13 December 2010

13/12/10

Treachery is noble when aimed at tyranny.
-Pierre Corneille

158 comments:

  1. Posted this yesterday..

    "...there is of course a fourth estate; arguably more important and influential..definitely way cooler... than the rest: the 'banned' "

    before you get any ideas BTH, I do, of course, class you as the 'gutter press'...remember the old Sunday Sport?

    "Lancaster Bomber Found on the Moon?"

    "London Bus seen at North Pole?"

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  2. Oh..here it is..

    http://www.badidea.co.uk/2009/01/the-first-newspaper-domino-to-fall-sunday-sport-publisher-has-serious-financial-problems/

    here's a good game...spot the headline that wasn't made up..

    "MUM GIVES BIRTH TO 8 POUND TROUT"

    "CAMERON: NHS SAFE IN OUR HANDS"

    "MAN FIGHTS SHARK WITH WIFE'S FALSE TEETH"

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  3. Anyone here know if there's an easy way to get hold of BBC24 footage? I want to get a few hours of the live reporting from the night of the protests last week, for a project.

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  4. Up early today MF...

    Meerkat, no idea to be honest, might be tricky to get hold of as wont be on iplayer.

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  5. "Up early today MF..."

    not really...late start today..waiting for a lift to Whitby...fish and chips for me dinner etc...but I bet it's fuckin freezing...I always have a game of crazy gold when I go to Whitby.

    Crazy golf and boxing are pretty much the only sports worthy of the name

    right...he's just rung..cup of tea and I'm off

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  6. Hi Jay, yeah I already looked on iplayer, and it's not there. I wonder why they don't store stuff on the news channels on iplayer? Irritatingly if it's not there, I don't think I can get it on Box of Broadcasts either.

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  7. Something wrong with my eyes this morning, first time around I read that as:


    WOMAN FIGHTS MAN WITH SHARK'S FALSE TESTICLE

    I'm off back to bed.

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  8. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  9. Leni,
    As I understand it there are at least two levels of literacy in China - one for farmers which requires something like knowledge of 500 characters less than the one for office workers. Then there is the study of classical mandarin .
    Lit levels are still slightly higher for men than for women. So overall % for literacy is a bit misleading. We have the notion of functional literacy here which is not necessarily very high.


    Literacy levels from 1949-1976 were measured on a basic level ie reading and simple arithmetic. In 1949 80% of the Chinese population could not do that. By the mid 1950’s a comprehensive national system of Primary schools had been established with the resulting rise in literacy rates.

    As regards literacy and Mandarin. In 1955 the PRC adopted a new form of Mandarin. Before 1955 there was no standardized form of written Mandarin that could be understood universally. With no standard alphabet every Mandarin word had to be learnt separately through ideograms for each word.

    The PRC introduced pinyin- all sounds in Mandarin were given a particular symbol making the learning process much easier and could be formulated into a standardized recognizable written form. The successful struggle and campaign for even basic, uniform literacy cannot be underestimated in as complex and vast country as China ravaged by a century of war and exploitation exacerbated by ancient customs and traditions.

    However, in 1982, a census revealed that less than 1% of the working population had a University degree, only 11% had received schooling after 16, only 26% secondary schooling, indeed in the 1970’s it was found that only 6% of the CCP had a formal education after 16.

    The extreme anti-intellectualism fostered by Mao in the Cultural revolution was key. Between 1966 and 1970, 130 million schoolchildren and students simply stopped attending school and University being encouraged to attack their teachers and tear up the curriculum. Nothing was regarded as having any intrinsic worth unless it “promoted” the revolution. The emphasis was on preparing young people to be loyal party members rather than being educated.

    So whilst the Communists dragged China out of the middle ages in terms of literacy and standardized Mandarin which cannot be underestimated, the progress of the country between 1949-76 in education terms was stunted as a result of the mayhem and chaos of the great leap forward and cultural revolution.

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  10. Some great fish & chips in Whitby MF - as they say these days, enjoy.

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  11. "Some great fish & chips in Whitby MF"

    some would say the best...I wouldn't argue

    Worst fish & chips...Brighton

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  12. Cheers Duke interesting post (as ever)

    "....was stunted as a result of the mayhem and chaos of the great leap forward and cultural revolution."


    But is the moral of the story not to have a communist revolution or not to have such a large leap forward, or perhaps just a little less culture......?


    Whenever the story turns to Stalin or Mao the baby and the bathwater all tend to the exit. People have such little confidence in their ability to learn from history.

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  13. "Worst fish & chips...Brighton" - I wouldn't argue either.

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  14. Meerkat - in the old days Glasgow used to have a key department that monitored the news media and published some good work on the basis of it's research.

    Perhaps they are spooling/storing the visual media these days?

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  15. Meerkat

    Glasgow Media Group

    I think the above is the latest incarnation of "the old days" - they might be able to help.

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  16. deano,

    I think you're referring to the Glasgow Media Group, happily still going strong.

    Whenever the story turns to Stalin or Mao the baby and the bathwater all tend to the exit. People have such little confidence in their ability to learn from history.

    or refuse to add nuance and an open mind to the study of History? As someone once said, can't remember who:

    We learn from History that we do not learn anything from History.

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  17. Medialens is also often worth a look meerkat. They're a bit ideological on the Chomsky front but they are always constantly exposing the bollockery that gets printed/broadcast in our media unchallenged, for example a politician saying on BBC News that we are fighting in Afghanistan 'to keep the streets of Britain safe from suicide bombers'.

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  18. "We learn from History that we do not learn anything from History."

    ..or is that what we are taught/encouraged to believe?

    Good to see the Glasgow group are still active Duke - I saw a few titles there on their website that I need to read. It seems a long time since bad news and more bad news etc.

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  19. Nap - something from the University of UT for you to get your teeth into. It might be helpful for your TEFL future.

    "If it ain't broke don't fix it and if it is broke don't fix it either.!

    - discuss with special reference to media hypocrisy and the study of history. Use Secretary Stalin, Chairman Mao and Winston Churchill as source materials.

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  20. No, Jay, they're right. Had some revolting stuff last week.

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  21. Behave yourself. - always the case that someone will come forward to attempt the defence of the indefensible.

    Folly young Jay - pure folly.

    The fish down south swim in the shite of Southerners. It is well known that the SE is sinking into the Channel under the weight of its own sewage....

    Nap ...that should have been First lord of the Treasury Winston Churchill.

    I'm away for the day.

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  22. I suspected that PeterJ would have some valuable insight into the question.

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  23. "It is well known that the SE is sinking into the Channel under the weight of its own sewage...."

    Put hairs on your chest you soppy Northern monkeys...

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  24. Fish and chips reminds me of the recent Viz letter

    Those scientists in Papua new Guinea who think they’ve just discovered the smallest creature ever recorded have obviously never had fish and chips from the Britannia Chippy, Wilson Rd, Stoke.

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  25. best fish and chips - Aldeburgh Chippy.

    not the "Golden Galleon".

    the proper one.

    that is all.

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  26. christ - hostage-taker at a French nursery school - he's got two swords and 15 kids...

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  27. Head east 10 miles from Brighton to Seaford. There, "Trawlers" do very passable fish and chips.

    Among other tasks, the Institut National de l'Audiovisuel in France is responsible for recording all TV and radio broadcasts and making archives available to researchers and academics. No equivalent in the UK?

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  28. Morning all,

    Without wanting to be too controversial, (and knowing that Monkeyfish won't actually see this now), there's better fish and chips to be had if you go from Whitby to Robin Hoods Bay (although one must obviously factor in the walk back up 'the hill' into the overall fish and chip enjoyment equation)!

    Philippa,

    According to the NYT, he's released some already, but still has five or six inside!?

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  29. aye - now saying two knives, maybe swords, and five kids and a teacher...

    GIPN onsite (SO19, basically) to negotiate - praying they manage to resolve it without going in hard...

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  30. He's only 17, so I hope they'll be able to talk him down.

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  31. ...there's better fish and chips to be had if you go from Whitby to Robin Hoods Bay...

    I suppose everyone knows about the Tweeter/Twitterer[?] who posted, after the chap who threatened to bomb Robin Hood Airport (is that what it was?) was finally hunted down and quite rightly tortured, made to retract and recant and finally hung, drawn and quartered and his head shoved on a spike:

    Don't know which film to watch tonight - "Blow Up" "Robin Hood" "Airport"

    ...or sumfink.

    Suppose everyone has read the survey which says that people want even more punishment aimed at the poor and think that failure to be rich and successful is purely due to laziness and being clumsy, rather than sufficiently fleet of foot and sharp of elbow.

    Obviously, the people saying this are not rich themselves. They just think that an unmarked suitcase of loot will be sent to them via FedEx as long as they keep repeating the mantra.

    A bit like praying, really.

    So, it looks like The Three Daves and the ConDems are going to be in for an easy win.

    PS Message to the security forces.

    The above comment in no way seeks to endorse, foster, promote or condone anything connected with terrrrism, which is obviously always very naughty indeed and should always be met with a very stern face and, if appropriate, a waggy finger and a loud tut. (Torture optional Wednesdays and Saturdays, free-for-all bombing subject to funds. Indoors if wet).

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  32. Message to the blue tree-frog at the top of the page.

    Much as your lovely bright blue colour looks utterly fabulous set against the dazzling yellows and golds of the flower on which you perch with such sophistication, it might be worth considering whether you may be sending the wrong signals to any passing predators.

    Can you see many others like you doing the same?

    Have a spiffing day.

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  33. Total arse. Every one knows the best chippies are cornish. As are the best steaks, pubs, pasties and cider. The rest is all old bollocks.

    AB - thanks for the twitter updates.

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  34. Bitterweed

    I think the Twitter thing is not exactly recent, certainly in terms of the fast-paced internet age, but in terms of geological time, it probably hasn't even happened yet.

    I used to see "Eat the Rich" painted on the sides of disused and derelict buildings sometimes.

    Was this a guerrilla advertising campaign for the programme?

    I saw quite a few Comic Strip productions, assuming you mean the Adrian Edmondson, Rick Mayall, Dawn French etc programmes.

    If you mean some seedy, flickery video of cartoon characters taking their clothes off, I must have missed it, but you could send me a copy if you want my professional opinion.

    PS Might be best to mark it "Private" in your best, clear handwriting. I don't like the way the postman leers and winks when handing over some of the bulkier items which he says got torn open when he tried stuffing them through the letterbox.

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  35. Siege over; all children released, 17-year-old arrested.

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  36. Can I just say I totally respect Charlie Gilmour, yar? He’s a blardy good bloke, rilly committed to the student protests and this government charging us £9,000 a week to study at Uni, my father would rilly have struggled with that, it’s so unfair… anyway, Charlie’s rilly clever actually, and who cares if he didn’t know what that big white monument was despite him being a history student, he’s only a second year, they do “War and soldiers” in the third year actually, we even got our own crayons to colour in the pictures (although I bet the Tories will start charging us for our own crayons soon grrr!), so-o-o-o-o cute as well actually, I’m not gay but my sister is totally into him. We went to Thailand together on our gap yar, rilly good guy actually, totally soaked up the culture, the lady boys rilly went for the guy, I rilly love Thailand actually, I’m definitely going back there once I finish sponging off my old man and shagging my way round the lower reaches of Burkes Peerage while studying EcPol at Oxbridge yar, anyway, who’s up for cracking some rozzers heads next week?

    Vive la revolution!

    PS Anyone know a good lawyer? Babylon’s got me on some trumped-up charges of affray or something, and the boss of Lazard’s just told me he’s not bankrolling me to ponce around in central London playing at revolutionaries when I should be knuckling down and getting ready for that totally awesome job he’s managed to line up for me once I leave Uni.

    Tchoh, dads, eh?

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  37. AB
    Roger all that, including the parcel.

    The movie had Lemmy in it as well, btw. Even better!

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  38. Britain's great TV-hypnotised public understand that being poor is a moral, ethical, aesthetic and imaginative failure. If you can't get a well-paid job, it's because you're not trying hard enough (or you're not Alan Rusbridger's daughter).

    If you're not making money, it's because you clearly don't want it enough to do a bit of insider-trading or off-shore tax-dodging (a la Guardian Media Group). Which makes you what our friend GIYUS would call 'sheeple'...and it's the job of 'sheeple' to get eaten by wolves.

    If you don't like it, find another planet to live on...and the plebs understand all this. They have, through some process of osmosis probably linked with shopping, absorbed the verities of Hayek, Mises and Friedman.

    Let's face it--the vast majority of the population have more sympathy and respect for bank robbers than for welfare recipients...welcome to The Big Society (©D. Clamereggborne)).


    But....Jason & The Scorchers - If Money Talks (Why Won't It Speak To Me?)

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  39. @BW:

    As it happens, I think his old man has already been on the blower to his legal team… precious little below-the-line comment enabled on the young man’s antics… just google “Charlie Gilmour”, and follow the trail to the Mail/Express etc, “Unable to accept comments due to legal issues” “Sorry, comment is disabled on this story”… etc etc… presumably the Carter Ruck photocopier was working overtime this weekend…

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  40. @Atomboy:

    I seem to recall hearing on some nature programme that any frog that isn't green is extremely poisonous -- the bright colour is a warning to would-be predators to stay away.

    Dot could probably tell us if I'm right.

    Off to work now. Have a lovely afternoon, everyone.

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  41. Shiloh - can't get used to this moniker mate !Makes me think of a red injun chief or something.

    Anyways, it's pretty sad isn't it to think that even Very Cool and Groovy Rock Stars and Uber Hippies like Dave (sorry David) Gilmour would consider the Carter-Fuck option... those 70s social commentary & 'protest' albums just become so many joint mats...

    His old man was an expert in pig genealogy by the way. Just thought I'd toss that in...

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  42. Charlie Gilmour v Otis Ferry in a rock offspring death match.

    Who'd you want to see win?

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  43. @13thDuke:

    Mutual suicide pact?

    Everyone's a winner!

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  44. SB
    Not a lot of people know thet Dave (sorry, DAVID) Gilmour did a stint modelling in Paris before buying a vintage strat and stepping in for mad-boy Syd Barret.

    @Duke
    Put them both in electric chairs. The last one to die wins.

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  45. Shiloh/BW, sounds about right to me.

    Speaking of Dave Gilmour, have you ever seen him and Dutch darts legend Raymond van Barneld in the same room?

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  46. Oh, I say, chaps...let's not be unsporting. Instead, I propose that we turn them both loose in the middle of the Sahara desert. They get a 24-hour head start, then Ray Mears tracks them down, kills them, skins them and makes the hides into an umbrella and some sandals. The leftovers, he turns into biltong. Now, that's a show I'd watch.

    On a more depressing note, I see that MothraInEpirus is busily sucking-up to the odious Julian Glover (he of the glistening, inflatable lips)...'great article! etc etc'...

    Is there anything that shameless little ponce won't do to ingratiate himself with The Groan and regain his coveted 'C' (for 'Coño'? 'Compromised'? 'Crap Artist'? 'Creep'?).

    I expect he'll change his avatar to a foto of himself holding a big cardboard 'C' (done in blue crayon)...or would that be too subversive for a man whose 'character' has more worldwide franchises than fucking McDonalds?

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  47. I've licked Arse For The Big C

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  48. Montana

    i think yhr frog is a poison arrow frog.

    duke

    a *darts* legend ?

    Literacy is still, i believe, measured at 2 levels in pinyin. The introduction of the new characters did improve literacy.

    Surely Bitey know about these things as a deals with Uni students ?

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  49. On a more depressing note, I see that MothraInEpirus is busily sucking-up to the odious Julian Glover (he of the glistening, inflatable lips)...'great article! etc etc'...

    Talk about unblushing abasement....and to Glover!

    Has the groan really snatched back his blue 'c'? Heh heh. Watching him present his derriere for a good shafting should be quite funny.

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  50. Afternoon all

    Fekkin cold again.

    At least Hugh Orde has got some common bloody sense. Theresa May wittering on about the use of water cannon (won't her dinky little leopard print kitten heels get soggy?) and Sir Hugh pointing out, quite rightly imo, that it would be a complete disaster to start going down that road.

    I bet it won't be long though now that May has pronounced on it. Since when has any government valued the opinions of experts over the opinion on the front page of the Daily Heil?

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  51. But BB water cannons are such fun. They knock those naughty little people off their feet. They clean down the streets at the same time thus negating the need for those miserable crossing sweepers.

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  52. Oh, and did anyone hear Pickles on the radio this morning? He is really not sounding as chipper as he usually does. In fact, he came across as positively subdued.

    I wonder if he was bricking it in case he was going to get a grilling on why he lied the other day when he said there was no social cleansing going on in London.

    Bloody liar.

    Looks like London is going to be the new Versailles...

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  53. Leni

    You're right. They need to cut the council budgets after all. In fact, if they don't cut the council budgets, I have it on good authority that the whole of the UK will be overtaken by rabid gerbils and we will all be eaten in our beds.

    So they could use the water cannons to kill - sorry, that should be control - protestors and make the road sweepers redundant at the same time.

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  54. BB
    Pickles made me laugh with all that schtick about how local authorities are going to be enabled to be really creative now. About as sincere as Jabba the Hutt.

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  55. jack
    Is there anything that shameless little ponce won't do to ingratiate himself with The Groan and regain his coveted 'C' (for 'Coño'? 'Compromised'? 'Crap Artist'? 'Creep'?).

    classic

    always thought it had been universally acknowledged that the "C" in marian's case stood for c@nt...only for that reason i was surprised they removed it

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  56. BW

    He was.. well... in a pickle really. Who in their right mind is going to believe that schtick, seriously?

    One of the things that struck me was that every other sentence started with "I believe..."

    And this is one of the things that gets me about this fucking government. It is all about faith in their dogma, and nothing to do with reality. Fucking sprinkling of Fairy Dust and it will all work fine...

    I would like to hear a few more sentences starting with the words "Our research has shown..." "The evidence we have is...." "The analysis is strong because..." - not fucking "I believe..."

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  57. Oh dear

    *BB is very sweary today... grump grump grump...*

    Anyhoo, let's talk about something more exciting. How's your hangover, BW? :p

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  58. Thanks for the suggestions, I'll look into those. Our completely fabulous librarian is also on the case for me. I *love* librarians.

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  59. It might be an idea for someone to draw a picture for the benefit of the Three Daves, to show the difference between a demonstration and a dinner-party. (Perhaps they could put in a little inset to show that a few bubbles spraying from a carelessly opened champagne bottle is not the same as a water-cannon).

    Most demonstrations will include some kind of rogue element, hell-bent on violence and mindless mayhem, the infiltrators with an agenda to create a media storm, the agents provocateurs who steer events from passive to aggressive and couldn't care less how much misery they cause and what damage they inflict on property and person.

    Many would say, though, that this is simply the police doing their job and it is part of British tradition.

    This is what Dave 3 was saying just months ago, however, and perhaps it shows the disparity between the dewy-eyed dream people had when they voted for the yellow team - before the yellow got mixed with the blue to produce shit-colour.

    A spirit [The Great Reform Act] this government will draw on as we deliver our programme for political reform: a power revolution. A fundamental resettlement of the relationship between state and citizen that puts you in charge.[...]

    Big, sweeping change. Not incremental, not bit by bit. Our democracy has suffered at the hands of encroaching centralisation and secrecy for decades. Take citizens’ rights: eroded by the quiet proliferation of laws that increase surveillance, quash dissent, limit freedom.

    We know that, when people see a real opportunity to shape the world they live in, they take it. Just think of the election we’ve just been through. Thousands of young people rushing to register to vote before they missed the deadline. When people have power they use it.

    And when they are denied it, there is anger and disappointment. [...]

    And Britain must not be a country where our children grow up so used to their liberty being infringed that they accept it without question. There will be no ContactPoint children’s database. Schools will not take children’s fingerprints without even asking their parent’s consent.

    This will be a government that is proud when British citizens stand up against illegitimate advances of the state. That values debate, that is unafraid of dissent. That’s why we’ll remove limits on the rights to peaceful protest. It’s why we’ll review libel laws so that we can better protect freedom of speech.


    http://www.libdemvoice.org/power-revolution-nick-clegg-new-politics-speech-19604.html

    (Not doing links as they just get spam-binned).

    Remember Blair calling the press "feral"? The same press he had manipulated and abused and turned into emasculated little toadies? (Don't know why that makes me think of CiF's very own Spanish correspondent).

    Suddenly, the students are now also feral.

    Start lining up the images used to demonise and vilify any group which is not part of the power-abuse-elite structure and wait for the dominoes to tumble from "feral" to "vermin" and award yourself a yellow star.

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  60. Montana

    I am quite sure you are right about blue frogs being the equivalent of someone with a beer-belly and a union jack T-shirt, leading a pit-bull with a spiked collar on a chain.

    They are saying, basically, "Don't kiss me!"

    Might be worth a lick, though, just as a test.

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  61. BB
    Anyone who thinks that gang of bastards is doing anything other than pursuing pure free market ideology is delusional. Bailing the banks out with all our cash then destroying public services in order to privatise them ? It's a great example of partnership working by the three major parties...

    Hangover's fine by thew way, was gone by yesterday afternoon. Country walk and a pint sort most minor ills out I reckon..

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  62. Bitterweed

    Pickles made me laugh with all that schtick about how local authorities are going to be enabled to be really creative now.

    Fuck me, "enabled" and "creative" in one sentence.

    The patented Lie-o-Meter must have melted trying to process that one.

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  63. Meerkatjie

    "Our completely fabulous librarian is also on the case for me. I *love* librarians."

    Careful. You will be inflaming Deano's ardour. He loves lady librarians. :o)

    AB - bloody good post as per.

    I am now addicted to Critical Legal Thinking, and there is an excellent article on there today about the vocabulary of the protests, particularly as used by the police. *The Graun has added it to its blogroll, and blooming good it is too.)

    People are not "kettled" they are "contained".

    The area is declared a "sterile zone"

    And the "containment" is ended by "drip-feeding"

    Like they were dealing with a virulent outbreak.

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  64. It's all going to get far worse, too. Leni was saying last night that people are already being given food vouchers by the Job Centre in her area.

    How long before the soup kitchens?

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  65. Changing the subject, but there is a really funny, and also really poignant, article by Jane Bussman on CiF, talking about the US being up to their ears in corruption in Uganda.

    Fabulous bit here that made I larf:

    "I maintain Bono flies round the world making Africans cry. "How are you," he says, arriving at the hut of someone who didn't have time to flee. "I'm fine," replies the African, politely. "But you're not fine," corrects Bono, "you've got Aids." By the time the millionaire pop star leaves the shack, the African is in tears"

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  66. BB

    Thank you.

    There is a charity which has basically been given the task of supplying food-parcels to the working poor and those who have been mugged by the benefits system. (Will try to remember the name).

    Keep in mind that the policy of any UK government is to ape the US, but without the wherewithal or can-do credentials and remember that in America, internal airline pilots rely on food percels because they are actually paid too little to be able to feed themselves.

    Coming to a town near you soon.

    Then your own town.

    Then your street.

    Then your house.

    We are all in this together.

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  67. Rough (true) scene from the heyday of Thatcher.

    Thatcher: In order to keep people in line, we need to return to the days of the soup-kitchens.

    Minister suppresses snigger.

    Thatcher: You can wipe that stupid grin off your face. I mean it.

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  68. You guys ever watched the Wire ?
    Wathing series 5 this week and wondering how many City Councils today feel like they've been given Baltimore to "run".

    This is worse than the eighties, yet every one -except the students, and all power to em - everyone else just seems so fucking resigned to it.

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  69. I am kind of hoping that the students' protests are just the beginning, BW. Others will follow.

    But having said that, did anyone hear the other little fucking gem of news this morning, that research shows that the majority of the people in this country are now essentially Thatcherite in their outlook?

    Doesn't surprise me, I s'pose. If you bring people up to believe that there is no such thing as society, that people are on the dole because they are feckless and lazy and that all that matters is you and your direct family and fuck everyone else, it is going to happen.

    Made my stomach churn though...

    Food parcels for the poor. I can remember my lad being asked to make up a shoe-box of stuff at Christmas to send to kids in Romania when he was in infants school. I didn't think I would see in my lifetime the possibility that they would be doing it to send to kids in Rotherham or Romford...

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  70. Bitterweed

    No, I haven't seen it, but understand what you mean.

    I wonder whether the students would have protested, though, had there not been a a very personal financial element involved.

    Would they have taken to the streets over a current equivalent of apartheid, say, which did not have an impact on their pockets?

    As for the rest of us, they say that an abused child will still be blaming himself or herself years later, even when they know intellectually that they were not to blame: that they were the innocent recipients of abuse.

    Children love their parents uncritically and unconditionally.

    Maybe we all just fell in love with Big Brother without noticing.

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  71. I've got the first series of the Wire on DVD, BW, but I still haven't watched more than two or three episodes. I thought it was good, but it was hard work for a bear of little brain to keep up with everything, who was who, etc.

    I will give it another go over Xmas when I will have some time to watch several in a row.

    Although I think, if Santa was listening to me the other day, I might be getting the box set of Life On Mars, so that might have to take priority...

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  72. It might be worth finding out about the food parcels and trying to get media from other countries to cover it - embarrass the UK in the international community, so to speak.

    Obviously, since we are all Americans now, other countries may as well get a whiff of what will soon also be their lot.

    I also thought this afternoon that we need to create a type of volunteer army, as per Dave 1's Big Society bollocks.

    The point would be to actually have legions of people helping each other, as he claims to want.

    Has he thought that maybe if it really happened, it would start picking holes in the economy, as people took business away from local taxi firms and builders and shops etc by doing odd things for free or a bit of barter?

    It might also get people talking to each other and undermine The Three Daves' propaganda machine.

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  73. I'm getting klaxons and flashing red lights warning me that I am in danger of overtaking MiriamInEnchantica and crashing through the twenty-thousand posts barrier, so I am just going to take a ball-peen hammer to my typing fingers.

    ReplyDelete
  74. LOL AB!

    I am way up there in the posting diarrhoea stakes. If it is any consolation, I never shut the fuck up IRL either...

    ReplyDelete
  75. She said the charity always runs low on bread, milk, cereal, margerine, nappies and toilet rolls.

    “We deliver food to families who are in real crisis,” said Michelle.

    “The number of increased referrals being received from the Jobcentre proves the recent cuts in benefits and delays has hit local families hard.

    “More shockingly we are delivering to more families with very young children who have been rehomed into Bed & Breakfast accommodation where they have no cooking facilities apart from a kettle.”

    http://www.northwalesweeklynews.co.uk/conwy-county-news/local-conwy-news/2010/08/26/children-in-conwy-are-going-hungry-says-charity-55243-27136794/

    This was from August - the need has spread across Wales. There are similar schemes I know of in England and I imagine similar in Scotland and NI.

    We need to publicise this but the uncaring -I/m all right types - won't really care.

    Some of this is caused by delays in benefit processing and payments.

    ReplyDelete
  76. Atoms

    An alternative economy will emerge from this - it will impact on small local business and the self employed. Barter systems - outside the sight of the tax system - are already appearing.

    ReplyDelete
  77. outside the sight of the tax system

    ... meaning that benefits will 'have' to be cut further to make up the tax shortfall....

    ReplyDelete
  78. Oh well...seems I've developed the knack of abusing the spam while up a ladder and thirty miles from my computer with my hands full of guttering, drill bits and a screwdriver.

    ..noticed this exchange between 'SevereBrianDamage' and kizbot



    kiz: "My money in Greece, though a lot less than the average earnings of a person in Britain doing a similar job"

    BrianDamage "OK. But's that's because sitting around all day doing fuck all other than trying to be the conscience of an on-line middle-class liberal talking shop and fighting 30 year old feminist non-issues isn't classed as a job over here sweetheart."

    kiz: "Seeing as you don't have a clue what my job is or what I do.. I can assure you, you are, yet again... talking bollocks.
    Haven't you got any pies to fry or other serious work to do?"

    Now the fried pies business is clearly a reference to me...I'm 'certain' she doesn't ever look in here and everything so maybe someone could point her in this direction as I have a number of points to make..

    1) It wasn't me...although it was a sentence I'd be proud to have written.

    2) No..you're right...since you seem to have had me in mind when responding...I don't know what you do...not that it appears particularly taxing...nor do I care what you do, nor especially what you 'think'.

    3) Can't you get it into your fuzzy little head that I don't post there any more...from which we can conclude that other people are just as unimpressed with your opinions as I am.

    4) I notice your off on this tack again..

    "As I remember it, virtually no one.. and certainly not any of the cif massive class warriors (with honarable exceptions PCC and zounds) gave a flying fuck about the crisis in Greece when it hit.. The vast majority of the threads were populated by the rightwing ranters screaming about how the Greeks deserved it.."

    ...maybe if you and the other inhabitants of Spamalot hadn't been so complicit in and ready to act as cheerleaders for the banning of certain left-wing posters, you wouldn't be facing this 'problem'.

    Does anybody know what SevereBrainDamage's deleted post contained btw?...I'm assuming he's banned now, although I like his/her style.

    Fish & Chips...spot on btw...best I've had in Brighton were at that half-arsed Harry Ramsden franchise...clearly pre-battered and frozen, cooked in Sunflower oil and basically ersatz nonsense. Jay..you are so wrong.

    ReplyDelete
  79. Have posted request to Jess for article on community food charities.

    ReplyDelete
  80. Just heard that total twat Nick Gibb trying to defend the ending of EMA, and failing miserably. Even the BBC interviewer was unimpressed.

    As for me, I possibly disturbed the neighbours by shouting foul-mouthed abuse at the radio, and not for the first time, Serves the buggers right for their incessant drilling and hammering at odd hours of the day and night.

    Fish and chips in Brighton... Might give the tiny place up a road a go. Can't be worse than all the others I've tried.

    ReplyDelete
  81. Leni

    I just read your former post and was about to say "put it up as a suggestion on waddya" and was scrolling down to read the rest. Really glad you have done it. I will second it.

    This is appalling.

    MF - where does the "fried pies" thing come from? I thought that was only a Scottish thing?

    ReplyDelete
  82. Thanks BB

    The latest figures for the thatcherite suppoters suggest we are losing the fight at the moment.


    It is the not so rich stupid types we have to target and convince.

    They are complicit in their own impending impoverishment. Why can't they see it ? Why don't they understand that prhaps only 2 months ago the desperate were in work like them , managing to pay housing costs then suddenly - Whoosh - all taken from them?

    ReplyDelete
  83. Leni

    I think they think it is like a mantra, a magic spell. If they keep repeating it, it means they are "different" from the ones suffering, that they will not "fail" in the same way they did.

    It really does amaze me - like I was saying earlier, the language used is one of a faith, a cult... everything is "I believe", "I'm sure", etc. but when faced with actual facts they are stumped.

    I had an interesting exchange with a sociopath calling himself Chesney9 on the Cohen thread yesterday, and he was chanting the mantra of the private sector creating all the jobs to take up the slack "like they did in 1993"... I responded by linking to and referring to the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development saying that it wasn't going to happen, the ONS statistics for the last quarter showing that it wasn't happening, and a report showing that only 4.5 million new jobs were created in the private sector between 1992 and 2008 - a 16 yr period - and he still blithely bumbled on that we would have to "wait and see", still insisting that the private sector would fill the gap.

    You can't reason with them. They are blinded by dogma.

    ReplyDelete
  84. Fuckin hell!!


    Throughout my entire life I've always been appalled by arseholes claiming influence, connections and insight they simply don't have. Brickies and plasterers making expert forecasts about interest rates and the housing market based on some 'insider knowledge'..to the point of implying they're not unacquainted with Mervyn King's most intimate thoughts...shabby guys in pubs talking about football giving me 'Gospel' on goings on in Premiership boardrooms...sad little fuckers in Liverpool bedsits selling a bit of weed while hinting they've got Pablo Escobar on speed dial...and I haven't got time to go into the shit you hear from bouncers and cabbies.

    I'm not particularly well connected...everyone I know talks bollocks...which leaves me particularly adept at picking up bullshit when I hear it. So let's examine this little gem...

    Expat: "Nixon was destroyed because he committed a crime, not because of his political record in office. He went on to become a much-respected elder statesman"

    much respected fuckin statesman?

    Now where the fuck has this come from? Let's look at the evidence.

    Brussels is a minor political hub...just the sort of place which attracts all sorts of politicos, journalists and consultants spouting self-inflating patter and bigging themselves up by implying just how connected and in the loop they are...and given, in the natural run of things, to making grand sweeping generalised political and historical claims. So what we get from Expat is overheard tittle-tattle from the tea lady which in turn in based on conversations whose primary purpose is rank self-puffery from dickheads who spout this crap to feel big about themselves and impress the gullible.

    Hence the bland and unexamined pan-European sham-liberal corporate-friendly bollocks which is her staple...now it seems she's either got herself a tea-making gig from a satellite of the Kissinger Foundation or some big fat fuck of a US Republican has complemented her on the way she served the Custard Creams...leaving her so giddy with excitement that she's decided he must be a real discerning and connected guy and has decided to quote him in full.

    Get a mind of your own you silly cow...or even try watching Futurama...or read Hitchens...he used to be red hot on Nixon before he got the neo-con bug...if he's a much respected elder statesman, I'm the King of Spain...so watch your back Martyn.

    ReplyDelete
  85. "MF - where does the "fried pies" thing come from?"

    I used to live near a chippie where they reheated the pies by chucking them in the fat...she disputed this..she was wrong..they're delicious btw.

    About two years ago I asked a girl in a chippie near here to chuck one in as all the pies were cold...only it exploded..and I got barred.

    ReplyDelete
  86. Re Fish and Chips, anyone who thinks that the worst fish and chips are in Brighton clearly has not had them much in London.

    There are some good chippies here but none near me. And there are hundreds of terrible ones.

    Last time I had fish and chips in Brighton they were find. Place near the railway station.

    ReplyDelete
  87. "Last time I had fish and chips in Brighton they were find"

    Where did they hide them?

    ReplyDelete
  88. MF - I believe she's mentioned that she works for, or used to work for, a US company - no doubt one trying to push the neocon agenda in Brussels. So yes, you're probably spot on.

    It's true that Nixon's reputation made a slight comeback in the last couple of years of his life, but that was mostly because the neocons got into power, and people (I use the term loosely) like Ann Coulter started moaning about how he was misunderstood, really, and that what he'd done wasn't anything anyone wouldn't have done under the circs.

    LOL at the exploding pie and resulting barring!

    ReplyDelete
  89. OK it was probably 15 years ago.

    ReplyDelete
  90. It was a place near the station that supplied the sludge I had last week. Wish I'd stayed in the Lord Nelson instead.

    ReplyDelete
  91. thaum

    He and Kissinger were both war criminals. They make Blair and Bush look like boy scouts who got involved in a prank which got a bit out of hand.

    ReplyDelete
  92. BB

    I have been a pondering the true nature of free speech.

    Now before Biey bites me I will make a public declaration of my support for freedom of expression, free speech and the right to grow potatoes in my back garden.

    My query is this ? Free Speech aimed at closed minds with the intention of closer them even further - is is still free speech if it does not spark the thinking process in response ? Is is imprisoning speech/

    To quote from a religious text to the enchanted - and claim the the literal interpretation of rulings thousands of years ago issued to completely different societies further entraps rather than freeing.

    same goes for economic or political semi deified exponents of theories.

    Should free speech enable the freedom of all or seperate us into self reinforcing antipathetic groupings ?

    ReplyDelete
  93. fish and chips are pretty shite in Brighton although the only time I ate them would be on my way out of a club so I prolly didn't notice.

    Got a proper yerksher bloke runs a chippy here, and they are fab.

    I've had a fried pie in Scotland - the scotch pies, though, with the lard thin pastry and stuffed with minced lamb. Never had one down here and never seen my yerksher bloke fry one.

    I'll ask him next time.

    That was a bit shite you getting banned for something someone else cocked up on, though, MF...

    ReplyDelete
  94. Hah. Just realised the time, and no email from work, which means I am "resting" tomorrow.

    I can log out and go back to being me.

    ReplyDelete
  95. I'm not particularly well connected...everyone I know talks bollocks...

    Yes, I'm in the same boat, which makes it such a vicarious pleasure to read about the social whirl of places in lovely abroad, where everyone is an important person doing a big job.

    It also gives an insight into why the poor and ordinary just cannot seem able to rise above their allotted station in life.

    Their problem seems to be that everyone they know is also a dreg, a failure, a no-hoper and an also-ran.

    Compare and contrast this with the lovely life of the political glitterati, with ambassadors' balls and soirees and ballets and constant supplies of chilled Ferrero Rocher and it is hardly any wonder that those who network in these rarefied realms not only get things done, but are also clever, beautiful and justly rich.

    As the saying goes, it is not quite so bad knowing that you will spend your days in the filthy gutter where you belong, as long as you are permitted to at least sometimes glimpse just how wonderful life could be if only you were not so damned by your stupidity, laziness and crippling lack of social graces.

    Sigh

    ReplyDelete
  96. Monkeyfish,

    You have to understand that having worked for an 'American company', one must be in a privileged position when acquiring said information, after all one doesn't work alongside someone who is now a 'WTO Deputy Director General' without picking up the odd titbit !

    Possibly Rufus H. Yerxa, as he seems the most likely candidate. The man's background:

    His private sector experience includes both law practice and a senior corporate role. He was a resident partner in the Brussels office of Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, where his practice focused on international trade matters and European regulatory affairs. He subsequently joined Monsanto Company, a leading producer of agricultural input products, where he was in charge of the law, government affairs and public affairs departments for Europe and Africa. He later served as Monsanto's international counsel in Washington.

    Now there's a nice place to be for an ex Monsanto employee !

    ReplyDelete
  97. MF - come now, Kissinger is a noble recipient of the Peace Prize.

    *retches*

    Oh, the same clowns have also tried to revive McCarthy's reputation.

    ReplyDelete
  98. "It is the not so rich stupid types we have to target and convince."

    Interesting stat the other day, less than one in 10 people earn over £40k. Even £40k is a bit on the lower side for how much you have to earn to be said to benefit from the way this dive is run. Its like the recently exploded myth of the "squeezed middle" - the way most hacks were talking you'd think this poor everyman of middle britain was earning about £80k.

    Speak of exploding food, just had a pot of pesto go off in my chest, face and hair. Tightened the lid but didnt spot wasnt on properly to start with. Started shaking it...

    Even worse, last summer got a big microwavable thing of soup out fridge, shook it, exploded, absolutely covered me, one of the big "feeds 2" jobbies. Absolutely covered. Must be dodgy lid. Had shower, changed clothes.

    Came down, got the next one out, shook it - identical thing happened. Plastered in soup. Cleaned myself up, looked at some of the others still in the fridge, the lids were bulging - werent dodgy lids after all, they'd gone out of date, the gasses built up, ready to blow... Covered the kitchen in shit too.

    ReplyDelete
  99. Monday night.. who's up for UC?

    ReplyDelete
  100. Yep - Nixon.

    I hear that he is on the list for the next beatifications, isn't he? And McCarthy was a cool dude - just so misunderstood.

    Jay

    You know there is a chinese definition of insanity which is repeating the same thing over again in the hope that the outcome will be different the next time... :p

    ReplyDelete
  101. To be fair, BB, i had been having these soups pretty much nightly for quite a long time by that point. Never happened before, so wasnt the most outrageous assumption that was a dodgy lid to blame. Thats my excuse anyway.

    When the first one off i was actually a little stunned, just stood there silently for a moment taking in what had happened and studying the damage, literally dripping in the crap. Just the sort of moment you thank your lucky stars wasnt witnessed by your housemates...

    ReplyDelete
  102. Re, the Gilmout twat. I take back what I said the other day. All the people who I had a go at for not speaking English properly are more deserving of that twat's Oxbridge place.

    While I am not an Imperialist and I am uneasy about the glorification of the dead signified in the cenotaph, the fact is that is our most important war memorial and actually has a grave of an unknown soldier (or is that St Paul's?) and every year it is a focal point for remembering the dead, all the British and Commonwealth dead, from all classes and places.

    ReplyDelete
  103. Hehe Jay - think you need to learn how to cook proper food!

    Maybe then you will learn to have sympathy for the poor, squeezed Harkers of this world, struggling to survive on a six-fugre (no doubt) salary.

    ReplyDelete
  104. Dont confuse laziness with incompetence, Turgle, I'm really not a bad cook, I've got a few moves in the kitchen department dont you worry...

    ReplyDelete
  105. Dont know about UC, Nap, but Hislops programme was quite interesting when i saw it few weeks ago, final episode tonight.

    ReplyDelete
  106. I'll play it on me own then :)

    ReplyDelete
  107. http://blog.talkingphilosophy.com/?p=2393

    this is good..until the conclusion

    "The interesting question is not how human life can have meaning, but how it could ever be a worry that it might have none."

    I think it's clear where the worry comes from: either guilt inspired ultimately by 'supernatural' considerations or guilt inspired by the rampant acquisitiveness we're all supposed to take part in whose 'purpose' turns out to be mere self-gratification...unless life has 'meaning' anyone who spends their time enriching themselves is just a self-serving gobshite and since life can't have a 'meaning'..which I'm taking in the sense of 'purpose'...without some external or supernatural 'gauge'...we're all self-serving gobshites. So we're really left with one option as regards a 'good life'...die absolutely penniless having spent as much of your time as possible persuading others not to be self-serving gobshites.

    Since the penniless bit is more or less written in the stars (or possibly the gutter) for me...let me just say

    "Stop being such acquisitive gobshites...shoot me now!"

    Does anyone remember that T shirt that read..

    "The one who dies with the most stuff is the winner"?

    ReplyDelete
  108. In this time of tribulations, when the Big Society we all yearn for is being born, people often say to me, they say "Vicar, what's it all about then?" and I answer them by saying that in a very real sense, we could all use a good fucking laugh...this should do it...Throat Culture - Easter Island Head

    ReplyDelete
  109. A nice metaphorical image for Cif threads.

    (via Balloon Juice)

    ReplyDelete
  110. I think Monbiot has just highlighted what is already known on most threads - that RW's are using the 'astroturf' method of disruption amongst debating threads.

    'Astroturf' being a development from MONSANTO !

    ReplyDelete
  111. @Charles

    I'm recording UC, I'll play later. For the moment, I'm trying to follow the match and work at the same time.

    ReplyDelete
  112. Tascia

    I was just reading that. It would explain a lot. All the jerks who seem to have turned up on CiF over the past 6 months for a start.

    ReplyDelete
  113. BB - Also some of the jerks that have infiltrated CiF and WTFyTA for periods longer than 6 months...

    posed the cynic...

    ReplyDelete
  114. 27. They really let the standards slip in the last 5 or 10 minutes though, that was when I got something like 10 correct answers. I really though I wouldn't get more than 15.

    ReplyDelete
  115. Nap

    My beloved is watching A Town Called Eureka - again - so I didn't get the chance to do it this week. 27 is pretty good though. I think last time I got 23...

    ReplyDelete
  116. Just read Monbiot's article. Interesting how the right-wing trolls are all over it immediately.

    ReplyDelete
  117. @thauma

    As I pointed out on the thread, one of Monbiot's own operations is no stranger to astroturfing.

    I think it's possible that some right-wing operations do the same thing, but it's also possible that large numbers of people do actually disagree with Monbiot, and leap at the chance of telling him so. Bizarre, I know...

    ReplyDelete
  118. "There's more to subversion than stripping and sequins. Burlesque was once a truly radical form of working-class theatre..."

    Says Laurie Penny middle class Oxbridge pseudo-prole

    I mentioned above my hyper-sensitive antennae re arrant bullshitters...so..taking a leaf from BTH...I give you Charliepolecat...spotting the bullshit a mere 16 minutes into her first CIF outing.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/aug/07/harriet-harman-feminism

    Note the 'foul mouthed obnoxious abuse'...which got Charlie banned

    ReplyDelete
  119. Here comes Polly...strategic advice to the Labour Party...must be another 'Last Chance for Labour' series in the offing.

    "A red carpet of opportunity awaits shell-shocked Labour"

    red carpet of opportunity...who comes up with this shite?

    ReplyDelete
  120. Marie Lloyd, monkeyfish, Marie Lloyd.

    Fuck me, Charles, you beat me. I am not playing anymore until it warms up. My memory goes when my head is frozen.

    By the way, I said as a sort of joke a while back that the answer to poetry questions was always T.S.Eliot. And it has been for three UT's on the trot.

    Your starter for 10...

    Am I psychic are the people setting the questions ignorant pseuds?

    ReplyDelete
  121. Peter - noticed your comment after I'd posted my previous on here! I take your point, but a couple of objections:

    1) "Honorary President" doesn't mean that he actually has anything at all to do with running it.

    2) They are not suggesting that their followers are paid. I don't see a lot of difference between that and those of us on the UT saying, "Hey, go and check out such-and-such an article".

    ReplyDelete
  122. I just read the rest of that 'first' Laurie Penny thread...interesting reading BTH if you're looking in...notable for the surreal turn it took once you joined in and had a go at Charliepolecat...accusing him of 'stalking' FFS...after Ms P had the fuckin nerve to accuse him of stalking her by..erm..writing a comment...one comment

    ReplyDelete
  123. "Marie Lloyd, monkeyfish, Marie Lloyd."
    OK but wasn't she 'music hall'...'vaudeville'...don't recall that she took any clothes off or strutted around in corsets

    ReplyDelete
  124. Of course, some might say that Marie Lloyd was actually Music Hall and that Burlesque is an American invention with nothing to do with the British working class...

    ReplyDelete
  125. Jinx, MF. My caveat came too late.

    ReplyDelete
  126. My excuse is that I used to be friends with Marisa Carr/Carnesky who was sort of proto-modern-burlesque. She divided her time between stripping in the old Sunset Strip in Soho and doing performance art which was amazingly not shit.

    I mean, some of it was a bit dodgy, as performance art is bound to be, but some of it was brilliant.

    She did a show with two fellow strippers from the Sunset in the ICA which was great because with the ICA being in The Mall it was only down the road from Soho, so half the audience were, well, the sort of people who go to ICA performance art pieces, and the other half were dirty old men from a Soho strip joint.

    Anyway, Marisa got me into Marie Lloyd and so I probably do mix the things up a bit in my head.

    ReplyDelete
  127. @thauma

    I still doubt that there are large numbers of Cif commenters taking the Big Oil shilling to have a go at Monbiot. There might be a few arriving from posts on anti-AGW blogs, but as you say that's no different from us on here. The CACC thing is more organised than that, although George might not have done much more there than lend his name.

    ReplyDelete
  128. "I think Monbiot has just highlighted what is already known on most threads - that RW's are using the 'astroturf' method of disruption amongst debating threads."

    ...aided by CIF who for reasons best known to themselves have divested themselves of most of the left-wing opposition and rely on the 'socialist' wiles of the likes of MartynInSpace, Kizbot and the world's least clued up tea-lady.

    ReplyDelete
  129. Yes! Back on top with a match in hand!

    ReplyDelete
  130. the world's least clued up tea-lady may be a 'sleeper', paid for by Monsanto !!!

    Disrupting threads,.. The ability to never answer a question... The ability of her posts are meant to put you to sleep !

    I'm getting far too cynical !!

    ReplyDelete
  131. BB

    Just noticed this..

    "That was a bit shite you getting banned for something someone else cocked up on, though, MF..."

    I didn't get banned...it wasn't me...kizbot assumed it was me...I don't post there any more...I only look in for a laugh...and to decide how to influence things by posting here...they pretend they don't look in but they must do...they're like little daft poodles..just look how, say pen, has cleaned up his act and cut out the abuse...it's basic psychology (duh)...the fact that they think it's me is both annoying but at the same time deeply satisfying...they decide they're under attack, circle the wagons and become even more dependent on each other..more incestuous and recommend each other for an ATL spot..."fuck me...so and so is so funny/ smart/ entertaining...please put them ATL Jess"

    It's all bollocks...none of them are worth reading...how come nobody's touting meerkat, heverdale or gandolfo for a turn?...just look at who they want to promote and then think "erm...hang on a minute"

    ReplyDelete
  132. "I'm getting far too cynical !!"

    is that possible these days?

    ReplyDelete
  133. (They both fucking deserve each other.

    And in the year or so it's got left, I'm going to watch and laugh as CiF rolls about in the soiled and diseased bed it made for itself, before finally succumbing to HepC, dysentery, and the internal bleeding caused by allowing certain posters to live, protected, in their colon.)

    As you were.

    ReplyDelete
  134. james

    you ok?!? feel better???!!!??

    BTW you forgot ebola virus and leprosy...

    ReplyDelete
  135. Gandolfo,

    Well, it's just shit isn't it!?

    And, knowing it's not going to change, we may as well get aboard the schadenfreude express, innit!!

    (and leprosy's relatively painless, isn't it, although ebola would have been a good one!!)

    ReplyDelete
  136. What did the leper say to the prostitute?

    Keep the tip!!*

    *I'm here all week....

    ReplyDelete
  137. Oh Fuck - Power shifting to Local Parish Councils.

    The likelihood that PCC's will suddenly have 100's of thousands of pounds to spend as they see fit.

    In our little place, we are opposing a PCC that is hell bent on building a Church hall. Despite a vote in the majority that didn't want it.

    Could get quite interesting !

    ReplyDelete
  138. James - you're cynicism is rubbing off !

    ReplyDelete
  139. Tascia,

    What can I say, it's a gift!!

    ;0)

    ReplyDelete
  140. james

    I know, god, I know.......I think I became cynical in 1979.......shit it is...........

    ReplyDelete
  141. I'm a relative newcomer to this cynicism lark, then?!

    (the luke* to your obi wan??)

    *without the nobishness though!!

    ReplyDelete
  142. *Actually, to be fair, it's probably with!!

    ReplyDelete
  143. OK, I belatedly read the Laura Penny article.

    Jesus Christ on a bike how does she come up with such complete bollocks?

    The basic idea seems to be that if burlesque is horny you are doing it wrong!

    Still, I guess I can see now why she gave it up.

    ReplyDelete
  144. Gandolfo - report on BBC news basically saying Berlusconi will continue as the 'only option'. Phah !

    Showed him getting out of a car - obviously wearing a Flak Jacket under his Puffa jacket. He must be worried !.

    ReplyDelete
  145. Anyway, having been a lovely little ray of sunshine in everybody's day, it's clocking off time for me.

    Have a good night folks, and be careful out there...

    ReplyDelete
  146. skywalker i feel more like chewbacca than the great sage Obi-Wan Kenobi
    well before i was a cynical optimist that was until 84 then just went downhill with a particular low when tony and his mates entered the scene....then fully fledged cynic cynic......yet i still have a teeny weeny bit of optimism conserved.....like a mini pickled onion

    ReplyDelete
  147. Penny couldnt be any more *Guardian* if she tried, she's the living embodiment of their collective wet dream, their hectoring excretions made living flesh and spouting shit 24 hours a day.

    Or is she supposed to be a sort of ironic, post-ironic character, ironically mocking the irony of it all? She's too absurd even for that i think, too painful, every phrase or sentence has to be loaded up with cliche and dogma.

    And she used to be a burlesque dancer? That is so totally cool and empowered in a, like, kind of ironic way?

    ReplyDelete
  148. well tomorrow confidence vote frankly anything could happen.....so i'm not keeping my cynical hopes up and i get the feeling the pickled onion will be staying in the jar tomorrow.......

    ReplyDelete
  149. Gandolfo - sorry - only relaying the beeb's view on things !

    ReplyDelete
  150. Something about putting a gun against the heads of fat arsewipes who think its clever to try to get away with tax-fiddling and threatening to pull out their tongues and boil their eyes if they try it again:

    http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2010/12/13/a-modest-proposal-for-philip-green-and-the-defenders-of-tax-dodging/

    (I may have elaborated and dramatised that a bit).

    Bed.

    ReplyDelete
  151. tascia

    i have a kind of tourette's syndrome reaction when i hear that name.........not your fault.....!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  152. Jay

    "And she used to be a burlesque dancer? That is so totally cool and empowered in a, like, kind of ironic way?"

    ...or...she's trying to be Ruth Fowler...the similarities are too great for coincidence..only she hasn't got the sense of humour...and let's face it...she doesn't do irony

    She gives her insider's overview of Burlesque based on a student 'lark' at Edinburgh...

    "During the months of our 2005 run in Edinburgh, it was a rare day indeed when a shy, bewildered girl wasn't crying in the toilets backstage because she thought her costume made her look fat. Sometimes that girl was me."

    ..so not really a burlesque performer...although I'd lay good money she thought she'd be good at it cos she's had ballet lessons (and a pony) as a kid...so no more among the ranks of burlesque artistes than she was among the nameless unemployed huddling around a candle for warmth in the bitter months of the notorious North London winter, eating beans and becoming ill with her fellow 'statistics'...and don't forget this nice little middle class girl is the Guardian's authentic voice of the recession for years to come...just like Joseph Harker's the voice of the black dispossessed and Polly Toynbee's a deep thinker

    It's no surprise CIF so values certain posters

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