Judge feels Probation is best for NI child porn officer

BBC NEWS | Northern Ireland | Probation for child porn officer

(From the BBC report)

A policeman who downloaded indecent images of children has been given three years probation.

The offence came to light, after William Neil McGonigle, 39, was caught trying to photograph two schoolgirls changing at a leisure centre.

Judge Norman Lockie told a court in Antrim on Thursday that McGonigle should be given the opportunity of a treatment programme for sex offenders.

Judge Lockie stressed "the public can be assured by me this is not an easy option", and nor was it simply "a slap on the wrist".

That is probably not how victims of sex crimes would see it!

See also here and here and here.

Also here too!

Patterns.

Sphere: Related Content

The Independent - UK MP's want media censorship

MPs seek to censor the media - UK Politics, UK - The Independent

Well is it just me or has this issue escalated to the fore in recent days. what with people flocking to the Home Secretary who can't wait for id cards to Communities Secretary Hazel Blears speech on Political Blogging. there may also be a connection to this from WikiLeaks.

Also from WikiLeaks is this which makes for some interesting reading Wikileaks and Internet Censorship - a comparative study

Sphere: Related Content

Yesterday was Mad Add-on Day!

Yes, I went a bit Add-on crazy yesterday and installed a few Firefox add-ons.

The first being CoolIris 1.8.

This is a lovely looking and performing application which previews any link in pop-up mini browser.

It performs very nicely, quick and effectively.



Using CoolIris 1.8 to view other potential add-on which I might want to install.



Using CoolIris 1.8 to view BlogRovr, which I also signed up for.



and finally a multi-application shot.......



using TweetWorks via the CoolIris window whilst over my Netvibes 'work' page, on a VMWare virtual PC.

Cool.

Sphere: Related Content

Report identifies "some thousands" of extremists are active in the UK

"The document, which was drawn up by the intelligence branch of the Ministry of Defence, MI5 and Special Branch, states that "some thousands" of extremists are active in the UK. They are predominantly UK-born and aged between 18 and 30, and many are believed to have been trained in overseas terrorist camps."

Sound like another load of propaganda to me.

You know, the old, 5th Column or rampant McCarthyism which can grip nations into allowing their liberties to be taken in the name of freedom.

This is an oxymoron.

Phrase to look up for the day is........False Flag.

Report identifies UK terrorist enclaves - Telegraph

Sphere: Related Content

Communities Secretary Hazel Blears attacks political bloggers

Hazel Blears attacks political bloggers


BBC NEWS | Politics | Blears attacks political bloggers

(Taken from the BBC article)

According to Communities Secretary Hazel Blears "Political blogs are fuelling a culture of cynicism about politics", and a "spreading corrosive cynicism" in political discussion, accusing them of fuelling disengagement by focusing on "unearthing scandals, conspiracies and perceived hypocrisy" and of being written by "people with disdain for the political system and politicians".

Yer and?

"The most popular blogs are right-wing...

(Really? well I wouldn't consider myself as right wing, far from it, I lived under the Thatcher Misrule, so I don't hold the current government wholly to blame for the situation the world finds itself in, but then I am not one of the more popular blogs, so my opinions do not amount to much),

...ranging from the considered Tory views of Iain Dale, to the vicious nihilism of Guido Fawkes,"

(nihilism)
1. Philosophy
a. An extreme form of skepticism that denies all existence.
b. A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated.
2. Rejection of all distinctions in moral or religious value and a willingness to repudiate all previous theories of morality or religious belief.
3. The belief that destruction of existing political or social institutions is necessary for future improvement.
4. also Nihilism A diffuse, revolutionary movement of mid 19th-century Russia that scorned authority and tradition and believed in reason, materialism, and radical change in society and government through terrorism and assassination.
5. Psychiatry A delusion, experienced in some mental disorders, that the world or one's mind, body, or self does not exist.)

Nihilism eh? Sounds abit strong that, given the definitions.

But she added: "Unless and until political blogging 'adds value' to our political culture, by allowing new and disparate voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and pessimism."

No, I think it is the actions of our elected representatives which will keep those fires burning and political spin, the Downing Street Memos. the illegal wars, the denial that the NULabour government helped in supporting extraordinary rendition, the Formula 1 Affair, the Saudi Affair as just a few that spring to mind, are more to blame for voters' cynicism than the 1500 or so, (not counting mine obviously) political blogs in the UK.

Guido Fawkes posted in response that spin, "focus-group derived policies" and partisan positioning for the cynicism described by Ms Blears.
He added that she misunderstood the relationship between a free press and politicians.

Methinks that political bloggers must be doing their job right if it has provoked this level of reaction but standby for some Draconian action by the government to stem this tide..oh wait, isn't that scheduled for when they shut the current Internet down and "reboot" it with their own, sanitised and monitored version.

"Take a memo Ms Blears, we are not here to 'add value', or do what politicians want, Guido has his own values and aims to hit back at political hypocrisy and lies. Politicians make laws, so they should be held to account, to a higher standard," he wrote.

Ms Blears told the BBC that politicians not giving straight answers could be an issue, but said a "grown up political discourse" could only happen if people were prepared to listen.


LOL! Would those people prepared to listen include this moribund government by any chance because we see little evidence that they are at the moment.

PPS

LOL !

As a addendum to this blog piece.

A few days after posting I was reading the comments section of the Independents’ article on Blears speech and my partner came in and asked me what I was doing and I told her, and my partner, who is not that political really said "when I heard the name I had this feeling of Doom."

What more needs to be said.

Sphere: Related Content

People 'can't wait for ID cards' Home Secretary Jacqui Smith

(Taken from the BBC article)

Jacqui Smith says public demand means people will be able to pre-register for an ID card within the next few months.

The cards will be available for all from 2012 but she said: "I regularly have people coming up to me and saying they don't want to wait that long."

Do you Jackie? Sorry, Jacqui!

Well I have chatted to a lot of people, I have read a lot of the BBC Have Your Say discussions on this subject for quite sometime, I have scoured the Internet and as far as I can see there is NO SUPPORT or clamoring to have ID Cards as the Home Sec claims.

More to the point, should anecdotal evidence be used as a justification to impose a policy of such magnitude as this?

Supermarket enrolment

In a speech to the Social Market Foundation Ms Smith said cards would be issued on a voluntary basis to young people from 2010 and for everyone else from 2012.

She added: "But I believe there is a demand, now, for cards - and as I go round the country I regularly have people coming up to me and saying they don't want to wait that long.

"I now want to put that to the test and find a way to allow those people who want a card sooner to be able pre-register their interest as early as the first few months of next year." She told the BBC: "We'll see where that interest is, and then we'll see if we can issue some cards to those who've expressed an interest by the end of next year."

("We'll see where that interest is".. mmm... and the opposition areas too!)

People applying for cards and passports from 2012 will have to provide fingerprints, photographs and a signature, which Ms Smith believes will create a market worth about £200m a year.

And in changes to earlier plans the Home Office is talking to retailers and the Post Office about setting up booths to gather biometric data.

Which leads to the question, how far will those in rural communities would have to travel to gain these ID cards if their local amenities such as Post Offices are being closed?

I very much doubt there is much grass route support for the National ID Card, given the well publicised record that this government has on data security, nobody trust you with it Jacqui.

But no doubt there will be a media event stage showing lots of happy, shiny faces, submitting themselves to a voluntary ID Cards as a visible demonstration of the Home Secretary's point.

Any retailer considering being involved by the provision of booths, could also be worried that their outlets may run the risk of being boycotted by those who strongly oppose this type of Orwellian scheme.

This is the crux of the matter, the money.

All of this is nothing to do with keeping us safe, preventing serious crime (because, as we have seen, the really serious crimes are left to the professionals, and police investigations are blocked by the powerful) or preventing terrorism.

Follow the money.

Your ID, well, in particular, your DNA information is extremely valuable to the likes of the pharmaceutical industry, the bio-weapons industry, the security industry, the insurance industry, the list could be endless.

And, they are going to charge us for the privilege.

Still, everybody is pestering the life out of poor Jacqui because she cannot get the ball rolling quick enough.

Really?

BBC NEWS | Politics | People 'can't wait for ID cards'

But, before I get carried away with my own stance on this subject, it is best to leave the final commentary on Jacqie's assertions that we will flock to have ourselves branded as the property of the New World Order to two of the most influential voices.

The first is one of the most popular political blogs, with in 100,000 hit per month, Guido Fawkes Blog. which is also followed by, and cringed over by most of our Parliamentary Representatives, with a "what happened next" scoop.....


....and you, my dear viewers.

Woops! slipped into a Dame Edna Moment there!!!

Sphere: Related Content

Twenty UK MPs want Hacker Gary McKinnon to serve his sentence in UK

BBC NEWS | Technology | MPs want UK jail time for hacker

(Taken from the BBC article)

Mr McKinnon is currently awaiting a decision by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith as to when the extradition process will begin.

In the interim, 20 UK MPs have signed an Early Day Motion which calls for any sentence imposed by a US court to be served in a British jail.

At last, some MP's with something resembling a spine!

Sphere: Related Content

More Downing Street memos! The Blair -Murdoch Project -The Guardian

I came across this article on Prison Planet originally.

(Taken from the Guardian)

Memo shows how Blair aided Murdoch

• David Hencke and Rob Evans
• The Guardian,
• Saturday November 1 2008
• Article history

A newly disclosed Downing Street memo has revealed how Tony Blair helped Rupert Murdoch overcome an official investigation which was jeopardising one of his big investments. It shows that Blair, while prime minister, immediately ordered his top officials to help the tycoon who was frustrated that a potentially lucrative scheme was being blocked by a long-running European commission investigation.

Blair told the media magnate that "he was instinctively sympathetic to what Murdoch was aiming to achieve". The tycoon eventually won approval for the plan. BSkyB had teamed up with other big companies to develop an interactive scheme in which people could shop and manage their finances through their televisions.

The memo is the first to be disclosed under freedom of information legislation documenting the contents of meetings between Murdoch and Blair. Blair has been accused of granting political favours to Murdoch in return for support from his newspapers; Lance Price, a former Downing Street spin doctor, said Murdoch seemed to be one of the four most influential people in the administration.

Over the past couple of years I have been chronicling, the to'ings and frow'ings of this NULabour Experiment , though I must admit, I haven't studied the Gorden Brown Stewardship as closely as have the Bliarite Years but it is a strange sycronity that I was just re-reading this part of the NULabour history the other day.

(Taken from "From Here to Modernity. A musical tale of poverty, war and political ambition."
A piece I have been working on for a few years, that I hope to finish it over the winter.)

On the 18th of March 1997, Rupert Murdoch's publication The Sun newspaper declares that it will support Labour Leader Blair at the general election.

That year’s election on the 1st of May 1997 sees the nation swing towards Labour by a landslide and by the next day, Tony Blair becomes the youngest prime minister since 1812 and with a Commons majority of 179.

The country was dazzled by this new broom that came to sweep out the dirty gutters, the blocked drains, the floors of the dusty and staid rooms of power. They were singing a new song, not the old songs but new, with rock star accompaniment, possibly with the remnants’ of the disbanded Red Wedge movement, the musically dubious promise that “Things could only get better."

Of course, with Tony Blair's training with the Durham's Chorister School, he ensured they were all singing from the same hymn book and a feeling of real change sweeped across the nation.

What we forgot about brooms though, is the story of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, the power rested within the broom and not with the Apprentice.

Well NULabour certainly turnout to be a Micky Mouse outfit!

Newly disclosed Downing Street memo shows how Blair aided Murdoch | Politics | The Guardian

Sphere: Related Content

Trust UK government data safety ? No says Gordon Brown - Times Online

Tell us something we don't know Gordo!

Yet they are hell bent on bringing in these ID Cards which have nothing to do with the prevention of terrorism but a tight system of control over us, and then they are losing data like a sieve, yer right Gordo, I believe you on this, you cannot be trusted. Period.


(From the Times)
Gordon Brown has made a frank admission that government cannot promise the safety of personal data entrusted by the public.

The Prime Minister was speaking hours after it emerged that a memory stick containing the passwords to a government website used submit online tax returns had been lost.

Speaking on the second day of his trip to the Gulf, the Prime Minister said it was caused by "mistakes" which were “human”.

(though David Icke has other views on whether they are indeed human)

He also sought to clear government officials of blame, stressing that a private company – Atos Origin, a computer management firm – had accepted responsibility for the loss.


Gordon Brown says government cannot ensure data safety - Times Online

Sphere: Related Content

Blogger v Netvibes Part V

Well it is Sunday on a grey, wet morning here on the Welsh/English Borders and shortly Smorg will arise from her slumbers and demand that I switch of this pc and join the world. which mainly means getting out and going to the local car boot. But before that happens I will take a bit of stock on what I have managed to achieve this week.

I have successfully:

Migrated all the files and setting from one virtual pc to a fresh virtual pc, which is faster, takes up less of a foot print that the old one, which is still stored until I am sure that the new one behaves itself.

Microsoft's File and Transfer Wizard is ok, but it doesn't make a complete job of it and I had to spend quite a lot of time hunting out passwords, reinstalling applications and then clearing out the deadwood and defragging the virtual and physical drives.
Next time I will experiment with some disc imaging software and see if this approach works on a virtual machine.

I have also been working on the old blog, cutting out duplication of features. Like, do I really need two blog applications which do the same job? No, I don't, delete.

Further on this has been the promotion of my Netvibes Universe route to get to my Blogger Blog.

Why have I been doing this?

Well to give any readers more choice.

My Blogger URL is

http://thetaoofblog-pablothehat.blogspot.com/

This takes you to this:



My Netvibes Universe URL is

http://www.netvibes.com/pablothehat




(As you can see, same blog but with Added Tabs (ooooh!).

Each of these tabs can take you to a different part of My Netvibes Universe. A bit like Bookmarks, but with more bells and whistles.

From here you can access TV and video from YouTube, including my favourites, BBCiPlayer (though whether iPlayer will function outside the UK I am unsure). Or access from TV Zattoo.

The Music and Radio Tab takes you to such sites as TalkSport Radio, Live365, Folk Alley, Radio Paradise and Pitchfork. There is even an iPhone mp3 player!

A Few of My Favourite Things leads the reader/viewer, (the distinctions are becoming blurred..) to David Byrne and Brian Eno and to the eFestivals site, because festivals is what I like to do in the summer, how about you?

If you want to read the ramblings and writings of my alter ego, and of course help support this improvised artist; check the Writings of Paul Dice and Pablo the Hat Tab.

Traffic Exchanges, Affiliations and Marketing are what it says on the Tab, a collection of my Traffic Exchange schemes and Amazon Titles that I am promoting. Again this is the money making and promotional side of what I do, but none of these, apart from Amazon purchases, need not cost you anything but your time.

As I help out the local Community Mental Health Council as a Volunteer Advocate for those experiencing mental health issues I have includes some of the resources available in the Welsh/English Borders under the Mental Health and Advocacy Services Powys Tab.

The News, Political Blogs and Prison Planet tabs cover the current affairs side of things with a none-mainstream eye.

More content will be added to these tabs and new tabs created. Your suggestions are welcome via the ? tab which is for Questions, comments and communications.

PS

I have also been using a shortened version of the Netvibes Universe URL, mainly on Twitter.

http://tinyurl.com/57rybf

Ah! Smorg has awoke so I can no longer tarry.

Sphere: Related Content