Records galore!

How about that?!

On the same day that A'level students achieved their 29th year of record-breaking results, the UK prison population also hit its record-breaking level. I think we should be told if these are in any way connected.

Lazy Lazy students!

So, for the 29th year in a row, A levels results have been better than the year before. If you believe the politicians, it is not the result of grade inflation. No! It is because students and teachers are working harder than ever and we should acknowledge and celebrate their efforts.

Modern students - now chained to their desks 

And I do. And yet, I want to have a go at this year's students for being a lazy bunch of losers. You see, this is how I figure it. I took my A levels back in the 1980s and the results that year were record-breaking. My my! We did work hard to get those results and the politicians were right. We deserved praise for all our hard work. That was the key to our success.

I must have been stupid & lazy

But, one year later, the students in the year below did even better. I don't know how, but they had worked harder than us. Still, despite all their hard work, the year below them worked even harder. They must have done. The politicians told us that's why they got record results. It now appears that I was actually a completely lazy layabout. Every year since, the students have worked a little bit harder every year. Given that modern students appear to be living fairly balanced lives - studying, partying, going to the cinema, etc, this clearly means that way back in my day, my hard work must have been a pretty paltry effort.

A-Levels - handed out on street corners

And when, in a few years' time, there have been even better results, it will be pretty clear that today's students have been fairly lazy too. So, well done students. Congratulations! And, at the same time, you should be pretty ashamed of your slacking.

Or perhaps the politicians are just lying to us yet again. They have been working harder and harder at lying for years now. And, this year is another record-breaking year for their stupid lies.

Hague tells Gaddafi - 'You must go - pretty please'

Yeah! I know what you are thinking. We've heard all this crap from him before. Many times before. Super Statesman, William Hague is at it again.

Thought he had Gaddafi where it hurts

What is it with this guy? He has been bleating that Gaddafi must go for months now. Does he think Gaddafi or anyone else for that matter, could care less what Uber-Statesman William Hague thinks, or says, or does? The trouble with Hague is that he has been in politics during an era when flexing a bit of military might did the trick. Gulf wars, Kosovo interventions - you name it. The West dictated and the world fell into line, even if it took a bit of carpet-bombing along the way to make it so.

Laughing loudly and pointing at Hague

And so our World Statesman, Willy, thought that the same would happen in Libya. Give the big speech, tell Gaddafi he must go and wait for the military magic to work. Hey Presto! William wills it - it happens.

And now...  the end is near...

Or maybe not this time. No response to the command. No puff of smoke at the end of his wand. No simple fiat. So this time he has changed the tune. 'Gaddafi might go. Gaddafi might even stay, but please go, Mr Gaddafi. Please? Pretty please?' The world heard his demand and now we are still hearing it again, only in a weak and pathetic voice. Seriously, Willy. Maybe it is time to shut up. Climb back in your box and stop playing the big man. No one cares. No one listens. You are bleating like a lamb on a lonely hillside. Go away!

This made me laugh

The title of a Melanie Phillips column in the Daily Fail...


Max Mosley. Hugh Grant. Steve Coogan. How can men like this pose as our new moral arbiters?



Isn't that just delicious? And this coming from Melanie Phillips. Yes, I know that irony metres all over the world have been shattering into millions of pieces. Here is a vile hag of a woman with the most deeply unpleasant views on just about everything - daring to criticise others for being 'moral arbiters'.

Moral vacuum - Melanie Phillips

What is most ridiculous about this commentary is that none of these men are guilty of setting themselves up as moral arbiters. The only person involved who does so on a regular basis is Phillips herself. I know that there is some difficulty criticising someone else's morals in a piece about moral arbitration, but I happily give myself permission in this case. Just read what she believes in - this Wikipedia article should do the trick - and you will see what I mean about the moral vacuum that is Melanie Phillips. I know I shouldn't be surprised. After all, slimy tabloid hacks like her do this sort of thing all the time. When your day to day profession is ruining peoples' lives in a completely unaccountable manner, how can you not fail to see the speck in others' eyes and miss the log in your own? Moral arbiters they are. Moral, they are not. The sooner Phillips and her ilk take their leave from British culture, the better.

Irony metre about to exceed maximum possible reading - take cover!

Surely the least shocking news of all time

Amy Winehouse has died. Whilst it is genuinely quite sad that someone should have died at the tender age of 27, can anybody really be surprised by this news? The poor girl lived her life on the front page of the tabloids, usually in a drugged-up or boozed-up condition, and her frequent (and ultimately unsuccessful) trips to rehab were standard fare for the red tops.

Dead at 27 - we knew about her foibles thanks to blanket tabloid coverage

Not that the same can be said for the horrific events in Norway. I wrote some time ago about the death of Olaf Palme, the Swedish Prime Minister who was gunned down in a Stockholm street 25 years ago. That story was all the more remarkable because we do not associate the Scandinavian countries with violence - at least not since the Vikings - and the events in Oslo have been quite stunning for all the wrong reasons. (Funny how all the usual suspects decided that it had to be another so-called 'Al-Qaeda' atrocity)

Carnage in Oslo

We are living in quite unsettling times. The fall of the Berlin Wall was predicted as the start of a new era - perhaps a time of peace and prosperity for the world. How wrong we were. Nature abhors a vacuum and human nature dictates that when one cause of evil and tension disappears, more will rush to take its place. Whilst the troubles besetting the Murdoch empire have given me cause for joy, I seriously doubt that it will spell the end of evil practices amongst the gutter press. Maybe the tactics will change, but ordinary innocent people will still find their lives devastated by these vile organs - and worse - and much more worrying - the British public will still continue to buy them, and in doing so, will give every encouragement to carry on causing pain and unhappiness.

Innocent people have their lives destroyed by these vile organs

The names, the faces, the places - these may change. The capacity to do evil will not. It is not always easy to go through life without causing harm along the way, but it is always worth the effort. Sometimes it is easy to predict the 'who' and the 'what'. At other times, the 'who' and the 'what' are a surprise. The only constant is the 'why'. Because that's what humans do...

Another crazy high-up video head-spin thing & stuff

What is the matter with some people? Who does this for fun? I can barely watch this - how does someone actually do this for real? My head is spinning. I'm just going to lie down for a while...

Stupid game - but we're better than you are...

Golf. You know. Hitting a wee white ball around some sand dunes. It's a silly game really and I don't really care who wins. Why would I? I understand the idea of supporting a team, but I have never really understood supporting an individual. So, when it comes to golf, I can happily support the European team as they battle against the American team in the Ryder Cup. But as for the individuals who make up the team. Meh! Who cares how they do when they are playing for themselves.

Stupid game - stupid pants

However, a pattern has been emerging in recent years. There are four main tournaments played each year - known to golf fans as the Majors. Three are played in the States - The Masters, The US Open & The PGA - whilst the other one is The UK Open. It has been fifteen years since any English player has won any of the Majors, but the same cannot be said of the Irish. In the last few years, the Irish have won six - three by Padraig Harrington and the rest by three Northern Irish players. Last year's US Open was won by Graeme McDowell, this year's US Open by Rory McIlroy and today's UK Open was won by Darren Clarke. How about that!

Darren Clarke - another win for the Emerald Isle

So, tough luck you English failures. Your golfing successes are more a matter of history than anything else. You have to go way back into the last century to remember an English golfer winning a Major. Whereas, for us Northern Irish, we have Major winners coming out of our ears. Hah! In your face...

English golfing success - a thing of the past

I'm so tired

I suppose that that is the reason why I have made so few entries into this blog recently. That, and the fact that I am so lazy. I have been reading up on the subject of tiredness recently and there are some amazing facts you should know about the old snoozing game.

• Did you know that a bout of tiredness can be alleviated by having a sleep. It's true! Sleep has long been associated with alleviating tiredness. The beauty of sleep is that you can do it just about anywhere and anywhen. I often try to take a nap during the night, when TV starts showing 30 minute long info-mercials about that knife set that you've always wanted but could never find anywhere - until now - for £29.99 (plus a paring knife and optional cheese knife for free). 
• Other people take their tiredness alleviation sleeps whilst they are doing mundane or boring activities. My friend Jason likes to sleep whilst driving long distances in his lorry (the M6 is a boring motorway and he has seen it so many times before). Another friend, Alison, sleeps whilst operating her band saw (don't try that at home as it is sometimes dangerous to sleep whilst operating sharp finger-lopping equipment).                                                                                                                                         

Sleep comes naturally to politicians

• The ancient Greeks didn't sleep at all. They saw the practice as excessively decadent, leading to people wanting pillows and other symbols of opulent living. The Romans were not so coy. It was the Roman play-write Septimus Bedensis who invented sleep in the first century BC and it became fashionable across the world shortly after that. In fact, the words 'sleep' & 'bed' are both derived from this clever man's name.
• Politicians are known to sleep longer than any other occupations. This is because they talk so much crap all of the time. The energy expended in talking crap, then listening to other people's crap saps their strength and they end up sleeping for nearly 17 hours per day. At the height of the second world war, Winston Churchill slept for so long each day that he was only woken to give inspirational speeches about fighting, beaches, and fighting on the beaches.

Anyway - all this talk of sleeping has made me tired. I'm off to bed. Good night!

A sad sign of the times

What we are saying goodbye to...

Space Shuttle launches are now a thing of the past. Today's launch of Atlantis is the last one ever. After this mission, the whole programme goes into retirement. I remember, as a kid, feeling excited by the whole concept of the space shuttle. Now, that whole era has come to an end. An exciting age of exploration and discovery - humans forging ahead into a new and better age - has ended, without anything to replace it.

What we are ushering in instead...

On the same day of the last ever shuttle launch, we have presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann signing 'The Marriage Vow', a far right homophobic and blatantly racist document which owes more to an age we thought we had left behind decades ago. This woman is a climate change denier, an advocate of anti-vaccination lunacy, believes in digging up half of Alaska in search of fossil fuels, opposes any sort of social security for the most vulnerable in society, considers a nuclear strike on Iran as a serious option, and would ban any sort of equality based on sexual orientation. She has an imaginative view of American history, with a view that the founding fathers of the United States would agree with all of her nasty, bigoted and ignorant views.

What is particularly sad is that her Victorian views have struck a chord with the underbelly of american opinion and she is being spoken of as a serious contender for the presidency. At one and the same time, we are waving goodbye to an age of serious scientific exploration and witnessing the emergence of an era of stupidity, anti-science, anti-reason, open-faced bigotry. Bachmann is dangerous because she doesn't understand just how stupid she really is. And for some reason, Americans quite like that...

News of the World to close - Good!

Murdoch is closing the News of the World. My initial feeling is joy - but - this is Murdoch. I don't trust this guy. He doesn't let things go so easily. Will this be the foundations of a seven day a week Sun? And what of the workers on the paper who are blameless - the printers, clerks, tea-ladies? And what of the guilty scum-bag journalists and editors - will they not just move on quietly into some other cushy position?

Frankly, I will only be happy if the Sun, the Mirror, the Mail and the Express follow suit. Britain can do without the lot of them. They stifle debate, spread hatred and ruin lives. Britain will be a happier, less cynical, less poisonous place without these dead-weights.

Americans are stupid

It's not a surprise to anyone, really. Still, it's not for me to make the case. Let's see them make it for themselves...

The return to Dickensian England

Channel 4 has an excellent documentary series called Dispatches. Tonight's episode exposed how there has been a rise in rogue landlords who are exploiting the very poorest and most vulnerable members of society. The situation has come about because of the lack of effort by successive governments to tackle the housing shortage and the very low levels of enforcement by local councils. Many poor and vulnerable people are being forced from their homes - which are already in a very poor state of repair - in order for the landlords to rent them out at higher and higher rents.

Jon Snow lifts the lid on the return of the Dickensian landlord

To add to the bleakness of the picture, it was also revealed that many more people are living in crowded conditions, with multiple occupancy of small rooms becoming more common and many people renting garden sheds as their sole living space. The government minister for housing, Grant Shapps, gave a 'ya-di-ya-di-ya' defence of the government's efforts, promising tough action and renewed enforcement - but clearly without any conviction or hope that anything will actually change.

Going backwards

And this week, it was revealed that the government's own figures reveal that 40,000 families face being made homeless by the changes to housing benefit being enacted by this government. It is pretty clear where this is all heading. We are seeing the re-emergence of slum-like housing conditions, heartless and scheming landlords and an indifferent government. This is the return to Dickensian living conditions for many of the most poor and vulnerable in this country. What else can we expect when no government of any persuasion since 1979 has seriously tackled the increasing divide between rich and poor? What is even sadder is that this situation is only going to get worse and no politician seems to give a monkeys.

When even the gutter is just not deep enough

How does a big steaming turd become even more steamy and turd-like? It's a strange question and one wonders why anyone would ask it?

The moral fibre of the average tabloid

Well, you need to have some way of describing the actions of the News of the World. We already know that they have been tapping the phones of the great and the good - and the not so good - but they have also been exposed as having tapped into the phone of a girl who was missing in order to listen to the desperate messages being left by her family. And when the phone's memory became filled, they deleted some messages so that they could make room for more.

I wouldn't wipe my arse with this

The parents, desperate for any sign that their daughted might somehow be safe, believed that the deletions were evidence that she was still alive. Who else would have been deleting the messages, only their daughter? I know that journalists often have a bad reputation. Very often they deserve it. But this has to be a new low in the way scummy tabloid journalists have pursued stories to fill their hate-filled rags. It is no more than I would have expected of a Murdoch publication. He's not called 'the dirty digger' for nothing.

Trampling on dead children for a story

There will be outrage over this story and some of that outrage will be voiced by other tabloids. However, by tomorrow, we will be able to stroll down any street in Britain and see people going to work with red tops  tucked under their arm. I don't know just how much evidence the public needs in order to realise that funding these scumbags by buying these papers is the problem. If you don't want pigeon crap everywhere, then you stop feeding the pigeons. You may think that it is a pipe dream to expect the british to stop buying these rags and that it will be business as usual come tomorrow. But it doesn't have to be this way.

The Sun craps on the Hillsborough victims

In the days following the Hillsborough disaster, when 96 Liverpool fans died in tragic circumstances, the Sun printed a story on its front page claiming all sorts of lies about the behaviour of the Club's fans as the tragedy unfolded. As a result of that particularly disgusting piece of journalism, the Sun newspaper is rarely seen under anybody's arm in that city. The paper has an almost zero circulation - people simply refuse to buy it. The Sun has worked hard to suck up to the city and its people, but with little impact. Good for the scousers. They show that it can be done. If only this policy was adopted by more people, then perhaps gutter journalism might just become a thing of the past. However, this is Britain. If you expect the british people to do this on a wider scale, then you will be waiting a very long time. I am not intending to hold my breath...

22 years of hurt

What sort of creepy buffoon is this man?

Watch this video. No - don't argue. Just do it. This is very weird and a bit creepy. Ed Milibland demonstrates that regardless of the question asked, you can just give the same answer five times in a row. And that is supposed to pass for grown-up politics? Is this really what the interaction between our creepy politicians and our hopeless media has thrown into existence? Apparently so. They deserve each other - except that the vacuum in the political sphere that is left is likely to wreak havoc in the lives of the poor and the vulnerable because those who should be sticking up for them are busy playing pathetic games. And the poor and vulnerable don't deserve that...

Grow up Milibland. Start acting like the opposition. Start acting like a Labour politician. And stop trying to out-Tory the Tories. They're better at it after all. They've had hundreds of years of practice at it.

Just too good for words

I've been thinking a lot about music recently. I borrowed some CDs from Reading Library and my choices have told me so much about where my musical preferences belong.

In common with so many people, I have an appreciation for the music of the Beatles. Throughout their career, they produced music that appealed to so many people. I mean people with very different tastes - even needs - they can find common ground in what the Beatles produced. No two fans will draw up the same list of their favourites. They crossed so many boundaries - appealed to all four quadrants of musical appreciation - energetic versus calm, dark versus positive. One of my favourite albums, which was among the CDs I borrowed, was 'Beatles for Sale', which although an early release, was a welcome departure from their positive pop into a more introspective and a darker space.

In terms of the quadrants, I am very much a fan of the dark (melancholic) and the calm. It explains my favourite songs, though my tastes are definitely not confined to this quadrant - there are many positive and energetic songs that I adore. Still, whilst I have never gone to the lengths of drawing up a top ten or a Desert Island Discs selection, I know that some of these would be among them:

Behind Blue Eyes - The Who
For a Friend - The Communards
11am - Incubus
Space & Time - 009 Sound System

And Bill Withers, of course. Who could leave this song out of their list...

They're all Tories now!

Last week, I posted whilst watching BBC's Question Time. I moaned then that the Lib Dems were sounding just like the Tories. Well, to my dismay, I have just watched Labour's John Denham on tonight's QT and he was sounding just like a Tory too. I cannot detect any real difference between any of the three major parties.

John Denham - If it looks like a Tory and sounds like a Tory... then it's a Tory

Today witnessed the teachers going on strike. Labour man Denham just sat there agreeing that the government line that these teachers - having had their pensions stolen from them - are just irresponsible and greedy. Nice one John! By the way, why did you join the Labour Party? Seriously, why? If you agree with the government that they have the right to strip working people of their hard-earned pensions, then why bother pretending to be a 'friend of the working man'.

Denham - you're a Tory!

Milliband - you're a Tory too!

So are you, Clegg!

Millibland - conducting a Labour Party policy review

There's barely a cigarette paper between you. You all basically agree with each other. The only differences are a matter of degrees. You're all singing from the same songsheet, though you may be singing in a different key. Or time signature (what do I know about music?). You get the idea? What I am saying is that they are all Tories, in case you hadn't clicked yet.
                          

A Tory       Another Tory      And Yet Another

Addendum

Millibland Quote of the day...

'The teachers' strike is wrong. It will inconvenience people, parents and children. They should return to the negotiating table...'

Well done, Ed. Maybe you should look up your labour movement history book and find out what the point of a strike really is. Yes, people are inconvenienced. That's the general idea, bonehead. Go and be a tory somewhere else.

Seriously! Who would be a teacher?

Why would anyone want to be a teacher these days? The government is busily robbing current teachers of their pensions. They are forcing teachers - who statistically enjoy very short retirements before the accumulated stress of the job kills them - to work for even longer for less pension at the end of it. And then they are being criticised for daring to take a stand.

The Tory Gumby in charge of education

Yes - teachers will be going on strike this week. About time. But here is the real stinker. This week the government is planning to make it harder to enter the profession. There will be more exacting standards required of them. Fair enough, perhaps, if you are trying to give the impression that you need to be high calibre to do the job. But the same Minister who is demanding these higher standards has also suggested that perhaps parents and volunteers could step into the classroom this week to cover while the teachers are out on strike. A job so hard we need the very best - but easy enough that any Tom Dick or Harriet could just step in and do it at the drop of a hat.

More forceful than the average teacher

Of course, I blame the government. But I blame the profession even more. There are three major teachers' unions. Teachers rarely speak with one voice and rarely act with one intent. Three unions equals no union. They are too reticent to act in their own interests and, as a result, are mucked about by successive governments. Teaching is a really tough job and they deserve to be paid well and receive a decent pension. To stand back and let the government steal their (relatively high contribution) pensions would be such a pathetic climbdown. Teachers need to grow a backbone, amalgamate their unions and stop acting like glorified child-minders. They are graduate professionals and they deserve to be treated as such. But it will only happen if they decide to grow a spine and protect their own interests.

City of Dreams

I left my heart in Liege. Who wouldn't? The minute I set eyes on its glorious cityscape I have longed to return. Here is one of my favourite attractions in downtown Liege. Isn't it lovely?

Talking to the latest versions

Having experienced a birthday in the last week, I am thoughtful of the advancing years and mindful that my generation are handing over to the next. The latest versions of the family genes are already grown up and purposeful - and it is always wonderful to get together with them and share some quality time. As nephews and niece(s) go, these are as fine a bunch as one could ever wish for.

The most famous resident of Wells - the baby-eating Bishop

Bath (and Wells) was the venue. A decent lunch and pattiseries were on the menu and talking & walking were the order of the day. Given their level of intellect, the conversation was more Exhibition Road than Eastenders -  and thank goodness for that. I don't care much for TV, Lady Gaga or stag nights - something that is shared by these marvellous individuals. We did talk about this though. This video has popped up out of the ether and it is just fascinating. A remote tribe meets europeans for the first time and are terrified by the 'ghosts' in their midst. As they tentatively approach, with their arrows and axes trained on the 'intruders', will they let rip or will they have the courage to investigate face to face? The tension is spell-binding...

Sounding like a Tory

I am sitting watching Question Time on BBC1. Norman Baker, Liberal Democrat MP, is appearing as a representative of the Con-Dem government, alongside two celebs, some Labour nobody and John Redwood representing Mars. What is almost chilling about this programme is the fact that Norman Baker sounds like a dyed-in-the-wool true-blue tory.

Go and shove a big blue rosette on your lapel, Norman

I really don't know what has happened to the Lib Dems. I understand that they have had to make compromises, but that doesn't mean throwing away everything you have ever believed in. If David Cameron is watching this, he must be chuckling his way through the programme in contrast to old school Liberals who must intermittently be crying in between bouts of nausea. Cameron - you have won. The Lib Dems have sold their soul to your party for a slice of life at the Cabinet table.

"Nice one, Norman!"

Fortunately, some members of the audience seem to be raising this very point. Good! As expected, Norm is oblivious to the criticism and is spouting the same old tired excuses. Go play on the road, Tory Boy.