Vanity Fair--Blair's Big Brother Legacy (very scary!!!!)

[Gloria]

This piece is up in today's Independent in the UK....where I first saw it.....

http://www.vanityfair.com/commentary/content/articles/060619roco03


Blair's Big Brother Legacy

In the guise of fighting terrorism and maintaining public order, Tony Blair's government has quietly and systematically taken power from Parliament and from the British people. The author charts a nine-year assault on civil liberties that reveals the danger of trading freedom for security—and must have Churchill spinning in his grave
By HENRY PORTER

I.M.-ING THE P.M.: BLAIR-PORTER E-MAIL EXCHANGE

[Sherman A1]

1. Does not bode well

[katty]

2. been reading about this over the years-PM: his majesty's pimp

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. It's not only the article, it's how the police have described it,

when charging a man for conducting a peacful protest. From the Independent article:

Charged for quoting George Orwell in public

In another example of the Government's draconian stance on political protest, Steven Jago, 36, a management accountant, yesterday became the latest person to be charged under the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act.

On 18 June, Mr Jago carried a placard in Whitehall bearing the George Orwell quote: "In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act." In his possession, he had several copies of an article in the American magazine Vanity Fair headlined "Blair's Big Brother Legacy", which were confiscated by the police. "The implication that I read from this statement at the time was that I was being accused of handing out subversive material," said Mr Jago. Yesterday, the author, Henry Porter, the magazine's London editor, wrote to Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, expressing concern that the freedom of the press would be severely curtailed if such articles were used in evidence under the Act.

Mr Porter said: "The police told Mr Jago this was 'politically motivated' material, and suggested it was evidence of his desire to break the law. I therefore seek your assurance that possession of Vanity Fair within a designated area is not regarded as 'politically motivated' and evidence of conscious law-breaking."

Scotland Yard has declined to comment.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article1129827.ece

[bananas]

4. Police hold mother-of-three for reading 'Independent' outside Downing St.

"Police hold mother-of-three for reading 'Independent' outside Downing St."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2365778