How Was It For You ?

The Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy of liberal England, Polly and David, on the first 7 years of New Labour.

Pretty accurate stuff it is, too.

"Important programmes with large sums expended often went unnoticed except by those directly affected".

"Those directly affected" being the anti-racist outreach five-a-day smoking cessation co-ordinator community.

White Flight And BBC Bias

So the figures confirm that native Londoners are getting out. Surprise surprise.

The BBC report and most of the press coverage is couched, perhaps unhelpfully, in terms of 'black' and 'white'. Given recent large movements of people from Eastern Europe this may not necessarily show the whole picture.

Once again the BBC gives us unbiased reporting, lining up a couple of spokespeople to criticise the report.

Migrationwatch, which is totally independent and funded by people putting their hands in their pockets, are to the BBC "the self-styled Migrationwatch UK pressure group".

The Immigration Advisory Service, described by the BBC yesterday as 'an independent charity', gets most of its money from the Home Office. Very independent.

And of course we can trust Keith Best, IAS chairman, to tell it like it is. He wouldn't go in for deception, would he ?

At Last - Apology for Guildford

As not seen in the Independent.


Thirty years after their members were killed or injured, ninety British families
finally received a public apology yesterday for the IRA bombings they did not commit.

Gerry Adams' declaration that those killed and maimed in the 1974 Guildford and Woolwich bombings deserved to be "completely and publicly exonerated" was what family members had demanded for years. The Sinn Fein leader was attempting to draw a line in the cases of the Guildford Five Dead and 45 injured and Woolwich Two Dead Forty injured, which are regarded as among the most conspicuous miscarriages of justice in recent times.

Mr Adams' apology was delivered in a TV statement in his office in the House of Commons and then in private to relatives of those wronged by Irish Republicanism. He said: "I'm very sorry that they were subject to such an ordeal and such an injustice. That's why I'm making this apology today - they deserve to be completely and publicly exonerated." He then shook them by the hands and patted the cheeks of those with both arms missing.

Mr Adams' official spokesman said: "It was a meeting which nobody who was present will ever forget. We have decided that the victims and their families are long overdue for compensation, which we are in a position to pay. Compensation will be paid them in used Northern Bank notes."


UPDATE 13/2/05 - the Sunday Times on who should apologise.



And how about the real Guildford bombers and their supporters? Where is their apology either to those who were wrongly imprisoned or to those whom they murdered and maimed?

The Balcombe Street gang were released early under the Good Friday agreement to attend a special Sinn Fein conference. Gerry Adams greeted them with words of praise and celebration: “These are remarkable men. These are our Nelson Mandelas.”

Sinn Fein - helping to preserve life

New Euroblogger England Expects on Sinn Fein MEP Bairbre de Brun.

"According to yesterday's Irish News (Sub required) she has,"pledged her support to ... a comprehensive smoking ban. "Many people are unaware that the Department of Health is currently undertaking a consultation process on smoking in the workplace, " she said".No doubt she will now oppose other life threatening activities like bombing, shooting, kidnapping and torture."

I think Sinn Fein policy is to allow people to smoke - but only if they're lying in several pieces in the road following an 'operation' of their glorious volunteers.

Saner Every Day

AL Kennedy again disappoints. No Iraqi blood or depleted uranium, no fat consumers or evil Christians - just plain factual stuff that everyone knows - about how the US isn't a democracy. I think it's something to do with the phases of the moon - it's new at the moment. More research needed to see if the most challenging pieces are full moon jobs.

Tim Worstall and Scott decipher the entrails.

More Snowdrops From The Curate's Garden ...

Cash For Good Whoreses - prostitutes get £360,000 from Lottery.

The caring Probation Service.

Charlotte Wyatt Update - Judges say 'Choose Death"

While West Yorkshire Police have a team working 10-hour days (registration required) watching BNP meetings, in Bradford Asians are living in daily fear of assault and worse. Civitas and Anthony Browne on the fate of Muslims who convert to Christianity.

And while a teacher faces a 10 year sentence for firing an air-gun into the ground following a campaign of harassment by local yobs, the police are hard pressed - providing protection to gangsters. After all, criminals need more protection than other people - bacause their lifestyle is more dangerous. They have human rights too, you know.

Finally the Magna Mater Melanie on idiot PC Ian Blair. More on him in a day or two.

There Is No Liberal Elite

Thanks to the Freedom Of Information Act, Lib Dem MP Norman Lamb and the Daily Mail, we can see who came to dinner at Chequers from 1997-2001, and it’s a list to confirm all one’s prejudices.

Can you guess which newspaper would have most representation ? I’ll give you a clue – Alan Rusbridger, Polly Toynbee, David Walker (Polly’s paramour), John O’Farrell, Jackie Ashley, Will Hutton.

Mr Ashley, Andrew Marr of the BBC is there, along with John Birt, former Director-General, Greg Dyke, then current D-G, Radio 4’s Melvyn Bragg, the Today programme’s James Naughtie and gorgeous governor Deborah Bull. Even the Indie gets a nod with ex-editor (and ex-smackhead) Rosie Boycott as well as Peter "I hope Price Harry goes to Auschwitz" Kellner.

One or two other standouts – a high rock’n’luvvie quotient - Elton, Sting’n’Trude, the Thompsons, the Bowies, Stephen Fry, Dame Judi, Helen Mirren, Jeremy Irons, the Frenches (Dawn and Lenny), even Joan Collins (pre-UKIP) and Michael Winner.

One thing that strikes me is the under-representation of ethnic minorities at these bashes. Where’s Lee Jasper, Trevor Phillips, Yazza or Mrs Patak ? Reinaldo da Silva (Peter Mandelson’s significant other), one Dorian Jabri (Chris Smith’s ditto), and TV tycoon Waheed Alli might possibly supply some missing colour, and their sexuality means you get two minorities for the price of one, but otherwise I can only spot Bill Morris, Iman (Mrs Bowie), the wonderfully named Thai Ping Wong (I had one the other night, and jolly nice it was too) and Lenny Henry.

The other notability is the low number of ‘partners’ among the dull old political straights. Old Labour are very married, and even among New you only find ‘partners’ for Stephen Byers and Aleister Campbell (Robin Cook brought Mrs Cook before returning to his secretary on the Monday), as well as Irish Premier Bertie Ahern. Ahern would have had them cut off for that in Ould, Catholic Ireland.

This conventionality at may not last though, if Professor M.W. Adler (‘leading academic who advises the Government on its Sexual Health strategy’) gets his way. My informants tell me his strategy for improving the Sexual Health of a Chequers weekend involves guest Helen Mirren re-enacting her memorable staircase entrance from the 1971 film ‘Savage Messiah’, as well as activities involving Anna Ford, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Professor Susan Greenfield and a large amount of fresh fruit prepared by Delia Smith, Lord Attenborough to film the proceedings. Script by Richard Curtis. Choreography by Trevor Nunn.

Ouch

Is there anyone out there who missed the story of the Welsh rugby follower who said if Wales beat England he'd cut off his testes ? Frankly I think that's taking things too far.

"He came back later wearing a kilt with his testicles in a bag," a fellow fan who was with Mr Huish at the social club told the Daily Mirror.

"He lifted the kilt up to show everyone what he had done. There was blood everywhere, it was terrible. That's when he collapsed."

Mr Huish was rushed to hospital with his testicles carried in a pint glass full of ice. He is now in a serious condition.

Press coverage in the rugby playing nations is mixed. I hope they're taking this seriously.

Fan's Punt a balls-up - Australia

Rugby Fan has no balls - South Africa

Welsh Fan in balls-up - New Zealand

Not to mention stories about missing tackles.

Light Blogging ...

Like the Pooter of Geek, I'm rebuilding a PC, so posting will be lightish. Meanwhile, cop this excellent Blimpish posting, on Blair's proposed reforms to incapacity benefit. It also applies in spades to immigration and to education. Talk tough - do nothing. And (over immigration/asylum) if you do try something the courts will overturn it. From the moment Frank Field went it was obvious that Labour weren't going to offend their client groups.

"Heard it all before, so we have - heard it all before.

Every now and then, the Government makes a rhetorical reconaissance-by-fire to keep the Tories tame and under control. It goes like this: Blair or one of his more loyal Secretaries of State will make an outrageously Daily Mail-seeking pronouncement. It will be outrageous because it's really not credible - either because plain bad policy or because the political cost makes implementation impossible - but the message will 'switch on' the less-engaged voters. The backtrack - even if explicit - is only picked up by the political obsessives, whose votes are already decided."

Fairytale of New York

And the practices of Mr Richard Desmond's (Daily Express owner, porn mag king, Labour donor - how the Labour Party is fallen) business associates. Philip Bailey was apparently Desmond's top aide. He's left the company now. Can't imagine why.

The limo hurtled east toward the river. "Do you know why we're here, you British bastard?" one of the men said. Bailey tried to keep his dignity. "If you know I'm British [you know] this approach won't get you anywhere," he said. In response, the gunman produced a box cutter and slashed Bailey several times on the face.

"We're here because of your f***ing boss, Desmond," the gunman shouted. "We want our money back. You tell your f***ing boss, it's a small pond. . . . If your boss sets foot here, he's a dead man. A f***ing dead man." He punctuated the threat with another zap to Bailey's groin from the stun gun. The beating and curses continued. The driver then told him, "We're gonna let you go; do you know how f***ing lucky you are? Tell your boss, you're the message." The two men in the back proceeded to grab Bailey's wallet, taking $70 and his Visa card. With the car still moving, they pushed the businessman out the door. Bailey went flying into the street.

As Bailey was lying there, the car screeched to a stop and then backed up toward him. Bailey thought he was about to be run over. Instead, the car stopped and the gunman got out, tossing Bailey's suitcase on top of him. He walked over to where Bailey lay sprawled and then stomped on his face. "Tell your boss he's a dead man," he said.

He Could Have Been A Contender

There have been sufficient bloggers taking a pop at Kilroy-Silk and Veritas to make any efforts of mine redundant. I'll just try and draw up a few pointers.

The performance of UKIP in the last Euro elections showed that there is a large constituency of the disillusioned out there. Having done nothing in the 5 years since the 1999 elections, despite having three seats, UKIP still picked up a massive vote increase - almost certainly due to their expensive, millionaire-funded poster campaign as well as Mr Kilroy-Silk.

At the time I wrote that the rise of UKIP demonstrated a sea-change in politics, where money and a charismatic front-man could get more votes than years of the traditional ward meetings and canvassing. I thought this a dangerous development and still do.

Kilroy-Silk's criticism of UKIP - namely that they don't seem to do much - was a valid one. But I'm not sure he's one to talk. Somehow I can't see Veritas as grass-roots campaigners - more as the Respect Coalition of the right, a colourful figurehead with minimal organisation at the individual constituency level.

Had he stayed within UKIP he may (or may not) have been able to change that. But he was easily their most recognisable face, and a great electoral asset. His speeches would attract much more publicity than the speeches of the leadership, he's a soundbite king. Had he stayed and avoided abusing his colleages (and they him), together they could have done a great deal of damage to the major parties, and the leadership might have been his inside a couple of years.

Alone, even if he finds UKIP levels of funding, things will be harder. There's not enough room on the right for two 'we're angry white men but not the BNP' parties. Unless a deal can be worked out where UKIP and Veritas keep off each other's turf, my money's on Veritas sinking without trace. He could have been a contender.

PS - I see that Baroness Kennedy is leading an enquiry (RealAudio) into the high levels of cynicism and disengagement among voters. I think it unlikely that she'll register the truth - that the high levels of disengagement are due to the fact that people like Baroness Kennedy have been running the country for the last 30 years.

How To Stop A Centre

1) pick centre up
2) tuck centre under left arm
3) run forward



As demonstrated by Gavin Henson.

Stormin Norm ?

They say that when the police arrest a respectable member of society for some dreadful crime, his friends and acquaintances suddenly remember (and tell the police) all kinds of bad things about him.

"I always thought he was a bit strange"

"Remember when he .. ?"

But I still can't quite equate Norman Geras, cricket and country music lover, whose cogent and frequent condemnations of the kind of kneejerk anti-US leftism that calls Zarqawi and his head-choppers 'the resistance' are always made more in sorrow than in anger, with the "Stormin Norm" I read of in today's Sunday Times, 'toast of the neocons' and 'darling of the Washington right wing '.


On the other hand, when I think about it, I'm sure he posted about attending an Emmylou Harris gig with Richard Perle and Charles Krauthammer. And his love of country music must be suspect - the songs of the racist white oppressor. Look at that Merle Haggard's lyrics. I always thought that was odd. Remember when he sent out requests for the top 10 rock music singles ? I've deleted the email, but I'm pretty sure it ended with the words 'Bomb Iran Now !'

Turncoat ! Imperialist skunk !

Gloria In Excelsis Deo

It could have been such a bad week.

Instead, millions of brave infidels defied the head-choppers and suicide bombers to vote in the Iraqi elections.

The Holy Father, peace and long life be upon him, is improving.

And my beloved Land of Bastards beat the Saesneg 11-9.

I would fail Tebbit's cricket test if it applied to rugby. Though I think of myself as English, despite having little English blood, when Six Nations time comes round I'm a small boy again, sat on the floor of my grandmother's front room in Cwmbwrla. Every chair is occupied, attention to the game (on a 405 line black and white TV) total until half time, when everyone gets up quickly to make tea, drink tea, go to the toilet. The half-time breaks in rugby were shorter then.

Forty years later I, and the surviving uncles and aunts still ring round after full time to discuss the game. It was a long chat tonight.

Not a great game of course for a neutral - errors all over the place. But for Wales it's so important to be the team that just wins by a point of two, rather than just losing as they did against New Zealand and South Africa last autumn, and against New Zealand and England in the World Cup.

They nearly blew it though. Stephen Jones, so good a kicker with the ball in his hands, repeated his World Cup performance against England. Wales failed to spot overlaps and kept giving away posession on the England 5-metre - sorry, 6 yard line. But this time Wilkinson wasn't on the pitch.

New England cap Mat Tait had a baptism of fire reminiscent of the hammering Arwel Thomas got from England, twice hit with tackles that lifted him off his feet. On the second occasion Gavin Henson ran forward a couple of yards holding the England player (who still held the ball) horizontally under one arm. In every living room in Wales men leapt from sofas to their feet. We like to see that sort of thing.

Different Worlds

"I've never had any experience of being on benefits, or ever known anyone who has."

Says new blogger Lacessitor. In some parts of Britain the converse would apply. (And you do know someone now, if only in cyberspace - I spent a taxpayer-funded year drinking cheap cider and leading a life wth all the good parts of the student existence but none of the less positive stuff like revision or exams. Mea culpa. But I didn't steal.)

Also added to the sidebar are PseudoMagazine (an eclectic set of links there, from Indymedia to Chrenkoff) and well-read cleverclogs Stumbling and Mumbling, who reckons he did his A-levels with the cleverest clog of them all. You're not telling me Oliver Kamm went to a State school ?

Typical quote "whom would you rather have a drink with – him (Robert Nozick), Rand or Hayek?". At that point, having read none of the three, I hoist the intellectual white flag.

But has he read 'The Adventures of the Little Wooden Horse', Ursula Moray Williams tale of the poor toymaker, with its charming illustrations by Peggy Fortnum, who illustrated the original Paddington Bear ?



Currently bedtime reading for my darling.

It's Oot ...

Norm's 100 best rock singles poll is here. By the musical vintage there's an awful lot of fortysomething bloggers out there.

Only two questions.

i) how can anyome with two ears and a brain listen to "White Man In The Hammersmith Palais" - surely some of the worst white reggae ever.

ii) where on earth are Lord Rockingham's XI, whose 1958 classic 'Hoots Mon' bestrides the narrow world of rock like a colossus.

"The first 5 seconds of “Hoots Mon” are gobsmackingly dumb and wonderful – the horns blaring, the organ sounding like it’s been stabbed, the rest of the band setting up a kind of snarling hum like a gang of lairy Buddhists. And once the main riff’s got going all these things recur - plus handclaps, shout-outs and the “Hoots Mon!” chant that gives the record its title-cum-gimmick. It’s proper musicians having a laugh who sound for a moment like cavemen having a go. It’s a calculated, compressed party. It’s a great record."

Years later bandleader Harry Robinson would arrange the strings for three classic Sandy Denny releases - the North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Like An Old Fasioned Waltz, and Rendezvous.

"the sea seemed to be quite far out"

It's a while since I've browsed Tulip-Maria's pink'n'fluffy blog. Looks like she picked the wrong place for a winter break.

Crime, Yobs and Guardian Readers

Alan Travis fulminates in the Guardian about 'the myth of yob Britain'. We've allowed those nasty tabloids to induce 'media hysteria' - andwho better to put that right than Mr Travis ?

"The report does confirm that teenagers do commit more than their fair share of crime - about a third of all offences - but it also shows that the kind of crime people get involved in changes as they get older." That's alright then.

"Among juveniles non-injury assaults account for a large share of the incidents." Phew.

Hey - guess what ? Older people commit crime too ! So what's the problem ?
"Young people, particularly males, are more likely to offend and are responsible for a disproportionate volume of crime; but it also shows that older people are a numerically large group of offenders."


"Far from needing to worry about the alarming growth of "yob Britain" the survey carries the more reassuring message that minor offending is not uncommon, but most people simply grow out of it."
If you get mugged, the perpetrator is likely to be going through a passing phase. After all, we were all teenagers once.

Travis does drop one significant truth into his piece.

" ..the report makes clear that in fact most prolific offenders were involved in minor crime, some of it very trivial ... these are not the kind of offences that keep the police awake at night".


This appeared on the same day as an excellent post from the Policeman, commenting on Harriet Sergeant's excellent piece in the latest Civitas Review.

"In her piece, the justice gap (the gap between how good we think we are and what the public really think) is exposed as a yawning chasm that is being filled (in London at least) by private security firms of which Yauheni is an employee. Yauheni is from Belaurus but many of the other guards have served in the Israeli Defence Force (IDF). Officially, I think it’s a really bad idea to put people like that out on the streets with no diversity training but, as a resident, I know I would feel safer if I knew former IDF soldiers were patrolling the streets where I lived.

The residents of her neighbourhood feel under siege and the police do not take their problems seriously. Official statistics (bureaucratic inefficiency in mathematical form) would seem to indicate that things are improving, but reality shows otherwise. Senior policemen and crime theorists take the view that the general population are stupid and have an irrational view about crime. But people aren’t stupid: they know what makes them feel safe and secure and if the police cannot or will not provide it, then they’ll go elsewhere. ACPO and the Federation will continue to complain about the growing number of private security firms, the extension of the police family and “policing on the cheap” and at the same time will do nothing to allay the public’s concerns."



In today's Guardian Jackie Ashley thinks 'it's all our fault'. I think she's correct, if she's referring to Guardian readers and journalists.

Can't quite work it out though. After all, the cultural revolution is pretty much complete. In let-it-hang-out Britain, where repression of feeling is the greatest crime, and do what thou wilt is the whole of the law, why are so many teenagers unhappy ?

"At times it seems there is hardly a single family unaffected. This child, so bright and optimistic so recently, is sunk in grey depression and won't go to school. That one, so athletic and cocky, has been violently mugged and now avoids walking anywhere, lurking inside his bedroom. Another cuts herself. Another suffers extreme bullying and has ballooned in size. Another was stabbed while walking the dog."

Violently mugged, bullied, stabbed while walking the dog. Read Alan "Media Hysteria" Travis again for the full 'cognitive dissonance' effect.

"More bobbies on the beat at school are needed at let-out time to curb the explosion in casual mugging and bullying" - Ashley.

"Even the most cursory reading of the Crime and Justice Survey report would find it hard to sustain the idea that the country is going through some new, previously unknown, alarming growth in yob culture. " - Travis.

New US Hostage Is Named

The Guardian reports today on the latest reported hostage-taking, of a black American soldier, whose photograph was posted on an Iraqi website. He was shown seated in front of a black flag, gun pointed at his head.



He has been identified as Action Figure Cody, a toy doll of the 'Action Man' variety.


Hat-tip - Irene Adler.

UPDATE - hostage mother pleads for son's life.

"The Wishy-Washy Standards of Contemporary Christianity"

What a great title for a band. I digress.


I'd never heard till recently of Muslim convert (since 1951 - no bandwagon jumper he) Charles le Gai Eaton, a scion of old Britain (Charterhouse, Cambridge and the Diplomatic Service), but a lot of Muslims have. His book 'Islam And The Destiny of Man' is highly praised. In a Sunday Times piece on Muslim converts, he said "I have received letters from people who are put off by the wishy-washy standards of contemporary Christianity and they are looking for a religion which does not compromise too much with the modern world.”

Strange. According to the great and good of the Anglican and Catholic Churches, the thing is to be relevant, modern, progressive, forward-looking, spurning the dead hand of a 2,000 year old book in favour of an inclusive, user-friendly new brand of Christianity where Fair Trade Chocolate is more important than stuffy old 'thou shalt nots'. The kind of thing that Rasputin, Peter Selby, Richard Harries and now the new Bishop of Hereford are so good at.

"Sarah Jones, aged 43, has been a curate in the Ross Team ministry in Herefordshire for the past six months but until Monday night only her fellow clergy knew she had not been born female.
Her former life as a man was revealed to parishioners at an emergency meeting arranged at Ross Parish Church following inquiries by a national newspaper.
The Bishop of Hereford, the Rt Rev Anthony Priddis, who ordained Sarah in September, told parishioners that she had undergone a painful process to become the woman she believed she was."

More tea and oestrogen, Vicar ?