Friday 19th October 2018

BCfm’s weekly Politics Show presented by Tony Gosling

At six – discussing the big stories in Bristol, Britain and around the world
After seven – straight talking and investigative reports with Martin Summers

Listen live http://www.bcfmradio.com/player or http://stream.bcfmradio.com:7017/live.mp3

BCfm audio files usually available 1hr, Radio4All 3-4hrs, after TX
Any probs mp3s should be on alternative links below by then

First hour: news review: Labour councillor for Frome Vale Nicola Bowden-Jones, also Norman Rogers who chairs the charity that runs the Ashton Court Miniature Railway, the Bristol Society of Model and Experimental Engineers (BSMEE). The railway has been based at Ashton Court for 45 years, but is under threat due to Bristol City Council’s austerity measures. Norman explains: “They’ve told us they can improve their return from this site. If they can find an appropriate commercial opportunity, they’d much prefer it to an amateur society and charity. We’ll get priced out.” The Society’s lease is renewed on a five-year basis but the Council’s proposition would result in the closure of the site at the end of the 2018 season. “I can’t imagine losing the site,” Norman, who has volunteered with BSMEE for 12years, says. “Bristol would lose an enormous community asset, loved by so many.” This year, Ashton Court Miniature Railway has hosted visits from Bristol Autism Project, Special Friends Club and Gordano Valley Church’s Cludo Club. BSMEE is also considered a charity for its educational value: “Children come and they learn here. It’s such a wonderful introduction to engineering,” Norman continues. “Often they’ll jump off an American switcher engine and beg their parents for another ticket because they haven’t ridden the steam engine.” The money made from rides largely goes to the upkeep of the railway. BRISTOL MAYOR MARVIN REES GIVES HIS ANNUAL STATE OF THE CITY ADDRESS: Bristol remains a city of challenges. We remain a wealthy city, the only region outside the south east to make a net contribution to the Treasury. We also have all the challenges of a modern city – air pollution, democracy deficit, education inequalities, health inequalities, congestion, housing shortage and insecurity… GLOBAL PARLIAMENT OF MAYORS COMES TO BRISTOL: Bristol is set to host the Global Parliament of Mayors this weekend, an event expected to bring the city to the forefront of international discussions. But it comes with a hefty £150,000 price tag that Marvin Rees will ask the council to underwrite, at a time when funding for public services are being slashed to the bone. Announcing the news during his annual State of the City Speech last month, Rees called it “a huge opportunity” for Bristol’s global profile and a chance to showcase all the city has to offer, in terms of investability, tourism and trade match-ups. The mayor is planning to underwrite the cost of hosting the event, that will see up to 100 city leaders, plus support staff, from across the globe convene in Bristol in November 2018, from his 2018/19 budget. It is hoped external sponsorship money can then be secured. “This is an important global event which puts Bristol at the centre of an international discussion on the role of cities and how we can address our shared problems around the world,” said Rees. ECONOMICS OF HAPPINESS CONFERENCE IN BRISTOL: Friday, October 19th – Sunday, October 21st, 2018 – Arnolfini Centre for Contemporary Arts – 16 Narrow Quay, Bristol, UK – Join us in the bustling city of Bristol for a highly participatory Economics of Happiness conference, set to coincide with the Annual Summit of the Global Parliament of Mayors. This will be our eighteenth international conference aimed at catalyzing a new economy that works for both people and planet. CAMPAIGN FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT HOLDS ANNUAL CONFERENCE IN BRISTOL: Towards a nuclear-free future: building change from the grass roots. At a time of increasing global threats and amid an unstable political situation, we will be meeting in Bristol on Saturday and Sunday 20th-21st October to decide our direction for the next year and discuss how we respond to the challenges ahead. On Saturday is our AGM and Policy Conference, and we urge as many groups and members as possible to come and contribute to the discussions.And Sunday‘s open public conference is a chance to learn from past and present campaigning techniques, in discussion with other activists, while we look to our future work. Both days will take place in the centre of Bristol at the historic Wills Memorial Building, on Queens Road, University of Bristol, BS8 1RJ. Interview with Bilderberg 2015 attendee and future unelected president of the EU Alexander Stubb.

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BCfm audio file

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTvRcKLknzM?t=1167

Second hour: Investigative reports: American Mercenaries Were Hired To Assassinate Politicians In The Middle East “There was a targeted assassination program in Yemen. I was running it. We did it.” The company that hired the soldiers and carried out the attack is Spear Operations Group, incorporated in Delaware and founded by Abraham Golan, a charismatic Hungarian Israeli security contractor who lives outside of Pittsburgh. He led the team’s strike against Mayo. “There was a targeted assassination program in Yemen,” he told BuzzFeed News. “I was running it. We did it. It was sanctioned by the UAE within the coalition.” The UAE and Saudi Arabia lead an alliance of nine countries in Yemen, fighting what is largely a proxy war against Iran. The US is helping the Saudi-UAE side by providing weapons, intelligence, and other support. The press office of the UAE’s US Embassy, as well as its US public affairs company, Harbour Group, did not respond to multiple phone calls and emails. The revelations that a Middle East monarchy hired Americans to carry out assassinations comes at a moment when the world is focused on the alleged murder of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi Arabia, an autocratic regime that has close ties to both the US and the UAE. (The Saudi Embassy in the US did not respond to a request for comment. Riyadh has denied it killed Khashoggi, though news reports suggest it is considering blaming his death on a botched interrogation.) Golan said that during his company’s months-long engagement in Yemen, his team was responsible for a number of the war’s high-profile assassinations, though he declined to specify which ones. He argued that the US needs an assassination program similar to the model he deployed. “I just want there to be a debate,” he said. “Maybe I’m a monster. Maybe I should be in jail. Maybe I’m a bad guy. But I’m right.” Bellingcat war propaganda, Facebook Censorship and the Atlantic Council: Yesterday we witnessed one of the greatest Facebook account and page purges since its formation over a decade ago. In total, 559 pages and 251 personal accounts were instantly removed from the platform, for having “consistently broken our rules against spam and coordinated inauthentic behavior” according to Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s Head of Cybersecurity and former White House National Security Council Director of Cybersecurity Policy under Obama. This is but one of similar yet smaller purges that have been unfolding in front of our eyes over the last year, all in the name of fighting “fake news” and so called “Russian propaganda”. What very few people know though, is that about 5 months ago, Facebook announced that is was officially partnering with the Atlantic Council in the form of an “election partnership […] to prevent [their] service from being abused during elections.” Indeed, the US midterm elections are only a couple of weeks away, so the Atlantic Council and its Digital Forensic Research Lab are now going at it with full force, closing facebook accounts left and right that they personally deem could be fake accounts, or accounts spreading misinformation, based on very shady criterias. One doesn’t need to look far to understand who the Atlantic Council are and what they stand for : it is a think tank essentially funded by NATO, weapons manufacturers, Middle-Eastern oil-state monarchies, billionaires and different branches of the US military. In short, it has been described as being nothing less than NATO’s unofficial propaganda wing. The Atlantic Council doesn’t shy away from its political intents across the world, which can be seen solely by looking at who sits on its directors board – the crème de la crème when it comes to US neocons & war criminals: Henry Kissinger, Condoleezza Rice, Frank Carlucci, James A. Baker, R. George P. Shultz, James Woolsey, Leon Panetta, Colin Powell, Robert Gates, and many more. Dirty deals for enriched Uranium done with the Nazis in the closing days of WWII – and for Nazi nuclear bomb detonator technology – we hear from author of the book – Nazi International Joseph Farrell on this and the organisations set up by vice President Harry Truman – WWII US president Franklin Roosevelt didn’t want to use the atomic weapons against population centres in Japan – then died a premature death. TORY ELECTION FRAUD TRIAL: Tory MP Craig Mackinlay ‘over-spent’ while standing against Farage, court hears.  Michael Crick C4 News Political Correspondent A Tory MP over-spent more than twice the legal limit during his 2015 general election campaign while trying to stop the then Ukip leader Nigel Farage becoming an MP, a court has heard. South Thanet MP Craig Mackinlay, along with his election agent Nathan Gray and Conservative party official Marion Little, are on trial alleged to have been complicit in submitting false expenditure declarations following Mr Mackinlay’s victory. SEVERAL $500m US F-22 RAPTOR JETS ‘LEFT OUT’ SMASHED UP BY HURRICANE MICHAEL: THE US Air Force’s Tyndall Air Base in Florida has taken a direct hit. Many of its ultra-advanced F-22 Raptor stealth fighters have been caught on the ground. Exactly how many of the $475 million aircraft were damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Michael has not yet been revealed. The United States Air Force could only afford to buy 187 operational examples of the 5th generation stealth fighter. Now, that number may have been significantly reduced.

Radio4All download pages
BCfm audio file

Radio4All audio file