Sunday 15 June 2008
Saturday 18 August 2007
On Floods and Preparedness...Read and learn..
Letter Re: Recent Floods in the UK and the Impact on Our Preparations
http://www.survivalblog.com/2007/08/letter_re_recent_floods_in_the.html
Further to my recent post about the recent flooding In the UK, things in the immediate area are pretty well back to normal now, aside from some continuing disruption to the road network due to land-slips, undermining and in some cases, bridges across water courses being washed away.
Here, we got off very lightly, compared to some. No loss of life, no injuries, very little property damage. There are many families, however, who will be counting the cost of this incident for a long time, both in terms of loss of loved ones and of property and livelihood. One’s heart goes out to them.As to how our preparations ameliorated the effects of the flooding, I must first of all say we were very lucky to have escaped. The waters found their way into areas never before affected, with properties and farmland many feet above the normal floodplain levels being covered. In one case, a farm tractor in just such a place was up to its cab-roof in floodwater.
However, we moved to this area for work purposes in 1999. Prior to the move we rented a property in the area to give us a base from which to explore and familiarise ourselves with it.
The next task was to obtain 1:50,000 Ordnance Survey maps of the entire region and work out the pros and cons of each likely area for settlement.
To the east of this region lies the flat, productive lands of the Vale of Evesham which, as beautiful and fertile as they may be, are crisscrossed with so many waterways that the map of the area appears to have varicose veins. To the west the topography changes as it moves into the mountains of Wales, an area of stunning countryside, so well beloved of tourists in the summers, but one so bleak in winter that it is used by Special Forces as a training ground. [JWR Adds: This is the "Brecon Beacons" area that many SurvivalBlog have read about in books about the SAS.]
In-between the two the land becomes one of foothills, with small peaks up to a thousand feet or so.
The area has several cities, many towns and villages, with all the concomitant amenities and services along with a good transport infrastructure. It ticked many of the boxes we had earmarked as necessities.
It also has one of the most unstable rivers in Europe running through it; the River Severn. With its source in the hills of mid-Wales, the Severn is one of many local rivers that feed from the mountains of Wales and find their way to the sea further south in England after joining with the Severn.
Coming in from the east is the River Avon, of Shakespeare and Stratford-upon-Avon fame. Another picturesque watercourse when in good humour, but truly frightening when in flood. This too joins the Severn as it moves west towards the sea.
Given all this water, the thought of joining the many flood-plain dwellers (does this name not give them a clue?) along these rivers did not have much appeal. Also not wanting to live in an urban environment, we ruled out the cities and larger towns. This led us to ‘head for the hills’ but given the additional need to be reasonably close to transport links due to work commitments, a compromise had to be reached.
We finally settled on (in?) the outskirts of a village in the foothills which had the requisite communication links and was high enough to avoid all but truly Armageddon-like flooding from the river system.
Being doomers by inclination and country folk by nature, we set about making the place as self-contained as possible given the constraints of time, money and the desire not to look out of place.
Water was a primary objective. Having invested so much time and effort trying to avoid it, we now installed a series of linked barrels to collect around 500 gallons of rainfall run-off from the various roofs. (The long term plan was to install underground storage but an impending move has forestalled this). This to be used in the summer for assisting with garden irrigation and for hygiene use should the need arise.
There is a mains supply of potable water, supplemented by bought bottled and spring water from the adjacent hills captured and stored in ex-military containers. (Again an underground cistern was planned).
When the recent floods hit, we found unprecedented amounts of rain had fallen (up to 131mm locally) in just over 24 hours and the subsequent run-off completely overwhelmed the drainage systems. It is not uncommon in these parts for the hill roads to turn into rivers after a storm, but the amount coming off the peaks was phenomenal. Due to our location on a hillside, we were in little danger of standing –floods, but fortunately had sandbagged the ventilation bricks and doorways to deal with the expected run off. Even so, the bags were in danger of being overtopped by the sheer volume of water. This caught us somewhat by surprise, never before had we needed to cover these points.
The mains water supply is electrically pumped throughout the area, so it is not unknown for it to fail when the power goes down. We had sufficient water available to deal with what was thankfully a short-term event. However, the provision of more capacity could only be a good thing especially in the event of a long term incident.Our electricity supply is mains provided, but due to local conditions is fairly unreliable, going off on average once a month. We have back-up for heating, cooking and lighting, with a variety of methods for providing for each. As well as propane heaters and cooking rings, we have wood stored and several camping style cooking sets using differing fuels. Lighting from candles, hurricane and Coleman lamps as well as the ubiquitous MagLites complete the list. Wind up radios are used to keep connected to news services.
This system works well for us in a bug-in situation, with some of the kit doubling for the bug-out bags, in which it is normally kept. It again worked this time and we are currently replenishing supplies ready for the autumn and winter weather.
We thought that given the predicted rainfall, bugging-in would be the best solution and this proved to be so. We also planned to be on site during the event as the lower surrounding area a re prone to flooding and we have been cut-off in the past. Had we been caught out of position, one or more of us would have been stranded. Cars were washed away by previously unheard of levels of rainfall and all exit routes were simply inundated. We have multiple exit routes planned and driven, but all were closed in a very short time.
Several staff members at one of our employers, who also live nearby, had to remain in the building for several days, unable to get out . Even if they could have escaped the building, they would have been unable to return to their homes due to the floodwaters.
Being aware of the potential for the area to become cut off by bad weather, we keep an above average level of consumables in. This includes foodstuffs, medications, hygiene materials etc. We keep little in freezers, having lost the contents once too often when power remained off too long. Most foods are either canned or dried and when the power does fail, we emulate the NCIS agents Jethro Gibbs and Kate Todd and eat the ice-cream before it melts!
When we could get from the property into the nearby town, we found the shelves of the shops were depleted of nearly everything. Some panic buying had apparently occurred, but this was also down to the inability to re-supply them as the entire area was cut off from road and rail links. The disturbing part about this was that this took no more than a couple of days for the shelves to empty. It seems that the ‘just-in-time’ approach also now applies to your local food store and those behind-the-shop front warehouses are no longer filled with more than a day or two’s goods.
What this would mean in a long term situation became all too obvious further down the Severn’s route as large scale efforts had to be mobilised to bring in bottled water and emergency food supplies to stranded people.
In summary, our initial site location work and subsequent ‘prepping’ served us well during this event, but if any of us had been caught out of position, or had we decided at the last minute to ‘bug-out’ as flood levels rose, we might well have found ourselves in a different situation.
No matter what precautions one takes, it is surely down to the Grace of God as to what happens and how well you fare. We are currently planning our next adventure, a move out of the UK to a small patch of land somewhere in the Mediterranean. The planning and preparation for this has been ongoing for several years. More on that in a future article. Keep safe. - Michael in England
Sunday 12 August 2007
Reuters image of Russian sub claiming North Pole was scene from film 'Titanic'
By James Macintyre
Published: 11 August 2007
Footage purporting to show Russian explorers claiming the seafloor beneath the North Pole was in fact a scene from the 1997 film, Titanic.
The Russians symbolically planted their flag below the surface nine days ago. The Independent led its Friday edition with the story, but did not use the Reuters images, now known to be misleading. However a number of media outlets around the world accompanied their coverage with the pictures, from the film starring Kate Winslett and Leonardo DiCaprio.
In fact the footage showed two Finnish-made Mir submersibles, filmed for sequences showing the search for the wreckage of the Titanic in James Cameron's blockbuster about the 1912 disaster.
It took a 13-year-old Finnish boy to call a local newspaper pointing out that the footage looked identical to that in the film.
Reuters said the footage came from the Russian television channel RTR, which used the images as "archive pictures" hours before the expedition was complete. In a statement, Reuters said: "This location error was corrected as soon as it was brought to our attention ... The caption has been corrected."
Saturday 4 August 2007
PUTIN RESORTS TO FAR RIGHT RHETORIC
Bigotry Monitor: Volume 7, Number 29
We are people of the same blood," President Vladimir Putin told over video link on July 28, bringing cheers from his audience of some 10,000 activists of the Kremlin-backed youth movement Nashi (�Ours�) assembled in a summer camp in the Tver Region. Though the reference to blood, rather than shared culture and language, has become increasingly common in Russian society and especially in neo-Nazi rhetoric, top state officials are not known to have publicly used the term that is reminiscent of Nazi propaganda. Perhaps reflecting uneasiness with the reference, state-controlled Rossiya TV highlighted another, more conventional quote from the same paragraph of Putin�s address: �You and I are part of the same team.� Rossiya�s report featured activists marching in combat gear and apparently learning to load some kind of gun and practicing combat techniques.
According to Nashi�s own count, the youth movement �unites more than 100,000 people from 50 Russian regions.� Western press reports from the summer camp expressed apprehensions about the militarism of the participants and the demonization of Putin�s opposition.
In his remarks to foreign journalists in Moscow on July 27, First Deputy Prime Minister and likely presidential candidate Dmitriy Medvedev played down the radicalism in Nashi noted by other observers. The remarks singled out by Itar-Tass stressed that society should not be afraid of Nashi. Commenting on the negative attitude of some Nashi members to some foreign countries he did not name (but, clearly, the reference was to the United States and Britain) Medvedev emphasized that countries with which Russia has friendly relations should not be demonized. At the same time, Medvedev noted that the young people have the right to express their attitudes to countries whose views they dislike. "But it doesn't mean that [Nashi�s] work is leading to the emergence of some new state ideology,� he added. �Ideology is a harmful thing.�
According to Itar-Tass, Medvedev �also stressed the need to prevent outbursts of xenophobia and racial intolerance.� "This is disgusting as it is, and even worse in this area [of trade] and the Russian state must watch over this," he said. "This is a new worry for us because 20 years ago nobody could have imagined this, and now we are facing this problem. The state's task is to respond toughly and create correct practices so that such cases are correctly identified, not turned into cases of common hooliganism, and are properly assessed from the legal point of view. And those involved should be brought to justice.�
Apparently conscious of his audience, Medvedev revealed: "I for one, ever since my student days, have always greatly respected what is known as Britain's unwritten constitution, including its Magna Carta.� As for the Russian constitution, Medvedev went on to say, even though it is not as old as Britain�s and can be legally flawed, it nevertheless is the Russian state's main law in force. "So it can be quite hurtful to hear comments such as 'you have a problem, so change your constitution to be like all the other civilized nations,�� Medvedev said, referring to the British request to extradite suspected murderer Andrei Lugovoy. Such comments will complicate mutual relations, he warned.
http://www.fsumonitor.com/stories/080307BM.shtm
Real Skinheads!
IN THE BEGINNING...
TROJAN SKINS GET THE MESSAGE....
Oi! Oi!!!
OH... SKINHEAD GIRL.....
Whether Nazi or Jihadi....you can't defeat UNITY and PRIDE.
BNP...THE ULTIMATE OPPORTUNISTS
Answer: Somebody else fills the void. Enter the BNP.
Full of half truths....expressing the concerns of the population.....with a hateful Agenda. I'm not going to take the piss, because these are peoples life experiences and that is the worrying part. Incidentally these guys are on their absolute best behaviour.....not what they really are...
Ahh yes there they are, the Goons we know and love so well....in their true colours. Silence leads to this. FOR EVERY DAY YOU BURY YOUR HEAD IN THE SAND LIBERALS STAY SILENT...THESE GUYS RECRUIT MORE MINDS.....SILENT LIBERALS....YOU ARE DOING ME ...NO FAVOURS! GET REAL! GET INVOLVED! GET VOCAL AND TAKE BACK THE DEBATE!
ALTERNATIVELY...DO NOTHING....I MEAN WE DON'T WANT TO OFFEND ANY BODY.......OH WELL....I GUESS I'LL JUST GET USED TO SAYING SIEG HEIL!
Adam Gadahn - Old Threats
'YARDBOY! WHERE EVER YA DEYA, UNNA REMEMBER YA HISTORY! MAKE NO MAN ROB YA OF YA FREEDOM!
We ain't gonna take it no more....
New Al Qaeda Web Ad Threatens 'Big Surprise'
ShareAugust 01, 2007 7:34 PM
The brief clip from al Qaeda's "as Sahab" propaganda arm juxtaposes the doctored photo of Bush and Musharraf along with previously seen images of al Qaeda's top leadership -- Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahri and Adam Gadahn -- as well as a photo of an SUV in a motorcade.
There is no additional information provided in the ad, and it closes with the words, "Soon -- God willing," written across the screen and repeated several times........
See the video here...
Iranian Police Enforces "Islamic Dress Code" on Women
Holy cow!.......'Madam didn't you know that Burka is so last season...'
Righteous feminists....are YOU ok with this?
ALERT! Children socialized into Jihad..
Muslims, apologists.....justify this.....no matter what criticism you may level at us...we don't indoctrinate our children like this.....ISLAM...THIS IS WHY WE FIGHT YOU.
Credit is due to all at Infidel Bloggers Alliance
http://ibloga.blogspot.com/2007/08/hamas-tv-promotes-jihadi-bee-show-for.html
Sunday 29 July 2007
The Alamo.....
Cut off and surrounded....our hero prepares to make his last stand as the Jihadi's move in...will they fight with honour or dishonour....you decide....
Man Say He's Jesus, Followers Get 666 Tattoos
Ok..... as a nervously open minded believer about end times etc.....possibly, this guy isn't scary he's just barking at the moon.....!....Hey send him to Afghanistan as part of the counter insurgency effort! ....Ok, America, how comes this guy gets residency and the average Brit doesn't......???....Would ANY of you buy a car of this guy...? ....Let alone give him Money?....For nothing.....?....Yes, I think that's MOS DEF one for British Cynicism....in the UK this guy would be in a Fraggle Rock (Nut house) some where, high as a kite.....Not running a Ministry in charge of a budget, probably of Millions $!! Please though, seriously I'd love to hear an American reaction to this guy....! Just for FUN...NO HATING PEOPLE!
PENTAGON CAN STRIKE IRAN W/IN 24HR OF bUSH ORDER-WAR
With that in mind....Look at this
Iran ...you cannot win, all you can do is cause more of your people to die unnecessarily...for the future is already planned...
Sex for the motherland: Russian youths encouraged to procreate at camp
Sinister: Millions of young Russians at a youth camp discerningly similar to the Hitler Youthhttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=471324&in_page_id=1770
.....Nashi's annual camp, 200 miles outside Moscow, is attended by 10,000 uniformed youngsters and involves two weeks of lectures and physical fitness.
Attendance is monitored via compulsory electronic badges and anyone who misses three events is expelled. So are drinkers; alcohol is banned. But sex is encouraged, and condoms are nowhere on sale..........But the real aim of the youth camp - and the 100,000-strong movement behind it - is not to improve Russia's demographic profile, but to attack democracy.
ALARM! PANIC ....NOW!!
Ok people, we've seen this before......yes I know the Russians are about to go extinct over the course of the next few decades......I know the Russians can be tastless, Crass, Oafs who have not even a pretence of understanding of the word DEMOCRACY.....but a replication of the Hitler Youth breeding programmes....More than that, what does this tell us about Putins intentions for the future.....I mean it's not like it is suggestive of a much longer term programme that he has every intention of overseeing to its conclusion.....(loyal super soldiers...read as SS) It's not as if there is millitary Psychological and Political orientation taking place, with combat manouvres in infantry tactics and unarmed combat being practised....with cosy chats round the camp fire from the 'Dear leader' about the evil United Kingdom telling peace loving Russia (Who wouldn't dream of sending Nuclear Bombers towards the UK 2-3 times last week) what to do.....I mean it's not as if Russia would dream of murdering a FOREIGN NATIONAL in A FOREIGN COUNTRY for the crime of criticising the corrupt Mafia riddled Russian state....Is it? I mean for Christ sake, IF THE DAILY MAIL GETS IT........
ROYAL NAVY GETS GO AHEAD ON 2 NEW CARRIERS
Carriers of good news for the Clyde and Rosyth
http://news.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=1165002007
TRADITIONALLY, champagne is only used to celebrate the launch of a new ship. But yesterday, the celebrations in dockyards across the UK - and in Scotland in particular - were for the announcement that in nearly a decade's time, two new vessels will eventually set sail. After years of dithering and delay, the government has finally confirmed that it will order two new aircraft carriers to replace the Royal Navy's ageing carriers. Costing £3.5 billion and weighing 65,000 tonnes, they will be the biggest military vessels Britain has ever built........
NO! COULD IT BE? FINALLY IS DIGINITY TO BE RETURNED TO THE ROYAL NAVY?Unveiled: The Pakistani tribe that dares to defy the fundamentalists
In the North West Frontier Province, the mullahs' word is law and the veil is worn. But one ancient tribe refuses to cover up. Jerome Taylor reports from the Rumbur Valley
Published: 18 July 2007
In Pakistan's deeply conservative North West Frontier Province, the veil is simply a way of life. Whether in the bazaars of the capital Peshawar or high up in the myriad of Himalayan villages bordering Afghanistan, women wishing to leave their houses do so under the cover of a niqab or a billowing burqa. So important is the Islamic concept of purdah that the fort-like houses in the tribal areas usually contain separate living quarters for women and men.
Give or take the occasional advertising hoarding or glitzy film from Lahore, most men are unlikely to see an adult female face outside of their immediate family until they marry.
But in the remote Chitral region nestled high in the Hindu Kush mountain range are the last remnants of a tribe where the women walk unveiled in bright red and black dresses. Lavishly decorated with orange bead necklaces and colourful hats made from cowrie shells, they dance in public and are often free to marry and take lovers. They are the Kalasha, one of Pakistan's only remaining indigenous non-Muslim communities and a remarkable living throwback to a pre-Islamic era.
Yet according to the Kalasha themselves, their unique way of life is under attack like never before. Thanks to rising extremism among a small minority of Pakistanis and the growing appeal of populist orthodox mullahs who espouse sharia law and Taliban-like austerity, the Kalasha are increasingly in the firing line.
"We've always been called kafirs (infidels) but most people simply left us alone," says Azam Kalash, one of the few members of his 3,500-strong community who managed to go to university and now campaigns for his tribe's welfare. "Now we are deemed enemy number one. Particularly after September 11 and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the missionaries and mullahs are determined to see us wiped out."
Isolated from the outside world by the remoteness of their valleys and the heavy Himalayan snows that block the mountain passes in winter, the Kalash somehow managed to survive successive waves of Muslim invaders and missionaries that pushed back the pre-Islamic Hindu, Buddhist and pagan tribes who once filled the fertile plains of the Indus valley.
Until last century, very few outsiders had ever made it as far as the three valleys of Rumbur, Bumboret and Birir where the Kalasha now live. Even today the valleys are only accessible by 4x4 along a tortuous road perilously carved into the shifting mountain side. But 20 years ago, following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the rise of the religious mujahedin, things began to change.
"For a long time the Kalasha lived in total isolation," says Cecil Chaudhury, General Secretary of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance. "I remember going there in the 1950s with a mountaineering expedition and they were blissfully happy living in their own distinct social system. But with the mujahedin came the missionaries and the Kalasha were always going to be an easy group to target. Now the extremists are back."
Although the fighters have largely disappeared from the Chitral region, the Kalasha are now outnumbered in their own villages by converts and outsiders. During the Soviet war in Afghanistan, the notoriously brutal Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar used the valley as his hideout and many believe he has returned to the region to continue his fight against Nato forces and the Afghan government.
After a 10-year lull, the missionaries are returning and many fear that if orthodox preachers, such as those who, until recently, ran Islamabad's Red Mosque, continue to increase their appeal, the country's last non-Muslim tribe may sink into oblivion.
No Kalasha would mean no Zonor Bibi. The mother of five sits on the front porch of her mud-walled house perched high above the swollen glacial river that roars through the heart of her village. It is harvest time and apricots lie drying in the summer sun eyed by her eight-year-old daughter Walena.
Zonor's husband has just set off on the daily three-hour walk to the grazing meadows that lie high above the village but that does not stop Zonor from welcoming outsiders with open arms, an act that would be unthinkable to her Muslim neighbours.
Deeply proud of her culture, she bursts into laughter when asked how long it takes to make the iconic cowrie shell hats that all Kalasha women wear.
"They take us months," she says. "It is important to continue our traditions so not to anger our spirits and god."
Kalasha believe that failure to practice their ancient traditions has profound religious implications and can bring disaster on the village which may explain why their dress and distinct practices have managed to survive against such odds.
The role of women in Kalash society is perhaps the most obvious aspect that separates their culture from their Muslim neighbours. Where Muslim women in the region generally remain indoors or hidden from public view, their Kalash counterparts are conspicuous in the fields working alongside their men. During the festivals that celebrate the various summer harvests and preparations for winter, it is not unusual to find Kalasha women drinking apricot wine and dancing in public with males that are neither their husband nor family. Although some marriages are arranged by families, it is perfectly acceptable for Kalasha women to choose their husbands. If they are treated unkindly during the marriage the women are expected to leave the house and take a lover.
Such comparative sexual and social freedom has led to the false but commonly held perception among many lowland Pakistanis that the tribe's women are sexually promiscuous. But while Kalasha men do seem to extend a greater level of physical and social freedom to their other halves, the lives of their women-folk are still strictly regimented.
To the Kalash the world is divided into two states, onjesta (pure, sacred) and pragata (impure, profane). Women are considered pragata, particularly during menstruation and childbirth where they are exiled to special huts away from the village. Only once they have purified themselves can they return to the tribe. Certain fields and shrines considered pure and sacred to the community are also out of bounds for the tribe's women.
Such peculiarly distinct customs have fascinated anthropologists, linguists and travellers alike for centuries, not just because the survival of the Kalasha in a sea of Islam is so unusual but because no one is sure exactly where they came from.
Their tongue, like many of the dialects spoken in the Hindu Kush range, is closest to the Dardic branch of the Indo-European languages of Central Asia. But Kalash oral history tells a different story, that they are descended from Shalak Shah, one of Alexander the Great's generals whose armies conquered as far as the Indus river before turning back towards Europe. Although blond hair and blue eyes are common amongst the Kalash, recent genetic testing has suggested that they may be an aboriginal group that are, in fact, indigenous to the area.
But how did the Kalasha manage to cling on to their distinct polytheistic pagan traditions in an area renowned for its particularly orthodox brand of Islam?
"I think they were just lucky," says Siraj Ul Mulk, a direct descendant of the Sunni Muslim royal family that once ruled the Chitral region until they ceded to Pakistan in the 1960s.
"Despite their orthodox appearance, Chitralis have always been very relaxed about the Kalasha and other minorities. The missionaries always tend to come from outside." Walking through the dusty fort that his father, the Mehtar of Chitral, once used as his summer palace, Mr Ul Mulk also offers another explanation for why the Kalasha of Pakistan remained unharmed: India's partition. "Under British partition we were lucky enough to be placed on the Pakistani side," he says. "If we'd ended up in Afghanistan I doubt the Kalasha would have survived."
Two hundred years ago Afghanistan was also home to numerous Kalasha tribes, known locally as the Red Kafirs, but they were annihilated at the end of the 19th century. After receiving a bloody nose in two disastrous conflicts with the Afghans, the British simply stood by as the founding father of modern Afghanistan, Abdur Rahman Khan, systematically forced the non-Muslim tribes in the east of the country to convert at the point of a sword. A small number of Afghan Kalasha managed to flee towards Chitral and can still be seen in the upper valleys wearing their distinctive red dresses but all Kalasha are fully aware of the threat that extremist beliefs pose to their very survival.
That the Kalash are frightened of the current climate in Pakistan is testament to how seriously they take the current threats. They survived the marauding armies of Tamerlaine, the religious zeal of Abdur Rahman and even the anti-Soviet mujahedin. But now, like many of Pakistan's religious and ethnic minorities, they once again feel unprotected and vulnerable.
"We've survived so much over the years and we're not about to give up now," says Azam Kalash. "For centuries we have lived happily alongside our Muslim neighbours but thanks to extremism our numbers are dwindling. Whether we'll survive this century I simply don't know."
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article2779426.ece
All it takes for evil to win is for a few good men (and women) to do nothing. As the Jihadis prepare to exterminate a rare beacon of cultural hope and civilisation in this savage land, will we in the free world yet again procrastinate and stand by up until and after these people disappear from the face of the earth....
Follow link for background on the Kalash
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalash
To the UN, The United States, Israel and Her Majesty's Government, a protective shield MUST be cast over these people. They have no Oil....yet is this not an opportunity for us Infidels to show or cultural superiority and compassion over the ISLAMOFASCISTS. Ultimatley is this not how we justify our actions, for truly is this not really why we fight? If it is not we have lost our way....
DON'T WAIT ACT NOW.
Blair 'was deluded about relations with Moscow'
Tony Blair has been criticised for being deluded over his close relationship with Vladimir Putin, the Russian President, by a former senior British diplomat, Sir Christopher Meyer.http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2785476.ece
And so the house of cards begins to fall.....we the peasants that will have to clean up your mess wish to sincerely thank you for giving us a reason to exist, after all lets face it, we the unwashed masses only have a use when there is a war to be fought...do we stop being 'Chavs' now Tony? Will we once again ascend to the vaunted heights of 'salt of the Earth' again....PS,how goes the new job...?
