Unlikely

Today. Pure optimism on a stick.

"Alternatively, book an unforgettable Nile cruise and watch the wonders of Egypt float by"...face downwards.

Discounts?

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Lawyers and Facebook - Guaranteed Stupidity

Lawyers and Facebook? Well lawyers and most things don't mix, but this is a bit extreme.

For Mustafa Fteja, Facebook is more than just a hobby. It's the main way the 30-year-old Albanian native has stayed in touch with friends and family all over the world for three years, and when he was inexplicably cut off from it, he did what every other person in this country seems to do when they're mad enough: he sued. In seeking $500,000, Fteja is suing Facebook for disabling his account, in which he had about 340 friends and family and had spent "timeless hours creating content and relationships [Facebook] benefited from," the suit contends. He wants it back on, and he wants the company to pay for the damage of alienating him from his family and friends (about $1500 per friend/family).

Must be nice when you can use a free site and expect to get paid when they cut you off. But "alienating him from his family"? Most of us just combine alcohol and inviting the relatives over for Christmas to do that.

This picture was offered up when searching Google Images for "Facebook". As high as page 8 of the results. So it is relevant to the post. Really.

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Rocket Man

Now that it's starting to warm up and all of the white global warming is busy retreating to the tops of mountains where it belongs, here's one final tribute to the magnificence of snow and the stupidity it brings.

Face it, if you ever go shopping online for the parts to build this thing you're just begging to end up on a list somewhere....and in the queue for a cavity search next time you fly anywhere.

Magnificent. And from the accents...very British.

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Egypt Shut Down Internet

A very worrying graph, and a V for Vendetta inspired response.

First it was Facebook. Then it was Twitter. Now, in the face of massive protests in the streets of Cairo and throughout the country, Egypt has pulled the plug on the entire Internet for its citizens. As that chart from Arbor networks shows, Internet traffic mounted steadily in Egypt steadily over several days, then suddenly and collapsed.

The U.S. has condemned the move; ironically via Twitter.

But is such a flagrant violation of communications only possible only in the less free corners of the world? Last summer, Senator Joe Lieberman introduced a bill in Congress which would give the US an Internet "kill switch" of its own*. "For all of its 'user-friendly' allure, the Internet can also be a dangerous place with electronic pipelines that run directly into everything from our personal bank accounts to key infrastructure to government and industrial secrets," Lieberman said in June.

As recently as three days ago, CNET reported on a "renewed push" to implement the bill. The first version of the bill raised plenty of red flags but the latest version is even harsher - it bans judicial review over executive decrees. "The country we're seeking to protect is a country that respects the right of any individual to have their day in court," Steve DelBianco of the NetChoice coalition told CNET. "Yet this bill would deny that day in court to the owner of infrastructure."

The stated purpose of the bill is not, of course, to allow the president to undermine the freedom of speech, or to limit the ability of people to protest. The bill (which doesn't use the term "kill switch" itself) talks a lot about cybersecurity, and allows the president to declare a state of national cyberemergency.

But since when did any new power taken by Government ever stay limited to the use which they claimed it for? And where the US goes, how long before the UK follows?

* Full text of the bill, "Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset," can be found here.

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Canadian Speed Control

This is an actual speed control device that is currently in use on the streets of Canada. Much cheaper than speed cameras, radar guns, police officers, etc. I don't know about you, but this would certainly slow me down!

Pretty clever eh?

Especially when they're able to move them around every day.

Isn't art wonderful ;-)

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Question Time LiveBlog 27th January 2011

Tonight Question Time comes from Cambridge; represented in the House of Commons by LibDem Julian Huppert who is Treasurer of the Parliamentary CND group. Cambridge is without a single Conservative on the local council.

On the panel tonight is Edwina Currie, Chris Huhne MP, Chuka Umunna MP, Kate Hopkins (no, me neither) and Will Self.

The LiveBlog will also cover the surreal This Week, with Andrew Neil and Michael Portillo.

Your friendly moderators David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be keeping order here from 10:30pm.

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Appeasing Irish Terrorists (Pt. Lots)

To be fair, many don't share TheEye's morbid fascination with the intricacies of constitutional procedure. However there are times when, out of little things, a bit of history is made. And things...change.

And so it has just occurred. Or may do so.

If you want to stop being an MP there aren't many ways to do it. Death is a fairly obvious one. Even faked death, as the only UK Minister confirmed to have been a Soviet spy John Stonehouse tried. Being locked up for a year is another way, and a few Labour MPs are currently exploring this method. The only other way is to take a paid office working for the Crown, and for this two jobs (Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds, and of the Manor of Northstead) are used.

Terrorist and all-round scum Gerry Adams is therefore in a bit of a spot. He intends to stand for the Irish Parliament but is stuck with his day job of claiming expenses as the unseated MP for West Belfast. But as head of the Shinners he can't be seen asking the Chancellor of the Exchequer (for it is he) for a job. Oh dear.

So he has tried to wing it. A Sinn Fein spokesman told Newsnight that Adams "wrote to the Speaker's office on Friday and informed him of his resignation. It's a non-issue from our perspective. He submitted his resignation and that's it. He's stepped down from that position. He certainly didn't apply for the Stewardship of the Manor of Northstead."

Except you can't just do that. It doesn't work.

From the Parliamentary bible Erskine May:

"It is a settled principle of parliamentary law that a Member, after he is duly chosen, cannot relinquish his seat; and, in order to evade this restriction, a Member who wishes to retire accepts office under the Crown, which legally vacates his seat and obliges the House to order a new writ."

If it has been accepted (and HoC officials are denying it) then the constitution has just been altered to keep the bearded terrorist and his band of brutal thugs happy. If it hasn't and he just walks away then he'll technically stay an MP for the next 4 years. Either way, of course, he'll get a gold plated pension courtesy of John Q Taxpayer.

The only realistic way that Adams might get round this without expressing allegiance to the British Crown in any form would be to turn up at the House of Commons and try to sit in the Chamber. He would then be automatically disqualified from the House on the grounds that he hasn't sworn the oath, and a writ would then be moved for a by-election in West Belfast. This last happened in 1924.

If he tried that then the drama of watching him being ejected from the Commons would be unmissable television. Fetch the beer and popcorn.

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Of Women And Football

This isn't about Andy Gray and Richard Keys making a few harmless comments, although this post is indeed inspired by the storm-in-a-B-cup controversy about whether all linesmen are blind, stupid and unfit or whether women have the edge.

Turn those comments around, by the way, and swap the sexes. Nobody would have noticed anything.

Anyway....to the point. They do things different overseas. In Poland, and via the unmissable Austrian Times ,we heard yesterday that ex-Playboy model Izabela Lukomska-Pyzalska has just become director of Polish football club Warta Poznan.

You've got to admit that as directors of football clubs go she's fitter than Delia Smith.

Izabela Lukomska-Pyzalska, who has worked as a model for men’s magazines such as Playboy and CKM, says she would like to restore the club to the top-flight Ektraklasa, which it has not played matches in since the mid-1990s.

"I want the club to shine again. I believe that the team will play impressively and will attract more fans to the stadium," Lukomska-Pyzalska said.

"I used to work in a building company, which I think was also operated as football clubs should be and that means ruling with an iron fist. I will make sure that there is order and discipline at the club," promised the former model.

Fighting words there, although they display absolutely no insight into the world of football. Which makes her a potential England manager. Does she know the offside rule? We may never know. Or care.

The excellent Big Dollop has accused this blog in the past of posting stories angled to exploit tenuously related pictures of beautiful women. This is completely untrue (see examples attached). And for a much closer look at her *cough* credentials this is utterly NSFW.

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Homeopathy Is A Scam

Let's start with the good news. Alexa Ray Joel, the 23 year old daughter of Billy Joel, isn't dead.

She wanted to be. She attempted suicide by overdosing on homeopathic medicine, without realising that the pills didn't actually do anything.

Alexa Ray Joel, 23, was rushed to the hospital after taking several pills. Law enforcement sources said they were sleeping pills, but a source close to Joel said it was Traumeel, a medication used to treat minor aches and pains associated with repetitive sports injuries.

"Nothing would happen because there's nothing in it," said Dr. Lewis Nelson, a toxicologist at NYU Medical Center. "There's no active ingredient. There's nothing in these pills."

Traumeel contains 12 biological ingredients, including several plants that are known to be toxic, and two mineral substances, according to Traumeel.com.

But homeopathic medicines are so diluted, they often end up not even containing the original ingredients.

"So basically you'd be taking more of nothing," Nelson said, adding that he still recommends following the instructions on the bottle. Traumeel is also used on horses, dogs and cats. In 1997, it became the first homeopathic medicine to be listed in the Physicians' Desk Reference.

Homeopathy has always been and will always be medical fraud. Luckily Alexa found out the hard way.

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Bar Graph Of The Day

Knowing that The Eye is a connoisseur of all things 'graph' I thought I would share this particular bar graph, that I happened across on my travels around the interwebz thingy. It's not the original. I've tarted it up a bit because when I first saw it, it looked like someone had put it together in a tearing hurry ... using a knife and fork .... blindfolded.

Anyhow, it tells us the possibilty of how often a computer type geek is likely to 'hit' on a girl in any particular given situation. No. Being neither a geek, a girl or an online computer game player it doesn't really float my boat either. However, it just goes to show that there is an info graphic, bar graph or pie chart available for just about everything you can think of.

Hmmm, so apart from the fact that The Eye likes 'charty' things and I found it mildly amusing, in a sad kind of way, I don't really know what the point of posting this is.

Oh well, maybe you'll all sleep better tonight for just knowing.

UPDATE: TheEye is very grateful to Max for posting that, and would like to remind everyone how things really work in the world of geekdom:

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Get over it Nips

So, the institutionally liberal BBC has felt the need to apologise about a joke regarding the atomic bombing of japan.

The Sons of Nippon lost, get over it!!
Alongside victor's justice, there is a secondary right of "Victor's Humour!

If you don't want to feel inferior win a war or two!!

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The USA As Countries

Found this fascinating map today of the USA in the Economist showing the GDP's of each of the 50 states of the USA (or 57, if you are Obama) as compared to other countries around the world. It gives a very interesting perspective on how the US fits together as a single entity.

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Wikileaks Lawyer vs Palin

It's safe to say who will come out best here. The lawyer for Julian Assange is making noise about prosecuting Sarah Palin if she ever goes to Australia.

In a Facebook post in December, Sarah Palin wrote that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should be “pursued with the same urgency as al-Qaida and Taliban leaders.” Robert Stary, an Australian lawyer for Assange, tells National Public Radio he’ll pursue a “private prosecution” of Palin if she ever sets foot on Aussie soil. Her remark is essentially a call for Assange’s execution, Stary says.

Our main concern is really the possible extradition [of Assange] to the U.S. We’ve been troubled by the sort of rhetoric that has come out of various commentators and principally Republican politicians – Sarah Palin and the like – saying Mr. Assange should be executed, assassinated.” …

Anyone who incites others to commit violence against his client, even outside Australia, Stary says, is violating Australian law and can be held accountable for it.

“Certainly if Sarah Palin or any of those other politicians come to Australia, for whatever purpose, then we can initiate a private prosecution, and that’s what we intend to do,” Stary said.

Of course it's only posturing and attention-whoring but nevertheless it says a lot about his state of mind. He's supporting Assange's right to free speech but not allowing Sarah Palin hers. One rule for one, eh? And apart from the fact that she didn't actually call for his assassination which renders the whole point rather moot, you'd hardly think that Oz public opinion is going to rally behind an organisation who have further risked the lives of the 1,500 Diggers currently serving in Afghanistan.

From The Anchorage Daily News via GatewayPundit

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Johnson Affair Exclusive Pic

So if Guido (repeated by the Telegraph) is right, the wife and the bodyguard isn't the main story but a useful distraction. They think Alan Johnson himself is guilty of wick dippage into out of bounds wax buckets.

But, exclusively here, we can reveal that it was in fact a threesome and took place in a small Cornish hotel with incredibly tasteful china:

Dirty bastard.

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Question Time LiveBlog 20th January 2011

Tonight Question Time comes from Burnley, best known for the fact the more Bénédictine is drunk in one bar there, the Burnley Miners' Club, than anywhere else in the world. LibDem Gordon Birtwistle, elected in 2010, is the first non-Labour MP for the area since the Great War.

On the panel we have lone Tory and serial QT underperformer Caroline Spelman MP, Simon "The Straight Choice" Hughes MP, below average cat-impersonator George Galloway, below average human-impersonator Alastair Campbell, and, unbelievably, Burnley Football Club central defender Clarke Carlisle. You couldn't make this stuff up.

The LiveBlog will also cover the surreal This Week, with Andrew Neil and Michael Portillo.

Your friendly moderators David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be repelling boarders here from 10:30pm.

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Civil Political Discourse

Forget cross-hairs on maps and blaming Sarah Palin for murdering nutters. In Russia, political debate is much more civilised. This speech, for example, is interrupted by .....a helicopter dildo....

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Hu Jintao Visits Washington

Those completely demented Taiwanese amimators have been let loose on the Chinese leader's state visit to Washington. It's as off the wall as usual.

Also, mocking Obama's tendency to bow to foreign leaders The Donald poked fun at him on Fox News. Speaking as Hu was about to arrive on US soil Donald Trump told Neil Cavuto, ”So, I don’t have a television in front of me: You’ll let me know whether our President drops to his knees, right?” “Obama will drop to his knees and kiss his hand,” “He’s done it before.” (that video from the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, Monday April 12, 2010 isn't as funny as the time Obama bowed to the mayor of Tampa).

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Emotional Distress Caused By Bird Insults

Taiwanese man has sued his neighbours claiming that they trained their mynah bird to swear at him and that the bird's relentless taunting caused him serious emotional distress and injuries.

It seems that Wang Han-chin had previously complained to police that his neighbours were too loud, and he claimed that in revenge the five of them trained their bird to call him a "clueless big-mouthed idiot" when he left for work in the morning.

Wang claimed that the bird's insults caused him serious distress, and had affected his concentration at work to the point that he had somehow burned himself. Prosecutors apparently declined to charge the neighbours with anything "due to insufficient evidence linking the bird to his injuries,". So he sued.

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No Backbone

From across the Pond, a CBS poll has found some disturbing results. Apparently 16% of the US public thinks it is sometimes justified “to take violent action against the government,”. A greater proportion of Republicans, 28%, subscribe to that point of view.

But that’s not the worrying part. What’s really alarming is that 76% of the public (and 64% of the Republican party) thinks that it is never justified to take violent action against a government.

This is absolutely amazing. Seventy-six percent of the citizens in a country that was formed after the violent overthrow of an oppressive government thinks such action is never justified.

If the poll had begun by stating the government in question was a representative one and that a democratic process was in place - you could understand that result. But it didn't. Few people would argue that violent action against a government is justified because, say, one particular party won an election over another...but to say that violent action is never justified, with no qualification whatsoever, is an amazing statement.

People should not be afraid of their governments. 
Governments should be afraid of their people.

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Money For Nothing Updated

As that the original version of the Dire Straits classic "Money for Nothing" has been banned in Canada for being politically incorrect, here's an updated version of it for the modern era.



Might as well burn YouTube's bandwidth to embed this, but in case the video is pulled there's a back-up on EyeTube here.

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How To Have Fun In Oz

Ah, pure Oz genius. Is this some sort of Ashes defeat escapism?

A COUPLE floating down Melbourne's Yarra River on inflatable dolls have been rescued after getting into trouble.

Police say the 19-year-old couple had just passed Pound Bend Tunnel at Warrandyte North when the water became turbulent and the woman lost control of her grip on the doll about 4.30pm (AEDT) on Sunday.

The woman grabbed hold of a tree that was floating in the river. The man stayed with her and they yelled for help, police say. A passer-by contacted triple zero and police and SES went to the scene. A kayaker took life jackets to the pair and the SES attended with a boat and rescued the pair. They were checked by ambulance officers but did not require medical attention.

Police say the fate of the dolls is unknown.

And if you've missed it, a great roundup of Ashes cricket jokes over on CatoSays here.

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Canada Bans Dire Straits Song

News from Canada, where to the horror of 80's music fans the Dire Straits massive hit "Money for Nothing" has just been permanently banned from the airwaves for thought crimes.

The song, from the Brothers In Arms album, contains the word "faggot", and of course that part of the victimocracy is protected. It's taken them 25 years to notice that it was there, but after that action was swift.

The ruling is here. So, for our occasional and welcome Canuck readers and also for everyone else - here it is uncensored (for now).

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Question Time LiveBlog 13th January 2011

Tonight the first Question Time of the new year comes from London.

David Dimbleby will be with Michael Gove MP, Diane Abbott MP, Charles Kennedy MP, right-on lesbian novelist and delicatessen owner Jeanette Winterson and Dragon's Den judge Nazim Khan who now calls himself James Caan since watching "Godfather".

For those playing the Buzzword Bingo, we'll be using the Soft On Crime, Soft On The Causes Of Crime Rules so any links to underworld denizens will be score highly tonight. Look out for triple-point references to Ken Clarke, Prison Closures, Control Orders and Prisoner Votes. On the same theme, special prizes tonight if anyone scores references to bang-to-rights Labour criminals Chaytor and Illsley openly on the BBC, and also Phil Woolarse, fire extinguisher lobber Edward Woollard and LibDem on-the-run donor fraudster Michael Brown who owes £2.4m. You'll notice that Palin has been taken off your bingo cards for this week as it's too predictable.

The LiveBlog will also cover the unspeakably strange This Week, with Andrew Neil and Michael Portillo and, if enthusiasm levels permit and alcohol levels allow, may stay open for the Oldham and Saddleworth by-election declaration. Maybe.

David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be feeding the guard dogs here from 10:30pm.

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Old and Sad

Today is the by-election in Oldham and Saddleworth. The previous MP for the area, Phil Woolas (Labour, just in case you rely on the BBC for news and therefore aren't sure) was removed from the House of Commons after lying about his political rivals so far above and beyond the usual level of abuse that it ended up in court.

Labour, of course, rallied mindlessly behind this twisted individual after his re-election, with Red Ed appointing Woolas to his front bench and Woolas receiving public statements of support from both Brown and Blair during the course of his trial.

All for nothing, though, as Woolas - famously mauled by the sainted Joanna Lumley for his betrayal of the Gurkhas - is now discredited and unemployable...and so will therefore become rich as a lobbyist for some fake charity or other.

And the sheep of Old and Sad will today vote for another politician from the same mould.

Enthusiasm is high, it appears, as this photograph of Jack Straw campaigning in the constituency and addressing a mass rally of ....err....one....shows. Maybe when convicted thugs and sex offenders get the vote there will be more visible support for Labour - although not at open air public meetings you'd hope.

Nevertheless it's strongly expected that the Labour woman with the face like a toolbox with the spanner drawer open will beat the blue-rosetted man so vast he has his own gravitational field and the lawyer-dependent sore-loser yellow one. And the others - including one who calls himself "The Flying Brick".

Voters will get exactly what they deserve.

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MoD Waste (Part: Lots)

For years Labour and the MoD have been battling to outspend each other on big budget shiny defence projects at the expense of effective purchasing. They were at their finest when the spending was mutually beneficial - Labour buying votes in shipyard towns with MoD brass also auditioning for retirement jobs at Big and Expensive (BaE).  Plenty of fat to trim.

Ironically that's not the only fat involved in wasted MoD spending. Take this new advertising campaign in Soldier magazine targeted at servicewomen who like a wet or two.

Some internal survey or other has apparently concluded that 23,000 members of the armed forces drink "hazardous and harmful" levels of booze. That's a pathetic 1 in 7 which isn't TheEye's experience at all. What changed in the last decade - have they all suddenly become wimps?

Overall the Senior Service must surely still uphold the finest drinking traditions of the forces and this survey was probably infiltrated and diluted by RAF-types.

But it's quite simple. If your fitness levels dip in the Army and you fall below required standards you're in for a more forceful nudge to get back up to speed than just an expensive magazine advert. Haven't they got better things to spend money on?

Plus all pongo women have large backsides anyway.

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Votes For Prisoners

Some interesting statistics released to Parliament yesterday (no, honestly!). If the ECHR gets its way, and it seems that the Government is indeed going to roll over and play dead, 28,770 prisoners who are serving a sentence of less than four years will now get the vote.

That number includes a splendid tally of 1,742 sex offenders, 2,484 robbers, 4,144 burglars, 3,484 thieves, 4,306 drug offenders, 1,060 fraudsters,and over 5,000 other random offenders.

Which is nice.

Malta, for example, comply with this nonsense with a sentence limit of one year and nobody bats an eyelid there, but it's long been LibDem policy to give the vote to the dregs of society so there you go. A Coalition-preserving triumph.

What's particularly entertaining to watch is the Labour Party's attempts to get good canvassing teams installed inside prisons across the country before this law comes in:  Illsley and Chaytor so far; but many many more to follow.

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Limiting Welfare Handouts

We haven't taken a look at the indispensable Austrian Times for a while, but here's an interesting thought which might strike a chord in the UK:

Dole bosses in Romania are adopting new laws banning people from claiming benefits if they own a camera.

Under the new rules people who own too many "luxury items" will be banned from any state handouts which start at 25 GBP a month to a maximum of 100 GBP.

Officials say anyone with one telly, one fridge, a bike, one desktop computer, a vacuum cleaner and a washing machine can still claim.

But anyone with a camera, laptop computer, photocopier, sewing machine or more than three cows and five pigs will be banned from benefits.

Three cows and five pigs, eh? Luxury! In my day...etc etc etc...

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Question Time LiveBlog 13th January 2011

A reminder, as if we needed one, that the grim horror of Question Time returns tomorrow Thursday the 13th for the first show of 2011. It's BBC bias in the raw; at its most blatant and visceral.

As usual we'll be hosting a live chat here starting at 10:30pm and followed by the unspeakably awful yet strangely unmissable This Week with Andrew Neil and Michael Portillo. If the wine hasn't run out and the enthusiasm remains we might stay online for the Oldham by-election result straight afterwards too.

The main event though, is first up and promises to be an unwelcome return to bias-as-usual. Join us here to discuss it, live and uncut, from 10:30pm tomorrow!

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When You Can't Arrest People

In Canada last August, police arrested several suspected terrorists who had circuit boards that could be used to remotely detonate bombs. They have since been charged and are awaiting trial. But the police say they made one mistake – they made the arrests during the "holy" month of Ramadan.

As RCMP investigators searched through homes, computers and the seized equipment of three terror suspects arrested at the end of August, the RCMP's community outreach office in Ottawa was calling an emergency meeting of the cultural diversity consultative committee to apologize to local Muslims.

“To show support to our Muslim brothers and sisters during RAMADAN, there will be no food or drink during this most important meeting. This meeting is for one hour only, in order to observe prayer time and the breaking of the fast during RAMADAN,” wrote Cpl. Wayne Russett.

Of course police in Muslim countries carry out arrests during Ramadan without complaints (apart from the obvious ones). In fact, even the people being apologised to couldn't work out why:

“This e-mail is an indication of how within the RCMP there are officers in authority who do not see the threat Islamism poses to our nation, but unwittingly perform the role of useful idiots,” said Tarek Fatah of the Muslim Canadian Congress.

“Why would they apologize to Muslims for arrests during Ramadan?” one of the meeting participants asked. The person, who did not want to be named, highly doubted police would call a meeting of Christian leaders to apologize for arresting someone on Christmas Day.

You're entering the realms of madness when even people you're grovelling to can't understand what you're doing it for.

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Kerry McCarthy Is A Moron

And so the beat goes on.....*sigh*. A contribution today from one of the most badly assembled human beings ever made - for it is she:

A MP has backed calls for the DNA screening of all men in Bristol as part of the hunt for the murderer of Jo Yeates.

What, all quarter of a million of them? Really?

Bristol East Labour MP Kerry McCarthy said if police thought the exercise was worthwhile she believed most men would understand why they were being asked.

Still not dropped the national DNA database idea have you? Totalitarian witch. It's fortunate that officialdom is so efficient and reliable, which is what makes this such a great idea. Not.

Ms McCarthy said she believed the majority of people would be sympathetic to requests for DNA samples.

All men are guilty! All men are guilty! Burn them! If they don't 'volunteer', burn them twice!

She added: "But rather than taking DNA just from men in the Clifton area, where the population is somewhat transient, the operation should be widened to include the whole of the city.

"Quite how the police would organise this I don't know," she added.

Right, so you don't know how...oh, whatever. Stupid, stupid, stupid. If this woman ever gets near the corridors of power again it’s torchlight parade of angry toothless peasants time.

UPDATE: The Police are taking DNA samples from Joanna Yeates' Facebook friends. The moral of that story is that if you know someone via Facebook - however vaguely - who is then murdered, you should drop them sharpish or someone will be knocking on your door with mouth swabs. Because you "surely you have nothing to hide..."?

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On Scientific Consensus

You must have seen the quote "97% of experts support the anthropogenic global warming theory" quote in a thousand places - and that's just on the BBC - but it's interesting to finally discover how that figure was cooked.

The number comes from a 2008 master’s thesis by student Maggie Kendall Zimmerman at the University of Illinois. Her results are headlined as having come from a survey of 10,257 Earth scientists - chosen, it turns out, not by qualification (many didn't have a PhD) but instead by their employer. However once you get past the exclusions and get to the sub-sample who actually make up the conclusion you're down to only 77 scientists, 75 of whom thought that humans contributed to climate change. The ratio 75/77 produces the 97% figure that pundits now tout.

In short - it's nonsense. For a longer fisking of the methodology behind the 97% there's a comprehensive demolition job here. It's worth reading so that you can understand how glibly repeated statistics in the media, held up as true and unassailable, are usually just extracted from somebody's arse.

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Assange And The Guardian

Vanity Fair has just published an absolutely fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the unlikely and tempestuous working relationship between Wikileak's Julian Assange and The Guardian. The timeline covers all of the events right from the start and it's a must-read to fill in any details you might have missed or not read elsewhere.

It also touches on the politics within the Wikileaks organisation and how it is splintering, with disgruntled ex-employees starting up openleaks.org to combat what they see as Assange's obsession with the US military over anything else.

The piece highlights the differences and conflicts between the Guardian's journalistic standards and Wikileak's agenda. Particularly interesting is the revelation that Julian Assange threatened to sue The Guardian if they publish a portion of Iraq War Logs leaked to them by a disgruntled Wikileaks volunteer, claiming 'he owned the information and had a financial interest in how and when it was released.

It's long, but because it's detailed as the subject deserves, so it's a recommended read.

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Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now

Right about now the England cricket team are setting about taking the last three Australian wickets before winning the first Ashes series Down Under since 1987.

And what was No1 at the time? The incredibly appropriate Nothing's Gonna To Stop Us Now...

Well done to Straussy and the lads. Ashes winners 2010-11.



UPDATE: 3-1 Woohoo!

Michael Vaughan: "What do you call an Australian with a bottle of champagne in his hand? A waiter."

Bravo.

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Dennis Miller Rants

The most serious things are often said in jest. From a recent HBO special, this clip of Dennis Miller giving "The Big Speech" is very good...

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Gerry Rafferty Dies

TheEye is a big fan of Gerry Rafferty's music, and it's very sad to hear that he's just died at the age of 63. But for those of us who have followed his career it's not a huge surprise.

Born into a working-class family at Paisley, he earned money busking on the London Underground before working with Billy Connolly in a band called The Humblebums. In 1972, Rafferty and Joe Egan formed Stealers Wheel, which was best known for the hit "Stuck in the Middle With You"; especially after its reprise during the torture scene in the 1992 movie Reservoir Dogs. But say his name and most people will think of Baker Street and that marvellous saxophone solo by Raphael Ravenscroft.

It is a huge personal regret never to have seen him play live - something he did very little of especially in the decade before his health deteriorated. The CDs are usually near the top of the pile around here, and there's one spinning right now.

RIP "Gerry" Rafferty (16 April 1947 – 4 January 2011)

If you get it wrong, you'll get it right next time...

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Zionist Vulture Plots

Thoroughly enjoyed this Daily Mail offering today:

A vulture tagged by scientists at Tel Aviv University has strayed into Saudi Arabian territory, where it was promptly arrested on suspicion of being a Mossad spy, Israeli and Saudi media reported Tuesday.

The bird was found in a rural area of the country wearing a transmitter and a leg bracelet bearing the words ‘Tel Aviv University’, according to the reports, which surfaced first in the Israeli daily Ma’ariv.

Although these tags indicate that the bird was part of a long-term research project into migration patters, residents and local reporters told Saudi Arabia’s Al-Weeam newspaper that the matter seemed to be a ‘Zionist plot.’

The accusations went viral, with hundreds of posts on Arabic-language websites and forums claiming that the ‘Zionists’ had trained these birds for espionage.

Perhaps it's only an on going Mossad campaign following their attempts to ruin the Egyptian tourist trade by releasing killer sharks.

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Please Don't Rescue Me!

After human traffickers took Chinese women to work in Africa as prostitutes, local and Chinese police mounted (is that the right word?) an operation to save them. But they don't want to go home.

Police from China flew to the Democratic Republic of Congo in November in the country's first operation to rescue women trafficked to Africa, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post.

They found 11 Chinese women who had been promised decent jobs in Paris by traffickers but ended up working in a Chinese-owned karaoke bar in the country's capital Kinshasa, the newspaper said.

After a joint raid by Chinese and Congolese police on the karaoke bar, however, the women decided to stay in the country, saying it was easier to make good money there than in China.

Luckily the girls have other people willing to help them too. Under an Obama "stimulus" initiative, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are spending $2.6 million to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly on the job. Apparently if they are sober they're less likely to pass on nasty scratchy diseases.

Which is nice.

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9 Madryn Street

Well there's a surprise...the Sunday Express is apparently still in print.

"Ringo Starr’s childhood home could be saved from the bulldozers, thanks to an obscure planning law. Planners at Liverpool City Council want to replace the buildings along Madryn Street with new housing, arguing that it would cost £150,000 to renovate each of the 300 two-up, two-down terraced homes... Housing Minister Grant Shapps is trying to save the drummer’s old home at number 9 from demolition because of its cultural importance. He is using an obscure law to argue for a reprieve for the building, giving heritage campaigners a chance to put forward a plan for its preservation."

Hasn't Grant Shapps got anything better to do? Like running a country? And if anyone has a decent answer to that then just take a look at the building itself and repeat the question. It's got less architectural significance than Michael Jackson's face. And less structural integrity, one suspects.

He's using a law for a purpose other than it was intended to clog up the wheels of bureaucracy for the sake of a cheap expensive headline and the approval of a handful of Scouse voters. Is he New Labour in disguise?

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One Cheer For The French

Not three cheers, obviously, because they're French. But one. Muffled.

They're learning slowly. In 2004 reporters Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot were kidnapped in Iraq. France paid $15 million dollars in ransom for their release. In 2005 Florence Aubenas, a reporter for the daily Libération was released after the French paid $10 million dollars in ransom.

So twice bitten, third time shy. They've finally noticed that people are taking the piss. And this time they just aren't bothering....and they are annoying people because of it.

"Taliban accuses France over kidnapped journalists," from AFP, January 1:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - The Taliban said Saturday that France had "not paid much attention" to their demands for securing the release of two French journalists held captive for more than a year. Herve Ghesquiere and Stephane Taponier, a reporter and a cameraman working for France 3, were kidnapped with three Afghan colleagues in December last year.

"We presented our conditions and demands even one year ago to the French government... They are very simple and easy conditions," Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told AFP.

"But unfortunately they have not paid much attention to our conditions and the rights of their citizens."...

Quite right too. The journalists have put themselves in harms way fully knowing the risks. and when you put the lives of soldiers in peril to rescue them and it goes a bit wrong you don't get any thanks for trying. Leave them there. They'll learn not to do it again.

And as far as British hostages have been concerned, we've had some low points too. Computer bloke Peter Moore was kidnapped in 2007 with his four bodyguards. They were all killed later, and the body of one still hasn't been recovered. Showing his appreciation of their sacrifice to protect him, he said "In 2009 things were actually pretty good. Things improved a lot. I was out of the chains. I had a PlayStation and satellite TV, a laptop computer, en suite shower, toilet facilities. And ultimately I got released, so that was excellent." Arsehole. Should have left him to be pampered to death.

After his release Moore was introduced to Terry Waite who had been chained to a radiator for the five years of his captivity. Considering the comfort Moore was kept in, at least they were able to swap anecdotes about domestic temperature control.

Probably the most comical was British hostage Philip Sands who begged for his life on a video that his captors forgot to send to Al Jazeera and was then 'rescued' accidentally by US troops who confessed that no-one knew he was missing.

Anyway, get yourself in that situation through your own stupidity or greed then learn to live (maybe briefly) with your own choices. Well done the French.

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The Blogging Den

In a splendidly retro way, TheEye has been tagged in a what-does-your-desk-look-like meme by Woman On A Raft. The path of tagging destruction wends its way back to Mordor via JuliaM; Grim Reaper and ManWiddecombe, Filthy Engineer and to the instigator, the unmissable Dick Puddlecote. Various others of the bloggers of Gondor have also been threatened with annihilation on the way.

And there you have it. The screensavers betray TheEye's love of fish, and there's a 110 gallon tank to the left of this shot; mostly angelfish. The discus tank is in the front room. The presence of a tape measure won't surprise the denizens of DickP's blog, and the books would get more attention if the paperweights above them didn't do such a splendid job. The elbowrest/bartowel is of unknown origin. It was just....there...one morning(ish).

TheEye tags John Ward and CatoSays if they've not been tapped up already.

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AllSeeingEye Now Legally A TV Station!

In Greg Dyke impersonation news today, it seems as though TheEye has an extra title for the business card - television mogul.

Italian newspaper La Repubblica reports that YouTube and similar websites (inluding EyeTube) based on user-generated content will be considered TV stations in Italian law (Google translation of Italian original), and will be subject to the same obligations.

Among these, a small tax (500 €), the obligation to publish corrections within 48 hours upon request of people who consider themselves slandered by published content, and the obligation not to broadcast content inappropriate for children in certain time slots.

The main change, though, is that such sites will be legally responsible (in Italy only!) for all published content as long as they have any form (even if automated) of editorial control. This is to force YouTube to assume editorial responsibility for all published content in order to help the ongoing € 500M lawsuit of Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi against YouTube. This results from the uploading of content copyrighted by Berlusconi's TV networks. Berlusconi's Spanish TV station, TeleCinco, was previously defeated in court on the grounds that YouTube is not a content provider.

TV mogul, eh? Excellent! Must order some huge cigars and a shark tank for the office.

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