I just finished watching 'The Government Inspector', which was aired this evening on the UK's Channel4. It was a dramatisation based on the events leading up to the suicide of the UK's chief weapons inspector in Iraq, and former UN weapons inspector, David Kelly. This story had really disappeared from my mind (and perhaps most of the public's) for months, but at the time was a deep shock to many people. I thought the programme highlighted the story quite well, and now I understand it a lot more.

Basically what happened was that Downing Street released a dossier in the run-up to the war in Iraq, stating that Saddam Hussein could launch a serious weapon against western targets within 45 minutes, thus laying the foundation for an 'excuse' to go to war. I'm sure most of you have heard similar stories from the UK and other countries, such as the, oh so funny now, 'mobile weapons labs' which was kindly brough to our attention by Colin Powell. Eventually, certain journalists started saying that the dossier was 'sexed up', basically made more exciting (esp. the 45 minute claim) by Tony Blair's chief publicist, Alistair Campbell. It was David Kelly who primarily leaked this information to the press, because he couldn't stand the thought of the country going to war based on lies, no matter how moral the intentions of the Prime Minister were. He was the chief weapons inspector and therefore had been in Iraq with a close insight into the true state of WMDs there. He eventually admitted to his employers, the UK Ministry of Defense (MOD) that he was the leak. From then on the governments hawkish spin-doctors (I remind you that this is a socialist, left-centre government) effectively hung Dr. Kelly out to dry, releasing his name to the wider press to take the heat off their own backs.

A few weeks later, David Kelly committed suicide in the forest near his home. While I do not believe that suicide is ever a solution to the problems that come with life, I do believe that it takes great mental strength to get through crises like that of David Kelly at the time. From the start of the programme, the viewer could see that he was obviously not of great mental strength (although highly intelligent and respectable). There is absolutely no excuse for the kind of spin-doctorism & scape-goatism which was and often still is employed by Blair's officials. There was a subsequent investigation by a judge (Lord Hutton), which was critised for having a very narrow scope which distorted the official outcome, relieving Blair's minions of responsibility and instead shifting the largest part of blame to the BBC and other journalists.

There is absolutely NO excuse for driving a person to suicide over a dodgy case for war, because of short-sightings of a zealot government spin-doctor and his team. No excuse!

Let's see if we can find a decent alternative to Tony Blair - as it stands, British politics on that level is sewn up due to the pathetic opposition of the Conservative Party.

Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) Minister, Mr Bill Rammell MP, today announced the recruitment of three youth delegates to attend this year's 60th UN General Assembly in New York.

Speaking today at an FCO public event on the UN's High Level Panel Report, Mr Rammell said:

'I am delighted to announce that the UK Government will send three youth delegates from Britain to the UN General Assembly this autumn as part of the UK's plans to mark the 60th anniversary. The delegates will also represent the UK at the UN's 10 year review of the World Programme of Action for Youth.

'This initiative is an excellent opportunity for British young people to experience and play a greater role in the work of the UN. This idea evolved following the first FCO/UN Youth Forum in October 2004.'

- This is something I have been actively encouraging, and working with the Foreign & Commonwealth Office for a long time to achieve. The UK will be only the 6th country in the world to send Youth Delegates to the GA; I hope this is encouraging news for all of you campaigners from other countries for the same thing.

BBC News is today reporting that television-over-internet-protocal (iPTV) trials by major content providers (BBC TV & BT) are nearing completion, and that it is likely that the UK will be one of the first countries where TV over broadband is available on the general market. The BBC even commented that their service may be available to non license-fee payers from outside of the UK; good news for all the British expats who miss their regular episodes of Eastenders.

This is a major step forward in facilitating the 'get the content you want, when & where you want it' aim of the major multi-media content providers. Young people are often the ones that spend most time in front of the computer, on the net, and in front of the TV. Now they can do it all with one box, one connection, wherever they happen to be in the world.




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Posted by Fresh! to Fresh! at 3/10/2005 12:13:00 AM

UK radio station, Virgin Radio, part of the Virgin Group owned by Richard Branson, recently announced that it will become the 'world's first' 3G radio broadcaster. Users will be able to download a plug-in from the Virgin Radio website, which will run on most 3G and some 2G mobile phone handsets, varying from network to network. Virgin's partner in this venture, Sydus claims that, "This radio player is what the 3G network was built for, giving consumers high-quality and high-data products through a handset in their pocket." And Virgin thinks that, "It places radio at the heart of the 3G revolution."

Perhaps the rhetoric is true, perhaps this is an example of how 3G can be put to good use, and some day pay back the £1billion (approx.) license fees that the networks paid to be permitted to develop 3G infrastructure. Quite likely when you consider that an hour's listening would require the listener to download around 7MB of data; at current costs that adds up to around £7 (10 euros).



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Posted by Fresh! to Fresh! at 3/9/2005 01:07:00 AM

According to new study findings, young people are responding to anti-smoking television ads which use graphic images about smoking-related health issues by cutting down the habit. The "truth" campaign was initiated in the United States in February 2000 by the American Legacy Foundation (ALF) as a result of an agreement between the US tobacco industry and 46 US-states. According to the ALF shows "at-risk youth rejecting tobacco" rather than more typical overt ads which have been seen in the US and other nations, like the United Kingdom. The effects of the campaign were gauged by analysing from around 50,000 high-school students who were asked about their smoking habits of the last 30 days.

According to RTI International's Center for Health Promotion Research, "as a result of the truth campaign, there were 300,000 fewer young smokers by 2002 than there would have been had the campaign never existed".



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Posted by Fresh! to Fresh! at 3/2/2005 02:38:00 AM