"http://www.ukcia.org/mp3s/moral_maze_cannabis_28_01-04.mp3 so that anyone who is interested can listen. My exchange with the noted drug smuggler Howard Marks received the supreme accolade of inclusion on Radio Four's Start the Week last weekend (which, alas, has no play-back facility). The trolls have been wetting themselves in delight over his performance, which says all one needs to know about them, I fear."

People with slower connections can listen here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/progs/listenagain.shtml

I feel obliged to reply.

Nothing I have said here is defamatory. If you believe otherwise, you should sue. If you do, I will demonstrate that there is clear evidence of distortion and smears that means that my words represent “fair comment”.

Let’s deal with a few facts. On Gilligan/Kelly – what Gilligan said which was inaccurate was that the government probably knew the 45-minute claim was incorrect before publication. He realised his error, omitted those words from all subsequent broadcasts and apologised for having used them. Fact.

You claim that “Andrew Gilligan wrongly reported Dr Kelly”. Lord Hutton concluded that “it is not possible to reach a definite conclusion as to what Dr Kelly said to Mr Gilligan”. Why do you know more of that conversation than do Lord Hutton or Andrew Gilligan? Were you there serving the drinks? If so, you should have given evidence to the enquiry. If not, you might be wise to stick to what we do know, rather than “sexing up” your version of what took place.

You have then said “Brendan also alleges that I did not read the Hutton report” and goes on to say that my claim is false and impugns her integrity. My comment was posted beneath her piece that begins “I haven't yet read Lord Hutton's report.” I correctly noted what you yourself said.

Jerusalem – the majority of the population of Jerusalem at the time of the UN plan was Arab, as recorded in the plan itself. Subsequent to the forced expulsion of Palestinians this balance shifted. Fact. See extract below. You are correct that you did not state that Jerusalem was part of the plan for Israel but you implied it. I apologise for that slight error in wording.

I have abided by the rules of this site. Nothing I have said is gratuitously personally abusive (in contrast to your repeated abuse of others, such as describing contributors as “trolls”); I have not quoted from private e-mails since you asked me not to do so (although I don’t accept that they were private), I have not defamed anyone and nothing which I have written is illegal.

*********************************************

Bit about Jerusalem for those interested:

“As of 1948, forty percent of the New City properties was owned by Arabs, twenty-six percent owned by Jews, fourteen percent by Christian endowments, and twenty percent by the government for public buildings, roads, and railways. Arabs also owned 795 of the 800 dunum area of the Old City.

Extrapolations from 1945 Mandatory statistics show that the Jerusalem sub-district contained slightly over a quarter of a million inhabitants of whom 59.6% were Arabs and 40.4% were Jewish. In the western Jerusalem areas that came under Israeli control after the war (251,945 dunums) 91.8% (231,446) dunums were Arab owned, 2.7% were Jewish owned, and the rest were public lands.”

[source: Institute for Jerusalem Studies]

Obviously ensuring civilised discussion is very important, but I wouldn't be overly censorious. The far-fetched and illiterate ranting of the pro-drugs crowd forms almost as strong a case against the substances as your columns. Anyone with half a brain is likely to look at most of their posts and promise never to touch the stuff.

Howard Marks: drug smuggler or smug druggler?

Melanie is entirely right about Hutton - the Gilligan report was essentially WRONG!

It has become rather fashionable to say that Andrew Gilligan's report was "basically right", and if only he had been more careful in a 'two-way' at 6:07 in the morning, then it would have been a great story. But here's the thing - the story was almost entirely wrong! We now know that regardless of Gilligan's "slip of the tongue" that the government inserted the 45 minute claim against the wishes of the intelligence services whilst knowing it to be wrong, the story still doesn't stand up.

Firstly, as far as the 45 minute claim was concerned, Dr Kelly was out of the loop on this matter, as this was not a piece of intelligence that he had dealt with himself. And even the technocrats in DIS - scientific experts - who did review the 45 minute claim, and had minor concerns over the language, still said that at no point did they argue against the inclusion of this intelligence in the dossier. (Brian Jones said he thought it could have started with the words "intelligence indicates....", which I find very strange, considering it was an intelligence document, and was never presented as cast iron fact.)

But DIS officials don't deal with sources, so they were not in the position of MI6 and the JIC to assess the credibility of this information. And we now know from the evidence given by the boss's of MI6 and the JIC that the intelligence on the 45 minute claim came from a "highly credible source" and they fully stand behind the accuracy of this piece of intelligence - totally discrediting Andrew Gilligan's claim that the government knew it was "unreliable" before inserting it into the dossier - "unreliable" being the word that Gilligan now says he should have used instead of "wrong".

So it's clear-for-all-to-see that even after corrections, the Gilligan report still doesn't stand up. The few concerns from people in DIS were the natural business of interagency government - not disquiet - where people who are not privy to all the information naturally feel concerned about something that they don't fully understand or know about. And on top of that, we have subsequently discovered that the DIS were not privy to all the intelligence either, which is why the boss's of DIS felt at ease with the minor concerns of a few officials in their department, knowing that it was not their job to assess the credibility of that information. But still, given all this, we must remember that DIS were happy with the dossier, and Dr Kelly himself gave it the thumps up, describing it as a "good document." But most importantly, the people whose job it was to assess ALL the intelligence, and the credibility of that intelligence, we're 100% happy.

So having established that the story itself was almost entirely inaccurate - apart from a few chronological details - people are still asking the legitimate question: aren't you allowed to report the concerns of a credible source even if they turn out to be wrong? But here again the Gilligan report falls down. Dr David Kelly and his family insist that Gilligan's report was not an accurate reflection of what Dr Kelly had told Mr Gilligan, which led to Dr Kelly himself telling one journalist that Gilligan's report was a crock of "shit". And the Kelly family lawyer described Mr Gilligan at the inquiry as an 'unreliable historian', such was the outrage at the inferences he had attributed to Dr Kelly. And further to this, Gilligan was unable to produce any evidence to prove that the claims he was attributing to Dr Kelly were consistent with what Dr Kelly had told him, not having made any satisfactory notes of the meeting. And Gilligan's inability to check whether Dr Kelly would be in a position to know to exact nature of Alistair Campbell's role - or Number 10's role - in the drawing up of the dossier was an extraordinary admission. To try and bring down the elected government on a single second hand source - a source which he had not been pressed on their ability to know the information they had allegedly given you, was astonishing and utterly incredible. The fact is, in the little that Dr Kelly did tell Mr Gilligan, he was engaging in office gossip about a situation which had happened eight months previously. It's fair to assume that not in Dr Kelly's wildest dreams could he have imagined that his words would be manipulated to try and bring down the government and to discredit a war he so passionately supported. And that's why he voluntarily came forward to discredit the report.

So that brings us to Andrew Gilligan's last line of defence - post-facto justification. He now asserts that because of the evidence that came out during the Hutton inquiry that Dr Brian Jones had concerns over the wording of the 45 minute claim, this proves that his story was correct. But putting aside the fact that we already know that Dr Brian Jones hadn't seen all the intelligence and never argued over the inclusion of this piece of intelligence, this charge is fundamentally different to the charge that Andrew Gilligan continued to make way after the famous 6:07 broadcast. Dr Jones's minor concerns on wording went no further than his line manager, because his line manager judged his concerns unfounded. This is not the same as the claim that it was "Number 10" who overruled the concerns of the "intelligence agencies". This was the claim that was made throughout the foreign affairs select committee process, and throughout the Hutton inquiry, and is still maintained by Gilligan to this day, even though there is not a shred of evidence to substantiate it, and an independent judge has ruled this to be unfounded.

Like Lord Hutton, I am completely at a loss as to why the BBC management didn't pull the story once the JIC and the head of MI6 confirmed that it wasn't true. It was almost entirely wrong when Andrew Gilligan first reported it, and it remains entirely wrong to this day.

I do not quite understand your point Brendan. Melanie argues from her standpoint and you argue from a Palestininan standpoint, but I thought Jerusalem was part of Transjordan...or at least part of it until 1967.

It is a bit arcane the point you try to make. By your logic we could say that the town of Gdansk was mainly German in 1945, but is now almost wholly Polish. Using data from a period before a signal change in circumstances is not sufficiently reliable, and as you know the ethnic composition of London is very different now from in 1945 or even 1967; should that be a basis for restoring the ethnic balance of 1945 in London ?.

The Institute of Jerusalem Studies (IJS), the Jerusalem branch of the Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS), was established in 1995, functioned in Ramallah and then moved to Jerusalem in the year 2000. Three years later, the offices were once again returned to Ramallah due to Israeli restrictions on movement.

IJS draws upon a local board of trustees, scholars, and administrators. The main objective of the Institute of Jerusalem Studies is to commission and publish research on final status issues, with a particular focus on Jerusalem and refugees. In addition, IJS is active in setting up networks with both local and international research communities around common areas of interest and in computerizing data on Palestine.

The work of the Institute of Jerusalem Studies encompasses several main areas:

the publication of our quarterly journal, the Jerusalem Quarterly File;
the printing and distribution of the Palestine edition of Majjalt al-Dirasat al-Falastineyeh;
hosting of scholarly conferences on Jerusalem and refugee issues;
the support and coordination of scholarly research projects for IPS;
the dissemination of research on Palestine to the local community through publishing and distributing the publications of IPS inside Palestine; and
the creation of online research and information resources about Palestine, in cooperation with Palestinian and international research institutions.

John C, I like your line of thought however, without wishing to misrepresent Dr Kelly in any way, I believe he would have an opinion on 45-minutes simply because he would know that they could not prepare a biological warfare load for a shell within that time period. He would know exactly how long such a weaponising would take, since this would no doubt have been within his remit at Porton Down, and he had seen the Soviet research centre.

I always considered Gilligan's sloppiness in language at variance with Dr Kelly's professional precision; and I doubt Kelly would say anything definitively or directly on such matters; and that his only reference to 45 minutes could be that he could not see a shell being prepped and battle-ready within that time.

Gilligan shot himself in the foot by focusing on 45-minutes, putting words in Kelly's mouth and betraying him to the Foreign Affairs Committe; and faking his so-called notes on the PDA.....he proved himself unreliable and sloppy, where Kelly was precise and professional.

Gilligan was also weird in some of his Baghdad reporting with comments for effect rather than accuracy; and it confirms the fact that only fools trust journalists, they are amoral.

I'm afraid most of them ganged up on you, Melanie, at the end of "The Moral Maze". Good show though.

I'm not sure your insistence on the psychological damage cannabis causes holds up. That is not to say it isn't bad for one's health to smoke (anything), and there is no doubt cannabis is a demotivator, but surely if it was as psychologically damaging as you represent there would be a lot of evidence before our very eyes. I don't see it.

I may be wrong, but I think you are opposed to pleasure. I may be doubly wrong, but I don't think you've ever smoked any cannabis. Herewith a prescription:

Go to the Central Station in The Hague and get someone to point you in the direction of Spekstraat 6a. Walk thither on a warm spring day. You will arrive at a koffie on teehuis called "The Jukebox". It's just where Spakstraat intersects with one of the finest retail shopping streets in the western world.

Order a cup of coffee and one of their hand-rolled joints: any one. Read the Daily Telegraph bought at the station, drink the coffee, then walk over to the large park you passed on the way. Spread the paper on the deep grass near the canal and smoke the joint.

Come back and write about the experience.

Brendan wrote:

"Jerusalem – the majority of the population of Jerusalem at the time of the UN plan was Arab, as recorded in the plan itself. Subsequent to the forced expulsion of Palestinians this balance shifted."

The vast majority of Arabs (who, incidentally, only became "Palestinian" a couple of decades ago) were nothing of the sort. They, in fact, left voluntarily, urged on by their leaders who were anticipating an easy and fast victory over the Jews; Jews who unquestionably would have been subjected to genocide had the Arabs won.

Compare the fate of those Arabs with the over 700,000 Jews who were stripped of all their possessions and summarily thrown out of those Arab countries of which they had been citizens, in many cases not just for centuries but millennia.

And indeed, those Arabs were far, far luckier than the Jews of Europe who a few short years earlier had been subjected to genocide by a German and Austria gone quite mad while millions of other European gentiles either directly collaborated, or, like those despicable "neutrals," averted their gaze while they no-so-secretly assisted the German and Austrian war effort.

Interesting article by Benny Morris, one of the Israeli "new historians," who has been much praised by the Arabs and their supporters... until recently

Ha'aretz - Fri., January 23, 2004

Right of Reply / I do not support expulsion

By Benny Morris

A few days after the publication of the interview with me ("Survival of the fittest," Haaretz Magazine, January 9), an angry Israeli-Arab student came to my office at Ben-Gurion University. He suggested that the Holocaust never happened (he cited what he called "an important and world-renowned Egyptian historian"), and claimed that the Twin Towers in New York were destroyed at the order of the CIA or the Mossad, and that Israeli soldiers and pilots in the territories are deliberately targeting and murdering innocent civilians. I mention this so that we all understand the kind of world we in the Middle East are living in.

The war being waged against us since September 2000 is three-dimensional: On one level, which is the one highlighted by Palestinian spokespersons, a struggle is being waged for liberation from Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip; on the second level, the Palestinians - according to spokesmen for Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah militants - are waging a war to eradicate the Zionist state and to restore their "rights" over all of Palestine; on the third level, the Palestinians' struggle is part of the global struggle being waged by jihadist Islam against the "Western Satan," with Israel being a vulnerable extension of Western culture in our region.

For jihadist Islam, Israel represents the embodiment of all the values it abhors - democracy and freedom, openness, tolerance and pluralism, individualism and secularism, criticality (including the value of expressing self-criticism, which is absent from their culture), women's rights, liberalism and progress, sexual freedom - while the proponents of jihad aspire to return to the days in which the sword of Islam ruled from India to the Atlantic Ocean and minorities quaked under its shadow. These jihadists - and the societies that support them and dispatch them - who rejoice in the streets whenever a building is brought crashing down upon hundreds or thousands of occupants or a bus is reduced to a smoldering hulk, deserve the name "barbarians." It's unfortunate that many in the West and in the extreme Israeli left prefer to ignore the second and third dimensions and to view the Palestinian struggle solely through the prism of the first dimension, resistance to occupation.

A central accusation in the letters to Haaretz Magazine ("The judgment of history," January 16) concerned the issue of "ethnic cleansing." I will repeat my words, which apparently did not register (perhaps because of the misleading title on the cover): I do not support the expulsion of Arabs from the territories or from the State of Israel! Such an expulsion would be immoral, and is also unrealistic. What I said was, that if in the future, these communities were to launch massive violence against the State of Israel in combination with a broad assault on Israel by its neighbors, and endanger its survival, expulsions would certainly be in the cards. As for Israeli Arabs, my comments may be seen to represent a minatory road sign pointing in two possible directions: They could, as a whole, choose the path of loyalty to the Jewish state and integration within it as equal citizens, and thus enjoy quiet, prosperous lives; or they could choose the path of disloyalty to the state and of active and violent support for those who seek its demise. The latter path - with which many Israeli Arabs identified in October 2000 and with which many in its leadership seem to identify today, in one convoluted way or another - will help lead to either the destruction of the Jewish state or to their being uprooted.

A general comment on the matter of ethnic cleansing: I am aware that "ethnic cleansing" is not politically correct and is morally problematic. But, what can we do - the history of the 20th century is replete with instances of ethnic cleansing that occurred under catastrophic circumstances and were ultimately beneficial for humanity, including for the expulsees themselves. Was not the expulsion of the Sudeten Germans (after World War II) - who contributed to the destruction of the Czechoslovak Republic - justified? And didn't it contribute, in the end, to their happiness, and certainly to the happiness of the Czech people? In the final analysis, didn't the ethnic cleansing perpetrated by the Turks against their Greek minority and by the Greeks against their Turkish minority after World War I contribute to the welfare and happiness of the two peoples, and to the peace that has prevailed between the two nations ever since?

One more thing: Among the biggest religio-ethnic cleansers in human history, in the distant past and in our time, has been the Arab Islamic nation. Mohammed and his men cleansed the Arabian Peninsula of its Jewish tribes, in part through the mass slaughter of the men and the enslavement and forced conversion of the young women. (According to the Koran, in one day, Mohammed's men massacred 800-900 men of the Bani Qureiza tribe - a larger number than all the Arab victims of Jewish massacres through the whole of the 1948 war.) In the ensuing centuries, the Muslim empires and the Arab states, with the help of the pogrom and the law, uprooted from their midst or forcibly converted most of their Christian communities and ethnically cleansed themselves of their Jewish communities. Has a single word of criticism about any of this history ever been voiced by MK Mohammed Barakeh and Dr. Haggai Ram and their friends? (And, by the way, every Jewish community that was conquered by the Arab armies in the course of the 1948 war, including the Jewish Quarter in the Old City, was ethnically cleansed and every site was completely leveled.)

In the modern age, no one has been more racist and more intolerant of "the other" - Kurd, Jew, Sudanese Christian and animist, Maronite Christian, etc. - than the Arab states. The constitution of Jordan, one of the more moderate Islamic Arab states, even includes a clause prohibiting Jews from being Jordanian citizens. The Arabs' attempt to annihilate the Jewish Yishuv [pre-state community in Palestine] in 1948 compelled Israel to uproot them from the Jewish territory.

Mr. Barakeh: Enough of your hypocrisy. Only one side in the conflict in our region is under the threat of annihilation and that's the Jewish side, and you know it. So it was in 1948 (see, for example, the declaration by Azzam Pasha, Secretary of the Arab League, on the eve of the Pan-Arab invasion of Palestine, about how the anticipated slaughter of the Jews would rival the carnage wreaked by the Mongols during their 13th-century invasion of the Middle East), and so it could also be in the future. The deep hatred among the Arabs of Palestine and the proximate Muslim world for the Zionist enterprise constitutes an infrastructure for such a future genocide. There is no such hatred for anyone among the Jews or in me.

In our region, the side that has been engaging for generations now in the systematic dehumanization of the adversary is the Palestinian side against the Jews - see the Hamas charter and the official political manifests of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, who represent at least half of the Palestinians in the territories, which routinely refer to the Jews, in accordance with Islamic tradition, as "sons of monkeys and pigs," "killers of prophets" and as a "lowly people." Yes, I will stick to the definition "savage beasts" to describe suicide bombers who are prepared to massacre dozens or even thousands of civilians in buses and skyscrapers in cities in Israel and the West.

In 1988, I regarded the Palestinian rebellion ("the first intifada") as a legitimate struggle for liberation from occupation. And I believe that most of the Palestinian stone-throwers then saw their struggle that way. This is why I felt it was right to refuse to serve in the territories, and to sit in prison. (Incidentally, I do not recall seeing the names of my morally enlightened colleagues from Ben-Gurion University appearing on the list of refuseniks then, just as I did not come across them during my service in the Paratroop brigades.)

In 2000, the Palestinians, led by Yasser Arafat, began a war that combined the three dimensions I've mentioned and whose ultimate objective is the destruction of Israel (or, "flying the flag of Palestine over the walls of Jerusalem," as Arafat coyly puts it) - just as Saladin destroyed the Crusader Kingdom. In Arafat's eyes, we are the "new Crusaders." This is the main reason why Arafat, in the name of the Palestinian people and without argument on the part of his colleagues, rejected the Barak-Clinton peace proposals of December 2000, which included Israeli withdrawal from about 95 percent of the West Bank and from 100 percent of the Gaza Strip, the evacuation of most of the settlements, and the establishment of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital. He rejected the proposals because he and his people want the entire country (their intransigence over the "right of return" is not a tactical matter).

And in so doing, Arafat remained consistent with the rejectionist heritage of his people, who in 1937 rejected the compromise proposed by the Peel Commission; in 1947-48, rejected the compromise proposed by the UN (the Partition Proposal); and in 1978, rejected the Egyptian-Israeli compromise (the Camp David Accords, in which the Palestinians were offered autonomy, which would in time have evolved into a Palestinian state).

Unfortunately, the destruction of Israel and the right of return of the refugees have become a key component of Palestinian identity, and as long as this component does not vanish, there is no possibility of an historic compromise. And without a compromise that is based on two states, in the end, only one state will remain here - either a Jewish one without a large Arab minority, or an Arab one with a Jewish minority that will continuously dwindle until it disappears, just as the Jewish communities disappeared from the Islamic world in the last century (after all, what Jew in his right mind would want to live as a minority in an Islamic state headed by the terrorist from the Muqata'a and the wheelchair-bound fanatic from Gaza?).

As for the near future, Israel must get out of most of the West Bank and from Gaza and East Jerusalem, with or without an agreement, and a fence will separate the two peoples (and if the Palestinians see it as prison, they are the ones responsible for its construction). As long as the Arabs' intentions toward us are murderous, there is no option but to complete the fence, but not along the planned route. The Israeli government is using a just enterprise to make unjust gains.

The compression of the seven hours of my interview with Ari Shavit into two pages did not do me justice, at least in terms of the tone. From a whole range of statements on different issues, the harshest ones were chosen, sometimes without nuances or qualifications. I admit, I slipped here and there - I do not support and did not support the extermination of the Indians, and I regret the use of the word "cage."

One last thing. I find it odd that the editors of Haaretz Magazine chose to accompany an article dealing with the tragedy of two peoples with photographs of a smiling Benny Morris. Contrary to the implication, I do not rejoice over bloodletting and expulsion. I also do not understand why the English edition of the magazine chose to entitle the interview, "Survival of the fittest." I did not use that expression and I abhor it.

In any event, I will be the first to rejoice if my judgments and predictions are proved wrong.

I don't think this thread is meant to be about the rights and wrongs of the Israeli cause. It is about Melanie Phillips extraordinary personal attack on one of her contributors.

My view is as follows: from what I see she's met her match in Brendan. She is a schoolyard bully prepared to heap insults, smears and threats on those with whom she takes issue in the hope of silencing them. Claiming a post is defamatory is a clear threat.

But he's not showing any signs of backing down - in fact, he's giving her a good pasting. I especially enjoyed the fact that his supposedly libellous claim that she'd not read Hutton was in fact a direct quote from her own article on which he was commenting!

If she sues put me down for the fighting fund.

Frankly I think the entire comment section should be scrapped.

Too many posters evidently suffer from a bad case of sour grapes. They show insufficient journalistic talent or integrity to ever get into print themselves, and so instead take out their fury and jealousy in spiteful attacks on one of the most successful journalists in the country. That they have the gall to do so on her own website and this abuse the good faith in which she runs this section just beggars belief.

Brendan claims that Gilligan apologised for his error in the 6.07 report. This is true - but only in the sense that he apologised during the Hutton inquiry. There is no evidence anywhere that Gilligan, or anyone at the BBC, apologised for the 6.07 error at any point in time near the broadcast.

On the day itself, the slander was simply not repeated in later broadcasts. Obviously, this indicates the Today team knew they were on a sticky wicket. Despite this, they didn't issue a correction or an apology. If Brendan persists with his notion that Gilligan or anyone else apologised for that error in good time, he demonstrates weakness of mind.

In the light of his defence of Gilligan, it isn't surprising that Brendan should resort to opportunistic misrepresentation. He correctly quotes Melanie as saying “Andrew Gilligan wrongly reported Dr Kelly”, but then promptly takes it out of context. As anyone can see by examining the piece these comments are attached to, Melanie is clearly referring to the 6.07 error. In this context, Melanie's correct view in keeping with Gilligan's belated admission and apology.

I'm not going to spend the time looking at more, but on the wider, on-topic, issue I will say this. If what Brendan has written above is typical of the sort of thing that is causing Melanie problems, I can't see what the fuss is about. He may be wrong, he may even be a bit of a git. But he is hardly out of order for blog comments. If this is what's causing upset, it's probably best to just disable comments.

Its odd how we cant click on the names of most people here supporting Melanie. Did I miss the option to hide your e-mail addy?

andrew, I leave the bit where it says 'Email Adress' blank, which is always helpful when you don't want to run the risk of other posters making contact.

Haha, "trolls" hahaha

hahahahahahahahaha. Mad mel vs mr nice.

Mr Nice: 1

Mad Mel: 0

When is round 2?

Brendan has missed the obvious point. The BBC were asked to withdraw the remark they refused. This alone destroys Brendans whole argument.

In her online diary, Melanie announces she has deleted visitors’ comments that are “defamatory of myself” and “contain serious misrepresentations”.

She goes on to add:

“A number of trolls who object to my views about drugs have been attempting to hijack the site by clogging it up with the kind of drivel that deters those who want to take part in intelligent debate. Accordingly, I have been deleting those posts which I consider to be mischievous or malicious, and will continue to do so… The trolls have been wetting themselves in delight over [Howard Marks] performance [on The Moral Maze], which says all one needs to know about them…”

“Trolls”? "Wetting themselves"? "All one needs to know about them"?

Er, double standard, anyone...?

Evidently, "intelligent debate" is, for Melanie, a subjective term, to be used as as and when it suits.

On topic, I feel the best way for Melanie to deal with the comments would be to reply to them directly, rather than to write posts personally insulting people who leave comments.

I've unfortunately not had the opportunity to hear her contribution to the Moral Maze. If it as enjoyable as her many acolytes on here claim, Melanie would be more than a match in any comments section for these "trolls"!

On topic, I feel the best way for Melanie to deal with the comments would be to reply to them directly, rather than to write posts personally insulting people who leave comments.

I've unfortunately not had the opportunity to hear her contribution to the Moral Maze. If it as enjoyable as her many acolytes on here claim, Melanie would be more than a match in any comments section for these "trolls"!

My advice to Melanie would be never to be goaded into an exchange with those contributions which, whether rightly or not, you take exception to on the site. Either delete them, or let them stand; it's your site and you're not obliged to give reasons why specific posts are deleted. You've explained the grounds on which you will do so, but how you apply those in particular cases is a matter for your own judgement.

Otherwise the resulting exchanges will only multiply and real trolls will be encouraged by having elicited a response. Many comment and debate web forums have been ruined this way - Peter Hitchen's being one of the most recent.

Simon you have a good point. It is also possible to post their IP number on the Website as it logs onto the server.

Surely, 'trolls' go with the territory if one has a blog. They are, however, a minority on this site compared to the late Peter Hitchens Forum (the forum is dead not Mr Hitchens!) which seemed to be dominated by trolls with no ability to debate anything with any rigour whatsoever.

Melanie's trolls seem generally to be a better class of troll - although some of them do seem to be permanently stoned...and actually strengthen the case against ever smoking the weed...

I think she should relax...being screamed at by a screaming harpy seems an occupational hazard for thoughtful posters on here ;-)

"being screamed at by a screaming harpy"

Before anyone takes umbrage, this comment does NOT refer to Melanie...but to a few of the other over-excitable posters who sometimes appear on this site ;-)

"Brendan has missed the obvious point. The BBC were asked to withdraw the remark they refused. This alone destroys Brendans whole argument."

Which remark? In any event, I think s/he has missed the obvious point. My whole argument was not about the rights and wrongs of the Hutton report: my whole argument was that Melanie Phillips is not in a strong position to criticise the ethics of other journalists when some of the material she writes is amongst the worst of its kind when judged against any sane yardstick of journalistic ethics.

She may scream about defamation but I stand by what I have said because it is true: she bends the facts, twists words and smears people. For example (and there are too many to detail here) her article about the ISM twists the facts in order to make her tendentious case. Referring to a suicide bomber as a “genocide bomber” is such a gross misuse of the term genocide as to be almost beyond belief. And can one get much lower than smearing a murder victim by (falsely) claiming that he supported terrorism and then alleging that his family are seeking to make political capital from his death, merely because they pressed for those responsible for his killing to be brought to justice. As I presume that someone pays her to write this drivel, it is surely she that is literally making capital from his killing?

And she smears people by describing them as anti-Semites when there is not a shred of evidence to support her claims (and, Melanie, before you jump up and down about that last one, I have some interesting e-mails which prove my point). She even ludicrously claims that the European Union has deliberately spawned “a rising tides of anti-Semitism” (and yet has the nerve to publish an article claiming that the whole of the Palestinian people has become professional actors and victims).

She claims to remove posts only if they are defamatory or insulting to others or illegal. But a number of mine have been removed not because they’re any of these but because they were critical of Melanie Phillips. And if she wants to remove posts that contain gratuitous insults then she should look at the ones in which Rod Liddle is called a fascist, Sir John Baker a creep, the Archbishop of Canterbury, nauseating, contributors to this site trolls, the entire media Stalin’s stooges, Andrew Gilligan a liar and so on and so on. In fact as just one person contributed all of these words, there must be a strong case for them to be banned. Now that would give her something worthwhile to write about for once: Melanie Phillips banned from the Melanie Phillips web site by Melanie Phillips.

For Brendan, two comments from different radio broadcats by Gilligan
6:07
"...what we have been told by one of the senior officials in charge of
drawing up that dossier was that actually the government probably knew that that
forty five minute figure was wrong even before it decided to put it in."

Your remarks showed that you had no understandinjg at all about the Hutton inquiry, either the original complaints, the evidence or the report. So on what grounds could you complain abo
7:32

" I have spoken to a British official who was involved in the prepartion
of the dossier............. It was included in the dossier against our wishes,
because it was unreliable"

These remarks have been shown to be totally unfounded.

They were only withdrawn after the evidence given to the Hutton inquiry had already shown them to be wrong.

You were wrong in just about everything you said about Gilligan, so hence your compliant against Melanie also didn't stack up.

Sorry mis posting on the previous comment.

For Brendan, two comments from different radio broadcats by Gilligan
6:07
"...what we have been told by one of the senior officials in charge of
drawing up that dossier was that actually the government probably knew that that
forty five minute figure was wrong even before it decided to put it in."

7:32

" I have spoken to a British official who was involved in the prepartion
of the dossier............. It was included in the dossier against our wishes,
because it was unreliable"

These remarks have been shown to be totally unfounded.

They were only withdrawn after the evidence given to the Hutton inquiry had already shown them to be wrong.

You were wrong in just about everything you said about Gilligan, so hence your compliant against Melanie also didn't stack up.

Speaking as nobody's accolyte, Brendan has sunk lower. Melanie chucks a few light remarks against someone on her website equating her conviction politics with Gilligan's misquoting an intelligence official to suggest the Prime Minister took Britain to war for nothing. Brendan is picking at her historical facts and comparing them with the oddest statistics I have ever seen on Israel 1948. It is a slur and he is behaving like a troll, not merely raising his material for discussion.

And it happens to be true that supporters of the Palestinian ISM are promoting Hurndall's case as much as Corrie's for political capital. That is fair enough but it doesn't close the case.

I assume that recent developments have brought the defenders of Hutton to realise they are wrong. Hutton was able to conclude there was no sexing up because the JIC took responsibility for the "intelligence" report even though it was indeed clearly sexed up to the dismay of the intelliegence experts themselves. The "intelligence" report led to media reports that Iraq had WMD deployable in 45 mins - something that even the defence secretary now admits he knows was wrong.

Robert Kay is a 35-year-old MS sufferer, his home is in Gt Yarmouth. Robert had been using cannabis to relieve the pain and to treat himself for MS, and the cannabis improved his condition so much that he was able to lead a nearly normal lifestyle. One evening when driving home home he was stopped searched and the police officer found a small amount of cannabis. They then searched his home and found a bag containing leaves and other cannabis material. He was arrested. After spending all night in the police station and being in considerable pain, he was charged. Last August he was tried, convicted and sentenced to twelve months in prison.

First he was sent to Norwich prison and about four weeks later he was moved to Wayland prison. Initially he thought it would be better, but it turned out to be considerably worse. In Norwich he had been receiving medication, baclafen for the pain from his MS. In Wayland He was only allowed five tablets, and he eked these out by splitting them in half, and when those were finished a further prescription was refused. In Norwich he had been allowed to use a walking stick but in Wayland he was not allowed to. He had to miss meals because he could get down the two flights of stairs to the canteen., and he suffered palpitations and cramps.

His family were very concerned that his living conditions could be life threatening, and also could considerably worsen the onset of his MS. His mother phoned the prison governor to explain their concerns, and eventually he was moved to his own cell and his prescription was renewed. However a previous offer of early release on a tag has been withdrawn as the governor says he might reoffend, ie use cannabis again to relieve his pain. Robert is now due for release by the end of February, having served six months of this twelve months sentence. Robert's case underlines the need for a system in Britain similar to that which operates in many states in the USA, where a doctor's letter recommending the use of cannabis for a medical condition allows the patient to have a legal supply and gives immunity from prosecution.

To all "sexed-up" document peacenik freaks.

If you think that phrasing an intelligence document to effect an outcome that is, on balance, advantageous to Iraq, the Middle East and to the Western World, is "sexing it up" ... then your sex lives are seriously lacking. I suggest you go practice real sex, rather than constantly blogging away with your fingertips in lonely frustration. Get a life, it's all over. If you you had no stomach for it then, as you always do, just sit back and let others clean up the mess. That way the freedoms you bang on about are preserved and you can enjoy them without lifting a finger or shedding a drop of either the enemy's or your own blood. Cowards cringing in the corner whining is an unedifying sight, particularly when the bullets are still flying.

Frank:

"To all "sexed-up" document peacenik freaks.

If you think that phrasing an intelligence document to effect an outcome that is, on balance, advantageous to Iraq, the Middle East and to the Western World, is "sexing it up" ... then your sex lives are seriously lacking. I suggest you go practice real sex, rather than constantly blogging away with your fingertips in lonely frustration. Get a life, it's all over. If you you had no stomach for it then, as you always do, just sit back and let others clean up the mess. That way the freedoms you bang on about are preserved and you can enjoy them without lifting a finger or shedding a drop of either the enemy's or your own blood. Cowards cringing in the corner whining is an unedifying sight, particularly when the bullets are still flying."

You've clearly lost it now, Frank. Where to begin, where to begin?

Perhaps by pointing out that you seem to post in here as much, if not more, than those "peacenik freaks" you condemn?

Or remind you that, far from sitting back, more than a million people marched against the war?

Or the inherent contradiction in your post that you say, "Get a life. It's all over," and then state that, "The bullets are still flying."

Or that we "peacenik freaks" wouldn't necessarily agree with you that the outcome in Iraq is advantageous to Iraq, the Middle East and the Western World?

Just one question, Frank. Do you think it's desirable for a government to lie to the country, as long as the outcome is "desirable"? Or you would rather see a government engaging in open, honest debate, and using their powers of influence and argument to persuade people to support their cause?

I can tell you what the "freaks" would rather see.

To the person of no name who keeps banging on about Gilligan/Hutton a few points:

1) This particular thread is about journalistic ethics, not Hutton, which was used as an example. Debate about Hutton is probably best done on that thread (but I’ll briefly pick up your points below)

2) I stand by my charge that Phillips has - here and elsewhere - twisted the truth and smeared people deliberately and knowingly. That is a serious charge. If untrue and made maliciously it would be defamatory. It's neither of those things. If Melanie Phillips thinks otherwise, I invite her to sue. But I promise that if she does, she will be buried in court.

3) You are very muddled about Gilligan’s broadcasts. First, you misquote the 6:07 because you omitted the important parts where he stumbled over his words. I heard the original; it was clear that he spoke extemporaneously. He made a mistake and did not repeat that form of words in any of his seventeen subsequent broadcasts that day. He actually inserted words to make clear that the government was not being accused of lying or dishonesty.

His subsequent reports that he was told by a senior official that the 45 minute claim was included in the document against the wishes of some of the people involved in drawing it up was true. Read the next bit slowly because you clearly have not yet understood it: it was true that he was told this – whether what he was told was true or not is a totally different matter. Can you grasp that distinction?

How do we know it was true? Gilligan testified to this in the Huton enquiry and as the other party to that conversation is dead there can be no way to prove otherwise. His evidence on this matter was corroborated by that of Susan Watts – Kelly told her much the same thing.

I would venture that I’m more familiar with the Hutton evidence than are you. Take a look at 244. Gilligan testified that Kelly “said that the statement that WMD were ready for use in 45 minutes was unreliable. He said it was wrong. He said it was included “against our wishes””.
So when Gilligan reported that an official had told him that the 45 minute claim “was included in the dossier against our wishes, because it was unreliable” that was an accurate report of what he had been told, was it not?

As for data for Palestine at the time of partition I don’t know why anyone can say they were the oddest they’ve ever seen. They were sourced from a reputable independent academic institute. If you don’t like them, then try Benny Morris or any other good quality text on the matter. I’m sorry but Phillips claim about Jerusalem population data is plain wrong. What was it meant to prove anyway? Was it meant to say that if the majority population of Jerusalem was Jewish they were entitled to seize the city? If so, she needs to think a little harder. The majority population of ISRAEL under the partition plan was Palestinian so by this logic the Palestinians were entitled to seize the land designated as Israeli.

BQ

I wondered which 'freak' would come out of the starting gate first - but you were odds on - 10-1 the field.

You say:
"Perhaps by pointing out that you seem to post in here as much, if not more, than those "peacenik freaks" you condemn?"

At my time of life sex would be an impractical proposition (even if I got one) so this blog is a diversionary substitute. But even so, I still don't fantasise about sex in relationship to intelligence reports. That really is weird. But then you've already fessed up in that regard and even if you hadn't, your non de plume sort of gives us a clue.

You say:
"Or remind you that, far from sitting back, more than a million people marched against the war?"

Don't accept your statistics, but those that were actually there, were protesting against WW1, WW2,the Vietnam War; the rest were just enjoying a few hours away from their Care in the Community Hostels. Then there was Tony Benn ... yerrss, well!

You say:
"Or the inherent contradiction in your post that you say, "Get a life. It's all over," and then state that, "The bullets are still flying."

Not inconsistent if you follow the drift. When I say, "... it's all over" I refer of course to your attempt to prevent the invasion, that's what's all over. And perhaps you'd like to tell your friends from the 'demos' that the other wars are over, too. It's too late now, as the song goes. The mopping up operations would be more successful if our own freaking compatriots stopped encouraging the remnants from whom the bullets are emanating.

You say:
"Or that we "peacenik freaks" wouldn't necessarily agree with you that the outcome in Iraq is advantageous to Iraq, the Middle East and the Western World?"

I'm sure you (collective) wouldn't! You are too busy whipping up a frenzy against the allies, aided and abetted by your fey chums in the Wood Lane Doughnut and in Port-Land Place.

"Just one question, Frank. Do you think it's desirable for a government to lie to the country, as long as the outcome is "desirable"? Or you would rather see a government engaging in open, honest debate, and using their powers of influence and argument to persuade people to support their cause?"

That's two questions! A to Q1: No! who said they did? Certainly not Lord Hutton. What I was pointing out was that some of Phony Tony's party didn't seem to understand what the issues were, so it had to be put in simpler language. It's called accommodating idiots. The Government needed to get the show on the road, or we'd have been left behind.

A to Q2: I'd quite like to see that, but I don't suppose I ever will, all governments have to take people like you into account before they try any sensible policies, as a consequence we get what we deserve.

What no one seems to have given us during this whole debate, is their prognostication on the outcome if Blair had lost the vote and felt unable to support Bush and made the Egregious Trio the Egregious Quartet?

France, Deutschland, Russia and Great(?)Britain. Standing on the sidelines! Together!! Uugghhh!

Roll on the election. It will be interesting watching New Labour tearing itself apart and the rest trying to explain away their duplicity. The Liberals of course will be up the Pub with Charlie, listening to his boolshit as he tries to convince them (and himself) that they exist as a political entity, before returning to 'Have I Got News For You.' What a shower!

hahahahahahaha

look at franks HAIR! hahahahaha

Malenie should post the IPs of the obvious trolls who are so intent on destroying any reasonable debate on her front page and if they persist, report them to their providers.

The majority of trolls have a problem with factual and historical truth and tend to post any propaganda to suit their purposes.

Melanie mustn't let her site become contaminated with disruptive trolls as Peter Hitchens site did.

The main purpose of the trolls is to close down as many sites as possible that they think is too "right wing" for them, so they gang up, invite their friends in and disrupt any decent debate.

It's called stifling free speech - these loud people make a lot of noise, demand attention and want to be heard.

It's a case of empty kettles making the most noise.

Leave Melanie alone and troll some propaganda sites who will listen to the absolute tosh you post!

To Boris.

Dr Jones gave evidence to the Hutton inquiry.

What he said was as follows:

Dr Jones " The important point is that we at no stage argued that this intelligence
should not be included in the dossier"

and

Dr Jones "We thought it was important intelligence. I personally thought that the
word used in the main body of the text, that the intelligence indicated this was
a little bit strong, but I felt I could live with that....."

Tey reading the whole of the evidence and not media sound bytes, you might learn something.

Dr Jones recent comments are about the wording, in what seems to be an attempt to cover his own back. Has nothing to do with Gilligans claim that the government inserted teh 45 minutes claim aganist the intelligence services advise. Dr Jones onw evidence to teh Hutton inquiry shows your comments to be incorrect.

To Brendan.

You state that Gilligan was telling the truth, because Gilligan said he was.

You do understand how weak a statement that is?

As Hutton stated, with the death of Dr Kelly, we can never know what was and what wasn't said in the conversation. But no other evidence backs up Gilligans claim, and that includes Ms Watts.
The intelligence people actually working on the dossier, unlike Dr Kelly who wasn't, he was informally consulated on a few portions of it, stated very clearly to the Hutton inquiry that the 45 minute should have been in the dossier.

Read up all of Dr Jones evidence for a starter.
Try these bits for a starter;

Dr Jones " The important point is that we at no stage argued that this intelligence
should not be included in the dossier"

and

Dr Jones "We thought it was important intelligence. I personally thought that the
word used in the main body of the text, that the intelligence indicated this was
a little bit strong, but I felt I could live with that....."

Dr Jones "..we felt it was reasonable to say that the intelligence indicated that this
was the case, and I think it was a resonable conclusion, but we did not think the
intelligence showed it beyond any shadow of doubt"

Other than Gilligans word there is noo reasonable grounds for Dr Kelly to have stated that the government inserted teh 45 minute against the wiahses of teh inteeligence services, and this is what Gilligan said.

If Gilligan had just made a slip, why did both he and the BBC refuse to withdraw it? They could easily have said, yes in those broadcasts it was a mistatement look to the rest. But they didn't, they said that they stood by their story.

You also ignore the fact that Gilligan also repeated a very similar allegation in the article he wrote for the mail on Sunday.

The whole point is that Gilligan and the BBC stood by Gilligan's incorrect statements. If they hadn't done this there would have been no problem.

Apologies for the number of typos in the previous post, I hope it remains readable.

Once Frank is able to respond to a post without resorting to snide remarks about the assumed sexuality of the poster, I will reply to his comments.

Sadly, until then, his comments don't merit a response.

janeyk:

"The majority of trolls have a problem with factual and historical truth and tend to post any propaganda to suit their purposes."

Funny that. The "trolls", I'm sure, would say exactly the same thing about Melanie and her articles.

To the anon poster above - you should take a look at the interview with Jones in the Indy a couple of days ago and you would see that my post is right. The experts like him were uncomfortable about the dossier but their reservations were batted away with the promise that other intelligence existed which they did not see. As we now know that was a lie. Further, Hoon is now admitting - read the papers fella - that he knew that the alarmist nonsense about 45mins to the destruction of Cyprus was rubbish at the time.

To Melanie - what about Brendan fronting up to you then? Fancy your chances in court?? Quite ironic that he appears to have caught you out when you were banging on about free speech a la Kilroy. You going step up to the plate - or maybe just delete his posts again?

Dr T,

Interesting and valid post but I do feel you're muddling a few things here. First the 'slip of the tongue' (I think it was more than that - it was sloppy) was to claim that the government probably knew the 45 minute claim was false before publication. Gilligan admitted that this part of his first broadcast was wrong and so subsequently made clear that the government was not being accused of deception or lying. He made that clear immeditely. The BBC did not have to backtrack on that: he'd already done so. They didn't apologise for the rest of the broadcast because they believed it to be true and fair.

The second aspect of his report - that the 45 minute claim was inserted against the wishes of some involved - appears to be an accurate report of what he was told (whether what he was told was true is an altogether different matter). Why? Because as Hutton said there is no evidence to contradict Gilligan on this point. There is also some corroborative evidence from Susan Watts. Now when I studied law, I learned that in such cases while one might treat a sole and interested witnesses evidence with caution, it did not invalidate it.

Can I also just add for the benefit of the joker who keeps posting about "trolls", if this type of contribution makes me a troll, I'm happy with that. This is the web site of a polemical journalists: she should be the last to complain for polemical contributions.

BeefQueen

For: "Sadly, until then, his comments don't merit a response."

read: "I'm flouncing again and being a bit hissy!"
[Thanks Caroline.]

What you really mean is that my riposte to each of your points was apropos and unanswerable. And if you don't wish to continue with the discourse that's your prerogative, duckie. But you've done this before and you know you can't resist a reprise.

Beef Queen, it's pretty sad that you have to defend the trolls on here, especially when Melanie uses good, reliable sources and not the biased propaganda that most trolls use.

Also, as it's Melanie's site, she's entitled to run it in the way she sees fit.

Otherwise, go back to the Guardian Talkboards (paid for by the newspaper) or Indymedia (paid for by members contributions) instead of a private site paid for by Melanie herself.

If you take issue with her articles in the newspapers, write a letter to the papers... but stop trolling.

Melanie, as a private individual, is fully entitled to publish the IP of any user abusing her comments section by trolling, and she's also entitled to inform the service provider, as well as being entitled to take legal action for defamatory remarks made against her. Just as other boards do.

We are now aware of the pakistani scientific establishment and sundry other muslim acolytes activities in selling information and nuclear equipment to those statesself evidently allied tothe aspirations of militant islamists.Have any of the proud dissenters any observations as to the readyness of the usual suspects tomake afast buck
enabling yet another palatial residence to be enjoyed!!

I've read all of the foregoing posts with their various points of view and I am amazed that so many people have such certain knowledge of what all the actors in this play really meant in their recorded words. My experience of people is that they will couch their views to match their ambitions. Truth never enters into it.

And yet so many seem to express views of such certainty that they feel entitled to sneer at the views of others that are based on the same doubtful sources!

"We are now aware of the Jewish political establishment and sundry other Zionist acolytes activities in taking bribes allied tothe aspirations of militant Zionists.Have any of the proud dissenters any observations as to the readyness of the usual suspects tomake afast buck
enabling yet another palatial residence to be enjoyed!!"

Now if I wrote that many - including Phillips - would be yelling "anti-Semite" at me (probably with some justification). But it passes as everyday comment in a world where Islamophobia and hatred of Arabs is common currency, encouraged and given some intellectual respectability by the likes of Phillips herself.