Tuesday 28 September 2010

Helpful sources in looking at Dr Kelly's death

Fortunately there is a lot of information and opinions in the public domain appertaining to Dr Kelly's death and in this entry I want to acknowledge the ones that have been particularly useful to me.

First up is the book "The Strange Death of David Kelly" written by the LibDem MP for Lewes: Norman Baker. First published in 2007 it is a 'must read' for those trying to get to the bottom of the Kelly mystery. To research and write this book Mr Baker waited until he could leave the front bench position he occupied for his party and used the time this then made available to investigate Dr Kelly's death. In other words he did the honourable thing by ensuring that the time he would normally spend dealing with constituency matters wasn't impinged on. Whether one agrees with every conclusion he reaches or not he has at least looked at things with a forensic eye. 978-1-84275-217-3 is the ISBN number.

Then there is this blog here written by Rowena Thursby. Sadly Ms Thursby suffers from a chronic neuro-immune condition but that hasn't prevented her from forming the 'Kelly Investigation Group' as a result of her real concerns about the official explanation of David Kelly's death and the various anomalies and inconsistencies associated with it. At the time of writing there are 72 entries on it, an indication of just how seriously Rowena has been looking at the Kelly death. I'm really grateful for the hard work that both she and Norman Baker have already done.

There are a number of other blogs and forums covering the subject and periodically the press have the odd article, particularly 'The Mail' and 'The Mail on Sunday'. I'm aware that journalists in newspapers are apt to add a little extra colour, perhaps a bit of exaggeration to their reports so one has to be careful in reading the 'facts' they state but nevertheless it is very helpful in this instance that the papers mentioned have had a crusade regarding questions about Dr Kelly's death.

Following my commenting on various newspaper reports that have been on line I have been contacted by someone else who also has worries about the official explanations of Kelly's demise. He has flagged up various items on the internet of which I had no knowledge and this is adding useful background.

I must also mention that of course 'The Hutton Report' is on line - a much more reader friendly version of the same can be found here This latter is an unofficial site but far easier to use than the official one I reckon.

Finally, of course, any opinions expressed in this blog will be all my own work!

Monday 27 September 2010

About the writer of this blog

This certainly isn't going to be an autobiography but I feel it's right to say just a little about myself in so far as it relates to the content of my blog. I have been writing a much more general blog for a considerable time under the name 'Brian in the Tamar Valley' for the not too surprising reason that my Christian name is Brian and that I am fortunate enough to live in the valley of the River Tamar in south west England. More specifically I live on the west or Cornish side of the river.

My full name is Brian Spencer and at the time of writing I am 67 years old. I'm just mentioning my age because from my own personal experience and from the observations I've made of other people one's judgement tends to improve with age, one of the bonuses of growing older I guess. Logic says this should be so in as much as every day can bring new experiences and the opportunity to meet different people so by factoring in all the events that one has encountered in the past as well it should be possible to make a better informed and better reasoned judgement on a specific issue. I certainly feel that way about myself.

I don't come to the question of David Kelly's death with any particular sort of expert knowledge, for instance I have never studied Law or Medicine - two disciplines very relevant in the Kelly business. What I believe I can say though is that I look at matters in a very forensic manner and that I very readily see flaws and inconsistencies in other people's arguments. I am not, nor ever have been, a member of any political party - if in this blog I am seen to be critical of the Labour government in 2003 it is not because of the name of that party, I would feel just the same if the decisions of the time had been made by a different government.

At the time when Dr Kelly went missing the police launched 'Operation Mason' of which more later. I'm mentioning this now as some people have linked this to Freemasons. For the avoidance of doubt I am not, nor ever have been, a Freemason.

Although I am both fascinated and concerned about the death of Dr Kelly I am certainly not putting myself on a pedestal to say I know more than anybody else about it. Far from it. I am certainly prepared for criticism! As I said in my first post I really feel the need to get my thoughts recorded and this I believe is the right time to do it.

A new blog about the death of Dr David Kelly

UK scientist Dr David Kelly died seven years ago and since that time countless numbers of articles and at least one well researched book have been written about his death, and whether he took his own life or was assassinated. So why after all this time am I writing a new blog on the subject? For a start there are so many peculiarities and events relating to the death, these constantly swirling around my mind, that I feel impelled to write down my observations and a blog is an excellent way to do this. I can look at one particular aspect of the evidence and write about it and then leave the blog for a day or three and interleave it with the rest of my life.

It isn't just that however: I passionately believe that a proper inquest must be convened to look into Dr Kelly's death. After seven years and thousands and thousands of words having been written it is understandable if what I might describe as "Dr Kelly fatigue" has set in. It would be easy to believe that the very slow and laboured way the present government are considering the possibility of a new inquest could be partly down to the hope that interest in the Scientist's death might evaporate and hence pressure removed from them making the decision that I and other concerned individuals feel should be made. I'm not saying this is the case but this sort of trickery does get used in politics. And of course with people in government getting shuffled in and out of jobs on occasion there is always the chance that, if you keep the brakes on, someone else might have to make that final decision!

I'm very happy for people to comment on this blog providing the language is reasonable and not blasphemous. However inane remarks such as "It was Blair wot did it" or "Conspiracy theorists are mentally retarded" will get deleted.

In my next post I shall say a little bit about myself that is relevant to this blog.