An Independent Scotland–An Unexpected Bonus

It has just occurred to me that should the Jocks decide in their referendum that their huff has arrived so they should leave in it, there is an immediate and real saving for the rest of us to be had from day one.

There are 59 Westminster Parliamentary Constituencies in Scotland. A Westminster MP is currently paid a salary of £66,396 English Pounds, so that’s £3,917,364 for all of them I've no idea what that will be in whatever currency they will end up using in Scotland should they secede, but then again neither does Alec Salmond (know what currency they will end up using that is). On top of this the 59 MPs claimed a total of £6,471,994 worth of expenses for 2011 which means the whole sorry lot costs us around £6.5 million per annum. An instant saving when they're no longer qualified to sit in Westminster.

The other good news of course is that the Labour Party would lose its 41 Scottish MPs and the Lib Dems their 6. Mr Miliband minor would find it much harder to get a parliamentary majority without a 40 plus seat head start. It might also do something to make the Lib Dems rue their failure to keep their promise to support boundary changes? It would also mean an instant resolution of The West Lothian Question. (see this article for a catch-up if you need one: http://tinyurl.com/p6ef8sk).

Personally I'm still looking for the answer to my “Mortimer Question” i.e.If every Scot you meet insists on telling you how passionately Scottish they are and how they are deeply wedded to their heritage, homeland and culture, why are they living and working here in the land of the hated Sassenach?

Is Ed Balls (By Both name & nature) Really Pro Profit?

So; Ed Balls (by both name and nature) went to talk to the CBI conference to try and convince them he is pro-profit. Of course he is pro-profit, of course he wants businesses to make profit. "Make loads of money" he says; not so that the businesses can re-invest in growth, dividends and jobs, but so he can grab it all in tax and give it to; benefit scroungers, immigrants, Local Councils; who will spend it on Ethnic Councillors, supporting organisations like “Black Gay Whales Against The Bomb”, and creating “Make Work” jobs for the boys to again stuff the labour ballot box; and, above all, create more Big Government to regulate even more aspects of our lives.

It is a constant source of amazement to me that the current generation cannot understand that the visceral essence of a Labour Government is predicated on their intention to tax and spend. Or, maybe the current generation is waking up to it, hence Labour’s stated policy to reduce the voting age to 16? If you don’t believe that there is a fundamental flaw in the doctrine of squeezing the rich until the pips squeak.Take a look at what’s happening in France.

(Dennis Healey as Labour Shadow Chancellor at the Labour conference on 1 October 1973, he said, "I warn you that there are going to be howls of anguish from those rich enough to pay over 75% on their last slice of earnings". In a speech in Lincoln on 18 February 1974, reported in The Times the following day, Healey went further, promising he would "squeeze property speculators until the pips squeak". He was later widely reported as saying that Labour would "tax the rich until the pips squeak").

There is revolution abroad in the the streets of France again (isn’t there always I hear you cry) about what its Government is doing.

The President François Hollande, a former Socialist party administrator with no experience of government before winning the presidency, has embarked on a policy of tax and spend in an attempt to finance his spending spree on public services and government civil servants. However, Hollande last week had to announce the “suspension” of a pollution tax on lorries that had triggered protests in Brittany. That was not enough to satisfy the rebels, however. A coalition of Breton farmers, lorry drivers, trade unionists and employers has now gone on the warpath against the eco-tax, claiming that Brittany would be penalised under the rules because of its remoteness.

Quimper, a picturesque town in Brittany, is a colourful hub of commerce where butchers and bakers vie for customers with sellers of sausage, cheese and wine. It is also a nucleus of insurrection against the Socialist government in Paris. Geneviève Coadour, the florist, is a figurehead of the so-called red bonnet rebellion. In between attending to customers last Thursday morning, she distributed protest posters and talked strategy with other insurgents. “We’re generally fed up with a government making such bad decisions,” she said, in a reference to Hollande and his governing team. “Unemployment has gone up. Taxes have gone up. We’ve had enough. We want change. “The eco-tax was the last straw”.

Suspension of the so-called eco-tax followed a government announcement last Sunday that it was scrapping plans to increase tax on savings accounts after a public outcry and a poll showing that 72% of the French think they are paying too much tax. In spite of the revolt against his tax and spend methods Hollande has clung to his 75% tax on earnings above €1m a year despite football clubs’ threats of a strike at the end of this month. But a big increase in corporate tax was abandoned after a protest by entrepreneurs. As a result of the high-tax policies thousands of people have been driven to leave France for more gentle fiscal climes overseas. It is now estimated that there are more French millionaires living in London than there are in Paris.

Outside of France there are those in Brussels and in Bonn who believe that M. Hollande’s policies are more of a danger to the Euro than Greece, Spain, or even Italy.

If we want to see these same disastrous polices here in the UK all we have to do is to believe the disingenuous Mr Balls (by both name and nature) and of course Red Ed Milliband Minor. It’s either that or prepare to man the barricades.

 

MPs debate immigration curbs plan

MPs are to debate government plans to toughen up the immigration system by making landlords question tenants about their status and cutting bank account access for those in the UK illegally. Ministers also want to make it easier to deport foreign criminals and cut the number of grounds for appeal.

Home Secretary Theresa May has said the changes will put the system "on the side" of those who abide by the law.

The government's plans, announced earlier this month, include:

• Making temporary residents, such as students, pay towards care provided by the NHS
• Powers to check driving licence applicants' immigration status
• Cutting the number of deportation decisions that can be appealed against from 17 to four
• Clamping down on people who try to gain an immigration advantage by entering into a "sham" marriage or civil partnership
• Requiring banks to check against a database of known immigration offenders before opening bank accounts

But of course Labour has tabled several amendments to the Immigration Bill. Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper will propose several amendments, including:

• Making it illegal for employers deliberately to run shifts only for foreign workers or segregate shifts by nationality
• Banning unsuitable accommodation being used as tied housing to offset the minimum wage
• Making it illegal for recruitment agencies to target and recruit only foreign workers
• Setting a maximum fine of £30,000 for employing illegal immigrants

 

I think that it is worthy of note that it appears to me that all the Coalition’s proposals are aimed at the individual immigrant while all of Labours amendments are aimed at businesses and employers.

Where was Labour’s zeal for this kind of legislation when they were in office? Having finally sensed that the public want a sensible, measured and above all controlled approach to immigration they now find themselves without their massive majority, which enabled them to totally ignore voters and do what they liked and are therefore forced into a position where they have to woo the electorate with proposals that go against the grain and must leave such a nasty taste in their mouths. They seek to mollify their distress by taking up their default position of condemning capitalism and strangling those who generate jobs and wealth. 

I am only worried about their proposals in that, like all Labour promises when they are in opposition; if they get back into government they will disappear like fairy gold, never to be seen again.

In my opinion reforms to the immigration system can't come soon enough. The people of the UK are not racist; the majority of them remain tolerant and welcoming to anyone who wants to come and make a life here, as long as they play by the rules. The problem has been that the previous Labour administrations abandoned any form of immigration policy in favour of an "Open Doors" policy in a blatant attempt to stuff the ballot box. They also sought to replace the tolerance of the British people with their doctrines of Multiculturalism, Political Correctness, Human Rights and a pandering to minorities, giving them privileges and rights without any responsibilities.

Let's have a sensible policy that determines who is eligible to come here and gives us the power to monitor and control our boarders.

Alistair Campbell The Archetypal Marxist Bully-Boy

I have just watched the piece on tonight’s Newsnight (01/09/13) with Alistair Campbell, Jon Steafel and Kirsty Wark.

Who appointed Alistair Campbell to be the BBC’s chief interviewer? Mr Campbell accused Paul Dacre of being a bully while haranguing Mr Steafel and subjecting him to third degree tactics that would never stand up under the force of the European Human Rights legislation which he so supported when he was the power behind the New Labour throne of Tony Blair.

Kirsty Wark was totally ineffectual in preventing Campbell from turning the piece into his attempt to brainwash the watching public by repeatedly trying to put his words into Mr Dacre’s mouth. Why is the BBC continuing to give Mr Campbell my, and other licence payer’s, money to continue to use his own bully-boy tactics to suppress other people’s views while railroading his own down other people’s throats? Campbell no longer has any power or influence and for him to continue to be feted by the BBC in this was is for many, many, many of the BBC’s viewers intolerable.

Shame on Kisty Wark for not being able to control Campbell’s boorish and frankly unacceptable behaviour. If we are looking for examples of the worst expressions of the excesses of the unacceptable face of Marxist control and suppression of opposing views we don’t have to go much further than the abominable Alistair Campbell.

If You Think This Government Is Useless Wait Until Nick Clegg Gets His Hands Around The Throat Of The Next One

I have just seen the highlights, if you can call them that, of Nick Clegg’s speech at the Liberal Democrat’s party conference. To say that I am incensed doesn’t even begin to cover it!
The sheer arrogance of the man. He has apparently decided that he is the only person who can dictate government policy and that it is the Lib Dem’s who should be the arbiters of what the next government can or can’t do.

It looks to me as if his only policy is to prevent what he believes to be the excesses of the other two parties. I thought that the whole point of an election campaign was to present polices to the electorate and let them decide whether they were acceptable or not. Nick Clegg’s view seems to be that the electorate can choose whatever party and/or policies they like, he will decide, after the people have spoken if they can have them or not.

The other thing that strikes me about what he said in his speech is that the result of his stance will be a government in stasis and stagnation, a leadership unable to lead, an executive deprived of executive decision making powers. He wants to have a lukewarm, insipid parliament and a cabinet of none of the talents. Just look at what Vince Cable has managed NOT to achieve while he has been in the Department of Industry and look at the damage Chris Hulne did in the Department of Energy. Do we want this replicated after the next general election?

Nick Clegg is a man seemingly incapable of keeping his manifesto promises or even his given word in a coalition deal. I don’t think his own party supporters, or the electorate in general will forgive him for reneging on his promise over tuition fees and his deliberate wrecking tactics in respect of boundary changes is looking increasingly like a cynical ploy to foster another hung parliament; a scenario that benefits nobody but himself and his party.

If you want a country that is going nowhere, if you want a government that can’t govern, if you want to watch our international competitors race past us economically then a coalition is the quickest way I can imagine to bring all that about.

Nick Clegg has already admitted that he’ll sell himself (and I suspect sell himself very cheaply indeed) to anyone who will keep his seat in a cabinet chair and his nose in the trough. A paltry number of seats from a rump of a principal-less party should not be a mandate for them to anchor us in a morass of ineffectual government.

It is my hope that the Conservative Party are given a majority at the next election. However, if we don’t get a majority, but are the largest party I hope that David Cameron will have the steel to tell |Mr Clegg to sling his hook back to the back benches and try and go for as long as he can as a minority government. My prediction is that if that happens it won’t be too long before Mr Clegg departs Westminster for the much more lucrative pastures of Brussels.

It’s The Conference Season; Liberals Beware It Looks Like An Outbreak of Doublethink Fever Has Already Broken Out In The Department Of Energy.

 

Wind farm opponents are living in stone age, Ed Davey claims.
(Headline from today’s Sunday Telegraph (14/09/2013)

 

Opponents of wind farms are living in the “Stone Age”, Ed Davey has said, as he declared war on Tory Cabinet colleagues over turbines.

Mr Davey is the Liberal Democrat Energy Secretary. He is reported in many of the Sunday papers today of attacks on his Conservative Cabinet cousins over what he sees as their recalcitrant attitudes and behaviour in seeking to block his “reforms”. Until now, Davey has kept the bitter behind-the-scenes battles to himself. Now it’s the conference season and it looks like he has decided he needs something to appeal to the bearded, sandal and sock wearing hard core Liberal lefties, He wants voters to know what he is up against and how hard he is having to fight against Tory opposition to his Green measures, such as wind farms, wave power, and covering large parts of southern England with solar panels. These he believes (well today he says he believes) are vital to safeguarding the country’s energy supplies. He calls these measures “Keeping the lights on”, I call it a recipe for brownouts, but we are all entitled to our opinion.

While he is currently making all this Green noise in the newspapers and in Glasgow, no doubt for the furtherance of his all party Liberal image and surrounded by the (ever dwindling) party faithful, it seems he has other ideas outside of the heady atmosphere of the conference hall.

In his day job Mr Davey, is overseeing plans for a new generation of nuclear power stations and he is adamant they are necessary. “I’m prepared to make the case . . . for new nuclear [power stations] because we can’t take low carbon options off the table,” he said He also says; I  have looked at a whole range of issues which people might have thought were difficult for a Liberal Democrat. For example, shale gas. I made the environmental case for [it]. That will be controversial in parts of the environmental movement.

I wrote last week about Labour’s dire case of Doublethink. Methinks this is a condition which could be catching? Is Mr Davey preparing the way to continue his coalition career by cosying up to Ed, Doublethink, Miliband? Now,If only they could get Nick Clegg to hold ONE idea consistently, he clearly failed with tuition fees, maybe they could have a close fit with Miliband Minor and his Newthink party. It would appear however that Cleggy’s chances of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct is somewhat beyond him. Ed Davey for leader you might have thought,but maybe he learnt all he knows about Newthink and Doublethink from master “Yoda” Vince Cable, the Benedict Arnold of the Labour and Liberal left who went over to the dark side aeons ago?

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The Labour Are Not Guilty Of Hypocrisy–Just Doublethink

In an article in today’s Daily Telegraph (04/09/2013) Graeme Archer points out that despite Ed Miliband campaigning for a NO vote against limited military action against Syria, in concert with the USA and France, now that Parliament have voted against it It turns out that Labour didn't expect the Government to lose. Now they want the chance to vote again.

Ben Bradshaw, MP for Exeter, a former Labour Cabinet minister, suggested [Mr Archer’s emphasis] that ED (the conquering hero who won the NO vote) would now support a second Parliamentary vote being called. Wouldn’t  this motion then have to be substantively identical to the one voted down 96 hours ago? If so you have to wonder if the Labour Party (Mr Miliband aside) wanted the original motion to succeed why didn’t they vote for it in the first place? I believe that this just goes to show that Miliband was not doing what he did for the good of democracy, or the good of the country, but only what he perceived, in the very short term, to be good for him.

Meanwhile Jim Murphy (MP for East Renfrewshire), Labour's defence spokesperson, said that "really significant developments in Syria" would imply that “of course the Prime Minister has the right to bring that back to Parliament." We know that thousands have already been killed in Syria's civil war; perhaps we should as Ed how many more would make it "significant"?

Now, if we were to apply logic to this position; (Okay, I’m aware that logic and the Labour Party are not comfortable bedfellows, but stay with me for a minute) then given the Government's motion you have to ask your self three questions:

1) Do you think Syria is a matter with which Britain should be involved?

2) Do you think Syria is a matter with which Britain should not be involved?

3) Are you not sure?

If your answer to the first question is YES then surely you should have voted FOR Mr Cameron’s motion. If you go with question two then surely you should have voted NO. If you were not sure then shouldn’t you have ABSTAINED? What I am now unclear about is is how you can vote against involvement on a Thursday and then, over the weekend, or maybe even as you were walking through the NO lobby, decide that it's all the Prime Minister's fault that you don't get to vote again next week, because this time you would support him.

Perhaps Ed Miliband is starting to worry that his behaviour last week confirms the negative perception we have of his personality. That he behaved like a total amoral lowlife toward his brother in his naked desire to to sell himself to the unions and become leader, maybe a bigger drag on what the public thinks of him than is generally appreciated by the pseudo-intellectual, metropolitan Neo-Marxists, toadies and “Yes Men” he has surrounded himself with. It looks like they have retreated to the position of: “When the facts change, I change … my opinion, moral stance, political ground, etc., etc. (strike out what does not apply). It may be more accurate to say: "When it looks like I might be on the wrong side of Received Opinion, I'll do whatever it takes to turn that focus group around.

Perhaps however something else going on in the mind of Miliband Minor and the members of the labour Party? Some, far more cynical that I, may think the original stance and this new one show up the blatant hypocrisy of these cheap hucksters who will, like a cheap whore, adopt any position for preferment, or maybe they have taken a leaf out of George Orwell’s 1984 had have adopted Big Brother’s concept of Newthink and Doublethink?

Newthink is language that deliberately disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words.Within Newthink is “Doublethink”; this is that the act whereby an individual or a group of people, for example in this case the Labour Party, can simultaneously accept two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct. This is Somewhat related to, but almost the opposite of what we consider to acceptable behaviour in a civilised society i.e cognitive dissonance. This is where contradictory beliefs cause conflict in one's mind. Newthink and Doublethink are notable due to a lack of cognitive dissonance — thus the person, or group engaging in them are completely unaware of any conflict or contradiction. The question we must ask is “Do we want people capable of Newthink and Doublethink running the country?”

Ed appears to have lead his party to a place where they now believe that there is nothing that he,or the party could say to us now that we would not believe and even should they all “about face” we would continue to believe them. What that leads to is more of the “Wisdom of Big Brother; ““War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”; “If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”. I however would prefer to live in in the twenty first century than 1984 and will be voting that way in 2015.

Ed Milliband; Weak, Wishy-Washy and A Totally Egocentric Cynic.

I'm not unhappy at the delay in our taking direct action against Syria ,because that's all it will be. Nothing convinces me that it would serve a purpose at the moment but the time will come.

The content of David Cameron's speech was what I wanted to hear and it was delivered with earnestness and conviction by a man showing true leadership qualities. We need such people However, but let's put the blame for our non-intervention squarely where it lies.

The increasingly lame Mr Milliband is looking to make political capital at the expense of our moral responsibilities and Syrian lives. He is trying to cowardly distance himself from the war criminal Tony B Liar who, unlike Cameron, blatantly lied to Parliament and took us into an illegal war.

Mr Milliband obviously has no moral compass or conscience. He is purely a Marxist, Union operated puppet, out for the main chance to try and rescue the shambles of his failed leadership of the Labour Party and his political career. What a cynic.

He is quoted in the papers today saying that he “urges the Government not to "wash its hands" of Syria”. This despite urging MPs to vote against the principle of military intervention. Even some of the Right Wing press appear to give him tacit support but then again the gentlemen of the fourth estate were ever fickle and easily swayed.

There is no doubt his tactic of first agreeing to support the Government and then turning his coat at the last minute worked, but it is the worst example of a cynical manipulation of Parliament and the most desperate pandering to public option in a last ditch attempt to try and achieve some public sympathy since Alistair Campbell ceased his unlawful and unholy machinations.

This unprincipled weak, wishy-washy and totally egocentric cynic must never be allowed to be Prime Minister, Remember he and Ed Balls were as much the architects of our recent disastrous economic plight as Gordon Brown and Tony Blair. I winder who was pushing his buttons back then; Len McCluskey perhaps?

Heard The One About The Four Scotsmen Who Are Going To Be A Couple Of Minutes Late?

Question: Why does BBC 2 always begin its traffic reports in Scotland and work south? As an example they will inevitably begin by reporting a lane closure on the A9 north of Pitlochry. Given the population density in those parts, even at the height of the tourist season, this probably means that three or four Jocks are going to experience a maximum of a five or, at most, a ten minute delay.

Meanwhile, on the M25 the Commissariat Militia (otherwise known as the Highways Agency Traffic Officer Service or “Traffic Wombles”) have closed three out of four lanes, causing ten to fifteen mile tailbacks and hours of delay to thousands of motorist’s journeys. All this because someone (now safely parked on the hard shoulder) has blown a tyre and left a small piece of tread on the inside lane.

Apparently they have to shut down so many lanes to maintain the safety of their officers; who are either policemen who have retired early on full pensions because they have a bad back, and are now raking in another publicly funded salary and amassing a second Civil Service pension, or wannabes who couldn’t get into the police force in the first place but now have a uniform and who think they have God like powers to lord it like Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring.

The BBC however will make the huge majority of people who may be affected by this wait three of four minutes while they bang on about Berwick, Ballymena and Barnard Castle.

Can’t they begin their reports with the major hold-ups which are affecting the vast majority or is this another example of tipping our hats to the multicultural minorities?

The Looney Lib Dems have finally lost it

Okay – it’s now official. The Looney Lib Dems have finally lost it. Power seems to have gone to the Liberals’ heads. They plan to win the next general election by clobbering the rich rather than making the country wealthy.

In a policy drawn up by the party’s “Tax Working Group” high earners would face a huge rise in their capital gains tax bills.They propose a cut in the tax-free capital gains allowance from £10,900 to just £2,000.

In addition the manifesto policies drawn up by party’s Federal Policy Committee includes limiting tax relief on pension contributions and cutting the size of pension pots to £1m (equivalent to about £20,000 a year for a 65 year-old married man). The Lib Dem leadership is also inviting grassroots activists to vote on the return of the controversial 50p income tax rate which was recently scrapped by the coalition; Inheritance tax will be tightened and non-dom taxpayers hit harder and the mansion tax is still coming too.

The Liberal Democrats call that “creative and progressive”.  That’s a very liberal use of the word ‘creative’. They describe it as fairer taxation that will encourage employment and economic growth. It is in fact the opposite.

Will you be one of the turkeys voting for these bearded sandal wearing weirdo’s Christmas at the next election then, or will you be going for the Punch & Judy knockabout, end of the pier UKIP show? You could of course decide to give the economy back to Ed. Ed, Yvette and Len McCluskey. I know who I’ll be supporting.

Who Watches The Watchers?

How long will be forced to put up with the petty tyranny that is the BBC’s Watchdog programme?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for consumer rights. After all I am one myself (a consumer that is). It appears to me however that Watchdog is no longer about helping the consumer by exposing sharp business practice, it’s more about “Shock Jock Journalism” in a blatant grab for ratings and promotion of Anne Robinson’s fading career. To my eye it looks like this programme deliberately sets out with a jaundiced and non-impartial eye to exaggerate the failings or flaws of what are often legitimate, honest, business, while ignoring the stupidity and naivety of their customers. Whatever happened to balanced impartial journalism?

To my mind often the so called “victims” are simple (Okay - stupid) people who have not read or taken the time to acquaint themselves with a company’s terms and conditions. Either that  or where there is an obvious fraud, they have forgotten the first rule of any business transaction “If something looks too good to be true – then is most probably is”. Once the customer falls foul of a clause in the contract they don’t like, or that doesn’t allow them the freedom to withdraw from a contract they freely entered into, they expect to be made the exception to the rule and treated as a special case.

Our society has become choked with those who firmly believe that the rules must be rigorously applied to everyone else, except them. Like spoilt children when they cannot get their way they go crying to Nanny (or in this case Anne Robinson) usually because they want their cake AND their ha’penny. The programme always takes the part of the customer no matter how stupid, lazy or indolent they are and appears to have no concern of the business reputations they besmirch and often ruin by their biased perspective.

Any transaction is in essence a contract. in a contract there are duties, roles and responsibilities assigned to and accepted by both sides. As customers we have as much responsibility to abide by the contract as the seller. Therefore, before we enter into a transaction we have a duty to make sure we know  what the terms and conditions are. We should not gripe, wail and moan when the other party seeks to enforce those conditions we don’t like if we default on our end of the bargain, or simply change our minds.

I believe that it’s time for consumer rights organisations to take a back seat. They should tell people their motto should really be “Caveat Emptor” (Buyer Beware).

Here are some of my rules for safe shopping:

1) Never buy anything where you haven’t instigated the sale.

2) Avoid “cold calls” and people who contact you without your knowledge (even if they know your name, or tell you you have won a prize).

3) Always make sure you understand the terms of the transaction (is there a returns policy? If so, what is it? Is there a guarantee?)

4) If there is a contract READ IT.

5) Don’t be embarrassed about taking as much time as you need. If you want to take the contract away or read it overnight, or if there are clauses you don’t understand ASK.

6) Remember the seller is anxious to sell you the goods. They will still be there the next time you ask for them.

7) Don’t believe the salesman who tells you “You must sign today or the opportunity will be gone”. (Like the opportunity, the likelihood is he salesman will be “Here today and gone tomorrow).

There are of course many other things I could say but in the end it all comes down to common sense. Unfortunately as the old saying has it “Common sense is a very uncommon commodity”.

Alternative Comedy–Don’t Make Me Laugh

The other night I watched some of the latest episode of Channel 4’s satirical comedy show 10 o’clock live. This program features the odious Charlie Booker who appears to be the latest in a line of so called “Alternative Comedians”. If he, and those such as Ben Elton, Alexei Sayle, and Jo Brand are to be believed then for “Alternative Comedy” we should read “Neo-Marxist Leninist polemic.

It appears that all that is necessary to qualify as an alternative comedian is to have a ten minute rant about the evils of  Conservative capitalism. In the 1980’s some comedian’s entire act consisted of “Mrs Thatcher – what a bitch!!” or “The Tories – Evil, posh upper class swine who are hell bent on closing down The North and raping manual workers”.

Foe all those trendy left wing, metropolitan Marxist, so called comedians, here is my “Alternative, Alternative Comedy” act.

“Tony Blair – twelve years of stealth taxes, slavish devotion to European health & safety, and the giving away of our sovereignty to Brussels.

The bribery of Europe with our money so that Tony could buy his way to the presidency of Europe (thankfully to no avail). The waging of illegal foreign wars at the behest of America which has left us the prime target of fanatical Muslim Jihadists. The ruination of businesses and entrepreneurship by the imposition of a centralist, bureaucratic behemoth Soviet style state.

The mental and cerebral castration of two generations of young people by the recruiting of crazy left wing teachers who thought it better that children were taught" that “no one looses” and who were allowed to re-write history in a great orgy of Stalinist revisionism. Teachers who in fact didn’t teach, so that children left school without the basic ability to read, write and do sums.

Who’s idea was it that 50% of pupils should go to university? – all that lead to was the dumbing down of our tertiary educational institutions.

The nanny state; a police force that has become a quasi- military militia whose purpose seems to no longer that of deterring crime and catching criminals but of acting as a direct arm of government or of the revenue.

Tony Blair’s government took away rights that had ben enshrined in our constitution since Magna Carta.

• The right to trial by jury (no longer applicable for certain offences).
• The right of habeas corpus (they wanted to lock people up with out charge or without trial for 90 days)
• Double Jeopardy (if you are found innocent the government can now keep bringing charges for the same offence until they get the judgement they want).

Then, when his Tonyness finally went, Gordon Brown and Ed Balls embarked on a spending spree (with borrowed money which they knew we had no hope of repaying in anyone's lifetime) on a Socialist experiment in social re-engineering. They also tried to use the public purse to create make-work “jobs for the boys” in local government “services” in a blatant attempt to stuff the ballot box.

Let’s not get into New Labour’s disastrous immigration policy (or complete lack thereof). opening our doors to a flood of Eastern European economic migrants who contribute nothing to our economy or cultural life but were/are just a drain on the public purse.

The entire doctrine of “Multiculturalism” – forcing the majority to give up its rights and privileges in favour of ethnic minorities.”

I could go on but let’s face it, it’s just not funny anymore and we all know that no one is laughing now.

So, to all the left wing Alternative Comedians out there – Do you still think cheap shots at the right are funny? “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone”     

Who's to blame for the failure to stop the Oxford sex ring?

On the TV news yesterday evening (15/05/13) I watched a procession of Social Services, Local Government and Thames Valley Police officers all seek to deny culpability in terms of their failure to intervene earlier in the Oxford sex ring saga. It appears that all these agencies were alerted to the fact that something was wrong as log ago as 2010. Several of the men who have now been convicted of these horrendous crimes were questioned by police and were known to Social Services yet nothing was done to properly investigate them.

I think that it is significant that the majority of the men involved are of Pakistani origin and the others were of North African extraction. While I would not seek to draw the conclusion that all men of similar ethnic backgrounds are perverted sex fiends, I do ask the question as to whether the agencies responsible went easy on them in their investigations because of the fear of being labeled racist?

It is now acknowledged by many that the previous government's policy of "multiculturalism" lead us to the point where any discussion of immigration was stifled by accusations of racism. I wonder if the same attitudes were promoted to pervade the culture of the police and social services so that it became difficult to investigate people if they were from a different ethnic community. Does the failure to stop the Oxford sex ring lie at the door of New Labour's metropolitan Marxist doctrines of political correctness and multiculturalism?    

Is A Victorian Attitude A Bad Thing?

The Victorians
When people talk about “The Victorians” most of the time the term is used in a negative and derogatory manner. People talk about “Victorian Values”, when they want to describe people who are sexually repressed, or have a harsh, unyielding or draconian attitude. The Victorians however were far from the rigid, inflexible, rule obsessed, intellectual inbreeds some people portray them as.

The Victorians were the architects of our modern world, who laid down the foundations of our current business and information society. Instead of shying away from “Victorian Values” we should be embracing them with the fervour and passion which they had.

The Victorians had the gift of believing that anything was possible. No mountain was too high, no valley too low; no river was too wide and no continent was too vast that it couldn't be climbed, spanned, crossed or conquered. Their ideas and their ambition were limitless and challenges and difficulties were things to be overcome not insurmountable obstacles to dishearten them and make them give up.

The Victorian attitude was to relentlessly press forward to their goal, regardless of whatever fate, nature, or even other men threw in their way to stop them. They did this by the simple application of four simple but vital premises: Information, Investigation, Innovation, and Implementation.

Having identified a problem they wanted to solve, or an obstacle the wanted to overcome, they gathered as much information about the problem as they could and clearly defined it. They would then investigate the implications of the problem, find out what resources were required or available to be brought to bear to bring about the solution that was required. If the required resources, systems, process, or procedures weren't in place or didn't exist they would innovate to create something new, vigorous, and exciting, to make sure that they could implement their solution and move forward.

If we compare that with what happens today we see that our own information and investigation stages are hampered and mired in concerns such as Health & Safety, Government Rules and Regulations, our P.R. profiles, or the fear of bad publicity. Our ability to innovate, or even in many cases our desire for innovation itself, has been suppressed or killed off by the fear of change or the fear of ridicule, as people tell us “it can't be done” or “you mustn't do it like that”. All this of course means that we seldom actually implement a timely or appropriate solution.

I believe that our Victorian forefathers would not have hesitated to build an island in the Thames to house a new multi-runway international airport, or the transport infrastructure to support it. The shades of Thomas Telford, Richard Trevithick, and Robert Stephenson, not to mention Isambard Kingdom Brunel, et al must be turning in their graves and railing at the shackles the politically correct planners and the loony lefty Greens are imposing on our entrepreneurial and engineering spirit.

In spite of all this there are still some entrepreneurs and innovative thinkers out there in the world of business and science. Men, and women, who embraced the true Victorian ideals of Information, Investigation, Innovation, and Implementation. Businessmen such as Richard Branson; Jack Cohen, who founded the Tesco supermarket chain; and Jeffery P Bezos, the founder of Amazon. These men have investigated and then changed the way we shop. Men of science like, Tim Berners Lee, Trevor Baylis, the inventor of the clockwork radio, Bill Gates and Steve Jobbs, whose innovations have impacted our way of communicating ideas. And men of ideas and new social constructs such as, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and Martin Luther King who have all implemented changes which have bettered the way we think about each other.

I believe that we should all re-embrace the spirit of the real Victorians. I’m sure that those Victorian gentlemen who’s Information, Investigation, Innovation, and Implementation was originally responsible for creating all that is good about Britain would be well pleased to see us returning to the true Victorian tradition and contributing to helping us build a better Britain.

We’re All Entitled To An Opinion–Here’s Charlie Brookers–And Mine

Charlie Brooker is a smug self-opinionated champagne socialist with all the apparent wit, grace and charm of a flatulent boorish water buffalo with personal hygiene issues. Lacking the erudition of the truly well-read, well-mannered or well-educated he seeks to make up in arrogance and self-opinionated offence what he so obviously lacks in knowledge or social grace. Here is another of the luvie, lefty, literati who, feted by the BBC, are happy to take the capitalist shilling.

I Support Social Services

I support public service but I also support the reduction of the bloated blood-sucking parasitic entity the previous Socialist mal-administration made. Packing local councils, social care, the NHS and the civil service with make-work, self-opinionated jobsworths was merely a thinly disguised means of buying votes for a Socialist (nay Soviet, Marxist) regime hell bent on performing blatant attempts at social engineering with the country’s money. When the surplus the last Conservative government had built up was all gone, Blair, Brown, Balls, Miliband and co. then proceeded to attempt to prop up the whole inflated edifice with borrowed money which we couldn't afford to pay back.

Now that the bills are due the Socialist “Brothers and Comrades” are happy to man (and women, must be politically correct lest we offend their already tender sensibilities) the barricades, suggesting the all the Tories want is to cut care, social welfare and benefit support. I believe that what the government really ought to do is to go back to us having a country that lives within its means. Let’s have no more cushy jobs for the Brothers and Comrades and no more free hand-outs for the work-shy and idle. Support public services by all means but don’t let Leninist Marxist dogma stop anyone from working out how you are going to fund and support it.

Oh, and by the way, Keynesian economics has already been shown to have failed to solve the recession. A recession caused by Blair, Brown and the like de-regulating the banks and financial markets and effectively causing the crash of 2008. Governments can’t borrow money from failed institutions to finance infrastructure projects (and huge social services budgets) to stimulate demand. Tight fiscal policies and an overall reduction of the tax burden, together with the dismantling of the red-tape and restrictions imposed by the previous administration’s Commissariat law makers are, in reality, what is needed.

Just How Crazy Can The Eurozone Get?

Because Cyprus is part of the Euro it has no control over its exchange rate. Isn't its decision to levy a 10% tax on bank deposits the only way it can effectively devalue? Doesn't this 10% levy mean that effectively the Euro in Cyprus is worth 10% less than anywhere else?

Now that the central dictatorship has forced the Cypriot government into a tax and a raid on savings they have again demonstrated that democracy and individual freedom are no longer an option in the federalist dystopia being unwillingly forced on Europe. If the economists, bankers and federalists who are now in charge were wearing military uniforms, the way they have usurped power in Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and now Cyprus would be call an outrage.

Apparently because they are wearing business suits, ruling without a democratic mandate is perfectly Okay. The sooner the madness that is the Eurozone is over the better the world will be.

On a related topic - If we want economic growth I believe we should be looking to Freidrich Hayek rather than John Maynard Keynes. Everyone from doctors to local bureaucrats; from bankers to politicians, have been seduced by the false hope of "Intervention". Let's just call it what it is i.e. "Meddling for personal profit, gain, personal satisfaction, or power".