The Curse of Jonah Brown Strikes Again

Sunday, 28 February 2010


The poor people of Chile must have thought they had got away lightly after Gordon Brown heaped praise on their president during a visit to Chile without the sky falling in.

But 11 months to the very day since his visit their country is hit by the biggest earthquake for over a century

I think Guido may have really hit on a metaphysical phenomenon with the Curse of Jonah meme.
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Falklands: Clinton to meet Kirchner

Saturday, 27 February 2010

The next Falklands crisis is bubbling away nicely. The Buenos Aires recognises the value of building international support for its claim, and Britain is more isolated in the international arena than at any time for decades.

Following a snub by Obama (and Dubya, Clinton, Bush Snr would have done the same as did Reagan), Mrs Clinton is to meet the Argentinian president Cristina de Kirchner in Urugay on March 1st.

This follows succesful Argentinian efforts to mobilise Latin American support for their Malvinas claim, and a further attempt to raise the issue at the UN. There are UN resolutions dating back to the 1960s calling for UK-Argentine talks, and I believe the US-UK invasion of Iraq invoking resolution 1441 set an uncomfortable precedent. If Britain goes to the negotiating table, then the Falklands will end up in Argentinian hands. If Britain does not go to the negotiating table, then the Falklands may well end up in Argentinian hands following a raft of UN resolutions.

The only solution is bold action, by reinforcing the Falklands through a draw-down of the Afghan deployment (hint hint, we have our own interests) and looking at a juicy carrot in the form of a South Atlantic Regional Development Fund from the oil revenues plus trade and business opportunities. Nasty, but with a bit of nice, and far from indecisive.

I bet this will flare up during the general election campaign. Cameron should be prepared...like the boy scouts.
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Scotland's Independence Referendum Bill

Friday, 26 February 2010




Yesterday morning Alex Salmond, Scotland's First Minister, published the Independence Referendum Bill consultation document which offered opposition parties the chance to frame a question on alternatives to outright secession. The proposals in the draft Bill are now out to a nine week consultation.

The proposal is for a referendum with two questions on two separate ballot papers and mirrors the approach of the 1997 referendum on the Scottish Parliament. You can see a copy of the Bill here.

First voters would be asked to vote 'yes' or 'no' on whether they support the Scottish parliament being given new devolved powers.

The consultation paper offers two alternatives for this question: one based on the so-called 'devolution max' option of giving Holyrood control of everything except defence, foreign affairs and financial regulation and another based on the more limited powers put forward by the Calman Commission.

They will then be asked whether "the parliament's powers should also be extended to enable independence to be achieved".

About a third of Scotland's people want independence but the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey issued in January showed 69% want to see their parliament take on more responsibility.

Scotland's opposition parties been giving their usual anti-soundbites against the Bill. "Unnecessary and unwanted", "a vanity project", "waste of money", "putting narrow nationalism ahead of the interests of Scotland" - all protestations we've heard before.

Whether one supports independence or not, there is one serious aspect of this Bill. It offers the Scottish people the chance to vote for their own futures in a referendum. Opposition parties must remember that when they are refusing to acknowledge this Bill, they are refusing the Scots the chance to decide their own futures.

Yesterday the unionist parties ignored questioning the FM on the subject at FMQs. They can't continue to ignore it for long. There are many throughout the UK who have long desired a referendum on the EU and been promised one by both labour and the tories - yet they have been openly conned. They will be watching this closely and see a government, who promised the people a referendum, fight for the right to achieve their objective. The actions of those against this right will also be closely observed.


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New Labour

Wednesday, 24 February 2010


















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Video: Andrew Neil & Sadiq Khan

From today's PMQs programme - it's a pleasure to watch Khan squirm as Andrew Neil presses him on the Darling/Brown 'tiff':


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Farage Mysteriously Bumped From Question Time

Tuesday, 23 February 2010

And there's more. I thought maybe Nigel Farage was bumped from BBC1's Question Time on impartiality grounds because fellow UKIP MEP Paul Nuttall was on Radio 4's Any Questions in the same week, but it seems there may be a more sinister explanation. It may be to do with the fact that this week's edition of Question Time was from Middlesbrough, where the Redcar steelworks is being closed.

From James Delingpole:
[Farage] was due to appear in the BBC’s “Question-Time” programme, from Middlesbrough, on 18th February, where the closure of the Redcar-plant was inevitably discussed. Almost at the last minute, his invitation to join the “Question-Time” panel was cancelled, without explanation.

An article, on the subject, by Neil Hamilton, which was due to appear in this week’s Sunday Express, has also been “pulled”.

Is there some things the political class just don't want us to know about?
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English Defence League Leaders Arrested

I'm not terribly fond of the English Defence League - they are a bit thuggish for my liking - but this has sent shivers up my spine:
On Saturday 20th February 2010 Members of the leadership team of the English Defence League were arrested as they traveled to Scotland to support the Scottish Defence League demonstration.
While in custody the team members homes and families homes were raided by police armed with automatic machine guns which terrified the leaderships family which included small children and other older family members. Computer equipment was seized during the 3 hour raid.
A signpost on the way to Britain as an Islamified police state?

In other news:

Generals are trying to block plans to build a mosque with two 100ft minarets next to Sandhurst.

The £3million building would have a clear view over the military academy and is just 400 yards from its parade ground.

I really don't know what to say.
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Carry on Gordo!

Sunday, 21 February 2010


This is a very funny post from Lobbydog which draws on that great line from Carry on Cleo: "Infamy, infamy - they've all got it in for me!"


Wonderful mental of picture of Ed Miliband in Harriet Harman's wig and mascara!

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Tea Party Movement Launches in UK

From Freedom Association blog:

From Boston in the USA to Brighton in the UK - The Freedom Association is launching The Tea Party Movement in the United Kingdom this week. Don't miss it. More details to follow shortly.
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More F-F-F-Fabian Tactics

Friday, 19 February 2010

But, this time, they're from the Conservatives:

The row about Cameron's imposed, pre-vetted shortlists is deepening with the release of a 2002 Michael Gove-penned, document entitled: 'Action Plan for Candidate Selection in Safe Seats'.
'Like a conjuror, we'll get more applause if the audience cannot see exactly how the trick is performed...

'There are several reasons why the Party should not publicly proclaim the new methodology.

'The more that the profusion of women, black, Asian or gay candidates appears to be the result of spontaneous open-mindedness on the part of grassroot activists the greater will be the accolades.

'Most Tories loathe political correctness and positive discrimination. If one tries to be 'in your face' about the fact that positive discrimination is taking place activists are much more likely to rebel; a version of 'don't ask, don't tell', is called for.

Mr Cameron is unrepentant and his decision to seize power from local associations, say his friends, is the culmination of the secret plan on how to neuter the party faithful in the country.

Some friends Cameron has there!   I can't believe this man, on whom the voters of the country relied to be strong, decisive and lead the way out of the mire, has been so stupid.

Whoever you like, as long as it's a woman
Cameron scores another bullseye

If Cameron becomes PM after the GE he also intends to make it as hard for the Party to remove him from office as it is for the Labour Party to remove Gordon Brown.  FFS - GET A GRIP CAMERON.

(Click to enlarge)

I think this is being reflected in the opinion polls at the moment which seem more volatile than usual - last week an Angus Reid poll gave the Cons a 14% lead but the one below, from the Sun, has it cut to just 7%:


Cross-posted
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What's Happened To Andrew Symeou?

Wednesday, 17 February 2010



The answer to that is 'pretty much nothing'.  Andrew Symeou is still in a filthy Greek jail, refused bail; there is still no trial date set and he can be held there for another twelve months.

UKIP raised the matter in the European Parliament in January and Andrew's case was highlighted as was that of two Britons being held in Budapest: Michael Turner and Jason McGoldrick.  Graham Watson, LibDem MEP,  has his moral priorities wrong and should be ashamed of himself - instead he seems rather proud about his role in implementing the EAW.  I wonder what a body language expert would make of him almost constantly 'washing' his hands during his brief, back-patting speech:



Liberty states:
  • A person should not be extradited to stand trial in a foreign country without evidence being presented in a British court to prove there is a basic (prima facie) case against them
  •  If the crime is alleged to have occurred in whole or in part in the UK, then the person should not be extradited if a court here decides it is not in the interest of justice to extradite
  • A person in the UK should not be extradited for something that is not a crime in the UK. British justice should not be circumvented.
Corpus Juris is no justice at all and despite the warnings when plans for the EAW were formulated, the EU has gone ahead and created a prison for all of us.
EU Arrest Warrant in Action
Fair Trials International
Free Mike & Jason campaign
'Overhaul' of British Courts

Cross-posted
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New Tory Poster Spoof

Tuesday, 16 February 2010


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Rear Of The Year

Tuesday, 9 February 2010

Please, let there be a God who shares my sense of humour! How delicious it would be for Dear Harriet, the leader of our feminazi sisterhood, to win the 2010 competition. She's already been nominated by several contributors - why not add your own voice?

Here's the RotY competition website

I'd like to think that this might be the only vote she wins this year but since she has a majority of 13,483 in her Labour constituency of Camberwell & Peckham, I won't hold my breath - it's the 17th safest seat in the country.

Voted moderately for a transparent Parliament.
Voted moderately for introducing a smoking ban.
Voted very strongly for introducing ID cards.
Voted very strongly for introducing foundation hospitals.
Voted strongly for introducing student top-up fees.
Voted strongly for Labour's anti-terrorism laws.
Voted very strongly for the Iraq war.
Voted very strongly against an investigation into the Iraq war.
Voted very strongly for replacing Trident.
Voted very strongly for the hunting ban.
Voted strongly for equal gay rights.
Voted moderately against laws to stop climate change

Plus:
Register of Members' Interests, but not updated since December 2008.
Charles Moore reviews Hattie's Bible: The Spirit Level
Extract:
The book seeks to show that inequality produces poor health, more murder, more mental instability, less trust and too much "chronic mobilisation of energy in the form of glucose into the bloodstream", resulting in obesity. Human society is better when we resemble bonobos, the authors claim: apparently these creatures solve problems via mutual masturbation, whereas nasty, rough chimps fight for status. Naturalists inform me, by the way, that bonobos are extremely stupid.
Cross-posted
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IPCC - More Gates Than Wickes

Sunday, 7 February 2010

Dr North takes the lead again in the fight back against the IPCC, with another revelation about the 2007 IPCC report which bogusly claimed that the Himalayan Glaciers would have melted in the next 25 years. That revelation showed that this was an entirely false claim and has rippled around the world and is what we know as Glaciergate.

Dr North now says that the very same report was again wrong with claims that food yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by 50% by 2020. The 2020 projection is in fact now exposed as based on nothing more than speculation that is sourced back to a Canadian advocacy group, and written by an obscure academic who specialises in Carbon Trading and citing references that do not support his claims.

Time and again, we must examine why such claims are plucked out of the air and then offered with a thin veneer of polish dressed up as scientific fact that we must all be afraid of. There have been moves to introduce global trading and taxing of a Carbon economy. Such an economy already exists, it is founded almost exclusively by people who believe wholeheartedly in the notion that the world is dying because of humans and our CO2 productions. Such CO2 levels they say are unsustainable and they are putting their money where their mouths are. Fair enough, up to the point that the science backs the arguments. This is the problem, time and time again, it is being revealed that the scientific facts do not back up their claims, and time and time again evidence is being shown to have been filtered and moulded to fit a certain line of thinking; then a small questionable fact is then presented to the World as evidence of an impending doom.

The Carbon Economy and its readiness to become the largest economic and political movement across the globe means that the Climate Change argument is no longer about asking people to be well intentioned and play it safe just in case. It is now linked to billions of dollars and has the political backing of some of the world’s most powerful people. It is absolutely right that assertions be questioned. This Carbon Economy cannot succeed if the people of the world are not motivated scared into making changes that mean we become consumers to their new markets, and that existing corporations through the necessity of following their consumers move too. Many in fact are financially invested in the inevitability of this future.

So, when we are being scared into thinking in a new way, we must ask two questions. Is this true and why is this claim made. Many of the claims are now being disproven or shown to be based upon unreliable and questionable data. Some, like Africagate, are rooted in the claims of those who stand to profit from Carbon Trading. The ‘why’ keeps leading back in the same direction each time these claims are exposed. They all tie back through scientific bodies to the architects of a global economy. We absolutely must question whether altruism or profit is the true motive here.

The Climategate emails showed that those few individuals who are centre to the research are routinely avoiding Scientific Method, they are refusing to share raw data, and present only adjusted data that they have manipulated. There is, in fact a conspiracy, real and documented to do all that they can to refute the approaches of those who wish to question and review their data. After hundreds of years of human scientific advancement, an approach as such is entirely suspicious. Validation of scientific claims is completely incestuous, and the must vaunted “peer-review” is all about growing climate science by sharing only within the family of believers. Anyone who showed dissent was shunned from this family, grants pulled and smear began. This has never been an open and pure journey towards true scientific discovery; it is about certain scientist purporting a type of science that fits with their political and often financial motivations.

Until we can all reproduce the claims, until it can be shown in everyday labs and tested by multitude of models. Until we can show completely how and why such things are happening, or even prove conclusively that they are indeed happening there is not a Scientific Consensus. So, I would question the motives of those who claim there is one, despite their obviously not being one.

Why then are the media so quick to take the Climate Camp side all of the time? Well again, let’s follow the money. The BBC is the biggest and most influential media source in the UK thanks to their unique tax funding though the Licence fee. Their eco-bias is today subject to a piece in the Sunday Express where they draw parallels between the BBC’s pension pot and their coverage of Climate Change. The article starts by stating that the Beeb is under investigation and is inundated with complaints that its editorial coverage is biased in favour of those who say it is a man-made phenomenon. At present for every £142.50 licence fee that is collected in the UK each year, about £8 (and rising) goes to the Corporations Pension Pot which has 58,744 members and it is valued at about £8billion. The BBC’s Pension Fund is a member of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change. So, 58,744 current and former employees of the BBC have their personal financial security linked to the emergence of a Carbon Economy… That places the Corporation very squarely in the camp that wants to see a global Carbon Market, it has linked itself to that market in a very hefty financial way. Why has the BBC placed all its eggs in such a precarious basket? Well, for that you should ask Peter Dunscombe who is the BBC Head of Pension Investment… oh, and Chairman of the very same Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change.

An editorial line thus follows that the Scientific Consensus is that the Science of Climate change is settled. But repeatedly we find out, not through disclosure but through investigation and leaks that the Science is really anything but settled. Peter Dunscombes Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change campaigned vigorously for a strong and binding global agreement on Climate Change at Copenhagen, which was the very same editorial line carried out by the BBC. The BBC despite its copy and paste responses to public letters of concern cannot be believed when so incredibly beholden to the need for Climate Change Governance. They can reply all they like, they aren’t impartial or balanced. They have one hand in your pocket, and the other in Al Gores.

A very quick check of their current members is revealing, and not entirely secular.  I would argue, nobody listed could hold an impartial position in a Climate Change debate.

Flip back to the Express story, and it is clear that not everyone at the BBC is happy about this situation. They quote veteran newsreader Peter Sissons as being unhappy with the Corporations coverage:

“The corporation’s most famous interrogators invariably begin by accepting that ‘the science is settled’ when there are countless reputable scientists and climatologists producing work that says it isn’t. It is, in effect, BBC policy, enthusiastically carried out by the BBC’s environment correspondents, that those views should not be heard.

“I was not proud to be working for an organisation with a corporate mind so closed on such an important issue.”
So, will the BBC now change its editorial line? No, it will not. Why, because even if it was conclusively proven that CO2 was not linked to man-made climate change their pensions and financial security is on the line. The Climate Change argument allowed them to push their viewers towards a lifestyle they largely believe is better, but it is rooted in a fictional belief. Contrast the money invested globally in efforts to prove the CO2 link to Climate Change and that invested to disprove it, and the BBC has years worth of stories to follow Scientist’s efforts to look in a single direction, and to push for a change in lifestyle that they approve of.

The Public however are not being taken in any longer, and despite the BBC’s blackout towards the sceptics, these arguments are making their way into the public debate. The man in the pub HAS taken note of it, those of us who visit our rapidly disappearing Public Houses know this, we are hearing it more and more. This is almost entirely thanks to the Internet and bloggers which were the only outlets who dared voice their opinion openly and as there were very few in the MSM who were brave enough to give such an opinion, but this has then led to a wider audience and has attracted the Express group and some of the Blogs of MSM press, if not the paper copies. Nonetheless, the arguments are there and more and more people are questioning this false and manufactured scientific consensus. There is a reluctance to allow sceptical argument to seep into the mainstream; but it is getting there. At the end of the day, why make such an effort to suppress people’s opinions? It can only be that the modern media is now more geared to shaping opinions than it is to reflecting them.

Public perception must be turning because even a poll commissioned by the BBC confirms this.

The Populus poll of 1,001 people mirrors a Populus poll commissioned by The Times in November and has turned up some interesting results, and an interesting shift in perceptions in just two months. Most notably the number of people who would sit in the sceptic camp now outweighs those who sit in the believer’s camp with only 26% of people now believing that Climate Change is happening and that it is manmade, down from 41% in November 2009.



It would be as ridiculous of me to claim that this will now lead to a complete reversal in public opinion, as comparatively ridiculous are the claims that the Science of Climate Change is settled. But there is another point I want to Labour (excuse the pun).

When the IPCC Scientist said that the Himalayan Glaciers would melt, that Polar Bears are drowning and that Africa is going to starve the answers they presented to these supposed issues are and were always that same. More Government, more taxes, more regulation. Not just more regional, National and supra-national government and regulation; but global regulation, and a global tax. These people always insist the cure to all our ailments is more socialism, more interference and they get it by ramping out more and more guilt to keep us in our place. It has worked time and time again, not just with Climate Change, but with a number of arguments.

If I was in a car show room and the salesman pitched a new car as the answer to all my woes, or if a double glazing salesman pitched new windows as the elixir to all my pains, you would like me suspect that I was being sold what was in stock to be sold by the person doing the selling, undoubtedly with commission to themselves. Those in government wanting more government are doing just the same, and because they succeed so often at it, a number of Global Companies are setting themselves up to operate in such an environment. Let’s just keep everybody’s motives in mind when discussing such matters, because like always this is what paints a truer picture. With Africagate, why were the very nations that were said to be in such danger by the IPCC being cajoled at Copenhagen into an expensive global regulating treaty, when the chief problem in building their agriculture is in fact another form of regulation; that of the criminally illiberal EU Common Agricultural Policy?

The answer is to keep all of the arguments going and keep all sides of the argument in the public domain so that people can make their own minds up, rather than being prescribed their opinion... Then, through true democratic discourse, allow those fairly accrued opinions influence their ballot decisions. If the debate cannot be impartial, and clearly it cannot be then it needs to be balanced with all sides and views heard. The Science, if there is any, needs to be tested by sceptics for that is how true scientific progress and consequently humanitarian progress can be achieved.

Climategate, Glaciergate, Africagate... hardly proving to be a balanced debate so far, is it.


Cross-posted.
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Change we need

Friday, 5 February 2010


Here's a change we need, MPs put behind bars. Join our facebook group Change we see (The real cost of Labour).

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Politician Makes Ridiculous Suggestion

Monday, 1 February 2010

A pact with France will keep us fighting fit | Malcolm Rifkind - Times Online

Malcolm Rifkind thinks that if Britain is to maintain any of its global power it should join forces with France:
Britain and France are Europe’s two nuclear weapon states. If closer co-operation and a degree of partnership are on the table, that is to be welcomed. Other expensive military equipment must be harmonised wherever possible. Joint procurement should be more the rule than the exception. Our Armed Forces must work together in peace as well as in war. France’s return to full membership of Nato makes that much easier than in earlier years.

Churchill offered the French joint citizenship in the dark days of 1940. Nothing quite as dramatic is needed now. But radical thinking is required to ensure that our military capability is preserved and enhanced. Serious defence co-operation with France is part of the answer.
I don't care if I sound racist but I wouldn't trust the French as far as I could throw a used condom. They've always been our enemy and always will be. Even now, as so-called EU 'partners', they're busy trying to destroy the position of the City of London as a financial capital. The French will take any opportunity to do Britain down.

Rifkind is an idiot. There's no reason for Britain to pretend any more that it is a global player. Our politicians should be thinking entirely in terms of self defence and not getting involved in other countries' military adventures. Unfortunately, this seems unlikely, given the fact that our politicians have sold us out to the EU and its plans for EU armed services on one hand, and are still lodged firmly up the 'special relationship' back passage of the USA on the other.
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