Just don't check the "Blogs for Bush" website unless you're really steeled today. I made that mistake after lunch and it sort of put me off everything.
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As long as moslems are permitted to continue killing our mothers, fathers and babies under the cover of religious protection our lives and civilization will remain imperiled. Appeasement can never work, containment is an impossible delusion, sanctions are meaningless, and declaring terrorism an enemy without specifically targeting islam is a battle of denial with no end and with no chance for success.
quote:Originally posted by Ganesh: Love the way the 'Merkins are covering this. From Fox News' Fox & Friends:
quote:KILMEADE: And he [British Prime Minister Tony Blair] made the statement, clearly shaken, but clearly determined. This is his second address in the last hour. First to the people of London, and now at the G8 summit, where their topic Number 1 --believe it or not-- was global warming, the second was African aid. And that was the first time since 9-11 when they should know, and they do know now, that terrorism should be Number 1. But it's important for them all to be together. I think that works to our advantage, in the Western world's advantage, for people to experience something like this together, just 500 miles from where the attacks have happened.
VARNEY: It puts the Number 1 issue right back on the front burner right at the point where all these world leaders are meeting. It takes global warming off the front burner. It takes African aid off the front burner. It sticks terrorism and the fight on the war on terror, right up front all over again.
KILMEADE: Yeah.
So, you see, every cloud has a silver-dollar lining.
Oh. My. God. Really? Is this real? Can't be. They wouldn't be that short-sighted, would they? I mean, fair enough, it was a fairly traumatic day for all involved today and for those that merely observed. 40 or more people died that shouldn't have today. But to let it govern what is discussed at the G8 summit would not only in a way, admit defeat to the terrorists in allowing them to disrupt our lives further but also take the focus off the more important, global issues of the environment and Africa's poverty. 40 people died this morning on their way to work, and I don't want to belittle that in any way, but in the same time, hundreds, if not thousands died in Africa from abject poverty.
posted
Today has been surreal... at home and glued to the TV all morning, thus getting what I later realised to be a slightly 'overkilled', saturation type of view of the events, followed by hightailing it out of the house to accompany TheGree on a job interview in a shitty part of Leeds, both of us recalling the 9/11 day and the Madrid bombing, for obvious reasons... TheGree goes to her interview, and I wander around the shitty part of Leeds before settling in an empty Ramada Jarvis hotel on York Road, of all fucking places, to watch more of the TV-fest while TheGree talks plastics and compost (being s Yank she still can't pronounce the word properly), then we went and got a bit drunk on cocktails and ended up eating at the restaurant where we got married, and then came home and, er, cooked chocolate-coated rice krispies, in the nud.
That doesn't really have anything to do with all the terrible shit that was going down, but for that very reason I wanted to write it down here, y'know? I hope that makes sense.
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quote:Originally posted by Keef: Oh. My. God. Really? Is this real? Can't be. They wouldn't be that short-sighted, would they?
...
Damn you Fox news.
My initial response was, "yeah well, Fox Fucking News", but I tuned in to This Week with Portillo and Abbott just in time to hear some American bloke suggesting that one benefit of this bombing is that it'll stop European governments quibbling over minutiae (like whether 9/11 had anything to do with Iraq), start agreeing again "at the highest level" (start agreeing with Bush, I think he means) and regain sufficient "political oomph" to go out there and "fight terror".
I suspect this is going to be a commoner American reaction than I'd expected...
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Hey, all you Londoners. I haven't been here forever, have been travelling back to Canada, but I wanted to check on all the TMO ers and others who are in London. Glad to see that so far everyone seems okay. One thing I was wondering, but haven't found any information on in the news stories: did any of the Underground's tunnels get damaged? Will the Underground be able to run, or had anyone heard of damages to the walls?
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posted
I'm really liking the idea, primarily espoused by Americans so far, that the immediate response to these attacks should be to stop wanking around with climate change and global inequality and concentrate on what matters - US foreign policy. Bless. Favourite so far was on Metafilter:
quote:In response to the statement issued by the authors of this horror, for every fatality, the UK should send 100 additional troops to Afghanistan, and 100 additional to Iraq.
Bless.
[ 08.07.2005, 05:15: Message edited by: The Peter Purves cargo cult ]
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turbo
Gold..... What is it good for? You can't eat it, you can't smoke it, yet everybody wants it.
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quote:Originally posted by mart: Today has been surreal... at home and glued to the TV all morning, thus getting what I later realised to be a slightly 'overkilled', saturation type of view of the events, ... recalling the 9/11 day and the Madrid bombing, for obvious reasons...
I had that last night - I had to switch the telly off and just not think about it for a while. It was just too much. I had the same thing with 9/11 - the image of that plane going into the building was something I saw so often I became immune to it. This morning I woke up and felt a little strange. It took a while to remember what had happened the day before.
Now I feel mainly angry and also a little sad. London is a city I've always loved and I've spent so much time there over the years. It feels like an invasion of 'my' city. I guess this is becuase these things have always happened in places I don't know (well) and now it's come just a little too close to home.
How do all you Londonites feel today? What's the general feeling in the city?
-------------------- Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names. Posts: 1189
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Balhamites are going about their business as usual.
There was a moment where I overheard some woman saying to her friend "I know it's terrible isn't it" for her friend to reply "yeah, but it worked out in the end because they had them in stock at the Putney Exchange"
-------------------- If Chuck Norris is late, time better slow the fuck down Posts: 2741
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Fans of fit, blood-soaked women might enjoy this story that Octavia related to me last night.
Santomonious do-gooder that she is, she went to give blood at the town hall in Oxford last night. after waiting and filling in the forms and the tests and the everything, she finally got her turn to be pricked. Apparently the nurse stuck her with a wide bore needle, but nothing happened. "Are you a little slow?" the nurse asked cryptically. They tried again and had her flexing her fists, trying to get the syringe to fill, but stone hearted bloodless Lady Macbeth that she is, nothing happened. Eventually they had to let her go. She exited the town hall and noticed that her arm had gone a bit numb and cold. Looking down at her hand she saw her hand was red with blood, spilling off her fingers and onto the town hall steps. Traiing blood back past the alarmed potential donors, she demanded to be seen again. Removing her jacket, her blouse was apparently soaked in blood, too. Apparently they'd pinned the vein in her arm, and getting her to flex her fists etc had jsut caused a massived build up. So once she was needle-free it all came spilling out down her forearms. Sweet!
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H1ppychick
We all prisoners, chickee-baby. We all locked in.
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Carrie-tastic!
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quote:Originally posted by turbo: How do all you Londonites feel today? What's the general feeling in the city?
Just getting on with it really, quite pissed off that it feels like the terrorists got what they wanted by interrupting G8 and fucking with the priorities of the issues being dealt with there. Generally quite subdued, people seem to be trying to get back into a normal routine, personally I feel a degree of loss, not that I knew anyone directly affected, but this is the city I was born in and have lived in all my life its my city, the people who died or were injured are our people, my people. Anyone who was present for the Billy Connoly debate may be saying that I am back-peddling furiously from the views I expressed there and to a certain extent you would be correct but I have never felt involved in such attrocities to the extent of what I felt yesterday. Its still a bit early for me to deal with all the things this has made me feel, need a bit of time to reflect. Being at work as usual both yesterday and today isnt really helping with the surreality of it all. I think the general response is "They've hurt us, yes killed some of us even, but the WE, the US (not U.S but us) survived and will continue to survive." Just reading back over this and I sound like some patriotic arse, but I am proud of the resiliance shown by Londoners and those who work in the city.
posted
its a wierd one over here. they're talking about "will this force the UK government out of iraq". well? will we? will it make much difference? the news over here is how "we need to strengthen our targets again". that "we can't defend everything all the time" "we need to be more vigilant". and that it suddenly seems ok to be scared again.
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posted
typical, everyone shows up to the party and then when there's cleaning up to be done they leg it as quickly as possible. nobody wants the bin bags full of puke and broken glass.
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quote:Originally posted by Travelling Canadian: That's a lovely sign, misc. Where was the picture taken?
Just outside the Seventh Day Church of the Mormon Scientologist Army of Jesus Hostel for Recovering Psychos, I believe.
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turbo
Gold..... What is it good for? You can't eat it, you can't smoke it, yet everybody wants it.
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quote:Originally posted by dang65: Just outside the Seventh Day Church of the Mormon Scientologist Army of Jesus Hostel for Recovering Psychos, I believe.
They're a lovely lot. Very warm and affectionate.
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In today's Meedja Guardian, Gary Younge reports on US newspapers getting all of a jitter about "Londonistan":
quote:London has become a "feeding ground for hate" and a "crossroads for would-be terrorists" where Muslims exploit civil liberties to "openly preach jihad"
Apparently, our police are so afraid of "upsetting Muslims" that we've become a hotbed of Islamic fundamentalism which threatens global security.
quote:"London is easily the most jihadist hub in western Europe," Roger Cressy, a former White House counterterrorism official, told the Los Angeles Times. "London has been an indoctrination and recruiting centre for many years," Michael Radu, a terrorism expert at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, told the Philadelphia Tribune.
In the Wall Street Journal, the former head of the State Department's counter-terrorism centre, Larry Johnson, said Britain had been too squeamish about respecting Muslims' rights.
As a result, argues Peter Bergen, a fellow of the New America Foundation, British Muslims pose "one of the greatest terrorist threats to the United States".
It seems we have the wrong sort of democracy. Can we now expect to be regime-changed back to the Stone Age?
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quote:Originally posted by Abby: Now I'm the first to admit that my spelling and grammar can be a bit....creative...but surely there is something very wrong with this?
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