SKRIPALMANIA byPatrick Armstrong

1. It’s obvious nonsense brought to you by proven liars.
2. The point of propaganda is to leave an impression after the details have been forgotten.
3. To get involved in discussing the minutiae of the story is to help the propagandists’ aims.
4. Therefore treat it as a badly constructed story that is failing to convince.
5. Do this by analysing the comments on the news stories which (at least the ones I’ve looked at) show that people are sceptical.
6. Also mock the meanderings of the story: At the restaurant! In the car! On the doorstep! Incredibly lethal but strangely ineffective. Miraculous recovery of daughter. Baby wipes as effective protection. Reminiscent of White Helmets and their flip flops, rubber gloves and paper masks; but, come to think of it, it’s the same authors in both stories. Who, after so many lies, are becoming overconfident and sloppy.

It’s a startlingly incompetent theatrical production and should be responded to with contemptuous mockery.

Comments

[JohnA]

Spontaneous mockery:

Skripal Case: How UK ‘Explains’ Why Russia Is to Blame in 1-Minute Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=47&v=yClMsr6ZfvM

[jsn]

And now back to your regularly scheduled Easter Weekend.
(thanks for weighing in!)

[Doug Colwell]

Thank you Mr. Armstrong. It is reassuring to know that there are some here in Canada who question the prevailing narrative. I find it deeply troubling that we have abandoned the principal of due process. Where will that end?

[FB Ali]

What Ms Nauert and her bosses are missing is that very few people take the USA seriously any more in the international sphere. No wonder Putin is so amused in that video JohnA linked to (@ #1).

About the only thing left for the US establishment to make people take them seriously is to threaten to blow up the world. The trouble is they don't even realise that this will be the end result if they use the nukes they like to wave around. That's what Putin has been trying to make them understand - so far without much success.

[Jony Kanuck]

Patrick,
From the beginning this story had more holes than a block of swiss cheese. It has only gotten worse with a cast of characters descending into buffoonery. We've been educating the masses for how many years. For sure they haven't read enough poetry:

Died some, pro patria,
non “dulce” non “et decor” . . .
walked eye-deep in hell
believing in old men’s lies, then unbelieving
came home, home to a lie,

Ezra Pound from Hugh Selwyn Mauberly

[Petrel]

The overall story given us is that Julia Skripal journeys to her father -- a convicted and released British agent-- from Russia to Salisbury. The following morning they visit her mother's grave north of town, drive to an Italian eatery in downtown Salisbury (all caught on security cameras) and walk past more security cameras through a public passageway to a downtown, riverside park. They sit down on a park bench and 15 - 20 minutes later pass out. A patrolling policeman tries to rouse them, calls Emergency Services and has them transported to hospital. Another policeman, a detective, is sent to the Skripal house and immediately falls ill. (So the mystery poison takes 4 hours to affect the Skripals and 15-30 minutes to affect the detective.)

Before any blood tests are done, the UK Prime Minister denounces Russia for using a Soviet researched, but never manufactured nerve agent, with a name invented by a BBC TV thriller-series 5 month earlier. The following day, the chief medical doctor of the Salisbury hospital denies that the Skripals and the detective were treated for any nerve agent. Meanwhile the Russians demanded that the British abide by a signed anti-chemical weapon convention and turn over whatever blood or other evidence backing the claim to an international agency. The Russians also demand Consular access to Julia Skripal, still a Russian citizen.

A month later, the British grant permission for the relevant International chemical watchdog to search for evidence. By now whatever evidence lay around the Skripals in their house, car, cemetery, restaurant and in their blood is long-gone history. (Since the Skripals have been heavily sedated for the period, we and they don't know what else has been injected into them since they passed out.)

My personal theory is that Skripal, a British double-agent, agreed to ingest poison, something like Valium, after he and his daughter had lunch. They moved to the park bench and waited for the material to render them unconscious, as the Skripal house was somehow poisoned, awaiting the detective's arrival.

What Prime Minister May et al did not know about was the existence of a Chemical Weapons Treaty, an agency in Belgium to enforce the Treaty and a protocol to follow. Russia invoking the Treaty caught them flat-footed, hence the hysterical behavior and statements by the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and a month-long delay before the international agency was allowed access to the still comatose Skripals.

[catherine]

Said May:

“Blood samples from Sergei Skripal and Yulia Skripal were analyzed and the findings indicated exposure to a nerve agent or related compound. The samples tested positive for the presence of a Novichok class nerve agent or closely related agent”

Or a "related compound" or "related agent"? I imagine there are quite a few countries that have related agents.
I think if the Kremlin poisoned Skripal they would have made sure he died from it and didn't recover.
Sounds like a set up to me.

[turcopolier]

patrick armstrong

I don't want "james" postimg on SST ad have removed his comments. Pls don't post any. pl

[Jonathan House]

Patrick,

Thanks. And thanks Petrel at comment #6.

I am conflicted about your point #3, i.e."To get involved in discussing the minutiae of the story is to help the propagandists’ aims." And so I have sent to friends and posted to Facebook etc etc not only your post but also comment #6 by Petrel ... although for my purpose Petrel's excellent summary might be even better without the "person theory."

The post and the comment are both helpful in trying educate. One or the other more so depending on those I am addressing.

In any case, thanks again to both of you,

Jonathan

[Jack]

Patrick

No amount of mockery will make those shameless ashamed.

The US, Britain and their fellow travelers have spent so much time and energy in falsehoods they no longer know what truth and reality are. This extends across the spectrum from foreign affairs to economics and finance. Falsity pervades. It is all about PR and marketing now. Baghdad Bob is us.

Big business are managed such that their stock is the product. Management's are incentivized to make that product rise not to insure the business of products that satisfy consumer needs and wants. There is no incentive to build intergenerational franchises. The Wall St mindset of making a quick buck has permeated everywhere.

Old notions of honor and stewardship have gone the wayside. I was born in the Depression and grew up in a different era. The world has changed in many ways yet the fundamental principles remain although temporarily masked by hubris. Thucydides observations of human nature ring true millenia later.

[Patrick Armstrong]

Got it. He was probably calling us all Putinbots.

[Patrick Armstrong]

If you discuss it as if it were serious, you keep the story alive. From a propaganda point the story is simple: Putin=Russia=Enemy. Argue with the details and you become part of a discussion on how much of an enemy? and enemy in other cases but not this and so on.
Much better to robustly assume anyone of sense understands the story is a lie and laugh at how idiotic anyone who believes it is.