Delay! The Thief of Accountability.

It may have escaped your notice in the fever surrounding the news cycle on both sides of the pond that Buddhist Pizza Inc. has been subject to a certain amount of investigation, in open session, by governmental committee. As a Global Non-Profit tasked with general philanthropy and alleviating poverty and suffering in the highest earning 1% of the population we are totally transparent and operate to the highest ethical and moral standards. We do not fear detailed questions, we do not reject scrutiny, we welcome intelligent and informed interrogation.

However, under god and the (unwritten) constitution we exercise our democratic right to delay, and have prepared accordingly.

Excuse me, I have to go and watch hell freeze over.

Many thanks to the daily dose for the link, and the daily dose.

Sluts and gonifs

I have to confess that I did not know what a gonif was. Susan McCarthy helpfully, provides a link in her blog commenting on the moral failings, allegedly, of dinosaurs.

Well no one is perfect. I have been known to indulge in Vin Santo myself and give voice but sluts, gonifs and divine retribution?

Three Blind Mice

Less than ten days before the whole sorry mess is subject to the will of the people. There seems little point in adding to the tons of stuff out there but if you have one of these bloggy things and are true netizen of tinterweb it seems a shame not to share.

El Cameron seems to be slightly bemused as to why his obvious breeding and wealth and the manifest failure of his so called opponents have left him looking like the kid who insists it is his turn and you have to give him the bicycle now!

Giordano Bruno is still slugging it out after all these years. The boxer who never fails to get up on the count of eight. Get me the Balham Basher, Peter. I’m sure I can still beat the Balham Basher. But you are the Balham Basher!

The Cleggster or is it the Cleggstar! Haven’t we been here before, 1997?

I have to confess to using the Beeb’s seat calculator with the latest polls to see the likely outcome. You can also put a decent margin for polling error in and the whole thing has an oracular and soothing effect on a fevered brow.

What a relief, chaos and anarchy, it’s official.

Manos Limpias

Thoughtful piece by Giles Tremlett in Th'Observer today about Baltasar Garzon.
You may have heard of him because of his attempt to extradite the slightly chilly General Peanuckle. However he goes back much further than that.
It is interesting that he effectively brought down the controversial socialist government of Felipe Gonzalez, which was mired in Caso Gal, with allegations of corruption and a dirty war against ETA. Felipe, a much underrated character in my view, hits the sweet spot as usual and is quoted in response to an attempt by the supreme court to dismiss the judge ...

"I don't have a very special relationship with this man, but what they are doing is inexplicable and unjust."

So to sum up..

Judge Battasar Garzon

Fought crimes long gone.

The Spanish Supremes

Said only in your dreams.

What we did on our Brithday (63 in a series)

The weather was kind for my sixty third to heaven.
We took ourselves off to the coast and there after a spot of lunch inspected the Navy, much reduced now we are in a period of austerity...
We had a brief artistic interlude where we inspected the front and rear of old Babs...




Then off to the seaside and a good time was had by all. Gracias a la vida.

Not Canadian Enough

Nice little story via the Grauniad Newsbucket.
Open Data not only good like Mom and Apple Pie but also saves money.
It is alleged that 3.2 billion dollars was being illegally sheltered from the revenue in Canada.
The use of open data meant that this was exposed and the abusive activity closed down.
One question; that would pay for an awful lot of red jackets, big hats and horses, wouldn't it? I suppose you do have to buy oats for the horses, hmmm...

Is the Pope a Catholic?

Even though I handed in my papers many years ago I still enjoy seeing a lump or two knocked out of the old theocracy.

Steven Fry makes a very good case for disbanding the old firm and sending it out there to do something worthwhile. It will have a hard time making up for all that evil!

Thanks to John Naughton and his contributors for the link in his blog.

Posh Toffs

So Ian Jack had this article in the Gauniad today, whinging on about the Toffs, and the schools, and Eaton. God, you think he could find something better to do!

He accuses Sir George Young of going to Eaton. Na na Na na na; is what I say.

I saw the Right on Bart earlier in the week, on the telle and I thought to myself, yes, this is tomorrow's man. God he could have your goolies, your liver and your lights off you before you even noticed the difference, and you would say thank you. Lovely chap! Such silky elegance in the face of Paxoid or some other dull, grey Grammar School Slouch. Such charm, such understated wit!

I don't know what his Mare and Pare paid for the sod to be educated at Eton but worth every sov! Today, to educate the old duckling between the ages of 11 and 18 would only set you back about 200k sovs without allowing for the inflation, worth every penny!

Da Liddel Guy

Not to demean old Simon Singh, his height, or even to suggest that he is any age at all, compared to myself, a spring chicken I'm sure. However, if there are any of you out there, double figures at the last count, and you have not already done so please sign the petition at the Libel Reform Campaign site. Go on, go on, go on!

There that didn't hurt did it and those very brave souls who risk their time, sanity and home to hold up some semblance of rationality in this crazy world deserve a wee bit of support.

Sermon over. Now phwat was I saying about that nice Mr Murdoch.

To think it could be so!

Hmm!
Another cracker from Susan McCarthy

And a nice flower

for Easter.

Life is never simple!

So Memex has a nice post. Yes you would want Myriad Genetics to have its socks rot on their dainty corporate feet, even as we speak. So hats off to the lads and lassies at the ACLU for digging in on this one. I have had differences of opinion with them on some things, including the decision about Skokie Illinois.

That is the nature of democracy, of course.

Talking about life, DNA and all that business. No further on with the synthesis of the chemicals or even precursor chemicals for life? Come on there sharpen up. Forget about the old Large Hardon Colander. Bugger the Higgs Boson! We all want to know where life comes from, so to speak.

Up to a Point Lord Co-oper

Aaaahhh!
The sound of a civil society; peace, harmony, and cooperation.
Yes Geoff, they are all jumping on the wagon with the non-hierarchical music collective on the back. Geoff Mulgan blogs in the Grauniad about the recent change in attitudes across the political spectrum towards social enterprise and the publication by the Carnegie UK Trust of a Report, Making Good Society, into the future of civil society. I'm sure I'll have some thoughts when I've read it but (that little word, three letters, and it gets me into so much trouble) I have some thoughts of my own.

It's good to see Dirty Dave and Fuzzy Osborne launching themselves at the back of the collective bandwagon. Welcome aboard. The Coop, that bastion of, well, the Coop, has opened the silos, a little, and there has been some movement. Not perhaps as much a we would like or with the self awareness that we would want, still mustn't grumble. According to my slightly bemused reading we are about to be overwhelmed by a Tsunami of Social Enterprise which will wipe away all ills and inequalities and heal our poor, broken, divided society. Er, perhaps not. I can see a lot of jobs for those aparatchicks, 'merchant bankers' and ere do wells who are thrown out on their ears in the not too distant socially enterprising future.

As a volunteer, I am often p'd off in some useless meeting. Notionally, it is meant to advance the causes near to my altruistic heart, making the world a better, more equal, and less violently hate filled place for me to live in. To fuel my inner devil I play count the cash. How much are people payed to attend this meeting for its duration, including travel, expenses, and organisation on costs. Oh give me the money Barney because I know a little mutual enterprise that creates jobs, gives people support in their endeavours to build their lives in the way that they want, provides homes that are affordable to rent and hangs on to community assets that would be given away to private enterprise at knockdown, fire sale, prices!

Naar, you don't want to do that, might make the world a better place for me to live in!

My Left Foot

Sad but inevitable.
Michael Foot was derided by many during his life and now
'he's dead, dead and never called me muver'
The bastards are saying he was the best thing since, consecrated, sliced bread!
Even Lady Dagenham had 'kind' words to say. I wonder who put them in her mouth?

When the wind blows the grass bends

Hang on to your hats this is going to be a wild ride.

Giordano Bruno, the man (no relation to G. Broon Esq.) his picture below, I am sorry about the cheap lighting effects.
He suffered a long drawn out trial and torture and death at the stake, which took place on 17 February 1600 in the Campo dei Fiori in Rome. (still no relation to G. Broon Esq.) Alas; it was for, amongst other things, believing that the earth rotates about the sun in a manner of speaking, relatively. (Enough wriggle room there to keep the old Inquisition off my trail!)

So we have left all that kind of torture and human rights abuses behind us? Wrong!

Blair, Broon, Straw and the lot of them can equivocate till the cows come home; and they will. They have been accused of complicity (or stupidity) in the use of torture by that well know group of hate filled pinkos, the judiciary.

The point of my tale, if you still have your hats on, is contained in this report from Open Democracy by Roberta Bacic, concerning the abuses in Chile in the not too distant past and the almost unbelievable courage of those who spoke out against it. The importance of speaking truth to power and using such things as arpilleras.

The first requirement to fight injustice is to report it; otherwise we are accomplices.

God, I don’t know what I would do if I was threatened with all sorts of stuff to recant, give away secrets or just conform. I do make a point of sitting down during the national anthem on the few occasions when it is played. Well it’s never going to be my national anthem!

Here’s to the brave buggers who did a wee bit more!

The Toffs ATM

So then Lord Cashcough!

Dave's mum said that you don't have a domicile.
It's sad really because you seem to have so much money, give so much of it away and yet you don't have a home of your own. Charity begins at home, so they say.

I'm sure the Turnip Taliban hereabouts would be able to find a house for you. Many of them have more than one of their own!

When in Rome Frankie!

Occasionally life throws up contrasts.
In a street in Rome recently I noticed a shop selling smart dresses and such. Not the sort of thing that would catch my eye apart from the name. Pinko.


Directly opposite there is a plaque on the wall!

Sore Throats

Good morning!
Please turn to page 92?
I may have mentioned San Blas or St Blaise once or twice before in these lectures.
The devout among you will have noticed that Wednesday this week was the feast day of the holy man, himself.

He is the patron saint of sore throats plus a few other things. Well, after martyrdom you need some interests as, in the left footer's version of heaven, there are no virgins made available.
Your man St Blaise makes a bob or two responding to prayers concerning the throat. Was he an ENT specialist, I hear you ask? Well no, I think his main qualification for the job was the fact that he had his head cut off, and like King Louis XIV, it spoiled his constitution. However, it did give him a unique insight into maintaining health and integrity in the region between the head and shoulders!

He was, allegedly, Armenian but has a great following in the north of Spain, Campoo, where we lived for a while. I do not think the Campurrianos have weak throats but I do know there is a tradition the storks appear and start building their nests on San Blas. We have seen them and therefore it must be true.


If you don't believe me have a look! They are ungainly, ponderous, inefficient, build their nests out of the most unsuitable sticks in the most ridiculous places and look complete arses while they do it. You can't help feeling a little stab of joy when, eventually, you see the head of the young stork appear above the edge of the nest.



Thank you.
Next weeks lecture will be on the importance of the
South Waziristan Institute of Strategic Hermeneutics (SWISH) in the development of interfaith hegemony and security in the tribal areas.

Wee Boots

Amazing what you can find in a house after 50 years.

Genes

I listened to Start the Week with Andrew Marr this morning. His guests included Steve, my job is to make sex boring, Jones the geneticist. Steve covers the usual ground of how the popular and misconceived view of genes is that they are specific indicators of everything from being shy and retiring to a proclivity for genocide and mass murder. I may exaggerate, but not much.
"In fact", says Steve and in my minds eye I can see a devilish twinkle in his, "they have found the one that makes your ears stick out!" or words to that effect. To give him his due, a true professional, Andy the wing nut only hesitated a demi-semi-quaver before moving on!

Hard Times

One of the songs that popped up around the McGarrigles offerings on UTube was Hard Times, hard times indeed for their family.

I got to thinking about our times. We are about to have a general election (not the 6th of May, Shirley!!!). We think things are bad now, for many of us they are not. In the hard times to come, courtesy of the dreadful Dave and his mates, things will be bad. The little people, the underclass, the people who never saw employment in the Blair/Broon years, yes they are going to be screwed. They were screwed before and Dave, the caring, sharing, compassionate Dave, is happy to see them screwed again! However, the problems we face in the economy, the environment, in the fabric and security of our society, mean that many of us, significant numbers, will be screwed regardless.

Hard times; you ain't seen nothing yet!