BS: Blair's body language

Subject: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 04:13 PM

I watched Tony Blair's body language with fascination on TV tonight as he said Irish people should put the past behind them.

He was talking about a situation where it seems that agents of the British state colluded in (or caused) the deaths of four people assassinated in Ireland.

The fascinating thing was the way in which Blair's hand movements registered concealment, and a placing aside of the matter under discussion. At no time did he show his palms; his eyes were guarded, and when he talked about putting the past behind "us", he mimed taking something from before him and placing it to one side.

(I should state my own views here, before any flame war lights up: I think that all murder is pointless, useless and wrong, but murder by a state, any state, is much, much worse.)

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: jacqui.c
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 04:50 PM

I have not trusted Blair from day one and, from recent reading about body language am beginning to understand why. I think it's now becoming more obvious though.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 04:52 PM

Christ ... eye of newt and toe of frog.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 07:50 PM

Seems to me I once heard of a book written by a psychologist who had actually studied this stuff, called something like "How to Tell When Somebody Is Lying." I'd love to read that book. Anybody know the name of the psychologist or the correct name of the book?

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 10:18 PM

Try searching 'body language Lying' on www.amazon.com

You'll get hits like:

Reading People : How to Understand People and Predict Their Behavior- -Anytime, Anyplace
by Mark C. Mazzarella (Author), Jo-Ellan Dimitrius (Author) (Paperback )

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 01 Apr 04 - 11:25 PM

The Republican and Loyalist Paramilitaries on both sides had a body language of their own - three and a half thousand of them. Why single out four deaths just because they were committed by those trying to preserve law and order? Condemn them all. Murder is brutal murder and you can't classify murders into 'more acceptable' or 'less acceptable'. They are all totally unacceptable.
IMHO.
Johnny

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 12:30 AM

tony blair is a sack of shit.johhn
[and yupoi can quoute me]

keir hardy will be turning in his grave!

tony-you are shit.john

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: LadyJean
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 12:40 AM

Dr. Roger Bennett of the Ohio University School of Journalism wrote some excellent pieces on how to tell if someone is lying. Bennett was a fine journalist, and an excellent teacher, easily the best in the department when I was there. So, I'm inclined to have some faith in his opinion. Google his name and see what you find.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 02:53 AM

Yes, Strollin', murder is murder.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Ellenpoly
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 03:02 AM

I urge you all to closely look at Tony Blair's face..then go back into your memory, or check on the internet-for pictures of both Alfred E. Newman (of "Mad Magazine" fame) and Howdie Doodie... Now isn't it obvious that Tony is the love child of the first two?

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: ard mhacha
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 05:47 AM

More important than Blair`s body language is the British Governments involvement in collusion with Loyalists death squads in state murder.
Judge Cory states in the death of Rosemary Nelson, "I am satisfied that there is evidence of collusion by government agencies in the murder of Rosemary Nelson that warrants a public inquiry"
The death of Robert Hamill was avoidable as the RUC sat in their Land Rovers and let a Loyalist mob kick Robert Hamill to death.
In the death of Pat Finucane, Cory goes on to say that a public inquiry will be of greater benefit than a prosecution.
The important thing about these murders is state involvment, this should be very worrying for the people of any country when a democratic government stoops to the level of the paramilitaries.

Worth reading for an insight into the workings of British intelligence is, Martin Ingram and Greg Harkin`s book "Stakeknife- Britain`s secret agents in Ireland" published by O`Brien Press.
You will have to be quick the book sold out quickly and is being re-printed.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 02 Apr 04 - 12:17 PM

What, no Cromwell?

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 02:56 AM

BigPink, you think Tony Blair may be Cromwell's child? What a fascinating thought. And indeed....

http://www.olivercromwell.org/biography.htm

there is a sort of faint resemblance. You think he was cloned in some dark experiment by the citizens of Huntingdon, perhaps? Oooh, that's scary!

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 04:27 AM

I'll say it again Ard, in case you didn't get it the first time - all murders and other acts of violence are totally unacceptable, it matters not a fig who the perpetrators are, the resultant misery is the same. Attempts to attribute a greater degree of 'wrongness' to a murder committed with the complicity of a government agency than to one committed by a sectarian terrorist organisation are a divisive red herring and serve only to rekindle the embers of hatred that seems to burn in the hearts of so many of the people of your beautiful country.

Murder is murder, period. All murders are completely unjustifiable. It's an inescapable fact.

A Sad Johnny :0|

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 06:35 AM

Johnny, I wonder, now; it seems to me that it's worse when the state turns killer, because a state is supposed to be based on an agreement between people, a kind of contract.

Under this contract, we agree to choose representatives who'll make laws and collect money and divvy it out for roads and schools and libraries, and who'll appoint people to keep order.

So when a state forms secret killing squads and wipes out people considered by its appointed rulers to be dangerous - in the case of the killings Blair was talking about, these were two lawyers, a man who was a Catholic in a Protestant area, and an admittedly dangerous loyalist - it seems to me to be particularly horrible.

It's horrible because it breaks the contract of "common good" that people have made in voting for those rulers. So it makes the whole contract void.

If I found that the Irish government was forming murder squads to target any of the criminal groups currently operating here, I'd be a lot more disturbed than I am by the fact that these groups themselves are committing murders. (For instance the nice middle-aged woman shot dead in her home a couple of miles from me last night.)

Maybe this isn't logical, I don't know.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 07:17 AM

A government which operates as a terrorist organisation becomes a terrorist organisation, but one with enormous powers and effective immunity.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: freda underhill
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 07:30 AM

our governments are becoming like the countries/ organisations they purport to protect us from.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,Van
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 03:52 PM

The strange thing is that he is a barrister - professional liar - if he made a living out of that how come he is so bloody awful at it. Has anyone seen him look at all comfortable or at ease.
Keir Hardy won't spin in his grave as he won't recognise this as his heritage.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Gareth
Date: 03 Apr 04 - 06:30 PM

It is proper that there be an enquirey.

The problem is that unless the enquirey states that it was official policy from the Queen downwards Ard M will call it a white wash.

Now shall we have an independant equirey into the 2000 or so deaths attributred to the IRA - I think not.

If there was a well organised "Hit List" there would have been no bodies or stories to enquire into. Even the CIA got that right !

Just quietly disappeared, and the corpse sunk into deep water / deep graves / hot fires.

Not that that would be right, but take it into perspective, does 4 = 2000+ ????

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 03:48 AM

JTT, Mac, and others who support your view - if you attribute varying degrees of 'wrongness' to murders perpetrated by different groups, you are surely taking the first small step down the road towards murders which could be deemed as 'acceptable'.

Murders committed by Al Q'aida, The Provisional IRA, The UDA, The CIA, MI5/6, The Boston Strangler, Fred & Rosemary West, Ian Huntley, anybody who murders, are all equally wrong.

Murder is murder. It's wrong. It's indefensible. Absolutely. 110%. If we can't all say that and mean it, we're shagged.

Johnny (very sadly) :0|

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 04:33 AM

Strollin', no, I don't think that follows at all.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 04:42 AM

Then your powers of logic are somewhat deficient and you're a very scary person.

BTW, what kinds of murder, and by whom, would you say are justified?

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 06:18 AM

Gareth, Your posts are as reliable as B[]lairs statments, 4 state murders you say?, this is only the tip of the iceberg, there is a hell of a lot more to follow, dropping down to the level of the paramilitaries is a despicable venture for any government.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 04:02 PM

Following the first post, and using a comment oft qoted before.

You can tell when Tony Blair is lying, his lips move! (allegedly)

Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 04:18 PM

Oh, gawd, here we go again...

British bad. Irish good.

Look - ALL polititians are lying toads. No exeptions. Anyone who thinks he or she can run other peoples lives is not playing with a full deck for a start. Anyone who thinks any single one of them is any better than the other needs their head examined.

The answer? I dunno mate. I'm not daft enough to think I can do any better...

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Gareth
Date: 04 Apr 04 - 07:50 PM

Hey Anon Guest - My posta are accurate !

Unlike the posts of anon guest.

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 05 Apr 04 - 06:44 AM

One comment of Strollin' Johnny's seems to me outrageous: "Why single out four deaths just because they were committed by those trying to preserve law and order?"

Conceivably someone (not me) might argue that the murder of Billy Wright, while he was detained in a British prison, served some greater good. For me it was a shaming disgrace and the fact that such a thing could happen carries serious implications. I thought Wright was a despicable individual but I haveno time for capital punishment, and much less for murder. It is entirely appropriate, and indeed reassuring, that the circumstances of his murder should be the subject of an inquiry.

In respect of the other three, I suspect Johnny has no knowledge or information on which to base his, to my mind, ignorant implication that their deaths helped in any way to preserve law and order. If there was security-forces collusion in these deaths then justice failed. It is no part of any police officer's or soldier's duty to be judge, jury and executioner.

Democracy only works when we can be confident that justice will be done. That day's been a long time coming in Northern Ireland, and the decision to have these inquiries, like the decision to have the Bloody Sunday inquiry, brings it a whole lot closer.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 05 Apr 04 - 08:47 AM

Peter, judging by your use of English in your posting you're anything but illiterate, so why is it that you (and for that matter several others on this thread) seem totally unable to grasp the single, simple point I've tried to make, which is that all murders are equally abhorrent. No murder is 'worse', 'less bad' or 'better' than any other - they are all totally and unarguably unjustifiable. I don't defend murders perpetrated with the backing of Government Agencies, I condemn them as I condemn all murders. How many effing times do I have to say it before people like you get it?

With regard to my 'outrageous' statement, would it have also been 'outrageous' had I chosen to make the point by saying 'the murders by terrorists and sectarian paramilitaries of inncocent people who are totally unconnected with the activities of those organisations are no less important and no less worthy of total condemnation than murders perpetrated by groups who have the benefit of support and intelligence from Government Agencies'? It's the same thing said a different way. The real outrage is that some people are able to square their consciences so long as the murder in question suits their personal agenda.

My starting point in this thread was where someone (perhaps several someones) suggested that murders committed with Government-Agencies' complicity are 'worse' than murders committed by individuals and groups acting independently. My conscience will not allow me to accept that there are differing degrees of murder, and that has been my ONE AND ONLY message throughout all of my postings here. I don't defend the murders of Pat Finucane et al, I condemn them utterly as I condemn all killings. MURDER IS MURDER AND ALL MURDERS ARE AN EQUAL AFFRONT TO HUMANITY. If you doubt that truth, ask the friends and relatives of the Madrid bombing, or any other such atrocity, if the deaths of their loved ones were less important than any other.

I hope that's cleared up your apparent misunderstanding - if not, it's you that's got a problem - with English Comprehension.

Cheers,
Johnny :0)

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 05 Apr 04 - 01:38 PM

Strollin', sorry to answer late, have a nasty bug. No, I don't think any murders are justified.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Eric the Viking
Date: 05 Apr 04 - 04:37 PM

Desmond Morris wrote a book called "body watching"(I thnk, trying to remember) published around the early 80's. There have been many studies of behaviour by others, some much more detailed and with more insight than DM's.Though "Body watching" became a number one best seller for a time. People like Blair, Thatcher etc get quite a lot of coaching in concealment and promotion of gesture and meaning. There was an article in Punch some years ago about how "they" make changes to their body language to improve image etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: steve in ottawa
Date: 05 Apr 04 - 05:07 PM

> ALL MURDERS ARE AN EQUAL AFFRONT TO HUMANITY

Using all-caps or shouting it really loudly doesn't make it true.

Humanity would have been blessed by the early murder of Hitler. Some people say Stalin, on the verge of beginning new purges and possible war, was murdered. If so, Stalin's murder was a blessing. Napoleon's murder, some time before 1812, probably would have been remarkably beneficial to humanity as well.

All murders are not equally horrible. However, I think the only acceptable way for the state to view the murder of its citizens is to treat all murders as equally horrible (and I think it's unacceptable that in civil courts, the pain and suffering of rich people is so much more readily compensated than the pain and suffering of poor people).

> if not, it's you that's got a problem - with English Comprehension

English is tricky Johnny. I note for example, that you haven't even defined what murder is.

Is all deliberate killing of humans by other humans murder? Is killing in self defence murder? Is killing invaders who aren't immediately threatening your home and family (but probably will) murder? Is all euthanasia murder? What about with the informed consent of the victim (assisted suicide)? Is abortion murder? Is the execution of a person condemned by a jury of his peers murder?

And for that matter, are all lives equally valuable and sacred?

As you might guess, I'd say no to all of the above. I know some people who would say yes to all the above.

And simply from the last assertion, that some lives are more valuable than others, you may conclude that I believe no two murders are equally heinous. Once again though: the law ought to treat all murders as equally terrible.

I consider myself a gentle person. But I know that I'm not supporting African famine victims to the utmost of my abilities. I have neglected some far-away persons whose lives I probably could have saved. Does that make me a murderer?

As for body language: thanks for the book-tips, people. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Blair's body language
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 06 Apr 04 - 03:54 AM

Steve, in the absence of vocal communication the Caps were a means of putting an emphasis on a point that I felt JTT and others were missing. Emphasis isn't the same thing as shouting - agreed?

You make valid points and yes, I've given them all a lot of thought over the 57 years I've been around. But I still firmly believe that the morality of a civilised society demands we start from one position - No Murder. It's a lynch-pin of all the major religions and embodied in the laws of all civilised countries. The moment we waver from that single point we make problems for ourselves, and end up with individuals and factions murdering to achieve personal or political ends and using fallacious arguments to justify their atrocities.

I'll say it again - the killing of one human being by another is WRONG (not shouting, just emphasising), and I include Judicial Murder in that. It has no place in a moral civilised society.

Incidentally, I'm talking murder here, not accidental killing or manslaughter. The definition of murder? Try the British legal definition which goes something along the lines of 'the killing of one human being by another, premeditated and with malice aforethought'.

Having thought about your posting, the only point on which I'd be willing to be persuaded would be that of killing in self-defence or in the defence of others, although in such cases it's frequently a difficult call whether the degree of force necessary extends as far as killing your assailant and, of course, being unpremeditated, it's not murder.

Now I gotta do some work. I'm outta here.
'Bye guys.
Johnny