The dictator style of compromise.
I was reading through some of the mail I get on a regular basis from our corporate area. One of the many articles is interviews with senior managers and this interview had questions about culture differences and respecting the culture of others. This guy who had moved into a senior position in another country was asked to give an example of values expressed differently because of cultural differences. I quote directly from the text.
"I’ll give a simple one — coffee break. When I first landed here, I expected a meeting to start punctually at 10 a.m. if that was the time I’d set for the meeting. I found instead that my team would arrive at 10 a.m., but then walk out immediately to get a cup of coffee. I could have seen this as a lack of respect for my time, except for the fact that it was completely accepted in the cultural context of Chile. So we came to an amicable solution — now my team members still get themselves a cup of coffee, but they get it before walking into the meeting area so we can still start the meeting at 10 a.m. sharp rather than 15 or 20 minutes later.
In other words, instead of thinking in terms of a clash between ABC
1 and South American values, we have to accommodate to local needs, so that cultural differences stop creating a problem and instead become a simple solution."
I nearly fell off my chair laughing and the others that read it didn't see anything wrong till I explained that he had basically told them to conform to his ideals and there was no compromise but instead a change in the local customs to meet a requirement from a foreigner. This was sold as an example of a clash of cultures that needed to be respected and a compromise made. Sometime these people shoot themselves in the foot but maybe not everybody is as picky as I am. After all the others I was with thought it was OK. To be honest our company is quite careful with cultural issues.
1 Names changed to protect the innocent.
Our key witness. A clearly reliable source.
Seems this case is a little bit more interesting than I thought
previously. It now seems our key witness is facing 70 years and is hoping to cut a deal. mmmm. Even with a deal I doubt he would make much of a dent on 70 years. OK he gets out 10 years after he died rather than 30. Makes no sense to me.
Meanwhile the case continues. Read more
here. I hope they really have more evidence than this. The case seems to be;
'Mr Khyam, Mr Garcia and Mr Hussain each deny possessing ammonium nitrate fertiliser - a chemical that can be used in bomb-making.' a chemical that can be used in gardening.
'Mr Khyam and Shujah Mahmood deny possessing aluminium powder, also used in bomb-making.' also used in car body filling.
Is it just me that is concerned about this? Soon it will be;
'Mr Bag denied possessing a pair pliers and a roll of wire - Tools that are used in bombmaking.'
ID cards. You don't have to have but you still have to pay.
Some compromise that is. You don't have to have a card but you have to pay for one. Read more
here. Also, if Labour win the next election they will be made compulsory then. Surely, that must be the final nail in the coffin.
Plus, we have a test subject. I thought of this a while ago but never mentioned it. This
guy has volunteered for an ID card.
Now what were the promises. Protects against identity fraud. Protects against terrorism. The system is probably tight at the moment because few people are connected up so that only leaves the terrorism side. Fingers crossed.
They have tainted Democracy.
As we all know Democracy is where you vote for a limited few like minded parasites with little to differentiate themselves and then they screw everything up.
These Iraqis seem to be tainting that in some way. They seem to be voting for people that don't fit into the world vision. The b4$^4&ds.
Well we went in to put Democracy in. We can go in and replace it with a dictator. Saddam seems nice and handy about now.
It's so funny it almost seem worth 100,000+ plus lives.
Read more
here about us not accepting the democratically elected leader of Iraq. Isn't democracy great. Well in Iraq it may be.
Is this really a crime?
I was looking at the report on the 'Terror Cell' in court at the moment. Now I remember looking at this before and thinking 'There must be more than this'. By the looks of things the answer is 'No, there is not'.
In the
article it says that the crime is they are smuggling in bomb parts and planning to detonate them on the London underground. These guys clearly love that place. I have no idea why, maybe it's because they see the potential for a lot of people in the same place at the same time and plenty of freedom to pick and chose. Anyway, target the underground. Got it.
Now when you look at the bomb parts you have to query what the hell were they up to? They buy Aluminium powder in Pakistan when you can buy tons of the stuff in the UK. I'm not an expert but I know it is used as a filler in a multitude of tasks and buying it here in bulk would not arouse suspicion. Well, not unless you are buying while Muslim. The Fertiliser, I have no idea about, but I would feel that they would never have got enough through in a box to meet their requirements. After all the Oklahoma bomber had a truck full to blow his place up. How much could you carry in person? It would have to be one of the conventional explosives or nothing. I've never seen anyone with a wheelbarrow on the underground. Maybe I've not been looking properly. So what use is the fertiliser? Finally, the detonators. Well, I don't even know if possession of these is an offence. If it is it's the only offence they have so far. This case stinks.
It's all about setting up loads of coincidences with legally held items and then saying there is only one conclusion. Don't be a foreign gardener with a job in car repair.
If they are bombers we have nothing to worry about. It's the terrorist equivalent of the Keystone Cops. It all looks a farce to me.
Watched V for Vendetta. Not as good as I had hoped.
Not one of my usual types of films. It is clearly a film created to fit into the current political climate in the UK and is not too far away from the current situation. Although based in the future most things are based on current technology. The only difference is that there is clearly a Soviet style secret police and we fit into the Soviet style of Government updated with the latest technology.
All in all, a bit disappointing really. The explosions and violence were there but not enough as they actually had a story which took up some of the time. The villain/hero talked much too much and didn't go out killing nearly enough.
Unfortunately it was a bit like a future based documentary. The interesting thing is although it is based beyond 2020 our government will be working towards making it fact in 2010.
A bit of a popcorn film really. Worth a watch but not going to be a classic unless it's banned or something.
This is a politician with balls.
As you no doubt expected it is not a UK one. I'm talking about the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas. He seems to still think his party won the election. Clearly he sees the leader, himself, being followed the same way Arafat did.
One thing though, he is certainly brave. He has warned the prime minister he would "exercise his authority" if the need arose. I'm not sure many politicians would go up against an organisation like Hamas and threaten to set up talks with Israel when the elected government has said they would not even recognise them. Read more
here.
For one thing. Would it be of any use for him to act unilaterally? Why does he believe he still has power in this government? Something is going on.
I see him getting lead injections soon. Either that or having his body parts distributed over a large area.
There has been rumblings but looks like Blair will be getting divorced.
At least from his disastrous relationship with Bush.
There have been several signs the relationship is in trouble. Blair has not been out for walkies for a while. They are both in trouble over Iraq. There has been several issues with terrorist suspects and finally the issues with the UK brokering defence agreements with Europe. Which makes the US nervous. In addition this one way extradition and the potential for moving on Iran. Does this mean that part of the reason Blair gave the EU a chunk of our rebate was a sacrifice to try and make it up to our old muckers? Even the US have noticed
things are not as they used to be and Blair is still being screwed by Bush but now with no kissing. Tantamount to abuse at the end of a relationship really. Blair has finally realised that his love is now one sided and Bush is only after what he could get.
All in all it's a good thing. The sooner these pair are isolated and can be harried into oblivion the better.
What a load of fuss over one man.
I've been following the case in Afghanistan where a man has been sentenced to death for converting from Islam to Christianity. Read more
here.
Now it is quite right that this case shows Islam for what it really is. It also shows what the Afghans have done with democracy and freedom. In addition, it shows an interesting view on us in the West.
Islam clearly is intolerant of anything else on this planet that does not fit in their mindset and they will not rest until everyone is converted and the whole world is Islamic. In our efforts to show we are not racist in our usual PC way we are merely allowing them to gain minor footholds which they will use to lever more and more until it all blows up. Usually with them doing the blowing up and us being blown up.
The fact we had invaded and removed their bad government and left it with one of our liking doesn't seem to have changed the mindset of the leaders never mind the general population. Therefore, while we make laws where you can be shot whilst wearing a backpack. They make laws that say you can't convert from Islam. In a true democracy it would be up to them. This probably would get their votes anyway. They probably don't really have a democracy but in reality neither have we.
Finally, our outrage on this seems skewed somehow. OK, the guy doesn't deserve a death sentence in my opinion. I agree with you all. But at the same time he could just say he converted and get away out of the country. He doesn't because he believes so strongly. In his religion there is life after death. So in his view he is not risking anything. He would be happy to die for his religion. Probably get brownies points but not any virgins though. So for this guy we make a big fuss and diplomatic statements and presentations. Meanwhile, women are still persecuted and killed daily for being women, people are getting bits removed, tortured and killed because of the way they are, dress or behave and we do nothing. Clearly this then is acceptable but to kill a Christian is not.
Seems strange to me how certain things just get blown out of all proportion and other things are just background noise and 'Well, what can you do?'. It at least shows where our priorities lie.
Shouting over discussion for racist reasons is what we do to everything.
An interesting
article on Devils Kitchen. Well worth a read and then have a think about it with an open mind. Bear in mind your opinions may be censored unless they conform to PC thinking.
Kids, the scourge of our society.
Reading this article about these 'mosquito' type repellers which are used on the youngsters in a bid to stop them congregating outside places. Read more
here.
As a nice sales gimmick it is classed as an 'anti-gang' device which is a bit like classing a pistol as an anti-terrorist device. It may be of use for that but it impacts on others as well not just the ones it was intended on. For one thing this one is on the outside of the shop and covering a public area. Are kids not members of the public?
To me it is strange that we seem to see a bunch of youths hanging around a shop as a threat. I know there are some who are abusive and violent but in general the kids of today are no different from when I was a kids. Many, many moons ago. I used to hang around a small shopping precinct and there was not much trouble including violence or intimidation. Raised voices and the motor bike engines were the main issues. Of course moving on did not stop you riding up and down the road for a while instead.
I think that, like America, we are now reading so much in the media, that when you walk into an area with kids you then consider yourself in danger, walk away and call the police. Regardless if the youths are a small group of two boys chatting up two girls. They have hoodies and are smoking. They must be expunged. The police always seem to have the time to call around within an hour or so and move everyone on. They must have a PR shift rota that says at 20:30 go round route one and move everyone on. Followed by route two, three and so on. Finish at 22:30 regardless.
In the meantime more youths come on the scene and the cycle goes on. There is insufficient places for these people to meet within a reasonable distance from their homes and yet there are shops and shopping precincts usually within a thousand yards of most homes. Where are these people expected to go before they are 18. No wonder they are all smoking and screwing there is nothing else for them to do unless they want to stay at home until they are 18.
Meantime we wonder why the youth appears to be out of control. They aren't. As usual it is just a few. They all move on when they get bikes, cars or can get into pubs. The next generation have already taken their places outside the shops. It will never stop until we can provide a place for them that isn't five miles away, isn't free and isn't controlled so much that they don't see a point in going.
In the meantime what is wrong with allowing people to meet and chat in a public place? It must be safer than driving them underground. Except, of course, for our shopkeepers profits.
What a day....
Just spent today traveling around a bit so I'm well out of touch with any news.
I've done the normal trick of traveling from my home to Leeds, transit time 3H 15M. Travel home transit time 1H 25M. Don't ask me why that is common. Although the average for the outgoing journey is 2H 15M. Every time it is like that.
There are a few roadworks springing up now so soon we will be plus 3H every trip. I can't wait.
On the plus side I got some major systems accepted so we should be getting paid. Pity I'm not on commission.
Kind of Ironic.
Was sitting at traffic lights and across my view came a bus with the words 'You can't beat a bus' on it as part of a logo.
On the advertisement underneath was a petrol guzzling 4x4.
No hint of irony there then and the power of money at work.
Half way is not good enough.
When Charles and Camilla went to Egypt it seems that she went barefoot and wore a headscarf. Read more
here.
I don't think that is good enough for someone of Camilla's standing. We should have made a more positive statement. A burka or something would have been much better. Anything that fully covers her face would have been fine.
Just keeping up diplomatic relations as Charles is trying to.
This could be a good idea for funding political parties.
As part of the backlash against
loans and funding for political parties there has also been some discussions that political parties are funded by the
public.
Many are against that as they see themselves funding more useless b4$^4&ds for no positive purpose. The only ones who seem in favour are those on the gravy train that would benefit.
Personally, I think that is potentially short sighted. I think that when I start my own political party I would certainly appreciate the help. I'm thinking of calling it the 'Easy Living Party'. Of course, I don't know if I could live on £50K a year but of course I wouldn't have my council tax to pay, or even taxes at all. Plus, I would get reasonable expenses paid, such as my mortgage, phone bills, travel and food. So it wouldn't be that bad. £50K a year after expenses
I'm sure I could think of a political policy and come up with a manifesto on me living easily on public funding as part of my new job now
I'm going to on the gravy trainconsidering a new career in politics.
Where is my application form?
B'Stard is back.
This should be worth seeing. Alan B'Stard joins the sleazy NuLabour project as Blair's enforcer. I loved the original series on 'The New Statesman' although this one is just a stage show. Read more
here.
I particularly liked the comment that Alan B'Stard does not have to change his character to move over as Labour are now as sleazy, if not more, than the Tories were for the original show.
Isn't it funny how comedy show actually emphasis real line and point out some things. I've just bought the 'Yes, Minister' and 'Yes, Prime Minister' DVDs and even after all these years it is still a good reflection of politics. Some of the issues are still topical now. The true classics. Comedy shows like 'The New Statesman', 'Yes, Prime Minister' etc. We should have more of these on the TV today.
I must be stupid. The police amalgamation does not make sense.
I read the article about amalgamating police forces down to 24 from 43. It actually sounds like they have thought about the savings and efficiency benefits and see it as a valid way forward.
However, when you think about the phrase "My vision for the police service in the 21st century is that it should be close, responsive and accountable to the communities it serves.". Of course it came from our wonderful Home Secretary who still goes on about ID cards helping terrorism when it has been fully debunked so there you go.
We've already hit problems with our local police force being 'made more efficient' and centralised about 30 parsecs
1 away. Read more
here. Increasing the distance will clearly make things better.
How exactly will having your police headquarters covering larger areas and being millions of miles
1 away make them close, (increasing distance makes them close. Only a liar like Clarke could say that), responsive (Well, they probably won't get worse. They don't turn up anyway) and accountable (Mmm, exactly how are they accountable. Never mind to the community it serves).
He also said 'larger forces with the "capacity and specialist expertise to protect the public from wider threats such as serious and organised crime."'
Larger forces, well that's a given when you merge two forces. Even if you get rid of a lot of resources then the force is still larger than the one it replaced. A true statement. I'll have to check to make sure that they don't sack 60% from each force.
Wider threats such as serious and organised crime. Well there we have it. They want to clamp down on DVD piracy, drugs and prostitution. Nothing there about burglars or muggers. All the things we worry about on a daily basis such as DVD Piracy, drugs and prostitution will be stamped on with our more efficient force.
So any other benefits of this amalgamation? Well there will be less Chief Constables and their command structures. Less HQs and HQ support staff.
So all in all a cost cutting exercise and with no real benefit to the public bar the tax savings which will of course just be used to fund the clamping down on organised crime.
I feel better about it already. Only why don't they go the whole hog and amalgamate them into one big force. Surely that would make them closer, responsive and accountable and enable them to have the capacity and expertise to tackle organised crime. Even more savings.
Read about the proposed plans and the bribes given to encourage the process
here. No peerages from what I can understand but you never know.
1) Exaggerated ever so slightly to emphasis the point.
Blight of knives. Knives are so bad.
Now there is a leading statement. Some 18 year old girl nutter, surprisingly one of the ethnic minorities, has stabbed a 15 year old girl to death. Read more
here.
This case apparently highlights the danger of knife crime. Of course, until this case none of us knew anything about knives being dangerous. After all, nobody has ever died from being stabbed before. Nobody has accidentally stabbed themselves while being stupid working on something. So we all think knives are similar to spoons in lethality.
The article talked about knives being used as a fashion accessory in the UK. I seem to remember when, with older nutters, it was guns. Of course we are having a knife amnesty. That should fix it. That coupled with the well thought out name, but poorly though our campaign, called Operation Blunt will fix everything.
A police spokesman said 'If you carry a knife you are more likely to become a victim of crime and more likely to get a criminal record'. Now I can understand the criminal record but a victim of crime. How does that work then? I would have though people would avoid these nutters. They are more likely to trigger crime than be victims.
I've carried a knife for over twenty years. Nobody has got stabbed or killed. I've used it frequently and the only person who has got hurt in any way is myself when I've been stupid.
Another instance of blame the tool and not the person. At least this one got 14 years. It's not perfect. She will still get out but it's a start.
Transport Policy. What a joke.
Road Tax. The biggest rip off that our government pulls on those with no choice.
It takes in something like £70B a year and pays out about £2B from what I understand. I can't find a link and I'm happy to be corrected.
Now it appears that they also want to put in car sharing lanes. Read more
here. Does this mean that we get a reduction on our Tax or that Car Lane drivers pay more tax? Yet again we have a new policy that is being introduced that will cause major disruption to all road users and then when it is complete will only benefit a few. What a farce.
Most people don't share cars because it impractical. All that this sort of thing does it cause more frustration on the roads and more people going postal. Road rage has increased dramatically over the last decade or so and yet there is no link between our abysmal transport network and road rage.
If we spent half of the money taken every year on the roads then we could get rid of most of the problems. We could bury our roads except for a where they come up for town driving and this would reduce the accident toll especially with kids and cyclists. We could improve our transport network so much that we might actually have a transport policy instead of the half arsed attempts we have at putting sticking plasters on our transport problems.
I've said it before. We really need someone to look at our transport issues and not start from the basic belief of we can't build our way out of trouble. We can and we should.
A new way of thinking is required for the threats we are facing.
It seems that Iraq is a lost cause. The former PM has said it is in civil war. Read More
here. The US and UK troops are not welcome any more. Between conflicts with the Iraqi police and the feelings of the Iraqi people the statement to leave is getting louder. Of course, having destroyed the security infrastructure , emasculated the army and police and left nothing in it's place the people are fearful about where it will go when we leave. Read more
here.
Of course our beloved PM is still saying everything is going smoothly and it is our media that is making people at home think the war is going badly. Reports from our troops are still saying everything is going OK. So it must be. How can anyone believe these reports when it is known we write fake news articles abroad and suppress news here?
We have shown ourselves to be aggressors and that, as we see nothing wrong in what we have done, we are willing to do the same again. Having said that God was involved in the decision to go to war with Iraq we are effectively saying that it is a religious war and Muslims worldwide feel they are next. Who can blame them?
In addition we have shown the world how to fight us. Big armies, like Saddam's Iraqi army, are not able to make even a small dent in the West's well equipped and trained armies. However guerilla warfare works brilliantly, worked in Vietnam, works in Iraq and Afghanistan and is the way to go. People willing to die against people who don't want to. Since some nameless leaders hundreds of years ago decided that 'a civilised war' would have two armies, made up of cannon fodder in uniforms, using defined weapons and following rules we have built our offence and defence around that principle. The world has changed and we are now fighting people who will not follow these rules. North Korea is probably the only one of the old style armies left but they have nukes and are nutty enough to use them. Who is the bigger threat to us. Iran who could create nukes and would use them or North Korea who have nukes and would use them. Who is it being threatened now by our leaders? We are already lining up support for our next invasion.
Anyway, Iraq, now we have completed our objectives which were to
punish Iraq for 911 Remove WMD Remove Saddam the tyrant and introduce democracy to the Middle East we should now leave. A phased withdrawal over a month or two to allow the Iraqi security services to take over each area while we can provide backup. Then just walk away and let them run their own country.
Of course our control would disappear and they still won't like us and it will make Iran much more difficult to deal with. After all in reality Iran's influence would then include Iraq. We are likely to lose out on Democracy but we gave it a go. The middle east is decades away from democracy. At least we got rid of Saddam it was worth the 100,000+ lives and the $850B+. Wait a minute could we not just have shot the guy? Oh! Sorry, the WMD. I forgot.
Let us bring an end to this dark part in our history and retire back to our bases and get the planners looking at our defence, after all our Army is in the Ministry of Defence, not Offence. Let's admit, even if it is internally, that we made a mistake and not plan for any 1st strikes again. Let's limit our planning to retaliation and peacekeeping. Let's build up our defensive capability for this new threat without impinging on our freedoms.
We have put ourselves in the line of fire for a global threat that we are not in a position to handle. We need to fix that as a matter of priority. Revamp the MoD for the new threat. These people don't forget and so we need to make sure we can handle anything they throw at us, now or in a decade. Hearts and minds for the new threat. Every bullet has a part of a pig in it, all explosives have pigs blood as an ingredient. Let's think outside the box.
National pensions day? How does that work then?
Looking on the BBC web site for my daily fix of something interesting and I read the title of 'Public meeting on pension crisis' with the underlying text saying that talks were taking place on national pensions day.
National pensions day? WTF? How does that work? I know that we have days for Stop smoking, awareness of disabled people etc. All these have the theme of you actually doing something. Try and giving up smoking for example. Giving a thought to disabled people, giving money to a cause.
Is this the government with their hands out yet again wanting us to contribute to resolve the pensions crisis or are they suggesting that pensioners boycott claiming for the day? Are there cards? Where do I contribute? Do I need to run over a pensioner in support?
I don't know what they are selling?
Isn't life strange.
Of all the stuff that Auntie Blairs Government has done, all the freedoms trampled, the lies, the hypocrisy and the total lack of care for anything that got in his way. Is it not ironic that when seems most likely to bring him down at this point is the sleaze that was the reason turned away from the Tories.
This could be the thing. £14M of
'loans' that didn't appear on the books.
A return to the sleaze marks the final move of Labour into the Tories homeland and don't they do it much, much better. No envelope with cash for these boys. They are much better organised.
The latest Pensions issue.
It seems like our Government has been told they need to cough up for a bunch of failed pension schemes in the UK. Read more
here.
At first glance it does sound ridiculous that we should consider the Government responsible for individual companies pensions. However, I believe that because they force so many rules and obligations on both us as individuals and the companies themselves then they have stepped forward and accepted some liability for pensions. Much as it pains me to have to dip into my pocket again.
I actually feel that if they had put certain limitations on and then just monitored them then they could just step back. But they take money out, change the rules to help business raid the piggy bank then when the business goes belly up they wring their hands and say 'Who was to know?'. The real losers are the poor saps who put their money in a pension scheme for 40 years and then are left with nothing. In the meantime others who don't save and pee it up a wall are treated the same as those that saved. That is not right.
Screw it all up and then refuse to accept responsibility. Pretty much a Government policy nowadays.
V for Vendetta.
Seen this on the telly and found a set of downloadable trailers on the films web site.
The
V for Vendetta web site.
It looks quite good and it's based in the near future. Probably closer than we all think.
I think this will be one of these I actually go to the pictures to see. Or I could wait for the
pirateDVD release.
Money well spent. Cartoon police on Cartoon protests.
Well well. It seems that our police after extensive research, thousands of man hours, and many hours, probably thousands again, of hand wringing have finally moved into *cough* swift and effective action.
From the same team that prosecute drivers for driving three miles about the limit, saying the names of the dead in Iraq and swearing in private conversation we have swooped on five, Yes, five of those involved in the protests. Read more
here.
We are safe in our beds once more. Unless you are a speeder of course.
Gossip about the gun fight in Manchester.
I live about 30 miles away from Manchester where the Pub shootings took place. Read more
here. Unusually there is a bit of gossip going the rounds which I'm going to raise here.
The gossip is that two men walked into the pub with the intention of killing two men watching a football game. They drew their guns and fired. At that point a few other patrons drew their guns and the two would be hit men made a run for it. Unfortunately for them, and fortunately for everyone else they didn't get far. They were executed on a grassy space near the pub. One shot in the back of his head and the other in his head while he lay on the ground.
So sad. Of course our upholders of law and order are arresting the people involved. But to me it sounds like a bit of summary justice.
Our police would of course rather that they killed the men watching a football game and escaped. They could then detect them or maybe not.
I'll see if I see this in the news. Two men saved against two hitmen by armed crowd. If only this was more common.
It's not just Islam that puts itself above criticism.
Well it seems that it is not just Islam that puts itself above criticism.
It seems Isaac Hayes, one of the people so fond of making fun of all sorts of people, has resigned because South Park, the programme he was on as a character, made an episode making fun of scientology. His religion. Read more
here. It seems that making fun of his religion shouldn't be allowed so he felt he had to go. What a hypocrite. It was OK to make fun of almost everything else on South Park.
On the plus side he didn't go round cutting off peoples heads. So all in all it was a win. A hypocrite has been unmasked and nobody died.
A sad day in my life. I can understand Ian Blair.
I was reading through this article about Ian Blair, our *cough* top policeman. It appears he has been secretly recording his calls with the AG and the IPCC. Read more
here. I would guess the calls were mainly regarding the de Menezes execution. In which case he didn't want to get set up and take the fall. I don't blame him. Soon it will be everybody in senior positions in the UK recording their calls to make sure there is no misunderstanding in the future.
I've recorded a few of my calls and discussions in the past. One with the
Cock SucChild Support Agency, one with the DHSS when they thought I was living with someone I wasn't and a couple of times at work when things started looking a little political and a scapegoat was being looked for. I'm thinking of having a call notifier on the phone saying all calls will be monitored, for training purposes, by default. Plus, a sign on the door saying everyone will be recorded on CCTV. When I get shot in the head 7 times I want the tape to be available to all and someone to pay.
Anyway, I have the sad situation where I can not only understand why he recorded the calls but actually agree with his thinking.
I bet those tapes would be very interesting. Could we request them under the FOI act?
They work for us update.
Following on from my previous post on our local council and their policy of destroying our town centre. Read the original thread
here.
Now a predictable cause and effect of the introduction parking charges in the town centre means that those places, close to the town centre, but outside the parking zone get chock a block with cars parking, the b4$^4&ds, for free. So much so that citizens in those areas have campaigned for resident parking permits.
Boy, has that backfired. Not only has our council increased the parking zone by about 200 yards to include many such areas but residents can now only have a maximum of two cars from each home on a residents pass. Visitors to those homes can get special rates for parking. Whoopie! At 25 tokens for £20. Now I think we can guess what will happen next. Everything will shift along 200 yards. One case mentioned was one guy who parks on the corner right outside his door can't get a permit because his address is the main town road which is all double yellows. Because he does not live on the street he parks he can't get a permit. He will need to park his car several hundred yards away after 18:00 and move it before 08:00 every day if he does not want to pay parking fees.
In addition because the town centre parking is not brining in the revenue they expected they are also going to be charging on our out of town areas. Yippee! Death to our local shops. And most of these are alongside big supermarkets with free parking. It's the council that will drive the little shops out of business. Or, more likely, not even make money because people will park just outside the parking zone or on the supermarkets car parks and the cycle starts again.
By the time they have finished increasing the zones you will have to pay our council for parking in Manchester and Liverpool airport. Our town centre will have a McDonalds, a KFC, our many pizza places and the council offices. Remember, that our council staff get free parking anyway unlike the rest of the town centre employees.
In addition Morrison's seems to have gone quiet. I only hope it is to plan a big legal surprise for our useless council officers.
Tom Fox's flawed theory.
I've always found it funny when guys like
Tom Fox get wasted. Not because I think he deserves to die because he clearly cared about people and nobody really deserves to die in such a way. But, because there is something ironic about a person who is so blinded by his own belief that he ignores facts because he knows better. In this case a fatal mistake. Even after he watched others with his mindset being kidnapped and executed he stayed in danger, comfortable in his blinkered beliefs that because he was helping them they would leave him alone.
Now this sort of thinking is all well and good. But, only if you are willing to commit yourself to this way of thinking. You make a decision, state it and them implement it yourself.
Now, and this is the real point in my article, I'm getting really fed up of people who have beliefs that they enforce on the general public but they don't do it themselves by circumventing or even breaking the law. They ban guns but politicians and senior business people are protected by the SAS and trained *cough* police. They force us to wait in queues for NHS heart checkups but they have their NHS checks done within days, they tax us to death but they ignore the same tax laws, they send soldiers out to die because they think it is the right thing to do but keep their own safe. They ban prostitution but are continually being tied up by rent boys. The list goes on.
When will we see the same sort of commitment as Tom Fox made from these people that want to interfere in everything we do? Let's see judges letting criminals out have them living near to them as they are so safe. Let the politicians who think a smart card will protect us from terrorists all sign up and let the SAS go back to Hereford. I could go on, some say I do already, but it does make me annoyed.
Screw all these do gooders.
A bit slow. These union bods have always been dinosaurs.
Seems the leader of the UK largest union is speaking out against it's one time partner Labour. Read more
here.
The part that made me laugh was the statement he is due to say '.... promises of a better future now seem hollow'. Only now.... it took long enough. Although, better late than never.
I thought it was made plain back in the 90s that the unions were not going to be listened to. You guys are our core voters and thanks for the votes but don't expect any favours. Not unless there is any real money in it. £500K of real money. Thank you
Lord Patel.
Looks like some of their core voters are now willing enough to rock the boat. Looks like they want to dislodge Blair. Fingers crossed he can't swim.
How exactly do we end up paying for his?
I found this article on a £100,000 payout by the police to Duwayne Brooks who was with Stephen Lawrence when he was knifed in 1993. Read more
here.
Now from what I understand it seems that because the police arrested this guy and then found him innocent, it was wrongful arrest and the trauma means that he need £100K to get to sleep at night.
First of all it was some bad guy with a knife that actually killed him and generated the trauma.
The police, quite reasonably I would have thought, considered the person with the victim to be a suspect until proved otherwise. Innocent people do geconcerneded when they are arrested by the police. Are they not to do that if they have reasonable suspicion now?
By the sound of things this guy has claimed that this suspicion was based on racism and, as usual, we have paid out rather than be put in court where it could be proved that somofficersrs are racist. So what? Those offices should be sacked and we should not be £100K down.
Should be expensive pretty soon. After all we are now arresting lots of people under the new KGB style laws. Of course the white ones can just live with their trauma but those that can claim racism are going to be quids in.
Better start working some overtime now to keep the tax coffers topped up.
I see a little clearer into the future.
I was browsing through some US blogs and come across this
link to a proposed Massachusetts law in a blog I have not visited for a long while
mAss Backwards.
The law is attempting to make possession of a machete a licensable event. It seems like the UK there are some areas of the US that have no common sense either. The proposal says that it will be an offence to own a machete and a yearly license can be used to own one if you have a valid reason to do so. Whoopee Do.
I wonder how long it will take for a law against blades to get enacted here.
One thing I did notice on the article was a nice succinct statement that read 'What better way to deter CRIMINALS from using a potentially dangerous object in a violent and illegal manner than to ban that object's possession by NON-CRIMINALS.'
In addition he said something I've said for a while 'These idiots honestly believe that an individual intent on hacking someone to death with a machete (an illegal activity, last I checked) will suddenly develop a new-found respect for law and order when told that owning a machete is against the law'.
Nicely put.
Living your life in fear. Life in the UK.
Just went and picked up my son from his friends house. Noticed the new front door has been damaged so I asked 'What happened here?' as I walked in. Well the woman of the house told me and what a sad tale it is too and a sad reflection on society in the UK.
It seems that this woman living alone with three kids, one, a girl, 16, and two sons 15 and 12 has been subject to harassment for a few years. A few kids up the road have been throwing rubbish on the garden, puncturing her tyres and scratching her car just because the kids stick in at school, keep themselves to themselves and are therefore seen as odd.
Last Thursday evening, when it was snowing, snowballs were being thrown at her new windows and doors, not just the ordinary little snowballs but the ones with the solid ice centres. They were making loud impact noises so she went out and shouted at them to stop. In retaliation the gang of about 10 youths started throwing stones and rubbish. She went inside and called the police, or tried to..... After 20 minutes a phone was picked up in Winsford 30 miles away, our new 'local' police station. 'Great Sutton, Where is that exactly? This is for Cheshire only. Oh! it is in Cheshire. Right I'll pass on the message'. Not a thing all night. They eventually stopped their terrorisation of a defenseless family probably out of boredom and went off to get more drink.
Next evening she went out to visit her mother leaving the eldest in the house. At her mothers she got a hysterical phone call from her daughter. They were hammering at the doors and windows and a couple were kicking at the front door. 'Phone the police I'm on the way back'
The girl phoned 999 only to be told 'This line is not for this sort of thing. Phone your local police station.' By the time mummy got home they had gone on to better things. Meanwhile no police came at all. No crime recorded so no harm done and no police required. The new
101 call line at 10p a minute looks like it is already place in our 'advanced' county. Where police will take 999 calls about speeders but not about people trying to kick your front door in. That number alone will cut the crime rate as people ain't going to use it and pay 10p a min for someone to give you a crime number. Bearing in mind that our coppers are really hot on these new ANPR vans, mobile radar units and streetcams. You also never see a copper on the beat at all now either. The
Cheshire Police Motto - Making Cheshire Safer. HaHaHa
Now admittedly she lives in a rough neighborhood. Probably about a third of the local area falls into this category now but you would have thought a gang of youths terrorising a defenseless family and trying to kick in a door would be something on their radar. Oh Radar. Used for the real criminals.
So next day she went down to the police station to complain. Seems it's more for custody and a tea house nowadays as all the detecting is done in Winsford. The desk sergeant was sympathetic, or was that pathetic, he said that they were powerless to stop these gangs and suggested she complain to Winsford. She mentioned that she was going to put up some cameras to record this for the future and was warned that they must not impinge on people privacy walking down the street and should only record her own property or she would be prosecuted. I said I thought she must have misunderstood but she was adamant that was what he said. So no help and one of the only actions open to her could leave her prosecuted. I understand she is not the only one in that area this is happening to. Bar moving home, where she has stayed for over thirty years, there is nothing else she can do. She can't use any tools to defend herself due to our stupid laws that protect these scum at her expense. They throw stones and abuse and if she waves a rolled up newspaper at them she gets prosecuted to the maximum extent of the law.
It's hard to believe that this is the UK we are talking about but such is the state of society in Auntie Tony's utopia. Oh, and Tony she voted for you because she thought you were going to be good for the country. I didn't ask but I'm sure she won't make that mistake again.
What problem?
Reading this
article about Kate Moss and her 'problem' she is taking acupuncture to cure.
Well I must confess I thought her problem was reporters and friend who are not really friends. Exactly how does sticking pins in yourself help that? Unless..... it's adjusting her tolerances so she doesn't have to be in big groups to party or can recognise hangers on.
I think she just needs to pretend to fix the problem. A few plasters is a small price to pay. She seems to have got away with it. Good for her. And, she seems to be more on the telly now than she was before so I don't know about losing contracts. Although I hope the contracts she did lose are having a bad time of it.
Poll on Firearms.
Copied unashamedly from An Englishman's Castle. I'm sure he won't mind. Link
here.
The Sunday Herald is holding a poll about banning ALL firearms, 10 years on from the Dunblane atrocity.
Have your opinion heard.
Assassination is now an official UK policy.
With the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) approving the policy that lead to the execution of Jean Charles de Menezes. With one criticism, the policy should be made public. Read more
here.
With those words we have now officially added execution to the list of powers in our Government. One not subject to due process but at the whim of a middle ranking police officer. The same resources that cocked up Jean Charles de Menezes investigation, resulting in an innocent mans death, and falsified the records.
I am now officially more concerned about our Government than any tin pot terrorists. Congratulations Osama bin Laden, Bush and Blair. We now are a massive step forward on the path to a third world society and the back door entry of the death penalty and Police death squads.
We must be so much safer our guardians of justice are on the ball.
A subject that will never be black or white.
Reading this
article about men being told to ensure consent is made for sex.
The whole things fills me with foreboding. Exactly how far do we go with this and is it still subject to 20/20 hindsight?
The situation appears to be that more and more women are shouting rape and yet the evil men are getting off on technicalities. That whole area is subject to interpretation although blokes seem to be automatically assumed to be the guilty parties. No change there then.
Now my view would be that we now need to video the whole sordid experience and then keep it for over forty years in case at a later date they then talk about their abuse a la Jane Fonda. That way we kill several birds with one stone.
We protect ourselves against a I didn't agree call.
We record the level of drunkenness, although that could still be subject to interpretation.
We protect ourselves against a I changed my mind call.
We have some entertainment for future lonesome nights or a night in with the lads.
Bearing in mind that there are proposals for I changed my mind after the event. How exactly that would work I don't know.
To be really effective we need to get them to agree, on tape, to be tied, abused and screwed senseless. Bearing in mind that you need to get the camera angles right.
I'll try that one on the missus and see how it goes.
Perhaps the Government should make it compulsory before every screw. We should video it before we go out.
'Hello dear I'm here to take you out for the evening and then bring you back for a good screwing'
'Not me! I'm not in the mood' 'OK then I'm off with my mates call me when you feel like a bonk' Save us blokes a fortune.
It will keep the rape calls down as well as we would spend more time with our mates and minimise the last minute 'I'm not in the mood' after you have spend £100 on a night out.
The truth makes the difference.
After the outpouring of grief over the young lads killed in the car crash a few
months ago and the subsequent
condolences in the local paper the inquest results came as a bit of a surprise for some.
In this weeks local rag the truth came out. And it was not two choirboys killed in a fluke crash.
It seems that the driver was the 16 year old killed. It was a stolen car and it had faulty brakes. It hit the school at nearly 100mph. A taxi driver on his way home was overtaken on the road and said it was weaving all over the place. And the best bit was that the driver got a phone call on his mobile just before the crash from a friend wondering where he was because he wanted to come out and play too. The 16 year olds dad said he has been stealing cars and driving around at night for a while now but he couldn't stop him. Never mind pop. He's not doing it now.
All in all not a bad result after all.
The impact of an oppressive society
With the move towards banning abortion in South Dakota, as mentioned
previously, people start looking for ways around the new laws.
Legal or otherwise.
Here is one of them
here. A Do It Yourself abortion guide. Part 1 - Early abortion.
I read this in a kind of horrified fascination way. Thinking would people use this? I think that desperate people will. This law has the potential to make people that desperate.
There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.
- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
A sign of things to come in the Pub trade.
Seems JD Wetherspoon's profits dipped when they introduced a smoking ban at some of their pubs. Read more
here.
Although fear not Mr Wetherspoon, or whoever. You will get your wish and because it will be across the board your customers won't have anywhere else to go to who can give them what they want.
There will undoubtedly be a drop across the whole market. Every time I've gone into a pub it's always been full of smokers. They may only make up 25% of the population but they seem to make up 80%
1 of all the people in the pubs. Of course any made unemployed due to lower profits across the market will be able to be on the dole knowing that their lungs are not full of passive smoke. Perhaps we should have offered masks to those who are really concerned. Although, if I was concerned about passive smoke I would not have chosen a job in the pub industry in the first place. But, of course that is me.
1) Please note that 93.43% of all statistics are made up on the spot. I'm referring to the 80% one as I believe the 25% one is true and it just seems there is more smokers than non smokers in pubs to about that proportion.
You reap what you sow.
I heard earlier, that the DNA scanning they wanted to do in Croydon isn't going too well. Only 114 men out of 4,000 so far. Read more
here. It doesn't show it in the link but a TV interview had reported that nobody really wanted to step forward because the did not trust the Police to dispose of their DNA after the event. Awww. That must mean that either, 3,800+ men have committed crimes and are scared of getting caught, police view, or that 3,800+ innocent men don't trust our guardians of law and order, reporters view. I know what I think. A senior Police figure said he could not understand why innocent people would not trust the Police. Jeez, how out of touch are these people. A few years ago maybe, but now.
In the same TV segment it was reported that, as predicted, minority communities are now clamming up and not reporting any suspicions to the Police. It seems they don't trust them any more than we do. I wonder why?
I bet the KGB were not very popular in Russia either. Not trying to say they are the same, but if it arrests like a duck just because of things they don't like and it does not provide justice like a duck. Then it must have a wet bottom. Or something.
You reap what you sow. Our Government has been very prolific in this respect.
He wasn't the only one.
It seem our beloved PM prayed to God over Iraq. Read more
here. Well he wasn't the only one as both
Bush and
myself have prayed. Although I got no answer and Bush got a conversation. I must be not worth speaking to. God clearly doesn't like the Muslims as he must have given the go ahead to Blair. I say this because I'm sure if God had said 'No' our Tony wouldn't have had to help kill over 100,000 innocent people in order to save them.
If God approves how come killing an Iraqi in their home country is OK but in the UK where they seem to be invading is not. Mmmm. Bit of twisted logic there I'm sure.
Maybe I should ask God if I should kill someone rather than ask him to do it. I'll use the Blair defence. It seems to be working for him.
Crime and punishment revisited.
Interestingly enough there were four articles on the BBC website regarding crime and punishment that caught my eye.
The first was that old pervert Gary Glitter. Seems he has been jailed in Vietnam for three years for kiddy fiddling. Three years. It's good what you can buy your way out of in countries like that. He was facing the death sentence. Read more
here. However, we have to get into the act too and it seems there are calls for us to prosecute him on his return to the UK. Let's get some other countries in on it too. We could send him all over the world for crimes that have nothing to do with anyone bar Vietnam. What a bunch of tossers we are.
The next was the eviction of a family from their home in Liverpool. It seems that their son, Michael Barton, broke the law, he helped kill Anthony Walker, and so they, his parents, must be evicted from that councils property. Why is that exactly? The Knowsley Housing Trust has served an eviction notice on Barton's parents and is asking the courts to repossess their home in Huyton. How the hell can this be justice? Read more
here. Hope the courts have more sense than KHT.
Next up was one I've mentioned
before. It's about indeterminate sentences where the criminal must prove he is not a threat to a review panel before he can be released. Now, I don't agree with this. I think that sentences should be tougher but not left wooly so that those that are more eloquent can worm their way out. Kill someone, get life with a minimum of 25 years. Parole considers them depending on merit. Steal something trivial, first offence, a year, get out without a review board, steal again, second offence three years and so on. What is the point of this type of sentencing. It bypasses our justice system yet again. Sounds good on paper but must lead to injustice. It now seems that this policy is increasing overcrowding in prison. Read more
here. What a surprise. Seems that the panel made up of who exactly are not releasing people they don't like the sound of. British justice in a nutshell.
Finally, read this about our beloved PM and his junkie father in law. It seems that Tony Booth, the name sounds familiar, asked our PM for permission to light a joint before him and Cherie were married. Read more
here. It's at the bottom. I hope our PM did his civic duty and turned him in. Mmmm. Seems not. Is he now an accessory? Jeez, he was lucky. If the PM then had been like him he might have spent some time in jail as an accessory being waterboarded to give up his dealer.
You have got to laugh.
This guy has been banned from car parks because he is a car thief. Read more
here. Typical really. The fact that stealing cars is illegal already and therefore the additional charge of 'being in a car park' won't have much sway really on his decisions.
Perhaps if we were to suggest 10 years next time he steals a car we won't have to worry about watching him in car parks.
A spokesman for Northumbria Police said: "We hope that this order has reassured members of the public and helps protect people who park their cars."
Err, Nope. What a tosser. A typical ineffective reaction to lack of punishment for existing crimes.
Hey. wait a minute.
I was reading this
article about Peter Osgood collapsing and dying at 59. I can remember him and it's sad that yet another sporting hero has popped off. It's not really surprising really because all these guys are now getting to that sort of age.
What made me pause however was that these guys, excluding Georgie Best, are all supposed to be the super fit type of he men we need to be. Not fat little gits like me. My Dad who is also a fat big git is going strong at 75. Peter Osgood a fit git is dead at 59.
Why do I need to watch what I'm eating again?
