JFK Fifty Years On

Read as much or as little as you wish, but I have underlined the crux of the matter. Not to be confused with Dr David Kelly's suicide and post mortem report sealed for seventy years.

What gets declassified?

JFK assassination documents offer surprising lessons about government secrecy -- and Obama's presidency
By Russ Baker

Next year will be a half-century since the death of JFK. And the Obama Administration thinks we need to keep secret the records on the matter … a little longer yet.

Believe it or not, more than 50,000 pages of JFK assassination–related documents are being withheld in full. And an untold number of documents have been partially withheld or released with everything interesting blacked out. But why?

Since the government and the big media keep telling us there was no conspiracy and that it was all Lee Harvey Oswald acting on his own, why continue to keep the wraps on? More Salon

Surgeon Seeks Permission to Challange Kelly Verdict

Good luck, you'll need it.

Update: Fail Whodathunkit?

Judge to hear campaigner's plea for inquest into Dr Kelly's controversial death
By Miles Goslett
16th December 2011

A retired surgeon campaigning for a full coroner’s inquest into the death of Dr David Kelly will have his case heard by a High Court judge on Monday.

David Halpin, 71, is seeking permission to challenge the Government’s decision in June not to order a coroner’s inquest into the controversial death.

Dr Kelly, a government weapons inspector, allegedly slashed his wrist and swallowed painkillers in an Oxfordshire wood in July 2003, after being named as the source of a BBC report accusing Tony Blair’s government of lying to take Britain into the Iraq war.

His death was the subject of a public inquiry but he is believed to be the only person in modern times found dead in suspicious circumstances in this country whose final hours have not been fully examined by a coroner.

Mr Halpin, a former trauma surgeon from Newton Abbot in Devon, said: ‘More than 800 members of the public worldwide, hundreds of them Daily Mail readers, have given about £40,000 to cover legal fees associated with this case. I am enormously grateful.

'I first got involved with this in 2003 because as a surgeon it seemed to me medically implausible that Dr Kelly bled to death by cutting the ulnar artery in his wrist, as officially found. It would close up very quickly and little blood would be lost.’

Monday’s hearing, which is open to the public, will last two hours and marks the first time that matters relating to the Iraq war, Dr Kelly’s death and the Blair government’s handling of both issues will be before a court rather than a public inquiry.

Attorney General Dominic Grieve ruled out a coroner’s inquest six months ago, saying there was ‘overwhelming evidence’ that Dr Kelly committed suicide. The Wail

Mystery of the Helicopter That Landed at Scene of Dr Kelly's Death

For reasons previously mentioned I'm loath to use the Daily Mail as a news source. And we can add to those reasons, again previously mentioned, that when it suits them, they can actually take on the appearance of a newspaper, as demonstrated by their previous coverage of the David Kelly affair. (See David Kelly tag in sidebar. See also the Mail's David Kelly tag below the article.)

Mystery of the helicopter that landed at scene of Dr Kelly's death after his body was found

A helicopter mysteriously landed at the scene of Dr David Kelly’s death shortly after the body was found.

The aircraft only remained on the ground for five minutes before leaving, suggesting it either deposited or collected somebody or something.

Details from its flight log, released under the Freedom of Information Act, show that the helicopter – hired by Thames Valley police – landed at Harrowdown Hill in Oxfordshire at 10.55am on July 18, 2003, 90 minutes after the body was discovered by volunteer search teams.

Significantly, the flight log has been heavily redacted, making it impossible to know who was on board or what its exact purpose was.

The flight was not mentioned in oral evidence at the Hutton Inquiry, set up by Tony Blair to investigate Dr Kelly’s death.

Dr Andrew Watt, who has previously raised questions about the suicide finding reached by Lord Hutton, has written to Attorney General Dominic Grieve drawing his attention to the flight.

Dr Watt, a clinical pharmacologist, said: ‘If the purpose of the helicopter flight was innocent, one has to ask why it was kept secret.’

The riddle joins the growing list of unanswered questions about the circumstances of the government weapons inspector’s final moments.

It emerges in the same week that Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell were accused of lying to the Chilcot Inquiry into the lead-up to the Iraq war.

The Mail reported yesterday how declassified documents from the inquiry revealed a spy chief disputed Campbell’s claim that the dossier was ‘not the case for war’.

A senior diplomat also accused the former prime minister of distorting expert reports about the post-war chaos.

Dr Kelly is said to have killed himself in woods near his home after being named as the prime source of a BBC report accusing the Labour government of lying to take Britain into war in Iraq.

Uniquely for a suspicious death, no coroner’s inquest has been held. Instead, the Hutton Inquiry found he committed suicide by swallowing painkillers and cutting his wrist with a blunt knife.

Dr Kelly left no suicide note and had arranged to meet his daughter on July 17, 2003, the day he was last seen alive. more

A Brief History of Tony Blair's Skeletons: Part Two

Part two, loadsa skeletons and includes some great third party quotes.

"He wasn't very good" says a retired commercial lawyer who hired him at the time through Derry Irvine's Chambers. "Frankly he didn't listen to the brief, and he caved in to the Judge...to the fury of my clients. So I fired him. I told Derry, 'Don't ever send that twat to me again'".

Assassinating a Prime Minister's Reputation: Ten Ways to Blackmail Blair

Part Two of the Blair/Brown Succession Story

Like John F. Kennedy thirty-seven years earlier, Tony Blair came to power with a clean-cut, charismatic image that promised 'safe' change, more social justice, and a strong head on his shoulders. But also like JFK, the youthful leader of 'New' Labour had more than a few skeletons trailing behind him. True or not, they remain the subject of intense gossip - and a number of incontrovertible facts - to this day.

They cover not only his early years as a barrister and MP, but also key moments when he was at the height of his power and reputation as an international statesman and warlord.

The wayward lawyer

Anthony Charles Lynton Blair married Cherie Booth on 29th March 1980. Just four years out of University, Blair was trying to establish himself as a barrister - but not with much success.

"He wasn't very good" says a retired commercial lawyer who hired him at the time through Derry Irvine's Chambers. "Frankly he didn't listen to the brief, and he caved in to the Judge...to the fury of my clients. So I fired him. I told Derry, 'Don't ever send that twat to me again'".

The solicitor was appalled at the ease with which Blair betrayed his clients "for a quiet life". Betrayal (as we shall see) is an amoral spine running through Teflon Tony's life-story.

We interviewed the lawyer at some length. "When I watched him give in to the EU about the eight billion quid" he said, "I thought of that day in Court".

Close friends of the Blairs agree that Tony was a washout as a barrister....and that Cherie was without doubt the superstar. But in turn, while specialising in wealthy and commercial clients, for a young man supposedly interested in left-wing ideas Blair defended some odd people.

Famouspeople.com notes that

'In the case of Nethermere v. Gardiner, Blair acted for employers that had refused holiday pay to employees at a trouser factory. He unsuccessfully defended the employers.'

Election to Parliament in 1983 provided a more promising career path.

Ugly Rumours

While researching Blair's early Parliamentary career, The Slog (or Not Born Yesterday as it then was) received the following email content:

'In the autumn of 1983, a young well-dressed man presented himself to Bow St Magistrates' Court on a morals charge. He was given a conditional discharge and bound over to keep the peace. The young man gave his name as Charles Lynton. He is now among the highest in the land.'

Blair's middle names are Charles and Lynton. I have asked for the records of the period (the Court no longer exists) but failed to trace any mention there of the 'case' - if indeed it ever existed. Although I found the general attitude of information suppliers to be obstructive, there wasn't any strong feeling of hiding stuff; frankly, I'd be amazed anyway if something incriminating about Tony Blair hadn't been removed by now. Another source wrote to us as follows:

'He was caught importuning in a Westminster toilet. It was all covered up.'

Two things are, however, relevant. Gossip did abound about Blair's sexuality during his time in the rock band Ugly Rumours at Oxford. And while nobody has ever stood them up, it is widely accepted that Derry Irvine (Blair's boss in Chambers) regularly referred to him as "the star closest to Uranus".

Would an indiscretion relating to bisexuality have worried Blair enough to do anything to cover it up? Perhaps it would in 1983....but probably not by 2006. A great many people have teen-and-twenties doubts about the side for which they bat. Thankfully, in the Twenty-first century such things are rarely if ever a matter for blackmail.

Editor's Note: For those who find this far-fetched, it is worth noting that Edward Heath was saved from homosexual importuning charges no less than four times by MI6 in the late 1950s.

The Rising Star

Blair networked among Labour's soft-Left to get the Sedgefield seat that remained his throughout a long Parliamentary career. Using his father-in-law Tony Booth's Labour contacts (and Booth's girfriend Pat Phoenix as a star performer during the campaign) he was selected for and won it in 1983, after boundary changes had changed its makeup.

Once in the Commons, he rose quickly, giving himself a brief to depict City types as incompetent, overpaid and "morally dubious" - an ironic way to start, given what came later. more

h/t Steel Magnolia

Lots of related stuff here. http://operationorethegambleconnection.blogspot.com/

A Brief History of Tony Blair's Skeletons: Introduction

Or part one if you will, but for no other reason than the follow up is billed as part two. Which I have to say is a tad more entertaining.

Exclusive: Why didn’t Brown bring down Blair until September 2006?

The Slogger pounces on a piece of murky illogic in the Brown/Blair succession story


The Sequence of events

Following the 2005 General Election, New Labour is desperately short of money. The Party is £26.2 million in debt, and Treasurer Jack Dromey is desperately worried. He becomes even more worried when told that a further £13M of debt has been dissolved thanks to illegal donations.

As a Brown supporter, in March 2006 he goes on TV without warning and says it’s outrageous….without permission, and clearly to stab Blair. Essentially, he points the finger at the Blair entourage of fundraisers.

We can assume that Brown has pushed Dromey towards this act of brazen politicking. (Tony Blair did).

Gordon expects this to be enough to force Blair out. But the PM rides it out: he decides the Chancellor has nothing but innuendo. In a rage, Gordon screams at the PM “I’ll bring you down with sleaze!”

But he doesn’t. This is a key point: it means that, effectively, Blair did not go in order to avoid facing donation-sleaze charges.

Chancellor Gordon Brown continues in pursuit of his ambition to oust the PM. Blair has on the one hand given his word long ago to Gordon that he will hand over power after two terms as PM; but on the other, Tony has told the media he will see out three terms. This is not unusual behaviour for Tony Blair: were human beings to have further upper-body limbs, there would be other hands all being promised exclusively to various interest groups.

As August progresses, Brown the self-proclaimed Greatest Ever Chancellor becomes more demanding: how is Operation Cake (the code-name for handover) proceeding, he keeps asking. The answers are vague. There are confrontations with the Prime Minister.

But a month later on September 1st, Blair is at an EU conference, refusing to discuss departure dates, making long-term summit plans – and still showing no signs of going. Government PPS Mahmoud resigns and junior defence minister Tom Watson does the same: both are doing so at Brown’s behest, to put further pressure on Blair.

Then, something happens. Nobody is really sure what, but it happens. Within days, Brown is in good form at a Party Conference planning meeting. Others are dismayed at what new Opposition Leader David Cameron is calling ‘a Government in meltdown’. But Brown smiles, asserting calmly, “Don’t worry – it won’t last long”.

A brooding pessimist by nature, here we are in early September with the Chancellor facing a seemingly immovable rival on the Throne. But he says only “it won’t last long”.

On September 6th, author Peter Watt finds Blair looking ‘old, grey and drained….it was obvious he was shell-shocked’.

The next day – to a staggered public – Prime Minister Tony Blair confirms that he is to stand down within twelve months. This will, he says, be his last Party Conference. more

'"I feared I'd end up dead in the woods like Dr Kelly,"

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Interesting, and if push came to shove on the truth of the matter I don't think I would have a big problem on who to believe, particularly in light of David Kelly's "suicide" and most definitely if billions of "wasted" dollars are involved.

An EU expert on biological warfare has told how she fears ending up 'dead in the woods' like scientist Dr David Kelly after an alleged campaign of intimidation by members of MI6 and the CIA.......

On one occasion, she says she found a hearse parked outside her house with the drivers 'staring straight ahead.' When she approached, it sped off and she pursued it, taking photographs as evidence.

After being told that Mr Baker was writing a book about the circumstances surrounding Dr Kelly's death, she sent him an email on March 23 designed, she says, to highlight the risk she felt she was under......

She believes the speech made her powerful enemies because she argued that billions of dollars spent by the US government to develop a smallpox vaccine has been wasted because scientists – including British experts – have used a different viral strain to the one she believes is being developed in Damascus. more

Previous on David Kelly.
Weapons Inspector David Kelly Murdered Says British MP
No Fingerprints On Kelly's "Suicide" Knife
Kelly Death. Update
Kelly death not suicide, says MP

And this is just the kind of thing that happens when the government don't like the sound of the truth.

Tony Blair yesterday placed himself at the heart of the government's controversial "naming strategy", which led to the unmasking of Dr David Kelly a week before his apparent suicide.......

Mr Blair's admission undermined earlier attempts by Downing Street to portray the Ministry of Defence as the "lead department" in the naming strategy. Under intense questioning from Lord Hutton, the prime minister said he had agonised for days over the "quandary" of whether to announce that the scientist had come forward. He spoke of the conflicting pressures of being open about Dr Kelly - to avoid charges of a cover-up - while acting "by the book".....


In his first public response to the inquiry, the Tory leader, Iain Duncan Smith, said: "The prime minister knew about, and was satisfied with, the underhand treatment of Dr Kelly and the systematic attempt to destroy his reputation both before and after his death. This is the most shameful act of this sorry saga."more

Weapons Inspector David Kelly Murdered Says British MP

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One doesn't need too fertile an imagination to concur.

Weapons expert Dr David Kelly was assassinated, an MP claims today.

Campaigning politician Norman Baker believes Dr Kelly, who exposed the Government's "sexed-up" Iraq dossier, was killed to stop him making further revelations about the lies that took Britain to war.

He says the murderers may have been anti-Saddam Iraqis, and suggests the crime was covered up by elements within the British establishment to prevent a diplomatic crisis.more

No Fingerprints On Kelly's "Suicide" Knife

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I guess it must have been the elves, the same elves that appear to have Kellly's widow under control.

Fresh doubts were raised over the suicide of Dr David Kelly after it emerged that no fingerprints were found on the knife he supposedly used to kill himself.

The Hutton Inquiry into the death of the Ministry of Defence weapons expert ruled that he slashed one of his wrists with a blunt garden knife and took an overdose of pills.

But the campaigning Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker has carried out his own investigation after forensic experts questioned the official version of events.

He has called for the case to be re-opened after Thames Valley Police revealed that no fingerprints were found on the knife.

The Lewes MP made the discovery after submitting a Freedom of Information request to the force.

The lack of fingerprints is especially strange as police records also revealed the germ warfare expert was not wearing any gloves when he died – nor were any found at the scene of his death.more.

Previous

David Kelly Update

For those wishing to view the BBC's documentary you can do so here.
I would recommend reading the comments first in the "Kelly death not suicide says MP"

Kelly Death. Update

Although I started to take notes, to carry on doing so would have meant virtually transcribing the whole show. I am a little off colour So I am going to offer only this and then the primary links that are germane to the show.

Shorter; In my opinion, murder and cover up 90% likely.
Subsequent actions that wavered from set protocols, highly suspicious, and the idea that Iraq was responsible, a non starter.

First link: Web site that featured prominently in the show.
Dr David Kelly.

Second: The program and BBC.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/conspiracy_files/

Third: Google search.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=the+kelly+investigation+group&btnG=Search&meta

Kelly death not suicide, says MP

An MP investigating the death of Dr David Kelly says he is convinced the weapons scientist did not kill himself.

This story has never smelled right, let's see what the Program comes up with.

Update. Preview