Steady as she Goes

Personally, I still don't fancy it. Mebbe someday it'll be uncool not too, though...

Mein Bouff

It seems like everybody's getting their knickers in a twist about the far right at the moment. The possibility of Nick Griffin accompanying London Assembly Member Richard Barnbrook (BNP both) to one of the Queen's garden parties has been scandalising the nation over the last week or so, though Griffin, PR objectives achieved, has now said that he isn't going to attend anyway, for fear of "embarrassing" Her Majesty.

The first thing I think we should do in this situation is congratulate Mr Barnbrook on coming up with someone we'd be even less keen on taking tea with than the Royal Family, and the second is to calm the hell down and talk this over. It seems to me that we, as a society, don't do enough talking about the far right, just hoping that they'll be good lads and scuttle off back to whence they came (much as they wish the darkies would do).

Let's face up to it, though. They're really nothing to be afraid of, after all. Most of them can't even read, I rather suspect. Not to stereotype. I'm an advocate, then, of bringing the nats into the light, where what passes for their ideas can be examined properly and dismissed out of hand by sensible people everywhere, which is pretty much everyone. Their ethno-nationalist twaddle bears no scrutinty whatsoever and deserves to be exposed for the sham that it is. That can never happen unless we give them the platform/rope with which to hang themselves. Let them have a panelist on Question Time, let them have a Member of the European Party, let them have Coventry, if they want them. Let's not flatter them with suppressal. They don't deserve it.

The Passion of the Spice

Islamic militants demonstrating against Pakistani military operations against the Taliban. I have no comment here, except on the level of passion on display. Literally nothing moves me to such extremes of feeling (or action). The closest I come is probably when eating a particularly spicy lamb saag. There's nothing like a hot saag.

"Catalan vs. Matalan"

Mad props to The Sun for today's headline, about Barcelona's dismantlement of Manchester United last night. Harsh but fair.

Other puntastic football-related Sun headlines include this old favourite, about Caledonian Thistle's 3-1 victory over Celtic in the Scottish Cup in 2003:

"Super Caley go ballistic, Celtic are atrocious"

Awesome stuff.

Not a Shock Part Deux

So, early results from a Peninsula medical school research exercise suggest that...marijuana could indeed have some medicinal benefit. Well stone me.

Snappy Snaps

Photos that shook the world.

Independents Day?

On Friday evening I had a new and potentially terrifying experience: I found myself agreeing with Danny Finkelstein, former speechwriter for John Major and chief blogger for The Times. The conversation, on Newsnight, was about what is currently being called The New Politics (where everybody jumps on the political/constitutional reform bandwagon in the wake of expensegate).

The above-mentioned Tory made the point that political parties in their current closed, secretive and cabbalistic form would not survive the internet age, with its emphasis on openness and instant information. My slide to the right continued with David Cameron's pieces on the same topic in the Guardian over the last few days, which containted the following statement:

"In media, shopping, travel, entertainment and music, we have huge choice and control provided by many organisations that offer us incredible service and value. But when it comes to the things we ask for from politics, government and the state, there's a sense of power and control draining away; having to take what we're given, with someone else pulling the strings."

This is, it seems to me, an excellent point. Our political parties are hugely outdated. All the evidence suggests that, contrary to their media portrayal as feckless hooligans, many young people (who don't vote in droves) are genuinely interested in politics, but are put off by our heavily party-oriented political system. In pretty much every other area of life, such as those outlined above by DC, people have a real say on the things that affect their lives. If you don't like a particular newspaper, you can just read another one. There are an almost infinite number of opinions to read, bands to listen to, or TV shows to watch. In comparison, there are pretty much only two political parties that have any chance of forming a government and our influence on them is, at the very least, questionable.

The Point is How You Get There

Lovely (short and non-political) South Park-style animation of some of the ideas of the late philosopher Alan Watts. Enjoy.

Fillng the Chair

So, as discussed previously, there is to be a new Speaker of the House of Commons. The candidates and their odds, according to Ladbrokes (on Tuesday - sue me), are as follows:

4/1 Sir Alan Haselhurst

4/1 Frank Field

8/1 Sir George Young

8/1 John Bercow

10/1 Richard Taylor

10/1 Vince Cable

10/1 Menzies Campbell

14/1 Sylvia Heal

14/1 Richard Shepherd

14/1 Ken Clarke

14/1 Patrick Cormack

16/1 Alan Beith

33/1 David Davis

33/1 Norman Baker

50/1 Keith Simpson

50/1 Damian Green

50/1 Kate Hoey

50/1 Diane Abbott

50/1 Tony Wright

250/1 Gordon Brown

Perhaps surprisingly, this blog doesn't have any inside info on this, or any opinions, really. Two ladies at work are putting pressure on me to award the prestigious Paltry Offerings endorsement to John Bercow, though. He's a Tory, which is a worry, but he's super independent (to the extent that he has more support among Labour than Tory MPs), which is a definite plus. Critically, he's also an Arsenal fan, so I'm tempted to declare for him right now. He has his very own (unofficial, as far as I know) fan blog, which can be found here.

Other than that chap, though, I don't have strong feelings about who gets the gig. I just want them to be witty. Most of the House's proceedings are so tedious that any kind of levity, which the Speaker is uniquely well-positioned to provide, is to be welcomed.

Analogy of the Day

Author Julian Barnes in Talking It Over, likening life to invading Russia:

"A blitz start, massed shakos, plumes dancing like a flustered henhouse; a period of svelte progress recorded in ebullient despatches as the enemy falls back.

"Then the beginning of a long morale-sapping trudge with rations getting shorter and the first snowflakes on your face."

Update: it has now become clear to me that this is an equally appropriate analogy for maintaining a blog.

Not a Shock

I'm knee deep in crime stats for a work thing at the moment and the British Crime Survey 2005/6 contains this gem:

"People who read national tabloids were around twice as likely as readers of national broadsheets to worry about all crime types (BCS 2005/06)."

Scenes of a Legendary Nature

Just in case you don't follow my instuctions as a matter of course, this here video should provide you with incontrovertible proof of Mr Simon's scriptwriting genius. One day I'll learn how to embed videos on the actual blog, but not today.

Pawnography

As it does every year, the Guardian is currently laying on the hype for the Hay Festival, in Hay-on-Wye, which starts tomorrow and goes on for a crushing 10 days. I say crushing, but it's actually great, assuming you're as middle class as I am.

Anyway, I mention this because it gives me an opportunity to wank over their star speaker, David Simon, who's interviewed today in, you guessed it, the Guardian. It's quite interesting. Have a read.

The man is pretty close to deity status for me, though, I will admit, he does have some slightly irritating character traits, such as preachy moralism and the inevitable bloated ego that comes from producing the greatest show in the history of television. I speak, of course, of The Wire, about which, if you've seen it, you almost certainly already agree with me, and if you haven't, that you're almost certainly sick of hearing about from cheap pimps like me. I wouldn't blame you if you never wanted to see it, so much do its cheerleaders, er, cheer for it. I wouldn't blame you, but you'd still be making a horrible mistake. It's the best show in the history of television, for David Simon's sake, are you really too busy for that?

Notes on Moats

So, "honourable" members of all parties have been on the fiddle, much as journalists, bankers, writers, lawyers and pretty much all the rest of us have done on occasion. The point, that MPs hardly have a monopoly on low-level cheating, was made last week by Stephen Fry in a Newsnight interview. This is very true, but, for me, is wide of the mark. MPs' gaming of expenses is quite different from that perpetrated by the above for one reason: the money is ours.

I really, really don't want to come over all Taxpayers' Alliance on you, but the fact remains that nobody volunteered their money to HMRC (even if some/most of them tacitly approved), so we're entitled to some say on, or at least interest in, what happens to it. Regrettably, I don't own a newspaper, so I'm not entitled to fuss about journalists' expenses claims in the same way. Those claiming public money are manifestly distinct from those on private teats, about whom I don't give a shit, basically. MPs are paid for by us and, therefore, are answerable to us. I simply demand a moat in compensation.

B'more, Jo'burg...Holby?

I'm still waiting for somebody to tell me this is some kind of sick joke...

Hush, Speaker

So, the poor ol' Speaker is no more (or will be as soon as he resigns/retires later today).

I've got to say, I feel for the man. Maybe his response to the current expenses scandal wasn't ideal (he was more angry about the leak that led to the scandal than the actual abuse of expenses); maybe he's too much of a "shop steward" for MPs and the status quo in the House; maybe he's not a fantastic Speaker; I don't really know, though it certainly looks like a tough job to me.

All that being said, though, it's hard to resist the conclusion that he's been scapegoated here. Also, the Tories have been after him for months, well before the expenses story broke. I'm always fascinated by the way that current events, whatever they may be, only serve to re-inforce peoples' existing views. Thus, David Cameron thinks the expenses scandal demands a General Election (to restore the public's faith in the House, you understand, not because the Tories think they would win), Polly Toynbee thinks that the only thing that can save "our" politics now is constitutional reform along the lines of an elected House of Lords, limiting party funding and, her personal obsession, introducing proportional representation for the House of Commons. Nick Clegg thinks some things too, but you, I and John Snow stopped listening at that point.

I'm going to come back to the whole MPs' expenses thang later, so don't change your dial.

Birthing a Blog

Well, that was pretty bloody simple. They (Blogger) really have made the miracle of creation a painless one. According to scripture, though, I'm entitled to a day's rest. Sweeet.

Recklessly ignoring whoever the hell it was that wrote Genesis, though, let me witter aimlessly in your general direction about what I intend this blog to be about:

...Alright, so I have no actual plans. Neither, for what it's worth, do I have any real areas of expertise, interest or, well, ability. I do quite enjoy writing, though, so I vaguely hope to just babble on about whatever interests me on any particular day. This is most defintely going to work, oh yes.

It's highly likely, though, that my witterings will be based in some loose sense around politics, society, culture and the arts (broad enough for you, hmm?), comedy and food, cos these are the things what come closest to animating me. I'm also into football, but I'm going to try not to talk about that too much, for fear of the blog descending into ill-informed and interminable tactical waffle and circular argument (all my own). This is not, however, a promise.

I'd be really impressed with myself if I managed to post once a day, but a little self-knowledge is a useful thing, so we'll bloody see.

Finally, I will make no efforts whatsoever to avoid profanity and/or obscenity, so don't effing petition me otherwise.

Actually finally, welcome and enjoy.