And another thing …

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

And another thing …

Before we hear any more drivel about the British media bravely attempting to "root out corruption" in its pursuit of Mr Mandelson, you might just recall that we have heard stories before about commissioners on luxury yachts, taking hospitality from rich men.

Does anyone remember, for instance, the little affair of Mr Barroso and Spiros Latsis, the Greek millionaire - and the role of the media? We do. Webroke the story ourselves in April 2005 after details emerged from a question asked by Nigel Farage in the EU Parliament.

We followed it up here and here, only then to note that it was, "inevitable that British media attention would centre on" … er … "Mr Mandelson, even though the Barroso story raised far more serious implications." That "obsession" we noted, continued with "Mandy" articles in both The Sunday Times and The Scotsman.

As the details of the Barroso/Latsis tryst emerged, The Times wrote, on the ball as always, that Mandelson was "at the centre of a new row over sleaze last night after it emerged that he attached a free Caribbean holiday to an official trip just months after his political comeback as a European commissioner."

Despite the lack of MSM interest, we pursued the story, unravelling layer upon layer of interesting material, followed by Booker, compounded byadditional detail as the story got murkier and murkier.

As we homed in on the details, did any of these wonderful blogs that are so interested in "corruption" link to us? Er …

Nevertheless, we continued our pursuit, alongside UKIP, while the Tory MEP group dropped out ... and our brave MSM continued to ignore the issue. But, with the details we had unearthed, UKIP got a motion of censure - supported by five Tory MEPs - which substantially raised the temperature of the affair.

Nevertheless, on the day, we reported:

According to the press officer for the Independent/Democracy Group, when he went down to the press office in the EU parliament with a sheaf of releases on the Latsis/Barroso story, so keen were the assembled hacks that he described it as "like walking into Trafalgar Square with an open packet of corn".

And the result? A search of Google this morning gives… nothing… ne rien… nada. However, the BBC's Today programme did a stonking story on Beckham's satin cummerbund.

We continued our coverage, with links only from a number of foreign blogs and some foreign media interest, while the brave, upright British mediaslumbered on. The few Tories who supported us got into trouble but weplodded on, ploughing our lonely furrow until the story petered out through lack of media interest.

A contact in Brussels tells me today that, the moment Mandelson got appointed, the MSM despatched dozens of hacks to Brussels, all with express instructions to "dig the dirt" on the former commissioner. He told me they had never seen so many British journalists in Brussels. Were they interested in what was going on Brussels? Nah. All they wanted was "dirt" – any dirt they could find, as long as it was about Mandelson.

I've said it before and, no doubt, I'll say it again. These people really are the dregs. And, of course, the "derivative" blogs just pile in and amplify the prattling.

On this site, are we really supposed to be impressed?

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Hidden in plain sight

Seeing as we are in "snarl mode" – our default position – let's have a go atGuido Fawkes, and the latest of his asinine comments, as he laps up theMandelson "drama". "It is a fascinating world inside the ruling elite isn't it?" twitters Guido:

Rupert Murdoch parks his yacht offshore from Nathaniel Rothschild's sunshine estate and drops in. Mandelson and Osborne take a ride in the same billionaire's boat when not dining together. All very cosy, enough to turn you into one of those crazy conspiracy theorists ...

What does make his comments particularly facile is that, when it comes to looking for (or hinting at – as Guido does) secret conspiracies to dominate the world, there aren't any. That doesn't mean conspiracies don't exist. The thing is, they are not secret.

They are there, they are real, they are visible and (relatively) easy to find, if you know where to look – and can be bothered. But, because they are so visible, no one takes a blind bit of notice of them, instead preferring to look for fantasy conspiracies of their own making.

The most obvious and visible "conspiracy", of course, is the European Union. It has its agenda, it makes no secret of it, it has been steadily pursuing that agenda for the best part of fifty years and, over that period, has had a modicum of success.

Yet, there is perhaps a bigger conspiracy here – the "conspiracy of silence" amongst our own ruling elite and chatterati, who will simply not talk about the European Union and its ambitions. Guido, of course, does not expose this – he is part of the conspiracy.

But this is boring. If you want a real conspiracy, go for that shadowy group of anonymous bankers, who meet in secret to hatch up plans to control the world's financial system. You want it? You got it! It is called the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS).

Take a moment to think about this. How much do you know about this committee? Who are its members? How often to they sit? Where do they meet? And what is its real agenda?

Whether you know anything about it or not, it is part of our government. More to the point, it is part of our global government. You didn't know we had a global government? Well, you do now, and this is part of it. Other parts include the Codex Alimentarius committee, the IASB, IMF, OECD, World Bank, OIE, ISO, WHO, WTO, ICES, INTERPOL, ITU, ITSO, UNECE, ICAO, IOSCO, IOML, IMO, WMO the IPPC and a whole host of other organisations in this alphabet soup, all linked together through formal and informal networks. Most of them, in their own way, make "laws" and decisions which reach down to affect our daily lives and our prosperity, some more than others.

We touched on some of these organisations in an earlier post, when we gazed on awe at that mysterious creature, "dual international quasi-legislation", which one of our readers promptly christened the "diqule". Through this – and other mechanisms - our lives are ruled.

Of all these organisations which spawn their "diqules" and rule our lives, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision is particularly interesting. Not only is it extremely powerful, its rules were at the heart of the near-collapse of the global banking system. Yet, by what authority does it issue its rules?

We know something of its ways, not least that it is not a "classical multilateral organisation" – meaning it is not a treaty organisation. The UK is in no way bound by its rules through treaty or other obligations. Yet it does what it is told.

We are informed that the British were particularly keen advocates of its latest settlement, the Basel II accord. What is meant by "the British"? Are we talking about the government, are we talking about the Bank of England, or what?

Specifically, who authorised our "delegation" to negotiate on our behalf, against what mandate, with what authority to compromise? To whom were our negotiators responsible and to what level of scrutiny were they subject? And who authorised and accepted the final accord?

Actually, we know the answer to that last question – the European Union. It turned the accord into EU law which was then, via that medium, transposed into UK law.

With all these organisations dipping their nibs into the legislative pot, however, there is one notable and glaring exception - the British Parliament. As thousands – quite literally thousands – of rules burst upon our shores, the one institution which supposedly governs us, has - as we pointed out earlier in just one aspect - nothing whatever to do with the process. That is, until it is too late to do anything about it. No wonder our MPs are so useless.

Out there, we have this vast, shadowy government. We barely know a fraction of its institutions, we know little about who runs them, we do not know their rules of procedure, the extent of their powers, when they meet, how they reach their decisions or even, sometimes, when they reach those decisions. Sometimes, it is years before their malign force is felt.

What we do know is that they are not transparent, not democratic and not accountable – yet collectively they wield unimaginable power. Despite that, little Guido Fawkes and his idle, prattling claque of zombies dissipate their energies on Nathaniel Rothschild and his friends, while under their very noses, those who would rule us expand their empires and prosper at our expense.

When it comes to conspiracies, the Guido Fawkes's of this world don't evenbegin to know the half of it, their bigger conspiracy being one of idleness and stupidity.

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