That's all well and good
But spooks don't give - and don't have to give - a flying fuck about "the law", do they?
Total culture of impunity, innit.
I have just received from the Dark Web, a samizdat copy of GCHQ’s Xmas card complete with cartoon from Chris Slane. The references (see below) provide a download of the complete Xmas card, which presumably can be printed out on cardboard in hard copy. I think we can assume that the card is genuine as it contains the exemption …
No, that can't be. Both these places are, to my mind, evil. So neither of them could be Minas Tirith.
A better analogy would be the Teeth of Mordor, Carchost and Narghost the two towers guarding the Morannon. You know ensuring the security of the state.
"We can assume that the card is genuine"... because some one has slapped some generic GCHQ boilerplate text on it?
*Really?*
I think we can assume this is a rubbish parody produced by someone almost certainly with no connection to GCHQ (or ability to write good poetry).
(Anyone producing this from within GCHQ would be liable to discipline for violation of the Civil Service Code at least....)
Personally i think it's entirely plausible that GCHQ would use this type of engagement at this kind of audience. They have confirmed the intent publically (for the first time ever) to the parliamentary committee. If it is fake, where then is our actual Xmas card with witty and insightful verse??
Many years ago, there was a SunOS fortune cookie:
Nine megs for the secretaries fair,
Seven megs for the hackers scarce,
Five megs for the grads in smoky lairs,
Three megs for system source;
One disk to rule them all,
One disk to bind them,
One disk to hold the files
And in the darkness grind 'em.
Personally I preferred Irving Berlin's take on such matters:
If you're evil and you don't know
Where to go, why don't you go
Where Sauron sings
Putting on the Rings
Evil king in pitch black cloak,
Rides black beast with loathsome croak
Mordor brings
Putting on the Rings
Dressed up like a old king from Numenor
Trying hard to look a bit like Gorthaur
Hordes roar
Let's match words where Haradrim
Carry swords, and bow to him
Who hates all things
Putting on the Rings
...feeding it into Google Image Search shows it seems to have originated from the New Zealand magazine The Listener, sometime in July. The image search may be here: http://tinyurl.com/lsllmkf
Unfortunately the article is paywalled, but here's another reference to the image from August:
http://humanrightsfoundation.wordpress.com/2013/08/01/twenty-seconds/
So yeah, I reckon that card's about as genuine as a chocolate fiver. Mmm, chocolate money...
WTF DOES the '7' mean, cos this 'ere numpty cannae work it out, either (in her defence, she IS very Moby at the mo - not to mention Jacobed - and it's rather affecting her noggin...).
I won't attempt any 'funnies', cos nobody appears to find my funnies funny anyway... No point in trying if nobody gets 'em, is there (think it's the autism; what's funny to me, obviously isn't to the average - or even non-average - neuro-typical bod...).
Oh yeah and a stripy mint-flavoured ovine to the lot of yas!