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Letters to the Media

From: David Halpin
Sent: Wednesday, June 05, 2013 10:42 PM
To: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.; Snow, Jon; Miller, Jonathan; Smith, Sarah; Thomson, Alex
Subject: C4 tonight

I seldom watch the ''News'' on either the BBC or C4 channel, but tonight I watched the latter.  I was disgusted at the bias and the lack of corroboration.

In regard to 'chemical weapons' I noted you did not quote the UN lady who reported that a nerve gas had been used by the rebels in one attack.  It would have been an easy matter to get shells to one of the c. 100 rabble groups.  And if the Syrian army had used chemical weapons 27 times -   cui bono  .  Would my colleague with his FRCS obtain advantage in this?  It would be a certain way to call NATO bombs upon his head.

Dear Mr Benfield and Ms Sitwell,

I will attempt to be brief because I know you have to work hard to get a good paper out. You know from previous e-mails that I have been unhappy about several things. It is not egotism which finally prompts me to write but the knowledge that the Morning Star is exactly that, truth amidst the capitalist and imperial mire.

It was about 8 years ago I met Roger Fletcher on a march when I heard about the MS. I have taken the paper since then, contributed to it and helped it in every possible way. I see there are 67 links to my name on the MS web site and an article, which jars a bit now for its metaphors, is relevant to the further stage in the evisceration of the NHS announced yesterday
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/23042

But things have changed a bit in the last year or so. The editorial responses to my input are of much lesser importance.
 

Dear Ms Mountjoy,

I refer to your Spotlight SW broadcast last evening on this subject from an Exeter girls' school. As a good journalist, I am sure you would agree that information you broadcast should be as complete and as balanced as reasonably possible. The duty of the BBC is not to project populist material in the way the government has already done on this subject, with key facts absent.

This programme, and a previous national BBC programme, focused on the agent which might trigger cervical carcinoma in later decades. It rightly stated that immunization did not cover all HPV types. It also stated that the virus was sexually transmitted.

What neither programme told its wide audience was that predominant causes of transmission of this oncogenic virus are
1. promiscuous sexual intercourse - thereby increasing the risk of transmission of the virus and individual infection

2. the absence of barrier contraception.
Thus, the youngster (and perhaps an illogical parent) is not being properly informed as to how they might best defend themselves.
 

Dear Sir,

Jerry Jones conclusion (Morning Star Wednesday June 8) that the National Health Service is well on the way to the market was spot on. As someone who fought tooth and nail against the US inspired 'internal market' of Thatcher, Ridley and Einthoven, my anger still cannot be contained. Few know the conspiracy caused the administrative costs to double at least, from about 5% of the total budget. That induced instability, with loss of professional leadership, set today's scene- from the causes of the MRSA epidemic to an easy ability to pick juicy grapes for corporatists everywhere.

Other correspondents have written of the systematic attack on everything that is of public value, especially to the poor. During the election period, a minority called in this paper for continued support for New Labour and for people to 'reform it from within'. This was symbolised for me by the reported, helpful conversation between Tony Benn and Tony Blair. I could not see that such reform would happen given the level of infiltration, sycophancy and preferment. Instead, I hoped against hope that the party would be incinerated so a true party of the left could be rebuilt. I am glad that I worked for Respect and I will see it grow as all the neo-liberal 'policies' are revealed as dross, driven by dogma or profit.

David Halpin FRCS

Dear Sir,

The firewall on my computer became inactive 5 weeks ago. Therefore I opened the e-mail system for very brief periods only. However, in those few days every one of my 6000 plus e-mail files was erased or removed. This will have been done by a state sponsored agency and not by an amateur acting singly.

Who might wish to cause me great difficulty? I speak and act firmly for justice in Palestine and against an occupation of indescribable brutality. I have asked, with other specialists, for the law to be upheld in the case of the late Dr David Kelly; that there should be a full inquest and not the half one that has taken place. I have spoken, marched and written to stop the war crimes committed against Afghans and Iraqis by our government and its odious leader.