Conjuring Hitler: How the Western Elite Incubated Nazism – 1900-38 Guido Preparata US: University of Michigan Press, 2005; h/b, $90.00; p/b $28.95 UK: Pluto Press, 2005; h/b £60.00; p/b £17.99 I would like to introduce a recently published book that has been overlooked. Guido Preparata’s Conjuring Hitler: How the Western Elite Incubated Nazism-1900-38 reinterprets … Read more
How perceptions have changed! In Leveller 51, March 1981, there was this snippet: ‘Why all the fuss about the Panorama programme on British Intelligence? Eventually there was just one cut — Gordon Winter, BOSS agent, former freelance journalist, in a pre-title sequence: “British intelligence has a saying that if there is a left-wing movement in … Read more
By Robin Ramsay See also: Lobster (magazine) at Wikipedia. Updated June 2022 The first issue of Lobster appeared in 1983. It was written by Stephen Dorril and myself. We met through the late Harry Irwin, who lived in Northern Ireland and was what Americans call a book scout: he bought and sold rare books. But … Read more
Why do they do this? In the previous issue I referred to the fictitious comments attributed by Tony Blair to a doctor in Africa. They’ve done it again. In February Blair’s spin doctor in chief, Alastair Campbell, claimed to have saved a man from being beaten by muggers, The Mail on Sunday (23 February) traced … Read more
Francis Beckett and David Hencke London: Constable, 2009, h/b, £18.99 This is quite interesting and impressive; but with a strange spin. There is a lot of (to me) new detail on the impact of the event on the Labour Party and trade unions, on money given to the NUM from other unions and on attempts … Read more
Searchlight again In the Daniel Brandt essay in this issue there is a section on the scandal in the United States resulting from the discovery that the Jewish organisation, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), has been found to be collecting data on hundreds of political groups, both right and left, and trading data with agencies of … Read more
Iraqi documents Iraq on the Record (<http://democrats.reform.house.gov/IraqOnTheRecord>) is a searchable collection of over 200 specific misleading statements made by Bush administration officials about the threat allegedly posed by Iraq. The collection would be even larger if it also included statements that appear mistaken only in hindsight. However, if a statement was ‘…an accurate reflection of … Read more
Some recent JFK literature In front of me is a copy of Guth and Wrone’s The Assassination of John F. Kennedy: A Comprehensive Historical and Legal Bibliography 1983-1979 (1980), nearly 450 pages, running to some 5,134 entries covering books, magazine articles, records, TV programmes, and news items from both the New York Times and the … Read more
This arrived from David Guyatt, prefaced by the following message: ‘Robin: This is being published on a couple of Internet sites shortly. I’ve given up trying to sell it or get any responsible journo/editor to carry my work forward. They all have chickened out, mostly without an explanation or even a courtesy call/reply. Fuck ’em … Read more
Barry and the boys The CIA, the Mob and America’s Secret History Daniel Hopsicker Venice (Florida): The Madcow Press, 2006, $19.95, p/b Barry is Barry Seal and ‘the boys’ are the CIA. There is a decent Wiki entry for Seal which conveys the outlines of his extraordinary life as a pilot, large-scale drug smuggler and, … Read more
