Thought for the day

Suppose every CCTV camera was replaced by a guard in a tower?

Rendition, the movie

A very interesting article by Brian Barder on this new movie about the practice of extraordinary rendition, and also read Stephen Grey’s comment on Barder’s article, and follow the link to his own article in the New Statesman.

It is interesting to again read the Foreign Office’s infamous leaked memo with the Ministry of Truth’s inline commentary, especially bearing in mind Jack Straw’s lecture (as Minister of Justice, for god’s sake) last week, given that he was Foreign Secretary at the time.

I mean, these people, Gordon Brown, Jack Straw and so on, are lecturing us about liberty, when they have been in a Government that for ten years has systematically eroded or pretty much every single liberty we have in this country, and they have turned a blind eye to such practices as rendition.

It really does beggar belief, that they have the gall to do that – is sociopath the correct term for such people?

National CCTV strategy

See SpyBlog:

We are still trying to understand the implications of the National CCTV Strategy document published by the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Home Office last week:- National CCTV Strategy October 2007 (.pdf 373Kb)

Unfortunately, whilst quite interesting, this document is incomplete in many areas, and must not be taken as the final word on the subject.

Some initial thoughts

Constitutional reform

Jon Bright at Our Kingdom writes,

Further to last week’s liberty speech, the government have published three consultation papers on some of the proposed constitutional tinkering set out in this summer’s Green Paper. Of course this is going to have the cynical spluttering into their morning coffee – but this is a (slim) chance to try and take some control of the process. The three papers are available in pdf format, with (very complicated) questionnaires at the back, and details about where to email completed questionnaires into in each one. Closing date is the 17th of January. The government is consulting on:

• Judicial Appointments
• Limiting executive power over War and Treaties
  
• Managing protest around Parliament

…

Does constitutional reform interest the public?

A poll suggests not very much.  See Little Man in a Tocque for details.