Mine is the Vengeance . . .says Who?

People are very fond of 'ex post facto' arguments and explanations. That, for example, 9/11 'created' Islamic terrorism; that drone attacks create more, and so on.

But the initial impulse, as I have tried to suggest every now and then, is a thirst for vengeance and revenge; and that is common to both 'sides' whatever 'side' they happen to think they are on.

And this is true, not of individuals, but of governments and their populations too. And often, I don't think people (including commenters 'above the line' as well as below it) are not willing to acknowledge it.

And this (I should warn you this video is really shocking) is where it leads.

In this case, a man being (literally) butchered on the streets of London, by people, who according to their own account seek nothing but revenge.

If you don't want to watch that video, this is what one of the murderers said (somewhat paraphrased, because I don't want to watch it again to transcribe it):

"I'm sorry women had to watch this. But women in our country" (we don't know yet which that is, but the man's accent is actually British) "have to see this all the time. None of you are safe. Your government doesn't care about you."

(And the latter sentence is something I hear propounded below this column often, too. The perpetuation and popularisation of that belief as though it's inevitable, immutable and unalterable can lead, not to that 'freedom' libertarians like to imagine is the only consequence, but to this kind of thing too.)

But . . .vengeance and revenge are undiscriminating. they do not apportion blame or responsibility to their victims .That man has told me (and the rest of us) that "none of us are safe".

And their actions make that literally true; the young man who was killed may have been a serving soldier; but he was wearing, according to witnesses, a T-shirt that related to a soldier's disability charity, which anyone, including me, since I'm disabled myself, might wear in general support on principles otherwise unconnected with  war or the consequences of war.

And which, in these blind terms of vengeance and revenge, could be turned into guilt,  'complicity' and 'responsibility' for actions and events someone might actually deplore, even be attempting to prevent.

He would not ask, no more than than perhaps some of those people who remotely pilot drones or order airstrikes or assassinations or devise bombing campaigns, if some of those on whom vengeance is wreaked, were actually against, or offended by, or made angry by, those acts of revenge which in themselves provoke vengeance in return.

Now there are going to be those who will (in response to this horrible incident in Woolwich) just going to say in one form or another "I told you so"; Mr Greenwald included.

But neither that, nor characterising all sorts of things just as 'terrorism' or 'mindless violence' or a matter of 'barbaric' or 'medieval' religion, or religion, or ethnicity or race, are going to help us to end this never-ending cycle of vengeance and revenge, until we all acknowledge that it is something that all of us should.

Note: I posted this originally on Greenwald's CIF in the Guardian;  but I'm tired now of, whenever I post a comment being taken to task for something I did not write, did not imply or did not infer, merely because it does not correspond precisely to what Mr Greenwald has written somewhere in his voluminous archive, and therefore I must be somehow making an implicit criticism, I'll probably, in future, restrict any comments I might want to make on any of his articles or responses to them, to this blog.

I've realised a little belatedly, that while one of the suspects now thought to be under arrest made a kind of public statement that's now in the public domain, the principle that no-one is guilty until found so in court by a jury still applies.

It's a bit unclear as to how this might affect comments people could make, in terms of prejudicing a future trial. I don't think we've come across quite this situation before. Therefore, any comments to this post will have to be moderated until someone better qualified than I works it out.

One Call Leads to Another

I've been a little exasperated by so many people commenting on the US Department of Justice's seizure of Associated Press's phone logs.

Far too many, it looks to me, don't seem to quite grasp how it might affect them. "Nothing to do with us ordinary folks, it's just about those rubbish journalists." "Somebody stole a secret. That's a crime. You should investigate crimes no matter who it upsets." (Which usually accompanies "Who gives a fuck if it's only journalists they piss off, good riddance" or some such.) "Anyway, it's about terrrorism, right?" And of course, the infamous "If you have nothing to hide, you've nothing to worry about."

So, in response to one, journalism having been my profession for quite a while, I wrote this little story to try to explain what it can mean to all those 'ordinary folks' who have 'nothing to fear':

I (a journalist) once phoned you, because I'm doing a story about drugs and gangs. I happen to know—I'm not going to tell you how, because I promised confidentiality to my source: you see, I'm not giving my sources away to anybody, and that means both the police and you—someone I think is a money launderer once had contact with you.

You tell me, "Who? No. . .Oh, it's coming back to me . . .Think it was him I got a coffee maker from in a yard sale, oh, must be a year ago. Only thing worth buying in it. Never heard of him or seen him since."

I say, "Oh, right. Just wondered if you'd come across him. Sorry to bother you." Pity (from my point of view) you hadn't bought an SUV very cheap which turned out to have a hidden compartment under the seat, traces of cocaine on the dashboard and a forgotten Uzi in the glove compartment, but there we are.

Now, the FBI has grabbed all the phone numbers I've called, including yours. Not because they were interested in me, or in what I was writing about, but for some other reason altogether. They have also worked out, from some other numbers and people I've called, or who have called me, I was interested in this money launderer and this drugs gang.

But they break your door down at 2am, scaring your kids to death, making the cat run away out of fright, and haul you off in handcuffs with all your newly-woken neighbours watching telling you they 'suspect' you of 'having knowledge about money laundering and drugs.'

Because, you see, they assume I told you in that—to me, fruitless, and now forgotten—phone call, what it was all about. Or, because they're just making connections, and don't know exactly what I was asking you about, or what you told me, they think you might  actually be involved somehow. And they won't tell me they've arrested you in Paris, Texas hundreds of  miles away from me, because if they did, I might go "Who?", look at my contacts book, or just fish about in my memory, remember what it was about, and start asking—it's my job!— "Oh, really? That's interesting. Why? What's it got to do with? And how did you get on to this chap in the first place?" 

Now, I could, at this point, theoretically, get you out of jail. But unless they tell me more, and they probably won't, I can't tell them, just like that, "Oh he said he'd bought a coffee percolator from a money launderer in a yard sale." Because what you told me is confidential too. 

And I have to protect you. I've believed what you told me; but if word gets out somehow that a journalist was talking to you because he thought you'd come across a drugs gang and money laundering, that same gang might not and might get the idea you know more about them than you do too.

And, whatever you think of me as a journalist, I don't actually want to hear six months from now that because of that somebody nailed your cat to your front door and shot up your kids.

And I can't tell them I'm investigating money laundering and a drugs gang, because they;re going to start asking me how I know about it, how much I know and about my sources, and. . .well, we're back where we started when they first walked in on me. 

And if they don't know about my story, if I hand it over to them now, they're going to be on at me forever and a day telling me that it's now their investigation and I can't write about it. They might even up the ante and tell me I can't write about it because 'it's a matter of national security', I'll be 'imperilling one of fheir agents or informants', and so on and on.

They don't come and ask me, also, because they know I'm going to say: "You've no right to ask me. You need a court order, and I'll be arguing about that even after you've got one." But also because they're asking about something to do with a story I'm working on, I'm also going to get instantly curious and ask them what they know.

They're not going to tell me, probably, but they also know that I might be happily typing into a story that the FBI has been investigating, maybe even 'conducting a wide-ranging investigation'. And since I'm a bit pissed off at them, that they've arrested a one-time 'neighbour' who 'claimed' to have no other connection with the whole business than a coffee percolator, but that they declined to comment about it.

And—because they've really annoyed me and I do not like being threatened—that when interviewed (that is, me asking them questions, not the other way round any more, thanks for calling, guys!) they couldn't confirm their investigation was having any results so far apart from arresting someone in possession of a coffee percolator rather than a hundred kilos of heroin or half a million in used notes, and they couldn't confirm they'd actually taken a dangerous drugs gang off the streets, or were even anywhere close to doing it.

(Not the kind of story they or their bosses in Washington want to read at all, but then, like I said, I'm not best pleased with what they're trying to do to me. So, tough.)

As soon as they've buggered off, I'll be phoning your neighbours, friends, family, wife, the local estate agents, maybe even getting someone to look for the cat, to try to decide what you told me was true.

You have a far, far worse time than I do; after all, if I work for an organisation like AP, my editor will have quite a lot of very good lawyers he can call to my aid very quickly. You probably won't.

You could even, if my story has other ramifications the FBI or Homeland Security know about, but I don't, yet, and that's not improbable these days, end up being nicked for something like "having foreknowledge of terrorism and/or failing to communicate it to the authorities" or something like that.

If you're very lucky, I might write a little filler of a paragraph or two about "Possible gang member's neighbour arrested by FBI for buying a coffee percolator". It might see print; it might not. In any case, I'd only give that to my editor after I'd finished my 'big' story anyway because I don't want that gang to find out I've been asking around about them yet, either. By which time you might well have been in jail for months. Sorry about that.

Even if they let you go after just a couple of days, if my little story about being arrested for being close enough to a drugs gang to get cheap coffee percolators from them hits Paris, Texas (that's not what I wrote exactly, of course, but you know very well, or should, that's what your neighbours, people at work, everyone you ever 'friended' on Facebook and your less forgiving relations are going to be saying because "there's no coffee without beans") things could get even worse for you.

Even if they aren't all saying out of the sides of their mouths when you walk past them "Ha! Very bloody likely! Coffee percolators? We know what he was really after that journalist didn't dare say right out, don't we?"

But hey, all you did was drop into a yard sale on impulse once and buy something from somebody you'd barely met.

But you're innocent; you've nothing to fear at all, have you? And I'm just one of those shitty 'lamestream media' guys nobody trusts anyway, so you'd never need me and you'll have forgotten my name and phone number long ago, won't you?

(Now I've 'translated' all this, because in my case it would be the Home Office, or Dept. of Justice, the Metropolitan Police, and the Anti-Terrorism Squad and Special Branch.)

Now do you begin to see why it's not 'much ado about nothing'?

At least, not to people like me. And, if you think carefully about my little story, not to 'ordinary people' either.

Because, and I know a lot of people won't believe me—partly because of Glenn Greenwald up there often telling you you shouldn't trust or believe people like me anyway—I do worry about things like this happening to people like you.

Boston: the real narrative

With conspiracy theories gaining ground daily here is a summary (partly taken from the official FBI Criminal Complaint) of what happened and when.

(It seems important someone try this, since most of the media has not corrected the numerous rumours and various mistaken statements since they first broadcast them or published them. A number of which have turned out to be misleading, speculation presented as fact, or just plain wrong.)

April 7: Man arrested at Hoboken New Jersey on train to New York carrying two explosive devices made of black powder' (the same as is presumed to be in the Boston bombs.) The arrest is kept secret until 26th April and remains virtually unpublicised. 

Between 2:45 and 2:49: bombs placed on Marathon route.


Two brothers on video at locations where bombs explode.


2.49 Explosions.


'Lockdown' of Boston area begins. Public events cancelled; a no-fly zone put in place; public transport stopped.


April 18: 5pm Pictures published. Public asked to help identify the two. It is unclear, however, exactly how the brothers were identified (if at all) between April 15th and April 19th.


(At some point, FBI find both brothers have Massachusetts driving licences; photos on record; but FBI had interviewed Tamerlan some years before. There seems to be no information as to where the brothers were, or what they were doing, between about 3pm on April 15th and 10pm three days later. At some point they are reported to have committed an armed robbery at a store; it would appear this report was wrong.)


Apr 18: 10:20pm shots heard on MIT campus; MIT policeman killed in car.


Apr 18: near midnight: Mercedes SUV and driver hijacked at gunpoint by elder brother in Cambridge.


Younger brother 'picked up at another location' says FBI. 'Something' (media reports assume this is a 'pressure cooker bomb) put in trunk. (Driver in broadcast interview says younger followed in another car—which we don't appear to know anything about—later got in.)


Drive to ATM, try to get money from victim's account.


Drive to gas station, where FBI says both get out of car. (Driver says in broadcast interview younger got out; elder stayed in. Driver escapes, elder tries to grab his him to stop him. Driver says ran to [another?] gas station, gets attendant to make 911 call.)


Both brothers photographed "at approximately 12:17am by a security camera at the ATM and the gas station." (Together? Separately?)


(In broadcast interview later, driver says they spoke Russian; he heard the word 'Manhattan': he 'assumed' they meant they were going to New York. He reports Tamerlan says he has killed a policeman.)


Towards 1am: Stolen SUV located in Watertown; they throw 'two small explosive devices' out of vehicle on Dexter Street. (A media broadcast showed a small scorchmark, about the size of a man's foot on road. Reports later say FBI found a 'fireworks detonator' in one of the brother's residences. Could the 'two explosive devices have been, effectively, fireworks? 'A large pyrotechnic' was found by the FBI at the younger brother's room at Dartmouth College.) The FBI charge says FBI "recovered two unexploded IED's, as well as the remnants of numerous exploded |ED's \from the scene of the shootout in Laurel Street." FBI says one exploded device was a pressure cooker bomb like those used at the Marathon; an unexploded one was a low-grade explosive in a plastic container 'wrapped with green hobby fuse'.


'A gunfight ensued in which numerous shots were fired'. One was 'severely injured and remained at the scene'. the other escaped in the SUV which was found 'a short distance away and an intact low-grade explosive device was discovered inside it.


(Reports first said gunfire exchanged; Tamerlan shot. Elder brother rumoured to be wearing explosive vest, and one or both heavily armed. Later revised: it appears Tamerlan had a single handgun, ran out of ammunition, walked to within ten feet of an officer, was tackled, forced to the ground by police, then run over by the SUV his brother was escaping in. Media reported at time wounds showed he had blown himself up. |Photos actually showed upper body wound. consistent with someone (probably lying face down or on his side) being run over and possibly dragged by a heavy vehicle.


Between 1am and 4am: Younger brother abandons vehicle. Watertown flooded by 9,000 (some reports said 12,000) heavily armed police, FBI, ATF agents and National Guard with armoured vehicles. Residents ordered to stay indoors and away from windows. Houses searched from daylight.


Apr 19 'evening': (about 7pm ?) when the police declared the 'lockdown' over and said it was safe for residents to come out; boat found disturbed by owner, sees someone lying inside (?) or blood (reports differ) who calls police. It is unclear when Dzhokar Tsarnaev was shot; probably around 1am; may have been hiding in boat, injured, since shortly after. That is, for more than 18 hours.


First official statement says this was outside the search area (where houses were entered by heavily armed police supported by armoured vehicles and residents including women and young children ejected forcibly with their arms raised); later corrected to having been inside it.


April 19 Approx 7-7:30 pm: Individual found in boat in Franklin Street. "After a standoff between the boat's occupant involving gunfire the individual was removed from the boat and searched." This 'stand off' lasted approximately 1 1/2 hours; a helicopter took infra-red photographs showing Tsarnaev lying near what may have been the engine casing. it began with a burst of gunfiire, reported by residents to be 30-40 shots; continued in silence; followed after some time by 'popping noises' which were probably flash grenades. Many bullet holes, 30+ seen in boat afterwards. Some reports claimed he got out of the boat himself, which seems highly improbable.) Enthusiastic media speculation he may be being left 'bleeding out. (A rather objectionable euphemism for "being left bleeding to death."


9pm: Boston police report 'captured'.


Dzhokar "had visible injuries, including apparent gunshot wounds to the head, neck, legs and hand." (Later reports say he was unarmed: no weapon found. in fact, from the beginning, the only gun seems to have been in the hands of his brother.)


25th April: Mayor Bloomberg reports brothers planned to bomb New York. (There is a peculiar coincidence here; shortly before the Boston bombings, a man of Ukrainian origin was arrested on 7th April in possession of two bombs actually bound on a train for New York. The arrest was kept secret until the 26th and there has been virtually no reporting about this bombing attempt. Curiously, while the two bombs would appear to be quite as lethal as the Boston ones, the man, Mykita Panasenko, has only been charged with 'endangering people and property' at the place where he made them. while Tsarnaev is charged with using a 'weapon of mass destruction'.)




There are a number of questions that really ought to be asked.

1) Were the two brothers actually equipped for a series of attacks? They appear to have had one additional bomb, which, though it is supposed to have exploded , either hurt no-one or possibly only injured the younger brother. Others look as though they were little more than fireworks.

2) If the elder brother had the only gun between them, ran out of ammunition and was tackled and brought to the ground by police, how did the younger escape?

3) Since he appears to have been injured and bleeding relatively early, why did that not appear from the vehicle he abandoned at around 1 am?

4) Was it really necessary to bring in 9,000 heavily armed police, FBI, ATF and all the rest to search for a single unarmed injured man? 

5) How did all those searchers manage to miss a tarpaulin covered boat in the drive of a house in plain view of the street and thus an obvious hiding place?

6) Was it necessary to conduct armed searches of houses, ordering whole families out of their homes onto the street with their hands above their heads? And why was this euphemistically referred to as an 'evacauation' when it was actually conducted as a military 'clearance' in a hostile environment?

In any case, what could the possible rationale for sending armed police to enter houses openly in search of a supposedly armed and dangerous terrorist? That would seem to seriously endanger the residents if an armed man had gained entry and was holding them hostage and be far from ensuring their safety; otherwise, the residents would presumably know, and this kind of entry would be unnecessary.

To those of us who have lived in cities where bomb attacks have been a somewhat more frequent occurrence, and (like me) have actually lived near where a police action occurred to arrest suspected armed bomb-makers in a house, this looked both dangerous and bizarre. (As it happened, I was only a hundred yards away when that particular operation began; the nearby residents were very quietly evacuated, and I, like nearly everyone else in the area didn't know anything of it until I saw a TV news item later that night.)

7) Who was responsible for the numerous erroneous or mistaken (and later retracted or modified) statements by the Boston police to the media? 

8) The inference is that those supposedly in charge had an inadequate control structure. In fact, who was supposed to be in charge, and, as much to the point, were they actually in control of or able to co-ordinate all the 9.000 involved? The confusion both at the time and since as to exactly what was happening where and to whom would appear to suggest not.

9) Were the brothers' motives as obvious as is supposed (i.e. motivated by religious and anti-US feeling?) They do not seem to have been as well prepared for a serious terrorist campaign as experience in other countries would suggest? (It would seem implausible that they had prepared only one other bomb, and that no store of materials appears to have been found, if they really had been planning a campaign in the public spaces of a city like New York.) One has to suspect that some grudge might have been more of an impetus.

10) How far was this exercise by the security forces a demonstration of extreme power and force? And, if that is what it was, was it aimed at future terrorists or the US population?

War, Games, and Wargames

First, this, from the Israeli Defence Forces Blog:

Yesterday (13 November 2012), US European Command and the Israel Defense Forces successfully concluded Austere Challenge 2012 (AC12), a large-scale air defense exercise that included both field training and command post simulations. Beginning in late October, the exercise was aimed at improving interoperability between the US and Israeli militaries and was conducted as part of a long-standing strategic agreement between USEUCOM and the IDF to hold bi-lateral training exercises on a regular basis. AC12 was cooperatively planned for more than two years, and included approximately 3,500 US personnel with more than 1,000 deployed to Israel. A similar number of IDF personnel participated.

“Austere Challenge 12 was tremendously successful on several levels.” said U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Craig Franklin, Third Air Force commander and commander of Joint Defense Forces-Israel during AC12. “We made great strides in improving our tactics and our command and control processes. Most importantly though, we reinforced our already strong US-IDF relationships. From our most senior commanders to most junior enlisted troops, we proved once again that there is clearly no substitute for training side by side with our Israeli partners.”

Franklin said that if the U.S. is ever called upon to join the IDF in the defense of Israel, U.S. forces are now even better prepared to do so.

And, also from that blog, if you're on FaceBook, you can 'join' the IDF in a game, and winning points can take you from the lowly rank of private to—who knows what dizzy. vanity-enhancing heights?

Perhaps if you only hit a handful of 'rocket sites' you only get to be a sergeant. (Maybe, just maybe, if you hit a hospital, you get demoted again. Or promoted?) No doubt, if you manage to assassinate the next leader of Hamas, you may get to be a Colonel. Or even a General.

Of course, you will also be, one imagines, 'friended' by the IDF and get loads of pro-IDF and Israeli propaganda being manufactured in Tel Aviv that's already pouring out to email adresses, sympathisers, and media all around the world as it is. One can see the day's 'talking points' appearing now by the minute almost. And now: millions of potential FaceBook converts they didn't reach with the setup during Operation Cast Lead.

Who will, mostly, not have a bloody clue about Palestinians, Palestine, Arabs, or the Middle East.

So that's the way war propaganda is going now? I find that so very, very, dispiriting.

A Tide of Unexpected Consequences . . .

All actions, or inaction, have consequences. And perhaps now, with a new war on Gaza, we are seeing another of those unanticipated consequences.

While Washington, Congress, the White House, the CIA and the Pentagon worry about the possible consequences of two scandals (the Petraeus/Allen) and Benghazi, half way around the world, the opportunityu of a distracted moment is taken again.

Yet again, I read the same taxonomies of blame. Of 'what people' are 'responsible' for what actions; the scales of justification; chemical the balances of just deserts and the propriety of retaliation.

I don't know that I want to write about this kind of thing, another 'Operation Cast Lead', again.

But I do know the time is right, yet once more, as so many tell us who is more, or less, justified in killing more, or fewer, people, to remind everyone of the words of John Donne:



No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know

For whom the bell tolls. . .

And the 'clod' that may be at risk of being 'washed away by the sea' may be Gaza. I heard yesterday (but have not seen anywhere today) that there are those in Israel who would like to force refugees by the thousand, or hundred thousand in to Sinai.

So that the Israeli's 'Palestinian Problem' becomes Egypt's 'Palestinian Problem'; at a time of course when Egypt is most ill-prepared for it.

When General Patreaus went to the White House to explain why he was resigning, did he mention something like this would be on the horizon within days? Or was he too pre-occupied with relative trivialities?

Heroes. . .and their Decline

There's been something said lately (it being that time of the month) about the way so many people in the USA look at every member of the military as a 'hero'.

So I thought I'd have a look for some.

But we'll leave Generals Petraeus and Allen out of it for the moment. Except for this report of May 2004 from Stars and Stripes:

Lt. Colonel Anthony R Wiliams “pleaded guilty last week [May 2004] to carrying on an unprofessional relationship with a female staff sergeant and using a government computer and e-mail system ["dereliction of duty" they called that] to send personal e-mails to her and another enlisted woman — a dental technician who was an airman first class at the time.” ["conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman"is what they called that].

Sentenced to seven months’ jail and a reprimand. Maximum sentence, forfeiture of pay, two years’ imprisonment and dismissal.

Now I do wonder what generals are due . . .




And now for some other heroes:


Brig. Gen. Jeffrey A. Sinclair: may ask the secretary of the Army for permission to retire rather than face possible court-martial for forcible sodomy. Also accused of threats to obtain oral sex, demanded junior female officers send him nude photos. [Also from Stars and Stripes (October)]


General Ward: diverted hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel and hotels to friends and family.


Colonel James H Johnson III: defrauded government buy diverting funds (to the tune of at least $300,000) to his Iraqi lover and her family.


Reserve Lt. Col Debra Harrison: got a Cadillac from a ‘contractor’; diverted $400,000 dollars for her own ‘home improvements’; acted as a ‘courier’ of ‘unregistered weapons’.


Commander Michael P Ward II: faked own death to get rid of a mistress.


Major Eddi Pressley (and Mrs Major Pressley): rang a bribery ring of 16 and collected $3 million for themselves in bribes from contractors to the US military in Kuwait.


Major John L Cockerham: taking bribes for military contracts in Kuwaite and Iraq. ($15 million.)


Major James Momon: along with above, $5 million.


Lt. Colonel Keith A Jackson: “the most respected chaplain in the Army.” Convicted of ‘sexually exploiting a child’ over the internet; though in fact it was a sting.


In 2011, 37 soldiers convicted of child pornography offences; 22 others for various offences, mostly including ‘indecent conduct’ with a child under 16.


“more than 110,000 active-duty Army troops last year were taking prescribed antidepressants, narcotics, sedatives, antipsychotics and anti-anxiety drugs, according to figures recently disclosed to The Times by the U.S. Army surgeon general. Nearly 8% of the active-duty Army is now on sedatives and more than 6% is on antidepressants — an eightfold increase since 2005.” [Stars and Stripes: a mine of information.]


(Interesting sidelight: PFC Naser Abdo—converted to Islam—was convicted of planning to bomb a restaurant used by soldier in a Federal court, May 2012.)

Welshing on Responsibility

How on earth does the BBC manage to continually shoot itself, not in just one foot, but in both?

Because their editors behave as though they're tabloid headline writers, not journalists, and least of all, 'investigative' journalists.

They ditch the original 'Savile Outing'. Why? Not so much because there was going to be a 'tribute' programme following; but because their premises were wrong.

It was supposed to be, not an investigation into what Savile had been up to. Nor, it seems, did they attempt to look for any of his victims. The 'report' was supposed to be 'Police failed to listen to witness in police investigation and ballsed it up'. And the 'proof' was supposed to lie in a single witness whose evidence the police and CPS either didn't trust or thought wasn't sufficient.

So when the report didn't quite come out supporting the 'headline' the editor wanted, it was ditched.

And now? The government announce an inquiry into the inquiry over Wrexham. What does Newsnight do? Look for another 'tabloid headline': something like "Police/Inquiry Cover Up Famous Name". Based on what? The tale of one witness, and an allegation that's been wandering around the internet for years.

My god. The result is, of course, that any real journalistic investigation is now totally screwed. And the Tory 'Abolish the Beeb' cohorts are already riding out like Cossacks to slash and burn it into oblivion.

Not only that, but Wrexham is a distraction.

I'm obviously not going to even hint at any names, but there were stories floating around London in the nineties of some then eminent politicians who were involved, not in paedophilia, necessarily, but certainly pederasty. And not in Wales; and nothing to do with children's homes.

That's what the Bureau of Investigative Journalism should have been digging away at. I wasn't an 'investigative journalist' then and I'm not now; yet I heard these stories. I even heard of a location, days, times and prices, for fuck's sake. I cannot possibly have been the only one in the early and mid nineties.

At the time, I admit I discounted some; the behaviour I was told about seemed, simply, too blatant. Too risky. Too damned obvious, even But some later events, watching some people's attitudes, led me to suspect I probably discounted them too lightly. It hardly helped, either, that one, probably two, of my 'informants' were quite obviously hoping for a fat News of the World cheque for their revelations. Nor that one particularly nasty story—which is still circulating around the internet—sounded to me rather too lurid and having something of an urban myth about it.

Despite (or because?) that one was told me by someone who was involved in gay pornography. the trouble is of course, that you hear one that's quite circumstantial (which is still enough to make me very uneasy when I think of it, and I still do) but its credibility is destroyed by one even more lurid and horrifying. Or you think of it as such, because you cannot, however cynical you are, believe that any public figure would ever risk being even remotely associated with anything like it. Age and its concomitant additional quotient of cynicism, of course, has made me rather less sceptical of that than I would like.

Especially now.

But a good many people in public life must have known this too.  Must still. And what happens? So -called 'investigative journalists' look no further than an old name and half-baked bloody tales on the internet?

It is so pathetic, does anyone wonder why I'm angry and disgusted? And even angrier that it's that kind of incompetence that will mean the only bunch of people to be 'investigated' and scapegoated will be at the BBC. Not the politicians (and one would have to suspect some around them) whose sexual exploitation, especially of young boys and young men, has been hidden for more than two decades, was, one has to assume, practically a lifelong career for one, two or more, and is going to stay hidden.