Mick Hartley

The Photography of Gordon Parks

Ingrid Bergman, Stromboli, Italy, 1949:

[Photo © The Gordon Parks Foundation]

From here.

The mindless admiration of wealthy men

Nick Cohen on Tony Blair's moral decline:

As one astonished and disgusted former supporter put it: "If you want to know what price a great man will sell his legacy for, it's $13m." According to the Financial Times, that is the sum that President Nursultan Nazarbayev has paid for Blair's services. His old gang is along for the ride and eager to see what an oil-rich dictatorship, which shoots strikers, burns the offices of opposition parties and kills their leaders, can offer....

The regime is grateful and not just for the uses the Blairites' support can be put to abroad. Like every other dictatorship, Kazakhstan wants to show its subjects that foreigners, who have no reason to fear the secret police, endorse the regime of their own free will. The backing of outsiders makes them seem more powerful and their propaganda sound more plausible. (It is for this reason that George Galloway has been such a popular figure in the presidential palaces of the Middle East.)

I know what you're thinking. Blair selling out is hardly news. But – and Observer readers may not provide the most sympathetic audience for this argument – there was always a case for Blair. His dedicated adherents could see no wrong in whatever he did. But others, including your correspondent, were, if you will, "left" or "anti-totalitarian" Blairites. Whatever criticisms of his domestic policies we had, we thought that when set against his enemies, Tony Blair was an admirable man.

Historians trying to capture the hypocrisy of Britain in the first decade of the 21st century may note, as we did, that Blair's opponents turned on him not for allowing the banks to run riot but for insisting that Britain should play its part in stopping the civil war in Sierra Leone, in ensuring that Slobodan Milosevic could not ethnically cleanse Kosovo, in helping throw the Taliban out of Kabul and in saying that after 24 years of occasionally genocidal rule, Saddam Hussein must be removed from power....

Blair's mindless admiration of wealthy men explains his decline. In the 21st century, they tend to be dictators with sovereign wealth funds and tame oligarchs to command, or financiers. No surprise, then, that as well as advising Kazakhstan, Blair also advises JP Morgan.

His love of money has brought down the worst fate that could have befallen him. He now has the manners and morals of his opponents. He has become a George Galloway with a Learjet at his disposal.

No comments yet, when I spotted this, but Nick's set himself up for a kicking from the CiF "Bliar, war criminal" crowd here. He's absolutely right though: Blair was, in many ways, an admirable man.

 

 

Auto accidents

From the Leslie Jones Collection at the Boston Public Library (via):

1936 - "Carl Boutille of Glenville Ave, Allston, driver only had bruises."

1927 - "Mail truck tries to climb tree. Comm. Ave. Boston."

1929 - "Car hits lamp post."

[Photos: Courtesy of the Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones Collection]

 

Empire of light

Southwark Cathedral, with street lamp:

Like that Rene Magritte painting, L'Empire des Lumieres. 

Oh well...suit yourselves.

Stax bassman

Sort of overlooked in all the recent higher-profile disco deaths, legendary Stax bassist Duck Dunn was another loss earlier this month. Here he is in action, 45 years ago:

Booker T and the MGS, straight into a funky Green Onions, Norway, 1967 - followed by the Mar-kays and Arthur Conley. 

Part 2 of the Stax Volt Tour of Norway...Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6. All great stuff: Booker T and The MGs, Arthur Conley, Sam and Dave, Eddie Floyd, the Mar-Keys and a five-song set by Otis Redding (go to part 5)....not forgetting how remarkable it was at the time to see black and white musicians playing together.

Pink, blue, green

Late spring colour, Kenwood:

Half time

Modenesi's Towers of Finale Emilia, after the earthquake on May 20, in Ferrara, Italy:

[Photo: Roberto Serra/Iguana Press/Getty Images]

From an In Focus photogallery Earthquake in Northern Italy.

Missiles aimed at the U.S

Well this is cheery news:

North Korea is constructing a new ballistic-missile launch pad in Musudan-ri, North Hamgyong Province, experts claimed Wednesday.

The U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, on its blog 38north.org on Wednesday, claimed the new launch pad is for intercontinental missiles aimed at the U.S. and suggested a possible link with Iran. It said the facility can accommodate a more advanced missile than the rocket whose launch failed in February.

Of course there's a large gap between what the North Koreans aim for, in terms of military technology, and what they actually achieve. And there has to be a strong suspicion that this may be for show, to pressure the US into further talks and maybe screw some aid out of them by way of the old nuclear blackmail shuffle. 

To that end it helps, too, if Pyongyang is seen as dangerously unstable, run by a bunch of demented lunatics. That part of the plan, it has to be said, is going well. Check out the rolling rat-themed banner headlines on the official Korean Central News Agency main page:

Let Us Cut Off Windpipes of the Lee Myung Bak-led Swarm of Rats!

Let Us Wipe Out the Lee Myung Bak-led Swarm of Rats in This Land and Sky!

Let Us Shower the Lee Myung Bak-led Swarm of Rats with Fire of Retaliation!

Let Us Launch a Nationwide Sacred War to Wipe Out the Rat-like Lee Myung Bak Group!

Not really the sort of people you'd want pointing nuclear missiles at you.

Charred wood

David Nash at Kew:

Death by stoning

The latest from the Islamic Republic of Sudan (via), from Daniel Tugume at the Uganda Observer:

A Sudanese judge, Sami Ibrahim Shabo sentenced to death by stoning a young woman accused of committing adultery.

Intisar Sharif Abdalla, believed to be between 15 and 17 years of age (although prison authorities claim she is 20) was sentenced to death in accordance with Article 146 of the Sudanese criminal law albeit without legal representation.

The judgment was made on May 13, 2012 after just one hearing and came after an “admission of guilt” plea following torture and brutal beatings by Sharif’s brother who instigated the case. Her co-accused however remains un-convicted and walks freely.

This absurd decision demonstrates both the inhumane and brutal sanctioning to death for committing sexual relations outside of marriage, but furthermore calls into questions the legal institutions and frameworks applied, especially as the “admission of guilt” was made under duress.

Sharif is accused of having a relationship outside wedlock and getting impregnated by a man that is not legally her husband.  Initially, she and the man whom she is co-accused with both denied the charges.

Her lawyer, only able to access her after the judgment was made, understands that following her initial denial she was beaten up and tortured repeatedly by her brother forcing her to confess to committing adultery. With the ‘coerced’ confession, Judge Sami Ibrahim Shabo of Ombada General Criminal Court, Khartoum state, sentenced her to stoning after just one court session.

Sharif is understood to be deeply traumatized and is without access to any suitable psychosocial support. Her newly born child is also with her in prison. Ultimately, some observers believe the judgment demonstrates the scale of discrimination against women and girls in Sudan and the biased judgments made against them for acts which involves two sexes – a man and woman.

I think they might be on to something there, these observers.