Russell Miller's Posts - Sustainable Hackney2024-03-19T01:25:20ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMillerhttps://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/68583441?profile=RESIZE_48X48&width=48&height=48&crop=1%3A1https://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blog/feed?user=199xjb72gok46&xn_auth=noSpycops and the Fight for Justicetag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-06-12:6446498:BlogPost:539312016-06-12T14:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<h1 class="western"><a href="https://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=107"><font size="3">Subversion, sabotage and spying: Political policing and state racism in the UK</font></a></h1>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">This was the title of the extraordinary conference I attended at South Bank Uni in early April. Over 2 days speaker after speaker spoke about appalling cases of racism, subversion, dishonesty, criminality and violence by the…</font></p>
<h1 class="western"><a href="https://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=107"><font size="3">Subversion, sabotage and spying: Political policing and state racism in the UK</font></a></h1>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">This was the title of the extraordinary conference I attended at South Bank Uni in early April. Over 2 days speaker after speaker spoke about appalling cases of racism, subversion, dishonesty, criminality and violence by the police and other British State agents. I was familiar with many of the cases and even worked with some of the speakers when I was a civil rights lawyer at Birnbergs. Little of what was said shocked me since I knew it already, but any one of the speakers could stun into silence most audiences were their stories to be given serious airtime. Fortunately the conference was videoed and you can watch many of the speeches online at:</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><a href="https://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/subversion-sabotage-and-spying-political-policing-and-state-racism-uk">https://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/subversion-sabotage-and-spying-political-policing-and-state-racism-uk</a>.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><b>Abuse and Deceit as Policy</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><a href="https://vimeo.com/164225448">Kate Wilson</a> and <a href="https://vimeo.com/164567174">Helen Steel</a> talked about their amazing fight to expose the undercover policemen who tricked them into long term relationships whilst spying on their friends. Both spoke with huge courage and clarity about this most disgusting of State crimes. <a href="https://undercoverinfo.wordpress.com/2015/11/22/cps-intervened-at-every-stage-to-ensure-no-spycop-was-prosecuted-the-evidence/" target="_blank">Crimes for which the Crown Prosecution Service refuses to prosecute</a> despite the obvious fact that any consent for sexual intimacy was clearly obtained by deceit. They are just two of the thousands of political activists spied on and abused by hundreds of spycops and MI5 agents. As Helen Steel pointed out, the fact that many spycops use similar tactics of emotional manipulation and psychological mirroring to groom their targets proves they were trained in how to do it. It was policy not rogue practice. Both women remain powerful activists dedicated to political and social justice.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">The dogged work pioneered by women like Kate and Helen has opened a window onto the sinister world of the British secret police. The campaign is led by groups like <a href="https://policespiesoutoflives.org.uk/" target="_blank">Police Spies Out of Lives</a> and <a href="http://campaignopposingpolicesurveillance.com/" target="_blank">Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance</a> with more detailed investigative work by <a href="http://undercoverresearch.net/" target="_blank">Undercover Research</a>. These groups, and the dozens of miscarriage of justice campaigns, are the only hope that State subversion of protest and State racism will be addressed. The public inquiry into undercover policing led by <a href="https://www.ucpi.org.uk/" target="_blank">Justice Pitchford</a> is by definition a contradiction in terms with State agencies desperate to hide from it and the public the truth. The fact is MI5 and <a href="http://specialbranchfiles.uk/" target="_blank">Special Branch</a> have been running sabotage, intelligence gathering and psyop operations against any and all effective progressive movements in the UK for over a century. Those operations are now better resourced in terms of both manpower and funding than ever before. Much of that subversive effort is directed at radical and dissenting communities such as those in Hackney. Many of the spycops identified to date operated in Hackney and many many more have yet to be exposed.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><b>Terrorism as Justification</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">Terrorism is the public justification and cover for all the political policing of dissent and another speaker <a href="https://vimeo.com/164225449">Prof Mark McGovan gave an excellent academic explanation</a> of the wider repressive agenda exemplified in the government's so called Prevent strategy. This involves criminalising and demonetising Islam whilst delegating thought control and repression to teachers and lecturers in all UK educational institutions. This is Big Brother.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><b>Racism and the Police</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><a href="https://vimeo.com/164336376">Sukhdev Reel described her experience</a> (similar to that of the Lawrence family) on realising she was placed under surveillance by the Met after her son was murdered by racists. The Met failed to catch her son's killers but felt it appropriate to deploy undercover officers to infiltrate the family's campaign for justice.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><b>Rotheram 12</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">The <a href="https://vimeo.com/164225452">young Asian activists from Rotheram</a> were the most urgent and inspiring speakers. Following the Rotheram child abuse scandal the police were allowed to dodge responsibility for allowing hundreds of white girls to be abused by a few sick misogynist Muslim men by a racist media hate campaign targeting the Muslim community. The police and Rotheram council had been told repeatedly about the abuse but both failed to act. Rather than ask why the authorities permitted the abuse to go on the tabloid media sought to exploit the opportunity to whip up racism. After months of racist abuse and violence from fascists the community finally reacted when an elderly Muslim man was murdered. True to form the police response to community self defence was to charge young men protecting their community with violent disorder. With clear echoes of the <a href="http://history-is-made-at-night.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/short-hot-summer-1981-bradford-12.html" target="_blank">Bradford 12</a> and many other cause celebs of the 1970s and 1980s the <a href="http://www.tmg-uk.org/support-the-rotherham-12/" target="_blank">Rotheram 12 case</a> is British justice on trial. SELF DEFENCE = NO OFFENCE.</font></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><b>Spies in our Communities</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3"><a href="https://vimeo.com/165409213">Dave Smith from Blacklisted</a> spoke about State and corporate collusion in blacklisting workers in the construction industry for union activism and raising health and safety concerns. This was a highly organised and cynical operation to keep from work ordinary working class people who dared to speak out in one of Britain's most accident prone industries.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">The above are just a few of the stories from the conference. We are on the border of a police state. Where we go from here is down to how much energy and will we have to fight. It is tempting not to want to know about all the pain and suffering that goes on but if you choose not to know who will be there when you need help?</font></p>Amber Nectar - Oak Bracket Returns to Clissold after 8 year Absencetag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-06-10:6446498:BlogPost:536102016-06-10T14:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732918?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732918?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a> It was wonderful to find my old friend Inonotus dryadeus (also known as <strong>Oak Bracket</strong>) back in Clissold on Monday. Calling a bracket fungus a friend may seem a bit weird but having not seen this amber beauty for 8 years it was joyous to rediscover it on the same veteran plum tree where it fruited in 2008. Surely knowing an organism as beautiful as this for 8…</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732918?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732918?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>It was wonderful to find my old friend Inonotus dryadeus (also known as <strong>Oak Bracket</strong>) back in Clissold on Monday. Calling a bracket fungus a friend may seem a bit weird but having not seen this amber beauty for 8 years it was joyous to rediscover it on the same veteran plum tree where it fruited in 2008. Surely knowing an organism as beautiful as this for 8 years and it making me smile at first sight is a pretty good basis for a friendship, no? It certainly worked for me.</p>
<p>It is also a superb demonstration as to why retaining tree stumps and urban veteran trees is so important. This is not a common fungus. It usually occurs on old oak trees, hence the common name. But we don't have many old oak trees in Hackney so this one is making the best of the hard heartwood of this old purple plum. However since purple plums are small trees the fungi only has a limited food resource so this could be the last time it fruits here!</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732957?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732957?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>The tree was cut down about 10 years ago but the rootstock is still alive and therefore continues to produce new wood. This also means new dead heartwood, as the new sapwood becomes dysfunctional, for the fungus to feed on. So if the suckers are allowed to grow on a bit there's a chance the fungus and tree could live togther for many more years.</p>
<p></p>
<p>So protect those knackered old trees and stumps. There's gold in them there trees!</p>Wild Bee Walk and West Hackney Rectag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-06-05:6446498:BlogPost:539042016-06-05T11:08:33.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732869?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732869?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a></p>
<p class="western">I Tweeted (@treeruss) the above photo to advertise yesterday's bee walk and it happens to feature the first bee we saw. This is a male Hairy Yellow-Face bee <em>Hylaeus hylinatus</em>. It's tiny, less than 6mm! Yesterday's male was a bit dozy, presumably due to the cold weather. It soon warmed up in the glass tube I used to show if to the assembled bee…</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732869?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732869?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></p>
<p class="western">I Tweeted (@treeruss) the above photo to advertise yesterday's bee walk and it happens to feature the first bee we saw. This is a male Hairy Yellow-Face bee <em>Hylaeus hylinatus</em>. It's tiny, less than 6mm! Yesterday's male was a bit dozy, presumably due to the cold weather. It soon warmed up in the glass tube I used to show if to the assembled bee enthusiasts befi=ore we let it go back to looking for a female.</p>
<p class="western"></p>
<p class="western">We also saw Buff Tailed bumble bees, Common Carder bees, an Andrena mining bee I've yet to identify and mining bee nests with the cautious occupiers poking their heads out!</p>
<p class="western"></p>
<p class="western">Next Hackney wild bee event: <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/events/wild-bees-in-hackney-a-talk-by-russell-miller" target="_self">Thurs 16th June 6pm Clissold House</a>.</p>went DOWN TO THE deadWOOD TODAYtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-05-22:6446498:BlogPost:534092016-05-22T20:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>If you know what you are looking for it's not that hard to demonstrate the <strong>vital importance of deadwood in parks</strong>.</p>
<p></p>
<p>10 minutes at a horse chestnut stump in CLissold Park this afternoon revealled <strong>2 new nationally scarce species for the park</strong>:</p>
<ul>
<li>a <strong>fungus beetle</strong> called <em><span class="zero-f" style="color: #888888;">Hallomenus binotatus</span></em> <strong><span class="zero-f" style="color: #888888;">Nationally Scarce…</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>If you know what you are looking for it's not that hard to demonstrate the <strong>vital importance of deadwood in parks</strong>.</p>
<p></p>
<p>10 minutes at a horse chestnut stump in CLissold Park this afternoon revealled <strong>2 new nationally scarce species for the park</strong>:</p>
<ul>
<li>a <strong>fungus beetle</strong> called <em><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">Hallomenus binotatus</span></em> <strong><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">Nationally Scarce B</span></strong><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">;</span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732823?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732823?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">and galleries of the <strong>Brown Tree Ant</strong> <em>Lasius brunneus</em> <strong><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">Nationally Scarce B</span></strong>.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732901?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732901?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></span></p>
<p><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">There were also Lesser Stag beelte galleries and two other beelte species:</span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">the wounderful (common) deadwood specialist - <em><span class="_Xbe kno-fv">Ptilinus pectinicornis</span></em>;</span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732944?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732944?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f">and an as yet unidentified rove beetle.</span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="color: #888888;" class="zero-f"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733027?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733027?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></span></p>Hackney Bees - another new speciestag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-04-04:6446498:BlogPost:523392016-04-04T22:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732809?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732809?profile=original" width="625"></img></a></p>
<p>Found Buffish Mining bee <em>Andrena nigroaeanea</em> on Hackney Downs last week<em>.</em> That's another new species for Hackney.</p>
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<p>That brings the total to 50 confirmed species in Hackney so far; 2 new species in a week! That's getting on for 20% of all UK species. See…</p>
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<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732809?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732809?profile=original" width="625"/></a></p>
<p>Found Buffish Mining bee <em>Andrena nigroaeanea</em> on Hackney Downs last week<em>.</em> That's another new species for Hackney.</p>
<p></p>
<p>That brings the total to 50 confirmed species in Hackney so far; 2 new species in a week! That's getting on for 20% of all UK species. See <a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732871?profile=original">Hackney Bee Species 2016.pdf</a>. Since I'm about the only person in Hackney doing serious bee ID there are bound to be others out there I've not found yet.</p>
<p></p>
<p>I've not found A. nigroaenea before even though it's one of the most common bees in England. Likewise I've only ever found one A. cineraria in Hackney, another common mining bee. This may suggest even common species are only just clinging on in Hackney as decades of habitat destruction continue to accelerate.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Here are a few tips you want to help solitary bees:</p>
<ul>
<li>encourage weeds likes dandelions (great pollen & nectar source);</li>
<li>encourage diverse, all year flower resources</li>
<li>create some bare ground for soil nesting (mining bees mine the soil to nest)</li>
<li>oppose loss of green space everywhere (in gardens, parks, estates, schools and development sites).</li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p>If you want to try and identify solitary bees get <a href="http://www.britishwildlife.com/viewbook.asp?bookid=34" target="_blank">Steve Falk's excellent new book</a>. It is not easy but it's just got a whole lot easier.</p>
<p></p>
<p></p>Some bees don't look like bees - New bee photostag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-03-31:6446498:BlogPost:523062016-03-31T22:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>This is a photo of the <strong>Furry-clasped Furrow bee</strong> (<em>Lasioglossum lativentre</em>) I discovered at Abney Park recently. This is a female. The tiny bees nest in the ground but little is known about them.</p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733005?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733005?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a> The species is fairly uncommon but not rare or scarce. It has never been recorded in north or east London before but that's more likely because no one's…</p>
<p>This is a photo of the <strong>Furry-clasped Furrow bee</strong> (<em>Lasioglossum lativentre</em>) I discovered at Abney Park recently. This is a female. The tiny bees nest in the ground but little is known about them.</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733005?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733005?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>The species is fairly uncommon but not rare or scarce. It has never been recorded in north or east London before but that's more likely because no one's been looking for it.</p>
<p></p>
<p><strong>Below</strong> is a photo of a <strong>male Small Nomad bee</strong> (Nomada flavoguttata). It is about 5mm long and only about 1mm wide. It is a parasite of small mining bees.</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732971?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732971?profile=original" width="600"/></a></p>3 New bee species at Abneytag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-03-28:6446498:BlogPost:519012016-03-28T12:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>Realising Good Friday was to be the pick of the Easter weekend weather I set out in determined fashion to see if I could find any new species of bees at Abney. After about four hours I had seen: <strong>Buff-tailed bumblebee queens</strong>, honey bees and lots of <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/main/search/search?q=hairy" target="_self">Hairy Footed Flower bees</a> (mostly males but a few females had begun flying). There were also quite a few butterflies on the wing. I counted 4…</p>
<p>Realising Good Friday was to be the pick of the Easter weekend weather I set out in determined fashion to see if I could find any new species of bees at Abney. After about four hours I had seen: <strong>Buff-tailed bumblebee queens</strong>, honey bees and lots of <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/main/search/search?q=hairy" target="_self">Hairy Footed Flower bees</a> (mostly males but a few females had begun flying). There were also quite a few butterflies on the wing. I counted 4 <strong>commas, 3 brimstone and a peacock</strong>. But still no new bees.</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732906?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732906?profile=original" width="600"/></a></p>
<p>I eventually gravitated toward a large area of lesser celandine (Ficaria) that is currently carpeting the ground in yellow near the defunct water fountain at the Stamford Hill end. Here I was lifted by sight of a lovely <strong>Mourning bee (<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63075200@N07/sets/72157633108592089/" target="_blank">Melecta albifrons</a> - PHOTO)</strong>. Still not a new species but an uncommon sight. This is a cuckoo (cleptoparasite) of the Hairy Footed Flower bee.<a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732953?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732953?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>This renewed my energies and my fifth hour of hunting proved the most productive. There was a slightly frost damaged small hawthorn in flower (in March!) and on it I caught site of a small mining bee. I recognised immediately it was probably a species I'd not seen at Abney before but before I could react it had rejected the poorly hawthorn flowers and was off!</p>
<p>However this increased my determination and during the next hour I did succeed in finding 3 new, very small bees - all new to Abney; 1 new to Hackney and which I've never seen anywhere.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/66784700@N07/9201982901/in/album-72157631683977469/" target="_blank">Gywnne's mining bee (Andrena bicolor)</a> is a small (i.e. not as big as a honey bee), fairly common early flying solitary bee. I found <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/andrena-praecox-male0001" target="_self">males</a> and females at Stoke Newington's East Reservoir last year and had tentatively identified it as being in Abney from photographs I'd taken a few years ago. But this was the first time I could closely examine and confirm the species as present with both a male and female seen.</p>
<p>The other two species were even smaller. Both strecthed my identification skills over the Easter weekend. Even with <a href="http://www.stevenfalk.co.uk/publications" target="_blank">Steve Falks fantastic new Field Guide</a> and his <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63075200@N07/collections/72157631518508520/" target="_blank">amazing Flickr site</a> positive identifications took me a few hours. Natural history is a wonderful science because you can approach it at any level, from watching butterflies and enjoying flowers, to painstaking microscope work. All of it is enjoyable and the knowledge acquired gradually increases (though sometimes painfully slowly and not without frustrations).</p>
<p>Ultimately discipline (hours of field work and more hours pouring over text books, websites and under the microscope) is what yields answers. Thirst for knowledge drives the discipline, and an a stuborn intellectual rigour not to settle for maybe. Not that all this hardwork is necessary just to enjoy bees or wildlife in general. A less scientific approach has plenty of rewards. It's just that if you want to know somehting very specific, such as which bee species live in <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/abney-woodland0001?context=user" target="_self">Abney's wonderful woodland nature reserve</a>, you have to put the time and thought in to get the right answers. Alas there are few who do this, not least because the intellectual and personal rewards cannot pay the bills and there are precious few willing to pay for professional entomology.</p>
<p>SO after all that: the new species are <a href="http://www.bwars.com/category/taxonomic-hierarchy/bee/halictidae/lasioglossum/lasioglossum-lativentre" target="_blank">Furry-claspered Furrow bee</a> and <a href="http://www.bwars.com/category/taxonomic-hierarchy/bee/apidae/nomada/nomada-flavoguttata" target="_blank">Little Nomad bee</a>. The latter (<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63075200@N07/sets/72157633441284751/" target="_blank">Nomada flavogutatta</a>) is a tiny 6mm, thin insect most would never guess to be a bee. It's another cuckoo, this time of small mining bees. I've found it at East Reservoir before but never at Abney. The rather long windedly named <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63075200@N07/sets/72157648811948039/" target="_blank">Furry-claspered Furrow bee (or Lasioglossum lativentre)</a> was completely new to me, Abney and Hackney. Looking at the NBN Gateway/BWARS <a href="https://data.nbn.org.uk/Taxa/NHMSYS0000876160" target="_blank">national distribution maps</a> the record is certainly a new hectad and it appears the bee has never been recorded anywhere in north or east London. The species is not rare but is decidedly local in its distribution, and its discovery is yet more proof of Abney's regional importance as one of London's most valuable nature reserves.</p>
<p>Not a bad way to spend Easter weekend (and I've not told you about musketeering on Sat & Sun).</p>
<p></p>BBC Invents 3 Different Reasons to Justify Anti-Corbyn Biastag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-02-21:6446498:BlogPost:513042016-02-21T20:03:56.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>Those who read <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/bbc-supports-tory-and-saudi-governments-but-censors-corbyn" target="_self">my blog at the time</a> will be familiar with the fact that back in October BBC Newsnight ran an astonishingly biased piece about the Tory government's U-turn on contracting to help the Saudi dictatorship run its prisons. [I know the BBC is routinely right-wing and anti- Corbyn but this really took the biscuit.]</p>
<p></p>
<p class="western">For…</p>
<p>Those who read <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/bbc-supports-tory-and-saudi-governments-but-censors-corbyn" target="_self">my blog at the time</a> will be familiar with the fact that back in October BBC Newsnight ran an astonishingly biased piece about the Tory government's U-turn on contracting to help the Saudi dictatorship run its prisons. [I know the BBC is routinely right-wing and anti- Corbyn but this really took the biscuit.]</p>
<p></p>
<p class="western">For those with the patience here is <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732859?profile=original" target="_self">my appeal to the BBC Trust to uphold my complaint</a> and dismiss the 3 crap reasons given so far to cover-up the censorship.</p>
<p class="western"></p>
<p class="western">My point in a nutshell:</p>
<p class="western">if when reporting on a change in govt policy - about which the leader of the opposition had specifically campaigned, having highlighted it in his recent inaugural party conference speech - you inaccurately attribute sole agency and credit to the govt, and fail to mention even the existence of an opposition, then that is not just bad, biased reporting; that is propaganda.</p>
<p></p>Cobalt Crust fungus, winter blues never looked so goodtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-02-08:6446498:BlogPost:499472016-02-08T13:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-6">Stunning Cobalt Crust fungus at Abney Park nature reserve.</span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732837?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732837?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a> Previously <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/cobalt-crust7?context=album&albumId=6446498%3AAlbum%3A8829" target="_self">seen in Wick…</a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-6">Stunning Cobalt Crust fungus at Abney Park nature reserve.</span><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732837?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732837?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>Previously <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/cobalt-crust7?context=album&albumId=6446498%3AAlbum%3A8829" target="_self">seen in Wick Woodland</a>.</p>Heathrow 13: British Justice 0tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-01-26:6446498:BlogPost:499192016-01-26T13:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-6"><strong>Heathrow 13: British Justice 0</strong></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong><span class="font-size-5">Judge loses plot in high stakes climate change battle</span></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><img class="irc_mi" height="400" src="http://planestupid.com/files/images/12565462_1547330728919852_226587584865064981_n.img_assist_custom-600x400.jpg" style="margin-top: 61px;" width="600"></img></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">As a former civil rights lawyer I've seen a fair…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-6"><strong>Heathrow 13: British Justice 0</strong></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong><span class="font-size-5">Judge loses plot in high stakes climate change battle</span></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><img src="http://planestupid.com/files/images/12565462_1547330728919852_226587584865064981_n.img_assist_custom-600x400.jpg" class="irc_mi" style="margin-top: 61px;" height="400" width="600"/></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">As a former civil rights lawyer I've seen a fair few judges and a number of political trials but the performance of District Judge Deborah Wright yesterday at the <a href="http://www.planestupid.com/content/heathrow-trial" target="_blank">Heathrow 13 trial</a> was probably the most extraordinary.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">13 amazing public spirited <a href="http://www.planestupid.com/aboutus" target="_blank">Plane Stipid</a> activists, many from Hackney and east London, occupied the runway at Heathrow last July to prevent planes from emitting greenhouse gases that cause climate change and air pollution. They stood charged with <a href="https://greenandblackcross.org/guides/laws/5-trespass-aggravated-trespass/" target="_blank">aggravated trespass, an offence created to criminalise direct action</a>. All are impressive people with astonishing c.v.s in campaigning to prevent climate change. So powerful was their case the judge was immediately forced to concede that climate change is caused by emissions, that it has catastrophic effects across the globe and that all the defendants acted with genuine and sincere belief that only direct action can stop the ongoing disaster. However the creep towards a police state in the UK has reached a point where this kind of brave and urgently necessary action is very hard to defend in court. Defendants are denied trial by their peers lest a jury recognise the justice of their cause and acquit. Instead very junior judges decide cases in magistrates courts. In highly political cases such as this specific, conservative and authoritarian, district judges are allocated these trails, often outside their own courts, just to be sure of a State approved verdict. This is how the British State deals with the most effective political activists.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">So it was yesterday at a packed number 1 court in Willesden Magistrates. Having spent the whole trial excluding evidence relating to climate change, political failure and dire human costs DJ Wright restricted the defence lawyers to 10 minutes each before delivering her predictable verdict of guilty. So far nothing very surprising. Although she was not especially hostile during the trial her bias was always clear and there was no doubt in anyone's mind she would hide behind legal technicality to convict. The dice were loaded long before anyone stepped into court.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">What was extraordinary however was what followed immediately after her <a href="http://planestupid.com/blogs/2016/01/25/heathrow13-trial-judges-verdict" target="_blank">largely reasoned judgement of guilty</a>. Shaking and struggling to control her own emotions the judge then began a rant against defendants that seconds earlier she had commended as genuine and having outstanding character references. She criticised the defendants for not commenting on matters about which neither she nor the prosecutor had bother to ask and literally invented evidence. Bias in judges is not uncommon but uncontrolled, irrational outbursts are usually restricted to a few doddery old men long past there intellectual prime. Wright accused the defendants of showing no concern or remorse for the inconvenience thousands had suffered from delayed or cancelled flights despite knowing full well the issue had never been raised in the trial other than by two defendants. She also relied on completely inaccurate figures of those delayed choosing numbers even the prosecution accepted were inflated by high winds that restricted flight movements on the same day. Most bizarre of all she then speculated, in the complete absence of any evidence, that those delayed might have been travelling to visit sick relatives or “going to school”. Aside from the obvious impropriety of making up evidence to suit her vindictiveness she clearly had gained no understanding whatsoever of the disaster that unnecessary constant flyers are wreaking on the climate (<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/20/frequent-flyer-tax-leisure-airfares">15% of UK population take 70% of UK flights</a>).</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">The rant concluded by instructing the defendants that that should all expect immediate custodial sentences for the disruption and the “absolutely astronomical” cost to Heathrow. Having excluded relevant evidence she had no idea how trivial those costs are compared to the national and global costs of flooding, drought, sea level rise and air pollution.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Slightly shocked by the judge's outburst but completely defiant the defendants told the waiting press they had no choice but to act in light of abject political failure to prevent 300,000 deaths per annum from climate change. Asked if they would do it again they said “definitely”. And this is the State's dilemma. Having abandoned any pretence of democracy and now completely in the hands of the 1% mega-rich psychopaths the British State is no longer able to play subtle games with repression. The gloves are well and truly off and in so doing the State is educating a new generation of activists who will have no naïvety as to who holds power and what to do about it.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-5">Bring on the Heathrow 130.</span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong><a href="http://www.planestupid.com/aboutus" target="_blank">Plane Stupid</a> is a network of grassroots groups that take <a href="http://planestupid.com/blogs/2009/06/18/plane-stupid-explains-why-take-direct-action">non violent direct action</a> against aviation expansion.</strong></p>Listen to the Trees - Act Now on Climate Changetag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-01-09:6446498:BlogPost:496562016-01-09T17:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732829?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732829?profile=original" width="600"></img></a></p>
<h1><span class="font-size-5" style="color: #000000; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Blireana plum (<i>Prunus</i> × <i>blireana</i>) on Shakspeare Walk in full flower yesterday (8 JANUARY 2016).…</span></h1>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732843?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732843?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600"></img></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732829?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732829?profile=original" width="600"/></a></p>
<h1><span class="font-size-5" style="color: #000000; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Blireana plum (<i>Prunus</i> × <i>blireana</i>) on Shakspeare Walk in full flower yesterday (8 JANUARY 2016).</span></h1>
<p></p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732843?profile=original"><img width="600" class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732843?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600"/></a></p>
<p><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-5">Same tree last year on 11 MARCH 2015!</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><strong><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;" class="font-size-6">What can YOU do?</span></strong></p>
<p><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;" class="font-size-5">Aside from reducing your own carbon emissions you can <strong>take action</strong>.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;" class="font-size-5">If you're not in a position to take action yourself, or its just not your thing, you can still support those local people who do. The following links take you to information on brave people who refuse to stand aside and watch capitalist insanity destroy lives and the planet:</span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;"><strong><span class="font-size-6"><a href="http://www.planestupid.com/" target="_blank">Plane Stupid</a></span></strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;" class="font-size-6">Activists who occupied the runway and stopped flights at Heathrow last summer face trial on <strong>18 January</strong> 2016. Turn up and support them in <strong>mass mobilsation at Willesden Magistrates Court</strong>;</span></p>
<ul>
<li><h1 class="page__title title" id="page-title"><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.desmog.uk/2015/10/28/meet-climate-change-activists-inside-matt-ridley-s-conscience" target="_blank">Matt Ridley’s Conscience</a></span></h1>
</li>
</ul>
<p><span class="font-size-6"><span style="font-family: comic sans ms,sans-serif;">Activits who stormed Tory Lord Matt Ridley's open cast coal mine are fund raising to pay court fines. Donate <a href="https://www.tilt.com/tilts/help-coal-activists-cover-costs?invite=CNVE942F070C1794BC1BBAADDE82F230319&utm_source=email&utm_medium=invite1&utm_term=inviteflow&utm_content=cta&utm_campaign=notification" target="_blank">here</a>.</span><br/></span></p>Rare Bumblebee Mimic found at Abney Nature Reservetag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2016-01-09:6446498:BlogPost:498452016-01-09T16:55:44.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>See link below <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732921?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-right" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732921?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400"></img></a> for my article in the current London Naturalist on Abney's rare bumblebee mimic not seen in London since 1966.</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733011?profile=original" target="_self">Pocota personata returns to…</a></p>
<p>See link below <a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732921?profile=original"><img width="400" class="align-right" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732921?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400"/></a>for my article in the current London Naturalist on Abney's rare bumblebee mimic not seen in London since 1966.</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84733011?profile=original" target="_self">Pocota personata returns to London</a></p>BBC supports Tory and Saudi governments but censors Corbyntag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-10-14:6446498:BlogPost:489092015-10-14T10:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Last night (<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b06j6h5c/newsnight-13102015">13.10.15) BBC Newsnight</a> reported the government decision to withdraw from a £6m British bid to provide prison services to the Saudi regime. According to the BBC the change of mind was down to Secretary of State Michael Gove (“Michael Gove had thought that and got his way”) and Tory concerns about Saudi regime's harsh treatment of a British citizen imprisoned…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Last night (<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b06j6h5c/newsnight-13102015">13.10.15) BBC Newsnight</a> reported the government decision to withdraw from a £6m British bid to provide prison services to the Saudi regime. According to the BBC the change of mind was down to Secretary of State Michael Gove (“Michael Gove had thought that and got his way”) and Tory concerns about Saudi regime's harsh treatment of a British citizen imprisoned for possession of alcohol. “All of a sudden the (Saudi) government has come under more scrutiny that ever”.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">But the BBC doesn't want viewers to know about the Saudi regime or the pressure for the UK to distance itself from this <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/iraq-crisis-how-saudi-arabia-helped-isis-take-over-the-north-of-the-country-9602312.html">terrorist sponsoring dictatorship</a>.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Newsnight completely failed to mention the campaign by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn for precisely this policy change. Corbyn's call could not have been more prominent. He made a <a href="https://www.rt.com/uk/318644-karl-andree-petition-saudi/" target="_blank">direct appeal for Cameron to withdraw from the proposed Saudi contract</a> in his recent speech to Labour Party Conference. He followed up the call with a letter to Cameron. Why was this very public position of the leader of the opposition censored from the Newsnight coverage? [At the time every message in the speech was censored as the BBC desperately invented stroies (e.g. 5% of the speech being borrowed from an older draft) to hide behind. One detail you probably never heard was that after his speech <a href="http://news.sky.com/story/1561050/sky-pulse-53-percent-can-imagine-corbyn-as-next-pm" target="_blank">53% of Sky viewers thought Corbyn prime ministerial</a>, and that figure rose steadily throughout the speech.]</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Also censored by Newsnight last night was reference to teenager <a href="http://www.reprieve.org.uk/saudi-arabia-stop-the-crucifixtion-of-ali-al-nimr/">Ali Mohammed al-Nimr sentenced to death and crucifixion</a> for participating in a pro-democracy demonstration in Saudi Arabia. <a href="http://www.amnesty.org.uk/blogs/yes-minister-it-human-rights-issue/jeremy-corbyn-labour-party-conference-human-rights">Corbyn highlighted this appalling case and demanded the PM intervene.</a> However Newsnight chose to reference the far less serious (but still appalling) threat to flog Karl Andree and gave a platform to Tory MP Bob Neill to offer advice to the Saudi regime. In its choice of case and spokesperson Newsnight chose to censor Corbyn's moral crusade for human rights, censor the Saudi government's vicious repression of democracy and instead highlight purported Tory concern for humane treatment of prisoners in Saudi Arabia at the very moment it did a complete U-turn in its policy on providing prison services to the regime. There was also no mention of the government's commitment to abolish the Human Right's Act.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Newsnight's coverage could not have been more sympathetic to the Conservative government and could not have been less balanced. Chinese state television could take lessons in invisibilising democracy from Ian Katz, Newsnight editor.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">The escalation of censorship and <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourbeeb/tom-mills/panorama-corbyn-surge-and-political-establishment" target="_blank">propaganda within the BBC</a> coincides with the threat Corbyn posses to the Neo-Conservative dictatorship in Britain. Since MI5 staged a coup within the Labour Party and brought Blair to power <a href="http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n20/paul-myerscough/corbyn-in-the-media" target="_blank">the agenda has shifted massively to the right</a>. Corbyn's landslide in the Labour leadership exposes the manipulation of politics in the UK and threatens a re-emergence of democracy. The majority of <a href="https://yougov.co.uk/news/2015/03/12/nationalisation-ideology-beats-pragmatism/" target="_blank">people in Britain support nationalisation</a> of key utilities, oppose illegal military intervention and favour equality rather than growing inequality. All these things run contrary not only to the policies of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Harmsworth,_4th_Viscount_Rothermere" target="_blank">billionaire press barons</a> who control the British capitalist press but also to the vast majority of Labour MPs, right wing BBC commentators like Laura Kuenssberg and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Neil" target="_blank">Andrew Neil</a>, and Guardian editorial policy.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">The fight is on for what is left of democracy in Britain. Now is the time to join in doing whatever you can or want to, such as: challenging right wing propaganda; exposing the lies and corruption of the 1%; demanding the <a href="http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n20/paul-myerscough/corbyn-in-the-media" target="_blank">BBC restore some balance</a>; or <a href="http://peoplesmomentum.com/" target="_blank">supporting Corbyn</a>, and others like <a href="https://twitter.com/CarolineLucas?ref_src=twsrc^google|twcamp^serp|twgr^author" target="_blank">Caroline Lucas</a>. Reformist optimism I know but the situation is desperate for millions in Britain and abroad. The Tory's are actively pursuing <a href="http://www.socresonline.org.uk/17/2/16.html" target="_blank">class war (neo-liberalism)</a> against the poor behind a BBC and corporate media smokescreen that misrepresents <a href="http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/david-camerons-fury-over-bullingdon-151270" target="_blank">Bullingdon thug</a>s like Osbourne, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6409757.stm" target="_blank">Cameron</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDJWkS2A9T0" target="_blank">Johnson</a> and Goldsmith as socially liberal conservatives.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Here are a few issues to be getting on with:</p>
<ul>
<li>non-domicile rich bastards who pretend to live abroad in order to pay no tax, fund Tory Party with tax dodged cash, influence policy and even sit in parliament! (e.g. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/sep/21/cameron-faces-fresh-questions-over-knowledge-of-ashcroft-tax-status" target="_blank">Lord Ashcroft - former Tory chairman</a>; <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/nov/29/zac-goldsmith-non-dom-status" target="_blank">even Zac Goldsmith? - recently reverted to UK domicle</a>; <a href="https://beastrabban.wordpress.com/2015/01/27/from-private-eye-lord-rothermeres-non-dom-tax-scam/" target="_blank">Viscount Rothermer - owner of Daily Mail</a>;</li>
<li><a href="http://www.oecd.org/unitedkingdom/OECD-Income-Inequality-UK.pdf" target="_blank">government (Tory, ConDem, and New Labour)</a> <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/britains-divided-decade-the-rich-are-64-richer-than-before-the-recession-while-the-poor-are-57-10097038.html" target="_blank">takes from poor to give to rich</a>, even the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/money-saving-tips/10095574/Super-rich-get-richer-while-everyone-else-gets-poorer.html" target="_blank">Daily Torygraph admits the 1% are the only benficiaries</a> of capitalist insanity;</li>
<li>Labour MPs who want to flout Labour and Common's democracy to <a href="http://off-guardian.org/2015/10/12/british-mps-want-to-defend-al-qaeda-in-syria-enforce-no-fly-zone-even-if-un-vetoes/" target="_blank">start war with Syria, Russia and Iran</a>.</li>
<li>add your own....</li>
</ul>Spring Hill Orchard - TM Mega Bramble Bashtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-10-12:6446498:BlogPost:489022015-10-12T10:27:34.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong><font size="4" style="font-size: 16pt;">Spring Hill Orchard</font></strong></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong><font size="4" style="font-size: 16pt;">TM Mega Bramble Bash</font></strong></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p align="left" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="3">The orchard at Spring Hill was planted by TMs and others…</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><strong><font style="font-size: 16pt;" size="4">Spring Hill Orchard</font></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><strong><font style="font-size: 16pt;" size="4">TM Mega Bramble Bash</font></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><font size="3">The orchard at Spring Hill was planted by TMs and others in two stages between 2005 and 2007. The trees have grown well on the fertile soil but without mowing the site has also nurtured nettles, comfrey, bindweed and brambles. Every year TMs do battle with the vegetation to keep the site open and with a posse of 11 on Sunday we made a major impact.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732460?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732460?profile=original" width="733"/></a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><font size="3">Our objective on Sunday was to expose all the fruit trees and to create access for LBH Parks mowers. Hopefully the site can now be mown once or twice a year to prevent the jungle returning. Volunteers left with a few scratches, brambles fight back!, but with a huge sense of achievement. The before and after photographs hardly convey the enormity of the task but the mounds of cuttings give some idea.</font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><span class="font-size-7"><strong><font size="3">BEFORE</font></strong></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732471?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732471?profile=original" width="733"/></a><strong><span class="font-size-5">AFTER</span></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><strong><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732479?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732479?profile=original" width="733"/></a></span></strong></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><span class="font-size-6"><font size="3">Watch the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/events" target="_self">SH Events page</a> for details of <strong>TM events</strong>.</font></span></p>Expulsions, Lies and Manipulation – the Right's Reaction to a Resurgent Lefttag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-08-31:6446498:BlogPost:482612015-08-31T16:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-7"><font size="5"><b>Expulsions, Lies and Manipulation – the Right's Reaction to a Resurgent Left</b></font></span></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Right-wing ridicule is turning into panic as Jeremy Corbyn's remarkable mass movement threatens to return the Labour Party to its socialist…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><span class="font-size-7"><font size="5"><b>Expulsions, Lies and Manipulation – the Right's Reaction to a Resurgent Left</b></font></span></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Right-wing ridicule is turning into panic as Jeremy Corbyn's remarkable mass movement threatens to return the Labour Party to its socialist roots. For the first time in three decades radical voices and policies are forcing their way onto the agenda. Even the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/abney-orgies-to-racist-government" target="_self">massively censored British media</a> is struggling to invisibilise or dismiss long suppressed common sense Left analysis of the current economic and social crises. With unrestrained corporate greed destroying social and environmental fabric, and imperialist war strategy creating an unprecedented world refugee crisis, hundreds of thousands are flocking to the campaign to elect a genuine, conviction politician as Labour leader. The <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Corbyn+rallies&biw=1440&bih=767&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CFQQsARqFQoTCP-KrsrZ08cCFcFXFAodevQBUA">Corbyn campaign’s massive rallies across the country</a> are attracting thousands of people, many of whom were not born when he fist became an MP, and a staggering 300,000 people have paid £3 to vote in the election. Try as they might, the right wing New Labour clique that controls the Labour Party appears unable to <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/michael-chessum/great-labour-purge-is-underway">purge</a> anything like the number of voters necessary to stop Corbyn from taking Labour back to its roots. Whilst anyone who admitted to voting Green on social media or who has criticised Labour from the Left has their vote for Corbyn discounted, right wing Labour Party members remain free to spread their capitalist propaganda (e.g. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Hodges">Daniel Hodges</a> – David Cameron's favourite Telegraph columnist who voted for Boris Johnson as London Mayor).</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Last week the Daily Torygraph did a u-turn on its <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/11741861/How-you-can-help-Jeremy-Corbyn-win-and-destroy-the-Labour-Party.html">“vote for Corbyn” campaign</a>. Having backed Corbyn in July and encouraged readers to sign up and vote for him, ridiculing him as destined to make the Labour unelectable, last week its editorial screamed <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/11817162/Jeremy-Corbyn-must-be-stopped.html">“Corbyn must be stopped”</a> because he was “dangerous”. Desperate to hide its contradictory hypocrisy the Telegraph concludes: “Corbyn’s victory ... would be a tragedy for Labour and a disastrous embarrassment for everyone else”. Well certainly for the right wing paper that campaigned for him!</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Obviously, as the reality of a mass Left movement dawns, the establishment propaganda starts going into over-drive, and today the attacks involve a <a href="http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/13636183.Corbyn_under_fire_over_Bin_Laden_death__tragedy__comment/" target="_self">disinformation interpretation of a 5 year old interview</a> Corbyn gave to an Iranian TV channel in which he quite accurately described the legacy of British and US involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq as a tragedy. Corbyn's pledge to apologise for the Iraq War if he becomes leader contrasts starkly with the Blair and New Labour warmongering insanity that destroyed Iraq and Afghanistan and created the instability and violence now forcing millions to flee Iraq and Syria. Yet the mainstream censored media today say Corbyn is a threat to National Security because he opposes spending <b>£100 billion</b> on replacing Trident (<a href="http://www.sunnation.co.uk/jeremy-corbyn-is-threat-to-national-security-chancellor-says/">George Osborne in the Sun</a>).</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">As <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBbsU9VkRvQ">Owen Jones</a> eloquently pointed out at the Islington Corbyn rally a couple of weeks ago Corbyn has been on the correct side of history for decades. He was <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uidRBQiwjFw">arrested on pickets of the South African Embassy</a> whilst <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrW79iye1kA">Thatcher was calling Nelson Mandela a terrorist</a>; he campaigned for gay rights when Tory and Labour right wingers were overt bigots; and he spoke to Sinn Fien before even Mo Mowlem, let alone Blair and Mandelson claimed to be peacemakers in Ireland. What was most striking about that and other rallies is the age range of Corbyn supporters and the <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Corbyn+rallies&biw=1440&bih=767&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CFQQsARqFQoTCP-KrsrZ08cCFcFXFAodevQBUA#imgrc=tOpb0iL6LQzhzM:">remarkable number of under 30s</a>. As Jones said, no one anticipated the strength of support Corbyn would receive but the massive surge in Labour support plus the commitment to building a long term mass movement is the most positive development in British politics since the 1980s.</p>Abney Biodiversity and Hackney Beestag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-04-16:6446498:BlogPost:454192015-04-16T11:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><span class="font-size-7">Species Lists</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5">Below are links to simple species lists for species recorded at Abney Park Nature Reserve and a general species list for Hackney bees.</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732403?profile=original" target="_self">Abney Park Invertebrates…</a></span></p>
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<p><span class="font-size-7">Species Lists</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5">Below are links to simple species lists for species recorded at Abney Park Nature Reserve and a general species list for Hackney bees.</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732403?profile=original" target="_self">Abney Park Invertebrates</a></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732443?profile=original">Abney Park flora</a></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732487?profile=original">Abney fungi species list</a></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-4"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732492?profile=original">Hackney%20Bee%20Species%20June%202015.pdf</a></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5">Recorders: Russell Miller (trees, bees, inverts); Annie Chipchase (flora) , Matthew Gandy (inverts - Lepidoptera), Gina Rackley (fungi) and others.</span></p>Tree Assassination Attempt Foiled by Tree Musketeertag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-03-26:6446498:BlogPost:444752015-03-26T12:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="5"><span class="font-size-6">Tree Assassination Attempt</span></font></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="5"><span class="font-size-6">Foiled by <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/tm" target="_self">Tree Musketeer…</a></span><br></br></font></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><font size="5"><span class="font-size-6">Tree Assassination Attempt</span></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><font size="5"><span class="font-size-6">Foiled by <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/tm" target="_self">Tree Musketeer</a></span><br/></font></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><span class="font-size-4"><font size="3">Amidst sanity there is always insanity.</font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732350?profile=original"><img width="350" class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732350?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="350"/></a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><font size="3">Y<font size="3">esterday t</font>he weekly veg collection turned into a mission to save a tree's life. Leaving the Old Fire Station in Stoke Newington - having collected my <a href="http://www.growingcommunities.org/">Growing Communities</a> veggies and my <a href="http://www.soleshare.net/#home">SoulShare</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlangius">Whiting</a> – I noticed an unnaturally white patch under the street tree opposite. I quickly realised the white powder around the base of the tree was salt and this was an attempt to kill the young tree. Salt absorbs water and when it leaches into soil tree roots die from desiccation (i.e. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osmosis">osmosis</a> is reversed and water is drawn out of the roots to dilute the higher salt concentration in the soil). Salt can also be translocated within the <a href="http://www.forestry.gov.uk/pdf/pathology_note11.pdf/$file/pathology_note11.pdf">tree, killing buds, leaves and shoots</a>.</font></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732409?profile=original"><img class="align-left" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732409?profile=original" height="234" width="298"/></a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><font size="3">I took a photo intending to alert the Council tree officer but then decided it was urgent to act before it rained and washed the salt into the soil. I tore off some cardboard from one of the veg boxes in GC's yard and started scraping away. Although deliberately compacted around the base of the tree the salt came away reasonably easily. I tidied up by borrowing a broom.</font></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><span class="font-size-5"><font size="3">The salt was very fresh and was presumably put there that morning or the night before. All that is needed now is for the culprit to be made aware that their destructive attempt did not go unnoticed!</font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="left"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732504?profile=original"><font size="3"><img class="align-right" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732504?profile=original" width="466"/></font></a></p>Prunus Okame - the best early flowering tree for bees in London?tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-03-13:6446498:BlogPost:445342015-03-13T13:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-6" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font size="6"><b>Prunus Okame</b></font></font></span></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font size="4" style="font-size: 16pt;"><b>the best early flowering tree for bees in…</b></font></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><span class="font-size-6" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font size="6"><b>Prunus Okame</b></font></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 16pt;" size="4"><b>the best early flowering tree for bees in London?</b></font></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732517?profile=original"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732517?profile=original" width="466"/></a><span class="font-size-2"><strong>Above: Honey bee on Prunus Okame flower on a street tre in Stoke Newington.</strong></span></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font size="3">There is much talk about pollinators, the need for forage, and trees as a key urban resource, however the complexity of combining an understanding of botany, entomology and arboriculture often makes for bewilderment and confusion. There is an increasing volume of guidance on this issue but with such a complex area accurate new information is always helpful. I thought it useful therefore to share my experience of this particular tree.</font></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><font size="3">Prunus Okame is a very early flowering cherry. It is a cultivar of hybrid origin (</font></font><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif">Prunus incisa</font></em> <font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif">and</font> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif">Prunus campanulata</font></em><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">). There are at least two very similar trees (P. 'Kursar' and P. 'Collingwood Ingram'). P. Okame is small and upright (at least when young) and therefore suitable for many locations, such as streets and gardens where space is limited. It is also fairly quick growing. It flowers profusely in late winter or early spring. In London that can mean early February or early March depending on the length and temperature of the preceding winter. Because London very rarely experiences hard late frosts the blossom is rarely damaged. Most significantly for our purposes the blossom is very attractive to bees.</span></font></em></span></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732477?profile=original"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732477?profile=original" width="350"/></a></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">Unlike some other early flowering trees (e.g. <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/cornus-mas-2?context=latest" target="_self">Cornelian cherry</a></span></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><i>Cornus mas</i></font></em><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">)</span></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><i>Prunus Okame</i></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">buzzes with honey bees, bumblebees and solitary bees.</span></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><i>Cornus mas</i></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">has its value, both as an attractive tree and as nectar source for early <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/eristalis-tenax-on-cornas-mas?context=album&albumId=6446498%3AAlbum%3A44498" target="_self">hoverflies</a>(and other Diptera), but it is rarely visited by bees. By contrast the tree pictured above is (invisibly) being worked by at least: 50 honeys bees; several <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/hairy-footed-flower-bee-f0001?context=album&albumId=6446498:Album:9689">hairy footed flower bees</a> and 2 bumblebees.</span></font></em></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">P. Okame is a great early, bulk food resource for hungry over wintered honey bees or recently emerged native bees. It should be part of a mosaic of planting as it is in Hackney's excellent new street tree collection. It is an excellent example of a non-native, street safe tree that adds value by way of amenity and still benefits biodiversity. I have yet to investigate whether its leaves are palatable to any native <a href="http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/phytophagous">phytophagous</a> insects.</span></font></em></span></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">Good companion trees include: Almond</span></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><i>Prunus dulcis</i></font></em><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">, which flowers even earlier, and later flowering Apricot</span></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><i>Prunus armeniaca</i></font></em> <em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">or other hybrid cultivars like</span></font></em> <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/prunus-x-amydalopersica0001?context=latest" target="_self">Prunus x amydalopersica</a><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">. A combination of these trees will see bees and other pollinators through to April when many later cherries, plums apples and pears take over.</span></font></em></span></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><em><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><span style="font-style: normal;"><b>Planting Site</b></span></font></em></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="font-size-3"><em><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><span style="font-style: normal;">London experiences high temperatures associated with its south easterly location and the urban heat island effect. This means air temperatures might be as much as 5°C higher in London than in the surrounding countryside. For this reason P. Okame may be of less significance outside London where it may flower when its is too cold for bees to fly. To be of real value however P. Okame should be planted with a southerly aspect. The tree flowers perfectly well on a north facing pavement but because temperatures tend to be low when it is in flower, bees need full sun to fly and take full advantage of the resource.</span></font></em></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><em><font face="Century Gothic, sans-serif"><span style="font-style: normal;"> <br/></span></font></em></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"></p>Spring Be – Enjoy the Beautytag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-03-06:6446498:BlogPost:445192015-03-06T21:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="6" style="font-size: 22pt;"><b>Spring Be – Enjoy the Beauty</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 2.3cm; margin-right: 2.33cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732300?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732300?profile=original" width="466"></img></a> <font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font size="2" style="font-size: 9pt;">Queen Buff-Tail Bumblebee (…</font></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><font style="font-size: 22pt;" size="6"><b>Spring Be – Enjoy the Beauty</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 2.3cm; margin-right: 2.33cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: center;"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732300?profile=original"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732300?profile=original" width="466"/></a><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2">Queen Buff-Tail Bumblebee (</font></font><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2"><i>Bombus terrestris</i></font></font><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2">) resting after emerging at Daubeney Fields Orchard.</font></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify">Yesterday afternoon I spent many peaceful hours tying string to fruit tree branches to train them into optimum positions at the Daubeney Fields Orchard. I also saw two new queen bumblebees emerge from winter hibernation. Newly planted trees, especially those amongst long grass, are excellent habitat for bumblebees. Even better if the trees have blossom with nectar and pollen. The mated <font color="#000080"><span xml:lang="zxx" lang="zxx"><u><a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/bubble-bee0001?context=album&albumId=6446498:Album:9689">queen bees over winter in the soft mulch beneath the trees</a></u></span></font> and then build their nests in abandoned rodent nests. Long grass increases vole populations benefiting bumblebees and kestrels (both have suffered huge declines in recent years). Hence the importance of seeing beyond 'unkempt' assumptions about long grass areas in parks.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 2.3cm; margin-right: 2.35cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: left;" align="justify"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732467?profile=original"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732467?profile=original" width="466"/></a><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2">The Daubeney Fields Orchard. Young fruit trees amidst rough grassland. Ideal habitat for bumblebees. The green string is training young apple branches down to shallow angles ideal for fruit production.</font></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 2.3cm; margin-right: 2.35cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-align: left;" align="justify"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 2.33cm; margin-right: 2.35cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="justify"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732523?profile=original"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732523?profile=original" width="466"/></a><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2">New solitary bee hotel installed on my balcony in the middle of the urban desert of Dalston, ready for early fliers such as Red Mason Bee (</font></font><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2"><i>Osmia bicornis</i></font></font><font face="Arial Black, sans-serif"><font style="font-size: 9pt;" size="2">)</font></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Today I installed my solitary bee hotel on my balcony today, in position ready for early fliers such as <a href="http://www.bwars.com/index.php?q=bee/megachilidae/osmia-bicornis" target="_blank">Red Mason Bee (Osmia bicornis)</a>. Thanks to Alison Benjamin and <font color="#000080"><span xml:lang="zxx" lang="zxx"><u><a href="http://www.urbanbees.co.uk/">Urban Bees</a></u></span></font> for materials and <font color="#000080"><span xml:lang="zxx" lang="zxx"><u><a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/events/workshop-on-making-bee-hotels-saturday-21-february-2015-2-5pm">construction workshop</a></u></span></font>. About 20 hotels were made and some are now in nearby <font color="#000080"><span xml:lang="zxx" lang="zxx"><u><a href="http://www.urbanbees.co.uk/blog_1/">DeBeavoiur Square</a></u></span></font> thanks to LBH Parks gardener Craig and Brian from Urban Bees.</p>This winter with the Tree Musketeerstag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2015-01-20:6446498:BlogPost:409282015-01-20T17:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-7"><font size="5"><b>Musketeering – join in the sanity</b></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Another world is not only possible, it exists right now, right here. People helping each other and the planet with no need for pointless, disposable commodities; no fear to engender</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">deference to…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="font-size-7"><font size="5"><b>Musketeering – join in the sanity</b></font></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Another world is not only possible, it exists right now, right here. People helping each other and the planet with no need for pointless, disposable commodities; no fear to engender</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">deference to authority; no hatred to divide us on grounds of race, religion, sexuality or gender. Just doing what needs doing because the world is a better place for doing it. And sharing time with lovely people while you're about it.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732483?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732483?profile=original" height="455" width="606"/></a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>TM Story so far <u>this winter</u></b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Around 80 of us began the year with the usual New Year's Day tree walk around Abney Park Cemetery Nature Reserve. This year we took the south boundary ride to look at, amongst other things:</p>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">veteran black poplars (including 7 threatened by the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/-">proposed Wilmer Place Sainsbury's</a>)</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">I discussed some of the wonderful rare species associated with <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/abney-park-nature-reserve-veteran-tree-project-1">Abney's veterans</a>:</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">we looked at nest galleries inside rotten poplar trees that indicate the scarce <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/photo/brown-tree-ant0001?context=album&albumId=6446498:Album:13117">Brown Tree Ant</a> <a href="http://www.bwars.com/index.php?q=category/taxonomic-hierarchy/ant/formicidae/formicinae/lasius/lasius-brunneus"><i>Lasius brunneus</i></a><span style="font-style: normal;">;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">I also explained how the <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/66784700@N07/14159183855/in/set-72157629445432654">very rare bumble-bee mimic hoverfly</a></span> <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/66784700@N07/14159183855/in/set-72157629445432654"><i>Pocota personata</i></a> <span style="font-style: normal;">may be nesting in the threatened poplars.</span></p>
</li>
</ul>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Click here for the <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732656?profile=original">Abney Veteran Tree map leaflet</a> .</span></p>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">We also looked at exotic oaks planted to honor Abney's heritage as a world class arboretum, including;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quercus_bicolor" target="_blank">Swamp White Oak</a> <i>Quercus bicolor</i><span style="font-style: normal;">;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quercus_phellos" target="_blank">Willow oak</a> <i>Q. phellos</i><span style="font-style: normal;">;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quercus_suber" target="_blank">Cork oak</a> <i>Q. suber</i><span style="font-style: normal;">;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quercus_frainetto" target="_blank">Hungarian oak</a> <i>Q. fainetto</i><span style="font-style: normal;">;</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">and </span><a href="http://www.brc.ac.uk/plantatlas/index.php?q=node/292" target="_blank">naturalised Lucombe oaks</a> <i>Q. x crenata</i> <span style="font-style: normal;">(syn.</span> <i>Q. x hispanica</i><span style="font-style: normal;">).</span></p>
</li>
</ul>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Click here f</span>or more <strong>detailed information</strong> about <a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732736?profile=original">AbneyTreesAndWoodland.pdf</a>.<br/></span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Many of the same people, plus another 120!, have helped Tree Musketeers:-</p>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>plant</b> 175 trees in:</p>
</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732595?profile=original"><img class="align-right" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732595?profile=original" width="350"/></a>Hackney Downs (1 field maple, yellow buckeye, alder, true service, cockspur thorn, large leafed thorn; 2 rowan; 3 wild cherry;<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">4 native hawthorn; 9 silver birch)</p>
</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">South Millfields (1 Apple, Norway maple, horse chestnut, Turkey oak, True Service)</p>
</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">North Marsh (30 native black poplars; 35 wild cherry; 75 oak)</p>
</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Well Street Common (1 hornbean, Holm oak; 4 Scot's pine)</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><strong>ALL THE TREES were grown locally</strong> at the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/tnefg" target="_self">Hackney Community Tree Nursery</a>.</p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>formatively prune</b> 100 young trees at:</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Abney Park</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Hackney Downs</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">South Millfields</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Stoke Newington Common</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Well Street Common;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">and prune 20 apple trees in the Hackney Downs orchard;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">weed and mulch 100 trees planted by contractors on North Marsh</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">in <b>Wick Woodland</b></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">coppice 20 hazel and willow stools;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">build 70m of deadhedge;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">thereby enhancing habitat for species like: hedgehogs, wood mice, bank voles, tawny owls, wrens, blackbirds, robbins as well as many invertebrates and fungi.</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">sold and given away <b>1300 <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/tm/calendar">Hackney Trees Calendar</a>s</b>.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">AND WE'VE NOT FINISHED YET! Why not join in?</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Come and join the 200 people who have been Tree Musketeers this winter. Check out the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/events">events page</a> for more information on upcoming events (fruit tree pruning, guided tree walks, woodland management).</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">None of this is possible without support and cooperation from others, who include:</p>
<ul>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://www.abneypark.org/" target="_blank">Abney Park Trust</a>;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/hmug" target="_self">Hackney Marshes Users' Group</a>;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">LB Hackney Parks Department;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">LBH Tree Officers;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/SNUG.N16" target="_blank">Stoke Newington Common Users' Group</a>;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a href="http://www.wellstreetcommon.co.uk/" target="_blank">Well Street Common Users' Group</a>;</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">BUT MOST OF ALL our 200 volunteers!</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: center;">Downs Tree Planting photo by <a href="http://www.scrumptiousfoodphotography.com/" target="_blank">Rhowena MacCuish</a>.</p>Abney Orgies to Racist Governmenttag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-11-23:6446498:BlogPost:402162014-11-23T16:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="5"><b>Abney Orgies to Racist Government</b></font></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><font size="5"><b>Censorship, Propaganda and Political Branding</b></font></p>
<p align="center" class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>Manufacturing Your Consent</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">One of the main reasons why…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><font size="5"><b>Abney Orgies to Racist Government</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"><font size="5"><b>Censorship, Propaganda and Political Branding</b></font></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;" align="center"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>Manufacturing Your Consent</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">One of the main reasons why desperately needed radical change is nowhere near happening is because in Britain people are staggeringly naive about censorship and propaganda. Too many think British media is somehow immune to the influences of State and corporate power that dominate TV and newspapers in the US, Russia, China and everywhere else. They forget that the <a href="http://leftfootforward.org/2013/06/everyone-should-know-who-owns-the-press-for-the-sake-of-our-democracy/">British 'Free Press' is owned by billionaires</a> and refuse to believe, or never knew, that <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1522875/Revealed-how-the-BBC-used-MI5-to-vet-thousands-of-staff.html">the BBC has always been vetted by MI5</a>. Our 'free media' is no more than a highly sophisticated and complex public relations machine for selling corporate propaganda and State censorship. This week saw a number of local and national examples of far-Right media bias that most people should be able to see through. Before looking at the the frightening campaign to foist a UKIP/Conservative coalition on us in 2015, there are some more trivial but nevertheless instructive games afoot in Hackney.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>Gazette Games</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">This week the Hackney Gazette was cornered into printing a <a href="http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/Launch.aspx?eid=311bf175-07e8-40c4-b9ba-ee21480e5440">letter of mine</a>. Two weeks ago the Gazette ran a bizarre '<a href="http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/Launch.aspx?eid=6738c938-f438-4629-aeb9-527d357ecf5f">Orgies and drug deals</a>' front page about Abney. The article was a torrid tabloid attack on Abney, drinkers, drug users and the homeless. It was based on the fabrications and fantasies of a mysterious <a href="http://www.doollee.com/PlaywrightsD/duggan-ryan-damian.html">Damian Duggan-Ryan</a> (he uses at least <a href="http://www.writerrowan.com/">3 different names</a> and doesn't seem to believe <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/3472087.stm">fiction and fact are two different things</a>). Worse, the story was repeated in the <a href="http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/police-increase-patrols-following-drugfuelled-orgies-involving-homeless-people-in-cemetery-9847809.html">London Evening Standard</a>, <a href="http://metro.co.uk/2014/11/09/tramps-are-going-at-it-like-rabbits-in-graveyard-orgies-locals-claim-4941436/">Metro</a>, <a href="http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/tramps-having-drug-fuelled-orgies-historic-4598768">Daily Mirror</a> and <a href="http://www.itv.com/news/london/2014-11-07/menace-of-drug-fuelled-orgies-involving-homeless-people-in-a-graveyard/">ITV website</a> (with more inaccurate nonsense from guess who). In response to my complaint (on behalf of Abney Park Users' Group) the Gazette was forced to agree a right of reply but they censored my letter, cutting out my reference to their previous censorship of the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/page/hackney-tree-carers-win-london-community-awards">Hackney Tree People award</a> (<a href="http://www.forestry.gov.uk/london-awards">Best Community Tree Project in London 2014</a>). I'm not surprised they declined to let me point out their censorship, but censoring complaints of censorship should give you an idea that '<span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="text-decoration: none;"><b>Free</b></span></span> Press' is like '<b>Free</b> Market', '<b>Free</b> Enterprise' or the oft advocated '<b>Free-dom</b>', i.e. it's bollocks.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>Q. So what? So the local press are crap, they publish tabloid nonsense and don't like good news?</b> Local papers are so desperate for copy, if your pet wins a farting competition in your kitchen and you've got a photo you're pretty much guaranteed at least page 6 (e.g. <a href="http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/Launch.aspx?eid=311bf175-07e8-40c4-b9ba-ee21480e5440" target="_self">New dog pound made page 4</a> this week and notice of a Friends of Regent Canal meeting made page 5!). Tree Musketeer London wide awards are news and if that news isn’t being published then that's censorship. As to the reason, that's another debate.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b>UKRAP, Political Branding and Filling the Power Vacuum</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">No one can have failed to notice how a certain political party and its jolly leader have been f<font face="Times New Roman, serif">ê</font>ted by all media of late. You cannot escape the ubiquitous, free UKIP publicity filling thousands of column inches and prime time TV minutes. None of it the slightest bit critical, challenging or even informative (anyone actually know what UKIP's policies are? Do UKIP?). This week the 'Left wing' (!??) New Statesmen publish a <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/11/nigel-farage-i-m-not-right-or-left-i-m-radical" target="_self">5,000 word 'interview' with the radical, hard working, Nige</a>. Here's a flavour of the hard hitting in-depth interview:</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 1.25cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i>Nigel Farage delights in the game of politics and in his role as an insurgent, a man of the people, a new kind of unlikely hero of the working class, as some of his supporters would have it. It’s cold and dry and the lunchtime crowd bustles and swirls around us. People keep approaching to shake his hand – “Keep it up, Nigel”; “You’re doing a great job, Nigel”; “Stick it to them, Nige” – and he receives them with interest and warmth. I ask if he ever grows weary of the attention. “Never. It’s huge fun,” he says, laughing loudly.</i></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">If you can read it without vomiting you'll struggle to find a single word of criticism or challenge. And that's true of almost all UKIP's corporate and State funded propaganda, be it the BBC News, The Times or so called Left wing press. It's all positive. Incidentally the Statesmen is <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/11/how-labour-lost-ukip-versus-tory-election">chock full of articles critical of Labour and Milliband</a> with a few token references to Greens.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><b>Q. So what the hell is going on?</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Well it's pretty obvious if you stop pretending you live in a democracy and start looking at the media from the critical perspective most people do in other countries. The media are the primary mechanism of control and their job is to ensure the docile masses remain docile. Now that's quite a tall order if wages are falling, prices are rising and political elites are transparently in it for themselves and their super rich friends. So the media have to keep people distracted from the real issues: i.e. massive and growing inequality, corruption, warmongering, repression, discrimination, authoritarianism, and the abject failure of the dictatorship of capital (aka Free Market economics). Instead they scream emotive garbage such as 'immigration', 'terrorism' or in the Hackney Gazette's case, drug fuelled orgies.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"><b>Q. But how does that work, is it a giant conspiracy with every journalist involved?</b></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Well yes and no. Yes it is a kind of giant conspiracy but most of the people involved are not briefed that their job is to manufacture propaganda and censor the truth. That is what MI5 and other secret power structures do, but the vast majority of editors, journalists and contributors just permit themselves to be restricted by the dominant ideas around them. So for example, most of them are capable of realising, and in many cases even admitting, UKIP is being promoted, but for the sake of their careers, salaries and promotions, they are content to delude themselves that UKIP's popularity is actually genuine and their own actions are reflective and responsive rather than determining. Key to the whole game are constructed lies that link the propaganda back to reality, e.g. UKIP rise is a symptom of the failure of the mainstream parties. In a sense that's true, but what matters is the fact that it is <a href="http://realfare.wordpress.com/2014/10/30/bbc-caught-rigging-2015-general-election/" target="_self">UKIP that benefits,</a> rather than the Greens or a truly radical alternative, and that is constructed by a combination of <a href="http://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/not-neutrality/">selective promotion</a> and selective censorship (BBC constant publicity for UKIP prior to the Euro elections <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/may/30/bbc-complaints-ukip-election-coverage-bias" target="_self">generated 1200 complaints</a>, meanwhile all the Greens got was a few seconds of Caroline Lucas in a remote studio on Newsnight on polling day <span style="text-decoration: none;"><b>after polls closed</b></span>).</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">The <a href="http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/major-political-parties-2014/statement" target="_self">Electoral Commissions decision</a> in March to re-grade UKIP as one of the four main partiesis significant. It's not the whole story, just a piece in the jigsaw. It is part of both the justification for excessive publicity and the pre-emptive defence of it. As for the New Statesmen's huge sycophantic platform for Farage, it's totally at odds with the magazines purported politics, but diluted within the blanket media propaganda, it can be disguised as simply symptomatic of his unassailable meteoric rise to popularity. Which is why a critical perspective, rather than naive passivity, is the only way to understand what's going on. What is the history of the New Statesmen and its editor? Why does it pose Left but attack Labour and celebrate Farage? The 'feign Left but promote Right' tactic is common and can be seen in the Guardian and our local Hackney Shitizen. At this point one might ask where do MI5 locate their journalistic agents? I'm not saying anyone in particular is a spook, I'm just pointing out how the whole game works. You don't have to control everyone directly, after all the whole capitalist system depends on self interest and the greed of millions. You can control thousands indirectly by the strategic and tactical moves of a handful. Specifically there's no need to infiltrate and subvert the Times or the Telegraph: the Right-wing press is on board with the Neo-Conservative, post-capitalist agenda. It's the likes of the BBC, New Statesmen and Guardian that matter. Control the voices of opposition and you've won the war. A few infiltrators influence the thousands of ambitious wannabes and those thousands control the millions via 'journalism' and advertising (nb anyone seen Sainsbury's Xmas ad - hijacking peace loving humanitarianism to stem falling profits?). If you don't think you are being manipulated, don't believe me, ask <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_Chomsky_and_the_Media">Noam Chomsky</a> (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQhEBCWMe44">Manufacturing Consent</a>) or <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis">Adam</a> <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis">Curtis</a> (<a href="http://vimeo.com/85948693">Century of the Self</a>).</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: -0.02cm; margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">If you haven't already realised it yet, next year we're gonna have a Tory/UKIP government even though very few want a racist, far Right coalition. Note at the last election, after 10 years of the worst Labour Government ever, the electorate didn't vote for the Right. <b>The Tories did not win</b> the election and the current Right-wing government was constructed using new boy Nick Clegg and his novel Lib Dems, with false promises of electoral reform and reduced tuition fees. They sold us New Labour in 1997, Clegg in 2010 (<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/apr/30/the-liberal-moment-has-come">Guardian says vote Lib Dem</a>), and they'll sell us Farage in 2015. They will keep selling us crap until we decide to stop buying their brands.</p>Tigers seen in Hackney!tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-08-08:6446498:BlogPost:389122014-08-08T19:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><span class="font-size-7">Big orange tigers with black and white stripes flying around Hackney!</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732539?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732539?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a> If you happen to have seen a large, bright orange 'butterfly' recently you have probably seen a <a href="http://ukmoths.org.uk/show.php?id=862" target="_blank">Jersey Tiger moth</a>. These day flying beauties have been popping up all over…</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-7">Big orange tigers with black and white stripes flying around Hackney!</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732539?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732539?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>If you happen to have seen a large, bright orange 'butterfly' recently you have probably seen a <a href="http://ukmoths.org.uk/show.php?id=862" target="_blank">Jersey Tiger moth</a>. These day flying beauties have been popping up all over London thanks to the warm winter allowing caterpillars to survive. There has been a small population in London for about 10 years but in warm summers after mild winters the numbers swell. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5">These amazing looking moths fly by day so can be seen in parks and gardens. They are also attracted to light at night and I had one in the bedroom last night.</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732667?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732667?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a>So far people have reported them from Victoria Park, Stamford Hill, Clissold Park and Dalston (as well as Woodford Green, Camden and Canary Wharf).</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5">If you have seen one post a comment with details of when and where; or record it directly on <a href="http://www.brc.ac.uk/irecord/" target="_blank">iRecord</a>.</span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732613?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732613?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a></span></p>What future for global sustainability?tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-08-04:6446498:BlogPost:388012014-08-04T21:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">We are creating an excellent local model but ....</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">The <u>SH AGM</u> was another well attended, top networking event with over 50 people from all across the Hackney spectrum. We are doing really well and the network grows steadily everyday (over 600 networking on the SH website).…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">We are creating an excellent local model but ....</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">The <u>SH AGM</u> was another well attended, top networking event with over 50 people from all across the Hackney spectrum. We are doing really well and the network grows steadily everyday (over 600 networking on the SH website). However, there remains and enormous gulf between this sustainable reality in miniature and the rampant capitalist destruction happening locally, nationally and globally.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Even the most basic minimum, household recycling, is still ignored by huge numbers of people. As I see it the problem however is not that the uninitiated do not understand Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. If we really want to see change we need to challenge ourselves against any assumption that there is any specific issue or answer. Instead we need to address widespread ignorance about how our society is governed. That ignorance is as prevalent amongst the politically initiated as the apparently apathetic. We need to understand why people have so little regard for the future; is it apathy, fear or sense of hopelessness?</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">It is important to KEEP THINGS FUN and that is what we did at the AGM but because we have to FACE THE BIGGER PICTURE I made a brief speech with reference to many of the less comfortable realities of our society. Fundamentally, you have to ask, is this system we are living in really a democracy; or anything like one? The US/UK have created permanent war in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan – transferring tax £billions to private arms companies whilst millions die. Israel imprisons an entire people and butchers them at will. Media narratives are highly manipulated and picking out reality amidst the spin is not easy. But with such vast contradictions between what we are told and what we know we must <b>read the symbols</b> that transcend the propaganda.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">In the UK, despite savage public sector spending cuts, more is being spent on <a href="http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-80ac-London-water-cannon-face-court-challenge/#.U-syGqOjzO8" target="_blank">water cannons</a>, <a href="http://www.prisonreformtrust.org.uk/Portals/0/Documents/Prisonthefacts.pdf" target="_blank">prisons</a>, surveillance, secret police spies and propaganda. Corporations spend billions on advertising that doesn’t just encourage us to consume, it deploys an array of sophisticated imagery, artistry and <a href="http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-century-of-the-self/" target="_blank">psychology to deliberately manipulate our feelings</a>. Feelings of insecurity, hunger, desire and ambition are harnessed, not to drive personal development but sublimated and perverted to sell transient commodities. <u>I</u> phones, me clothes, not you cars. Meanwhile state managed propaganda gives UKIP mass publicity with no mention of their <a href="http://icyapril.com/post/57264351405/things-you-should-know-before-you-vote-ukip">reactionary policies</a>. Julian complete Farce was in every newspaper, on every TV news bulletin, with far greater coverage than Ed Milliband, despite UKIP never having had a single MP. Green MP Caroline Lucas was on Newsnight in May, 30 minutes <u>after</u> polls closed.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">At the same time “economic recovery” means the rich get richer as the poor get poorer, and “development” provides not homes for the homeless but inflated investment units where rich landlords and builders make millions more. When was the last time you heard any commentator or politician pointing out the absurdity of the government subsidised housing scam for the rich? Instead all we get is idiotic demands to build more debt prisons (aka private flats), destroying both social housing and biodiversity in the process.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">If we want others to jettison their apathy and believe in a better future then we too have to challenge our conservatism and credulity. We need to understand the pervasive and sophisticated censorship we are subjected to: silence in the media on action from the left, the radical, the generous and concerned (e.g. Climate Camp, Anti-Fracking, NHS Action, Green Party, etc.). In media propaganda speak the word radical now means (reactionary) Islamic fundamentalists. The symbols are there if you choose to see them. Even 50 years after JFK's assassination every mainstream voice repeated the lie that Oswald did it and completely suppressed <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/where-were-you-when-you-heard-about-the-coup-in-dallas" target="_self">the truth</a>.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-left: 0.64cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Even our own Tree Musketeer/Sustainable Hackney <a href="http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/environment/greening-london/re-leaf/releaf-awards" target="_blank">RELEAF awards</a> were censored from <u>all</u> local media. Purportedly liberal media like the Guardian and BBC attack the sane (Snowdon, <a href="http://www.australiantimes.co.uk/news/julian-assange-a-dishonest-monster-uk-journalist.htm">Julian Assange</a>, <a href="http://www.bjr.org.uk/blog/2012/09/05/covering-assange/">Wikileaks</a>, Left (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKDuhGOqr8E">Galloway</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoSdWcp-3GY">Harman</a>) while putting up a defence of perpetrators (tabloids, corrupt police, Saville, spooks, Blair). Even local Labour politicians are so desperate to appease power they attack what's right (Pipe's hostility to Tree Musketeers or <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/unless-you-wake-up-all-is-lost" target="_self">Louise Thomson's attacks on Pilger and Assange</a>). The mainstream media are State/corporate controlled and that is why they fail to make those responsible for the banking crisis, phone hacking, corrupt police, newspaper/political elite relationships accountable. Those in power are completely unaccountable - no bankers went to prison and Blair is a peace envoy! Meanwhile the powerless, the unemployed, poor, migrants, public sector workers, are <a href="http://jengba.blogspot.co.uk/2012_09_01_archive.html" target="_blank">criminalised</a>, tied up in paperwork, subjected to scurrilous propaganda and repression. We need to seek out <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/posts/NO-FUTURE" target="_blank">independent grassroots media</a> that will tell us the truth and we need to be part of telling that truth.</p>Stokey Sainsbury's in court - we win the first argumenttag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-05-23:6446498:BlogPost:340182014-05-23T18:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p>Nick Perry of Stokey Local succeeded in persuading a High Court judge to grant leave for a judicial review (JR) of the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/object-now-to-sainsbury-s-wilmer-place-planning-application-2013-" target="_self">Wilmer Place planning deicison</a>. This is the second JR to be granted permission to proceed. It's complicated but there are two challenges (JRs) to two LBH planning decisions to allow Newmark Properties to build a Sainsbury's and block…</p>
<p>Nick Perry of Stokey Local succeeded in persuading a High Court judge to grant leave for a judicial review (JR) of the <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/object-now-to-sainsbury-s-wilmer-place-planning-application-2013-" target="_self">Wilmer Place planning deicison</a>. This is the second JR to be granted permission to proceed. It's complicated but there are two challenges (JRs) to two LBH planning decisions to allow Newmark Properties to build a Sainsbury's and block of flats next to <a href="http://www.abneypark.org/" target="_blank">Abney Park Nature Reserve</a>.</p>
<p>The fight is far from over but this does mean <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/abney-woodland-edge-saved" target="_self">Abney's woodland edge</a> is safe for another summer. Which means the rare bees and other insects that inhabit this precious woodland edge can go through this year's life cycles unharmed.</p>
<p>If you want to make sure they are safe next year <a href="https://www.facebook.com/StokeyLocal" target="_blank">support Stokey Local</a>. They need more cash for the legal fight.</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732393?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732393?profile=original" width="392"/></a>Girlded Mining Bee (Andrena labiata) in Wilmer Place.</p>
<p>Nationally Scarce A - London BAP priority species.</p>
<p>One of several rare and important insects threatened by this mad development.</p>
<p></p>Remember whoever you vote for the government always wins.tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-05-18:6446498:BlogPost:337602014-05-18T09:00:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732608?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732608?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a> <span class="font-size-6">Remember whoever you vote for the <a href="https://twitter.com/lessig/status/467334944382283776" target="_blank">government always wins</a>.</span></p>
<p>Which means what is misrepresented to us as 'democracy' is in reality nothing of the sort. Whether the control comes from Capital, corporate, State, Media or other institutional or private POWER,…</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732608?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732608?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"/></a><span class="font-size-6">Remember whoever you vote for the <a href="https://twitter.com/lessig/status/467334944382283776" target="_blank">government always wins</a>.</span></p>
<p>Which means what is misrepresented to us as 'democracy' is in reality nothing of the sort. Whether the control comes from Capital, corporate, State, Media or other institutional or private POWER, democracy - i.e. rule by the people - is consciously and deliberately subverted everyday by those who can and do force their twisted and self serving interests on us. Most passively accept this hidden dictatorship, consciously or sub-consciously aware of their dis-empowerment but that passive acceptance is reinforced by State and corporate repression of those who will not lie down or stay silent. Another world is possible. One that does not require mass starvation, poverty, permanent wars, violence and deceit. But that world will not become a reality until people take responsibility for making it happen. Being responsible for our collective future does not mean marking a piece of paper in a not so secret ballot where the odds are controlled and stacked by a myriad hidden games. Choosing to believe in the unbelievable bullshit is no solution. New Labour is like New Improved Daz. Clegg and the Lib Dems. Barack for Change. Now UKIP Farce or independent SNP Scotland? Meanwhile the rich get richer and the world gets poorer. Democracy? Stop buying their lies. Wake up to the games they are selling you. Only you can make a better world and only by doing it yourself with others.</p>Spring blossoms but State abuse prevents a better futuretag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-03-08:6446498:BlogPost:331292014-03-08T23:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">I had a wonderful day pruning one of Hackney's orchards today. I find it hard to reconcile the beauty of these warm first days of spring, the peach blossom, the bird song, the emerging bees and the bursting hope of a new season, with the insanity and violence that secretly dominates our world. <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732294?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-left" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732294?profile=original" width="105"></img></a> As the EU, USA and Russia play dangerous…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">I had a wonderful day pruning one of Hackney's orchards today. I find it hard to reconcile the beauty of these warm first days of spring, the peach blossom, the bird song, the emerging bees and the bursting hope of a new season, with the insanity and violence that secretly dominates our world. <a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732294?profile=original"><img class="align-left" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732294?profile=original" width="105"/></a>As the EU, USA and Russia play dangerous power games in the Ukraine, at home the pervasive reach of secret political policing becomes ever more apparent. My old life as a civil rights lawyer keeps me conscious of other agendas. Whilst a bogus pretence, the memorial at Westminster for Mandela reminds me how little I have sacrificed compared to some others.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">This <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26466867" target="_blank">Ellison investigation</a> reveallations about corrupt police, and State infiltration of the Lawrence Campaign require consideration. Details hidden from the MacPhearson Inquiry (though MacPherson chose not to investigate corruption) demonstrate the depths the Met were willing to go to ensure the racist murders of Stephen Lawrence were protected and that those campaigning for justice were sabotaged by police spies. Yesterday the <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2575488/Doreen-Lawrence-wants-heads-roll-Met-revelations-officers-spied-her.html" target="_blank">Met's head of counter-terrorism was transferred</a> because of his role as a conduit for that political intelligence. Commander Richard Walton had de-briefed the as yet unnamed Special Demonstration Squad spy placed in the Lawrence Campaign by Special Branch. Then Inspector Walton used the information to brief Met Commissioner Paul Condon, who claims he did not know about the secret police infiltration. But Condon was a pioneer of multi-agency policing when a Deputy Assistant Commissioner in West London. His team persecuted Afro-Carribean activists in Notting Hill <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/restaurant-that-became-a-symbol-for-radicalism-an-action-for-damages-by-a-civil-rights-leader-has-ended-but-without-an-apology-heather-mills-reports-155706" target="_blank">planting drugs on the late great Frank Critchlow</a> as part of a long term State attack on his <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/frank-critchlow-community-leader-who-made-the-mangrove-restaurant-the-beating-heart-of-notting-hill-2086839.html" target="_blank">Mangrove Association and on black radicalism</a>.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">What they did in Notting Hill in the 1990s they are doing in Hackney today. The tools are the same, as is the agenda. Destroy dissent by direct attacks on activists backed up by aggressive, development led gentrification. We know secret <a href="http://hackneyhistory.wordpress.com/2013/03/11/hackney-spy-cop-mark-cassidyjenner/" target="_blank">police spies operated in Hackne</a>y and <a href="http://policespiesoutoflives.potager.org/where-we-stand/" target="_blank">abused women activists</a> in deceitful relationships. Only an idiot would believe they have gone away. Now State agents permeate all agencies and the tactics are more subtle than planting huge bags of cocaine on community leaders. Uniformed police can take a back seat as a combination of secret informers, media censorship, bogus fronts and a hidden social cleansing planning policy do the State's work. It may be hard to identify the actors or pinpoint the ring leaders but make no mistake the insanity of luxury flats for the rich is not just a finance scam. Places like <a href="http://hackneyhistory.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Hackney</a>, <a href="http://rememberolivemorris.wordpress.com/2007/09/27/brixton-black-panthers-movement/" target="_blank">Brixton</a>and <a href="http://www.georgepadmoreinstitute.org/Mangrove%20Nine" target="_blank">Notting Hill</a> have long been the homes of the radical, the disenfranchised and the rebellious. As the lunatic Right tighten their grip on power privatisation of education indoctrinates children, life-long debt imprisons the young, whist gentrification of the old 'ghettos' bulldozes the past.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">The ideological battle combines revisionist history and constant distraction. The class struggle and radicalism of the 1970s are portrayed as chaotic and degenerate and the abhorrent cull of the working class during WWI as a glorious and necessary sacrifice. Divisive irrelevancies such as immigration or Scottish independence and constructed smear stories (e.g. <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/02/harman-right-go-war-daily-mail" target="_blank">Harriet Harman and NCCL</a>, timed for the week of NCCL's 80th anniversary) dominate headlines whilst the country sinks beneath Climate Change deluges and super-rich greed.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732417?profile=original"><img width="750" class="align-right" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732417?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" height="215" width="325"/></a></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">So what can we do? Well we can keep our eyes and hearts open. We can smell the peach blossom and be kind to those deserving of our love. But most of all we can keep our minds awake. I apply my political experience to comprehend what happens around me and I seek solace in nature when it all gets too much. The fact is their time is over. The capitalist party is running on empty. The economy is fake and fuelled by debt. They have only lies and hate to hide their destruction. Whoever you are, whatever your troubles, would you for one moment give up your conscience, your integrity, your decency to join their madness? Not me.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">So I'll leave you with a conundrum. How do you explain the following?</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">On Weds evening, <a href="http://opendalston.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">Open Dalston</a> and a diversity of community activists gathered at the Town Hall to fight <a href="http://opendalston.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/one-man-two-votes-georgian-houses-of.html" target="_blank">another destructive planning decision</a>. Meanwhile 'Dalston Futures' met to 'decide' what to do for Dalston. Having already created a petition about Dalston's Eastern Curve Garden, without consulting those who created and run it, and engaged in a series of facilitated meetings about development in Dalston, without engaging with local activists and Open Dalston; Dalston Futures uses Lottery money and Council grants to 'survey' local opinion and 'represent' local voices. I've filled in 3 or 4 such surveys but they're not interested in what I have to say. Publicly funded community activism, that's a new one.</p>Olympic Park - Land Grab for Unaffordable Housingtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-02-13:6446498:BlogPost:325652014-02-13T11:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p style="text-align: center;"><span class="font-size-6">Olympic Park - Land Grab for Unaffordable Housing</span></p>
<p></p>
<p>The London Legacy Deveolopment Corporation (the name is descriptive!) wants to steal 0.85ha of the Olympic legacy park to make money for private housing. Hackney lost 9 ha of green space to the olympics including very biodiverse sites like Arena Field and White Hart Field. After the £12bn party for the elite the LLDC was created to deliver a lasting legacy for…</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span class="font-size-6">Olympic Park - Land Grab for Unaffordable Housing</span></p>
<p></p>
<p>The London Legacy Deveolopment Corporation (the name is descriptive!) wants to steal 0.85ha of the Olympic legacy park to make money for private housing. Hackney lost 9 ha of green space to the olympics including very biodiverse sites like Arena Field and White Hart Field. After the £12bn party for the elite the LLDC was created to deliver a lasting legacy for everyone. A large part of the olympic site was always destined for private housing, that was a major driver behind the whole olympics scam (public money to rich, corporate pockets). However they had to promise to give something back and now they want to steal a part of the park that was intended as green space. If permitted this will mean the loss of around 50 trees and almost 1 ha of parkland (see images in attached LBH planning report - below).</p>
<p>THe LLDC are applying to remove a planning condition that prevents them from building on this land. Object <strong>NOW</strong> send your OBJECTIONS to: planningenquiries@londonlegacy.co.uk.</p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732494?profile=original">Pre-application%20-%20East%20Wick%20Queen%20Elizabeth%20Olympic%20Park.pdf</a></p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732500?profile=original">LLDC%20Planning%20Notice</a></p>Rare reed beetle found at Stoke Newington Reservoirtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-02-04:6446498:BlogPost:326032014-02-04T17:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p style="text-align: center;"><span class="font-size-6"><strong><span style="color: #008000;">Rare reed beetle found at Stoke Newington East Reservoir</span></strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732502?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732502?profile=original" width="533"></img></a> The Nationally Scarce reed beetle Demetrias imperialis. I found this little beauty when collecting reeds to make bee/bug hotels. At less than 6mm its easy to miss but the extensive reed baeds at the…</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span class="font-size-6"><strong><span style="color: #008000;">Rare reed beetle found at Stoke Newington East Reservoir</span></strong></span></p>
<p><a target="_self" href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732502?profile=original"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/84732502?profile=original" width="533"/></a>The Nationally Scarce reed beetle Demetrias imperialis. I found this little beauty when collecting reeds to make bee/bug hotels. At less than 6mm its easy to miss but the extensive reed baeds at the East Reservoir are ideal habitat.<br/>The beetle is very rarely recorded in London and it only occurs where there are reeds.</p>
<p>See <a href="https://data.nbn.org.uk/imt/?mode=SPECIES&species=NHMSYS0001717869#3-0.609,51.356,0.380,51.679!09QDcq" target="_blank">distribution map</a>.</p>
<p></p>Unless YOU wake up - ALL IS LOSTtag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2014-01-02:6446498:BlogPost:321612014-01-02T12:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western">A new year. It would be nice to start it with a message of hope. Alas that's not very easy in a country dominated by a secret state, rich crooks and coward politicians. To be fair to myself I did start the year with my usual hopeful NYD nature walk around Abney Nature Reserve. Remarkable nearly 40 people braved the cold, wind and rain to join me. It was surprisingly lovely.</p>
<p class="western">But having foolishly glanced at Tweets on the …</p>
<p class="western">A new year. It would be nice to start it with a message of hope. Alas that's not very easy in a country dominated by a secret state, rich crooks and coward politicians. To be fair to myself I did start the year with my usual hopeful NYD nature walk around Abney Nature Reserve. Remarkable nearly 40 people braved the cold, wind and rain to join me. It was surprisingly lovely.</p>
<p class="western">But having foolishly glanced at Tweets on the <a href="https://twitter.com/" target="_blank">SH following page</a> (my excuse, I had to Tweet a woodland workshop for this weekend) I despair at the fawning, supine, idiocy of pseudo progressives attacking Julian Assange and John Pilger. Both have dedicated their lives to challenging and exposing abuse of power by the world's most sinister agencies. On the incredibly rare occasion that <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25574846" target="_blank">BBC Radio 4</a> actually broadcasts a genuinely radical voice why is it the likes of <a href="https://twitter.com/welovestokey" target="_blank">local Labour councillors</a> feel compelled to Tweet childish rants about smashing their radio? Is it that like so many others in this dying nation they are so scared of State and corporate power they instinctively attack those few remaining individuals who still have the courage to stand alone? To be fair at least Dianne Abbott MP celebrated the BBC's rare dabble with dissent. Coming on the heels of the <a href="http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/13/anonymous-hacks-mit-web-site-after-death-of-web-activist-aaron-swartz/" target="_blank">suicide of a US hacktivist</a> the spineless heckles of people who crave comfort and safety whilst posing as progressive should be enough to make them social outcasts. Yet it is the activists, the courageous and the brave who remain excluded from the media, social and poltical world. Capitalism fears its own reflection and there are many power hungry wannabees all too eager paint a canvas of lies.</p>
<p class="western">In this cold <a href="http://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profiles/blogs/exiled-from-hackney-we-re-all-refugees-now" target="_self">winter of the soul</a> it is not surprising the best of cultural media is the likes of 'All is Lost'. The new <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/all-is-lost-movie-review-robert-redford-delivers-an-astonishing-one-man-show/2013/10/24/a5af9e38-3bdb-11e3-b7ba-503fb5822c3e_story.html" target="_blank">Robert Redford film</a> is a very clever metaphor using an isolated, ageing sailor's unsolicited battle against super container ships to illustrate the tragic futility of post-capitalist insanity. No amount of technology, ingenuity or wisdom can stop the titanic, runaway madness. It's a great film but not exactly hopeful. Unsurprisingly most of the critics miss the point.</p>
<p class="western">Tomorrow we will bury a victim of Britain's violent state. My friend <a href="http://www.red-star-research.org.uk/" target="_blank">Malcolm Kennedy</a> died recently. His life was turned upside down on Xmas eve 1990 when he was randomly fitted up for the murder of Patrick Quinn. Quinn was viciously kicked to death in a cell INSIDE Hammersmith Police Station. Malcolm was the unfortunate scapegoat. After 3 high profile trials and a successful appeal (its complicated) he remained convicted because the truth was too awful for juries and judges to admit. Having served 9 years he was released from prison but remained an enemy of the state. Years more harassment followed in perverse <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_warfare" target="_blank">psyops</a> designed to prevent him clearing his name. Further cases before the ECHR and bogus <a href="http://www.panopticonblog.com/tag/investigatory-powers-tribunal/" target="_blank">IPT</a> were either dismissed or sabotaged by MI5 assets. Why? Well if Malcolm was innocent who murdered Quinn? It's not that hard to join the dots. When I met Malcolm in recent years I offered what advice and solace I could but now he is gone I feel a combination of relief (for him) and guilt (for not doing more).</p>
<p class="western">If you do not have the political education or activist history to read between the lines of propaganda and hate, at least read the symbols that are all around you. Climate change means this insanity will end, one way or another. The planet will rid itself of its human parasites if we do not have the gumption and courage to live less destructive lives. That means global regime change.</p>
<p class="western">Capitalism destroys. It destroys nature for profit, enslaves billions to poverty and debt, and perverts language to market lies. It relies on hungry egos and the weak minded to hide its crimes. For those that fight back or expose truth the State steps in with repression and violence. Another world is possible but first we must stop lying to ourselves and each other. Stand up for truth and defend those attacked for their courage. Do not allow the simplistic lies of capitalist sympathisers to cloud your judgement. You have a choice: live as an honest, conscious, loving, sentient being, juggling the inevitable compromises as best you can; or give up your soul, mind, integrity, agency and humanity to participate in the insanity. Is the choice really so hard?</p>
<p class="western"></p>
<p class="western">Happy New Year.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"></p>Where were you when you heard about the coup in Dallas?tag:sustainablehackney.org.uk,2013-11-23:6446498:BlogPost:316002013-11-23T00:30:00.000ZRussell Millerhttps://sustainablehackney.org.uk/profile/RussellMiller
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Funny how that's not a question that was asked very often. Even though there are fewer and fewer people alive today who can actually remember the day US democracy was assassinated 50 years ago it seems to me an event worth remembering. If you are at all unsure about how or why JFK was murdered then it's not very hard to educate yourself. In fact it can be fairly entertaining since Oliver Stone's 1993 movie is based on a pretty good balance of fact…</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Funny how that's not a question that was asked very often. Even though there are fewer and fewer people alive today who can actually remember the day US democracy was assassinated 50 years ago it seems to me an event worth remembering. If you are at all unsure about how or why JFK was murdered then it's not very hard to educate yourself. In fact it can be fairly entertaining since Oliver Stone's 1993 movie is based on a pretty good balance of fact and political acumen.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">However more interesting, and indeed more pressing, than understanding that historic attack on so called Western democracy, is the almost blanket media cover-up that still 50 years later dominates the mainstream. Today's Guardian psycho babble article <i><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/nov/22/john-kennedy-conspiracy-theories?">What is it about human psychology that makes conspiracy theories so appealing?</a></i> <span style="font-style: normal;">is a typical example as was the BBC's woeful Ten Days that Shook the World garbage.</span></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Significantly the power structure no longer feels it necessary to actually argue its propaganda. Instead of producing elaborate explanations as to why their lies actually make sense, now they just demonize those who still believe truth matters. Any idiot, even the majority of Americans, can see Oswald did not kill Kennedy but the lie is repeated ad nauseum without serious clarification. Having defeated socialism, communism, liberalism, journalism, justice and on a headlong mission to destroy most life on earth the lunatics in charge of the capitalist asylum are now desperate to convince us it is we and not they who are crazy.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Anyone who cares about truth, justice, humanity, ecology, or for that matter their children, should devote some part of their brain and soul to recognising and owning truth. Collectively we stand a chance of one day halting the insanity and creating a better world. We have the resources and capacity to live in peace, harmony and plenty. The primary obstacle right now is mass media mythology. Until people are brave enough to kick the comfort of the big lies (e.g. we live in a democracy, mainstream media tells the truth, government is in parliament, etc.) and take responsibility for building something real we stand no chance. Stepping off the mainstream lie machine is scary. Where do you anchor your reasoning given you cannot analyse everything yourself? There are no easy answers, but choosing to believe the lies of institutions committed to global catastrophe is a far more desperate alternative.</p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;"></p>
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Just to help here's my top 10 why you'd have to be stupid to believe Oswald killed JFK:</p>
<ol>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">There never has been any evidence at all that Oswald fired a gun on 22 Nov. 1963. In fact such evidence as there is suggests the opposite: he tested negative for firearms residue, the alleged murder rifle was never tested to see if it had been fired, and neither the FBI nor Dallas police could find Oswald's fingerprints on it.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">The <a href="http://22november1963.org.uk/single-bullet-theory-jfk-assassination">official 3 shot/Magic Bullet theory</a> is ludicrous. It only exists because the Zapruder film records at least 3 shots and one of those had to be 'allocated' to hitting a bystander by the underpass (because the official version was only 3 shots). So given one shot clearly blew off part of Kennedy's head, all the 5 non-leathal wounds to Kennedy (back and neck) and Senator Connolly (back, chest, wrist and thigh) had to be caused by the one remaining bullet. The film, witness, ballistics and medical evidence all shows this is absurd.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Oswald was a US marine and intelligence officer (he spoke Russian, defected to Russia, married a Russian woman, then went back to the US, and brought her back to the US all with financial support from the US). He infiltrated both communist and anti-Castro groups during the 1960s. He probably believed he was there to gain intelligence on the assassination plotters, one of many reasons why he too was murdered before so many awkward questions could be asked at any trial.</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">The <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU83R7rpXQY">private cine film</a> (shot by Abraham Zapruder) is a key forensic record of the shooting. It records the timing of the shots and the direction of impact of the fatal head shot. Kennedy's head is thrown backwards and to his left demonstrating the bullet that killed him came from his front, right.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">An assassin in the Book depository would have shot Kennedy when the motorcade drove towards him rather than wait till it was 50m away and driving away.</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Kennedy was not a radical but as an astute politician of the early 1960s he recognised he had to appeal to the young, and the growing civil rights and anti-nuclear movements. He recognised the political capital in nuclear détente and anti-racism but was nervous of being labelled a communist sympathiser. He trod a careful path but knew backing a war in Vietnam was never going to win him votes.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Outgoing <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenhower's_farewell_address">President Eisenhower used his farewell address</a> to the nation to warn of the dangers of power concentrated in what he called the Military Industrial Complex. Arms companies made $billions from the Vietnam War and continue to make 100s of $billions from current wars.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;">At least <a href="http://22november1963.org.uk/jfk-assassination-grassy-knoll-witnesses#wesley-frazier">40 eye witnesses</a> said they heard shots come from the grassy knoll in front and to the right of the motorcade.</span></p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">Kennedy sacked Allan Dulles as CIA chief after the Bay of Pigs fiasco and outlawed CIA black operations. Dulles was a key member of the Warren Commission dealing with all intelligence related issues. His CIA deputy was also sacked and happened to be the brother of the mayor of Dallas.</p>
</li>
<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0cm; font-style: normal;">The Warren Commission invented an absurd theory that a Marxist, ex-marine and former defector to Russia acted entirely alone in firing 3 impossible shots to kill one of the most popular presidents in US history. Fifty years later the entire corporate media lie machine is still repeating that nonsense without even a caveat that Oswald was never tried and no evidence has ever been produced to show he even fired a gun that day.</p>
</li>
</ol>