Thursday 31 December 2009

Best Wishes for the New Year

I've just popped back to say Happy New Year to everyone that reads my blog.

I've been horrendously busy over the past couple of weeks, which accounts for the lack of blogging activity. Rest assured I'll start back up in the New Year. Despite my prognostications for a dire 2010, I still hope that you can make the best of whatever circumstances befall us next year.

Anyway, I'm off to provide Taxi service for the family and watch them and friends get er, a little tipsy over the next few hours.

All the best to everyone.

Thursday 24 December 2009

Weather Chaos (2): Unbelievable!

Its now been two days, yes two days of chaos, in a country that is supposed to expect and be prepared for snow!

Aparrently some local trains were cancelled due to the snow. What fucking snow? It hasn't snowed since Monday, so how has this magical snow crawled from the ground onto the rails, causing such chaos? Here in Pompey, there is no snow, its all melted.

I really do despair at the incompetence of public service managers, that seem to plan less and less for these extremes of weather. When I was a kid, snow was expected and planned for. Now its an excuse to bunk of work, the trains and the buses become unreliable, schools close because a snowflake settles on the playground, roads become unpassable because of lack of gritting.... it just goes on and on.

I really do despair at what this country has become. From a nation ready to fight off foreign invaders, from a country prepared for all that mother nature could throw at it, we have become a feckles, unprepared mess.

Tuesday 22 December 2009

Weather Chaos: The Usual Story

It seems this country just can't plan ahead for bad weather.

Just an inch or so of snow has brought most of the South East to a halt. What is it with these Southerners that makes them panic when driving upon seeing a snowflake? Why aren't roads gritted in advance? Who knows.

I made the journey from Portsmouth to Oxford and back again today, with only one problem. The A272 from Petersfield was fine on the outbound journey at 1pm, but by the time we came back a 6pm, the junction between the A31 and the A272 was turned into chaos because the road had some ice in patches. I had to turn back and use the M27 which was clear all the way to Portsmouth.

Why a major route like the A31 and A272 wasn't gritted when the snow started falling at lunchtime is a mystery. Certainly it wasn't gritted but drivable when we used it at 1pm, but still didn't appear to have been gritted 5 hours later. Cars were stuck trying to negotiate the hill up to Cheesefoot Head and they only started moving after a gritter (presumably the first on that road all day) finally gritted the hill. I decided that it would be better not to negotiate the A272 if this first bit of chaos was a sign of the state of the road further on.

I come from up North originally and I did my driving lessons in weather far worse than this. They were never cancelled, my instructor insisted on taking all his students out in challenging weather. Mind you, we got more of it up north. But at least once we'd experienced it, we knew how to handle driving in those conditions.

Even more recently, 10 years ago I rode a motorcycle in blizzard conditions from Oxford to London and back to commute into work. Never at that time were the roads closed or treacherous enough that I thought better of riding on two wheels. Today it would have been suicidal.

Just what is happening to our namby-pamby, risk-averse, never-plan-for-the-worst society? Its crumbling before our very eyes. Trains stop, we can't keep the roads clear, we shut motorways just because someones wing mirror dropped off their car, we panic at the sight of snowflakes.

I just think hope that I'm bringing my kids up with the right stuff, where stopping at a service station car park covered in snow is a good excuse to have a sliding competition and a a bloody good snowball fight (and no-one brought a gun).

Oh, and I can certainly say, using rear fog lights in snowy conditions is not recommended. It just blinds the person behind you. By all means, use them in foggy conditions, where the mist will absorb the light, but in snow, where its just white stuff falling with gaps between them and you can quite easily see normal tail lights, rear fogs just cause more problems.  Wipers on, heater on demist; yes, but rear fogs: no.
It has to be pretty bad snow to reduce visibility under 100m, which is the limit for the use of fog lights. It certainly wasn't that bad on the road today.

Monday 21 December 2009

Apologies for the Lack of Blogging and a Merry Christmas.

It seems that planning for a Christmas that involves catering for 15 staying over Cristmas Eve/Christmas Day (I always go eek when I tot upall the kids, partners and grandkids!) and working at one of the busiest times of year for my employer is taking its task of my blogging activities. Plus I had my mate Rob (Hi Rob!) staying over this weekend so it would have been rude to ignore him and blog instead.

All you shoppers out there (don't you all know there's a recession on?) will be keeping me working full-time hours this week, so blogging will be sparse all week too.

Anyway, Merry Christmas to everyone who passes by this blog.

Thursday 17 December 2009

Newsnight "Science"

I saw it last night and its doing the rounds of the blogosphere: The episode in last Note at the start,  night's NewsNight where man made global warming was supposedly proven in a reporters kitchen.

The experiement was two large bottles in front of spotlamps. One filled with air, one filled with air and extra CO2 provided by a DIY mixture of vinegar and baking soda. The "CO2 Enhanced" bottle showed a 4 degree increase in temperature, supposedly caused by the increased CO2 content.

This was touted on the programme as science, but hang on, this is kitchen worktop science and in no way correlates to the atmosphere.

For instance, did the mixture in the CO2-rich bottle exactly correlate to the concentration of CO2 the warmists say we'll get, or was it a higher concentration, to falsely enhance the result? Note at the start, the scientist added the CO2, screwed the cap on the bottle and....... nothing happened. Nada, zilch. There was no sudden increase in temperature. It was only after a suspicious break in the filming and cut back to the kitchen that suddenly there was a convenient 4 degree difference.

So, hardly the proven, repeatable, accurate science we need to believe in man made warming at all.

And to be honest, this is an indication of how NewsNight has changed recently. I've watched the dumbing down of "normal" news programmes and now NewsNight, which resisted the trend for a while seems to be following suit.

Anthrax and Heroin: The New Doomsday Weapon?

I remember reports earlier on in the year that the heroin growers in Afghanistan had moved to refining their produce. This was part of a report saying how there seemed to be an aparrent lack of heroin on the streets considering the amount that was being grown.

Now obviously its too early to produce a definate link, but what if the Taliban, Al-Qaeda or whoever wanted to hold back production to refine a new weapon, adding a deadly infectious agent with heroin? Its an ideal medium, as the product is sealed for transport, therefore as long as production is done safely producers, distributors and couriers shouldn't become infected unless they sample the produce. Only the end users become infected and they willingly inject it into their bodies.

Now I'm not saying this report is evidence of anything of the sort, but it does make you think, doesn't it?

Makes you also hope that the stockpiles of smallpox are secure.

Wednesday 16 December 2009

The New BattleGround

In recent times I've started to form an idea of the next battle humankind will face. Its not global warming: busting that myth will eventually go mainstream. Its not poverty: poverty is a man-made phenomenon. Its not war: war is man-made as well.

No, the next battleground humankind will face is ideological.

Okay, let me explain. Currently there are several streams, running in parallel. All seperate, but with the same goal in mind: control of humanity. We have corporations, who want a one-world government that allows unfettered, universal trade across the whole globe, socialists who want a one-world government where everyone and evrything is as poor as the rest of the world, fascists who want a one-world government which controls every aspect of our lives and finally we have the religious extremists, who want a one-world government run by theologues that favour a particular religion.

These theological and ideological streams have never been closer and all work towards the same goal: a single world government.

However, there will be a battle between these factions for our hearts and minds. Some say its already begun with the corporatists striking a blow against the theologists in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. I forsee the battle becoming more heated as the streams work together to forge their unified globe. As the globe becomes more unified, so I see the battles to control that unity becoming ever more fierce, until the winner emerges.

Of course the losers in all of this are us, the little people: the cannon fodder, the targets, the subjects, to be used exploited and extorted at will by whoever gains complete dominance. I'm sorry to say that this is the fate that awaits those generations that follow me.

The sad thing is that all those one-worlders are well-resourced, how do you compete against them, let alone defeat them? Now I've identified the battle, maybe I can have a go at figuring out an answer to that very question.

Monday 14 December 2009

BA ain't gonna fly no plane

Ah, British Airways...... where has it gone so wrong for them?

Last year I blogged about the terminal 5 fiasco and how it was quite aparrent there was something very, very wrong with the management culture at BA. I put it down you young graduates being parachuted into management jobs, ostensibly to become yes men and women: people that had so little experience that they could only agree with whatever upper management decreed. I gave them 5 years at most before they became history.

It seems I was right on the money, because whatever is going on within British Airways (someone with inside information please tell me, because it must be a fascinating insight into flawed management culture), it now seems the workers are squaring up to managers and going on strike over Christmas and New Year.

This is despite BA staff being some of the best paid in their sector of employment, despite BA's business strategy crashing and burning, despite profits plummeting, despite there being the worst unemployment in decades, despite the recession.

Neither side it seems, want to compromise, see sense or back down. From where I'm standing, looking in, I see a very poorly run operation indeed. For it to come to this point, when in effect strike action will if not kill, will certainly cripple the company for decades, is madness. For BA employees to vote in favour of strike action under the present circumstances, either they're stupid, fallen out badly with management, been very badly informed, or hideously manipulated by the Unions.

They say turkeys don't vote for Christmas, but this might be the one exception.

Gordon Brown in Afghanistan



So Gordo has been getting touchy-feely in Afghanistan. I just wonder if the curse of Gordo will strike...

I notice that he was making a big play on the blast-resistant vehicles that have finally been delivered into theatre after long delays. Its a bit much seeing as they were supposed to be delivered months ago and up until last week, I saw news reports showing our soldiers on patrol in not-very-blast-resistant-at-all snatch LandRovers.

Sunday 13 December 2009

W i d e s c r e e N

As befits this Hi-Def, Widescreen world of entertainment, I've altered my blog layout to become the full-on widescreen experience in glorious 1000-pixel width. Ok, to be honest I was fed up of those huge black areas of nothing at the sides of the blog when viewing it.

If anyone experiences any problems viewing the blog in this new format, drop me a line and I'll sort it out.


Thanks.

Saturday 12 December 2009

The Blair Insanity

It was religion what dunnit.

It wasn't me.

Honest, your worshipful members of the War Crimes Court.

Wednesday 9 December 2009

Pre-Budget Report

Not seen much of this today: a full day at work and a whole evening Christmas shopping haven't allowed me to fully digest its contents.

Suffice to say that all the soundbites and headlines I've seen don't bode well for a future under Labour. Mr Darling lacks the political will to curtail his horrendous borrowing habit, only making minor tweaks.

What is clear though is the course that Labour have set their rigging for: One that can only include higher taxes and high inflation. The first to try and close the funding gap and the second to reduce the debt burden.

Not a very sound future ahead then. Very uncertain and uncharted waters lie ahead, with many risks, not only for the government, but mainly for small businesses, small investors, small savers.... you get the picture. Its not looking rosy for us ordinary people at all.

Remember, exactly the same inflationary policy was tried in the seventies, but it got out of hand rather quickly. No-one has yet explained how it would be any different this time around. Once the money men spot a wound in the flank of the UK, they will descend and devour us just like any predator would.

UPDATE:

You know, the more I think about this, the more I'm convinced that Labour are steering deliberately towards some financial brick wall. A financial game of chicken with huge consequences for millions of people. Once they hit the wall and we lose our AAA rating, suffer a bond market failure, have to go cap in hand to the IMF, etc. Whatever the reason, its always been New Labour's policy: to follow a path until someone or something else forces them to modify their behaviour. That way its not Labour that caused the pain: no, don't blame the nice Labour people, its the nasty IMF/conservatives/voters or whoever. Its just the usual blame-dodging from the government.

But at a huge cost to the country.

All for political reasons. I'm convinced that Gordon Brown would ruin this country completely for polictical ends. He would sell his kids, his wife, house, political party and country, he would set the whole nation ablaze and watch it burn to the ground, just so he can get one over on his political opponents.

Monday 7 December 2009

The "None of the Above Candidate" and Lords Reform.

The handful of regular readers of this blog may remember me writing a blog extolling the virtues of voting for independant candidates at the next election as a "None of the above" option for those disinclined to vote in the first place.

Old Holborn also blogged something similar today. He wants people to vote for candidates that have never been an MP before.

I'd agree with that. We need a more varied mix of independant thinkers in Parliament. The Conservatives with their open primaries have taken a step towards this, but its resulted in pretty predictable results, so far a couple of doctors and a TV personality's daughter have been selected as candidates. But where are the "ordinary" people? We need ordinary, trustworthy people in Parliament.

I suppose the answer lies these days in the lack of community: there are no people that have large enough blocks of friends to put them forward and vote for them in numbers enough to get them selected. Which is a shame, as it makes the House of Commons a mixture of people unrepresentative of the wider population.

This is why one of my other ideas is to have a completely randomly selected upper house to replace the house of Lords. No patronage required, no dodgy deals or donations necessary.

In my system representatives for the upper house would be selected like jurors: entirely at random from the public. The randomness will ensure an upper house than would be representative of the nation at large.

The details would need to be thrashed out as to whether its a temporary position; say for a year, so that one group of "Peers" are able to pass a whole years worth of legislature and then return to life. How one would go about compensating them and their employers for a year of absence is another matter.
It may be a possibility that they become "Life Peers" and are selected entirely at random and serve for life, being replaced by other random selections upon death or their voluntary retirement.

Certainly the worst option for the upper house is that proposed by the main Parties: elected or selected candidates. Either way, we would just be reinforcing the party political system, which mustn't happen. The upper house must be entirely neutral and representative in order to provide the checks and balances necessary to rein in the legislative excesses of a majority government in the lower house, whatever their political leanings.

I'm sure there are some that would say without a voting system, this system would be undemocratic. But whats democratic in a system governed by patronage, or influenced by who has the biggest election fund? What indeed is democratic in the party whipping system?

My fervent wish is that we remove party politics from Parliament altogether, because what is clear is that after decades of it, concensus politics no longer exists. The direction of legislation, its content and its application are commenced and directed by a handful of people at the top, with a party apparatus on hand to blindly rubber stamp those decisions. Thats not democratic nor representative and we need to move away from it as it has corrupted and ruined what should be our Parliament.

Sunday 6 December 2009

What is it With BBC Scheduling?

I have to mention this: what is going on with BBC scheduling at the moment?

It seems the corporation has a death wish, scheduling its popular entertainment programmes all over the shop.

There used to be certain slots in the schedule for instance, for comedy programmes: BBC2 used to have a "comedy Thursday" where popular comedy programmes were concentrated. You knew, without browsing the schedules, you could sit down on a Thursday evening and you'd be treated to a decent hour of comedy.

Not so now. Some (but not all) of those comedy programmes made famous have migrated to BBC1, some have stayed on BBC2, but ALL of them have been scattered all over the weekly schedule, so its impossible to remember when they're on.

Add to that the BBC's penchant for arbitrarily moving programmes to new timeslots in mid-series, stopping them for no apparent reason mid-series and replacing them with a totally different genre of program, you really have to ask, what the hell is going on?

There does appear to be a something at work damaging the BBC as a broadcaster, whether its cocking up the scheduling, or some of the worst casting I've seen in years.

I'd like to say its some sort of conspiracy as its more exciting, but I'm far more inclined to say its poor management and poor quality of staff. There appears to be an influx of medicocre graduates inducted into the corporation and a loss of focus at the BBC and to be honest I'm not impressed. I hark back to my days working for a large computer manufacturer: they started a policy of fast-tracking graduates (of any kind, with no engineering or I.T. background) into management positions ahead of experienced candidates. Within 5 years the company ceased to exist.

I'm not saying the BBC will cease to exist, but I'm sure its share of the market will fall and give ammunition to those who want to privatise it.

GoogleClimateGate

Another interesting side story to climategate, is the supposed strange behaviour of the Google search engine in not proffering links to climategate articles in its auto-suggest option. Many climate warming web pages are suggested as you type c-l-i-m-a-t-e, but as you continue to type g-a-t-e your options shrink, when upon after typing the whole word, you are left with two suggestions.

Once you hit the enter key to start the search, it returns with currently almost 31 million results.

Conspiracy theories regarding this are popping up on various blogs, even suggesting Google is censoring the word from its auto-suggest database. But is it?

Comparing other search engines for the term "climategate" shows varying results.

Google: 30,900,000 results (No Auto-Suggestions)

Bing: 2,400,000 (Typing climate gives a/s climate-gate, more typing makes a/s disappear)

Ask: 9,124,000 (No Auto-Suggestions)

Yahoo: 31,700,000 (No Auto-Suggestions)

So it seems that auto-suggestions for climategate don't work on a number of search sites. It would be interesting to note just what algorithm is used to create auto-suggestions and find out why climategate doesn't come up.

However, if you type in t-i-g-e-r c-r-a-s-h, searching for info on the very high publicity crash outside the golf star's home which has about the same lifespan as climategate, you also don't get any auto-suggestions. However, press enter and the search engine returns 41,400,000 results.

So conspiracy theorists can sleep safe in their beds: there is no conspiracy. Either Google is doing some maintenance to their auto-suggestion system, or it takes time for search results to become available in the auto-suggest window.

Saturday 5 December 2009

ClimateGate Arrogant Scientists

A link on the excellent Burning our Money flagged up Friday's Newsnight, where a climate scientist called an American sceptic "an asshole". The argument really has come down to that. With that one word, Professor Watson shows how much contempt he feels for man made global warming deniers.

Watch the program for yourself (while you can) and see that Professor Watson from UEA is the sort of arrogant self-serving scientist that will brook no dissent. This is the same sort of attitude that has got the MMGW camp into such a mess: the almost religious belief that they are right and everyone else are wrong. Not only that, but those that disbelieve are idiots or "assholes".

There is very little doubt in my mind that what has happened with man made global warming is that the scientists crossed a big fat red line which marked the boundary between subjectivity and objectivity. By crossing the line into the territory marked subjectivity, the MMGW people have created their own problem. They have purposefully gone about making the science fit the thesis, manipulating data where it diverted from their theoretical model. Even Professor Watson in the newsnight interview, (if you listen carefully) says that the email entries about hiding the decline were to do with tree ring data, that matched their thesis, until a point where it diverted, so they had to fudge the data. In his own words: "they are looking at temperatures over the last thousand years, trying to reconstruct them and they use a particular method; Er, with tree rings and it works well, up until about 1960 and then it goes wrong for reasons which, which.. there are lots of papers on, which we don't need to go into..."

In other word, they use tree ring data whilst it supports their thesis, up until it diverts from their model, for a reason they can't or won't explain, then they discard it, or make up the data to fit their model.

The arrogance with which Professor Watson dismisses this poor science boggles me. If the data doesn't fit the model, then the model is wrong, at that point they have to prove the mechanism by which the divergent data still continues to fit the model, or modify the model. All of which has to stand up to independant scrutiny, not some closed shop cabal of climate disciples.

I didn't believe at first that ClimateGate was such a big deal, but the more that comes out ot the affair, the more I'm convinced that its big and unstoppable. There will be major repercussions in science, climatology, high finance and politics.

Thank you mysterious climategate hacker/whistleblower, wherever you are. You have given the blogosphere global provenence.

The downside is, I fear a global backlash. Be ready for it.

Targeting the Bloggers: BloggerGate?

There has been in the past few months, a worrying trend towards harrassing bloggers. Several have aparrently shut up shop over the past weeks, thanks to the hassle. The highest profile blog being Anna Racoon, who is now keeping her blog alive guest hosting.

The lastest casualty being the ever excellent Subrosa, who I've followed for ages, and who has regularly commented on my blog. Her blog now has restricted access, which is a pity as her pithy observations of the Scottish political climate as well as her more general observations will be missed.

The thing is though, either this person or persons behind this are pretty fucked up in the head and get some perverted joy out of this, or there are more sinister reasons for this open season on blogs. I just hope that there is something more behind this rather than some geeky turd knocking one out because he caused a blog to close, because that'd be a pretty sad story.

To be honest, this latest trend doesn't bother me, as my stats are way below anything that would register on anyone's radar. I'd be a pretty irrelevant scalp. To be honest if you're reading this, you're one of a pretty select group of people. Thank you.

Not that I'd be a scalp, as I'm not the sort that takes the role of victim. When I started blogging, I had a lot to think about. I have enough skeletons in my closet to remake Jason and the Argonauts. However, I'm far from ashamed about my past or my present activities and if anyone wants to make them public in any way, be my guest. They are already public in other fora and it doesn't take a brain surgeon or master hacker to do a google search and make the link.
Anyone that does, will get a huge "who fucking cares?" from me.

Friday 4 December 2009

ClimateGate: U.N. Enter the Debate

It seems the head of the U.N body responsible for climate studies has made a statement about the leaked UEA emails saying the allegations of data manipulation warrant further investigation.

It seems the story is growing. I just wonder if the Copenhagen Climate Conference will now be a different animal to the one originally planned.

Thursday 3 December 2009

ClimateGate: Links

A couple of days ago you may have read my climategate ranting about how the Shell Oil company were promoting the carbon credit commidity trading market.

It now appears that there are links between the UEA's Climate Research Unit and Shell.

Now the front is peeled away, there seems to be a very intriguing and quite incestuous relationship all round the Man Made Global Warming community. Whether its getting dodgy science peer-reviewed by a sympathetic scientist, to locking out dissenting points of view from scientific fora and now to funding linked to oil companies who promote commodity markets. Those people duped by the whole scam, those misguided climate camp people that actually thought they were the anti-establishment, must now be wondering who they were protesting for. Were they really just duped into promoting a point of view led by the big commodity traders?

I'm sure there's a lot more to come from this, but the mass media must surely now start to pick up on this. This could be a really, really big story, with reverberations around the globe. Not for the effects of CO2, but for the scale of the scandalous manipulation that has been wrought across the scientific and environmental communities in country after country.

Wednesday 2 December 2009

Climate Gate: Time to Take Stock

Ok, its been a while since the release of the emails and data from UEA, so what exactly has happened since?

Well, a review has been comissioned to investigate the leak. Its a pity theres so far no investigation to review the methods used at UEA CRU, but it may come in time. The one glimmer is that Phil Jones, one of the senior figures in the emails and director of the CRU has stepped down while the investigation takes place. Maybe wiser heads can prevail there while he's away and procedures put into place to ensure proper scientific processes are put in place. We've had a few mentions on U.S. TV shows, but nothing much over here.

As for the wider world, what else has happened? Well, it seems every new day since the leak has had a new climate factoid released, or a celebrity spouting climate bollocks, or something in the news to keep the warmist agenda firmly in the minds of the public. Not much has been heard in the mainstream media of the leak, or the opposing view.

Whats my take on things? Well, I'm sure by now you'll know that I'm firmly in the "Man Made Global Warming is bollocks" camp. This is an explaination why:

The real drivers in the weather aren't gases, but the sun and water vapour. Gases have a minimal impact on weather. Sure, the sun can heat up the air and it takes on a brownian motion, giving rise to thermals, but air without water vapour isn't a terrifically energetic medium. However, add water vapour into the mix and you can get some of THE most violent weather systems, because all the water vapour adds mass to the air. It also reacts with the heat from the sun in a more volatile way than a gas on its own. Physical and thermal weather effects are magnified several times by the presence of water vapour. Clouds cool the atmosphere, cloud dynamics move hot and cold atmosphere around, water in the form of snow at the poles reflects light, clouds distribute moisture and drop it on Cumbria, causing floods. Water in the oceans can store heat and CO2, it can move heat around the globe. Water is cool stuff and on a quantum level is pretty fascinating.

Now you can see that the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere has risen in recent years and consequently our weather patterns have changed, at the fringes becoming more energetic and wetter, which accounts for some of the unprecedented weather events we've seen in the past decade. Anyone who has flown through a storm cloud will testify to the power of water vapour.

Do I think that man made CO2 is to blame? No.

Do you want to know why? Its because also in this past decade, the Sun has also undergone unprecedented events. The Sun is by far the most powerful driver of weather on this planet and the amount of energy it imparts into our atmosphere is several magnitudes higher than anything man made CO2 can achieve. I'm quite sure that Solar weather is driectly linked to Terrestrial weather. In fact CERN have a project called CLOUD, which is trying to replicate what happens when energetic particles from the Sun interact with our upper atmosphere. Our knowledge about how the world works grows every day and I'm sure we will get a better understanding one day.

The Sun has a normal 11 year sunspot cycle. Except this last cycle has been different in a number of ways and the new cycle has been late in coming, in fact its been delayed for just over 2 years. Which correspondingly in my rough mental estimate, is the sort of time we've been having pretty serious floods around the country. To me, its a pretty established fact that the Sun is the main energetic driver of this planet in all sorts of ways and for scientists to start spouting on a minimal increase in CO2 caused by man is going to cause global doom is to be frank, quite arrogant.

This is just a natural cycle and all that we as humans can do is adapt to it. Just like our forefathers did back in the Ice Age and back in the Medieval Warm Period. In the Ice Age, humans adapted and lived in the snow and ice. In the Medieval Warm Period, Vikings exploited Greenland for farming.

I'm no climatologist, no scientist, all I can go on is my empirical data. But those that know me know when I have a hunch, when I see a system or process in action, I'm pretty much on the money when it comes to diagnosis.

Five years on from now I'm pretty sure things will get back to normal and we'll be debating what all this panic was all about.

Finally, for anyone wanting me to provide proof for my theory, tough, I'm not going to release it. My raw data was lost years ago (my memory is limited to only remembering significant events like snow in June and drought in 1976, or hurricane winds in 1979 and 1987), anyhow it stays mine and ( to paraphrase the MMGW scientists) I won't share it with anyone. Won't, Won't, Won't.

The Problems of Brownfield Housing.

So-called "Brownfield" sites for housing have for many years been touted as one of the ways we can tackle the shortage of housing in the UK.

However, here is a report which gives a lesson as to why brownfield housing has to be sited with care, as not all brownfield sites are suitable for housing.

There's a reason why railways tend to be lined by non-residential properties and the noise they can cause is one of them. As a kid I well remember in the summer months with the windows open, listening to the engine noise of the trains and the squeal of the wheels coming from the railway sidings half a mile away. I know how noisy railways can be. I also get goosebumps just remembering the whistling noise from the turbos of the diesel engines. As nostalgic I reckon as someone harking back to the days of steam.

Anyway I digress.

The point is, planners seem not to take into account the impact of the local environment including noise and other factors when approving brownfield and other sites, like housing developments on flood plains. Its about time they did, despite the pressure to create new housing, there should also be pressure to arrive at housing that is fit for people to live in.

Tuesday 1 December 2009

Britain Bankrupt in 2010

I've been saying it for nearly 2 years now, that 2010 will be a historic year. So many things come together in this one year that it can't be anything other than a massively significant milestone in the history of our nation.

Now comes the pretty solid news that our financial situation will become dire next year.

As I've said before, if you thought this was a recession, think again, we've been on the lip of the biggest crash this country has ever seen. The only thing propping up the house of cards economy is a tissue-paper foundation propped up by quantative easing. It WILL collapse next year and the effects will be catastrophic. The principal architects of this disaster, the Labour government will try and prop things up until the election so that the Conservatives can be blamed for the austere decade(s) we face and our children and grandchildren will inherit. Never mind climate bollocks, righting this scorched-earth economic policy wrought by Labour is our biggest challenge for the future. A policy whos architects should be tried as the criminals they are.

When is your Land and Property not yours?

When its accessible to the public, thats when.

If this legal ruling has any meaning, then untaxed or ininsured cars on drives could be siezed and crushed.

Nowhere is free from this overwhelming burden of beaurocracy any more, not even your own land and property is yours in truth.


Superlorry vs the Police

No, not a new lorry-shaped superhero devoted to righting Police injustice, but a new twin trailer lorry developed by Denby Transport. Designed to carry light-but-bulky loads up to the legal weight limit of 38 tons.

The Police as usual in situations where they are unsure if its legal or not, decided to treat it as illegal and stopped it from going on the roads.

Hopefully now a test case will ensue to see who is right in law and whether the 25m long lorry can carry goods on the road. I do love it when private entrepreneurs take on the government. They rarely win, but its nice to see someone with the balls to have a go and push things along.

I love the specious argument from the Campaign for Better Transport loon spouting at the end of the report: "So we get 25m lorries that can carry 44 tons, then they'll carry 60 tons, do we then end up with 50m lorries carrying 100 tons?" No this is one lorry, designed to go up to the current legal maximum weight limit. Knob.

A Minute of Silence

Pray if you will, in joining me in a minutes silence, to mourn the passing of democracy in Europe.

The lights begin to go out from this minute forth, unless good men step forth and save us. By this time next year, I predict we will have witnessed many previously unforseen events.

The answer to war is not tyranny. Europe will not be saved by this totalitarianism. It is mortally weakened, against all foes, foreign and domestic.

Good Night and God Speed.

Sunday 29 November 2009

More CO2 Bollocks

So, the science that was settled, isn't actually settled since the UEA leak.

Then it was CO2 will acidify the Oceans and dissolve the corals or knacker fishes sense of smell.

They really are trying desperately hard to give us umpteen reasons that all the expensive enviro-tax-and-spend policies should remain in place, with less and less evidence and credibility.

Now Paul McCartney says missing out on eating one meat-based meal will solve our CO2 problems. Or something.

Aparrently our gluttonous appetite for meat will double the amount of CO2 meat-producing agriculture emits. Hmm, any hard scienctific facts behind that Paul, or have you perfected talking out of your arse? Or you just peddling this meat-free Monday nonsense to promote a certain soya-based meat substitute? How much CO2 does that soya-based processed crap produce eh?

He was talking to those Biofuel Bunny Burning sponsors at the EU, who I suspect will eventually decide there are too many proles outside the hallowed halls of the EU commission, then true to form for European Totalitarians, march us off to the camps and burn us all for biofuel. Of course I have no proof thats going to happen, but then neither do McCarntney and his fucking man made CO2 global warming enviro-fascist friends.

Copenhagen Climate Conference Part 1 (of many I suspect)

Just off the top of my head: one of the big things at Copenhagen is getting many countries to agree to swap and trade carbon credits, known just as "Carbon Trading".

Now is it just me, or does this sound like yet another commodity that the financial markets of this world would end up trading in?

Is man made global warming just another scam backed by the financial markets to generate money literally out of fresh air?

Update:

Hmm, that'll be a yes then. Looky who's pushing for an unrestricted market, one of the oil companies. Well, well.

More from the FT: "Carbon Trading could be a $2000 Billion market in pretty short order"

Its all about money and power. Nothing changes.

So, the story is: Scientists conjure up climate warming model, ecologists hype up the scare story, then politicians and business jump on the bandwagon after seeing opportunities to raise tax and generate profits from nothing.

I hope people won't be disappointed when nothing changes after the release of the UEA CRU data. As I've said, this is way to big an issue now to turn round immediately. A small chip has been taken out of the cornerstone of the MMGW edifice, but we have to chip away a hell of a lot more to reverse and eventually topple the scam that is Man Made Global Warming. Sorry to be cynical folks, but the money men have billions invested in this, its not going to go away THAT easily, despite how much of an injustice is being done in the name of the climate.

Saturday 28 November 2009

Climategate Inquiry

It looks as though the royal commission are to instigate an inquiry into the leak of information from East Anglia CRU.

You'll note, the inquiry deals with the leak, NOT the insubstantive nature of the methods, data and computer models used by the CRU to support their hypothesis.

I smell the odour of whitewash.

Especially as the great and the good are setting up the mother of all tax grabs at the Copenhagen Climate Summit. This is an opportunity not to be missed: photo ops with the sainted Obama, opportunities to redistrubute more wealth from us into big corporations and excuses to prevent the emerging world from overtaking the established western economies too fast.

Nothing, I repeat nothing, will get in the way of Copenhagen panning out the way the elite want it to pan out.

Well, nothing except the blogosphere and our ability to keep pushing a point on a global scale. And push we will.

Regrettable Racoon Retirement

Anna Racoon has reported she is retiring her blog.

Its a shame, as she has proved on of the most eloquent and readable blog posters in the blogosphere and she will be sorely missed. She's been on the list of my favourite blogs since I started.

In fact she was the first established blogger to contact me, which came as a shock as it took me a while to be bothered about collecting site statistics, so I wasn't sure if anyone was actually reading my online mutterings.

Best Wishes Anna.

Friday 27 November 2009

Climategate on Question Time

I've just listened to the question about Climategate on BBC's Question Time last night. It appears the public at large is brainwashed, going by the way they applauded the points made in favour of man made global warming.

Its typical that the Politicians will say that man made global warming exists as it gives them a chance to extort more money from the public's pockets.

Its also interesting to note that their story has changed to reflect Climategate: the scence is not "settled" and never will be, depite us being told for years that the science was settled and we must do something about it. So they'll carry on as normal demanding taxes and spending our money even though there is no hard evidence that the process is man made and not a natural global cycle.

If the science isn't settled as they say, then we shouldn't be committing billions of pounds of taxpayer's money to the cause.

One Place Derek Acorah and Derren Brown won't be going on Holiday...

Saudi Arabia.

Where a Lebanese TV presenter, who was just in Saudi on pilgrimage has been sentenced to death after being convicted of witchcraft.

All because he gave lifestyle advice and made predictions about the future on Lebanese TV.

I'd hate to think what they'd do to Derek Acorah and Derren Brown.

I'm sure there are those out there who might want to contribute to a holiday fund for the pair of them however.....

Climategate

I've not followed this so closely as I've not had the time to devote to it.

What I would say is that things don't look good for climate science in general and more specifically the science around anthropomorphic global warming. The evidence held in the leaked emails looks pretty damning in itself, but its also the wider picture.

If the data models, data, charts and graphs from the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia are based on bad data and bad programming in an attempt to replicate the graphs from other climate research units around the world, then the graphs (and therefore the data) from other climate research units around the world are equally suspect.

Lets extend the problem further:

If the leaked data is true, then the CRU at East Anglia frigged their data and programs in order to match the graphs from other climate units showing severe global warming.

They frigged the data, because the raw data they were using didn't produce the now infamous "hockey stick " graph showing an extreme rise in global temperature.

By frigging the data I mean using various tricks and dodges, some borrowed from other climate units (as stated in the emails) to produce results that favour the man made global warming hypothesis.

I seem to remember a scientist proclaiming he had produced "cold fusion" but was decried by all his scientific peers when it was found no-one else could reproduce his results. Is the difference here just numbers? Did all the CRU people just gang together and conspire to make sure this wasn't going to be another cold fusion episode and that if they ganged together to emulate and promote each other's results they would get their thesis into science? Did the thing get out of hand when ecologists, lobbyists and governments jumped on the bandwagon?

It stands to reason that the data and graphs from the other climate research units mentioned using these tricks is also tainted and must come under suspicion. Because if they are using these same tricks, then their frigged data also diverges from the raw data. All in order to support the single hypothesis of MMGW, without any attention as to whether the data may be saying a different story. Its also pertinant to note at this point there seems to be a lack noise from CRUs distancing themselves from the Hadley and East Anglia people and their data.

So, the East Anglia leak and the exposed fraud goes further into the Man Made Global Warming camp that at first appears.

These scientists are now as discredited as the cold fusion mob and the whole man made global warming scam should be immediately put on hold until the data and science is reviewed, remodelled and independantly scrutinised. THATS what should now be happening at the Copenhagen climate summit.

Certainly ALL the CRUs that have been involved in the MMGW "science" should now open up their own code, data and models for independant scrutiny by the whole scientific community. Certainly what should NOT happen is for things to continue as the closed shop it is at the moment, neither should the code and data be reviewed by a selected set of scientists. This MUST be for the WHOLE scientific community to debate and form a concensus on, before we commit another penny to the cause.

But now I want to take things a little further:

What if the result of increased CO2 levels isn't the MMGW that these scientists predicted and manipulated the data to prove? What if the global cooling indicated by the raw data is the problem? What if we're heading for the ice age that scientists predicted back in the seventies? What if the problem is far, far worse and we're heading for a less survivable future? How would we know given that these so-called scientists have so skewed the scientific community, the data and the computer models?

What if governments use that as an excuse to extort more money from you? Would any of us trust the science any more?

Wednesday 25 November 2009

Traffic Analysis Time.

I thought its time I did some traffic analysis and see who's looking at the site and what they're looking at.

It seems quite a few people have taken an interest in my Post about my daughter and the EU. Including the European Commission, noless. A gaggle of LEAs showed an interest too, no doubt concerned whether a teenager is forming independant thought in their area and whether action needed to be taken to crush it.

The Insanity of Government

Here's a timely reminder of just what our current government is like.

More spin than substance, more show than go, all haste and waste. The lunatics (more like morons actually) really are in charge.

Foreign Aid for Climate Change Goes Missing

Well fuck me, we give squillions away in cash to corrupt, devloping countries and it goes missing. As if that was a suprise.

The whole fucking climate change thing is a con. End of. All it is is a mechanism to allow those in authority to extort more money from us and give them more control over our lives.

The scientists that have frigged and manipulated data in order to show a non-existent rise in temperature are complicit in the whole scam. If the data didn't fit, then they should have held their hands up and said so. As it is, the CRU data and emails leaked this week prove their complicity in the affair. It doesn't matter if their intentions were good: the road to hell is paved with them.

Tuesday 24 November 2009

Money Down the Back of the Sofa.

It was heartening to see the Police in action this morning, doing their bit to reduce our fiscal deficit, by driving around in shiny new vehicles including a brand new, unmarked silver BMW 3 series (it seems Vauxhalls don't cut it any more in Plodland) and a raft of shiny new BMW motorcycles. In the space of 10 minutes, I saw no less than two cars followed and stopped, with a third Police motorcyclist staking out our local roundabout.

This, in an area where I have yet to see a copper walking the beat.

Yes, it looks like the boys in blue are just a few steps away from full integration into HMRC.

Welcome to the new plan: we are this and the next government's piggy bank and we will all be turned upside down and severely shaken until the money drops out of our pockets.

It seems this must be a new directive, because they've been working hard today. This evening the revenue gathering operation seemed to have moved to Havant.

Monday 23 November 2009

Department for International Development


I urge people to have a look at the DfID website. Theres a huge public expenditure there we can cut straight away. It does nothing to directly benefit the people of the UK, which in these austere times is exactly what we should be concentrating on. I concede that Pakistan is a special case, given we need to keep them onside during the Afghan conflict. But some of the things the DfID are doing with OUR money.....

*Health Warning: Those of a nervous disposition or people with high blood pressure should do any more than a cursory access of the website. Detailed searching of the site may induce apoplexy. *

More money wasted by MoD?

This Sky report says the money is wasted. I don't see it that way: at least the troops in Iraq got an upgraded armored vehicle.

I see the report says that Mastiffs and Ridgebacks have replaced snatch Landrovers in Afghanistan.

I wonder why then, that 2 weeks ago during a live BBC report (you know the type: keeping in touch with our guys on the front line, positive comments from all the troops interviewed, etc) from camp Bastion I saw a group for troops being interviewed before supposedly just about to go out on patrol - In a Snatch Landrover?

Why No One Should Have Power to End Life

This report (about a man trapped in a paralysed body and not the coma he was diagnosed to be in for 23 years) is a reminder (should we ever need one) that doctors should not have the power to deny treatment to people and therefore end their life prematurely. They don't always get things right, nor is their science perfect.

By all means, a person should be able to chose to end their own life in a dignified manner, but no-one should have the power to end another's life.

The UK in 10 Years Time?

I did blog a while back that the UK will be like Russia was just after the fall of the Iron Curtain: a lawless state run by the "mafia".

This article gives you an indication of what goes on inside Russia at the moment. Reporters are killed, people are held hostage, countries are invaded. All on the whim of a government that seems complicit in some of the criminals acts. Whether its a sign of a government that has had to get tough on big businesses that avoid paying their dues or cracking down on criminal activity but has gone too far or a government that has been taken over by those original criminal elements, I don't know.

But I do know that making our Police force responsible for claiming extra taxes in the form of new offenses dreamed up on a whim enforced by fixed penalty notices and using the courts to enforce the same, combined with a Parliament that thinks criminal fidling of expenses is acceptable, topped by a government that is spending billions more then it earns, is a recipe for exactly the same sort of things to happen here as in Russia.

It may take a while. It might never happen. But it is a risk and us the public need to be vigilant and ready to oppose it, for the sake of our children and grandchildren.

Sunday 22 November 2009

Men Throughout the Land Rejoice....

"Alcohol protects men's hearts".

We're constantly bombarded with conflicting health advice. Eat this, don't eat this, this is good for you, then its bad for you... blah blah.

Whats patently obvious is that there are far too many of these studies going on, globally eating vast quantities of money, for no real gain.

Saturday 21 November 2009

Yet Another CO2 Scare

Okay, the day after the blogosphere opens the pandoras box and exposes the myth that is Man Made Global Warming, we get yet another CO2-related scare in the news. I assume in an effort to say increased CO2 doesn't just cause global warming.

Well, increased CO2 levels causing lower Ph levels is something I and many aquarists know about. And this scare is another load of bollocks. In an aquarium's closed environment, yes increased CO2 does cause a significant Ph drop, but there's enough buffering material in the oceans to absorb huge amounts of CO2 without having to worry about acidification for centuries. Plenty of time for organisms to adapt.

So just fuck off and find some other mug to palm your dodgy science off on you fuckwits.

Update: I really am annoyed about this study. Two sets of fish were put into a tank one had been reared in "normal" water and the other in water with a reduced Ph. The tank was fed by two streams of water, one from a tank full of predators, the other from a tank without predators. No mention of Ph or chemical content of the different streams, so no real correlation as the fish could be exhibiting a preference for each stream of water based on any number of different factors.

But the science must be made to fit: the fish brought up in reduced Ph water couldn't smell their predators and so acidification of oceans is bad. FFS. Where is the proof, the real, irrefutable proof that this is actually what is happening and not something else? Bet there isn't any.

I Don't Know Art, But I Know What I Like.

The Turnip Prize for Bad Art.

Whether its art or not I can't comment, but I do love the humour.

Friday 20 November 2009

ACPO Threatening Governments Now?

It seems that ACPO (a Public limited company and therefore not publicly accountable) is making direct threats to the Conservative Party, if they insist on making the Police more accountable to the local public

Its very interesting that ACPO, a company that controls the Police force and is in no way accountable for the public money it receives, is threatening what would be a publicly elected and accountable government.

How fucking dare they?

ACPO it seems, need taking down a peg or to. Either they need to be disbanded altogether, or made more publicly accountable.

It is NOT right that an unelected, unrepresentative, unaccountable body should receive public money. "No taxation without representation" also equates to "No public funding without public accountability".

Of course Sir Hugh Orde's comments about Police independance from political pressure would be fine, if they hadn't morphed into some paramilitary force of occupation that gets involved with and has powers over a vast swathe of our lives, and swaggers about the land lording it over us all instead of being public servants. If the Police were still a civil organisation, not headed by a public limited company, if they were accountable to an independant elected committee rather than an unelected directorship, then his words might have some resonance. But instead, his position is incomprehensible and to be honest quite offensive to me.

Tuesday 17 November 2009

Inflation on the move....

Inflation rose in September, supposed due to fuel price increases. Yeah, right. Nothing at all to do wih quantative easing then? And we are still stoking the money supply, at the same time the inflation meter has just had its first twitch into significantly positive territory.

Ready for the rollercoaster? Did anyone really think that printing vast sums of money would have no consequence? Did anyone doubt that effectively devaluing the pound would be pain-free?

Do Labour care? I really doubt it. Their plan is obviously the create a huge amount of carnage for the next government to sort out. They really don't care about the country, they would destroy this nation just to make the opposition look bad and themselves look good.

Sunday 15 November 2009

Curb on Freedoms Extends to America it Seems

In the US, Defence Secretary Bob Gates has ordered the banning of publication of pictures showing US troops abusing prisoners. The move is qute rightly being contested by civil liberties campaigners.

Over here in the UK, should the government wish to make pictures such as these illegal to possess, never mind distribute, they will find no such hinderance from civil liberties lawyers, nor indeed from the Houses of Parliament. Thats because thanks to the violent pornography part of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act, all the government needs to do to suppress such images is to issue a statute, with no debate in Parliament and no opportunity to argue against in in a court of law.

Just remember that: images that might bring a government or its agencies into disrepute or show them acting illegally can be suppressed as easily as introducing a statute. There doesn't need to be debate or votes in the house of commons for the act to be enlarged or changed in scope to include anything the government doesn't want us to see.

Yeah, Forced Migration 40 Years Ago is a Real Priority

Violent Crime is Up, Street Crime is up, Drug use is up, Racial Tensions are rising. We are in the middle of the worst recession in recorded history. Our troops are dying on a weekly basis in Afghanistan for god only knows what reason (because our elected representatives are clueless).

What is such a huge priority that the government of the day has decided that the Prime Minister will devote time to?

Yes, he's going to apologise for forced child migration. Not long after I reported Parliament wasting precious time debating slavery. They really don't get it do they? They really don't get that all this round the edges fuckwittery just calls them into disrepute.

I really, really am convinced that these are clear indications of the amount of power and sovereignty we've handed over to the EU. Otherwise our elected representatives would be busy debating about and hammering out a plan to improve our financial situation. Instead, thanks to the EU now holding most of the power, all they can do in Westminister is debate about fucking non-issues, fiddling round the edges, while those outside in the real world face ever more hardship, unemployment and restraints on freedom.

The end of Empire

Are you ready? Are you really ready for the fall? By which I mean are you ready for the real rollercoaster ride to begin?

Because if this comes to pass, then the industry underpinning our house-of-cards service-based economy will collapse.

No ifs, no buts. Without financial services, we are a third world economy. And with significant legislation put in place to inhibit their practices, they will abandon the UK in droves.

Which will be an interesting exercise, because when we do fall and we become a net drain on the E.U. as opposed to a net contributor, will the E.U. prop us up to the tune of say Greece, or the new accession countries?

Friday 13 November 2009

Social Engineering, Labour-Style.

A couple of weeks ago we had the revelation from an ex-number 10 aide that Labour deliberately opened our borders to immigrants in order to force multiculturalism in the UK. They would call it social engineering to enhance cultural diversity.
But was multiculturalism the real aim, or was it the importation of a mass of thankful Labour voters?

Over the past 12 years we've had new public financed call centres open up, predominantly in poorer northern areas in order to boost the economy. Labour would call that social engineering in order to bosst deprived economies.
But was helping deprived areas the real aim, or was it to keep core Labour voting areas onside and voting for Labour?

Labour have increased benefits introducing working tax credits, child tax credits and the like, Labour would say in order to help the poor and reduce child poverty.
But it hasn't decreased child poverty. All it has done is create more work for government departments. Departments created (again) in northern Labour areas.
If Labour really wanted to help the poor, why did they abolish the 10p tax rate?

Or, is it as I suspect that all Labour policy is really about is buying votes to keep Labour politicians in power and sat with their snouts in the trough?

Thursday 12 November 2009

Gary McKinnon: MPs on the case at last?

An unspecified number of MPs want the extradition of Gary McKinnon halted. About bloody time we heard from our elected representatives. The cabinet and the home Office steadfastly refuse to accept the extradition treaty we have with the U.S. is unfair and unequal.

Now we need an MP or two to start raising hell about it in the House of Commons.

Wednesday 11 November 2009

Why is it (2):

That when you get a job, you get more job offers than when you were unemployed.

Literally minutes after I took the job at Argos, I had a call from an agency about working in a warehouse.

Today I had a call about working in a callcentre, in a job more suited to my technical skills.

The problem in both cases though is the fact that they want staff with immediate effect.

For instance, the one today couldn't grasp the fact that I wasn't going to drop a job I've already (albeit part-time) on the speculative assumption I may get their full-time job after interview.
I'd love to take the job, but after 18 months of job-hunting I'm not going to give this part-time one up without a guarantee that the new job is mine obviously.

Such is the state of the current job market that employers and agencies have a tranche of skilled unemployed people they can phone and demand such immediate action. They have so many people on the books currently unemployed that they can be so uncompromising.

I see that the unemployment figures went up again this week.
The newspapers are spinning it as a success, because the figure wasn't as high as expected, so the line is unemployment is levelling out.

However, youth unemployment is at an all-time high, despite Gordon Brown's promise to reduce it. Just like child poverty, is there any Labour target that they have succeeded in attaining?

Why is It:

That delegates to a conference on climate change, fly there in huge carbon dioxide-producing aircraft?

Where is the sense in that?

Why don't they use technology like video-conferencing to reduce the amount of CO2?

If they're serious about climate change that is....

Tuesday 10 November 2009

A Brave Mother

I've listened to the recording of Gordon Brown's phone call to Jaqui Janes.

One thing she asks is why are Merlin helicopters still not in Afghanistan. I've blogged on this before and the reason is they're not fit for purpose. They are currently undergoing a huge refit programme to try and bring them up to standard, including as mentioned during the call the fitting of new rotor blades to enable them to fly in the hot and high climate of Afghanistan. I've heard the reports from the training exercises in the U.S. and to say that the Merlin operates "differently" in Afghani-like conditions is a coy euphamism.

Anyone that takes a look at this report on UK helicopter upgrades in Rotor & Wing Magazine will be struck by the huge costs being pumped into upgrading our ageing helicopters (Sea King, Puma and Lynx) and bringing our new ones (Merlin) up to a decent specification in order for them to operate in the hot and high conditions of Afghanistan. One should however, take note at the proposed in-service dates, which are ludicrously some years away. What we need are helicopters fit to fly in Afghanistan NOW, not in 2010, 2013 or beyond.

Its about time the government and the MoD had a healthy dose of realism and started to look at buying helicopters of the correct spec to fly in Afghanistan off the peg. Note the Apache doesn't have any operational problems in that theatre. Neither does the Black Hawk transport helicopter, the type we've been offered by the Americans a number of times but turned down.

What we don't need, is up-engined mongrels only just able to drag their sorry arses off the desert floor, never mind carry a decent payload. Neither do we want complex high-maintenance eurocopters that are never available because they are always breaking down. A failure rate that will only be exacerbated by continuously operating close to maximum payloads for the conditions.

What is clear from the helicopter debacle is that MoD procurement is lagging decades behind our current operational requirements. We have a complement of helicopters designed to operate in a cold war environment, in a temperate climate. We fought our first modern desert war in Iraq in 1990 and 1991 and it appears the MoD still don't have the procurement process tuned into the new battlefield environment almost 2 decades later.

I've said it before that there are plenty of helicopters available around the world with very little lead time that can be in service next year. We could be buying Black Hawks as mentioned, Bell 412s or even Rusian ones. Some battlefield lift capability no matter where it comes from, is better than none.

Saturday 7 November 2009

More Alcohol Purchase Idiocy

A woman has been fined, because she asked her daughter to reach to the top shelf for some alcohol for her.

When she got to the till she was refused the 4 bottles her daughter got off the shelf. She then left the store, loadd up her car and returned on her own and got the alcohol, but staff still refused to let her purchase it, saying they thought she was supplying a minor. She took the bottles she had with her leaving the shop with the exact amount of money and walked out of the store. Later the Police called to her home and issued her with a fixed penalty notice.

Note in all of this there is no proof of her supplying a minor, only someone's suspicion of the the intent to supply. It'll be interesting when it goes to court. From the video accompanyning the report, I get the impression shes not a woman to be messed with!

Friday 6 November 2009

Lisbon Treaty: A 15-year-old's Perspective.

My daughter came in from school yesterday and promptly declared "We've just handed Britain over to the EU haven't we? Thats disgusting!"

Quite how she came by this information I don't know (I make a point of letting my kids make their own minds up about such things), but if its clear to her as a fifteen-year-old with no interest in politics, it must be clear to the rest of the country.

We've been handed, lock, stock and barrel to the EU. There's no point in the disingenuous points the Tories are trying to make such as treaty revisions. There's no point. The Lisbon treaty has made promises of further referenda immaterial.

David Cameron knows that, as do the rest of the shadow cabinet. Its a bald lie that Britain can do any tweaking round the edges. The deal is done.

There is ONLY ONE choice available to us now. To STAY in THE EU, OR TO LEAVE.

Thursday 5 November 2009

Rise in the Green Economy? Not on Labours Watch.

A lovely, comical piece on the BBC website today. Well, its not supposed to be comical, its a serious piece about a new electric car, designed by F1 designer Gordon Murray.

Now I've blogged before about battery-powered electric cars being a technological cul-de-sac, but the comedy isn't about where the power comes from.

No, its the looks:



Just look at it. £4.5 million of taxpayers money has been sunk into this abomination. Thats half the cost of developing it. Thats 9 million quid to develop a buggy, when I've seen better built in 10 hours on scrapheap challenge.

I'm not even remotely impressed by the supposedly new iStream technology, where the body panels are made by welding flat panels together. Anyone can learn to weld flat panels together and why would you build a car built out of flat sheets of steel anyway? How many people love Stealth Fighter Chic?

This thing is so wrong for so many reasons. But indicative of government funded projects, where government fail to spot where the smart money is going. The smart money is investing in Hydrogen infrastructure and hydrogen fuel cells for cars. Its investing in that technology simply because its the least alien of the future technologies. People will fuel their cars just like they're fuelling them now. There won't be a range issue like there is with battery technology.

But government money has never been smart money.......

Wednesday 4 November 2009

Fall of an Empire

Although its about Formula 1, this report shows in no uncertain terms what a tough time Japan and other established manufacturing economies are having against the emerging world.

India and China is where all the money is going at the moment, which begs the question, why the hell are we still giving foreign aid to India? Its a nation that has its own space programme FFS!

At some point in time, our economic model, based on financial transactions will go the same way. In this digital age financial transactions can be done anywhere and if manufacturing with all its associated infrastructure can be relocated, so can virtual industries. Just what does the UK have to replace it? Is there a plan B? The more I think about the detail of this global financial realignment, the more I'm convinced there won't be a happy outcome.

I'm glad that the blogosphere's condemnation of Gordon Brown's "The UK is best placed to weather the financial storm" remarks have so shown to be accurate. I'm sure that the other prognostications such as hyperinflation, massive job losses and a double-dip recession will come to pass as well. After all, the next government has an tricky task ahead, attempting to reverse the huge government overspend while keeping the economy from plummeting. Good luck to them, because I can't see a way of walking that tightrope successfully.

Tuesday 3 November 2009

No Guarantees (Cast Iron or Otherwise)

So, now that the Czechs have ratified the Lisbon Treaty, David Cameron has said there will be no UK referendum on it. So now not only have Labour gone back on manifesto promises, but the Conservatives have gone back on a "cast-iron" guarantee.

You really do know where you are with our current Parliament: They'll promise the earth, punch you to the ground, shit in your face, piss on the rest of you, then nick your wallet, before giving you a good kick as they depart.

People actually think that things will be different with Cameron in charge. The Lisbon Treaty has shown that really, truthfully, it won't.

Not unless we the public change things.

Saturday 31 October 2009

Nothing to Hide Nothing to Fear from the Police?

For those that trot out this little ditty every time the Police want extra powers, you should read this report.

Still pictures of actors in the movie "The Firm" somehow accidentally got mixed in with photos of genuine football hooligans wanted for questioning about football violence. Just how pictures of innocent people totally unrelated to the incident the Police want to investigate got anywhere near being mixed up with real hooligans isn't made clear, but one thing is for sure: it should never happen. Just what would have happened if any of the innocent guys HAD been arrested, or if they'd (understandably) been a bit reluctant to go to the station and something nasty had happened during the arrest doesn't bear thinking about.

Just another reason why the Police shouldn't have been given the massive, sweeping powers they have at the moment. They are human and fallible and can make mistakes. Its us the population at large that have to pick up the pieces after any wrongful arrest.

Those proponents of the DNA database should take this as a salutory warning before things go too far and someone gets hurt. The Police are fallible, database engines are fallible, DNA profiling is fallible.

Nothing to hide nothing to fear? I've never heard so much bollocks in so few words.

Thursday 29 October 2009

Jacqui Smith on Question Time

The trougher extrordinaire and mealy mouthed apologiser is on QT tonight. I wonder if she'll get a hard time over her expenses? I do hope so.

Wednesday 28 October 2009

Google Wave

Interesting app from Google in the works. Google Wave can work seemlessly as email, IM, blog feed, document colaboration tool and it seems quite a bit more.

Its from the team that brought us Google Maps. Maps has been a global hit, especially the APIs that allow you to integrate maps into your own websites. Its become commonplace to see Google Maps embedded in a website for directions, as well as businesses searched for via google to have a map produced showing their location.

The same goes for Wave: its been designed to be open source and there are a host of open APIs for developers to exploit. It'll be interesting if it captures the imagination of the public.

Google Wave may just give online publishing a big kick when it eventually arrives.

Tuesday 27 October 2009

McKinnon Extradition "frozen"

In another outburst of common sense of the type that seems to be gripping the government as we get closer to the General Election, Alan Johnson has announced he has "frozen" the extradition of Gary McKinnon.

This travesty of justice needs to be sorted once and for all. I doubt President Obama would like UK headlines blasting the U.S. for vindictively persuing the extradition and prosecution of a vulnerable adult with a mental impairment.

He should be tried here in the UK with the sympathy that someone with aspergers deserves, not dragged to some foreign land and justice system.

Monday 26 October 2009

Yeah, Slavery is a Real Problem on our Streets.

Violent Crime is Up, Street Crime is up, Drug use is up, Racial Tensions are rising.

What do our political elite discuss? What is such a threat to society that it requires time allocated for debate above all the other crises that are afflicting the country at the moment?

Slavery.

Yeah, fucking slavery, that thing that we already have laws against. That problem that is so rife, you can't walk down the street for people dragging their chains behind them. Yes, I'm being sarcastic. In other words, such a fucking miniscule problem it has no place wasting time in Parliament when there are bigger problems to sort.

I really do fucking despair as to when the fuckwits in charge will get a grip and actually sort the shit out that we're in. You know, the thing we pay them to do.

Sunday 25 October 2009

Political Manipulation?

The link about New Labour I added to the Nick Griffin thread has had me thinking. Despite it being an example of the sort of vindictive, spiteful politics we've become to associate with New Labour, there has to be a word of caution, mainly to do with the timing of the release of the news.

We've just had a weeks worth of media furore over the BNP QT episode and now along comes some information to seemingly stoke the race and immigration issue even further. Coincidence? I think not. Labour will be looking for any and all ways to shut down forums for the BNP to air their views and if they can prove a significant shift to the BNP, or an increase in protests or violence as a result of question time, that will give them (in their eyes) enough excuse to shut down the BNP.

Thats why I view the timing of this information as cynical manipulation.

The fact that it also wants me to hunt down all those that have deliberately manipulated the country for serious political gain and hang the fuckers is by-the-by.

I'm beginning to lose count the number of times the country has been goaded into responding by the political elite over the past few months. I've come to the definitive conclusion there is a deliberate policy in motion there too.

Friday 23 October 2009

Question Time and Nick Griffin

Many have blogged about the programme. True to form it was an attempt by the political elite to kill off the threat posed by the BNP towards the main parties.

However, beware of creating a martyr.

Amongst the boos and jeers he made a valid point: if the Scots and Welsh can have a national identity, why can't the English? Why indeed and it'll be a message that will resonate with many. Why are the English suppressed and reviled in their own country?

One other point was for once, immigration was debated honestly in a grown-up fashion, with no childish name-calling of racist, because the real racists was sat right there with them.

If the one thing that comes out of the political rise of the BNP is an honest debate about immigration, I'd be satisfied, especially after these revelations.

Still in Recession

Yup, despite those so-called "experts" bigging up the economy and predicting we'd come out of recession, in fact we continued to stay in it.

This is now officially the longest recession in history. Well Tony Blair and Gordon Brown wanted to enter the history books and leave a legacy.

Well you fucking pair of morons, thats it. You fucked up so badly that you are THE WORST GOVERNMENT IN THE HISTORY OF THE UK. No one else as fucked up so spectacularly for so long as you clowns have.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: 2010 will be a pivotal year for so many reasons. So many threads are coming together now, it can't be anything else.

Thursday 22 October 2009

Wake up World!

It occurred to me, as it often does while I let my mind meander, that the world really is beholden to a few nations and a few people within those nations. a while back, I did ponder the question who is financing western economies given that they are essentially bankrupt after real jobs went east?

Take for instance America, supposed bastion of freedom. Their ecomony is bankrolled to an extortionate amount by the Saudis, so it stands to reason therefore that the Saudis have quite a lot of influence in America. Its a delicious irony that gas-guzzling-truck-driving-good'ole-American patriots are actually contributing to the downfall of their country and the rise of Islam by pouring their dollars into their fuel tanks and directly to Saudi Arabia or some other Islamic country. They have yet to realise that even if a miniscule fraction of Islamic Oil wealth ends up in the hands of extremists, a miniscule amout of several billions is still more than enough to wage a worldwide campaign for as long as the oil keeps pumping. Kill the need for oil and you kill off the funding for the extremists.

The same goes for China, who thank Americans for buying their cheap DVD players as it bankrolls their worldwide resource-grabbing operations and allows them to buy American debt. Debt which is used to buy infinately more DVD players and huge TVs. Who gets the profit on this circuitous money-go-round? Well, it certainly isn't the ordinary citizens of America.

If they, the ordinary citizens of America realised how they had been conned into giving away their country one purchase at a time and did something about it, maybe the world would be a better place.

Here in Britain things are no better. Our economy is built on a fragile house of cards, with no real money changing hands. Instead of making things and selling them, our economy is based on moving money around in complex ways; a smoke and mirrors economy, where the moment the smoke begins to clear, our government leap in and pour more banknotes onto the fire in order to obfuscate the obvious fact: we are bankrupt. Anything of substance has been sold off to the highest foreign bidder. Napoleon called us a nation of shopkeepers and thats exactly what we are: the only major UK-owned businesses are in shopping or services. Our heavy manufacturing like steel is foreign-owned, our utilities are foreign-owned and the majority of our railway companies are also foreign-owned. The government are determined to sell-off, or if that doesn't work completely destroy one of the last bastions of UK-ownership, the Post Office. Why does no-one ask the simple question: why? Why would they do their utmost to conspire to sell it into foreign ownership?

In the wider scheme of Europe, our political elite are conspiring to ensnare us so that when we do eventually come to our senses, find out the whole bloody thing is a Stalinist sham and start to rebel, they have such overbearing draconian powers that we may never be able to escape the trap set for us.

Africa is constantly fed arms from China in exchange for mineral rights. China knows where the future is and its not in oil, but the control of the raw materials necessary to make things. As China is the worlds biggest manufacturer, claiming control of mineral rights for itself via "partnerships" is a sensible, self-preservation policy.
The world policy on Africa seems to be give it enough guns to be unstable, because if it ever became organised, it would be a force to be reckoned with.

I just hope for our childrens sakes that eventually, in the not-too-distant future, the majority of ordinary people will see what is going on and demand change. Freedom from being held to ransom by the finances of despotic regimes, freedom from a political elite that would sell their own mother to line their pockets, freedom from a lifetime of tyrrany and slavery.

Wednesday 21 October 2009

BNP on Question Time

It looks like the BBC are standing up to the government and allowing the BNP onto question time.

Despite Peter Hain squealing like a stuck pig.

The BBC can't deny the BNP a place on the programme, as other small parties such as UKIP and the Greens have been represented on question time on numerous occasions.

It will be interesting on what questions the BBC select for the panel to answer. I've a feeling that the audience will be overly represented by Labour activists, as a way of controlling the situation.

But it'll be an interesting programme thats for sure.

Monday 19 October 2009

Congratulations to Brawn GP.

Well, they've managed to do it! Brawn GP are Formula 1 the Formula 1 world champions. Congratulations to them and to Ross Brawn, who surely is one of the great men of Formula 1.

Congratulations to Jenson Button, a thoroughly deserving world champion, who has finally had the break he deserved, after having a tough career moving through the ranks, not getting the car he deserved early on in F1 and then sticking with underperforming teams in what some thought was misguided loyalty.

Commiserations to Rubens Barrichello, who contributed so much to the team and repaid the faith Ross Brawn showed in him at the start of the season.

Like I said earlier in the year, I lived not far from Brackley and cheered the local team on through thick and thin. Its just a pity the buggers decided to win the championship after I moved 100 miles away. But to me they're still my local team.

The prime Minister is a Wanker

I'm off to work, where there's no internet.

So I'll just say that the PM is a fucking wanker.

Global Warming, climate change, whatever you want to call it a load of bollocks.

I just wish he'd fuck right off and leave us alone.

Sunday 18 October 2009

Is Burning Bunnies Biofuel?

This report from the BBC although making me laugh in a sick and twisted way, had me thinking. Can burning dead Rabbits be classed as biofuel? I suppose its a renewable resource as with most organic lifeforms. Its just a bit higher up the food chain, which raises the ethical and moral dilemma.

Its an EU sponsored project and we know how evil and corrupt the EU is. I just hope they don't start looking higher up the food chain and start to think that using people for biofuel is a good idea.

General Strike.

It seems to me the plan the governing elite have for us is a life of everlasting extortion and servitude, extending onwards until (if we're lucky) our seventies.

Billions have been given to banks who have said thanks and started squandering the money, we've got a ruling class that think they are above the law and are only in power to rake in as much as they can for them and their chums, we have faulty laws made by half a dozen people and passed to the commons for rubber-stamping, with no democratic debate or due process.

I think its time we put a warning shot across their bows.

Maybe its time we had a general strike. Not a long one, just one day. But one day where EVERYONE withdraws their labour. One day won't hurt, one day is do-able. One day would send a signal to the elite we can organise when necessary. One day that is a statement of intent. One day that says no more tax, One day that says no more petty laws, One day that means anything you want it to mean, but above all sends a warning to those in government that we have had enough and we will take no more.

One day that says they work for us, not us for them.

Friday 16 October 2009

You Have One Month Before the World Ends.


Or not.

The black hole machine is starting up again.

It probably won't create a black hole that devours the world, but just in case it does, then I need to say it so I can say "I told you so" when it happened. Of course if a black hole does devour the planet I won't exist, so, ah, ok there's a flaw in my plan.

Conservatives found wanting by Blogosphere?

Being a feckless unemployed type, I regularly trawl through the blogosphere to see whats what with the world.

It provides a bit of an insight into blog trends. The latest trend is interesting. As we get nearer to the general election and the likely winners of that election are the Conservatives, the more the blogosphere is moving attention away from Labour towards scrutinising the policies and actions of the Conservatives.

To be honest, the blogosphere doesn't seem to like what they see. Sure there are some that will welcome the Tories in with open arms. There always will be. But those with more independance of thought , those that really analyse what the Tories are doing and saying are finding their policies and actions lacking.

It really does look like we won't get anywhere near the change of direction necessary to turn the country round. The Conservatives aren't nearly radical enough and to be honest, their hierachy serve the same patrons, attend the same meetings and generally swim in the same waters as the Labour hierarchy, so really it shouldn't come as a great shock that the Cameroids will be just as bad as the Brownians.

I have a job!

Well, a part-time job. 15 hours a week stacking shelves, but its money that we desperately need seeing as how I'm not recieving any benefits.

So, blogging might take on a less depressed tone in future.

Thursday 15 October 2009

More climate change bollocks

From the BBC: "Arctic to be Ice Free in Summer".

Yes, but not this summer, possibly in 10 years time according to the article, possibly never according to the accuracy of most long-term weather forecasts.

It does annoy when they spout on about global warming and its effects when there's no direct correlation with the amount of man-made CO2 and changes in the climate, plus the fact that the arctic passage has been open and navigable before in recorded history, so its not the doomsday scenario this and other reports peddle.

The Polar Bears survived last time, so why wouldn't they survive this time? I assume they moved inland and hunted for food there instead of on the ice floes. Of course the difference today as opposed to a century ago is that there are more people living within the Polar Bear hunting grounds. The ice melting isn't a problem for the bears, who will survive thanks to their ability to adapt. Instead the problem is with the people living and working in the Arctic Circle who who see climate change as a threat as it means they will have to live with Polar Bears foraging in their towns. They have no recollection of previous thawing periods, but just see the current thaw as a threat. I wonder whether the Inuit population are bothered about it. My guess is not as they probably have a historical record of previous thaws and probably just get on with adapting, rather than crying "the skies falling".

Monday 12 October 2009

Jacqui Smith has to say sorry

She has to say sorry for helping herself to money she wasn't entitled to, is that all?

She reported at being dissapointed at having to do that. I bet she wasn't. I bet she was fucking elated that she didn't have to do a spell in prison. Which is where I'd put her and all her fraudulent fucking friends in Parliament.

The fact the whole thing is a fucking whitewash is abundantly clear in this quote from the report: "We accept that it appears that Ms Smith spent more time in London than in Redditch, even during the period 2007-09, when she spent more nights in Redditch than in London." Er, excuse me, she spent more nights in London even during the time she didn't spend more nights in London? Which fucking existentialist parallel universe does that equate to sensible logic?

As is everything with this government, take everything at face value, the way you assume the words have a meaning, but delve into the detail and forensically examine the text, you see they actually mean completely the opposite. The Conservatives are no better, using exactly the same tactics.

Well here some plain speaking: Its about time we arose, chucked the fucking lot out and started all over again. Who's for playing Cromwell?

Keeping the Bailiffs at Bay

No, not me, although I still have an ongoing bailiff problem. No, this time it seems Gordon Brown is desperate to avoid the bailiffs knocking at the door and demanding instant payment that he's announced a sale of government assets.

Far be it from me to ponder the obvious and say that announcing a sale well in advance is the wrong thing to do, but he did exactly the same thing when selling off our gold reserves and look how badly that went.

Most heinous of the assets reportedly for sale is the student loan book. Once in private hands there will be no guarantees to students about their loans: the company owning it can change the terms as they see fit. They may start to charge commercial interest rates, or impose time limits on repayment, or request repayment when graduates are earning less than the current threshold. Its one more nail in the coffin of Labours supposed target of getting 50 percent of people into university. So much for the 1997 promises of "joined up government".

Its yet another indication of where this Labour government insists on wasting money. On the one hand they are spending money encouraging new students, on the other they are discouraging them with uncertainty over student loans. Its wasteful and a sure sign of the psychotic nature of a Labour government that has been in power way too long, one that has spent all the money in the bank account, then taken out massive loans to finance its profligacy and is now desperately trying to sell anything it can in order to keep the bailiffs at bay.

P.S. Another asset for sale is the governments stake in Urenco, the European Uranium Consortium, which processes uranium for the nuclear industry. How gloriously ironic it would be if the company that buys the 33 percent stake turns out to have any links at all to Iran.

Saturday 10 October 2009

Gordon Brown's Eye

Yes, Gordo's good eye is as gammy as earlier reports suggested.

The reporting of this means that thanks to the Irish voting yes to, and the Poles ratifying the Lisbon Treaty, Gordon Brown is now surplus to the requirements of Peter Mandelson.... sorry, I mean the Labour party.

Global Warming: Unproven Science and thats a Fact.

Even the BBC are now reporting against the man-made global warming (MMGW) phenomenon.

Its a fact that the science is unproven. Unproven to a degree that would satisfy most that the country should stump up billions we currently do in tax and spend those billions on MMGW projects domestic and foreign.

Its got so farcial that the MMGW lobbyists have swapped the "global warming" tag (because it isn't warming at all) to the more generic "climate change" moniker. Of course, you can't deny climate change as the climate changes all the time naturally.

I just hope this is the start of a national outbreak of common sense with regards to climatology.