Tony Blair’s speech – not given to parliament but to a media briefing at Downing Street – on Friday, August 5, has already become notorious.

In it he attempted to signal the end of the prevailing consensus of liberalism and tolerance, and promote the arbitrariness and authoritarianism which is at the heart of the programme of the "Third Way". It has been a programme which has unfolded starkly and step-by-step since 9/11 in this fashion, an Anglo-American programme of reaction and aggression in which the British government adopts the moral high ground, the role of justifier and ideologue.

Thus it is that Tony Blair is posing the present battle as one of ideologies, not to enable the people to mould a world outlook, but the opposite – that the ideology and values of neo-liberalism, presented as universal and "good", should triumph over Islamic extremism, just as, in his argument, it triumphed over that other "evil" "extremism" which he himself terms "revolutionary communism". At almost every step of the way since he declared on September 11 that the world had changed and he launched the agenda of the "war on terror", one pretext, one justification, has been replaced by another.

At its present stage, Blair is adopting the profile of the promoter of strong government, an over-rider of human rights and the judiciary, an advocate of constitutional reform in which the authority of the prerogative is concentrated in the hands of an executive elite, a saviour from the terror of an "evil ideology". In a climate of hysteria and a psychosis of fear, promoted by his government and with the collaboration of the media, he therefore announces that the "mood" has changed, and hence that the "rules of the game" must change too.

Tony Blair and his government must draw back from this dangerous course and let the people soberly assess the situation. No proof is being given why the right to conscience should be violated, why the European Convention on Human Rights should be thrown out of the window, why state terror and the impunity of the state forces should be the order of the day, of why there should suddenly be only one set of values in the world, of why one set of "anti-terrorism" legislation should be piled on another faster than the draughtsman can frame them. No proof except the declaration that now it is up to the government to use force, to intimidate, to deny the freedom of speech, to set arbitrary criteria for citizenship, to revive the medievalist conception of the "king’s enemies", and so on and so forth.

The path that Tony Blair is opening up is in absolute contempt of the rule of law, of the need for calm so that peace and security can be guaranteed, of the requirement for rights to be given a guarantee. This is the meaning of his "best yet" third term of office, of an election held to consolidate the arrangements of fascism and neo-liberal globalisation, of the unipolar world, of plunder and monopoly right.

And in respect of the internet world, well I think this is something we have to look at Internationally as well. This is a real problem because these sort of extremist internet types are a very, very direct incitement and they are used extensively by people who want to foment this type of hatred and I think we are still, I hope, in the international summit that is taking place in September on some of this where the United Nations are trying to convene people to take firmer action on terrorism, I hope we can start looking at how we can, across borders, deal with some of these issues because it is a real problem. And I think that the more I think about this type of phenomenon which we are dealing with and it is why I see this as a global threat that has to be handled at a number of different levels, including the level of ideas and ideology, as well as security measures, is that I think it has got some of the same characteristics as revolutionary communism, you know, in the sense that it has got an ideology, it is very extreme, that it can be used to engage young people at a certain level and in a certain way, it has got often the cells of it of a loose association with one another, but on the other hand they have got this ideology that binds them together, they know the types of places that they can go to to get the information and to try and stimulate this type of extremism and we have got to deal with it in a way that recognises that its roots are very deep, very extensive around the world, and you need to pull them up at the same time as dealing with all the rest of it [rse]. That is why what happens in the Middle East is very important, what happens in the Middle East is a very important part of winning this battle here, what happens in Iraq and Afghanistan is an important part of winning this battle here, because it is a battle of ideas and what these people want to say is the purpose of Western policy, American policy in particular, is to suppress Islam. Now you may agree or disagree with American policy but that is not its purpose and if we can achieve democracy in certain countries that starts to send a very different signal and that is a very important part of winning this battle of ideas, so that people in the end become less attracted to this propaganda because it is so obviously countered by reality [!]. It is also why I have also said it is important that we try and make progress in the Middle East.

Shit isn't it?

Lets see ...

"these sort of extremist internet types". I know that Bliar has terrible trouble keeping up with "the technology" (the truth is that he's too mad to be able to use it) and 'the world is changing' is the only justification for many of Blair's Neo-liberal policies but he really should realise that the internet only communicates words and ideas. So who the fuck are the 'extremist internet types' that Bliar can't countenance?

Oh here it is, "the more I think about this type of phenomenon which we are dealing with ... I think it has got some of the same characteristics as revolutionary communism.

The rsole is saying that revolutionary communism (a.k.a. Marxists or Socialists) is extremist like terrorism. We have seen this shortly before when the rsole claims that Socialists are terrorists. He's saying that all the Marxist inspired political activists are unacceptable, terrorist-like extremists. He's saying that selling papers is equal to terrorist bombings!

...

I don't think that we should allow ourselves to be backed into an argument, and neither incidentally do I think this is remotely what was being said, but I don't think we should allow ourselves to be backed into an argument where we say when you are protecting national security you are interfering with civil rights or civil liberties. Article 2 of the European Convention is the Right to Life. The European Convention specifically recognises that you have got to be able to protect your citizens and their right to be free from attack, or free from terrorism. So I think it is not so much a question, in fact, of saying we put national security above civil liberties, on the contrary it is more a question of saying, what is the right balance between the rights of people to say what they want, or do certain things, and the rights of other people to be free from attack, or free from fear, and that is the balance that has to be struck in any situation where you are debating rights. And I don't, and never have accepted this idea that somehow there is a clash between the concept of human rights and the concept of protecting the country from terrorism. People have a right to be protected from terrorism, they also have a right to speak out, but the right to speak out carries with it a responsibility, and part of the responsibility is not to go and incite people to do something that interferes with the rights of the law abiding citizen, and that is the best way, I think, to look at it.

Is he saying that people can be killed for what they say because others have the right to be free from terrorism - which he defines as fear? He's a stark raving lunatic.

Who the fuck are these law-biding citizens? We all fucking are until we are judged gulty before a court of law. It doesn't work like that for insane UK prime ministers.

...

I think people have two almost quite separate currents of feeling about this. One is, we are not going to let these people intimidate us, destroy the tolerance and respect that is part of the British way of life for people of all races, religions, cultures. Second, we are angry about these extremists, we are angry about what they are doing to our country, we are angry about people abusing our good nature and our toleration, and those two currents have got to be satisfied together, and I think they can be actually, perfectly sensibly, but both exist in my view.

That would be the biggoted telerant intolerance of Socialists and "extremist internet types" who are as bad as terrorists?

...

You can't win this battle by security measures alone. Now it doesn't follow from that that you don't have to take security measures, you do. But I have constantly said this is a battle of ideology as well and you have got to defeat the ideas of these people. You have got to take them head on. You have got to take them head on in their perversion of the two doctrines in faith of Islam, you have got to take them head on in their assertions about America, about American Foreign policy, about what the West wants, or does not want. That is not to say, incidentally, that people can't disagree with what American policy is. People may passionately disagree with it, but it is completely absurd to suggest someone like myself was engaged in military action in Afghanistan or Iraq, or takes the view that we do about the Middle East process because of religion, and it is important to divorce that from the politics of particular issues. And you have got to take them head on in the view that there can ever be anything acceptable about deliberately killing innocent people for the purpose of furthering a political cause [Hypocrite Blair]. And I don't mean to go into the rights or wrongs, even of revolutionary communism, but it is that type of battle that we are engaged in and the roots of this go very deep, they have arisen over many, many years and I am afraid that the way that we will beat it will be over many, many years.

Blair is trying to outlaw disagreement on what American policy is. That is one ridiculous position to propose because we know full well that Blair is a Crypto-fascist pursing Project for the New American Century policies while pretending to be committed to democracy. You will also recall that Bush was pursuing "a crusade" at the start of all this nonsense and that Blair's government is incredibly subsurvient to Israel.

"And I don't mean to go into the rights or wrongs, even of revolutionary communism". Not going to ... counter it with reality or take it on head on then? rsole.

Do you think that Blair would have dared make a speech like this if he believed that deep was still alive?