Somjee's Abduction

I've quoted from Murphy on Evidence before,

"Judicial reasoning is a combination of three different kinds of logical process, ie, inductive reasoning ...; deductive ...; and abductive (reasoning by way of comparative analysis of rival hypotheses towards a qualitative preference for one of them over the others)."

In Somjee v Barnsley District General Hospital, a personal injury case, the facts are as follows: Somjee tripped on a pathing slab, she made a claim against the hospital (where the trip happened), her claim was defeated.

What is of interest is that the law reports says, "... she was represented by solicitors (with whom she is now in dispute and whom she accuses of conspiring to defeat her claim)."

Also, earlier in the report,

"He rejected as unproved an assertion of collusion between the Hospital's solicitors and Miss Somjee's former solicitors; and also the allegation that the Hospital's solicitors had tried to 'bully' Miss Somjee in the lead up to the trial. The judge said all these allegations were 'extremely serious … [were] all unsupported by any evidence and appear to me to have no basis in fact'. He said the very fact that she made them seriously undermined her credibility, and he had taken them into account in assessing the reliability of her evidence."

I don't want to comment on this particular case: I have only read the report linked above, I wasn't at the hearing. Instead I want to take the general point about whether or not a solicitor would collude with the opposition in a case such as this.

In the UK, a huge amount of work for solicitors comes not from the private sector but the public sector. Why wouldn't you collude with your prospective employer/cash cow to help defeat a claim?

If you cover your tracks it can only lead to the claimant undermining their case if they cry foul.

Wiesner's Misfortune

"The story of quantum cryptography dates back to a curious idea developed in the late 1960s by Stephen Wiesner, then a graduate student at Columbia University. Sadly, it was Wiesner's misfortune to invent an idea so ahead of its time that nobody took it seriously.
....
..., Wiesner submitted a paper to a scientific journal. It was rejected. He submitted it to three other journals, and it was rejected three more times. Wiesner claims that they simply did not understand the physics."
From p 332 of Simon Singh's, "The Code Book".

This sort of thing must be happening time and time again.

Which brings us to the wisdom of Daubert; the judgment that sets out criteria for deciding whether or not scientific expert opinion evidence is scientific or not. When it comes to whether or not the science has been published or not, we have the opinion of Mr Justice Blackmun for the court,

"Another pertinent consideration is whether the theory or technique has been subjected to peer review and publication. Publication (which is but one element of peer review) is not a sine qua non of admissibility; it does not necessarily correlate with reliability, see S. Jasanoff, The Fifth Branch: Science Advisors as Policymakers 61-76 (1990), and in some instances well grounded but innovative theories will not have been published, see Horrobin, The Philosophical Basis of Peer Review and the Suppression of Innovation, 263 J. Am. Med. Assn. 1438 (1990). Some propositions, moreover, are too particular, too new, or of too limited interest to be published. But submission to the scrutiny of the scientific community is a component of "good science," in part because it increases the likelihood that substantive flaws in methodology will be detected. See J. Ziman, Reliable Knowledge: An Exploration of the Grounds for Belief in Science 130-133 (1978); Relman and Angell, How Good Is Peer Review?, 321 New Eng. J. Med. 827 (1989). The fact of publication (or lack thereof) in a peer reviewed journal thus will be a relevant, though not dispositive, consideration in assessing the scientific validity of a particular technique or methodology on which an opinion is premised."

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Blackmun J also goes on to say, "[a]dditionally, in the case of a particular scientific technique, the court ordinarily should consider the known or potential rate of error,"

What it s the known or potential rate of error of finger print analysis?

Tip of the Iceberg

The Times reports that Al Gore could become the world's first carbon billionaire.

The problem is that this isn't wealth creation but wealth transfer.

Transfer from poor to rich (have you got the wherewithall to have a windfarm in your back garden?).

This is the tip of the iceberg and is being repeated on a massive scale where the recipients are global corporations (scroll down for sponsors).

Philosophical Beliefs: Darwinism and Anthropogenic Global Warmimg

Grainger v Nicholson is discussed in an employment law blog where they provide a link (word doc) to the court case.

As has been well reported, man-made global warming, in law, can be regarded as a philosophical belief (subject to factual tests) for the purposes of Article 9 of the ECHR.

Curiously, according Burton J, "Darwinism must plainly be capable of being a philosophical belief, albeit that it may be based entirely on scientific conclusions (not all of which may be uncontroversial)."

I make no particular points in this post ... the judgment is simply of interest.

Is that it? An explanation.

Bologna Train Station Stopped Clock.

In the previous post, Gladio. Is that it?, I quoted from the European Union's Official Journal; a resolution and a response.

The resolution was incredibly damning. In short, it said that post war democracy within Europe has been a sham. It never existed. The will of the people was allowed to be expressed through government policy only if it satisfied the agenda of others.

I responded by saying, 'is that it?'. This was in reply to the response to the indictment which was akin to a shrug of the shoulders. Subsequently, nothing has happened. This post war history, the consequences of which are that democracy in Europe was a sham, most probably is still a sham, and will continue to be a sham, was and is being ignored. Ignored by political institutions such as national and european parliaments; ignored by mainstream media.

Without any public scrutiny of Gladio we cannot know whether or not it is responsible for any terrorist attack in Blighty, Europe, or anywhere else in the world.

Gladio is one of the known unknowns.

There is no reason that this should be the case. Scrutiny of the organisation, their crimes and methods, and prosecutions of the terrorists who murdered people would reduce it to a known known.

Part E of the resolution says, "these organizations operated and continue to operate completely outside the law". On the basis of this, for all we know, this organisation was responsible for the Madrid and London bombings: Gladio bombed the Bologna train station. Why not these other two cities?

The pathetic inaction towards this resolution express the power of this clandestine organisation; the pathetic inaction shows who rules.

Just imagine if Gladio was an Islamic terrorist organisation: no stone would be unturned in order to seek them out. Gladio would be a proscribed organisation; instead, nothing.

I wonder what the Home Secretary would say if I asked him why Gladio was not a proscribed organisation?

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Perhaps the same as Archie Hamilton back in 1992?

Operation Gladio

Mr. Flynn : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is his policy on the public disclosure of information on the activities of and United Kingdom support for Operation Gladio since its inception.

Mr. Archie Hamilton : It has been the policy of successive Governments not to comment on matters of this nature. This remains the policy.

Gladio. Is that it?

A simple search of Eur-Lex (access to European Law) using the search term Gladio gives two results.

"RESOLUTION on the Gladio affair Official Journal C 324 , 24/12/1990 P. 0201" And, "WRITTEN QUESTION No. 727/91 by Mr Luigi COLAJANNI to European Political Cooperation. Clandestine ' Gladio' network Official Journal C 202 , 10/08/1992 P. 0003 "

The website doesn't provide anything further, so I reproduce below the notes from the Official Journal.

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C324/201

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2. Gladio

— Joint resolution replacing B3-2021, 2058, 2068, 2078 and 2087/90

RESOLUTION

on the Gladio Affair

The European Parliament

1. having regard to the revelation by several European governments of the existence for 40 years of a clandestine intelligence and armed operations organization in several Member States of the Community,
   
   
2. whereas for over 40 years this organziation has eluded all democratic controls and has been run by the secret services of the states concerned in collaboration with NATO,
   
   
3. fearing the danger that such clandestine networks may have interfered illegally in the internal political affairs of Member States or may still do so,
   
   
4. whereas in certain Member States military secret services (or uncontrolled branches thereof) were involved in serious cases of terrorism and crime as evidenced by various judicial inquiries,
   
   
5. whereas these organizations operated and continue to operate comletely outside the law since they are not subject to any parliamentary control and frequently those holding the highest government and constitutional posts have claimed to be in the dark as to these matters,
   
   
6. whereas the various 'GLADIO' organizations have at their disposal independent arsenals and military resources which give them an unknown strike potential, thereby jeopardizing the democratic structures of the countries in which they are operating or have been operating,
   
   
7. greatly concerned at the existence of decision-making and operational bodies which are not subject to any form of democratic control and are of a completely clandestine nature at a time when greater Community cooperation in the field of security is a constant subject of discussion.

1.    Condemns the clandestine creation of manipulative and operational networks and calls for a full investigation into the nature, structure, aims and all other aspects of these clandestine organizations, any misuse thereof, their use for illegal interference in the internal political affairs of the countries concerned, the problems of terrorism in Europe and the possible collusion of the secret services of Member States or third countries;

2.    Protests vigorously at the assumption by certain US military personnel at SHAPE and in NATO of the right to encourage the establisment in Europe of a clandestine intelligence and operation network;

3.    Calls on the governments of the Member States to dismantle all clandestine military and paramilitary networks;

4.    Calls on the judiciaries of the countries in which the presence of such military organizations has been ascetained to elucidate fully their actual extent and modus operandi and to clarify any action they may have taken to destabilize the democratic structures of the Member States;

5.    Requests all the Member States to take the necessary measures, if necessary by establishing parliamentary committees of inquiry, to draw up a complete list of organizations active in this field, and at the same time to investigate their links with the respective state intelligence services and their links, if any, with terrorist action groups and/or other illegal practices;

6.    Calls on the Council of Ministers to provide full information on the activities of these secret intelligence and operational services;

7.    Instructs its Political Affairs Committee to consider holding a hearing in order to clarify the role and impact of the 'GLADIO' organization and any similar bodies;

8.    Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Commission, the Council, the Secretary-General of NATO, the governments of the Member States and the United States Government.

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C202/3

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WRITTEN QUESTION No 727/91
by Mr Luigi Colajanni (GUE)
to European Political Cooperation
(23 April 1991)
(92/C 202/05)
Subject: Clandestine 'Gladio' network

There have been many reports, including those based on official sources, on the existence of a clandestine parallel intelligence and armed operations organization.

The European Parliament adopted a resolution on 22 November 1990 (¹) calling for a full investigation into the activities of this organization.

Having regard to paragraphs 5 and 6 in particular of the above resolution:

1. Can EPC provide the European Parliament with information on the activities of these secret intelligence and operational services?
   
   
2. Can it report on any action which these services have taken to destabilize the democratic structures of the Member States and on their involvement in subversive and terrorist plots which have led to various unexplained violent events in recent years?

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(¹ Minutes of proceedings of the sitting of 22 November 1990.

Answer
(13 July 1992)

The question raised by the Honourable Member has not been discussed within the EPC framework.

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Is that it?

Drug War Propaganda Meets Objective Reality

A Drug War Carol

The Daily Mail gives us this headline,

"Remember, David Nutt does not have to face the voters

"Professor Nutt - while free to speak his mind - does not have to face voters with his deeply contentious views that ecstasy and LSD are safer than alcohol, and that cannabis laws should not have been toughened."

We've had almost a hundred years of drug war propaganda: the ignorance being peddled over this issue is astounding.

Science is not about democracy ... an apple falls from a tree under the force of gravity irrespective of any elections. To suggest otherwise is to be ignorant.

Is this really how the labour gov want to be remembered?