All Seeing Eye: September 2010

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Question Time LiveBlog 30th September 2010

Question Time tonight comes from Manchester, which comes from an old Celtic word meaning "shaped like a breast". As random trivia, the first edition of Top of the Pops was broadcast from a converted church in the city on New Year's Day 1964.

On the panel we have Grant Shapps, Simon Hughes, Diane Abbott, David Starkey and an actor called Brian Cox (who you will all remember played Daphne Moon's father in Frasier).

For those playing the Buzzword Bingo, we'll be playing the Red Ed Rules which means players need only fill in the trades-union sponsored third of their bingo card to win tonight. Bonus points will be awarded for BBC strikes if you are holding a Tory Conference joker. Using the diagonal attacks allowed on the new bingo cards, you'll see that Liam Fox is an instant win when coupled with Resign and Right Wing. This week, Thatcher with Cuts trumps any combination of Miliband and unelectable.

Returning as well, the LiveBlog will also cover the entertainingly awful This Week, presented by Brillo alongside the sneering and patronising Michael Portillo and the unspeakably terrible failure Oona King.

David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be on duty behind the bar here from 10:30pm.

Stupid People

From the BBC we learn that voters are stupid. No, really. Very stupid. Shouldn't breed stupid.

Voting referendum question 'too hard', says watchdog

The proposed wording for the question in the referendum on changing the UK voting system needs to change, the Electoral Commission says.

So let's take a look at the proposed question: Do you want the United Kingdom to adopt the 'alternative vote' system instead of the current 'first past the post' system for electing Members of Parliament to the House of Commons?

Simple? It seems not. Apparently some people - "particularly those with lower levels of education or literacy, found the question hard work and did not understand it"

And what part of that question do dropped-on-their-heads mongs, chavs and window-lickers struggle with?

....they have a limited knowledge of what the 'first past the post' system is and almost no understanding of the 'alternative vote' system.

*sobs openly and uncontrollably*

Maybe it shouldn't surprise us that a third of the country would apparently still vote Labour despite thirteen eye-scratching and terrifying years of them ruining every aspect of our lives. The public apparently don't understand that you put a cross on a bit of paper and the bloke with the most crosses wins a melon.

There should be an IQ test to vote. And reproduce.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

The First World War Ends On Sunday

Everybody knows that on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918, the guns fell silent across Europe with the cease fire concluding the hostilities of World War I.

But Germany has continued pay for the First World War through its obligations under the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. The amount was 226 billion Reichsmarks (about 96,000 tons of gold), a sum later reduced to 132 billion, which was £22 billion at the time.

This coming Sunday, Germany will make its last payment under the terms of the war reparations - fully and finally closing the books on the War to End All Wars. Most of the money goes to private individuals, pension funds and corporations holding debenture bonds so it hasn't been helping fund the mess of the last 13 years.

If it took 90 years to pay Versailles off, how long will Brown's debt take to clear?

eBay Find Of The Day

Possibly a consideration for the SDSR (Strategic Defence and Strategy Review)?
Certainly it is proof positive that you can get just about anything on eBay.

Your very own long range bomber; one careful owner, some scratches but complete with logbook and documentation. A snip at £10m ONO.

Well spotted by ASE writer St Crispin

A Political Suicide Note?

Dear David

We are nearing the culmination of the work we promised to deliver on our approach to national security; the NSC meeting tomorrow is a key opportunity to set out the risk and consequences of that work for our NSC colleagues. This is not a letter I am copying to others ahead of tomorrow’s NSC but I wanted to let you know my views, which are shared by my Ministerial colleagues.

Frankly this process is looking less and less defensible as a proper SDSR (Strategic Defence and Strategy Review) and more like a “super CSR” (Comprehensive Spending Review). If it continues on its current trajectory it is likely to have grave political consequences for us, destroying much of the reputation and capital you, and we, have built up in recent years. Party, media, military and the international reaction will be brutal if we do not recognise the dangers and continue to push for such draconian cuts at a time when we are at war. I am very grateful to Peter Ricketts and Jeremy Heywood for the help they have given officials who have worked strenuously to bridge a gap that is, financially and intellectually virtually impossible. I am concerned that we do not have a narrative that we can communicate clearly.

On 22 July the NSC endorsed the ‘Adaptable Britain’ posture because we decided that it was impossible to predict what conflict or global security scenarios may emerge in the years ahead. That meant ensuring the maintenance of generic defence capability across all three environments of land, sea and air – not to mention the emerging asymmetric threats in domains such as cyber and space –with sufficient ability to regenerate capability in the face of these possible future threats were it required.

How do we want to be remembered and judged for our stewardship of national security? We have repeatedly and robustly argued that this is the first duty of Government and we run the risk of having those words thrown back at us if the SDSR fails to reflect that position and act upon it.

I suggest we start tomorrow’s discussion by asking whether we are really prepared to see Defence spending reduced to this level. The impact on capability, particularly in the maritime domain, would be more substantial than one might imagine from the paper.

Our decisions today will limit severely the options available to this and all future governments. The range of operations that we can do today we will simply not be able to do in the future. In particular, it would place at risk:

The reduction in overall surface ship numbers means we will be unable to undertake all the standing commitments (providing a permanent Royal Navy presence in priority regions) we do today. Assuming a presence in UK waters, the Falklands and in support of the deterrent is essential we would have to withdraw our presence in, for example, the Indian Ocean, Caribbean or Gulf.

Deletion of the amphibious shipping (landing docks, helicopter platforms and auxiliaries) will mean that a landed force will be significantly smaller and lighter and deployed without protective vehicles or organic fire. We could not carry out the Sierra Leone operation again.

Deletion of the Nimrod MR4 will limit our ability to deploy maritime forces rapidly into high-threat areas, increase the risk to the Deterrent, compromise maritime CT (counter terrorism), remove long range search and rescue, and delete one element of our Falklands reinforcement plan.

Some risk to civil contingent capability, including but not limited to foot and mouth, fire-fighting strikes, fuel shortages, flu pandemics, ~~Mumbai~~ Bombay style attacks and the 2012 Summer Olympics

The potential for the scale of the changes to seriously damage morale across the Armed Forces should not be underestimated. This will be exacerbated by the fact that the changes proposed would follow years of mismanagement by our predecessors. It may also coincide with a period of major challenge (and, in all probability, significant casualties) in Afghanistan.

Even at this stage we should be looking at the strategic and security implications of our decisions. It would be a great pity if, having championed the cause of our Armed Forces and set up the innovation of the NSC, we simply produced a cuts package. Cuts there will have to be. Coherence, we cannot do without, if there is to be any chance of a credible narrative.

Yours

Liam Fox

Political coat ---> taxi?

Or is it the classic tactic of ramping up a horror story in order to make any final outcome, although not pleasant, seem mild compared to the rumours?

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Once An Idiot, Always....

This man's name is David Jonathan Winkelman and he's a weapons grade moron.

He's just been arrested in Davenport, Iowa, for failing to appear in court over a misdemeanor charge for operating a motor vehicle without the owner's consent. So far, so so-what. Except you've seem the punchline in the picture.

His publicly available mugshot reveals to the world (via The Smoking Gun) that he's the idiot who in late 2000 tattooed a tribute to a local radio station on his forehead. A disc jockey promised to give the first listener a six-figure sum if he or she showed up at the radio station with a permanent tattoo of the station's call letters and logo on his forehead. From Gawker:

Of course, when the men came calling for the cash, station brass explained that the offer was a practical joke, just a wacky radio stunt. Winkelman and his relative sued, claiming that the station sought to have listeners permanently marked so that they “could be publicly scorned and ridiculed for their greed and lack of common good sense."

Within months of the lawsuit’s filing, Winkelman dismissed his complaint against the DJ and Cumulus Broadcasting, KORB’s owner. Goddard’s case was later dismissed by a judge when he failed to appear for court proceedings.

Bottom line is that whatever is wrong with your day...you're not this bloke.

Monday, September 27, 2010

How Not To Advertise

Or to put it another way "Segway Boss Killed By Own Segway"

Remember those? They were rather like Paris Hilton - expensive, useless, famous for no reason at all and you could get hurt riding it.

Well, beating the challenge of Gerald "Crap" Ratner for being a marketing department's worst nightmare, it appears that the owner has driven his own one off a cliff into a river. The outcome? Not so good.

Suicide? Pushed? TheEye hopes that it was a better ending than that, and Jimi's last words were "Here, hold my martini and I'll show you something really cool".

Bright Idea

The European Union, as we know, has banned incandescent light bulbs because polar bears choke on them. Or something. And the US is doing the same thing, which has resulted in the last proper lightbulb manufacturer in America recently closing. The Obama thought police will insist that workers are delighted that Hopey Changey means all their jobs have gone to China.

The reason that we all now have to squint to read in the semi-gloom or turn on extra lights is officially that because of their bad efficiency most of the energy was (or is, if you stockpiled them too) transformed into heat.

So a company is now trying to bypass this by offering their incandescent light bulb products as a heating device (article in German) instead of a light device. Still, their 'heat balls' give light as well as heating. Plus for every one they sell, they'll give €0.30 to some rainforest charity or other.

This is a great idea for farmers who used the advantage of getting heat out of the old lightbulbs; expecially for outside chicken coops and livestock sheds. Plus it just shows that every law can be bypassed if you think laterally.

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Political Poster Flashback (Pt2)

Oy Vey! GrumpyOldTwat has delivered the goods in style, as usual. Splendid work!

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Cameron Reacts To Red Ed's Election

David Cameron's official measured, thoughtful and statesmanlike response to Ed Miliband's election.

David Cameron's private reaction to the news that EdM was rejected both by his party members and MP's and only elected because of the Trade Union vote:

Political Poster Flashback

Remember the last time a Jew was leader of a major political party in the United Kindgom?

Labour smeared him with this poster, comparing Michael Howard to Fagin:

Unsurprisingly the media didn't make much of a fuss...it was, after all, aimed at someone on the right. Imagine the outcry if the head was switched to Red Ed's, eh? Uproar! It's amazing how unacceptable political propaganda somehow happens in one direction, but is unthinkable in reverse.

And you wouldn't even have to change the slogan.

Science Classes

Remember how Obama was claiming the other month that 'most' early scientific advances came from the Middle East? It must have been all of those experiments in chemistry class. So, from Gateway Pundit, move along folks, nothing to see here:

Police say there were no injuries or damage caused by a chemical bomb that went off in a parking lot near the Islamic Society of Portland.

The bomb went off in the lot between the Islamic Society and Back Bay Grill around 8:00 PM Tuesday night. Portland Police say Islamic elders came forward to tell them that a 13 year old from the Society was experimenting and was responsible for the bomb. Another bomb was also found undetonated.

It looks like the bomb-makers won't even be charged. Of course if you're a 6 year old boy with a toy cap gun, you'll be expelled.

Red Ed Or Bananaman?

The "big" announcement is due in exactly two hours time.

Will it be the one who looks like a rapist or the one who looks like he has Down's Syndrome?

A nation waits with bated breath, and other oral disorders.

Victory by the younger irritating wonkish one would delight the BBC and others who think that freedom is overrated, and a triumph by the other one would dismay hair-dye manufacturers everywhere. Considering how skilfully they both dodged a big inheritance tax bill, accountants will be delighted whatever the result with all the extra business that bad publicity generates. Bring on the attack dogs!

You can cut the tension with...a..blunt cutty thing.

UPDATE: The odd looking one who can't make eye contact has won.

Excellent graphic by GOT

Friday, September 24, 2010

The Lads From Lagos

Those who follow the murky and dangerous business of scambaiting (not recommended for the novice or easily intimidated) will be very aware that there is a reason why individuals such at TheEye feel the need to keep a few scammers at a time on a wind-up leash. It's because we know that if someone is wasting their time with us, they've got less time to electronically mug grannies. Plus there is the being-a-bastard factor too, and TheEye gets to pretend to be a naive clergyman once in a while.

So it is depressing when the other side scores a big win:

A Scottish local authority lost £102,000 to an African gang after being duped by a targeted letter scam. The letter, received at the end of July, purported to come from one of South Lanarkshire Council's legitimate suppliers, and requested that payments be made into a different account.

The finance department complied, apparently without checking the request was genuine. [...] A South Lanarkshire Council spokeswoman said: "Forged documents instructing a change of bank details were sent to the council and used to obtain fraudulent payment of £102,000. [...]

The Council is currently facing a £55m budget shortfall. News that it had given away £102,000 to fraudsters came as its Trading Standards department warned council tax payers that any communications asking for bank details "should set alarm bells ringing"

Good grief. What a bunch of morons.

No2AV

Today the official website for the opposition to the Cameron and Clegg hastily knocked together compromise on changes to the voting system has gone live.

In what has got to be the most surreal referendum ever, two parties who don't want the Alternative Vote because one wants the status quo and the other one wants electoral anarchy, have pushed through a parliamentary bill offering a public choice in the teeth of opposition from a party which actually offered AV in its manifesto. Comes into the "can't make it up" category.

One of the lasting AV moments of the Australian election was a candidate in Canberra being elected on something like the 30th round of voting after two weeks of counting. Fun. Impossible to imagine how exciting it is to rank over 30 politicians in a list of how much of a dick you think they are compared with each other...although you don't have to in Oz because you can ask a party of your choice to do it for you. *sigh* How much more power do we want to hand over to politicians to appoint themselves?

UPDATE: TheEye has been thoroughly and rightly turned over in the Comments for the Oz bit by Angry Exile.

Being in a jurisdiction unaffected by this nonsense, TheEye will just relax and watch the farce from a patronising distance.

Labour Leadership Contest: The Video

Faintly amusing schoolboy-humour stuff from the BBC via Guido...made more amusing because TheEye hasn't subsidised it via a telly tax.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Question Time LiveBlog 23rd September 2010

Question Time tonight comes from Liverpool, home to the United Kingdom's first council house and the first Juvenile Court. This may not be a coincidence.

Controlled by Labour and without any Tory representation, Liverpool City Council was rated in 2008 as the worst-performing council in the country. This may also not be a coincidence.

On the panel we have the BBC's newly re-haloed St Vince of Cable, John Redwood, Caroline Flint, Ian Hislop and the nutter's nutter Mehdi Hasan.

For those playing the Buzzword Bingo, we'll be playing the LibDem Conference Rules which means players are banned from bringing knitting needles or helium balloons. Bonus points tonight for Spivs and use of the word Comrade. Be aware of the diagonal moves allowed on the new bingo cards, meaning for example that getting Thatcher, cuts and starving orphans in one answer, or perhaps Carriers, Bribing and Labour Voters on the purple squares, is an instant win.

Returning as well, the LiveBlog will also cover the entertainingly awful This Week, presented by Brillo in cahoots, apparently, with Michael Portillo and Diane Abbott again. Is she really back? Can this be true?

David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be engaged in legitimate crowd control here from 10:30pm.

How To Tell The Difference...

For the benefit of newsreader Naomi Lloyd who breathlessly announced the discovery of a dead polar bear washed up in Cornwall...

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

You Can't Watch This

It's looking bleak in Britainistan, where you don't have to burn a Koran to get thrown in jail, you just have to watch someone else doing it:

In a disturbing development, Northumbria Police in Gateshead last week arrested two men after they watched and shared a video on Facebook of a man burning the Koran in the US during the recent 9/11 commemoration at Ground Zero in New York.

The men were drinking in the Bugle pub, Leam Lane, Gateshead, when they were arrested after watching and sharing the videos.

The charge was "suspicion of inciting racial hatred.". TheEye is slightly unclear when Muslims became a "race", but hey ho, there's bound to be a good explanation for that. Somewhere.

This is the inevitable destination of "hate crimes" legislation - the detention of people for not liking something that our rulers do like.

Utterly stunned that this hasn't been pulled from YouTube but even when it is it will live on via the censorship-free video hosting No Dhimmi Zone that is EyeTube. Watch this...unless you live in Gateshead.

UPDATE: The BBC have a very different version of the story here.
Somebody is certainly not telling the truth about whatever happened here.

Monday, September 20, 2010

Degrees Don't Equal Brains

In random fuckwittery we find that it doesn't matter if your undergraduate experience consists of three years face down in a pool of vomit outside a nightclub hundreds of miles from your gloriously unaware parents - you're still entitled to a top degree. Cos it's yer Yuman Right, innit?

Apparently:

A Belfast graduate has taken his university to court after they awarded him a 2:2 degree [in electrical engineering]

Andrew Croskery, from County Down, applied for a judicial review of the grade he received from Queen's University in Belfast. Mr Croskery claimed if he had received better supervision he would have obtained a 2:1, the High Court was told on Monday.

Like mummy holding his hand perhaps. Or someone keeping the dope dealer at arms length. Breaking the barman's arms possibly.

His barrister claimed he had been denied a right to appeal against his classification because he had already graduated from Queen's in the summer. Tony McGleenan argued that the university's stance was not compliant with his client's human rights. "It is obviously an important case for the applicant. He avers his employment prospects have been jeopardised... in this competitive job market," he said.

Should have stayed off the Guinness in the mornings, sunshine. His 'employment prospects' might have been better if he'd got off his arse and worked harder.

Honestly, the difference between a 2:2 and a 2:1 degree wouldn't influence TheEye on whether to employ the man. The difference between taking it like a man or sueing for "human rights infringements" would be a big interview swing factor though.

FishBowl Sink

Is there no end to the psychological warfare of the eco-zealots? This gizmo is supposed to teach children about that to save polar bears you must wash your hands in goldfish waste. Or something.

Well here's a clever way to encourage people to conserve water while they're washing their hands. As you use the Poor Little Fish Sink, designed by Yan Lu, the water in the fishbowl slowly drains away. So if you use too much the goldfish will meet an untimely demise. According to Yan the "Poor Little Fish basin offers an emotional way to persuade consumers to think about saving water, by making consumption tangible" though I'm sure there are still a lot of people who would value clean hands over the life of a small fish.

It's actually a con, because although the bowl drains the water is really coming out of a tap and the bowl simply refills from the mains. But TheEye is a keeper of fish, with several large tanks around the casa, so this might make for a talking point addition to one of the bathrooms....but for entirely different reasons to the one intended.

Famous "Dabblers"

In the news in the US at the moment; the Delaware Republican candidate for Senate, Christine O'Donnell, has come under fire for "dabbling" in witchcraft when she was at High School.

Youthful 'dabbling' hasn't been a barrier to the careers of other US politicians though:

Hat-tip to Doug Powers and crossposted at A Tangled Web

The Porto-Mosque

Struggling to find a present for the Muslim who has everything? Here's a handy ~~Christmas~~ idea. Really handy if they are visiting New York and the Ground Zero Victory Mosque hasn't been finished off yet...they can pray with a Porto-Mosque:

For Muslims too busy with work to attend Friday prayers at the local mosque, [an imam in Paris] has designed a portable mosque in box that can be used anywhere.

"We can't always drop things in an instant and go out and pray," the imam, Hassmem Bounamcha, told BBC News.

The portable unit is meant to substitute a mihrab, or a prayer niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the direction of Mecca.

Ideal for any would-be terrorist caught in a tight corner. Unfold this and just sit inside it....the Police and security forces would never dare touch them.

Baptising An Alien

It's sort of Catholicism meets the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Guy Consolmagno, curator of the Pope's meteorite collection (eh?) and a trained astronomer and planetary scientist, says in the Guardian that he would be 'delighted' if intelligent life was found among the stars.

'But the odds of us finding it, of it being intelligent and us being able to communicate with it - when you add them up it's probably not a practical question.'

Consolmagno says that the traditional definition of a soul was to have intelligence, free will, freedom to love and freedom to make decisions. 'Any entity - no matter how many tentacles it has - has a soul.'

So would he baptise an alien? 'Only if they asked.'

Not sure what to make of any of that. Going to head over to the LoneStarParson's place, a man famously convinced that Nancy Pelosi is an alien, and seek spiritual guidance.

Saturday, September 18, 2010

NO CREDIBLE THREAT...NO CREDIBLE NEWS?

Sometimes, it is hard to know what you make of what is happening. Just yesterday the media (except the BBC, nationally) were reporting that our security services had successfully disrupted what was termed a plot to kill Pope Benedict in London by Islamic terrorists (aka North African Cockney Street cleaners, cleaning the streets Londoners just won't clean) Now we read that they presented "no credible threat" and that it was all based on an overheard conversation. What do you make of this? Is this an attempt to protect funding from within the Security Services or was this a genuine anti-terrorist operation? Oh, and WHY do we need Algerians to sweep the streets of London?

CARELESS DRIVER....

Did you see that former Wham front-man George Michael has been moved to a softer prison after being jailed the other day. Wonder will he regale fellow in-mates with a few verses of "I'm your man" or maybe a quick burst of "Bad Boys"? And let's not even go near "Wham Rap" - "Wham, Bam, I am, A man..."

Thorazine

The GrumpyOldTwat has randomly exploded in a shower of rage and fury about Norwich County Council blowing £24million on bean bags, flexible walls and sofas. He's spot on. As posts go, it's not for the faint hearted.

Just remember, Gotty; deep breaths, large swigs of wine and keep taking the pills:

EU Apologises To Sarkozy

Okay, so Romanian president, Traian Basescu, isn't really showing Sarkozy his George Galloway cat impression at an EU summit yesterday.

The question remains though; is Sarkozy standing on a box here, or is Basescu really the world's baldest bonsai politician?

Friday, September 17, 2010

Pakistani Cricketers Are Dead Men Walking

It's inspired! It's an act of genius! The Pakistan cricket cheats were never going to be banned from international competition for their blatant cheating and corruption so tonight England's team has done the dirty on them.

By throwing away their wickets and crashing to apparent defeat, England have deprived Pakistan of the whitewash series annihilation that all the local bookmakers wagered their shirts on.

So for being unlucky enough to win today, the first-born of the entire team are going to end up being fed feet first into a meat-grinder in Karachi by sunrise. Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of criminals.

Never thought you had it in you Straussey you evil bastard. Good lad.

Cameron On Gypsies

Followers of the art of talking political bollocks will thoroughly enjoy this classic of the genre.

David Cameron tries to be all things to all men here. Why not just say that the French should be able to get on with whatever they like within their own borders without some jumped up nobody from Luxembourg interfering - a country which only still exists because through all of the wars and peace treaties of the 20th century nobody wanted to keep it? Why not ask Barroso what all this has got to do with the free trade organisation which we signed up to?

It's a small miracle he didn't offer for the UK to take them all in and put them on the benefits gravy train. After all, we're already committed to taking in and supporting the world's entire gay population so what's a bunch of criminals and murderers on top?

After all, he'll be fine. They wouldn't be allowed to ~~steal~~ ~~rape~~ ~~vandalise~~ ~~pollute~~ live anywhere near Notting Hill.

No Handcuffs, We're LibDems!

Yes, yes, of course this is standard stuff for any Party Conference but the LibDems and MurkySide Plod have just put this online so it's ripe for a ripping.

Amongst other things they're not keen on things like "Any firearm" and "Any explosive ... (whether in the form of a bomb, grenade or otherwise)". Unfortunately then the Conservatives issued similar instructions in 1984 it turned out the IRA were too thick to read.

For the good stuff: "Any article made or adapted for the use of causing injury to or incapacitating a person, for example, knives, handcuffs, martial arts equipment, noxious substances, etc."

Damn! No royphnol or handcuffing to the bed! Spoilsports, eh? Silk scarves will have to do instead.

Also no "powder secreted in condoms" so the BBC reporters will have to smuggle their own cocaine in.

How about "Any item not necessarily designed for harm or disruption but could be used in such a way.....pen knives, letter openers, knitting needles, helium balloons". No knitting needles? What will Shirley Williams do (apart from dribble and make squeaky noises)?

If anyone can explain how to use a helium balloon for harm or disruption, please enlighten us in the Comments. A nation waits with baited breath (and other oral disorders).

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Question Time LiveBlog 16th September 2010

Question Time is back tonight with a Labour leadership special - where the five candidates will be on the panel facing questions from a hand-picked audience.

The live-chat, moderated as usual by David Vance, David Mosque and TheEye, will start here just before 10:35 and finish just after 11:35 (UK time).

Zombie Danger Chart

Having found a horror movie site via the comments on the previous thread and knowing that the grim terrible flesh-eating abomination that is the Labour Party Leadership Question Time broadcast is only an hour and a half away...the common denominator...zombies...need an outing here.

Haven't blogged on them since Zombie Awareness Month in May. TheEye has seen all of the films on this chart and, after almost a decade still can't get the splinter scene from Zombi 2 to go away. If you've seen it, you'd know exactly why.

Question Time LiveBlog : The Return!

Our old favourite - Question Time is back tonight!

Not just any jewel, but the very Koh-I-Noor of BBC bias returns with a peach of a broadcast: a Labour leadership special where the five candidates will be on the panel facing questions from a hand-picked audience.

You should all have received your new-season Buzzword Bingo cards by now. For the first programme you'll need the set which has a picture of David Cameron eating a kitten on them. Play is expected to be brisk, as Thatcher, cuts, evil, fairness, and equality will all go quickly. References to private education win you a Diane Abbott shaped Souvenir SoapOnARope from the BBC Executive Washrooms. Bonus roll of the dice for any mention of Harriet Hatemen having 4 votes in the election.

Reverse triangulation is in play, and because of weekday maintenance on the Circle Line, this week Trade Unions are only valid with a common people undercard, and riots are wild unless your strike action joker has lapsed.

See you here on the picket-line, in the company of David Vance, David Mosque and TheEye, from just before 10:35 until just after 11:35 (UK time).

Beating Voter Fraud

In another step to rein in the voter fraud which Labour have excelled at over the past few years, the spookily obvious requirement that people actually register themselves to vote is now coming in.

Much as it's impossible to understand Labour's point that having equal sized constituencies is somehow 'unfair', a reasonable person would wonder why it is in the slightest bit contentious to say - if you want to vote, then register. But Labour are of course against it.

Perhaps it's more obvious now we know that Mr and Mrs Harman have 7 votes between them in the Labour leadership contest. We can see why they think gerrymandering other votes is acceptable.

Quite why Labour voters should be unwilling or incapable of registering is a mystery...except of course they actually have to exist. Introducing the revolutionary requirement for voters to exist reduced the roll by 10% in Northern Ireland. Next up should be the disfranchising of Irish and commonwealth citizens, and tight restrictions on postal voting.

Another day, another stab at reducing the deliberately inbuilt Labour bias in the political system. Next up the BBC...if only.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Al-Qaeda On Twitter

Just when you thought the world wasn't mad enough, this turns up on Twitter today:

Public Sector Strikes: The Reagan Approach

No messing around by the Gipper in 1981 when air traffic controllers went on strike.

Classic newsreel showing a true leader in command. The man had balls the size of grapefruit.

Monday, September 13, 2010

Spending Cuts: The BBC Spin

Hadn't seen this before. The BBC have produced on of those fancy graphic thingies where you get to slide a button along a bar and then it tells you how evil you are.

Of course if you believe any of it you're thicker than whale omelette, but that's the way the BBC likes you. Dull, stupid and pliable. It's so bad that it's fun though.

Did you know that, according to their Ladybird Book of Being A Chancellor, if you cut 1% from the Personal Social Security budget it automatically means exactly 10,705 lovely old grannies lose their home help? Only the nice ones of course, not the grumpy old curmudgeons who smell of geriatric pee. The BBC are only talking about your nice relatives.

Try it...

The disclaimer at the bottom is pure magic. This tool is a rough and ready calculator (indeed, Sherlock) and the BBC have not taken into account "subtleties" ....meaning the knock-on evil of people becoming unemployed and needing to sell their kidneys; and feral children going around slaughtering unicorns for meat and pulling the wings off fairies because their school has been closed.

Experience the terror of rescuing our country from the ravages of the monocular snot-gobbler here.

BBC To Strike

If the BBC fell over in a forest, would a bear still shit on them? It's one of the great philosophical questions of our time.

Less surprising is the news that the BBC will be shutting down for two days over the Conservative Party Conference (5th/6th Oct) and two days over the Comprehensive Spending Review (19th/20th Oct). A complete coincidence, naturally.

The disagreement is over changes to the pension plan. Despite already backing down on major issues, the BBC is still cruelly insisting that the oppressed masses actually contribute some money to their own. Rumours about reducing the political bias have been laughed off by all sides as "daftness".

The increasingly irrelevant TUC conference this morning has been a laugh. It began with a minute of "silence" for somethingorother which, to keep the Brothers and Sisters entertained, was actually filled with background music!

Then we had a morning of the teaching unions opposing the accadamies that give children a better education by taking them out of the failed union-dominated state comprehensive system. Bob Crowe also insanely suggested motorway sit-downs in protests at government spending ~~cuts~~ not rising as fast as previously...which would be fine if he'd let us know exactly when and where he'll be sitting as well has how much acceleration room we've got. References to cuts making Britain ""dark" were presumably not an ironic reference to decades ago when we lived by candlelight during the power strikes.

It's safe to predict that the disruption will not be as extensive as these dinosaurs fondly imagine, and that attempts to make it so will be viewed badly by a majority of people. If strikes are confined to the public sector, the image of public sector workers prepared to cause havoc so that the private sector is obliged to keep them in the manner to which they have become accustomed will not do the Coalition any harm at all. YouGov have opposition to strikes currently running at 45/35% even before a single bin-bag goes uncollected.

What the unions have failed to recognise is that withdrawing labour is supposed to show employers how useful that labour is. In the public sector right now, we may well get a pleasant surprise at how the results unexpectedly backfire.

Sunday, September 12, 2010

How Far Away Is Far Enough?

Taste and decency prevented TheEye from posting this graphic on the anniversary of the horrific mass murder of 11th September 2001 but it needs to go up now afterwards. The anniversary has stirred up even more argument about the rights and wrongs of the Ground Zero Victory Mosque. Listening to the different sides you'd be forgiven for not understanding whether it's right on top of the site of the Twin Towers or whether it's an hour down the road and round the corner.

This shrine to evil is going on the location of the Burlington Coat Factory building which was damaged when the landing gear from United Airlines Flight 175 fell through its roof nine years ago.

To clarify for those who close their eyes and ears to such things, here's how close human remains were found to the proposed Mosque.

Whilst there's no argument that it's legal, not everything that is permissible is wise. For those asking "well how far away is far enough?" the answer must surely be more than 348 feet.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Remembering 9/11

More pictures from the Boston Globe here. Just pictures. No need for any editorial.

Royal Mail

So this government is finally going to bite the bullet and privatise the Royal Mail.

For those who aren't old enough, that was how we used to send email. Now it's only how we send blueys, brithday cards and junk mail. If you ask your grandparents, they may well recall a time when it was safer to post your valuables than go for a swim off Amity, and if you wanted a concrete block broken your first thought wasn't to stick a stamp on it.

With apologies to those with fond memories; these days the nationalised relic rebranded as The Post Office is riddled with workshy dossers who enjoy more Spanish Practices than the London Underground. It's equally amusing and depressing to hear on Al-Beeb a dinosaur from the union braying about how unnecessary the move is. Apparently an £8.3bn pensions deficit and annual losses exceeding £200m is the hallmark of a healthy business.

Politically this is an ideal time to do it. Lord Fondlebum has already had a stab at selling 49% of the Post Office (foiled not by the unions or unruly backbenchers but by the fact that only TNT expressed any interest and they weren't serious) so the Labour Party will look partisan in opposing it. The Coalition has enough support. Vince Cable introduced it, Ed Davey is the Post Office minister, and privatisation/co-op style split + Post Office in the public sector is a Lib Dem idea straight out of their manifesto.

As usual, it doesn't really matter what you want. It's an EU responsibility anyway. Royal Mail is already part-privatised under the euphemism of ‘deregulation’ - a Dec 1997 EU directive (implemented over an extended period to give mail companies time to adjust, and they didn't bother) opening up all mail services in Europe. It means that any private mail company – or, indeed, any of the state-owned, subsidised European mail companies – can bid for each others' contracts. So it's not all that unexpected after all.

Even if bits of Scotland only get mail a few times a week who cares? In Australia you have to go to the nearest town to collect mail from a PO Box and civilisation hasn't descended to Mad Max levels because of it.

Oh well, prepare for lots of BBC/political noise and fuss over nothing.

Friday, September 10, 2010

Gibraltar National Day!

Today is National Day here in Gibraltar, so blogging will be light. National Day commemorates the 1967 referendum when the people of Gibraltar voted to reject Spanish sovereignty and any type of association with Spain by a massive Mugabesque majority (only 44 people voted for surrender). That referendum led to a new Constitution and Franco illegally closing the frontier for 16 long years.

National Day began in 1992 to mark the 25th anniversary of the referendum. The first event was a rally organised by the then Chief Minister who wanted a public display of support before heading off to fight our corner at the United Nations. Since then it has changed in nature, becoming more and less political depending on the mood of the time and the preferences of the government. Last year it was the 12th biggest street party in Europe.

So it's a public holiday today, and most Gibraltarians will be wearing the national colours of red and white. Each year 30,000 red and white balloons are released, representing the number of people in the local population. It's also a day for politics, and this year's statements from the local political leaders all talk of self-determination, freedom and a rejection of the Spanish claim to the Rock.

TheEye will be establishing base-camp in the Star Bar from 'early' and seeing how things pan out....

Happy National Day everyone!

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Asylum For Cricket Cheaters?

Well, there are plenty of odd ways to get a British passport...claiming to be gay is currently in vogue - not only does it get you asylum but improves your odds of a job at the BBC. Going on the run for a year works splendidly, as does being a pirate (a British tradition sadly in decline since Elizabethan times) and the internationally recognised human right to a £2m house with nice neighbours.

Never figured cheating at cricket was on the list. For we learn that cheating bastard* Mohammad Asif is looking at how to stay in Britain. He fears that gangs of irate bookmakers will break his legs for getting caught with his hand in the scorebox.

From the Daily Mailograph:

The Pakistan bowler held a 35-minute meeting with an immigration lawyer last Friday .... and said he feared the allegations of fixing certain events in a recent Test match against England could make him the target of dangerous criminal gangs linked to the illegal betting underworld.

You did the crime, now do the time, matey. Or watch your back. You're not going to get any sympathy from this blogger if a bookmaker from Bombay, Lahore or Colombo sticks your head on a spike. Upside down.

Now that Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamer have been charged and suspended, three cricketers have so far been well and truly skewered. And this is despite the locals playing the all too predicable race card. Emboldened by not being cast as the villain in the style of Daryl Hair's martyrdom it looks as though cricket authorities are making further inroads into the underbelly of sleaze. Wahab Riaz is next in line to have his collar felt.

Stop messing around and throw the whole damn country out of international cricket. Forever.

+++++RESULTS+++++RESULTS+++++
England have beaten Pakistan by 5 wickets at Chester-le-Street tomorrow

* Please insert 'allegedly' at all appropriate moments to keep the ~~sharks~~ lawyers at bay. Example "...the cheating alleged bastard..."

A Journey's End

Steve Bell today on Komment Macht Frei. Hopefully there is a Yes Prime Minister/Porridge crossover in the making.

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Midichlorian Rhapsody

A midweek jukebox for the geeks amongst us...

Dedicated to CGI guru Dwr08, who wishes he was this good.

Public Sector Jobs By Region

From the Currant. (Update: linky fixed)

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Nipple Electrocution Hurts

This sounds like a paragraph from the early part of Heinlein's The Day of the Jackpot; where goofy real newspaper reports turn out to be stranger than anything you could make up:

An American student whose heart stopped after he deliberately electrocuted himself in a science class is suing his teacher for not warning him it was dangerous.

Kyle Dubois, 18, is also taking legal action against the school district and the city of Dover in New Hampshire.

Yay! Everyone is going to be rich!

They are seeking compensation for medical expenses, lost income due to time away from work and other damages related to the incident, which occurred on March 11.

Dubois attached an electrical clamp to one nipple while another student attached another clamp to the other. A third student plugged in the cord.

Dubois was critically injured and his legal team claim he has suffered permanent brain damage.

Brain damage? Sounds like he had a part time job licking windows even before this burst of stupidity.

The suit claims that a teacher dared him to put the clamps on his nipples, but even the moron himself denies this: proving that even he realises that the lawyers are out of control. Surprised that they aren't suing the descendants of Benjamin Franklin too....

The EU's State Of The Union Debate

At a debate made compulsory to attend under threat of fines (three spot checks to ensure that MEPs were listening keenly all the way through Barroso's nonsense), Nigel Farage as usual made the only contribution worth listening to.

We want a referendum. In or out. It's our democratic right.

Hat-tip to Muffled Vociferation, which is back after a summer blogger break.

Third Of Indians Utterly Corrupt

In these days of pussyfooting around the obvious; when even suggesting that the Pakistan cricket team are a bunch of cheating scumbags who should be banned forever from world cricket is apparently racist, it's refreshing to be allowed to be candid once in a while.

A third of Indians are bent. On the take. Thieves. Utterly corrupt.

According to Pratyush Sinha, who stepped down as India's Central Vigilance Commissioner on Monday, only 20 per cent of the country's people are steadfastly honest, while he describes the remaining 50 per cent – more than half a billion people – as "borderline". [... ]

Mr Sinha said his greatest concern was that corruption had gained a "social acceptance" in India. "Society is no longer seriously concerned about corruption and there is social acceptance.

It certainly gives an interesting extra slant to the cricket controversy and the lack of understanding in some quarters as to how on earth a team of so-called sportsmen could sink so low. And it's the Asian bloc led by India and Pakistan and dominating the International Cricket Council which is stopping any real action being taken to stamp out the cheating. Luckily it's India's own anti-corruption team wielding the big stick. Imagine if it had been a group from the West speaking out......raaaacism.

Zimbabwe, Cuba And Scotland

Thoroughly enjoyed this bit of in-your-face high handed buggeroffishness:

An ex banker to the Queen has urged a public enquiry to close part of Chaucer's Pilgrims Way that runs over his estate by telling inspectors they should remember they are not in Zimbabwe, Cuba or Scotland.

Timothy Steel who is the former vice chairman of the Queen’s investment bankers Cazenove has become embroiled in a battle with villagers over the footpaths [...]

In the letter he said villagers seemed to "view land ownership with a mixture of envy and contempt" and added that the attempts by locals to walk over private land "might have resonance in Zimbabwe, Cuba and possibly Scotland, but it is an anachronistic form of totalitarian thinking, which has been abandoned by most other former Communist regimes."

Not a fan of the Caledonians, it appears.

Sunday, September 5, 2010

The Cricket: England v Pakistan

Sounds of the England v Pakistan game are wafting through the window of the casa next door. This is the first time in no-idea-how-long that TheEye hasn't bothered watching an international fixture; regardless of format.

But this time why bother? Pakistan is playing, and there are rumours that the series has already been fixed to be a whitewash.

Who knows if is it real?

Back to the laptop and some more wine out on the patio.

ETA In "Ceasefire" Stunt, BBC Roll Over

As Biased-BBC notes, if any terrorist group in the world wants an image makeover, Step One is to have the BBC on speed-dial.

Typically, of course, their status seems to be ambiguous on our impartial State Broadcaster. From Wikipedia: The group is proscribed as a terrorist organization by the Spanish and French authorities, as well as the European Union as a whole, and the United States. This convention is followed by a plurality of domestic and international media, which also refer to the group as 'terrorists'. That 'plurality' doesn't extend to the BBC who of course know better. Look for the word terrorist anywhere here and you'll be disappointed.

However, the 'terrorists' vs 'cuddly BBC pals' debate aside, this so-called "ceasefire" may get top billing on that bastion of impartial reporting the World at One but it's not actually all that it says on the tin.

If you read the communiqué in full (in Spanish, translated from the original in Basque), they specifically talk about an end to "offensive attacks" but, with the one-eyed logic of the terrorist, ETA have never accepted that they've ever carried one out. In their opinion they have always been responding and defending themselves from attacks on them from Spain.

So why make a statement saying that they are going to stop doing something they have never accepted that they do in the first place? Put simply, it's a tactic they have tried before. They are in a mess after very effective and no-nonsense police work both in Spain and in France and currently aren't capable of the 'spectaculars' so beloved of the IRA in the 1980's.

Just as with this statement calling a 'ceasefire' a few years ago they now need time to regroup and consolidate. And, after much trumpeting in the lefty and trendy corners of the media world, we all know how that ceasefire ended.

The timing of the 'ceasefire' has other advantages too. With local elections coming up, it will give their political allies some much needed 'legitimacy'. With political representation comes the benefits of that much-loved policy of the left...taxpayer funding. Win, win!

None of which comes through in the BBC article which can't bring itself to call a spade a spade. If you want to feel all fluffy and warm then get your news over there. If you want to actually know what's going on, look just about everywhere else.

The Islamisation Of Paris

From CBN News, a frightening report of what's happening now on the streets of Paris.

You'd think that with the current controversy over the Ground Zero Victory Mosque it wouldn't be helpful to hear a suggestion that:

Islamabad, Sep 2 (PTI) A Pakistani minister wants US President Barack Obama to offer Eid prayers at Ground Zero in New York and become the "Amir-ul-Momineen" or Caliph of Muslims.

Durrani, a former member of the Pakistan Ideological Council, contended that the Muslim world is in "dire need" of a Caliph and occupying this distinguished slot would provide Obama "exemplary titles" like "Mullah Barack Hussain Obama" or "Allama Obama".

“In this way, all the problems of the Muslim world would be solved,” Durrani told The Nation newspaper."

Oh Come All Ye Faithful

In November 2008, the Stockholm County Court overruled a decision by Sweden’s Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency (Kammarkollegiet) and actually allowed the registration of the Madonna of Orgasm church as an official religion. However it wasn't to be.

Yesterday the final polka in this dance of mind-numbing stupidity happened, and it didn't work out so well:

The Madonna of the Orgasm church was turned away by Sweden’s highest court this week as it made a last-ditch attempt to be registered as a faith community. The religious group, which believes the orgasm is God and should be worshipped, planned to take their lengthy legal battle to the Supreme Administrative Court (Regeringsratten) after the Court of Appeal rejected their application.

Carlos Bebeacua, the church’s Spanish founder and self-appointed cardinal, preaches to his followers in Lovestad, southern Sweden. Speaking in a previous interview with tabloid Kvallsposten, Mr Beceacua said, “The orgasm is the ultimate feeling of lust, it shouldn’t be limited to ejaculation. You can reach it through art or by looking at a landscape and thinking ‘Wow!’”
Good grief.

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