You wait ages for one, and then you explode.

I'm sure it's happened to all of us. There you are, standing at a bus stop, and the bus is late. Late enough that you're starting to wonder if you've missed it, and whether or not you have time to pop into the shop down the road or light a cigarette. You decide not to chance it, and continue to wait. Time passes. Soon you've been standing there long enough to have smoked an entire pack and go to the shop for another. Finally, you decide that the bus isn't coming. Your focus wavers, and just as you give up on the bus arriving any time soon and move off- wham! There's the driver, glaring at you impatiently through the open doors. You're caught off guard. You rush back from the direction of the shop. You trip, drop your change. In your flustered state you inhale your cigarette. You can't breathe. Darkness claims you.

The weight of anecdotal evidence on this phenomenon is staggering. Perhaps not the death-by-asphyxiation part, but certainly the bit with buses turning up just as the potential passenger fully gives up hope. So much so that we can safely assert a causation between low commitment to waiting, and the sudden arrival of the bus in question. It is as though any given bus, en route to a passenger with a defeatist mindset, was compelled by some causal law to adjust its velocity in accordance with their hope of seeing it. This being the case, it leads us to accept that we have encountered a vital link between Sod's Law and hard, quantifiable Physics. The intriguing part of this concentration-based system of public transit appearance is the potential to harness its regularity in non-transport areas. Were people at every stop on a bus route to give up on waiting at the same moment, the bus would have to appear at each stop almost simultaneously- in other words, the bus would have to travel at the speed of light in order to disappoint everyone in its catchment area. Achieving light-speed travel so simply is certainly a thrilling prospect, but we should bear in mind the limitations of the method. We could not use light-speed buses for instantaneous transfer of goods or mail, for example. By definition, somebody expecting the bus to arrive somewhere with their package would cause it to drop from light speed, to the velocity of the cyclist trundling ahead of it. This is why, regrettably, the only foreseeable applications of the light-speed bus are military.

In order to elaborate on the concept of the unexpected bus as a weapon, it is necessary to emphasise the interplay between hard science and somebody muttering how bloody typical it all is. A bus so accelerated is drawn by Sod's Law, not the physical mathematics which make it useful. Therefore, the eager physicist would do well to remember that their work is merely a utilization of something which is outside of their field. With this in mind, imagine the system of simultaneous bus-forsaking described above, which accelerates the vehicle to the maximum possible speed. Now suppose that the bus route ends in a ramp, so angled that the bus will land directly on a hostile country's largest population centre. North Korea would soon stop its nuclear sabre-rattling if a double-decker 38C left Dennistoun and landed in downtown Pyongyang at the speed of light. As a weapon of mass destruction powered by British pettiness at minor inconveniences, it is also unable to be manufactured by foreign powers, making a public transport arms race impossible. With such a force under her command, outweighing even the power of atomic weapons, Britain might once again be in control of global affairs.

The only downside to this invention is that it requires the death of a bus driver each time it is used. But this can be made less distasteful with the right amount of ceremony. Just as Kamikaze pilots drank sake with their commanders before flying to their deaths, the martyred bus drivers of Britain might enjoy a pint with the Secretary of State for Transport before their final journey. Considering the potential power of this weapon, and the level of influence it would allow Britain to achieve, there should be no shortage of patriots willing to sign up. Although it is worth considering the payment of a generous pension to the deceased driver's family in order to assist recruitment. Besides, it would not even be necessary to launch a bus against a foreign power except in severe circumstances. Necessary leverage in international politics could be achieved simply by assembling a squad of willing drivers and keeping them on standby.

All these things having been considered, it seems obvious that Britain is in possession of a unique super-weapon which will allow us to exert control on the world stage in a manner which would previously have been unthinkable. It should therefore be obvious that we have no longer have any need for alliances with other countries, or of anchoring ourselves to agreements where we are required to pull our weight.

With this in mind, vote Leave on June 23^rd. Britain can go it alone. We have our light-speed buses of mass destruction. 

My Black, Evil Heart

I know I haven't posted anything for a while. The truth is that my life hasn't really been all that great recently. Some pretty bad things have been happening, and it didn't seem appropriate to turn it into a blog post. It isn't anybody's fault- all of my friends have been great- it's just something I had to go through alone. I think that sometimes you feel as though you're in control of what's happening, but then life punches you square in the gut. Then it does it again and again and again. Anyway, fuck it, this is what's been happening to me recently.

The whole thing started around the middle of February, when I was walking out of the bank. I went out during my lunch break to pay my rent, and somebody held the door for me as I was leaving. I turned to say thanks, and was amazed by how much the stranger looked like me. The stranger noticed the same thing and it wasn't long before we realised that we were long-lost identical twin brothers. For the sake of keeping the police from knowing too much too soon, I'll call my twin 'Peter'. We agreed that we'd stay in touch frequently, and he invited me round to have dinner with him and his wife, Mileena. It was great getting to know Peter at first, catching up on each other's lives, and discovering all the things we had in common, like enjoying a 1/9 food/salt ratio at mealtimes. We speculated over how we had been separated, but since our parents had been dead for several years, we were forced to leave it as a mystery.

I'm not sure exactly when I began getting a strange sense of foreboding about my relationship with Peter, but I do remember the day I realised what was causing it. One weekend in early spring, Peter invited me over to look at some paintings he had recently finished. They were important, he said, as they completed his study of the European aesthetic relationship with somethingorother. His flat was stacked with canvases depicting the most insightful views of the continent's architecture. As I looked over the various images in his studio, I jokingly asked Mileena which painting was the most important for me to look at. Pointing out an abstract portrait above the fireplace, she explained that Peter had painted it to commemorate the moment when he had proposed to her. It was only when she mentioned the date of it's inspiration- March 3rd 2006- that things became eerie for me. Bad memories suddenly rose up, which otherwise would have remained stagnating. On that particular day of that particular year, I had been in the process of dumping someone. It had been ugly. No, worse than ugly- sloppy. I had called the police at one point, then had to ask them to leave again because I had been embarrassed at my own overreaction in calling them. Police officers don't like people doing that kind of thing, and they will chastise you in one ear while your now-ex girlfriend calls you a cunt in the other. It was when Mileena mentioned the date that I began thinking about what different days Peter and I had been having on that particular March the 3rd. Peter lived out a Mills and Boon proposal of passionate love, with paintings to boot. I had been apologising to a police officer for panicking at my partner lifting a colander in a threatening manner. What stayed with me from the comparison was, while one party had enjoyed romantic bliss, the other had experienced angry humiliation.

After that incident, so much fell into place. On every criterion Peter seemed to be far better than myself- not better in the sense of skill or accomplishment, but in the underlying nature of his achievements. Everything he'd done had an air of wholesomeness and goodness which my own related successes lacked. What made it painfully clear was that we'd done so many of the same things, but with fundamental differences. We had both been sponsored to climb Mount Kilimanjaro during university; but while I had done it as little more than a free holiday posing as charity, Peter had raised the money himself and covered his own travelling expenses. We both shared the same introverted social manner; but while my awkward handling of everyday situations was often interpreted as a sign of imminent kidnap, Peter was known for being endearingly modest and reserved. No matter what area of life we discussed, in everything that Peter had done there was always the glow of intrinsic goodness outshining my own debased version of a personality. Some people might have expected me to begin showing signs of jealousy, and I dearly wish that had been the case. I would have happily maintained a petty sense of envy for the rest of my life than endure the realisation which came to me a few weeks ago. I remember it clearly: I was on the phone with a friend, telling them about how Peter had once saved a child from drowning. They jokingly said something like, "thank god the right brother was nearby; you'd be more likely to throw stones than a lifebelt". And suddenly a violent string of words resonated through my head:

Oh my god, I'm the evil twin.

I was staggered, but it explained everything. When identical twin siblings suddenly reunite, one of them always turns out to be evil, and between the two of us there was no doubt that Peter was the less likely candidate. No wonder all my attempts at being a good person had felt so hollow and half-hearted. All this time my natural inclination had been towards wickedness, but nobody had ever told me my role. As someone who was raised Catholic, the realisation that I was evil should have been old news, but I surprised myself by how hard it hit me. I spent a while in a fairly deep depression, resigning myself to the fact that I had a whole new direction in my life that I'd never wanted. What eventually got me out of the slump was the thought that my purpose might be to destroy my twin. That at least was something I could devote myself to. Besides, once my opposite number was out of the way, there would be no good twin hanging about to define me as evil by comparison. After Peter had suffered his downfall at my hands I could go back to being like everybody else, and only appear morally inferior next to people like foreign aid doctors and Emma Watson. But even as I grimly accepted the new mission, I wished for a fresh start, some time to gather myself. I thought about other evil twins, who would suddenly appear cackling at vital moments. They always seemed to have had lots of time to brood over an ingenious plan. Why hadn't I been allowed to do the same? That's what was so frustrating. I was already in the role before I knew what to do with it. I anxiously began researching old episodes of Star Trek, and they both confirmed and aggravated my suspicions; as a morally-compromised duplicate, my primary duty was to appear out of nowhere and bring about the undoing of my despised sibling. I found myself faced with two main problems regarding this mission: First, I didn't particularly dislike my new twin brother. Secondly, even if I did, then I probably wouldn't do anything about it. I know that some evil twins deal with their vendettas by shaking a fist and making long speeches about how they'll rue the day and so on, but that had never held much appeal for me. In the past I've simply avoided people I didn't like, which seemed to work better than constantly plotting their demise and going out of my way to seek them out. But the conclusions drawn from the evidence were unavoidable, and so I resolved to fake it until I could make it. From what I had seen in the course of my research, a good starting point for Peter's eventual destruction would be replacing him in everyday life and ruining everything he held dear. Technically that should have meant killing his wife, but on reflection I decided that was a bit much. I mean there's evil, and then there's just being silly. As an alternative I opted to take his place at work and ruin his reputation.

Before I go on, I want to make something clear: being evil is hard. There's a reason why people who commit truly abhorrent crimes come from certain upbringings, and that reason is practice. Like gymnastics, you can only be really good at evil if you start practicing in childhood. For this reason my attempt to undermine Peter's reputation did not go smoothly. Getting into his office was easy enough, since he happened to come down with the flu the same day I started trying to destroy him utterly. Claiming a sudden recovery, I strolled into the office as 'Peter' and soon found his desk. My plan had been to use his work computer to access some risqué online material, and use his company's HR department as the instrument of my wrath, but it never occurred to me that I would need his login details. This threw me somewhat, as it was exactly the kind of situation which can reveal an evil twin's identity. To deflect suspicion, I began roaming the office with an intent look on my face and soon found my way into the stationary cupboard. Yes! Stealing office supplies would make a perfect alternative to the Brazzers website. Cackling to myself, I began filling my pockets with boxes of staples until my trousers bulged with illicit supplies. As a final masterstroke I emptied a couple of boxes onto the floor, ensuring that Peter's co-workers would notice the theft quickly. For the next hour I sat in Peter's chair, legs jiggling with anticipation and eyes locked on the stationary cupboard door. After several people had come and gone without raising any kind of alarm, I grew impatient. I started opening boxes of staples in full view of everyone and sorting through the contents with a self-satisfied air. Finally a bewildered voice sounded behind me. "What are you doing?" I looked up, preparing to boldly launch into the uncaring admission of guilt I'd been mentally rehearsing all day, but stopped dead at the sight of my brother. Peter, ever the hard worker, had decided to struggle into the office anyway, and here he stood, while I sat in his cubicle, lap peppered with staples. My mind raced. If I'd been caught in my attempts to destroy him, then tradition dictated that I should reveal my agenda with an evil laugh, and vanish mysteriously. I leapt to my feet and raised my arms dramatically, a box of staples in each hand. This was the point where my nefarious speech should have begun, but I was having trouble getting my thoughts in order. To cover the pause I began cackling fiendishly, then continued doing so, as thinking of something to say proved difficult. I don't know if you've ever cackled fiendishly for a full minute, but let me tell you, it kills the throat. With an air of concern Peter led me, still cackling, from the office, and out to the car park, where he began phoning an ambulance. I was still struggling to find a place to begin explaining myself, but I knew I couldn't let myself be both unmasked and apprehended on the same day. As a feeble substitute for a villainous declaration of hatred, I threw a handful of staples at him and ran away with his phone.

So that's what's been getting me down lately. I still feel like I'm in over my head with this whole evil twin business, but writing it all down has done me a lot of good. I can see from reading over this that I'm trying too hard to fit society's prescribed idea of how an evil twin should behave. In fact, I'm starting to think that the whole good/evil binary is far too rigid, and doesn't allow for situations like mine. Peter might be a decent person, but he's hardly going to be given a sainthood for it. So if my nemesis is only slightly good, then it makes sense that I should be only slightly villainous. From now on I'm only going to be a generally-discourteous identical twin, turning up out of the blue to malevolently borrow a DVD which I won't return for ages. My only worry is that Peter might start getting even more wholesome, and I'll have to respond with a lot of time-consuming fiendish plots. He mentioned giving some clothes to a car boot sale the other day, and it was only my quick thinking which convinced him that the event may well have been funding a human trafficking ring. I'm having to improvise a lot of my plots, but things are basically under control. At the moment, I'm trying to get him involved in online gaming. Somebody like Peter normally wouldn't waste their free time on something so unproductive, but I can tell he's starting to show an interest. All I need is for him to spend a couple of days on Xbox Live and pick up some of their mannerisms over the chat feature. After that, the rot should set in, and he'll be morally compromised just enough that I shouldn't need to do anything to counteract him. Of course, his wife has taken a dislike to me ever since I started influencing Peter towards sitting in front of the TV all day, but I don't mind all that much. If she gets in the way of my becoming morally neutral again, I can always kill her.

A good suicide note should be concise.

• Goodbye cruel world, you never properly explained what a Bitcoin is.


• Who am I to outlive the Simpsons?
  


• Catch me if you can, Alzheimers!
   
• Catch me if you can, student loan!


• Bury me with an anti-dandruff shampoo which actually works.


• My lighter is all the way over there and it's Sunday.
  


• Coming soon to a Ouija board near you.


• I died to make space for Beyoncé's wardrobe.


• Somebody told me I'm a beautiful unique individual with the potential to spread a bounty of love over the Earth, illimitible, enriching the lives of all. Sounds hard.


• My flatmate wouldn't stop talking about Dark Souls.


• You know those days where you just can't be bothered getting out of bed? It's like that, but forever.


• Please react to this note appropriately, the webcam is still on.

The Conspiracies Series #2- The Moon Landing

2. The moon landing pictures were real, but every other photo is forged.

The old version of the moon landing conspiracy claims that the U.S government hired Stanley Kubrick to film some fraudulent footage of Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong bounding around on the surface. This was allegedly done so the American public could picture the Russians dashing their furry hats to the ground and saying "darn it!", while a comedy trombone played in the background. But this theory does not stand up for two reasons. Firstly, Kubrick was such a perfectionist that the Russians would have established a moon colony long before he approved the final edit. Secondly, the Americans wouldn't make up a story about landing on the moon without also including a bit where they liberate the moon people by overthrowing their tyrannical rulers. The truth behind the moon landing is not only more devious than any previous theory, but also makes full account of all the available evidence.

During the 50s and 60s, the 'space race' was at the forefront of everyone's mind. Both the Americans and Russians went to great lengths to prove their country's power by launching insects, dogs, monkeys, and bears into orbit. Neither country knew what it was proving with this, but each had their separate theories. The Russians thought it was a question of getting the biggest animal into space, and began keeping an elephant in a centrifuge in preparation for launching it into the atmosphere. Kennedy seemed to think that the point of using so many animals astronauts was to build a zoo on Mars, and shipped an entire aviary to NASA. But at some point in the early 60s, the idea came about that sending a human being to the moon would prove once and for all who was the best at building rocket ships. It was then, while closely examining the moon, that government-funded astronomers on both sides made a horrifying discovery- the object in the night sky which we call the moon was really Earth, while humanity had been living on the moon all along! For both the Americans and Russians the problems with this discovery were twofold. Were the public ready for the revelation that they lived on the moon? And what of the damage the announcement could have for the credibility of either government? No leader would be prepared to stand up before the whole world and say, "Sorry everyone, but it turns out we live on the moon. We thought we lived on Earth". The central worry was that the masses would react with anger at being inconvenienced with such a massive piece of information, and inflict that anger on whoever blew their minds. The decision was therefore taken to suppress the findings and leave some other country to invoke the furious irritation of the public. As an interesting side note, the truth about the moon-Earth relationship was in fact discovered centuries prior, by Galileo. Considering their options, the Catholic church had him placed under house arrest and told everyone that his discovery had been about the Earth's orbit around the sun. The fact that the church chose to concede this blow to their worldview speaks volumes about their fear of people finding out that we all live on the moon.

Meanwhile in the 1960s, the Russian and American governments had a major problem on their hands. So much posturing had gone into claiming that each side would be the first to the moon, one of them had to produce something or the deception would be unmasked. It was eventually agreed that the Americans would stage the 'landing' in their own country, and in return the Russians could flood Hollywood with subliminal communist propaganda. So it was that on the 20th of July 1969, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong went out to the back garden of the White House and jumped around a bit, while Kennedy filmed them from the kitchen window. Anyone who wishes to corroborate my version of events need only take an ordinary "Earth" rock and compare it with any of the rocks which NASA claim were "brought back" from the moon. They will be identical, because they were taken from the same ground we all walk upon, specifically the bottom of the White House garden, where Marilyn Monroe was trying to grow rhubarb.

Stage two of the deception required that no observant free thinker should notice that they were actually living on the moon, and make a fuss about it. To ensure this, a massive project of evidence tampering began, wherein all mass media was heavily edited to make it look as though it were filmed on Earth. There is a reason why cinema and television from the 1970s appears so far removed from everyday reality, and that reason is because all fiction is set on an interpretation of what Earth is like, while we all live on the damn moon. I feel that a comparison may help to illustrate the difference. Here is a photograph taken in the 1940s, before the governments began their frantic cover up:

To an unbiased eye, this photo was clearly taken on the moon. Look at the way the flag is bunching up as it is raised into position. Shouldn't an Earth flag be hanging downwards relative to the flag pole? The American government will try to tell you that the flag was flapping that way due to the direction of Earth's winds, but don't be fooled. Nobody knows how the winds on Earth truly work, because nobody has ever been there. The flag in this picture is moving under the influence of the moon's gravity, which is far lower that that of the real Earth. The only winds in play here are solar winds, which as we all know, come from space. Now look at the soldiers. Isn't it suspicious that we can't see their faces? This is because they were all wearing astronaut helmets under their army costumes, and the breathing devices had to be hidden. I also find their poses very suspect, exaggerated even. It's almost as though they're holding onto the flag to prevent themselves floating off into space. Next, let's look at an image from a film released after the Americans began their blanket propaganda campaign to prevent us suspecting the truth.

Are we really supposed to believe that Earth looks like this? Rather than ramble through all the obvious errors in this image, I'll simply present a list:

- The hair. Sealed in place with hairspray to prevent it waving about in low gravity.

- Suspiciously large boots counteracting same low gravity levels.

- The gut is sucked in to an absurd degree. Actor clearly holding in a lungful of sweet oxygen from a canister prior to cameras rolling.

- Notice how actor is pointing up while clenching his fist towards the ground. A covert message which pleads with us to LEARN THE TRUTH.

- Despite all of Jimmy Carter's attempts to maintain the lie, actor's jacket still flaps loosely in the moon's atmosphere.

- Not a single tree or mountain in shot.

I would like to end this portfolio of evidence with a final observation. It would be so easy for us to reveal the truth behind the moon landing footage if we could just get John F Kennedy to admit his involvement. Yet due to his assassination, we cannot. And as we all know, part of the speculation surrounding the JFK assassination was the 'magic bullet theory', wherein a bullet appeared to perform an impossible swerve in order to strike both the president and his driver. Impossible in terms of Earth physics perhaps, but on the moon...

Well, need I say more?

The Conspiracies Series #1- 9/11

I've been reading a bit about conspiracy theories lately. I started with a book debunking the better known ones, like Kennedy, then picked up a 400 page tirade by David Icke, a man so devoted to independent thinking he's outgrown the need for evidence. But as I read the various accounts of magic bullets and aliens with weather machines, something seemed off about the picture the theorists are trying to paint. All big conspiracy theories require, at their heart, some body of all-powerful conspirators who are able to manipulate events on a grand and convoluted scale, yet these figures do nothing about the people who are trying to expose their plans. We're talking about figures who staged the destruction of the World Trade Center, and maneuvered entire nations into war, yet they haven't the resources to ensure a whistle-blower like David Icke has a conveniently fatal accident? You'd think that offing the occasional writer or blogger would be small potatoes for the Illuminati, the kind of job they'd give to the work experience kids. Based on the fact that such people haven't mysteriously vanished for getting too close to the truth, I conclude that they were never anywhere near the truth. The truth remains out there, and I plan to discover it. What follows is the first of my own conspiracy theories based on my own independent research. Read them closely. If I should die in a Parisian underpass, or get shot while driving through Dallas in the near future, do not believe the official version of events, for I have been silenced by the New World Order.

1. A beloved American icon was behind 9/11

As conspiracies go, this is the big one. Not only because the alternative account suggest that the U.S government is willing to murder thousands of its own citizens to manipulate global politics, but also because the alleged perpetrators are still alive. If we were able to produce evidence that George Bush et al. had cooked up the idea to blow up the Twin Towers, it would lead to the biggest war crime trial since Nuremberg. Unfortunately, based on the evidence I am about to reveal it seems that the Bush administration is completely innocent of any illegal warmongering allegations. The truth of the 9/11 attacks may come across as somewhat mundane following the extravagant theories which have been suggested previously, but from my own research it seems that the true perpetrator of the atrocity was none other than Amelia Earhart.

As far as history is concerned, Earhart vanished while attempting to fly around the world and was presumed to have crashed into the ocean. But when we look a little closer, we begin to find some disturbing connections. According to Earhart's official website, on the 2nd July 1937, Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan set off for Howland Island in the Pacific, and seemed intent on landing to refuel. However, the last recorded location of Earhart's aircraft showed that they had overshot the island, and from there it is accepted that they ran out of fuel and crashed. What the official story does not mention however is that Howland Island was bombed by Japanese forces in 1941, the day after the Pearl Harbour attack. Based on this, I posit that Earhart did not in fact crash, but rather flew around Japanese airspace for four years in search of land, refueling by harvesting oil from whales. At some point she encountered a lost Japanese fighter pilot, who spent 60 years convincing her to renounce America, culminating in the devastating events of 9/11.

Let us consider the evidence. Following the attack on Pearl Harbour, many kamikaze pilots were unaccounted for, having 'crashed en route', or 'flown off course'. These pilots were often later recovered by American naval forces. There are also documented instances of Japanese infantry who continued performing their duties in the Pacific jungles, unaware the war had ended decades earlier. We know for a fact that Japanese air forces were in the area of Howland Island just a few years following her disappearance. Given this, it stands to reason that while flying around the Pacific region in the early 40s, Earhart may have encountered a Japanese pilot who was MIA. For the next 60 years they flew around the Atlantic, refueling in the most part from BP oil spills - until the forgotten Japanese pilot finally convinced Earhart to launch a kamikaze strike against America in the name of the emperor. Even looking at the footage of the attacks, it is obvious to an unbiased eye that the aircraft being flown are Earhart's Lockheed Electra and a WW2 Japanese bomber.

But what of Earhart herself? Why should we be so eager to believe that such a beloved American icon would turn her back on her country and commit such a terrible kamikaze attack at age 107? We need only look at her character. Consider this youthful anecdote from the official Earhart website:

A pilot spotted Earhart and her friend, who were watching from an isolated clearing, and dove at them. "I am sure he said to himself, 'Watch me make them scamper,'" she exclaimed. Earhart, who felt a mixture of fear and pleasure, stood her ground. As the plane swooped by, something inside her awakened. "I did not understand it at the time," she admitted, "but I believe that little red airplane said something to me as it swished by."

Could that something have been “death to America”? This event took place before Earhart had even sat in an aircraft, and we can see that her feelings at the sight of a plane rushing towards her in a nosedive stirred a certain thrill of suicidal excitement. Could the temptation of creating such a self-destructive spectacle for herself have continued after her first flight in 1921? We should also note that Earhart collected newspaper clipping on women involved in traditionally male careers, such as mechanical engineering. Might she have gained insider knowledge from such feminist studies which allowed her to strike the Twin Towers with even more deadly precision? These are questions which the official account of Earhart's disappearance will never address.

From the evidence I have provided, a very different picture of Earhart emerges. Though as determined and resolute as her supporters claim, was also see that she was bloodthirsty and violent. A self-destructive calculating centenarian, obsessed with mechanical engineering and planes in suicidal plunges, she is clearly the most likely candidate to have carried out the 9/11 attacks. The government, most likely in an attempt to shield her reputation, launched the second Iraq war as a smokescreen.