicion of rather a mean kind is John Burns's burning sin. A man of splendid physique, fine strong intelligence, human sympathy, practical capacity, he is unfitted for a really great position by his utter inability to be a constant for a loyal comrade. He stands absolutely alone. He is intensely jealous of other Labour men, acutely suspicious of all middle-class sympathizers, while his hatred of Keir Hardie reaches about the dimensions of mania. All said and done, it is pitiful to see this splendid man a prey to egotism of the most sordid kind."

In the 1892 General Election John Burns was elected to represent Battersea in the House of Commons. Burns now joined the other socialist who won a seat in the election, James Keir Hardie. Whereas Burns was willing to work closely with the Liberal Party, Hardie argued for the formation of a new working class political party. Burns attended the meeting in 1900 that established the Labour Representation Committee, the forerunner of the Labour Party, but refused to join and continued to align himself to the Liberal Party.

Burns knew that the Liberal Party might win the next election whereas the Labour Party would take a long time before it was in a position to form a government. When the Liberal Party won the 1906 General Election, the new Prime Minister, Henry Campbell-Bannerman, offered John Burns the post of President of the Local Government Board.

Burns, the first member of the working-class to become a government minister, disappointed the labour movement with his period in office. Burns was responsible for only one important piece of legislation, the Housing and Town Planning Act of 1909, during his time in government. Burns, who was now earning £5,000 a year, was bitterly attacked in the House of Commons by old comrades such as Fred Jowett, when he argued for no outdoor relief to be given to the poor. Burns was reminded how he had been a strong critic of the Poor Law and the workhouse system when he had been a member of the Social Democratic Federation.

Kenneth D. Brown has pointed out: "It has been generally concluded that Burns's eight years at the Local Government Board were barren. Behind this judgement lies the view, originally propagated by Beatrice Webb, that Burns's civil servants played on his personal vanity, flattering him into becoming an ineffective and reactionary minister. Burns's vanity is not in doubt: when Campbell-Bannerman offered him the Local Government Board, Burns is alleged to have replied that the prime minister had never done a more popular thing. But Mrs Webb's views were heavily influenced by the fact that Burns was the rock on which her ambitious plans for restructuring the poor law foundered. He had long believed that poverty and its related problems were the combined outcome of individual failure and an inadequate social environment. This was reinforced by a strong streak of puritanism which expressed itself in his opposition to smoking, drinking, and gambling."

Burns was retained in the cabinet when Herbert Asquith replaced Henry Campbell-Bannerman as prime minister in 1908. Supporters of Burns point out that he did have his successes. For example, he piloted through the House of Commons the 1910 Census Bill that sought to obtain more information about both family structure and urban conditions in order for the government to develop policies to tackle problems such as infant mortality and slum housing. By 1913 his administrative reforms had resulted in a more effective deployment of medical staff in the infirmaries.

Burns gradually began to question the growth in the Welfare State. He told a conference in August 1913, that the government and charity organisations should not "supersede the mother, and they should not by over-attention sterilise her initiative and capacity to do what every mother should be able to do for herself." Beatrice Webb was furious with this approach to poverty: "Burns is a monstrosity, an enormous personal vanity feeding on the deference and flattery yielded to patronage and power. He talks incessantly, and never listens to anyone except the officials to whom he must listen in order to accomplish the routine work of of his office. Hence he is completely in their hands and is becoming the most hidebound of departmental chiefs." Fred Jowett argued that he had clearly gone over to the other side.

In 1914 Burns was appointed as President of the Board of Trade. However, soon afterwards, the British government decided to declare war on Germany. Burns was opposed to Britain becoming involved in a European conflict and along with John Morley and Charles Trevelyan, resigned from the government. Burns stated: "Why four great powers should fight over Serbia no fellow can understand. This I know, there is one fellow who will have nothing to do with such a criminal folly, the effects of which will be appalling to the welter of nations who will be involved. It must be averted by all the means in our power. Apart from the merits of the case it is my especial duty to dissociate myself, and the principles I hold and the trusteeship for the working classes I carry from such a universal crime as the contemplated war will be. My duty is clear and at all costs will be done."

Kenneth D. Brown has argued: "This was the effective end of Burns's political career although he did not leave the House of Commons until 1918. There was no obvious political home for him in post-war Britain. He had forfeited the support of the Asquithian Liberals through his anti-war stance and he would not consider supporting Lloyd George, for whom he had a deep antipathy. But neither could Burns, despite a few fanciful entries in his diary, contemplate a return as a Labour candidate, for his stewardship of the Local Government Board, particularly his handling of unemployment and the Poplar poor-law inquiry, had closed that particular door."

In 1919 Andrew Carnegie left Burns an annuity of £1,000. Burns spent the rest of his life on his hobbies: the history of London, book collecting and cricket. He wrote: "Books are a real solace, friendships are good but action is better than all for the moment and for some time great events have been denied me and forward action may not come my way.

John Burns died of heart failure and senile arteriosclerosis at the Bolingbroke Hospital in Wandsworth on 24 January 1943, and was buried in St Mary's Churchyard in Battersea.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/REburns.htm

In the 1892 General Election John Burns was elected to represent Battersea in the House of Commons. Burns now joined the other socialist who won a seat in the election, James Keir Hardie. Whereas Burns was willing to work closely with the Liberal Party, Hardie argued for the formation of a new working class political party. Burns attended the meeting in 1900 that established the Labour Representation Committee, the forerunner of the Labour Party, but refused to join and continued to align himself to the Liberal Party.

Burns knew that the Liberal Party might win the next election whereas the Labour Party would take a long time before it was in a position to form a government. When the Liberal Party won the 1906 General Election, the new Prime Minister, Henry Campbell-Bannerman, offered John Burns the post of President of the Local Government Board.

Burns, the first member of the working-class to become a government minister, disappointed the labour movement with his period in office. Burns was responsible for only one important piece of legislation, the Housing and Town Planning Act of 1909, during his time in government. Burns, who was now earning £5,000 a year, was bitterly attacked in the House of Commons by old comrades such as Fred Jowett, when he argued for no outdoor relief to be given to the poor. Burns was reminded how he had been a strong critic of the Poor Law and the workhouse system when he had been a member of the Social Democratic Federation.

Burns was retained in the cabinet when Herbert Asquith replaced Henry Campbell-Bannerman as prime minister in 1908. Supporters of Burns point out that he did have his successes. For example, he piloted through the House of Commons the 1910 Census Bill that sought to obtain more information about both family structure and urban conditions in order for the government to develop policies to tackle problems such as infant mortality and slum housing. By 1913 his administrative reforms had resulted in a more effective deployment of medical staff in the infirmaries.

Burns gradually began to question the growth in the Welfare State. He told a conference in August 1913, that the government and charity organisations should not "supersede the mother, and they should not by over-attention sterilise her initiative and capacity to do what every mother should be able to do for herself." Beatrice Webb was furious with this approach to poverty: "Burns is a monstrosity, an enormous personal vanity feeding on the deference and flattery yielded to patronage and power. He talks incessantly, and never listens to anyone except the officials to whom he must listen in order to accomplish the routine work of of his office. Hence he is completely in their hands and is becoming the most hidebound of departmental chiefs." Fred Jowett argued that he had clearly gone over to the other side.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/REburns.htm