children

i hate kids, well more accurately i hate what kids do and are allowed to do. so to be honest i hate the way that some parents have not brought up their kids, have not taught their kids to behave, not taught their kids to respect other people, and in fact have just let them run wild.

i am not sure why i have had this sea change in attitude towards children - for several years i was a step dad and i like to think i did a good job of being a parent.

it's all those little things that start to add up and make me a child hater - the posh parents who take their kids to galleries and then let them run around making noise and spoiling the enjoyment of the other people there. or taking them into shops and again letting them run off to cause havoc. the closest they come to criticism is a short shrug of the shoulders that seems to say yes i know they are a little shit but aren't they cute. the poor parents who just swear at their kids, or ignore them or let them drop litter all over the place. at best these parents are aware their children exist but would prefer they were someone else's problems. then there are the accessory children - those whose parents think it was just the done thing to have a child and were not really concerned with what was going to happen once they got tired of the novelty of being a parent. these are the sort of people who were probably not suited to having pets not alone children.

i find it odd that some people think that having children is a right and that anyone can do it.

me i think that people should not be able to breed unless they are capable of showing that they are going to teach the child the right values, that they are going to provide the child with a stable home, that they are capable of understanding just what is entailed with having kids - not just for them but for the wider society.
we can't drive cars without having passed a test the same should be true of bringing children into the world. if you don't pass the test you can't have the kids. it's a simple and effective plan.
sure it could be open to a lot of abuse - but with a little thought a number of practical criteria could be put in place and then if you pass you are entitled to have children - simple really.

(mmmm thinking about it this is me at my most miserable. i put it down to the fact that they are now saying the olympic bid went well this week. Bugger!)

laugh

sometimes you just have to laugh or else you would cry.

so here are some of the things that have occurred just recently that have made me smile.

ikea: i am not particularly house proud. in fact i probably take an inordinate amount of pride in just how messy my place is. it is no longer a pigsty - it is worse than that. i have so much junk it is not true. what is worse is that i seem to add to it each week. even i am not thinking that my flat is approaching being a dangerous tip and i need to do something about it.
having said that i am still a loooong way from wanting to go to a midnight opening of ikea, especially if that opening happens to be in edmonton (even the lovely city of london has to have some depressing places). but lured by the promise of opening day bargains such as a £45 leather sofa (it surely couldn't have been the less than funny poster ads they had used) 6000 people queued to enter the store, and when the doors opened all english decorum left them and pandemonium broke out.
"Ms Christian, 38, a civil servant, said: "There were people who each had one end of a sofa and were pulling in different directions, both shouting, 'It's mine.' Some were lying on sofas that people were trying to take away. It was total chaos. In fact, chaos was an understatement. I've never seen anything like it in my life.'' (from the independent)
in what could be a scene from dawn of the dead the piece goes on
"Inside, Mr Olie said it had all been going "very smoothly'' as the first people were let in. "But then they gathered all around the store and tried to come in through all the doors. We closed the doors and tried to let in one person at a time but then they came in force.''
the good news (if you happen to be into home decorating and such like) is that the store has reopened and that:
" a counselling service had been set up for the workers by the company following the events. " (bbc)
now that is what i call classy - but also a little depressing. still we live in a world of victim culture so what can we expect.

cherie: not really a fan of hers - the smiling gash of a mouth scares me. however i appreciate she must being doing something right to be a mum of several kids, married to the pm and still be a success in her chosen field of the law. that said i am not sure i would pay a penny to hear her speak. she is currently on a controversial speaking tour of austrailia and new zealand. from what i can make out it is controversial because she is making a lot of money from it rather than she is saying anything that is boat rocking radical.
but i have to say i would have like to have been there when she confused new zealand with austrailia - not once but twice. for me it would be like being called welsh or, heaven forbid, french! now i know public speaking isn't easy - in the right circumstances i can talk the hind legs off a donkey - ask me to speak in public and i am as shy as a mouse. but even i know you prepare your notes carefully to make sure you have the names and places right.
whats more people said she was dull and boring. (telegraph)

ellen: i must confess to being underwhelmed by ellen macarthur's record breaking round the world solo sail. oh i can appreciate the skill, the dedication, the determination it must have taken for her to do it. i am sure she overcame physical hardship and faced potential danger. but i am left with a big so what. her achievement has not changed or impacted on my life, it means nothing to me. (to be honest i am like that with most things though - i was not buoyed up (to keep the nautical feel) by the gold medals that were won by the gb team in the olympics. i appreciated the skills of those who achieved but it was just a fleeting glancing whoop of pleasure from me, it was the same when england won the rugby world cup).

now this might make me appear to be a miserable old git - and frankly you would be right.
but this letter to the independent - well takes it to another level entirely.

"Lone sailors off watch
Sir: While Ellen MacArthur's latest round-the-world bid ended in success, I wonder how she managed to complete this while breaking international law.
The International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea clearly state: "Every vessel shall at all times maintain a proper lookout by sight and hearing as well as by all available means appropriate in the prevailing circumstances and conditions so as to make a full appraisal of the situation and of the risk of collision."
Nowhere in these rules is there a section which allows you to break them if you are on a solo round-the-world bid. There are reports that she had no more than four hours' sleep per day, but during these four hours there is no way she could be keeping a lookout by sight. I am a merchant navy officer and have seen many of my professional colleagues fined or indeed facing jail sentences for failing to keep a proper lookout.
These are the same people who would have to risk their lives in a rescue attempt if these solo yachtspersons get into difficulties.
DEREK GRAY Chirnside, Berwickshire"
derek - i doff my cap to you for showing me that there are still levels of miseryguts that i have yet to explore. you are my new hero and my new guiding light.

also from the same edition

"Sir: Congratulations to Ellen MacArthur on an extraordinary achievement. At the same time it would be apt to remember and raise a glass to previous world-rounders who have achieved the same single-handed feat, albeit slower, without the daily security of satellite navigation systems.
JASON GRIST Teddington, Middlesex"
while you jason - you need to read derek's letter because you have shown yourself to be small and petty when it comes to being miserable. read derek and learn. and in future jason don't be such a wishy washy miserable git.

while ellen's efforts have done little to spark my imagination i realise that the world needs people like her to keep doing those eccentric headline making journeys, climbs, walks, runs, etc. they brighten up the day and continue to remind us that we can achieve a lot just by being people.
(now that makes me appear to be as bad and as wishy washy as jason. darn!)

camilla: i gave up my royalist leanings many many years ago, probably about the time i realised that actually i was not abducted from the royal family when i was a baby and that i was never going to be king. so the announcement that camilla and charles are going to get married feels me with about as much excitement as someone sailing around the world did.
there have been a few moments that i have liked in this. one was the lass who married the really useless member of the family saying "i recommend getting married in windsor castle". i am sure that this is an option open to most of us.
i like the fact that it has been timed to take a certain amount of heat of of andy for using helicopters at tax payers expense rather than catch the train.
i admire charles for going with a woman his own age - not like that nice mr. trump and his thatched hair, or mr douglas and ms zeta-jones.
the other aspect of it all has been the rash of polls about whether or not camilla should be queen, whether the queen should abdicate, should charles still be the head of the church (or as he calls it defender of the faith - a judas priest lp if ever there was one - rock on charles), that nazi prince and his brother are in favour of it all.
all of this is operating within the scope of the fact the royal family are relevant. they are not. and as we are trying to be more american why don't we copy the one thing they have done that is good.
lets become a republic.
about time.

freedom

in a week that has seen me get giddy with excitement and anticipation one night and crushed and dejected the next night. (ok that is me overstating it a little ... well quite a lot. though events of the week left me a little disappointed i am not going to inflict on the world my version of pink floyd's the wall.... Actually that might not be true either.....)

anyway enough guff also during this week i read this piece in the new statesman from terry eagleton. (actually the piece was written january 31st - i am just behind on my reading...)

"All the papers have noted the number of times Bush used the word "freedom" in his inaugural speech, or sometimes "liberty". (Who said he was semantically impoverished?) He was right to hammer it home, since "freedom" is the most usefully ambiguous term in the political lexicon. It has both a high-minded spiritual sense and a low-minded material one, so you can appear to mean the first while intending the second. Freedom is a precious human right . . . and a rationale for incinerating small children. The lost souls of Guantanamo thirst for it, and small farmers are bankrupted in its name. The language of freedom is one of the few to be spoken with equal fluency by archbishops and casino owners, oilmen and Oxford philosophers. No one is against it, which is exactly what is so vacuous about it. What will destroy us is not mean-minded materialism, but visionary idealism."

i was struck not only by how true this was but also how depressed it made me.
as a left leaning progressive i have often gotten into mel gibson mode and cried "freedom" but so often the freedoms i am chomping at the mouth about are not always the ones that others are craving or frankly needing.

in order to cheer myself up i pulled down all the respect party posters i saw along brick lane wednesday night as i went for a beigel.
in truth it did make me feel much better.

crime

we live in a period where the politicians want us to be scared.
they want us to be scared so that we will vote for whatever solution to the problem they are peddling.
on the global scale it is terrorism we are to be scared of. and in order to be "safe" from this we are being asked to give up civil liberties, we are being asked to believe the lies of the those that lead us and further more we have live in a world that is constantly getting more dangerous – filled with a greater potential for war on a global scale. But we are ok because the politicians are there to tell us how they can make us safe from this self fulfilling prophecy.

Meanwhile back at home we are being treated to the twin spectres of immigration (and the race to appear to be racist enough to appeal to the readers of the sun and the daily mail but not as racist as the other party) and crime. Together they are a jackpot winning hand at blackjack.

So we now have the conservative party’s law and order proposals.
The introduction of minimum and maximum sentences (you have to at least serve the minimum sentence before you can be let out).
The return of “three strikes and you are out!” whereby your third offence for burglary means a guaranteed sentence. Though there might be exceptional circumstances where this would not count.
Scrapping of early release scheme – because since labour had introduced it in 1999 3500 crimes had been committed by people on early release. (dave Wilson, a criminologist, says: “And 90% of those on the early release curfew scheme did not reoffend before the end of their sentence”).
Of course this means building more prison places and howard has pledged funding for an extra 20,000 prison places by 2010. (which will add to the 17,000 places created under labour – which currently gives the uk the biggest prison population in Europe)?
Remember this is about a specific type of criminal. There is nothing here about potential white collar crime – that in many ways hurts more people and more often. Whether it is through fraud, poor health and safety or just wilful disregard for your rights. The people who do that are fine, and they don’t need to be imprisoned. After all someone needs to pay for the tories… (and sadly new labour).

Howard says that prison sends out a strong message “that crime does not pay!” it is such a pity that the message is either being ignored or is not being understood by the target audience – or why else is there a need to increase prison places?
Simple reason is fear – create the spectre of a lawless society then promise to fill the prisons to bursting point and well you have a vote winner.
As howard says:
"Build more prisons and fewer criminals will be free to commit crime,"…. "It's common sense. its how I will cut crime."
And when crime continues – just build more….
Nacro - the national crime reduction charity - said Tories would be better spending money on more measures to prevent crime, support victims and alternatives to prison.
But that caring rehabilitating attitude does not pander to the needs of the right wing press and it does not pander to the needs of the “hang and birch them” brigade, who still seem to hold sway over much of the thinking of current politics.

For the tories it is not about trying to remove the possible causes of crime, it is not about taking criminals and attempting to make them “useful” members of society, for the tories it is about retribution plain and simple.
Or to cite Juliet Lyon, the director of the Prison Reform Trust. She criticised Mr Howard for believing "that prison works" when three out of five people walked out of jail and returned to crime.

New labours response: prison is for the most dangerous and the persistent offenders. Oh and the tories have said where the money is going to come for this prison expansion. I can guess it will be something like a pfi with a private (no doubt American) company running the place and when it all goes horribly wrong the state will have to step in and pick up the pieces.

But we can all feel safe because not only does howard talk tough he acts tough – as he also joined Cleveland police on a dawn raid to bring down some drug dealers. (tsk tsk for thinking that this was a publicity stunt to help bring attention to his speech, and yes that stab proof vest did make him look almost as silly as bush in the flight suit). Three suspected dealers were arrested in two raids and a quantity of cannabis seized.
"It has been a very good example of pro-active policing of the kind I want to encourage" howard said.
I suppose we should be thankful he stopped short at encouraging us all to have a go!

Crime, like immigration, is a serious issue for many people. If we have not been the victim of a crime we probably know someone who has been. But if you believe the comments of howard, the sun and the daily mail just the simple act of stepping outside your door is to invite being robbed and mugged. They hark back to some bygone golden age when we lived crime free leaving our doors open safe in the knowledge out worldly possessions were safe and that we could walk anywhere without fear. If there was ever a time when this was true then that sense of belonged to a community and being safe in that community was mugged by the many years of tory rule under thatcher, major and howard and his ilk.
Why should we trust him now?

archer

there is much going on in the world right now.
for instance condi is in the middle east telling the israelis and the palestinians that they must play well together and be nice. while dubya is getting ready to declare war on syria or iran or maybe both (it's not like he has finished the last two he started...) but look folks lets take heart from it all if going to the edge of armageddon with iran brings peace to israel and the middle east it will be worth it for the few minutes they both remain uncrispied in the nuclear blasts.

meanwhile back in blighty the tories and new labour are about to enter the you say potatoe and i say potato phase of politics. one says quota the other says point system - but what they are both saying is "look johnny brown/yellow skinned foreigner we don't want you in our country unless you are going to do some solid good work for us or you are rich." but we don't want to appear to be racist and we don't actually want to get into a discussion about this so what we will do is say only so many of you nasty immigrants can come in.
the clever thing about this is both parties will claim that they have to have this "scare mongering" debate because if they don't then the far right extremist parties will and they might get a couple of seats in the houses of parliament. here i am referring to bnp and such like as opposed to the daily mail or sun readers party.

but lets be honest the most important thing of all is that jeffrey archer can come back.
true new labour have allowed ali campbell to rejoin them in order to show that they are no longer the party of spin.
now jeffery can come back into the tory fold to show that they are indeed the party of law and order. this is because his 5 year expulsion from the party has elapsed.
as dr liam fox said ""I'm sure that in line with people having served their sentence and having done some reparations for what they did wrong, we would look at that sympathetically.
"I don't believe in vindictiveness, I don't think that has any place in politics, unlike the prime minister and Alastair Campbell." (he may not believe in vindictiveness but not above some cheap points scoring ........
and as norman (on yer bike) tebbit said ""After all, he is far from being the worst perjurer in the world," hell he probably isn't even the worst perjurer in the tory party, let alonethe world.

once archer is back in where will it stop aitken ? hamilton (he must be up for a shot after all he has just gotten money of max clifford so he is a winner and that is something that the tories have forgotten how to feel!)

the real question for the tories isn't whether or not to let him in - like it or not they need him. the question is does he need them or want them. if he is a smart cookie he will pass this time around let them lose and then come and help them for the next one.
still it would be fun to see archer and campbell go at it like two warrior spin doctors.

the tory all stars would be portillo, johnson and archer.
throw in virginia bottomley and edwina currie (just for me and part of the top tory totty list) and then the tories have a faint chance.
but the party that has howard, fox and letwin are unelectable and for that we should give thanks.

kneel and pray.

eggs

years ago when i was a student and i had the pleasure to study at the polytechnic of north london i was introduced to a political radicalism that i had been totally unaware of.
it was a large wake up call for me, and in many respects helped shape many of the views i hold today (most of which i had previous to going there but they were unfocused and not properly thought through - yes i know that they still seem that way but....)
at pnl one of the things i discovered was that the socialist workers party (swp) was very active (it still is and it is still saying pretty much the same things it did then - the only difference is the language it uses to couch it's arguments) and often when it went to demonstrate and protest part of it's weapon of choice was the egg. the egg is easy to carry, easy to throw and makes a great splat when it hits the target. the perfect weapon of the class war protester.
imagine my surprise when i went to the london school of economics and the edwina (top tory totty) was there speaking to the students and she wasn't pelted with eggs! i had gone from a hotbed of radicalism to a college that had returned to the establishment.

when i saw this headline "Demonstrators pelt Hoon with eggs" i could only think of two things that the defence minister had been the subject of an attack by the swp and this was because of a] he is a politician b] he is closely linked with the iraq war c] he is thoroughly unlikable and that i was not sure how to make wmd's into an egg joke (never came up with an answer!)

imagine my surprise when i discovered it was not the swp but my friends in the pro-hunt circle.
it is nice to see that they are respecters of democracy. no one has been arrested according to the story, one has to wonder if the police were that concerned to arrest anyone. you just know that if it were an anti-globalisation demo then several would be banged up at the moment.

and look i am back to mentioning hunters again.

trump

i am not sure where i heard it, and because of that i am not even sure if it is true or is just something i dreamt in one of my more lucid dreams, but it was rumoured the higher up you were in the pecking order of hollywood the less likely it was that anyone would mention you were wearing a wig, and not only were you wearing a wig but that it was a truly horrendous one.
the fact that a person is so vain that they need a wig is one thing, but that they then call attention to the fact that they are wearing one by choosing the most inappropriate syrup is beyond me.

the movie strange days is notable for a few things 1] angela basset 2] that anyone in their right mind would be more interested in juliette lewis than angela basset and 3] tom sizemore in a hideous wig (ok later on in the movie it is revealed as a wig... oooops spoilt the only interesting part of that film for you).

william shatner is notorious for his wig.
elton john for his attempts at hair transplants.
i would say lets just be normal and be ourselves but that apparently isn't an option in some parts of society.
i read that some american businessmen were getting chin implants to give them that square jawed look that people respected and trusted. of course if the practice is widespread enough that it makes the news you have to wonder if anyone trusts american businessmen (it's a rhetorical question so no need to send answers on a postcard.)

all of which brings me to donald trump. he has just gotten married again, to a young beautiful thing. and i have to admit that if i was very rich and very wealthy i would have no problems in marrying someone who was so obviously after me for my money - hell you can't take it with you.
but there is one question i have ?
what is going on with donald's hair.
i first became aware of the trumpsters hair while watching wrestlemania XX he got interviewed during the bouts and it looked like someone had dropped some ginger coloured candyfloss on his head. it was like a bad special effect was trying to give him a halo or something. then i saw the cover to hello magazine (trump had very cleverly made sure that other people had paid for the wedding... i am guessing it is one of the reasons why he is wealthy) and the hair is still there and it still looks like it is mutating on his head.
i want to know what is causing it - it can only be considered dangerous and a hazard to world peace if it escapes.
we must know the truth of what is going on with trumps hair.....

hunters

from the independent newspaper letter’s page on tuesday feb the 1st

oh no not the hunt again pat. let it rest i can hear say, let it go, move on i hear you cry. i can’t. i know i should but i just can’t.
it’s not because i like foxes, i don’t. i don’t even like bunny rabbits. really i don’t. but i hate wankers who go on about tradition and human rights but are the first people to trample over the rights and traditions of others when it suits them. what is more she is canadian – let her go hunt elks and moose – go riding with the mounties if you like riding horses.
see below for more incisive commentary from me (ok snide jibes…)

hunt ban tramples on a thousand years of english tradition
sir: thank you for publishing the letter from david dear ("hunt celebrates life", 25 january). he is absolutely right.
early in december, i had the opportunity to go out with the fernie of leicestershire. on that day, i rode over some of the most beautiful countryside i have ever seen, the ancestral home of my mother's family. i had hired a wonderful horse, a mare of such quality and excellent training that i felt unworthy of her.
***** one of the main arguments that the hunters always use is that it is social. so why can’t they just go out and have a ride about with their mates. i am sure the horses are not going to be too bothered if they are running around the countryside because the riders just fancy going here or there rather than running after the fox.
if hunting stops right now, this very instant – the beautiful countryside will still be there. wow what an amazing concept the land will still be there, in all it’s natural glory without gloried idiots dressed to the nines prancing around on a horse after a fox.
and i am sorry the moment anyone says she was not worthy of the horse has been reading too many fantasy novels and thinks they have stumbled into middle earth – get a reality check: it’s a horse.

it was so utterly moving to hunt in the country that i consider my second home, i found myself near tears.
i've never seen ordinary people ride with such courage and skill.
**** see above, you almost expecting her to mention how not only did they ride down a fox but they also scouted the local area to make sure no stray (and dangerous) immigrant (or should that be orc?) has strayed into the pristine countryside.

the hunt followers, both on foot and on horseback, were hugely welcoming and friendly. even the threat of an impending ban on an activity so central to their livelihood did not take the smiles from their faces.
**** obviously she has not seen the ruddy faced bile spewing idiots when they come into london to “protest”.

many who are in favour of the uk hunting ban will argue that foxhunting dates back only about 300 years. the truth is that your people have been hunting with hounds across the centuries. your foxhounds are descended from animals brought during the norman conquest. your hunters have been bred from crosses of ancient native british stock with the thoroughbred. the latter is a gorgeous creature, a work of art, created by the english. the hedgerows over which the hunt rides date back to saxon times.
the right to hunt is not a privilege held by the wealthy elite. it's part of who you are as britons; please preserve it. the ban is a smack in the face to the people who built the country, fought and died for it, and for five hundred years made it the richest and most influential nation in the world.
**** i am pretty sure that when my grandfather and uncles went to war the first thing on their minds was “we must preserve the hunt”. in fact i am pretty sure that is the real reason blair went into iraq – not only did saddam have wmds but he was going to ban the hunt!
as i said before the disappearance of the hunt will not mean hedgerows will disappear, they will still be there. the foxhounds well if they need a job i know an animal testing centre or two….

the hunting ban is very obviously motivated by class jealousy and cultural self-hatred disguised as compassion. it's a revenge law written by people who harbour a horror of the man on horseback.
***** as i have said before i could care less about the foxes, and if i was in government this is an issue that would be at the bottom of my list of priorities. but now that it has passed, now that the majority have spoken (this is a democracy after all and banning of hunting with hounds has been a part of the labour policy for a loooong time, i expect those people who care about tradition, who care about rights to uphold and abide by the law. of course they won’t they think that they are above the rest of us and can ride roughshod over democracy when it suits them. these lovers of tradition were nowhere to be seen when mines and factories were being closed, they were nowhere to be seen when the unions were being crushed. so those people lost their lifestyles, their traditions and their communities. well hunters you can suffer it as well.
learn to enjoy a leisurely ride with your friends. learn that you don’t have to be chasing after an animal to kill it in order to have fun. if you are so keen to see blood – join up. substitute your hunters uniform for that of the soldier, learn new traditions.
i do hope that nazi prince harry and his family are caught out on a hunt and they get banged up inside for it.
and there is one noble english tradition i wish the hunters would abide by – that of the stiff upper lip when facing adversity and not this endless whining and whinging.

on 19 february, i will think of the hunt staffs, followers and supporters, and be cheering for them. i urge them to fight honourably and hard in the war against the loss of their freedom. and i fully expect to return to england to hunt foxes again.
meredith stranges peterborough, ontario, canada
***** i can only hope that on the 19th you are crying into your cups as the hunters lose again. but sadly i just know that in terms of class war we will lose this war, but hey winning one round was pretty cool.

i am thinking i should move on from hunters. so with luck this will be my last gripe at them.

jacko

we have a nazi prince while the americans have the noncey (it being the acronym for “not on normal courtyard exercise – don’t say you don’t learn anything when you visit it!) king of pop. both have dodgy taste in clothes. both have probably been involved in some dodgy sexual encounters (though we do hope that the nazi prince was at least doing it with a consenting partner – but who can tell with these public schoolboys?)

michael jackson’s trial for being a child molester (apparently he is also up for extortion as well –who would have thought he was that hard up for cash?) has begun. up first is the important process of finding 12 people who can sit on the jury and judge jackson fairly. 750 people are up for the 12 places (why no one has thought to make this a reality tv thing is beyond me - you just know there are enough sad people out there who would 1] want to be involved in the jury and 2] more than enough people would watch it throughout all the twists and turns of the case (and yes jay i am thinking of you.!) it is suspected that of that 750 a number of people will have to drop out because they can’t afford to be away from job and family for the estimated six months of the case.
the defence and the prosecution have to weed out various people in order to find those people who are most “favourable” to their points of view. so they have to be careful not to find people who have strong views on racism, plastic surgery, bad pop records or child abuse (frankly how can you not have an opinion on child abuse it strikes me it’s something you can’t really have grey areas on – unless of course you are an official in the catholic church – ooops that’s me going to hell.)
they also have to look out for “stealth jurors”: the people who want to make a name for themselves with a media deal after the event, or who want to “save” or “punish” jackson in order to make a statement.
although i shouldn’t be surprised about it the media coverage has been vast and the number of his fans (who are called soldiers of love) who have travelled out to support jackson in his hour of need. in so doing they have shown that they are a little like their hero in the slightly cuckoo department.

so you have lidi gyampoh, 25, from canterbury, kent, left her three children, aged three, 18 months and six months, with her mother to travel for 23 hours to be at the court.
"i remember seeing michael on television when i was about five or six. i remember thinking, i really want this man to be my father. and that never really changed throughout my childhood.
(and already she seems like she is treating her kids with the respect that they need to grew into well adjusted adults .....)

[bit of a pat digression sidebar here - since when did being a parent become a right? it's people like lidi who make me think that people should have to pass a test before they can have kids - we have to learn to drive - why not learn to be parents? perhaps i will return to that little hobby horse another time - oh i know you can't wait for that to happen!]

or
manish pandya from hounslow, west london, said: "we believe he's totally innocent so we came here to support him. some of our friends think we're totally crazy but they're very supportive." (i’ve news for you manish you are crazy).

or (and a wonderful example of capitalist entrepreneurship and lack of morals)
"you want to know what i think, what i really think?" asked terrie h, selling pictures of jackson emblazoned with the word innocent for $5 each. "i think he's guilty. he's always with kids. a 46-year-old man? i'm just helping my cousin out selling these. we've sold six today. i don't believe he's innocent. i just don't."

in the end you hope that what ever the outcome is there is a fair trail carried out and that whatever the verdict is it is seen to be done correctly.

and in a parallel with out nazi prince you have to wonder at the people who advise jackson and who haven’t said at one time or another “look mike this appears to be a bit dicey you hanging out with kids without a responsible adult hanging around to make sure it’s all above board….” just like you would have thought that one of harry’s many staff should have said “harry dear swastika’s just don’t go with your eyes…..”

at least harry’s dodgy choice of fancy dress is not going to get him banged up, jackson’s alleged child abuse is going to see him turned into someone’s prison bitch. if he is lucky perhaps jonathon king and gary glitter will send him tips on how to survive when he is living his new version of oz. even better perhaps he can use peter townsend’s excuse “it was research!”

veritas

veritas is the name given to the virtue of truthfulness, which was considered one of the main virtues any good roman should possess.

while in vino veritasin vino veritas: in wine there is truth. (when a person is under the influence of wine he shows himself in his true colours.) or more commonly you are likely to say things you will regret when you are pissed.

veritas is also the name of robert kilroy-silk's new euro sceptic party, due to launch this week (feb 2nd). it would not be fair to say that veritas broke off from the uk independence party (ukip) more it was a case of kilroy-silk throwing a hissy because they wouldn’t let him be the leader. so he has flounced out and has now set up his own gang. now it appears the promise of a bit of power in the new party means other people from ukip are deserting that party for veritas.
“damian hockney said ex-chatshow host mr kilroy-silk would "deliver better" as the leader of a euro sceptic party.
he said mr kilroy-silk had made him deputy party leader of veritas, latin for truth. “
hockney is currently elected to the london assembly and ukip (quite rightly) want him to give up his seat for a ukip member. it will be interesting to see what he does. why? because hockney had proposed a motion that requires any successful ukip election candidate who later left the party to resign their seat to allow a genuine representative of the party to take their place. it was a motion that was passed by ukip. true it is no longer binding on hockney – but it’ll be an instant measure of the virtue of the man and the new party. (oh hell what i am i thinking he will keep the seat. we all know it!) (oh and this will be the fourth political party hockney has been a member of – he’s like my mate paul, only for paul it is rugby clubs).
have to ask though for a party that is euro sceptic why the choice of veritas as a name – why not use the english word truth? could it be that veritas gives you a sense of gravitas? and let’s be fair these little self important inadequate politicians need all the help they can get in looking, sounding and feeling important. and as any marketer will tell you the brand is all important – just a shame they have chosen a name that smacks of europe!

mind you given what has recently been said by a member of ukip you can see why there is a much to join the new party of the perma-tanned unctuous one. ukip have had to suspend a member for the somewhat outlandish views of “suggesting the criminally insane should be killed” but it’s ok john houston does actually say that their organs should be used to benefit the law abiding citizens of the country. (are you listening george w bush – it could be away to make your love of the death penalty more acceptable – have a lottery for the organs… somehow i wish i hadn’t said that i expect it to be someone’s policy in the next 5 years ….)
houston also went on to say “"the problems for the human race - environmental and others - can only be dealt with on a global scale, and that calls for a radical alliance of the english-speaking nations, which they are uniquely able to do."” (i am guessing that michael howard is kicking himself for not being able to get that nugget out into a speech).
ukip claim that houston never mentioned any of these thoughts when he was being selected – well they would say that though.

it’s odd really all this reminds me of the various far right and far left groups who spend most of their time arguing over the smallest slight, the minutest of differences between themselves, and winning the struggle between them becomes all important. to the outside world they all appear to be nutters to be shunned and avoided at all costs. with only a few people squandering their votes on them, they should not be given the chance to influence the direction of serious politics. yet sad to say both the main uk political parties take them seriously and will do all they can to win those few “extreme” votes and will make the claim that it is better that they talking about it than the far right or far left does.

all veritas and ukip need are archer, aitken and thatcher junior to join them and well it would be perfect.
and talking of thatcher – this is from the telegraph
“queueing up in london's freezing temperatures on tuesday, mark thatcher was spotted patiently waiting his turn alongside several hundred other visa applicants at the us embassy.
thatcher, who recently pleaded guilty to being linked to a botched coup in equatorial guinea, needs the visa to travel to america to see his wife and children.
"he looked very nervous standing there," says my source.
"a few people asked him whether it was true that he'd attempted to overthrow president bush but he didn't appear to find their comments amusing."
like all other applicants, thatcher may have to wait up to a week for a visa but his status as a convicted felon won't aid the process.
when i call, a spokesman for thatcher insists: "mark wasn't queueing with anyone. he had an appointment at 8am to discuss his application. the meeting went very well and we're now awaiting the decision."
one can only hope that the american’s show more taste than we did and stop him from travelling to the usa – after all he is a felon! one hopes that he is under some sort of terrorist watch after all he did try to overthrow the leadership of a country, though i suppose he could use the pre-emptive strike there were wmds there (that would be wads of money and diamonds). on second thoughts the yanks will let him in – they let his batty mum in!

rejoice

let the bells sing out. rejoice rejoice the heavenly hosts proclaim.
pat is back! pat is back!
yes after some terrible times with computers i seem to be up and running again so the virtriol, the venting, the spleen, comedy and poetry that you have all come to expect will continue again!
(ok i know you never get any of the above from me - but a man has to dream, and dream i do!)

just be happy i am back.

guilty

ho! ho! ho!
sometimes you just have to laugh at another person's misfortunes. it may not be clever, it may not be big but it is therapeutic and i am smiling just that little bit more because of my old pal mark thatcher.
admittedly he will not be banged up inside some nasty south african or zimbabwean jail, but in order to escape jail he has had to cop a plea and pay a large fine.
although he still protests his innocence we all know he is guilty.
so it is nice to hear him wriggle and weasel out of it. thatcher, who once lost his way in a rally, maintained that he thought his helicopter was going to be used as an air ambulance “but in his plea bargain statement, sir mark says he came to realise the helicopter was to be used for mercenary activities before the deal was finalised.” (bbc)
just a shame he never told anyone – well if he was lucky he might have made a few bob or two so why rock the boat!
of course now that thatcher has turned grass (oops sorry i mean concerned citizen) he is just going to be hit with a large fine and can now leave south africa.
he said of this
“speaking outside court, an emotional sir mark said: "there is no price too high for me to pay to be reunited with my family and i am sure all of you who are husbands and fathers would agree with that." (bbc).
you wonder why he didn’t think of that before he got involved in the shady dealings in the first place – though i doubt he ever thought about being caught.
and it was nice to see the family standing behind all the way in texas – good on yer girl stand by your man.

the only thing that would have made it sweeter would have been jeffery archer being implicated in it all. mind you now that thatcher is about to spill the beans to keep himself free who knows who else may have to spend time playing bitch in a south african prison.


this story covered by the bbc , guardian, telegraph (you have to register for the telegraph story but it is free...) and i am guessing any decent news source - especially those edited by people my age who still remember what maggie put us through.

bloddy hell hunt ban now thatcher - it's like class war never went away.

truth

how does the old saying go? the truth will out (or perhaps it is the truth is out there – but that would point out that i watched x-files... ooops just have).

the truth is a many splendid thing – one man’s truth is another man’s bare faced lie. the idea of absolute truth has been (and will continue to) argued over for thousands of years. most of us accept the world is a complicated and complex place made up of many shades of grey. we may wish it to be black and white, but we know it will never be.

people like michael moore will use the fact that no one challenges him in court as proof that he is telling the truth (mind you that is the same defence that david icke uses so i am not so sure that is necessarily one to hide behind). mostly i suspect that moore is not taken to court because his opponents do not see the point in getting into a debate with him over his claims because they know that in doing so gives him even more legitimacy, secondly they know that once a debate has been opened all arguments then come under scrutiny, and finally they know the truth is not an easy thing to prove.

what on earth or you going on about pat ?
well partly it is this story just off of the bbc website:
“intelligence officials have confirmed the us has stopped searching for weapons of mass destruction in iraq. “
the “existence” of these wmds is the main reason we went to war with iraq, in fact tony blair after the event continued to claim that wmd’s would be found now they had ousted saddam, they have not been. they were never going to be.
we are now left with:
“mr duelfer said when he released his interim report in october that former iraqi leader saddam hussein had still had the desire to restart wmd programmes, when he could.” which holds as much weight as my desire to have sharon stone sit on my face.
the importance of this story is huge, especially for the bbc. the bbc came under attack from the government of tony blair for daring to say that they had “sexed” up the existence of wmds to make it easier to go to war.
but by jingo they did, do they regret, goodness gracious i don’t think so. (oops that’s me swiping doonesbury doing his impression of rumsfeld. it is funnier when he does it.
at the time of hutton report the truth was blair’s truth, now it appears that truth is not so true anymore!

following on from that the daily telegraph (among others) are reporting that mi6 is to hire a quality control watchdog in order to safeguard the quality of it’s intelligence. apparently “a businessman with management experience had already been appointed before the report's release to check the agency's overall operations”.
now i am missing something here – and i might be doing the businessman in question a disservice (unless of course it is digby and then i am spot on…) but what on earth do they know about the events and information that the intelligence services are reporting on? how are they to know they have gotten the full story ? how are they to validate it – use google ? get their secretary to phone someone up?
surely this is something that has to be done within the service and frankly questions of validity are the things that the government who is using the information should be raising – especially before it goes to war based on it all.
(and yes there are issues where hold on if this is information that can’t be used in court because of national security how can it be allowed to go to an external agency for vetting – what the private sector is more trustworthy than the judiciary ?)

the butler report had said “had thin sources.
it only had five main sources on the ground in iraq. it also gave more credence to untried agents than normal and had agents working beyond their expertise.” again someone senior in whitehall and the government should have asked the question at the time….
but they didn’t and guess what we went to war and we now find there was not a shred of evidence.
in my mind having an outside agency involved is not going to help especially if they are of the quality of group 4 or jarvis, with those in charge you know we probably would have invaded the wrong country……
and what are they going to call it? offshh! or ofcensored ?

sarnies

was in my local tescos metro this morning. hunting and gathering for the food i need to get me through the hard day at work.
hoping against all hope to get the king of sandwiches, though some see it as a humble thing, i see the cheese and pickle sarnie as the pinnacle of food creation. simple easy and tasty.
but not in tescos.
i could find a thing called the limited edition cheese & chutney sandwich though.
the job i am in limited implies a certain amount of collectability, a certain amount of keepability, a certain amount of investment. it does not imply a sandwich you are planning on eating before the day is out.
added to that they describe it as being filled with thin slices of cheddar cheese – which would be a fine thing except that have put them all together and so many of them they have become a thick wedge of cheese (which is no bad thing – it’s just not a thin slice…)
sometimes marketing speak goes to far and becomes utter bollocks.
i give you the limited edition sandwich – easier to find than the cheese and pickle sarnie – but remember it is limited.

censorship

(in a bizarre twist of fate this piece has taken over 3 days to write as i struggle to get a computer to work. twice computers have crashed while i was writing it. so somewhere along the way some of what i was going to write has been lost , some of the tone and some of the wit has disappeared…..

furthermore the show has been shown – the world remains in place we have not swung out of orbit, civilisations have not come crashing down. in the end over 45,000 people complained and i still reckon about 10 of them saw the show.)


tonight the bbc are planning on broadcasting an as live performance of the jerry springer the opera. this is part of the bbc's plan to show that opera has something for everyone. it will be shown on bbc2 (the channel no one really watches because it is seen as "high brow") at 10pm and it will be preceded by a warning. as you probably know the opera is based on the (in)famous jerry springer show, it's a show in which jerry allows his guests to air their personal problems and issues, because these people were "normal" it often degenerates into a slanging street brawl. it is a show that was like watching a train wreck; you knew it was a bad thing to do but you just couldn't drag yourself away from watching it. perhaps it was an element of cultural snobbery which allowed us to watch as gutter tramp americans going wild. (the attempt to have it work over here failed.. too much stiff upper lip i guess.) perhaps it's a bit of the but for the grace of... go i. perhaps it's as close to grand guignol most of as well ever get. so the tv show is available to most people with a tv. the opera is available if you want to go along and put down your hard earned cash and get a ticket, you can buy the soundtrack, you can see the posters. the beeb wants to show it, and that is where the trouble starts. because the late night start on bbc2 is not enough for some people. it has still managed to create an uproar. the sun news paper had it on it's front page of january 6th. going on about the 15,000 complaints that had been received about the showing of the opera on tv. john beyer of mediawatch uk (go to their site and you will know instantly what sort of people they are) describes it as "pigsty tv", "its sick and offensive". and why is that - well mainly because it has about 8000 sweary words in it's 2 hour running time (even i am impressed by that amount of swearing and if my math is right it's 66.6 words a minute - now check out that number!) mediawatch has said "the stream of obscenities is not in accordance with the bbc's taste and decency guidelines." (hate to break it to you but 8000 is not a stream it's a fucking tsunami of foul mouthy, and just a hint of bad taste on my part.) peter luff a conservative mp (you knew there had to be at least one of them in this) has said he does not "believe in censorship" will "defend the right for a theatre to perform a play that some find offensive." but by having it on tv where children might be able to see it is irresponsible. the sun in their editorial asks will bbc bosses be encouraging their families to watch it. so lets have a little look at this. 15,000 complaints seems a lot. but if you think bbc2 might have an average audience of a million viewers that means 985,000 have not complained. of course the more people who watch the show the less impressive that number of complaints looks. peter luff who is not for censorship (oh yes he is!) doesn't mind sikhs being offended by plays but by jingo do not upset christians. he is part of a party that doesn't want a nanny state, but is quick to make a decision for the rest of us when it comes to what we watch in case some kids get to see it. it's the job of the parents to make sure kids do not see inappropriate shows not the bbc. (and frankly i get tired of the kid card being played all the time.) and the sun a newspaper who shows nipples, revels in revealing the sex scandals of the celebrities of the world and is left lying around the place where children can easily see, seems an odd one to take the moral high ground. especially in the case of this story they seem to be happy not to be totally accurate. how so pat - surely the sun wouldn't lie... well lets go back to that 8000 cuss words. it seems the 8000 is arrived at if you include it every time someone says it - including the chorus (remember it's an opera) so if you have 15 or 20 people in the chorus one fuck in the libretto becomes 15 or 20. so the actual count is more like 400 distinct uses of swear words. which brings it in line with my usual output. so the moral high ground is occupied by some people who are only able to be there through loud outrage rather than by right of argument.

from all of this you would think i am against censorship. far from it; it’s easy to make the claim i will defend the right of anyone to say anything or i think nothing is taboo and everything should be allowed to be said. in fact i have sat in many meetings where such arguments have been made.
but we all know that there are some things that just can’t be said that’s why we have hate crime to prevent people from inciting racial hatred through the use of words.
the question of censorship isn’t a yes or no – it’s a question of where and who draws the line.

and make no mistake the freedom of speech is fine and dandy, and contrary to what i have said above, needs to be defended. but with that freedom also goes responsibility. if you go out of your way to offend someone or some group you have to expect them to protest. once they do though there is no point using the “it is an attack on my freedom of speech” attack at that point.
mind you there is a duty on the part of the protestors to at least have seen, heard, read what they are protesting against. in the case of jerry spinger the opera it is a good bet that the people who were contacting the bbc to complain had not seen the show and were only on the phone because someone had told them that this was a vile show.

but freedom of speech is not access to knowledge or access to power. the information we get is in the main controlled by a few people and these gatekeepers are the ones that decide what does or doesn’t make the news and what does or doesn’t inform the debates of the day. it is there that censorship takes place.

oh well in the style of the springer show and in the style of the sun’s reporting i leave you with a ditty.

fuck me fuck me fuck me it’s an opera with swear words
it’ll stink up the place like fucking great big turds
fuck me fuck me fuck me it’s an opera with swear words
it’ll stink up the place like fucking great big turds
fuck me fuck me fuck me it’s an opera with swear words
it’ll stink up the place like fucking great big turds
fuck me fuck me fuck me it’s an opera with swear words
it’ll stink up the place like fucking great big turds
and all those fukcing cunts in mediawatch uk
shag dogs of a peculiar pedigree
and all those fukcing cunts in mediawatch uk
shag dogs of a peculiar pedigree
and all those fukcing cunts in mediawatch uk
shag dogs of a peculiar pedigree
and all those fukcing cunts in mediawatch uk
shag dogs of a peculiar pedigree
and all those fukcing cunts in mediawatch uk
shag dogs of a peculiar pedigree
(repeat ad nauseam)

normalcy

it is surprising just how quickly things have returned to normal after the festive break.
the number 25 bus still can't run it's route without the driver having to have a long stop, so all the time saved by them not having to collect tickets is lost when they make up or lose time at various rest stops.
the central line and the hammersmith and city line have managed to have delays on them each time i have used them.
and the mayor of london and various train operators wonder why we are annoyed at the recent above inflation raise in transport prices.

sainsburys they have solved the problem of conspicuous consumption that is such a problem of the capitalist west. how have they done this? simple most of their shelves are empty. i am sure sainsburys are missing a potential marketing angle to this... the sainsbury's diet. we have no food to feed you don't expect to gain weight.

and look here i am moaning.

more things change the more that stay the same!

naked

enough.
let this year be an end to it.
i like naked bodies as much as the next person (well ok probably more than most) but there comes a time when enough is enough.
what am i talking about - it's those sodding "naked" calendars of normal people stripping off for a good cause and making a calendar of it.
at least one of these calendars has gone too far, well at least in the eyes of the organisation they belonged to. apparently it left little to the imagination and has resulted in 9000 of the 10 000 calendars being pulped. this has meant that something that was done for charity has meant that the people involved now have a £15k debt to deal with, and the charity they were doing it for has nothing.
so on behalf of the rest of us i am begging all you farmers, weavers, firemen, toilet attendants, traffic wardens, cheerleaders (no what am i thinking you lot can still strip off), dentists, pizza deliverymen please when 2005 comes to an end do not have a 2006 calendar ready to hit the shelves. just give the production money to the charity of your choice.

lets leave the saucy calendars to the professionals. the people who make the bare walls of offices and factories a nicer place to stare at while trying to complete the daily drudge. so naked tailor, so naked shelf stacker just leave the calendars to the jordans, nells and abi titmuss' of the world. it may not be fair but it is right.

(sidebar: another thing I would like to see the end of now we are heading into 2005 is the feeble joke book that is chucked out there at Christmas time in the vague hope that it will prove to be a publishing sensation. Lets have no more crap town books – not funny, not even close. Lets have no more parody books of successful books and films, lets have no more half arsed celebrity comedy books (flanimals – who bought it , according to amazon.co.uk a lot of you did, why? Why? Why? was it a present for someone you didn’t like……)
the nadir of this species of book has to be the “fuck off” book (ok it also gives me an opportunity to say fuck) which comprised of lots of basic illustrated cartoons which have the punch line of “fuck off”. Oh look laughed so hard there goes a rib.
Mind you for a truly funny book, though not at all pc, check out the modern toss book. I laughed so hard I had an accident.

missed

well 2005 is here and to celebrate here are some of the things i meant to write about last year but just never got around to.
so this is a big hairy arsed post - fasten your seatbelts and enjoy the ride... it's a dull one.

blunkett – oh so much could have been said about this affair, and in the press so much was. although one of the key questions was never raised – what did she see (geddit) in him? obviously power is an aphrodisiac, which explains why david mellor and robin cook got to shag around.
it many ways it didn’t bother me too much that he had “helped” a friend of a friend get a visa. because let’s be honest if we were in a position to help a mate we would. what galls is that the visa was for a nanny, oh hold on what i should say it was for cheap labour. for a government that wants to impose quotas on the number of people seeking to enter the country to live and to work, the idea that we can still find time to get a visa sorted out for cheap labour, sorry a nanny, is just wrong.
this doesn’t even touch on the fact that blunkett and co have pontificated on marriage and stable relationships – yet here is a man who was shagging another man’s wife and not taking steps to make sure he was protected. true david is trying to take responsibility for his possible sprogs, but if you are going to tell people how to live their lives you have to be able to live by the same rules.
i don’t expect politicians to be role models – i want them to be a little like me. what i do want from them though is not to be total hypocrites.
as for the money for the train ticket – as one wag in the newspapers pointed out the crimes wasn’t that blunkett had passed the ticket on to his squeeze but just how much the ticket cost….
(sidebar 1: it appears kimberly was not at it just with david blunkett but with some other chaps as well. must be fun being her husband at the moment. bet no one is laughing at him. nope not one person, no one at all.
sidebar 2: in canada there is a current scandal about politicians and immigration only there it is over extending visas to romanian erotic dancers. now that’s a visa policy i can get behind.
sidebar 3: blunkett also got into a spot of bother because of his biographer who reported some of his less than pleasant comments about his colleagues. i am guessing that when david fell on his sword (geddit) few tears were shed!)

geez if that was the short version of my blunkett piece imagine how long it could have been!

faith – a number of things made me want to talk about faith. there was the article in wired magazine about intelligent design, which seemed to be at first glance creationism version 2.0, the basic stance of the intelligent design brigade is that science doesn’t have all the answers and there are still things that can’t be explained and these things might be the result of a “cosmic designer” (whether it be “god” or extra terrestrials). then there were several articles about atheism (and more and more i am finding atheists to be just as much tub thumpers for their own “faith” as those they rail against) some of which argued that there was a decline in religious faith others which pointed out that religious faith had been replaced in many people’s lives with new age beliefs.
of course there has been the ongoing debate about islam and christianity. and with christmas there has been acres of print about christmas just being about mammon (most of the people who took this line seemed happy enough to go out and spend a fortune buying presents…..)
and what does any of this have to do with the price of coffee pat? you ask. well just that this year i have realised that i had lost a lot of faith in recent years, but it’s not a bad thing to have faith.
true if asked i couldn’t explain why i feel this way. it’s like trying to explain colours to the blind or cliché to the illiterate. and true i can reconcile my faith with any number of seemingly contradictory ideas (marxism, evolution and naked cheerleader websites and i know for a fact that boybands are the work of satan …..) i know that faith has not made me a better person, nor has it made me a good person, it has just made me a slightly more contented person.

olympics: still don’t want them in london. i am annoyed that london transport have been able to give the bid advertising space but have still managed to put the fares up (and the first day of the fares being up what do i get – delays!). the fact that seb coe and digby jones are involved in the bid makes me hate it even more. seb is a tory and that’s bad enough, but at least he looks like he has an idea about what sport is about (well he should he is a gold medal winner after all) but digby (also a tory) and looks like he is in training for the uk’s olympic dart team or sumo team.
having them in london will take away the magic of the games. there will be weeks of anticipation of how well our team will do only to watch all the medals go to americans, russians and australians. then there will be calls for more to go into sport to ensure that we can win more gold medals, because it is good for the country’s morale. when really all that tax money is doing is making a few overpaid athletes a little bit richer, and them a lot happier, while my 10 minute euphoria over kelly holmes winning is soon replaced with the knowledge i have to go to work tomorrow.
if you want sport to make a difference make sure kids have playing fields to play on.

digby: i don’t really know digby jones so it is probably a bit rich of me to say this: but i hate him. i hate him for all he stands for and i hate him because invariably he is on radio 5 first thing in the morning and the people who interview him never ever question him and just let him spout.
it doesn’t help that he has now been made a sir and is involved in the olympic bid.
it’s digby’s job to save that business is wonderful and that government and the unions are evil. he does it very well and he does it often.
so there he was going on about outsourcing (that’s moving work from the uk abroad because it is cheaper), its good for uk plc says digby because it means that british workers can get better jobs, assuming that they can 1] find them 2] have the necessary skills for them. that’s ok they can retrain…. the only jobs that never seem to be outsourced are the senior expensive mangers and board members. why can’t they be outsourced to china and india – i am sure there are loads of competent people there who could do the job just as well and for a tenth of the price. hell most of their staff are there.
digby is one of those people who believes the market is right, at all times. and as long as shareholders are making a profit that is all that matters. what invest for the future? pay a reasonable amount of tax so that we have schools and health service that is more than adequate for everyone. why on earth would we want to do that.
as if that wasn’t enough he shares the same birthday as me. sometimes life does suck.
porn – i was going to write about porn because there were two news items that made me wonder about the whole subject. first off there was the story about larry flynt’s hustler empire opening up a store in the uk, birmingham. then there was the news that boots the chemists were planning on offering sex toys in their stores as something special for the ladies, (echoes of the old style barbers who would offer gentlemen “something for the weekend”..)
now i like porn, i like it a lot. so my shock and outrage at the stories were nothing to do with being a prude. it was more of a case of hold on a minute porn isn’t something that should be easily available (hey that’s why in newsagents it’s on the tops shelf!). porn by it’s very nature needs to be a little bit seedy, a little bit sleazy. a lot of the fun of going out to buy porn is in the fact that you are going into a semi den of iniquity. it’s like the first time you bunk into cinema to see an x (well as it was in my day, you youngsters just have 18s), or the times when you go into the pub to buy your first underage drink.
so that frisson you get when you enter a porn shop could soon be replaced with the dread i always feel whenever i enter a supermarket.

hunters – i know i know i should just let it go but….. there have been several more stories in the news about this, culminating in the boxing day hunts, the appeals to the court of human rights etc. i am sort of hoping that the hunters do cause a civil disturbance because i have the solution for it. generally hunters strike me as being all part of the hang ‘em , flog ‘em brigade, who warble on about the decline of standards that would be rectified with the return of national service.
so if hunters break the law they should be publicly birched. the younger ones sent off to do a year in the army. repeat offenders could be branded with a h. or they could also be made to run from the hounds and hunt saboteurs could be employed to chase them to ground. if they get to their hole in time then no national service for them..

galloway – just a simple aaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh and uuuuuuuuuurgh will service.

identity cards – they are going to cost lots of money, the contract is going to be given to a private company who will promise much, under deliver and over charge, the system will not work . it is an infringement on civil liberties (oh no i am turning into a bleeding hunter..) and what’s worse there is no proof that is going to stop terrorists in anyway shape or form.
it’s another of those bad ideas that the government has that will not go away and they won’t kill it off like they should do.
instead we will have to listen to them try to justify it time and time again until the darned cards are with us. i won’t be any safer, but i will be out of pocket!

star wars: no not the movie the continued desire of the bush administration to have a space shield, a strategic defence initiative. again all the proof goes to show that it is unlikely the usa will ever suffer an intercontinental ballistic missile attack from anyone. so the idea of creating a defence for a threat that is not there is so typical of the fighting the last war mentality.
and surely if there is one thing that 9-11 proved is that all you need to do is fly a plane into a building and you have done the deed.
but no they are pressing ahead with it. so recently they had a test of it, well they were going to but the weather was bad so they had to postpone. well that’s ok then i am sure most nuclear threats will only take place when the weather is good, so you can combine the launch of a wmd with a bit of a picnic.
i have to say i am not sure that i am ready to trust a system that is going to be based the technology that *ahem* found saddam’s wmd programme….. yup that’s a nuke lets launch…shit it’s a passenger plane, no worries its aeroflot……. works for me.
(sidebar: of course tony has stepped up to the plate and agreed to allowing this system to have some of it’s necessary tracking devices based at fylingdales. of course this means if there is such a threat then we have just painted a very big bull’s-eye on ourselves. and what do we get for this gesture of solidarity, of standing shoulder to shoulder…. mmmm nothing, not a thing, nada. that tony he bargains hard!)

well there you go some of the pieces i was going to write and never did.
however if i had of written them at the time they would have been wittier, better edited and more interesting. but on that you will just have to take my word.

2005

everything back to normal.
by the end of this week everyone would have told their "i had a wonderful christmas and a fantastic new year" stories.
by the end of this week shops will be back to opening at the right time.
by the end of this week the west end will not be filled with hordes of people all fighting over sale items.

ah bliss.
welcome to 2005 - pretty much the same as 2004!

humour

like so many things humour is in the eye of the beholder.
i am english and of a certain age so benny hill, carry on, morcambe and wise and citizen smith are among the things that make me laugh. hell even charlie drake and some mothers do have them can raise a titter from me.
there was even a time when i thought i could be a comedian, (no seriously it was up there with policeman, probation officer and international man of mystery as a possible career) but then i realised i was not as funny as i thought. a good sign is when you are the one laughing hardest at your own wittisms.
as the years have gone by and i have become more and more bitter, cynical and twisted and in doing so i have left behind my carefree youth to adopt the mantle of a misanthropic misery guts i find that i like dark, twisted and warped humour. sometimes i direct it at myself other times it is other people.
and while the two funniest jokes in the world end with "yes it does" and "he was collecting coconuts" (just typing those words has brought a smile to my face), there is nothing quite like real life to provide you with moments of pure humour.

in a past life i had a thing for liza minnelli so her recent trials and tribulations have been of a passing interest. but her recent accident has me smiling like a chesire cat! as if falling out of bed is not enough she had to get the police involved. and then to end this story off there is the little bit at the end about being sued by her ex husband and bodyguard because she beat them and forced them to have sex. liza is of course keeping a low profile on this - she is countersuing them both.
i hate to break it to a friend of jacko's but it is a little too late to worry about your good name now!

in it's own little way it is as funny as andy fordham breaking down on celebrity fat club (i read about it!) or princess margaret and the hot water.

sales

i love them.
i hate them.
every time there is a sale on i go in the hopeful expectation that there will be things i need, not just want, but need. pretty much each time i am rebuffed and disappointed.
so currently i want to buy some expensive tech stuff - there is the apple ibook i want - oh cheers apple.com and apple store you are not even bothering to have a sale......
then there is the nikon d100 i want - nice one jessops £20 off (and considering the mark up they have on that they are still making mondo bucks).
just going to have to look harder.
so what about the books, cds and dvds i could get (notice i have skipped clothes and household goods. lucky i am a slob!)
oh borders make a big song and dance about their sale - but it amounts to a bunch of books chucked in boxes with no rhyme or reason. pretty much the same at foyles. blackwells actually have some items for sale and they have them on shelves for you to look at! (and i bought some). haven't tired waterstones yet, not that i need to as i have enough books to last me for years. besides which i have a few months to wait until the sequel to "quicksilver" comes out.
hmv have yet again got one of their many sales on - where certain dvds seem to be permanently on sale, but sometimes they are half price, sometimes they are part of a buy one get one free, or just have a basic sale price. oddly in all those guises the prices are roughly the same once you take into account the offer. hmv are like the enron of the sales world. virgin's sale prices just seem to have no basis in reality, so why bother going there.
while the national gallery proclaim their sale in big letters throughout the gallery and it seems to be about 5 items and the stuff they have left over from christmas. i know you are an art institution and should not be sullied by commercialism but i can tell you now: it's not a sale not by a looooong chalk.

and what i really hate about sales is that they are always packed (which is part of the reason for them i know) but it still doesn't make going to them any better. i suppose that is why i don't do clothes and household goods, because as bad as it is in some of the stores i have mentioned above its even worse in the other ones.
just walking around in the centre of london is an assault course at the moment.
but i just have to do as one of those stores might just have that copy of larry adler plays gershwin i have been after.

criminey christmas is over and i am still a grinch.
more things change the more they stay the same.

fear

right away, right up front i have to say that this is going to be one of those rambling things where i know i had a point to make at the start, somewhere in the middle i will realise that i have lost it and towards the end i will just meander to a stop. (in many ways like most of the conversations i find myself in....)

ok so why am i talking about fear?
a number of factors have sparked this.
firstly a member of the curry club II mentioned he had seen a programme on the tv about campaigning based on the fear factor. politicians now get us to vote based on what they can make scare us. (hey joel).
secondly another pal (wotcha nevile) wrote an email saying how, because of various circumstances he was feeling fearless.
thirdly there was the moment while watching "the grudge" with sarah michelle gellar (look i was tired ok, it spooked me, i was alone at home in the dark - ok enough already!)
fourthly i had read something about seneca, a stoic, who basically said prepare yourself for the worst and you won't be too upset. admittedly he used a lot more words, bigger and better ones and has been read by more people than i will ever be.... (find out a little about him here or here
and then today there was this from the bbc website
"In his New Year message, the prime minister said he understood people's confidence was undermined by the fear of crime and insecure national borders."
and this goes a long way to proving the first point.
while this commentary piece from the guardian points to the current fears we have about things that in many ways are beyond our control (which is where seneca comes in); such as the recent earthquake and tsunami that has potentially killed over 100,000 people with more to go because of the possibility of a large outbreak of disease.

and when you put all this together what do you have?
well to be honest i am not sure. each of us encounters a level of fear in our daily lives from the silly phobias that we might have of the dark, spiders or hunters. or it might be the fears of modern living: being mugged, robbed, being made redundant or forced to listen to an endless diet of urban music. or we might have the fear of not being in a relationship or it might be the fear of commitment.
in some way or another we deal with all of these fears - some more successfully than others.
which is why we are shocked and horrified when an event like the earthquake/tsunami. it is an event so beyond our ken that we have to find ways to make it manageable and personal (such as the death of some of the attenboroughs (who cares?) or the death of over 40 britons, or in the case of the survivors they will talk about how poor the rescue services were in dealing with the disaster, as if it is something that happens everyday).
we do this partly because we are being told endlessly by those around us in politics or in the media that there are all these things we have to fear (immigration, weapons of mass destruction, organised crime, boybands and the like). they do this because they want to tell us that although they do not have all the solutions they are best able to protect us from this potential harm they have mentioned.
they want us to be on our guard against something, anything. it's not quite orwell's 1984, but it is not the carefree days we used to enjoy. so the media and politicians will get us to agree to stricter immigration rules, harsher punishments for criminals and get us to agree to carry an ID card.
in the meantime when something like the earthquake and tsunami that has devastated indonesia, sri lanka , thailand etc occurs it catches all and sundry on the hop.
as it should - thats part of the beauty of an act of nature (or of god) is that it happens and you just can't stop it or really prepare for it. (that guy seneca he had the right idea!) so in some senses it is pointless to go on about what could or couldn't be done about it, or to make the argument that it only happens to the poor.
but by the same token those world leaders who are always talking about the threats to our ways of life (that would be you george and you tony) have to be prepared to actually respond when a crisis occurs. it's not good enough to say the right words and look soulful in front of the cameras. now is the time to gird your loins and do the right thing. whether it is making sure that there is money available, whether it is excusing those countries who are affected their debt, ensuring that the knowledge, materials and manpower is made available in order to clear up the situation that has occurred.
in order to do that though there is a chance, just a small chance that they have to let go some of the fears they have been feeding us, and instead offer out something that looks and smells a little like hope. so instead of offering us a shield from which we can hide behind to protect us from the unknown fears, they start offering us a vision of the world as a better place.

fear is easier though. you can change it to suit the times and the circumstances. you can always offer up fear and a ready made solution to it. we all know that as bad as this tragedy is in a few days time it will be replaced in the headlines by some wayward celebrity showing her draws to another overpaid footballer or singer. cynical but true.
meanwhile as vision and hope are a little harder to do politicians and the media will avoid like the plague.

this is the point i mentioned when i started this. i have sort of come to a stop.
i may just come back to this at a later date.

tories

are they a dead party?
you have to say that they are pretty much.
is this a good thing? there is a part of me that says yes (it's the part of me that remembers thatcher....), but there is another part of me that says no it is not.
why isn't it pat (i can hear you cry) why are you saying the demise of the party of the fox hunter (no not them again!) is a bad thing.
firstly and mainly it means that there is no real opposition to the madcap schemes of new labour. the problem of being in opposition and with no real chance of getting into power you spout nonsense and make stupid plans and policy because you know you have no chance of being voted in to make those ideas realities. it is why the liberal party can always go on about increasing tax to fund education (it's not a bad idea) and why they can go on about increasing tax on the super wealthy (even better idea), we know they won't get in and they know they won't get in but we all feel much better that the ideas are out in the open so we can pay them lip service. but then we will vote for one of the two serious parties.
the problem is that more and more there is only one serious party and that is new labour. the conservative party has found itself moved more and more to right, appealing more and more to a hardcore votership and being less and less in touch with the common people.
part of the reason has been mismanagement - the internecine fighting over europe which has dragged on and on, the election of frankly unelectable leaders (hague, duncan-smith and now howard) and the fact that they have no one on the front bench who is, how to put this .... well frankly likeable....
the other reason has been the incredible skill at which blair and the new labour project has stolen all the jewels that used to belong to the conservative party. you want low taxes - well new labour will offer them to you, you want private enterprises in the public services - new labour, you want tough law and order - see new labour, you want harsh immigration laws - check out new labour, you want ID cards, you want wars, you want to allow big business to get away with tax evasions, you want a little bit of sleaze... all can be done by new labour.
so the tory party has to move to the right. it has had to learn to almost goosestep, it's got to dust down it's brown shirts or else there will be no clear blue water between them and new labour.
oh the tories can bang on about having to speak the unspeakable in order to prevent extremist parties from getting the vote, they are not scared of the BNP getting a vote or two - they are worried that they are losing votes to the BNP.
so what do the tories do - they think of ways of cutting government, they think of ways of cutting red tape for businesses, they think of ways of cutting taxes and all the while preaching the mantra that our services will not be cut (and they expect us to believe them).
but in the course of looking for smaller government they support the ID card bill - lets see how that works and interferes with the average persons liberty.
in the course of cutting taxes they are expecting the market to provide but look at how well the market has done with building schools and hospitals (say hi jarvis - or is that bye jarvis because you have not done a good job of it?). look at how well the market has done with sorting out transport in this country - oh not well at all.
the tories solution? more of the same......

still they will be cutting back on the numbers of mps that will be in parliament. (which is a little bit of irony while they talk about brussels being a place where we are governed by the faceless they actually want to reduce the numbers of mps - that means more of us are represented by fewer of them.... it should be the other way round. they should be able to hear our voices and they should be dependent on each and every vote!)
the irony of it is that it will be a bit of vote winner for them. not because we want less representation it's just that those people who do represent us we don't trust.

and the ones i don't trust the most (well aside from galloway of respect) are the tory party. hell they can't even keep their most electable mps in position of power.

heres to an interesting 2005 as howard and the tories try to convince us that they really care.

peace

to my readers (oh yes there are more than one of you) i wish a special seasonal greeting.

so to adam, cliff, jay, jim, joel, kenny, kent, kevin, nate, nick, nigel, paul, tammi and the others i have no doubt missed.
i say to you all have a merry christmas and a happy new year.
may any of the troubles you had in 2004 disappear in 2005.
and lets hope that 2005 is indeed a year of peace - well we can hope.

have a good one folks.

normal miserable service will be resumed shortly.

best

misery

they say misery loves company, they could be right but i can be really miserable all on my own thank you very much.
and if you think i have been miserable recently about the run up to christmas - i will spare you the utter despair i go through during the new year festivities. i time when just the letter NYE are enough to turn me into a raving lunatic who wants to hunt down and kill all those insipid smiling twits who go on and on about how much they love you because they are too drunk to realise that 1] you are a total stranger and 2] you are the same sex they are.

so yes at this time of festive joy and pleasure i am indeed the grinch, scrooge and jack skellington all rolled into one - the difference is there is no walt disney ending that comes along and turns my heart of stone into a heart of gold.
bah humbug.

but even i can raise a smile when stories like this appear.
posties refusing to deliver mail to a no go street because they are always being attacked. where one of the posties was even soaked in urine. in a one of gesture the postal service managers will go out in pairs to deliver the mail in order to make sure that the households get their post on time. frankly (geddit) if it was down to me i'd soak all their post in piss until they learnt to behave.
but it is this sort of attitude which means that i will never get elected.

my local mp is in the news again. apparently oona king has mentioned that an mep once propositioned her for sex, the unnamed mep offered her £10,000 , now i have to say she is a tasty lass (but no diane abbot hubba hubba - who could almost qualify as top tory totty since her recent move to the dark side of private education), but £10k is a lot of money and to my untutored eye and taste there are going to be very few people who are going to be worth that much for a roll in the sack. and sadly oona isn't one of them.
what has gotten everyone up in arms is that this was something that had been dealt with many years ago, that in an ulrika like move oona is not saying who so all the meps of the time are tarred with the allegation. (sod the fact they wanted to buy sex what are we doing sending someone to represent the people of the uk who has a spare £10k for an orgasm?).
given oona's poor showing with sending out eid cards to the wrong faith (and not sending me a card this year.....) perhaps one can say she is looking for victim status ahead of the forthcoming election against galloping george galloway.
even though i am offended by oona not being able to send me a card i will still have to get off my fat arse and campaign for her.

hunters - i still hate them. once again i have had to listen to some arse on the radio going on about it being an infringement of liberty, it being against human rights etc - this from a bunch of landowners who will fight tooth and nail to stop you walking across their land!
i know i have banged on about hunters a lot and there will be at least one more to come before the year is out.

hirst's shark is up for sale and it looks like saatchi is going to sell it. i have to say it is an impressive piece. i have seen it a couple of times and have been deeply moved by it. in fact a lot of hirst's work has had that effect on me. equally a lot of it has left me thinking that this is all about money for old rope. i suppose i had better get over to the saatchi gallery and see it one more time before it goes.
apparently saatchi is going to sink (geddit) some of the profits of this into buying paintings as saatchi sees painting as the new art.

and a little story to make you go aaaaaaaaah a bunch of penguins have survived an earthquake on a remote antarctic archipelago. its the biggest earthquake since 2001.
not only did the penguins survive but:
"Despite its size, 22 staff of the Australian Antarctic Division slept through the tremors.
"Nobody felt anything," a spokesman said. "
if that isn't an antidote to my cynicism i don't know what is

joke

what did hip hop santa want for christmas ?
ho ho hos

well it is the season to be jolly.

rummy

there are times when someone shows such a lack of common sense you find yourself having to stand and admire them for the sheer front that they have to expect to get away with it.
think david blunkett and his recent foray into nanny headhunting (and there is so much to write about that ... but all i can say is that it couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke).
then there is donald rumsfeld, a man who appears to be smart and in control. a man who looks like he was a star of numerous 1970s american tv shows (he reminds me of robert culp, and if the iraq war is ever made into a musical then dick van dyke is a shoo in to play donny!) obviously running the iraq war is time consuming and so donny has his hands full (after all they have given up the search for osama - remember him?) so he has had to answer questions from marines and to have to explain why they do not have adequate kit (they might also want to ask him why they are drafting ex servicemen, why they are looking to cut servicemen's benefits....)
but of course donny is in the news not for his adept skills as an administrator, but because he couldn't find the time to sign the letters of condolences that are sent out to relatives of dead service men.
nope donny and co have used technology to speed the process up, the signatures are mechanically reproduced onto the letter. you have to hand it to him - why waste precious time when you can automate it.
as someone said:
"To me it's an insult, not only as someone who lost a loved one but also as someone who served in Iraq," soldier Ivan Medina - whose twin brother Irving was killed in Iraq last summer - told Stars and Stripes.
hey why should rummy care it's not like it is his son he is sending to war, nor the son of his friends and colleagues. it is just the strange kids of those urban poor who see the military as a way of escaping poverty or getting a career for themselves.

so i admire donald rumsfelfd for at least continuing to treat the relatives of the dead with the contempt that bush, condi, rumsfeld and co treat active troops and the rest of the american public.
but sometimes it doesn't pay to be honest.........

bullets

according to this week's private eye (a great magazine that has a unique slant on the news and often has stories you will never see elsewhere) the US military has just bought 130 million bullets from the UK military, because they face a shortage.
lets look at that number again 130 million - that's a lot of bullets. a hell of a lot of bullets.
but lets back up a bit - the US military are facing a shortage... how can that be. the simple answer is of course iraq! but lets look at the number again 130 million bullets (ok for some american militias that is barely a weekends playing in the woods.... )
from the private eye story it appears that the one factory in the usa that manufactures the bullets cannot keep up with the demand.
i am going out on a limb here and thinking that this is a factory that is dedicated just to the american military, and that because of what it does it has to be highly defended and protected - but there is only one? whatever happened to the free market, is that why there is fighting going on in iraq - so we can just bring them monopolies - say it ain't so gi joe!
but i can understand why you would want this sensitive operation to be under very strict control and so you might only want the one - that way you have total quality control and you also have complete freedom to control supply - increase it when demand is high and lower it when demand is low (again it's the market stupid....)
somewhere along the line either the military planners have forgotten to place the requisition order (hey it happens), or the usa military have gone a little too gung ho and are firing bullets off like they are auditioning for the next john woo flick.

guess what? what pat what i can hear you cry. the ministry of defense is providing the bullets to the americans at book price - not a bit of profit being made from them. now on one hand you can understand that, don't want to be a war profiteer after all. but dammit man we are also providing troops into iraq to aid the americans free of charge (and last time i looked there were not that many british companies getting fat on the riches of iraq reconstruction!)

but lets go back to that number again 130 million bullets. why in all that is holy do the british army have a spare 130 million bullets, it's not like a cup of sugar, it's a 130 million bullets.....
hey at least this bit of arms trading might be called ethical arms trade (and who remembers new labour's promises on that!)

one more time 130,000,000 bullets. perhaps they should learn to be better shots or spend less time popping off shots into wounded combatants.
just a thought.