Random thoughts of Nowun Till

Poland slaps fine on singer for bashing Bible

2012-01-16T23:23:00.000Z

Poland slaps fine on singer for bashing Bible: WARSAW, Poland (AP) -- A Polish court slapped a fine on a popular singer who bad-mouthed the Bible - the latest episode in which authorities grapple with religious defamation in a traditionally Catholic country that is growing increasingly secular....

Iran warns Gulf Arabs on oil

2012-01-16T07:09:00.000Z

Iran warns Gulf Arabs on oil: CAIRO (AP) -- Iran warned Gulf Arab oil producers against boosting production to offset any potential drop in Tehran's crude exports in the event of an embargo affecting its oil sales, the latest salvo in the dispute between the West and the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program....

HK protesters demand D&G apologize for photo ban

2012-01-16T07:08:00.000Z

HK protesters demand D&G apologize for photo ban: HONG KONG (AP) -- Occupy Dolce & Gabbana? A Hong Kong outlet of the Italian fashion label has been the target of repeated protests because residents claim the store's staff have discriminated against them....

Laugh I could have died

2011-03-02T16:53:00.001Z

called by an off-shore call centre telling me they were part of microsoft and would help me clear all the viruses off my computer....

caller ...Hello, are you the owner of the computer

me.. err, err, yes
......
caller.... crap about microsoft and viruses. followed by ... Is your computer turned on, do you own it and are you by the keyboard.

Me... yes, ooooh what is happening I am scared.

caller... no need to worry I am here to help.

An attempt to take over control of my computer.

Me.... I have something strange on my screen

caller... what does it say?

Me. F for foxtrot, U for uncle C for Charlie K for king I for indigo N nor nobody G for goose W for whisky

Caller... hold on a moment. (He must hang up)

I was transferred to a supervisor.

Supervisor... That looks like a bad virus, new attempt to take over my computer.

Me. Oh no this looks horrible lots of stuff on my screen, please help.

Supervisor.... What do you have.

Me... W for whisky... did you get that

Supervisor... yes (Every letter afterwards, same question, same response).

Me... A for alphabet

N for nobody

K for King

E for Egg

Me...new line and lots of spaces, do you want that too (surely I must be found out by now)

Supervisor... No this is a bad virus we will sort it out in a moment, what else is on the screen.

R for Romeo

S for Stereo

C for Charlie

A for Apple

M for mother

M for mother

E for Egg

and now a big gap

R for red

S for erm.. Sock

That is all I dont know what it means, what does it say.....

Supervisor... (gets the conversation with him in one)

Me... no you missed the first word...

Supervisor... Oh shit.

Made me smile and now I digress

Laugh I could have died I have not laughed so much since auntie mabel caught her left tit in the mangle... Peter Cook and Dudley Moore Ad Nauseum (Sick Bag) a brilliant peice of satire

http://eil.com/shop/moreinfo.asp?catalogid=453919

Womb for hire

2010-12-13T09:23:00.005Z

Is there nothing that the UK won't follow the US in doing?

In a recent case a High Court Family Judge gave a ruling giving the green light to the commoditisation of the womb.

A couple paid an American Woman to give birth to their child and the Judge decided that the fee they had paid this woman was acceptable.

I can see the adverts and websites springing up -

Healthy womb, good pelvic bone, available for hire in March. £25,000. Successful delivery of 18 babies. Will also consider Caesarean for that perfect Christmas Present.

Womb for rent, slightly uncertain pedigree, has managed 5 live births with 2 still births, reduced rate £10,000

Wanted - healthy womb - Couple wanting to celebrate their anniversary in style require the baby to be delivered on 27th May. Prepared to pay up to £35,000 for the right applicant.

Want a womb to rent but strapped for cash. Wombs for hire loans are available at a competitive rate.

I am desperate for cash to pay my mortgage and prepared to offer a reduced rate for my womb, highest deposit secures.

Need a baby in a hurry? Safe Caesareans - We are a specialist clinic working with our womb renters to ensure the fastest delivery possible. See our website for endorsements by satisfied customers.

What a sick country this is becoming.

Net Neutrality blown out of the water

2010-12-05T12:40:00.009Z

Over the past few weeks there are increasingly ominous signs that net-neutrality and an open internet is a thing of the past.

For years countries such as China and Iraq have been pilloried by politicians and journalists in the West over their control and censorship of the internet. No longer can this continue.

This notice is appearing across websites in America, as their Department of Homeland Security makes a land grab for websites. Websites, they claim are offering or pointing to illegal download sites.

There are sites, which have nothing to do with downloads, that are being seized and closed.

The USA has a legal process to follow, in fact a choice of two:

DMCA, whereby a website is informed of infringements and have the opportunity to respond.

The more recently introduced COICA requires that the attorney general ask a court to place that website on a blacklist.

The Department of Homeland Security has however taken it upon themselves to by-pass this legislation and summarily executed court-ordered seizure warrants against a number of domain names, with little evidence, other than a complaint.

This pre-emption would be bad enough on its own, but this is compounded with the WikiLeaks saga, which has seen the USA chase the domain and business around the world, putting pressure on hosts and even going so far as to introducing new legislation, the SHIELD Act, which is an amendment to a section of the Espionage Act, extending it to include:

publishing information concerning the identity of a classified source or informant of an element of the intelligence community of the United States, or concerning the human intelligence activities of the United States or any foreign government.

A piece of legislation which by its very hurry to be implemented indicates how quickly Governments in the West will aim to close down any website with which it has an issue.

In the UK, there has been the pre-emptive closing down on Fitwatch under the say so of a junior ranking police officer. Who decided he was going to act as investigator, prosecutor, barrister, judge and jury coercing a hosting company to remove the site. The site has now been re-instated with another host and as of now, no charges have been made against the domain owner.

A Government Minister in the UK has openly backed the end of net-neutrality with a call for a multi speed internet, with ISPs being able to charge either the website owner, or the consumer a fee, for internet access speed based on the site being visited.

The minister involved, Ed Vaizey, is either extremely thick, or duplicitous, as he continues to claim he is all in favour of net neutrality and on the same page as Berners-Lee and all other net neutrality advocates. He even goes so far as to suggest that because a consumer can choose which speed internet access he purchases from his ISP, is already indicative of a multi-speed internet. I posit, Vaizey isn't as thick as he pretends and has some ulterior motive in wanting to destroy net-neutrality and introduce a multi-speed internet.

This erosion has come about quickly and with little warning, who knows where it will lead.

The President Carter 1980 Rescue mission in Iran still haunts the USA

2010-10-26T22:21:00.005+01:00

American Paranoia continues to sweep over their servants in Europe.

America, determined to create an Empire, keep up their relentless drive to world domination and are currently sashaying to the mood music of Iran and their threat to the West.

Having failed so far, but do watch this space, to convince the poodles in London to support an invasion of Iran, nothing to do with the Carter rescue debacle of 1980 still bruising their egos?

The upright and decent US of A are putting pressure on NATO to accept their demands for a European Missile Shield. The reality being that the European Missile Shield against the immediate and highly dangerous threat of an Iranian missile launch in to Europe will plug in to their missile defences in Israel and the Gulf, which technically are separate and in different stages of development. But they are all designed to plug into command-and-control systems operated by, or with, the U.S. military. Providing the USA with absolute military power and control across Europe and the Middle East.

While the UK has just undertaken a range of financial cuts, they did have the unedifying sight of having their supposed Government asking for permission from the Americans to undertake their defence review and ensure it met with Americas requirement of their little puppy.

Evidently the American demanded and received a slobbering agreement that the UK stump up with their part of the US$200million cost for this oh so necessary project.

That bastion of freedom, Turkey are less easily manipulated by the USA and their bullying tactics have so far failed to make Turkey to acquiesce, or to put it more prosaically, Defence Secretary Robert M. Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with their Turkish counterparts, as Gates put it - '..I would say that we are not putting pressure on the Turks, but we are having continuing conversations with them as one of our allies...'

Lisbon, in November 2010 will undoubtedly see the freedom fighters of the USA, win their argument for a European Defence Shield in one way or another.

This is the same free USA which still argues that Gay military service personnel should be hung drawn and quartered. Oh for the Land of the free.

Time for a break

2010-05-26T20:10:00.002+01:00

The slimebags have been elected and now we have waffle of urgent work that needs to be undertaken.

But there is the slight issue of a holiday.

These rip-off merchants will be away in just 28 days of sittings before heading off for three months holiday.

Urgent... Decisions.... Hard working families....

Sod the lot of them

Local Government Ombudsman

2010-05-13T09:32:00.003+01:00

I am hugely impressed with the LGO, who have a staffing budget of over £10 000 000 a year but when calling them this morning was advised by an automated response that lines were closed due to staff training and wouldn't re-open until 10:30.

What a hugely efficient organisation this is. Payroll costs of over £10m and they manage to send everyoen on training at the same time.

No Idon't believe it either.

Crass incompetence. In addition to raising my initial complaint I will be adding a further complaint about a QUango that so happily wastes money.

The election

2010-05-09T23:58:00.002+01:00

We had an election in the UK.

You may have voted, you may have had faith, good for you.

Who actually was on marches to get rid of corrupt politicians, that was the whole 650 of them. Were you?

You voted for Conservative, why? The leader of this party thought it was fine to claim from you his wisteria clippings.

You voted Labour, why? The leader of this party claimed Sky Sports as an expense, but still demands it is kept as a secret as this is a 'security risk'.

You voted Clegg, why? This man admitted taking expenses for business-class air travel while actually flying economy

Shoot the lot of them.

My wish for 2010

2009-12-28T15:14:00.001Z

It is a great shame that in many countries, puppets are deemed far more relevant than real people.

It is an absolute abhorrence that an Actor/Actress is paid more to pretend to be someone than the real person doing a real job.

Why are puppets paid more to pretend than real people to actually do something useful?

Does an actor/actress really believe them pretending to save someones life, is worth more than someone actually saving a real life? Does a pretend soldier really think they are of greater value to society than a real soldier being shot in the battle field, screaming an real agony and actually bleeding to death?

Does a pretend fireman in all honesty think they are worthy of an accolade for following a directors direction and getting in to no harms way, when a real fireman really does save people, risk their life and all with nothing more than a pittance in relative salary.

It is a sad state of affairs when as a society the pretenders are valued more highly than the realists, but this is our Society.

I have many wishes for the new decade, but of relevance to this post:

I wish people would stop shelling out vast sums of money to watch plastic people play out pretend roles, whilst begrudging paying more tax to financially support real people doing real jobs.

Do we really live in a Society in which serial murderers can't sell their story but a pretend person can be paid millions of dollars for pretending to be that murderer?

Lest MPs forget - Remembrance Sunday - No expenses for wreaths

2009-11-02T18:21:00.004Z

Image via Wikipedia

MPs are quick with their Public Service Announcements, so I thought it may be helpful to make an announcement for MPs as we begin November.

Remembrance Sunday Wreaths are not reclaimable expenses.

The excuses of 'claimed in error' don't wash and never have. Amongst others Ed Balls and Boris Johnson have managed to try and slip this expense past the tax payer.

Remembrance Sunday is not a day to go out and buy a wreath then bill it back to the tax payer.

So just to re-iterate, if you wish to make a donation, or purchase a Remembrance Sunday Wreath, pay it out of your own salary, not out of the taxpayers.

Enough of their pathetic excuses, claiming this type of expense is perhaps as morally low as any of the excessive claims have been.

Lest We forget - in the case of Balls and Johnson, I won't.

Is the FSA for real?

2009-10-19T21:37:00.003+01:00

The FSA, that long discredited regulator is coming up with farcical ideas as they reach the end of their lifespan.

We have had a suggestion that bankers bonuses should be regulated, which is highly fashionable at present, but based on little reality. We have the FSA championed by the Darling, suggesting that if the banks went back to pre-1985 Big Bang, then there would never be another bail-out needed and we have the FSA once

Image via Wikipedia

again supported by Brown, supporting loan regulation.

I am no fan of bankers, but it would be nice to have a little reality.

Bankers bonuses: The bonuses are approved by shareholders. If the shareholders do not wish to take the risk profile suggested by the Directors, there is a simple way to achieve change. Vote against the Directors resolutions at theAGM . But of course the Shareholders have historically been the pension fund managers who sit as non-execs of the banks. However there have been numerous proposals put forward regarding shareholder revisions, but theFSA choose to ignore this reality. In today's climate, the banks who are causing the greatest concern are the banks in which the tax-payer holds a significant shareholding, so the answer is to ensure the tax-payers vote No. But dear old Darling doesn't like simple answers as it clears the decks to easily and the mainstream media just love to hate anyone, so tarnish all bankers with the same brush. The banks who took no funding do not deserve any cut back on bonuses, but that doesn't suit the climate.

Dividing the banks, so that there will be no further bail-out: What trite rubbish, where do Governments and the largest businesses secure complex financing? Funnily enough it isn't from a retail bank. However Darling, Brown and Myners would have us all myopically walk in to a situation that the banks are split as per pre-1985 and all is hunky dory. Let's run that one again, A.N. Investment bank fails, on which the US Government, China, the UK Government and Unilever are reliant on a syndicated finance agreement and the Government would just let it fall like a ton of bricks? How stupid is Darling, or how stupid does he think the population is? Failing retail banks are a problem for the general public, but failing Investment banks are the death knell to capitalism.

Tightening credit, there are a myriad of examples here, but let's take a simple one:

Joe Bloggs earns £100 000 a year and wishes to purchase a property, which is a little run down for £250 000 but he also want to spend £50 000 on refurbishment. Under the proposed FSA rules he could borrow a loan for a house valued at £300 000 on his salary, but borrowing £250 000 plus £50 000 to refurbish the place is an unacceptable Loan to Value, so is a no go: absolute madness. He therefore needs to borrow the additional £50 000 as a personal loan over perhaps 10 years at a far higher rate of interest and monthly repayment than borrowing that money as part of his mortgage.

One more example: Jane Smith has a house valued at £140 000 which is mortgaged at 100%, she also has credit card debts of £10 000 and a personal loan for £5 000. Is the FSA suggesting that LTV is the absolute measure of credit worthiness? What about Andy Pandy, who has no house but want to borrow £2 000, should his personal loan be asset backed?

It is all good knock about media stuff, but the crew running the regulators really need to join up their thinking a little.

The FTC endorsement guidelines

2009-10-16T11:17:00.005+01:00

It has been a while, since I was here, life has been a little busy.

I thought it may help readers of this blog and other bloggers, to put up the ftc guidelines on advertising and endorsement. Unfortunately they are yet another example of yet more red tape in a world full of red tape.

Each video is different

Here is the link for the pdf of the text to the guidelines in detail

happy reading.

Oh and by the way, I get a small commission if adverts on this site are clicked, but I was not paid by the ftc, or even sent a thank you note or any sort of acknowledgement. No coffee was offered, Green card, free flights, visitors visa, luxury hotel, or even dingy hotel stay. No meetings with any individual, corporate or governmental agency were promised as a result of posting this article. I was offered no inducement, no pork barrel legislation or even primary legislation was discussed, promised or offered. In fact I have had no contact with the FTC in relation to this article and have received nor been promised anything at all in fact in return for this public service announcement. (I think that just about covers it).

Come to think of it, why haven't I been paid for writing about an alien Governments legislation?

Has google become too clever?

2009-10-09T20:34:00.003+01:00

Less an irritation than my usual posts, rather a simple question. Has google lost sight of the user?

Personally I am a google fan and welcome areas such as Wave, Android, Squared, Analytics, [show options], gmail, pages, wheel, blogger, maps, earth, etc. etc, etc. but there is a not so glamorous side, which includes the cookie which sits on your computer unless you opt-out, the new google 'wiki'. Neither the glamour nor the darkness are really the purpose of the post. Who uses al

Image via CrunchBase

l this stuff and why is Google constantly releasing more and more?

While I don't consider myself a geek (well perhaps I am a bit geeky as I live on the computer and am an alpha tester by 'index finger reflex' - that well known medical condition) I like to try out all this stuff, I work with most of it and I use a lot of it, which is great for me as a user of google services. Google docs, makes my life easy, igoogle makes my home page useful, google reader keeps me up to date, but really who uses this.

In conversation with 'normal' users of the web, there is little comprehension or interest that a google search can be in "" with a +, with a -, with a square 10 page view 100 page view, news, blogs etc. etc. etc.

Google works because it retrieves what people want easily, their little 'darkside' moves are hidden, their added value is hidden. I am of the opinion that those who support Google are those of a Geek disposition, each process adds revenue to Google for sure, as we the geeks find ways to optimise, utilise, advertise the medium of communication we select, but does the average user really know that Google Earth and Google Maps are different products showing different things? The answer is by a short straw poll, absolutely not. I had a recent conversation with someone who constantly talked of google earrth, but was referring to google maps.

Does that confusion matter? No, of course it doesn't, Google was mentioned and from the Google perspective, that is all that mattered.

Who actually subscribes to the Google blog? Lonely hand raised over here.

I am not whinging about google as I like much of what they do, but on speaking to casual internet users, google remains the box you type in your search term and perhaps a gmail account, but not much else. Google marketing needs to get its ass in gear, there is a whole world aside from the geeks.

Nowun Till, brought to you by another Google product - Blogspot

Some songs are just so complete

2009-10-05T13:05:00.001+01:00

Kate Miller sums it up with a great parody of friends on facebook

Ann Minch sums it up

2009-09-24T04:16:00.001+01:00

Sometimes there is nothing to add....

MPs Second Homes

2009-09-20T10:02:00.003+01:00

MPs second homes remain a bug bear and now that politicians have started to filter back to the fray with their conferences, it would be good to hear at least one of the parties talk about the scandal of MPs expenses.

No doubt the fond hope politicians have, is that their abuse of expenses will have been forgotten and they can concentrate on more important issues such as clinging on to what so many believe is their career.

Many MPs do have a need for accommodation closer to London I don't argue against that point. (Other than the whole system is wrong, but that is well know by blog readers). But taking the starting point that we do have this system and we do have Westminster, there can be little doubt that MPs need to be able to get to there.

What is absolutely wrong, is that MPs purchase property, which is subsidised or paid for outright by the tax payer and the MP then takes the profit. This is completely different to House flipping, which is circumvention of Capital Gains tax payments. MPs use the system to make fat profits out of taxpayers when they sell the property the tax payer has paid for and this is plainly wrong under even the most cursory of glances.

There is no excuse at all for MPs being permitted to take 100% ownership of a home which is paid for out of public funds. This abuse must be stamped out immediately.

MPs must not be permitted to deflect the argument, by saying they now no longer are permitted to flip houses, that is a personal tax issue. They must not be able to pocket the profits on a house sale which has been funded in anyway by allowances.

An MPs second home paid for by taxpayers is not an MPs home, it belongs to the taxpayer.

image ( 'Going Once' Colour Edition by STATIC) courtesy of another wall

Strictly Come Dancing Interviews

2009-09-15T15:49:00.005+01:00

Strictly Come Dancing heading for BBC One and BBC HD on Friday 18th September, 8.30pm with the second show on Saturday 19th September, 7.25pm.

Pre-show thoughts by the dancing celebrities

Political spin and fetish porn

2009-09-14T23:56:00.004+01:00

Yet again the political parties are sound blasting about Public Sector spending after the election and once again listening to politicians thinking they are being clever by refusing to talk about what they will actually do is becoming increasingly annoying.

Political media advisers live in such effective sound proof boxes, that I don't think they can even hear what they themselves are saying. While the Conservatives are unclear about what they will actually cut, we at least know they are going to make cuts, but the Labour Party - no idea what their plans are.

Like a broken record, they all pound out the mantra 'difficult decisions' what on earth does that actually mean?

Politicians need to start engaging with the general public, discussing the issues, not politicians wish to lecture on, but the issues on which people want answers. The more political media advisers decide on the next 'headline' the less relevance it has and the less credibility the politicians have to a wider audience.

There is no point in politicians trying to engage each other in debates, when neither of them actual listens to what another politician says, particularly when that debate is not something which resonates with the general public.

Many people would like to know what cuts are intended and when, then a serious debate can develop, meanwhile the politicians want to sabre rattle over whether a 'cut' is going to happen or whether a 'cut' is only a tightening of the belt, it is fatuous and whilst appearing glossy to those in the Westminster cesspit is as edifying as watching '2 girls 1 cup', I wonder if that particular cesspit would have made for a more appropriate location? (If you haven't seen the clip I don't recommend it).

I want to become a corrupt official

2009-09-11T07:33:00.004+01:00

A great video by the journalist Zhang Jun which was originally running on the Southern Metropolis Daily has subsequently been removed, was looking at what young children would like to do when they grew up.

It was all going well until:
appeared on screen, at about 2:03 in to the video.

Earlier children had said the usual things, I don't know, a photographer, a painter, a pilot and the ubiquitous fireman.

The star of the video declared:

I want to be an official

The reporter questioned: 'What kind of an official'

To which she smilingly replied: 'A corrupt official, because corrupt officials have a lot of things.'

Her smiling response is superb.

Acted or real, it makes for great viewing and sadly shows corruption is not unique to British Politicians.

The video edit is classic irony as the final pupil says that she would like to become a music teacher and fades out to her rendition of Jasmine Flower.

Is this research?

2009-09-08T08:59:00.004+01:00

I heard about the Dishonesty research that was recently conducted by Brunel University and was as amazed as many people I spoke to about the findings of the researchers, so was all set to write a scathing article about Moral turpitude and the country having the politicians it deserves.

However, I wanted to find the research material the paper had been based on and found the website on which this survey had been conducted, the study is still open, so I decided to take the test and it really didn't seem to be based on very much at all.

The website itself highlights the 'wall of shame' and 'confessions' so automatically the site is goading the respondent that 'dishonesty' will give you a reward by showcasing your sins.

Image by ~Sage~ via Flickr

The survey itself is also hardly robust. A selection of 5 video clips are offered, with drop down responses on offer. Some scenarios are clear cut, but too many require context, as in 'does your employer permit this to happen'.

There are questions on taking things from the stationary cupboard. When I ran an office based business, I explicitly gave staff permission to use company stationary, in a limited way, for personal use. So the 'is this right or wrong' had no context.

Having completed 5 videos the respondent has the opportunity to take another set of 5 videos ad infinitum as far as I could tell. The videos changing based on what appeared to be a random selection as occasionally videos previously seen were re-presented.

While the study received much publicity, I am unconvinced about the robust nature of the study.

Is there a possibility that 'scientific study' and 'Research material' is taken too much at face value.

blue pulse

2009-09-07T08:47:00.001+01:00

North Korea and enriched Uranium

2009-09-04T09:45:00.002+01:00

It always seems to come as a surprise to the UN that North Korea is continuing with its development of Nuclear weapons and the response by the UN is pretty well the same. More sanctions.

I don't quite know who the politicians think sanctions hurt, but they can't really expect the leadership of any country against whom sanctions are imposed to find life too difficult and certainly not in comparison to the general population of the country on which sanctions are imposed.

Image via Wikipedia

Perhaps the intention really is for a bloody civil war to ensue, with UN peacekeepers riding in like knights in shining armour to condemn war atrocities clear up the dead bodies and tut, tut about the chaos.

Maybe it is in some bizarre belief that the leadership of the country will take the sanctions hit first and decide to cow-tow to the diktats of the UN, or more honestly the diktats of the US in their ever increasing desire to run the world.

I wonder sometimes if the political leadership of the US are just desperate to have the stamp of 'Empire' written in history books about the USA some time in the future.

A small country, targeted by the USA really only has one form of protection and that is Nuclear Weapons. With little doubt were it not for the nuclear weapons in Pakistan, the US would by now be fighting to overthrow the Government in Pakistan claiming a crusade against terrorism.

They may have flown missions in to Pakistani airspace and killed many people in the process, but having been told to back off, the threat of the nuclear trigger has made them listen. Would they had that threat not been there? I doubt it very much.

What does the UN and in particular the US expect the North Korean leadership to do? Hand over the reigns of power to a democratically elected Government? Do they really? Do they expect the political leadership of North Korea sit around waiting for another American led invasion?

Not only does political power breed arrogance it also breeds contempt towards other people. Just because the US is contemptuous of the North Korean leadership, doesn't make the North Korean leadership stupid, so they take action which they believe will stall an invasion and all the evidence suggest, if you have nuclear weapons, you are suddenly not such a roll-over.

The response to this reaction being, 'let's impose more sanctions'. After all they have been so successful in the past?

The aggressive machismo of American military power has so far resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians and the displacement of millions of people.

After 8 years of failing to build an Empire, it is long past time the US headed back to their apple pies and white picket fences. The world was a far better place 8 years ago and when the US gets back inside its borders, perhaps they could this time decide not to fund international terrorists.

Strictly come dancing swhirls back to the screens

2009-08-28T11:41:00.004+01:00

Away from the politics for a change to a much lighter subject, in fact can you get lighter than light entertainment?

The BBC are once again running with Strictly Come Dancing, which achieved a peak viewing of 13 million people.

Dance has always been a feature of BBC broadcasting.

The schedule for September 1, 1936, 'Here's looking at you' features Carol Chilton & Maceo Thomas - Creole dancers & singers - amongst others. The earliest broadcasting recording known to exist from a 1933 programme 'Looking in' includes 'the Paramount Astoria Girls' a dance troupe.

Strictly come dancing, has in the minds of the Judges been a competition to find the most proficient dancers, many viewers take a contrary view and see the programme as entertainment, voting for the celebrity they like best and not necessarily for the best dancer.

The competition returns to the BBC in September, with new line-up of dancers, some new judges and a new format.

The competition for viewers continues to heat up and the BBC have appointed Headstream for the PR this year.

For the lowdown on this years programme here is the BBC link

Kennedy dies memories go fuzzy

2009-08-26T17:05:00.004+01:00

Kennedy, who has just died, is now being lauded by many politicians.

This video remembers Mary Jo Kopechne, who died 40 years aged 28, when Kennedy left her to die after he drove his car over the bridge at Chappaquiddick

Back in March of this year Gordon Brown announced that Kennedy had been conferred an honourary knighthood, which caused considerable derision.

Kennedy was the man who said Protestants who didn't want a United Ireland, should leave for the mainland and equated the presence of British Troops akin to American troops in the Vietnam.

Kennedy died would been more than enough news coverage for this man.

NORAID, Scotland and the USA

2009-08-24T09:00:00.003+01:00

A broad range of people in the USA are jumping on an anti-Scottish bandwagon as they disagree with the position taken by the Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill, over his decision to release Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds.

While I can understand the decision is divisive, many people supporting fully the decision, others oppose vehemently, what I find particularly galling is the stream of bile which is emanating from Political figures in the USA.

Lieberman, an independent senator called for an investigation into the release, adding the release was a "real setback for the anti-terrorist cause".

Democratic Senator Cardin, said: "The terrorist shows no compassion and to give him a compassionate release was wrong. 'I think it's very serious and I think there should be consequences.'

Mueller, head of the FBI said the decision had made a mockery of justice and given comfort to terrorists around the world.

These may be views which hold a certain amount of resonance to many people. But I would just like to take a step away from the rhetoric and look at recent American terrorist support.

NORIAD- In May 1981, the U.S. Department of Justice won a court case forcing Noraid to register the Provisional Irish Republican Army as its "foreign principal", under the Foreign Agents Registration Act 1938.

Noraid hugely successful fund raisers in the USA, provided many believe, substantial funding for the IRA to purchase arms. Noraid openly expressed support for the IRA but said it gave money for humanitarian aid,denying donations were used for the purchase of arms.

The Irish Freedom Committee still posts on the front page of its website:

The Irish Freedom Committee^®(IFC) is an American-based human rights activist organization. We oppose the 1998 Stormont Treaty with Britain-- disingenuously titled the "Good Friday Agreement" or "Peace Process"-- as it is a British-imposed document which has nothing to do with peace, but is designed only to shore up Partition and to strengthen British rule in Ireland.

John McDonagh while chairman of the IFC was able to distinguish between IRA bombs and the World trade centre attacks saying: 'There's no comparison. I don't think it's in the psyche of the Irish to become suicide bombers. The IRA gives warnings before its bombings. What happened here brings it to a whole new level.'

The Irish Freedom Committee is committed to the pursuit of TRUTH with JUSTICE in a Free, United, Sovereign All-Ireland Republic.

US-Ireland Alliance, which has a facebook group with over 1 000 members entitled:

Supporters of the IRA (Irish Republican Army)

The Mission of the IRA is to free Ireland from British rule and give Ireland back to the Irish. The IRA is devoted to freedom and justice for the Irish people. We must fight back against centuries of rape and pillage. IRA Forever!!!

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” -John F Kennedy

I suggest before the head of the FBI starts calling Scotland a country which supports terrorism, he may well be better advised to look at some of his own countries organisations.

EU election monitors - Afghanistan a fair vote

2009-08-23T02:38:00.004+01:00

Well if the EU, with absolutely no vested interest in the election outcome, claim it was a fair vote, it must have been.

Apart from the small issue of their problem with voting in the South of the Country, but hey that doesn't matter, it is all about the count. Oh the indelible ink problem? Never heard of it. Thanks to the EU commission for the endorsement, but some of us actually have a brain.

Politicians in a social network

2009-08-17T16:52:00.002+01:00

The concept of British politicians understanding social networking, is perhaps one of the greatest jokes this year.

We have MPs who don't understand the contempt with which they are held, voting as Speaker a man who held a Directorship of a Caymans Island registered Company and flipped his houses, while at the same time they pretend to push hard for a change in off shore tax-havens whilst lambasting house flippers.

Perhaps they really are too thick to understand how to fill in their expenses claims.

The Labour Party has chosen a woman by the name of Kerry McCarthy, as their 'New media expert', it would appear from that choice, she is the Labour Party 'expert', I could find people expressing more coherence drunkenly swaying at a late night party.

Already dubbed by many of her fellow MPs as the twitter Tsar, which to be fair to her she doesn't like. 'But we are getting back in touch', her colleagues proclaim. Tsar - some basic knowledge of history would indicate how far out of touch and offensive this term can be.

But still they push forward, with the Labour Party anointing Kerry as the Guru on 'new media', although she seems to think that social networking consists of twitter, facebook, linkedin and a nod to Youtube, hardly new media.

Twitter, according to McCarthy is the place to be, Facebook is just a place to communicate with friends and linkedin is the place for professional contacts. The opines of an out of touch politico.

Apparently, according to the 'new media' expert you and I will head off and find these politicians on their blogs and social networking sites, while all they have to do is sit and wait for our visit.

They want to teach us how to use the internet responsibly, they don't even appear to understand what it is?

If McCarthy really expects people outside the Westminster tent to engage with Politicians and in particular the Labour Party she needs to learn about Social Networking. To dismiss Facebook as a no go area demonstrates how ridiculous and out of touch politicians really are with the real world.

I doubt many politicians will understand the satire, or references to social networking on the following video.

ASBOS and social dileniation

2009-08-10T16:43:00.006+01:00

The thrust on ASBOs, since they first emerged always seemed to be they were a law focussed on people in Social Housing, leaving louts in private homes largely untouched.

As the regulations on ASBOs have been developed and the focus of the legislation has become more illuminated, I am drawn more towards this conclusion.

Much emphasis is made on ASBOs about how those with the orders can find themselves thrown out of their rented accommodation, in some attempt to show the orders have some teeth.

I decided, that my perception needed a little more investigation, so contacted the Home Office to obtain some statistics, particularly in relation to the % of ASBOs cited against people living in Social Housing and as to how many ASBOs were instigated by Social Landlords, as other than the Police and Local Authority they are the only people able to instigate an ASBO.

While I was delighted with the speed of response by the Home Office statistics office, only a matter of a few days, the content was depressing.

'...Information is not collected centrally about the characteristics or circumstances of persons issued with an ASBO. ...'

In other words, the Government is continuing to pursue a line that ASBOs are effective because people can loose their homes, on an assumption, without any supporting evidence that ASBOs are directed at those living in Social Housing.

This is classic class warfare being conducted strangely by a party which claims to have equality at its heart.

We have a disgraceful situation in which a law enables Social Housing tenants to be evicted from their property, but homeowners can not be sanctioned in the same way.

This really is an us and them piece of legislation.

Why is it, that if I live near to someone who is of 'anti-social' (I will leave the term hanging in its connotation)and they live in Social Housing I can contact three sets of people to have action taken and if they continue to cause a problem they may be evicted, not on breach of tenancy agreement grounds, but on breach of ASBO grounds. However if that same person lives in private accommodation. I only have two ways to take action and that person can't be evicted on the grounds of breaching the ASBO.

I am not talking about changing the status of ASBOs to include legislation to enable state confiscation of homes for ASBO breaches, I would be one of the first to condemn such a move.

I am however disgusted to be living in a country in which the less well off face a set of laws, set by the state, not a question of access to representation, that doesn't apply to those who are better off.

As the Home Office Stats office doesn't have any available information on the social backgrounds of those with ASBOs, why does the Governnment and the Home Office in particular continue to focus sanctions against those who live in Social housing, while avoiding any meaningful sanctions against those in private accomodation?

I could imagine the 'disgusted of Tunbridge Wells' had ASBOs been introduced with the ability to evict home owners but not Social Housing tenants.

We already live in a fragmented Society with rafts of people being left to sink, legislation such as those which framework ASBOs are unforgiveble.

Stiletto heels and the work place

2009-08-07T11:57:00.007+01:00

The TUC have decided to raise an issue which is creating something of a divide in the views of both men and women, with the divisions not coming across on gender lines. The TUC have put forwards a proposal that stiletto heels should be banned from the workplace, on the grounds of health and safety.

As an advocate of retaining freedom, I believe the TUC is sticking its nose in to an area in which they have no real business to concern themselves. I have visions of our ever protective Labour Government deciding this would be a good bandwagon to jump on, requiring all high heels are sold with a stamp on the soles, or more likely across the heel and uppers, stating these may cause a health risk.

In practical terms, High heels are not appropriate in all work places, but that goes for Ties for men. Is the natural development of this type of legislation that we should all turn up to work in Maoists suits?

Certainly there are many people who feel that a female dressed in high heels does not project a professional image, but that is for the individual and employer to deal with.

The aspect of work attire, is an ever present conundrum for individuals and employers to negotiate. The timing of the proposal sits neatly with the Liberal Democratic party proposal on photoshopping advertising, with the claim that photoshopped adverts put pressure on women to conform to an idealistic 'standard'.

A similar argument of pressure in attire can be fashioned for high heels. While many people have commented that heels provide them with a sense of empowerment and confidence, many are arguing it looks sexy, which appears to be, for many roles, perhaps a reason that they are inappropriate and are irrelevant to work place standards. The idea that a High Court Judge is wondering if they look 'sexy' while in court, would raise alarm bells for many.

Tory MP Nadine Dorries said the extra height can help women in the workplace. She added: 'I'm 5ft 3in need every inch of my Christian Louboutin heels to look my male colleagues in the eye. If high heels were banned in Westminster, no one would be able to find me. (source Daily Mail)

This type of comment, doesn't, I think, help in any way. I fail to see any need to mention the shoe manufacturer, as it brings the level down to, I wear more expensive clothes than you, once again bringing the issue of dress code down to a battle of wallet and idolatry.

Wearing of high heels in the work place should not be an area in which the TUC get involved. The spurious argument some are making is that for them to be making any comment is sexist, is fatuous.

Those who have concerns with 'image projection' should reign back their horns a little. The issue is being raised on Health and Safety grounds and this is an area in which legislation is rife and becoming ever more encroaching. Those who like the idea of freedom to wear what ever they and their employer deem acceptable, need to listen to the grounds the TUC are taking a stance. Don't let the health and safety creep take away all our civil liberties.

The issue of clothing in the workplace is and should remain, in the majority of cases an issue between employer and employee, not a concern for the Health and Safety police.

Image source China culture center

Censoring airbrushed photographs in advertising

2009-08-03T13:09:00.006+01:00

The Liberal Democrats are calling for advertising aimed at people under the age of 16 to be completely prohibited from airbrushing adverts, or for a disclosure notice to be placed next to the adverts aimed at older age groups.

This is yet another example of MPs desire to meddle being without the slightest thought. Jo Swinson claims that "Liberal Democrats believe in the freedom of companies to advertise but we also believe in the freedom of young people to develop their self-esteem and to be as comfortable as possible with their bodies, without constantly feeling the need to measure up to a very narrow range of digitally manipulated shapes and sizes."

The top picture is of Jo on the liberal democrats campaign for Gender Balance

The one, below, is not quite so posed, any reason the lower photograph isn't that being used, it appears to be the same clothes, so may have even been taken on the same day?

The idea that digitally enhanced photographs can somehow be controlled by legislation, speaks volumes for the simplistic notion MPs have of what really matters.

Are the Liberal Democrats suggesting that make-up shouldn't be worn by subjects in photographs, what about lighting effects, backgrounds, the pose itself? When will MPs stop trying to interfere with the minutiae of everyone else's life and get on with proposing policies for aspects which matter.

The suggestion that the use of airbrushed images in advertising is somehow corrupting misses the point. They need to look at what they are trying to achieve and work to a solution from there. The easy headline of banning airbrushed photographs will do nothing, if they are trying to stop people feeling the need to look one way or another. The product being advertised is the core issue, not the image surrounding it. Though that is not in any way to suggest they need to stick their noses into product advertising, it is intended to demonstrate the backward thinking of Politicians.

An advertising agency would work round such a ridiculous legislation, with consummate ease and the Lib/Dem objective, ridiculous as it is, would have been missed by a mile.

Thanks Jo, but no thanks, enough meddling. Time to change the image on the gender balance website, as it appears to contravene a few of these policy document guidelines.

Eco-friendly manufacturing on a small island

2009-07-30T10:50:00.003+01:00

Perhaps it is just me, but the name kind of gives it away. The Isle of Wight,

located just off the Southern coast of mainland Britain. Being a small island, it requires that virtually all manufactured items be transported by sea off the island, many transferred to road and rail freight from nearby Portsmouth and Southampton, or in to larger ships for onward distribution.

The development of an eco-energy plant on a location with difficult transportation issues would not seem to be a long thought out strategic location. Be that as it may, Vestas, a Danish business set up a wind turbine blade manufacturing unit on the island, Vestas Blades, together with a research and development facility.

Vestas deem that the Northern European market and in particular the UK wind turbine market is in such a poor state that it is no longer viable to produce the blades on the island and have decided to shut down the plant.

As a result of such a large employer closing down on the Island, the workers, supported by trades unions have been fighting to keep the factory open. As part of the protest about 25 workers became involved in a lock-in, which is now resulting in a legal battle by Vestas to force the sit-in to end.

While I may not be the greatest fan of trades unions and fail to get it that when a business decides to shut a unit, the employees deem that the business should stay open regardless of any financial losses being made by the business, I do however fully support the rights for people to demonstrate, so can kind of get my head around the sit-in.

What I don't understand is why this protest has brought Green demonstraters to the proceedings. So called eco-warriors have joined the demonstrations over the shut down, despite the fact that Vestas have indicated there is no market in Northern Europe and they are planning on expanding the US operation, whilst increasing the R&D facilities on the Island.

The Government, has offered to inject money in to the plant, but Vestas have made a commercial decision that the plant is not viable.

If the eco-warriors wish to protest about the issue, they need to look, not at Vestas, but the 'nimby' attitude across much of the UK. It is council planning and local residents committees who are stopping the development of wind farms, not companies like Vestas who are actively engaged in the business. The big energy companies make great noises about eco-friendly power generation, but do very little to force the issue, so perhaps a word in their ear may be more useful.

The eco-warriors should be supporting the development of the R&D facility in to wind power generation, not bemoaning the loss of a manufacturing plant located in an ill-conceived location.

While politicians talk, businesses act

2009-07-29T11:04:00.002+01:00

Image via Wikipedia

In September 2008, Gordon Brown made great play of a £285 million Mortgage Rescue Scheme, which would save 6 000 homes from repossession.

Eventually in January this year, the scheme was actually launched and so far the grand total of six homes have been helped.

Businesses on the other hand are actually getting on with things and as a result, approaching 1 000 homes a week are currently being repossessed.

When pressed on the numbers of homes which had received help from the scheme, Mandelson wouldn't be drawn on a figure, when he was told the number was six, his response was a cringing, 'you have scored your point'.

That Mandelson is back in office is a scandal, about which I have written previously, that he sees the fact that a 1 000 homes a week are being repossessed and only six families have actually been helped as a 'point scored' says all you need to know about the state of British Politics.

While politicians rush to take the microphone and grab a few seconds air time to announce yet another 'policy' the world continues around them, a fact of which they seem completely oblivious.

Homeless families are not 'scored points'. Mandelson may have friends who lend him money to buy houses, while he investigates their probity, he may get away with forgetting to inform the Britannia Building Society about the 'deposit' being a loan, but that is not the way for most people.

Politicians talk about doing things, Banks repossess homes and families are destroyed. Not scored points, but real people.

Bercow looks above the parapet

2009-07-28T17:49:00.002+01:00

Bercow, the new speaker of the House of Commons, has noticed that people are pretty fed up with the £25 a day unreceipted subsistance allowance that went through on a nod and has decided to call for a meeting of the members estimate committee next week.

Already Nick Harvey is claiming the story of the allowance has been blown out of proportion and all this was agreed way back in March.

Strange how MPs have been managing to claim on this allowance, but none of them actually bothered to pipe up and mention that the subsistance allowance didn't require any receipts. Even stranger it wasn't until the story gathered pace today that Bercow noticed the problem.

Who said Politics in the UK couldn't become more odious?

The Government does care about military personnel, really

2009-07-28T13:01:00.002+01:00

The decision by the MoD to appeal against payments received by service personnel, is being excused by the MoD as a necessary process to validate legislation.

While the Government continue to protest that they support service personnel, their comments and actions hold little confidence in wider circles. While politicians and Senior Military personnel wander around attempting to out shout each other, the reality of death and injury on the battlefields continue.

The MoD is taking to the Court of Appeal cases against two servicemen:

Light Dragoon Anthony Duncan, was originally awarded £9,250 which was increased to £46,000 by an appeal tribunal, for injuries received in Iraq.

Royal Marine Matthew McWilliams was awarded £8,250, increased to £28,750 on appeal.

The deaths of two more British soldiers in Afghanistan were announced yesterday, bringing the number killed in July to 22.

Increasing number of service personnel are dying and being injured, yet the platitudes offered by politicians do nothing to appease the concerns being expressed by the General Public. This own goal by the MoD will do nothing to restore any confidence.

Of ongoing concern will be the fate of soldiers who develop mental health problems on returning home.

The closure of the Henderson Hospital last year, which was a world renowned therapeutic community for people with disorders including post traumatic stress, which was opened in 1947 to help soldiers returned from the Second World War, with the ramification of curtailing expenditure on service provision and research, is a clear demonstration that the Government is more interested in saving money than ensuring the infrastructure is in place to assist wounded and mentally scarred service personnel on their return from active service.

Don't let foreigners use the NHS - but let us use your hospitals

2009-07-27T13:39:00.004+01:00

The clarion call from the right wing of British Politics, which seems to include everything in mainstream politics, is that foreigners are using up valuable resources in the UK and of particular concern is the over use of NHS resources.

I wonder how these people feel, now that a British patient is being treated in a Swedish hospital, for swine flu.

There are five specialist beds in Britain for the technique, known as extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), at a hospital in Leicester, but they are currently all taken, so this woman was flown into Sweden, where she is now receiving treatment at Karolinska University Hospital in Solna.

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It would be interesting to take a straw poll on those who object to foreigners using NHS resources, on whether British Nationals using valuable resource in foreign hospitals is acceptable, or should this woman just have been left to see how it all turned out?

The NHS is in the process of making contingency plans to fly a limited number of swine flu patients to European hospitals if Britain’s intensive care services become overwhelmed.

Political amnesia

2009-07-25T09:11:00.009+01:00

The Norwich-North by-election has thrown up an interesting phenomena, so the reports from mainstream media would appear to suggest.

Political commentators tend to congregate around political activists and forget the world is far wider than myopic interest groups, reading and listening to comments pre and post election saw a focus on the 'Ian Gibson' effect. The suggestion in the world of political punditry suggesting that the fact that Ian Gibson had been axed by the Labour party caused great resentment in the constituency, with people feeling it unfair that he had been singled out by a Gordon Brown vendetta, for being an Independent minded MP.

Ian Gibson voting record Publicwhip
From -------To -------- Rebellions --------------- Attendance
5 May 2005 8 Jun 2009 63 votes out of 897, 7.0% 897 votes out of 1047, 85.7%
7 Jun 2001 11 Apr 2005 52 votes out of 953, 5.5% 953 votes out of 1246, 76.5%
1 May 1997 14 May 2001 16 votes out of 1067, 1.5% 1067 votes out of 1273, 83.8%

Elliot Morley who was also axed, shows few rebellions

From ------ To --------- Rebellions -------------- Attendance
5 May 2005 still in office 5 votes out of 760, 0.7% 760 votes out of 1113, 68.3%
7 Jun 2001 11 Apr 2005 6 votes out of 766, 0.8% 766 votes out of 1246, 61.5%
1 May 1997 14 May 2001 5 votes out of 864, 0.6% 864 votes out of 1273, 67.9%

Which leads the 'vendetta argument' a little thin.

The argument continues other MPs, who are closer to Brown, did far worse and didn't receive the same treatment. It may be true, but does that mean he shouldn't have been axed?

Great play was made on some reports of the lone protester at the celebrations, that this was emblematic of the true feeling in Norwich, that this 'hard working' MP had been hard done by. A lone protester does not make for a rational argument.

Brown may well be hugely unpopular, there may well be many MPs who committed far worse infractions, but that shouldn't leave political commentators in a state of denial.

The simple facts are that Ian Gibson let his daughter live, rent-free, in a flat largely paid for out of expenses, and then sold it to her for below market value. The claiming for a second home for his daughter is and was untenable.

We hear how 'hard working' he was. This has become the mantra of the Labour party spin machine, based on political village gossip, that really everyone in Norwich North thinks he was a good man. We had the absurd sight of Geoff Hoon, on Question Time, defending Gibson on the grounds that he was hard working, this is the same Geoff Hoon, who was found out to have been claiming allowances on two 'second homes' of course by mistake and was forced to return an overpayment, claimed £400 a month in food allowances, lived in a grace-and-favour apartment in Whitehall yet claimed costs for his home in Derbyshire which he flipped within months of losing his grace-and-favour apartment in 2006.

Being hard-working is not in itself a virtue, Bernard Madoff, was by all accounts a very hard working man, unfortunately for those he ripped off, he was a man busy committing financial fraud.

The closed political circus are attempting to make the Labour defeat in Norwich-North to be an opportunity to blame Brown for yet another problem in the Labour Party. Brown may be totally discredited, the Labour Government out of steam and out of touch, but Gibson was the man claiming irregular expenses and it was right he was axed. It was his choice to stand down prior to the election, a good thing I would hasten to add. As a result of the by-election one bad apple has been thrown out of Parliament and that is a good thing, it is a great pity that more do not resign, have not yet been prosecuted and are not being sanctioned.

Irrespective of the size of the indescretion, any discredited MP who is out of office is a good thing. Were the mainstream media commentators to get their noses out of the Westminster trough and smell some real air, they may well also be celebrating this fact.

Ed Balls and literacy levels

2009-07-10T10:17:00.004+01:00

Ed Balls, has set himself up with a twitter account, which in itself is in my opinion a good thing, as he exposes himself to immediate reaction to his comments and a way for people to directly communicate with him.

Increasingly MPs are doing this in the UK and theoretically it can only be to the good. However in exposing themselves to this level of scrutiny, they also need to take responsibility and be aware that their actions on Social networking sites, provides an insight to some of their actions they may wish to keep out of the public glare. In other words, they should behave responsibly.

Today saw Ed Balls, make a bit of a twitter gaff. He evidently decided that he needed to generate more followers, so set himself up with one of those 'get lots of followers on twitter' sites. The value of which is a different debate and open to personal preference.

Having decided to join one of these sites, a twitter user needs to know exactly who they are dealing with. Not only does the particular site in question, require your log-in details for your twitter account, itself something that can be problematical, but in this particular instance the 'contact us page' leads to a 404 error page, the 'about us page' tells you nothing about the company itself, but is full of typographic errors.

About
XXX (site name removed as I have no wish to promote this site) is a tools website for twitter. Here you will gain more followers for your account. This concept is quit simple and works very well. The 1st thing you will need to do is login your account (The same info as your twitter credentials) Then after loging in your taken to page with a list of vip members and regular members. The vip members are paid members and will gain the most followers on our site. Right now vip members are getting anywhere betwenn 400-1500 followers a day. The regular members are free members. Before anyone can join this site you are obligated to click and follow all the vip members and the last 20 regular members. After doing the following you can then join the site to get more followers.

These two problem pages should lead to alarm bells, but evidently to Ed Balls this wasn't the case. So he decided to sign up for an account, despite not reading the terms of service, which do actually lead to a link with some meaningful, if incorrectly spelt information. It is only a 7 point terms of service, so hardly onerous.

T.O.S
1. You agree to submit your twitter accout credentials.

2. You agree to allow us to store your account information in our database.

3. You agree your account will be used to automatically tweet an update on your account for promotional purposes every 6 hours with the exception of VIP members.

4. You agree upon loging in you allow us tweet an update on your twitter for promotion.

5. You agree when buying vip there are no refunds or returns what so ever.

6. You agree to allow us up to 6 hours to put your twitter user name on the vip section.

7. You agree if you spam our site you will be banned from our service forever with out hesitation.

But Ed appears not to have read this and when the spam messages began to appear:

I just become a member of this AWESOME site that gets you TONS of followers: http://XXX

unsuprisingly followers were not amused.

He was suprised by this, sending out the following message:

Apologies to all.. I followed a link and it has spammed everyone. Still learning.. RT @deburca: Be aware of all of these automated tweets!

I accept people make mistakes, yes even I do, but this process provides an insight into the mind of this man.

He doesn't check site validity prior to signing up, he doesn't read T.O.S. despite them being very simple and easily seen.

I wonder whether Ed Balls is someone we should trust to prepare and scrutinize legislation. If he can't read a 7 point Terms of Service, how on earth does he manage with reams of documentation?

Is it any wonder the Learning Skills Council overspend occured? Balls introduced legislation to raise the education leaving age from 16 to 18, yet failed to give schools and colleges the money they needed to make these reforms a reality.

He has shown himself someone as not fit to tell other people how to use the Internet, as he doesn't grasp the reality of not checking out a site, or the need to read the T.O.S.

The wasted 16 million pounds and the missing Minister

2009-07-07T08:53:00.005+01:00

The investigation into the collapse of MG Rover in 2005, which resulted in the loss of 6,000 jobs at the plant was finally completed 4 years after its instigation a

Image via Wikipedia

t the cost of £16 million.

Just when it appeared that some questions would be answered about the Phoenix Four, the SFO were asked to investigate the collapse, leading to the report being suppressed.

As this is a fairly significant issue in the UK, it is right that the Government are called to explain their actions. But this being the UK, it really isn't as simple as that.

Due to the archaic structure of Government, Ministers can be and are appointed, who have not been elected to office. It is not possible to question unelected Government Ministers in the House of Commons. This may seem perfectly reasonable to the knuckle heads in Parliament, but it is not an acceptable position.

The more unfortunate aspect in this particular case, is that the Minister who can't be questioned is none other than Mandelson.

Mandelson, is the man who was ousted from Office twice due to irregularities in his conduct. Who the voters of Hartlepool threw out at a General Election, then reappeared as one of Blairs special appointment's as a European Commissioner and has now resurfaced under the Brown administration as the Minister of all he surveys.

To Mandelson and the Politico commentators, his re-emergence, is a source of great amusement. His appointment and reincarnation is not in the least amusing. This is a man who has an unquestionably murky past, who at one time was borrowing money off friends to support his lifestyle, but now seems to have vast tracts of wealth, while he has not held a position with a large enough income to explain his largess.

The continued lack of accountability by the Government, which in this case is explained away as 'oh well he is in "the other place"', which can't be seen by the myopic political pundits as anything more than, 'that is the way it is', is untenable.

We require an accountable Government which means Ministers must be open to questioning in the democratically elected chamber, by democratically elected MPs. Anything else is not acceptable. The obfuscation that these ministers can be called in for questioning by committees is not good enough. There are times and the MG Rover situation is one of them, when Ministers need to be questioned straight away.

The appointment by Brown of someone that the people of Hartlepool didn't think was fit to serve them, as an unaccountable Minister has brought the farcical situation whereby Ministers can't be questioned, to a head.

The UK has the facade of a democracy, but in reality, we have a largely unelected and unaccountable Government.

Police dogs found dead

2009-07-02T06:32:00.003+01:00

Nottinghamshire Police Force have had a complaint filed to the IPCC after two police dogs were found dead in the back of a Police Vehicle on a hot summers day.

The marked police car was parked in the HQ car park of the Force. Whilst the case has been referred to the IPCC no-one has been suspended.

The incompetence of the Police doesn't come as any great surprise, I sincerely hope the RSPCA do push for a prosecution of the Officers involved.

The callous disregard by the Police of animal welfare, resulted in the Animal Welfare Lay Visitor Scheme. The operation of the scheme is the responsibility of the Police
Authority, and that responsibility is exercised, in consultation with the Chief
Constable. The AWLVS appears to have become yet another PR stunt, with no teeth.

The death of animals, particularly dogs, in vehicles during hot weather, is page 1 of the common sense guide to animal welfare, why and how these two dogs died is still being investigated.

Nottinghamshire Police Force need to get their act together. Police Officers are not above the law and this case should lead to a prosecution.

Michael Jackson, a suspected paedophile

2009-06-27T19:56:00.004+01:00

I had wanted to avoid posting about this man, but unfortunately he keeps getting comments.

He is a suspected paedophile, the US justice system seems to operate on a 'Are you a celebrity' , a la Simpson and Jackson.

If you fit the criteria of being a 'celebrity' the fact that evidence points to guilt, counts for nothing.

American seem to forgive crime: Dear old Phil Spector took decades to get to court, Roman Polanski, still wanted on paedophilia charges in the USA, but managed to get an Oscar in 2002 , OJ 'not guilty' made the rest of the world snort, not to mention his slow-mo car chase. Try it one day and the US cops will get you off the road fast as hell unless you are perceived as a 'celebrity', they then managed to find him innocent. Strangely enough where is he now?

Jacko the wacko paid off a family, why?

He got to court and was found innocent... any ring of Simpson?

Now he is dead, suddenly he was sorely misunderstood, a man with problems, but his music was great.

I have no time for it, he was a suspected paedophile and in the light of his actions probably more than suspected.

I have no eulogy for this man, as the world stands today, Jacksons death is nothing I mourn.

The world is a better place for dead paedophiles, not that I would possibly suggest that paedophilia and sweet innocent Michael Jackson and the pay off was in any way related.

testing pixelpipe

2009-06-26T01:45:00.001+01:00

Having attempted a direct post on blogger using the android phone and failing as I was unable to type in the post area, I am now trying using the pixelpipe app.

Election of the Speaker of the House of commons

2009-06-22T09:34:00.006+01:00

Members of Parliament just don't understand the Public mood and are today running a farcical election for a discredited role in the House of Commons.

The election of a new Speaker is an absolutely farcical situation, as the role of the Speaker needs reform not just a new face.

Amongst the urgently needed reforms of the role of the Speaker includes the function as the Chair of The Members Estimate Committee, which should not remain in the remit of the House of Commons. The Members Estate Committee considers matters relating to MPs’ pay and allowances on behalf of the House of Commons.

The front runners for the position include: John Bercow, A regular house flipper and a man who is a consultant to a Cayman Island registered business. One tax break after another, just the style of speaker we need; Sir Alan Beith, who together with his wife claimed £178 000 in second home allowances including a claim for a £5 457 kitchen. He also claimed just over £6 000 in food expenses between 2005 and 2008, what a breath of fresh air he would be; Margaret Beckett, claimed for almost £11,000 in gardening expenses, including £1,380 for plants, she said that a £600 claim in 2005, which was rejected by the fees office, had been 'a mistake', funnily enough she had made three similar claims between 2001 and 2003, sounds like just the decent, honest hardworking MP to head the Members Estate Committee we need.

Members of Parliament almost daily are managing to show complete contempt to the British Public, the farce of the election of a new Speaker being just the latest in a long line. The body politic becomes more remote and less relevant to the needs of the United Kingdom as each day passes.

Part 2 of the Civil Contingencies Act and Swine Flu

2009-06-18T08:27:00.006+01:00

After a lengthy delay, I finally received a response to my question posed in April about the CCA as to:

- Whether, as part of the planning for a declaration by the World Health Organization that this is a flu pandemic, the Government is considering activating Part 2 of the CCA

- if the CCA does form part of the strategy to deal with the pandemic (if declared), at what level of infection in the UK is the Government intending to enforce this Act?

As you can tell from the question, this was posed some time ago, as the outbreak has now been confirmed as a pandemic.

Gillian Merron, Minister of State in the Department of Health, who responded to the enquiry stated that the DoH, Health Protection Agency and Cabinet Office are working together to ascertain at what level of infection Government intervention would be necessary and when and how to bring forward legislation to manage public resources, adding Part 2 of the CCA is one option for delivering some of the measures under consideration.

Gillian further comments on the 'triple lock' mechanism which would need to be met before Part 2 of the Act was brought in to force. These test being:

- an emergency that threatens serious damage to human welfare, the environment or security has occurred, is occurring or is about to occur

- it is necessary to make provision urgently in order to resolve the emergency

- the emergency regulations are proportionate

Whether or not Swine Flu reaches the stage whereby Emergency Powers under the CCA is invoked or not, is something of a sideline. The real concern, is that an outbreak of Flu is deemed by the Government as a potential trigger for the Act to come in to force, which demonstrates, the way in which legislation introduced in a climate of 'fear' becomes a dangerous tool in the hands of politicians.

The 2004 revision of the CCA Scope of emergency regulations provide draconian powers to the State; the General Public have no safeguards or rights when the Act is enforced.

Did political parties forget there was an election?

2009-06-15T11:47:00.004+01:00

In the run up to the recent Euro and local council elections, the apathy displayed by political parties was all too apparent.

No one canvassed at the door and only the Conservatiove Party bothered to post any information about the local election candidate through the door. The leaflet presented gave absolutely no contact information for the candidate. After numerous calls to the Conservative central office, the Local Party Office, which was shut, the local Conservative club and the office in the House of Commons of the local MP, I eventually received a call from the candidate.

I attempted to make contact with the prospective Liberal Democrat for the seat and although I managed to speak to the leader of the Liberal Democrats for the local council and elicited a promise of a returned call, I received nothing back at all.

The Euro elections fared no better, again no canvassing.

An information leaflet from the Green Party came with a telephone number. I called to ask a question and was assured I would be called back, of course I wasn't.

I spoke to UKIP, who also provided a telephone number on their leaflet, my question was met with a response that the policy in question wasn't actually currently formulated, but a working party was considering the issue. At least I received a reply, useless though it was.

The Conservative party leaflet contained no telephone number, but at least there was a number on the central party website. Once again a promise of a returned call resulted in nothing.

The Labour party leaflet provided an sms service, but no telephone number, scouring their central website gave no contact telephone number.

The liberal Democrats couldn't be bothered to send through a leaflet.

The Christian Democrats managed to get a leaflet through, but again there was no contact number.

That was the extent of the interest political parties had in obtaining my vote.

Until such time a politicians do more than pay lip service to communicating, I fail to see what and how they intend to 'engage' the general public.

For the record: I didn't vote and never have done. I do not support the UK Democratic system, which is neither Democratic nor representative.

Civilised interrogation, most people call it torture

2009-06-09T23:32:00.004+01:00

Americans hang your heads in shame, this has been done on behalf of 'freedom'.

The UK is just an American State

2009-06-07T10:30:00.004+01:00

Diego Garcia, the island which has been used for extra-ordinary rendition, is part of the British Indian Ocean Territory, an archipelago of 55 islands which covers 54,000 sq km of ocean. The islands have a land area of 60 sq km.

The territory is overseen by a Commissioner and Administrator who are based in London. The Commissioner's Representative in the BIOT is the commanding officer of the British Royal Navy Party at Diego Garcia and who serves as the Justice of the Peace.

In the mid-1960s, Britain secretly leased Diego Garcia to the United States for 50 years, in exchange for a discount of US$11million on Polaris nuclear submarines. The deal was not disclosed to the US Congress, the British Parliament, or the United Nations. A memo from then Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart to Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson in 1969 admitted that the payment was kept secret from Parliament and the US Congress.However, America accepted only on condition that the islands were uninhabited. As a result, over the next few years the 1 200 inhabitants of the Chagossian Islands were forced to leave and sent to either Mauritius or the Seychelles in 1971, Britain made it official with an Immigration Ordinance denying the Chagossians the right to return. In 1978 Chagossians were each paid twenty pounds in compensation.

The constitutional arrangements for BIOT are set out in the British Indian Ocean Territory ( Constitution) Order 2004 and related instruments. The 2004 Order gives the Commissioner full power to make laws for the Territory. A series of UK/US Agreements regulate matters relating to the use of the Territory for defence purposes, such as jurisdiction over US military and other personnel.

Despite numerous court cases, which appeared to set the Chagossians able to return home in 2008 the Foreign Office successfully argued, that allowing the Chagossian islanders to go back to their Indian Ocean homes would be a "precarious and costly" operation, and the United States had said that it would also present an "unacceptable risk" to its base on Diego Garcia.

While Diego Garcia remains leased to the USA, Britain retains no control over the island, nor over the whole of BIOT. The fact that BIOT law is meant to be precedent in the Islands, yet evidently is interpreted to suit American desires, is a sad indictment of the way the UK continues to cede to American supremacy over the Sovereignty of the UK.

The Government has claimed 'the UK expects the US to seek permission before rendering detainees through British territory'. The US evidently don't really care what the UK expects as it has transpired that at least two rendition flights landed in Diego Garcia, about which the US didn't bother to inform the UK.

Having broken their lease by not informing the UK of this use, the US should be kicked off the island, but of course that wont happen.

The British Government used Orders of Council rather than statute, to continue to following the American demands in 2004. Jack Straw, then Foreign Secretary, signed the exclusion orders. He was subsequently asked how he now justifies the decision to deny the Chagossians the right to return to their home. He replied ‘..It was a difficult decision with two alternatives: whether to do it by Orders in Council or by statute….it was simpler to use Orders in Council...’ He was then asked ‘..Do you think the Chagos islands decision should have gone at least before the the Foreign Affairs Select Committee of the House of Commons?’ Mr. Straw replied ‘In retrospect, yes. I think, with the benefit of hindsight, that what I exchanged was speed for legitimacy.’

The British version of elected dictatorship is discredited both in domestic and international affairs.

Shailesh Vara MP and his second home

2009-06-03T09:37:00.002+01:00

The MP for North West Cambridgeshire, Shailesh Vara, was outed yesterday by the Daily Telegraph in relation to claiming for mortgage interest relief prior to being elected. He countered this with the argument he forgot to pro-rata his claim for the time he wasn't a politician. A genuine mistake he would argue.

The property in question was in his wife's name only, he blamed that on his Solicitors mistake when the house was purchased. Fair enough he claims.

But one statement he made which I can't get my head round is:

'....The house was our matrimonial home and the name on the deeds and bills does not alter the reality of the ownership....'

Just one little problem here. 'Matrimonial Home' A matrimonial home is not a second home. Why was Shailesh Vara claiming for what he describes as his Matrimonial home?

Police investigations of Politicians

2009-06-03T09:25:00.005+01:00

There have been numerous calls for Police investigations into the actions and claims by politicians for expenses over the recent weeks, but so far nothing has happened.

I have been wondering why this would be the case?

Are the Police in cahoots with Politicians and won't investigate anyone? Are the investigations going on in secret? Are there no questions to ask?

I don't think any of those are the real reason we have heard nothing about investigations.

Tomorrow we have elections for the European Parliament and various council seats. I would guess, these investigations have been suppressed, under political pressure until after the elections. I anticipate that by next week, we will hear of investigations by the Police into certain MPs.

That in itself is an even more worrying sign than corrupt politicians. It means the Police are once again being manipulated by Government to meet a political agenda.

The mainstream parties are concerned of a backlash against them at the elections and much has been made of the potential benefits extremist parties may gain from this backlash. To have investigations ongoing of mainstream party politicians prior to the elections, has probably been deemed as a risk of corroding their support further.

Corrupt politicians are of considerable concern, a Police State is far worse.

Boardroom pay bonanza

2009-06-02T09:36:00.001+01:00

While Politicians are being lambasted for claiming expenses for cutting Wisteria and financing non-existent homes, not all Chief Executives of the FTSE100 Companies are getting the point.

The Largest Companies in the UK seem to think they are in the football leagues, with a Premiership of the top 100 and a Champion’s League of the FTSE250.

The average remuneration for a top 100 company CEO in 2008 was £2 600 000 an increase of 7% on 2007, whilst the top 250 average pay was £ 1 400 000 up by 5% on the previous year.

Not only does it appear that the CEO thinks they are worth a large salary, but they have scant regard for anyone else in their organisation, receiving on average 60% more than the next highest paid Director.

While profits and share prices have slumped, bonuses have remained the same. The FTSE100 fell by 30% last year, but CEOs maintain an average £510 000 bonus payment.

Ripping off the electorate

2009-06-01T09:55:00.003+01:00

Listening to Politicians pontificating about the need for wholesale change in British Politics is an unedifying spectacle. The idea that these people have suddenly woken up to wholesale political corruption, but had no idea of any of it before the Daily Telegraph ran their ongoing saga, is ridiculous.

We have Saint Cameron, forgetting he ripped of the tax payer and paid back to the kitty, only after he was found out. On what basis does he think he has any justification to lecture anyone else? Perhaps he feels his mini error is acceptable, after all he has now paid it back. it isn't. If it is wring in the cold light of a newspaper expose, it was wrong when the claim was made. The very fact he claimed it in the first place, demonstrates his ethics and they do not sit comfortably with the hand wringing he his now conducting.

As for Brown, a man who lives in a grace and favour residence, but still feels the need to claim for a cleaner, enough said. It isn't acceptable, never has been nor will it ever be so.

The very idea of yet another committee comprising Peers of the realm to head up an investigation in to wholesale change is farcical. Just last month 2 Peers were suspended for corruption and others had to make speeches of apology, which the Peers deem enough. A suspension and an apology are not enough for their breach of trust and to suggest they are in any way placed to decide the future of the political landscape would be comical, were it not so sad.

This doesn't leave us in the block, politicians would have us believe.

Now is the time when people can get together to look at change and put themselves forward for election to a committee who has the remit to undertake a radical review of the whole political system, from Parish Council to Central Government.

A committee with a two year fixed term. This committee would be further elected to regulate Parliament and Government once again on fixed two year terms and no one able to stand for office more than twice. Similarly anyone elected to this committee unable to stand for political office for a period of 4 year after their serving on the committee and should the consensus be to retain the peerage system, no honour or peerage to be bestowed for a period of four years after working on the committee. No one who has sat in political office should be permitted to stand on the committee for a period of two terms of the political arena in which they served. Be that eight, ten years, or whatever term the committee deems appropriate.

The next general election would be the last under the current system

Sure we are going through a financial crisis, with many additional major issues facing not just the UK, but the rest of the world, but without a political system in which people have faith, there is no hope for any 'buy in' from the general public.

It is essential to maintain a distance between the political system and the judiciary, something we have seen weaken over the recent years, it is also essential that anyone involved in a change of the political landscape must be divorced from the quagmire they scrutinize.

Joanna Lumley and Politics

2009-05-08T11:06:00.005+01:00

While I fully support the fight for justice for the Ghurkas and believe they should be able to settle in the UK, I find the unedifying sight of Government policy being made on the hoof at the behest of Joanna Lumley somewhat disturbing.

We have had investigations into cash for peerages and questions asked about the ability to buy changes in legislation, all of which are of course denied, but here we saw in the most gaphic form, how politicins can be and are manipulated.

The sight of Paul Woolas nodding his head like a sheep each time Joanna Lumley introduced a new clause, is a sign of a Government not fit for office.

The message is unhealthy. If you are a welknown actress you will get Ministers to nod their head in agreement. If you are a newspaper vendor in Central London, you will be assaulted by the Police in Public view and your death covered up.

Swine Flu pandemic and the Civil Contingencies Act

2009-04-30T18:09:00.006+01:00

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

We are hearing much about a potential Flu Pandemic, but nothing about the ramifications of this to the UK. I am not looking here at health concerns specifically, but at the potential to enforce the civil contingencies act.

The DoH statement made by Alan Johnson on 27th April refers to meetings with opposition shadows.

This always raises the question of the truth behind the bland statement and the potential ramifications, in addition to meeting with the civil contingencies committee.

On turning to the Cabinet Office pages there is a specific section regarding the flu scare.

This document finishes with:

'....However well developed, plans are unlikely to be successful without the active support of individuals and communities. Therefore, a key part of the response will be to encourage the public to follow government advice and adopt basic hygiene measures to manage or reduce their own risk of catching or spreading the virus. Ensuring that all of us are fully aware of the necessary precautionary and response measures, are prepared to cooperate actively with them and accept responsibility for helping themselves and others must therefore be an integral part of our overall preparedness strategy.....' (My bold)

As someone who is a little cynical and bearing in mind that opposition shadows have already been met, I doubt very much the meeting Alan Johnson had with the Secretariat, was to discuss the current DoH guidelines, on washing your hands and throwing away tissues.

I am trying to ascertain as to whether as part of the planning for a declaration by the WHO that this is a Flu Pandemic, the Government are considering activating the Civil Contingencies Act plus attached sections, which since the 2004 revisions provide for considerable powers to Police and Military on a region by region basis.

As the Labour party are always looking to deprive civil liberties and need a big story to cover up their failings, I would not be at all surprised were the plans not to include triggering the Act.

If a Flu pandemic is declared by the WHO on a Global basis, whilst there may be a global pandemic, that of and by itself, does not mean that the UK is hit hard by the Flu.

If the CCA does form part of the strategy to deal with the pandemic, at what level of infection in the UK are the Government intending to enforce this Act?

I have sent off the questions and am waiting for responses.

More 'fiction' from Government Ministers

2009-04-29T11:32:00.004+01:00

It has emerged that once again British Ministers have been making up stories to facilitate their own aims.

Yet another TLA Quango, the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, who had responsibility for key stage tests for children aged 11 to 14, failed miserably to manage to get the results out in a timely manner.

As a result of the fiasco, millions of pounds were wasted on yet another inquiry, chaired by yet another Lord, Government Ministers were asked to provide evidence.

Keen as pigs sniffing truffles, Jim Knight, Schools Minister and Ed Balls (an apt surname if ever there was one), sought to disparage Ken Boston, the then head of the QCA.

They offered evidence to the enquiry that at a meeting on 17th June, Jim Knight claimed that Ken Boston was complacent and disengaged at the meeting.

Only problem is that Ken Boston wasn't at the meeting, so it is hardly much of a surprise he was disengaged is it?

Of course the dear old 'onest 'injun, Knight has denied this turn of events is accurate as he claims he subsequently wrote a letter to Sutherland, '..explaining an error in the way the June 17th meeting had been described...'

Sounds a little like Mistress if Porn, Home Office Secretary Jacqui Smith, claiming the expenses claim for Porn Films was an 'error' someone else should have picked up, but now it is all in the open and been corrected, all is well.

The speed with which politicians seek to absolve themselves of responsibility for anything, other than praise, is a disgrace.

Continually blaming quangos for mistakes is farcical. These Ministers work for Prime Minister Gordon Brown who promised a ‘…bonfire of the Quango’s…’ before Labour came to power, claiming that they were ‘..often government in secret, free from full public scrutiny…’.

If Brown really believes this, why have 7 Government Departments added more Quangos and why when a Quango is shown to fail, does responsibility pass to yet another Quango and not back to Government?

Politicians need to take responsibility, stop lying and stop blaming other people for their lies.

How Knight has the gall to think that sending a follow up letter to clarify a lie in a previous submission is good enough, beggars belief.

The question remains, why did Knight submit evidence that someone who wasn't at a meeting, was disengaged and complacent at the meeting?

Ken Boston, may not be calling for a ministerial resignation, I am.

A Minister who can make submissions which are evidently untrue: Knight was advising he felt that Boston was disengaged, when he knew full well the man wasn't even there, should not be in that position.

To claim it was an error is nonsense. Knight knew full well Boston wasn't at the meeting and should have corrected the lie prior to submission, not after the buck passing had been carried out.

PC Rob Ward, violent police officer, or sadly misunderstood?

2009-04-25T11:06:00.006+01:00

Rob Ward, is perhaps not the brightest candle of all time.

On the evening of the death of Ian Tomlinson, he managed to post the following on his facebook page.

I guess he didn't realize, facebook is the largest social network site going.

Just another thug going to the riots, you may think. But unfortunately no.

PC Rob Ward, is in the Metropolitan Police.

His page has gone from facebook and he has been given a verbal warning by the Met, pending an investigation, but be aware this man has not been suspended from duty.

If you happen to meet this 27 year old copper, he is a fan of violent football films, perhaps he was just attracted to the Police Force because of the freedom to kill people with only a slight chance of being admonished, never mind convicted, so be warned, he is copper who takes great pride in telling everyone he is up for a bit of violence..

I had been led to understand that the Police Force had a minimum education level, but I guess not, he can't quite manage to spell hippies. Perhaps the qualification now based on the severity of psychosis and willingness to kill in the name of freedom.

That a Police Officer has the arrogance and mental deficiency to post this on Facebook just an hour after a man died at the protests says, I think, all that is necessary to understand the culture of the British Police Force.

Gordon Brown hyberbole

2009-04-13T20:02:00.003+01:00

Image via Wikipedia

Gordon Brown the Prime Minister of the UK, either lives in myopic nirvana or really thinks the British Public are thick.

He sent a letter today today to the head of the civil service, proclaiming '....The public would expect no less and would also expect the highest possible standards from all their politicians and all those who work for them....'

This is the same Brown who claims an allowance for a home despite being given a grace and favour residence paid for by the British Tax Payer, the same Brown who still supports Jacqui Smith, who had the gall to defend her position on claiming allowances the wide Public opinion finds indefensible and is even so mean as to claim for a bath plug. How petty minded and tight fisted can a mind to claim for this be? This is the woman who made a fraudulent claim for porn films and protested someone else should have told her. I wonder what other fraud she has committed.

The same Brown who even now defends politicians expenses. Who defends Myners, the man who knew about Goodwin's pension, but lied and pretended he didn't.

The same Gordon Brown who continues to defend politicians claiming expenses that many people think are indefensible. This is the man who thinks he can save the world from global depression, but can't work out that MP expense claims are nothing more than self aggrandisement.

He adds: '...I entered politics because of a sense of public duty and to improve the lives and opportunities of those less fortunate than me...'

Brown your morals have been lost, there is no one 'less fortunate' than you. You may be alive and think you are important. You are nothing more than a moral bankrupt. A trip to a Psychiatrist may help.

Transcript of the letter Gordon Brown wrote to the head of the civil service, Sir Gus O'Donnell dated 13th April 2009:

Dear Gus

I am writing about the Code of Conduct for Special Advisers, and the proposals I want to make to tighten this up.

I am assured that no minister and no political adviser other than the person involved had any knowledge of or involvement in these private emails that are the subject of current discussion.

I have already taken responsibility for acting on this - first by accepting Mr McBride's resignation and by making it clear to all concerned that such actions have no part to play in the public life of our country.

I have also written personally to all those who were subject to these unsubstantiated claims.

Mr McBride has apologised and done so unreservedly. But it is also important to make sure such behaviour does not happen again.

Any activity such as this that affects the reputation of our politics is a matter of great regret to me and I am ready to take whatever action is necessary to improve our political system.

I would therefore now like a more explicit assurance included in the special advisers Code of Conduct that not only are the highest standards expected of political advisers but that the preparation or dissemination of inappropriate material or personal attacks have no part to play in the job of being a special adviser, just as it has no part to play in the conduct of all our public life.

I also think it right to make it a part of the special advisers contract by asking our political advisers to sign such an assurance and to recognise that if they are ever found to be preparing and disseminating inappropriate material they will automatically lose their jobs.

I think you will agree that all of us in public life have a responsibility to ensure that those we employ and who are in involved in our parties observe the highest standards.

Like the overwhelming majority of figures in public life across the political spectrum, I entered politics because of a sense of public duty and to improve the lives and opportunities of those less fortunate than me.

My undivided focus as prime minister is on acting to make Britain a fairer, safer and more prosperous nation and, in particular, on guiding the country through the current economic difficulties.

The public would expect no less and would also expect the highest possible standards from all their politicians and all those who work for them.

Yours sincerely

Gordon Brown

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Killer copper steps forward

2009-04-09T00:32:00.004+01:00

Since my last posting the murderer of Ian Tomlinson has decided to step forward. Perhaps he has a plea bargain in mind.

But he hasn't been named or even apparently arrested, despite the IPCC stating that independent criminal probe has begun.

If it may be a criminal offence perhaps the copper should be arrested.

What is the name of the killer and why are the Police protecting him?

Murder at the G20

2009-04-08T19:51:00.004+01:00

Another example of British Justice, see also previous post on hitman for free.

Ian Tomlinson, murdered by a police officer.

These bent coppers know exactly who pushed Ian Tomlinson, why doesn't one of them come forward?

Who are these coppers?

Who is this key witness?

Who is the murderer?

Lying murdering scum.

The NHS - Looking for a hospital in which to die?

2009-04-05T18:02:00.004+01:00

It is hardly any wonder the UK Politicians see no need for legislation into assisted suicide, it is quite easy to do this on the NHS.

Mid-Staffordshire trust, which was uncovered as an example of the NHS at its best, with patients drinking from flower vases and others being left in filthy soiled beds, all culminating in a Standardised Mortality Score of 127, which indicates that the hospital suffered 27% more deaths than would be expected. Or more prosaically about 500 extra deaths in 3 years. Bearing in mind these figures are complied by the Health Care Commission, who point blank refuse to investigate 10 other trusts with a higher SMR score, I would expect this 500 deaths to be a conservative estimate of unnecessary deaths. Bearing in mind poor statistics bring down the overall Mortality Score. Mid-Staffordshire now have slipped to a meagre 116. Hardly worth a mention.

The trusts to head for, to achieve a death by neglect are:

Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, a score of 132.
Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Trust, achieving a creditible 126
Blackpool, Fylde and Were Hospitals managing 123,
George Eliot Hospital a meritable 120
Swindon and Marlborough also scored 120, but out of shame at not being able to kill more people have decided to change their name to Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
North Middlesex University Hospital a below par 119
Bolton Hospitals only 118 and as a result of such a low death toll are now known as Royal Bolton Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Queen Mary’s Sidcup scraping into the list with a score of 117
Tameside Hospital also 117
and Mid Cheshire Hospitals also a lowly rated 117

In a vote of confidence in the way these trusts are killing people, the Health Commission refuse to investigate and the Care Quality Commission, which has taken over from the Commission, has no plans to do so either.

Have you changed your bank account?

2009-04-04T01:11:00.004+01:00

I hear a mass of whingeing about the banks being corrupt and stealing money etc. etc. etc.

The power is in the hands of the consumer.

Have you changed your bank account because you are in disagreement with their policies? Have you moved your bank account because they have failed you? Have you questioned your bank because they are not passing on interest rate cuts? Have you questioned your bank about their level of service?

Don't wait for the scum politician to do anything. Where do you think they all end up after their political stint is over?

Now is the time to make banks change. Banks do not run the world, their customers have the power to make change.

If you whinge about banking ineptitude and do nothing about it, by way of challenging the bank you whinge about, why will they change? Why should they change?

Hammer your bank if you don't like it and force it to change. 1 person wont make a hill of beans, a hill of people scare the heck out of a board of directors.

Your pension is tied up with these people, make them accountable.

I wonder if I am just p***ing in the wind.

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Corrupt Politicians

2009-03-26T22:19:00.006Z

We have moved in to an era of acid tripping as far as UK politicians are concerned.

Goodwin, receives an excessive pension and politicians decide to deride the man. Oh, did I forget he is Sir Fred, let me bow down before you Sire.

But on the wings we have the corrupt trough sniffers of politicians who deride the scum Fred, for his greed, but feel their own greed is within the law, so all is well.

Goodwin, has taken a pension, within the law, so he decides he has done nothing wrong.

But politician wring their hands and claim he is in the wrong, yet within the past few months we have had:

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling claiming £104,183 over six years for a London flat when he has a family home just 17 miles from Parliament.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith's claims that her main residence is a room at her sister's house in South London.

Employment Minister Tony McNulty claimed expenses for a second home - after it was revealed that it is in fact his parents' house, except of course now, he decides he will stop claiming the allowance.

All insisting they have broken no rules.

Yet all of them decide that Goodwin is unethical.

Politicians are too often, self serving hypocritical idiots, who display the morals and ethics of an alley cat.

British politics is a house of corruption.

Cash for Honours, cash for amendments, failure to listen to the voters and scant disregard for any ethical standard. Reminds me of the Boston Tea Party.

When selling yourself goes wrong

2009-03-10T17:59:00.005Z

As the recession bites harder, there are more so called 'experts' advising on how to make money on the internet.

Some of these people do know what they are doing, but the vast majority are just selling products in what is called MLM, but what most of us think of as pyramid type selling. Each level of person gaining money from the money paid by the next level down paying for the privilege of selling to the next layer down.

I don't worry too much about typos in this blog as it isn't an important issue. Though I do try and keep errors to a minimum. However if I were selling from this blog, then I would ensure it was error free, particularly if I were selling a product purporting to help people improve their copy writing skills. I am not talking here of American against English spelling, I am referring to plain and simple typos.

A great example of this can be found on a site in which the person involved refers to himself as...

'Acclaimed marketer, preparing to reveal breakthrough wordsmithing strategies for perfecting print persuasion...'

Whatever that may mean.

Aside from wordsmithing he manages the following great illustrations of how not to write, when he is in fact trying to persuade you that he has the solution to writing copy.

'Who Else Wants To See Your Conversions and Profits Maximized...'

I guess he means who else wants to see 'their' conversions....

'The words on your pages, the words in your emails, the words that are spoken in your audios, videos and during live presentations.'

The sentence above conveys nothing and may as well be a shopping list.

'Emotions are frequently triggered by the subsconcious mind’s processing...'

An example of lazy spell checking the word he was seeking was 'subconscious'

The page is littered with grammatical and typographic errors and unfortunately, he will probably get away with this junk.

The web has some great people on it, it also has some who really would be better off letting others do the typing.

If you still feel these 'breakthough wordsmithing strategies' could be of some help, just copy and paste the url (I could link it but I feel slightly cleaner by not doing so) http://www.michaelmillman.com/IMNW-special.html

Another good day to bury bad news - Jo Moore and Mandelson meet again

2009-02-26T01:10:00.007Z

The spin failure Mandelson, managed to run through the House of Lords the first reading of the part privatisation of royal mail, in an undebated hearing.

While Gordon Brown sunk politics to a disparagingly low level of consideration, by pretending he gave a monkeys arse about the death of Camerons son, Mandelson went one better.

Due for debate today (26th February) Mandelson decided that, an unpopular bill, with more than 120 Labour MPs signing a motion to oppose the Bill, he would introduce it a day earlier as an opportunistic piece of politics.

It does smack of sweet Jo Moore in 2001 '11 Sept 2001: Spin doctor Jo Moore sent her infamous e-mail, suggesting to colleagues it was a good day to "bury" bad news.'

Mandelson, was twice forced to resign from Ministerial positions, had to borrow money from friends to purchase houses, yet turned up as a Euro Minister and enjoying a luxury lifestyle, all on a salary of less than US$300,000 a year, ignoring all questions of 'how did you get the money?' and garnering a peerage at the same time.

In 1996 he acquired No. 9 Northumberland Place, a four storey Georgian terraced house in Notting Hill Gate at a cost of £475,000, with another £50,000 spent on a remodelling by the designer Seth Stein. At the time there was a certain amount of speculation regarding how Mandelson had managed to afford such luxury. It was established that another Labour MP, Geoffrey Robinson had lent him £373,000 on an interest free basis.

Mandelson failed to declare this loan as an interest as he was required to do, but to make the sleaze even worse, Geoffrey Robinson had been linked with Robert Maxwell and was under investigation by the Department of Trade and Industry, the ministry which Mandelson headed. Blair's legal advisers, Charles Falconer (The same man who decided the invasion of Iraq was OK) and Derry Irvine decided that as Mandelson was not in direct control of the Robinson investigation there should be no problem. Mandelson appeared on television to argue that '...There is no conflict of interest so the question of resignation does not arise...'.

Mandelson had neglected to inform the Britannia Building Society (who had lent the rest of the money) that the £373,000 was a loan and not his own money, and was therefore technically guilty of deception. The man resigned.

A year later in 1999, he returned to office thanks to 'no sleaze' Blair. Strichand Hinduja re-applied for a British Passport in February 1998, at the same time as the Hindujas made an offer to help fund the Millenium Dome, to the tune of £1 million. Mandelson made a telephone call to Mike O'Brien, the Home office minister, enquiring as to the progress of this application, and also passed on a written enquiry regarding the passport application of a third brother, Prakash Hinduja in May 2000.

Mandelson initially appeared to deny that he had ever made any "direct contact" with anyone in the Home Office on behalf of the Hindujas, then retracted his denial claiming he'd been missunderstood. Within days he was required to sign a second resignation letter and left the government on the 24th January 2001.

In 2004 Blair put him forward as the British choice for European Commissioner and he was duly appointed.

This poor misunderstood man was subsequently given a peerage and returned as yet another of Browns unelected and unaccountable Ministers in Cabinet in 2007.

So the cycle revolves.

Dead people make for a good time to introduce unpopular policies.

Jo Moore on 11th September 2001 and Mandelson the former Minister without portfolio and spin meister general for the Labour Politbureau, follow a fashion in labour party politics.

Think of the lowest depth you can go to and then go further.

Nice one Mandelson. Have you already chosen the investor for the Post Office 'investment' by any chance?

Why did Mandelson choose to introduce the Bill a day earlier when UK politicians were pretending to give a flying fig about dead children?

Ryanair contempt - is it any surprise?

2009-02-25T22:52:00.005Z

Ryanair are in yet another spat about how they treat the world with contempt.

This all arises from a comment on a blog about a Ryanair online booking service bug. In inimitable Ryanair style a response was made to this blog post

response # 10

Ryanair Staff #1 Says:
February 19th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
jason!
you’re an idiot and a liar!! fact is!
you’ve opened one session then another and requested a page meant for a different session, you are so stupid you dont even know how you did it! you dont get a free flight, there is no dynamic data to render which is prob why you got 0.00. what self respecting developer uses a crappy CMS such as word press anyway AND puts they’re mobile ph number online, i suppose even a prank call is better than nothing on a lonely sat evening!!

Not the best PR, supposing it was a ryanair staffer. The ip address confirmed it was a Ryanair response, so Ryanair came up with an even more disparaging response....

'...Ryanair can confirm that a Ryanair staff member did engage in a blog discussion. It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy in corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won’t be happening again. Lunatic bloggers can have the blog sphere all to themselves as our people are far too busy driving down the cost of air travel...'.

It hit the national press as another example of how Ryanair treats the world with contempt.

In my view, it is of no great surprise Ryanair treats people with contempt.

People who fly Ryanair deserve all the abuse Ryanair and anyone else can muster.

The world is made of those who pay their way and contribute to society and those who suck like leeches and Ryanair customers fit the latter profile comfortably.

What makes the arrogant, predominately British flying passenger, think they deserve anything other than contempt, when they actually bother to spend the time to find a flight which costs virtually nothing?

There are people around the world who are dying of starvation for the price of their bargain seat. I know of people who have paid more for their taxi fare to the airport, 20 miles away than a flight over hundreds of miles.

If I were O'Leary, I too would treat my passengers with contempt.

Sure, if Ryanair were dealing with normal people then this attitude would stink, but they aren't. Ryanair deal with the tight fisted arses of society. The 'I want it for nothing' mentality, so pervasive in British Society.

To people who would not fly Ryanair, for sure their responses stink, the replies are contemptuous and illiterate, but they are not seeking to appease these people. Ryanair is looking to attract the leeches of Society. The people who were at the last hours of the sales at Woolworths, picking up the final meaningless bargains.

The Ryanair customer is likely to be revelling in the recession, delighting in failed businesses in administration, picking up 'bargains', not in the least bothered by the families and lives destroyed by redundancy, loss of home and loss of self esteem.

The same people who turn up at property auction to grab a repossessed house, without a flicker of concern or conscience for the now homeless family.

Ryanair do certainly mess up if you are a human being who actually gives a damn, but for those who don't, money is and always will be king, Ryanair treating you with contempt is part of the deal.

Tomorrow will Ryanair ticket sales be reduced? I doubt it.

Will Ryanair give a damn that some people in the blogosphere are upset that Ryainair stance is that:

'...It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy in corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won’t be happening again. Lunatic bloggers can have the blog sphere all to themselves...'

of course not.

Do they really care that The Times and The Daily Telegraph are upset? Why would they, 'Upset from Royal Tunbridge Wells' is not their target market.

Ryanair treat their passengers with the contempt they deserve, the rest of us, they know will never fly with them and therefore on a business model, they don't give a damn.

Ivan Cameron dies, UK political system grinds to a halt

2009-02-25T10:08:00.004Z

Over stated perhaps.

While I am sure the Cameron's are very distressed at the loss of their son in the early hours of this morning, I fail to see why the political process needs to stop.

Gordon Brown has decided to pull out of PMQs today. PMQs are a weekly showdown. Sure many of the questions are planted and the theatre can over take the value of the weekly Parliamentary session, but they are an important part of the political process and the Prime Minister should not be looking for easy options to deny MPs the opportunity to question him and his policies.

I can't say I personally have any view either way on Cameron, or his family and how they will react to this death, but I do know these people Cameron included, want to lead the country. Well leadership means responsibility and responsibility is not about forgetting the millions of people he wants to lead while he has a personal setback.

Brown has absolutely no excuse. Protocol may leave it that the PM doesn't appear if the opposition leader isn't about and vice versa, but that is insulting to everyone and indicative of the way politicians haven't got a clue about leadership or management. The 'I am too important to appear if my equal isn't about' attitude stinks and should be eliminated. Politicians waffle endlessly about getting rid of the class system, this attitude reeks of class structure.

I don't know the Cameron or his family. I do however know thousands of parents every year loose their children, some through illness, such as the death of the boy, others through accidents and war, I don't recall the chairman of BP taking the day off because one of his staff lost their child.

Brown continues to wage war in Afghanistan and Iraq, where many innocent civilians are killed and described as 'collateral damage'. This man should be in the House today answering questions as to why he finds the killing of innocent children in Afghanistan and Iraq causes him no upset or concern what so ever, yet the death of this particular child makes it impossible for him to function.

Thanks to Jesse from overstimulate

2009-02-24T10:13:00.004Z

The wonderful world of twitter came once again to my clarion call.

I was having a problem with a firefox add-on and after trying for an hour or so to resolve the problem myself, I managed to achieve nothing apart from annoyed.

I used that easy communication tool, twitter and sent out a request for help. The joy of twitter, is that it not ony spreads out to your contacts, but can be found by people interested in a subject area.

In the early hours of this morning, I received a response from someone i had never heard of until just then.

He proceeded to work with me to resolve the problem.

Thanks Jesse who blogs at overstimulate

If you are wondering about twitter, new online business ideas has a useful post twitter review about using and setting up a twitter account.

If you are a twitter user, my account is anarchyintheuk, look forward to catching up

Genital mutilation, but hey its all in the name of freedom

2009-02-05T09:27:00.003Z

The barriers between the judiciary and government have been obliterated by the National Socialist Party of the UK, more commonly known as the Labour Party, who are the current elected oligarchs in the UK.

For no apparent reason, from a legal perspective, two judges, Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones, decided that the release of intelligence information in the case of Binyam Mohamed, would put the public of the United Kingdom at risk.

That is a governmental issue, not a judicial issue.

The Stasi style operation is made murkier, by the fact that it was under US Government pressure that this decision was reached.

We are in a position, that the US Government uses strong arm tactics on the UK Government, so much for Saint Obama and the new 'US co-operation', were this not bad enough, the UK Government then puts pressure on the Judiciary to make political decisions.

This smacks of similar tactics in the BAe investigation, which was ground down by Political influence in judicial process.

While politicians learn very little from history, one thing they do seem to digest are the manuals of dictatorships.

The UK judicial system must be kept free from political influence and the judges who made this decision should be kicked off the benches.

The alleged torture of this man, including genital mutilation, in the name of freedom, requires due legal process. A question mark hangs over whether the UK is the correct country to be involved in this process in the first instance remains, as Binyam Mohamed is an Ethiopian National, who was granted leave to stay in the UK, but not UK citizenship and was 'arrested' in Pakistan. It appears therefore that under the 1951 UN refugee convention, Britain has no responsibility for this man.

That said, US political let alone UK political pressure, has no place in the UK Judicial system.

The case continues with a possible appeal of the House of Lords, but as these Peers are happy to take cash for amendments, it seems unlikely anything will change.

With this backdrop, it is anticipated Binyam Mohamed, will be released soon, as all charges were dropped in 2005, why three years on he is still being held Guantanamo, is yet another intriguing question.

The question of UK intelligence officers complicity in the torture of Binyam Mohamed is, according to the Government, still an ongoing investigation.

Britain signals a call for help

2009-02-04T10:14:00.003Z

Mandelson looks a little forlorn as he holds the Union Flag upside down, while at an agreement signing ceremony with Chinese officials.

Flying the Union Flag upside down, historically indicates distress and a call for help.

While many are suggesting the flag was inverted in error, because Mandelson, Brown and the civil service are just plain incompetent, or alternatively they are too stupid to realize the Flag can be flown upside down, but I just wonder, whether this was in reality a call for help, either because the trade agreement is of no value to Britain or because the UK is on the verge of bankruptcy and all assistance is now required.

Whatever the real reason, the visit of the Chinese Premier to the UK, has shown the complete contempt with which British Police treat demonstrators. The irony being, the protests were about lack of freedom, in China, specifically the Tibet issue.

The UK is quite simply, no longer a country in which liberty and personal freedom play any part in the thinking of the Orwellian Politburo in Government.

Camera Phone Predator Alert Act

2009-01-28T13:37:00.003Z

Do me a favour. Are politicians completely insane?

Legislation for legislation's sake...........

In the US a new bill is being presented to make it illegal for camera phones not to click when used.

How on earth does congressman Peter T. King think this will help deaf people, people in noisy areas, or someone being photographed from a way off - or is there to be an amendment that the click needs to be a minimum of xxx decibels with a huge flash to alert the deaf, then what is he going to introduce the aid the deaf and blind?

More importantly why does he think this needs to become law?

H.R.414
Title: To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/9/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Latest Major Action: 1/9/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

SUMMARY AS OF:
1/9/2009--Introduced.

Camera Phone Predator Alert Act - Requires any mobile phone containing a digital camera to sound a tone whenever a photograph is taken with the camera's phone. Prohibits such a phone from being equipped with a means of disabling or silencing the tone. Treats the requirement as a consumer product safety standard and requires enforcement by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

MAJOR ACTIONS:

***NONE***

ALL ACTIONS:

1/9/2009:: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

TITLE(S): (italics indicate a title for a portion of a bill)

SHORT TITLE(S) AS INTRODUCED:
Camera Phone Predator Alert Act
OFFICIAL TITLE AS INTRODUCED:
To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken.

COSPONSOR(S):

***NONE***

COMMITTEE(S):

Committee/Subcommittee:		Activity:
House Energy and Commerce		Referral, In Committee

RELATED BILL DETAILS:

***NONE***

AMENDMENT(S):

***NONE***

In this time of economic austerity this congressman has... so far this month sponsored...(source library of congress

1. H.RES.63 : Supporting the goals and ideals of the Knights of Pythias.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/14/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Oversight and Government Reform
Latest Major Action: 1/14/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

2. H.R.358 : -- Private Bill; For the relief of Alemseghed Mussie Tesfamical.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/8/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Judiciary
Latest Major Action: 1/8/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.

3. H.R.414 : To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/9/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Energy and Commerce
Latest Major Action: 1/9/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

4. H.R.415 : To provide Capitol-flown flags to the immediate family of fire fighters, law enforcement officers, emergency medical technicians, and other rescue workers who are killed in the line of duty.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/9/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Administration
Latest Major Action: 1/9/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on House Administration.

5. H.R.521 : To amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for the national collection of data on stillbirths in a standardized manner, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/14/2009) Cosponsors (3)
Committees: House Energy and Commerce
Latest Major Action: 1/14/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

6. H.R.522 : To amend the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act to authorize the Federal Trade Commission to issue new rules to prohibit any telemarketing calls during the hours of 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/14/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Energy and Commerce
Latest Major Action: 1/14/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

7. H.R.523 : To establish a United States Boxing Commission to administer the Professional Boxing Safety Act of 1996, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/14/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Education and Labor; House Energy and Commerce
Latest Major Action: 1/14/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the Committee on Education and Labor, and in addition to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned.

8. H.R.549 : To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to establish the Office for Bombing Prevention, to address terrorist explosive threats, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/15/2009) Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Homeland Security
Latest Major Action: 1/15/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Homeland Security.

9. H.R.620 : To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow an increased work opportunity credit with respect to recent veterans.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/21/2009) Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Ways and Means
Latest Major Action: 1/21/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Ways and Means.

10. H.R.651 : To provide for certain tunnel life safety and rehabilitation projects for Amtrak.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/22/2009) Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Transportation and Infrastructure
Latest Major Action: 1/22/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

11. H.R.652 : To amend the Public Health Service Act to establish a comprehensive national system for skilled construction workers to assist first responders in disasters.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/22/2009) Cosponsors (None)
Committees: House Energy and Commerce; House Transportation and Infrastructure
Latest Major Action: 1/22/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned.

12. H.R.704 : To provide for free mailing privileges for personal correspondence and parcels sent to members of the Armed Forces serving on active duty in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-3] (introduced 1/27/2009) Cosponsors (1)
Committees: House Armed Services
Latest Major Action: 1/27/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on Armed Services.

Peers investigating Peers

2009-01-28T12:01:00.003Z

What a surprise....

It seems as though the noble peers of the realm (who make up the upper chamber in British parliament) are under suspicion of taking money to change laws. Hardly a shock and hardly news worthy I wouldn't have thought.

Under our last illustrious Prime Minister, Tony Blair, there was an investigation into 'cash for honour' whereby Peerages were granted for making political donations. The Labour Government managed to avoid any thorough investigation being carried out. So it is hardly surprising that these same peers who paid to get their honours, wouldn't feel completely justified in taking payments to alter legislation.

Corruption breeds corruption and as Winston Churchill once said 'Democracy is the worst form of Government....'

Politicians are careerists and as with any other walk of life there are corrupt individuals, politics seems to attract a higher number of them, which is no great shock.

So the likely hood is we have corrupt peers, who obtained their peerages by corruption. It isn't exactly rocket science is it?

Yet the mantra is still spouted that every country needs a fully fledged democracy like ours. Why?

The political system in the UK is an example of a broken wheel which badly needs fixing and that is not 'fixing' in the sense that many politicians may understand.

Having politicians investigating other politicians behaviour is like having the police investigate the murders they commit.... pointless and a whitewash.

Oh and shock of shocks, Mandelson has managed to fix a bail out for Jaguar as reported under the symbiosis between Mandelson and the Hinduja brothers in an earlier blog entry.

Quite why Mandelson came to mind when I was writing about corrupt peers I am not sure.

2008 in review

2009-01-12T18:37:00.001Z

Another great video from JibJab

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

Thanks Jibjab

Junkie actor Oscar possibility - dead cameraman who cares

2009-01-09T20:34:00.004Z

The morons who watch and are involved in the film industry never cease to amaze me.

Father-of-two Conway Wickliffe, 41, was on a camera truck filming an unmanned special effects car, when it struck a tree. Warner Bros Pictures said the accident had happened at a special effects facility for Batman: The Dark Knight. His death was accidental, a jury ruled.

Miles Francis, who represented the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) at the hearing, said afterwards: "Our inquiries are continuing and a decision will be made in due course whether there will be a prosecution."

This still continues

Some moronic actor - The ones who think they matter because they are puppets acting the words and actions others - His name Heath Ledger - got a little flustered because his former fiancee was about to serve papers demanding sole access, went on a drugs binge. I wonder why she didn't want some out of control junkie looking after her child?

Both are mentioned in the film credits, but who does the film world think was wonderful? The junkie father, or the loving father of two?

Funnily enough, the pathetic junkie wins the 'we care' badge.

The film industry really has got its head up its own a**e.

The Oscars are nothing more than the international photocopier salesman of the year awards, but because of wealth have managed to capture the headlines.

........

While ranting on the topic, wtf.

ER featured actors salaries average at US$20 000 per episode. These are puppets pretending to be medics, proper Doctors in the US who actually save lives in emergency care are paid an average of US$ 240 000 per annum. Nurses with 20 years experience, who work 40 hours a week earn US$56 000. A Doctor in China earns on average US$81 000 and a nurse US$49 000.

But still the morons in the USA feel they are underpaid and are threatening a strike, actors such as Mel Gibson, Martin Sheen and Ed Harris, feel it is all justified.

Who in their right mind thinks a junkie who overdoses should receive a reward and what arrogant mentality must you have to believe your pretending to save lives is worth more than people who actually save lives?

Perhaps they are just spouting the words of their puppet masters.

Hitmen for free

2009-01-08T11:02:00.004Z

Looking to have someone killed?

I am able to provide information of two free services. One based in the US and the other in the UK, complete with video references of succesful hits.

In the US

How to contact a BART Officer

* Report to a police officer or any other uniformed BART employee onboard the train.
* You may also use the train intercom located at the ends of each train car. This will allow you to make your report to the train operator who will forward the information to the police department's communications center.
* If you have cell phone coverage, call the BART Police toll-free at 877.679.7000. In a BART station: Contact a police officer or station agent. You may contact the agent either in person, or you may use a white courtesy phone. Several of these phones are located throughout the station, including on the platforms.
* You may also use a payphone or cellular phone and call the police department's communications center directly. Either dial 9-1-1 for emergencies, or dial 877.679.7000 for emergencies or non-emergencies.

The Metropolitan Police in London, have a long and successful track record in murder .
Unless it’s an emergency, call the Metropolitan Police Service on 0300 123 1212.

Recent high profile murders include John Charles De Menezes.

On Israel and Gaza

2009-01-08T00:04:00.003Z

The West and the UN is so busy jumping on the band wagon of how Israel is killing civilians in Gaza, they seem to have forgotten their own atrocities in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

It is extremely irritating to hear Politicians from the UK and US lambasting Israel over civilian deaths.

Absolutely right that The opponents of Israel do this, they tend not to obfuscate and equally criticise the West for civilian deaths.

It is estimated 151 000 civilian Iraqis have died as a result of the US led invasion of Iraq.

Approximately 80 000 Afghanistani civilians have been killed.

December 17th 2008 - Kabul - An official in eastern Afghanistan said Wednesday three civilians were killed and two others were wounded when their house was attacked by US soldiers.

26th July 2008 - British soldiers in Afghanistan today killed four civilians and injured three more after opening fire on a vehicle

11th July 2008 - 45 women and children and two men were killed when a US aircraft bombed a wedding party in eastern Afghanistan last Sunday, .

September 3rd 2008 - Helicopters ferried U.S.-led troops to a border village in a raid that left at least 15 people dead on Wednesday, including civilians, officials said. A Pakistani army spokesman said the attack was the first ever ground incursion by foreign forces on its territory and warned that it undermined efforts against terrorism.

So the list goes on.

The UN appointed Tony Blair, a man with few ethics and no sense of decency to become the UN peace envoy to the Middle East, a man who snuggled up to the USA in what most sane commentators view as an illegal war led by lies (Hans Blick and his team was actually in Iraq, informing the UN there were no weapons of mass destruction when the US decided they had to invade right now, this minute) and almost certainly a classic case of Oedipus Complex, over the invasion of Iraq.

But despite this, the UN and the West still see fit to condemn Israel, without giving a thought to their own behaviour.

Surely a case of a mote in the eye

Nationwide Building Society - nothing but porn loopers

2009-01-07T23:45:00.003Z

If you are an internet account holder of the Nationwide Building Society, you know the one, stupid ads with some fat git and abysmal service.

Try making contact through their secure messaging service.

You will be taken through a loop of contact us here, sign in, contact us here, sign in, contact us here, sign in..... ad infinitum.

There is a telephone number, when you call it..... The response is, well you need to contact us via the internet if it is an internet issue.

There is an obscure link to contact the webmasters, so like any reasonable person (fed up as you may be) you try to use that one, all looks good. But no chance. The message comes back.... Call our help line number, which is the same number that tells you you need to contact the website directly.

Anyone at the Nationwide give a flying .... Of course not. Directors of bankers really are w.....s

The energy wars, Poland and the missile placement

2009-01-02T12:10:00.007Z

Russia may have slipped away from being a world military superpower, so say the pundits... But somehow I can't see all those nuclear weapons just melted away, regardless of that, energy is the new weapon of control.

Russia, who supply 20% of the Eu's gas, piped through the Ukraine, have got a little upset with Ukraine, once again and stopped their supply, but have said that they are not going to disrupt gas supply to the West. Gazprom, have said, they have in fact increased supply to the West recently through the Ukraine pipeline.

Despite words of reassurance, in the UK, Gas suppliers are likely to delay reducing fuel prices to consumers, as wholesale prices once again became more volatile after Russia's action in the Ukraine. Wholesale gas rices rose by 2.5% yesterday.

Meanwhile the USA persists with its desire to place missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic on the pretext that these weapons will ensure safety from a North Korean or Iranian missile strike into Europe.

Russia, funnily enough do not believe a word of it and just take a look at a world map to see how unlikely the scenario really is

The US government appear to have failed to notice Russia stuck in the middle of the route for any missile travelling from North Korea on the bottom right of the map to Europe over on the left, not to mention China sitting in the way.

It would in fact be an easier target to aim a missile form North Korea into the USA than into Europe. The missile would only need to fly over Japan.

It may well be that many Americans fail to grasp World Geography, but I would have thought their Generals would have some concept and at least acknowledge that Russia and China may get a little upset if North Korea starts to use their airspace to launch missiles. Not to mention to slight issue of distance, which is in excess of 4,500 miles.

At some point in time the world will wake up to the fact that Russia hold enormous energy supplies and getting the country irritated is not necessarily the best thing to do.

Peter Mandelson the Hinduja Group and Jaguar cars

2008-12-18T12:25:00.003Z

Well, well well.....

Peter Mandelson has been back as a minister in the UK for a matter of a few weeks and already the situation becomes intriguing.

He has today announced an interest in trying to save Jaguar/Land Rover, all well and good may be the view, a big employer, lots of jobs, but I wonder why he has chosen this particular employer.

Jaguar is now ultimately owned by Tata Group, who are an Indian owned business.

Interestingly Tata Group, announced the signature of a joint venture agreement with Indian Oil Corporation Ltd for establishing a coal-based power plant in Orissa, on 17 December

More importantly this joint venture will meet the demands of the IOCL Paradip refinery and petrochemicals complex, according to a Tata Power communication to the stock exchange. Tata Power will hold 74 per cent equity and IOCL will hold 26 per cent equity in the proposed joint venture.

No great shakes there. However, on December 12th, ONGC and Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOC) joined hands for mutual co-operation in the fields of oil and gas exploration, production, and marketing.

ONGC themsleves have joint ventures in the development of Oil and Gas refineries in Iran and on 4th December the Hinduja group announced plans to develop a further refinery in Kakinda, although the ONGC are dragging their heels a little.

While there is nothing definitive about any of this, it seems a little strange, that for the first time in the recent past the Hinduja Group and Tata are loosely connected, it is within a matter of days, when large investments are being made, that Mandelson steps up to the plate to save Tata having to divert money into bailing out Jaguar/Land Rover.

Tata and Hinduja have crossed wires previously when Hinduja Group had a Joint Venture with Iveco(Fiat), before buying out the Iveco interest of Ashok Leyland, Ratan Tata is on the board of Fiat.

While this may all be an innocent coincidence, Mandelson, the Hindujas and seemingly unrelated trade deals do seem to go hand in hand.

I seem to recall Mandelson was forced to resign over a small matter of passports and the Hinduja brothers 7 years ago

Nowun Till on John Sergeant thanks to Now Magazine

2008-11-26T08:29:00.002Z

I enjoyed the piece by Now Magazine published on 25th Novemeber about the Strictly Come Dancing television programme.

..... ‘BBC executives feel that John was driven out,’ a source tells the Daily Mail. ‘No action could be taken mid-series. However, when the ratings figures start to come in, they will be carefully scrutinised.’

Almost 12 viewers tuned in for 64-year-old John's farewell dance.....
(Full article)

Almost 12 viewers. Well I know I wasn't one of those 12, so who was?

Nowun Till on Barack Obama

2008-11-24T13:31:00.003Z

I wondered how long the hype would last.

Obama was elected with a sense that he would bring changes and a new sense of prosperity to a world besieged by recession and economic gloom.

Surely if any one could, the superhero Obama would save the world (well the US and closely allied capitalist countries) from doom.

Well he isn't yet the 'hands on the tiller' president, but if his book sales are anything to go by, it doesn't bode well.

The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
by Obama, Barack

Is being offered at a 40% discount (somewhat worse than the measure of recession).

However, if you haven't bought the book yet and want to find out more about the Obama dream, pick it up here with a 40% discount

Nowun Till is intrigued by Waitrose advertising Heroin

2008-10-18T05:36:00.002+01:00

In the UK, there is a group of ad writers who really believe it is trendy and hip to use the '70's as a style icon.

We have the farcical idea that John Lydon is a man to sell butter. Waitrose now feel that using the Stranglers track Golden Brown, is a way to introduce us to their products.

These are evidently people of my generation who now wish to pretend they were the rebels in their youth. I assure you, when I was a teenager in the '70's these ad copy writers were not quite as rebellious as they like to pretend.

I was living in Bromley, I was a punk rocker, but I had very few friends, very few allies and faced a peer group who despised my lifestyle.

Yet now, the pretence is that this was all great stuff and was supported by these advertising copy writers.

The Sex Pistols, sold out to cash very early and to the credit of them, they made no pretence of it. Lydon was and remains an image, but not a reality of the time. His only interest was in money, good for him, but pretending he was rebelling and that the advertising copy wirters were supporters. really takes a joke one step too far.

We have London Calling, as a theme behind the Olympics 2012, which is nothing but a sick joke. London Calling, was a song of its time about social deprivation, not about London being a great City.

The Waitrose theme song, Golden Brown, evidently unbeknown to the copy writers, is about Heroin.

Why don't the morons, now in their late 40's and early 50's, stop pretending they were of the punk '70s.

Punk has become a focal point for the seventies and early eighties (way after Lydon had disappeared). but was a minority and intensely disliked lifestyle, I still have the knife scars to prove how disliked we were.

I have yet to find one of these aged 'trendy' ad execs, who actually understands punk.

Sure the Stranglers were not mainstream punk, but at the time, no one cared, but they seem to now.... but when Waitrose advertise Heroin, you know the ad agencies really are run by morons.

Nowun Till snorts around the bank directors tax payers trough

2008-10-08T18:35:00.002+01:00

Great news for all of us in the UK. Our banks are safe.... erm???

Lets try that one more time... Great news Bank Executives bonuses guaranteed by tax payers.

The announcement that the UK Government is going to purchase shares in a few banks and insist the money is lent out is being viewed by some as a wonderful idea.

Lets look at what got us into the mire here... Lending and over borrowing... So to get out of it... Borrow more. As we are heading into a recession, the UK Government has itself announced 3,000 people being sacked today, how are all these redundant workers going to pay for these loans? To suggest the banks need the money to lend to each other is any kind of solution, is to ignore the issue of what happened this time round.

Even worse, is the Directors trough. It may have escaped the myopic vision of some people, but executives are paid bonuses, in many ways, including .... share price.... Tax payers buying shares in failing companies funnily enough will bolster share prices and the poor old executives will be forced to accept their bonuses for such wonderful performance.

I do however agree that any bank which has managed to get tax payers to clear their debts and bolster their assets should be rewarding the directors with huge bonuses. It is a wonderful learning exercise for those of us not running banks... Create a business model which fails and is too complicated for politicians to understand, insist the world will end if your business goes bust and hey, your debts are gone and the taxpayers bolster your share-price.

Why don't politicians leave what they don't understand alone and cease listening to spin doctors, the failing banks have insisted the world is about to end and those PR guys have done a great job in creating a smoke screen behind which politicians have panicked.

The simple fact remains, in the UK and US there remain a significant number of banks, who are doing very nicely and very capable of buying out any ailing and failing banks. The investor guarantee schemes fulfil requirements for 98% of the population.

Nowun Till thinks about ID cards

2008-10-02T08:52:00.002+01:00

The British Government are intent on introducing ID cards, on the pretext it will stop terrorism and illegal immigration. Despite simple common sense that this is nonsense, my own views to one side. I wonder how effective this will really turn out.

Already, weekly there are reports of sensitive personal data being lost and IDs being stolen. Not to mention the biometrics intended to be used on the cards have shown a very high failure rate.

This week, comes some even more reassuring news.

The Stalinist sounding 'Border Agency', run by HM Revenue and Customs until 1st April have problems with their own security checks. Seven Security Personnel working in the Border Agency turn out to be illegal immigrants. One has been arrested, five have resigned and one is on maternity leave.

This isn't new news, as the problems were discovered in December last year, however information was only obtained recently, using disclosures under the Freedom of Information Act, not because the department wished to be honest, but because they were forced. I wonder what else is sitting under the carpet waiting to be forced out in to the open. HMRC specialised in employing illegal workers, in 2005, 10 cleaners were found to be carrying forged documents.

HMRC commented, these 'irregularities' came about during routine checks on paperwork. In other words, employ first and check later.... Nice way to work and an interesting defence for any child care home who 'accidently' employs a paedophile... Well we were going to check later, or a hospital employing a mass killer.... well it was on our to do list.

Not good enough HMRC and certainly note a vote of confidence on the ability for ID checks and hence cards, to be in any way effective.

Nowun Till - learning from the Nigerian email scam

2008-09-27T10:59:00.003+01:00

If you receive this email, it may not be a scam....

From: Henry Paulson
Date: 9/23/2008
Subject: Urgent transaction - need your help

Bright Greetings Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent and important business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had a crisis that has caused the need for a large transfer of funds of 700 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with renowned Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren towallstreetbailout (at) treasury (dot) gov so that we transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive you’re information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Wonderful salutations to you cherish friend from Republic of America.

Yours Faithfully,
Minister of Treasury Paulson

Nowun till welcomes the extra S in the USA

2008-09-16T09:03:00.003+01:00

That stalwart of free market capitalism, finally capitulates and becomes a socialist republic, welcome to the new USA, alternatively called the Republic of the United Socialist States of America or RUSSA for short, oh the irony.

With the collapse of the mainstay of the capitalist structures, namely banks, RUSSA has shown its hand clearly and the state has effectively taken control of the banking system. Billions of US$ have been used to shore up creaking money lenders, with little regard for the wider economy.

It appears that if you run a medium sized business in the US, you and your staff can go swim, but if you run a bank, the good old treasury will step in, maintain your bonus, pump billions into your business and let you keep running what you destroyed. More galling, if you wish to take over one of these failed banks, the Government will subsidize your purchase.

Oh, but a line has been drawn in the sand with Merrills - hardly. The line has been crossed and once crossed, it is like Canute trying to keep back the sea.

The tragedy is that these banks have been run with a failed business model and as such in free market capitalism should fail as a business. What is the point of keeping in place, the same board and management team who destroyed the business in the first place?

Were this a systemic and catastrophic failure of capitalism, places like Bank of America etc. would not be running succesful businesses, which can afford to buy out these failed businesses. There is nothing more than simple incompetence that has caused these failures and socialism doesn't cover up failure.

Now that RUSSA has been created, perhaps we can expect to see more concern for the individual. How a country can morally sit and pontificate, while pouring billions into keeping failed business managers in jobs, while permitting people to live in abject poverty, failing after years to rebuild a destroyed city, because it is in the South, I don't know.

Welcome RUSSA goodbye the USA

Nowun Till wonders about personal responsibility

2008-09-15T21:30:00.002+01:00

I am completely bored with idiots claiming their debt is the fault of the banks.

If I sent a mailer offering untold riches if the recipient just blew their head off, would anyone take me up on the offer?

Just because a bank tells someone it is prepared to offer a loan, doesn't mean they have to accept the offer.

Look at the income work out if you can afford the debt, if not... walk away.

Now we have a bunch of equally thick 'economists' proclaiming this is the worst thing that has ever happened and the world is doomed.

Yes, thousands of people will loose their jobs, house prices will fall and companies will go bust..... So what. This is the flip side of capitalism. It isn't all profit and it isn't all glitter, else we would all live in luxury.

Work it out, the minute anyone needs something, someone has to create/manufacture it, so by simple intelligence, we can't all be living a life of Riley.

So Thick idiot borrowed too much money on their credit card, bank loan, mortgage. That is thick idiots fault, not mine, not HBOS, not the Government. Thick idiot the one who signed the credit agreement, get over it.

Yet still these idiots who couldn't work out their own finances, now wish to proclaim their right to vote, to influence and to engage. No thanks, the sooner they fall through the trap door the better. They are evidently are too thick to understand their own finances, do they really have any sensible thoughts on deciding anything outside their own influence, when they get that wrong?

Stop blaming others for your own failings.

If you are about to loose your house, that is your own fault, no one elses. Try facing up to personal responsibility.

Nowun Till listens to out of the woodwork astrophysicists

2008-09-10T23:08:00.005+01:00

Get over it, suddenly the world is full of expert astrophysicists. The Cern particle accelerator, has not been created today, CERN has been around for years conducting experiments, but suddenly the world is "going to end". Even more galling, is the simple fact that the significant experiments don't even start until next year.

Yes, these are new experiments, yes they are in a much larger and faster accelerator, but headlines to not you an astrophysicist make.

The intention is to determine the answer =4, the question is not being identified.

The experiments will possibly help identify what happened immediately after big bang, they will not and are not an attempt to discover what cause big bang, so they may well find out the answer =4 but they will still not discover what plus, multiplied, divided, cubed or whatever else actually made =4.

The assumption is still unproven that there ever was a big bang. That particular question is still up for debate.

As for the woodwork experts, do they even know what the alternative theories to big bang are? Could they determine black hole light shift if it hit them in the head (as it regularly does) and can they discuss the Friedmann-lemaitre expanding-spacetime paradigm?

I doubt it, but suddenly they know all about the CERN particle accelerator, as if they even know what it is and question the safety of these current experiments.

Nowun Till at home with the great and the good

2008-09-06T21:05:00.002+01:00

The expression 'the great and the good' what exactly does it mean and who is it meant to impress?

Is this a club membership, apparently Bill Clinton qualifies for this group. Is the entry criteria for this group one that means you have to lie to your wife after getting a blow job from your secretary? Great? Good? Not sure on that.

Tony Blair apparently meets the qualifying mark. Ex Prime Minister of the UK, widely derided and despised, ignored the public and consistently lied (apparently all politicians 'have to lie'). Great? Good?

Roman Polanski is another qualifier. He is still wanted in the US for questioning about his sexual preferences, which include having sex with a thirteen-year-old girl. Great? Good?

Seems the term 'great and good' may have become a little distorted and should perhaps read perverted and corrupt.

Nowun Till wonders what NICE would make of 19 gold medals

2008-08-26T10:28:00.004+01:00

It would be interesting to obtain an evaluation form NICE, as to whether the £300 million invested in team GB for the Olympics, resulting in 19 gold medals was money well spent.

NICE, is the UK body, which evaluates the cost/benefit of medicines and decides whether they will be available for NHS patients in the UK.

They have decided that many peoples lives are not worth saving as the investment is too high and have such barriers to entry, that Roche have recently decided not to bother sending some cancer drugs for evaluation by NICE, as it is too expensive to go through the process.

I have a feeling that NICE would decide that at £15 million a gold medal, the value for money just isn't there.

Would we be better off in the UK having NICE decide on investment in sport, or Sport bodies evaluating on investment in saving lives?

Nowun Till wonders at Rooney arrogance

2008-08-24T08:01:00.004+01:00

Bolt increasingly showboated as he progressed though the 100 and 200 meter sprints at the 2008 Olympics. While ugly to watch, he was at least able to deliver.

An unheard of British 400 meter runner in the British 4x400 meter relay team decided he would join the party, with far more amusing results.

Another athlete who feels the need to wear sunglasses on dark nights, he was the anchor runner in the semi-final, which the British team won, by a handsome margin. Unfortunately, Rooney, decided to wave his baton, in a come and catch me if you can attitude, as he approached the finishing line.

It was a pleasure to watch him fail miserably in the final leg of the final, where Britain finished in 4th. I was watching for his showmanship as he approached the line, but strangely it wasn't there. All he was able to do on this occasion was throw the baton on the ground in the manner of a tempestuous child.

Arrogance never looks pretty and even less so from a failure.

Nowun Till wonders how many racists it takes to change a light bulb?

2008-08-22T20:01:00.006+01:00

The bigots in the UK are happily winning their battle to isolate the islands from dirty foreigners, stealing 'our jobs'. Well done racists.

With a downturn in economic activity in the UK and boneheaded immigration policies by the totalitarian labour government, the number of immigrants in the UK is set to decline steeply. Good old recession should be the war cry of the closed minded.

There are currently 72 000 foreign workers employed in the British food industry around 53% of these are Polish and they are beginning to head home. As a result 28% of food and drink manufacturers surveyed, have indicated this will hamper productivity. Increasing vacancy levels, which should be a good thing in an economic downturn. However British workers have priced themselves out of the market demanding far higher wages, than any sensible employer would pay. The F&B sector will be forced to employ British workers, who wont get out of bed unless they are overpaid, this will inevitably lead to a hike in food prices.

While the bigots in the UK like to believe every Daily Mail headline, the only reason British workers are not being employed is because they demand wages which are unacceptable. As a result, the UK now faces the position, whereby the bigots can be delighted that foreign workers are being driven out of this country. I wonder what they will screech when they have to pay double digit inflation prices for their food?

Don't tell me, profiteering businesses?

It is not just the bigots in delight unfortunately. F&B manufacturers are now trying to climb on the gravy train of grants for training, as apparently the indigenous species in the UK is too thick to work in the industry, so need to be trained.

base source thanks go to nutraingredients.com

oh and the answer... Can't be done, they don't want to be enlightened.

Nowun Till wonders about data protection

2008-08-22T06:35:00.003+01:00

The continued incompetence of bureaucrats in handling data is no longer of any surprise. Once again in the UK, the government have managed to loose sensitive data held on individuals. This time, it is the records of prisoners.

On this occasion, it was a private contracting firm who have managed to loose the information. It appears that the government is happy for sensitive data to be passed on to contractors on a whim. Many of these privately contracted firms, use contract labour in administrative roles, so the security and integrity of the data is always compromised, so much for data protection.

The continued demands for Identity Cards to be carried by individuals in the UK, is not something I support, on a variety of grounds. My own perspective aside, how much faith can even the most ardent supporter have of systems which so evidently fail?

The irony on this occasion, is that the records that have been lost, are of convicted criminals and it anticipated many of these individuals will seek protection or relocation, as their names and addresses are held on the data files.

This comes hard on the heels of 25 million records detailing claimants of child benefit.

At this rate, it may be better to load all the information onto the internet and let google index it, at least that way it is likely to collated correctly, it will save millions of pounds in contract fees, as the costs will be for data input, rather than IT consultants and I have more faith that Google will be able to collate the information by individual. Who knows what everyone's record will show, if the UK government are responsible for collation.

Once again there is to be an 'enquiry' what exactly is the point of these enquiries. Nothing happens, data files are still lost and the Government continues to loose credibility. The only beneficiaries are yet more political cronies who are appointed and paid to undertake these enquiries.

Nowun Till reflects on sunglasses

2008-08-19T16:41:00.004+01:00

Watching the women's hurdles final this afternoon, a confident American, Lolo Jones, stood at the starting blocks. Expectations surrounding her, that she would win the final.

All was going well until she met the penultimate hurdle, which she ran into as though she hadn't seen it. Perhaps she hadn't. The night sky over Beijing being dark and the stadium floodlight, there evidently wasn't any sun around, but that didn't stop Lolo Jones finding the need to wear sunglasses.

Why, oh why, do people feel the need to wear sunglasses at night? Why wear them in a sprint race at all when there is absolutely no glare?

I am delighted she ran into the hurdle, this constant need to look like an idiot, sporting sunglasses at midnight is laughable, but not as funny as an idiot wearing sunglasses doing something stupid.

Sunglasses have never been cool, nor will they ever. What they demonstrate, particularly out of sunlight, is lack of confidence and a desire to hide. The antithesis of the 'cool' unfazed, intended image.

Nowun Till on 'we' and the added 'h'

2008-08-19T09:36:00.005+01:00

Having watched some of the Olympics, it becomes ever more irritating the more I watch it.

No, not because I have any problem with the sports, or the coverage, but the interviews with competitors are the bane.

Increasingly when asked how an individual feels after an event the athlete concerned manages to introduce the term 'we' into it. That would be absolutely fine were they actually referring to more than one person, but they aren't. They are talking about themselves and no one else.

This 'Napoleon complex' is becoming increasingly common in sport and acting, where the interviewee develops some massive ego boost and suddenly thinks they are a multitude of people. I just wish the interviewer would have the front to ask them who are the other people they are referring to.

The sooner it stops, the better.

Which leads me on to a phenomenon in the UK, which is particularly irritating. The additional 'h'. There is a city on the south coast of the UK called Southampton, pronounced suhth-amp-tuhn, but regularly an additional 'h' appears with the pronunciation becoming south-hampton. Even more ridiculous is Southall an area of London. pronounced Suh-thall, which has now become South-hall. Why? Bearing in mind in England regularly letters are omitted completely in speech,, why do pretentious radio broadcasters feel the need to poncify pronunciation of areas? Anything to do with house prices in the area they live?

It reminds me of Clapham in South London, always a used to be great place, but not in the least trendy, until the late '80s and early '90s, when people with some money began to move into the area and a new sub-location defined as Clapham Common (which to be more precise had to be the North side of the Common) became the new 'desirable residence, or 'des res' according to estate agents. Some even managed to change the pronunciation Clap-m to Claam.

Why are the British net curtain twitchers so irritating.

Don't you just love the pretentious

Nowun Till wonders about Sebastian Coe

2008-08-18T13:59:00.004+01:00

What exactly is it that Sebastian Coe has, that makes him the right person to be the chair of the London organising committee for the London 2012 Olympics.

He won Olympic gold, so was a good athlete - ok, but is that relevant?

He is a politician - Not a good thing

He is a peer - Not a good thing

In 2006 he was appointed to the board of Bio-Synergy. Relevant?

Well Sebastian Coe likes to put himself forward as the epitome of banishing drugs in sport. Strangely enough Bio Synergy sell a controversial performance-enhancing substance banned in some countries. Creatine is found naturally in the body and in foods such as meat and fish which means it would be difficult to include on the list of prohibited substances. But is banned in France as a supplement, it is used by some British athletes as a legal alternative to anabolic steroids.

Medical experts have raised concerns about creatines long-term effects: It has been linked to cancer and kidney damage and side-effects are said to include muscle cramps, vomiting and dehydration.

FIFA, world football's governing body (of which he has held the position of Chair ofthe ethics committee), issued a warning to players using creatine, saying there were risks it could be contaminated with traces of banned substances.

Russell Langley, of UK Sport, the agency responsible for implementing anti-doping policy in the UK, said its advice to athletes was not to take any supplements because of the risks.

Sebastian Coe had this to say ... "This has nothing to do with my involvement with London 2012."

Complete Leisure Group - established shortly after London won the bid in 2005 to host the Olympics, with Lord Coe as the majority shareholder and main asset. - relevant?

CLG consists of Sebastian Coe Ltd - through which Lord Coe is paid for his appearances, media work and consultancies - the Sport magazine publisher, and sports drinks firm Biosynergy Ltd.

In August of 2007 In an email sent on 20 August, one of the company's directors, Robin Miller, wrote to Lord Coe and another director, Peter Abbey, calling for "urgent" action because he was being threatened with legal action after CLG failed to file annual accounts as required by company law.

CLG's accountant, Rakesh Patel of the Adler Shine ... "any auditor, us included, would not be able to give a clean audit report and would need to qualify (the accounts)... as the group (CLG) would not be able to demonstrate that it had sufficient cash resources to pay their debts".

He also added that Adler Shine will do no further work until CLG has settled the fees it owes the firm, and asks for the current year's auditing fee in advance.

CLG raised £1 million in investment with the help of Peter Abbey, In an exchange of emails with Craig Inglis, an investor from the Liberty Hill Group Abbey said "I am not hiding anything...The money, along with another 400,000, was pissed away ... and if you want to come in and see me, I will tell you chapter and verse... I am not happy having this in writing for obvious reasons...this is about the worst situation I have had to deal with and we are trying to solve it quietly. DO NOT circulate this PLEASE!!!"

Sebastian Coe also strenuously denies any link between his Olympics role and his earnings of at least £200,000 from speeches, product endorsements, and consultancy funnelled through CLG. However his PA Susie Black, who is contracted to be employed full-time by London 2012 and is paid as such out of Olympic funds. A spokeswoman for Sebastian Coe commented..' Ms Black also sometimes "printed things out" for CLG on London 2012 office printers and may have been involved in scheduling Lord Coe's private speaking events.

"Lord Coe has one diary. If it was a CLG meeting she might make (the appointment)" '

I am not too sure any of this adds much credibility to someone responsible for holding the purse strings to £multi-billion of anyone's money.

So what does make Sebastian Coe the best person for the job?

His drive? His commitment? His education? His network? Or something else...

Nowun Till on the recession

2008-08-18T08:13:00.005+01:00

Why are economists unable to use the term 'decline'?

I wonder sometimes if economists are spending too much time with politicians, jazzing up their speech with double talk.

The use of the word 'decline' seems to have been banished, much as Stalin banished those he didn't like. Reports by economists now refer to 'negative growth', why? It sounds like a second hand car dealer telling someone that a car with 100,000 miles on the clock, is 'run in'. It is nothing more than presentational skills gone whack.

Who are these economists protecting and why do they need to? As a listener/reader I don't want to have to translate doublespeak into some semblance of a language I understand. I expect it of politicians, who tell us all they 'have to lie' (I will leave that to another time), but not of economists and reporters.

It gets even worse, when they they talk about the periods of growth that have preceded this period. Just today I heard a reporter, even his head doing somersaults over what exactly he was trying to say, when he told listeners ' the two quarters of negative growth need to be compared to the growth, erm strong growth, growth over the previous few years.'

Decline is decline, growth is growth and negative growth would have made Winston Smith wince.