Thursday 30 June 2016

Brexit- One Week On

It is now a whole week since the British people went to the polls, and against all the odds and in the face of all adversity won the referendum to leave the European Union. See the background links at the bottom for my coverage of this event. Most of the populace seem to have got used to the idea of Brexit (Incidentally Brexit is a neologism; a year ago nobody had heard the word and now it's on everybody's lips. It is simply an abbreviation of "Britain's exit from the European Union" and will surely be in the Oxford English Dictionary next year). There are already signs emerging of what Richard Dolan and Bryce Zabel call a "new normal". However, for the political classes the situation is very different. They are still in a state of denial. The exception being Nigel Farage who made a speech in the EU parliament that, even if you don't completely trust him, is like a glass of water after a hike in the desert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlN9o3g-yuA. All the main UK parties are in turmoil with a vote of no confidence in the Opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn, which is simply opportunistic Blairites striking while they can. The fact that Corbyn is currently pushing for Tony Blair's war crimes prosecution is another of those David Icke "Just a coincidence, nothing to worry about" moments. The ruling Conservative Party is also running a new leadership contest. Boris Johnson has just stepped down which is disappointing. I'm not a supporter of his, but he would have at least made the process more entertaining. Instead we have the usual line-up of suited non-entities like Michael Gove and Liam Fox, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36672591. I tried to reassure the Remainistas that the original post-vote financial panic that saw the pound crash by almost fifty cents against the dollar would not last long and it hasn't. The markets have stabilized. In fact, as the economist Peter Schiff has explained, the minor economic ripple caused by Brexit is the least of our worries, see: http://www.schiffradio.com/if-the-markets-were-healthy-brexit-would-be-a-non-event-ep-177/. Following the crisis in the Eurozone since 2008 it is obvious that there are enormous monetary benefits of being completely independent from the European Central Bank, as I reported on last year, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/greece-decides.html. Britain is now in a far stronger long term economic position than it ever was before. A symptom of the government's true contempt for the people can be seen in the scheduling of talks to plan a single military force for the European Union. These were timed to start just after the referendum date. The scumbags were so confident they would get a REMAIN victory when it would be too late to stop them. What a narrow escape we've had! See: http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/06/29/european-leaders-release-plan-eu-army-turkish-membership/. Luckily it looks as if the EU and UK governments will shortly activate Article 50 which will begin the two-year process to remove Britain from the EU, probably even before Cameron's departure after the end of the leadership election in October. Indeed the EU seems more in a rush than Westminster. As I said above, it is highly unlikely that the tendency wanting an immediate second referendum will have their way, but this is still just the first shot in what is bound to be a long war. The powers-that-be will back off for now, but will duck down and double back to try again with more crooked methods. As Paul Joseph Watson has pointed out, we will see Brexit blamed for everything by the media. If Wimbledon is rained off... it's Brexit's fault. Your drain gets blocked... it's Brexit's fault. Your neighbour's cat comes home with half its fur shaved off... it's Brexit's fault, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_72Wbg5tjN0. George Osborne hasn't missed a trick! I predicted, almost to his very words, exactly what he would say about Brexit needing a new array of cuts and austerity, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36647006.

On a personal level, I've now recovered from my "happyshock" and calmed down a bit. However, my mood is still strangely manic. I tend not to post much on social media, but my Twitter and Facebook feed are currently covered with status updates and memes; many of which I've made myself, like the tableau above. I explain in the background links that I am under no illusions that this is the ultimate triumph against the New World Order, but it is still such a major pitfall to their agenda. For the first time ever in my life something has happened in the political world that is a tangible, unmitigated and manifest disaster for global Illuminati rule. I hear all the time from people like David Icke that soon there will come a "turning of the tide", a "great transformation" etc. The LEAVE victory is at long last a positive indication that history has finally reached the corner and is starting to turn back. Because this is a new experience for me it has generated feelings that I've never felt before. The sense of justice and vindication is intoxicating. It's a joy that is overwhelming, almost vertiginous. Contemplating it makes me feel dizzy. Whatever happens in the future nothing can take that away; it is done, a fait accompli. I even have images in my head comparing the EU to the One Ring from Lord of the Rings and what happens when it's finally destroyed in Mount Doom. Of course I have been messaged by all the usual Truth-posers telling me that Brexit is a completely controlled event without explaining why. Instead, predictably, they just call me a "sheeple" or "shill" for disagreeing with them. I rationally detail in the background links exactly why I think that this is not the case. Brexit is indeed an unplanned and unexpected deviation from the elite's script and they're struggling to contain it. In the meantime I am working to control my own emotions. I am on a "high"; that's for sure; one that is not logically sustainable in all likelihood. Everything looks brighter and cleaner. Is it just my imagination or do other people look happier too? Obviously there are exceptions, like the left wing sour grapes who are protesting in London and demanding the will of the people be overturned. Even Thunderf00t on YouTube has been a right old wet blanket, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TX0U9i8qnk8. Generally though I do detect a spring in the step of those I pass in the street. Has Brexit given people a new sense of hope, self-respect and empowerment? In his book Homage to Catalonia, George Orwell describes Barcelona after it was taken over by the POUM in 1936, the movement he fought for in the Spanish Civil War. Every person was filled with a unique euphoria, an unbearable lightness of being. It was the sudden liberation and emergence of a new social contract, a return to that simple sense of fairness we had as children. Orwell was a democratic socialist and I differ with him politically, but he had a sense of decency and honour that excuses him of his mistaken allegiance in my view. Has Brexit given us that same promise of freedom? Brexit may not be the end, but maybe, just maybe... it could be the beginning of the end.

Monday 27 June 2016

Brexit- the Backlash Begins

On the subject of the European Union referendum, I have not written anything in the immediate run-up and aftermath of it, but my coverage is extensive on HPANWO TV and Radio. The links to it are listed below in chronological order.
The poster you see above is on display in the window of a house in a residential area of Oxford that is populated almost exclusively by REMAIN-supporters. There has also been a petition calling for the EU referendum result to be declared void because the turnout was less than 75 percent and LEAVE won by less than ten points. The rules of the vote do not specify a minimum turnout nor qualify the outcome on how unanimous it is; however this hasn't stopped 2.7 million people, minus seventy thousand fraudulent signatures, signing to demand the rules are changed retrospectively because they didn't win... I'm going to try that with the National Lottery! As I say in the bottom link above, David Lammy MP for Tottenham, London has endorsed these sour grapes, as have the pathetic household in Oxford who taped up that ridiculous poster in the picture. Basically they want to undo the entire spirit of the referendum because of a legal technicality. As I've said, they are literally correct, but to consider seriously such a move is politically impossible. Even Cameron has consistently ruled it out. And how long would we keep having referendums? Until 60% or 70% vote either way? Under these criteria the rules can change so much that we will go on voting forever. The fact is, one side has to win and the other has to lose; and LEAVE has won, end of. This shows that the REMAIN side consists of people who are totally divorced from reality and feel contempt for the rights and will of the British people. Imagine what they would say to us if REMAIN won and we whined about it: "Suck it up, guys! Get in your white vans and keep on driving!" No, Parliament cannot fail to ratify this referendum without opening the doors to overt dictatorship. Yes, they will try to reverse the decision the British people have made, but they will do it by much more devious means, as they already have in other countries. As of now, I predict that there will be a discussion to amend Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty to prevent other nations from following the Brits' example and leaving the EU. Along with the resignation of David Cameron, the opposition is also in turmoil. Most of Jeremy Corbyn's shadow cabinet have resigned and Hillary Benn has been sacked for allegedly being the ringleader of a circle of rebels who want a vote of no-confidence in the old socialist leader after his supposed mishandling of the Brexit issue. I suspect that they are simply using this as another opportunity to try and unseat Corbyn. There has been an internal war raging in the Labour Party since Corbyn's election as leader last year, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36638041. At the same time Nicola Sturgeon, the First Minister of Scotland, is pushing for another referendum for independence from the UK. I can't see how anybody can stop her because the Scots are very pro-EU and as a nation taken alone voted overwhelmingly for REMAIN, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-36643385. It's good that politics has suddenly become exciting again! Who knows what will happen in the weeks and months ahead.

Friday 24 June 2016

Will Donald Trump be Assassinated?

We are going through a period which feels to me like an increasingly violent conquest of the entire world by everything that is establishment. After decades of renowned and traditional cynicism and hostility towards it, it looks probable that the British public are about to agree to "REMAIN" in the European Union; and there are many suspicious circumstances surrounding this, see: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/vote-leave.html and: http://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/programme-193-podcast-eu-referendum.html and: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/vote-leave-2-count.html. Just two days earlier a British man was arrested when trying to snatch a policeman's gun at a rally by the US Presidential candidate Donald Trump, see: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/20/donald-trump-assassination-attempt-las-vegas-rally. This is the second such attempt and Trump's public events have been marred by less acute but more widespread violence. After some consideration I've come to the conclusion that Donald Trump is definitely not an establishment candidate and that his accession to the last stages of the process is an aberration that was not intended by the powers-that-be. Hillary Clinton is the chosen one. For this reason she will have to face an opponent that she can easily beat. Trump is not this opponent; in fact there's a good chance that, face-to-face, the manipulators will be unable to control the situation and Trump will defeat Hillary. This will not be allowed to happen. Trump will be removed one way or another. Enemies of the Clinton family traditionally die in suspicious plane crashes. Maybe this will be their method. On the other hand it could be a heart attack or other disease. Trump is seventy years old, not a young man. How could you prove foul play if he were to suddenly fall off the perch?

Monday 20 June 2016

The Sirius Letters- Ben Emlyn-Jones interviews Carol Cochrane

The Sirius Letters is an independent short film by Neil Geddes-Ward featuring Carol Cochrane and myself. See here for the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSN3QFkzR2M.
In the programme, Carol and I discuss the possible message that the crop circle makers are trying to communicate with human beings.
See here for Neil's previous film in which I interview Andrew Johnson: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/the-starchild-skull-and-twin-towers.html.
See here for my HPANWO Radio interview with Carol: (coming soon)

Friday 17 June 2016

Ben Emlyn-Jones live at New Horizons St Annes 3

I'm pleased to say that I'm going back to St Annes, one of my favourite places in the world. I'm presenting a live lecture at New Horizons St Annes, hopefully followed by a Q&A. The date will be Monday the 11th of July. The venue will be the Community Centre on St Albans Road in Lytham St Annes, (next door to the YMCA centre) Lancashire, see: http://www.newhorizonsstannes.com/index.htm. The event begins at 7.30PM and costs just £3, including refreshments. My lecture will be entitled: Skeptics- Who are they? Why are they wrong? And why does it matter? "Ben Emlyn-Jones asks some searching questions about those who challenge those who challenge All people who look into paranormal, alternative or conspiratorial matters will, at some point, come across the skeptics; people who dismiss and deny everything that has been discovered." This is a brand new speech and this will be the first time I've presented it.
This will be my third appearance at New Horizons St Annes, see here for a film of the last time I was there: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/ben-emlyn-jones-live-real-zombies.html.

Monday 13 June 2016

Did Christopher Hitchens become Religious?

Christopher Hitchens was one of the "four horsemen" of New Atheism, along with Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett. He died in 2011 at the age of sixty-two after a battle with cancer and during his terminal eighteen months he remained as steadfast to his conviction as ever, that there is no God and he had no afterlife to look forward to, at least publicly, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/christopher-hitchens-dies.html. He is mourned by millions of admirers around the world. Fellow atheists like the comedian Stephen Fry and author Richard Dawkins delivered moving tributes to their late colleague and friend; Dawkins said: "He was one of the greatest orators of all time. He was a polymath, a wit, immensely knowledgeable and a valiant fighter against all tyrants including imaginary supernatural ones." However a new obituary has just emerged that is as affectionate as all the others, however it portrays the departed in a very different light and it has aroused enormous controversy and resentment from Hitchens' other fans. The Faith of Christopher Hitchens- the Restless Soul of the World’s Most Notorious Atheist was published in February 2016 and it is written by Larry Alex Taunton, a famous Christian journalist and broadcaster from Alabama USA. As somebody who was always enthralled by Hitchens, I was intrigued by this superficially preposterous title. I knew I had to read that book to find out. The author details his first meeting with Hitchens as a flashback from his funeral. He was expecting a fire-breathing "atheist jihadist" who would brawl with him in the hotel lobby, but instead came across a witty, funny and genial character whom he immediately warmed to. The two of them got to know each other when they were on stage as opponents during one of Hitchens' textbook public debates. They got on well and ended up spending a lot of time together, at one point driving on several day-long trip through the beautiful Yellowstone national park. As they drove they discussed the Gospel according to St John. The book begins with the author making similar observations of Hitchens' personality that many others have, indicating that the two men did know each other and were close, contradicting what many others have claimed. Indeed, some of the people invited to Hitchens' funeral were not people who liked him. Larry Taunton also had a low opinion of some of the mourners. Lawrence Krauss, whom he was appearing on the same TV programme with in 2016, see below, he describes as a "smarmy little physicist". The funeral was "a celebration of misanthropy and excesses of every kind!" the author laments. His summary of Christopher Hitchens' life is very different from Hitchens' own; he regards his friend as "self-obsessed" and "always his own favourite". Hitchens hated authority generally, a theme that recurs in the book. For Hitchens' traditional English public school education, this authority was essentially embodied in the church. He was seduced by Marxism, like many educated youths, and describes the intoxicating feeling it gave him, of being in the driving seat of history. He truly believed that he had the power to change the world. He did not believe in God or Heaven so he would create Heaven here on Earth. However he kept "two sets of books" indicating that he did have divisions within himself, a public persona and a private self; the latter he kept carefully concealed. The suicide of his mother drove him even more against religion. She took her own life in a suicide pact with the leader of a cult she had joined. He loved her and had been very close to her, but was at the same time angry with her for keeping the secret that she, and therefore her children, were Jewish. Interestingly, Christopher's brother Peter was completely different; he initially joined Christopher in Marxist activism and atheism, but then became a Christian. Today Peter Hitchens is a top palaeoconservative Christian journalist. Taunton's book has a whole chapter on the relationship between the Hitchens brothers. When 9/11 happened it changed Christopher Hitchens' life forever. His worldview was shaken from top to bottom; not least because of what he saw as the weak and distorted reaction by his comrades on the political left. This is well-documented by Hitchens himself, however Taunton believes that he began to question his antitheism as well, at least when it comes to Christianity. Perhaps this was because of the perceived threat of Islam. This is an extraordinary claim that makes no initial sense; because it was after 9/11 that Hitchens became best known as an atheo-skeptic polemicist against Christianity as much as Islam. It gave him a sense of patriotism similar to that of his father, a Royal Navy World War II veteran. It gave his life a mission. He became a fellow traveller in the ascendant neoconservative moment. He also wrote his most famous atheist book God is Not Great. If he really was "keeping two books", in the second one did he really have doubts about God's absence? Was his debate tour with evangelicals a form of projection? When he said "I'll debate you believers any time any place any where!" was this a manifestation of a conflict within his own heart? In fact a New York critic called Hitchens' book "the angriest of all the New Atheist bestsellers." but who was Christopher Hitchens really angry at? Being an ardent anti-religious disputant also allowed him covering fire when it came to his atheist friends whom he wanted to keep his new feelings secret from. According to Taunton, Hitchens had no problem with genuine Christian believers. His real antipathy was for individuals and institutions who privately reject what they profess while dispassionately continue to take money from their flock; for example Al Sharpton, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Greek and Russian orthodox churches. He had a similar attitude to his political opponents. Hitchens' morality was very intuitively sourced, such as the chapter in his book about pigs and his dislike of abortion. This is far more like a spiritual person than an atheist. Despite the protestations of the humanist movement, see: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/andrew-copson-at-greenwich-sitp.html, atheist morality is deeply pragmatic, cold and synthetic. A good example is when an expectant mother wrote to Richard Dawkins and told him she was expecting a baby with Down's syndrome and asked his advice, Dawkins simply replied: "Terminate it and try again." Hitchens interestingly revealed to Taunton privately that he had never even read The God Delusion. One of the most moving scenes in the book is where Hitchens has a conversation with Taunton's adopted daughter. A ten year old orphan from Ukraine called Sacha. Both her parents have died, she has brain damage, is HIV positive and has lost most of her teeth. Hitchens once said that it was human suffering that convinced him that God could not possibly exist; his friend Stephen Fry said the same. Sacha was a girl who had suffered in the single the short decade of her life more than most people do in their three score years and ten. She lost her mother, father and health, yet she smiled as she greeted her adopted father's friend. She told him "God is there, and He hears us." For the first time ever, the great orator and contrarian was totally speechless. Christopher Hitchens' favourite song is Higher Love by Steve Winwood, it was played at his funeral; but never before had he realized that such a love existed. There were many more bonding events between the two men. At one point Hitchens was with some atheist friends in a pub when Taunton walked in and one of the atheists almost snarled "There's a Christian standing behind you!" Hitchens responded by saying to them: "Mr Taunton is my friend!" and walked out. When Hitchens was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer Taunton was one of the first people he called. He was devastated and terrified; he begged his friend not to tell his family yet. They went on their long road trips and had the long private discussions I mentioned; also they did a live debate, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obycPvu5fro. At the end of the event Taunton was disappointed with the audience. The supporters on both sides didn't really understand the nature of the debate. They just congratulated their hero on how well he had "beat the enemy!" When they say a warm farewell they both have a feeling that they'll never meet again. Larry Taunton was informed by text message that Christopher Hitchens was dead. This message included a request to do an interview about it on Sky TV. Taunton reported that Christopher Hitchens was not an atheist extremist towards the end. Despite the harsh epithets the atheo-skeptics have leveled at Taunton, the author does not claim that Hitchens became a born again Christian. He calls Hitchens a "searcher", and of all his eulogies at his funeral, only Ian McEwan's understood that. When a man is faced with his own mortality, it does change the way we think. What Hitchens says to Taunton, according to the book, does not sound like the ravings of somebody in the delirium of dying. The book ends with Larry Taunton's speculation about his late friend's real feelings when it came to the eternal and infinite. Taunton compares this to the famous deathbed conversation between David Hume and James Boswell, see background links below. What would have happened if Christopher Hitchens had lived? Taunton also chastises the rest of the atheist community, especially Richard Dawkins, for what he sees as an appropriation of Hitchens final public appearance. They selfishly forced him into being a martyr to their cause. This thorny issue is written about professionally and rationally. See: https://www.amazon.com/Faith-Christopher-Hitchens-Restless-Notorious/dp/0718022173.
The reaction to the book from the atheo-skeptic community has been outrage. They have given The Faith of Christopher Hitchens some of the worst book reviews I have ever read. Nick Cohen calls the author "A particular species of creep... a true fanatic who has never learned when to seize a golden opportunity to hold his tongue.", see: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/04/deathbed-conversion-christopher-hitchens-defiant-to-last. Matthew D'Ancona is slightly more reasonable and says: "There is so much wrong with this book that one hardly knows where to start...", see: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/29/christopher-hitchens-christian-conversion-book. BBC's Newsnight programme interviewed Larry Taunton in May 2016. After Taunton's interview Lawrence Krauss appears; he's another atheist and close friend of Hitchens. Krauss refused to speak to Taunton on the air and only agreed to participate if he and Taunton were broadcast separately. Both Krauss and the interviewer suggest that Taunton is lying just to get rich by flogging a few books. Richard Dawkins says similar things about Alister McGrath and his other detractors. It's interesting that atheo-skeptics make these assumptions so glibly and thoughtlessly. When Dawkins wrote The God Delusion everybody declares that he "wanted to educate the world!". So, anybody who writes a book supporting atheo-skepticism apparently has equally noble motives. If you write a book disagreeing with atheo-skepticism then you're just an insincere literary grave-robber trying to make yourself a few quid. This preconception is invariable and never scrutinized. Dawkins has said about McGrath: "Alister McGrath has now published two books with my name in the title... a professor of theology is building a career riding on my back? It is tempting to quote Yeats: 'Was there ever dog that praised his fleas?'." This is a narrow-minded, cynical and intellectually dishonest. Prof. McGrath has written some books disagreeing with Dawkins, books which even when all put together have sold far less than The God Delusion. Does Dawkins think there's a law against that? What does Prof. Dawkins consider a legitimate medium of criticism of his works, may I ask? Krauss begins with this same rhetoric. He also pointed out how disgusted Hitchens' widow Carol Blue was about the book. As I explain in the background links below, people are continuously using rhetoric in a debate and substituting it for a logical argument without even understanding the difference. Dawkins and Krauss are as ignorant as all the others regarding that. Krauss also denies that Taunton and Hitchens were even friends. According to him, Hitchens only ever saw Taunton on paid assignments and that he last saw Hitchens over a year before he died. This doesn't accord with the tone of the dialogue in the book, nor with all the recorded facts. Christopher Hitchens was famous for being very polite and friendly with people in a personal setting, even after he'd just eviscerated them on stage in front of the TV cameras. He was also very academically curious about religion. He loved robust conversation and had many close friends who had different views to himself. Did Taunton mistake his civility and curiosity for a conversion? See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQDXcobRbnU. Another YouTuber also indulges himself at the start of his "point-by-point breakdown" of an interview with Larry Taunton on a Christian radio show saying: "There's something almost physically sickening about the idea of a religious opportunist publishing a book... Listen to these hyenas laughing it up!" He does make a crucial point though; Hitchens himself warned people in advance that if rumours came out after his death about a religious conversion at the last minute then they should not believe it. These were either lies or that his brain had become addled by his death throes, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4cPe_YS8i8. Taunton scolded him for that afterwards; and, as I said above, his discourse with Taunton sounds perfectly compos mentis to me. However, why didn't Hitchens reveal his emergent religious beliefs to his wife? (There are a lot of MBA statements in this video too): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFsfZqhkV3A. I doubt whether Lawrence Krauss or "TheWeekInDoubt" have read The Faith of Christopher Hitchens. They have probably just read a synopsis and invented without knowing what the rest of it says. Nobody is immune to emotional revulsion when faced with their iconoclasts. Hitchens was regarded as a hero for atheists all over the world, especially in the USA where public atheism can still relegate you to a social underclass. The notion that their mentor was not as ideologically pure as they always believed could be so unpalatable as to cause instinctive distaste. The fact that Hitchens has passed on makes the perceived slander even worse, speaking ill of the dead. However Taunton's book treats the subject respectfully and kindly. There's no doubt the author loved Hitchens and wants to portray him approvingly. The scene in which the two of them take a long drive and have a deep theological discussion also sounds very authentic with a genuine rapport. The sad and obvious fact is that Taunton's assessment of Christopher Hitchens' beliefs is unfalsifiable. Only one man can confirm or deny whether the book is true or false, and he is no longer with us. This does not justify the atheo-skeptics' dismissal of it, nor their personal public derision of Larry Taunton, as I explain above. They are lashing out at somebody because he's saying something they don't like. Based on Hitchens' words alone, I would never have considered him a candidate for being born again... but I didn't know him personally. When it comes to the opposing worlds of atheism and religious belief, both sides recruit converts from the other. Derren Brown, Julia Sweeney and Matt Dillahunty are all former Christian believers who became prominent atheists. They are lavished with praise by the Dawkinsian clique. Yet they pass plenty of people on the road driving the opposite way, for whom there is considerably less approval. The aforementioned Alister McGrath for example. The best known of these ex-atheists is CS Lewis. As a young man, Lewis once wrote: "The general impression is that other religions are a mere farrago of nonsense, but our own is true. My impression is that all religion is utterly false... The day I dropped my faith was a day of greatest relief." He also talks of his prayers in the trenches where he fought in the Great War and how he felt stupid, like he was talking to nobody. Yet in 1929 he began attending the services at his Oxford college chapel and his writings leave no doubt he was undergoing a very profound spiritual awakening. He went on to be the world's foremost Christian apologist. If CS Lewis can change his mind about God, anybody can. Why shouldn't Christopher Hitchens? It's a shame we will never know, not only if Larry Taunton was right about Hitchens, but what Hitchens would have said and done next if he had lived. One thing is for sure, and Taunton makes this point in the book, the atheo-skeptic community would not have taken kindly to such a high-profile defection. Christopher Hitchens would have found yet another group of people from which to be denounced as a pariah... But has that ever stopped him before?

Thursday 9 June 2016

Oya in conversation with Ben Emlyn-Jones 2

I have been interviewed again by the YouTube user "Oya", whose real name is Kathy. In this informal discussion we cover a multitude of subjects, including my background and paranormal encounters of my childhood and past, strange individuals attached to my family, the European Union and much much more. The film is available on Kathy's channel "OYA 1100".
See here for a direct link to the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sb26uMigvk.

Wednesday 8 June 2016

Dovestone Man

On the 12th of December 2015 a passing mountain cyclist found the dead body of a man beside a track high up in the Peak District. He was lying parallel to the road, flat on his back with his legs straight together and his arms across his chest. He was wearing ordinary clothes, including a light jacket and slip-on shoes. The area is popular with hikers, but they have to wear proper boots and warm clothing, especially in the winter. The mountain rescue team at fist assumed he had got lost and died of exposure or exhaustion the night before. When Detective Sergeant John Colman of Greater Manchester Police investigated, he expected the case to be a standard one of a body turning up; a sadly common duty for a policeman. However he soon realized that this death was far from ordinary. The man had no possessions in his pockets except for about a hundred and thirty pounds in cash and some train tickets. Bodies can normally be identified from ID, bank cards, mobile phones or door keys etc, but this man had none of those. He was aged from approximately sixty-five to seventy-five years old and was tall and slim, about six-foot-one in height; but nobody had reported anybody missing answering that description. They circulated an artist's impression of his face in the local area, but could not find anybody who knew him. Nevertheless somebody did recognize him; the landlord of a local pub, The Clarence, came forward and told the police that the mysterious man had called at the pub the afternoon before his body was found and asked the way to "the top of the mountain". The pub is located in Greenfield, Greater Manchester at the foot of the path up onto the Dovestone Peak. The barman gave him directions, but warned him that it was too late to attempt the climb before nightfall and that he was inappropriately equipped; the man thanked him and left. The train tickets were vital clues to trace his journey. He purchased a single ticket at 9.04 AM at Ealing Broadway Underground in London to Euston in central London. There he caught a national railway train to Manchester Piccadilly where he arrived at 12.07 PM. He can be seen on CCTV wandering around the station shops and amusements. He bought a sandwich at M&S and then went to the information desk to ask the way to a taxi rank. He didn't leave the station until 1 PM. He headed into the city on foot and never caught a taxi. After that there is an hour of missing time in which nobody knows where he was. This I find hard to believe seeing as Manchester is almost as rife with CCTV cameras as London; I was there myself a couple of weeks ago. I know somebody who was tracked all the way by CCTV in his car from there to Oldham simply due to a minor public order offence. I wonder how in the case of a mysterious death more information is not available. All that has been publicly released is that one hour later at 2 PM the man entered the pub in Greenfield to ask directions. Two hours later at 4 PM two ramblers passed him on the track up to Dovestone but did not speak to him. By now it was after sunset and everybody should heading down the track not up it. These were the last people known to have seen the man alive. The next morning his body was found in Chew Valley, a local beauty spot in the Dovestone area.

When I went to Manchester the other week my coach travelled through the Peak District. It's just a twenty-minute drive from the metropolis, yet feels a million miles away. The road ascends sharply into another world. It looks very bleak and primeval; huge bare hills of moss and heather, not so much as a tree in sight. Even in the 21st century human encroachment is almost non-existent. The Chew Valley is a part of Saddleworth Moor, a place whose name still generates a sinister echo as it is the location where unspeakable acts of torture and murder were carried out on children by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley in the early 1960's. The resting place of one of their young victims, Keith Bennett, remains unknown to this day, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/demonic-moors-murderers.html. It seems somehow appropriate as a setting for dark acts of mystery. The enigmatic elderly man who died there last December has still not been traced at the time of writing. The police went to Ealing in London where his last journey began and made enquiries, but nobody who lives and works there seemed to know him. The man was picked up on CCTV at Ealing Broadway and does appear unfamiliar with the area. He wandered about aimlessly for a while like he did in Manchester. Did he come to Ealing from his home somewhere else? The mystery deepened yet further when his body was given a post-mortem. The man had died of strychnine poisoning. There was a medicine bottle near the body filled with strychnine pellets and it is thought that the man had brought them with him and swallowed them, making it a suicide. This is a highly unusual form of suicide though. Strychnine is used as a rat poison but is banned in the UK. The bottle was made in Pakistan where strychnine is still permitted. Death by strychnine poisoning is very unpleasant; the toxin causes agonizing convulsions and it's rare for people to use this as a suicide method. What's more, the man had bought a return ticket on the train; why had he done that if he intended to kill himself? There was another intriguing link to Pakistan; the man had had surgery. At some point about two years before he died, the man suffered a major fracture of the thigh and he was operated on to mend the cracked femur with a titanium plate. The plate had an identifying number on it indicating that it had been made and used in Pakistan. The man himself is racially Euro-Caucasoid and the landlord of The Clarence did not report any foreign accent in his speech. Therefore we can assume he spoke with a pure British English accent so he himself was probably from this country. So what was he doing in Pakistan? If he lived there it might explain how nobody in Ealing knew him. Yet a white British man living in Pakistan should stand out. The police hope to find out who he by asking the Pakistani police to help them find his medical records. At the time of writing this has not yet been accomplished, see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-e8c6cbab-da44-4a3c-8f9b-c4fccd53dd24. This is not the first time bodies have turned up that have not been identified, but it is still extremely rare; there are just forty-two identifications currently pending in Britain. I've written about several of them before. In 1975 one such incident happened in Oxford, where I live, see here from 35.48: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bfi5YEDhXxM. In Australia there was an even more curious death, "Somerton Man"; this remains unsolved even though it happened long ago, 1948, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/somerton-man.html. In the case of "Dovestone Man", the answers may yet come. He might have been living abroad and travelled to the UK to kill himself for reasons only known to the deceased. If so he must have abandoned or destroyed his travel documents and passport. What about CCTV at the airports? He might have been a loner with no close family, as some old people sadly are. However, if the police enquiries continue to draw a blank, we might have to consider the conspiratorial angle, or even the paranormal one.

Sunday 5 June 2016

Spectre

Like most people, I've enjoyed the James Bond films my entire life. They're the ultimate in action adventure bloke-flicks. When I became aware of it I also realized the films, and the books they're based on by Ian Fleming (Fleming himself has an interesting background, see: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/helen-duncan-wartime-psychic-jailed.html), are inherently very politically incorrect and put up a brave resistance to cultural Marxism. However not all the films live up to the quality I expect from the franchise, especially those later in the series. The cause of this decline has been mostly bad casting for the eponymous character; Timothy Dalton was a particularly awful choice. In 2005 Pierce Brosnan, a reasonable Bond, was replaced by Daniel Craig. Craig's first film was Casino Royale (not to be confused with the official 1967 spoof with that title). I didn't think it was very good and the next one, Quantum of Solace, was truly poor. This was despite the bright spark of Judy Dench's brilliant performance as "M", head of the secret service and Bond's boss. At that point I gave up watching Bond cinema releases altogether. However, after Sam Mendes became the director the films have dramatically improved. I watched Skyfall on DVD and really liked it. Then came Spectre.

Spectre was released last year as the most expensive James Bond film ever made. It also featured the world's biggest pyrotechnic explosion ever seen in cinema. The title of the film refers to the organization "SPECTRE". It is an old nemesis of James Bond, an international criminal network last appearing in Diamonds are Forever in 1971. It is run by an evil genius called Ernst Stavro Blofeld, famous for being accompanied everywhere by a white cat. The film Spectre has all the features I've come to enjoy from Bond; great camerawork and excitement, stunts and special effects, emotion and sensuality, intrigue and mystery. However, this film caught my eye in a way none of the others have before because of its breathtaking conspiratorial awareness. Paranormal and anti-New World Order themes have appeared in James Bond stories before; for example in the aforementioned Diamonds are Forever in which Bond infiltrates a secret laboratory that appears to be faking the Apollo moon landings, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y03zBX_q4TM (See here for more details on the subject of the fake moon landings: http://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/programme-179-podcast-marcus-allen.html). In Spectre there is far more than just a hint. In the storyline, MI6 is about to be closed down because the government want to amalgamate it with an international intelligence agency called "Nine Eyes" which would use all the latest intelligence technology to monitor the entire world under a complete electronic surveillance grid; "George Orwell's worst nightmare" as one of the characters says in the script. The changeover is being managed by a youthful and obnoxious bureaucrat called Max Denbigh, codename "C"... presumably because he's a total one! "C" intends to make Bond and his colleagues "M", "Q" and Miss Moneypenny redundant. Bond's conflict with "C" is one I sympathize with totally. In any large modern institution, like the NHS in my case, especially nowadays, old veterans will inevitably find themselves being ordered about by young whippersnappers fully-loaded with academic qualifications and all the attendant pomposity, but with no experience of the job. C's objective is for all the existing national intelligence groups to become part of his new international organization. He holds a meeting in which he openly says he wants a "New World Order", with all the agencies. All of them agree to sign up except one, South Africa. A short time later a "terrorist bomb" explodes in a city centre in South Africa and the viewer is left in no doubt that this is a false flag attack carried out by C, meant to act as a warning to the country and punishment for not joining his "Nine Eyes". This is an astonishing new element which is growing in cinema generally, with movies like V for Vendetta and Hitler- the Rise of Evil. I never expected the James Bond films to follow suit. Predictably it turns out that C is really working for SPECTRE. Previously portrayed as a mere organized crime family, in this movie it plays a role that is similar to the Illuminati, having secret meetings in Rome and with its own people in covert positions, like C, and with a long term geopolitical agenda. It also has the power to censor Google Earth. SPECTRE's headquarters lie inside a volcanic crater, like they did in You Only Live Twice, but this time it is in the middle of the Sahara Desert not Japan. However it can't be seen online by ordinary internet users. There are other themes such as the use of nanotechnology in the form of miniscule robots that Bond has injected into his bloodstream by Q... Goodness knows what C planned to do with them! There's a clear message in the story about the potential for abuse when it comes to sophisticated electronic advancement. I wonder who gave Spectre's production team the idea to include these plot devices into the film. Are they trying to give us clues to make the viewer think alternatively, without making it too obvious that they're doing it? Why not? Lots of other people in the media and the arts are currently doing so.

Saturday 4 June 2016

Ben Emlyn-Jones on Enemy Within Radio 23

I have been interviewed again on Enemy Within Radio with Thomas Barnes, this show is part of the Truth Frequency Radio network, see: http://truthfrequencyradio.com/enemy-within-radio-tom-barnes-64318/.
I am featured for the entire two hour programme and subjects discussed include: pro-EU government propaganda, Bigfoot in Britain, ape-human hybrids and much much more.
See here for my previous appearance on Enemy Within Radio, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/ben-emlyn-jones-on-enemy-within-radio-21.html.

Thursday 2 June 2016

Sleep Paralysis Again

Last year I wrote about a sleep paralysis experience I had, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/sleep-paralysis-and-shadow-people.html. I am struck by sleep paralysis regularly, on average about once a month, usually when I'm in a light sleep, in the early morning or when I'm napping. It's very common and a well understood neurological disorder. It's caused by the mechanisms in the body of sleep and wakefulness overlapping. There's a function in our brain which paralyses the skeletal muscles when we fall asleep; this prevents us from physically moving in the way we do in our dreams. When this is not working people sleepwalk. Sometimes when we wake up, this paralysing mechanism continues to work when it shouldn't, leaving us wide awake but unable to move. For me this involves just a few minutes of discomfort every so often, but occasionally I experience additional phenomena, like the black hooded figure I saw at my bedside that I describe in the above link. Last Saturday it happened again. I was staying with Ustane at her house near Nottingham and was asleep in her bed as usual. I awoke with early morning light shining in through the window. I recognized the usual symptoms of sleep paralysis; I couldn’t move any part of my body except my eyes, I couldn’t speak and I couldn’t awaken properly. I then saw a figure standing by the bed on the far side. It looked like a small thin woman wearing a dark blue dress. She had black hair tied up tightly in buns. She had a pale face with thin lips and small eyes. She was leaning over to her right with her arms hanging by her sides and she trembled as if suffering a seizure. I eventually managed to awaken fully and the apparition vanished. Ustane was nowhere to be seen. We had gone to bed together at about eleven PM the night before, but she had later got up and moved to the spare bed in her daughter’s room. This was not uncommon because I sometimes snore loudly and she finds it difficult to sleep next to me as a result. I left the house before she woke up because I had to catch an early bus to Nottingham. I was heading for the coach station because I was travelling to Manchester for the REPCON conference, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/repcon-mc.html; I don’t know if there’s a connection there, seeing as discussion of sleep paralysis came up during the event’s proceedings. Strangely it was not until the afternoon that I remembered what happened that morning, and there was another peculiar postscript. After the conference on Monday morning I returned to Ustane’s place and she told me something very interesting. The reason she had moved to the other bedroom on Friday night was not because of my snoring; it was because I had woken her up in the middle of the night and told her: “There’s a Chinese lady standing over you beside the bed!” I don’t remember this incident during the night and I’m certain the experience I’ve related took place in the morning just before I woke up. So did I have two visions during my sleep that night?