There are lots of reports around the blogosphere of Tom Franks million dollar challenge so I won't repeat it here.
Better I thought to then to bring you Franks own words and let them describe his feelings, but more importantly his logic behind them and where that logic has taken him, "The Million Dollar Challenge."
What he has to say is as important as his challenge, in my book, far more so.
Having blogged extensively about America I think I can safely say without fear of contradiction that, among many other things, it is the land of bullshit, everybody is trying to shit somebody, and probably the biggest bullshitters of all are Texans.
Am I about to attack Tom Franks? au contraire.
Let me offer you this little used phrase, The more rivers you cross, the more you know about crossing rivers, Tom Franks lives in the bullshit capital of the world, I think he can spot bullshit when he sees it.
Those good ol' boys down Texas have a term to describe a bullshitter or someone of little substance, He's all hat and no cattle, our Mister Franks however seems possessed of both.
Got cows Gerry?
Update: It,s possible that this whole thing is spurious, however every word still applies, both Franks and mine.
A case that needs to be answered
I first became aware of the case of Madeleine McCann in September 2007. I saw a report on CNN that the parents were suspected of killing their child. That was not a surprise, because in most cases where a very young child disappears the parents or guardians are involved. I cannot say I took a lot of interest in this case until very recently. In my business (Real Estate) I have one or two contacts in England. Last week one of these contacts sent me a copy of a letter and a book What Really Happened to Madeleine McCann that showed that Mr. and Mrs. McCann were never charged with any crime, not even child neglect, despite overwhelming evidence. Many believe this situation was a direct result of interference by the British media and political machine.
Now I don't know about you, but I do not like it when adults hurt children. Worse, I do not like it when they hurt children and then lie about it. Worse still, when they hurt children, then lie about it and then are protected by politicians. I was told enough about the parents of Madeleine McCann to decide to spend some time doing my own research. What I found was astonishing.
These people have been protected by a ring of British politicians including Prime Minister Gordon Brown and those close to him, including a spin doctor, the Foreign Secretary, a government spokesperson and former Prime Minister Tony Blair. This would be like sending Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton, Robert Gibbs and George Bush, and let's throw in Bill Clinton for good measure, to the aid of JonBenet Ramsey's parents to provide good PR, to manipulate the media coverage to their advantage and to interfer in the police investigation.
Not only that, but politicians of the two British opposition parties and British members of the European Parliament also threw their public support behind the parents of Madeleine McCann, even while they were official suspects. The McCanns were recruited as child-protection ambassadors by British European members of parliament. Gordon Brown waded in, speaking directly to the Portuguese Prime Minister. The Portuguese police chief in charge of the investigation was mocked and threatened by the British, and after complaining about the interference he was sacked. Is it any wonder the Portuguese (under attack by the full force of the British political machine and their gutter press determined to portray the Portuguese as incompetent and ruin their tourism in the process) put their hands up and said: "we give up?"
When you look at that and you look at the McCann parents, you have to ask yourself: what the hell is going on? How can anyone believe this couple for one second? Everything points to them being guilty. The list goes on and on, from the mother refusing to answer police questions, telling the media they would take a lie detector test then refusing, claiming shutters in the condo had been forced open when plainly they had not, holding up a vast T-shirt with their daughter's image on it while grinning from ear to ear, playing tennis and running while others searched for their daughter, saying how well they were sleeping just a few days after Madeleine had disappeared, turning their daughter's eye defect into a logo to raise money and using that money to pay for their mortgage, refusing to take part in a police reconstruction (their spin doctor said they would only do a reconstruction if it was a TV show), grinning and laughing when they were unaware TV cameras were still rolling after faux emotional pleas.
These things are all to do with their behavior, but then there is also the forensic evidence, blood and death scent found by the dogs, in their car and in their condo. All DNA markers pointing to Madeleine. Why did Mrs. McCann's car keys smell of cadaver? Why did Madeleine's soft toy smell of cadaver? Why did Kate McCann wash the toy? Why was the apartment clinically cleaned? Why was furniture rearranged? Why was there no forensic evidence to support the abduction story? The abduction story itself has more holes in it than a bath sponge. One child has gone and everything points to the parents. Why have they attracted so much adulation and protection by politicians in Britain and the British media? What is so special about them?
Imagine a scenario where a child has been taken by a maniac on the loose. If he is stealing little girls from their beds, you can bet he is not doing it just to give them an ice cream. He is probably going to be a pedophile and that child will suffer in the most horrendous and painful ways before being murdered or left for dead, although Gerald McCann keeps telling us there is no reason to think Madeleine has been harmed. Maybe the monster had been watching them, spying on their every move, observing how the negligent McCanns left their children all alone each night to go to the bar with their friends. Then the beast pounces and whoosh one child is gone and we do not want to think of the obscene things he might do to her.
That is the scenario we are supposed to believe. Now what about the other children? What would any parent do in that situation with their other children? They would be extra protective. They would not want the other children to be out of their sight. But not Mr. and Mrs. McCann. They could not return the twins to the resort creche quck enough, where the beast could strike again at any time, while they carried on with their vacation activities, including jogging, tennis and traveling around Europe. Whoosh and another child could be gone.
Now come on! If any parent really thought one child had been taken after being left alone, they would be filled with remorse and guilt and fear. Paranoia about the safety of the other children would be consuming. They would be afraid to leave the other children alone again. The last thing they are going to do is leave their two-year-old twins out in the open for the evil creature to strike again. It would be like watching one child being eaten by an alligator, because you let it stray too far from a tourist group in the swamps of Loisiana, and then throwing the other children down in the front of its gaping jaws like lumps of raw meat. No parent would do it, unless of course they did not really believe there was a child-snatcher on the loose, in which case the whole story about an abduction would have to be nothing but a tissue of lies.
Let me tell you about another McCann story that is a tissue of lies. A woman called Gail Cooper was on vacation in Portugal before the McCanns arrived there and she saw a man. Wow! Somebody saw a man! Only the McCanns and their team of media people could turn this into major news. They even staged a faux police appeal with an artist's impression of the man for the obedient British gutter press, with their spin doctor playing the part of the police spokesman. There was nothing to suggest the man was a child-snatcher. Nothing. The police never suspected him. The police never wanted him. The police never had any evidence about him. They knew it was a diversion tactic. There was nothing to indicate the man has anything to do with this case. Nothing.
Why then does Gerry McCann claim on his website that the man is "Madeleine's probable abductor?" It is not 'probable.' To be probable there would have to be evidence. So it is a lie. And if it is a lie, why is it a lie? There can only be one reason. Gerry McCann wants us to believe an innocent man took his child. He cannot be interested in us finding the truth. He cannot be interested in finding Madeleine. This leads me to my million dollar challenge.
A website bearing the name All Hat and No Cattle was born out of the achievements of the biggest disaster to hit world politics in living memory and the world's biggest wannabee Texan, non other....
