Yank in London
occasional musings on politics, culture and life in general from an american in exile


"We have it in our power to begin the world over again"

Tom Paine - Common Sense

"A republic, sir, if you can keep it."

Benjamin Franklin

"War! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!"

Norman Whitfield / Barrett Strong

30 April 2007
  Wolfie to leave cheaply?
According to Ray Story Paul Wolfowitz wants to make sure he gets the 400K USD bonus he is due on 1 June before agreeing to leave.

By today's standards 400K barely qualifies as a handshake let alone a golden one!
  16:23:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Decider(TM) ♥'s Wolfie!
He hasn't got many friends left but World Bank President received a hearty show of support from Bush and his minions this morning prior to meeting with the Bank's board where, if he has any honour, he will resign.
  16:04:00 0 comments links to this post
  Hey - the Beeb does baseball!
The BBC website has a story about the unassisted triple play by Colorado Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki. It includes a brief explanation of what it calls the "unusual feat". I can't wait for Sports Illustrated to do an article on the googly!
  15:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  Science gone mad!
In a world that is absolutely filled with millions upon millions of young boys was it absolutely necessary to invent artificial snot? Don't they have enough to go around? Aren't we overlooking a virtually limitless natural supply of something we will now have to manufacture?
  15:18:00 0 comments links to this post
  This Safer World - brought to you by Bush&CO
The US State Department is set to release its annual report on terrorism and it will show that there has been a 29% increase in terrorist attacks in 2006 as compared to 2005. 45% of the world's 14,000 (that's 38 a day folks) attacks were in Iraq.

Anyone want to bet this goes out late on Friday afternoon?
  15:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  Mixed marriages just don't work
That is why I think that the candidacy of Abdul Dean, a Muslim, who is running for a Scottish regional seat as a member of the Christian Peoples Alliance Party is doomed to failure.
  14:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  Up close and personal
The question on everyone's lips is will high ranking American and Iranian officials actually talk to each other when they both attend a conference on Iraq's security in Egypt next week.

On everyone's lips but mine that is! What I want to know is whether they've booked senior statesman Senator John McCain as the musical entertainment.


  14:48:00 0 comments links to this post
  Looking to do something different this summer?
Tried of basking on the beach or camping with the kids? Can't handle one more trip to Disney World? Why not give Captain Bert's Biblical Betrothal Camp a try? But hurry as places are strictly limited. If you are an unmarried couple seperate trailers are de rigueur so plan accordingly.
  13:36:00 0 comments links to this post
  Blind pilot flies from London to Sydney...
...says he was trying to get to Anglesea.
  13:35:00 0 comments links to this post
  April is the cruelest month
The US death toll in Iraq has topped 100 in April making it the worst month so far this year. As far as civilian casualties go it would seem that even the Iraqis have stopped counting.
  13:25:00 0 comments links to this post
  What's the matter with Kansas (or is it Missouri)?
Yesterday four human beings were shot and killed in a shopping mall in one of the Kansas Cities. Today if when I go to the KansasCity.com news home page I find nary a mention. The featured story is about a legislative initiative to repair university buildings. In the "More from the Star" section the first mention I can find is the sixteenth listed story.

Is Kansas City such a dangerous place that this isn't news? I admit I haven't been there since the early 80s but it certainly wasn't like that then.
  13:14:00 0 comments links to this post
  Non-news
From the department of "isn't news supposed to be something we didn't know already" come reports that Blacks and Latinos are more likely to be searched and arrested by police after a traffic stop than whites. Anyone surprised?
  12:49:00 0 comments links to this post
  Looking for a way out
Beleaguered World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz is due to meet with the Bank's board today and everyone seems to be looking for an easy way out of the crisis that has been bubbling away since the news became public that the randy Wolfman arranged for a cosy secondment at the US State Department, under US Vice President "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney’s daughter, with a hefty wage increase for his paramour who was also a Bank employee. The International Herald Tribune reports today that it is possible that Wolfowitz could resign in return for an acknowledgement that he acted in "good faith" and the Bank's ethics watchdogs were aware of what he had done and had approved of the moves.
  12:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why treat churches with kid gloves?
There has been a settlement between the state of Pennsylvania and some Christian organisations who had sued the state because they were prevented from using a state sponsored job site to find employees. Why were they prohibited? Because they want to insist that all of their employees must be Christians so Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoist, humanists, agnostics and atheists would be specifically discriminated against. The settlement will allow them to use the site and to discriminate.

What I do not understand is why churches (I won't use the term "religions" as I think that is too broad based) and other church related institutions are treated in this favourable way whereas other institutions are not? I even think that one of the attorneys who fought the case against the state agrees with me. Timothy Tracy is quoted as saying that "the right of a religious organization to align itself with individuals of shared belief is as central to that organization's mission as other viewpoints are to nonreligious organizations". If I understand him, and he was not quoted out of context, he is saying that all employers should be allowed to discriminate based on belief so that a scientific publishing company should be allowed to exclude those who do not believe in evolution from their workforce and that oil companies should be able not refuse to hire those folks who believe that the Earth is only 7,000 years old as it takes millions of years to make fossil fuels and this would be a sign that they don't believe in the product.

If that is not what you are saying Mr. Tracy I would appreciate it if you would clarify your remarks.

This is wrong. Just plain wrong.
  12:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  City of Brotherly Love
Do you know what makes me saddest about the horrorific murder rate (none of them killed by guns of course!) in Philly this year (1.2 per diem)? It isn't even news in Philly. It is as if it is acceptable and there is nothing that can be down about it. There were four murders at the weekend taking the toll so far this year to 137 and, according to their websites it isn't even mentioned on the front page of either the Inquirrer and barely gets a mention in the Daily News.
  11:52:00 0 comments links to this post
  Old MacDonald had a pharm
The Guardian has a rather interesting article today about the genetic modification of crops with the intention of producing medicines and drugs, also known as "pharming". I confess to mixed emotions about genetic modification in general but I do not suffer from the knee jerk opposition that many in the green community or on the left seem to do. I do think that GM foods have great promise in helping the world, especially the poor, feed themselves but not in the hands of huge multinational corporations.

As presented in this story the use of crops to produce medicines that could not otherwise be produced inexpensively enough to aid the emerging world would seem to have enormous potential, again not in the hands of huge multinationals.

There is also much to fear. We have to ensure that they stay out of the food chain. The recent experience with GM rice in the United States clearly indicates that that country's protocols in this regard are woefully inadequate and, given the lack of uproar over the incident, are likely to remain that way.

Care, in the form of governmental regulation with harsh penalties that would include explicitly defining the criminal responsibility of corporate executives and boards and ensure custodial sentences, needs to be taken to ensure that:
  1. No products are released without sufficient testing to ensure that they products, foods or pharmaceuticals, present no danger to humanity.
  2. That all products are marketed in a manner that ensures that they are labelled as genetically modified and that all down stream products (i.e. crops and / or livestock that are fed or treated with GM products) are identified as such
  3. That sufficient safeguards are in place and rigidly complied with so that these products cannot "accidentally" get into either the human or animal food chain
  4. That sufficient safeguards are in place and rigidly complied with so that these organisms cannot cross breed with other strains and in this matter be released into the wild
  11:23:00 0 comments links to this post
  The unreality based universe
The Guardian today has a short story about the new "alternative" web sites that are springing up for those who scorn much of what is out there for religious or philosophical beliefs. These sites, such as GodTube, Conservapedia, CreationWiki and the curiously named Ditty Talk (a "Christian My Space Alternative"). The article quite adequately describes a couple of these sites as "just like Wikipedia but are free from the unpleasant left- liberal bias that tends to accompany the truth". Of course the Guardian is a charter member of the hard left main stream media and ergo anything that they publish must immediately be discarded and/or condemned.
  11:09:00 6 comments links to this post
  Tenet speaks
Former CIA director George Tenet has a new book out entitled At the Center of the Storm. He has given a combatitive interview to CBS's 60 Minutes. It is clear he is an angry man and I sense in him more credibility, even if I don't always agree with his positions, than most of those he worked with.

The Bushies, of course, "say it ain't so".
  11:06:00 0 comments links to this post
  Only in America
For the well heeled amongst California's prison population things can be a good bit easier than they are for the rest of the population. For 75 to 125 USD a day (£35 - £60) you can get a cell upgrade that keeps you away from the "real" criminal element (i.e. those who are Republicans) and where you may be allowed a laptop or an IPod. You will be called a "client" rather than a prisoner by the "staff" (aka guards).

Now this sort of thing happens all over the world, usually in the developing world (and one suspects Italy as well) but the scam is not so brazen. In order to receive special treatment a "client" has to discretely slip large amounts of cash or drugs to a "member of staff" and the relationship generally lacks official sanction. Only in America would this be an opportunity for the state (or a private prison) to open up a new "revenue stream" in order to "maximise investment" and taxpayer (or shareholder) investment.

It can only be a matter of time before they offer loyalty card schemes; stay 1000 nights and get a free conjugal visit! This is so nineteenth century don't you think?
  10:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  See it before it melts!
Antarctica is the final frontier, at least on this planet, the last wilderness and the continent that is least likely to be ticked off as having been visited even by globe trotting travellers. But tourism there is on the increase and it is not doing it any good. So hurry up and see it whilst it is still there and by doing so you ensure that it will be gone just a wee bit sooner!
  10:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 42)
I wonder how US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales spent the balance of his weekend after being heckled at his law school reunion on Saturday night? Even at the reunion, which should have been a triumphant return for Gone-zo, one suspects that he wasn't, as he should have been, at the centre of a cluster of "friends" and others kissing up to the government's most powerful lawyer. I suspect he was treated as if he were poison. Well I'm sure he has another exciting week ahead of him trying to make the world understand how such an inept and incompetent toady ever got the position in the first place.

England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren is still lying low and rooting for Gone-zo.

(To be continued...)
  10:21:00 0 comments links to this post
29 April 2007
  You're not exactly free to go
More than 20% of the America's guests at Guantánamo Bay Beach and Leisure Resort have been cleared but not released as there is nowhere for them to go.

I guess that they are lucky they are in such a nice place with excellent conditions. Maybe they can even wrangle an upgrade to business class!
  13:03:00 0 comments links to this post
  Just because you're paranoid
What is the fixation of the American right wing with the Clintons? It is hard to fathom. Is it because the husband managed to defeat them twice and they are concerned that the wife might repeat the success? Whatever the reason they have a new home on the internets: StopHerNow.com. I hope their tubes don't get all clogged up. I have already signed up for their email updates and look forward to endless hours of entertainment.
  12:58:00 0 comments links to this post
  12.5% isn't bad
A survey of eight Iraqi reconstruction projects declared as success by the Americans has found that only one of them was still functioning. In at least one case the review came only six months after the last successful inspection. I wonder how many of these were Halliburton jobs.
  12:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why should Wolfie be any different?
It is always the cover up that seems to be the downfall of the arrogant and the greedy; two traits that apply to beleaguered World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz in spades. Documents released by the Bank's ethics committee show that Wolfie tried to "cover his tracks" as regards his intervention in the employment and compensation of his lover.
  12:46:00 0 comments links to this post
  Iraq update
Iraq suffered 2.22 Virginia Tech Equivalents yesterday as suicide bombers killed seventy one people in Karbala. The toll is only 1.33 VTEs if you use the three fifths of a person rule for brown people as enshrined in the US Constitution.
  12:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  Like dominos I imagine
Expect all hell to break loose in Washington DC next week if the defence in the case of accused madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey decides to go through with its proposed strategy of naming names of customers. Washington gossip has it that "Randy" Randall Tobias, the State Department official who resigned on Friday once his name came out, will not be the only casualty. Figures who could be named include White House and Pentagon staff, lobbyists and Congressional staff. I would expect both Republicans and Democrats to be nervous over this as lust has no political affiliation that I know of.
  12:34:00 0 comments links to this post
  How do you know that a young child is going to grow up to be a Republican?
If their first words are "I won't resign"!
  12:31:00 0 comments links to this post
  1001 reasons American must be armed at all times - number 233
How will unarmed Americans be able to protect themselves, their families and their cable television when crazed wild deer break into their homes? The story does not note whether the animals were wearing Kevlar® and therefore one has to assume that, in addition to weapons, the American family must keep armour piercing ammunition on hand as well!
  12:24:00 6 comments links to this post
  What to do, what to do
This is just speculation of course but I am trying to work out which way the Decider(TM) will decide to decide to go should Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul ultimately claim victory in the country's Presidential election leading the Turkish military to defend secularism. This could be a very difficult choice for Mr. Bush. On one hand he has his "Freedom Agenda" and theoretically supports democracy. On another hand he is no fan of secularism and prefers "faith based governments". On the third hand (why did elect a mutant President?) he sure doesn't look positively on Islamic governments especially is they are popularly elected without the intervention a judges appointed by one's father.
  12:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  Crystal Palace reborn*
South London is the forgotten part of the capital, most of the posh bits are north of the river and those of us who live to the south have to remember to take our passports with us when we travel up London. So it is with great pride that I announce that Isambard Kingdom Brunel's water towers that once powered the fountains at Crystal Palace are to be rebuilt as wind turbines. For those of you who do not know the history of South London, and that will be most of you, the Crystal Palace was originally erected in Hyde Park for the Great Exhibition of 1851. At the close of the exhibition it was re-erected in the distant southern suburbs near Sydenham where it remained until it burned down before WWII. (Yeah - I don't know how crystal burns either.) The foundations can still be seen in Crystal Palace Park which is a just short ride on the 227 for me. The dinosaurs, described in Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything as the world's first theme park remain even if they are no longer scientifically correct.

*Note: I am not referring here to my football side, Crystal Palace FC, who are languishing in mid-table obscurity in the Championship and are unlikely to be "reborn" or promoted anytime soon.
  11:49:00 0 comments links to this post
  A very royal surge
Not to be outdone by the Americans the British are going to have a troop surge of their own. As you may or may not know by now Prince Harry, third in line to the British throne and the grandson of German and Greek immigrants, is to be deployed to Iraq after much ministerial hand-wringing. Of course his grandmother is very concerned about his well being and, in order to ease her concerns, the military is to send a extra group of special forces troops to keep him safe. Not only that but he after two months will get to go home and help organise a concert to honour the anniversary of his mum's death. Not every soldier gets that, do they?
  11:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 41)
It happens to all of us. There are times we have social obligations but we just want to stay at home, put our feet up, pop a beer and watch a little telly but, recognising our obligations, we put on the monkey suit and go anyway. That must describe how US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales felt when deciding whether to go to his law school reunion at Harvard. What happened? Some protesters showed up and ruined the evening for everyone.

The other contestant vying for second place in the who-will-get-sacked-first England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren probably just stayed home.

(To be continued...)
  11:33:00 0 comments links to this post
28 April 2007
  The Trojans of Terror
Classrooms at a Community College in Iowa had to be evacuated yesterday because of a suspicious package. The package turned out to be condoms. Since the students had all had only "abstinence only" sex education none of them had ever seen a prophylactic before, including the pregnant ones.
  16:42:00 0 comments links to this post
  Americans agree...
...that climate change is really someone else problem. As a representative of the rest of the world I would like to personally thank each and every one of you very much indeed for all of your hard work and willingness to sacrifice.
  16:33:00 0 comments links to this post
  Better safe than sorry
Increasingly irrelevant US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Norway to speak on issues related to Afghanistan, Kosovo and the Middle East. "Why Norway?" you ask. Do you have any idea how dangerous those other places are?
  16:29:00 0 comments links to this post
  "I guess that means I'm in the clear"
At Human Events Online Pat Buchanan absolves himself of any responsibility for the recent tragedy at Virginia Tech in an article entitled "Too Much Tolerance". If there was ever a more intolerant man than Mr. Buchanan I would not like to meet him. In fact, I would not like to meet Mr. Buchanan either despite the fact that Hunter S. Thompson used to like to get pissed with him.
  16:20:00 0 comments links to this post
  Dissent in aisle 14
Should we worry that Wal-Mart is hiring former military and government intelligence officers as part of an operation to identify real or perceived "threats" to the world's largest retailer? The targets include "suspect individuals and groups". At least if they spot any of these folks shoplifting Wal-Mart will be ready to act, eh?
  16:07:00 0 comments links to this post
  One to a customer
Neither the United States nor Israel want to give up using cluster bombs. The UK doesn't either but in the future has pleged to use only so-called "smart" cluster bombs which have a much lower rate of unexploded bomblets.

I would suggest to anyone who thinks this is a good idea that perhaps they should move to Southern Lebanon where, as a result of the recent Israeli invasion, there is a least one unexploded bomb for every resident.

"Go on out and play kids. Just don't play in traffic."
  16:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  I'm sure he can do it!
This is the geezer, Ray Comfort, shown here with religious philosopher and C list actor Kirk Cameron, who on 5 May 2007 is going to prove the existence of God. It should be ever so exciting don't you think. Don't forget that is 5 May 2007. Put it in your Crackberry.



I would like it to be known that I am an atheist and I am constantly having nightmares about bananas! The man is a genius.
  15:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  And now for the Scientology
Vertically challenged actor Tom Cruise and his young Stepford wife are helping to ensure that emergency workers who laboured so courageously on and after 11 September 2001 can get Scientologically detoxified. I can just picture L. Ron Hubbard beaming down on the two from on high.

I saw some of his comrades out on Bromley High Street earlier today. Perhaps I should go get one of their free "stress tests". Or perhaps not.
  15:37:00 0 comments links to this post
  Lest we forget
In case you were under the impression that Iraq was the only crisis and/or disaster on the world stage today this link will take you to an interview with Paul Rusesabagina on whose story the film Hotel Rwanda was based. It makes one wonder how much good we could actually be doing in the world if we weren't pouring limitless billions of USD and the lives of thousands of Americans (and tens of thousands of others) down the drain in Iraq.
  15:17:00 0 comments links to this post
  I like having a Congressman I actually voted for!
I received the following email from my Congressman, Joe Sestak (D - PA), this morning in response to an email I had sent him thanking him for his work on Iraq.


Dear Mr. Stringer,

Thank you for contacting me to express your views about our current engagement in Iraq . I greatly appreciate your input, and I apologize for the delay in my reply.

As a Member of Congress, it is my responsibility to represent my constituents' concerns and interests and to provide them the honorable and enthusiastic service they deserve. I truly value your input and suggestions on issues before the House. In a representative government such as ours, it is essential that I know what your thoughts and views are on these issues.

As you may know, I firmly believe that Iraq is a tragic misadventure because it was never a clear and certainly not a present danger for our nation. We are now on the road to nowhere in Iraq , and our current policies are doing nothing but taking us farther down this path. We need to do the following things in order to extract ourselves from this situation:

1) Decrease the dependence of the Iraqis on us, both politically and militarily, so they are able to shoulder the burden of their own security when our troops are no longer present

2) Acknowledge and accept the evidence that increasing troops in Baghdad will not work. This is something we have tried time and again but which has failed to curtail the violence. The resolution to this civil war is dependent upon the political decisions that need to be made by Iraqi leaders to cease the sectarian violence - not on the number of troops we have in the country.

3) Finally, we must stop overextending our military. We have an army at home that is nearly broken because of the strain of multiple deployments to Iraq . Continuing a military engagement will further hinder our readiness, and divert attention and resources away from our global security concerns in North Korea , Iran , Afghanistan , the Western Pacific and the Middle East .

The bottom line is that we must set a deliberate timetable for the redeployment of our troops from Iraq . This plan to redeploy will serve as the catalyst for the Iraqis to accept responsibility for their country and will allow us to better address our strategic security interests throughout the rest of the world, as well as here at home. We must also have the confidence to work with Iran and Syria , as well as other regional nations, which have an interest in Iraq becoming stable as we redeploy our troops. They do not want to have millions of dislocated Iraqis overflow the border like two million already have nor do they want a proxy war between their majority Sunni and Shia populations if each side were then to support the different Iraqi Shia and Sunni factions causing the sectarian violence in that nation.

These are all steps that I have laid out in legislation that I have sponsored - H.R. 960, the "Enhancing America's Security by Redeployment from Iraq Act." This binding legislation sets the end of 2007 as the date certain for our redeployment from Iraq . The rationale for doing so is clear - only the Iraqis can bring about the needed reconciliation in their country. Their political leaders must take the difficult political steps needed to cease the violence, by building coalitions among competing sects, ensuring minority rights, balancing power between provincial and central governments, and sharing oil revenues among all regions in Iraq . We simply cannot do this work for them.

While the redeployment specified in my legislation will be carried out to enhance the global security interests of the United States and to improve our military readiness, it will not apply to: special operations forces assigned outside of Iraq that conduct targeted counter-terrorism operations or periodic support operations of the Iraqi security forces in Iraq; air forces assigned to locations outside of Iraq that conduct air operations over Iraq; or other military liaison teams that operate within Iraq.

In addition, H.R. 960 calls for the United States to take a leadership role in the diplomacy and negotiations necessary to bring regional nations together to ensure a stable Iraq . It also calls for the convening of an international conference of nations with the goal of providing economic aid for rebuilding Iraqi infrastructure and other reconstruction efforts that are key to its long-term stability.

The fact of the matter is that everyday we are in Iraq , our overall security goes down. Afghanistan is again prey to terrorists as the Taliban has begun to control the Southern Provinces. North Korea has exploded a nuclear device, Iran is bent upon developing one, and the Middle East is in a perpetual state of conflict - while we have failed to address the center of strategic gravity in the future-the Western Pacific, where China is emerging diplomatically, economically and in other areas.

We simply cannot afford to continue on our current course any longer. There is a better strategy - one that will better address our security interests both abroad and at home - and as your Member of Congress, I will work to ensure that it is implemented.

Again, I appreciate you taking the time to share your views on this matter of utmost importance to our nation's security. If I can be of any additional assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me again. If you would like to receive regular updates on these and other Congressional issues, please visit my website at http://www.house.gov/sestak to sign up for my e-newsletter. I look forward to our future correspondence.

Sincerely,

Joe Sestak
Member of Congress


This is vastly superior to all those years of "Crazy" Curt Weldon.
  15:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  A useful primer
Media Matters for America has a handy little guide to the myths and outright lies propagated by the climate change deniers. Commit it to memory as it will undoubtedly come in handy when having a fag with a right wing nut outside your office's back door on Monday morning.
  14:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  Whatever you do don't mention the war
At least not until September. I am certain that the Decider(TM) will be far too busy until then what with the cook outs, the brush clearing and all.

In celebration of this insightful decision I give you the finest example of not mentioning the war known to mankind.

  14:42:00 0 comments links to this post
  Bye bye Wolfie bye bye
World Bank President must surely be spending his weekend packing up the office. Today the Washington Post reports:

A World Bank committee investigating president Paul D. Wolfowitz has nearly completed a report that it plans to give the institution's governing board, concluding that he breached ethics rules when he engineered a pay raise for his girlfriend, three senior bank officials said Friday.

Friday evening, the committee was debating whether to explicitly recommend that Wolfowitz resign, according to the sources, who spoke on condition they not be named, citing an ongoing probe into leaks.

Wolfowitz is scheduled to appear before the committee with his attorney on Monday morning and mount his defense, and the bank's 24-member board of directors will convene that afternoon to discuss the report. The sources suggested that a vote by the board could come that day.

Through his attorney, Wolfowitz vowed to continue the fight to keep his job. "He will not resign under this cloud," said his attorney, Robert S. Bennett, when told of the imminent completion of the committee's report. "He's not going to give in to these coercive tactics."

I note that his defenders, of whom there are fewer and fewer as time passes, always seem to suggest that he did all he could to avoid the conflict of interest. They completely ignore the one thing he could, and should, have done and that is to refuse to accept the position because it would create a conflict of interest. Since he chose not to take that path then we he reaps is what he deserves.
  14:31:00 0 comments links to this post
  Oh dear
Randall "Randy" Tobias, the Bush administration's head of foreign aid has suddenly decided that he needs to spend more time with his family and less time with high priced hookers. After all he is 65 and probably needs the rest. Besides if we link foreign aid to "abstinence" should we link the dishing out of foreign aid to the same?
  12:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  How did I miss an earthquake?
Admittedly it wasn't a very big one and Californians will undoubtedly thumb their noses at it but surely I should have felt something. Perhaps it has to do with my uncertainty as to whether I really live in Kent. The Royal Mail says that I do but both my phone number, an 0208 prefix, and the Mayor of London say that I live in London instead. I do have to drive about four or five miles away from town to reach the "Welcome to Kent" sign if that is any indication.
  12:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  If George Tenet refuses to fall upon his sword he must be pushed!
Former CIA director George Tenet’s new book is due out Monday and it is already causing a storm of controversy as he apparently refuses to do the honourable thing and accept the blame for the catastrophe that is Iraq. He instead suggests that Bush and his minions had decided to illegally invade with or without the aid of the intelligence community and that Mr. Tenet’s now infamous “slam dunk” remark did not have any influence. Of course there are some who find all of this to be just "self-serving revisionism" and somehow manage to associate it with Sheryl Crow.
  12:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  "Hmm. Now just where did I put those darn documents?"
How much do you wish to wager that the White House won't remember where they put these documents related to the death of Pat Tillman that the House Oversight Committee would like to see?
  11:54:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why is the Alabama Free Militia like Luis Posada Carriles?
Because despite all evidence to the contrary the press doesn't seem to want to refer to them as "suspected terrorists" despite the fact that a raid of several member's homes in Alabama yielded "nearly 250 grenades and improvised explosive devices and 2,500 rounds of ammunition". Alice Martin, a not-yet-sacked US Attorney, announced the arrests and said that the group, which is considered violent, " just have a beef with the government". Let us see how the press describes these lovely men shall we?

The Huntsville (AL) Times - "anti-government militia"

The Sand Mountain (AL) Reporter - "anti-government group"

The Birmingham (AL) Times - "a group"

The esteemed Washington Times - - "a militia operation"

ABC News - no categorisation at all

So the Feds arrest five men who have a "beef with the government" and who have been "stockpiling weapons" including explosives not to mention drugs and it's no big deal. They must be white Christians.
  11:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi to face American justice
The US has released news that it has in its custody Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi who is said to be a high ranking al Qaeda operative and that they are transferring him to Guantánamo Bay Beach and Leisure Resort where he will undoubtedly receive humane treatment, get a free and fair trail and work on his tan all without unduly taxing the legal community.

I am not saying that Mr. Hadi is not in all probability a not very nice person. I am just saying that with the process so stacked against him that irrespective of the outcome I will always harbour a suspicion that justice has not been served.
  11:20:00 0 comments links to this post
  To boldly go where only Gene Roddenberry has gone before
Today the ashes of (not really very good but incredibly lucky) actor James Doohan aka Star Trek's Scotty are due to be launched into their final frontier. A moment of silence if you please.
  11:15:00 0 comments links to this post
  My advice for the good women of Indiana
Do not, under any circumstances, marry this man. Trust me on this. It will all go pear shaped in the end.
  11:11:00 0 comments links to this post
  Are we up for it?
A UN study due to be released next week and previewed by the Guardian today is to say that the world has the resources; scientific, technological and financial; to defeat climate change if we are willing to put our minds to it.

Read it and get to work will you?
  11:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  Fußball und Fruchtbarkeit
Want to increase your country's fertility rate? Do well in the World Cup. Apparently the positive emotions increase the odds of pregnancy and if your side does well the old man will probably be up for shagging. It seems to have worked for Germany at any rate.
  10:59:00 0 comments links to this post
  What's a country to do?
A state that takes human rights seriously in the 21st century (sorry for eliminating the US from the discussion straightaway) clearly has a difficult path to follow. Imagine that your country is host to some individuals that you seriously believe have strong associations with terrorism but you have insufficient evidence to charge and try them. Normally you would deport them to their country of origin but in this case their home state is suspected of abusing and torturing suspects and depriving them of other human rights such as the presumption of innocence and access to a fair trial. (No - they are not Americans!) Then someone in the government comes up with a bright idea. You will deport them to their homes but before you do you will get their government to sign a little letter promising not to torture the deportees. After all there is no reason to distrust a country that abuses its own citizens is there?

But then your damned activist judiciary gets in the way and says: "Sorry mate. We can't trust these geezers and you've got to set the men free." I can't wait to see the next idea they come up with.
  10:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 40)
US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales has managed to stagger, reeling and rocking, into another weekend whilst still hanging onto his job but it seems that some folks are still dissatisfied. I hope he has a relaxing weekend before he wades back into battle on the Monday.

Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren has also staggered into the weekend still employed largely by keeping his head down.

(To be continued...)
  10:24:00 0 comments links to this post
27 April 2007
  An interesting new theory
I'm going to have to give this some thought. One Ms. Mary Grabar, over at the ever enlightening Townhall.com, puts forward the idea that guns don't kill people but the liberal arts do. A someone who majored in English Literature at University I think this means I'm supposed to go out and commit mass murder now if only to prove Ms. Grabar correct.
  16:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  Is Google taking political positions now?
Today I noticed that on the Google News World page that a story entitled "US Papers Friday: Aiding the Enemy" has positioned next to it the photograph from this article. Do they know something that I only suspect?
  16:17:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Washington Times misleads me!
Imagine my surprise when I discovered that this headline* did not lead me to an article about Alberto "Gone-zo" Gonzales's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee!

*"D.C. region seen as prone to blackouts"
  16:14:00 0 comments links to this post
  War is good!
Oil wars are even better. At least they are if you are ExxonMobil whose profits leapt to 9.28 billion USD for the last QUARTER! For those of you who are shite at maths that comes to 1.2 million USD a second! Not bad eh?
  16:03:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wackos, wackos everywhere and not a mole in sight
As if the suggestion that the US Constitution should be amended for the purposes of regulating violence on television wasn't barmy enough now we have someone named John M. Snyder that Congress should prohibit Federal tax funds going to any institution of higher learning that doesn't allow students to pack heat! In the words of this obviously obsessed and possibly unstable man legislation could be written that

"could provide that on any college or university campus receiving federal funds, students or faculty there who have state issued permits to carry concealed firearms will not be prevented by institutional officials from carrying them."

I don't think Mr. Snyder goes far enough. I think that taxpayer financing should be kept from any college or university that does not REQUIRE students to carry concealed weapons! Why should taxpayer funds be spent on security and police to keep people safe when it is a citizen's responsibility to take care of that him or herself.

The other curious thing about this news release is that was issued by an organisation that calls itself "Christian Newswire". Is this a religious issue? Has God told us to carry automatic small arms with us everywhere when I wasn't listening to what She was saying? I don't get it.
  15:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why does the Bush administration hate the Second Amendment?
I am waiting for the bile and vitriol to start spewing forth from the headquarters of the National Rifle Association in opposition to a proposal from the Bush administration that would allow the Attorney General the discretion to deny TERRORISM SUPSECTS the "right" to buy guns!
  15:32:00 0 comments links to this post
  A common sense approach (except for that bit at the end)
Robert Peters, president of (my kind of) Morality in the Media, issued a statement yesterday applauding the FCC's report relating to children and violence in broadcast media. Fair enough. I think we can all agree with that. I think it is hard to argue with the statement that American children are exposed to too much violence (and not enough sex!) on TV. (OK, OK the sex thing is my addition to the argument. I've been watching European TV for fifteen years!) Then just when I think I can agree with all of this the top of his head explodes and madness comes pouring out. Towards the end of his statement we get the following:

Failing that [more activist right wing Supreme Court Justices], the Constitution will have to be amended to clarify that the First Amendment does not prevent government from enacting reasonable legislation to protect children from entertainment that is harmful to them."

I always thought conservatives were supposed to be big on personal responsibility. Whatever happened to parental responsibility, eh?
  14:49:00 0 comments links to this post
  Maximising shareholder value - the Abbot Labs way
Abbot Laboratories, one of the founding members of Big Pharma, is holding a gun to the head of the Thai government over medications for AIDS/HIV.

Some may call it unethical but I say “Unethical my arse - it's just good business!”
  14:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  Freedom on the march!
I think that the Decider(TM) should take a good hard look at the new constitution proposed for Thailand. Perhaps he could get a few pointers. I'm sure that he would be more than happy to operate under a system that would, as described by the Christian Science Monitor, prevent "future politician from using a popular mandate to challenge the status quo. Instead, the framers appear to favor a partial democracy that reins in the powers of elected representatives and keeps their ambitions in check." It's not exactly that dictatorship you were so looking forward to but it is certainly headed in that direction!
  14:31:00 0 comments links to this post
  Bible porn!
As brought to you by the global Jewish conspiracy. It would seem that the Jewish faith has a different Old Testament to the one that Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell read!
  14:25:00 0 comments links to this post
  A step further
Yesterday Russian President Vladimir Putin said that his country would suspend compliance with a critical military treaty in reaction to American plans to install missile and radar bases in former Warsaw Pact countries. Today he goes further by calling the American weapons "not just a defence system [but]...part of the US nuclear weapons system" and suggested that they could cause "mutual damage and even destruction". I think it is fair to say that he is opposed.
  14:21:00 0 comments links to this post
  Cruel and inhuman and not justice either
As Amnesty International reports that world executions are down despite over 20,000 people being on death row one has to wonder if it is just coincidental that George W. Bush is no longer the Governor of Texas. In a not unrelated development Iraq has leapt ahead of its mentor the United States to move into joint fourth place with the Sudan. The US slips to sixth.
  14:16:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Devil's doing
A delegate to the Utah Republican Party conference, what a load of laughs that must be, has put forward a resolution that he believes to think clarifies an issue that is currently of great interest to many Americans. Don Larsen of Utah County Utah, not to be confused with this Don Larsen, uses his resolution, to be debated by the state's prominent Republicans, to point out "Satan's plan to destroy the U.S. by stealth invasion". Couldn't be clearer in my opinion. To quote from his submission:

"In order for Satan to establish his 'New World Order' and destroy the freedom of all people as predicted in the Scriptures, he must first destroy the U.S....The mostly quiet and unspectacular invasion of illegal immigrants does not focus the attention of the nations the way open warfare does, but is all the more insidious for its stealth and innocuousness."

Will this make it to the party's national platform one wonders? One can only hope so.
  14:03:00 0 comments links to this post
  Peer reviewed religion?
"Best selling" author Ray Comfort tells us that God's existence is not a matter of faith and that he can prove it! I wait with bated breath to be ensured of Her existence.
  13:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  Good news from Iraq!
I thought I should hurry up and tell you that Iraqi government with assistance from UNICEF, the World Health Organisation and the European Commission is making a major effort to ensure that children are vaccinated against measles. So just in case something goes wrong there it is. Good news. Iraq.

Don't anyone dare to tell me that I'm always so negative!
  13:20:00 0 comments links to this post
  If Americans didn't have a "right" to guns...
...what would they use to threaten those who want to regulate access?

I think that should settle it once and for all don't you?
  13:16:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wolfie's bedroom folly continues
Perhaps we should have a new competition to see who has the fewest friends; US Attorney General Alberto "Gone-zo" Gonzales or World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz. I would have initially bet on the former but Wolfie is gaining considerable ground, by losing hosts of friends, at a breakneck pace. Yesterday the World Bank's anticorruption team that was formed by Mr. Wolfowitz said that the scandal swirling around Wolfie and his lover was making there job difficult. They did stop short of saying he should resign but then they do work for him and haven't, as yet, managed to acquire one of those Wolfowitz Special Contracts like Ms. Riza.
  13:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  Don't forget check your bacon carefully
Whilst the FDA wasn't looking at least 300 hogs that were fed on the contaminated feed at the heart of the recent pet food scandal slipped into the human food. In related news someone best call the Pope as another 6000 of the porcine beasts who may have also had the feed are scheduled to be euthanized!
  12:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  Lest we forget
Yesterday was the seventieth anniversary of the bombing of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War. The incident was famously memorialised by Pablo Picasso in a mural originally painted for the Spanish Pavilion of the 1937 World's Fair.
  12:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  "and the land of the free" (an occasional series)
The American government has asked a Federal appeals court to allow more restrictions on the access of lawyers to residents at the Guantánamo Bay Beach & Leisure Resort above and beyond the draconian regime that is already in place. The Yanks claim that visits by solicitors "cause unrest on the base". This is probably due to the lawyers giving the prisoners outlandish ideas such as the possibility of their innocence. After all the Decider(TM) long ago decided to decide that these men and boys are guilty Evil Doers.

I don't know about you but that is certainly good enough for me!
  12:39:00 0 comments links to this post
  Thou shalt have no other gods before me
I'm not certain about this but could it be that the Christian God is undergoing a de-merger process and we will be left with a Catholic God who believes in climate change and that the "faithful" should do something about it alongside an Protestant evangelical God who doesn't believe in climate change and who thinks that those atheistic green folks are trying to put one over on her flock?
  12:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Pinking of Poland
I do not know this but I imagine that Polish Prime Minster Jaroslaw Kaczynski must surely be a darling of the American religious right. He yesterday rejected criticism of Poland's homophobic society and said that it was "not in society's interests to increase the number of gay people". At roughly the same time the European Union called on Poland to put a halt to homophobia and end discrimination based on sexual preference.

I am sure this will all work out in the end. It is not as if they are kilometres apart, is it?
  12:10:00 0 comments links to this post
  Cold war redux?
Russian President Vladimir Putin has indicated that Russia comply with the terms of the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty, which was negotiated between the Soviet Union and NATO. The treaty limits, as its name would suggest, the numbers of conventional forces on the continent. The Russian suspension is in reaction to American plans to install American missiles on Russia's doorstep, in Poland and/or the Czech Republic, as part of the son-of-the-son-of-the-son-of-Star-Wars.
  12:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  The world is a little less today
Cellist extraordinaire Mstislav Rostropovich died today at the age of 80. He was a brilliant cellist, a fine composer and a brave resister against the Soviet authorities.
  11:59:00 0 comments links to this post
  Getting worser all the time
Who forgot to give General David Petraeus the official White House "This Is How Rosy Things Going in Iraq" script? Karl Rove must be slipping to allow this to happen; perhaps he is concerned that a White House counsel that is being investigated for political corruption is going to investigate him for political corruption. Testifying before Congress yesterday the commander of US forces in Iraq he admitted that the situation there will "get harder before it gets easier".
  11:52:00 0 comments links to this post
  Don't tell ExxonMobil but...
...this April is set to be the warmest on record in England since the English started keeping track of these things nearly 300 years ago. I, for one, am not finding it "delightful" as the weather folks on the telly feel we should find it. I would much prefer highs of 14-15C with it being warm in the sun and rather cool at night. Perhaps I should move to Finland.
  11:39:00 0 comments links to this post
  Those are some mighty big toes you've stepped on Tony
I have previously noted that I am inspired by the slavish devotion that the Tony Blair government shows to protecting the fragile reputation of British merchant-of-death BAE systems.

My awe is even greater now that I learn the Tony is risking the considerable wrath of the Decider(TM) who has had his Ambassador lodge an official complaint over the cancellation of the inquiry into BAE's alleged corrupt practices.

One does wonder what caused the Americans, usually such good friends to young Tony, to get their knickers in a twist over this. The options are limited. I seem only three probable scenarios:

a) The United States is launching a campaign against corrupt business practices and, in addition to this complaint, have decided to cease offering no bid contracts in Iraq, have severed all ties with US Vice President "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney's former firm Halliburton because of a fear that there would appear to be a conflict of interest and that the Decider(TM) has decided to decided to order World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz to resign.

b) The US is concerned that the sale of advanced weaponry to countries in such an unstable part of the world could lead to wider conflict and ruin the chance for peace in the region. (The BAE deal which sparked the cancelled inquiry was to sell EuroFighters to the Saudis.) The US is set to announce the cancellation of all proposed and previously contracted arms sales to Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirate, Egypt, Qatar, Kuwait and Pakistan.

c) The US is pissed off because they feel that the British deal, corruptly arranged, took the place of a deal between the Saudi's and an American merchant-of-death that could have been corruptly arranged.

After much consideration I have to go with option c)!
  11:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  I know I can't dance - he doesn't seem to know that he can't
The only way the Decider's behaviour in the White House garden yesterday could be deemed acceptable is if he had been at a family wedding and he'd had a wee bit too much to drink. Well there wasn't a wedding and he doesn't drink, allegedly.

As you watch this remember this is not your slightly embarrassing and intellectually challenged neighbour from a few doors down but the person is generally described as the "leader of the free world" and who has his finger on the launch button of the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.

  11:15:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 39)
Yet another weekend is looming over us yet US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales continues to hang on to his job. No matter what happens from this point forward Gone-zo will certainly rank amongst the most inept and least intellectually capable of American Attorneys General. Still his cause cannot be helped that the less-than-liberal seems to notice that Gone-zo has no friends.

Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren is also still hanging onto the England football manager spot.

(To be continued...)
  11:08:00 0 comments links to this post
26 April 2007
  I never looked at it this way.
I mean what if God isn't actually ON America's side? What if she is on some other country's side? Let's take Iran as an example. Their President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is suggesting that God, or Allah as she is known in those parts might be on their side instead.

Shit. This might not be good news!
  16:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  And we haven't even got a (written) Constitution
Yet the British High Court has ruled that a man who has been held by British authorities without charge since 2004 must be released after his lawyers filed one of those pesky habeas corpus petitions that the Decider(TM) is so un-fond of. The court said that his detention was "arbitrary and unjustified".
  16:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Only one to a customer!
I'm only going to say this once. Just because a bunch of European socialist scientists have found Planet Earth II doesn't mean we can stop worrying about climate change, nuclear weapons or who will get voted off of American Idol.

We can't OK. If we fuck this planet up that is it. No second chances. No hopping off to this rock orbiting Gliese 581 and fucking up that one too.

No, no, a thousand times no!
  16:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  "Mummy - why does Rover sleep all day?"
Is the family pet depressed? Does he find it hard to crawl out of his basket in the morning to go for a wee? Is he listless or has he gone off his feed?

For these pet symptoms and many, many more Eli Lilly has the answer!

Prozac for dogs.
  16:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  Is this a high crime or a misdemeanour?
The White House saw to it that top officials at twenty different government agencies got political briefings on the mid term elections last year. These were seemingly part of a larger effort to ensure that agency staff were kept abreast of Republican political fortunes and undoubtedly needs as well.

A violation of the Hatch Act? Maybe, maybe not. Impeachable? Now that is a much better question!
  16:09:00 7 comments links to this post
  Who knew the pill popping prima donna was this talented?
His immenseness Rush Limbaugh does like to entertain his audience. This week he brings us "Barrack - the Magic Negro as a bit of light entertainment.

Quite a guy our Rush. I wonder how is erectile dysfunction is coming along.
  15:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  An up and coming war (or is it just a front)
It will be US ally Turkey v US allies Iraqi Kurds unless something happens to change course. There have already been Turkish air incursions into Iraqi air space and the Iraqi Kurdish freedom fighters, or are they terrorists - I get so confused, are massing forces at the Iraq - Turkey border.

I wonder how the Decider(TM) will manage to spin this as progress; not that I doubt he will at least try.
  15:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  The invisible hand of the market....
...meets the invisible hand of the regulator and all is well. The US government's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), charged as its name suggests with monitoring and ensuring employee safety, is more or less shutting itself down and allowing industry to "self-regulate" except in extraordinary cases. Of course the health and safety of workers has not been affected favourably by this unannounced shift but profits and share prices probably are.
  15:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  Swiss guns
One of the places that the US National Rifle Association likes to point to attempt to prove their "guns don't kill people - gun control kills people" argument is Switzerland where all adult men are issued an army weapon that they keep at home after going through their training. Well it is possible they won't be able to do so for much longer; not because the Swiss have started killing each other en masse but because the Swiss don't seem to think that it is a good idea any longer.
  15:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  Dumb like a fox
I hear yet another chorus of criticism from those damned, treasonous lefties about the fact that Scott Bloch, head of the White House’s Office of Special Council, who is set to launch an investigation into Karl Rove’s political activities out of the White House, has some ethics problems of his own. Mr. Bloch is under investigation himself after a number of complaints from his own staff. (See what happens when you don’t value loyalty über alles?) Mr. Bloch is accused of politicising his own office.

I don’t see why those damn hard left liberals (I think I stole that phrase from Bill O’Reilly) don’t think this is such a good idea. If you are going to go looking for corruption and ethical violations you wouldn’t want some choirboy doing the looking would you? How the hell would he know where to look? You need someone just a sleazy. I say that Mr. Bloch is exactly the man for the job. It's just like hiring hackers to be in charge of internet security!
  15:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  A bold green initiative from the Bushies
The US Environmental Protection Agency (who says Americans have no sense of irony) has finally agreed to rule on California's request to regulate tailpipe emissions of cars and trucks. However the head of the EPA refused to be drawn as to exactly how long this might take. I reckon it will take just over 634 days.
  14:25:00 0 comments links to this post
  At least it's not a hooker this time
Hugh Grant has had a previous brush with the law, back in 1995 he was arrested in LA for lewd conduct as a result of his encounter with the less-than-Divine Brown, a local prostitute.

This time he's been arrested for attacking a photographer with baked beans.
  14:14:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wolfowitz asked to resign?
UPI is reporting that the agency that oversees the World Bank has asked the Bank's president, Paul Wolfowitz, to resign citing the "irreparable harm" he is doing to the Bank.

And take your bloody socks with you!
  13:02:00 0 comments links to this post
  Calling all editors
Didn't anyone send McClatchy Newspapers the Luis Posada Carriles script? If so, why are they referring to the newly freed man as a "alleged terrorist" rather than the mandated "anti-Castro militant"?

By the way is it just me or is there more than a passing resemblance between Sr. Posada and Andy Griffith during his Matlock period?
  12:52:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Decider(TM) tries his hand at healing
I'm sure the Decider(TM) truly and honestly decided to decide that it was a good idea for him to call up injured NJ Governor Jon Corzine and wish him well but would it make you feel any better?
  12:48:00 0 comments links to this post
  Don't the Chinese follow the American press?
If they did they would probably realise that they were seriously wasting their time by inviting the US Food and Drug Administration to share their food inspection expertise with the Chinese are roughly the same time that the FDA is more or less admitting that their expertise is flawed and the US food chain is largely unprotected.
  12:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Where have all the constructionists gone?
It used to be that most conservative judges were what are known as "constructionists" in that their judicial philosophy as regards the Constitution and its amendments tries to put themselves into the heads of the framers, or those responsible for the writing of later amendments, to try and determine what their "original intent" was as regards the meaning and to make decisions that do not stray from that irrespective of how much the world has moved on. They were also firm believers in state decisis.

That no longer seems to be the case; at least with the conservative, or perhaps one should say, right-wing, justices on the US Supreme Court. They recently overturned precedent in the decision to allow bans on certain late term abortions to stand and it would now appear that they are seriously considering overturning the McCain-Feingold Reform Act which regulates political campaigns. If they do it will be on the basis that they equate the unlimited spending of money as free speech. I defy anyone to go into the Federalist Papers and related documents and show me something to prove that framers clearly had that intent.

Go on. I dare ya!
  12:28:00 0 comments links to this post
  Can you blame them?
A poll of citizens of four Muslim nations finds that, in general, they are distrustful of America and its motives and believe that "the United States has an intention to harm Islam [and] undermine Islam". Disturbingly a surprising percentage do not believe that al Qaeda was responsible for the 11 September attacks.

Since Karen Hughes is so capable and she also works for a man who values competence above all else we can only assume that things were much, much worse 18 months ago before she took on the task of improving America's image amongst the world's Muslim people.
  12:18:00 0 comments links to this post
  I am beyond words
Sometimes I have to tell people, whether here or abroad, that on certain occasions I have been ashamed to be an American. Telling that to the wrong person in the States usually brings forth a seemingly unending stream of vitriol usually followed by instructions to "fuck off back to England". Nonetheless I continue to persist in making the statement when conditions warrant it. After watching this I found it necessary once again. This made me ashamed to be American and I hope that there are others who share my remorse and if there are I hope that they also share the desire see to it that this sort of unforgivable abuse of American citizens and soldiers does not happen again. We should start with demanding the resignation, preferably with a dishonourable discharge, of Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich who so ineloquently described Pat Tillman as "worm dirt" because he and his family didn't have religious beliefs that lived up to the Colonel's high standards.
  12:03:00 6 comments links to this post
  Is there something about the Decider(TM) that they're not telling us?
I only ask because this headline, "Osborne 'intimate' with Bush... and 150 others", piqued my curiosity. Ostensibly it is about the British Tory Party attempting to rebuild their relationship with the Bushite wing of the American Republican Party but I'm suspicious that there could be a coded meaning of some sort.
  11:59:00 0 comments links to this post
  "We’re not fighting terrorism...we’re sitting here in an air conditioned place"
It is unlikely that anyone will ever accuse US Congressman Jack Murtha (D - PA) of being a great orator. Whilst he is a Democrat, he is a very conservative Democrat and there are any number of issues on which he and I will disagree and disagree strongly. However if anyone, anywhere, anytime has the unmitigated gall to question his true, real and profound devotion to the men and women in the US Armed Forces they must be called out on it. In the clip below he address the House on the Iraq financing bill. In addition to the quote in the title he also calls out McCain on his lame attempt at an IED joke on the Daily Show.


  11:46:00 0 comments links to this post
  1001 reasons to be a (British Republican) - number 138
Because some people are more equal than others. Now I have nothing against young Prince Harry personally and I do not wish him, or any other member of the British Armed Forces, harm but he has signed up for a career in the Army and should not, indeed must not, receive special treatment simply because of his German - Greek bloodlines!
  11:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why is it I wonder...
...that Andrew Cockburn's forthcoming book about the ex-US Defense Secretary is entitled Rumsfeld: An American Disaster in the UK whereas in the States it is to be called Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall, and Catastrophic Legacy? Are my countrymen really that sensitive?
  11:24:00 0 comments links to this post
  Isn't gambling illegal in America?
As I am not a rich person I am probably not considered possessed of sufficient expertise to comment on new record achieved by the Dow Jones Industrial Average yesterday but I will nonetheless. Please excuse me for shouting.

DOESN'T ANYONE BOTHER TO EVEN LOOK AT THE UNDERLYING ECONOMIC DATA ANYMORE??!!
  11:20:00 0 comments links to this post
  The global "War on Truth"
Why, one is compelled to ask, would the Iraqi government withold statistics on civilian deaths from the United Nations unless they are under pressure from the Decider(TM) and his minions who are desperate to make the "Surge" appear as if it is working?

In related news the United Kingdom government refused a transit visa to Dr. Riyadh Lafta, co-author of the study published in the Lancet to allow him to pass through London on his way to present a paper in British Columbia. The United States had already denied him a visa that would have allowed him to speak at the University of Washington. What is it that an epidemiologist has to say that is so dangerous?
  11:06:00 1 comments links to this post
  Gordon and Paddy in a tree
In a move to appear more serious about affairs outside of the Exchequer British Prime Minister-in-waiting (and waiting and waiting and waiting) Gordon Brown is to enlist the aid of former Liberal Democrat Party leader and the "Baron of Bosnia" Paddy Ashdown to help him rethink the Iraq strategy and hopefully find a way out of this mess.
  11:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  Will they bring the Stonehenge set along?
Great news for all of those who believe that an amplifier is not really an amplifier unless it goes up to eleven; Spinal Tap is to "reform" and perform live at Wembley Stadium in the Live Earth concert promoting the fight against global warming.
  10:46:00 0 comments links to this post
  The nature of secrets
Sir Nigel Sheinwald, a senior Blair adviser, has told a court that the leak of the minutes of a meeting between the British PM and the Decider(TM) in which the two allegedly discussed, with some seriousness, bombing al-Jazeera damaged "Britain's international standing" and put lives at risk. If fact he went further and suggested that these discussions must remain secret irrespective of the "illegal or morally abhorrent the nature of their discussions".

I find this argument specious and dangerous. In reality what suffers the most damage here is not Britain's but the standing, reputations and future legacy of Blair and the Decider(TM).
  10:32:00 0 comments links to this post
  There's only one Alan Ball...
...but alas no more.

How long before England again, if ever, has another World Cup hero like him?
  10:29:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 38)
I never thought when I began these daily reviews of the status of US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales's career I certainly didn't suspect I would still be at it after 38 days. Clearly I underestimated the sleazy little amnesiac's desire and ability to hang on to a job that is well beyond his abilities. The Salt Lake Tribune, from out there in the left wing heartland, reports that Senators are asking Gone-zo to emulate the Gropenator and submit himself to a Total Recall experience.

Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren front is also still hanging onto the England football manager spot.

(To be continued...)
  10:17:00 0 comments links to this post
25 April 2007
  In the spirit of "no one like's me I don't care"...
...I present beleaguered World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz. The only one who seems to like is, once again, the Decider(TM).
  17:53:00 0 comments links to this post
  I should say so!
According to a gay Tory MP former British Prime Minister Ted Heath had to be warned off cruising for gay sex or it might "harm his future political career".
  17:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone too far
Most of Pennsylvania, my home state (I was actually born in Delaware but only spent a fortnight there), is home territory for the National Rifle Association but have pro-gun lunatics finally gone too far by hanging up a banner at the state Capitol that called for the lynching, murder or execution, take your pick, of State Rep. Angel Cruz (D - Philly) who has had to audacity to introduce a serious gun control bill?

I think so. I believe in free speech as much, and generally much more, than the next guy but once you cross the line of endorsing or encouraging violence it is a crime as far as I am concerned. Lock 'em up I say!
  17:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  Strange but true?
Given the current (lack of) value of the US dollar I find it hard to believe that the US turned out to be the most expensive country in which to buy ten tourist essentials, one of which is beer.
  17:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  Like ships that pass in the night
As the United States forges back into the past its southern neighbour, Mexico, heads the other way.
  17:34:00 0 comments links to this post
  I thought you should know
The Guardian's "Diary" column reports today that David Crosby is quoted in the current issue of Classic Rock magazine as saying about the Decider(TM)

"Don't you think there should be a law that you cannot have control of nuclear weapons unless you can pronounce the word 'nuclear'?"

I'm not going to actually purchase this magazine to confirm it.
  17:28:00 0 comments links to this post
  Corrections and clarifications
I fear I may have misreported yesterday when I said that doctors had failed in their attempts to reattach the penis of the man who had cut it off in a restaurant on the Strand. It seems now that they have managed to sew it back on but aren't sure it will take. In the words of an unnamed urologist:

"Attaching the penis is a very long, complex and painstaking operation"

Should the surgery prove to be a failure they will have to cut the man's member off again.
  17:28:00 6 comments links to this post
  Schadenfruede alert
Things really are going poorly for the Decider(TM) and his minions these days aren't they? I have the greatest sympathy for the family and friends of Pat Tillman as well as for Jessica Lynch and her family nonetheless I am allowed to take just a soupçon of enjoyment out of the difficulties being caused to Bush&Co by their failures to spin the tragic events surrounding these two brave individuals into good political news. Come on, I am, aren't I?
  17:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  "We're number two - we're number two!"
It would appear that US Vice President "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney is falling down on the job in his role as America's Greenhouse Gas Emissions Czar (GGEC). Word reaches us that China is now expected to surpass the US, on a total but certainly not per capita basis, as the world's leading CO2 emitter far earlier than expected and perhaps as early as the end of this summer.

Americans, will you take this lying down or will you fill yourself with a good old American can-do attitude (and the Hummer with petrol) and get out there and start emitting like mad before it's too late?
  17:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  We must have forgot to declare victory!
According to sources at the ever venerable Scotland Yard al-Qaida is doing just fine despite the global "War on Terra" (which we don't mention anymore). How could that be? Everyone else keeps telling us how rosy things are.
  17:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  "We didn't actually say $50 billion did we? Oh dear!"
It seems that, as usual, the spin was better than the reality as regards the promises of the G8 nations to contribute 50 billion USD to help "make poverty history" two years ago. It seems that most folks forgot to write the cheques.

As long as they got re-elected they probably don't care either. I mean who will remember?
  17:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 37)
The attitude of US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales to the chorus of "get out now mate" from Republicans and Democrats alike reminds me of the old Millwall FC chat - "Nobody likes us - we don't care". As long as the Decider(TM) has decided to decide to continue to think that Gone-zo is alright nothing else seems to matter.

No news on the Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren front.

(To be continued...)
  16:57:00 0 comments links to this post
24 April 2007
  The Decider(TM) gets his facts wrong (again)!
He says that Americans didn't "vote for failure". Well enough of them, even if not a majority of them, voted for him didn't they?
  17:32:00 0 comments links to this post
  Link between abortion and breast cancer refuted
A report in the upcoming issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine tells us that there appears to be no link between either abortion or miscarriage and breast cancer risk. Of course there are those who, without bothering with the science, tell us that those Harvard folks are just plain wrong.
  17:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  SNL and Gone-zo
And I didn't even know Saturday Night Live was still on. Is it even remotely funny anymore?

  17:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  Oops
Even by Israeli standards (they obviously have never placed a high priority on public relations) shooting a Nobel Peace Prize winner has to be considered a faux pas. Mairead Corrigan was shot with a plastic bullet and tear gassed at a demonstration against the wall that the Israelis are building to imprison the Palestinians.
  16:57:00 0 comments links to this post
  I'd stick to the computer games
Taiwan has run a computer simulation that says it would win a war with China. If I were them I would stick to the Play Station and leave real war to the big boys.
  16:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  I'm not this optimistic
Former President of the Irish Republic and head of human rights for the United Nations Mary Robinson is hopeful that the recent tragedy at Virginia Tech will spur the US to support a treaty to limit the world wide trade in small arms. I don't think she should hold her breath.
  16:41:00 0 comments links to this post
  It is good to know I'm right!
Less than an hour ago I wrote a post that asked the question "Don't they know gun control kills people".

Now I my prescience has been confirmed by no less a luminary than a son (not the gay one I think) of Ronald Reagan who tells us in unequivocal terms that "Gun laws kill". So there!
  16:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  I guess they wouldn't let Aldous Huxley into the States anymore either
Andrew Feldmar is a Vancouver psychologist. Recently he was headed down to Seattle to visit a friend. He was randomly pulled out of a queue at the US border and when he said he was a psychologist the border guards Googled his work. He had once written an article on the therapeutic potential of LSD which suggested that he had used the drug himself. When the agents found this article they barred him from entry for narcotics use and finger printed him for the FBI. They then ushered him back to his car, made sure he did a U-turn and sent him on his way home.

Some country, eh? It makes my heart swell with pride it does.
  15:46:00 0 comments links to this post
  Don't they know gun control kills people?
Those left winger Communist anti-American thugs over at the Washington Post are proving their disloyalty to God's blessed land, the United State, by running an article today entitled "Britain's Gun Laws Seen as Curbing Attacks" as if the guns were responsible as opposed to the victims!

They'll be pitching for warm beer, cricket and driving on the left anytime now I reckon.
  15:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  I can't hear you!
I hope that all of those on the right who made fun of British Cabinet member Hillary Benn when he said that the UK government has stopped using the phrase "War on Terra" as it was unhelpful will also take time out of their otherwise busy schedules to take the piss out of the Pentagon now that they have stopped referring to the "War on Terra" as a long war. According to Lt. Col. Matthew McLaughlin, a spokesman for Central Command, the change "is a product of our ongoing effort to use language that describes the conflict for our Western audience while understanding the cultural implications of how that language is construed in the Middle East...The idea that we are going to be involved in a 'Long War', at the current level of operations, is not likely and unhelpful" (emphasis mine).

I wait with bated breath.

Addendum: Also are these generals, by saying the "War on Terra" is not going to be a long war in fact telling the terrorist, evil-doers and Islamofascists that it will in fact be a short one and ergo all they have to do is wait? That strikes me as "aiding and abetting".
  15:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  Love the corrupter - hate the corruption
Now that he is knee deep in shit World Bank President and neo-con emeritus Paul Wolfowitz has promised his board that he can change and change he will, damnit, but he won't resign. That and he's keeping Checkers as well!
  15:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  New name for Gone-zo
The Chicago Tribune has come up with a new name for US Attorney General Alberto "Gone-zo" Gonzales: The Man Who Wasn't There. I'm sure that he will wear his new moniker with considerable pride.
  15:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  Alien sues US under US Alien Tort Act
Those freedom haters at the American Civil Liberties Union have filed a suit against the CIA on behalf of Khaled El-Masri, a German national, who was "extraordinarily rendered" to Afghanistan where he contends he was tortured and mistreated. El-Masri has never been charged with a crime and was released by the Americans after five months. He was scheduled to attend yesterday's news conference announcing the legal action but the US authorities denied him entry to the country when he landed at Atlanta. Foreigners have the right to pursue redress for human rights violations in American courts under the Alien Tort Act although I do not expect the drafters of the legislation ever envisioned this result.

Anyone want to bet that the government cries "national security, national security" to stop the case getting to court and gets away with it?
  14:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  Soros-o-phobia
Bill O'Reilly has a caught an extreme case. Watch it.

Note his fair and balanced discussion group that consists of Bill (right wing nut case), an author (and right wing nut case) and "commentator" (and right wing nut case). When he was a kid he must at the playground he must have put everybody on one end of his teeter-totter and then couldn't figure out why it never got off the ground!
  14:28:00 0 comments links to this post
  A monumental idiocy
In a tribute to the George W. Bush Memorial Freedom Wall in Baghdad I give you Jefferson Airplane and "We Can Be Together". (As it is a 70s telly clip the lyrics have been amended slightly.) Don't you just love the psychedelic effects!


  14:25:00 0 comments links to this post
  Yogi's voice
Salon (yeah - I know you've gotta watch the ad to read it!) shows us the philosopher who is really behind the Bush administration. Yogi Berra.

Frankly - I think that's too flattering to them.
  14:24:00 0 comments links to this post
  Is surging anything like spiralling?
Yesterday was the deadliest day for American forces in Iraq for over a year and taking April fatalities to the highest level since December last.
  14:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why is Canada more free than America?
At least in Canada there is open debate over the treatment of "detainees" and arguments put forward that the country must halt turning over prisoners to the Afghan authorities where they are abused and tortured. I reckon they won't want to turn them over the Yanks either.
  14:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  Superman rendered harmless in Serbia!
No I'm not kidding. They've found Kryptonite there. In a mine. Seriously.
  13:00:00 0 comments links to this post
  Army approves of paganism....
....some bigoted Christians undoubtedly furious!
  12:51:00 0 comments links to this post
  Meet the new boss...
...same as the old boss, more or less.
  12:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  David Halberstam - RIP
Journalist and write David Halberstam has killed in a car crash at the age of 73. By some bizarre coincidence at the weekend I picked up a copy of his book The Children at the library but haven't actually opened it yet.
  12:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  Still some freedom left
A Municipal Judge in Philadelphia has found that fourteen activists who were arrested at the Philadelphia office of ex-Senator (hooray!) Rick Santorum in order to present Pennsylvania's then junior Senator with a petition opposing the illegal Iraq invasion did not commit trespass. The men and women had been arrested before even entering Santorum's office with four of them being trapped in the lift after security guards turned off the power.

For those who thought that bring these charges was a good idea I would like to remind the of the First Amendment to the US Constitution

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

  12:16:00 0 comments links to this post
  Does Bush look good in brown?
In today's Guardian Naomi Klein maps out the Decider's ten easy steps to Fascism. They are:
  1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy √
  2. Create a gulag √
  3. Develop a thug caste
  4. Set up an internal surveillance system √
  5. Harass citizens' groups √
  6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release √
  7. Target key individuals √
  8. Control the press
  9. Dissent equals treason √
  10. Suspend the rule of law

Despite Ms. Klein’s arguments to the contrary I am not convinced that he and his minions have, as yet, managed items 3, 8 or 10 although there clearly have been material steps taken that push us in that direction.

So I can only give Bush&Co an impressive but not yet top flight 7 out of 10 on the Klein-o-matic Fascism scale.

  11:47:00 0 comments links to this post
  Like the mad leading the unstable
The fearless Dave Gaubatz who was so instrumental in helping the Daily Mail's nearly sane Melanie Phillips find Saddam's ever so elusive WMDs, in a non-finding sort of way of course, has moved on to bigger and better things. He has now embarked on a project, reported breathlessly by the Jawa Report, to the pernicious and pervasive influence of Sharia law in America. You can go to his informative website, Mappingsharia.us to find out how you can help in this courageous and necessary endeavour.

I have a hint for Mr. Gaubatz. If you are looking for evidence of the application of American law in a way that fits Qu'ranic principles, especially as regards executions, you probably ought to start in Texas.
  11:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  I think I ate here once!
A man between the ages of thirty and forty cut off his own penis (it hurts just to type those words!) in Zizzi's restaurant on the Strand in London on Sunday evening. Police had to use CS gas to restrain him before taking him to a South London hospital where he is in stable condition. Doctors were, however, unable to reattach his member. A spokeswoman for the restaurant relates the events (those with tender sensibilities may wish to look away now):

"At around 9pm on Sunday, a man walked into the Zizzi restaurant on The Strand, down the stairs to the basement restaurant area and tried to enter a kitchen.

"Members of staff stopped him, at which he ran into a second kitchen area.

"The man then picked up a kitchen knife and slashed himself across the wrist and groin areas before running back into the restaurant, where he continued to stab himself.

"This happened in a matter of seconds and was obviously extremely frightening and distressing for the many customers and staff in the restaurant at the time."

"Apart from the man, we understand that no-one else suffered any physical injuries."

I think some of the witnesses to events might have to take a trip or two to the shrink I reckon.
  11:03:00 0 comments links to this post
  Good luck with this one
Dr. Aric Sigman, a prominent psychologist, told a group of British MPs yesterday that the television viewing habits of children should be severely restricted by the adults responsible for them. He believes, citing recent research, that watching as little as one and half hours a day at a young age could be a trigger for attention-deficit disorder, autism or obesity. He believes that children under the age of three should watch no television at all and that from the ages of three to seven it should be restricted to thirty minutes to an hour daily. Then from the ages of seven to twelve he suggest no more than one hour a day, from twelve to fifteen one and a half hours a day and over sixteen only two hours. He believes that children should not have tellies in their rooms.

This will be a very hard sell in Britain and in America, well you may as well just forget it!
  10:48:00 0 comments links to this post
  "Hey buddy - wanna buy some fighters?"
I don't know about you but I find the lengths to which the Blair government is willing to go to shield the actions of British "merchant of death" BAE from any sort of scrutiny whatsoever absolutely awe inspiring. They ruthless crushed any attempts by the legal authorities to investigate allegations of bribery and corruption in BAE's deal to sell EuroFighters to Saudi Arabia. Now that the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has stepped in to see if the UK might be in violation of its treaty obligations related to corrupt practices the UK government is trying to out the OECD's anti-bribery head, Mark Pieth, claiming that his is to "outspoken" or honest or investigative or something.
  10:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 36)
In order to make it appear that the controversy surrounding him is not affecting his meagre ability to do his job US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales yesterday announced a bold yet lacklustre plan to combat identity theft. At least that is what is seems on the surface but what if Gone-zo is cleverly planting the seeds of his own defence here. What if he is planning to claim that in any situation where wrong doing by the AG is alleged it wasn't actually Gone-zo who did it but rather some sad loser who chose to steal Gone-zo's identity? Dumb like a fox a say!

There is not much to report in the case of England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren who would appear likely to keep his job until at least sometime in June as the side won't play again until then. However sometimes England keeper David "Calamity" James saw fit to criticise McClaren for watching nature videos rather than James's matches at lowly Portsmouth. I don't think we can really blame McClaren for that, can we?

(To be continued...)
  10:29:00 0 comments links to this post
23 April 2007
  Living in a world seen through a Faux News filter
Not only has the Decider(TM) decided to decide to spend a small portion of his valuable time today putting in a plug for "Gone-zo" Gonzales ("This is an honest, honorable man, in whom I have confidence") but he went so far as to say that the earnest young Mexican American's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week "increased [his] confidence" in him.

What bloody channel was he watching?
  15:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  Breaking news
Boris Yeltsin dead at 76!
  15:26:00 0 comments links to this post
  1001 reasons to be a (British Republican) - number 137
Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth II of England and Wales and Elizabeth I of Scotland supports the Arse.
  15:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  Bad news from home
Situation worsening in City of Ballistic Love: at least ten dead in a weekend orgy of violence. Fortunately Newt Gingrich has fortunately told us that none of these people, despite the fact that they were all shot, were killed by guns; they were killed by liberals!

Year to date: 127 homicides - 112 days.
  15:11:00 0 comments links to this post
  FDA knew about spinach and peanut butter problems...
...but did nothing. Whatever happened to "trust but verify"? The FDA seems to have forgotten the second bit.
  14:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  Packing heat
This argument simultaneously befuddles and frightens me. According to this bloke, and trust me he is not alone in thinking this way, the tragedy at Virginia Tech (he doesn't mention NASA) would have been unthinkable if only everyone in the classrooms, the dormitories, the locker rooms and the cafeterias been armed.

Madness. Madness. Madness.
  14:11:00 0 comments links to this post
  Losing his cameo
British billionaire and owner of Virgin Atlantic airlines Sir Richard Branson, as well as many other Virgin things, has a cameo appearance in the most recent Bond film Casino Royale unless, of course, you see the film on a British Airways flight, in which case he doesn't! Virgin and BA have a relationship that is mostly defined by enmity going back to the early 90s. In addition to the disappearance of the face shot of Sir Richard Virgin Air planes appearing in the film have had their tail fins altered as well. A spokesperson for BA is quoted as saying:

"All films are screened. We want to ensure that they contain no material that might upset our customers."

I reckon they don't want to upset the board either!
  14:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  In Fahrenheit would this be a twelve step programme?
Today's Guardian contains a handy little guide to what we can expect as the Earth heats up degree Celsius by degree Celsius entitled "Six steps to hell". The article is essentially a précis of Mark Lynas's book Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet, now out in paperback apparently. Some lowlights -

One degree C:

Drought in the American grain belt - as bad as or worse than the Dustbowl years of the thirties

The snows of Kilimanjaro are gone

Alpine glaciers are melting with significant impact due to rock slides as the ice that holds the mountains together disappears

Coral reefs and plankton at serious risk - their extinction or significant reduction could turn the world's oceans into a desert

Two degrees C:

European suffering under extreme summers similar to the one a few years ago in which 30,000 people died

The Greenland ice sheet is disappearing or gone leading to a rise in sea level of somewhere between half a metre and seven metres.

Andean glaciers will shrink causing severe drought

Loss of snow pack in the Sierra Nevada will create significant problems for Los Angeles and may turn it back to desert

Global food supplies for humans will be dramatically reduced but survivable. Other species will not fair as well and bio-diversity will be severely effected.

Three degrees C

Increasingly large areas of the planet would be rendered uninhabitable by drought and/or heat

Large areas of southern Africa and Australia reduced to desert

The most powerful hurricanes and typhoons would become have an upper limit half a level beyond today's Category Five

Hundreds of millions of refugees will be driven from their homes and their countries by climatic conditions or rising sea levels

Europe and North America seeing a cycle of summer drought and winter flooding with serious impacts on agriculture

Four degrees C

Hundreds of billions of tonnes of CO2 locked up in permafrost, primarily in Siberia, are released into the atmosphere accelerating the greenhouse effects

The Arctic ice cap disappears and along with the last of the polar bear and other arctic species that rely on the ice

Europe will see the return of deserts to Italy, Spain, Greece and Turkey; glaciers in the Alps will be reduced to only the highest peaks. Southern England could see summer temperatures of 45C. (Note: I start to complain about the heat at around 25C!)

Five degrees C

Bad; very, very bad

Six degrees C

Trust me you won't want to be there

This is first time I think I've felt that my age is an advantage. I pity the kids though.
  13:26:00 0 comments links to this post
  Undoubtedly it was the Iranians
The armour of a British Challenger tank has, for the first time, been penetrated by a bomb in Iraq. Demonstrating a gift for understatement Professor Michael Clarke from King's College's Defence Studies centre said:

"Most of the things on a battlefield are not much of a threat to a tank, usually. ..This is worrying, because if there are many of these sorts of very heavy penetrative Improvised Explosive Devices around in the area then no vehicle is safe."

  13:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  Guns don't kill people, bullets don't kill people...
...liberalism kills people. Just ask Newt.
  13:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  Kudos due to the New York Daily News
For they have done something that almost no other American paper has done, including all those dangerous lefty rags that so outrage the right wingnuts such as the NY Times and the Washington Post, by calling a terrorist a terrorist in the form of Luis Posada Carriles!

Well done - now back to work!
  13:05:00 0 comments links to this post
  Rizagate - the plot thickens
On Friday the World Bank broadened the scope of its investigation into the affairs of the Bank's President Paul Wolfowitz to include the employment contracts of a number of neo-con advisers that he brought into the Bank when we took over. In fact things are going so bad for poor Wolfie that he's Bill Clinton's former lawyer. There isn't a dress somewhere that we are about to find out about is there? Does anyone know the whereabouts of Linda Tripp?

There are a number of folks who are defending Mr. Wolfowitz and by extension Ms. Riza, saying that he did all that he could do when he was hired by revealing his romantic relationship with Ms. Riza and arranging for her secondment (with a considerably improved wage packet) to the US Department of State. Why has no one suggested that, if he wished to continue his relationship with Ms. Riza, and truly loved and respected her that he refuse the job and look elsewhere for employment? Surely that would have been the correct thing to do instead of trying to have his cake etc etc.
  12:54:00 0 comments links to this post
  "We've got a warrant lady - your womb belongs to us!"
The Bush administration has in its sweaty little hands a shiny brand new United States Supreme Court decision that allows it ban what it calls "partial birth abortion", even though no such medical term exists. Some members of the pro-choice community are concerned as to what methods they will choose to use to enforce it.
  12:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  Now where could they have learned to act like this I wonder?
Hundreds, perhaps more, of men and women across Africa are being handcuffed, blindfolded and transported to other countries for "interrogation" as evildoers in an obvious imitation of the illegal American tactic of "extraordinary rendition". Many of these victims are refugees who are fleeing war and disorder in places such as Somalia or elsewhere. Authorities in both Kenya and Ethiopia have admitted complicity in these acts which in some cases has included providing those in dentition to American agents for interrogation. Ethiopia has admitted continuing to hold as many as thirty six "suspected terrorists" but has refused to grant the International Committee of the Red Cross access to them. The Kenyan government has said that anyone who feels that the law has been broken is "welcome to file an official complaint".

Those detained have included nationals of Tanzania, Sweden, the Sudan, and the Yemen.
  12:33:00 0 comments links to this post
  Mum's the word
Is the government of Jordan* guilty of censorship after seizing an al-Jazeera videotape on which the former Crown Prince and uncle of the current King, Prince Hassan accused the United States and Saudi Arabia of "destructive" policies in the Middle East? According to a government spokesman

:"We cannot afford to have any misinterpretation of Jordan's stand at this delicate stage...Remember, we live in the Middle East where media outlets are sometimes employed to serve political purposes."

Unlike America of course where "news" outlets could never be used for political purposes.

*Note to tabloid readers in this case we are refering to this Jordan as opposed to this Jordan.
  12:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  101 techniques to get you out of prision - number 45
Get a mate to send a fake fax from the corner shop. It worked for nineteen year old Timothy Rouse as it managed to get him released from the Kentucky Correctional and Psychiatric Center in LaGrange where he was under psychiatric evaluation. The fax, which was not even sent of letterhead and contained a number of misspellings and grammatical errors, was purported to be from the Kentucky Supreme Court. Young Mr. Rouse managed to stay at large for a fortnight before the mistake was noticed and the police found him round his Mum's place.

One wonders if Mr. Rouse is a Guardian reader or perhaps is related in some way to Mohamed Al Fayed.
  12:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  Who in their right mind would drive in Manhattan anyway?
New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg, with whom I occasionally find myself agreeing - on guns for example, has used the occasion of Earth Day to announce a number of "green" measures including, in emulation of London, the imposition of a congestion charge for motor vehicles in lower Manhattan.

In emulation of the American embassy in London I can only hope that the British consulate in New York is preparing plans to identify this pernicious charge as what it truly is, a tax, and therefore refuse to pay it. Hopefully some of the money that is saved in this way will be passed on to London as recompense for amounts that the Yanks refuse to pay and therefore go to lower my council tax!

Time will tell how the Americans, who assume a God given right to drive anywhere they wish, will take to this.
  12:11:00 0 comments links to this post
  Who is in charge? (You get two guesses)
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has ordered the illegal American occupation forces to stop building a wall around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad which the Americans suggest will "unite" the Sunni and Sh'ia. The new American ambassador has said, in reply, that the US will "respect the wishes" of the Iraqis but did not say whether the construction would be halted.
  11:58:00 0 comments links to this post
  A new religious crack on the Iraqi scene?
An inter-religious elopement appears to have led to the massacre of twenty three members of a small religious sect in Mosul in Iraq. Those killed were members of the Yazidi faith, an ancient but little understood belief system which contains elements of Judaism, Zoroasterism, Islam and Christianity.
  11:49:00 0 comments links to this post
  Nigeria on the brink
The oil rich state of Nigeria (are you listening Mr. Bush?) is teetering on the edge of widespread unrest as the results of charges of vote rigging and corruption are levelled against the process by both parties in opposition to the current government and by independent observers both local and international.

The Nigerian government's response is to say "nonsense".

We await further developments. I assume this is making oil traders nervous.
  11:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Bishara flees Israel under threat
Israeli Member of the Knesset Azmi Bishara, chairman of the largely Arab Balad party, has resigned his legislative seat and left the country. Mr. Bishara is the subject of a secret Israeli government investigation against him, believed to focus on his meetings with Syrian officials and might include "consorting with the enemy". As an Israeli Arab leader Mr. Bishara has long been vilified by right wing parties and has faced charges before. By resigning his seat in the Knesset he surrenders his immunity to prosecution.

It is hard to tell what the next step will be but it is likely that Israeli authorities will move quickly to prefer charges against him, in part to deflect attention from their own difficulties with the law, as both the Israeli President and the Finance Minister stand accused.
  11:33:00 0 comments links to this post
  Lolly for Lordships
The British Attorney General and friend to the Prime Minister Lord Goldsmith has repeated that he will not step aside in the decision as to whether or not charges will be made and against whom they might be made in the "Lolly-for-Lordships" Labour funding scandal. Of course we needn't worry about this cosy relationship at all because, in Lord Goldsmith's own words:

"I can assure you and everyone else that, if I am consulted, any decision will be taken objectively, on the evidence, independently of government, because my first duty is to the law, not to party politics."

Well that's that settled then!
  11:16:00 0 comments links to this post
  Victory is bitter
Since this past December drinkers in Lewes, Sussex have been boycotting the Lewes Arms after it was taken over by the Greene King Brewery and the new landlords replaced the local tipple Harvey's Bitter with Greene King IPA. Well to boycotters can now celebrate, at the Lewes Arms if they so wish, as the brewery has now given in and the local speciality is back on the rack. According to one Harvey's loyalist:

"It's wonderful. I've just been back in and it's like getting your home back after wrongful eviction. It was hippies versus suits and we won."

  11:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  Get pissed - get healthy!
It would have thought it could be so easy. I have finally found lifestyle advice that I am willing to follow in the news that fruity cocktails might count as health food! If this turns out to be true getting my five a day allotment of fruit and veg could be as easy as trundling down the pub.

Tiny cocktail brollies optional.
  11:00:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Firth of Filth
The picturesque Firth of Forth near Edinburgh, familiar to golf fans as the body of water you see in the distance when the Open Championship is held at the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, is facing an environmental disaster as millions of litres of raw sewage are being pumped into the water. Local folks have been told not to enter the water, as if the fact that the water is absolutely fucking freezing weren’t disincentive enough, or to pick up dead fish. So my advice is to stick to whiskey and dead fried Mars bars until further notice then.
  10:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 35)
Given the state of play in the Bush administration these days with scandals everywhere and the Decider's approval ratings heading into "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney territory I feel it is a bit harsh to suggest, as some currently are, that the fact that US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales is continuing to desperately hang on to his job is "damaging the White House". Nonetheless he remains the favourite for second place in the who-will-get-sacked-first competition over England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren.

(To be continued...)
  10:20:00 0 comments links to this post
22 April 2007
  Playing good soldier, bad soldier
There are some in the left wing community who will condemn this approach. I prefer to think of it as clever outsourcing!
  13:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  Going solo in theTyrol
Looking for a place to stay in Bad Hofgastein? Well you could do worse than to stay at the Haus Wanker! I wonder if it's single rooms only.
  13:16:00 0 comments links to this post
  The third world returns to America
The United States has the highest infant mortality rate in the industrialised world with a level near that of impoverished and Communist Cuba and far higher than what is found in those creepy Socialist European states. The rate is highest in southern states such as Mississippi but there have been significant improvements in recent decades probably as a result of better access for the poor to medical services through Medicaid and other government programmes. In the recent past however that trend has stalled and even begun to reverse.

Well I say if that is what the market demands, so be it!
  13:07:00 0 comments links to this post
  Another star falls off Old Glory
The state of Washington has become the latest to turn against the combined wishes of God, Jesus and Pat Robertson by enacting a domestic partnership law which will allow same sex partnerships to be recognised. Former Reverend Ted Haggard's position on the issue is clouded in mystery.
  12:54:00 0 comments links to this post
  News from home
The pace of death in Philadelphia continues unabated with five killings on Friday and early Saturday. I should like to make perfectly clear that, all five of those murdered were shot to death, the guns had allegedly involved had absolutely nothing to do with it and, if in fact, the deceased had been more heavily armed these tragedies might never have occurred.
  12:47:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why America's days as a power in the world of science are numbered
The Creation Museum in Kentucky will be open soon and our kids will get to learn that Tyrannosaurus rex was a veggie* and lived with a bit of moulded clay and a homeless rib in the Garden of Eden. This should keep the Nobel Prizes coming our way indefinitely.

*Note: I worry that they have confused the infamous dinosaur with the glam rock band T-Rex whose lead singer wasfamously vegetarian.
  12:34:00 0 comments links to this post
  Happy birthday Jack
I have loved Jack Nicholson as an actor ever since Easy Rider and Five Easy Pieces so I find myself compelled to wish him happy seventieth birthday. He has made surprisingly few stinkers although I must confess that way back when I eagerly awaited the chance to see him with his mentor of sorts, Marlon Brando, in Missouri Breaks only to be bitterly disappointed. I did have a chance to see the film again a few years ago and it was better than I recalled but still less than I wanted to be.

In any case Jack I recommend that you spend the day getting pissed and then go get laid, not that you need my advice in either arena.
  12:26:00 0 comments links to this post
  Of Ug99 et al
The world is currently struggling to feed the 6 billion plus people that inhabit her so it is not good news that crop pests, especially wheat blight, are evolving into ever more virulent strains against which current hybrids are not resistant. The staple crops of billions of human beings are increasingly at risk unless science manages to find a solution.
  12:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  Trouble brewing
Today's election in France has probably received a good deal more press in the West than the elections in Nigeria but the results in Africa's most populous state could lead to a new hot spot of instability on the already troubled continent. Unlike the troubles in Zimbabwe, Darfur, Somalia and elsewhere however as Nigeria is an oil rich country and major energy exporter these problems will probably pique the Decider's curiosity.
  12:11:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 34)
The race for second place in my who-will-get-sacked-first competition continues with US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales a hot favourite to stagger across the finishing line first. He apparently took time off from updating his CV to attend last night's White House Correspondent's dinner; No word as yet as to how that worked out. When he finally has to wrap up his meagre belongings in a handkerchief, tie to to a stick and walk away from his fantasy life in the White House into the "reality based community" I would love to be a fly on the wall for his first job interview. I suspect the most interesting question will be "so Mr. Gonzales it has been a very long time since you had a job that was not gifted to you by the Decider(TM) how prepared do you believe you are to take on a real job?"

All remains quiet on the Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren as his troubles have been eclipsed by the shock "resignation" of ex-England cricket coach and competition winner Duncan Fletcher.

(To be continued...)
  12:00:00 0 comments links to this post
21 April 2007
  Shorter Charles Krauthammer
Lock up the insane but once you let them out they ought to be able to buy guns straightaway.
  16:38:00 0 comments links to this post
  The Fourteenth State
Earlier I was singing the praises of Denis Kucinich for his plans to introduce a bill to impeach "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney.

By the same token I must equally sing the praises of the great state of Vermont as its state Senate passes a resolution calling for the impeachment of the Decider(TM) and his side kick.

Hmmm. Vermont. Isn't that a French word?
  16:29:00 0 comments links to this post
  Attacking the Dalits
Why am I glad that I didn't go to school in India? Because of this story about a head teacher sprinkling Dalit students with gomutra (cow piss) in an attempt to purify them.

As if adolescence wasn't difficult enough already.
  16:21:00 0 comments links to this post
  Why Britain isn't the US yet
We have a newly launched National Stem Cell Network (UKNSCN) to coordinate that research that it is practically illegal and in any case impractical for Americans to do!
  16:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  Heretical Auntie
Over at ever rational Human Events On Line one Susan Easton tells us that the BBC was guilty of heresy, blasphemy and worse in their choice of the Rt. Rev. Jeffrey Johns, Dean of St. Albans, to give a Lenten Talk on Radio 4 before Easter. Reverend Johns had the affront to suggest that the Bible and the Easter story perhaps ought not be taken literally. Clearly we must shut down the BBC immediately and replace it with Pat Robertson. While we are at it we probably should imprison Rev. Johns for something or other.

Would that be sufficient Ms. Easton?
  15:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  Quiet please - I have an endorsement to make
I guess it is time I showed my hand. In the past Presidential race whenever I took one of those "who should you support" quizzes that attempts to align one's political beliefs with the stated positions of the various candidates the answer always came out Dennis Kucinich. So there you have it. I hereby throw my support behind Dennis Kucinich's campaign for US President.

Do I realistically believe that he has a chance to win? No. (Sorry Congressman!) However I believe that it is important that there is at least one candidate who could reasonably be considered to be left of centre.

My support it strengthened by the news that Rep. Kucinich plans to introduce a bill to impeach Vice President "I'm a Big" Dick Cheney next week.
  15:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  Freedom of Choice Act reintroduced
In the wake of the Supreme Court's rightwards lurch US Senator Barbara Boxer (D - CA) and US Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) have reintroduced the Freedom of Choice Act (text - PDF) which would codify a woman's right to contraception as well as to terminate a pregnancy.

It is purely ceremonial of course because there is absolutely no chance of getting a veto proof majority.
  15:10:00 0 comments links to this post
  Counting the dead
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has a brief interview with Dr. Les Roberts, an epidemiologist who was co-author of the study, published in The Lancet, that puts the deaths caused by the illegal invasion of Iraq at around 650,000. It is worth a read.

Dr. Roberts was in Seattle as a last minute replacement as a speaker at the University of Washington for his colleague and report co-author, Dr. Riyadh Lafta, a highly respected Iraqi physician who was denied a visa by the United States. It couldn't be related to the report, do you think?
  15:03:00 0 comments links to this post
  Few restrictions, badly enforced
Under US Federal law the perpetrator of the horrible events at Virginia Tech should have been unable to purchase a gun. But as we all well know that didn't stop him.
  14:54:00 0 comments links to this post
  Maybe he was just a horribly disturbed individual
I haven't watched the video made by the Virginia Tech killer because I do not see how it could enlighten me in any way. I have read enough coverage of it to understand that it represents the ranting of a seriously disturbed individual. There have been millions of words devoted to the perpetrator of the incident across the internets since the tragedy occurred, many of them nonsensical or disturbing in their own right. There are two areas that many on the opposite side of the political spectrum from me are focusing on which I find curious at best.

The first thing that they keep referring to the man as a "Korean" or an "alien" or a "foreigner" as if this somehow explains his crime. Irrespective of his immigration status, which as far as I understand was a legal alien, he had lived in America from the age of eight. To whatever extent formative influences may help to explain his state of mind those influences would be American and not "Korean", "alien" or "foreign". He was, to mine and my country's shame, clearly a product of the United States.

The second element that seems to fascinate, and mislead, many is that both his writings and the video make reference to an "Ismail ax" (there are several permutations of this) and that he also had the phrase written on his arm. Many seem to believe that this reflect the "Islamic" variant spelling of Ishmael who is a figure in the Talmud, the Bible and the Qur'an and that therefore this horrible incident is somehow part of the great Islamist conspiracy against God's chosen country, the United States.

Perhaps investigating some samples might prove helpful. Shall we start with our perennial favourite Pammie who sees the fact that it took nearly twenty four hours to release Cho's identity and that some in the media have found "Ismail Ax" to be a reference to James Fennimore Cooper's novel The Prairie as signs of a clear official conspiracy to suppress the obvious, to Pam, truth of the involvement of Islamofasiterrorism. She seems to believe somehow that Cho, whose father may or may not have worked in Saudi Arabia at one time, was some sort of junior Manchurian candidate when he arrived on American shore at the age of seven or eight. It must be terribly difficult for Pammie to live inside that crowded head of hers!

Over at Infidels are Cool, a site I'd not stumbled on before day, the blogger at first seems certain that the killer was a Muslim and sees shades of Pammie's conspiracy in the fact that the damned liberal main stream media isn't "following up" on the Ismail Ax lead for fear of "what they will find". Later when the tape reveals Cho ranting about Jesus and crucifixion he (or she) decides that the killer probably didn't have a religion. At least is his mind Cho certainly wasn't Christian.

And on a subject as important as this to all American and indeed all the world would the Freepers disappoint us? No they would not. A few choice snippets:

"I wonder if he was in contact with any jihadist influences? With a name such as that it sure sounds that way."

"NBC had a news 'exclusive' they held until their evening broadcast...They all want a 'scoop' and are playing this for ratings. Wonder if any of them will sit on a bombshell until May sweeps."

"KEY POINT: God's covenant was made with Abraham and extended through Isaac, not Ishmael."

"Or as Al Sharpton would say: What did Ishmael Aks?"

"Interesting, isn’t the the twisting they put the logic through to avoid saying Ismail was traditionally the father of the Moslems by leaving the false impression Ismail was the father of the Jews. The father of the Jews was Abraham’s second son, Isaac...'The angel of the LORD said to her further, 'Behold, you are with child, and you will bear a son; and you shall call his name Ishmael, because the LORD has given heed to your affliction.'...'He will be a wild donkey of a man, his hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him; and he will live to the east of all his brothers.'

"The crew on Brit’s show tonight were quick to cut Charles Krauthammer off tonight when he pointed out the similarity of the killer’s video to the videos that the jihadis always film to be played after they blow themselves up. And his disparaging remarks about Christianity certainly would fit the scenario of jihadi influence."
I am glad that someone said this.

And I have to include this one, not because it is interesting but because it is linguistically challanged:

"God promiced(sic) Abraham and Sarah that they would have a son. They begin to get old and they feared thier(sic) chances of having a child was(sic) passing. Instead of having faith in Gods(sic) promice(sic), they decided to take matters in thier(sic) own hands. Sarah brought thier(sic) 'handmaiden' for Abraham to be with, so she could bare(sic) them a son. She had Abrahams(sic) son and they named him Ishmael. Then Sarah got pregnant even though she was old. Sarah and Abraham decided to cast Ishmeal(sic) and his Mother out. His Mother was arab. God gave all the promices(sic) to Issac(sic), not Ishmael. Issac(sic) is Jewish. Ishmael is arab. Issac is the true son that God promiced(sic) to Abraham and Sarah...To this day this is why the arabs are jealous of the Jews. Its the reason for the everlasting hatred they have for the Jews. They both claim Abraham as thiersic) Father. Even though Ishmael is from Abraham, God gave all the promices(sic) to Issac not Ishmael.

Elsewhere Cassandra sees the same conspiracy of silence in the media as the others.

The American Thinker seems to think that Cho was driven to kill by Nikki Giovanni or perhaps by the "Lesbian love stories of Professor Matthew Vollmer" or even Karl Marx or the US Civil Rights Commission or someone who speaks Spanish and let us not forget the post-Modernists! (Somehow he seems to have missed Moby Dick out. I am sure he will amend this oversight eventually.)

And there's lots more sensible thinking out there so, kiddos, get searching!
  12:55:00 0 comments links to this post
  Can the Pope do this?
I recognise that I am not an expert on these matters but I would have thought that Heaven v Hell decisions would be within God’s and that her decision would be final. Therefore I am confused by today's reports that the Pope has decided that unbaptised babies don't have tohang out in Limbo waiting for the Rapture. Even if this is true does it mean that they did up until now and that there is a mass migration of billions and billions of dead baby souls currently underway? It's not as if they were going to have to wait much longer in any case.
  12:34:00 1 comments links to this post
  Faux News' faux optimism
They go scouring about into the depths of the Paul "I'd Like to Recommend my Lover" Wolfowitz scandal and think that they have unearthed something positive. The article is headlined "Pentagon Report: Wolfowitz Did Not Abuse Position by Recommending Girlfriend for Contract".
  12:30:00 0 comments links to this post
  How do you spell "suuuuuuuuuuurge"?
Has the Decider(TM) decided to decide to keep the higher level of American troops from his incredibly superior strategic move, aka "The Surge", in Iraq for longer than he has told us so far?
  12:27:00 0 comments links to this post
  America's guns - a view from a foreigner
In the Guardian today Gary Younge, currently "embedded" in America, explains why even the recent tragic events will do nothing to change American attitudes or laws relating to guns. Here are a couple of paragraphs I found particularly telling (emphasis mine):

"By Thursday CNN was reduced to gleaning insight from the woman who drives the student shuttle bus and screening Cho's rambling rants. They beeped out the expletives as though the swearing was the most offensive thing about their content.

The videos made Cho the source of much revulsion but proved unworthy of moral panic. Some commentators tried to emphasise his Korean birth as somehow relevant to the slaughter. But Cho was made in America, every bit as much as his elder sister who had gone to Princeton. True he was an immigrant, who came to the country at the age of eight. But his parents were "good" immigrants - legal, solvent and self-employed. At home they had been poor. Now they'd put one child through an Ivy League college with money from their dry-cleaning business; their story owed more to Ellis Island than the Rio Grande.

  12:14:00 0 comments links to this post
  Guantánamo non grata
Today's Guardian sees the publication of an extract from Guantánamo lawyer Clive Stafford Smith's new book Bad Men about his experiences. The extract focuses on publications that were prohibited by the US authorities, generally without explanation, and the absurd censorship of his own notes and communications. Publications that he was no allowed to take into the camp or provide to his clients included:

National Geographic magazine (in defence of the Yanks I must mean that one of the issues did feature an article on the construction of an atomic weapon)

Scientific American magazine

Runner's World clearly a dangerous and seditious publication

The African-American Slave by Frederick Douglass

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe

An anthology of First World War poetry

Law books including one which discussed the rights of prisoners (one of his clients was in the process of studying for his law exams)

Hidden Agendas by John Pilger

Blair's Wars by John Kampfner

An Honourable Deception? New Labour, Iraq and the Misuse of Power by former British Minister Claire Short

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow (we wouldn't want the prisoners to get any funny ideas now would we?)

The New Dinkum Aussie Dictionary (????)

Last but not least Arabic translations of Puss in Boots, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk and Beauty and the Beast. (An FBI agent explained the banning of these by saying that "you know that Arabic script is full of squiggles, and it can easily hide messages to the prisoners".)

Eventually the attorneys were barred from bringing any printed materials to their clients.

Even more curious is Mr. Stafford Smith's discussion of the process he had to go through with the notes he would take during discussions with his clients. He was not allowed to take these with him but rather to enclose them in an envelope marked "Secret" which the camps authorities would post, via regular mail, to an (secret) office in Washington where all state secrets, including any mention of torture or mistreatment, were excised. He also had to submit for censoring any communication he had with anyone else which touched on his discussions with his clients (attorney client privilege being the least of many rights discarded) including a letter that he sent to the Prime Minister. In this missive, in which he included descriptions of allegations of torture against two British citizens, he also included the statement:

"Anything that has been censored or blacked out in this letter, your close allies in the United States don't think you should be allowed to hear."

When returned from Washington all allegations of mistreatment had been carefully removed, undoubtedly to protect Mr. Tony's delicate sensibilities, but statement about censorship had curiously been left in.
  11:36:00 0 comments links to this post
  NASA shootings - guns not involved!
Yesterday's fatal shootings* at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Johnson Space Center will undoubtedly be overshadowed by the even more tragic events at Virginia Tech a few days before. I guess we will have to file this incident, in which a contract employee managed to smuggle a hand gun into an allegedly secure Federal facility, in the already overcrowded guns-don't-kill-people folder.

*Note: I found the sub head to this Houston Chronicle article ("It's not known why contractor took gun to work") curious. You would think that people in Texas would understand that he did so because it was his God given right and that by doing so he was helping to keep the workplace safe!
  11:28:00 0 comments links to this post
  Schadenfreude alert!
Scotland Yard has finally turned over the Lolly-for-Lordships case file over to the Crown Prosecution Service. It is believed that charges could be brought against several individuals including New Labour's chief fundraiser, Lord Levy and Tony Blair aide Ruth Turner. Those two, along with Sir Christopher Evans, a Labour party backer, remain on police bail following their arrests during the inquiry.

This news is unlikely to help Labour's fading chances in the upcoming Scottish elections.
  11:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  Old Stone keeps on rolling
Bill Wyman retired from the Rolling Stones around fourteen years ago but, approaching seventy, he still leads an exciting and enterprising life. This past week, whilst his old band mates were suffering from some bad publicity over their plans to get some 300 Serbian horses stoned he was announcing the release of the exciting new Bill Wyman Signature metal detector.

For those of you significantly older and/or sadder than me you can get one here!
  11:01:00 0 comments links to this post
  The new Baghdad - an estate agent's eyeview
"Welcome to Adhamiyah Estates, an exicting new development in the heart of bustling Baghdad, the City that Never Sleeps. Life in this gated community brings to you many of the exiciting features of Twenty-First century living such as twenty four hour security provided by a mixture of the American army, the Iraqi police and Balckwater Security while still maintaining all of the quaintness of the days of yore (intermittent water supplies, non-functioning drains and little or no electricy supply). The village-like atmosphere of Adhamiyah Estates features a tasteful 3.7 metre hall wall which will unite you with, rather than divide you from, your Sh'ia neighbours.

Conveniently located close the heart of this exciting, multi-ethnic city there will be no long and dangerous commute to your job for those of you lucky enough to have one.

Properties are moving fast so don't hesitate to ring us for an appointment or just drop in Sunday through Thursday 9AM to 5PM.

Brought to you by a-Cheney Homes Ltd, a Halliburton company.
  10:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 33)
I realise that the shocking come from behind victory of England cricket coach Duncan Fletcher has taken some of the shine off of our inaugural who-gets-sacked-first competition. Nonetheless for those of you who still care we shall continue to follow the fortunes of the two remaining runners; US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales & England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren.

In the "Gone-zo" stakes his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday has failed to impress, well, anyone. Seventy one times he said that he couldn't recall details of his involvement in the firings of the US Attorneys. This has led many Republican politicians in Washington to fail to recall why they ever supported him. Even Faux News was unable to shore up his support. Enjoy the weekend Mr. Gonzales. It may be your the last of your government employment.

Elsewhere there is nothing at all to report on the McClaren front and England's next match is not until June.

(To be continued...)
  10:32:00 0 comments links to this post
20 April 2007
  "and the land of the free" - one in an occasional series
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."



  15:56:00 0 comments links to this post
  The arid antipodes
Australia is suffering the ravages of its worst drought in living memory, its roots going back ten years or more; water restrictions are starting to bite and causing conflict between agriculture and urban / suburban communities. A taste of things to come perhaps?
  15:22:00 0 comments links to this post
  Darwin responsible for Virginia Tech massacre
I kid you not that is the premise put forward by one Dr. Grady McMurtry who postures himself as a creation evangelist whatever that might be.

It takes all kinds I reckon. Why it does is, I think, a valid question.
  14:26:00 0 comments links to this post
  Maybe seventy one is his lucky number
Taking full advantage of the Ronald Reagan "I Can't Recall" (at least Ronnie had a reason!) defence US Attorney General Alberto "Gone-zo" Gonzales claimed on seventy one separate occasions during yesterday's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that he could neither recall nor remember incidents about which he was asked. Not really much of a lawyer is he really?

I hope he didn't get lost on the way home. Maybe we should tag him.
  14:20:00 0 comments links to this post
  Saddam's WMD found by Daily Mail columnist!
The surprisingly un-sane Melanie Phillips has finally found Saddam's WMDs. They were there all along and we just didn't look in the right places. She bases her scoop on information from someone named Dave Gaubatz who was part of the team that found them in the aftermath of the now-legal (based on this new information) invasion of Iraq. He told the Iraq Study Group where he had found them and told them to come with heavy equipment to unearth them. Showing how far up the chain the conspiracy to conceal this important find went the ISG never showed and a Iraqis, Syrians and Russians dug them up and took them to Syria.

It is such a relief to know, at long last, that the Decider(TM) was right all along!

For those of you who remain incredulous I suggest that you visit Mr. Gaubatz's website so that you can better understand the profound nature of his credibility. If I may quote a short excerpt from the home page here just to give you a taste:

"GUN LAWS: If law abiding American citizens (not aliens or illegals) were authorized & encouraged to carry guns, CHO SUENG-HUI (murderer) and other cowards like him, would lose their courage. Today the parents, family, friends, and America, would not be grieving the loss of 32 innocent people. The cowards such as HUI, gang members, illegal aliens, and terrorists would sink into the sewage drains they come from. They live on our fears because they know we are defenseless."

See. Who do you believe Dave or your lying eyes?

I think that all of Western civilisation, especially the American speaking bits, owe a great debt of gratitude to Ms. Phillips and Mr. Gaubatz, don't you?
  13:41:00 0 comments links to this post
  How hard did Karl Rove have to work to make 5M emails disappear?
Rather than trust me, listen to the experts on the near impossibility of "accidentally" losing even one email.
  12:47:00 0 comments links to this post
  McCain's musical comedy
Senator and erstwhile Presidential candidate John McCain was caught on camera doing a fairly poor Beach Boys imitation with his version of "Bomb Iran". Later he told critics to "get a life" and belittled the suggestion that it was impossible to be insensitive to Iranis.

The bad news in all of this is that there is a terrifyingly large segment of the US population to which this is sensible behaviour.
  12:29:00 0 comments links to this post
  Haggard heading south
Disgraced former minister and claimed ex-homosexual Ted Haggard has moved from his home in Colorado Springs to seek a fresh start in Phoenix.

If the ex-Reverend reads this post I think he might find this website of considerable use to him in adjusting to his new surroundings.
  12:25:00 0 comments links to this post
  Our kind of terrorist
A court in Texas has allowed confessed terrorist, albeit known as a "militant" in the American press, Luis Posada Carriles to walk free on bail. The American government refuses to extradite him to either Cuba or Venezuela citing concerns as to whether Sr. Posada would receive a fair trial. (They must be worried that he is being extradited to the Guantánamo Bay Beach and Leisure Resort!) Both countries wish to try him on charges related to the bombing of a Cuban plane in 1976 in which 73 people, mostly Cuban and Venezuelan, died.

In a more recent development Nicaragua has announced that they plan to seek Posada's extradition hoping that a trial in a more neutral country would be acceptable to the US. I rather doubt it.
  12:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  From the Guardian
Blumenthal on Wolfowitz. Read it.
  12:08:00 0 comments links to this post
  A cry for help?
The Decider(TM) speaking at Tipp City (?), OH about the tragic events at Virginia Tech warns all Americans to be ever vigilant in the hope of prevent further incidents. He told the audience that

"when people see somebody or know somebody who is exhibiting abnormal behavior, you do something about it, to suggest that somebody take a look".

And who, I ask you, has evidenced odder behaviour than the current Oval Office occupant himself? Is it time for an intervention?

To strengthen my case the White House website shows us the Decider(TM) writing on a dry erase board with a permanent marker. I can just hear the school's custodian seeing that and saying "that stupid fucking son of a bitch".
  11:57:00 0 comments links to this post
  "I hope you know this is for your own good"
Just like a parent beating an unruly child with a strap or a switch, back in the 60s or 70s when such things were allowed, and explaining not very patiently to the child that each stroke hurts the beater more than it hurts the beatee, American Defense Secretary Robert Gates is telling the Iraqis that it about time that stepped up to the plate and implemented the flawed American plan. If it works it will be proof of the genius of the Decider(TM) and his minions. If it fails it will be because of the failures of the Iraqi people.
  11:51:00 0 comments links to this post
  What a great idea!
Perhaps as part of the surge or perhaps not, American soldiers are building a three mile wall, or maybe they call it a fence, around a Sunni neighbourhood in Baghdad in order to protect them from evil-doers.

After all we know, from experience, that building a wall around a group of people, for their own safety, has always worked out rather well.
  11:43:00 0 comments links to this post
  Has anyone seen Rod Serling lately?
Because I think that the creator of The Twilight Zone might have had something to do with this.
  11:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  Better than instant!
I'm sure we've all had a cup of coffee, usually around at a diner or other greasy spoon at four in the morning after a night out, which has tasted just a bit like soap. Thanks to the ingenuity of some entrepreneurial scientists he can skip the coffee and go straight to the soap!
  11:37:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wolfie's day off
Embattled World Bank President and hose-ially challenged neo-con darling Paul Wolfowitz failed to attend an important World Bank meeting yesterday as speculation swirls around him that he is about to "resign".

If he shows up with a sick note to explain yesterday's absence I would check the handwriting against a sample from this woman.
  11:33:00 0 comments links to this post
  Beware of the ice backs
Someone better warn the Minutemen that they need to start planning to set up operations in Alaska. If the Russians actually go ahead and build a tunnel to Alaska under the Bering Strait how long will it be before Slavic, undoubtedly Communist illegal alien infiltrators find a way across to steal American jobs, despoil chaste and abstemious American virgins and pollute American minds?
  11:23:00 0 comments links to this post
  In the City of Brotherly Love
What is happening in the old home town? It was once the world’s most prominent hot bed of republicanism (as in “down with the royals” as opposed to “up with the Bushes”). Earlier this year the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall popped in, possibly to buy some organic scrapple at the Reading Terminal Market.

Yesterday it was the turn of ex-royal family member and ginger headed publicity hound Fergie to stop by.

Who is next? Who cares?
  11:18:00 0 comments links to this post
  Don't forget to wash your hands and remove your shoes
A hospital in Sweden is planning to prohibit staff from wearing plastic clogs as the hospital believes that the footwear is responsible for an increasing number of incidents in which electronic medical equipment is being "zapped" by static electricity.

But they come in so many lovely colours!
  11:07:00 0 comments links to this post
  A well intended very bad idea
The European Union has taken steps to make incitement to "racial hatred" as well as justification or gross trivialisation of genocide crimes punishable by imprisonment.

I have no problem with making speech that incites violence; irrespective of whether it has a racial, religious or ethnic dimension; a criminal act but how does one define "hatred"? Where does one draw the line? Will one still be able to incite "deep dislike" or "general distaste"?

It is a bad, bad, bad idea but no there' will be no stopping it I imagine.
  11:00:00 0 comments links to this post
  Besting the mentor
Since the re-introduction of the death penalty in Iraq the country has leapt ahead of its guiding light and inspiration, the United States, in the world execution league tables to fourth position. It trails only those other liberal democracies China, Iran and Pakistan.

The full Amnesty International report may be found here.
  10:50:00 7 comments links to this post
  Number 11 does Number 10's spring cleaning
It seems that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is preparing Number 10 Downing Street for his imminent and seemingly unstoppable arrival by consigning some of Mr. Tony's worst ideas to the rubbish bin. The most recent example that we know of, thanks to leak in the Treasury somewhere, is that Blair's plan to privatise welfare provision is now just a piece of history.
  10:40:00 0 comments links to this post
  Gone-zo watch (day 32)
Before we discuss Gone-zo's big day out up on Capitol Hill we need to announce the surprise winner of our who-gets-sacked-first competition. Brash outsider, England cricket coach Duncan Fletcher, has stunned the gambling community with a strong, late run from way back in the field to snatch the much coveted first annual Yank in London who-gets-sacked-first award. As Mr. Fletcher did not even get a look in at the opening of the competition yesterday's announcement of his resignation came as a complete shock to many. May I offer my congratulations to you Mr. Fletcher? You may stop by anytime to collect your YIL cup.

Now on to the remaining contestants for those of you who made an each way bet.

Yesterday US Attorney General and Bush succubus Antonio "Gone-zo" Gonzales's made the trek to testify, under oath, before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Even Senators that used to be his mates, such as my own Senator the cowardly and inconsistent Arlen Specter, gave him a rather hard time but, proving his considerable courage in the face of his own incompetence, he has vowed to stay. Even the good folks over at the National Review found his performance less than convincing. I wonder if Gone-zo took a baloney sandwich with him as his packed lunch.

Barring unusual events it would seem almost certain to me that at this juncture England football manager Steve "I've never really coached a winning team and it doesn't look like I'm going to start now" McClaren will end this competition mired in last place. Who would have thought that even a few weeks ago!

(To be continued...)
  10:19:00 0 comments links to this post
  Pat Robertson at the wipe board...
...explains the Virginia Tech tragedy. Who would have thought it was as simple as this?
  10:17:00 0 comments links to this post
19 April 2007
  Best hurry up with that oil law Maliki...
...because there is more oil to steal in Iraq than we thought.
  17:39:00 0 comments links to this post
  Some alarmism is easier to see than others
According to this story Republicans in the US House of Representatives see alarmism in discussions related to climate change.

Funny that they can identify alarmism now isn't it? They never managed to see it in any of the specious claims that the Decider(TM) and his minions used to lie the world into an unnecessary war. Maybe they're just learning.
  17:13:00 0 comments links to this post
  Well they wouldn't be secret then would they?
Right thinking Senators joined together to prevent the Decider(tm) from having to disclose where he is keeping the evil doers from the "War on Terra" (void in the UK).
  16:34:00 0 comments links to this post
  Will Keith and Ronnie stay with the horses?
News comes to us that 300 racehorses may have to be drugged during a Rolling Stones concert in Belgrade; in celebration thereof I give you "Wild Horses" live in Rio 2006.

  16:09:00 0 comments links to this post
  Beneath contempt
Keith Olbermann gives us the World's Most Heartless wingnuts whose comments are so despicable that they do not repeating. I will make an exception for the comments of John Derbyshire who essentially accuses the students, including those who died, of failing to display the same unrivalled heroism that Mr. Derbyshire has demonstrated everyday since the onset of the "War on Terra".

From his bedroom. In his dancing elephant PJs.
  15:53:00 0 comments links to this post
  Extra! New mass killing at school!
The tortured bodies of seventeen dead men (either 0.53 or 0.32 VTEs - see post below) were found in a schoolyard last week. Oh, wait, they were only Iraqis. Never mind.
  15:50:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wal-Mart's loop-canyon
Because anything you can drive2.3 billion USD through sure as hell ain't a loophole.
  15:47:00 0 comments links to this post
  Ironic Ann?
It is possible that the anorexic evil-tongued one, Ann Coulter, is attempting to be ironic in her latest effort but then again probably not.

She does make a reference to "Adam" and "apples" though and also tells us that "deranged individuals" exist. Are either or both of these self-referential and self-deprecating?
  15:44:00 0 comments links to this post
  And now a public service message
For all of those good Christians out there who are always telling me that all life is sacred I would like to remind you that there were 7.28 Virginia Tech's across Iraq yesterday; 5.72 VTEs (Virginia Tech Equivalents) in Baghdad alone*. Please adjust your prayers and concerns accordingly.

*Note: for those of you utilising the three fifths rule for brown people as enshrined (to our great pride) in the US Constitution these figures are 4.37 and 3.43 respectively.
  15:32:00 0 comments links to this post
  Maybe it is just me...
...but this product of right wing Judicial Watch strikes as a rather misleading poll.

I think most Americans, like me (I don't get to say that very often do I?), are mildly or greatly concerned about corruption in public office and that it does not alter a great deal irrespective of what individual is holding which office.
  15:21:00 0 comments links to this post
  Wherein I introduce a new (and I think potentially important) new term
Yesterday's disappointing but predictable US Supreme Court ruling allowing a ban on certain late term abortions to stand has set me to thinking about what the Decider's true legacy will be.

During his tenure so far he has radically reshaped the Federal bench, including and rather obviously after yesterday, the Supreme Court. For the most part these are not old fashioned small "c" conservatives but radicals with an agenda who hold no special love of stare decisis. We can expect long standing precedents to fall in the areas of civil liberties including privacy, abortion and women's rights and loss of restraint over government intrusion. The rapidly dissolving divided between religion and state will probably be swept aside. Corporate power will grow and regulatory power (local, state and Federal) will be dramatically reduced.

This is the brave new world that we will have to live with long after the Decider(TM) has returned to lonely ignominy on his country estate in Texas. (He hasn't got horses so it definitely IS NOT a ranch!)

I have decided that in the future I shall refer to this phenomenon as "Bushite Occupied Government" or BOG for short. (For Americans you should look here for a British definition of "bog".) As a derivative form we may wish to refer to that portion of the internets devoted to salivating over all things Bush and Bush-like as the "Bog-o-sphere".

Don't forget BOG is everywhere so tread carefully.
  15:02:00 0 comments links to this post
  Keeping the missing emails missing
I am not a lawyer but I am a logical person. On the basis of logic and an assumption that logic must play some part, however small, in the law I do not understand how the White House would even attempt to make the argument that email accounts in the Republic National Committee domain which supposedly only existed to keep political activity separate and isolated from executive activity may be withheld from Congress on the basis of executive privilege.

Maybe they teach 'em different down at the Regent University School of Law!
  14:47:00 0 comments links to this post
  Tolerance - Indiana style
Plans for participation in the National Day of Silence in support of gay rights and in opposition to bullying of gays were disrupted at New Castle Chrysler* High School
in Indiana after someone allegedly threatened to bring a gun to school. I am assuming, and I could be entirely wrong here, that the individual concerned isn't a NDS supporter!

*Note: I know that I have lived out of the country for quite a while now, I'm in my fifteenth year, but do high schools have sponsors now just like sports stadia do?
  14:32:00 0 comments links to this post
  When Teresa Tomeo talks, we listen!
I think the headline to this story would more accurately have been "32 Killed by Video Games at Virginia Tech".
  14:23:00 0 comments links to this post
  Republican family values
First it was my (former) personal representative in Congress, "Crazy" Curt Weldon and his daughter and now it is Californian Republican Congressman John Doolittle and his wife. I guess the family that grafts together stays together!
  14:12:00 0 comments links to this post
  I hope nothing really bad happens to them...
...nonetheless I am having a hard time working up any sympathy for these Canadian seal hunters that have managed to get themselves trapped in pack ice off the coast of Newfoundland. Maybe just a little frostbite.
  12:53:00 0 comments links to this post
  This could prove interesting
British science minister Malcolm Wicks has suggested that vulnerable older people ("older" now means older-than-me) could be tagged and tracked by satellite to make sure they don't go missing. This could lead to some interesting and unforgettable conversations in households up and down the country including something like this:

"Terry will you go out and bring your father home right now please! I just checked the GPS and he's gone down the knocking shop again. Whatever will the neighbours think?"

  12:46:00 0 comments links to this post
  You never know what you might learn
Exciting news! Stephen L. Johnson, Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, is going to host "Ask the White House" tomorrow at 15:00 EDT live on the internets. This is an extra special treat for Earth Day.

If you have a question for the undoubtedly able and light of his feet Mr. Johnson you can leave it for him here.
  12:41:00