Thursday 30 April 2009

Is Mayor Boris re-arranging deckchairs and not clearing the way?

WARNING: Parochial London-centric blogpost. However, this post has some relevance in the general issue of devolving power, boundaries etc.

Is Mayor Boris re-arranging deckchairs and not clearing the way?

Boris is backing a new City Charter, but I am concerned that some of the ideas will not move us forward. Just because the current arrangements are not ideal, does not mean that change will automatically mean improvement.

Lets take a look at some of the proposals.
* Appoint borough commanders instead of the Met chief doing so.
This might have legs, but I'd rather the people voted, not the Boroughs.
* Spend NHS money currently under the control of primary care trusts.
This is replacing one monopoly with another, with no plurality. Problem here is coordination and the fact that PCTs are not limited to one borough. My son was born in Hammersmith. If you get per-Borough control of monies, my mind sees into the future people will be limited to using their local borough's health services. Bad. bad. bad.
* Decide on GPs' opening hours.
Like 24 hours a day, 7 days a week? Who knows, this could be a wheeze to push through the dreaded Polyclinics, which will end up forcing out GPs and resulting in people having a de facto monopoly for General Practice provided by some faceless company who won a "tender" by the PCT. I smell corruption behind all this, as I always do when I see a Private Monopoly Operating Under State Mandate. I suspect we will end up with poorer services, higher costs and certainly far less choice and a further distance to see one's doctor than now. For those who do not know, Polyclinics are facilities offering some limited outpatient care, minor operations and sometimes a "Nurse Practitioner" environment instead of Doctor-led. They are larger than GP surgeries and serve a larger area, thus becoming a monopoly presence for many. The setting up of a Polyclinic often requires resources beyond that of the traditional GP partnerships, so only private corporations can bid. The link between you and your doctor can be shaky as it is, with a Polyclinic it is likely to break entirely.
* Change bus routes and timetables, taking control of local services from Transport for London.
Bus routes do not operate within a borough. Queue cat-fights as boroughs argue the toss as buses cross boundaries. One borough might not want a useful route diverted to a busy high street, screwing up the services. Whatever, we will see the spawning of 32 tin-pot TfLs around London. Yes to more local input into services, but I do not consider if my bus crosses into Hounslow or Acton when I get on it, so why should Ealing Borough care?
* Take charge of the trunk roads run by TfL.
Not sure why this is needed. Trunk routes by defintion are pan-borough, so it makes sense that the supra-borough entity runs them.


Still, if it means more INVOLVEMENT then fine, but I get the feeling it will just create a whole series of new layers reproduced in 32 boroughs with lower quality staff.

Someone Please Explain why Mr Noumbiwa needs to be outside Cameroon, let alone in the UK?

Got tipped off about a plea to stop the deportation of an Illegal Immigrant/Asylum Seeker. I must say I smell an opportunistic rat.

Anselme Noumbiwa fled Cameroon in 2006 because he was at risk of punishment for not adhering to the tribal traditions of the *Bamileke people. As the son and heir to the tribal Chief, Anselme was expected to assume his father's role, which included 'marrying' his many wives. When his father died in May 2006, Anselme refused to become the new Chief because polygamy contravened his Christian beliefs. In an attempt to force Anselme to comply with tradition, the village elders subjected him to the most degrading and terrifying torture.

Now, the Bamileke people are one tribal group in Cameroon concentrated in the western provinces and not part of the National Government AFAICT.

There is no central Chief, but many many small tribal fiefdoms, often at the village level, though their villages are said to be large and compact, so let us call it a town. Even so, I suspect we are not talking about an event involving all 2m Bamileke!

Cameroon is previously a French colony. Ergo, Mr Noumbiwa would surely be aiming for France. No?

Fact is there are countless people who wish to move to the UK. Many are following the legal channels, often paying large sums in Visas and waiting their turn under due process.

To keep pandering to stunts and, on the face of it, rather dubious, non-sequitur claims by Asylum Seekers rather insults the very term. It costs a fortune. It delays valid claims. It brings disrepute to valid Asylum Seekers fleeing genuine State or organised terror that would affect one across that nation. You know, like opposition leaders or activists, suffragettes, human rights activists or Gay Iranians.

I suspect that Mr Noumbiwa could quite happily live his life no worse off than his fellow Cameroons if he just lived away from his tribal homeland. You know, like in the nearest City. So, the Cameroon Government is a shit, bleats the supporters' website. Well, by that logic all the population of Cameroon should be permitted to stay in the UK. The best way for Cameroon to be fixed is for the Cameroons to stay and fix it themselves. Nobody else is going to do it.

This case appears to me to be like my pleading Asylum to live in Switzerland because da Slough Massive beat me up.

Fact is, while we have various people supporting what appears to me to be a rather tenuous claim for Asylum, we had countless Gurkhas being denied entry or being deported. I know where my focus has been.

Joanna Lumley committing an act of knife crime.


There is a queue. A very long queue. British people like queues for the very reason that they are fair. Fill out your form. Get in the right queue. Stay in line. Wait your turn. No criminal record, honest intent and skills to offer? Right this way, if you please!

Coffeehouse calls for "A proper debate on the 50p tax". Why?

Why have a "proper debate" about what is basically a cheap piece of envy politics? The tax rate is nuts. The theft of the personal allowance over £100k is nuts. It is almost certainly going to lose revenue. It is almost certainly going to result in talent leaving and less talent arriving.

The 50% tax band should be junked and the horse it rod in on boiled down for glue.

The UK should become a Tax Haven, period. We should do this so talent, wealth and wealth-creating people and companies want to domicile here.

This will have greater power if we have Free Banking, meaning that the currencies used can be totally independent of the Central Government if people so wish, further increasing confidence that wealth will not be appropriated.

Democracy. Rule of Law

Hat tip, Samizdata.
"Democracy is nowadays a greatly over-hyped blessing, particularly by Americans, who have no pre-democratic history to provide a perspective. It is clearly less important than freedom, the rule of law and constitutional government, which ideally it should entrench, but may well not do so." - Nigel Lawson, former UK finance minister, journalist and more recently, a fine debunker of global warming alarmism.
Nigel points out key beliefs of the LPUK. Rule of Law is more important than Democracy. Democracy's main role is to remove bad governments. It is not very good at providing the good. It is also the least damaging system so far devised to existing Rule of Law, but no guarantor of it.

The threats to Rule of Law will change slightly under the Tories, but it is by no means safe.

Wednesday 29 April 2009

Unimog: A personal favourite now in Dorset

I see that Dorset Fire Brigade have taken delivery of their new Mercedes-Benz Unimog Fire appliance. What is a bit sad about the vid is that it is not "they" who call it a Unimog - it is a decades old brand. Get a grip, boy.

I have always had a soft spot for Unimogs, being as they are tough, flexible, robust and very capable vehicles. When things get too big for a Landy, get a Unimog. If ever I [bought my Bamboo plantation in Thailand|Move to Sutherland|Retired to a lake in Canada], I would have an old Unimog and probably convert it to series hybrid with a solar panel on the roof for good measure. Of course, no newer than a 406 - the later models were just plain UGLY.

Consume for Happiness

Hat Tip, Patrick over at Towards Mutual Benefit.

Tuesday 28 April 2009

60m Citizens Targeted by war room scams.

60m Citizens targeted by war room scams

More than a third of people targeted by HM Treasury fraudsters during the past 12 years were pensioners, the City watchdog has said.

Around 35pc of people who were defrauded by HM Treasury con men who bought worthless bank shares were aged over 65, according to the Financial Services Authority (FSA).

Just under a quarter of people in this age group thought they could become the victims of The State this year, but 49pc said they did not have enough information on how to protect themselves from the Government.

Four out of 10 people who did not realise that The State could use personal details to steal their identity were also aged over 65. The research was published as the FSA announced plans to work with charity Age Concern and Help the Aged to help protect older people from becoming victims of fraud.

The survey showed that around 24 million adult internet users in the UK will be covertly snooped on by the State wanting them to establish their bank details, email and browsing habits, take part in a pyramid scheme (National Insurance) or a money transfer scam (also called Income Tax, Capital Gains Tax, Stamp Duty and Inheritance Tax).

Chris Pond, FSA director of financial capability, said: “The State, like all criminals, tend to prey on the most vulnerable people and our research shows this is definitely the case with Governments who commit financial crimes. We are delighted that Age Concern and Help the Aged have agreed to work with us on tackling this problem.

“Our partnership will help ensure older people are better equipped with the tools they need to protect themselves from fraud and other financial scams so the fruits of their life’s labours do not fall into the wrong (i.e. Government) hands.”

Michelle Mitchell, charity director for Age Concern and Help the Aged, said: “All too often older people are the target of HM Treasury scammers and this is why a strategy designed to protect older people is so important.

“Through our partnership with the FSA we hope to bring an end to unscrupulous Governments taking vulnerable older people for their entire life savings. Older people have worked a lifetime to save what money they have and to see that money stolen is simply unacceptable.”

ENDS

++++++++++++++++++

What is so shocking is that I had to change so very little of that to make it fit perfectly with the behaviour of our present Administration. The Tories will be little better, mark my words. No Grand Repeal, no hard promises on shrinking the State.

The only party with a solution to this nightmare is the Libertarian Party, UK, who have a manifesto for Sound Money, Rule of Law, reducing coercion and establishing consent as the way people live together.

My apologies to The Daily Telegraph



Friday 17 April 2009

China and Copper Reserves.

There is a curious story in The Telegraph about the idea that China is looking to copper, not as a means to wire its country, but as a reserve metal.

A number of interesting comments. One of those that stood out said this:
Healthy sceptic on April 17, 2009 at 05:46 AM
Excellent article. The media is obsessed with Jade Goody's private life, McBride's emails, the latest entry in Pop-stars, Beckham's shoes, etc..Concentrating on entirely the wrong issue.

The Chinese are proving far more ambitious than the Japanese. Brown is setting out to save the poor of the world - by taking money from the poor of Britain. And the Chinese are chasing real wealth. China wants to divert the proceeds of the world's mines into it's factories and workshops. Meanwhile the liberal-Marxists running the West are concentrating on ethnic representation, outsourcing, rescuing bankers, taxing real work, celebrating celebrity media culture, designer clothes and wall to wall sports coverage. The Chinese have realised that Marxism is a load of nonsense - but they need the West to keep trying Marxisim. The Chinese are using Communism the same way Singapore used conservatism - as a front for Confucian values. The West is bogged down in liberal Marxism and is going down the tubes. You will see the BBC agreeing with Ambrose in five years time - by which time Britain will be totally bankrupt, and Englishmen will be queuing up to work in mines in Australia for Chinese bosses. Brown will be writing his memoirs, and the Observer will be serialising them. And nobody will seem to notice. Gordon Brown will leave Britain a basket case. Britain needs a real leader to turn everything around - instead a dithering delusional idiot is in charge. The left in Britain continually lambasted George Bush. America will recover from George Bush. But Britain will never recover from Brown and his liberal new left nonsense.
Another poster talked about their gladness at the initiative. They were Australian. Now, although that sounds nice in some ways, just be careful that one of the points in the post quoted above does not come true - the mines in Australia owned by Chinese. Never say it will never happen.

A Few Good Bloggers

Guido Fawlkes lays out the story in The Times today. It is a very fine piece of writing indeed.

As I am not Guido, I can put it another way. Guido is one of a "Few Good Bloggers". He stood a post and he handled the truth, while some in the Lobby criticised him for leaking the emails, forgetting all about those who created them, shared them and built the House that nurtured them. Guido ordered the Code Red.

Col. Jessep: You want answers?
Kaffee: I think I'm entitled.
Col. Jessep: YOU WANT ANSWERS?
Kaffee: I want the TRUTH!
Col. Jessep: YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!
pauses
Col. Jessep: Son, we live in a world that has walls and those walls need to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and curse the Marines; you have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives and that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use then as the backbone of a life trying to defend something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said "thank you," and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest that you pick up a weapon and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think you are entitled to.

The above speech destroys the faux-Liberal stance, even as many who read it think that the speech is what crucified Jessep.

We want Guido on that blog. We need Guido on that blog, along with countless other bloggers who are willing to stand a post in the name of truth. In this case, Guido did not take payment, so was not hauled off, and so the country was not weakened.

Thursday 16 April 2009

The Crossest Man in Scotland

Well, maybe not after last weekend's revelations...

I particularly like part 4., as it shows how to deal with scum.


BBC Have Your Say Hatstandery.

You could not make this up.

Added: Thursday, 16 April, 2009, 17:11 GMT 18:11 UK

Subsidise my car with £5000, of my own money???
From new Labour, Gordon, pull the other one.
Alex C, London

But it isn't your money is it? It's tax payer's money and you are but one out of millions of tax payers.

So the £5000 you are claiming is yours, it's actually more like 5000 divided by 26 million = less than 1 pence!

So you spend 1 penny and the £4999.99 is from all the other tax payers, not a bad deal is it?

Gillian T, Loddon Bridge, Reading

Recommended by 0 people

So that's all right, then!

Spotted: A helpful critical review of Draper's "Life Support"

Spotted up on Amazon.co.uk...

The Devil is in the detail.


Gordon Brown Pretends to Apologise for the Smears

Gordon Brown has performed an act that typifies this Government. He has attempted to give the impression something has happened or is being done, but actually doing it is not on the agenda.

He wants to give the impression of apologising for the smears.

Let us see what he said:

"I am sorry about what happened.

"I said all along that when I saw this first, I was horrified, I was shocked and I was very angry indeed.

"I take full responsibility for what happened - that is why the person that was responsible went immediately.

"I wrote to those people, I expressed my deep regret. Everything is being done to clean up politics in our country. I ensured that there were new rules, so that this won't happen again."


Gordon is sorry for what happened. He is sorry his attack dog was found out, sure. I am certain he is even sorrier that his initial attempt to downplay the story failed and then he had to send his pooch off to the pound. Is he sorry that people were to be and in some cases actually smeared? No sign of that. None whatsoever.

Of course, countless scoundrels caught out are horrified, shocked and angry. Those terms are meaningless in the context he has placed them.

So Gordon takes full responsibility for what happened? If so and we believe his next statement, Gordon should have resigned already. The person who "went" - McBride - did not go immediately, but only left after the damage limitation exercise failed. Two wrongs in that sentence don't make a right, Gordon.

Errors, in this case, matey, follow the log scale.

Then he states about everything being done to clean up politics. That is such an untruth, such a worthless platitude. It is disingenuous pap. If you want to clean up politics, you need to get the State out of so many areas to remove the temptation and point of corruption. Jacqui Smith is still in office, for a start. How can not punishing Senior Cabinet Ministers - No3 in the Government for crying out loud - be cleaning up anything except fat wedges of unearned cash?

There is no need for new rules here just as there is no need for new regulations on the banking industry, expenses or a host of other situations when all that is needed is for the existing rules to be applied properly, consistently and with vigour.

Gordon did not apologise for the lies that were created and then discussed by those he hired. That would mean he acknowledges the acts and thus the fatally flawed culture that operated in No10. This has been my point about this whole affair since it broke - the issue here has never been the lies or the emails, but the culture of No10.


This is not an apology. This is like a crook saying they were guilty of nothing more than being caught.

Tea Party Event Skim

Just a rapid skim past the Tea Party demonstrations in America protesting about the Bailout/Fiscal Stimulus/Robbery going on.

Some interesting pictures over at Instapundit.

Just to point out some slogans that caught my eye:

"Keep the Change! Give me back my paycheck!"

"I need a bailout to pay my taxes!"

"Greed is spending our children's money" (always lost on the anticap Socialist carpet munchers)

"Bailout + Debt = Fiscal Child Abuse"

"American Citizens are Tea'd off" (took me a couple of goes to read that one, can't think why).

"Debt is the problem - how can it be the solution?"

"Don't spread my wealth, spread my work ethic"

"Save trees - stop printing money"

"Reward responsibility, not irresponsibility"

And a couple of LOLs

"Tax his teleprompter"

"In GOD we trust. Obama & Congress? eh...not so much"


The most important one:

"Tea Party today. Tar and Feathers Tomorrow".

Fusion Power: Polywell gets USD2m funding

Via Samizdata, CountingCats and Power and Control.

It is a small amount of money, granted, but sometimes fantastic engineering can be done with small amounts of money. Keeps it under the radar, gives focus, keeps the bureaucrats away, who are more interested in the delivery of progress reports than progress itself. This was one reason the US Navy kept their funding low and thus low profile.


Background: The Polywell fusion project, initiated by the late Dr Bussard, has the potential to create working ship and shore fusion power generators. In the Deuterium fuel model, it will produce practically no neutron, gamma or beta radiation - the stuff that crashes into your cells and kills you. It can be switched off almost instantaneously, with no long cool down or prospect of a China Syndrome or Chernobyl-style accident. If it scales properly, we can see the end of the Oil economy...and the "renewables" economy, too, for that matter, so no more ugly wind farms, no more food production taken to grab biofuel subsidies and no need for dams across the Severn that will disrupt the habitat. Most of all no more patronising control-freaks who in truth want us all to regress to living in mud huts on the Danube.

Wednesday 15 April 2009

UK Only, time limited. "West End Jungle"

There is an absolute gem on BBC's iPlayer right now called "West End Jungle". Banned when it came out in 1961, it catalogues one viewpoint on the changing shape of vice in the West End of London though a series of vignettes, just before and then after the new legislation in 1959, which introduced larger penalties and imprisonment to prostitutes.

See empty streets (almost no parked cars), everyone wearing hats and suits except the very young men and the ubiquitousness of tobacco, from its advertisement, through sale to consumption. The soundtrack shifts from Big Band (I was almost expecting Edmundo Ross to appear) to hints of Beat/Jazz.

It is an amazing record of male-centric cultural mores of the time, especially the reality of "entertainment".

Smeargate: Nice to see two points people are finally realising.

Nice to see that it is dawning on people that

1. Gordon Brown is in possession of a demagnetised moral compass. It has been so for years.
2. A fish rots from the head.

This story is fundamentally about that, as has a litany of stories about the damage Labour have been.

This is not just a New Labour problem - it is an Old Labour problem. Brown is a Marxist. He wanted Nationalised Banks*. He wants everyone beholden to the State. He wants everyone to feel the fetid breath of overseers down their necks via CCTV, ID Cards, Internet filtering, phone tapping, email snooping. He removes the 10p tax band and then expects people to go cap in hand to claim tax credits. The list is endless.

People call him "autistic" which really does not fit the bill. It might explain some of his social clumsiness, but not his other behaviours. No, for me the term is "Sociopath".

Gordon is setting himself up for his own CeauÅŸescu Moment. He is almost there. Kevin Maguire will know what that means by now...


* and so State control of who gets a loan and who does not - ergo complete control of the economy.

Tuesday 14 April 2009

Fencepost No. 13: HIPs

A stooge of the Fake Charity WWF-UK* talks about treating the owners of poorly insulated homes as "criminals". DK over at The Kitchen does a fine disembowelling.

And people wonder why the rent-seeking HIP was forced through against all common sense? It was a fencepost after all and we are being softened up for the panels to be slid in place.

The HIP was a cover for the introduction of compulsory EPA inspection. Cooper near as damn it lied about it being for surveys and "buyer information". If buyers want it, sellers will provide it. But, as I have posted recently and many times before, we are talking about Authoritarians here, and Socialist ones at that. They do not consider people to be rational actors, but clay. Clay for their hot, eager little hands to mould into shape. They are not content with clearning away obstructions so people will make a sensible choice for themselves -I would not have been fussed if they just proposed the standard format for an EPA should someone want to have it done. No, they want to compel. It is easier to then say "we were right", just as Kim Jong Il says he is popular when he gets 100% of the vote...

What will it be, I wonder? A higher stamp duty on houses with lower EPA ratings? Will they "refuse to issue a HIP" on poorly rated homes which means then the house, technically, cannot be sold. Who knows? What I suspect is that the home insulation Mafia are about to get payback. Rent-seekers, man your clipboards!


* surely they mean "WTF-UK"?

Monday 13 April 2009

Turning Japanese: Brown regrets but does not apologise

Much as the Japanese cannot bring themselves to apologise to the Chinese for the brutal treatment they dished out in the 1920's and 1930's (which makes any colonial behaviour by the Western Powers seem like the opening credits to Till Death us do Part in comparison), so Gordon Brown only expresses regret.

How right Dan Hannan was when he spoke about Gordon's pathological incapacity for doing so.

The letters appear to talk around the outcomes and the impact on the wider world of politics. It does not speak about the fact that someone was responsible for employing those people and what that implies about the culture in No10 - what was acceptable and what was an instant dismissal offence.

As I say, a fish rots from the head.

Slave Labour: PM Plans to Implement Slavery

PM plans to Implement Slavery

Gordon Brown
Mr Brown first proposed the idea of a National Youth Service last year

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has pledged to ensure every young person has done 50 years of involuntary work by the time they are 69 years old.

Mr Brown said a promise to bring in slavery would be a part of his next election manifesto.

Under the scheme, the work may include paying taxes to fund fake charities and is likely to begin as part of the school curriculum.

The scheme would be woven into plans to make everyone stay in servitude or slavery until the age of 69 by 2011.

Mr Brown told the News of the World newspaper: "It is my ambition to create a Britain in which there is a clear expectation that all people will undertake slave labour in service to their political elite, and where oppression will become a normal part of growing up in Britain.

'Clear exploitation'

"And, by doing so, the contributions of each of them will build a better society for all of us politicians and their hangers-on."

The prime minister added: "That would mean young people being expected to contribute at least 50 years of community slavery by the time they have reached the age of 69.

"This will build on the platform provided by citizenship classes as they develop in our schools. But because the greater part of what I envisage as community slavery takes place outside the school day, it will require the close involvement of local community overseers and lickspittles."

Mr Brown said the work would also be linked to a "clear system of exploitation" so that young people would be able rue the day they were born gained through slavery.

He added: "By building from compulsory slavery studies in the 14-16 curriculum, we can create an expectation of national youth community slavery."

Gordon Brown first proposed the idea of a National Youth Service to channel teenagers into involuntary work last year.

It is due to be formally launched in September, and would become compulsory if Labour were re-elected.




Apologies to The BBC.

This is slavery, pure and simple. If Labour thinks my son owes them 50 hours of work on a project they decide is "suitable", they have another thing coming. Think of which projects will be granted access to this slave labour. Think of the jostling for a piece of the pie, the lobbying, the corruption. Think of the temptation for insidious peer-pressure in pushing this vile concept.

Labour is Socialist and Socialists only understand how to get people to do what they want by compulsion. Compulsion is in their DNA. It is enforced collectivism, a core plank of the Socialist mindset. They hate the idea of people not agreeing with them and, worse still, succeeding outside their mental prison compound, for that exposes their ideology as the lie that it is.

Leave people alone and if the idea of volunteering is "good", then plenty of people will take it up. THEY DO SO ALREADY.

>I must say that it is very tempting to say that this plan is all part of the Fabian agenda. It is another plank in their scheme. It will make people think they are owned by and owe a debt to the State, instead of the State just being a group of people employed by the people and lent, temporarily and with limitations, the authority and sovereignty of those people.

My answer to Gordon Brown is simple.

Μολὼν λάβε

Obama has a spine (for once). The UK Premier must also.

I am no fan of Obama. He uses brain-dead non-phrases - "Change!" - to mislead people into thinking he is going to do what they want. He has shown his willingness to engineer vast transfers of wealth from the many to the few without consent in bailout after bailout.

He has done at least two things right.

One was to extend the hand of friendship to the Iranian people.

The second was to give the nod to allow lethal force in the rescue of the Captain captured by Somalian pirates.

Three pirates were killed. This will give a moment of pause to all thinking of doing similar deeds. They will pick their targets more carefully. The chances of them letting a US ship pass them by has gone up dramatically and so the lives of US merchant sailors are safer now.

Begs the question. Would Brown do the same? I say no. He is vain, vacillating, cowardly. Would Blair? Unlikely, in my view. Thatcher? Does that need an answer? Mrs T has form. Her willingness to make a similar decision in the Iranian Embassy Siege enabled it to be resolved in a professional manner. The SAS knew - to use an American phrase - that Mrs T had "got their back", i.e. she would cover them, and it was her who gave the go-ahead not to have any "untidiness" at the end and she made it clear that she was the one from which the order came.

For all the anarchy, I suspect Somalian pirates are, on the whole, rational actors. Britain needs to ensure that we exploit that to the advantage of our shipping. I suspect that it will need another incident and another firefight to sort that out. Our PM needs to make that decision. Until we get a new PM, I suspect our sailors and shipping are still at risk.

p.s. We are told that the Somalians "respcet their village elders". Ok, so why don't these elders openly say that piracy is wrong and end this behviour? I leave you to come to the blatantly obvious conclusion.

Private School Pupils to coach Comprehensive Kids?

Private School pupils to be asked to coach children in Comprehensives.

Sorry, I had to just delete a load of random characters from this post as my jaw dropped onto the keyboard. I mean how can anyone put this forward without deafening dissonance over State "education"? The fundamental problems exist in the State sector. Their answer:- paper over the cracks, dab on some Savlon.

How about cutting down the razorwire that slices the future of our children into a bloody mess?

The solution is for the government to get OUT of Education provision. No more national curriculum. No more enforced exam boards. No more LEA stranglehold. Heads, teachers and parents know best. Leave them alone to get on with it.

Brown's Moral Compass

Telegraph says Brown has "lost sight of moral compass".

If so, he has been using the Hubble Space telescope for the last 12 years.

Saturday 11 April 2009

Guido in the Process of Delivering Some Ownage.

The insidious and State-funded dirt-diggers Damien McBride and his pet fringe Derek Draper are about to get pwned by Guido and it looks like it will be a good one...

McBride! Look up!!!!...here it comes!



That'll teach you for dirtying the hood.

A 1934 Cartoon sheds light on our dark road ahead.

This very interesting cartoon dates back to 1934 in the US. (via IanPJ, Bob Murphy and Jim Myners). Little changes.

The US recovery only really got going in 1939. Funny that, for that is when the UK began to buy shiploads of goods from the US paid in gold, bonds, mining rights and concessions so as to be able to afford to fight Fascism. Correlation or causation?

Friday 10 April 2009

There is almost no money left to re-paper over the cracks.

Our educational system is crumbling. We have the LSC dithering about because it has run out of money (but not their own salaries, natch). We have Ed Balls passing the buck and basically being incompetent as the State runs out of money again and pulls the rug from under establishments. We have the dumbing down, the abdication of responsibility and the general rot at the core.

I am going to go into the quality of examinations which are the tip of the iceberg which indicates the quality of that hidden beneath the waves.

Before I do that, there is an excellent post by Leg Iron which rails against the bitter fruits being harvested in our Educational system and the thrust I solidly agree with.

Children have been "empowered" and adults have been intimidated and eviscerated as part of the cult of youth. Of course the Fabians and Righteous love the youth - they don't know enough to see through their lies. They are like Mao mischievously whipping up his Red Guards.

What I wanted to add to the piece was the following:

Many children are in the second generation of this madness. Their parents were brought up in the "no winners, all winners" mentality. Indulged. Appeased. Squeezed through a comprehensive, unstreamed sausage machine to end up like end-of-term Plasticine. Their studies steadily stripped of useful content, critical reasoning, facts and structure to be replaced with "understanding", "projects" and other mechanisms to inveigle opinion and propaganda and undermine the capacity for students to grasp the fundamentals that would enable them to expose the lies.

You can see the difference by comparing the IGCSE and the GCSE for domestic consumption. The IGCSE asks for facts and for the individual to show how they understand the topic. The GCSE just presents question after question of "Match the four answers to the four questions" or, at best, multiple choice. It does not even test knowledge much of the time for once one obvious question is matched, the chance of getting the others wrong reduces dramatically, especially if one or two combinations can be discarded - it is hardly a test at all!

Examples:

From the IGCSE Question 1.

1 Four of the classes of vertebrates and five possible descriptions of these classes are shown

below.

Draw a straight line to match each class of vertebrate to its description.

Vertebrate:


bird

fish

mammal

reptile


class of vertebrate description

body with naked skin, two

pairs of limbs

body with hair, two pairs

of limbs


body with feathers, one

pair of wings


body with scales, with fins

body with scaly skin, two

pairs of limbs or no limbs


Note that there are 5 descriptions and 4 classes.

On the GCSE, we have a picture of a head with numbers 1 to 4 pointing to the ear, eye mouth and nose.

Match words, A, B, C and D, with the numbers 1ñ 4 on the drawing.

A contains light receptors

B contains receptors sensitive to some liquid chemicals

C contains sound receptors

D contains receptors sensitive to some gaseous chemicals


Once you know what the term "receptor" means, 2 answers are in the bag. There remains the last two and even if you do not know what "gaseous" means (apart from describing the contents of the exam setter's skull), it is pretty certain that liquid has to refer to the mouth. There is no trick answer. Oh no, can't have the darlings presented with a falsehood, for that might make them question if what they read is right or not!

The second question will start to show you where the high road and low road pull away from each other.

First the IGCSE, giving a question more in keeping with our memories of exams...

2 (a) Many communities treat their sewage and release non-polluting water into a local river.

What is meant by the term sewage?

[2 marks]

(b) Sometimes the sewage treatment works cannot deal with all of the sewage and

untreated material is released into the river.

Suggest the likely effects of releasing untreated sewage into a river.


[4 marks]


Oh my gor-dedede - kids asked to think and reason? Possibility of their being wrong? Good.

Lets see how the GCSE exercises the mind of our future wealth creators...

Match substances, A, B, C and D, with the numbers 1-4 in the table.

A cannabis

B painkiller

C antibiotic

D statin

Information

1 kills bacteria in the body

2 may lead to addiction to hard drugs

3 lowers the level of cholesterol in the blood

4 relieves some of the symptoms of the disease



Oh, another 4 questions and 4 answers. No attempt to see if incorrect information can be filtered out. Easy to use some form of elimination to get points even when some facts are not known. However one of the options (option 4) is actually pretty poorly put. Painkillers relieve PAIN. I suspect the author is confusing drugs like Paracetomol which can both reduce pain and lower temperature with the baseline concept of a painkiller. Doh!

Note also the subtle propaganda in Option 2.


Let us not jump to conclusions. Let us soldier on...

Question 3 in the IGCSE...



(a) (i) Name an organism from this food web that is a


primary consumer [1]

tertiary (third level) consumer [1]

producer [1]

(ii) Using information only from Fig. 3.1, complete the food chain.

→ → → → leopard [1]


(b) Fig. 3.2 shows a pyramid of numbers for a food chain from this food web.

Which organism in the food web would occupy the 3rd trophic level in this pyramid of numbers? [1]


(c) In some years a plague of locusts occurs.

Predict and explain what could happen to the population of baboons when this occurs. [4]



Currently we have a plague of Educationalist morons and the baboons are breeding like crazy, because the following is what the GCSE has to offer as its Q3...

Q3. This question is about IVF (in-vitro fertilisation).


Match structures, A, B, C and D, with the numbers 1ñ4 on the diagram.

A egg

B embryo

C fertilised egg

D sperm



Well, that really stretched me. Apart from the fact that the terms for IVF were not capitalised, the question is lame and certainly omits major key facts like how to claim for it off the NHS...(joke)

I shall not go on, for the GCSE is just a litany of matching equal numbers of statements together, or at best, multiple choice.

Question 4 in the GCSE is a ludicrous picture with a brain, spinal column, muscle and a dotted line from the finger to the spinal column. 4 arrows, 4 labels to match.

The IGCSE, on the other hand, has a cross-section of a flower and you have to label 3 parts. Now, this is infinitely harder as you need to know the parts. It is not "assign the labels to the arrows" but you have to find all three parts and draw on the arrow and correctly label it.

Where the GCSE has graphs where you have to match answers to questions, the IGCSE presents a table of data which you have to plot ONTO a piece of graph paper and then are asked your view on the data - "state, with a reason, the type of variation shown...".

I mean, I could go on but it is just so very sad to see that this is the level that 16 year olds are expected to aim for GCSE and that it permits all manner of subtle propaganda to be used. Is this simplicity needed because of the constant disruption? I mean, you hardly need a teacher to teach you the GCSE if that is what is called "testing".

The disease of "prizes for all" and covering up failure is still being forced upon the system. One teaching union and Ken Livingstone wants to end any form of parent choice at all, forcing kids to go to the nearest school, like-it-or-lump-it. How dare parents express an opinion?!!!! How DARE bad schools be exposed for what they are through lower rolls! How DARE schools want to decide what exam board or system they use!!!! Irony off.

It is a crying shame. I intend to see that schools are able to free themselves from the dead hand of the State so they will live or die on thier fitness for purpose, knowing that most schools will shape up when faced with that little understood (by Socialists) concept of competition. We need a surplus of places in any area so that if a school begins to fail, it can be abandoned as pupils find a better learning environment in other establishments.

It has to be done and, despite the plans of the Conservatives, which are not far enough and keep s the State's grip, the Libertarian Party is the only Party to really let schools, Heads, Teachers, parents and pupils shine.

Wednesday 8 April 2009

Legislatum Ridicularis!

Today we hear of a "raid" on Harry Potter actor Jamie Waylett's bedroom to seize £2000 worth of cannabis plants. The story calls them a "farm". As in "ant", I presume.

The plants were stashed by his playstation and DJ decks and lit by hydroponic lamps.

The chap was lifted as he was found to be driving erratically. Driving while not in proper control of your vehicle is not something I will defend. The police saw the behaviour and pulled him. I am fine with that. Had this been a random stop, then that would be another thing entirely.

They did find 8 bags of cannabis in the car. Now, I am not sure of these are "baggies" or "Lock Stock" bin-bags. I suspect baggies, given the apparent scale of the "farm".

Thing is, outside of the driving, which could apply to someone on flu medicine or Bacardi Breezers, what harm is being done by the baggies or even the 'erb cultivation? Surely the chap is able to avoid contact with criminal elements created by the very fact that cannabis is prohibited? Is that not a good thing?

Someone tell me what harm has been caused by possession and cultivation? No fraud, no theft and no violence.

We need to end prohibition and stop wasting Police time. Nab him for the driving offence and that should be the end of it.

Seemingly Disgraceful Police Behaviour: But the Left have no right to claim the highground

via Old Holborn, a video in The Guardian does seem to reveal key evidence in the fate of a middle aged chap in the wrong place at the wrong time.


Problem is, some are saying "The Left" have seized on this and appear to be trying to grab the moral high ground, as if they "own" victimhood from Police brutality. I have seen a comment in another place saying they are "with the Left on this one".

Oh for crying out loud. WHY does anyone think this a "LEFT" thing? Our Government and Home Sec are from the Rancid Left and so the Met takes their queue form them. Lefties are at LEAST as Authoritarian as the Right and certainly partisan.

This issue is about Rule of Law, NOT Left-Right. There was absolutely no reason to trip up/push over the chap AFAICT. Tripping someone up in a situation like that - paved floor - is a risk. Not a big one, but a risk nonetheless, especially if the person is not a youth who is likely to be more resilient and have faster reactions (no, that does not mean that young swampies can be thrown to the ground roughly with abandon, even if they have sad-act metal in their faces).

Of course we need to get all the facts, but right now, with what I have seen, the following terms come to my mind:

Cowardly. Unnecessary. Ugly. Disgraceful. Obscene.


On the question of the Police not knowing about any imminent heart condition before throwing someone to the ground unneccessarliy. Sorry, tough titties, Copper. If you were dealing with a CIP (crime in progress) and the perp had a heart attack, then no case to answer if reasonable force is being applied. Here, this is not a case of reasonable force. If this were a yob on the street tripping up a chap, I would want at least manslaughter charges and unless we get more evidence to the contrary, I want to see this happen here to.

I am fed up with the excuse "I diddern meeeeenn iiiiit/know" when people do things that clearly endanger others. Anyone who kicks a person when down - Attempted murder. Anyone who stabs someone except in say, the hand or buttocks - Attempted Murder. Violent attack on a pensioner - Attempted Murder.

The sooner people realise there are consequences for their unprovoked violent or aggressive acts the better. What you see in that Policeman is CREATED by the Left, by the Fabian undermining of social order and common decency. So please, don't give me no "with the Left" on this one...

All Your Posters are Belong To Us

Some fun can be had here. Hat tip Old Holborn.





Tuesday 7 April 2009

MPs in expenses "carousel fraud"

Guido is on a mother lode in his digging up of MP troughing.

He appears to be discovering that MPs have been aquiring buy-to-let properties and renting them out to their staff who they then pay salaries claimed from expenses paid by the taxpayer.

This is almost (but not quite) a form of "carousel" fraud. Ok, not a carousel, lets just call it a plain old gravy train, eh?


I always thought Socialists and Statists lusted to be The National Mill Owner, but this takes it one fraudulent, money-grubbing step further.

Along with the NMO point, I have also been convinced that Socialists hated the "elite" not because they wanted to remove the concept of the "elite" - even though they told that to their "useful idiots" - but because the Socialists themselves wanted to become the elite. They coveted the position and once they get there, they become compulsive ladder-kickers who want a vast lumpen illiteriat kept down and dumb to be patronised at their leisure.

I would not be surprised, as one or two commenters to Guido's post suggest, that the Left are as bad if not worse in this regard. Even if the Tories were equally as bad, the Lefties are more repugnant for all their hypocritical posturing.

If this goes on the main parties will be running out of "clean sheets" to change the constituency beds and so an opportunity for untainted parties to come forward, like the LPUK.

Monday 6 April 2009

Resisting Resistance is Futile! IPJ's "Window".

Re the previous post about the Database State trying to snoop on all our traffic, presuming guilt before innocence.

Ian Parker-Jospeh, Leader of the Libertarian Party has put forward a simple, neat, novel campaign to swamp the monitoring systems in regard to email. The basic idea is to attach a boiler-plate footer to each and every email containing various hot keywords. This will mean all traffic needs to be read and inspected, something that will be increasingly impossible to do as more and more people attach the footer, rendering the attempt at surveillance for naught. It is the internet equivalent of "Window".

NOTE: THIS WILL ONLY WORK IF PEOPLE INVENT THEIR OWN FOOTERS!!!! - copy Ian's and it will be simple to filter your attempts out, as it will be one note and not noise!

The Government wants to live by the Database, so it will DIE by the Database!

As a parallel, I propose the introduction of an off-shore proxy server that you connect to via a 256-bit AES IP Tunnel, rendering snooping an expensive hobby in terms of CPU resources, which is now under serious consideration.


Just admit it, you bunch of prod-nosed bureaucrats - resisting our resistance is futile!

Sunday 5 April 2009

Presumed Guilty: Personal Web Data to be Stored for a Year

Now the noose tightens.

We have had attempts by the EU to build a "Great Firewall of Europe" to somehow control what we see.

Now we see a more "effective" and altogether insidious move which has been on the cards for some time - the storage of our web movements and email relationships for a year. Mark my words, one year will soon become longer then become eternal. Content, not movement or relationships will soon be stored. Motive will be determined by the State observer and not the observed. Think of the absurd concept from the Macpherson Report (1999) on the death of Stephen Lawrence, stating that:
A racist incident is any incident which is perceived to be racist by the victim or any other person.
This is utter hogwash, but that has not prevented it from being widely adopted by ricebowlers, self-loathers, sufferers of victimhood, Fabians and others. A terrorist incident, I suspect will be one determined by the "any other person". The motive and thoughts of the accused will be of no concern.

So, storing such information is an outrage that is unconstitutional for the following reasons IMHO:

1. It is an invasion of privacy.
2. No individual warrant has been issued for the collection of individuals' data
3. It presumes the guilt of all and not innocence
4. In relation to the above, it puts the burden of proof upon the individual to "explain" actions without due process or probable cause being presented by the authorities.
5. It has the potential to suppress the freedoms of all by making people think twice about otherwise perfectly legal activity in case it should be highlighted.
6. The pool of data is not, will not and could never be made adequately secure, allowing for individuals to be subject to blackmail, slander, innuendo, further contributing to the effect of 5., above.
7. The State is almost certain to begin "fishing" expeditions. Data mining is almost an addiction to some. Human curiosity and the need by many to systematise, pigeonhole and find out is unlimited and this database will feed and expand on that craving.

This project, I hear, is part of EU directives. I suspect our Authoritarian Gaulieters have been gold-plating it.

The argument that it is to fight "terrorism" or is "for the chiiiiiildren" is absurd. Anyone involved in such areas will make other arrangements immediately. No, I withdraw that - it is likely that such people and groups are ALREADY making arrangements. They would be pretty stupid not to have by now and with this news they will most certainly do so.

Therefore almost NO terrorists and almost NO kiddie fiddlers that might be caught will be caught by this. However, EVERYONE will feel the Panopticon breathing down their necks, the constant surveil of Big Brother behind the Telescreen.

Anyone pretending to suggest this measure will achieve the stated goals is either

a) Lying
b) A useful idiot parroting inanities
c) An imbecile
d) All the above.

As is so often with this New Labour Authoritarian administration, bureaucratic convenience trumps our freedoms in their eyes.

Again we see the mentality to "protect". This is to suggest that one proactively remove all possible threats and does not take into account freedom of the individual, personal responsibility and assessment of risk depending on circumstances by an adult or others under the supervision of adults.

We need "defence". We need a ready, willing and capable response to when something or someone transgresses. You know, like THE LAW does? Well, the Common Law, at least. And that is part of our problem.

I think it is the duty of all people in the UK to perform civil disobedience or forms of obfuscation to render their plans for naught. Maybe it will be the inclusion of tags and keywords to make ALL communications require manual checking, so bogging down their systems, or to implement highly encrypted channels and tunnels out of EU jurisdiction so as to prevent intercept or raise the cost of intercept to an unacceptable level.

On the other hand I might just learn gibberish.


Machine-wrapped with butter!