A force for good, or good business.

We may assume that the world is enhanced by the interweb, its works and pomps. Indeed, you would have to be a complete Luddite not to admit considerable benefit to Messers All and Sundry from the beast itself.

An article by Eli Pariser, the author of The Filter Bubble, in The Observer, Sunday 12 June 2011 questions the universal benefits of the web.

In an extract from The Filter Bubble he writes

An invisible revolution has taken place is the way we use the net, but the increasing personalisation of information by search engines such as Google threatens to limit our access to information and enclose us in a self-reinforcing world view.

A great danger to be aware of. The article argues further:-

In Bowling Alone, his book on the decline of civic life in America, Robert Putnam looked at the problem of the major decrease in "social capital" – the bonds of trust and allegiance that encourage people to do each other favours, work together to solve common problems, and collaborate. Putnam identified two kinds of social capital: there's the in-group-oriented "bonding" capital created when you attend a meeting of your college alumni, and then there's "bridging" capital, which is created at an event like a town meeting when people from lots of different backgrounds come together to meet each other. Bridging capital is potent: build more of it, and you're more likely to be able to find that next job or an investor for your small business, because it allows you to tap into lots of different networks for help.

Everybody expected the internet to be a huge source of bridging capital. Writing at the height of the dotcom bubble, Tom Friedman declared that the internet would "make us all next-door neighbours". In fact, this idea was the core of his thesis in The Lexus and the Olive Tree: "The internet is going to be like a huge vice that takes the globalisation system … and keeps tightening and tightening that system around everyone, in ways that will only make the world smaller and smaller and faster and faster with each passing day."

Friedman seemed to have in mind a kind of global village in which kids in Africa and executives in New York would build a community together. But that's not what's happening: our virtual neighbours look more and more like our real-world neighbours and our real-world neighbours look more and more like us. We're getting a lot of bonding but very little bridging. And this is important because it's bridging that creates our sense of the "public" – the space where we address the problems that transcend our narrow self-interests.

The Big Society is currently being wheeled out as a producer and reservoir of social capital. Of course, cynically, it is a method to avoid investing real capital and providing revenue to run necessary services. Many vital services cannot be provided efficiently or effectively by volunteerism alone. Believe me I'm a volunteer. However, the model being put forward by the government is almost exclusively "bonding" social capital. My group, society or coop does not include you for whatever reason and so you will only benefit if we let you. As Pariser notes, we need more "bridging" social capital, we need to build the public and the civic domains as well as tending our own, Big Society, cabbage patch.

Hey, be careful when you Google out there!

Why do we hate all bankers?

Interview with Muhammad Yunus who has been required to step down from his position as managing director at Grameen bank. The interesting question is why?
Of all the bankers, in all the countries, in all the world, why pick on this guy?

Suggestions of other bankers with appropriate punishments should be sent on a post card to
Sheikh Hasina c/o the Bangladeshi government.

Two Wheels Good?

Its not quite as simple as that, as always.
As an ex cyclist of many years standing (that's many years riding, not standing and I haven't used a bicycle in anger for ... That's enough already... Ed.) I thought the guy in this video had guts and knew how to use new media! Enjoy the tumbles but also read the Grauniad article.

Poor Kids

BBC 1 broadcast a programme last night with the title Poor Kids.
You may have missed it, you may have chosen to miss it.
It is here for the next 7 days.

Jezza Neumann, the director, has blogged about it here.

The programme presents the reality for many of the 3.5 million children living in poverty in the UK in their own words. I know it pales set against the poverty and horror of the lives of children around the world.

We live in this country, we have the vote, we consume, we are part of civic society. We can do something! If we do not, the ghosts of these children and their stories will come back to haunt us in our unquiet graves and be a shadow on our children and their lives.

At one point Sam is asked about food, going without, and hunger when there is no dinner (lunch in Islington). He replies with bright eyed, proud, honesty that he has learned to save up his hunger!

There's prudence.

Memories are made of this

We take memory for granted, never missing the water until the well runs dry. It carries us on a continuous, conscious journey providing holiday snaps. There may be gaps, the vision may be darker, fainter, further away, faulty. It may be fast failing but, unless we are unfortunate, it never seems to fail catastrophically and permanently. What if it did?
We refuse to believe it could. There would always be a part of us that knew we preferred red to white wine, did not take sugar in our tea and hated country music! Would we?

The novel, Before I Go To Sleep, by S J Watson explores this.

It takes an extreme form of amnesia, the inability to retain memories from day to day, and makes it the central plank of a thriller, a real cracker. It explores our ideas of permanence of memory and identity and how they could be undermined fatally. If they were, what would that mean for our independence and sanity? The situation of the amnesiac in the novel creates the psychological equivalent of the murder in a locked room. How can I trust other people, their versions of reality and even myself if I cannot bring my own tenuous recollections of yesterday and before to bear on them?

Now where did I put my glasses?

The Bees Knees

I am sat at my computer listening to Late Junction for 2/6/11 on the iPlayer. Nils Henrik Asheim / Gjertrud's Gypsy Orchestra are playing — Chopin: Mazurka Op. 68 No. 2 in A minor. (Mazurka: Remaking Chopin, LAWO LWC1016.) The sun is shining through the blind and the 'bees', which have squatted under our eaves, are dancing in the sun casting their small shadows on the blind.

The Information

SCL librarians have, yet again, delivered a book for me to my local library, only 2 miles away. (Note to SCC -If you close it my carbon footprint will increase as I will have to go the extra six miles to the next one. There is no suitable public transport. You will argue, of course, that I could be served by a mobile library bus with a big satellite dish on the top for direct links to Langley. Up to a point councillor Copper. It will visit our humble homesteads once every Preston Guild and, given our ages, physical and mental states, is likely to be pursued throughout the county by packs of infirm, forgetful old folk. A bit like the old rag and bone carts being pursued by dogs.) I digress.

The Information by James Gleick is a book I would recommend. I think he does a good job as it says on the tin/book moving from the history, the theory and pointing out the flood of information. Though, given the political dimension and scale of the subject it has been subject to criticism; sins of omission, possibly.

The jacket describes him as the author of Chaos! (Wouldn’t some of us love to be the author of chaos.) I enjoyed that one too!

Perhaps you could order it from your local library?

The Other Island

Along with all the hype about Brenda going over the water but refusing the Guinness is a thoughtful piece(aren't they all) by Fintan O'Toole dated 23 May 2011 in openDemocracy.

Ireland and Britain: ends and beginnings

The other Island may have its, economic, troubles. I'm glad to see that they have not lost the wet and dry humour that nearly had Parnell's eye out.

The lack of reverence was obvious in the humour that was threaded through the week. There was the suggestion from an Irish Times letter-writer that making the queen sit through Westlife meant that we could call it quits for 800 years of oppression. Within an hour of the royal visit to Croker, people were showing each other texts and emails sent by an anonymous Louth GAA spokesman complaining that “at the site of the single greatest injustice in our history, to invite those responsible back to the scene of the crime is galling”. The target was the Meath forward Joe Sheridan, who was there to meet the queen and who scored an infamous “goal” to deprive Louth of last year’s Leinster title.

Bogie Man

I settled into the office chair which filed its usual complaint and I opened the bottom draw of my desk, my fist aid draw rather than a place for my trousseau. It contained a quart of bourbon and a few glasses that look as if they had been introduced to water but shortly after made their excuses and never returned. I poured a stiff one and tried it for size. It seemed remarkably fluid and a little small so I tried again. I pulled the phone towards me in case anyone rang. Nobody ever rings! I had the odd hour to kill. One, three, five, you get the picture. Things have been a little slack recently.

The latest LRB lay on my desk like the letter from a maiden aunt, without the cheque. I started to thumb through the pages. Not too many pictures and no sports section.
There was a piece by this broad called Diski. Seems someone was singing about a guy, Bogie, a real charmer. All the usual stuff; Hollywood, Cagney, Raft, and the broads, none of them from Norfolk, it was laid end to end by this canary Kanfer. Bogie made his dough, drank his scotch, and had his women. The last one, Bacall, was a real piece of work, classy. I ploughed on with the story and the bourbon. Seems like she wasn't the last one, she was beaten to the drawers by Verita, the hairdresser. He must have liked her style a lot, Verita! By this time the bottle was nearly done and so was I. The last sentence...

"Then again it might shake your world more to learn that Bogie…"

It stopped. I looked for what I might learn about this Bogie guy on the next page and the next. Nada! Back and forth through the paper, like a hop-head looking to score, but still I found nada. By the time I got to the funny ads by funny people, and I mean funny, it was over. I had been suckered by this Diski broad.

I hung around a club where I guessed she might take the waters. Sure enough, there she was, pretty as a picture but non too steady heading towards me on the sidewalk. I always come to the assistance of a damsel in distress and high heels. I took her arm and steered her into the alleyway.
"OK Sister, shake my world. Tell me the last thing I need to know about Bogie?"

She smiled and tried to kiss me. I asked her again but she was partying with the fairies somewhere and I wasn't going to get a look in. I'm no angel but I am not the guy to slap a broad around. I put her in a cab, gave the driver a twenty and told him to pour her home, gently.

So my desk is as empty as before, my calendar has spare dates, if you are interested, and the telephone is a silent as brick in a bucket of water. I reached down to reacquaint myself with the liquid trousseau. The post comes through the office door. I thumb through the bills and there at the bottom of the pile is the latest LRB. Do I want to be suckered again? No, but I need to know. I may be a man with a thirst but sometimes that thirst is not just for bourbon. I turned the pages. There it was - the remaining part of the sentence - three little words...

...wore a wig!

Would you look at that? Bogie had a syrup, no wonder he was sweet on Verita.

What can you do?

When I read a story like this piece in the Grauniad I almost despair.
The horrors, even if only half of it is correct, are beyond comprehension.
The Laogai is as much a stain on our humanity, collectively and personally, as the Gulags, the Holocaust and the casual genocide we have visited upon humanity from time to time.
We can't say we don't know. That lame excuse is no longer available to any human being.
We can only choose to ignore.
Never again we said. We were wrong.

Life has given us so much we owe it to the human spirit we all share to object, condemn and organise.

Ding Dong Mr Bell

I am reliably informed by that paper of recrod and journle of note, The Grauniad, that a certain Mr Bell has passed the 'Age of the Bus Pass'. God bless you sir. A quote -

What I craved was a job where I could shut myself in a room and talk to myself, sometimes very loudly and in a variety of accents.

Don't we all! However, Steve has used that to eviscerate the egos of people who would have been better off being placed in the charge of a large and sympathetic character who was able to listen attentively, supply tea, lashings of tea, and a firm, restraining, hand when their charges tried to enter the real world!

Here's to another 60 and may no politician or gombeen man feel safe from your pen!

Priesting

The day I was due to be electrocuted (therapeutic not judicial, even Suffolk is not that right wing) I had a late reprieve! The powers that be judged I had regained my wonderful sense of rhythm and the future for me lay in drugs not electrification. I am nothing if not a pathfinder for my country.
My own view is that the NHS had run out of shillings for the lecky meter and needed a few bob prior to privatisation, however, we will let that go.

Given that we were not doing anything else, Lady BP and yours truly went off to the local wildlife trust. A lovely day and glad to be electrically neutral we wandered thither and yon looking for a kingfisher or two (Ed... you're getting carried away and besides this blog can not afford more than one kingfisher at a time!)

In one of the hides we spotted a heron, priesting, as we say along with Dylan; Thomas that is not Bob. A completely different kettle of herring. ( Ed... Jesus, let's do the artwork and get out of here back to the asylum before you are locked out. )

Snapped on the old Magi-Phone, not very good, but you can see, surely, the blatant levitical posturing of the bird in the centre

Spanish Revolutions

Just when you thought you had got to grips with the last one along comes another
#SpanishRevolution!

Very excitable, foreigners, but as rubber man Cameroon and Gideon are always banging on about it, we are all in this together. I think that is what El Pueblo Unido Jamas Sera Vencido means in English. Can't think where I have heard that before. One of the perils of long life Dave, a view!

If you are perplexed it may help to read an article about Understanding ‘Spanishrevolution’
by Pedro Silverio Moreno in openDemocracy.

Then again, it may not! I think I'll just sit down now while someone phones for the Cruz Rioja!

Fun

World Peace and Justice have long been, I think, modest objectives for my considerable talents.
As you may have noticed, I have experienced a few setbacks recently.
I could be going about this the wrong way.

In order to persuade people to invest trust and commit to the building of social capital perhaps we should adopt the change through fun agenda.

What do we want? Fun!
When do we want it? By 16:00 hrs and our position is not negotiable!

If it don't work, neither do I and at least we've had some.....
You got it.
Amen

Big Numbers

The Wall Street Journal has an article

The Really Smart Phone by Robert Lee Hotz

(Linked from the Grauniad)

Many interesting statements:-

Today, almost three-quarters of the world's people carry a wireless phone.

Splutter as muesli goes out of mouth in explosive spray - big numbers!

My good friend Mr Wikipedia would make that an estimated population, world for the use of, 7 billion and change - give or take. Three quarters of that number gives you about 5.25 billion and change - give or take. (Ed... Yes, yes we all know you had the benefits of a catholic and a scientific education.) The WSJ probably checks the odd fact or two. However, here at BP Towers, we have the latest supercomputer fact checking department and our staunch friend Mr Wikipedia. According to the man there are an estimated 4.6 billion mobile phone subscribers ( not handsets.) Not so far out but still big numbers and when they are potentially linked in a network the mind bogoggles!

The article has other points to make; minor questions of identifying location, 'privacy' and predicting behaviour. You can read for yourself.

The following did catch my mental funny bone

Perhaps less surprisingly, people are happiest when they are making love and most miserable when sick in bed. The most despondent place in the U.K. is an hour or so west of London, in a town called Slough.

Didn't someone write a poem about that once, Slough, bombs, despond! Rings a bell.

Being Wrong.

Mr Murphy has had some problems with his blog and in a Freudian moment described this as
big BT problems today.
He claims
I meant to say IT problems
but then sees the potential wisdom of his mistake.

A comment suggests this could be described as a Freudian Blip.

However, I think it's a Spoonerian Bong Wryte.
Just a thought!

Tax Research is good stuff.
Get your mice clicking and your keyboards rattling to demand principle based tax payments and tax justice from your MP and this miserable bunch of looters and gombeen men we call the government!

T' Urns Wormed

Didn't old Salmo Salmar do well.
Keith's mum thinks that he is worth a snog and a cuddle.
Given he is such a slippery character I hope he makes Rubber Man Cameroon's life slow hell.
(Sour grapes and wishful thinking... Ed)
Talking about Rubber Man and Gideon the word on the street is they are now brilliant strategists. Hmm... a few bob from the men in Bermuda Shorts (Oh even I can't believe I said that) must have helped.
I found that I had to indicate on my ballot in the local elections that I was spoilt for choice.
Seems to have produced a few chuckles.

Is there a progressive majority?
Not sure.
If the Jocks go their own way eventually, and good luck to them, what will be left?
Depressing thoughts over.
Just been listening to Tamikrest — Ayitma Madjam - Toumastin
Not that I understand the words but my informant, a Ms Kothari of the British Broadcasting Corporation, assures me that it contains a positive message.

Having finished off The Man from Beijing my staunch pals at the Local Library have provided Being Wrong for my delight and delectation.

It seems the pheasants of Suffolk, having risen up as one person with their hammers and sickles, have saved our local library, banished the wicked Witch of the East, and ensured that world peace and justice are just around the corner.

Being wrong, yes I'm looking forward to that!

Later, on Page 84, a group of individuals with little or no knowledge or expertise discussing theoretical physics:-

In fact, we could far more aptly have have been called shoestring theorists: virtuosos of developing elaborate hypotheses based on vanishingly small amounts of information.

I like that.

Red Kites in the Sunrise

Slo Mo to take your breath away.

We used to watch these birds with endless fascination in Cantabria.
Little did we know!

Thanks to the Grauniad for the Link

Where we went on our holidays

Anyone drawing conclusions about the state of the nation from this photo could be seriously wrong. It has been booked by a young couple for their honeymoon!

By their names ye shall know them

The Beeb reports

Earlier this month ministers announced a "listening exercise" to review their NHS reforms for England amid mounting criticism.

Critics have dismissed the two-month consultation as a PR stunt.

But Sir Stephen Bubb, who will report for the review on choice and competition, says he is not "biddable".

I don't know Sir Stephen Bubble from Adam or Eve for that matter. I suspect he is a smoothie chops, an Oxford man, who can be relied upon to give the appearance of not rocking the boat with all the finesse of rocking a babbie's cradle.

As Tommy Beecham might have said:-

Very singular Mr Bubb, very singular!

Guerrillas in the midst

So. (have you noticed the penchant for scientific, techie or technical persons to start an explanation with - So? (So. What is that word penchant doing here?... Ed.))
I know it is Holy Week and all good Christians are supposed to be po-faced. Live a little!
A post from Mr Shaxson's excellent website Treasure Islands should give persons of good heart a small lift and the linked video a sliver of hope for the future. If not then listen to the music. Nice one!
And now a word to our sponsors:-

Pay your taxes you gouging gobs****s!

OK. Back to sackcloth and ashes.

( I'm still worried about that word penchant... Ed.)

Get it now!

Advertisement!
While it's good and hot, get it now!
Try before you buy - at Stormsteg
Then buy at http://www.stormsteg.nu/
A small sensation here.

Find more Stormsteg songs at Myspace Music

Full disclosure:-The author of this blog may be known to one or more of Stormsteg but he thinks it's great stuff.

So have you bought it yet?

Prepare to be moved - on!

Never mind what it is advertising! You won't remember anyway.

A very powerful message.

However, being a cynical old bugger if

- Ian Drunken Smith were to pass by he would add up the contents of the tin and deduct it from benefits;

- Gideon Osborne sauntered by he would issue a tax demand for undeclared income;

- Rubber Man Cameroon wheeled by he would give him a card, not in Braille, saying this document entitles you to 5 seconds of my most heartfelt sympathy and smile as the personal photographer captured the moment; of course one of his two man security detail would then retrieve the card after 4 seconds;

- St Vincent de Cable would praise the man for his enterprise and inquire if he had registered as a Soul Trader;

- Clarke the Lark would pad up to him in his hush puppies, blow cigar smoke in his face, and say

"Right. Blind Lemon McTavish, you're nicked!"

Thanks to Mr Murphy for the link.

It's that time of year.

Being deeply conservative, I have made few changes to this blog over the years. However, increasing exasperation and fury with those whose greed causes such suffering and disconnection in the world. I have included Mr Murphy's excellent blog Tax Research UK in my blogroll, or list of links to the right of this post. Let us be thankful for small Murphys as I'm sure his mum has cause to say!

If you are at a loss for what to do on the 29th April; lock yourself in a room with lashings of tea or whatever your poison is; read, mark and inwardly digest Treasure Islands.

Short Supply

John Julius Norwich caught my ear recently reading from his book The Popes. I can't claim to have read it and I'm sure the extract on Radio 4 did not do it justice. Nevertheless, a claim from John Paul 1 touched my funny bone. On page 445 he is quoted (without source) speaking of the Vatican:-

Also , I have noticed two things that appear to be in very short supply: honesty and a good cup of coffee.

Always difficult that- a good cup of coffee!

Library Card or Credit Card?

Not a rant in my usual style about how evil capitalists are out to destroy public libraries, eat babies and be cruel to children and other small animals; they are but that is a story told well enough elsewhere.

Instead a real spirit lifter. Karen claims in a post on the Voices For the Library website.

My library card is probably as valuable as a credit card.

If you don't believe her have a look. Now I bet you didn't know librarians did that sort of thing or provided those sorts of services.

'Right on the bubble' (as Primo Levi said: P48, The Wrench, borrowed from Suffolk County Libraries, god bless 'em)

Voices For the Library looks like a very well organised and presented campaign.
If I was Gauleiter Pickles I would be afraid, very afraid. Once the librarians are agin you,

yer doomt, doomt I telt yer.

He will become a minor misspelt footnote in the political history of the early part of this century.

Those words again.

I came across the word theodicy in a review in the LRB (31/3/11, Lord Have Mercy , James Shapiro) of Plague Writing in Early Modern England, by Earnest Gilman. (Smart boy wanted! ...Ed.) In my defence I had never knowingly seen it before and so blundled on for a few paragraphs happy in the belief that the word indicated the idiocy of those who believe in god. Whether by divine intervention or a passing acquaintance with my own limitations the niggle started that I had not quite got that right.
As always, in a spirit of humble scholarship I consulted with my good friends Mr Collins

the branch of theology concerned with defending the attributes of God against objections resulting from physical and moral evil

and Mr Chambers

a vindication of the justice of God in establishing a world in which evil exists.

Ooops. I've done it again.

Even the canting folk of Oxford and Messers Stewart, Coleridge and White quoted in the OED offered me no mercy

...vindication of the divine attributes, esp. justice and holiness, in respect to the existence of evil; a writing, doctrine, or theory intended to ‘justify the ways of God to men’.

So nailed with the wrong word for the right reason!

I blogged previously about teaching with Terry Burke many years ago in a Salford secondary modern school. He asked a small child, weren't they all, what he thought a theodolite was. Despite it being a science lesson and dealing with measurement, surveying instruments etc. and being shown a picture of the bloody thing, the child demonstrated the benefits of a good catholic education.

An instrument for measuring God

He intoned.
Amen!!

Watcha!

The wonderful Lopa Kothari had some lovely stuff for us last night on World on 3, the unplugged studio session was amazing!

Watch Watcha here or thereabouts when the iPlayer fades as indeed it must and all good things turn to dust!

(Don't get carried away, just because it rhymes doesn't mean it's poetry! ...Ed.)

Good Havens!

Don't laugh at this ( re) post by Mr Murphy although it was 1 April some gombeen man is probably working out the details, even as we chortle.

Remember! In Space no one can hear you scream, with delight. Greed is the creed.

Tom Hunter

The Essay on Radio 3 had a 15 minute slot from Tom Hunter who lives and works in Hackney.
If that link is removed link to his website and the photo below!

Woman Reading Possession Order

I'm very cooperative

This month, as an email from ABCUL reminded me, sees the 250th anniversary of the founding of the Fenwick Weavers Society. It is claimed that this is the first known co-operative in the world for which full records are held. Which could put the collective noses of the Rochdale Pioneers out of joint by 84 years, if such things mattered. The residents of Toad Lane have traditionally considered themselves the first among equals.

An interesting article in the Grauniad concerning the Big Society in the Basque Country (Euskadi). Great stuff but not without its problems as the last three paragraphs outline.

Mondragón's utopian ideal, however, is tempered by the fact that only half of staff are co-op members and their vote decides the future of the other 50%. The result is a two-tier system.
During the recession it was non-member staff who suffered, losing jobs as temporary contracts were not renewed. None of its foreign divisions have become co-ops, stymied by a lack of profits and trade unions abroad suspicious of worker ownership.
Carlos Fernández Isoird, a former manager who left to set up social enterprises, says Mondragón is too large, too multinational and too capitalist in outlook: "Mondragón stopped forming co-ops years ago. They have 6,000 workers in China and just opened two factories in India. Tell me when will a Chinese get to be president of Mondragón?"

Ah yes membership, equality and globalisation!

What would a network of cooperatives, mutuals, non-profits etc. look like? Hmmm...

Once upon time in a London Borough far, far away a young lad was enchanted listening to the tale told by a colleague of some considerable experience. On a visit to explore the, architectural, wonders of Bordeaux he fell in with a wine coop which had celebrated its 100th anniversary. The way they had chosen to do this was by bottling an anniversary wine with the label Chateau Rochdale in honour of our friends in Toad Lane!

Let me know if you find a bottle and how good it was!

El Norte

I was delighted with this post by Nicholas Carr which links to a series of photos by Sebastian Schutyser of the Ermitas of Northern Spain. Schutyser gives a brief but fascinating account of the series in Carr's blog.
We spent some time here and it really is that interesting and delightful. We blunbled on so much that has stayed with us and sustained us. The shot below is of a small but perfectly formed church in a village near where we lived in the magic valley.

These are copies of copies. See the real thing!

Warning! These locations contain peace and beauty!

Out of the Mouths of Bankers and Sucklings

A bright spring morn. To the local flea pit for a screening of the film.
Inside Job. Yes, we all know the origins of our current shortage of the old readies. We know our CDOs from our CDSs. We know the perfidy of Lehman and others, the Gargantua of investment banking and the beggaring of a number of countries by Merchants of Greed. (MoGs)

It was good to see it set out so clearly and unequivocally with mug shots of the players Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke & Timothy Geithner, for example. Whatever happened to them?
Christine Lagarde calling him Honk Paulson, Glenn Hubbard caught in the headlights like a rabbit; it's all good clean fun!

We should not forget what these people did and the effect they will have on the lives of those that are not able to deal with it! But we will, we will.

The director, Charles Ferguson, was asked in October 2010 what the most important lesson in his film was:-

"Oh that's simple. That finance is too important to be left to the financiers."

The MoGs are still out there sucking.

Passing through the graveyard.

I thought it was a memorial to a Victorian balladeer with a weakness for triple alliteration. However, it is a sad tale of bankruptcy, penury and writing dreadful novels to bring the pennies in. The memorial stone gets seven hits on flickr. If I don’t mention his name he will sink into obscurity in this blog! Now there’s a thought. Sic transit gloria mundi.

How do you make a phlebotomist laugh?

I regularly visit the blood testing department at our local hospital.
Phlebotomists are usually very professional, more competent than doctors at drawing blood and probably have to put up with their fair share of rotten jokes about vampires and armfuls. Maybe as a consequence they all seem to have a dour expression permanently attached. I have been thinking of awarding myself a few points if I could raise a smile from the phlebotomist.
My chance came today. I was ushered into the cubical asked to take a seat and as a precaution (Know your customer) required to give my name, address and date of birth. I complied. After this I was required to give the current dose of Warfarin that I was taking.

"4mg during the week and 5mg at the weekend. Party time!"

A smile, a chuckle and then back to sooking the lemon pan drops.

And Another One Bites the Dust

Lovely day for it.




Beccles 19/3/2011

Out of the Mouths of Chartered Accountants

I wish I was young and healthy enough to participate on March 26th. I would enjoy the carnival spirit, especially as it is Lent. There is no substitute for the joining together of honest men, women and children in whatever numbers to raise their voices to call for peace and justice and to speak truth to power. We stereotype, we discriminate, we exclude and we judge where we should be judged. We can also unite, cooperate, demonstrate that we share a common humanity, up to a point, even with accountants. Mr Murphy's excellent Blog, Tax Research UK hits the 2 inch wire lost head on its apex as usual!

I shall expect to see rubberman Cameron, Gideon, and St Vincent de Cable at the march, proudly bearing a placard with the legend - Cabinet Members Against the Cuts. The Claggster will be spending more time with his family, of course.

It is very tempting. If you see a doddery old codger underneath a sign :-

Buddhist Pizza :- Accept no Cuts or Substitutes

you will know I have succumbed to irrational exuberance.

The Discrete Charm of the Embussed

I can't spell for toffee but I had a chuckle at the Beeb's report on The Cunning
Plan of Her Britannic Majesty's Metropolitan Police Force (or violence as we called it back in the day)
It is reported that The Met police briefing document advises

Avoid hasty actions or taking the bait - this will require nerve, discretion and discipline.

and when waiting around in police vans:

If drinking coffee or reading the paper when embussed (sic), please be discrete (sic).

Oh lordy, lordy Friday already an we hent paid the rent.

Still good to know the lads were paid a decent wage for their discrete embussment, coffee and papers provided!

A Tax on all of us.

As the end of the financial year draws nigh at Buddhist Pizza Inc. we have considered various salaries, payments, emoluments, bonuses and other matters of remuneration. The year has not been without its challenges and the modest profit of 4 trillion dollars has only been achieved through the tried and tested methods that have stood the financial services industry in such good stead for many years. Through the good offices and endeavours of our accountants, Messrs Bent, Filchit, Haven and Transfer-Pricing, we will pay tax of some 2,000 dollars to the government of the Cayenne Islands, where we are incorporated and have our magnificent headquarters alongside Fast Willy’s Chicken Diner. It is only fitting that we accept our corporate social responsibility and contribute to the economy of the Cayenne Islands. As a gesture of good will over and above this we will pay for a re-spray on Fast Willy’s van, in our corporate colours of course. Waste receptacles will also be provided to assist with the conservation of the environment and to reduce expenditure on rat poison. We expect, after dividend, professional services and other unavoidable costs, to be able to distribute 3.999 trillion dollars to board members and senior staff.

However, the way ahead is not without its dangers. My friends in the City of London have alerted me to moves by the great unwashed to force dynamic entrepreneurs, myself included, to pay more tax! I have created the magnificent wealth generating behemoth Buddhist Pizza Inc. as a contribution to humanity. It is my life’s work, it is my contribution to society. I have gained so little and given so much! What do they want now, blood? Oh no they want to:-

Pursue transparency,

Prioritise the needs of developing countries,

Abolish the City of London Corporation,

Reform onshore taxation,

Tackle the intermediaries and private users of offshore vehicles,

Reform the financial sector.

My god!

(see Treasure Islands – Tax havens and the men who stole the world. Nicholas Shaxson)

There are men like John Christensen biting the hand that is trying to take food from your table. I must confess that I had to sit down with a very stiff drink (40 year old Glen Trust – 2,000 sovs. a bottle) when I saw the anti-wealth pornography at Mr Murphy’s site.

I couldn’t finish watching it all. I had to finish the bottle instead.

So I say to Mr Cameron:- Stand firm rubber man!

And to Gideon:- Don’t be lily livered, live up to your name; cut, cut and cut again!

St Vincent De Cable remember:- the poor will always be with us, who else are we going to tax?

Dig This

I always wanted a Swiss Army Knife, the one with a thing for getting boy scouts out of horses hooves. Well the PLA have come up with something better, much better! If you are one of those people who like to call a spade a spade Dig This It's worth taking a few minutes out of a busy day for the soundtrack alone.

Just the thing for getting out of the Laogai, no political prisoner should be without one.

Thanks to her outdoors and FSC for this

Leslie 1941 - 2011

Your voice echoed the dreaming spires
Your face the folk of the four corners
Your companion Listening Woman
Your burial a bone pointed to a blue sky

In the midst of death there is farce.

I have been reading, thanks to the NYT, the ideas of Gene Sharp in From Dictatorship to Democracy which is available as a free download.

Well someone has to start thinking strategically about the downfall of rubber man, the clagster and coalition forces! It also fits in with ideas about how to encourage slow politics.

It is somewhat unnerving that the world changes so quickly and leaves so many with their trousers round their ankles (Mr Blair endlessly snogging the green and latterly brown tyrant) It is also unbelievable that more have not been killed though no doubt there will be deaths untold and horrors that we will not (and some will not wish to) know about.

A lighter, farcical, note was provided by Robert Fiske reporting in the Indie

It now emerges, thanks to a genuine old-fashioned scoop in Le Monde, that President Ben Ali didn't really intend to flee his country at all. He planned to fly his immediate family to safety in Riyadh and then return to Tunis next morning to continue his reign. Only when the Tunisair crew arrived in Saudi Arabia and saw al-Jazeera in the airport's VIP lounge, announcing Ben Ali's overthrow, did they call Tunis and receive a new flight plan to take off at 1.30am the following day. They discreetly flew away while the President slept, leaving the dictator planeless in Riyadh.

Worthy of Boot of the Beast.

I wonder what the world will be like at $200 per barrel. I can’t see that level of power being wasted on democracy. As evidence m’lud I cite a certain Mr Put In. Tovarish of this parish and one time member of the organs of state security. He has achieved a such a lot on $100 a barrel!

Happy Birthday 2

Further to our recent post:-

If you want to see what the other buggers look like, mugshots here.

Most of them thrown out of the Securitate for cruelty!

Happy Solving.

Tax Matters

(In the voice of E L Whisty)

Dear Gideon,
I hope you forgive the familiarity of my calling you that but since your hands have been all over my assets I feel a certain closeness. I am writing to you because I would like to pay my income tax at the same rate as a certain Mr Barclay who owns a bank in these parts. If I am to believe a report in the Grauniad newspaper today he is charged a very reasonable 1 %. I took the liberty, recently, of submitting a tax return to you in which I calculated that my income attracted a much higher rate and that even after this I still owed Her Delightful Majesty's Revenue and Customs Service 35p.

I am an old man surviving, for want of a better word, on a small pension. I have to use the local library (due for closure) for books which I cannot afford to buy. I try to get out now and then to places like Thetford Forest (rescued from privatisation, for the time being) but the local public transport is appalling and the kindly folk at Suffolk County Council are restricting the use I make of my travel card.

I know you think I shouldn't complain. I live in a peaceful country free from nuclear attack and screaming jihadis. A land of plenty of litter where pit bulls and rottweilers roam free.

If you could see your way to a 1% tax on my meagre income I would be very grateful and would see you alright, if you know what I mean. I don't want to be too explicit in case I get you into trouble, but expect a plain brown envelope to arrive any day soon.

I look forward to hearing from Her Delightful Majesty's Revenue and Customs Service in due course and if you could forget the 35p we can call it quits.

Yours and Oblige,

Lord Buddhist Pizza
c/o Barclays Bank
Cayman Islands.

Bumblebee Lectures

We sat, yesterday evening, entranced and moved by the elegant and eloquent defence of the rights of children given by Michael Morpurgo in the 35th Dimbleby Lecture. It was more though. It made the case passionately for books and libraries and the space for children to grow and learn and develop. The iPlayer link is here and I will update that if there is a permanent record after 7 days.

I didn't notice any members of the cabinet in the audience. I'm sure if they were and were tackled about the issues raised they would only have shaken their wise heads and said:-

Yes I know, terrible isn't it? I blame the last government!

Come on Dave. We want a society that is big enough to cherish and nurture all its children as a priority!

Happy Birthday!

It's good after the start of a year with so much death to be able to celebrate a bit of life.
Araucaria is 90 today; a very, very happy birthday you old bugger!

That may seem a strange thing to say about someone who I have never met and would not recognise if I tripped over him in the street. However, he has provided me, and doubtless many others, with some rare moments of pleasure, frustration, confusion and satisfaction. He is a great distraction and consolation when dealing with the NHS and other bureaucracies.

An affectionate tribute here by Simon Hoggart in the Grauniad, and even an editorial, I'm impressed.

Roll on 91 I say, that's over a hundred more crosswords.

Certainty

We are all willing to talk about taxes some of us have very strong opinions and are not unwilling to share them. Death is, as they say, an entirely different kettle of herring.

I attended the death of a much loved family member. It brought sadness, tears and the recognition at the end of the process that the person was no longer there and would be no more. The consolation, if any existed, was that the death was dignified, peaceful and by all the evidence without pain. Since I had been there I felt a duty to report this to members of the family as appropriately as I could. I hope it was part of the process of grieving and life for us. One appeared very grateful for this, wanting to know but not knowing how to ask.

My own experience of the dead started early in life. In death my family were laid out in an open coffin in our front room (a 2 up 2 down slum) in Salford. Family, friends and neighbours would visit to view the body, pray and, of course, take tea. The corpse would remain with us overnight before the funeral and burial. I knew what the dying and the dead were like. I have avoided a fear of dead bodies but I am sure will piss and panic at my own death if I am conscious.

Different traditions exist in different communities. I read an article in the NYT by Ben Daitz about attempts to enable the Diné to speak of death and the dead. While it is necessary to discuss these from the perspective of care and near death provision the Diné religion and tradition makes this very difficult if not impossible. It was reported that one way to ease this process was to read the poem below with those affected.

When that time comes,
When my last breath leaves me,
I choose to die in peace
To meet Shi’dy’in

Metonymy

Metonymy flashed up on the old peepers recently and, as a word that I was not familiar with, was cause for investigation and reflection. There is a very good example by Elif Batuman in a recent blog. I don’t think I will forget the link between Ajda – Pekhan or tea glass and the meaning of metonymy.

Mr Collins has a much less vibrant description in his excellent book of words

the substitution of a word referring to an attribute for the thing that is meant, as for example the use of the crown to refer to a monarch

However, I was instructed at the end of this definition to - compare synecdoche!

You can not go around giving orders like that to a young lad without there being consequences. I confess I have wrestled with synecdoche almost as long as I have wrestled with the demon drink and sins of the flesh. I have used mortification of the body and spiritual exercises to cope with this word but it is no use. It has me defeated.

Mr Collins may briefly define it thus

a figure of speech in which a part is substituted for a whole or a whole for a part, as in 50 head of cattle for 50 cows, or the army for a soldier

and be back at the rashers and eggs in no time, washing it down with lashings of tea I’m sure, but I am destroyed. The little worm is there; the tautological quantum elusiveness of the smile on Schrödinger’s Cat:- a part is substituted for a whole or a whole for a part

I’m extirpated!

(Ed. There, there. Come and sit down and have a cup of tea. Do you want me to call your Mammy?)

Nobody Escapes the Spanish Audition.

I noticed the LRB has, in its series of Winter Lectures, one by Elif Batuman:-
Cervantes, Balzac and double-entry bookkeeping.

Now you know how something like that can set me off.

Wikipedia has it that

Cervantes worked as a purveyor for the Spanish Armada, and later as a tax collector. In 1597, discrepancies in his accounts of three years previous landed him in the Crown Jail of Seville.

So there I am with this picture in my head. Poor old Cervantes up against some hatchet faced cleric with a pencil moustache and goatee beard, his Gracious Majesty’s Auditor General.

So Miguelito, you say the Santa Pinyada sank with all hands and a fortune in gold bullion in the Irish Sea?

Yee.ss.

Just outside a port known by the heretic English as Liverpool, such disgusting names?

Yee.ss.

Then can you explain to me how a ship, a ship looking remarkably like the Santa Pinyada, was seen in a dry dock in this Liverpool having its name repainted as the New Brighton Ferry?

Can you further explain why a claim has been made by you on the insurance for the Santa Pinyada, loss with all hands and gold bullion, on the Armada No 1 Policy, at the Holy Catholic Insurance Society in Sevilla, (In God we trust and for the rest HCIS)? No, no explanation? Well I can only say how disappointed I am, deeply disappointed, and you do not want to disappoint the Spanish Audition!

Hit Me McTavish!

There may be those out there who feel we have had a surfeit of Scottish persons and Scottishness. New Year, the celebration of the Great Rabbi, Haggis, Salmo Salmar rubbing our noses in the fact that we are under a Coalition Yoke ( or is that a Tory Joke?). To those I offer these chaps, the Red Hot Chilli Pipers. I am listening to a session on the iPlayer, featuring them at Celtic Connections, 27/1/2011. If you can't get the iPlayer link in time, bash your ears here

Chasing Cars

3 pipers, and I love the title- chasing cars. Can't see Dave and Gideon pretending to do singalong. Normally I am happy to hear the pipes playing the Black Isle on a hillside somewhere. Sometimes you just have to let go!

Remind me again how many Westminster MPs represent Scottish constituencies or not as the case may be? Never mind the quantity feel the width!

Deer Management

An interesting post, as always, from Susan McCarthy. I love the title -

Act casual, act vegetarian!

I will be pulling the leg of my vegetarian friends and relations for some time about that.

There are other ways of dealing with the beasts, of course!

Nice One Philip

There is an article by Philip Pullman in Open Democracy Our Kingdom.
It concerns the proposed attack by the Coalition Forces on libraries.
As regular readers will know I too have a soft spot for libraries.
I'm glad that someone with a sharper mind and greater powers of argument is here to defend them and make the case that those who need them the most are least able to prevent closure.
The book burners and the library destroyers are a bad lot and who knows what damage they will do to us?

I know that we live in a world where there are greater ills and where unbelievable horrors greet people on a daily basis. I have no answer to this but I do know that libraries in whatever form open access to a shared humanity. Hopefully we are less likely to kill, maim, rape or exploit those we recognise as sharing that humanity.

To paraphrase the great Rabbi Burns, a teacher of some note, who you may celebrate this evening:

Some hae books and canna read,
And some wad read that want it;
But we hae books, and we can read,
Sae let the books be thankit

If I can help somebody

Notice seen in the window of a Dublin Teashop above a sack of potatoes.

This Teashop will be closed for business until further notice.
We are very grateful to all those we have helped along the way.
Please help yourselves to a few spuds from the sack below.
Me Ma said that they are the best she has ever grown!
Brian (without the other Brian this time) xxx

Anyone Who Has a Heart

So. Dick Cheney is in want of a heart and in need of a transplant.


Well that shouldn’t be too difficult. Given his power, wealth and influence the process should run like clockwork. A donor may be difficult. Matching tissue type and rejection can be problems. Not insurmountable I’m sure.

So in the spirit of peace and forgiveness I attach a picture of a source of the finest East Anglian Flints. There must be one there that fits.

Go on Dick! Take your pick.

And to cheer you on your way a wee tune and words for as long as it is up there on the interweb.
Could I suggest that after any successful operation you might like a change of scenery. No, no the hills and glens but The Hague!

AWOL in BABELFISH Translation

At some point over the last few days a Sainsbury's promo appeared to have dropped out of one of the papers. Always on the scrounge for new recipes I opened it and began to browse. Imagine my surprise when Juan Mari Arzak and his daughter smiled at me from a picture under the title of a dish which promised:

PRETTY IN BONFIRE OF GRUDGES

So, after Lady Buddhistpizza and I had picked ourselves off the floor, soothed our aching sides and dried our eyes, we added the recipe to the lost in translation pile! We giggled assuming the pretty fish was bonito, claro! We assumed the bonfire was of taste not a barbie, a salsa fuerte perhaps, but those grudges they mouldered on for some time. Could they be goujons? No, definitely a false friend. Could they be resentments buried deep in the psyche of the Basque cook? I think they dealt with old Boney, at least, with an armoury of pots and pans. A likely candidate is the noun grujidor which Collins Dictionary defines as a glass cutter. Could it be that the shavings of glass (produced by the grujidor?) find a resonance in the scales of the pretty fish!? Well, I leave that to the fevered imaginations of our regular readers.

However, hats off to Emily Drinking Tea, who got there in this blog:-
Sainsbury's you need a recipe editor
Ain't that the truth.

In Cod We Trust

Up to a point Capt'n Copper, up to a point.
Channel 4 has been running its muckraking paws through our fish.
One aspect of this has been Hugh's Fish Fight the link will give you the idea of the waste of food/fish in the requirement to discard over quota fish! A crime! It will be interesting to see if this campaign will have an impact on the Common Fisheries Policy, I hope it does.

Alex Thomson in today's fish supper "Fish Unwrapped" (Dispatches Series at 19:05) presented a tale of dodgy labeling and treatment of product that would cause Arthur Daley to blush. Catch it if you can and you think you're hard enough! It's on 4oD for the next 29 days as are most of the fishy tales

One good thing to come out of it though is an addition to our supper menu.
Mackerel in a bap, with salad and a wasabi/yoghurt dressing.

(Ed. That wasabi looks a bit wabbit to me.)

Elizabeth 1916-2011

Time takes its dreadful toll on us all.
We panic at the flickering of a dim light.
At the going down of the sun
We fear we may not be there to remember.
Unspoken the fear that we will be there but not remember.

Life, a fragile web of chemistry,
Forms the human to make what it can.
Self, family, friends; stations on the impermanent way.
Fortunes good, bad, and those made by our endeavours.
Our name and our future shining bright behind us.

Born into slaughter, growing in hard times,
You carried life and gave it four forms.
Tumult passed you by as did the voices of those you loved.
You nurtured your family, your friends, your garden
and the birds that pleased/vexed you silently.

These are your name and your future.
Two generations loved and blessed, no harsh words for any,
But every hedge clipped to within an inch of its life.
Your own words, your tribute,
Good and Gracious!

Unfair

Letter to the Wall Street Journal

Dear Sir,
Could I draw your attention to the blog on your website titled
You Decide: Goldman’s Facebook Pitch or Nigerian Email ‘Opportunity’

This scurrilous piece makes a very unfair comparison between Goldman Sachs and entrepreneurial activity by Nigerian citizens. It is my view that Goldman Sachs are not a financial services organisation that I or any of my immediate circle of friends and colleagues would wish to do business with. It has been subject to criticism the latest here which, of course, they deny. We await the report of the The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission this month with interest and expect it will throw light into many corporate dark places!

I would like to make the case in a free market economy for the little person and can attest that I have had nothing but kindness and consideration from my many Nigerian correspondents. Of course, I have chosen not to take advantage of the abundant investment opportunities they have offered me but damn it all that is the essence of capitalism, caveat emptor.

NOW IF YOU WILL IN STRICTEST CONFIDENCE EMAIL YOUR BANK DETAILS TO ME AT BUDDHIST PIZZA INC. I WILL BE PLEASED TO PROVIDE YOU WITH THE OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME

Minder

One of the sharpest criticisms of Thatcherism in popular culture in the eighties was, in my view, Arthur Daley's hapless, seedy entrepreneur. I was reminded of this when our own becondommed leader offered us flu vaccine from previous years.

So there you are in some drinking dive in Westminster. Smoothie chops Dave, camel hair coat, ridiculous titfer, cigar in one hand and V&T in the other is holding forth. He leans across the bar to Andrew, a dour silvertop who is polishing bedpans.

“So Andy, we are running out of the old flu vaccine.

It just so happens I know this guy in Catford who has a warehouse full of the stuff.

This is the real McCoy. It would bring down a herd of swans at 50 paces. Lamentable, because it is a tad past its sell by date it is languishing in a crummy lockup!

Andy holds a bedpan up to the light squints at it. With all the enthusiasm of man about to cut off his own right arm with a rusty butter knife he lets out a slow stream of breath followed by,

“I suppose we could give it a try, it would have to be dated 2000 an somefink though Dave, no tricks mind!”

Arthur looks mortified, as if someone had accused him of a VAT fiddle. He replies,

“Andy, how long have you known me? Would I seek to abuse the bonds of friendship, pollute the trust of two trading partners with some cheap legerdemain? “

He turns to a sallow yoof at his side and rouses him from a reverie of heaven knows what with,

“Gideon, get the motor, pop round to Stavros at Biggie Pharma and pick up a few cases of Chateau Avian 2009! Try not to drop it. “

Arthur smiles, empties his glass, points it in the direction of the vodka optic and requests,

“A large one, please Andy, not too much ice!”

What is life?

I can remember reading one of Richard Dawkins books and feeling a sense of paranoia.

Pretty devious stuff this DNA, my guess is that it is taking over the world!

If you want to know the mechanism for the central dogma behind this assertion the video in the following link may give you a clue, or it may not, anyway pure Star Wars.

The Central Dogma

Better

We were riveted by Rosie.

How much better if she could have been an engineer.

We need both, of course.

Dead, Dead, and never called me Mava!

Got that one spectacularly wrong then.
Nigel, in the Archers, should have taken advantage of those flying lessons when he had the chance.

We are acquainted with an eponymously handled couple and herself received a text at 19:16 hrs on Monday 3rd Jan. 2011 from our Nigel to the effect that:-

It's official, I'm dead, please address all future communications to Elizabeth.

Very droll but I'm not sure I would want to tempt fate!

The Year Ahead

A Statement by the Chairperson.
Buddhist Pizza Inc has, over the holiday period, been reconsidering its mission statement, its strategy for the next five years, its business plan and cash flows.
The executive summary is set out below with an appropriate reference.

Robert McCrum, in Th'Observer, has an interesting paragraph or two about the tensions between what we buy to read and what some of us would like you to think we read:- Stieg Larsson ahead of Hilary Mantel (Ed. I read and enjoyed both) He points out the importance, especially now, of the publishers being able (and of course willing) to cross-subsidise.

Being a literary gent he uses a quote to lend weight to his argument:-

In search of some support from the past, I found this passage in the preface to Tom Jones. "An author ought to consider himself," wrote Henry Fielding, "not as a gentleman who gives a private treat, but rather as one who keeps a pub, at which all persons are welcome for their money."

That's it then.

Buddhist Pizza:- think of it as a pub with no beer, but it's free.

Cheap at half the price!

What will the New Year bring?

I try not to allow the real world (Ambridge) to encroach on these musings and I am no great shakes in the prognostications department. I have enough problems with the here and now and the recent... However, here goes:-

I would put good money (50p each way) on Tony, the whinging misery guts, popping his clogs in some fashion on Sunday.

There now, I apologise to the host of our regular readers, yes you two at the back, who do not know what I am bleating on about.

Good wishes for the New Year!

More Pleasure Now!

Have been waiting for Treme, the series, to cross the Atlantic.
I came across a short video on the grauniad site about Treme, the district in New Orleans. Anyway, Wendell Pierce speaks about the origins, music and customs of Treme, and mentions the Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs (Mutual Societies). What a great idea, the name that is.

Too late now but we should have suggested that when they were looking for alternative names for the, somewhat presbyterian, Industrial and Provident Societies!

The link is here and it's short.

Another brick in the foundations of slow politics.

The time has come

The end of the year; no doubt we will be plagued by pundits, caused to fret by futurologists, and startled significantly by jobbing scriveners. Concerns will be raised about many things and I would, if given to betting, put 50p each way on the tired old nag being dragged to the starting line that the interweb is shortly to, if it has not done so already:-

• reduce our brains and those of our first-born to jelly,
• turn us into a nation of drooling addicts with personal hygiene problems, significant gambling debts and RSI in our wrists,
• suffer the horror at an ATM of finding that all our accounts have been emptied by arms dealing Albanians operating from a grass hut in Nigeria,
• force good, honest, hardworking monopolies to reconsider their modest surpluses,
• and in the last, mortal, words of Bluebottle that we have been deaded by an evil jazz playing conspiracy of grizzled old men called the Biderbeck Group.

(Ed. Ahem... could we move on a little?)

I made brief reference in a blog to some thoughts John Naughton had about the internet
in June of this year, and I would suggest you reread them.

They will act as an adumbrating antidote, a poultice for puffery, a balm for the bewildered....

(Ed. That's enough now. One more alliteration and I will turn the electrons off. Adumbrating antidote indeed!)

Slow Slow Quick Quick Slow

An article in Open Democracy caught my eye, Slow Food and the Pleasure Principle, by David Ransom and Richard Swift. It wasn't the prospect of even more overindulgence at this time of year but the trail:-

Much of left thinking has been based on denial: don't eat this, believe that or behave like the other. Slow Food provides a healthy antidote of inclusion, rather than exclusion...

It got me thinking.

The final paragraphs

Slow Food raises a lot of questions about what a social movement actually is. It undoubtedly has had a wider impact in Italy, where it has spun off a number of other slow movements (Slow Cities, Slow Money). But also beyond, there are now tens of thousands of adherents all around the globe, who identify with an analysis that merges issues of quality with those of justice and sustainability. The movement is, by and large, entrepreneurial, championing smallholders' rights to produce and sell their goods to eco-conscious consumers, in a market setting not dominated by corporate agriculture. This separates Slow Food from the conventional left. So does its enthusiastic embrace of the pleasure principle.

identify other evolving approaches, movements, but it also sets out what could be problems for the left.

We know what we want (see UN declaration of Human Rights if you don't)

We have had a few years since that was published, boy have we done well!

That is the problem. It's not going to be easy and it's not going to be quick.

Slow politics. Why not?

The cycle of politics even in democratic states means that little is achieved in the 4 to 5 years between elections. The parties, organisations and movements of the left are not geared to securing irevocable progress for people who need it. Added to which, of course, no one who has power ever relinquishes it.

Even though I am old, grey and have not changed much in the world I am heartened by the yoof of today and its approaches to these problems. Laurie Penny articulates some of these, in the cement is free grauniad, and captures a fine absurdity.

Of course, the old left is not about to disappear completely. It is highly likely that even after a nuclear attack, the only remaining life-forms will be cockroaches and sour-faced vendors of the Socialist Worker. Stunningly, the paper is still being peddled at every demonstration to young cyber-activists for whom the very concept of a newspaper is almost as outdated as the notion of ideological unity as a basis for action.

We speak in hundreds of thousands of voices – voices that are being raised across Europe, not in unison but in harmony.

Now if you can turn that very elegant phrase into a programme of action and create a set of tools for progress and conviviality you will really do something. But don't forget the conviviality, in my view it is what defines us as truly human!

Sod 'em

I'm reading a book about the other mafia; no not the Tories boy, do pay attention!
Gomorrah is a view of the Neapolitan Camorra by Roberto Saviano. (I did not select it from the wonderful world of Suffolk County Libraries on the off chance that it contained lewd and lascivious material. It contains much that is obscene but in a very different way.)

It would appear in the world of the Camorrista at some point you acquire a defining nickname which stays with you for the rest of your life.

Have we reached that point with Gideon? The Beeb website gives the following quote attributed to David Heath Deputy Leader of the House:-

George Osborne has a capacity to get up one's nose, doesn't he?

Gideon "Chicken Scratch" Osborne?

If not there are alternatives, including:-Bazooka; Blizzard; Blow; Bouncing Powder; Florida Snow; Foo Foo; Gold Dust; Prime Time; Star Dust; Star-Spangled Powder; Sugar; Sweet Stuff; Toke; Toot;
Sourced at link

Personally, I could go for sweet stuff.
Any offers gratefully accepted.

Ding dong!

Some things and some people are such a part of life, as we know it Jim, that we rather take them for granted. A certain Mr Bell is one such. I have lived long enough to know that, in some future biography, there may be allegations of a concrete curdling nature. Did he show less than complete kindliness to children and small animals? Would he regularly down the last of the sherry straight from the bottle before the vicar called? Discounts for cash, an account at the Gay Hussar, the company of East End pre-owned vehicle executives, a penchant for pipe and herbal tobacco, did he, really?

Apart from a lifelong affection for country and western music, for which there is not one scintilla of evidence, I could forgive him much for such little gems.

Having Steve Bell portray you as a caring, sharing, smoothie chops, politician with a condom over your head and knowing that he will do so for the rest of your time in power must give you a boost in the morning.

Revolting Students

An interesting article in the London Review of Books by Joanna Biggs, At The Occupation, gave me some hope. Buddhist Pizza's efforts in this department have improved little and left unchanged a lot.

On a personal level - I managed to appear behind police lines at a Stop the Tour Demo many years ago. I could not understand why the nice little piggies would not part like the Red Sea to let myself and a few of my navigationally challenged protesting friends through to join the revolution. I'm not sure the world is much of a better place for my feeble efforts in Student Politics, Local Government or Mutual Societies. However, it was cheering to read of the UCL protest and the things that they wanted in addition to their demands on fees :-

for the university to pay UCL cleaners the London living wage, to bring outsourced support staff in-house and to change the composition of the university council to get rid of the majority of corporate non-UCL members (they'd like a quarter each of management, students, tutors and support staff)

It is good to see some thought, humour and non violence in demonstrations for change. (I have to admit that I get no joy from seeing buildings trashed or people pulled from wheelchairs, the dinosaurs on both sides do themselves no favours by such.) It is interesting to see the use of technology and the internet to co-ordinate, organise and disseminate. Does it make the protest more effective? It certainly captures transgressions and makes them available for all to see. We may not know who you are, we may not know where you live but we know the cowardly, vicious and violent things that you do and so does everyone else.
Still, as Jody McIntyre said:-

'Why is it so surprising that the police dragged me from my wheelchair?'

I suppose it is a mercy that he is not Brazilian or a vendor of newspapers.

An Open Letter on a Happy Occasion

Dear Hu Jintao,

I would like to congratulate you as the Chairman of the People's Republic of China, its President,
on the award of the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize to one of your foremost citizens -
Liu Xiaobo.

I would have sent this letter from myself, a private individual but felt that the occasion was sufficiently auspicious, happy indeed, that it needed to be made available as widely as possible. You must be very proud of the work of Liu Xiaobo and the inspiration he gives to the downtrodden masses in the world. I know the joy I feel in my heart at the thought of his selfless striving in the fields of literature, political thought and humanity without fear or favour. I believe the emergence of such a person in your state under the Communist Party of the Peoples Republic of China is a real tribute.

I look forward in my declining years to the award of many more Nobel Peace Prizes to citizens of your state to include in the panoply of good men and women committed to peace regardless of whether it is profitable or popular including such luminaries as;
Muhammad Yunus,
Nelson Mandela,
Rigoberta Menchú Tum,
Aung San Suu Kyi,
Tenzin Gyatso,
Desmond Mpilo Tutu and of course
Martin Luther King Jr.

Kindest Regards,

Buddhist Pizza.

A Cure for Elephants

And another one bites the dust.
So some kack handed jihadi nearly caused major mayhem.
Was he a sneaky sleeper, a person well guarded in speech and behaviour? Did his cover include tea at the vicarage and speaking regularly at the WI. Up to a point Agent Copper.
What were the spooks doing? You may well ask but are likely to be told that the brave lads and lassies were doing all manner of things to save the country, nay western civilisation and very possibly humanity itself. What might that be? Couldn't tell you Gov, might have to kill you if I did and besides we are only providing information through the orifices of a certain Mr Assangle, under contract.

This has always struck me as being a powerful argument. Very much the same as my claim to have found a cure for elephants which can be very big and very troublesome.

I have an arrangement of stones in my back garden which, with the secret incantation muttered at the dead of night to a timetable involving the phases of the moon, has kept our garden, in the depths of Suffolk, elephant free for years. There are no equivocations, ifs, buts, or other mendacity beloved of politicios. This has worked! (Patent Applied For.)

Anarchy on a Tuesday!

Deep in the bowels of the Buddhist Pizza Manorial Home there is a small coterie of anarchists, trouble makers, Wikileakers and no good boyos. Lady BP feeds them caviar, mushy peas, and black pudding, washed down with tea, lashings of tea. They foment, they rail they call for the rebirth of Western civilization but, they pay their bills and there is no drink, women or noise after 10.00 pm. We have made provision, in the form of extensive server farms and other gizmology about the estate, to counter any denial of service. They have been subjected to vicious and vitriolic attacks. They have been accused of crimes, misdemeanours, perversions and failures of moral character that would curdle concrete and this by thrupenny jobsworths of low breeding, no hair and a very noticeable lack personal hygiene. I issue a call to support them. The very foundation of free speech is imperilled. If we do not take a stand now we risk all that we hold dear, our homes, our families, our jobs, our pensions, our mortgages, our savings and very possibly our first born! (to be continued ....)

It is very easy in this superheated, febrile, atmosphere with accusations of treason and treachery bandied about like snuff at a wake to miss that which we have always known.

The chumps of politicians lied to us, don't they always. Their actions caused the unnecessary deaths of tens, hundreds, of thousands of human beings. They are supporting corrupt regimes which are so far beyond the pale they are translucent.

The same chumps will try to control what we know and when we know it.

For once, possibly because of the technology, they are finding it very difficult.


John Naughton seems to think so!

What's in a name?

Jim, Jim ah Jim!
We have all tiped our slongs at some point.
I had a colleague, an architect, with a particular dread of Buckminster Fuller.

Still, many a true word out of the mouths of sabes and bucklings!
I'm sure your man, the culture secretary Jeremy Hunt, could be described, loosely, in that fashion without too much offense being given to the female form!.

Very Krafty!

Don't let Cadbury cack on you.

How to avoid paying tax, other examples apply.

There was a rich man called Green.
Whose profits were entirely obscene.
The divvy for the wife
Caused considerable strife
She never paid a penny to the Queen!

God Bless you Marm.

If your lucky enough to have them, your home, job, pension, education, library, hospital, welfare benefits, mortgage and first born may be in danger if you continue eating the wrong sort of chocky.