Sensible lefty comment of the day 'it doesn’t matter whether everyone has a fair and equal shot at power; it matters that power is not abused. And constitutional monarchy is as good a guarantee of that as we have so far come up with'

For more of Tim Collard's reconciliation of left-wing views and support for the monarchy his Telegraph article is a good read.

'I am happy to live in a country where the highest dignities of the state cannot be acquired by anyone with sharp elbows and/or a lot of money. When people condemn the monarchy in the name of “meritocracy” my blood boils. The rich (who have the real power) don’t get rich on grounds of merit, and is anyone seriously arguing that democratically elected politicians get where they are by being particularly meritorious?

And what’s so marvellous about republics, which all the worst 20th-century tyrannies have been? Even amongst democracies there are two kinds of republics; those with an executive president and those with an honorary one. With the first kind, you get a Head of State who is viscerally hated by at least 49 per cent of the population (as in the USA); with the second, you get a superannuated politician tolerated for his/her harmlessness but commanding little real respect. You can make your own guesses as to who might become President of a British Republic. And shudder.

...

... Prince William, with every imaginable opportunity to turn into a ghastly Hooray and rich aristocratic waster, has got his head down, got some service in, and become the admirable and level-headed man he clearly is. And, mutatis mutandis, the same goes for the new Duchess of Cambridge.

God bless them both, and let us hope that the horrendous pressures of the job don’t drive them apart. Of course I know that the wedding isn’t the really significant occasion. That will be the birth of an heir, whose reign I hope I will never see; but, as an Englishman and a socialist, I will die happy knowing that one is in place.'

So that wasn't true!

When people like me dared to point out that Egypt had a land border with Gaza as well as Israel, so if Israel was blockading Gaza so was Egypt, I remember being informed by Middle East 'experts' (often on the BBC) that this was because Israel was not allowing Egypt to open the Rafah border crossing. Maps were produced showing how Israel stopped Egypt opening this border. It all seemed rather odd and unlikely at the time and now that the new Egyptian government have opened the Rafah border without any problems from Israel we can see what should have been obvious - the BBC couldn't bear to blame anyone other than Israel for the blockade of Gaza and so skewed the evidence accordingly.

Similarly when the Arab revolts started I remember hearing that the Syrian would not face the same revolts as that government was respected by its people 'for standing up to Israel'. Thise same experts seem to have gone awfully quiet about that expert comment now that the revolts in Syria are shoing how repressive a regime it is that rules Syria and how unloved they are.

Neither of the two above examples mean that the Arab revolts are anything other than bad news for Israel. The current regime in Egypt will move to be more antagonistic towards Israel and the elected government that replaces it will be more influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood than the 'experts' still insist will be the case. Any new government in Syria will be even more Islamist than anyone yet believes possible.

Events in the Middle East are heading towards the end of Israel and I think the end game could start to play out before the end of the summer.

The cartwheeling verger

Apparently a happy verger after the Royal Wedding decided that the red carpet down the aisle was too good to leave un-performed upon. Nice idea but rather untidy legs on the finishes.

The face of the left and why a mealy-mouthed apology is really not adequate

The BBC reported  a few days back that:

'Welsh Labour's leader has said an assembly candidate who wrote online that he hopes Margaret Thatcher will die soon has learned a "severe lesson".

Ynys Mon candidate Joe Lock, 25, has apologised for comments he made on Facebook about the former Conservative Prime Minister.

He also wrote he "loves Tories, as long as they are impaled on a large spike".
The Conservatives called the remarks "offensive, abusive" and "unacceptable for anyone seeking public office".

Among his postings in 2010, Mr Lock placed a link to a Facebook group called Is Margaret Thatcher Dead Yet? with the comment "can't be long, fingers crossed".'

So what was Mr Lock's apology? Did he withdraw the offensive sentiments?

'Mr Lock said: "These were stupid comments and intended for friends, but that is absolutely no excuse."

So amongst your friends wishing Lady Thatcher dead and Tories impaled on a spike? Nice friends you have.

'He added: "I accept completely that I should not have made these comments and I apologise unreservedly to anyone I may have offended.'

He accepts that he shouldn't have made the comments and apologises if he offended anyone but does he still wish Lady Thatcher dead and Conservatives impaled on spikes?

'"I have offered a personal apology to Welsh Labour, the local party and to Carwyn Jones for any embarrassment I may have caused."'

Ah that's the reason for the 'apology', to get the Welsh Labour party out of an embarrassing situation.

Now that he has apologised to his Party who might have been 'embarrassed', will he now apologise to Lady Thatcher who he wished dead? I think I know that he won't and why...

So why was Tony Blair not invited to the Royal Wedding?

Three interesting possibilities:
1) From this 2007 Mail article :

'For a modern monarch to rebuke a serving Prime Minister is extremely rare.

The Queen has done it only once in her reign - and the object of her disfavour was Tony Blair. The telling-off came in the early days of the Blair premiership.

The occasion was the State Opening of Parliament which followed a few days after the 1997 election.

In a massive challenge to the authority of the British monarchy, Tony and Cherie Blair sought to capture the event for themselves.

They made the unprecedented decision to walk from Downing Street to Parliament while the Queen arrived in her royal coach.

This decision mattered deeply because the drama of the state opening is all about the Queen: her departure by stagecoach from Buckingham Palace, her arrival in Parliament through the Sovereign's Entrance under the Royal Tower, the putting on of the crown and robes of state before the final entrance to the House of Lords' chamber.

...

An air of understated but definite menace at all times lay behind New Labour's dealing with the monarchy.

In 1997 the New Labour manifesto gave an assurance that "we have no plans to replace the monarchy".

This undertaking - as the more intelligent courtiers grasped - would not have been made had an attack on the British monarchy not been on the agenda.

Plans to get rid of the Royal Yacht were at the heart of the election campaign, sending out what pollsters called a "dog whistle" message - not heard by everyone - that the party was opposed to the Royal Family.

In private briefings with allies in the Press, New Labour in government was openly hostile, with senior figures inside Downing Street freely attacking the Royal Family.

In private the Blairs and their official entourage showed a startling lack of respect.

For the first time since the Queen acceded to the throne in 1952, relations between senior members of the Royal Family and the Prime Minister became actively unpleasant.

This reflected a new attitude from the Prime Minister and those around him. His aides were capable of great impatience with royal procedures, often going beyond rudeness.

The worst offenders were Tony Blair's wife, Cherie, and his adviser Alastair Campbell. She would refuse to curtsy when she met the Queen, and was capable of blanking out senior members of the Royal Family when she encountered them.

She made no pretence at all that she enjoyed royal occasions, and often, through physical and other signals, made it clear that she would rather be elsewhere.

This private lack of respect towards the Royal Family came to be reciprocated. Once Cherie Blair told Princess Anne to "call me Cherie". "Mrs Blair will do," replied the Princess Royal.

...

Shortly after he was appointed Foreign Secretary in 2002, Jack Straw gave an interview to the Guardian in which he referred twice to Tony Blair as "head of state".

At one stage the Downing Street website described how the Queen enjoyed audiences with Tony Blair, and not the other way around.

The Treasury moved fast to remove the royal coat of arms from its logo and drop the initials HM from its official title. The change was said to "reflect a modern image under Gordon Brown's stewardship".

During a visit to Kosovo Tony Blair referred to "my" armed forces, oblivious to the important constitutional fact that British troops owe their allegiance to the monarch as head of state.

Meanwhile the Government set out to write the monarchy out of British public life, an audacious task involving the unravelling of 1,000 years of history.

The most important example of this was the very serious attempt by the Labour government to create a new national identity.

This involved disregarding the institutions of the state that had historically been at the heart of Britain, and replacing them by others, such as a new national day.

In a series of public statements Labour ministers argued that Britain should be defined by abstract values such as fairness. They never mentioned the monarchy.

A series of speeches by Gordon Brown about "Britishness" - an ugly and artificial word - systematically excluded the British monarchy, even though the Queen is head of state and the monarchy encapsulated Britain's long history better than any other institution, including Parliament.

...

Attempts to intrude on the territory of the monarch were to become a repeated feature of the Blair period in office.

The death of Diana, Princess of Wales in August 1997 gave a massive opportunity for the Prime Minister.

The words he uttered on the morning after the tragedy, in which he expressed his devastation at the death of Princess Diana, were brilliantly chosen and widely praised for expressing the mood of the nation.

Members of the Royal Family had been trained from birth to suppress their emotions, exercise restraint and show dignity.

The political philosopher David Marquand noted that when Diana died "the royals behaved as they had been taught to do: as symbols of the state, quintessential inhabitants of the public domain, with all its emotional austerity and self-control".

Previous generations of politicians, had shown comparable restraint (and the Tory leader William Hague was criticised for an inadequate expression of grief when he made his statement about the Princess's death).

Tony Blair, in his response, was at his most formidable as a politician. By showing open grief, and by using the phrase "people's princess", he was opening up new ground and massively extending the territory of the Political Class.

Five years later, following the death of the Queen Mother, the Prime Minister sought to intrude once again into the public domain occupied by the British Royal Family.

Within 24 hours of the Queen Mother's death on March 30, 2002, Tony Blair was seeking to enlarge his public role in the funeral.

Downing Street officials persistently rang Lt-General Sir Michael Willcocks, known as "Black Rod", putting pressure on him for the Prime Minister to play a more prominent part than had originally been planned, including the astonishing proposal that Tony Blair should break with precedent and walk from Downing Street to Westminister Hall in order to meet the Queen Mother's coffin. This pressure was rejected.

Sir Michael also faced intimidation in the wake of the funeral. He refused to endorse the false Downing Street claim that Tony Blair had not tried to muscle in.

After he withstood constant pressure, Tony Blair's press secretary Alastair Campbell vowed that "we'll get him one day".

The problem for Tony Blair and New Labour is simple to explain. The ten-day remembrance period for the Queen Mother left him without a central role.

At state events such as the Queen Mother's funeral, the Prime Minister of the day ranked lower than politically far less significant figures such as the Lord Chancellor and the Speaker of the House of Commons.

This was not, of course, a threat to the Government: the funeral of the Queen Mother had nothing at all to do with politics as it had conventionally been practised.

But it was a challenge specifically to New Labour, because the commemoration period for the Queen Mother claimed back a part of British public life, normally outside politics, that New Labour has asserted as its own.

This meant that the queues for the lying-in-state were almost as disconcerting for New Labour as the grief for Princess Diana had been for the Royal Family five years previously.

The great celebration of the Queen Mother's life was an affront to the Political Class because it was a reminder of the existence of a Britain whose loyalties and allegiances went far deeper than party, but had everything to do with the love of Queen, country, village, school, town and family.

These allegiances were wholly compatible with voting Labour, Liberal Democrat, Tory or any number of other political parties.

They are not, however, compatible with totalitarian politics, which lays claim to space that lies well outside party politics as it has always been practised in Britain.

There is little doubt that New Labour in power yearned to make a full-frontal and lethal attack on the British monarchy. There is little doubt that only the sustained popularity of the Queen prevented it from doing so.

Extracted from THE TRIUMPH OF THE POLITICAL CLASS by Peter Oborne'

2. Alex Masterley thinks there might be another explanation:

'Rules for wedding invites, particularly Royal ones

...

Which leads us to the issue of the preferment of Arab dictator princelings to Scottish ex-prime ministers. Now let's face it, if it came down to a personality test, it would probably be a dead heat, but that isn't what counts. Forget protocol (there is none), and consider the feelings of the young couple.

Which would they rather have at their wedding? The one who isn't just going to give them a full dinner service, but also a pair of his and hers matching Lamborghinis and a year's supply of petrol. With some wedding guests, excessive lavishness is de rigueuer.

... but not Phoney Bliar and Prudence McDoom.'

3. Or was it Prince William's decision:

'A prominent historian has claimed that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was not invited to Friday’s royal wedding because Prince William dislikes the politician and not of political things.

“I think the plain truth is that for all sorts of reasons, (Prince) William developed a powerful dislike of Mr Blair,” David Starkey told Sky News during a debate on the monarchy.

“Particularly the way in which he intervened at his mother’s funeral service. These are not political at all, they are personal choices,” he said.'

Whatever the reason I must say that it was pleasant not to have see the unbearably smug Tony Blair and his ever grasping wife, Cherie, sitting in the Quire/Choir. I presume that the Metropolitan Police were also relieved at not having to accommodate his personal protection team as well as not having to keep an eye on Cherie in case she decided to acquire some souvenirs to sell on eBay...

Putting the record straight

A few Google searches show that a blog can help put the record straight:

'cost of royal family'  - fourth place and telling a fairer story than most

'Anjem Choudary' - number 7 about this dreadful man

Congestion Charge problem

I tried to pay the London Congestion Charge for Prince Charles' Aston Martin DB6 Volante but oddly got the above message... Congestion Charge Exempt as it runs on wine or are Royal cars except or just not stored on database?

The next Johan Cruyff?

Baerke Van Der Meij aged 18 months...

Now officially signed for Dutch club VVV Venlo on a 10 year deal.

Google suggest not working

I have had quite a lot of people coming to this blog having Googled 'Imogen Thomas +footballer' or similar so I was interested that if you type Imogen Thomas into Google there are no auto-suggestions. I did some investigating and Hobo Web has done more research...

The eco-loons always predict doom and disaster and keep getting it wrong

On the first Earth day in 1970 these were some of the predictions made and of course proved wrong:

“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.”
• George Wald, Harvard Biologist

“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist

“By…[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist

“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation.”
• Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day

“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions….By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.”
• Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University

“Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half….”
• Life Magazine, January 1970

“At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable.”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist

“Air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist

“By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate…that there won’t be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill ‘er up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, `I am very sorry, there isn’t any.’”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist

“Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.”
• Sen. Gaylord Nelson

“The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist'

So the next time the BBC report some new expert as explaining that we are all doomed unless we change our habits and reduce our living standards, remember the above also solid predictions, note the use of words such as "will end... inevitably... agree almost unanimously... solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions... certainly... " and realise that the experts and the BBC spread these predictions to scare us and so further their agenda.

I wonder if any of the experts quoted are still alive and would care to comment on their previous predictions proved to be so alarmist and so wrong.

Thanks to I hate the media for the spots.

Ouch tweet of the day

No room at the Inn?

No availability at the Goring Hotel this weekend?!

Three reasons why Gordon Brown has not been invited to the wedding of Prince William and Katherine Middleton

1) He sold half of our gold reserves...

 £10 billion to date

2) He might pick his nose



3) He's an embarrassment, a disgrace and I have not forgotten or forgiven him for what he has done to this country.

Boris Johnson's wedding present to William and Katherine

A tandem?!

Is Barack Obama's 'certificate of live birth' the real deal?

Has Barack Obama silenced queries about his place of birth with his release of the Hawaiian long-form birth certificate? Of course not...


'Proof Obama Birth Certificate is Fake with Adobe Illustrator'



'Proof the Obama Birth Certificate is a fake'


Please watch both videos before calling people 'birthers' or 'racists'. Please watch both videos and ready your explanations before commenting.

What happens when a tornado hits town?

Video of the violent tornado which caused significant damage in Tuscaloosa AL on April 27 2011. This video was captured by a tower camera and broadcast live. Dozens of people have been killed so far this season, shocking isn't it?

Wow

Tonight's final of MasterChef - wow! I would happily eat at any of the three finalist's restaurants but I would be most excited to eat at Tim's. What an incredible menu, beautifully presented and how he made all of that in three hours I will never know. Tim Anderson, remember that name.

Karen Gillan aka Amy Pond on the Craig Ferguson chat show

Not much Doctor Who but it's still Amy Pond...

Denis MacShane at it again

A Tweet this morning from Denis MacShane all but too my breath away:

'Time for public inquiry into why M Howarrd + SPAD Dave let in so many jihadi Islamists to live/preach violence in Londonistan up to 97?'

I'll let the replies posted by me and others speak for themselves:

'@notasheepagoat NotaSheep MaybeaGoat

@DenisMacShane Absolutely so, I presume you will also support one into Labour's massive increase in immigration post 1997?

 

@GarethJAnderson Gareth Anderson

@DenisMacShane @JohnRentoul I assume therefore that Blair and Jack Straw sorted all of that out after 97? Or just a cheap party point?'

Denis MacShane's chutzpah truly is astounding. Does he not realise what the Labour did to increase immigration 'to rub the right's face in diversity'?

Later on Denis MacShane maybe realised that even he couldn't be as blindly partisan as he had been and managed to Tweet this:

'Labour post 97 as bad as Howard on blind eye to Islamist infiltration. Nly got fired as min in 03 for denouncing this. Only chngd aftr 7/7'

Perhaps he could explain how policy substantially changed after 7/7 and also whether he thinks the government which he supported should apologise to the country for their woeful record on combating Islamic extremism in the UK.

 

Can you really compare the 11th Doctor to the adventures of Jar Jar Binks and a blow-up doll, trying to look as if they smoulder against a bad CGI background?

I would never say that but Lawrence Miles does and he continues:

'We know, by now, that there are certain... all right, let's be positive, and call them "tropes" rather than "clichés" or "acts of desperation". Certain tropes that Moffat will always use, the most obvious being the "going back in time and messing about with history in order to produce the desired result" idea. '90s-era fandom will know that this began with his Decalog story "Continuity Errors", the first (official) thing he ever wrote for Doctor Who, and magnificent in itself. "In itself" because he's pirated bits of it for almost everything he's done since. "Curse of the Fatal Death", "The Girl in the Fireplace", "Blink" (but perhaps more tellingly, the Sally Sparrow story that "Blink" was based on), "Silence in the Library", and then - finally, or at least, I hope it's finally - "A Christmas Carol", not so much a cannibalisation as a remake with festive icing. Although the most cloying example is obviously "The Eleventh Hour", because the moment you see two unnamed "Girls" in the Radio Times cast list, you know they're going to be two previous versions of the new companion and you know the Doctor is going to spend the whole twatty hour going backwards and forwards while being surprised by things that don't even surprise the audience. Even a mook like Charlie Brooker called it "business as usual".'

Now that I have found Lawrence Miles's 'Doctor Who Thing' I fear that I may have found a new site to spend hours on.

Andrew Marr and BBC impartiality

We are told that the BBC is impartial, indeed Helen Boaden said that 'impartiality was in their genes'. So with the spotlight currently on Andrew Marr, albeit for something that is of little or no interest to me, I thought it a good time to repeat what he said in the Daily Mail on 21 Oct 2006.

"The BBC is not impartial or neutral. It's a publicly funded, urban organisation with an abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people. It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias"

So which of Andrew Marr and Helen Boaden were telling the truth and which not; is the BBC impartial or not? Your thoughts Helen Boaden and Andrew Marr would be welcome...

A responsibility to protect? Getting things into perspective with Glenn Beck.

Do watch this Glenn Beck video from start to finish and before you doubt the veracity of what Glenn Beck says, here's the New York Times and Chron/Washington Post.

One place that you won't find much news of this story is the BBC whose only stories re Mexico that I can find are these: 'Almost seven in every 10 foreign prisoners in US jails are Mexicans, a US government report has revealed.' and 'Mexican police rescue 51 people, among them Central American and Chinese immigrants, kidnapped in the north-east of the country.'

35,000 dead in Mexico in the last four years, people being bludgeoned to death in Mexico and not a word on the BBC but  wait for the wall to wall coverage when Israel has to stop the next 'peace convoy'. For to the BBC and many others it often seems that the top priority in world polictics is to diminish and then destroy Israel.

Here comes the Palestinian State

I predicted this here and here, now I see that Glenn Beck has a similar opinion at the start of the following video re a unilaterally declared Palestinian state supported by the United Nations...

The rest of the video is also well worth a watch but more on that later...

How to behave when your principles are under attack by Islamists

'Sensitivity Training 101: Abandon all your principles. Defending ideals like individual liberty and freedom of expression can be offensive to others and dangerous to yourself.'

Andrew Klavan speaks his mind and includes examples...

Googling

A lot of visitors have come to this site today having googled Andrew Marr but oddly one also came having googled 'andrew sachs granddaughter'. There's a subject that I had all but forgotten about - the Russell Brand/Jonathan Ross/Andrew Sachs/Georgina Baillie story.

Here's the lady in question...

Meanwhile the Andrew Marr searches have been along the lines of 'andrew marr's mistress name' even though I have not named her although I not that others on the web have.

A question comes to mind when watching this video - Who the hell puts a toilet in front of enormous floor to ceiling windows?

Watts Up With That has the details of this $6,400 NUMI super toilet from Kohler.

Gwyneth Paltrow says the c-word

Gwyneth Paltrow on the US Chelsea Lately chat show, trying to be a bad girl.


Rapping (?) on the Jimmy Fallon show.


Actually singing well on the Ellen DeGeneres show

A Scots Guard speaks

'Watching a massive Jew gathering at the Tower of London! Have never seen so many rabbis in my life.'

A pal replied: 'Get the rifle out…'

To which he responded: 'Have got one of the Jews in my sights now lmao' ('laugh my arse off'

Classy? Threatening? Anti-Semitic?

Israelly Cool has the full details of this pleasant chap's other misspeaks that have got him taken off duty from the Royal Wedding Parade. I wonder if the 'Jew' comments would have been enough without his anti-Kate Middleton comments? Somehow I doubt it.

Why should the taxpayer pay for Trade Union officials?

Following several previous posting, most noticeably this one from September 2010, this one from March 2010, this from March 2010 and this from March 2011, I note that David Morris MP has raised a question today:

"There have been press reports recently that money earmarked for frontline NHS services is being used by hospitals to pay salaries to Trade Union officials. Does my Rt Hon friend (Andrew Lansley) believe it is acceptable to spend taxpayers’ money on union hatchet people and will he order an urgent investigation."

This may be a subject that more people will pick up ion and about bloody time too.

Andrew Marr - oh dear

The news that Andrew Marr has decided to become the first public figure to voluntarily admit previously trying to conceal his infidelity via a super-injunction/gagging order comes as no real surprise. I doubt that there were many people who if interested had not managed to discover who the male celebrity, previously only hinted at in news reports, was. Andrew Marr managed to impose a High Court injunction in January 2008 so as to suppress any reporting of a relationship with a fellow journalist five years earlier. At the time Andrew Marr believed he had fathered a child with the woman and so was making maintenance payments. A fairly recent DNA test showed that he was not in fact the girl's father. Private Eye has dropped heavy hints in the past, indeed the current issue continues that pattern, and I believe was planning to challenge the injunction.

Now Andrew Marr has made the odd comment that "I did not come into journalism to go around gagging journalists"; but that is just what you did do Andrew.

However I am not really concerned by Andrew Marr's private life, his infidelity, his mistress or his love-child (or not). I am more concerned by the way that a former member of the Socialist Campaign for a Labour Victory whilst at Cambridge University, a former self-confessed 'raving leftie' nicknamed 'Red Andy' and the current husband of the political journalist at the left-wing Guardian Jackie Ashley has become one of the chief political interviewers at the 'impartial' BBC.

Andrew Marr's infidelities and gagging orders are of no real interest to me but his blatant pro-Labour/anti-Conservative bias in interviews is. Here is what I wrote in June 2010:

'Here is the text of a complaint that I have just lodged at the BBC Trust's complaint's page re the bias shown by Andrew Marr in his interviews with the three main party leaders:

'... Andrew Marr's interview with Gordon Brown broke down between subjects thus:
Hung parliaments, campaign, the Queen - 12m 18s (48.5%)
Immigration - 5m 21s (21%)
Bankers - 3m 11s (12.5%)
Ash cloud - 2m 40s (10.5%)
Afghanistan - 1m 56s (7.5%)
Cuts, deficit - 0 m 0s (0%)

Andrew Marr's interview with Nick Clegg broke down between subjects thus:
Hung parliaments, Clegg personally - 11m 7s (49.7%)
Immigration - 7m 32s (33.7%)
Trident - 3m 42s (16.6%)
Cuts, deficit - 0m os (0%)

Andrew Marr's interview with David Cameron broke down between subjects thus:
Cuts, deficit - 15m 26s (67%)
Priorities - 3m 20s (14.5%)
Hung parliament, campaign - 3 m 0s (13%)
Living Wage - 1m 18s (5.5%)


So Andrew Marr spent 2/3 of the whole interview discussing with David Cameron a subject that he chose not to raise with Nick Clegg and Gordon Brown at all. If the subject of 'cuts' was so important as to warrant 2/3 of the interview with David Cameron, why was it not important enough to raise with Gordon Brown or Nick Clegg? Does Andrew Marr believe that only the Conservatives will make cuts or is that just the perception he would like to leave viewers with?


Andrew Marr's position as one of the BBC's lead interviewer is compromised by such blatant bias; what action will the BBC Trust take against him now that you have proof of his anti-Conservative bias?


The percentages are sourced from http://beebbiascraig.blogspot.com/2010/05/more-on-marr.html - If you disagree with the figures, do please correct them.'

You can read about the BBC's response and my response to that here.

Anyway now that Andrew Marr has decided to come clean about his personal life do you think he will do the same about his political bias?

Charlie Sheen down one 'goddess'

I hear that Charlie Sheen Adult has lost one of his 'goddesses' as film star Rachel 'Bree' Olson has sent him a short text message saying she wanted to end the two month long relationship.

Rachel 'Bree' Olson, 24, has been by Charlie Sheen's side, and elsewhere, since he was fired from 'Two and a Half Men' and has been part of his 'Torpedo of Truth' tour along with the other goddess, Natalie Kenly.

Just to put this into context here's Charlie Sheen plus Rachel Olson, Nathalie Kenly and ex-wife Brroke Mueller...

And because I found this photo whilst 'researching' this article, here's Rachel 'Bree' Olson and two other women friends of Charlie Sheen keeping hold of their assets...

Poor old Charlie!

The one hundred and twenty seventh weekly "No shit, Sherlock" award

This week's award is presented to various US military and intelligence services for the production of "Matrix of Threat Indicators for Enemy Combatants" which lists the intelligence services of Pakistan, Iran, and Yemen as "associated forces" known to support al Qaeda and allied movements, including the Taliban.

"No shit, Sherlocks"

United Nations officials are injured and not a word on the BBC?

Early today Israel National News was reporting that:

'Three employees of the United Nations suffered light to moderate wounds Friday, when a mortar shell launched by terrorists in Gaza exploded near the Karni Crossing between the Hamas-controlled area and the rest of Israel.

Gaza sources blamed the explosion on Israeli tank fire.'

To date the BBC have not managed to report this story; somehow I think that if UN employees had been injured by Israeli weapons they would be reporting the story loud and clear.

Is this global financial meltdown scenario video about to become real?

Watch the video...
The beginning of the video makes a degree of sense but it does get apocalyptic very quickly and the World government section stretches my concept of possibility somewhat. However Damon Vickers ahs a book sto sell - 'The Day After The Dollar Crashes'.

With the start of the video in mind read this from Zero Hedge:

'China has decided to serve the world another surprise. Following last week's announcement by PBoC Governor Zhou (Where's Waldo) Xiaochuan that the country's excessive stockpile of USD reserves has to be urgently diversified, today we get a sense of just how big the upcoming Chinese defection from the "buy US debt" Nash equilibrium will be. Not surprisingly, China appears to be getting ready to cut its USD reserves by roughly the amount of dollars that was recently printed by the Fed, or $2 trilion or so. And to think that this comes just as news that the Japanese pension fund will soon be dumping who knows what. '

So how do you feel about trading prospects on Tuesday morning?

To celebrate the upcoming wedding of prince Willian and Catherine Middleton

'I could have married Kate' - a brillinat satirical song by Barbershopera



Thanks to Theo Spark for the spot.

Imogen Thomas - the name rings a bell

I seem to remember that I watched the Big Brother series that Imogen Thomas was in so I remember her like this...

In recent days the name has been popping up all over Twitter and the Internet in association (pun intended) with a married Premiership Footballer. I have tried very briefly to see who the footballer is and three names seem to crop up most often, but to be honest I really can't get excited at the story. What was interesting is that Imogen Thomas seems to have... changed a little, well a lot...

It seems that whilst I had lost track of Imogen Thomas her career had taken off albeit in publications that I very rarely or never read (per Wikipedia):

'Since her time on the Big Brother series ended, Thomas has become a glamour model. She has had covergirl shoots with Zoo and Maxim magazines, while she had long running contracts with the Daily Star newspaper. Thomas was in the running for FHM sexiest Woman in the world, coming in 58th. In 2008, she was included in the list of Playboy Bunnies on Playboy's website. In 2010 she shot her first calendar.

In November 2006, Thomas was voted the sexiest Woman in Wales, ahead of both Catherine Zeta Jones and Charlotte Church. Thomas has also been voted the sexiest Big Brother housemate.

...

Thomas had a relationship with American model Tyson Beckford, whom she first met at the Sanderson Hotel. Since her apperance on Big Brother she has dated Russell Brand, polo player Jamie Morrisson, and footballers Matthew Collins of Swansea City, and Tottenham Hotspur's Jermain Defoe. In 2010/11, Thomas had a six month relationship with an unnamed married Premiership footballer, who obtained via Mr Justice Eady a super-injunction so that he could not be named in the press. Thomas subsequently took advice from Max Clifford whereby her story was then published in The Mirror.'

It is odd how some pretty women often seem to have this career path now: reality show, some body remodelling, glamour modelling for papers and lads mags, date a succession of footballers & other celebrities and then marry one or sell their story via Max Clifford. It's not a career that I could follow but is it really any less worthwhile than being an estate agent for example?

Contrasting the reactions of Jews and Muslims to their holy scriptures being burnt

When a Koran is burnt in America by a slightly Christian pastor, Islamists in Afghanistan go on the rampage and kill innocent UN officials. When the synagogue in Corfu is attacked and the Sefer Torah burned  barely a word is raised in protest let alone violent retribution attacks. The former instance engendered much coverage in the world's media, the hardly a whisper - has anyone seen anything on the BBC?

So does this show that Jews are more peaceable than some Muslims or are they just more cowed and used to anti-Semitic attack?


Post written earlier this morning and not timed posted by Google but saved as a draft as it sometimes does. Is there any way to change Blogger's default saving settings?

Are you scared of flying? How about being in the airport terminal?

'Security cameras video released by Lambert Airport shows dramatic pictures of the tornado that hit St. Louis on Friday. The airport reopened on Saturday night for a handful of arriving flights, and officials expected around 70 percent of the scheduled arrivals and departures to go on as planned early on Sunday. Some 750 homes in the St. Louis region were damaged, and less than 100 were uninhabitable, by the 128 kilometres per hour (80 miles per hour) tornado, officials said.'

Should the West really be supporting the Libyan rebels?

Pajamas Media says that it has 
'Mounting Evidence of Rebel Atrocities in Libya' including 'Video clips depict summary executions, lynching of an alleged mercenary and a beheading. Black African prisoners are singled out for abuse.'

Here are some extracts can you spot the two common themes?

'What is probably the most harrowing of the clips depicts a public beheading. A man with a long knife can be seen alternately sawing and hacking at the neck of a man who has been suspended upside-down. The victim’s inert body is soaked in blood. The beheading takes place in front of a burnt-out building in what appears to be a public square. The Dutch public broadcaster NOS has identified the location as the main square of the rebel capital of Benghazi.

A crowd numbering at least in the hundreds cheers on the assailants. At one point, a man begins chanting “Libya Hurra!”: “Free Libya!” According to the NOS translation, someone can be heard saying, “He looks like an African.” As the principal assailant begins to saw at the victim’s neck, members of the crowd yell “Allahu Akbar!” Dozens of members of the crowd can be seen filming the proceedings with digital cameras or cell phones. (See clip #1 here or here.)

A second clip depicts a black African prisoner being aggressively questioned and beaten. The man is alleged to be a pro-Gaddafi mercenary. Extracts from the footage have been broadcast on both the Libyan state television Al-Libya and on Al-Jazeera. More complete “raw footage,” which is available on YouTube, shows the beating continuing even after the man is lying face down on the ground, the surrounding concrete splattered with his blood. By way of photographs and identity papers, a video from an unknown source on YouTube identifies the victim as a Libyan citizen and a regular member of the Libyan army. (See clip #2 here.)

Similar footage of rebels demanding a confession from an alleged black African mercenary has also been shown on Western television. It should be noted that even just the mere exposure of a prisoner to “public curiosity” constitutes a violation of the Geneva Conventions – to say nothing of acts of intimidation and abuse or the outright lynching that appears to be documented in the above clip.

...

As in other clips, a black prisoner is singled out for particular abuse. Barking out accusations, the interrogator hovers over him with what appears to be a sort of machete in his hand. In a later shot, what appears to be the same group of men is seen lying on the ground in pools of blood. Their eyes have been bound and they appear to have been shot in the back of the head. Persons walking among the corpses can be heard shouting “Allahu Akbar!” The footage was shown on a broadcast on Al-Libya television. But the “raw footage” and other apparently related footage is also available on YouTube. The actual shooting of the prisoners is not shown. (See clip #3 here or here.)'

I make that casual hatred of black people and a liking forshouting “Allahu Akbar!”. Is it the case tha tthe West are supporting an Islamic revolution in Libya and if so that that what replaces Gaddafi's vile regime could actually be worse? Don't worry those were rhetorical questions, the answers to both being 'Yes'.

These filmed and distributed beheadings and other murders are just what jihadis so all over the world.What we are witnessing is an Islamic jihadi revolution and the West are assisting the jihadis - are we insane?

Sri Sathya Sai Baba R.I.P.

The Indian spiritual guru Sri Sathya Sai Baba has died at the age of 86. Sri Sathya Sai Baba was revered as a living god by many millions of followers in India and elsewhere.

Sai Baba's followers included many in the upper echelons of Indian society including Indian politicians, sportsmen (which in India mainly means cricketers), business tycoons and Bollywood stars.

Sai Baba's organisation ran schools and hospitals in many countries around the world as well as in India.

The Indian Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, has said that Sai Baba's death was "an irreparable loss" to all. The thoughts of one of Sai Baba's most ardent followers Sachin Tendulkar are awaited, for in India Sachin Tendulkar is more important a figure than any mere politician.

Happy Easter from the religion of peace

Islamic tolerance for Christianity and Christians (Fellow people of the book) has been on display over the Easter weekend. In Indonesia 19 Islamists have been arrested for planting bombs beneath a gas pipeline by the Christ Cathedral near Jakarta. These bombs, which were defused in a 10-hour operation on Thursday, had been set to explode during Good Friday services at the 3,000 seat Roman Catholic church.

Meanwhile In Israel one Jewish worshiper was killed and five further wounded in Nablus early on Sunday morning after their vehicle was shot at by Palestinian Authority security forces as they were leaving the city following services held at Joseph’s Tomb. In the background to this story is the fact that whilst Israel allows freedom of religion to all religions, even to the extent that Muslims pray at the Mosque built above the ruins of the Jewish Temple, leaving Jews just the Western or Wailing Wall to pray at, the Palestinian Authority allows Jews to pray at Joseph's tomb just one night a month.

In Indonesia it was Islamist terrorists and in the second instance it was Palestinian Authority security. In the first case they failed, in the second the murder was not it seems pre-meditated. The first incident seems to follow the standard Islamist terrorist attack blueprint plan of a massive explosion designed to kill and maim as many kufr as possible with the extra twist this time that the attack was to be filmed. The second case also has a twist in that following the shooting, Muslims gathered at the tomb of Joseph to protest, not at the killing of innocent Jews but instead to burn the site that Muslims claim is holy to Islam as well as Judaism.

Religious tolerance seems to be something that Christians and Jews preach and practice but many adherents of Islam just preach and even then with limitations.

Happy Easter?!

Doctor Who series preview spot

In the preview that I posted earlier this week I have just spotted something rather odd and maybe significant... Pause the video at 37 seconds in and the Tardis inside shown is the 10th Doctor's not the 11th!

Am I right? If so, what does this mean?

Why Star Wars is secretly terrifying for women; where are the female role models?

Why 'Star Wars' Is Secretly Terrifying for Women -- powered by Cracked.com

Thought provoking and way more geekier than I could ever be; honest it is...

But oh Leia...

Was God sending a message?

The Telegraph reports that:

'Seville's famous Good Friday processions were cancelled for the first time since the Spanish Civil War, bringing bitter disappointment to women allowed to participate in the religious event for the first time ever.'

Hmmm, was God sending a message about allowing women to participate in this traditionally men only procession? No he wasn't but you can see why the thought arose!

In case you were wondering why the BBC are so clearly in favour of AV

The BBC's promotion of the Alternative Vote has been clear to anyone watching, listening or reading their coverage of the story, Craig's piece at Biased-BBC being a good analysis of just one example, but many are asking why? Surely the Labour party are split on this matter so why are the BBC so decided? Then Vince Cable (government loyalist (?)) explained it with his comments this morning that voting for AV would end Tory dominance; what more reason does a true BBC person need to support AV than that?

Working outside of the law in the USA

''Forget About the Law' Union Bosses & White House Advisors Bob Park & Rich Trumka Admitting They Are Overriding US Law & Sovereignty With The International Labor Movement'

America; welcome to the rule by Trade Unions that did so much for the UK during the 1970s.

Is Iraq now part of Iran?

AAWSAT report some odd news:

'The mausoleum of Hussein Ibn Ali, the third Imam of Shiism, in Karbala will soon have a new gate. It took dozens of Iranian artisans several years to make the gate that, according to experts, is a masterpiece of Persian handicraft.

At first glance, there is nothing remarkable in that news item carried by Iranian media last week.

After all, the mausoleum, like other Shiite places of pilgrimage in Iraq, was built by Iranians and maintained by their donations for centuries.

What is remarkable is that the Iran's state-owned media have chosen to present the report in the section devoted to "domestic news." The official news agency, IRNA, carried the item in its section of "news from the provinces."

Karbala, however, is located in Iraq, a country that, although a neighbor of Iran, has been an independent state for almost 90 years.

It is clear that many within Iran's ruling elite have difficulty acknowledging that fact. To them, concepts like national sovereignty have little meaning.

Official mullahs, such as Ahmad Khatami, a preacher at the Friday prayers at Tehran University, pretend to have never heard the word "Iraq." To them, Iraq is either "Bayn al-Nahrayn" (Mesopotamia) or "Atabat al-Aliyat" (The Holy shrines). Apparently, even the war that lasted eight years and left a million dead has not convinced them that Iraq is a sovereign state.'

The Iran Iraq war killed millions of people. The Iraniansare now trying to takeover Iraq from within, this will not end well...

Does this mean that the IRA didn't really completely decommission their arms?

Police Officer Ronan Kerr was killed by men who until recently were members of the Provisional IRA. Police Officer Ronan Kerr was killed by men using IRA weapons, weapons that should have been decommissioned. So two questions come to mind: first how did Ronan Kerr's killers get access to Provo weapons and second does this mean that the IRA did not really decommission all of their arms?

The second question is one that I suspect we all know the answer to... Can we expect a statement from Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness and if so should we believe a word that they say?

Is there anything Vince cable could do that would get him fired by David Cameron?

Declare his own bias in an extrajudicial role - No

Oppose agreed coalition policy - No

Declare that "Conservative governments have dominated ever since without securing a majority of the popular vote... We need to make sure the progressive majority wins elections in this century and not the Conservatives as they did, by the back door, for two-thirds of the last century."
This is not just a pro-AV call it is anti-Conservative one.

In late 2010 Vince Cable declared that he had "a nuclear option... if they push me too far then I can walk out and bring the government down and they know that". Is he right? Can he say and do anything, knowing that David Cameron will have to grin and bear it? Is David Cameron really that spineless?

I know John Major and others have subscribed to the view that it is better to have some opponents in the camp pissing out than outside pissing in but hasn't Vince Cable gone too far?

Happy St George's Day

What it is to be English...

The Yes2AV campaign's latest rubbish

LetMeAvIt is a piss poor game that seems to suggest that the No2AV campaign wants to stop people voting. Desperate lies, the usual resort of the Yes campaign.

Bill Maher: ‘There Is One Religion In The World That Kills You When You Disagree With Them’

I am not a big fan of Bill Maher but in this instance he is correct.

'There is one religion in the world that kills you when you disagree with them and they say look we are a religion of peace and if you disagree, we'll f***king cut your head off.'

Contrasting Christian and Muslim modes of protest and communication

Andrew Klavan explains the differences and points out liberal 'intellectual' dishonesty.



Thanks to Theo Spark for the spot.

47 years of Doctor Who in 6 minutes

In a sort of reduced Shakespeare Company style here are The Fine Brothers with their history of Doctor Who


Ready for the Easter episodes yet?

Isn't modern Britain marvelous?

Read this story from yesterday's Mail and tell me what sort of punishment the guilty individual who threw the brick should get. Now tell me what you think he will actually get as a sentence. Now tell me how that makes you feel...

'Recalling the incident, Mr Perry said: ‘Jersey-Lou, my partner and my other daughter were with me in the van - they were strapped into the passenger seats.

‘I had pulled over when a group of lads started kicking a ball up against the door.

‘It was scaring the girls so I got out and told them to pack it in because I had young kids inside.


‘A group of about 12 to 15 of them started to walk towards me. I got back in the van and was going to drive away.

‘I started driving off and a guy who had been hiding behind a wall jumped out and threw something.

‘I heard glass smashing and looked over to see if everyone was all right.

‘That’s when I saw Jersey-Lou had been hit. She was out cold and there was blood everywhere.’

Mr Perry drove straight to the Diana, Princess Of Wales Hospital, in Grimsby, where his injured daughter was kept in overnight for observation.

She was treated for a broken nose, two broken front teeth, and dozens of cuts and bruises - but the long-term effects of her injuries will not be known until she has been seen by a bone specialist next week.'

'Police have arrested a 17-year-old youth after a four-year-old girl was left with horrific injuries when she was hit in the face with a brick.

Jersey-Lou Perry was knocked out, her nose was broken and shards of glass were embedded in her face after the disgusting attack in Grimsby.'

The Mail have some quite horrifying photos but somehow I doubt that the judge will give a tough enough sentence.

Is the Amstrad em@iler being neutered?

Mike Rouse reports on a communication from Amstrad:

'Dear Amstrad e-m@iler user

We are sorry to advise that as a result of operational changes we are no longer able to provide the full e-m@ailer service and therefore a number of the features of your e-m@ailer unit will cease to function.

All units will receive a configuration change between 30th June 2011 and 14th July 2011 which will mean that the following features (if present on the model of e-m@ailer you own) will no longer be available after this configuration change has taken place:

- Email (Please note that you will still be able to access and view any emails stored on the e-m@ailer prior to the end date.)

...'

Is this for real? The Amstrad e-m@iler was an odd business model especially as internet access became cheaper and more ubiquitous. I do like the idea that whilst you will not be able to send or receive emails at least you will be able to look at old stored emails. There are other service changes, detailed in the report.

Was Vittorio Arrigoni Murdered Because He Was Gay?

Israelly Cool has an interesting theory regarding the recent murder of Vittorio Arrigoni and one that if true I am sure the BBC will avoid mentioning as it would bring their pro-homosexuality agenda into conflict with their pro-Islam agenda.

I do not know if this theory is correct, and if it is not I will happily report the fact, but it does bring into sharp focus Islam's view of homosexuality. If I was gay and had to live in the Middle East there is only one country that I would feel comfortable living in: Israel. Yet the West's 'liberals' regularly attack Israel for being an evil state whilst supporting the various nasty states that surround it.

A sad music video

Matt Berry - 'Take My Hand'
The Huffington Post wonder if this may be 'The Saddest Robot In The World', I wonder if The Mail have a view?

Yes that is the Matt Berry from 'The Mighty Boosh'.

Very funny indeed

Last night's Down The line was brilliant as they play with the idea of astronomers sharing names with famous actors - I think Professor Brian Cox may have set them thinking...

'Bloated And Dysfunctional'

When I read the words 'Bloated And Dysfunctional' in connection with the House of Lords I assumed it was referring to John Prescott but no... Read here

The importance of &webm=1

When googling a video try adding "&webm=1" (ignore the " ") so you get the WebM version.

Don't say I didn't warn you

In a move completely unconnected with the Muslim Brotherhood's increasing influence in Egypt I note that Egypt and Iran are preparing to resume diplomatic relations and appoint ambassadors to end 30 years of hostility. The Iranian foreign ministry confirmed that moves were under way to appoint its first ambassador to Cairo since 1980, a spokesman said "We believe that developing relations between Iran and Egypt are in the interest of both countries and the region."

Meanwhile Egyptian foreign ministry spokeswoman, Ambassador Menha Bakhoum, said this week "We are prepared to take a different view of Iran. The former regime used to see Iran as an enemy, but we don't."

All looking very positive isn't it?

The cost of Gordon Brown's stupidity

Gordon Brown and his advisers ignored experts' advice and sold 400 tonnes of British gold reserves in a pre-announced sale that helped drive the price received paid for the gold down to a 20 year low. Gordon Brown managed to achieve a price of under $300 an ounce for the gold, the price of gold has just breached the $1,500 per ounce level. I calculate that as 1 tonne equates to 35,273.9619 ounces, Gordon Brown and his advisers including Ed Balls and Ed Miliband have lost the country around $16.9 billion which is around £10.3 billion - that's £10,300,000,000 - so far on this deal.

Gordon Brown - economic genius fit to lead the IMF or dangerous idiot who preferably should stand trial for his reckless stupidity or at least face the deserved ridicule of this country?

I have posted before on this matter and will do so again. The BBC however will not remind us of the stupidity of Gordon Brown in selling gold to 'achieve a better balance in the portfolio by increasing the proportion held in currency' as protecting Labour from attack is one of their top priorities.

Should we withold our BBC licence fee?

UKIP's Paul Wiffen thinks so and proposed a motion to that effect at the 2009 UKIP Conference - 'we were beaten by crappy UKIP even though the BBC were with us all the way' - disgusting.

The 'religion of peace' strikes again

Once again Islamists have destroyed another religion's artifacts and the condemnation from moderate Muslims is noticeable by its absence. This time it's in Bangladesh where Hindu Existence reports that:

'Mohammedan fanatics burned sacred Hindu scripture “Srimad Bhagabad Gita” after destroying 555 yrs old Hindu temple complex in Islamic Republic of Bangladesh.'

Read the whole piece and note that the result amongst Hindus is peaceable protests not killing of UN officials.

Elizabeth Sladen aka Sarah Jane Smith R.I.P

Actress Eliabeth Sladen passed way last night aged 63, another victim of the evil that is cancer. I am sure Elisabeth Sladen had a full and varied career but to me he will always be Sarah Jane Smith, companion to the Doctor. She was companion to both the third and fourth incarnations of the Doctor (Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker) in the 'classic series' before returning to play opposite the tenth Doctor (David Tennant). Elizabeth Sladen even had her own spin-off children's series 'The Sarah Jane Adventures'.

Sarah Jane we miss you..

Congratulations (?) Prince Charles

Today Prince Charles overtakes the then Prince Edward who acceded to the throne as Edward VII, to become the longest-serving heir-apparent and the longest-serving Prince of Wales, so far 59 years, 2 months and 14 days.

'Got it wrong' or 'lied'

The BBC manage to report that:

'The Labour Leader has admitted that his party "got it wrong" over immigration.

Ed Miliband has told the BBC that in the past his party had lost touch with people's concerns on the issue.'

Oddly they have still not reported that Labour's Lord Glasman admitted that:

'Labour lied to people about the extent of immigration and the extent of illegal immigration'

The BBC, shameless in what they report and how.

Only a few days to go...

First the series trailer with more portentous words to end it...


And now the 'prequel' to Episode 1 - 'The Impossible Astronaut'


All the BBC pre-publicity for this and the next episode point to Richard Nixon being an ally of The Doctor, somehow I doubt that as he is somewhat of a hate figure for the left in the USA and here in the UK.

Skynet

April 19, 2011, at 20:11 Skynet is meant to have gone live; just saying...

The BBC's walking the reporting tightrope

The BBC have to report Standard & Poor's downgrade of the US economic outlook from stable to negative, increasing the likelihood that the rating could be cut within the next two years. The BBC also have to report that the problem lies with debt reduction although the lead in sentence muddies who is to blame:

'S&P is concerned that Democrats and Republicans will not be able to agree a plan to reduce the growing US deficit.'

I would have thought that identifying which party wants to cut the deficit and which is opposing such cuts would be good reporting but the BBC cannot bring themselves to lay blame on Barack Obama's Democratic party.

The BBC do not report what S&P had to say about other economies, I wonder why? Here's some extracts from elsewhere on the web:

'While thus far U.S. policymakers have been unable to agree on a fiscal consolidation strategy, the U.S.'s closest 'AAA' rated peers have already begun implementing theirs. The U.K., for example, suffered a recession almost twice as severe as that in the U.S. (U.K. GDP declined 4.9% in real terms in 2009, while the U.S.'s dropped 2.6%). In addition, the U.K.'s net general government indebtedness has risen in tandem with that of the U.S. since 2007.


In June 2010, the U.K. began to implement a fiscal consolidation plan that we believe credibly sets the country's general government deficit on a medium-term downward path, retreating below 5% of GDP by 2013.


We also expect that by 2013, France's austerity program, which it is already implementing, will reduce that country's deficit, which never rose to the levels of the U.S. or U.K. during the recent recession, to slightly below the U.K. deficit. Germany, which suffered a recession of similar magnitude to that in the U.K. (but has enjoyed a much stronger recovery), enacted a constitutional limit on fiscal deficits in 2009 and we believe its general government deficit was already at 3% of GDP last year and will likely decrease further. Meanwhile, Canada, the only sovereign of the peer group to suffer no major financial institution failures requiring direct government assistance during the crisis, enjoys by far the lowest net general government debt of the five peers (we estimate it at 34% of GDP this year), largely because of an unbroken string of balanced-or-better general government budgetary outturns from 1997 through 2008. Canada's general government deficit never exceeded 4% of GDP during the recent recession, and we believe it will likely return to less than 0.5% of GDP by 2013.

I wonder why the BBC see fit not to report that S&P have stated that

'In June 2010, the U.K. began to implement a fiscal consolidation plan that we believe credibly sets the country's general government deficit on a medium-term downward path, retreating below 5% of GDP by 2013.'

Could it be that the BBC would rather not report something than report something complimentary of the Conservative lead Coalition?

Maybe the BBC could put S&P's conclusions re the UK to Ed 'second choice' Balls or Ed 'secret first class traveller' Miliband; somehow I doubt that the BBC will.

Is Google Video really closing down?

'Dear Google Video User,

Later this month, hosted video content on Google Video will no longer be available for playback. Google Video stopped taking uploads in May 2009 and now we're removing the remaining hosted content. We've always maintained that the strength of Google Video is its ability to let people search videos from across the web, regardless of where those videos are hosted. And this move will enable us to focus on developing these technologies further to the benefit of searchers worldwide.

On April 29, 2011, videos that have been uploaded to Google Video will no longer be available for playback. We've added a Download button to the video status page, so you can download any video content you want to save. If you don't want to download your content, you don't need to do anything. (The Download feature will be disabled after May 13, 2011.)

We encourage you to move to your content to YouTube if you haven't done so already. YouTube offers many video hosting options including the ability to share your videos privately or in an unlisted manner. To learn more go here.

Here's how to download your videos:

1. Go to the Video Status page.
2. To download a video to your computer, click the Download Video link located on the right side of each of your videos in the Actions column.

Once a video has been downloaded, "Already Downloaded" will appear next to the Download Video link.

If you have many videos on Google Video, you may need to use the paging controls located on the bottom right of the page to access them all.

Please note: This download option will be available through May 13, 2011.

Thank you for being a Google Video user.

Sincerely,

The Google Video Team

© 2011 Google | 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043

Google is a trademark of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

You have received this mandatory email service announcement to update you about important changes to Google Video and your Google Video account.'

This Wiki are trying to create an archive:
'Google Video is a video sharing website which is shutting down.

If you want to save your own videos, see the announcement and tools below.

If you want to help archive Google Video, get some machines running and join us in IRC (EFNet #archiveteam / #googlegrape)

...

On April 29, 2011 videos that have been uploaded to Google Video will no longer be available for playback. We’ve added a Download button to the Video Status page, so you can download videos that you want to save. If you don’t want to download your videos, you don’t need to do anything. (The Download feature will be disabled after May 13, 2011.)

How do I download videos that I've uploaded?
On the Video Status page, click Download Video located on the right side of each of your videos in the "Actions" column.Once a video has been downloaded, an "Already Downloaded" message will appear. If you have many videos on Google Video, you may need to use the paging controls located on the bottom right of the page to access them all. This download option will be available through May 13, 2011.

I've downloaded my videos. Now what do I do with these FLV files?
FLV files are videos that have been encoded in the Flash Video Format. You can upload your videos in FLV format to other video hosting sites like YouTube or Picassa Web Albums. If you would like to playback your videos on your computer and they don’t seem to be working, you might need to install an FLV player. In order to find an FLV player to install, try doing a Google search for [ FLV player ].

Should Danny Baker take over from Steve Wright?

Danny Baker aka The Candyman was back on BBC Radio London today.

Finally we can answer one of the great unanswered questions: are baby penguins tickleish?

Cookie the Little Penguin at the Cincinnati Zoo is tickleish

Evil Israeli soldiers don't let a pregnant Palestinian woman pass through a military barricade

I have just been made aware of this disgusting incident, please watch the video and spread the news that Israeli soldiers don't let a pregnant Palestinian woman pass through a military barricade so she can go to hospital...


Sorry I'll try that again: A young Palestinian woman, disguised as being pregnant, was sent to blow up the hospital in Israel who had been treating her . Her explosive device was found during a routine security check at Erez checkpoint, watch as she tries and fails to detonate the device and then succeeds.

The one hundred and twenty sixth weekly "No shit, Sherlock" award

This week's winners are the FBI for this comment as reported by ABC News:

'FBI Counter-Terror Official: Al Qaeda 'Thrives' After Dictators Fall'

"No shit, Sherlocks", onlythe BBC would think that this would not happen.

Question: When is a Grad an 'indiscriminate weapon that - while not illegal - could be even deadlier than cluster bombs' and when is it of no real concern?

Answer: If you are the BBC then if it is being fired at Islamist rebels in Libya it is an 'indiscriminate weapon that - while not illegal - could be even deadlier than cluster bombs' but if it is being fired by Hamas terrorists at Israelis then "It was just a signal, aimed at the outskirts" or it is an ineffective weapon that causes little or no injuries to Israelis.

Of course the reason that relatively few injuries are caused to Israeli citizens by Grad rockets is that they are protected by bomb shelters built by the Israeli government to protect its people. But would the BBC really report the attacks any differently if Israelis were being killed by them?

Another complaint to the BBC

Complaint type: BBC News

Location: England

What is your complaint about: BBC News Online

Address of the page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-13109092

Complaint category: Bias

Complaint summary: Deliberately misleading reporting

Full complaint:

Your news piece about the arrest of two Palestinians for the brutal murder of five members of the Fogel family includes this: 'The murders were greeted with revulsion in Israel and were condemned by Palestinian leaders as well. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called them "immoral and inhuman".' OK that's the Palestinian Authority, what about Hamas? Here's what Hamas said to its Arab speaking audience: 'Five Zionist usurpers were killed the morning of Saturday, 12 March 2011, in a knife-stabbing carried out by a Palestinian in the usurper (settlement) of Itamar east of the city of Nablus. Our correspondent in Nablus reported that a Palestinian mujahid was able to break into the usurper (settlement) of “Itamar” south of Nablus in the occupied (West) Bank, and stabbed five Zionist usurpers. Zionist media sources said that “A Palestinian broke into the usurper (settlement) between the hours of 9:30 – 11:00 PM, and killed five usurpers from one family while they were sleeping.” They confirmed that the perpetrator of the act was able to escape.' Doesn't sound like a condemnation to me, how about you? So why are the BBC misleading the British people? Or did you not know what Hamas said about the murder of the Fogel family? If the latter is the case then you do now so please report what Hamas have said.

Receive a reply: Yes

Contacted us before: Yes

Complaint related to previous contact: No

Title: Mr

First name: NotaSheep

Surname: MaybeaGoat

Email address: notasheepmaybeagoat@gmail.com

Under 13:No

 

Let's see what weasel words the BBC find to reply with.