Friday 5 March 2010

Brown failed to identify his views on the legal process and the Attorney Generals sudden conversion and his views on the intelligence raises more questions than it answers.

Surely it was all "patchy and sporadic" and was not robust at all.

Does he imply the intelligence services stitched him up as it clearly was patchy and sporadic and based on assumptions?

But as Nick Robinson suggest I suppose unless he gets caught out by documentation then he can't be damaged too much.

There is no suggestion from him that the cabinet process was bypassed by a clique and an obliging Attorney General.

He is content with the process that caused such domestic and international outrage. He would do it all again.

There is no sense of shame or contrition at all and there it is no surprise that Blair before went on the offensive with regard to Iran.

On Wilders and Lord Pearson does this mean the spectre of previously mooted cooperation with the BNP is as dead as a doornail or is there more ambiguity there that needs to be clarified?

The German and Greek spat is of less concern to me than the issue of how Greece apparently got hold of far more credit than it could manage.

There is I presume no reason that this could not happen again in the future and I wonder whether EU rules would have to be turned into something more like regional regulation with repercussions for banks who tried to bypass the rules?

Think there is something in this:

"German leaders will pretend to offer assistance, attach difficult conditions for aid, and walk away when not met. They want expulsion and an end to $300 billion in annual welfare for wrecked nations carried in the South, a grand impairment to the German savings and standard of living."

Ref : https://www.freebuck.com/articles/jwillie/100223jwillie.htm

A typical gold analyst dooming talk.

A semicolon in English is more than the slight pause of a comma and obviously less of a full stop .

German may use a comma to link two independent clauses without a conjunction.

In Greek its
a question

On Wilders I should have mentioned for new visitors that some of the far right posters will pollute this page later will make obscure comments about the perils of democratic freedoms - but usually don't mention the National Socialism that they admire.

They will mention race and genetics but never explain why those like the BNP always duck the chance to take their "scientific" evidence into a court as they could over the EHRC legal requirement for multi-racial membership. They hardly ever mention their desire for active eugenics.

They will similarly often mention the "Jewish hegemony" but again the "evidence" never shows up in any court through a class action.

Sometimes when they have been whupped on all of the facts they simply change their login identity and start posting the same tired old lies under a new name.

Does the BBC impartiality not cover the implication of David Dimbleby suggesting that Clegg could not win the next election and therefore had questionable credentials to be in the leaders debate?

Clegg probably won't win but given how soft the vote is for each of the two major parties and the potential for economic events and political scandal to further damage their standings the Lib Dems could make the break through that ends the two party pendulum.

Its the cosy status quo that has led to such political paralysis and the sleaze of MP's expenses.

They have a steady 17-20% but there are probably a good few sections of Labour support who don't actually want to see another five years of "Stalin" and could not vote Tory.

The Tories alienated so many people when in power before that their vote is looking quite wobbly and there is the Ashcroft effect.

Therefore it really isn't impossible that the Lib Dems could make giant leaps in the next election and potentially a follow on election if the hung Parliament is not held up by them.

met give up seasonal forecasts but still insist they can predict the weather 20 years from now?

the eu wants a 'carbon tax' on fuel. why is this carbon tax still going when the 'science' upon which is has been based has been shown to be corrupted/incomplete/propaganda by one worlders and those who own the carbon exchange and so stand to make a fortune?

https://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8551416.stm

Admit that they can't reliably forecast the weather for the next few months yet expect us all to believe that they can forecast the weather in 20-50 years when it comes down to promoting their Corporate Nazi Climate Change Scam ?

And controversial Dutch MP Geert Wilders has arrived in the UK to show his anti-Islam film after overturning a ban on entering the country.

We are world famous for having an open door policy to the world's anarchists. This goes way back. Buy now, pay later.

> We are looking at the culture clash between German and Greece

I read that as
We are looking at the culture clash between Germaine and Greer


Brown hasn't said anything you wouldn't expect him to.

3. thegangofone 'The German and Greek spat is of less concern to me than the issue of how Greece apparently got hold of far more credit than it could manage.'

Apparently, would you believe, it was the Great Squid of Wall Street.

Gordon Brown is flogging off our assets to cover the interest on the debts he's run up so who are we in a culture clash with?

Is the Euro and Axis of Weasels, like Iraq, bad for the petrodollar?

BWOWN'S SMILES CAME LIKE CONTRACTIONS.

Then, while 'doing' the finer points of Iraqi policing, IT GOT STUCK. He just could not 'compute' the right moment to turn it off, so it stayed on.

Should such a dysfunctional (not to mention devious) man be in charge of 60+ million - half of whom are already barmy? And now we 'know' war is for him, a good thing, should James G Brown have his own 'Nucular' Button? You know how badly he wants to be greater than Tony.

Iraq Inquiry am

gordon has an interesting foreign policy. The uk must go to war with any state that that breaks UN resolutions repeatedly. suppose such a state is one of our 'strategic partners'? as is currently the case?

he plainly states that plan A was for the UN to do all the aftermath work with no plan b should that not prove the case [as it did]. So they were working on the Kosovo model as the template for Iraq.

about 103mins gordon effectively admits the uk intelligence failed in informing ministers about the divisions in the usa between the pentagon and the state department? he says he was unaware of what was going on in the usa. Did mi6 not inform the government about what was going on behind the scenes in our 'closest ally'? Political science is knowing 'where the power is' Did SIS not know where the power was in the USA?

about 110 mins in gordon keeps talking about the uk being at war with 2 countries. Who in the uk in their daily lives feels 'at war'? even the government is not on a war footing? There was no single minister responsible for these wars?

by mentioning a huge list of 'lessons' Gordon admits the action was reckless?


listening to gordon say the military could have had anything they asked for the current chiefs should get on the phone and ask for 50 helicopters, 100k more troops, 20 more ships to defend the falklands etc?

gordon defends calling the iraq war budget as 'anti terrorism'. The only people who saw iraq as terrorists in 2003 were the israelis?

gordon comes across like the wooden FO witnesses who had a schooled mantra to say? thus avoiding several questions. how he can sign that statement the answers to the questions are true fair and accurate looks an exercise of a contortionist?

as for the rest of Gordon's AM answers its all on itsnotmegov.co.uk

8 snap!

14. barriesingleton 'half of whom are already barmy?'

Perhaps it's all that make-up etc? It must make it harder to know who one really is.

"Prime Minister Gordon Brown is giving evidence at the Chilcot Inquiry"

I think you use the term "giving evidence" loosely. It's a shame that your very own Mr Paxman wasn't on the enquiry panel, or he might have actually had to answer some of the questions he was asked.

..Anti-Afghan War Awol soldier Joe Glenton jailed..

https://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/8551245.stm

the idf has refuseniks to. its part of the logic of the occupation paradigm to lock people up who see it as a war crime. As for bullying in the army its a strategic moral collapse of the officer class. They seem to think abuse of people is the way to get the best out of them?

that shocking c4 film The Mark of Cain gives an insight into how such a troglodyte mindset can easily lead to war crimes upon civilians.

#10 - You could have a migraine coming on and it may spread to the rest of the world. It could be a hole in the heart or maybe not.

#14 - Not to worry Barrie it will all be over for Mr Brown soon. We have our fingers on the nuke button and our minds cannot be manipulated by smug tics, Mandys or bully-boys any more.

#14

Barrie

There's no danger of Brown ever becoming greater than Blair. I know you do not like TB but whatever one might think about him he was a statesman. I remember both the Poles and the French thinking and talking of him as such while Brown, despite camouflage, is beginning to make it into mockery shows abroad, etc. One can hide one's own true nature only for so long. Eventually the veil does drop down making quite a bit of noise on top of it.

mim

P.S. Love the way you talk about his smile dependent on computer buttons.

Forecasting climate and weather are different things.
Forecasting the weather is like trying to predict the exact clothes you'll be wearing in a few a days time.
Forecasting the climate is like trying to predict what style of clothing you'll be wearing in a few decades.

Predicting the climate should be less complex as you're not trying to account for the vaguaries of a chaotic system in quite the same way.
But you lack the ability to refine what you are doing as you don't get as many additional data points and I think it's more likely to be open to over-fitting. Also getting small things wrong can take you down a completely fallacious path. For example, a volcanic super eruption could be a complete game changer.

15. jauntycyclist 'about 110 mins in gordon keeps talking about the uk being at war with 2 countries. Who in the uk in their daily lives feels 'at war'? even the government is not on a war footing? There was no single minister responsible for these wars?'

Yes, but UK people now lack a sense of perspective over all sorts of matters and have no grasp of numbers and their significance, or how few of our EU neighbours ever contributed to this largely American/Israeli side-show. At the height of the invasion, the UK contributed 46,000 troops, which was then reduced to about 8,500, so whatever our forces were/are doing there, they can't have been achieving very much as there just weren't enough of them, as has been said many times, by many people. It's kept in the news all the time though, and that's been great for Israel, as those in the Middle East are even more dim than the average Briton - hey just hear that the Europeans are in the Middle East. That Brown uses words like 'at war' to describe this pantomime, and that the media gives it so much airtime, is really sad testament to the major loss of perspective in our times. What matters is the dismal state of care for people, especially old people, at home, but they can't do that, so they male out they're saving Iraq's or Afghanistan's people. It's like the ACA distraction from bankers and their kleptocratic behaviour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-ENhGRJ028&feature=player_embedded#

controversial Dutch MP Geert Wilders....Recent polls suggest that he could soon become one of the most powerful men in the Netherlands.

Jolly good, he's a good friend of Israel. Holland was where the Spanish Jews went after they were cruelly expelled in 1492 (it being a Spanish Colony). It later became independent, funded the English Civil War's New Model Army, and was where England was later invaded (liberated) from in 1688. After that, its days as a banking and world trade centre started to decline, and England's place on the world stage began to grow instead. Then it was America's turn. Great liberals the Dutch. Founded NYC as New Amsterdam.

23

our non conscript army can only ever be a fighting force and not an occupation force. occupation of afghanistan had estimates of 500k troops. given the attitude of 'allies' where would we get that without conscription?

Marco Wanderwitz, a member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's C.D.U. party states: "If the European Union and, therefore, Germany, helps out Greece economically, it will need to give something in exchange. Some islands, for example, might be a solution."

As with all things European and of the E.U., there are messages within messages within messages. Are we one of the intended recipients of this statement? Are we to expect to have to bail-out Greece, too? Replace "Germany" with "United Kingdom". Which islands would anyone like?

Jeremy rather let Christine Lagarde off the hook, recently, when raising this point.

no round of applause at the end for gordon....

https://www.climategate.com/james-delingpole-versus-george-monbiot-on-climate-change

I see Frank Skinner has been ranting in defence of Catholicism. I don't know why he bothers trying to support these bossy suthoritarians, we all now know that the Catholic clergy spend their time doing the most terrible things to innocents etc. What we want is more liberals!

Hey look, schools are not doing so well under new OFSTED inspection rules. Best get in there and do some regime changes into 'Academies' (or just privatise them) so their staffing levels can be 'rationalised' (most of a school's budget goes on staffing for some odd reason).

BEWARE PRANCING PIPE-PLAYING NINNIES IN DOUBLET AND HOSE MIM (#21)

You are a very impressionable twirler Mim; your judgement of men - especially con-men - is deeply flawed. The real Tony is out there - obscenely rich, accredited-while-discredited and Global Snake Oil seller extraordinaire. When the 9/11 house of deceptive cards, comes down at near-free-fall speed, even you will see the real Tony Blair unmasked. Till then, if the Pied Piper comes down your road: fingers in ears and go: "la la la can't hear you!"

Yesterday in the Commons an ex-minister said that trust between the electorate and the legislature will never be fully re-established until they - the HMP’s - better represent the views of the GBP rather than represent themselves.

Hmm? .. Maybe old dogs can be taught new tricks?

Help! .... I’m showing signs of cyanosis!

Missed Nn for the first time in ages yesterday, baby boomers aren’t really my idea of news of the night hence ....

On last night’s QT a panel member asked for an enquiry into the Iraq War!

Oh well, some people are good at maths and maybe not much else.


Three ‘things’ that might be reminiscent of the ongoing effect of butterfly wings .....( and about which the liberally minded seem to be obsessed) ....

History, religion and immigration.

Time for a reality check folks .....

You can’t, however hard you try, change history!

Re: Chilcott. How many water wells, anti-biotic shots and sets of body armour could be bought for all the cash these committees are using up? Horses & gates anyone?

Get real and move on!

Religion would best be consigned to history.

Far too generous perhaps?

And one has to wonder just how well Mr Wilders’ party will actually do come the summer?

Fact: It’s an issue that won’t go away during the election. Telling people that it is ‘all good’ ‘aint gonna wash!

Which just happens to be an adequate link to ( Tee hee!) ....


Quite an interesting piece on immigration in BBC Look East this evening ( iPlayer job perhaps?) An attempt to add to the the most skewed programme the BBC has broadcast in ages i.e. Mr Davis’ - ‘I say ‘ol boy, let’s cast a factumentary using C4’s Big Brother audition criteria’? - “The day the immigrants left”. AKA “Deliberately putting square pegs into round holes. ( To justify the premise of our programme.)”

Apart from again telling the viewers that immigration is good for the UK it featured an interesting interview with ‘an industry - quasi - insider’ which alone makes it worth seeking out. To add further intrigue; If you had HMG monies to use to improve ‘integration’ what would you spend it on? Also .... What proportion of a small group of students - by definition surely having a modicum of intelligence? - would consider the BNP worthy of consideration at the election?

And ....

Oh Yes! ......

Some suited liberals are outraged at the possibility that the BBC will be giving further airtime to smaller parties, including the BNP, in the run-up to the election .....

If you ignore it, it will not then become irrelevant!


Talking of which ....

Top Con is still not answering questions on Mr Ashcroft ...

But then ‘it’ - the funding concerns - has been described as an....

“ .... unwelcome distraction ...”

by a Lower Con!

Is that really all it is?

Hmm!

I have just had to good fortune to watch the type of programme that BBC 2 does so well i.e. Master-crafts.

A very good example of what could be possible if you attempt to fit a round peg into a round hole. (See No. 33 above)

Perhaps there’s a TV programme here?

“Presenter Swop”

Mr Don interviewing the PM, Mr Davis spreading fertiliser!

Hmm!

Worth hearing / watching?

Hmm!

'Prime Minister Gordon Brown is giving evidence at the Chilcot Inquiry, insisting that the decision to go to war in 2003 was "right". We will have the latest on that.'

What's the point? Seriously? None of it makes any sense, it's just PR, as the 'witnesses' keep referring to the nebulous realm of the 'psychological', which, as anyone with any education knows, is never an explanation/justification for anything - legally.

I fear you may be patronising your audience Newsnight, or has university education really deteriorated this much?

#32

Ir'a norhing to do with being impressionable. I'm just saying that Tony Blair was helpful with my job as a PA which I did for all those 13 years.

Personally, I couldn't care less whether he's stinking rich, or notI'm not, unlike yourself, a jealous person. All I'm trying to say is that he has not lost that basic sense of humanity as opposed to Gordon who just pretends he is a 'nice' man.

Gordon too is driven by jealousy and begrudges journalists like Jeremy Paxman earning more money than himself.

Do you know that I personally know a few very attractive long legged blondes with much more money and in established relationships who are jealous of me? It's not that I delight in it. Quite the opposite. I'm trying my best to give them credit for what they are or do if it's due obviously.

mim

#32 addendum

I can believe that 9/11 was partly caused by nasty Western elements but I somehow can't imagine Tony Blair having anything to do with it. G W Bush yes but not TB. He may have been naive but he is not a nasty.

mim

P.S. Both my grandpa and a lady cousin of mine who's been to visit me in London were born on the 11th of September. I suppose it's just a coincidence!?

Geert Wilders on Newsnight: I hope GO1 did'nt choke on his veggie burger when he witnessed that report and interview. His homework ain't gonna get done this weekend is it.

Gordon Brooon non answers: yeah well..whatever. No surprises from this former chanceller. Was he economical with the truth? ..and was that a cheap pun? ('cheap'..sorry) Maybe he should've tried the 5th amendment. Do we have something comparable like that in British law? could've saved some time and had an earlier lunch; no answers but smiles all around.

I do like the New look review and the little music slot at the end. Good to see Chris evans younger brother, those busking years at the underground did'nt go to waste. yeah, good.

#36 another addendum

And anyway, people who have quite a bit of money are likely to create more jobs than those who don't like for instance by the mere fact of buying a house and then doing work on it. Besides by having money they are likely to give more to their chosen charities, for example, than those who can't afford a penny either because of the circumstances they may have found themselves in or by being stupid with whatever they may have had in the past but lost it all due to gambling for example.

Something to think about over the weekend?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7379983/Hundreds-of-NHS-wards-to-be-shut-in-secret-plans.html

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

In my calendar it’s the 6th Day of Spring
And my heart continues to swing.
Swing with joy rather than in between
Different factions fighting for mim.

yet more on Tony Blair

However his years in power will be judged, Tony Blair will remain in the history books as the man who helped bring about relative peace and stability in Northern Ireland!

mim

Having registered with the White House in Washington, I get regular e-mails from them. Yesterday's e-mail was to do with the current state of affairs with regard to Barack Obama's healthcare reform and that's what I wrote back to them:

Good luck with that.

Let’s hope the Republicans stop thinking of the President’s ideas of how to reform the American Healthcare system as some kind of chip off the communist ideology, etc.

By the way, a few weeks ago I did see bits of the healthcare debate between the Congressmen/Congresswomen of different persuasions and they seemed to have been talking about some kind of experiment that had been started by G W Bush. My hope is that they forget all about the said experiment and concentrate on the future of the health of the American people instead.

All the very best, Nancy-Ann DeParle and thank you for carrying on sending me the updates from the White House.

Kind regards to the President, Mr Barack Obama and his family, as well.
Monika

P.S. I think the actual White House texts are available for all to see on their website.

#40

In which case, Ecolizzy, it may be difficult, if not impossible, for them to keep the admission waiting lists down. Electoral promises, eh?

43. mimpromptu 'However his years in power will be judged, Tony Blair will remain in the history books as the man who helped bring about relative peace and stability in Northern Ireland!'

A man at the head of a vanguard of 'socialists' delivering the first steps towards independence for NI, Scotland, Wales, London, the South-East, South West, Midlands, North East, North West, ensuring that Brussels sapped any remaining power so none of the former could ever again rally behind an obscene cry of United Kingdom, Great Britain or even England. He will be remembered as a great man of freedom.

For all the horror that Blair and Brown have subtended upon us its financial non-regulation that has wrought most havoc on the public and been affecting - in some cases devastating. A direct result of the creation and their dictate of the FSA. I really want to know what Mr Cameron is going to do in detail on this matter. What is his plan on regulation? What is he going to do about the banks if anything is possible, what is possible and realistically achievable ? I want to know how cases already in the pipe line for fraud at the FSA are going to be affected ? We will not get the truth but its worth hearing the filtration.

If its not possible to stop CDS's and other morally incomprehensible madness can banks be separated from the casino operations ?

Also its clear that fraud prevention by banks (know your customer) failed to protect the consumer on an unprecedented level under Mr Brown and Mr Blair. What will you do on this front to protect people from, not only the banks themselves but wide-boy sociopaths intent on scamming - seeing the eventual UK prison sentence as a worthwhile cost - actually factoring it in and not a deterrent ?

How anarchists did it (Paul Foot, Ian Hislop etc etc) usually without knowing what they were doing no doubt. Check out Spiked and its heritage.

Humour - it's a funny thing.

Start with the Revolutionary Communist Party, and see Monbiot on the strange world of 'left-wing' Living Marxism and its comrades. Billions spend on Cold War arms and foreign policy/regime change etc...

If your head hurts, maybe it's telling you somefink?

(Naive?) Michael Foot RIP.

Mr Cameron how are you going to separate yourself from the very thing that sustains your party, the flip side of which has caused us near ruination. What method of insulation will be instigated and how will you know when holes are being burnt through by the mind warping powers of magnifying glass wielding hedge fund managers, similar results of which can been seen on Mr Browns face ?

CAN YOU SUPPORT A LIE WITH WORDS OF TRUTH?

Why would anyone do that? What sort of mentality takes leave of his inquisitors, happy IN HIS OWN MIND that he didn't (actually) lie, but with his Manse-Pants a beacon of Hellfire, telling the world a different story? WHAT SORT OF MENTALITY?

Is this not the action of the ARCHETYPAL LITTLE BOY since Adam - wide eyed - incriminating everyone but himself?

Is this not the WESTMINSTER ETHOS, practiced in the highest tower of that Citadel, by our Prime Minister, to some unfathomable self-satisfaction? Small wonder, then, that MPs have been found wanting en masse, while media, commerce, banking, retail etc, all 'LIVE INSIDE THE LIE' that is now our established culture.

The above is a 'CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER'. It arises, not from external rogue-states or terror-cells, but from our own decay, epitomised by the recent 'performance' of James Gordon Brown, at Chilcot.

WHAT DID YOU DO ABOUT THE WAR DADDY?

29. brossen99 The problem is that in some areas of science, the peer review system has been corrupted. This was highlighted in a Health Select Committee into 'The Influence of the Pharmaceutical Industry' a few years ago, when David Healy (and others) gave evidence on how articles were being ghost written for scientists (along with other inducements) in order to push some drugs (e.g. the so-called SSRIs). This is all in Hansard for anyone who is interested. In fact, Monbiot himself knows how treacherous this has all become, as he has written about it in another context, often. The problem is, does he really have enough scientific experience to know what he is talking about?

There are some scientific truths, but does Monbiot know how to spot them? By that, I mean by what objective methods, as it's not a matter of personal (self-aggrandizing) judgement. Not everything is open to 'debate', some things are true.

51. barriesingleton - Are you sure, looking at the likely outcome of what you advocate, you're not an anarchist?

See the first (and second in 1688) Interregnum?

Note who did well after that.

Why do you have such faith in populism given that you think half the population potty? Where would your 'independents' get their funding from to support their candidacies?

Surely in practice you're advocating anarchism?

#52
Yes that's important stuff on David Healy he was a witness in the appalling Donald Schell case:

https://www.healyprozac.com/Trials/Tobin/default.htm

Yes Mr Cameron after the banks what are you going to do about big pharma ? Seems an impossible task.

greek greed tries to hide behind history?

however the euro is just a euphemism for the deutchmark and is run as if it was.

ON BEING SURE (#53)

Q: "Are you sure, looking at the likely outcome of what you advocate, you're not an anarchist?"

A: No.

But you, Statist, exude certainty ('some things are true').
It would be quite illuminating (at least for me) if you were to clearly label YOURSELF.
Let us, for the moment, assume I AM an anarchist; by the same token (and looking, not a little, like Nigel Farrage) my question is: "What, IN TRUTH, are you?"

54. flicks 'Seems an impossible task.'

It does indeed.

The first thing to take on board is the reality of American, 'Neoconservative', influence on post WWII European politics. As the USA is economically/demographically weakened (largely at its own hands), so too will this crippling force weaken also. Is the smart political bet on China?

56. barriesingleton 'But you, Statist, exude certainty ('some things are true').'

That is because there are some propositions which are truth functional, and some which are not. The 'trick' is to avoid the ones which have 'predicates' which are not truth functional, such as the psychological verbs. There are scientific truths, but they eschew these idioms. These truths are conjunctive statements, i.e. relations (e.g. conditions under which water 'boils').

"It would be quite illuminating (at least for me) if you were to clearly label YOURSELF."

Surely that is manifestly obvious? How much clearer could it be?

As an aside, and perhaps something to think about, you do appreciate that seniorish Civil Servants (and it used to be so with politicians too) used to be put in post not for their personal qualities, but for their ability to perform the duties of the post? It's not just for this reason that finding personal faults is a mistake (as we all have personal faults), but because the ad hominem and our obsession with celebrity and the personal are two sides of the same corrupted (linguistic) currency.

What if, (just as a conjecture mind, i.e. just as a counterfactual), there has, throughout history, been an internationally mobile band of troopers, 'half' of whom were merchant bankers and the other 'half' being anarchists?

What if the job of the first group of shock-troppers was to cleverly subvert existing structures via populist appeals of freedom and improved efficiency etc, with the second ready to move in and take over the vacated posts? What if this was all the work of one nepotistic group of colonists? Wouldn't it show up in the statistics?

55. 'however the euro is just a euphemism for the deutsche mark and is run as if it was.'

Is that market-forces at work? Maybe the truth is that a) one can't keep a rational people down and b) one shouldn't try to via malicious allegations and name calling?

I heard this one said today:
Greece is the canary in the economic mineshaft.

Gerald Celente, trends forcaster. He ain't wrong.

#56

Half the population, Barrie? No, almost the whole of it, otherwise it's him, Mao, Stalin, Hitler and Churchill apart from being a bunny, a doggie, a cat to be stroked and oh yes, Mario and Charlie, of course! Wake up Barrie, you've been corresponding with a genius! You really should take your hat off..

mim

#62 addendum

Oh, I forgot, there's also Sacha, otherwise introducing himself as a sachet. You really should, Barrie, send him at least a round of applause.

Some anti-statists - what are they like?

APOCALYPSE NOW? (#58)

Knowing you (of all people) would not lead me to draw an unsubstantiated conclusion, Statist, I ask again that you LABEL YOURSELF, taking as your reference point my post #56.

Should it transpire that you, a man of consummate precision, whilst feeling moved to suggest a tag for me, still cannot/will not label YOURSELF, unequivocally, then I must prepare for the imminent End of The Age.

I don't know whether the readers of these pages are aware of the fact that Carla Bruni when asked about her premarital affairs said that it was better to sleep around rather than knit.

I've recently finished off a jumper and made a few scarves.......

P.S. Please do not take me wrong. In no way am I judgemental about Carla Bruni. It just takes all sorts. It's always been like that and will remain so till the end of mankind.

Koestler upset a group of people with his book The Thirteenth Tribe.

Life certainly has its little ironies.

IF IT STOPS BRUNI 'SINGING' I'M IN FAVOUR (#66)

And she can smoke all she likes after . . .

66. mimpromptu 'I've recently finished off a jumper and made a few scarves.......'

For some reason, that triggered an image of the French Revolution and Kirsty Wark.

FWIW I think you're right on this matter, and that Carla has it the wrong way round.

Nice song... explains her life-choices....?

THE UNPAYABLE DEBT CHRISTIANITY OWES THE JEWS (#67 link 2)

How can Christianity ever repay the Jews of the Bible for ensuring that Jesus redeemed the sins of mankind?

Why did the two faiths fail to publicise the truth of this*. Come to that, why did the Chosen Ones act to save all those Gentile souls, when Jews, presumably, would have inherited the earth, had Jesus lived.

*So redolent of Blair-Labour staying silent, when newspapers splashed the 45 minute claim. Could it be we are being misled?

65. barriesingleton. Look it up.

Statist.

#69

Carla was neither right or wrong and anyway she wasn't at the time engaged to Nicolas Sarkozy. It's just a question of personal preference.

Talking of the French President, I've been listening to a French comedian come imitator, Nicolas Canteloup, who is intelligently funny. The other day he mentioned Sarkozy's attraction to some draws. I'm not sure what and whose draws he was 'talking' about but it did sound funny.

I'd love to let Nicolas Canteloup loose on the UK politicians.

#68

I quite like a few of her songs and the way she sings them

72. mimpromptu 'Carla was neither right or wrong .......It's just a question of personal preference.'

Is any behaviour right or wrong? Or is all just a 'question of personal preference'?

Aren't some preferences right, and others wrong?

You should be able to sleep around and knit...though not at the same time, unless Gordon Brooon can tell us otherwise, he may know some energetic Kilt weavers who can multitask. Prescotts old secretary, she could multitask, she could kick the door closed whilst 'at it'.

anyhow er..concsiousness drives the universe. Just thought I'd drop that one in here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9bVd3BspIQ

On that French radio station that I listen to there are other quite amazing people/journalists. One of them reports on cooking. When he really gets going, my mouth starts experiencing all kinds of sensations and yesterday I thought I'd jump out of my skin the way he spoke about a baked grated potato dish. I got so stimulated that I'm now trying to create something along the lines of his artistic description.

The other day they also had an interview with a Frenchman who says he loves living and writing songs in London which doesn't mean he doesn't like Paris he added. His young son who goes to an English school is now a bilingual and helps his Dad with his diction, etc.

Isn't it good rather than constantly bringing up the past and the strenuous relationships between the over the Channel neighbours?

76. mimpromptu 'Isn't it good rather than constantly bringing up the past and the strenuous relationships between the over the Channel neighbours?'

Do the 'over the channel neighbours' know where they came from? Shlomo Sand seems to think the 'outraged ones' may be a bunch of deluded nutters..

Maybe it was something in East European cuisine or a virus or something? It does seem to run in families now (I'm not persuaded by the cat poo theory).

Anyhow, it's a pity so many of the rest of us have had to put up with the consequences of such nonsense for so long don't you think? In days gone by, such people, making out they were extra special and chosen by some superior being, would have been sectioned, or at least exorcised/ducked surely? These days, such people have to be at risk of harming themselves or someone else for that (probably a good move I hasten to add), so many more walk amongst us, and in ever greater, and ever more unhappy, numbers. Hence all the zombie and vampire movies of late?

Still, who's to say what's odd these days?

A MATTER OF TIME AND PLACE?

"....Aren't some preferences right, and others wrong?"

I do believe they are but I also see that the pendulum swings according to time and place on many value judgements. If one trawls back through history and across nations, moral and social accepted good/bad preferences have often changed (not always for the long term greater good) according to the needs and of course fashions and governance of the day.

We seem to stray into the greatest mire when needs and fashions (set by the ruling and gliterati classes of the day) collide and when 'fashion' wins.

RE: CEREBRAL & ARTISTIC CELEBRITIES

Cerebral celebrities would not have become as such without their cerebri working in a cerebrally interesting ways.

Artitistic celebrities would not have become as such without their brains and souls working in artistic ways.

One may have preferences, art movements go out of fashion, some cerebral celebrities are remember for longer than others, etc, etc, etc.

CEREBRAL AND ARTISTIC CELEBRITIES ARE AS HUMAN AS THEIR NEIGHBOURS OR EVEN, PERHAPS, MORE SO BY BEING MORE ATTUNED TO THAT EXCLUSIVELY HUMAN ACTIVITY WHICH ONE COULD CALL ENDLESSLY EVOLVING CREATIVITY

According to Mongolian horoscope pearls represent Pisces and turquoise Taurus.

RE Don McCullin (although not specific to Mr McCullin's work)

This is the way photographers think these days :-

'AB – Yes, our work is definitely a move away from that. Politically speaking, we often talk about how war photographers are so much a part of the system of conflict, and how the photographers on the frontlines are kind of colluding in that system. So much of that photography - the ‘Baghdad Boys’, and so on - is not challenging the status quo anymore; it’s part of it. And I think that it’s important to make pictures that are challenging. It’s very clear to us that we either have to come either before or after the fact. We consciously avoid that moment of action.'

'It’s not just about having big balls anymore; you know what I mean? It’s actually about thinking.'

Ref: https://www.seesawmagazine.com/figpages/figinterview.html

These two are intelligent in realising that photography has become feminized and they have to work with that context to have a career. So you have a situation where by they photograph a leaf blown off a tree by a bomber. I think of it in the future context - what will a photograph of a leaf say to the future about suicide bombers ?

Liked your hair cut kirsty

#74

Depends what's involved. I would call torture or rape wrong while sleeping around with consenting partners a neutral morally activity, at least as far as I am concerned.

Are yes I see the problem you would have with that one image on the link - thought so - interesting debate don't you think mods?

It was a disgraceful show Wilders was giving away in the UK today, im ashamed too be dutch.

https://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100028631/what-dave-and-his-chum-barack-dont-want-you-to-know-about-green-jobs-and-green-energy/

BEING ALIVE DAMAGES HEALTH, INTERRUPTS SLEEP, AND FINALLY KILLS YOU (#85)

Mawkings - Moonbat - Danglepole; why must we suffer these denizens of the Cracked Bellcurve?

Given the choice, knowing what I now know, worse - knowing that 'the Goof is out there' (and his chums) - I would have taken the Zeroth Amendment: 'YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN UNCONCEIVED'.

There are nutters among us starving themselves BECAUSE FOOD SHORTENS YOUR LIFE! Are they for real? The only strategy that might have been viable, in planetary terms, would have been for the Thinking Ape to have thought FIRST, and eschewed the bloody thinking. As things are, we must run our nihilistic course; but OH how much easier it would be without wacky experts!

79. mimpromptu 'Artistic celebrities would not have become as such without their brains and souls working in artistic ways.

One may have preferences, art movements go out of fashion, some cerebral celebrities are remember for longer than others, etc, etc, etc.'

The problem is that today, ever more folk would have us all believe that their preference for 2+2 equalling 'a beautiful butterfly' must be given equal merit to it equalling 4. This not only makes teaching extremely difficult, but it also makes getting on with each other more than a chore. There has to be respect for convention. Language and socialisation demands it. It isn't creative just to flout convention, it's often just bad taste/manners or anarchism (e.g. Tracy Emin's bed)

86. barriesingleton 'The only strategy that might have been viable, in planetary terms, would have been for the Thinking Ape to have thought FIRST, and eschewed the bloody thinking.'

Ah, yes - that is very much my line. It was in fact de rigueur in respectable psychology until the nutters from Eastern Europe took over in the 60s and 70s. It's all been downhill ever since.

#87 - from the Emin link

'An unmade bed is transformed into a consummate work of art once it is bought by Charles Saatchi and placed in a prestigious art gallery. The artist acquires a mystique created out of the power of suggestion.'

Yes not bad - switched on all right - she's getting at the feudal, total affinity fraud nature of the art world that the regulators have yet to happenstance upon. Give them a little while - the bankers and major dealers will concoct another bubble - they need more than gold can give after they delude themselves to near oblivion with fiat money.

THE BRIGHT ELUSIVE BUTTERFLY OF ABSOLUTE ADDITION (#87)

I'm struggling here Sttist. Would you demolish Arthur Eddington for me?
Eddington quote:

"We used to think that if we knew one, we knew two, because one and one are two. We are finding that we must learn a great deal more about 'and'.

#87

Don't see it as being about anarchy though at least from my understanding of the word which is derived from the Greek meaning 'without ruler' . The art world is exactly the opposite - its about total control within a feudal hierarchy implemented by important institutions their curators and 'important' collectors and critics. Any regulator would have a hell of a time unravelling it all and what its really become. It may come to exert an aid to anarchy due to a total lack of vicarious duty by any financial regulation at least that I'm aware of. Just a thought.

What you going to do Dave ?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/elderhealth/7386805/My-father-saved-all-his-life-but-was-failed-by-the-NHS.html

85. brossen99 from your line, last lines: 'Do our political leaders think we’re stupid? Or so supine and malleable that we simply won’t mind being lied to if it’s for our “own good”?'

Yes. That's conventional Straussian Neocon dogma. The sincere, evidence-based belief is that most people can't cope with truth as they aren't bright/educable enough. Is this wrong?

I was always lousy at knitting/sewing etc - but then I found it boring :p
There are FAR better ways to pass the time :o)

91. flicks 'Don't see it as being about anarchy though at least from my understanding of the word which is derived from the Greek meaning 'without ruler''

Then you don't understand politically what liberal-democracy is in practice. It is anarchism, i.e. deregulation, where the free-market determines value, not state planning. This is not he same as anarchy. Anarchism has to be planned (hence one of Von Mises' books 'Planned Chaos'.) Have a look into The Austrian School. The Mises website will do, or just look up libertarianism. German National Socialism and Soviet Socialism in One County under Stalin were essentially the same anti-anarchistic political system from Von Mises' and the Austrian School's perspective. Anarchism is the opposite of statism, the latter being vilified as 'The Road to Serfdom' (Hayek). Anarchism is what the UK has 'enjoyed' since at least 1979, and it's what the USA exports as 'freedom/democracy'. The Cold War was essentially a battle between statistic and anarchism, and it still continues today, just more subtly given the inconceivability of MAD. It's why the Middle East (which is still essentially a satellite of the SCO) refers to the USA as 'The Great Satan', Israel being The Little Satan, sometimes these are cynically reversed. Terrorism may be seen as a response to the imperialism of anarchism.

I'm not misleading you. Check the above out for yourself.

Statist # 93

Most of the people in this country are probably totally ignorant ( stupid ) due to living on planet Coronation Street / Eastenders / Emmerdale !

94. Mistress76uk 'There are FAR better ways to pass the time :o)'

You'll grow out of it.

96. brossen99 'Most of the people in this country are probably totally ignorant ( stupid ) due to living on planet Coronation Street / Eastenders / Emmerdale !'

No, they're just products/consequences which service a need. The causes/drivers run far deeper, and are, sadly, immutable, and growing in aggregate it would seem.

Should have been: 'a battle between statism and anarchism', sorry.

90. barriesingleton - Yes: maths is a set of useful tautologies which are pragmatically useful to scientists in their pursuit of truth. A language which helps one get around the traps which natural languages ensnare the unwary. One can reduce it to ones NAND zeros ;-)

Dull eh?