The Killing$ of Tony Blair

I have finally got round to watching this documentary which has come highly recommend by others.  And I have to say I am appalled.

I admire bits about George Galloway, notably his testimony in the US when he has been accused of being in the pocket of Saddam Hussein, a man he was admittedly, felt to be too close to.  But this documentary is driven by hatred and is quite biased.  

The main thing it forgets, is that to bring about change, you must be heard. And Tony Blair and the U.K. under his leadership was heard and was listened to.

Galloway slates Blair for his work in Khazakstan, notably after a massacre of strikers there, but forgets to mention that Blair addressed this (and that action was taken against those found responsible).

He discusses the deal with the devil that Blair made with the Murdoch empire which was vital in helping secure public opinion which allowed Labour to do so much by being elected more than once into office. And while he admits Labour under Blair did improve things for many, he glosses over a lot of what had been done to help the nation under New Labour.

He discusses the debacle that was (and sadly still is) PFI without looking at the reasons why it was used, this being to rescue the NHS from the terrible state that the Conservatives had left it in 1997.

He claims that the man who had Labour elected over and over again was trying to destroy Labour.

And he also mentions the Iraq War.  Back then, we had to face several bad choices.  Our nation, under the Conservatives had armed Saddam, and when it came to what Iraq had with chemical weapons, we still had the receipts. If we were to not invade, it would have been to continue sanctions, or allow Saddam to regain the WMD he had used, during the Iran-Iraq war again.  And that ignores the help he was giving to support terrorism in Palestine and Israel which made it so much harder to bring about a just peace.

That was not the first conflict that Blair had taken the UK into.  We had the interventions in Sierra Leone, preventing a recurrence of he violence seen in Rwanda where the world watched genocide take place. We had e conflict in Kosovo, where we backed the side that was felt to be the least bad to prevent a repeat of the horrors seen during the Bosnian War.  And of course, there was Afghanistan, where the Taliban had sheltered the man behind the September the 11th attacks.  We could have left the Taliban alone, and allowed them to continue to oppress women and religious minorities and shelter terrorists, who had attacked the west.

He is however right to bring up issues such as the deal with Bernie Ecclestone, as well as the sale of a military air traffic control system to an impoverished nation with no meaningful air force of significance. The deal with the Saudi's, which ignored the bribery that had occurred, was, in my opinion a necessary evil to try and get them to take some more action to combat terrorism.

In summary, an interesting 'documentary' but on that belongs on channels known for mixing fact and fiction, such as Russia Today, Fox News or Press TV.

Words fail me

Yesterday, we spent time after the street party helping my son with the speech he had to make for his school. His sister, the week before had her speech, this being on why junk food is good for you. My son had an idea of making his speech on his favourite cakes. My wife and I did not think that this was a good idea and made some other suggestions for him.  This included talking about his snails that we had bought for him on Saturday. But he pointed out this would not get him many votes. So we all talked about other options and decided to talk about making science fun. A few years ago my daughter spoke about this and carried out an experiment featuring mint Mentos and Diet Coke. She did well but found herself having to make a speech again, which she did not like.  Since then she has done her best not to win the first round of speeches! My son though has ambitions to beat her.  And he had such a good chance. We taught him about the physics of one of his NERF guns and practised his speech, including a bit on fidget spinners.  And after the speech was prepared we got him to leave everything in a bag by the front door (I wanted it in his backpack).

So today, the day he was to present his speech, my wife was called at work, because he left it at home. All that work...

The Street Party

I forgot to mention a few things.  This includes the street party that we have, along with my son playing cricket.

He had played rugby before, but did not like the times that too much mud was involved.  And although he did take up football, again that was not for him, and I feel that the weather was involved with games being played when it was cold and wet.  And it did not help that there was not much actual skills training involved in it.  But now, he is playing cricket.  He has only been to a few days but come the street party, this showed with him hitting the ball when he was in for batting.  In fact both his sister and he noted that I failed to hit a ball at all, a difference from last year when I had managed to do so.  His sister has been fairly good at throwing and catching for a while, he on the other hand has improved lots.  They both make me proud.

Anyway, since last seen, there has been a general election which I will discuss at a later time.  And with chess, I have finished third in a tournament.  Now, to bed, or Line of Fire.

Friends, Romans, countrymen...

Today, I was meant to go to work, but a late night listening to the election results, then my wife keeping me up watching it meant that I needed some rest today.  So we went to a festival of Roman heritage in Colchester which was awesome. The kids got to meet Boudicea who literally brought teaching history alive and after going there, we went to get some plants for Nevyn, the Siamese fighting fish that my daughter has.  But, we ended up getting one plant, and two snails as we decided to move him to a window sill.  We will see how that lasts....

Live music

We took the kids out today. Or rather tonight. It has been a while since we went to Little Rabbit Barn, last going there a few years ago when Red Sky July played there.  But we took the kids there, and fatigue allowing, they loved it!

I am not sure that they will go again, for a while, as my son ended up falling asleep, and while my daughter was able to stay awake, she was very tired.  They are now tucked up in bed, but I can not wait to go again with my amazing wife.  Until then, have a listen to the first person we heard sing there.

Trump was elected despite his Russian connections. Does it matter if he is working for Putin?

At the time of posting this, The Manchurian Candidate has sold weapons to Saudi Arabia to supply a war driven along sectarian lines between factions fighting because the other is the wrong type of Muslim. Ignoring the issue of the double standards of calling for peace in Syria when arming another war, he has called for Muslims to unite against terror. Am I the only one to think that this call is insane when his actions will fuel more conflict?

Anyway, he has also fired the man investigating his connections to Russia, and after his staff have said it is nothing to do with this investigation, he has said it is. And there is the issue of him allegedly asking Comey to drop the investigation, and then, after people said he did not give classified information to Russia, he admitted to doing so.

The thing is that he was elected despite his links to Russia, not just the things that he has said in the past about Russian links, but also his call to Russia to hack the emails of Clinton before the election (calling for a foreign power to take part in espionage to influence an election). That may be dismissed as a joke, as can the allegations that he paid prostitutes to urinate on a bed that Obama has slept in when he had been in Russia. 

So, does it really matter to the people of America if he has links to Russia? 

Of course it matters to the Baltic nations, and us in the UK, but does it really matter to America to work more closely with Putin?

How does a cow sneak off a farm? Right pasteurise.

It has been a while since I last posted. In fact, when it comes to the family, this is my first post of the month.  My daughter has come back from a friends birthday party which involved climbing and mud, lots of mud.  And she seems to have enjoyed it.  In the party bag which was given out beforehand, there was items to use in the shower that they used afterwards, which meant that the decision that my wife and I had made for her to go straight into the bath, or shower (it was to be her choice) was not needed. And in the last week I went on a school trip with my son to Bhaktivedanta Manor which was fun as well.  It was great to be able to spend time with my son on a trip and also help out with his school.  The pictures are from there as taken by the school.  Sadly I have been unwell since then, though I was able to get my annual appraisal done. 

On a different note, I am nervous about Arsenal as the final game of the season determines if we finish in a top four slot and then qualify for the European cup, where, if we qualify, we will fail to get beyond the first knockout stage after the group stages.  Or we may finish fifth and qualify for the Europa Cup. While we would have more chance of winning it, playing in it means we will have no chance of winning the league at home.  

My kids are not playing chess as much as I would like but I have been doing better. Well, in two out of the last three tournaments I have.  I did not fare well in this one, but came second and first in the other two!

I would post more, but as I don't feel well and am going to go to bed now.