Sieze them! Burn them!

Our elected representatives (alright, Scotland's elected representatives) are targeting their time on the issues that matter most in a country already ravaged by the effects of the recession: yes, the Hokey Cokey. The same political establishment which welcomes with open arms IRA commanders elected to Parliament wants to ban a song which lightly mocks the latin mass.

It is difficult to say what this illustrates most: the petty, insane obsessions of modern progressive liberalism or the overbearing dominance of the modern state. Still, it's all lucrative work for the MPs, MSPs and all their hangers on, so it can't be that bad. Idle hands, and all that.

And so it begins, again

The BBC, suffering as it does from Institutional Stockholm Syndrome, is already beginning the long and sly process of shifting blame for the Mumbai atrocities away from the people who actually carried it out, the terrorists (sorry millitants, sorry activists) and onto the authorities, the police.

They have done it so successfully in Britain that now the Menezes case is more widely known and reported than the terrorist, sorry, activist attacks of two weeks previously.

Note that by enclosing 'error' in scare quotes how they slyly insinuate that it may not been an error at all! Perhaps the police deliberately lured the guests to a point where the terrorists, sorry activists would have no choice but for their guns to accidentally go off on their own accord and accidentally shoot them.

Three things characterise each and every terrorist atrocity the BBC 'covers':

The word 'terrorist'

They never use the word terrorist, unless it is in a quote from a lunatic describing the actions of western governments. The BBC believes that using the 'T' word is not helpful in accurately describing the events. Even at Beslan, where the terrorists shot terrified children in the back of the head, they were described as militants, or on one notorious and appalling occasion, activists. Activists go round pushing political literature through letter boxes at election time, they don't shoot children. The BBC, however, thinks it is clearer to label both groups of people with exactly the same word.

The 'M' or 'I' words

The BBC would rather die in a ditch with only a copy of the Daily Mail for company than mention the facts that everyone knows, that the terrorists who carried out the Mumbai attacks were Muslims, and that they did it in the name of Islam. Finding the words 'Muslim' or 'Islam' in BBC articles reporting terrorist, sorry activist attacks is like winning the Lottery. Even the f*cking Guardian mentions it. The BBC, when it is forced to identify them, prefers the word 'Asians', which libels another approximately two billion Chinese, Indians, Japanese and other sundry nations in a casually racist slur, rather than point out the completely fucking obvious.

We are always to blame

The BBC will find someone, usually within the first two or three paragraphs, to blame us, Israel, the First Crusade, the Battle of Actium, whatever, instead of the people who are actually responsible. The BBC and the rest of the Left will laugh themselves into a hernia whenever someone supporting the right to bear arms says that "guns don't kill, people do", but mysteriously when the people holding the guns are Islamic terrorists, suddenly it becomes true. People aren't murdered by the terrorists, they 'die' during the attacks, as if they suffered a heart attack or something. This is particularly prevalent in the BBC's appalling coverage of Israel vs Hamas and sundry Islamists. Israel kills Palestinians; Israelis happen to die during Palestinian attacks.

Incredibly, the BBC is still considered a trusted news source by the bovine herd which characterises the British population. This is partly down to the cunning and skill with which the BBC presents their bias, but mostly it is down to the fact that the average Briton doesn't have a clue what is going on in the world and doesn't realise he/she is being spoonfed poison every day of their lives.

How caring government works

buy an enormous home you cannot afford, and you'll get a two year loan backed by the state at your current mortage rate.

Get into difficulties through no fault of your own, and you can get a loan from the state at an easy to afford interest rate of between 12.68% and 26.8%.

See, Labour cares about the poor. It's the evil Toreees who don't. Spin this one, Polly, you hypocrite.

Police crack down on dangerous criminal

Thank God for South Wales Police. Who knows how this could have escalated if they had not descended upon this dangerous man and stamped out his dangerous behaviour?

People reading this article might think that Port Talbot is a quiet place, so lacking in crime that three bored policemen are so desperate to crack a crime that they jump into a riot van and hotfoot it to the scene of the despicable crime. Well, actually Port Talbot isn't a particularly crime-free area. In fact, it is infested with the usual low-level anti-social behaviour common to all South Wales towns (and all the other towns in the United Kingdom). Clearly there is much for the police to do in Port Talbot, they just can't be fucking bothered. Far, far easier to react to a trumped up complaint from one of the now legion of perpetually offended wankers and jump in two-footed at a suspected 'hate crime'.

Here's a wild assumption - had the shop owner called in a robbery, the police might have turned up about seven hours later. Put a fat bird gag in the shop window and you get the South Wales version of the CRS kicking the door in. Such is the state of policing in even what once was a refreshingly un-PC area of the country.

What is wrong with these people?

Would they rather the plane crashed with them on board?

parents were shouting and screaming and there were women and children crying.

Apparently, there were adults present but this makes you think there weren't. Again, were they demanding the plane flew regardless of how dangerous the weather conditions were?

These people are lunatics. Get a grip.

I wake up and it is 1973 again

You will shortly be subsidising the cost of that Jaguar that rich fella in your local is thinking of buying. If you are Labour, it's a no-brainer - you get to buy votes in marginal constituencies, the unions are happy, the Tories have to pick up the tab of EVEN MORE borrowing when they win the election.

As for the car industry - thousands of jobs. Well yes, but tens of thousands of jobs have gone in the finance sector already - I don't see the BBC weeping over them. Clearly, some jobs are more worthy than others, and as everyone who works in the City is apparently an evil fat cat, even the secretaries, there is much rejoicing on the Left over their demise.

So, after the car industry, whose next? Which industries are sited in marginal constituencies? I could do a survey, but I can't be arsed.

Who will rid us of this meddlesome druid?

Rowan the Happy Druid is at it again. Its a mystery how a socialist got on to the Today programme to talk about how we are all consumed by greed, but that's by the by. This is another example of recession porn, liberals and leftists getting their rocks off by welcoming what is going to be a Depression. For them, it is a triumphant vindication of their beliefs, and there's no-one more smugly triumphant than a progressive liberal.

Williams talks of the depression as a "welcome reality-check". Personally, I'd trust his opinion on reality as much as I'd trust a cat's opinion on Bach. His past pronouncements have not exactly screwed his reputation to the sticking-plate of reality. This is the man, after all, who thought (thinks) Sharia Law is inevitable in the UK.

Still, back to the "welcome reality check". It is a welcome reality check to all the progressive liberals who have become rich on the system they so profess to despise, and who are so completely insulated from the hurricane which will shortly flatten our economy that they can afford to indulge in most public and unseemly gloating. If you live in an enormous palace on the banks of the Thames, enjoy a very, very comfortable salary and have servants to assist your every want, why it is easy to enjoy the "reality check" from your lofty seat.

For the poor bugger who has lost his job, or is living in fear that he will lose his job, "reality" is not so welcome. In fact, the "reality" of "unsustainable greed" which the Archdruid alludes to is not a reality at all, but a progressive liberal fantasy. The average Joe in Britain is so crushed by taxes (truly the unsustainable greed!) and the cost of living that he can barely provide for his family, let alone indulge in the Archdruid's fantasy of hedonistic consumption. If Williams stepped out of his socialist fantasy for fifteen seconds he would see the truth of this, but there is no room at the Inn for unwelcome truths.

The meme is entrenched, the progressives dominate the establishment and the media, and an awful lot of people are going to hurt a great deal as the libs sate their pious lust to blame anyone except themselves. I loathe each and every one of them.

Beyond parody

You've gotta larf. (HT Julia)

Heads explode in hypocrisy and lies overload

Freedom is slavery. Black is white. Less is more. Etc.

Plans to directly elect some members of police authorities have been scrapped following opposition from senior officers and Labour council chiefs.

She told The Guardian she feared the police would become politicised.

She left out the words "even more" before 'politicised'. The hypocrisy, humbug, lies and sheer lunacy from the Left in this article is astonishing. So, top coppers don't want to go through the tedious business of being elected? No surprise there. Councillors don't want their power and influence reduced? Again, my jaw didn't touch the floor. That Labour are in retreat over the completely obvious opposition of vested interests is proof that this was one of their "dog whistle" policies, presented simply to trawl for votes with no intention whatsoever of actually putting it into practice.

The Order of the Tinfoil Hat, however, goes to Keith "chubby" Vaz:

They were also attacked by the chairman of the influential home affairs select committee, Keith Vaz, who ...raised fears police authorities could be "captured" by far right groups.

You WHAT? Some sort of military putsch in Northampton, you mean? A March on Devizes seizing control of the Traffic Regulations Enforcement Committee of the local council? What is this nutter on? Assuming by "far right" he means fascists and not just anyone to the right of Chris Huhne, their influence in the UK is pathetically small, though Labour are doing their damndest to stoke up their support by, for example, making it legal to discriminate against white males in employment. Still, the chances of a police authority being "captured by the far right" are laughably remote. The chances of all police authorities remaining in control of New Labour apparatchiks, however, now remain extremely high, at least until the Conservatives win the next election.

Sir Jeremy Beecham, chairman of the Labour group on the Local Government Association, told the committee the proposals could "fragment" the relationship between police and councils.

The point, surely?

The home secretary defended the plan as recently as last month, telling a meeting: "People with bizarre views can be elected and that is a challenge for us as a democracy but I have faith in the public who I think will elect the person who is going to represent them best."

This points to the fundamental opinion New Labour and the rest of the political class have of the public - that we are not sensible in our choices, and that if you give us democracy we will all just vote for nutters, lunatics, fringe candidates. Like New Labour, for example. Still, when "Tits" Jacqui talks of "people with bizarre views", I don't think she means Lord Loon wearing a duck on his head and calling for Ovaltine to me made a class B drug. No, the "bizarre views" will be mad stuff like, oh, reducing crime, listening to local people, doing what they want, not what liberal pressure groups
want. This cannot be allowed.

Looking at what has happened over the past two months, there has been a fundamental shift in the way people think about the politicisation of the police.

I put that down to the London mayor's intervention in the resignation of Sir Ian Blair and the events surrounding the Damian Green affair.

Chutzpah of the Year award to Tits. You arrest an opposition spokesman on trumped up political charges, and then claim this as an excuse to back pedal on this fundamental reform! The hypocrisy and greasy politics are vile, truly vile.

And finally, the comfortable elite themselves, the police:

It is right to resist the potential for extremists or single issue groups to excerpt control of local policing, which must remain free of party-political influence.

Total bollocks. Policing in the UK was captured by political pressure groups years, if not decades ago. Coppers can't fart without the approval of leftist and liberal pressure groups.

That clang you heard was the sound of the liberal Establishment slamming the door shut. You peasants can shiver outside in the cold for a few more years, this isn't for the likes of you.

The new plumbers

Plumbers are out; "NHS Doctors" are in - the latest must-have euphemism for avoiding at all costs the phrase "Muslim terrorist". In fact, the BBC does its usual trick of not mentioning the I or the M words AT ALL in the article.

Still, they did manage to get in the usual Lefty equivalence about "we are as bad as the terrorists", except of course they avoid using the word "terrorist" as well, in case it might offend. They only use it when an unimpeachable source (e.g. a terrorist) says it, and then they quote. The left-wing media in the court (i.e. most of it) must have creamed in their pants when the terrorist said:

he believed the British government and Army could equally be accused of terrorism for their actions in Iraq.

A dream quote for them; they so want to believe. Islamic terrorists know that all they have to do to get the Left onside (and it doesn't take much effort, believe me) is to say the correct slogans about Bush and Iraq. Never mind that their attacks are planned years in advance, often beginning before the events they 'blame' have ever took place. No, all it takes is for the slogan to be said, and it becomes real.

It's the little things that tell the story

Ah, Christmas. Maybe I am wearing rose-tinted spectacles here, but I don't recall campaigns to crack down on gun and knife crime at Christmas "when I were a lad". When swimming against the tide of official lies about how crime is constantly falling, it is small stories like this which strike a discordant note and tell you what is really going on.

When is a Fat Cat not a Fat Cat?

When it is capable of having kittens, I guess. City financiers aren't usually given gushing titles such as "superwoman" by the BBC. I suppose if the gender fits, it's all change on the Ideology Express.

Looking on the bright side

Today's Spin Award goes to this article. 75% of terrorism plots in Britain involve Pakistan. Many people, no doubt, will be shocked by this. I was; I thought the percentage would be at least 90%. Still, just look how Brown spins this catastrophe:

Mr Brown said a £6m partnership with Pakistan would be "the most comprehensive anti-terrorist programme" between the UK and another country.

Right...great. Ever wondered that if Pakistani Muslims weren't at the epicentre of world terrorism, we wouldn't have a problem which required a "comprehensive anti-terrorist programme"?

Breathtaking

The BBC manage to pen an entire article about the Mumbai Jewish community's vulnerability without ONCE saying who is targeting them. OK, it's the BBC so covering up for Islamic terrorism is hardly news, but you would think it would be difficult to write an article and avoid the CENTRAL point.

But no, this one goes one step further:

The Jewish community here is close to Muslims

They are bosom buddies! OK, they want to kill all the Jews, and they think they are descended from pigs and apes, but hey - that's just banter.

A druid speaks

I normally have little time for the views of bearded progressive liberals, and for the Archbishop of Canterbury, the prima inter pares among them, I have almost no time at all. Still, his remarks yesterday bear some examination.

Britain...does not seem to like itself very much

Thanks, tell us something we didn't know. Perhaps an admission that thirty years of extreme liberalism and multiculturalism has fractured our culture and society? That people who are deliberately raised with no respect for themselves and their country, their culture, certainly aren't going to have respect for anyone else? A country whose first instinct is to reward the recklessly feckless, even though the consequences are even more fecklessness?

Nope, none of that. I enjoyed this, taking about what the average Briton says:

I'm worried about what will happen to me tomorrow because I've got nothing really in the bank.

Yes Rowan, it's called earning a living and paying your way. Archbishops don't have to worry about that, but ordinary people do. It isn't a sign of a broken society but a normal one. The only broken bit is that despite the longest economic boom in British history (certainly within the last century), the average Briton has no savings and is in hock to thousands. What better illustration of the liberal commandment of "Do what thou wouldst" could you want?

Still, I'm not convinced that Williams is the man to solve our problems. This is the man, remember, who is hot for Sharia.

I have always admired the Germans

No, I really have. It was a desperate shame that we fought two world wars against them; in terms of national character we are almost brothers. Germans are sensible, hard working and clever. Oh, alright, maybe we aren't brothers...we have lost at least two of those virtues.

Anyway, the reason for this post is this. The BBC try to slander him with the charge of "unusual breach of standard diplomacy", but their real problem is the attack on their hero, 'Flash' Gordon. Unfortunately for them, what he says is exactly right and they haven't a leg to stand on. I think he is being optimistic, though, when he says

this will...raise Britain's debt to a level that will take a whole generation to work off

We were way past that level several years ago. We are now spending out grandchildren's inheritance. How about Herr Steinbruck for Prime Minister?

Flash! Ah-hah, saviour of the...oh

He's mad, isn't he? I mean, it was bad enough that he smoothly shifted blame for his calamitous spending splurge onto the USA, but claiming to save the world? Even the BBC won't swallow that...yet.

All that talk of control-freakery, colossal temper tantrums...do we have a mentalist in charge of the nuclear button?

Addicts and Fixes?

Here. What happens when the 7-day high wears off? Another fix?

It Certainly Could (giggle)

Climate Bill 'Could lead world':

Here.

Yes, it certainly would, but not in the way the greens and other assorted extreme leftists imagine. This is from the same source which gave us unilateral disarmament for the UK - the idea that rational actors abroad will set aside their own interests and hurt themselves just because they see some pious idiots on the other side of the world doing it. For me, to continue to think this way betrays signs of a disturbing mental illness. The mixture of a messianic complex and extreme naiveity is remarkable.

Anyway, back to the original point. Such a bill would, indeed, lead the world. Scotland would become the first industrialised country EVER to beggar itself into a pastoral, starving existence for no other reason than cultural suicide. One could say that Scotland is on its way to beggaring itself anyway, but us south of the Tweed cannot feel so smug about that these days as our own Clan is desperately doing the same to us. The real irony, though, is whatever carbon savings Scotland makes to offset against their economic and cultural collapse would be wiped out by an over-exuberant celebration of the Chinese New Year in a couple of suburbs of Shanghai.

In short, it is pointless and tremendously dangerous. Only the mad or very small children think like this.

UPDATE: One has to admire the impartial way the BBC wrote this article. There is no opposition to this proposal, not a single word of criticism. It is a press release for environmentalists, no more, no less.

The story that just keeps on giving

I have blogged previously about this trial. It just gets better and better. Today's headline was almost as good as the "I'm a patriot, really" one from a few weeks ago.

One thing gets me though - does this show that British justice is good and impartial, or is it just taking the piss?

They didn't even have to have a warrant

Gorbals Mick, the worst speaker in British history, couldn't even be arsed to find out if the terror police who ransacked Damien Green's parliamentary office even had a fucking warrant. Well, he's a Tory, isn't he? Who cares about the sovereignty of Parliament, the causes of the Civil War, hundreds of years of history and precendent? When you haven't got a fucking clue what you are doing, who cares?

When Harriet "Harpy" Harperson sticks the knife in, you know it's all over. How did he ever become Speaker? Some sort of diversity initiative?

Scientist calls for huge sums of money to be pissed away

Here. Great timing, mate. As the world plunges into recession, or even depression, he wants enormous sums of money spent countering a threat whose risk is infinitessimal and which probably couldn't be stopped anyway. These things travel at colossal speed, by the time we know it is heading for earth it will probably be too late anyway. Asteroid strikes make global warming look like a cast-iron certainty.

Still, it isn't exactly odd for the UN to want to grab even more cash to spend on 'global' action on spurious 'global crises'.

Who says the State is running out of ideas in the fight against crime?

If you tried to make stuff like this up, people would laugh at you. This is how violence and drunkenness are policed in Britain today. I'm not surprised by it though; personal experiences can often reinforce a nagging feeling that things have gone terribly wrong.

For me, it was the time at a cricket match at Lord's a year or so ago. As I was walking past the Nursery end to leave by the North Gate, a vile drunk yob stuck his face to within three inches of a female steward and screamed "We fucking did you!". There were two police officers three yards away and they...smiled indulgently. I thought about remonstrating politely with them but realised this is the Met, they'd think twice about arresting a violent yob for assault but would nick me without thinking.

So, when I see stories like the above, it is all part of the same indulgent attitude. It is strange that on the one hand we have parts of the State making ominous noises about alcohol, while other parts of the State let the worst excesses of alcohol pass without notice. If I were paranoid I'd think that they wanted to let things get so bad that, after a few years of friendly media coverage, they'd be able to crack down seriously on anyone who dares to drink. I'm sure that's their fantasy scenario, but I imagine the reality is more prosaic - like all huge and powerful organisations, it is not a single identity with a common cause but a sack full of competing and contradictory interests, much like the Nazi party was.

On the one hand, you have the Department of Health, now vying with the Home Office as the most sinister department of government. These people have moved well beyond the old position of advising about health but letting people take the consequences of their own behaviour; their aim is now coercion, bending the public to THEIR will and their ideas of how people should live. Their excuse is cost, but never believe any public organisation which professes to be worried about costs - they are lying. This is about power.

On the other, you have the Police. The public 'services' in Britain have never been known for their German-like efficiency and devotion to duty, and the police are no different. Still, in the old days they knew what the law was and they enforced it. A generation of university educated (brainwashed) senior officers later, and now it is an organisation which believes that criminals are all victims and not responsible for their behaviour.

It is simple - if you want to cut down on drunken violence, spend a year arresting people for being drunk and violent, and publicise it widely. If, by some miracle, arresting people is permitted by the Human Rights Act, by the end of the year I think drunken violence would have declined somewhat. It's a new and exciting policy, but it might work.