THE BRITISH THREAD II

Yes Mac, go and see Ocean's 13.

downunder we love Witcheetee grubs, fresh out of hollow tree trunks! Even Charly likes them.

What's a Murghi Twister?

The place is as dead as heaven on a Saturday night!

Tell you what Mathos, you write what you like, and other people will write what they like, and meanwhile you can stick your stupid opinions and your aggressive attitude where the sun don't shine.

I recall a British civil servant seeing a picture of a veiled Margaret Thatcher descending the steps of a jet to grovel at the feet of some Saudi princes at the time of the 1985 al-Yamamah contract. "This," he said with a sigh, "will end in tears." Thatcher was also negotiating the Pergau dam deal with Malaysia, heavy with kickbacks. Tony Blair did likewise with the Tanzania radar contract, a third of which comprised bribes. Prime ministers seemed to think themselves above the law. In both latter cases they overruled ministers and officials.

The £43bn al-Yamamah deal was not so much about defence as laundering huge sums of surplus oil revenue into the pockets of the Saudi rich, distorting Britain's heavily subsidised defence industry into the bargain. The Saudis do not fight. They have no plausible army. Their purchases of overpriced ships and planes must be operated by mercenaries from Pakistan and elsewhere and sit rusting in docks and deserts.