CoffeeHousers' Wall, 22 March - 28 March

Mr. Green

Tory MPs mustn't be afraid of saying they are "Conservatives"!
My youngest daughter (10) knows I am interested in politics and so told me about an MP who came to her school to give a talk. She told me his name and remembered what he talked about, but couldn't tell me what party he was from.

She was quite taken by what he said and asked me if she could ever be one (well actually she asked "how much money do they earn?" - good girl). But she needed me to tell her that he was a Conservative MP.

Frank P

This is the first day of the enacted USSA.
Let us join Matt Patterson on the American Thinker blog to mark the occasion:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/03/where_were_you_when_the_republ.html

Extract:

>"In November 2008, Americans elected a socialist as their president. In March 2010, they woke up stunned to find themselves living in a socialist country.

Health insurers - once private companies - are now organs of the federal government. Every citizen is a ward of the state, which can now compel you to have insurance; punish you if you don't; determine if your insurance is acceptable; punish you if it isn't. Thousands of new federal bureaucrats will soon spill from the D.C. Beltway and flood the country, scrutinizing our finances to verify compliance with this new law.

A government that grants itself this kind of power over us can conceivably do anything to us. For our own good, of course. Such a country is in no meaningful sense "free."

And this is only the beginning. Liberals are salivating in contemplation of all the fanciful window trimmings that can in the future be hung from this legislative framework. Public option will soon appear as prelude to single payer, as was the intent all along. Soon, Americans won't even have the illusion of a choice - the government will move from subsidizer to provider, and it will be the only game in town."<

Read it all and shout it from the rooftops!

Sam Armstrong

R.I.P. FREEDOM

A very sad day

Zoo keeper (Elephant house)

Brown has pledged that you'll all soon have your own Webpage.
Read : You're all going to be controlled, herded, watched.

Thank God I moved to a third world police state where the sun shines brightly every day under the 23rd Parallel.
And the closest thing to an immigrant is... well... me.
I really can thoroughly recommend it.
Good luck with the GE by the way.

Yosemite Sam

I have picked up a story that CCHQ have said the the Union Modernisation Fund will continue if the Tories win the election. Please tell me this is not true! If it is true, I shall be forced to throw myself off Wigan Pier whilst whistling the Red Flag and playing the Internationale a la Petomane.

Laura

Welcome to Britain. Welcome to the Third World:

Homeowner who forgot his wallet returns to find Romanian family moving in

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1259798/Man-goes-work-comes-home-Romanian-family-moved-in.html

Freddie Forsyth on the bleating over Beckham:

http://www.express.co.uk/ourcomments/view/163835/Frederick-Forsyth

Freddie Forsyth on the bleating over Michael Foot:

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/163831/Be-grateful-that-Michael-Foot-never-became-Prime-Minister

Thank God we still have some journalists not in that Westminster bubble.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Laura: There are also the scummy illegal immigrants who are squatting at the bottom of a Cambridgeshire family's garden. They have taken over a wooden outhouse, and the ground is strewn with human feces and injection needles. The police state they can do nothing as it is a civil not a criminal affair. We need what this NuLabour government dare to call 'Vigilantes'. The Anti-Fascists probably support this garbage, being really Fascists. Bring on the English Defence League! No doubt the people in Cambridge will do bugger all, no wonder this country has been taken over by all the world's shite. And all with just a whimper!

Ghengis

Today, watched HH "performing" on the front bench. She was stuttering and stammering more frequently than GB does when skating on thin ice. Mind you, when as leader of the House, Members representing all parties are informing firmly you that this latest whitewash is not what they or their constituents require, Its difficult to pretend.

Chingford Man

Trouble brewing in the selection battle to be the joint Conservative-Unionist candidate in the NI seat of South Antrim.

It seems that the Tory side is objecting to the Ulster Unionist nominee in this marginal seat on the grounds of his attitude to the gay rights agenda so beloved of the Cameroons.

What Cameron can get away with in Norfolk SW he certainly won't get away with in Ulster. One to watch.

Tim W

Can I suggest a change in economic wording?

Nobody will vote for someone because they say "I'll cut the deficit." Sorry but the ordinary person has no idea what that means.

I suggest something along the lines of: "Aiming for balanced budgets." or "We will aim to balance our budgets."
Simple "balance budgets" sounds better than "cut deficit."

I point to Mike Bloomberg's speech (courtesy of wikipedia!) made at the Tory 2007 conference. He said this:
"To me, fiscal conservatism means balancing budgets — not running deficits that the next generation can't afford."

That is perfect phraseology and he was advised by Squier, Knapp, Dunn communications. Apparently they are helping Osborne this election. We should take this idea.

David Ossitt

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

“Laura: There are also the scummy illegal immigrants who are squatting at the bottom of a Cambridgeshire family's garden.”

Anne this is a clear case for the use of baseball bats in the dead of night; or possibly the words, ‘petrol’ and ‘bomb’ might be more appropriate.

On a more serious note; each and every time we hear of cases like this, where the police will not step in to do their job, a job that they are so reluctant to do.

I wonder whether it would be permissible to fight fire with fire, by this I mean, those who are at the mercy of the squatters should themselves squat on and in their own property and with as many supporters as possible.

If at the same time; the original illegal squatters were to feel a little or even a lot of pain, so much the better.

David Ossitt

Tim W
"He said this: To me, fiscal conservatism means balancing budgets — not running deficits that the next generation can't afford."

Well said; that man.

daifromwales

Tonight's London evening paper headline is "1000 roadworks a day hit London"

Half are caused by Thames Water replacing leaking pipes.

The mad thing about this is that the economic damage is hugely greater than the value of the water thus saved: just as the industry said - but no Politician wants to hear the truth. It's being done to satisfy shrill journalists and their silly readers who had nothing better to write about last time we had a few weeks of drought after Government had deliberately refused to allow water companies to cater for their future needs. It isn't even possible to measure the losses, nor to measure how much is being saved, because water cannot be metered accurately enough to measure either.

The Safety Industry meanwhile makes it far worse. Works which are no bigger than a parked car are surrounded by one-at-a-time traffic lights which paralyse all movement at key junctions - because Local Authority engineers are frightened of Corporate Manslaughter charges in the event that a pair of incompetent motorists hurt themselves.

Meanwhile if the lobbyists get their way we are heading for blanket 20mph speed limit across all of London. Without the excursions to 30 mph between junctions, journey times will increase by about 30%, at a cost greater than the value of lives saved - since the economy will be that much less able to support the health services etc. And contempt for the mad Law will expand still further, as the Young are criminalised and the Old meekly submit to their leaders' commands.

Paul Danon

Please could you stop all this meaningless, jargony CoffeeHousers business? Why not just be the Spectator website and present your articles plainly? The magazine is nice to read because it's straightforward. Just because it's the internet doesn't mean it has to be snazzy.

daniel maris

Come on, Obama and all that. People said the same about FDR.

There is not much freedom in being bankrupted because you fall ill or become unemployed.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

When I was a girl, there was a popular expression "Better dead than red." Last night I thought whether to chcck in case there were reds under the bed. Then I remembered how silly this would be. Milliband, Straw and Byers, to name just three. The Trotskyites are not under the bed, they are in it grabbing all the blankets!

Malfleur

Would the Coffee House please consider a Salon des Refusés?

Webster

Litigation fears are stifling local democracy in the Scottish Highlands. Councillors who oppose windfarm developments are being banned from the debating chamber during planning debates for windfarm developments.

http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1651038

EC

Malfleur,

I thought that was the CH Wall actually was...

EC

Webster,

Now that really is disturbing!

It won't be long before 'Scotsmen' becomes synonymous with Trot's men!

AndyinBrum

Frank P appears to be at his slathering best (?) again. I wonder whether he has shares in a health insurance company? Or works for Fox

Ghengis

Today's poll in the Sun shows 60% expressing the view "they are all the same" when being asked which party is more to be blamed in relation to the expenses scandal. What then holds the Conservative party back from cleansing itself in order to grab its share of these voters?.

Nicholas

Webster and EC - I wonder if "Assistant chief executive Michelle Morris and head of legal services Leslie Johnstone" responsible for this exclusion are Common Purpose graduates and members?

From their website:- "It is because women have been kept out of many positions of power they have got better at leading beyond authority and working on the margins. They have learnt to create power." Creating power, eh? What about limiting power in the interests of the democratic majority? What about representing the needs of those without power rather than creating it for oneself? All this talk of "in the interest of the public good" but who decides exactly what is in the interest of the public good and on what basis?

Also from their website a statement by Sir David Bell refuting "conspiracy theories" about the organisation:-

http://www.commonpurpose.org.uk/about/governance/trustee-statement

Verity

I see the vile, pig ignorant, uppity English police have quizzed Conservative MP Philip Hollobone for saying that "wearing a burqa is like wearing a paper bag over your head".

I'm sure it gave the moron a warm tingle to be reprimanding an MP, when what he was doing was demonstrating his clownish ignorance.

AGAIN: Islam is not genetic. It's a belief system. It's a choice.

AGAIN: The burqa and similar attire has absolutely nothing, rien, nada to do with their religion - although granted many of the more stupid ones who come from a long line of first cousin marriages may sincerely believe it does.

AGAIN: This attire is not mentioned anywhere in the Q'ran or the Surahs.

AGAIN: This attire is ancient desert nomad wear, intelligently designed to keep the constantly blowing and shifting desert sands out of the nose, mouth, throat, eyes and ears. That is all.

The long robes, which men also wear (as they also wear the keffiya which serves the same purpose) keeps the searing desert sun off the skin, yet allow a breeze to blow through, drying off the sweat.

It's an intelligent design for the purpose and it has absolutely bugger all to do with islam, mohammad or allah.

Mr Hollobone, by the way, is the cheapest MP in Parliament and has the smallest office.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1260041/MP-Philip-Hollobone-quizzed-police-controversial-burkha-comments.html#comments

Noa Zrk

Despite Verity's well known preference for tea at, for us, unearthly times of the day, I actually like the title of Coffee House, it alludes to a C18th gathering place for political and business thought and debate in the age of reason.

Snazzy it ain't, butit works.

Malfleur " Salon des Refuses"? Come on, that's rubbish!
But "Salon des Whites", still sounds a bit camp and non-pc, but alluding to the anti-bolshevic struggle by exiled White Russians, works for me in Brown's McDystopian Camp Paradise.

Derek

Mr Straw said: “There is such anger in the Parliamentary Labour Party, as well as I may say incredulity, about their stupidity in allowing themselves to be suckered in a sting like this." (DT online)

Gloss: Labour Ministers must try much harder not to be caught.

James Murphy

Give me a paper bag any day of the week, Verity. Much cooler, and with a wonderfully nostalgic air of the 50s, iced buns, balloons, missile crises and Khrushchev - what wonderfully predictable Islamist-nutter-free days!

Malfleur

Noa Zrk

Well, you may find it rubbish, but I imagine that there others who would be interested to see a separate room at the back of the Coffee House, perhaps behind bead curtains, in which the rejected and/or removed posts of Frank P et alios could be discreetly viewed to be mocked at and bearing the suitable and necessary disclaimers of the Spectator.

The editor might even hang his long-promised article on Neathergate there - it might become a collector's item...

Frank P

Dan Collins helps us to understand the implications of Obamacare with a neat and well notated analysis:

http://powip.com/2010/03/privacy-and-transparency-under-bush-and-obama/

Nicholas

This burka banning thing is a bit worrying. Do you think they'll extend it to tin foil hats and knitted balaclava helmets? (I have to wear the balaclava to hide the tin foil hat whenever I go out but it's the old open-faced school job).

Jez

Hi everyone,

Do you think that maybe approaching an issue that is rapidly exacerbating across the continent rather than pretending it hasn't happened, is probably (if you think about it maturely) the best course of action to take?

Boy, our MSM is brilliant.

He's the ONLY (half decent) description of the Front Nationale's result last week.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a9cf874c-3619-11df-aa43-00144feabdc0.html

"The National Front has acquired a new lease of life, scoring an average of 17.8 per cent in the 12 regions where it fielded candidates in the second round run-off."

Does the powers-that-be feel this is just going to go away if they ignore it (on our behalf)?

Oh dear.

James Murphy

Noa Zrk - you allude to "Verity's well known preference for tea at, for us, unearthly times of the day" - Pshaw! There IS no unearthly time for tea in the diary of an Englishman - or woman!

egh

Are the frogules taking over Coffeehouse? Nasty flowers and national fronts I never heard of, all over the place!

No need for them to answer, though. I have no intention ever of understanding anything about them.

Noa Zrk

"..behind bead curtains...".

Yes, you definitely have something there. A room 101, with special things on the top shelf, in sealed plastic:-

Big Ger's General Election date

Call Me Daves EU Referendum

Mr Jacquie Smith's old dvd collection

Cleggies ex-girlfriend list, (mislaid in the back of the Lib Dem manifesto)

The Byers Book of Favourite Charities (long edtn, 1 page)

An old Peter Mandelson mortgage application

Ali MyDarlings "A Budget for a UK in credit"

A Samantha Cameron Tax Credit adjustment claim.

and so on.

It can be even called the Tea Room, with its own kettle and a stock of Liptons Yellow label tea bags for visiting expats...

Malfleur

Noa Zrk

and the kettle could be called Black.

Noa Zrk

James Murphy

-Pshaw! There IS no unearthly time for tea in the diary of an Englishman - or woman!

Your point duly noted James. But everything has it's time and place. Unless one is tea total one also has to make time for Sundowners.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

My initial reaction on reading that the Soham murderer Ian Huntley was attacked in prison was one of satisfaction. However, on reflection I now fear that some imbecile judiciary will demand that as Huntley cannot be protected in prison, he should be released on humanitarian grounds. Ever since Lord Justice Alan Moses declined to set a maximum life sentence, instead giving a twenty-year minimum, I have been expecting some awful moves from the perverted establishment who appear to have greater sympathy for the perpetrators of evil rather than the victims.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

I typed 20 years instead of 40 years. Apologies.

Julipa

Frank P - 12.47pm "... Americans won't even have the illusion of a choice....."

I agree. The Healthcare Bill is America's next step towards the gradual evolvement of democracy into Fascism and the corporate state. Take a look at this:

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/63181

AndyinBrum

That's a very Christian view there AWK. Jesus would be proud (see told you it wouldn't last long)

Is the Coffee House (I preferr Gin Soak btw) going to cover the abomination which is the DEB? Which means any site can be closed down if accused (not convicted, accused) of publishing or linking to copyrighted materials 3 times.

For example, Richard could post 3 links to copyrighted material, & the ISP would be forced to shut the Gin Soak down.

Nicholas

"Turning immigration into a tool of social engineering" on spiked. Interesting.

http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8335/

Wilhelm

How do you know Gordon Broon is lying ?

Answer. He's moving his lips.

Thankyou and goodnight.

Frank P

Nicholas (11.46pm)

Thanks for the link. As you say, interesting. Very interesting. Neather revisited, but not in name.

A bit repetitive and prolix though. You're not espousing open borders yourself, like O'Neill, are you? The residue of Living Marxism shows through the piece, too.

He adduced some interesting stats and other facts; I'm not sure about his net negatives on immigration during the periods mentioned, considering the ignorance of successive governments of both stripes on just how many illegals have arrived or overstayed; his conclusions are muddled, too. He seems to both support and deny any conspiracy on the part of NuLab. Perhaps Fraser Nelson would like to read it and give us a proper critique.

BMC

Hmmmm, I came on the CoffeeHouse site yesterday looking for the team's comments on the news that the UK inflation rate fell in February.

I was rather surprised that there was no such post, unlike when the figures increase, when we have a deluge of economically unsophisticated comments about the debasement of our currency by the Bank of England.

Obviously the boys only feel the need to comment on events when they fit their own political viewpoint...

Wilhelm

Regards to Neathergate , the liebour party is truly despicable, just to piss off the tories they let in millions of immigrants and the social cohesion of the country can go to hell.

And we are left to pick up the pieces. Thanks a bunch.

Nicholas

Frank P - me, espouse open borders? Not likely. I'm far too cynical about the number of scumbags that dwell around us to espouse that (and I'm talking criminal proclivities not race!). And, as recent news items here have shown, we currently appear to be the destination of choice for same - as indeed they appear to be the immigrants of choice for our lovely government of all the creeps.

It will not be long now before criminal gangs who put a very low value on human life discover the relative impunity of operating in the countryside, where many people live in relatively remote homes, defenceless, community spirit has declined and the police are useless. I give it 5-10 years. When it comes the British will marvel that their police actually wasted time investigating things people were alleged to have said.

But the article is interesting, coming from the perspective it does and demonstrates that the issue may be debated in a way that is not limited to to the simplistic "racist" vs "anti-racist". The very fact that it exists is an embarassment to the Spectator, which chose instead to run away and put its collective head under the pillow.

New Labour did something very profound with immigration, that much is now proven, but their motives, whether deliberate, reckless or a combination of both, and the consequences of what they did, now and in the future, are surely worthy of debate.

Nicholas

BMC - silly comment. I could spend my whole time on left wing websites making the same comment. Although of course there it is not just ommision but downright lying too.

And the sweeping statement about the economic comments is priggishly arrogant (as might be expected). I have read some highly informed and incisive commentary on economic issues here, both from posters and the resident staff.

Elaine

Apropos Obama, I came across a link to this on an American blog, and itâ™s Mary Ellen Synon, who has written some great stuff on Obama before but normally covers Europe. The relevance of her piece here is how Obamaâ™s view of America is changing its place within the globe.

The reason why this piece is popping up on American blogs is because it is unbelievably good and it seems to be getting shared very quickly over there.

If you have a minute, do take the chance to check it out.

I cannot understand why Paul Dacre published this online but in the hard copy edition of the Mail yesterday we got another piece of Obama hagiography from the useless Max Hastings.

I hope this piece is being syndicated to a hard print newspaper or magazine as it really does deserve the very widest of audiences.

http://synonblog.dailymail.co.uk/2010/03/barack-hussein-obama-and-indonesia-theres-no-place-like-home.html

Encore, encore!

Vulture

I know its 'be nice to Dave' week, what with the coming happy event and all ...but...

Anyone who still thinks that the Cast Iron one will make a good PM should take a look at last night's Gay issues interview with him on Channel 4 ( available on various Look Again outlets).

He was - there's no other word for it - simply terrible. Dreadful beyond belief. He hesitated, stumbled, got his facts wrong, did not know which way Tory MEPs voted on a Gay issue ...and in the end was so lost he pleaded for the cameras to be turned off.

Even I, no Dave lover, felt sorry for the guy.

It's his own fault though: he deliberately panders to the pink lobby ( many of whom will vote Tory anyhow) - and then doesn't bother to do his homework.

Thank God that as most people are a) not gay and b) don't watch Commie 4 News, few will see this slow-mo car crash.

But heaven help us all in the unlikely event of him reaching No.10.

Nicholas

Vulture: "But heaven help us all in the unlikely event of him reaching No.10."

As opposed to what? Brown remaining there? Balls taking over, perhaps, or Harmon?

As for the car-crash. Well, at least it was an "authentic" car-crash was it not? And I have watched many more sound performances from Cameron than I have seen car-crashes. Then, when I compare that to Brown . . .

Vulture

@ Nicholas:
(sigh..)
We've already had this conversation a couple of times.

Because Cameron is self-evidently dreadful, that does not make Bruin better. As I have said many times before he is obviously worse. People should (in most places) vote Tory. Under no circumstances should they vote Liebour.

What I am saying is that on this evidence, Dave won't be a great deal better if he limps into office, and the Tories would be doing much better with a strong leader voicing distinct policies and hitting this awful Govt where it hurts:
>Economy.
>Corruption.
>Crime.
>Immigration.
>Surveillance/Nanny state.
>EU.

Intead, a few weeks before the election he's wittering on abt Gay rights - and what's worse - making a complete hash of it.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

AndyinBrum
March 23rd, 2010 11:17pm

Andy, when I turn the other cheek, it's too give a bloody great head butt! :-)

Frank P

Nicholas

Whew! - you had me worried with that original cryptic comment and link to O'Neill's windy essay from a Marxist perspective. I'm glad you were engendering debate rather than underwriting O'Neill's wordy spiel, though - as I said - it is heartening that even the comrades are looking down their noses at the current Maladministration's policies over immigration, as revealed by Neather (even if O.Neill's solution - open borders - would be infinitely worse) - whereas our own so-called Opposition and its (alleged) handmaidens on this Magazine choose not only to ignore it, but piss off its readership by breaking promises to raise it to an an editorial level.

The fact that O'Neill doesn't accept that NuLabs intentions were wilful and according to the gospel of Gramsci, but merely the mixed and muddled melange of misbegotten initiatives is thought provoking. It makes me wonder sometimes just how many of the current leftist 'political elite' (as O'Neill refers to them) themselves realise just how much of their neo-Marxist tutelage in Halls of Academe sprang from the prison scribblings of Antonio and his disciples. Is that they do know and think it is necessary to maintain the subterfuge, even now, of his counter-culture-hegemonic aspirations, or have they just not bothered to reach back into their own ideological origins?

While I fully understand you when you aver that when we are about to enter a major battle for power in Britain, it is perhaps a little foolish to question the efficacy and motives of our own General as we go over the top, it nonetheless seems quite legitimate to wonder who the fuck Field Marshall Cameron really is, when we find both Obama's banner and the Eurostars folded between the loose pages of the battle blueprints in his knapsack, while his puerile PR prattle washes o'er us like baby oil.

Particularly so when he suddenly produces a multi-pack from Mothercare as yet another diversion from the shit and bullets of trench warfare that will be necessary when the whistle is blown for the off.

I suppose we can keep a close eye on his movements and maintain a bead on his shoulder blades just in case he heads off towards the sinistral badlands. Anyway, the case has already kicked off, so the Jury must watch every stanza of the testimony and every artefact of the forensics before it can come to a rational verdict. But had he been the main witness in a case of mine, during my stint in the old profession, I would have told him to go sick and get somebody else to to revisit, review and reshape the case.

When I see what Obama and his thugs, aided and abetted by the patently potty Pelosi and the Harry 'The Zombie' Reid, have just achieved against the odds and what they now intend to rush through on the back of their rout, to quote Consiglieri Biden, "It's a Bi-igg fucken Deal, Boss" and my blood runs cold. What message does this convey to Cameron - clearly under fluence of the Obamessiah and already employing his Alinsky argot.

"Yes, We Can, Dave." But you'd better not! We know where you live.

Stuart Seacole Smith

Obama's antics have certainly got people thinking. I have to admit, though I'm at heart a conservative I did somehow get just a little bit carried away with the Obamania thing during the run-up to his election. I certainly feel the fool for it now. Still, not being American, at least I didn't get to vote for him - I'd feel sick as a dog if I had.

It seems to me the Obamania phenomenon was based on ordinary people's willingness (idiot me included), desire even, to believe that he was better than he was - that he could embody inclusiveness, fair-mindedness and balance at home and on the foreign policy front.

What a con that facade has turned out to be, with his extreme partisan politics at home, kow-towing to the backward and the brutal abroad, indulging personal grudges, and undermining friends and allies at every opportunity.

I have a personal theory that he'd actually like to see Israel pushed into war with it's neighbours or Iran sometime before the end of his term, that way he could assume the mantle of wartime president and get himself another term to "keep up the good work".

Stomach turning duplicity, and profoundly worrying.

Wilhelm

Ive been posting comments on newspapers for several years. After about 3 or 4 months I noticed that those who were sensible, i.e right wing were all ex pats living in Hong Kong, Australia, Spain or the Americas.

Those who had the errorneous thinking, i.e anti America, anti Israel, pro radical islam, self loathing of European civilization, guilt ridden liberals who gush about the slave trade which was 200 years ago . ( you would think it was yesterday ) all live in England.

Its strange that , isnt it ? I suppose the lame stream media is 100% liberal and they brainwash the people and they are all braindead.

BMC

Nicholas,

But the Spectator shouldn't aim to lower itself to the standards of any number of "left-wing websites"...

All I was saying was that when inflation rises we tend to see several comments saying "its hardly surprising considering xy and z" I would have just been quite interested to see what everyone's take on the drop in the rate was. That's all

Wilhelm

BMC

Dont play the Little Bo Peep routine, it may work on the Guardian but it wont wash here, kid.

BMC

"Priggishly arrogant" and "Little Bo Peep"... Good effort I think.

For the record, I am a Tory whose economic views are fairly "right wing". Its just that I believe that if the Spec is going to wade into economic comment, it would be good if they appeared to know what they were talking about. And staying quiet when something disproves your point doesn't exactly reek of being on the right side of a debate.....

Nicholas

BMC: "For the record, I am a Tory whose economic views are fairly "right wing". Its just that I believe that if the Spec is going to wade into economic comment, it would be good if they appeared to know what they were talking about. And staying quiet when something disproves your point doesn't exactly reek of being on the right side of a debate....."

Yeah, right.

Wilhelm

Regards to the budget.

Alistair Darling and Gordon Broon are like a couple of pigeons.

They shit on you and then fly away.

And the taxpayer pays to clean up the mess.

Alexandrovich

Is Theo waiting for the comments to reach 100 or is he just digesting the existing 95?

John Richardson

'Vulture' 9:59am

You are right, and I hope that those who care about Cameron's basic competence and ability would spend 2:59sec. over on Gerald Warners 'Telegraph blog watching for themselves.
The Horrible Truth.
Even his worst detractors may feel sorry for him.

Nicholas 10:37am.
From my perspective Cameron's meltdown was certainly not sincere.
Instead, it was direct consequence of his moral and intellectual dishonesty.
Mr Warner explains this below in similar terms to those I might use.
Cameron's intellectual mediocrity should not really be a defense.

John Richardson

Nicholas,

On a lighter note (you failure to appreciate this is our 1939....will we fight or not....).

Regarding 'BMC'

Does he/she know what happened to this town's last Sheriff ?

I guess not huuh ?

daniel maris

The Sherrif? Let's put it this way [spits out wad of tobacco] - we had a vote and then we got a rope.

Wilhelm

BMC shrieks

'' Im right wing, very, very right wing, by jingo. ''

The court sentences you to the gallows for being a fibber and may God have mercy on your soul.

Wilhelm

Oh God, Question Time is coming from Glasgow tonight

So expect the audience to be made up of 100 % bolshie, marxist, commie, atheists, trots, multy culty fanatics, trade unionist bar room brawlers, man hating feminists and pub bores.

And a good dose of anti America, anti Israel, pro PLO Hamas garbage from the panel and audience.

Nicholas

John Richardson: "On a lighter note (you failure to appreciate this is our 1939....will we fight or not....)."

You've lost me there. I have no idea what you mean. I wrote a post in reply to Frank P's last one but the Speccies clunking CH machinery ate it. I think the machinery grinds to a halt over lunchtime for some unknown reason. We were promised instant posting by pre-registering but that is clearly not the case!

EC

AWK1, "... when I turn the other cheek, it's too give a bloody great head butt! :-)"

Nie bother lass! It's when you lift the other cheek ....
THAT's when even the most hardened amongst us will rush for the door!
:-))

David Ossitt

Wilhelm

“Oh God, Question Time is coming from Glasgow tonight.

So expect the audience to be made up of 100 % bolshie, marxist, commie, atheists, trots, multy culty fanatics, trade unionist bar room brawlers, man hating feminists and pub bores.”

You are not wrong but you missed out on the smattering of female towel heads.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

EC: In your dreams!!!!! ;=)

Nicholas

QT seems to be making a tour of Notorious Socialist Cities as part of the BBC's Election Campaign on behalf of New Labour.

Wilhelm's post sad but true and well summed up.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

QT = Quisling Time

Rhoda Klapp

Any chance of the Spectator having a look at GLOBE International, an influence-peddling outfit linked to Byers which takes public money and uses it to push an agenda politically? And from there the whole scandal of lobbyist outfits getting public funds to influence policy, both here and in the EU. And always the same bunch of people from the G&tG involved. And if there is ever a scandal, as in the climategate thing, they appoint somebody from the clique to head the investigation/whitewash.

Aren't journalists meant to protect us from this sort of thing?

(Rhoda in naive mode, for rhetorical purposes only)

James Murphy

Extraordinarily politically inept budget for a slimey bunch of Marxists - maybe they want to lose! At any rate,with such an unimpressive giveaway, it's 'game over' for Labour. Ignore the current ratings. - Today's opinion polls are all full of pre-election schizophrenia: I predict a whole lot of froth on the Labour cappuccino, which, in fact, the deeper one drinks is found to contain no coffee at all! . When the day comes, Brown will be swept away, and so, too, once and for all, the ineffably stupid smirk on his face, which can then subside back into our infantile nightmares like the Cheshire cat's smile (why Cheshire?). Indeed, I think that in the forthcoming Tory landslide, NooLaboor will be hard-pushed to return with 160 seats. This, however, is only half the problem: the other bit concerns Dave's ability to deliver us all from the shackles of 13 years of dilute Marxism and return us to a genuine free-enterprise culture. I don't share Verity's view that Dave is a closet (conservative) communist. His 'caring-sharing' Green credentials, for example, are the sign of a second-rate mind, not a clandestine agenda. However, nor, on the other hand, do I see Dave as anything other than a stopgap, a station if you like, on the way back to a truly individualist Toryism. Though perhaps not at any time soon, the latter spirit will be reborn, precisely because it is in the human DNA to re-assert on all fronts - spiritual, artistic, cultural and yes, even economic - the sacred glory of the Individual founded on the bedrock principle of a loving family.

James Murphy

Can I just put much-respected CH readers right? - Atheism is a dodgy belief to tar with a single broad brush. The lack of belief in a creator-god is not necessarily synonymous with mind-numbing moral degeneracy (though it can be). Atheism, is in fact, a broad umbrella: it would have to be to cover the world's 500 million Buddhists, the best of whom mentally believe in, and actively base their daily lives upon, the inner sanctity and perfectibility of the soul - what Blake called 'the human divine'. Now CH readers may not share this credo, but rest assured it is NOT the same as modern Western cultural atheism, which (quasi-religious) belief I take to mean an absolute trust in the power of materialistic phenomena to deliver lasting happiness. (Oh dear, I sense Frank P and Ghenghis about to dismiss my argument by calling me Spud...)

Frank P

A different twist on the entente cordiale:

Sitting together on a train, travelling through the Swiss Alps were a French guy, an English bloke, a little old Greek lady, and a young blonde Swiss girl with large breasts.

The Train goes into a dark tunnel and a few seconds later there is the sound of a loud slap. When the train emerges from the tunnel, the French guy has a bright red, hand print on his cheek. No one speaks.
The old lady thinks: The French guy must have groped the blonde in the dark, and she slapped his cheek.

The blonde Swiss girl thinks: That French guy must have tried to grope me in the dark, but missed and fondled the old lady and she slapped his cheek.

The French guy thinks: That English bloke must have groped the blonde in the dark she tried to slap him but missed and got me instead.

And the English bloke thinks: I can't wait for another tunnel, just so I can smack the Froggy bastard again.

Ian Walker

Banging my usual STV drum, but if you're interested in whether a change in the electoral system would "improve" politics or otherwise, take a look at http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Electoral-reforms-lead-to-councillors.6178502.jp

A piece by the Speccie on this would be nice. Time for FPTP to go and let us have a modern democracy.

Nicholas

Frank P, excellent. But in the next telling please also make the French guy short and stroppy, like "Retired Bantamweight"!

oldtimer

Those of you, if any, still following the AGW story and who also like conspiracy theories should take a look at GLOBE. GLOBE has popped up on the radar because Lord Oxburgh is a Director along with Stephen Byers (of cab for hire fame) and, until recently, Elliot Morley MP (one of those charged by the DSP for fiddling his expenses).

Lord Oxburgh failed to declare this interest when he was appointed to chair the University of East Anglia enquiry into the scientific evidence re man made global warming (part of the CRUgate email scandal).

The Bishop Hill blog has some intersting information on this. As the Wall precludes posting links, you will need to google Bishop Hill to get to his blog.
It throws a little more light on how things work in Parliament - out of view of the public. It is worth a look as a brief glimpse of how the establishment actually works. In short, it is a stitch up.

Frank P

Verity

Have you no news from South of the Border about the murder and mayhem in Mehico? What sort reaction did the US delegation get after the latest charade of the 'War on Drugs' initiative. More casualties there than throughout the entire Iraq and Afghan war and no report from our intrepid girl-on-the spot? Let's have the skinny at least, kiddo.

Frank P

James Murphy,

'Oh Dear'?? ... For someone so opinionated, you are certainly a very thin-skinned potato, Jimmy. But I'm sure we can all 'rest assured' that you will continue to educate, inform and entertain us by regularly dipping into your bottomless reservoir of knowledge and understanding: of the arts, philosophy, religion, politics, psephology, economics, psychoanalysis, medicine, sexual peculiarity (and no doubt many other disciplines yet to be mentioned) and producing, for our delectation, limpid pools of perspicacity and wit. I, for one, am extremely grateful. In fact for one so accomplished, I am amazed that you are able to find so much time for charitable works. For example, tutoring thickos like Genghis and me on the good things of life; in particular - good manners. You are obviously also a one for lost causes.

Had I known that the little King Edward that I tossed at you during a previous exchange of ideas would bruise so deeply, I would have instead used a raspberry.

One small reservation: do you think you could possibly be just a tad less feckin' condescending and patronising in your delivery? Other than that - keep up the good work!

Julipa

FrankP to James Murphy
"....do you think you could possibly be just a tad less feckin' condescending and patronising in your delivery?"

Oh dear...sounds like the pot calling the kettle black to me.

Austin Barry

I see that 86 KFC eateries in the UK are testing a scheme where they sell nothing but halal meat, and have removed pork items from the menu given that our Caliphate chums refuse to eat anything prepared on the same premises as pork.

Quite what KFC's late founder, the devout presbyterian Colonel Harland Sanders, would have made of this news I don't know, but I suspect it would have the same emetic qualities as KFC's latest dessert offering, the Little Bucket Parfait.

Austin Barry

Julipa@ 12.43

Without Frank P's bracing posts CoffeeHouse would be as attractive as a Halal pub.

Noa Zrk

"... expect the audience to be made up of 100 % bolshie, marxist, commie, atheists, trots, multy culty fanatics, trade unionist bar room brawlers, man hating feminists and pub bores...".

But not shipyard or any other real industrial workers anymore.

James Murphy

Frank - I looked at that list you made of all the subjects I'm an expert in - and I have to confess you're right - I am clearly an absolute genius. This is a heavy burden I will continue to carry with grace and no small amount of humility, with kind regards, your ever-loving Spud. PS - In addition to my unworldly spiritual expertise, I also know everything about sex, women, sports of every kind, DIY and classic motorcars... Just ask.

James Murphy

Frank - another thing, I forgot to mention: I suspect - no, I KNOW, you and Ghenghis are one and the same: your stridulations are too similar to emanate from different gadflies!

Paul B

Austin@13.33 I expect Col` Saunders would approve, if its a decision based on hard commercial reasons. If the wings are chickin` lickin` good, who cares which way the bird is killed?

Frank P

Julipa

That's your alter ego, is it Spud? Very Freudian - and just as I suspected! In which case I'd better point out that I prefer any stridulation to be with the opposite sex, though, at my time of life, not with the frequency or urgency that once obtained.

As for for Genghis & me being one of the same; stand by for a writ from Genghis for gross defamation.

Noa Zrk

"...I also know everything about sex, women, sports of every kind, DIY and classic motorcars... Just ask..."

It's interesting that you differentiate between these various activities James, given a certain level of experience many of us would not, let alone want to ask you to particularise in these columns...in your offfered role as a sort of Ask Jeeves Ann Summery Coffee House search engine...

Sam Armstrong

Austin Barry - re. Halal fried chicken

It's not only KFC that are doing this, I recently found out to my horror that SUBWAY are also serving Halal meat only.

On a recent trip to Florida, I felt compelled to visit SUBWAY to see if the stores there were doing the same. Of course they aren't. So I guess SUBWAY and KFC HQ in the UK have presumably arrived at the opinion that Halal is better.

Britain, the nation of animal lovers, now prefers meat that comes from animals that have been slaughtered as part of a bloodthirsty religious ritual.

Eat up!

Austin Barry

Do the chickens have to don little orange jumpsuits before being slaughtered?

James Murphy

Noa Zrk - "It's interesting that you differentiate between these various activities James" - Only, Noa, insofar as I am less and less able as the years go by to combine simultaneously making love whilst doing DIY on my classic car, and thus have to separate out my skills into areas of specialisation...

PaulB

Sam, is that all Subways in Britain, or jusr the branches (and I understand they are individually owned franchises) in areas where there is high Islamic populations. When the Tescos on the North Circ` in Neasden first opened , it stocked large quantities of kosher grub and now they stock Polish food (the sausage is rather nice)

Austin, not oranage jumpsuits, but they have to climb into orange baskets, produce a video and say three Hail Marys. Inshallah or whatever.

Julipa

Austin Barry@1.40pm.

Thanks Austin. Yes, I agree. I may be a new name posting here but I've followed you all for some time with great interest and often concur with Frank's opinions, apart from the odd times when he's been sniffing the glue, as with his post to James, on which I had the presumption to comment. Not done for a newbie outside the clique perhaps?

Julipa

Frank P. 3.05pm

I'm excited to see that you prefer stridulation from the opposite sex, albeit infrequently these days - same here. However, you will no doubt be thrilled to hear that during my perusals of the Wall you have been responsible for inducing that effect on me while reading your more sensible posts and I am heard to squeal "Yes! Yes! Yes" at your efforts. The neighbours think I have a man in. Congratulations - it doesn't happen often but 'you do it for me' as they say.

On reflection, it appears my pot and kettle comment, though I believe still justified, was entirely unnecessary as it appears James is more than capable of witty response.

Am I still to be known as SPUD from now on?

.

John Richardson

Nicholas.

Hello,
I was referring to the way a previous self-appointed blog Sheriff was 'seen off' on the previous Wall.

Oh well,
Daniel Maris (9:01pm) seemed to get it...back to the politics I suppose ...Cameron is dangerous blah blah It's UKIP for me blah blah have you seen the Newspapers etc etc what about Neather drone drone......

AndyinBrum

athiesm is the rejection that their is a supreme being, ie God.

That is all

Noa Zrk

James, Julipa.

Yeeees indeeeed.

Glad to see you have similar interests. Have you been introduced?

Austin Barry

Oh dear, I was just about to post that this evening's Question Time Glasgow audience seemed remarkably and unusually level-headed and sane until some gum-chewing moron disabused me of the notion. His statement, applauded by the audience, was that Israel was a "terrorist state that goes around killing people." Yes, well, and three cheers for Hamas and we're all Hezbullah now, etc. etc. What does the Question Time ticket say, "Admit one Useful Idiot"?

Wilhelm

Andy Pandy squeeks

'' There is no God, thats all.''

Where did this joker come from ?

Wilhelm

Andy Pandy dribbles

'' Im an atheist, damn it.''

Are you boasting or complaining ? which is it, son ?

Wilhelm

Watched Question Time last night to comfirm my prejudices. The audience was all pasty faced, a lot of beards, unshaved faces, unkempt hair. They all looked as if they had fallen out of a tumble dryer. Personal grooming is not big in Glasgow.

The audience was pretty subdued I thought, it probably wasnt a full moon last night. But in the last 5 minutes a shit stirring, bar room brawler , Mr Shouty man screeched that '' Israel is a terrorist state going around killing people.'' You dont say ?

It would be a laugh if it wasnt so tragic, you dont dignify a question like that from the village idiot with a response.

Liam Byrne was doing his annoying, matey, mockney cockney
schtick, the poor mans Tony Bliar, plus there was 2 birds on it as well, probably to fill up the BBC gender quota.

EC

EC didn't watch Question Time and he had a more peaceful night than he otherwise would have!

AndyinBrum

Kaiser bill - just stated a fact, athiesm is the rejection of a supreme being. If you can't handle the meaning of a word, I'd suggest you get back in to your darkened box, and don't leave

Vulture

A couple of weeks ago on the wall I asked (in vain) for info abt a new 'Socialist' party led by Bob Crow, the meat-headed Neaderthal abt to shut down the national rail network.

Thanx to Today today I now have that info. There is indeed a new Socialist party led by
Comrade Bob which will be fielding candidates against Liebour at the next election. I think its called TUSP (Trade Union Socialist Party) which doesn't sound terribly appealing. They had clips from one of their meetings: ranting on as though the 80s, 90s and Noughties never happened abt the good old days when a worker would slide into a factory job the day he left skool and never leave.

Well, it ain't like that now and we all know why. The good news, however, is that this party will haemorrhage votes away from Liebour.

Given a choice between Comrade Bruin and Comrade Bob I'd even choose the latter. He may be terminally dim, but I think he's an honest man. And he hates the EU.

daniel maris

I thought the funniest moment on QT last night was when the Lib Dem woman said it was outrageous that we had had the spectacle of MPs trying to influence governmnet policy. Er??? I thought that was the idea of an MP... Of course she was trying to make a point about the Byers revelation but it was rather a telling moment wasn't it?

EC

Sam Armstrong @4:40pm,

Great! The past couple of days I have been wondering if there were any Veggies, piscatorians or, better still, Vegans who frequented the Speccie site. (not that I am suggesting that you are)

There is nothing quite like a good spat between the "all meat is murder, I won't eat anything that had a face or had parents " brigade and normal people. Of course it would be nice to keep the jews, the muslims and Hitler (wasn't he a veggie?) out of it but .... hell the more the merrier! There are really important questions to be answered. eg. Are there any right wing veggies? What percentage of veggies are also global warmers? etc.

Dead is Dead. Have your ever visited an abattoir without TV cameras rolling? It doesn't matter whether the method is secular, kosher or halal, killing animals is a really messy business and they probably don't enjoy it much.

An examination of the meat sold by supermarkets might lead one to conclude that ALL animals are actually killed by a lethal injection - of WATER!

Noa Zrk

EC

Re veggies, vegans and vulcans.
It looks to me as though you've covered all the arguments.
But QT had an audience and panelists, that looked as though it should be fed to its own dogs.

Nicholas

daniel maris: "I thought the funniest moment on QT last night was when the Lib Dem woman said it was outrageous . . . "

And the other funny thing about Ms Strident But Not Very Bright was that having launched a carefully scripted party-political tirade against the Tories because they had not been specific enough about what they would cut and what they would not, when asked a few questions later about what the Lib-Dems would cut replied "Well, er, it depends, er . . . we would need to see the books, etc., etc."

What is it with the Lib-Dems and this anti-Tory thing? An opposition party that seems to spend most of its public air time attacking another opposition party instead of the exploitative regime loosely termed a "government".

Ah, but her dodgy performance paled into comparison to that Master of Slither, that Wormtongue, that dissembling, duplicitous, bright-eyed and un-bushy Byrne. Out of uniform, with not even a party or union badge on his lapel or jackboots under his expensive champagne socialist suit, this British incarnation of something from Hitler's asphalt legion peddled his craft. But suddenly, his sinuous patois was challenged by a forthright member of the audience who took the bald, be-latted one to task for so glibly re-writing history in solemnly reminding the audience how bad were Mrs Thatcher's 1980's strikes, when the country was brought to a standstill by the Unions. An interesting twist this, bearing in mind what the BBC has to say about his memory of those days:- (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8393746.stm) and his rosy recollections of the striking miners. But of course Reichsfuhrer Byrne was probably not old enough to recall when the former, "Old" Labour government of the day also made a hash of things.

Byrne's performance on QT was so similar to that of Shaun Woodward that I wondered if they had attended the same "Being a Smug, Patronising, Oily Bastard" course that seems be such a prerequisite in New Labour's style of media interaction. And then, in a moment of brief malt-induced madness I even wondered if they were plastic replicants, cyborgs, programmed to soothe, dissuade and dissemble on behalf of the national socialists. They are very skillfully created but there is still a problem with the plastic hair.

No doubt Reichsfuhrer Byrne will be immensely pleased with himself this morning, sitting behind his enormous desk under the giant swastika flag, sipping his latte and reading his reviews as his taxpayer funded minions fawn over him. But for all these trappings of pomp and power he remains, essentially, a smarmy, jumped-up git (q.v.).

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

EC: Your earlier posting specifically addressed to me was very cheeky (])!
On a more serious vein, I suppose I can be considered right-wing as I loathe everything the left stand for. I am becoming more vegetarian as time passes, but I do not believe in this global warming nonsense. Does this assist your hypothesis?

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Wilhelm: Agreed with your comments on QT. I didn't watch it as I found even the TV film of those present polluted the living room. WEnt to bed and read "Wolf Hall".

Noa Zrk

Nicholas imaginatively captures the socialist gore fest that QT has become. Laugh? I nearly dropped my Tokarov!

After QT The Week in Politics elicted two key facts:
Andrew Neil admitted that the red sofa he stashes Motormouth Abbot and Portillo on is deliberately small, to force them close together, and
They admitted they don't like each other. Hardly a surprise but certainly a pleasure. I always thought Portillo had more about him than to be earning his crust next to that self satisfied execresence.

In fact he's a genuine Cameron alternative.

Esther Rantzen also gave a good account of herself against Fatty Abbott in her rationale for standing as a sleaze free MP.
All in all a better watch than the Labour PP broadcast that is QT.

EC

AWK1,

I love a nice bit of rump, but these days, despite retaining all my own teeth, I am finding it increasingly difficult to source good quality meat that isn't tough as old boots and full of added water. So, like you, I am eating less meat as a result. Fear not! It doesn't sound like you'll ever become a militant veggie.

Noa Zrk,

It could happen. One of Blunkett's dogs turned on him!

Ghengis

Frank P -- Methinks, we have incurred the wrath of one James Murphy by our economical keyboard usage. Such economy with words or other components of written communications is not demonstrated in Spud,s comments, wherein the point could be made only using the same number of sentences as paragraphs. Perhaps, you and I have unwittingly unearthed the first genius bearing the name SPUD.

Wilhelm

Andy Pandy babbles

'' Gosh, Atheism is a fact, now, where's my dummy ?''

Nah, its a belief system, you either believe in God or not, its not right or wrong.

And when you fibbed '' thats all '' atheism is not about '' thats all ''. What aggressive militant atheists like Dicky Dorkins fail to GRASP is that if you get rid of Christianity there will be a power vacumn and who will fill that vacumn, Yup, you guessed it, Islam.

When the Germans got rid of the Kaiser and the Russians got rid of the Czar, little did they realise what was coming next. And atheist countries have been a great success, havent they ? Mao's China, Pol Pots Cambodia, Stalins Russia, Albania, North Korea.

Wilhelm

Its funny how history repeats itself.

Its 1979 all over again, when liebour is in power they always, always screw it up.

The worst winter in 30 years.
Plane and train strikes.
Liebour has wrecked the countries finances.

I suppose thats what you call a socialist utopian paradise.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Ghengis: From little acorns great oak trees grow.
Likewise: From little seeds wopping great spuds will grow

Austin Barry

I’ve had notion for some time now that Diane Abbott may be a love child of the late Idi Amin Dada. Apart from the uncanny physical resemblance, they share a preening self-regard and smirking contempt for the rest of us.

Wilhelm

Have you seen the YouTube video on Rod Liddle's blog ?

ITS TRULY SHOCKING and SICKENING.

A primary school teacher has got a group of children to sing a song in praise of tub of lard Diane Abbott. Children being used for liebour propaganda purposes. The teacher should be fired on the spot.

How would people react if the teacher got the kids to sing a song in praise of Nick Griffin ?

David Ossitt

EC

Try M&S rump,sirloin or better still their fillet stakes.

Vulture

@ Wilhelm : the big difference between now and 1979 is that then we had a decent opposition with a leader who knew what had to be done to reverse the situation.

Now we have....Dave.

In the words of a splendid piece by Douglas Murray in the April excellent Standpoint magazine (highly recommended to those who haven't seen it):
"It required a miracle for Brown to find an opponent so incompetent that Labour would not be comprehensively booted from office this year. Yet in David Cameron just such a magnificent incompetent appears to have been found....this is what friends of the Conservative party have got for five years of "detoxifying" insults, sustained political cowardice and a leadership-led abandonement of every issue of grassroots importance..." and so magnificently on.
I could not have put it better myself.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

David Ossitt: Hello, David,
Have you fixed up your Parisian holiday yet? Better do it soon, because if heaven forbid, Nu Labour return, they may ban or tax heavily any foreign holidays.

Greenslime

Poor choice of journalist:

Vienna Boys’ Choir caught up in sex abuse scandal

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article7065824.ece

Whoever allocated this story to this journalist obviously had a sense of humour!

James Murphy

As I said before - Ghenghis Khan't.

Frank P

Nicholas (10.10am)

One of the best TV reviews I have seen for many a long day; measured. malicious, wickedly funny and utterly deserved. You nailed Byrne utterly. Brilliant. It should be read out on the next QT instead of one of the utterly predictable and boring questions that get repeated over, and over, and over, and over ...again! (with the same bloody boring responses). Send it to Humpty Dumblebee; judging by his recent TV documentary series (for which I must grudgingly award him top marks, incidentally) he has a sense of humour 'neath that dynastic pomposity.

Austin Barry. (1.05pm)

And your journey into the possible parentage of the ever-inflating Diane Abbott tested my
posterior urethral valve to its limit. It's really time for a change on that couch. The Lizard and the Lardass have become far too predictable and smug.

Genghis

Young Jimmy could have done with a stint in the Kate, where all Murphys are "Spud", all Millers are "Dusty"; all Smiths are "Smudger", etcetera, etcetera and etcetera.

His tender susceptibilities and his pontifications would have no doubt been adjusted accordingly. A little learning is dangerous. Reinstate National Service. It would solve so many of today's societal problems. 'Asbos'? My arse! Two months at Catterick Camp and a good RSM would sort the snotty and the spotty little bleeders.

James Murphy

And of course the reason Ghenghis Khan't is because he's Frank.

David Ossitt

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

“David Ossitt: Hello, David,
Have you fixed up your Parisian holiday yet?”

Not as yet Anne; I was about to book, in fact I almost did, but then my beloved suggested that we delay until I have finished a course of medication, it has a side effect of making me a little bit hyper.

She is very wise and knows me so well.

Andy Carpark

Wilhelm. That's nothing. You ought to hear what they make the kids sing in the kindergartens of Oldham and Saddleworth.
________________

Verse 1

The Pennines glow in the morning sun
Shaping up our beautiful land.
Our Honorable Member, who's hailed by us all
And cheered throughout the land.
He leads our people, the Sun's cause he carries on

Chorus:

Vivat! Vivat! Minister of State for Borders and Immigration:
Phil Woolas !

Verse 2

Flower blossoms all around tell
His broad and warm love to us
Blue waters of the East and West Seas sing
Of all he has done.
He's a great artist full of joy, No flies on our Phil

Repeat Chorus

Verse 3

He defends our Socialist cause
Full of iron will and courage
He spreads the honor of our nation dear
Throughout all of the world.
He's the champion of justice, and independence is his stance

Repeat Chorus

James Murphy

The vegetarian thing: - Hitler was a vegetarian - he was also a psychotic mass-murderer. No great moral virtue need therefore be ascribed to vegetarians - and I speak as one myself (vegetarian, that is, not psycho). Personally, I never proselytize about vegetarianism: evangelists are invariably insufferable. I regard it as a private matter between me and my conscience. I, myself eat a bit of fish now and again and just get on with it. Some of the biggest fools I know are vegetarians and some of the nimblest minds, meat-eaters. That said, if you eat meat, though you may, indeed, be my moral, intellectual, spiritual superior (not you, frank) - but it won't be because you eat meat, but by dint of other virtues. What is, perhaps a little galling in some meat-eaters (let alone horribly inconsistent and culturally blinkered - hundreds of millions of Asians are culturally vegetarian), is a kind of inverse, spikey, defensive contempt, an insistence that vegetarianism is ipso facto (look it up Frank) a form of mental weakness. It is nothing of the sort. It is a simple recognition that animals relish life as we do, tremble before the prospect of death as we do. As the Buddha was heard to say in a particular sutra (I can't remember chapter and verse) 'all beings fear death, therefore one should neither kill nor cause to be killed..' All this said, as much as I genuinely respect the next person's right to enjoy life as he/she sees fit (within obvious limits) I should also confess i have little time for people puling sentimentally over their pets, then tucking into a good lamb steak. It behooves human beings who, unlike animals, have the mental capacity to reconcile such ludicrous inconsistencies.
EC. You ask for Right-wing vegetarians? Alan Clark was a cracking Tory example. And proves that vegetarians also have wonderful libidos - but then Tories always were stylish adulterers!

James Murphy

By the way Wilhelm (is that really your name: I picture you crossbow-in-hand aiming at hapless boy with apple-on-head), why do you insist on referring to posters with whom you disagree as 'son'? - Maybe you really are foreign and don't realise that it sounds barrow-boy yobbish? Or maybe you don't mind sounding like a yob, son?

John Richardson

Re-carnivores.

"I regard it as a private matter between me and my conscience."

...and Porky The Pig, potentially

"All this said, as much as I genuinely respect the next person's right to enjoy life as he/she sees fit.."

...er..medium rare to rare with salad please.

Beer Moth

That little thing by the masthead there, which has been disturbing me for some weeks now: the one which has the faces of Heath, Cameron and Thatcher, 'morphing' I believe it's known as - how come Boris Yeltsin gets to be in there?

Noa Zrk

Andy Rollerstop @ 5:15pm

Tell me please that this turdgid floriditty was the creation of your darkest imaginings and not really Saddleworth's own equivalent of Ode to Joy.

If its really, really true I shall demand complete copies of each verse, as written and sung in 43 languages.

Wilhelm

Mr Spud Peeler

Calling people son is a form of affection and endearment, did you not know that, kid ?

Noa Zrk

Vulture March 26th, 2010 1:41pm

"In the words of a splendid piece by Douglas Murray in the April excellent Standpoint magazine (highly recommended to those who haven't seen it):
"It required a miracle for Brown to find an opponent so incompetent that Labour would not be comprehensively booted from office this year. Yet in David Cameron just such a magnificent incompetent appears to have been found...etc" and so magnificently on. I could not have put it better myself".

We if not better, at least as well and many thanks for the recommendation to Standpoint.

Julipa

NoaZrk 25th @9.58pm
"James, Julipa.
Glad to see you have similar interests. Have you been introduced?"

No, but I'm considering a name change. Sadly, Desiree would be a misnomer and too earthy, but Maris Piper might do.

Now, initiation rites hopefully over, I shall return to the main pleasures of this esteemed organ, study the writings of the clique masters and Piper down - for the time being anyway.

Noa Zrk

Julipa

I'm delighted to see you getting into full stridulatory mode. Chitting well, earthed up and we can look forward to the main crop.

"...study the writings of the clique masters..." ha ha! respect!

Wilhelm

Mr Spud Peeler

My chakras tell me that you are an atheist.

Am I right or am I right ?

Wilhelm

Mr Spud Peeler

Im an International man of mystery, fighting for truth and justice , and putting the world to rights.

Have you got a problem with that ?

Frank P

This is interesting:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/03/earth_hour_2009.html

Beer Moth

A steamed organ.

Spotted dick?

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Douglas Hogg MP is certainly well named. He believes MPs are underpaid, and should receive 50 % more. Good job he is standing down.

Nicholas

There was something about meat eating in the book about the lost Franklin Expedition "Frozen in Time" but I can barely remember it now. Something to do with the Inuit eating raw blubber to prevent some nasty degeneration in the physical condition but the Franklin survivors refusing to eat it when it was offered because to them it seemed so disgusting. Anyone have the full poop on this?

There is no doubt that the successful anti-smoking campaign methodology is now being applied to alcohol and the first tentative steps that campaign took are also now being applied to meat. There does seem to be a corrolation between banning things we might like to do and the way the Left operate, motivated by an ideology of communal responsibility for what individuals do to themselves promulgated on a sort of authoritarian puritan health morality. Somehow this idea that because the health service have to deal with the results of self abuse (their description) they have a right and duty to lay down the law about how and what individuals should smoke, eat and drink has gained enormous currency.

I'm trying to get my head around whether all this is essentially down to the complete politicisation of community and public services by New Labour in their creation of an actual authoritarian corporate state, or the gradual infantilisation of adults, or both. Charles Moore touches on it beautifully in this week's Speccie, referring to a "weird new version of the corporate state" being constructed. I saw the NatWest advert he refers to and thought exactly the same thing. Schoolchildren and a school being used for propaganda in a slightly creepy blending of political ideology and commerce.

I have noticed a trend in TV adverts to show large groups of adults behaving like irrational mobs, dressed up as a sort of happy-clappy, communal mutuality, and it seems to be a meme for the way British society is going. When I was a young man the concept of crowds of people applauding the passage of a hearse would have seemed a bizarre and obscene nightmare. Can clapping hands really be an adequate or fitting tribute to young men and women killed in war? One claps a theatrical performance, a retiring colleague or a good speech - the QT audience claps on cue - but death in battle? What ever happened to the dignified bowing of the head and a respectful silence as the mortal remains make the passage to their final resting place? Are we now going to stand and clap for two minutes on Armistice Day instead of remaining silent and contemplative? What has happened to us?

EC

Frank P @ 2:13am,

Very prophetic! Very difficult to see how the lights will stay on when they are powered by wind turdbines.

EC

James Murphy,

"A vegetarian must be a very sturdy moralist who does not love a bacon sandwich more than a bowl of porridge."
... with apologies to Samuel Johnson.

I think most vegetarians are totally selfish because they will never give you so much as a bacon sandwich when you visit them although they expect you to cater for their needs when they visit.

Also, a happy vegetarian is about as rare as a happy eco-mentalist which is about as rare as rocking horse sh*t.

And, why do you obsess about whether you are superior/inferior to others or whether they consider themselves in that regard towards others? Not exactly Buddhism is it ........

EC

Beer Moth, March 26th, 2010 7:50pm

Yes, Boris Yeltsin, definitely!
How? He must have got pissed and fell off his running machine in much the same way as our beloved Rod did.

James Murphy

Oh come on EC! Human nature is all about measuring oneself against one's own conscience and against one's fellow men! There would have been no evolution without this spirit of competition. And as to whether it's Buddhist or not: the Buddha quite ruthlessly exposed the shortcomings of his followers at times - as I do Frank's...

James Murphy

Wilhelm (Tell) - all believers and followers of Buddhist Truth (Dharma) would, by your somewhat monochrome definition, be atheists, insofar as they do not believe in a creator god, but rather in the divine perfectibility of the human spirit, which, in its Absolute state of perfect wisdom and compassion, has that within it which (metaphorically) passeth all understanding. Now back to your crossbow, son.

Wilhelm

Spud boasts

'' metaphorically, passeth all understandingth.''

OK, so you know a big word and you've got a lisp, ( are you Sylvester the cat ? )

But whats that gotta do with the price of fish ?

Noa Zrk

James Murpy
"Human nature is all about measuring oneself against one's own conscience and against one's fellow men! There would have been no evolution without this spirit of competition..."

So whats it to be for you James? An over-weaning ambition to build the worlds' best bacon buttie or its finest bean stew?

Ghengis

Spud: Ghengis is a separate entity from Frank P, not given to self qualification or praise, deeply non conformist and a pragmatist. I exist in the deep end of life. Farewell.

Ghengis

Spud: PS- May you long benefit from your proper nomenclature.

Julipa

Beer Moth. 8.49am.
"A steamed organ.
Spotted Dick?"

Yours? Lanacane might help. Enjoy applying, but don't poke it around during treatment.

David Ossitt

John Richardson

John you forgot the french fries.

Wilhelm

Spud

A good tip for you.

Next time post in English, eh ? that always helps.

David Ossitt

James Murphy

you are in a hole; please stop digging.

Vulture

@David Ossitt;
Off-topic but this is the Wall.

Have you complained to the Police yet abt Richard having access to your medical records and broadcasting them to us all?

Apart from the satisfaction you would derive personally, you would do us all a favour by depriving the dyslexic, illiterate little tit of a platform.

Alternatively you could just get the eds. to stop posting him.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Ron Liddle is running an interesting forum on Fatty Ass aka D. Abbott. There is also a poster C. Cole who has added to the fun by inventing a parlour game. By the way, hope Verity is O.K. as we haven't heard from her.

Austin Barry

As if being a London commuter were not unpleasant enough, soon to be compounded by Crow-magnon man's strikes, we now have packs of feral youths and murderous mayhem in Victoria Station. Quite what John Betjeman, the Bard of British Rail would make of it all I don't know, but then his mild-mannered metropolis is fading into sepia memory. Its replacement is a Disneyland of violence, cultural dislocation and simmering tensions.

So, after me everyone, "Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner, that the schoolkids cut me down. I get a funny feelin' inside me, but that's because my aorta is torn.... "

Wilhelm

Austin

No prizes guessing what ethnic background he came from .
The lame stream media never ever mentions it.

Austin Barry

Wilhelm@8:33pm

Also, the photo of the victim shown on most sites is edited to crop the gang sign he is flashing.

daniel maris

Wilhelm -

In keeping with your principles shouldn't you give your ethnic origin before posting comments? If we knew you were Aryan First Class, with your family origins traced back to 1780, we might at least know where you're coming from - and be suitably warned as to your intent, given some of us are proudly not Aryan?

Beer Moth

Wilhelm

I think Betjeman was of distant Dutch extraction. White European certainly.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Austin Barry and Wilhelm: Good morning - it'a a white wash!

David Ossitt

Vulture

No I have not; you see it could have been an informed guess; approximately 70% of 70 year olds do have this condition in one form or another.

It might be my imagination but he appears to have toned down and reduced the number of his diatribes, since posters have been making comment on his crass remarks.

Thucydides

Racially-obsessed Wilhelm of the many sons,

A horrible crime, but what has ethnic origin got to do with it - and so why should the media report it

daifromwales

Thucydides
It is highly relevant because the Somalians have brought their Civil War to London. And because the Somalia cultural norm is to carry knives (actually they prefer something closer to a machete - but that's a bit harder to hide).
The BBC does not want to tell the truth about this for fear of increasing support for BNP.

The actual battle seems to have been a 'turf war' between 'Afro-Caribeans' and Somalians.

If you walk down a dark street late at night and there is a white yout approaching on one side and a black youth on the other, you are several dozen times more likely to be at risk from the latter. So although you must not particularise from the general (e.g. my scariest encounters in London have been from white youths), you must conduct your own swift risk analysis and behave i your own probabl best interests. But you do need data, which the Press (and presumably Thucydides) would prefer to withold.

Kevyn Bodman

I also hope Verity is OK.
I like her comments and I miss her contributions.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

David Ossit: Helloi David,
--------------------
No I have not; you see it could have been an informed guess; approximately 70% of 70 year olds do have this condition in one form or another
--------------
As an over 70 year old, I am intrigued. Has it anything to do with Wine, Women and Song?
:=) (for myself I substitute Men), I am not that horrid Sandi Toxic Toksvig.

John Richardson

'Nicholas'

"...all this is...their creation of an actual authoritarian corporate state, or the gradual infantilization of adults, or both[?]..."

The developments you mention are happening all across the West, regardless of who is in Office. New Labour are not the 'originators' of the new Laws or 'Regulations' that control some aspects of our lives to the level of a Police State (intrusion,a powerful Bureaucracy,files/records/DNA kept on innocent non-criminals,TV surveillance,legally enforced suppression of dissent etc).
The Political Class in general is too mediocre (here & abroad) to put this together. They buy into 'Terrorism/AGW' but the real power goes away from the politicians.
Personally, I am convinced a 'post democratic' Order has already been established. Most people have just not realised yet. Or try to ignore the fact.
As for an 'infantilized public?' I sometimes wonder if we have witnessed the gradual alteration of The Public Realm into a feminine rather than a masculine dominated area of life. Something has certainly dramatically changed in the last two generations.
It can't ALLL be down to the Blair/Brown. Taken together they were 3rd raters.

Regs.

Wilhelm

Thickydiddy squeels '' racially obsessed Wilhelm.''

He's actually talking about himself, HE'S the one who is racially obsessed.

He's a bar room brawler wanting a fight and Im not going to give it to him,.

So there !!

Beer Moth

Thucydides

Ethnic origin might well be a factor in the carrying of knives. In fact knife - and gun - crime does seem to be rising and almost always, it involves young males whose origins are not British. Uncomfortable maybe.

But, a media which actively fails to report such, would be irresponsible.

EC

The Turks are turning ugly as Angela Merkel prepares for her two day visit tomorrow to discuss their limping EU accession bid originally championed by Tony Blair.

http://www.thelocal.de/national/20100328-26175.html

The decision to appoint Van Rumpy instead of Blair as EU President got Nigel Farage very cross, and 71 million Turks were also quite disappointed.

Austin Barry

EC

Yes, I suppose 71 million Turks would be upset as the El Dorado of the UK benefits system retreats from view. I suspect though that 60 million Brits (minus our ruling elite, say 675 people tops, and 2 million domestic Islamists) don't give a monkey's.

EC

Van Rumpy and Ashton are being paid more than Obama and Clinton yet Merkel still has to go and do the barking herself!

Verity

Frank P, AWK and Kevyn Bodman - Thank you and yes, I'm fine. I have just had a techie in to recontact my computer and internet phone, having moved 2,000 miles across Mexico.

I hated the climate where I was before and frankly didn't take to the people. It was a gruelling trip with cats - first leg by plane then driving for four hours to the Sierra Madre, then another four hours through the mountains. (I had a van and a driver ... I'm not that intrepid ...). And then camping out in my new house, which I bought sight unseen, by the way, until my furniture arrived. I'd bought the house on the strength of the photos on the agent's site and emails and phone calls. Everyone said I was crazy, but I am very pleased.

A techie came in to hook up my computer about an hour ago, and other than answering anxious emails from family and friends, and looking at the news to check whether Jack Straw had been the victim of an armed disaffected indigenous voter, my first port of call was The Wall.

David Ossitt

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

“As an over 70 year old, I am intrigued”

Anne it is situated in the one organ that women do not have the equivalent of!

Frank P

V

We were all Verity worried; thought the cartels had gotcha, kiddo. Good to see things are more or less 'normalised', as 'they' say. Good luck with your new set-up.
You didn't miss much here as you can see, but today there has been a really horrific Obamaburst, as the MSM did a complete hagiography and ra-ra-ra on the alleged new, invigorated third-time-risen Obamessiah, regarding his past two months of victorious legislation and a 'rout of the GOP'. Then The One himself capped it with an extravaganza in Afg'stn, where he played his B Movie role as a black all-conquering POTUS (rather than the shitty streak-of-piss commie front man that he really is). There are people around me who are otherwise quite bright and street-savvy who are swallowing this bullcrap! Hunker down, gal! The other five (or fifteen as it seemed to emerge) of Frazier's 'Coffee House Six' may well be asking for asylum where you are quite soon. So if you really are living in South Mimms, rather than adjacent to Humphrey Bogart territory, you'd better 'fess up' to prevent a minor catastrophe.
;-)

Btw. The News of the World have been talking to the bookies; they now tell us that they are sufficiently sure of their headline about a Conservative victory cum May 6/7th - "It was The NoW Wot Diddit" - that they have now announced their intention to get Cameron elected. How Fraser pulled that stroke, when Murdoch's SKY is almost as bad as the Beeb in propagating leftist electioneering at the moment, defeats me. I think we should be told.

Frank P

EC (9.53am)

"Very prophetic! Very difficult to see how the lights will stay on when they are powered by wind turdbines."

Perhaps it could be powered from the steam generated as a result of boiled Spud emanating from this thread.

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

David Ossitt
March 28th, 2010 11:52pm

Oh! :=(

James Murphy

John Richardson - "As for an 'infantilized public?' I sometimes wonder if we have witnessed the gradual alteration of The Public Realm into a feminine rather than a masculine dominated area of life..." Very close to the truth, I think. Aided and abetted by the essentially Marxist concept of the 'New Man', which blackens the name of everything previously lauded as masculine, and puts in its place a list of pseudo-feminised virtues, such as 'caring', 'sharing', 'listening', etc. The real consequence is an evisceration of any sense of personal power, and a handing-over thereof to the state. I don't necessarily agree with you that this pernicious phenomenon was pre-planned by whatever powers-that-be: more that, sadly, the weak instinct to hand over all one's problems to 'daddy' sadly lies deep within human nature itself.

James Murphy

David O – ah there’s nothing like a minor sense of betrayal – and after I wished you well on your Parisian jaunt too! No doubt decades in that grim Northern climate has got to your brain cells. Never mind, with my saintly virtue, (see Fran-ghis and Wilhem Tell) I forgive you.

paulg

I have just read damien thompsons blog on the telegraph site - this is what he wrote..Cardinal Groer stepped down as head of the Roman Catholic Church in Austria in 1995.After his resignation there were further allegations that he sexually molested monks.

What is going on in the catholic church! what depths of depravity can these people sink too!

Molesting monks, yes monks! These perverts deviousness knows know end. He has clearly targeted them because they are trappists and take a vow of silence.

One wonders what the collective cry of consternation sounded like at the monastery when they read that the cardinal taking sunday mass that week! God only knows.

andrew

S&P affirmed UK's AAA rating but remains on negative outlook

extract from the S&P update:

" -- The outlook on the United Kingdom remains negative, based on our view
that, in the absence of a strong fiscal consolidation plan, the U.K.'s net
general government debt burden may approach a level incompatible with a 'AAA'
rating." S&P

James Murphy

By the way Fran-ghis and other mummy's boys, Verity's a big girl, she can look after herself: she lives in the desert after all. Anyway, give the girl a rest. Surely you can do without maternal protection for a day or two without feeling the pinch? Maybe not.

Ghengis

verity, it may cheer you a trifle to hear, Straw has through various antics become diectly opposed to Mandelson in policy regarding the future house of lords.

Ghengis

Just as well to check the habitat, I hear its time to make sure of your Helminthosparian solani spores.

daifromwales

James Murphy loves a good "stir", but agree with him regarding feminisation of political and social fabric of the nation. The entire 'Safety' portion of the H&S industry is dominated by the risk-averse (more female and feminine) to demonise those risk-takers (male or masculine). It took the ghastly Barbara Castle (our first female Transport Minister) to execute the coup-de-grace on the UK motor industry by imposing the 70mph speed limit after a spot of moral outrage in the tabloid press.

Had females always been in charge, we would still be living in caves and walking everywhere. Very well furnished caves but...