HAPPY NEW YEAR!

HAPPY 2010 to one and all. I'm looking positively into the new year determined to make it a good one. I've been off the air, so to speak, with festivities and family fun. Will attend to the matter of pontificating later.

TWENTY TEN - Well I never!

Tony Blair and his Iraq notions!

So Tony Blair only had a "notion" that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the Middle East region and to the rest of the world. Well I have a "notion" that Blair is a dissembler, a deceiving spinner and a man whose politics were mainly built on the "notion" that all the people he met whilst gallivanting around the world would help him become a multi-millionaire. The bonused bankers achieve wealth through making money out of thin air. He has made money out of hot air.

These are "notions" but what the hell. We all have them these days. Nobody has much to say for politicians mainly because they have too many "notions". I'm glad Blair's gone. He was always on the make with his "well, yeah, so" type of approach to it all.

The fact that he sleeps at night is because he believes his own bullshit. I doubt if he ever will get round to thinking in any other way. What a life, eh?

Bats in Quentin Davies' belfry!

Quentin Davies is an MP who left the Tories in a huff so he could dance to the New Labour tune. Having rubbished Gordon Brown's stewardship of the economy as Chancellor, he praises him as Prime Minister. I once canvassed for the man when he was describing himself as John Davies to the more humble voters of Birmingham. I introduced him to a particularly bewildered high-rise council flat dweller as John Quentin Davies (which was the name the agent was touting!) whereupon Davies had a go at me saying that he didn't want the man to think he was some kind of double-barrelled toff.

So it comes as no surprise that his bell tower needs attention. Too many political bats crapping in the thing. He has denied trying to claim on expenses the £20,700 cost of rebuilding the tower at his constituency home. As usual, it's all a misunderstanding. A bit like the whole of the New Labour regime's time in office. Blair was good at misunderstandings! "Well, yeah, look!" kind of stuff.

I haven't been proved wrong. This nonsense will rumble on and on until someone gives Brown a kick up the backside.

Is CPS wanting to be judge and jury?

It seems to me that the Crown Prosecution Service is never satisfied by the outcome of court cases which involve them taking people to court over politically correct offences. The case over the Christian hotelier and the Muslim convert woman has ended with the judge dismissing the case. Now that more facts have emerged pehaps I was hasty in putting forward a judgement. However, it does appear that the two sides were acting like two dormant volcanoes suddenly erupting on the same day!

My attention was drawn to a comment by CPS senior lawyer Nicola Inskip. She said of the case, "We were satisfied that there was sufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction that a religiously aggravated offence should be charged." Implying that she felt the Christian couple was at fault not the woman who was a Muslim convert. They basically took sides and came down in favour of the Muslim.

Each time that a case like this is thrown out the CPS offers up a whining comment that they were right and that, by implication, the judge, and jury if involved, were wrong. It is a sign that the infection of political correctness or more actually political incorrectness has invaded almost every part of our civil structure. It is insiduous and somehow we must put a stop to it.

Christian hotelier 'abused' Muslim guest

The BBC reports that at a court hearing it was revealed that a Muslim woman was asked by a Christian hotelier if she was a terrorist and a murderer because she was wearing Islamic dress. The hotelier is alleged to have been abusive using threatening or insulting words which were religiously aggravated. And there's more!

The man may be from a Christian background but he appears to have left all traces of Christian charity at the back of his brain. An organisation called The Christian Institute demonstrated in support of the couple outside the court. Did they indeed? "By their fruits ye shall know them comes" to mind.

Bugger the bankers!

In a time of deep recession, brought about in part by the headlong scramble by some bankers to make money out of loans that were past their subprime value, it would be nice to think that a kind of patriotic move might not go amiss. The bonus greed currently sweeping the City of London is very unsavoury to say the least. Angela Knight, she of the British Bankers' Association, whines on amount bankers leaving the country if they don't get more money. Even Croesus would have thought better! Well, if they are so hellbent on going, let them go. As George V might have said on his deathbed if confronted by these blackmailing types "Bugger the bankers!". Quite so.

No wedded bliss under New Labour regime

In some ways the New Labour regime mirrors the US Episcopal Church as some kind of secular PC alternative. They are all for a bizarre idea of equality, thrusting alternative lifestyles at us in place of married bliss and generally failing to help the disadvantaged and the wronged because they have a blanket approach to it all.

New Labour heard that some sub-continental brides had been sold into marital slavery and abuse in order to obtain cash dowries for the grasping grooms. At first this was dismissed because no self-respecting New Labour apparatchik could bring himself/herself to accept anything untoward from the Asian community. Then they were forced to admit that forced marriages needed acting upon. Of course, being New Labour, they couldn't construct an act that dealt with the problem. No, they had to include every race, creed and human being possible into their law. So it is that totally innocent people get caught up in this legal minefield.

The Home Office is diligently applying the rules and regulations with vigour. British bride Amber Aguilar, from Friern Barnet, north London, faced the dilemma of having to choose between her career ambitions in the UK or living abroad with her Chilean husband because of the policy. The ‘heartbroken’ 18-year-old chose to live with 19-year-old Diego Andres Aguilar Quila, who had to leave the country recently after his student visa expired. The Home Office has been labelled heartless. I'd say they were just a bunch of jobsworths with a penchant for momentary lapses into jobsworthlessnesses (like losing computer data!).

It is not what Britain should be about. The sooner this lot go the better for all of us!

Pompous little Miliband

All environmental eyes are on Copenhagen. Some scientists do not think the global warming phenomenon is as bad as the majority of climate scientists do. They have studied the matter and concluded certain points and opinions. That is OK. They may be right, they may be wrong. I am no scientist so don't know if all the perceived dangers are rock solid true.

What I do know is that in an adult debate people's sincerely held views should be respected. The Milliband brothers appear to be some kind of reborn Zealots, keenly rubbishing opponents' opinions with a mixture of highbrow disdain and vulgar put-downs.

So it was that Ed Miliband pompously dismissed Lord Lawson yesterday with "I think you are being profoundly irresponsible by saying we can stick our heads in the sand and just hope this thing goes away. It's not going to." Nobody is taking the ostrich approach. Lord Lawson responded by saying it was also profoundly irresponsible not to allow an "honest, rational, reasoned debate".

And that is the nub. Miliband is like some preacher on speed. All he spouts is gospel truth to be believed hook like and sinker. Anyone else who has a contrary view must be made to look foolish and ridiculed. I don't know if Lord Lawson's views hold credence but he has a right to express them without pompous little prats sounding all prophetic!

People in glass pools shouldn't sink any lower!

The Episcopal Church seems hellbent on being the modern day version of the Synagogue of the Libertines. All things to all men, women, and 101 genders in between. The episcopacy is modelled in their image and for their designs and fancies. Out goes anything much that St.Paul spoke about. Sin is now an optional extra in the polity of the church. In fact, the only sin that can be committed in the Episcopal Church is gainsaying the liberal agenda.

It's a farflung experience from the days when the church had some moral backbone. Now the essence of faith is that there are virtually no wrongs that can be done other than be a follower of traditional doctrine.

Mary Glasspool has been elected as a female prelate in the diocese of Los Angeles. Exactly what the angels think is not credited to the shinanigans. Ms Glasspool is the very model of a modern Episcopalian. She is also a lesbian in a 21 year-old relationship. Her lifestyle is at odds with traditional teaching. She has turned the received wisdom of understanding what sin is into a rejection of the faith in favour of her own views on moral conduct. It is far more than the Pick 'N Mix at Woolworths. This is like walking into the old Woolies and demanding that the selection of chocolates and candies on offer be removed so that a whole new range can be brought in just for personal satisfaction.

When Jesus met with the woman caught in adultery he forgave her. Her accusers had fled not willing to condemn her because of their own sins. He said to her, "Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more". The whole thing about that was not sinning anymore. It is a state of being seemingly lost on the hierachy of the diocese of Los Angeles.

This has caused a stir in the press. They love a good contretemps in the church. But the one comment that is a bit rich is from Canon Giles Fraser, Chancellor of St Paul's and one of the founders of the liberal Inclusive Church network. He says it "is another nail in the coffin of Christian homophobia". Utter tripe, but there you go. Those opposed to rewriting the Faith are not phobic of anyone, but want sinfulness rightly explained and explored.

I do not come to the blogosphere as some paragon of virtue. We all do things we should not. But I would be very much against getting my personal baggage encoded as some sort of new sacramental doctrine for others to follow.

I see that the Archbishop of Canterbury is somewhat uneasy about the whole thing. Difficulty for him is that he has helped to get the door open a bit. He's now trying to put a brand new self-closing mechanism on it. Best really to let the Episcopal Church leave the Anglican Communion so they can follow their hearts and desires in a new direction. I don't have anything against Ms Glasspool and her beliefs. Everyone is entitled to freedom of expression and belief. I just don't want her trying to force me to follow in her footsteps.

Tony Blair lied about Iraq says Bob Ainsworth

Bob Ainsworth knows what's what. Stick a pin in him and he warbles about almost anything. He's got two chips on his shoulder (a bit like John Prescott) which are that he came from humble beginnings and that he thinks people take him for a fool. Well, I for one don't knock him for either. Good on him getting to be Defence Secretary. Just as the Earl of Onslow suggested to Prescott that he should feel proud of his achievements rather than to feel irked, the same goes for Bob.

My beef with Mr. Ainsworth is this. He knows more than he is letting on. Or at least letting on to those that should be knowing about his thoughts and his views. Bob was at a public meeting in Coventry at the Aldermoor Farm Primary School. At the meeting he was apparently asked about Iraq. To astonishment he said that "Tony Blair had fed lies" to the Labour Party about the war. He then went on to say that he "was an ordinary man from a council estate in Coventry. I don't sit in ivory towers".

So the audience got to hear that he thinks Tony Blair is a liar but that he didn't do anything about this because he is basically too naively simple to take it further. Wow! And how did I hear of this? Via the BNP website, because the BNP candidate for Coventry North-East, Tom Gower, was at the meeting and reported it all on the BNP site.

Do I believe Gower's reporting? I don't know, but why should I not? Interestingly, this has not been reported anywhere else as far as I can see. The only piece I can find is on the Coventry Telegraph's site, where Bob Ainsworth talked blandly about Afghanistan not Iraq. That's nearly three weeks ago and is all a very different take on Mr.Gower's.

So is the BNP making it all up and Ainsworth never said anything about Blair being a liar? Or is the mainstream media suppressing it because this was "leaked" by the BNP? Or what?

The truth is not quite as it seems. My point in revealing this is that it will only aid the BNP's election chances if the mainstream gives them cause to reveal unpalatable facts and allows them the chance to dress up the information revealed. I think we need to know if Bob Ainsworth actually called Tony Blair a liar ("fed lies") because it drives a coach and horses through the Labour party's defence of the war.

The next election will be fought over transparency. The truth getters against the obfuscators, liars, spinners and cheats. I just hope someone other than a BNP candidate can unearth the prattling lies.

Coughs and sneezes!

I just popped up to say that I'm trying to rid myself of a sudden bout of a cold type thing. It's not swine flu, or any other flu, but it's just not letting me think straight, so I've not got a lot to say at the moment. Thinking, yes, but that's another matter!

UKIP and the new leader

Lord Pearson of Rannoch has been elected the new leader of UK Independence Party. This is interesting for two points. First, he is the first leader of a political party to sit in the Lords since the Earl of Home become leader of the Conservative Party in 1963 (although that was for a very short period). Second, he is the first leader of a political party with elected politicians not to have been elected to any office himself.

So his election paves the way for Nigel Farage to try to oust Speaker Bercow at Buckingham. If Farage succeeds, will he want his job back?

Iraq War nonsense - today's ramblings!

Sir Jeremy Greenstock, the UK's ambassador to the UN in 2003, said the invasion of Iraq did not have the backing of most UN members or even the UK public. It was of "questionable legitimacy" even though it is unlikely to be ever proved illegal. He said he believed the US and UK had "established" its legality in that it had never been challenged in court.

So that's alright, then?

It's a bit like saying an inveterate thief, one who habitually steals things willy-nilly, is doing nothing illegal because his activities have never been challenged in court. Lots of people do some very bad things. Some MPs have been up to no good. What about the banks selling each other dodgy "financial instruments"? It's OK folks, none of it is illegal because it has never been challenged in court.

It's all very legally-challenged, of that there's no doubt!

Peter Cook, or should I say E.L.Wisty, had something to say about judges in this sketch about whether to be a miner or a judge.

Recession? The penny hasn't dropped yet!

Yesterday most financial commentators were beside themselves because Britain is still in recession. I don't give much credence to all their computer calculating and number crunching excercises. I prefer a more simple method of comprehending whether we are out of recession.

When Gordon Brown was over-gulping on the air and telling us that he had abolished boom and bust I regularly spotted coins dropped on paths and pavements as I walked about. Outside the post office, in car parks, by the telephone kiosk, outside the boozer and so on. I once picked up a pound! Then we had the start of the credit crunch and the pennies stopped dropping from heaven or wherever. I still peer at the ground. Once in a blue moon I spot a coin. But it's a rare occurrence.

When those coins start being dropped again with gay abandon and caution being thrown to some economic growth wind I will believe that we are out of recession. Until then, it's just a hard slog and a determination not to say too many rude things about bankers and Brown!

Gatecrashers at White House

Well, well! what was that about getting on the A-list? It seems a couple gatecrashed their way in to the dinner that President Obama was laying on for the Indian Prime Minister. Tareq and Michaele Salahi were reportedly not invited but later posted photos of themselves on Facebook. Much to the chagrin of the Secret Service. Now they should be a service for uncovering other people's secrets, but all the gismos and gadgets failed to uncover this dining duo.

Apparently it was all about getting on reality TV. Really? What people will do to get noticed, eh?

Obama gathers his A list for first state dinner

Heard the expression "jockeying for position"? That's a mild expression for what's going on in Washington right now. It seems the race to be invited to President Obama's first state dinner is becoming something akin to the Gaderene Swine rushing for the clifftops. India's prime minister is being honoured. Possibly feted and fauned over in equal measure too. The Americans are very keen to make sure that the Indian government is made to feel very welcome and secure in its worldwide ascendency. It will be all posh poppadoms and rose-scented finger bowls!

In a departure from the traditional venue, the elegant State Dining Room, the Obamas will gather with a few hundred VIPs in a huge, heated tent on the South Lawn. I doubt though that Manmohan Singh is the man the tented diners will be there to see, though. No, they want to be seen there at the dinner by the TV and the loser B-Listers. To show that they are the pukka lot. It's the hottest ticket item in town. Dee Dee Myers, who served as President Clinton's press secretary, said the lobbying by people seeking an invite had probably been relentless. "The first [state dinner] is always the most dramatic," she said. "First impressions are important. That's your A list, that's your top game right there. By the time you get to the eighth state dinner, it'll be a lot less important." Those left off the shindig's list will be venting on the airwaves the very next day!

So, there we have it. Whoever gets to be at the eighth state dinner, either as guest or C-list attendee, it will be a very lowkey affair. The Indians must be wondering if being first has all the advantages. Hope the tent doesn't overheat. Might as well be back in Bombay!

The Baroness and The Clown

Much has been said in today's papers about Baroness Ashton of Upholland and the Belgian Prime Minister, Herman Van Rompuy. I tend to agree with lots about the undemocratic nature of the EU decision-making process. In 48 hours as much has been written about them as in the last 48 years!

Baroness Ashton is keen on the Daleks of Doctor Who fame. So much so that she has a full-sized one at home. Mr Van Rompuy has been likened by his sister, a rival politician, to a clown. Perhaps the Dalek may have ways of exterminating the EU or maybe loads of clowns can descend on the Commission to out gag the new clown!

Either way, Daleks or Clowns - it's still an organisation that likes to exterminate democratic choice and make clowns out of us all. For example, what organisation in the world that purports to be for the people can hide their financial activity behind years of unaudited accounts?

Archbishop of Canterbury in goalpost moving exercise

The Archbishop of Canterbury has gone to Rome. Not over to Rome. Just a short visit to speak his mind. However, it seems to me his mind is tortuously flexible these days. He spoke at length when giving an address in Rome, as the guest of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. The address was part of a symposium being held at the Gregorian University, to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Cardinal Willebrands, the first president of the Council. Much of the address contained reference to women's ordination in relation to traditional catholic understanding.

The Archbishop's prose is sometimes heaving going on the reader, but the gist of his argument is that local churches without the whole catholic church can makes "local decisions" without deviating in any mammoth way from core beliefs. This is a bit like stretching rubber to see when it will break. He also suggests now that female ministry is based on baptism and on vocation, as a measure of equality. It all smacks a bit of changing the ingredients in a well-established recipe because some people think the recipe makes a bad cake.

He says this, "All ordained ministers are ordained into the shared richness of the apostolic ministerial order – or perhaps we could say ministerial 'communion' yet again. None ministers as a solitary individual. Thus if the ministerial collective is understood strictly in terms of the ecclesiology we have been considering, as serving the goal of filial and communal holiness as the character of restored humanity, how much is that undermined if individuals within the ministerial communion are of different genders? Even if there remains uncertainty in the minds of some about the rightness of ordaining women, is there a way of recognising that somehow the corporate exercise of a Catholic and evangelical ministry remains intact even when there is dispute about the standing of female individuals?" (Use of the word gender instead of sex is telling). The implication is that only a few have uncertainty over ordaining women whereas the opposite is crystal clear. He also seeks to find a way of incorporating female ministers into some kind of nebulous collegiality without really addressing what he calls a "dispute about the standing of female individuals".

The goalposts are being moved and the players are being given to think that the new rules will have no affect on the play in the field. The Archbishop also asked that the Roman Catholic Church give an answer as to what exactly is wrong with what some "local churches" are doing. I'd say if he doesn't know now he never will.

In a nutshell, this address was a convoluted way of asking whether there was a possibility of putting the current impaired communion of Christians together in a quick-fix solution ignoring disputes and disagreements. We all know we have to heed the Dominical request that we "all be one". Rowan Williams' suggestions sound laudable but it would surely be at the expense of conscience and catholic (universal) tradition.

Obama's poll rating falls below 50%

It's shock news to one and all apparently. President Obama is only reckoned to be turning in a good performance by 49% of the American people. He should worry. This news follows hard on the heels of Rush Limbaugh's ridiculous assertion that Gallup were oversampling blacks in order to boost the ratings. Gallup called this tosh "a complete and inexplicable fabrication". Limbaugh must be coming to the end of the road, surely? I used to listen to his rants on the radio whilst I drove around metro Atlanta. He always appeared harmless but with a limited ratio of intellect. It always bothered me that the Republican Party attracted people with only two beans for brains. The intelligent ones were in the background goading the likes of Limbaugh on. All very peculiar.

So inexplicable fabrications are par for the course. I do hope people realise that most of these radio jocks are just on-air businesses trying to crank up the dollar revenues at the expense of truth and decency. And what of this oversampling of blacks? Is Gallup being accused of stuffing focus groups with only African Americans or is it some kind of graveyard voting experience (like the good old days in Northern Ireland!)? It's a preposterous allegation. But being preposterous is what the American neocons are all about.

I sincerely hope all right-minded American conservatives will see the light and come to the aid of the party.

Secular world wants control of the Church

It isn't enough for the secular world to distance itself from the Church. It wants to control it through a mixture of legalisms and diatribes. St Mary The Virgin Parish Church in St Mary’s Road, Swanley, Kent is a well-known Anglo-Catholic church. It professes the unchanged Faith in a changing and changeable world. A rumpus has erupted in the town because the local branch of the Royal British Legion, having appointed a female cleric as their chaplain, were miffed that they could not hold a service within the church. St.Mary's does not recognise the validity of women in priest's orders. This, as the diocese confirms, is "the legal position and is well-documented".

Looking for an alternative venue, the local town council stepped in to allow the Legion to hold their service in a banqueting suite. Mutterings were heard. The council leader Councillor Robert Woodbridge said, “My view is we now live in the 21st century and things have changed. But they will point out there are things in the bible which says women should not be priests, but it’s a matter for the church.” It is this detached view of Christendom that allows such people as Harriet Harman to pursue her so-called Equalities Bill. Councillor Woodbridge may feel times change, and they do. But the Christian Faith does not change. What was heard and understood by the Disciples is heard and understood today and will be in centuries to come.

People may want to use the church as some kind of social club and take precious little interest in the doctrines. Fair do's. But they must surely see that they do themselves no good by being rude, condescending or simply dismissive in an ignorant fashion.

Democracy in England - LibDems £2.4M Donation!

Here's a quango at work in the political arena. The Electoral Commission in fact. In a toss of coins they come down in favour of the Liberal Democrats retaining a dodgy loan of £2.4 million and get quite exercised over a UKIP donation of £363,697. The LibDems keep their cash because they could not be held to have realised that the money came from a convicted fraudster. UKIP on the other hand failed to realise that their donor was not on the electoral register at the time of the donation. Even though a district judge ruled that UKIP should only repay £14,481 after ruling the breach had been accidental, the Commission appealed to the High Court and won.

If they had dug a bit deeper with the LibDems one wonders what they might have found out. In any event it hardly seems evenhanded.

Harriet Harman to be prosecuted for careless driving!

Careless driving, eh? Following on from careless expense calculating and careless politicking. She is alleged to have been driving without due care and attention and driving while using a mobile phone. She "strongly refutes the allegations and will deny the charges". Umm! Does she now.

If she has been falsely accused, then I'd be the first to back her to the hilt. There are many who have had to endure falsehoods without the ability or resources to establish the truth. If she is found guilty, then it is a very bad example indeed of arrogance and an above-the-law attitude.

Every day I see mobile phones being used. There is an exceptance by quite a few that it doesn't matter and that they won't get caught. Good examples of perpetual law breakers are delivery van drivers. I see them most mornings. It is quite outrageous that household name businesses should be letting their employees loose on the roads without a hands-free kit.

Harriet Harman knows the law. The Crown Prosecution Service has said there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest to prosecute. Yes, they should prosecute. Not because it's her, but because this activity (alleged in this case) is both anti-social and potentially life threatening. And it will be a lesson to all arrogant drivers who abuse other road users through attitude and high-mindedness that their minority actions are actually not tolerated.

Gordon Brown's gratuitous comments!

Gordon Brown, whilst sidestepping the anti-democratic nature of the appointements of two EU functionaries, suggested tonight in a very gratuitous way that the selection of a female "Foreign Minister of Europe" was a signal that discrimination was defeated and that equality was supported.

Where has this obsession got him? Are we now so politically correct that every time a woman is appointed to any position, gratuitous remarks about slaying some mythical discrimination dragon need amplifying. This is not a breaking down of a barrier. It is just an appointment. Sexism was only in his mind. He must be the only one in the world who thought that one up! Lack of democracy - YES! Sex discrimination - NO!

Shame on you, Mr. Brown.

Ex-soldier faces jail for handing in gun

You couldn't make it up, could you? In fact, why would anyone do so? The world can be crazy, but this story just shows how bad our legislators have become in making good law. The Surrey Mirror reports that a former soldier who handed a discarded shotgun in to police faces at least five years imprisonment for "doing his duty". Judge Christopher Critchlow said, "This is an unusual case, but in law there is no dispute that Mr Clarke has no defence to this charge. The intention of anybody possessing a firearm is irrelevant." So with that we all now know madness is at large.

The judge goes along with it, the police go along with it, the prosecutors go along with it. All defending madness. Just let them think what would happen if a child under ten (the age of criminal responsibility!) got hold of the weapon and started brandishing it around, letting the thing go off and blasting someone's face away! Would these jobsworths think the law was such a fine thing then?

We need this changing and we need it changing now. The Surrey Mirror says on their site "Comments on this story have been disabled for legal reasons". Well, stuff those legal reasons! They are only smokescreens for the inept, the befuddled and the bewildered.

This is a monstrous outrage. Very shameful indeed.

Sarah Palin's radar picks up no signals

Sarah Palin has told Oprah Winfrey that a run for the presidency in 2012 is not on her radar. The thing about radars is that they can pick up extraordinary things. In some cases, the operator thinks there's an extraterrestrial object out there. In any case, it's no good looking at the radar today. Palin needs to keep checking the equipment. I bet she'll find at least a few blips on the screen. One or two neocons popping up, a couple of Alaskan oil workers, fundamentalist Bible-bashers, all kinds. Even detractors blowing her a few raspberries!

The first maxim of politics is "Never say never". She didn't say never, but she implied the radar would and that her radar is working well. "It's not on my radar screen right now", she told Oprah, as if to say it might flicker across the screen at a later date. She'll need to keep the electricity flowing through it as much as she has a growing band of eager-beaver nominators. There could come a time when they all ask "is this the time, Sarah?" and she replies, "Radar Says NO!"

Who is Kevin Hoeffer?

A while back I posted on the fact that a get-rich-quick scheme had enter my computer with the nasal tones of Kevin Hoeffer piping up each time I logged on. Now I find that his name is the most used in Google searches that find this blog. So who is Kevin Hoeffer? And why do so many people (2,500,000 according to Google) what to know too?

I have no clue who this person is apart from the fact that he is an American. Maybe that isn't so, though? Some think he's dead, a make-believe person, or just a scam merchant. The internet has an amazing ability to advise, teach, distribute information, etc. But it also is a playground for human piranahs!

Kevin eventually decided to leave me alone. But I got the same kind of maddening question enter my head as those dumb cowboys who watched as the Lone Ranger and Tonto rode out of town.

"Who exactly is Kevin Hoeffer?"

Key to Anglican distress

The Revision Committee of the Church of England (overseeing the introduction of women bishops) has just given a snub to traditionalists by not giving any safeguards to protect their beliefs. Maybe this was a change of mind due to the Pope's recent intervention in the matter. It pleases the zealots of the winner-takes-all variety. They want a church without compromise to their heady mixture of secular notions and equality measures. One such person at the forefront of this bandwagon with bullbars on it is Christina Rees. She is a long-time proponent of browbeating her opponents into eventual submission. A lot of what she says is tempered with un-Christian sentiment and a desire to promote wordly ideas over the sacred.

She is chair of a group called Women and the Church and she says that the plans show the Church is committed to equal treatment. "This is wonderful news. It's a major breakthrough as it expresses the view that men and women are equal in the sight of God. I'm glad that we have not ended up with a political compromise and the committee has instead ceded to the will of the people." The implied barb is that those who do not agree with her do not see that men and women are equal in the sight of God. Of course, that is baloney, but her insidious detractions hold sway in the prevailing world. What is lost on her is that orthodox Christianity has never understood that men and women are "equal" in this world. They have complementary states of being for living out God's purpose. One without the other diminishes humanity. However, a crude equalisation of human beings is something traditional Christians cannot accept as being part of the Catholic Faith.

Many Anglican catholics are viewed at best as a mildly eccentric group and at worst as a unsavoury cuckoo in a very precise and politically correct nest. In my own family, my catholic beliefs within Anglicanism are seen as difficult to comprehend. Most prefer a religious adherence that never questions, never sets boundaries, but has the glow of a feelgood factor. Low on the doctrine, high on the octane. And please believe me when I say I don't mean this in a nasty way. They have said as much themselves.

Robert Key is a Conservative MP. In matters of religion, though, he is anything but conservative. More like a radical with a rapier. He is a man with little sympathy for pain of the consciences of dedicated priests. He wants no truck with safeguards or episcopal oversight. It's a love it or lump it arrangement. When this measure gets to the House of Commons, some odd alliances will come to the fore. Key has no desire for compromise or compassion. Pity!

With the Pope's provision for an Anglican enclave in the Roman Catholic Church, Catholic Anglicans are caught between going or staying. If we go, we may find the journey longer than we thought. If one reads Damian Thompson's blog or Ruth Gledhill's it is full of Catholics (RC's that is) deriding Anglican orders, verbally abusing the concept of "Anglo-Catholics" (they put the inverted commas round anything catholic to highlight differences). There are those, like Damian, who see this new Anglican Rite as a great thing. If we stay, we may get our PEV's removed and a female prelate demanding the legal right to officiate at a service. This happened in the USA when women bishops, Jane Dixon in particular, tried to enter churches where they were not accepted as sacramentally valid.

The answer to the distress is really simple. Anglicanism has always been a via media. Now it's turning into via one way. I'm not about to say women cannot be bishops if that's their belief. The position currently is that we have impaired communion. Anglicans are either in or out of communion with each other. Some have left the Anglican Communion altogether. It is far better to be together with mutual respect than not.

I suspect many will stay. If we get to the stage where a woman bishop is determined to enter a church formerly under the oversight of a PEV, then life will be hard. Maybe she might call the police in. Who knows? We've been here before when priests were put in jail for contravening a law that impinged on catholic practices and belief. It may happen again. But not if faith, hope and charity have a deciding part in future developments.

Gay days in the African bush

"There will come a time when they who kill you think they do God's Will". Sometimes this is killing the heart, sometimes its killing the body. It never results in killing the soul. How we lead our lives is complex indeed. The traditional Christian teaching on matters sexual is that sexual activity takes place within the Sacrament of Matrimony. The complementary state is Celibacy. These two are the ways of being for Christians. However, this is the goal. It is certainly not the right of Christians to impose it on others should they wish to live by other standards or norms.

In Uganda there is proposed legislation which would introduce the death penalty for certain consensual homosexual acts. In itself it is bad enough. This is more than just two wrongs not making a right. It is a devilish attitude of moral superiority. I doubt if any of the legislators in Uganda have the capability to stand in downtown Kampala regailing the crowds with their saintly histories.

One can be against the concept of a homosexual lifestyle as being part of the Christian Faith, but the Christian Faith is surely against substituting God's Judgement for the transient moral judgements of those who cannot say they are without sin. The Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement says that “A deafening silence comes from the Anglican Church in Britain towards the proposed draconian private members Bill currently before the Ugandan Parliament regarding homosexuality”. That shouldn't surprise them. Deafening silences are ways to let the matter rest through sheer boredom. The same could be said of several other issues facing the C of E.

"Let all grow until the harvest". The trouble is too many people want to do unnecessary weeding beforehand.

Condoleezza Rice for President of the European Union!

Sometimes politicians get a fan base ranging from the young turks in a party to the virtually senile who dote on the every move that the politician makes.

The Democracy Forum has thrown up an interesting thread. "Condoleezza Rice for President of the European Union!". It's still a bit one sided in her favour. But why not, or someone else who is not European. There are some in the USA who have publicly expressed the opinion that Tony Blair would make a jolly good president. We've had kings and queens from other countries. In fact, about ten of them!

So I look to see how the Draft Condi movement gets along. Seems Angela Merkel has a touchy-feely relationship with her from those YouTube offerings. Who knows? Stranger things have happened. However if we do get to know, it won't be from Katie Couric's probing questions!

Thatcher the cat passes away!

John Major had trouble with the Downing Street cat Humphrey in those last episodes of Spitting Image. The cat had a fairly low opinion of the prime minister's abilities as he struggled to keep his cabinet in place. Now it appears that Margaret Thatcher's namesake, a beloved cat belonging to the Canadian transport minister John Baird, has popped its paws and gone to cat heaven. Lady T is still around.

The internet grapevine can move faster than a cat chasing a mouse but without the same purpose sometimes. Canada's transport minister was bereft by the demise of his cat so he sent a text message reading, "Thatcher has died". Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper was soon informed that 84-year-old former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had passed away.

This is not the first time famous people have been deemed dead before their time. Mark Twain famously wrote "The report of my death was an exaggeration". Indeed! I well remember the late Sandy Powell, who was reintroduced to the general public after a period away from the limelight. He'd come onto the stage and say, "I know what you're thinking! You're thinking 'I thought he was dead!' " and proceed with a rusty routine. Maybe Margaret Thatcher could say something similar at future events.

Sarah Palin's comeback experience on Oprah's show

Matthew Continetti is the associate editor of The Weekly Standard and the author of "The Persecution of Sarah Palin which is out this week. He thinks Sarah Palin is at the start of a rehabilitation. I never thought she was that poorly, but hey what do I know. There are some who seriously think that Palin will be serving up moose burgers in the White House in 2013. Mr.Continetti is one of them.

He says -

"Ms. Palin has two problems. The first is that she's become one of the most polarizing figures in the country. The second is that voters continue to worry about her qualifications for the presidency, a concern that her abrupt resignation from office last July intensified.

Lucky for her, both problems are solvable. Since Ms. Palin appeared on the national stage, the left has unfairly demonized her. Blockbuster interviews and book tours will humanize her.
More important than these public appearances is Ms. Palin's message. She needs to adopt a market-friendly populist agenda to strengthen her policy credentials and make her seem less partisan to independent voters. A bipartisan, center-right approach should come easily to her. That's how she won her race for governor in 2006."

He is backing her, if rather cautiously, by suggesting she adopts the kind of campaign that did for Reagan against Carter. It could work. Somehow, though, I feel the American public will be looking around for a classier act and she will have a tough time getting the GOP nomination, assuming she wants it.

Her rehabilitation make go forward with Oprah's help or it may go several paces back. Pity I won't be able to see it!

The Oprah Winfrey Show - A World Exclusive: Oprah and Sarah Palin Meet for the First Time

Police in Preston neighbourhood carol watch

As if the state of British society wasn't bad enough, with people being scared witless by the idea that a terrorist, paedophile, bandit or burglar is about to pounce. We live with the constant reminder that things are not safe or not suitable or whatever. Now Lancashire Police have decided to issue postcards for people to put in their doors and windows warning festive revellers not to bother calling because doors won't be opened to them. The idea is that some people are alarmed by seeing other people after dark. Forget the joy of Christmas!

This just reinforces the idea that society does not exist on any meaningful level. It's more sad than shameful.

Government's "homophobic law" is no gay thing

Going out at night seeking to cause physical harm to someone just because you have a hatred of their sexual behaviour is something that should rightly be outlawed in a civilised society. Shouting abuse at someone is equally disgusting as is encouraging others to cause injury or mayhem. Public order should have public decency as it core.

However, discussing the issue of sexuality or professing a distate or disagreement with the behaviour or lifestyle of homosexuals should not be a criminal matter. Free speech allows for vigorous debate so long as that is all it is. My concern with the government's Coroners and Justice Bill is that it seems to outlaw criticism of lifestyle and allows the police to be initial arbiters of the content of debate.

Currently, the police are happy to arrest people who have written or said things stridently, either for publication or in a public place. It is apparent that the driving force of New Labour in this respect is to make the public understand that homosexuality and heterosexuality are of an equal nature and therefore must be held by everyone as such. This approach is a kind of thought police 1984 reasoning. It will backfire on them.

I am totally opposed to snide remarks about anyone. It hardly merits reasoned agreement. Being distasteful and hurtful is always wrong. But to suggest that a sincerely held view must be witheld from discussion because it is likely to offend is to deny free speech and to enter the realms of the censored society.

Death Row gets another death to add to the others!

John Allen Muhammad was put to death yesterday. He was the so-called Washington Sniper. Apparently he was a schizophrenic. Plus he was paranoid and psychotic and delusional. Just the type to bung in the Death Chamber. There's a lot of death around at the moment. By that, I mean not by natural causes. There was the Brit gunned down by a trigger-happy guy in Amarillo. Then the Muslim soldier went on the rampage killing as he went in the army compound. Death in Afghanistan, now too much for many to bear. And a young footballer in Germany sends himself to the next world by getting hit by a train.

Death all around us. Many Americans think death is something of a punishment. In that they've got some kind of religious schizophrenia. The victims of Muhammad's gunfire were encouraged to visit the execution. All grist to the vengeance mill, quite out of keeping with Dominical Teaching. "Vengeance is mine saith the Lord. I will repay". Not a message that the Correctional Centers like put to them. One visitor welcomed the death. "He basically watched my dad breathe his last breath," she told the Associated Press news agency. "Why shouldn't I watch his last breath?" No reason, but is that going to be repeated at the Last Judgement?

This execution will do not one jot of difference to the safety and wellbeing of Americans and visitors to the United States. I take it as read that if I set foot in the country I may not leave as I arrived. The answer to the justice question is to keep schizophrenics off the streets and to curtail their ability to buy guns. One wonders where the madmen actually are. My guess is that quite a few are sitting in Washington cleaning out their porkbarrels!

Bad managers beset the British workers

I'm no commie, but as an uncle of mine once said, there are times when you want to.... Now it has been revealed that almost half of UK workers say they have left a job because of bad management. Half of them? That's a hell of a lot of disgruntled people who feel they have been held captive by foolish people who have no rhyme or reason to be in a management position other than that their face fits. The findings come in a survey from the Chartered Institute of Management, which says it is launching a campaign to improve standards among bosses.

I've had occasion to listen to the woes of redundant junior managers, bank workers desperate to leave and tales of incompetent bosses. Now don't get me wrong, there are plenty of good energetic bosses doing their utmost for their businesses. But they are let down by the ones who are incapable of or unwilling to change.

The survey also found unhappiness among managers themselves. Sixty-eight per cent said they had fallen into the role by chance. Chance would not be a fine thing, I think, in these cases. Politicians talk of merit and opportunity and self-reliance. Seems we are getting more of buggins' turn and deadmen's shoes!

I thought the Terry-Thomas boss types had gone. Perhaps they have, but they've been replaced by a bunch that has little in the way of respect given and of whom sniggering into a cupped hand is more than they deserve.

It's a mad world out there!

I've just been having a wander around the political websites and have been looking at a BNP one. It carries Google Ads. Quite incongruously one popped up and caught my eye.

Because You are an Indian
You can get a loan for a home in India. While you are in UK. Enquire

Well, I never!

Parliamentary interns exploited?

The House of Commons has been doing everything on the cheap it seems. By that I mean it seems to want to get the maximum benefit out of a very small purse. We must be the only country in the world where foreigners get to have a good laugh at our expense. That's the British way - make do and mend. Currently, we're trying to mend a ridiculous system of expenses. Now another problem may have arisen.

MPs have been used to having young graduates work in their offices for nothing. Or virtually nothing. Pete Barden spent the past summer working as an intern for a Liberal Democrat MP, dealing with duties ranging from opening mail to campaign work and engaging with constituents. He says, "I was exploited but everyone's exploited. It's the way it works." Not all interns agree with the exploitation bit, but nearly all think they should be treated better financially. Maybe travel expenses would be a start, they think.

This is just another element of the crazy way MPs are scared of allowing a proper payments system to be implemented. It is also a real problem in that these interns are mainly apprenticed MPs, hoping to move onto the green benches in a dead men's shoes routine. We need proper researchers on proper pay.

I am still convinced that the next general election will be about the way MPs are paid as much as it is about their approach to the monumental debt crisis. Most voters will be so enraged come next June that votes will go all over the place. What was once a two-horse race will now be a political version of the Grand National. Pity there won't be a political version of Mrs Topham to oversee events!

Sir Jock stirs it up over Afghan mission

Only this last week, the hapless Gordon Brown was telling us all about that nasty Alky Ada he keeps on about. Well, today Sir Jock Stirrup rode into town to appear on the Andrew Marr Show.
He said, amongst other things, this -

"It is true that al-Queda are not operating in Afghanistan at the moment. It is also true that over the last couple of years in particular the al-Queda core has suffered significant damage".

Not in Afghanistan? Where are they, then? Oh, don't tell me, it's Pakistan. But we aren't going after them there are we? Not a chance! We don't want uprisings in Britain do we?

What a shower! Brown waffles on about his wretched Afghan campaign. He has about as much clue as those hopeless First World War generals. As with most British people, I have a relative laid to rest in that battlefield. Have we learnt anything?

Safe in our beds with Pauline?

Shadow security minister Baroness Pauline Neville Jones was on the Today Programme this morning. She was with the chairman of the Royal United Services Institute, Sir Paul Lever. I got the impression that Pauline was a tad muddled up. She got all muddled over the idea that Islamic terrorists are "home grown". It seem to her like an awkward question. Her claim to be in Afghanistan is apparently based on terrorist training camps. But Gordon Brown is claiming it is about democracy as much as training up the Afghan police. Nobody in political circles has clarity.

Personally I'd feel a lot safer with Sir Paul Lever in charge, but then he's not where Pauline is. Pity!

School racist hunters go OTT in barmy episode

You have to hand it to the politically correct. In bucketloads! They are so keen to root out what they consider racist behaviour that they associate harmless remarks with the vilist Nazi propaganda. Teachers have signed up to a morons charter, designed by this ludicrous government, to jot down every word, phrase or remark with a scintilla of assumed racist content.

So it was that a six-year-old girl has been branded a racist for telling a black girl she had chocolate on her face. Innocence turned into a gestapo-style report. When the girl's mother went to collect her she was told the incident was "racist" and that a complaint had been logged.

The school claims it was blown out of all proportion. I hardly think so. Not if it was put in the book! These people are supposed to be running a Church school. They'd be far better off binning this ridiculous book and just taking children's remarks as they come.

All that the school has done is unnecessarily causing the girl to feel guilty about an innocent remark just because they put their political correctness in front of common sense. They do themselves no merit and they are a cancer in society that needs eradicating.

Gordon Brown's Afghan egg displeases curate's congregation

The curate's egg was good in parts. He was implying that something which is partly good can be ruined by the bad bit.

Right Reverend Host. "I’m afraid you’ve got a bad Egg, Mr. Jones!"
The Curate. "Oh no, my Lord, I assure you! Parts of it are excellect!"

We could say the same about Gordon Brown's speech this morning. He is still trying to persuade us that his nemesis, Alky Ada, is about to strike out in London on a savage rampage all due to the problems starting in Kabul. Cut off the Afghan terrorists and Britain is a safer place. It's all poppycock. He ruins a basically good premise by including untruths and speculation. Al Queda are in Pakistan giving grief to that benighted country. If they ever were in Afghanistan they have long since fled. Terrorists are not insurgents. Fine point, maybe, but the aims are different. It is the Taliban, a group of warlords and displaced poppy farmers, that are the anti-social scourge of the Afghans. We don't wish to seize the moment in Pakistan to go after Al Queda. Probably because we would get an uprising in Britain as well as in Pakistan.

So the Afghan war is about telling us we are fighting terrorism to make Britain a safer place. The Taliban are enemies of the democratising process of Afghan society. We are telling Karzai about corruption. Gordon Brown lectures him on good governance, suggesting that a government must not stand back and let corruption take place. Excuse me! What has Brown beeen doing in Westminster? Trying to hide MPs expenses, his own cleaning bills and Sky Sports subscriptions, by invoking parliamentary privilege, stifling freedom of information and redacting documents. Nice one.

The country is not behind this war because the premise is false. We are behind our soldiers and each and every one of them has put themselves where virtually none of us would go. But the government needs to do far better than come up with this travesty of the truth.

There are four countries in the world that the "West" has difficulty with. Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan. Not one is a fully functioning democracy. All have despots waiting to take over. All have simmering grievances. The peoples of each country want peace and prosperity. They don't care if it is with democracy or with a benign overlord. They just want peace. In that, Gordon Brown is right to say that the first duty of a government is the security of the nation. But he negates his good reasons by including fancifully bad ones.

Until the truth is out, this war will go nowhere. Until our objectives are crystal clear, we have only the curate's opinion to guide us.

Democracy? Did we ever have it?

I'm of the opinion that democracy doesn't really exist in the so-called "western countries". Free speech is a far greater asset and one which the authorities allow and support. But they are woefully scared of true democracy. Witness the antics of the EU hierachy, all hellbent on getting YES votes in referendums, the very polls they fought hard deny most voters in the 27 countries. Witness also the ridiculous way in which a candidate in the USA has to get vast numbers of voters to support his/her candidature just to get ballot access. All manner of hoops and hurdles are placed in the way of parties which dissent from the agreed two-party arrangement.

I think it was summed up for me when something remarkable happened in East Devon in 1989. Stuart Hughes, now a Conservative councillor, although a maverick one, was a candidate for his Raving Loony Green Giant Party. Having fallen out with David Sutch of the OMLRP, he ploughed his own furrow. He stood against a matriarchal Conservative and beat her. She waspishly queried the result, saying "What have they done?" and then rounded on Mr.Hughes by stating he better not lark around in the council chamber. She took defeat very badly. Many have done so in the past and no doubt will in the future.

Democracy is not that welcome in the corridors of power. Free speech doesn't bother them. I'm entitled, allowed, or whatever, to sound off on this blog. That's not going to twitch an eyebrow. But if I mobilised an army of voters to unseat MPs, then I would be in trouble. It's a form of poking my nose in where I'm not welcome.

Daniel Hannan has a good line in his blog entry yesterday. He says -

"It’s not chiefly about Europe – it’s about democracy. Regular readers will know that I have always seen the repatriation of jurisdiction from Brussels as a means to an end. Having got the powers back, we should pass them down to local authorities or, better yet, to individual citizens. I want decisions to be decentralised, diffused, democratised. I want open primaries, popular initiative procedures, elected sheriffs, self-financing councils, an end to quangos, recall mechanisms and, yes, referendums – lots and lots of referendums."

An end to quangos? I seem to remember a lot of us campaigned hard for that when Margaret Thatcher came to office. Democracy is yet to be accomplished in full, but it will be achieved because of the free speech of people like Daniel Hannan.

Bouncing Czech puts Cameron's current account in the red!

So the Czech's have signed, ratified and sealed the Lisbon Treaty. Democracy is the poorer, weasel wordsmiths are having a field day. David Cameron and the higher echelons of the Conservative Party are u-turning as I type. All manner of reasons as to why a referendum is now out of the question. Cast iron guarantees are being melting down tonight. EU alchemy is trying to make gold ingots out of this cast iron. Well, let them! They know no better.

My fear is that come the general election the two largest parties in Britain will be defending political records of scheming, subterfuge, u-turning, deception, and a wilful acceptance of the greed of mates and pals and the dismissal of those MPs of lesser worth and political value.

David Cameron's current account has suddenly gone into the red. UKIP must be sensing a real victory in that those who thought Cameron would deliver now find a man whose word is as worthless as the fictitious money transactions that the conniving banks were doing when they turned toxic sub-prime loans into the grandchild of the South Sea Bubble. Many Conservative supporters will drift away, others will run enthusiastically into the UKIP fold.

Politics needs a new start. No good lecturing the likes of Afghanistan's President Kazi, when the EU variety has far more corrosive arrangements for denying true democracy.

I sincerely hope David Cameron knows what has befallen him. Gordon Brown barged into Tony Blair's No 10 bunker to declare that he didn't believe a ****ing the then PM said. The people may well say the same next year about Cameron's referendum guarantee melting like a chocolate soldier in the desert.

Harry Potter puts in for EU Presidency

Harry Potter as the new President of Europe? Well not exactly. It's not the fantastical character of cinematic and book fame but the lookalike Dutch prime minister. Jan Peter Balkenende is a man who knows about deals in smoke-filled rooms (actually smoke-free now due to the smoking ban). Each Dutch election is followed by a Jan'll Fixit arrangement. Seems the EU chief bottlewashers are dead against Tony Blair knocking on the door. At least they have some sense in that direction. So they've given Jan Peter the nod and the wink.

According to this Dutch website, the majority of the Dutch people want Balkenende to go to Brussels if he gets the chance so they are rid of him. That's the most-heard opinion apparently. Various polls indicate a majority of the electorate also want general elections if 'their' premier is picked.

Now that kind of rings a few bells. I hear the sound of Tony Blair's name being mentioned in likeminded tones. One has to wonder what it is about the political infections our national leaders pick up in Brussels. Old Biffo Cowan was implicated in undemocratic stuff in Ireland. Sarkozy is up to his tricks again, in cohoots with Frau Merkel (Tippytoes and the Hausfrau - what a combination!), trying to stitch up a deal over this EU Presidency thing. And Baldenende dismissed the Dutch NEI! as a temporary blip.

None of them is remotely democratic when it comes to keeping the EU Gravy train on its tracks. Chief among the democratic dissemblers are Blair and Brown. Both are cheats when it comes to giving the people a say. So it comes as no surprise that the Dutch want to give Harry Potter a good kicking. A pair of the finest clogs will do. To unclog the democratic deficit!

Wal-Mart starts selling coffins

Wal-Mart doesn't miss a trick. They've reckoned that, as everybody eventually dies, selling coffins is not a bad idea. Even if they got a tiny fraction of the deceased people's purchasing power, that would produce a tidy sum.

I've had a look at these coffins. Actually, they're not coffins but the far more grandiose caskets that Americans have come to cherish. These are the satin-lined plush interiored things that open halfway so you can get a peek of the dead relative or friend as you pay your last respects. These weighty things make for better profits but they are hellish for pallbearers. If fact in most cases they give up trying to lift them. No, these things are usually wheeled in on a folding trolley, many times looking as if trolley and casket are going to come to grief in some way.

I favour coffins over caskets. But Wal-Mart won't be selling coffins. Far too deathlike for their liking. The casket seems to be a more sanitised way of coping with death. I was told once of a good Anglo-Catholic church in America that wanted a funeral with pallbearers carrying the coffin shoulder high into the church. The priest was being fobbed off with a fancy casket. He wanted this parishioner to have a nice oak coffin. Nothing doing. So he went on the internet and found a Jewish coffin maker in California, many miles away, who had just the right thing. With a bit of redecoration the wooden coffin did the job and he was able to escort the deceased into church, shoulder high with pallbearers in attendance.

Wal-Mart may well sell quite a few. On the other hand, if you don't buy your casket from a fancy funeral director, are you expected to arrange your own Wal-Mart funeral? Maybe, but don't be late for it!

Different planets and parallel universes

The BBC reports that a man of 112 has "married" a girl of 17 in Somalia. In itself it must send shock waves throught the western world. However, all is not as it may seem, I think.

The old codger might be up to some tricks. So might the girl and her family. He says, "I didn't force her, but used my experience to convince her of my love; and then we agreed to marry". At his age he needs to be careful over affairs of the heart. He could just conk out any minute if he overexerted himself.

My guess is that he has a bit put away on the money front. He'll have a Cecil Colby moment, fade away gracefully, and she becomes queen bee of the village. Probably works out fine for all concerned.

In the scheme of things, Somalia is definitely a law unto itself!

Has Tony McNulty any honour?

It seems that MPs are split into two camps. Those that do an honourable job in an honourable way and are seemingly honourable people. Then there are the fiddlers, the backsliders and the muckrakers. Was it any different? Thankfully the honourable members are in the significant majority.

Tony McNulty has been huffing and puffing that he "played by the rules" but when it comes to the Fees Office and the House of Commons, for some this was no better organised than the tuck shop at Greyfriars School. "Crickey! It's old Quelch. Better hide these receipts jolly fast!" McNulty was investigated by the Parliamentary standards watchdog for claiming the second home allowance for a property in which his parents lived. This house was only nine miles from his own home! Any honourable person would have thought, wouldn't they, that a quick train or tube ride would have worked most evenings. But not Tony, oh no. He decided to pocket the maximum he could get his hands on.

It's because of his apparent greed that he has been given the parliamentary equivalent of six of the best. Plus the humiliation (well, maybe not in his case!) of handing back £13,837. And he has, along with others, given Parliament a bad name and allowed the public to think that every MP is just like him. No wonder Suzy Gale is upset by it all. She works hard for her husband and his constituents. But fellow MP Derek Conway abused the system. So his abuse is an assumed systemic cancer that every MP's spouse is capable of contracting, including Suzy? It's nonsense, of course. But it is the sad times we live in.

Common sense has left the minds of most people currently. Nobody takes responsibility. Blame the other guy. Don't admit to anything in case you get sued or arrested or whatever. It's fast becoming a polecats' paridise. Instead of allowing the dodgy characters to continue, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards John Lyon should have been allowed to recommend that certain MPs just left the House. So what if we had a load of by-elections. Far better that then letting the matter drift on.

Tony Blair for EU President? Stuff of nightmares!

Give me strength. Gordon Brown is said to be actively lobbying for Tony Blair to be the new-fangled president of the EU monolith. Why on earth would the good people of Europe deserve this?

Can you imagine it? Tony Blair knocking on the EU door. "Anything I can do for you Europeans?". He's been knocking on doors and cheesily moving into position since his weaning days. I very much hope there will be those who see this as not in our best interests, I really do.

He is a dissembler par excellence, his Iraq war history an example of low politics. His ambition outsmarts his convictions. His convictions appear to be at odds with his conscience. His general message is one of opaqueness rather than transparency. There must be other candidates, surely?

BNP do better in the Bahamas!

The BNP is trumpeting the fact that they are the most visited political website in the UK. As my mother would say, bully for them! I visited Alexa, the web tracking service, to find that the BNP is warmly received in the Bahamas. 230th most popular site. In India it ranks at 89, 566 but that is curiously interesting given the number of sites emanating from that country.

So the BBC has helped to unleash something. Are we capable of debating the points that arise or are we not? Given Jack Straw's lamentable performance last week, I think a new drawing board is required!

'Hate crime' grandmother considers suing

Free speech in Britain is becoming one-side. Or should I say lopsided? A 67-year old grandmother, Pauline Howe, has been investigated by Norfolk police for 'hate crime' after she wrote a letter to her council objecting to a gay pride march. Now she is considering suing the authorities.

It's a funny old world. It is perfectly acceptable for some people to say all manner of things about the Pope, to castigate the Bishop of Rochester as an evil this and that, but it is not acceptable to say that one is, at least, uncomfortable about overt displays in public of a homosexual nature.

Bridget Buttinger is Norwich City Council's deputy chief executive. She wrote back warning that the grandmother could face criminal charges. She wrote, "The content of your letter has been assessed as potentially being hate related because of the views you expressed towards people of a certain sexual orientation." So basically Ms Buttinger is saying that anyone minded to express a traditional Christian opinion is deemed a hateful person. Ms Buttinger probably hoped Mrs. Howe would be jailed!

I know that certain homosexuals would rather spit blood than let Mrs. Howe express her views, but views they are. Many people share them. Norfolk Constabulary has defended its action as "proportionate". I wonder what a disproportiate action would be in the chief constable's mind?

'Younger wife' for marital bliss

According to the BBC reports, the secret to a happy marriage is choosing a wife who is smarter and at least five years younger than you. This is what UK "experts" say. Couples are more likely to go the distance (presumably unto death), particularly if neither has been divorced in the past, according to the Bath University team.

Well, I fit the bill on both counts. My wife is at least five years younger that me and is a lot smarter. And neither of us has been divorced.

So thank you Bath University experts. You've made my day!

Lord Carey takes on the BNP

Lord Carey has come out to denounce the BNP and to pronounce an unsettled view of the Pope's invitation to Catholic Anglicans. The two topics are not related, but have been scrambled together as a soundbite piece. The former Archbishop came onto the Today programme yesterday to say he didn't say this and he didn't say that about the Pope's announcement.

So what did he say about the BNP. Apparently that their views are 'irredeemably evil'. I'm glad he said views and not the people themselves, because the Christian gospel tells us that nobody is beyond redemption. The archbishop should have clarified this point. In the heat of the moment all kinds of things can be misinterpreted.

Lord Carey spoke of views, plural. I have an overriding problem with the BNP's policy on promoting racially based policies likely to cause favouritism for white people (DNA tested, no doubt!) above others. However, on paper, this is the only detestable policy. All their other policies seem fairly anodine and stand up to scrutiny. I have an issue with the emphasis on "command and control" but that's about it.

What we have now is not a debate, because that would allow the BNP to become "equals". No, we have a crazed demonisation which allows Nick Griffin to sell himself as a political martyr. If all the media has in their arsenal is likening Griffin to Hitler and telling us what a bigot he is, then that won't change a thing. Tell us something we don't know.

So, my question is this. Can the mainstream politicians debate the policies of the BNP other than turning Griffin's personal bigotry into the main discussion topic? If they can't, then the BNP gets to go under the political radar and into pastures new!

Man arrested for making coffee in own home while naked

An American man who made coffee in his own home while nude is facing charges of indecent exposure. This is a bizarre case indeed. The police who arrested him, Fairfax County Police Virginia, said they believed he wanted to be seen naked by the public. He faces up to a year in jail and a $2,000 fine if he is convicted. He is fighting the charge and seeking damages from police. Quite right too.

If police officers can arrest people because they think someone is going to do something or wants to do something, it's definitely turning into a police state world. This is not the same as a conspiracy to commit a crime. That is when there is evidence of pre-planning but without commission of a crime.

Police officers could arrest someone sitting in a car because they believed they might drive off at an illegal speed. Or they could arrest someone entering a store because they thought the person wanted to shoplift. It could go on.

We live in a society now, or at least the so-called western world, where any innocent occurrence immediately has impure connotations placed on it. This man claims he did nothing abnormal in his own home. Just got out of bed, naked, and went to make a cup of coffee. Unfortunately he now faces the prospect of a court case with people mulling over whether he is a sick pervert or just a naked man making coffee.

Some people get their lives turned upside down in a day. It just goes to show that we do not know what tomorrow will bring.