15/7/06
Some facts as I understand them:
The Middle East governments and lead-players will never be at peace; they do not desire it and the people will not be given the opportunity elsewhere to get close to it - for over 60 years it was and it still is front page news - Bush, Blair and bin Laden know far more about each other than they lead us to believe, they always did, even before September 11; however, now bin Laden is a spent force as is the mythical 'al-Qaeda', Bush and Blair perpetuate that myth because it pleases them to do so - There are terrorists, there always have been terrorists but there is not a single 'network' working under one umbrella (apart from the umbrella of what they would like to believe is 'faith'), that is the success of our Christian storytellers - It is all about controlling oil (on all sides), controlling the price of oil and ensuring the destabilization of countries that produce it - never forget Bush is a failed oil magnate - sadness is felt worldwide but nothing is ever going to change the way Israel sees itself - perpetually paranoid - because the US will perpetuate that because it knows that condition only too well and it allows for the other myth of the right to defend ones country by whatever means necessary - even as far as the abuse of Human Rights -
There are hundreds if not thousands of inhabitants of this region (Cumbria) of the UK who cannot read, or will not and whose education remains among the poorest in Britain - mostly men - I met one tonight - his name was Al (not sure if that was his real name but that was the one he gave me) and he was about 22 - he wore a dark blue football shirt under a paler one that he kept open, and jeans and sneakers - he was good-looking and kept his thick black hair in good condition - he was tanned too - but when he came up to me, smoking a cigarette, he talked and indeed had the look in his eyes of someone on the offensive, as if the world was always about to take something from him and therefore it always owed him something in return - he stood beside me as I waited at the bus stop, he went over to the timetable but span round too quickly to have read it - without saying 'hello' or 'excuse me' or any kind of disarming introduction he asked me what time the busses were - I told him but I said you'd better check just in case and I pointed at the timetable - he gave me a look that said 'are you fucking with me' and he walked off without saying anything else - social interaction skills at a minimum - later, when the teenage girls had gathered with their McDonald's and were chatting up older boys, when the boy-racers in the car park sat with their engines turned on and were revving them up to a high scream without actually intending to go anywhere, Al came back - he lingered at the edges watching the girls and hawking, contemplating chances - and I nodded and he just looked and so I asked if he'd sorted out which bus he was getting and it turned out it would be the same one I was expecting - he simply said 'Cockermouth one' in a real deep Cumbrian brogue - silence and so I offered him my paper to read to pass the time and he gave me that look again as if I was the craziest person in the world, that or he was the most offended and then I knew he couldn't read, or else had at one time had the skill but hadn't used it for so long he had forgotten how to - when the bus arrived, a small, rattling thing he waited in the midst of the queue and when a middle-aged lady and the man she was with (young, Dutch, carrying a large rucksack) got on he shoved in behind them and got on the bus without paying, went toward the rear and hunkered, low down in the seat so he couldn't be seen -
That bus was like a version of hell - riding into the wide empty night, the bleak hills dark above us - and within, the drunken girls and boys of Penrith stinking of fags and booze and fast-food meat, shouting conversations to each other about getting drunk and how drunk they were, over and over an endless replay of the night's inebriation as if they were stuck in a loop - the stench was overwhelming and the decibel level increased as the little bus struggled its way up and down - meanwhile Al slept like a baby -
When I get back I understand the Convention is in town - a gathering of Christian evangelicals from all over the world here for two long hot weeks of reinforced faith - no doubt they'll be saying their prayers for the 'good' of Israel, ignoring the fact that David has now become Goliath -
Oh, and Vodaphone have appropriated one of the best 'punk' songs of all time for it's new advertising campaign - Another Girl, Another Planet by The Only Ones - it makes me laugh (despite the fact I hate them for using every decent song under the sun for the sake of global sell-out) because I suspect they don't realize the song is a paean to heroin abuse?
Some facts as I understand them:
The Middle East governments and lead-players will never be at peace; they do not desire it and the people will not be given the opportunity elsewhere to get close to it - for over 60 years it was and it still is front page news - Bush, Blair and bin Laden know far more about each other than they lead us to believe, they always did, even before September 11; however, now bin Laden is a spent force as is the mythical 'al-Qaeda', Bush and Blair perpetuate that myth because it pleases them to do so - There are terrorists, there always have been terrorists but there is not a single 'network' working under one umbrella (apart from the umbrella of what they would like to believe is 'faith'), that is the success of our Christian storytellers - It is all about controlling oil (on all sides), controlling the price of oil and ensuring the destabilization of countries that produce it - never forget Bush is a failed oil magnate - sadness is felt worldwide but nothing is ever going to change the way Israel sees itself - perpetually paranoid - because the US will perpetuate that because it knows that condition only too well and it allows for the other myth of the right to defend ones country by whatever means necessary - even as far as the abuse of Human Rights -
There are hundreds if not thousands of inhabitants of this region (Cumbria) of the UK who cannot read, or will not and whose education remains among the poorest in Britain - mostly men - I met one tonight - his name was Al (not sure if that was his real name but that was the one he gave me) and he was about 22 - he wore a dark blue football shirt under a paler one that he kept open, and jeans and sneakers - he was good-looking and kept his thick black hair in good condition - he was tanned too - but when he came up to me, smoking a cigarette, he talked and indeed had the look in his eyes of someone on the offensive, as if the world was always about to take something from him and therefore it always owed him something in return - he stood beside me as I waited at the bus stop, he went over to the timetable but span round too quickly to have read it - without saying 'hello' or 'excuse me' or any kind of disarming introduction he asked me what time the busses were - I told him but I said you'd better check just in case and I pointed at the timetable - he gave me a look that said 'are you fucking with me' and he walked off without saying anything else - social interaction skills at a minimum - later, when the teenage girls had gathered with their McDonald's and were chatting up older boys, when the boy-racers in the car park sat with their engines turned on and were revving them up to a high scream without actually intending to go anywhere, Al came back - he lingered at the edges watching the girls and hawking, contemplating chances - and I nodded and he just looked and so I asked if he'd sorted out which bus he was getting and it turned out it would be the same one I was expecting - he simply said 'Cockermouth one' in a real deep Cumbrian brogue - silence and so I offered him my paper to read to pass the time and he gave me that look again as if I was the craziest person in the world, that or he was the most offended and then I knew he couldn't read, or else had at one time had the skill but hadn't used it for so long he had forgotten how to - when the bus arrived, a small, rattling thing he waited in the midst of the queue and when a middle-aged lady and the man she was with (young, Dutch, carrying a large rucksack) got on he shoved in behind them and got on the bus without paying, went toward the rear and hunkered, low down in the seat so he couldn't be seen -
That bus was like a version of hell - riding into the wide empty night, the bleak hills dark above us - and within, the drunken girls and boys of Penrith stinking of fags and booze and fast-food meat, shouting conversations to each other about getting drunk and how drunk they were, over and over an endless replay of the night's inebriation as if they were stuck in a loop - the stench was overwhelming and the decibel level increased as the little bus struggled its way up and down - meanwhile Al slept like a baby -
When I get back I understand the Convention is in town - a gathering of Christian evangelicals from all over the world here for two long hot weeks of reinforced faith - no doubt they'll be saying their prayers for the 'good' of Israel, ignoring the fact that David has now become Goliath -
Oh, and Vodaphone have appropriated one of the best 'punk' songs of all time for it's new advertising campaign - Another Girl, Another Planet by The Only Ones - it makes me laugh (despite the fact I hate them for using every decent song under the sun for the sake of global sell-out) because I suspect they don't realize the song is a paean to heroin abuse?
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