Now this is the kind of thing that boils my piss. (Click title to read the story).
Why have the tenants simply allowed this? And why, I have to ask, are they going to pay for it?
Most of the tenants have just realised how invasive the cameras are. They seem shocked at the number of cameras and the positions they are sited in. The government can sit and watch their very own reality show, 24/7. Next we'll have Davina down there providing a running commentary.
"But not everyone is totally against the move. Steve Brinsley, 50, who has lived on the estate for 28 years, said: 'I don't like the way the government are recording everyone, but I am willing to accept a bit less freedom for a bit more safety and peace of mind"
As someone famous once said, Steve: those who give up freedom for safety deserve neither. (I paraphrased). And seriously, do you really, really want this inept bunch of retards knowing your every move? If you can honestly say "Yes" to that question then I have a long list of countries that you really ought to be living in. Here's a couple of ideas, get packing: Iran, Cuba, KSA, China, Russia.
I would be content to have the cameras outside, but only if a group of tenants took it in turns to monitor the action. Telling the government to step in was a mistake of monumental proportions.
Got any benefit cheats in the buildings? They're fucked. It's only a matter of time before someone at Housing talks to someone at the Jobcentre. Unless, of course, you live under the illusion that any of these bastards can be trusted with any information. They cannot.
"We do, however, want to reassure residents that Riviera staff members will only gain access to view the footage should there be an incident regarding criminal activity, anti-social behaviour or vandalism".
Yes indeed. She went on to say that she was inviting all residents to join a fantastic Ponzi scheme, and that emails from 419'ers were just fine and dandy. "Be sure to give any strangers ALL your personal banking details" she added.
Resident Philip Mays admitted there had been problems on the estate but that 90 per cent of them were sorted out among residents themselves.
Ah, the old fashioned way. Infinitely preferable to the solution you have now, eh?
'These cameras will stop people socialising together. When we associate, we will be watched'
No shit, Sherlock.
We continue to allow this crap to happen. Not only that but we invite them to intrude, but we then pay for that intrusion. And I don't mean the extra 2 quid a week the residents are paying. This sets a dangerous precedent for the rest of us.
Maybe O'Brien was right in 1984. First we hate Big Brother, then we come to love him.
But I just cannot get that stamping jackboot image out of my mind these days....
August 28, 2009
August 17, 2009
Bubble Theory
I took my dogs for a long walk yesterday in some nearby woods. (Perhaps I should avoid walking in woods as long as I am writing this blog. I have already upset some senior members of our elected elite).
Dog-walking time is thinking time, for me, at any rate, my dogs don't think much. (They are content to roll around in deer poop). And I got around to mulling over what those 646 actually get up to in Westminster Village. Not much, was my conclusion. I tried to put myself in their position and I came up with my very own theory. I call it the Bubble Theory. It probably isn't unique, but it makes sense. To me, anyway. I meander a little here, but bear with me. We'll get to it shortly.
My theory is based on what I see, read, and hear. And what I see, read, and hear about mostly is how badly things have gone wrong in the last few years. I think it started after Labour won their second election. My observations are based on certain timelines. I like timelines. I know they are simplistic and A does not always lead to B, but sometimes, particularly if you are looking at a graph, it leaps off the page at you. All of a sudden the activity you are trying to pin down races up and to the right on the graph. I did this with pub closures. I was monitoring them after the smoker bans were enacted. In 2005, things were fairly normal. Around 100 pubs closed in that year. Not bad considering there were 58,000 of them. In 2006 it doubled, to 200. Still not bad. Then, in the second half of 2007 there were a whopping 1600 closures. What happened in the middle of 2007? The smoking ban. The closures got worse and worse as hundreds of publicans caved in to the inevitable. They had thrown away their biggest, most loyal customer base. For this to make sense you need to know that whilst smokers make up around 22% of the population, the demographic changes disproportionately inside pubs. Many landlords reported that 50, 60, 70, or even 80% of their customers smoked. I put this down to smokers who didn't smoke at home. The pub was the only place they indulged. For a myriad of reasons. In late 2007, closures crept up to 20 a week, Then 30. Then in 2008, they went up to 39 a week, In 2009 the number is 53 closures per week. Customer numbers, it almost goes without saying, sped down and to the left on my graph. Unprecedented closures, and unprecedented numbers of customers staying away from pubs is not a good mix. Mass closures don't make sense in a growing population, either. Usually, pub attendances are good during recessions. Folks need somewhere to meet, to bitch and to moan, and where better than the pub with your pals? Before you all shout at me, I do not think that the smoking ban, in isolation, is the cause of every one of those 53+ closures now. There are other variables in play. I do contend that it is the single biggest reason. Over 4,000 are now closed. These are net figures, they allow for new openings too. Workingmens Clubs, that last bastion, has been savaged too. 92, most with very long histories, have closed down. Bingo halls, the refuge of mums and grannies a couple of times a week, have been similarly butchered. Over 90 of them are gone. Each one a loss to the Chancellor of £1 million. Each pub closure means Uncle Alistair loses around £500K per year in various taxes. The smoking ban has cost us dear. For me, the price is too high. For many publicans, it cost them everything. The right thing for HMG to do, ironically, was nothing at all. The market had been steadily creating non-smoking venues and would have normalised all on its own. That is the nature of markets. They react to customer demands. Until the bans were brought in, smoker prevalence was falling. After the bans, smoker prevalence began to grow again. This was something that had not happened for decades. A failure on every level.
This will look unrelated at first glance but hopefully I will pull all the threads together in a moment.
20 years ago I worked at BP Exploration. There were around 3000 people in my building. I was a contractor, that is to say, I was not directly employed by BP. The vast majority, at the time, worked for BP. I hadn't been there long before BP announced that they were outsourcing the IT & Telecoms Division. Some 400 people. Well, the world had ended for most of them. This was pure calamity! There was much gnashing of teeth, and "Woe is me!" was a phrase I heard thirty or forty times a day. Many had been there for 20-25 years and had never once contemplated another employer. BP was, as far as they were concerned, their world. There was nothing beyond it. Nothing! BP was the only employer in Britain. "What will we do? What will we DO?", people asked me daily. "Relax", said I, "You'll be fine". Few believed me. The outsourcing company came in, held weeks and weeks of consultations and eventually, everyone had simmered down. BP, you see, was giving everyone a fat wad of cash, to ease the pain of parting. Those longest serving members did well. The lowest payment, I recall, was £18K, and the highest that I heard of, was £61K. Most paid off their mortgages, booked fancy holidays, or bought new shiny cars. Here's the kicker: every one of those 400 that were "fired" on Friday afternoon returned to BP on the Monday morning with fresh new jobs with the outsourcing company. Usually, I heard, with an increase in pay. So, the widespread panic, and the rush to learn how to compile a C.V calmed down. Normality resumed. The sky was not falling in after all. If you have never heard 400 people sigh at the same time, try and catch it one day. It's an amazing sound. They all settled in again, and life was good. CV's were trashed, calls to job agencies were cancelled, and the workload over at HR reduced by about 2000% overnight. Routine was re-established.
This leads me nicely on to Bubble Theory.
Westminster is a unique place. Its' employees spend months begging their constituents to vote them into parliament, having made more promises than a lovesick teen, and, as soon as they settle into their offices, promptly forget all about those that put them there. This may not be instantaneous, but it seems to happen pretty damn quickly. The plebs who voted for them can now be safely forgotten until election time rolls around again. There is stuff to be done! They are lawmakers now! And make law they do. At an alarming pace. The trouble is, I now know that they barely make time to even read about whatever statute it is that is going through. Party Whips run around and herd them all together and "advise" on whether to vote Yea or Nay. No-one reads this stuff. The average statute is 80 pages long. They make for dry reading. I know. I have read several. They are written in legalese, and without a translation, the average MP is clueless. During NuLabours tenure they have ejaculated an average of one statute per day. Do you think that any MP has read this all of this stuff? Over 3,500 new statutes? Me neither. If they did, more than 75% of these "laws" wouldn't see the light of day. What's important is to appear to have done something. Something vital. "Lawmaking" ticks that box. They are swallowed up in their little world. Here they are safe. They get very nice salaries, unbelievably generous pensions, and super expense accounts. They may even have time for second jobs, or seats on some company board or other. Most put in a couple of days a week at the HoC. Meals and drinks are heavily subsidised. Grace and favour houses, or generous housing allowances, are given to them, they never need to spend their own money, Joe/Jane Public are conned out of the billions thrown at them. In short, it is a safe, happy, secure little existence. The only danger comes when interacting with Joe & Jane and that can (and must) be avoided at all costs. Nice work if you can get it. They are insulated from real life at every turn. Over 85% of them have never had a proper job. They went through schools, on to Uni, then they hit the streets for a few months before entering parliament. They have never known anything else. They are no different from the lifers at BP. They are cocooned. They are cosseted. They are pampered. They are protected. My theory is that because they have lived in this entirely false little world, they cannot communicate with those of us that have normal lives. Hell, they think their lives are normal. I conclude that they can never understand me. They can never understand how normal people get by. None of them understood our anger at the expenses scandal. None of them understood just how damaging that was to British politics. And why should they? I got tired of hearing them say "Well, I did nothing wrong, but look! Here is my cheque for £15,231.81p. I'm repaying it even though I don't need to! Aren't I generous?!"
One small story, (greatly, perhaps criminally under-reported at the time) was of a single mum who had applied to the Social Fund for a single bed for her daughter. (Bear in mind that claim for moat cleaning as you read this). She was told that she qualified for a bed, but not a mattress. Her little girl slept on the springs. That story alone told me that these muppets were so far out of touch there was absolutely zero chance of them ever connecting with those who elected them.
I have used a fairly broad brush there and I do not mean to tar them all. I used what I believe is a poor statute, enacted with no evidence that it would do what it said on the tin (it didn't), and showed you what happens when people do not do what they are paid to do. Think first, and legislate only as a last resort. The outcome of the Health Act 2006 (Smoking Ban) was obvious to me because I researched outcomes in other countries. Why could they not have done that?
There are good ones. There are MPs that do care and genuinely follow a vocation. Sadly though, they are a distinct minority.
We need to burst their bubble. We need them to see us and we need them to hear us. Moreover, we need them to obey us. But I fear it is too late for that. If we elect the Conservatives to office, we are merely replacing drones with drones. That is not fair on the British people. They deserve much, much better.
I think the kindest thing to do is to fire them all. All at once. They can be replaced with apolitical citizens that have no idea how to lie, spin, trough, and ignore. A non-party affiliated Administration made up of people who have no axe to grind, no wishes other than to serve the public. People who know that quango's and fake charities are unnecessary and unwanted warts that must be burned off. People who realise the value of a multicultural society but also realise that the immigration door should be gently, but firmly eased shut, at least until we can determine those that want to contribute from those that don't. People who realise that we really don't need 3,500 new crimes to be created every ten years. People who realise that less government is better, more effective than a bloated civil service, created only to ensure votes for whoever gave them the jobs in the first place. People who have never inhabited a bubble. People who want 99% of decisions to be taken at the local level, where the decisions count for something and are meaningful. People who don't want to be spied on, by neighbours, or by 4.3 million cameras littering out streets and cities. People who don't want to carry ID cards. People that prefer to be presumed innocent instead of guilty. People who think a top rate of 10 or 15% income tax is more than generous. People who are tired of watching this government give £2 million per hour to the EU. People who are sick and tired of reading about the billions this government wastes every year.
People, in other words, like you and me.
Dog-walking time is thinking time, for me, at any rate, my dogs don't think much. (They are content to roll around in deer poop). And I got around to mulling over what those 646 actually get up to in Westminster Village. Not much, was my conclusion. I tried to put myself in their position and I came up with my very own theory. I call it the Bubble Theory. It probably isn't unique, but it makes sense. To me, anyway. I meander a little here, but bear with me. We'll get to it shortly.
My theory is based on what I see, read, and hear. And what I see, read, and hear about mostly is how badly things have gone wrong in the last few years. I think it started after Labour won their second election. My observations are based on certain timelines. I like timelines. I know they are simplistic and A does not always lead to B, but sometimes, particularly if you are looking at a graph, it leaps off the page at you. All of a sudden the activity you are trying to pin down races up and to the right on the graph. I did this with pub closures. I was monitoring them after the smoker bans were enacted. In 2005, things were fairly normal. Around 100 pubs closed in that year. Not bad considering there were 58,000 of them. In 2006 it doubled, to 200. Still not bad. Then, in the second half of 2007 there were a whopping 1600 closures. What happened in the middle of 2007? The smoking ban. The closures got worse and worse as hundreds of publicans caved in to the inevitable. They had thrown away their biggest, most loyal customer base. For this to make sense you need to know that whilst smokers make up around 22% of the population, the demographic changes disproportionately inside pubs. Many landlords reported that 50, 60, 70, or even 80% of their customers smoked. I put this down to smokers who didn't smoke at home. The pub was the only place they indulged. For a myriad of reasons. In late 2007, closures crept up to 20 a week, Then 30. Then in 2008, they went up to 39 a week, In 2009 the number is 53 closures per week. Customer numbers, it almost goes without saying, sped down and to the left on my graph. Unprecedented closures, and unprecedented numbers of customers staying away from pubs is not a good mix. Mass closures don't make sense in a growing population, either. Usually, pub attendances are good during recessions. Folks need somewhere to meet, to bitch and to moan, and where better than the pub with your pals? Before you all shout at me, I do not think that the smoking ban, in isolation, is the cause of every one of those 53+ closures now. There are other variables in play. I do contend that it is the single biggest reason. Over 4,000 are now closed. These are net figures, they allow for new openings too. Workingmens Clubs, that last bastion, has been savaged too. 92, most with very long histories, have closed down. Bingo halls, the refuge of mums and grannies a couple of times a week, have been similarly butchered. Over 90 of them are gone. Each one a loss to the Chancellor of £1 million. Each pub closure means Uncle Alistair loses around £500K per year in various taxes. The smoking ban has cost us dear. For me, the price is too high. For many publicans, it cost them everything. The right thing for HMG to do, ironically, was nothing at all. The market had been steadily creating non-smoking venues and would have normalised all on its own. That is the nature of markets. They react to customer demands. Until the bans were brought in, smoker prevalence was falling. After the bans, smoker prevalence began to grow again. This was something that had not happened for decades. A failure on every level.
This will look unrelated at first glance but hopefully I will pull all the threads together in a moment.
20 years ago I worked at BP Exploration. There were around 3000 people in my building. I was a contractor, that is to say, I was not directly employed by BP. The vast majority, at the time, worked for BP. I hadn't been there long before BP announced that they were outsourcing the IT & Telecoms Division. Some 400 people. Well, the world had ended for most of them. This was pure calamity! There was much gnashing of teeth, and "Woe is me!" was a phrase I heard thirty or forty times a day. Many had been there for 20-25 years and had never once contemplated another employer. BP was, as far as they were concerned, their world. There was nothing beyond it. Nothing! BP was the only employer in Britain. "What will we do? What will we DO?", people asked me daily. "Relax", said I, "You'll be fine". Few believed me. The outsourcing company came in, held weeks and weeks of consultations and eventually, everyone had simmered down. BP, you see, was giving everyone a fat wad of cash, to ease the pain of parting. Those longest serving members did well. The lowest payment, I recall, was £18K, and the highest that I heard of, was £61K. Most paid off their mortgages, booked fancy holidays, or bought new shiny cars. Here's the kicker: every one of those 400 that were "fired" on Friday afternoon returned to BP on the Monday morning with fresh new jobs with the outsourcing company. Usually, I heard, with an increase in pay. So, the widespread panic, and the rush to learn how to compile a C.V calmed down. Normality resumed. The sky was not falling in after all. If you have never heard 400 people sigh at the same time, try and catch it one day. It's an amazing sound. They all settled in again, and life was good. CV's were trashed, calls to job agencies were cancelled, and the workload over at HR reduced by about 2000% overnight. Routine was re-established.
This leads me nicely on to Bubble Theory.
Westminster is a unique place. Its' employees spend months begging their constituents to vote them into parliament, having made more promises than a lovesick teen, and, as soon as they settle into their offices, promptly forget all about those that put them there. This may not be instantaneous, but it seems to happen pretty damn quickly. The plebs who voted for them can now be safely forgotten until election time rolls around again. There is stuff to be done! They are lawmakers now! And make law they do. At an alarming pace. The trouble is, I now know that they barely make time to even read about whatever statute it is that is going through. Party Whips run around and herd them all together and "advise" on whether to vote Yea or Nay. No-one reads this stuff. The average statute is 80 pages long. They make for dry reading. I know. I have read several. They are written in legalese, and without a translation, the average MP is clueless. During NuLabours tenure they have ejaculated an average of one statute per day. Do you think that any MP has read this all of this stuff? Over 3,500 new statutes? Me neither. If they did, more than 75% of these "laws" wouldn't see the light of day. What's important is to appear to have done something. Something vital. "Lawmaking" ticks that box. They are swallowed up in their little world. Here they are safe. They get very nice salaries, unbelievably generous pensions, and super expense accounts. They may even have time for second jobs, or seats on some company board or other. Most put in a couple of days a week at the HoC. Meals and drinks are heavily subsidised. Grace and favour houses, or generous housing allowances, are given to them, they never need to spend their own money, Joe/Jane Public are conned out of the billions thrown at them. In short, it is a safe, happy, secure little existence. The only danger comes when interacting with Joe & Jane and that can (and must) be avoided at all costs. Nice work if you can get it. They are insulated from real life at every turn. Over 85% of them have never had a proper job. They went through schools, on to Uni, then they hit the streets for a few months before entering parliament. They have never known anything else. They are no different from the lifers at BP. They are cocooned. They are cosseted. They are pampered. They are protected. My theory is that because they have lived in this entirely false little world, they cannot communicate with those of us that have normal lives. Hell, they think their lives are normal. I conclude that they can never understand me. They can never understand how normal people get by. None of them understood our anger at the expenses scandal. None of them understood just how damaging that was to British politics. And why should they? I got tired of hearing them say "Well, I did nothing wrong, but look! Here is my cheque for £15,231.81p. I'm repaying it even though I don't need to! Aren't I generous?!"
One small story, (greatly, perhaps criminally under-reported at the time) was of a single mum who had applied to the Social Fund for a single bed for her daughter. (Bear in mind that claim for moat cleaning as you read this). She was told that she qualified for a bed, but not a mattress. Her little girl slept on the springs. That story alone told me that these muppets were so far out of touch there was absolutely zero chance of them ever connecting with those who elected them.
I have used a fairly broad brush there and I do not mean to tar them all. I used what I believe is a poor statute, enacted with no evidence that it would do what it said on the tin (it didn't), and showed you what happens when people do not do what they are paid to do. Think first, and legislate only as a last resort. The outcome of the Health Act 2006 (Smoking Ban) was obvious to me because I researched outcomes in other countries. Why could they not have done that?
There are good ones. There are MPs that do care and genuinely follow a vocation. Sadly though, they are a distinct minority.
We need to burst their bubble. We need them to see us and we need them to hear us. Moreover, we need them to obey us. But I fear it is too late for that. If we elect the Conservatives to office, we are merely replacing drones with drones. That is not fair on the British people. They deserve much, much better.
I think the kindest thing to do is to fire them all. All at once. They can be replaced with apolitical citizens that have no idea how to lie, spin, trough, and ignore. A non-party affiliated Administration made up of people who have no axe to grind, no wishes other than to serve the public. People who know that quango's and fake charities are unnecessary and unwanted warts that must be burned off. People who realise the value of a multicultural society but also realise that the immigration door should be gently, but firmly eased shut, at least until we can determine those that want to contribute from those that don't. People who realise that we really don't need 3,500 new crimes to be created every ten years. People who realise that less government is better, more effective than a bloated civil service, created only to ensure votes for whoever gave them the jobs in the first place. People who have never inhabited a bubble. People who want 99% of decisions to be taken at the local level, where the decisions count for something and are meaningful. People who don't want to be spied on, by neighbours, or by 4.3 million cameras littering out streets and cities. People who don't want to carry ID cards. People that prefer to be presumed innocent instead of guilty. People who think a top rate of 10 or 15% income tax is more than generous. People who are tired of watching this government give £2 million per hour to the EU. People who are sick and tired of reading about the billions this government wastes every year.
People, in other words, like you and me.
August 15, 2009
Just. Say. No.
Words have incredible power.
Every blogger knows this. Every politician knows this. Every human being knows this.
I wonder though, if we have collectively realised that the most powerful word in the English language, in any language, is "No".
Revolutions come, and revolutions go. They all start with the same word. No.
No, we will not be forced.
No, we will not be bullied.
No, we will not endure this treatment.
No, we will not stand for this corruption.
No, we will not put up with your greed.
No, we will not pay unfair taxes.
No, we will not be vaccinated.
No, we will not be microchipped.
No, we will not carry ID.
No, we will not be incarcerated on a whim.
No, we will not believe anything/everything you say.
No, no, no, no, no, no and no again.
We don't need guns. We don't need knives. Or bombs. Or bullets. Or Molotov Cocktails. Or Sarin Gas.
We just need to quietly say "No". We retain our dignity and we retain our composure.
And we get what we want. The simplicity of the NO Campaign is the key.
But look at the results. Look what this word has achieved down the years.
Gandhi picked up a grain of salt on Dandi beach on April 5, 1930. He was told to put it down, to pay the dreadful Salt Tax by the British rulers. He said, "No". And so began the end of colonial rule in India. Hitler's downfall began when we, as a nation, said "No". Idi Amin Dada's reign of terror ended when Ugandan Nationalists finally found their voices and said "No". Pol Pot (real name Saloth Sar) butchered 21% of his fellow Cambodians, and eventually, they, and the Vietnamese, said "No", and drove him out.
Injustice, corruption, greed, a hunger for power, a burning need to control.
With the exception of Gandhi, all the men listed had those traits. I contend that Gordon Brown and his party of oddballs have the same traits. Yes, they are somewhat diluted but a poisoned system is still a poisoned system. They (the Labour Party) have had men killed, they have killed hundreds of thousands in two illegal wars in the last twenty years. Their desire to control us has been slower than Pol Pot's, or Idi Amin's but the desire is there. Why else do we have over a quarter of the worlds CCTV camera's? Why else do they have this unhealthy desire to have us all on some super-database? Why do we, free men and women, need ID cards in our own country? We need these things only because the idiots in charge say we do. I have yet to see any campaign groups forming to fight for these things.
Tell your friends to say "No". Tell your friends to tell their friends to say "No".
Then tell them again.
If we can get enough people to say "No" when unreasonable or unfair demands are made of them as sovereign human beings, we can topple this, and any subsequent governments who get out of (our) control. They will start to listen again, just as they are paid to do.
Never forget: they are elected to do our bidding, we are not here to do theirs.
They have forgotten that simple truth.
It is our duty to remind them.
By saying "No".
Every blogger knows this. Every politician knows this. Every human being knows this.
I wonder though, if we have collectively realised that the most powerful word in the English language, in any language, is "No".
Revolutions come, and revolutions go. They all start with the same word. No.
No, we will not be forced.
No, we will not be bullied.
No, we will not endure this treatment.
No, we will not stand for this corruption.
No, we will not put up with your greed.
No, we will not pay unfair taxes.
No, we will not be vaccinated.
No, we will not be microchipped.
No, we will not carry ID.
No, we will not be incarcerated on a whim.
No, we will not believe anything/everything you say.
No, no, no, no, no, no and no again.
We don't need guns. We don't need knives. Or bombs. Or bullets. Or Molotov Cocktails. Or Sarin Gas.
We just need to quietly say "No". We retain our dignity and we retain our composure.
And we get what we want. The simplicity of the NO Campaign is the key.
But look at the results. Look what this word has achieved down the years.
Gandhi picked up a grain of salt on Dandi beach on April 5, 1930. He was told to put it down, to pay the dreadful Salt Tax by the British rulers. He said, "No". And so began the end of colonial rule in India. Hitler's downfall began when we, as a nation, said "No". Idi Amin Dada's reign of terror ended when Ugandan Nationalists finally found their voices and said "No". Pol Pot (real name Saloth Sar) butchered 21% of his fellow Cambodians, and eventually, they, and the Vietnamese, said "No", and drove him out.
Injustice, corruption, greed, a hunger for power, a burning need to control.
With the exception of Gandhi, all the men listed had those traits. I contend that Gordon Brown and his party of oddballs have the same traits. Yes, they are somewhat diluted but a poisoned system is still a poisoned system. They (the Labour Party) have had men killed, they have killed hundreds of thousands in two illegal wars in the last twenty years. Their desire to control us has been slower than Pol Pot's, or Idi Amin's but the desire is there. Why else do we have over a quarter of the worlds CCTV camera's? Why else do they have this unhealthy desire to have us all on some super-database? Why do we, free men and women, need ID cards in our own country? We need these things only because the idiots in charge say we do. I have yet to see any campaign groups forming to fight for these things.
Tell your friends to say "No". Tell your friends to tell their friends to say "No".
Then tell them again.
If we can get enough people to say "No" when unreasonable or unfair demands are made of them as sovereign human beings, we can topple this, and any subsequent governments who get out of (our) control. They will start to listen again, just as they are paid to do.
Never forget: they are elected to do our bidding, we are not here to do theirs.
They have forgotten that simple truth.
It is our duty to remind them.
By saying "No".
August 11, 2009
Sign Of The Times
The sign above has to be the cleverest sign in this rapidly degrading nation of ours. It will become, I hope, an obvious theme throughout this rant.
It should be nailed to the inside of every door in the land, to serve as a reminder of what happens when you give way on a small thing that does not necessarily bother you. You may think that something like the PACE "Stop and Account" shenanigans won't affect you overmuch. After all, if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear, right? A reasonable, but completely wrong assumption. By giving the police, or worse, those idiots in parliament the nod to carry on with this nonsense you put us all in harms way. It has affected hundreds of thousands of people, yet a staggeringly low number of arrests have been made. This is yet another case of punishing all for the sins of the few.
The Police National Computer was an innovation back in the day. It became a repository for all data on the bad guys. It meant that every police force in the land could whack a few keys and get the form on the villain they either had in custody, or wanted to have in custody. It was a great idea. Until innocent people had their details on there by mistake. It's the same old story where computer databases are concerned. GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out.
Just for chuckles, let's see who now has access to the PNC:
1. Access Northern Ireland
2. British Transport Police
3. Charity Commission
4. Civil Nuclear Constabulary
5. Courts (Warrant Enforcement)
6. Criminal case Review Commission
7. Criminal Records Bureau
8. Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Litigations and Prosecutions
9. Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform
10. Department for Transport
11. Department of Works and Pensions Solicitors
12. Disclosure Scotland
13. Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority
14. Environment Agency
15. Financial Services Authority
16. Foreign and Commonwealth Office
17. Guernsey Police
18. Health and Safety Executive
19. Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary
20. Highways Agency
21. Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs
22. Home Office
23. Independent Police Complaints Commission
24. Isle of Man Police
25. Jersey Police
26. Mersey Tunnel Police
27. Ministry of Defence (MOD) Police
28. Ministry Of Justice
29. MOD Defence Vetting Agency
30. National Air Traffic Services Ltd.
31. National Offender Management Service
32. National Health Service Counter Fraud
33.Office for Civil Nuclear Security
34. Office of fair Trading
35. Port of Tilbury Police
36. Prison Service
37. Royal Military Police
38. Security Services
39. Service Police Crime Bureau
40. Serious Organised Crime Agency (Domestic)
41. Serious Organised Crime Agency (International)
42. United Kingdom Border Agency
43. Vehicle and Operator Services Agency.
So, just the 43 agencies then. No danger of those many thousands of people with access making mistakes or worse, making mischief. No danger at all.
I see today the sentences for those that harmed, tortured and killed Peter Donnelly are woefully inadequate. They range from 3 to 5 to 15 years. I am, by nature, a libertarian and should really disagree with heavy sentencing but where children are concerned, a red mist descends. I would spend 38p on each of the three animals involved in the harming and killing of this innocent little boy. 38p is the cost of 1 x 9mm round. £1.14p and our problems are over. Instead we will spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on this vermin. Thanks to their human rights we also have to give each of them a new identity when they are released from their cosy little cells in 1.5, 2.5, and 7.5 years respectively. Justice isn't blind. Justice is a fucking moron. Oh, and just for the record, I would also spend 38p on every case officer involved from Haringey Council. Incompetent fuckwits, every single one of them.
The dreadful smoking ban continues to outrage me. This pathetic legislation was enacted just over two years ago and is the single biggest cause of my misery as it ended my social life. And yes, I am hale and hearty, so I can simply step outside the pub for a smoke. But I will not debase myself. My landlord will start seeing my money again as soon as he welcomes me inside, with my cigarettes, like all the other patrons. I deserve to be warm, comfortable and safe, just like they do. I am happy to pay todays prices for beer, wine, gin, whatever, but I will not pay and then voluntarily walk outside into all weathers just so that I can smoke. The anti-smokers are just realising that they also voted in the demise of their own local pubs and clubs. They really should be careful what they wish for. I have read more about smoking and second hand smoke in the last few years than is strictly good for me. I now possess an encyclopedic knowledge and a humongous library containing all the original studies. Disclaimer: I have all the studies that they published. Hundreds of studies have been buried deeper than Jimmy Hoffa because they do not conclude that second hand smoke is harmful at all. As it is, those that they dared to publish are still pretty awful. The ratio is 6:1. For every study that claims harm, there are six that say it does no harm. Given that the evidence is non-existent I can only conclude that the 646 chimps in the HoC enacted legislation to combat an odour. Well done.
This last item (for now), concerns the Chancellors brand new tax. Not satisfied with robbing us of 52% of our earnings every year, he has decided to tax us for parking our cars at work. Just how nasty can this clown get? More importantly, just how stupid can the British public be? My guess, and it is based on many such examples, is that they will react typically. That is to say, they will do fuck all. Then, in the one pub left open, they will stand and piss and moan about it. I wonder how many will even try to stop it happening?
Not enough, is my prophecy.
Slippery slopes are dangerous.
For every single one of us.
August 04, 2009
Dear Tony....
I thought that this was worth repeating. Hat tip to those over at Freedom to Choose. (Link to website by clicking on the title)
The following may, or may not, be true.
It's either a perfect snapshot of our nation, or, like everything else, it's a complete fabrication.
You decide.
*****EYES ONLY*****
To: The Supreme Ruler Of Europe (Designate)
From: The OESC
Dear Tony,
Well, talk about poisoned chalices! A fine mess you left me to sort out. Still, progress has been phenomenal. Your last words to me were, if I recall correctly, "If it looks like you won't win a GE, burn everything. Destroy it all". I have applied myself unstintingly and my scorched earth policy is going better even than we both dreamed. I have to say, I was a trifle worried about that smoker ban but it has had the desired effect. I am now up to 53 closures a week and by the time the general election comes around (if it does, tee hee), the idiots will have almost nowhere left to gather to discuss our failures. It was a brilliant plan: make some stuff up about second hand smoke and pit neighbour against neighbour, destroy communities, and bring about carnage in the hospitality industry. An added bonus was damaging the tourist trade, but what the hell, it's only money.
You did well to leech 52% out of the fools with direct and indirect taxation, but I just came up with a doozy! I'm going to tax them if they park their cars at work! They are so stupid they will fork out for anything! It's handy pumping out new statutes by the dozen. The gibbons here in Westminster have no clue what they are agreeing to. We just tell them to vote "Aye", and they do! It's good to be the King!
Our efforts to slaughter the sheep continues unabated. We are now slaying around 60,000 a year in the hospitals. We call them "iatrogenic deaths" and these morons think it is a new disease! I am proud to tell you that we lead Europe in MRSA deaths. We got the numbers up to 6,600. The very best the rest of Europe can manage is 100 per year. Pathetic! If I can do 6,600 with a population of 60,000,000 why can't they do better? They have 500 million sheep. Losers!
I am still blaming tobacco for killing 87,000 a year but we know that is a fabrication. Got to be seen to be doing the "right" thing. It keeps the anti-smokers incensed, and takes their eye off the other causes. Causes we can be blamed for. You know, vehicle emissions, radon, asbestos, that sort of thing. Those buggers at Freedom to Choose continue to irk me. They remind people constantly that SHS is a load of tripe. Worse, they keep uncovering those studies we had tried to hide. The ace up my sleeve is the Swine Flu "pandemic". Sheer genius. We are going to inject the entire population with a dangerous (and completely useless) cocktail of bile. That should see a few off. No pain, no gain, I always say.
One disappointment: the "Summer of Rage" riots are looking less likely. These sheep are so fast asleep that nothing motivates them to take to the streets. As you know, we had planned for these riots, and we have spent a fortune preparing for NATO troops to get settled in. They couldn't care who they shoot. It's nice to have a "legitimate" mercenary force at our disposal. I am slightly troubled that the riots won't happen. We need them so that we can declare martial law if we are to avoid a troublesome election. Failing that, we will just have to cheat. Mind you, there's nothing new in that. We lie about everything, but it would have been cleaner if we could just have shot a few thousand of them, and in so doing, rebuild the terror in the rest of them.
In closing, I just wanted to remind you that I have managed to devalue the £. Again. It is at its lowest for bloody years! Everyone's property has lost value, so that's going to plan as well. Hit 'em in the pocket, you always said, and it was good advice! That, and big lies. A wonderful combination. Can't wait for the Lisbon Treaty to kick in. That was another masterful plan. God, these people are dumb! I managed to get unemployment up to 5.8 million. Of course, the "official" figure is 2.2 million but with some creative manipulation I can paint a much rosier picture.
That's it from me. I'll drop you a note towards the end of the year when it's time to report to you again.
Be lucky,
Gordon.
*****EYES ONLY*****
The following may, or may not, be true.
It's either a perfect snapshot of our nation, or, like everything else, it's a complete fabrication.
You decide.
*****EYES ONLY*****
To: The Supreme Ruler Of Europe (Designate)
From: The OESC
Dear Tony,
Well, talk about poisoned chalices! A fine mess you left me to sort out. Still, progress has been phenomenal. Your last words to me were, if I recall correctly, "If it looks like you won't win a GE, burn everything. Destroy it all". I have applied myself unstintingly and my scorched earth policy is going better even than we both dreamed. I have to say, I was a trifle worried about that smoker ban but it has had the desired effect. I am now up to 53 closures a week and by the time the general election comes around (if it does, tee hee), the idiots will have almost nowhere left to gather to discuss our failures. It was a brilliant plan: make some stuff up about second hand smoke and pit neighbour against neighbour, destroy communities, and bring about carnage in the hospitality industry. An added bonus was damaging the tourist trade, but what the hell, it's only money.
You did well to leech 52% out of the fools with direct and indirect taxation, but I just came up with a doozy! I'm going to tax them if they park their cars at work! They are so stupid they will fork out for anything! It's handy pumping out new statutes by the dozen. The gibbons here in Westminster have no clue what they are agreeing to. We just tell them to vote "Aye", and they do! It's good to be the King!
Our efforts to slaughter the sheep continues unabated. We are now slaying around 60,000 a year in the hospitals. We call them "iatrogenic deaths" and these morons think it is a new disease! I am proud to tell you that we lead Europe in MRSA deaths. We got the numbers up to 6,600. The very best the rest of Europe can manage is 100 per year. Pathetic! If I can do 6,600 with a population of 60,000,000 why can't they do better? They have 500 million sheep. Losers!
I am still blaming tobacco for killing 87,000 a year but we know that is a fabrication. Got to be seen to be doing the "right" thing. It keeps the anti-smokers incensed, and takes their eye off the other causes. Causes we can be blamed for. You know, vehicle emissions, radon, asbestos, that sort of thing. Those buggers at Freedom to Choose continue to irk me. They remind people constantly that SHS is a load of tripe. Worse, they keep uncovering those studies we had tried to hide. The ace up my sleeve is the Swine Flu "pandemic". Sheer genius. We are going to inject the entire population with a dangerous (and completely useless) cocktail of bile. That should see a few off. No pain, no gain, I always say.
One disappointment: the "Summer of Rage" riots are looking less likely. These sheep are so fast asleep that nothing motivates them to take to the streets. As you know, we had planned for these riots, and we have spent a fortune preparing for NATO troops to get settled in. They couldn't care who they shoot. It's nice to have a "legitimate" mercenary force at our disposal. I am slightly troubled that the riots won't happen. We need them so that we can declare martial law if we are to avoid a troublesome election. Failing that, we will just have to cheat. Mind you, there's nothing new in that. We lie about everything, but it would have been cleaner if we could just have shot a few thousand of them, and in so doing, rebuild the terror in the rest of them.
In closing, I just wanted to remind you that I have managed to devalue the £. Again. It is at its lowest for bloody years! Everyone's property has lost value, so that's going to plan as well. Hit 'em in the pocket, you always said, and it was good advice! That, and big lies. A wonderful combination. Can't wait for the Lisbon Treaty to kick in. That was another masterful plan. God, these people are dumb! I managed to get unemployment up to 5.8 million. Of course, the "official" figure is 2.2 million but with some creative manipulation I can paint a much rosier picture.
That's it from me. I'll drop you a note towards the end of the year when it's time to report to you again.
Be lucky,
Gordon.
*****EYES ONLY*****
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