One of the most significant stories of the week, in my opinion, has passed with barely a murmur; eclipsed by other news, including BBC and MPs’ expenses, a new Speaker, the Iraq Coverup Inquiry, and the passing of St Michael of Neverland. It relates to a £1 million pilot project, run by the Border Agency in Kent, to help failed asylum seekers return home.
It repatriated one family. Just one.
The unmitigated failure of this £1 million project is highly significant because it illustrates, in one small, untidy package, many of the reasons why Labour is utterly unfit for government.
OK, I know that £1 million is probably trivial in the context of overall government spending, but it matters to me because it is still a shedload of taxpayers’ money and because it represents the annual tax burden for almost 200 people on the average salary. My guess is that they would be pretty incensed if they knew.
So how does this largely overlooked little story encapsulate Labour’s failings?
First, like so much else in its liberal-socialist nirvana, New Labour tried to tackle the effect of a problem, rather than address its cause. Labour’s immigration and asylum policies are in tatters and our borders leak like a sieve. The Border Agency, which has a £2.28 billion budget, spent £7.8 million on its own publicity in 2008/09, so a million here or there is doubtless lost in its own noise.
Elsewhere, health, social work, defence and education suffer from the same heavy-handed band-aid approach.
Got a government problem? Talk with heavy gravitas, set up an Agency/ Commision/ anybloodyquango and sit back in righteous satisfaction at a job well done.
But addressing effect rather than cause doesn’t work. You may have heard a huge sigh of relief echoing around the country today. It was when teachers heard that Labour has abandoned its primary school literacy and numeracy policy – after only 12 years of inhibiting the education of a generation.
Labour certainly learns lessons quickly. Which is more than it has allowed children to do.
Next, the Kent pilot project was incoherent. The Children’s Society, which reviewed it, said: “It wasn’t clear what the UK Border Agency was trying to achieve with the project, which caused considerable confusion from the outset.”
Hmmmm. Sound familiar?
Acolastus spent 30 years in an arm of public service that is world-renowned for doing what it does with excellence. From day one, we were taught that every activity has an Aim. And determining the Aim required a logical process of analysis, which we were also taught.
But Labour doesn’t work like that. Oh No. Rather than use handsomely rewarded Servile Servants to do this work, it will farm out the analysis, and often the whole problem, to consultants. Or create another quango.
But consultants and quangos rarely have deep familiarity of the detail and scope of a problem. Yet those who employ them do, and in engaging them, admit to either incompetence or idleness.
In 2005, Labour spent £1 billion of taxpayers’ money on consultancy and £180 billion on quangos; organisations that are utterly unaccountable to the public. What do our Servile Servants do, for heaven’s sake.
This is semi-detached public administration by a semi-detached government.
Next, Labour has abandoned those fundamental and inextricably linked principles of public service governance; accountability and responsibility. For those too young to remember what these meant, if you are responsible for something you are accountable for it.
In short, screw up and expect to get your arse kicked.
So who, I wonder, got fired from the Borders Agency for the Kent debacle? Surely, wasting £1 million of taxpayers’ money is a firing offence?
I’m not holding my breath. Because these days, public servants are likely to sue for dismissal. Even if their incompetence has cost lives. And Labour doesn’t like being sued.
So, finally, they will spin their way out of trouble.
Fresh from his illuminating encounter with Joanna Lumley and the Ghurkas, that nice Immigration Minister, Mr Woollas, said of the Kent fiasco: “The lessons we learnt have been used to design a new pilot currently running in Glasgow. This demonstrates our commitment to keep exploring alternatives to detention which increase voluntary returns and provide value for money to the taxpayer. This is a complex issue with no one-size-fits-all remedy, which is why these pilots are so crucial.”
Unbelievable, utter cant. And not one syllable of regret or apology for the waste of those 200 taxpayers’ money. Shame on him.
The really worrying aspect of all this is that the shabby, spendthrift, unaccountable culture championed by Labour over the last 12 years may have become so engrained in our public services that it has become the default position.
This is something David Cameron must address comprehensively as soon as he enters Number 10. Root and branch reform is required if citizens are to regain value from their taxes.
As is a General Election.
Friday, 26 June 2009
Thursday, 25 June 2009
A Warning from History for the Concensus on Global Warming
The essay below, from Watts Up With That?, carries a tragic story and a stark warning for those who would mortgage our country's future on the basis the hypothesis-based "consensus" on Global Warning.But concensus based on hypothesis is neither fact or proof. There is still room, and real need for debate.
Credit to the author, Professor David Deming, and to the copyright holder Lew Rockwell for generously allowing reproduction.
Death of a Civilization
by David Deming
This memorial is situated near Bisho in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. It commemorates the mass killing of cattle in the Eastern Cape that took place in the 1850s . A Xhosa prophetess had delivered a message from the ancestors saying that the Xhosa must slaughter their cattle (wealth) so that they could rise again anew after defeats by the British colonialsts and mass deaths of their cattle from a lung disease. Following the massacre, some 40000 Xhosa died of starvation. The inscription reads "HERE REST MEN, WOMEN AND CHILDREN - INNOCENT VICTIMS OF THE 1856/7 CATASTROPHIC CATTLE KILLING".
Over the past several years we have learned that small groups of people can engage in mass suicide. In 1978, 918 members of the Peoples’ Temple led by Jim Jones perished after drinking poisoned koolaid. In 1997, 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate cult died after drugging themselves and tieing plastic bags around their heads. Unfortunately, history also demonstrates that it is possible for an entire civilization to commit suicide by intentionally destroying the means of its subsistence.
In the early nineteenth century, the British colonized Southeast Africa. The native Xhosa resisted, but suffered repeated and humiliating defeats at the hands of British military forces. The Xhosa lost their independence and their native land became an English colony. The British adopted a policy of westernizing the Xhosa. They were to be converted to Christianity, and their native culture and religion was to be wiped out. Under the stress of being confronted by a superior and irresistible technology, the Xhosa developed feelings of inadequacy and inferiority. In this climate, a prophet appeared.
In April of 1856, a fifteen-year-old girl named Nongqawuse heard a voice telling her that the Xhosa must kill all their cattle, stop cultivating their fields, and destroy their stores of grain and food. The voice insisted that the Xhosa must also get rid of their hoes, cooking pots, and every utensil necessary for the maintenance of life. Once these things were accomplished, a new day would magically dawn. Everything necessary for life would spring spontaneously from the earth. The dead would be resurrected. The blind would see and the old would have their youth restored. New food and livestock would appear in abundance, spontaneously sprouting from the earth. The British would be swept into the sea, and the Xhosa would be restored to their former glory. What was promised was nothing less than the establishment of paradise on earth.
Nongqawuse told this story to her guardian and uncle, Mhlakaza. At first, the uncle was skeptical. But he became a believer after accompanying his niece to the spot where she heard the voices. Although Mhlakaza heard nothing, he became convinced that Nongqawuse was hearing the voice of her dead father, and that the instructions must be obeyed. Mhlakaza became the chief prophet and leader of the cattle-killing movement.
News of the prophecy spread rapidly, and within a few weeks the Xhosa king, Sarhili, became a convert. He ordered the Xhosa to slaughter their cattle and, in a symbolic act, killed his favorite ox. As the hysteria widened, other Xhosa began to have visions. Some saw shadows of the resurrected dead arising from the sea, standing in rushes on the river bank, or even floating in the air. Everywhere that people looked, they found evidence to support what they desperately wanted to be true.
The believers began their work in earnest. Vast amounts of grain were taken out of storage and scattered on the ground to rot. Cattle were killed so quickly and on such an immense scale that vultures could not entirely devour the rotting flesh. The ultimate number of cattle that the Xhosa slaughtered was 400,000. After killing their livestock, the Xhosa built new, larger kraals to hold the marvelous new beasts that they anticipated would rise out of the earth. The impetus of the movement became irresistible.
The resurrection of the dead was predicted to occur on the full moon of June, 1856. Nothing happened. The chief prophet of the cattle-killing movement, Mhlakaza, moved the date to the full moon of August. But again the prophecy was not fulfilled.
The cattle-killing movement now began to enter a final, deadly phase, which its own internal logic dictated as inevitable. The failure of the prophecies was blamed on the fact that the cattle-killing had not been completed. Most believers had retained a few cattle, chiefly consisting of milk cows that provided an immediate and continuous food supply. Worse yet, there was a minority community of skeptical non-believers who refused to kill their livestock.
The fall planting season came and went. Believers threw their spades into the rivers and did not sow a single seed in the ground. By December of 1856, the Xhosa began to feel the pangs of hunger. They scoured the fields and woods for berries and roots, and attempted to eat bark stripped from trees. Mhlakaza set a new date of December 11 for the fulfillment of the prophecy. When the anticipated event did not occur, unbelievers were blamed.
The resurrection was rescheduled yet again for February 16, 1857, but the believers were again disappointed. Even this late, the average believer still had three or four head of livestock alive. The repeated failure of the prophecies could only mean that the Xhosa had failed to fulfill the necessary requirement of killing every last head of cattle. Now, they finally began to complete the killing process. Not only cattle were slaughtered, but also chickens and goats. Any viable means of sustenance had to be destroyed. Any cattle that might have escaped earlier killing were now slaughtered for food.
Serious famine began in late spring of 1857. All the food was gone. The starving population broke into stables and ate horse food. They gathered bones that had lay bleaching in the sun for years and tried to make soup. They ate grass. Maddened by hunger, some resorted to cannibalism. Weakened by starvation, family members often had to lay and watch dogs devour the corpses of their spouses and children. Those who did not die directly from hunger fell prey to disease. To the end, true believers never renounced their faith. They simply starved to death, blaming the failure of the prophecy on the doubts of non-believers.
By the end of 1858, the Xhosa population had dropped from 105,000 to 26,000. Forty to fifty-thousand people starved to death, and the rest migrated. With Xhosa civilization destroyed, the land was cleared for white settlement. The British found that those Xhosa who survived proved to be docile and useful servants. What the British Empire had been unable to accomplish in more than fifty years of aggressive colonialism, the Xhosa did to themselves in less than two years.
Western civilization now stands on the brink of repeating the experience of the Xhosa. Since the advent of the Industrial Revolution in the late eighteenth century, Europe and North America have enjoyed the greatest prosperity ever known on earth. Life expectancy has doubled. In a little more than two hundred years, every objective measure of human welfare has increased more than in all of previous human history.
But Western Civilization is coasting on an impetus provided by our ancestors. There is scarcely anyone alive in Europe or America today who believes in the superiority of Western society. Guilt and shame hang around our necks like millstones, dragging our emasculated culture to the verge of self-immolation. Whatever faults the British Empire-builders may have had, they were certain of themselves.
Our forefathers built a technological civilization based on energy provided by carbon-based fossil fuels. Without the inexpensive and reliable energy provided by coal, oil, and gas, our civilization would quickly collapse. The prophets of global warming now want us to do precisely that.
Like the prophet Mhlakaza, Al Gore promises that if we stop using carbon-based energy, new energy technologies will magically appear. The laws of physics and chemistry will be repealed by political will power. We will achieve prosperity by destroying the very means by which prosperity is created.
While Western Civilization sits confused, crippled with self-doubt and guilt, the Chinese are rapidly building an energy-intensive technological civilization. They have 2,000 coal-fired power plants, and are currently constructing new ones at the rate of one a week. In China, more people believe in free-market economics than in the US. Our Asian friends are about to be nominated by history as the new torchbearers of human progress.
May 13, 2009
David Deming is associate professor of Arts and Sciences at the University of Oklahoma.
Copyright © 2009 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.
Global Warming - Who is Right?
A worrying story from The Daily Mash suggests that "GLOBAL warming has caused an acceleration in evolution that should see the world overrun by 20ft mice within 10 years". See the whole terrifying account here.
On the other hand, over at Watts Up With That? it appears from this post that :
"The average arctic temperature is still not above (take your pick) 32°F 0°C 273.15°K–this the latest date in fifty years of record keeping that this has happened. Usually it is beginning to level off now and if it does so, it will stay near freezing on average in the arctic leading to still less melting than last summer which saw a 9% increase in arctic ice than in 2007".
So what about all the melting icebergs and stranded polar bears?
I'm Confused.
Who is right?
Well, I'll tell you one conclusion I've reached.
I'll bet a Pound to a pinch of pigshit it ain't Hilary Benn.
But he and his worthless kind in Westminster and Brussels are happy to bankrupt this country further on the basis of unproven "consensual" science.
Oh, but "consensus" isn't proof; it's newspeak for "la la la la - I can't hear you because I have organic carrots in my ears".
It's time for an open, even and honest debate before billions of taxpayers pounds are wasted.
Pigs will fly.
On the other hand, over at Watts Up With That? it appears from this post that :
"The average arctic temperature is still not above (take your pick) 32°F 0°C 273.15°K–this the latest date in fifty years of record keeping that this has happened. Usually it is beginning to level off now and if it does so, it will stay near freezing on average in the arctic leading to still less melting than last summer which saw a 9% increase in arctic ice than in 2007".
So what about all the melting icebergs and stranded polar bears?
I'm Confused.
Who is right?
Well, I'll tell you one conclusion I've reached.
I'll bet a Pound to a pinch of pigshit it ain't Hilary Benn.
But he and his worthless kind in Westminster and Brussels are happy to bankrupt this country further on the basis of unproven "consensual" science.
Oh, but "consensus" isn't proof; it's newspeak for "la la la la - I can't hear you because I have organic carrots in my ears".
It's time for an open, even and honest debate before billions of taxpayers pounds are wasted.
Pigs will fly.
Joke of the Day
H/T to Brookie for this.
A father walks into a Starbucks with his young son. He gives the young boy three coins to play with to keep him occupied.Suddenly, the boy starts choking, going blue in the face.
The father realizes the boy has swallowed the coins and starts slapping him on the back.The boy coughs up two of the coins, but keeps choking. Looking at his son, the father is panicking, shouting for help.
A well dressed, attractive, and serious looking woman, in a blue business suit is sitting at a coffee bar reading a newspaper and sipping a cup of coffee.
At the sound of the commotion, she looks up, puts her coffee cup down, neatly folds the newspaper and places it on the counter, gets up from her seat and makes her way, unhurriedly, across the restaurant.
Reaching the boy, the woman carefully drops his pants; takes hold of the boy's' testicles and starts to squeeze and twist, gently at first and then ever so firmly.. After a few seconds the boy convulses violently and coughs up the last coin, which the woman deftly catches in her free hand.
Releasing the boy's testicles, the woman hands the last coin to the father and walks back to her seat at the coffee bar without saying a word.
As soon as he is sure that his son has suffered no ill effects, the father rushes over to the woman and starts thanking her saying, "I've never seen anybody do anything like that before, it was fantastic. Are you a doctor? "
'No,' the woman replied. 'I'm with The Inland Revenue.'
A father walks into a Starbucks with his young son. He gives the young boy three coins to play with to keep him occupied.Suddenly, the boy starts choking, going blue in the face.
The father realizes the boy has swallowed the coins and starts slapping him on the back.The boy coughs up two of the coins, but keeps choking. Looking at his son, the father is panicking, shouting for help.
A well dressed, attractive, and serious looking woman, in a blue business suit is sitting at a coffee bar reading a newspaper and sipping a cup of coffee.
At the sound of the commotion, she looks up, puts her coffee cup down, neatly folds the newspaper and places it on the counter, gets up from her seat and makes her way, unhurriedly, across the restaurant.
Reaching the boy, the woman carefully drops his pants; takes hold of the boy's' testicles and starts to squeeze and twist, gently at first and then ever so firmly.. After a few seconds the boy convulses violently and coughs up the last coin, which the woman deftly catches in her free hand.
Releasing the boy's testicles, the woman hands the last coin to the father and walks back to her seat at the coffee bar without saying a word.
As soon as he is sure that his son has suffered no ill effects, the father rushes over to the woman and starts thanking her saying, "I've never seen anybody do anything like that before, it was fantastic. Are you a doctor? "
'No,' the woman replied. 'I'm with The Inland Revenue.'
An objective view of Labour
Morale was raised by the post below, which is reproduced with the generous permission of The New Adventures of Juliette , a blog always guaranteed to raise spirits.
Labour Pains
I'm about to make a fairly radical comment here
I can't stand Labour.
Whether it's Old Labour, New Labour or sort of Middle Aged But Young At Heart Labour, it gets on my bloody nerves. And it always has done
Normally, anyone who fancies themself as a bit on the intellectual or satirical side is duty-bound to say the exact opposite. Labour is my bestest friend. And Convervatives are stupid/boring/ ugly/unsexy/smell of poo-poo/have nits/can't play with us.
Well, sorry. But - while I'm no great pom-pom carrying cheerleader for the Right (and I still think George Osbourne is Central Casting's ideal choice for a Home Counties Patrick Bateman) - the fact is, I hate the Left a whole lot more.
There are many vices in this world I can happily tolerate.
However, hypocrisy is not one of them.
And the Left is absolutely crawling with the stuff. Exuding it from every sanctimonious pore.
Read the Guardian comment section, and its columnists are constantly warning of the hell that will await us under the Tories. Within months of Cameron acending to power, England will become a nightmarish dystopia of cruelty and evil. Peasants being whipped to death in the street for the crime of pulling a rickshaw too slowly. Babies starving in gutters as top-hatted capitalists whisk past lighting their foot-long cigars with hundred-pound notes. Serfs, vassals and droit de seigneur. People of England, you have been warned.
Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but - unlike the proles in 1984 - I do have a fairly reliable memory. And it tells me that day-to-day life under the Tories was pretty much same as it is now.
Maybe a bit lighter on Diversity Co-ordinators, Traveller Liaison Support Workers and Equality Support Strategic Development Co-ordination Czars.
But what the hell, we survived.
And yes, I know there are statistics showing that there's less crime, safer streets, happier pensioners, better healthcare etc etc etc under Labour. Thing is, you can prove anything with statistics. Literally anything. Especially if you threaten the people producing them with demotion or dismissal if they can't make the numbers go the right way. You can prove that Iraq is a safer place to live than Tunbridge Wells. Or that you're in more danger from a feather duster than a terrorist bomb. Don't believe me, watch The Wire some time.
IMHO, all politicians without exception are dodgy, thieving, lying wankers who care about exactly two things - getting elected, and getting rich(er).
The only difference is that the right are (very slightly) less hypocritical and annoying about it.
And while they're ripping you off, screwing the public for every last penny, not giving a tinker's toss about the poor and needy, crawling up the arses of any dodgy Russian billionaires that happen to bung them a few (milion) quid and scrounging freebies right, left and centre, they don't simultaneously expect you to bow down and worship them as the public-spirited holiest of public-spirited holies.
Here are my top reasons why the right-on left wing sucks...
1
Polly Toynbee
God, how I loathe this woman. How can I even begin to convey the depth of my hatred and contempt for her, and everything she stands for?
Here is my case for the prosecution.
Exhibit A - her smug, annoying, sanctimoniously smirking face - which acts much like a government health warning on a packet of fags, immediately warning you of what horrors lurk within. She has the most instantly dislikeable visage this side of Mark Thatcher.
Exhibit B - her relentless patronising air of holier-than-thou superiority, which she takes to a level that would make Lady Bountiful physically sick. Underscored by the certain knowledge that, for all her pontificating on the tragedy of inner city estates and what must be done to help their unfortunate underprivileged inhabitants, she lives about as far away from an inner city estate as it's humanly possible to get without the aid of space travel.
She is the sort of person who will earnestly use the phrase 'people less fortunate than ourselves'
The sort of person who will say 'it is tremendously important to understand the social context that compels under-privileged young people to demonstrate challenging behaviour and become involved in the justice system.'
But you can bet your left tit she's got a bloody good burglar alarm.
The only good thing about Polly Toynbee is that - if you read her column right before Body Combat - you'll go into that class like a young Mike Tyson on crack.
So from the narrow perspective of my health and fitness, I guess she's not a complete waste of space...
2
John Prescott
Yes, I know he's yesterday's man. But for me, his entire being summarises an entire breed - he's the sanctimonious Old Left incarnate. And highlights a rather awkward truth which the likes of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists somehow endeavoured to ignore.
People in power immediately become greedy bastards. Fact.
This applies whether they were born in a forty-bedroomed stately home with wall-to-wall housemaids and hot and cold running butlers, or in a cardboard box in t'middle of t'motorway a la the Monty Python sketch.
Far as I can tell, the only difference between old-left John Prescott and old-right Nicholas Soames is that Nicholas Soames a - knows how to hold his cutlery, b - isn't carrying something on his shoulder that's less a chip, more a fair-sized branch of McDonalds, and c - isn't a hypocritical cock jockey who thinks he's a man of the people despite owning five dozen polo ponies, eight mansions and a private army.
Apart from that, they're two smug greedy fat peas in a particularly ugly pod (think the horrible great slimy things in Gremlins...)
3
Virginia/Harriet/Jacqui/Margaret/Hazel/Thing
Aaargh! It's a multi headed political monster in horrible flat brown lace-up shoes, and it's trying to bore us to death! It's bombarding us with heavy-duty jargon at machine-gun pace! Multi-agency-working! Robust strategic partnerships! Outcome-focused patient-centric services! Use the Farce, Luke. Use the Farce!
4
The Observer On Sunday Magazine Section
Lost. Will to live. Answers to the name of Fluffy.
5
Polly Toynbee
Yes, I know I mentioned her before. But I hate the pious old bag so much, I just had to give her a second reference.
So it's another mention for the intrepid people's champion, with a real intuitive grasp of how ordinary British citizens live, think, work and feel. Daughter of rich literati. Great-niece of billionaire philathropist. Alumnus of Badminton School and St Anne's College, Oxford.
Anyone know where I can buy a decent voodoo doll round the Liverpool Street area?
6
The Right-On Teachers Of My Youth
If a teacher attempted to brainwash kids by reading them right-wing propaganda, there would be an uproar - and rightly so.
So how come, in my youth as now, it's perfectly okay to do the opposite?
Today, the offending books would almost certainly have been the staggeringly over-rated works of Philip Pullman - whose entire philosophy could be summarised as follows. Brainwashing kids to be conservative or religious is vile and unforgivable, and CS Lewis was a wanker. It's quite okay to brainwash them to be liberal atheists, though. Hey kids, God is dead, gay is good and anyone who says any different is evil and deserves to die.
Back in the day, however, it was a book series named The Borribles by a man named Michel de Larrabeiti. Which was read out to our primary school class, in not-particularly-eagerly-awaited instalments, by some Thatch-hatin' commie twat of a teacher called Mr Wilson. He had a guitar, too. And wore jeans. If he'd been any more of a cliche, he'd have been removed from the first draft of his own life by an eagle-eyed editor.
For some inexplicable reason, the Borribles series has fallen into obscurity. But here's the story in brief, if memory serves. Kids (who are good) run away from home and from grown-ups (which are bad), and form an anarchic tribe of their own called the Borribles (which is good). They survive by stealing (which is good) from adult businesses (which are bad). But they only steal food, and not money (which is bad). Their enemies are the police (who are bad), who try to catch them and make them become respectable law-abiding citizens (which is bad).
The police are led by an evil man named Inspector Sussworth, who is short and dark-haired with a toothbrush moustanche and a passion for order. The author doesn't actually give him one bollock or a German accent, but you get the impression it was a close-run thing.
It was the most most glaring attempt at childhood brainwashing since Swastika Press released their children's classic Jenny Lives With Adolf and Eva.
Although actually, it didn't work. Because even at the tender age of nine, I privately considered Mr Wilson to be an annoying cock monkey - and hence believed the exact opposite of anything he told us.
To this very day, I still think the police are better than shoplifters.
Sorry, Mr Wilson.
I'm voting Conservative next election, anyway. And at this point, I'm going to come right out and tell you the shocking truth.
I voted Conservative last general election, too.
Hey, sue me...
J x
A couple more points discovered here about Blessed Saint Polly. Failed her 11-Plus, so couldn't stay at Badminton. Went to that exemplar of egalitarian comprehensive education, Holland Park, emerging with one A Level. Got a scholarship to Oxford, but left after 18 months and didn't complete her degree.
A great role model.
Labour Pains
I'm about to make a fairly radical comment here
I can't stand Labour.
Whether it's Old Labour, New Labour or sort of Middle Aged But Young At Heart Labour, it gets on my bloody nerves. And it always has done
Normally, anyone who fancies themself as a bit on the intellectual or satirical side is duty-bound to say the exact opposite. Labour is my bestest friend. And Convervatives are stupid/boring/ ugly/unsexy/smell of poo-poo/have nits/can't play with us.
Well, sorry. But - while I'm no great pom-pom carrying cheerleader for the Right (and I still think George Osbourne is Central Casting's ideal choice for a Home Counties Patrick Bateman) - the fact is, I hate the Left a whole lot more.
There are many vices in this world I can happily tolerate.
However, hypocrisy is not one of them.
And the Left is absolutely crawling with the stuff. Exuding it from every sanctimonious pore.
Read the Guardian comment section, and its columnists are constantly warning of the hell that will await us under the Tories. Within months of Cameron acending to power, England will become a nightmarish dystopia of cruelty and evil. Peasants being whipped to death in the street for the crime of pulling a rickshaw too slowly. Babies starving in gutters as top-hatted capitalists whisk past lighting their foot-long cigars with hundred-pound notes. Serfs, vassals and droit de seigneur. People of England, you have been warned.
Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but - unlike the proles in 1984 - I do have a fairly reliable memory. And it tells me that day-to-day life under the Tories was pretty much same as it is now.
Maybe a bit lighter on Diversity Co-ordinators, Traveller Liaison Support Workers and Equality Support Strategic Development Co-ordination Czars.
But what the hell, we survived.
And yes, I know there are statistics showing that there's less crime, safer streets, happier pensioners, better healthcare etc etc etc under Labour. Thing is, you can prove anything with statistics. Literally anything. Especially if you threaten the people producing them with demotion or dismissal if they can't make the numbers go the right way. You can prove that Iraq is a safer place to live than Tunbridge Wells. Or that you're in more danger from a feather duster than a terrorist bomb. Don't believe me, watch The Wire some time.
IMHO, all politicians without exception are dodgy, thieving, lying wankers who care about exactly two things - getting elected, and getting rich(er).
The only difference is that the right are (very slightly) less hypocritical and annoying about it.
And while they're ripping you off, screwing the public for every last penny, not giving a tinker's toss about the poor and needy, crawling up the arses of any dodgy Russian billionaires that happen to bung them a few (milion) quid and scrounging freebies right, left and centre, they don't simultaneously expect you to bow down and worship them as the public-spirited holiest of public-spirited holies.
Here are my top reasons why the right-on left wing sucks...
1
Polly Toynbee
God, how I loathe this woman. How can I even begin to convey the depth of my hatred and contempt for her, and everything she stands for?
Here is my case for the prosecution.
Exhibit A - her smug, annoying, sanctimoniously smirking face - which acts much like a government health warning on a packet of fags, immediately warning you of what horrors lurk within. She has the most instantly dislikeable visage this side of Mark Thatcher.
Exhibit B - her relentless patronising air of holier-than-thou superiority, which she takes to a level that would make Lady Bountiful physically sick. Underscored by the certain knowledge that, for all her pontificating on the tragedy of inner city estates and what must be done to help their unfortunate underprivileged inhabitants, she lives about as far away from an inner city estate as it's humanly possible to get without the aid of space travel.
She is the sort of person who will earnestly use the phrase 'people less fortunate than ourselves'
The sort of person who will say 'it is tremendously important to understand the social context that compels under-privileged young people to demonstrate challenging behaviour and become involved in the justice system.'
But you can bet your left tit she's got a bloody good burglar alarm.
The only good thing about Polly Toynbee is that - if you read her column right before Body Combat - you'll go into that class like a young Mike Tyson on crack.
So from the narrow perspective of my health and fitness, I guess she's not a complete waste of space...
2
John Prescott
Yes, I know he's yesterday's man. But for me, his entire being summarises an entire breed - he's the sanctimonious Old Left incarnate. And highlights a rather awkward truth which the likes of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists somehow endeavoured to ignore.
People in power immediately become greedy bastards. Fact.
This applies whether they were born in a forty-bedroomed stately home with wall-to-wall housemaids and hot and cold running butlers, or in a cardboard box in t'middle of t'motorway a la the Monty Python sketch.
Far as I can tell, the only difference between old-left John Prescott and old-right Nicholas Soames is that Nicholas Soames a - knows how to hold his cutlery, b - isn't carrying something on his shoulder that's less a chip, more a fair-sized branch of McDonalds, and c - isn't a hypocritical cock jockey who thinks he's a man of the people despite owning five dozen polo ponies, eight mansions and a private army.
Apart from that, they're two smug greedy fat peas in a particularly ugly pod (think the horrible great slimy things in Gremlins...)
3
Virginia/Harriet/Jacqui/Margaret/Hazel/Thing
Aaargh! It's a multi headed political monster in horrible flat brown lace-up shoes, and it's trying to bore us to death! It's bombarding us with heavy-duty jargon at machine-gun pace! Multi-agency-working! Robust strategic partnerships! Outcome-focused patient-centric services! Use the Farce, Luke. Use the Farce!
4
The Observer On Sunday Magazine Section
Lost. Will to live. Answers to the name of Fluffy.
5
Polly Toynbee
Yes, I know I mentioned her before. But I hate the pious old bag so much, I just had to give her a second reference.
So it's another mention for the intrepid people's champion, with a real intuitive grasp of how ordinary British citizens live, think, work and feel. Daughter of rich literati. Great-niece of billionaire philathropist. Alumnus of Badminton School and St Anne's College, Oxford.
Anyone know where I can buy a decent voodoo doll round the Liverpool Street area?
6
The Right-On Teachers Of My Youth
If a teacher attempted to brainwash kids by reading them right-wing propaganda, there would be an uproar - and rightly so.
So how come, in my youth as now, it's perfectly okay to do the opposite?
Today, the offending books would almost certainly have been the staggeringly over-rated works of Philip Pullman - whose entire philosophy could be summarised as follows. Brainwashing kids to be conservative or religious is vile and unforgivable, and CS Lewis was a wanker. It's quite okay to brainwash them to be liberal atheists, though. Hey kids, God is dead, gay is good and anyone who says any different is evil and deserves to die.
Back in the day, however, it was a book series named The Borribles by a man named Michel de Larrabeiti. Which was read out to our primary school class, in not-particularly-eagerly-awaited instalments, by some Thatch-hatin' commie twat of a teacher called Mr Wilson. He had a guitar, too. And wore jeans. If he'd been any more of a cliche, he'd have been removed from the first draft of his own life by an eagle-eyed editor.
For some inexplicable reason, the Borribles series has fallen into obscurity. But here's the story in brief, if memory serves. Kids (who are good) run away from home and from grown-ups (which are bad), and form an anarchic tribe of their own called the Borribles (which is good). They survive by stealing (which is good) from adult businesses (which are bad). But they only steal food, and not money (which is bad). Their enemies are the police (who are bad), who try to catch them and make them become respectable law-abiding citizens (which is bad).
The police are led by an evil man named Inspector Sussworth, who is short and dark-haired with a toothbrush moustanche and a passion for order. The author doesn't actually give him one bollock or a German accent, but you get the impression it was a close-run thing.
It was the most most glaring attempt at childhood brainwashing since Swastika Press released their children's classic Jenny Lives With Adolf and Eva.
Although actually, it didn't work. Because even at the tender age of nine, I privately considered Mr Wilson to be an annoying cock monkey - and hence believed the exact opposite of anything he told us.
To this very day, I still think the police are better than shoplifters.
Sorry, Mr Wilson.
I'm voting Conservative next election, anyway. And at this point, I'm going to come right out and tell you the shocking truth.
I voted Conservative last general election, too.
Hey, sue me...
J x
A couple more points discovered here about Blessed Saint Polly. Failed her 11-Plus, so couldn't stay at Badminton. Went to that exemplar of egalitarian comprehensive education, Holland Park, emerging with one A Level. Got a scholarship to Oxford, but left after 18 months and didn't complete her degree.
A great role model.
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
Poems I Learned at My Father's Knee
It's just a bit of doggerel, really, but as my late Father used to say:
It happened 695 years ago today.
Robert Bruce (1274 - 1329), King of Scots from 1306, breaks the handle of his battleaxe as he kills the English knight Sir Henry de Bohun with a blow to the head before the Battle of Bannockburn, June 1314. Photo: Hulton Archive/Getty Images.
Bruce and De Bohun
Fought for the Croon,
Bruce drew his battleaxe
and knocked De Bohun Doon.
It happened 695 years ago today.
Robert Bruce (1274 - 1329), King of Scots from 1306, breaks the handle of his battleaxe as he kills the English knight Sir Henry de Bohun with a blow to the head before the Battle of Bannockburn, June 1314. Photo: Hulton Archive/Getty Images. Thus is history learned. The independance of a small nation was protected against aggression until a mutual Union created something greater. Will the same vigour ever be shown in preserving the sovereignty of this United Kingdom? Not under this government.
An Odious Little Speck
Much erudite comment has been written over the last couple of days regarding the elevation of J S Bercow Esquire to the dignity of First Commoner in the land. I shall resist the obvious cheap shot.
Not that I am a fan of Mr Bercow. While I have never met him, nothing I have learned of him is endearing, although I am sure he loves his wife and small fluffy animals.
But every time I see or hear him, he reminds me of the odious speck at school who would frequently be seen emerging from the Head’s study, face a picture of smug self-satisfaction, having sneaked on one of his fellows. Perhaps his favourite small fluffy animal is a weasel.
Some might describe him as self-satisfied; an unattractive trait. His performance on Monday, during his speech and subsequently, did nothing to allay this perception. Conceit appeared to ooze from his pores. But perhaps that is just his manner and such judgement harsh.
There is no doubt that Mr Bercow is a trimmer. His weaving political voyage puts one in mind of a drunken sailor returning to his ship. But I do not believe his to be a random journey, since Mr Bercow is shrewd and calculating.
Like many small men his lack of stature is counterbalanced by the size of his ego. Knowing that his trimming would be unlikely to earn him advancement in his own party, and that crossing the floor would, at best, gain a shadow brief, perhaps he saw the Speaker’s chair as the only route to the advancement he believed he deserved.
Mr Bercow is of modest origins. He has that in common with some of the finest Speakers of recent years. But unlike them, he clearly has little regard for the dignity and history of his new position. He appears to typify the “me, now” generation and fails to understand that he is now the incumbent of a post that is steeped in tradition which he has a responsibility to uphold.
It is not his place to tear asunder that tradition on a personal whim. If he had a whiff of modesty or judgement about him he would at least have taken counsel from his Sovereign. But his performance on ITV last night showed not one whit of modesty, but an arrogant, abrupt school bully.
However, PMQs today brought some little cause for optimism. If he has the courage to translate into discipline his warning about trailing legislation in the media, entertaining times await. Mr Hain seems to think otherwise, and since flaunting the primacy of Parliament is so engrained in Labour’s psyche, it is likely we will enjoy the delight of a Minister before the Bar.
Labour’s contempt of Parliament in backing Bercow brought the politics of the schoolyard to our legislature. Infantile and puerile, their only aim was to score a cheap point. It is illuminating that only one of his 15 proposers came from his own party.
Mr Bercow is on probation. He has 11 months to prove that Parliament’s interests, not his own, dominate his agenda. He may confound his doubters, but I suspect that this leopard will remain very spotty.
The Conservative party should be very careful if they wish to remove Bercow once they gain power. They have lost much of their reputation as the nasty party, and talk of removing another Speaker might lose them ground.
They should play a long game; Mr Bercow will make it easy for them.
Not that I am a fan of Mr Bercow. While I have never met him, nothing I have learned of him is endearing, although I am sure he loves his wife and small fluffy animals.
But every time I see or hear him, he reminds me of the odious speck at school who would frequently be seen emerging from the Head’s study, face a picture of smug self-satisfaction, having sneaked on one of his fellows. Perhaps his favourite small fluffy animal is a weasel.
Some might describe him as self-satisfied; an unattractive trait. His performance on Monday, during his speech and subsequently, did nothing to allay this perception. Conceit appeared to ooze from his pores. But perhaps that is just his manner and such judgement harsh.
There is no doubt that Mr Bercow is a trimmer. His weaving political voyage puts one in mind of a drunken sailor returning to his ship. But I do not believe his to be a random journey, since Mr Bercow is shrewd and calculating.
Like many small men his lack of stature is counterbalanced by the size of his ego. Knowing that his trimming would be unlikely to earn him advancement in his own party, and that crossing the floor would, at best, gain a shadow brief, perhaps he saw the Speaker’s chair as the only route to the advancement he believed he deserved.
Mr Bercow is of modest origins. He has that in common with some of the finest Speakers of recent years. But unlike them, he clearly has little regard for the dignity and history of his new position. He appears to typify the “me, now” generation and fails to understand that he is now the incumbent of a post that is steeped in tradition which he has a responsibility to uphold.
It is not his place to tear asunder that tradition on a personal whim. If he had a whiff of modesty or judgement about him he would at least have taken counsel from his Sovereign. But his performance on ITV last night showed not one whit of modesty, but an arrogant, abrupt school bully.
However, PMQs today brought some little cause for optimism. If he has the courage to translate into discipline his warning about trailing legislation in the media, entertaining times await. Mr Hain seems to think otherwise, and since flaunting the primacy of Parliament is so engrained in Labour’s psyche, it is likely we will enjoy the delight of a Minister before the Bar.
Labour’s contempt of Parliament in backing Bercow brought the politics of the schoolyard to our legislature. Infantile and puerile, their only aim was to score a cheap point. It is illuminating that only one of his 15 proposers came from his own party.
Mr Bercow is on probation. He has 11 months to prove that Parliament’s interests, not his own, dominate his agenda. He may confound his doubters, but I suspect that this leopard will remain very spotty.
The Conservative party should be very careful if they wish to remove Bercow once they gain power. They have lost much of their reputation as the nasty party, and talk of removing another Speaker might lose them ground.
They should play a long game; Mr Bercow will make it easy for them.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)