Tossers...

Cotswold leader Lynden Stowe forced to show ID to police after being mistaken for Nick Griffin

• Steven Morris
• guardian.co.uk, Monday 1 March 2010 13.02 GMT
• Article history

Conservative party councillor Lynden Stowe, right, says he is sometimes mistaken for the BNP leader Nick Griffin.

• Daniel Nasaw in Washington

• guardian.co.uk, Monday 4 January 2010 18.56 GMT

Barack Obama returns from his holiday break in Hawaii. Photograph: Alex Brandon/AP

The US secret service is investigating an apparent effigy of Barack Obama hung from a storefront in Georgia. Local television news showed what appeared to be a black doll at the end of a noose on the main road in Plains, home of Jimmy Carter, the former Democratic president, Georgia governor and Nobel peace prize winner.

Witnesses said the doll bore a sign with Obama's name. The effigy was quickly removed by the fire department after it was discovered on Saturday.

The election of Obama, the first African-American president, incensed US racists and his policies have provoked angry conservatives to compare him to Hitler and Stalin. But the number of threats to his life so far has been roughly similar to those against Bill Clinton and George Bush at a similar point in their presidencies, the US secret service director told a House of Representatives committee last month.

The tiny town of Plains, 120 miles south of Atlanta, is proud of its connection to Carter, president from 1977 to 1981, and residents said they hoped news of the effigy would not overshadow the link. Georgia was long a hotbed of racial animosity and when Carter was inaugurated governor in 1971 he declared: "The time for racial discrimination is over."

In October 2008 two students in Kentucky hung an effigy of Obama in what they called a Halloween prank. They were arrested, but charges were later dropped. During Bush's presidency crowds in Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and across the Muslim world frequently burned him in effigy.

BNP leader who believes climate change activists are 'cranks' will be member of European parliament's delegation

• Toby Helm
• The Observer, Sunday 29 November 2009
• Article history

Nick Griffin amid an anti-BNP demonstration. Photograph: John Stillwell/PA

Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National party, is to represent the European parliament at the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen, which opens next week.

Last night politicians and scientists reacted furiously to news that the far-right politician and climate change denier should be attending the summit on behalf of the EU.

Griffin, who was elected to the European parliament in June, confirmed last night that he would attend as the representative of the parliament's environmental committee. World leaders, including Barack Obama and Gordon Brown, are hoping to forge a new global agreement to curtail greenhouse gas emissions.

Without such a deal, scientists warn that world temperatures will increase by more than 2C by the end of the century, triggering ice cap melting, sea-level rises, widespread flooding, the spread of deserts and devastating storms.

In a speech in the parliament last week, Griffin denounced those who warn of the consequences of climate change as "cranks". He said they had reached "an Orwellian consensus" that was "based not on scientific agreement, but on bullying, censorship and fraudulent statistics".

"The anti-western intellectual cranks of the left suffered a collective breakdown when communism collapsed. Climate change is their new theology… But the heretics will have a voice in Copenhagen and the truth will out. Climate change is being used to impose an anti-human utopia as deadly as anything conceived by Stalin or Mao."

Griffin will be one of 15 representatives chosen to speak on behalf of the EU in Copenhagen. The shadow climate change secretary, Greg Clark, condemned the move last night. "It is utterly ridiculous that someone who doesn't even believe in climate change should be seeking to represent Europe in Copenhagen. The BNP does not command the support of the people of Britain, let alone of the rest of Europe," he said.

A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "Membership of the European parliament's delegation to Copenhagen is a matter for the European parliament. Its delegates do not represent the UK government or its views. Nick Griffin will not be part of the UK delegation."

Tim Yeo, chairman of the Commons environmental audit committee, said the decision to choose Griffin showed the "bizarre way" the parliament operated. He added: "If the future prosperity of the human race, in the face of climate change, depends on the contributions of people like Nick Griffin, there is little hope for any of us."

Professor Alan Thorpe, chief executive of the Natural Environment Research Council, said Griffin's claim that thousands of scientists dispute the existence of man-made global warming was simply not true. "The intergovernmental panel on climate change draws on the views of most of the world's leading climate scientists and they have been quite clear that the evidence shows, with a high degree of certainty, that human activities are now having a substantial effect on the climate. It is simply not the case that there is a substantial number who do not accept a link."

Bob Ward, of Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, said: "Griffin denies the overwhelming scientific evidence on climate change. This appears to be driven by a dogmatic strand of right-wing ideology that opposes any form of environmental regulation, usually hidden behind the dishonest claim that climate change is a left-wing conspiracy."

Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrats' home affairs spokesman and a former MEP, said the European parliament always divided up positions on such delegations according to the parliament's political balance. "Griffin was bound to get something at some stage. It is just a shame they didn't send him to Iceland instead."

Critics say Griffin addresses environmental issues when he believes he can use them to advance anti-immigration policies. His party claims that it would improve Britain's transport infrastructure and reduce carbon dioxide levels by reducing the number of immigrants in Britain using roads, cars, trains and buses.

Gerry Gable, publisher of the anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, said Griffin once tried to win over environmentalists in the 1980s. "His core beliefs – that the white race is being threatened by an invading minority – are the so-called principles that have run through his nasty career."

Daniel Foggo and Jon Ungoed-Thomas

NICK GRIFFIN is to be investigated by the privacy watchdog after the BNP leader was accused of paying for a database containing the names and addresses of thousands of members of a rival party.

The database, which belonged to the UK Independence party and contained the details of about 3,500 of its members from London and the southeast, was passed to the British National party by a disaffected member in return for about £500, sources say.

The BNP then canvassed many of the people on the UKIP list asking for funds to help fight its campaign in the run-up to June’s European elections. The BNP went on to claim two seats, including one for Griffin.

Last night the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which oversees data protection, said it would investigate. Under the terms of the Data Protection Act, anyone who sells data without authorisation from the designated “data controller” is guilty of an offence, as is the person who obtains it.

If prosecuted and found guilty, transgressors are liable to a fine of up to £5,000. The Ministry of Justice is consulting about whether to impose custodial sentences for future breaches.

Griffin said yesterday that he had never personally paid for a UKIP membership list, although he conceded that some UKIP details had been passed to his party by former members.

He added: “To the best of my knowledge, no one in the party has paid for such a list.

“Some UKIP members do join us and provide names and addresses of people who might be interested to hear from us. We have never had an entire UKIP membership list.”

Last week Griffin said the anonymous leaking on a website of his own party’s membership — the second time it has happened in the past 12 months — was part of a “concerted anti-BNP campaign”.

One of the names on the leaked UKIP database was Gerard Batten, an MEP for the party, who has previously complained to the ICO about the apparent data breach. Last night he said he was preparing a fresh complaint based on The Sunday Times’s evidence that the database had been bought and sold.

“We have long suspected the BNP had a [UKIP] membership list. Our members don’t want this stuff. The BNP do this based on the false belief they can take away some of our members,” he said.

Batten and others received unsolicited requests for donations from the BNP from 2008 until earlier this year. One sent in January appealed for funds for the BNP’s European election battle. It said: “If we can win one seat, the floodgates will open. One seat, just one, would put us on the world stage and would lead to an avalanche of popular support throughout this country.”

Last year Batten wrote to the ICO: “I suspect that my address and those of our UKIP London members were illegally accessed from a UKIP database.”

Now other sources, including from within the BNP, have confirmed that the database was obtained and exploited by the party. “Nick Griffin bought the database for surprisingly little, just a few hundred pounds,” said a source.

It is understood that the privacy watchdog wrote to the BNP warning it not to send Batten any more communications. But the source said the watchdog did not know the party also had the names and addresses of 3,500 other UKIP members.

An ICO spokesman said: “We are very concerned to hear that some UKIP members’ personal details have apparently been traded with the BNP. We will investigate this incident to establish the full facts.

“Buying or selling personal data is against the law, unless there is a public interest defence.”

Gerry Gable, publisher of the anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, said: “The BNP jump up and down when their own membership lists are leaked, but it now emerges they are procuring the details of members of another party in an underhand way.”

Hmm... remember this?

Today's tabloids express mock outrage at the appearance of N*ck Gr*ff*n on the BBC Question Time programme. But they have short memories.

Here's today's Star:

Hang on, though. Isn't that the same newspaper that did this?

and this?

The Express, meanwhile, is also clutching its pearl necklace, claiming that the party is going to get taxpayer-funded broadcasts at the next election. Not a big lead on Griffin, because there's apparently another twist in the Diana saga (and as ever the stock image of her wearing a seatbelt, which would have saved her life in the crash, nutjob neenaw whoop-whoop conspiracy or no conspiracy)

But it's got those because it's gained votes. I wonder why? I wonder which newspapers are read by BNP supporters? Maybe ones that say stuff like this

or this?

or even this?

And not forgetting the all-time classic:

Not some. Not five hundred. Not even a thousand. Not half. Not three-quarters. No. ALL. IN BIG RED FUCKING LETTERS SO YOU'RE MADE CLEARLY AWARE THAT IT'S ALL.

Hey, and please let's not forget this:

I almost didn't include this!

Which is almost the same as this!

But no. The Express doesn't like the BNP. They just happen to share entirely the same views on immigration, but Griffin is bad, because... well. I haven't quite worked out why he's bad. Maybe he doesn't hate Muslims enough for their tastes?

The Mail have also had a bash, but as ever they're more concerned with attacking their nemesis the BBC than they are about hand-wringing over Griffin:

Having said which, I still think

it's worth making the point

that the Mail doesn't always steer so far away

from using content

which the BNP and 'bigot' N*ck Gr*ff*n

might completely agree with

and it's not long

before you might start thinking to yourself

are they really protesting a bit too much? And what's the difference, really, between the BNP bigots and the supposedly mainstream newspaper which claims to distance itself from them so much?

And you have to start thinking: do these newspapers which select certain types of images of ethnic minorities and use them again and again

really have such different views or agendas from the likes of the BNP?

It's all very well people blaming Labour, or the BBC, or whoever, for the 'rise' of the BNP. But if there has been a significant increase in BNP support - and it hasn't translated into votes yet, despite a severe recession and growing unemployment - perhaps that might have more to do with the legitimisation and absorption of their extreme views by newspapers creating scare story after scare story concerning race and immigration, often baseless stories created simply to scare? It's one thing going to a BNP meeting but it's quite another to hear exactly the same thing over the breakfast table from a publication which purports to report the facts.

But no. It's all the BBC's fault. Let's blame them.

A great post.