Gavin's Blog

Im going to London again this afternoon – I will try my very best to get Radio to work on another computer, so all things going well I will blog later this evening. If not it might be up to a week before I update. I won’t lose many readers…will I?

In a thrilling game, my home side Munster defeated arch rivals Leicester in the Heineken Cup. O’Gara and Peter Stringer both got memorable tries. The Leicester kicker played very badly and missed all of the penalties. Final score Munster 20, Leicester 7.

Next stop Toulouse for the semi-final.

By renouncing America’s traditional foreign policy and adopting one of global military domination, the Bush administration has made a fundamental change in the international balance.

Just been reading about how French and German companies will be denied any contracts for rebuilding Iraq – but Dick Cheney and others in his ilk will likely benefit financially from the rebuilding contracts. Here is a simple equation for getting money from American taxpayers.

Taxpayers pay money for US military, and invasion force, circa $100 billion – taxpayers money spent on blowing up a country – leaders of US who started the war awarded lucrative contracts to rebuild the country – revenue to come from Iraqi oil sales – oil that incidentally goes to the US.

Just a thought.

Jonathan Freedland pointedly asks if the war has really helped the situation or just made it worse. I would go with the latter too.

This week William Kristol, senior intellectual of the neo-conservative set, testified before the Senate foreign relations committee. He was asked whether the logic of the Iraq war – targeting a Ba’athist regime with links to terror and weapons of mass destruction – did not point inevitably to an attack on Syria, which meets all those same criteria. Kristol saw the logic, conceding that war with Syria could not be ruled out. This is the message from Washington: the shock and the awe may not be over yet.

Mark Lawson on Homer Simpson. 300th episode its almost here, I cant help but feel that since the death of Maude the Simpsons has declined somewhat. Still though, we have a movie to look forward to.

Jaysus everything on the net today seems to be going slow. The Independent website is constantly giving me messages saying the server is too busy to serve. Bernie is having DNS problems, the Iraqi Information site is down…hope I’m not next.

Robert Fisk’s latest report from Baghdad.

At the Kindi hospital, they ordered journalists away from the premises but, briefly obtaining access to the emergency ward, I found a Shia Muslim cleric inside, a man who had studied in southern Lebanon, lecturing the gunmen on the need to restore order in the city. Of course, that was the Americans’ job. But they weren’t doing it.

And in another piece:

I sat on Saddam’s throne and surveyed the dark chamber where terror was dispensed

Outside stand the American Abrams tanks of the 3rd Infantry, their names expressing the banality and power of another nation. On their barrels the crews have nicknamed their armoured behemoths. Atomic Dog. Annihilator. Arsonist. Anthrax. Anguish. Agamemnon. Saddam would have approved.

Apologies if I seemed to kicking up stink about Dishings.com – it just came as a shock. Im not quite sure who they are but I take it as a compliment that they liked my site enough to copy parts of it. I realise it is a Radio theme, just the links were the same! LOL .

Dishings appear to be new on the blogscene – I hope they are finding their feet and *welcome to the Radio/blog world*

(Dip hat to Bernie)

And Mark? You are in Amsterdam now? That internet over power lines thing is interesting – I think its been used in Germany for over a year now, and they tested it alot in Scotland.