Israel shelled Gaza Palestinians after evacuating them, UN says
"At least 30 people were killed in the Zeitoun district of Gaza after Israeli troops repeatedly shelled a house to which more than 100 Palestinians had been evacuated by the Israeli military, the UN said today." (World news | guardian.co.uk)
With one of the most dreadful pictures I have ever seen. It shows the law of the conservation of beauty, no matter how much you try to destroy it, it cannot be made into anything other than beauty. The destruction marks the destroyer, it never marks the victim. And medical help was denied access for several days, till they arrived to find dying children waiting beside dead parents. The great democracy!
Zoz
Friday, January 09, 2009
Thursday, January 08, 2009
New improved
Searches: The W.H. now has joined forces with Blogger to enable you to search the nearly 2,000 articles here so far, and show the actual articles together on the page - not a Google link list like it used to produce.
Labels: Nearly everything has now been labelled as well, so you can click on a label and likewise get the selected articles together on one page. If you click on the link for my name below, for example, you should see all the articles with my byline.
Comments: There are still some problems with the links to comments in the old format, which we're trying to fix. Moderation is now turned on for comments on posts older than ten days. For the avoidance of all tedium, comments are only enabled on new articles in a lighter vein.
Mergers: Most of Ossian's and Zoz's posts from their other blogs have now been imported and merged into the W.H. posts in date sequence by using the new Blogger import and export utilities. All of the imported posts are signed Zoz or Ossian and labelled Zozimus or Sloe Wine respectively.
Known problems: When viewing archives, search results or label results, the side archive links do not work. The earliest posts did not have headings and so the spacing looks different on them. There is strange additional spacing on some of the imported posts as well.
Simon Moribund
Labels: Nearly everything has now been labelled as well, so you can click on a label and likewise get the selected articles together on one page. If you click on the link for my name below, for example, you should see all the articles with my byline.
Comments: There are still some problems with the links to comments in the old format, which we're trying to fix. Moderation is now turned on for comments on posts older than ten days. For the avoidance of all tedium, comments are only enabled on new articles in a lighter vein.
Mergers: Most of Ossian's and Zoz's posts from their other blogs have now been imported and merged into the W.H. posts in date sequence by using the new Blogger import and export utilities. All of the imported posts are signed Zoz or Ossian and labelled Zozimus or Sloe Wine respectively.
Known problems: When viewing archives, search results or label results, the side archive links do not work. The earliest posts did not have headings and so the spacing looks different on them. There is strange additional spacing on some of the imported posts as well.
Simon Moribund
40 killed sheltering in United Nations school
UN spokesman: "Israel has briefed us that there were no mortars fired from the school." Now comes the strategic guilt trip instead of the initial lies. This follows a pattern. Soon some portentous creep will pop up intoning that there will be a full inquiry. You know how they have to always try and find out afterwards what it was they were doing at any given time: it's never known until there's an inquiry. So why do they do shell schools and other civilian targets when they never know what they're doing, apparently? The fact is they know exactly what they're doing.
Zoz
Willesden tech show 2009
Dragons' Den cold sweat inducing gadgets at the biennial Willesden tech show 2009
The disappearing book: After a page has been read it fades to blank from exposure to light. At the end you're left with a handy notebook.
The Kronk, an electronic golf putter: This will be used mainly for training purposes, as it's unlikely to be allowed in competitive tournaments. Tiny cameras in the putter scan the terrain, including slopes, between the putter and the hole when you place the putter on the ground. When the data is processed the putter head displays a red light on the left or right along a scale to indicate when your putter head is angled too far to either side, or a green light in the centre of the scale when it's angled correctly. Next, sensors will analyse your practice swings and activate forward or backward red lights along another scale to indicate when you need to increase or reduce your swing, or a green light in the centre of the scale when it's correct. Anyone who has used a guitar tuner will understand this system of red and green lights along a scale. When you get the two green lights, go for it and hole every time. (This was the W.H. science correspondent's idea.)
Toothpaste dispenser: All the cost of toothpaste is in the packaging. Get a cheap refill and put it in our handy wall-mounted or free-standing dispenser. Simply press the big lever to dispense directly onto your toothbrush. No more arguments about who squeezes the tube in the middle! Plus you save money and help the environment.
Biodegradable poopscoopers: This is basically a special cardboard and lined paper bag with its own built-in handles to operate like a plastic poopscooper but you pop the entire thing into the dog waste bin and it is handier and better for the environment. If you've ever had to fiddle with those dreadful plastic bags that take an age to open and place into those special plastic contraptions, especially if you have two dogs or more to walk, you'll know what a royal pain it can be. Now you can simply take the next self-contained impervious cardboard and paper ready-made scoops, which are shaped and behave just like the plastic ones, and you're not only saving time but switching to biodegradable containers. The paper mechanism for "turning inside out" such that the hands are protected and the container sealed would be refined and worked out so that the thing snaps over and seals itself.
There are millions to be made from any new application for paper, I believe, as there is a limitless supply of cheap material that can be resold expensively if only more applications can be discovered. So kindly send me an ex-gratia payment if you become the next Percy Cats'-Eyes wozname, from any of these. I still haven't had anything after suggesting "Chilli Non Carne" to Linda McCartney Foods, they just used it and never even replied (true).
Simon Moribund
The disappearing book: After a page has been read it fades to blank from exposure to light. At the end you're left with a handy notebook.
The Kronk, an electronic golf putter: This will be used mainly for training purposes, as it's unlikely to be allowed in competitive tournaments. Tiny cameras in the putter scan the terrain, including slopes, between the putter and the hole when you place the putter on the ground. When the data is processed the putter head displays a red light on the left or right along a scale to indicate when your putter head is angled too far to either side, or a green light in the centre of the scale when it's angled correctly. Next, sensors will analyse your practice swings and activate forward or backward red lights along another scale to indicate when you need to increase or reduce your swing, or a green light in the centre of the scale when it's correct. Anyone who has used a guitar tuner will understand this system of red and green lights along a scale. When you get the two green lights, go for it and hole every time. (This was the W.H. science correspondent's idea.)
Toothpaste dispenser: All the cost of toothpaste is in the packaging. Get a cheap refill and put it in our handy wall-mounted or free-standing dispenser. Simply press the big lever to dispense directly onto your toothbrush. No more arguments about who squeezes the tube in the middle! Plus you save money and help the environment.
Biodegradable poopscoopers: This is basically a special cardboard and lined paper bag with its own built-in handles to operate like a plastic poopscooper but you pop the entire thing into the dog waste bin and it is handier and better for the environment. If you've ever had to fiddle with those dreadful plastic bags that take an age to open and place into those special plastic contraptions, especially if you have two dogs or more to walk, you'll know what a royal pain it can be. Now you can simply take the next self-contained impervious cardboard and paper ready-made scoops, which are shaped and behave just like the plastic ones, and you're not only saving time but switching to biodegradable containers. The paper mechanism for "turning inside out" such that the hands are protected and the container sealed would be refined and worked out so that the thing snaps over and seals itself.
There are millions to be made from any new application for paper, I believe, as there is a limitless supply of cheap material that can be resold expensively if only more applications can be discovered. So kindly send me an ex-gratia payment if you become the next Percy Cats'-Eyes wozname, from any of these. I still haven't had anything after suggesting "Chilli Non Carne" to Linda McCartney Foods, they just used it and never even replied (true).
Simon Moribund
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
Short Story Café
Time Out: Critics' Choice
Come early and hog the sofa at the Pulp Net Short Story Café
(doors from 7.15pm)
Mon 12 January 7.30pm, suggested donation £3+
COSTA 15 Lower Regent Street, (Lower Ground Floor) SW1Y 4LR
"An hour of short stories a month in the comfort of a London coffee-house – what more could you ask for? In the first of this event series, the Short Story Cafe presents: award-winning short story author Helen Simpson, story writer and debut novelist Chris Killen, Costa writer-in-residence Davey Spens, and Willesden’s finest, Stephen Moran." (Pulp)
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
Eyeless in Gaza
Put to the labour of a Beast, debas't
Lower than bondslave! Promise was that I
Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver;
Ask for this great Deliverer now, and find him
Eyeless in Gaza at the Mill with slaves,
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke;
[...]
O impotence of mind, in body strong!
But what is strength without a double share
Of wisdom, vast, unwieldy, burdensom,
Proudly secure, yet liable to fall
By weakest subtleties, not made to rule,
But to subserve where wisdom bears command.
From Samson Agonistes: John Milton (1608-1674)
Lower than bondslave! Promise was that I
Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver;
Ask for this great Deliverer now, and find him
Eyeless in Gaza at the Mill with slaves,
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke;
[...]
O impotence of mind, in body strong!
But what is strength without a double share
Of wisdom, vast, unwieldy, burdensom,
Proudly secure, yet liable to fall
By weakest subtleties, not made to rule,
But to subserve where wisdom bears command.
From Samson Agonistes: John Milton (1608-1674)
A brief survey of the short story
A brief survey of the short story | Books | guardian.co.uk: "Chris Power looks at masters of the short story through the ages"
Part 13 on Franz Kafka today. I've only just found this and it's already on part thirteen. Part 1 was Anton Chekhov, appropriately. The series also covers some contemporary writers.
Ossian
Part 13 on Franz Kafka today. I've only just found this and it's already on part thirteen. Part 1 was Anton Chekhov, appropriately. The series also covers some contemporary writers.
Ossian
There are probably three gods in a convoy
Atheist buses go nationwide (Guardian)
How ludicrous that tenets of philosophy, or science for that anti-matter, should be promoted like suntan lotion with slogans on the sides of buses. Will some cabal of Cartesians and followers of Pascal get together to sponsor posters with "I think therefore I am and I'm putting my shirt on God" for the sides of other buses. Will the Vatican bankroll a campaign to promulgate little mottoes formerly confined to small posters on church noticeboards. Will climate change enthusiasts and opponents sponsor slogans on buses that say, "It's not overheating. Chill out, now just enjoy life" or "We're all going to fry. It's too late. You are to blame."
Feargal Mooney
How ludicrous that tenets of philosophy, or science for that anti-matter, should be promoted like suntan lotion with slogans on the sides of buses. Will some cabal of Cartesians and followers of Pascal get together to sponsor posters with "I think therefore I am and I'm putting my shirt on God" for the sides of other buses. Will the Vatican bankroll a campaign to promulgate little mottoes formerly confined to small posters on church noticeboards. Will climate change enthusiasts and opponents sponsor slogans on buses that say, "It's not overheating. Chill out, now just enjoy life" or "We're all going to fry. It's too late. You are to blame."
Feargal Mooney
Monday, January 05, 2009
Today Gaza, tomorrow London estates
There are dozens of people being killed on the streets of England by gangs armed with guns and knives. Over 20 young people killed by knives alone in London in 2008.
No country on earth would tolerate this daily risk to its people, 7 million Londoners in range of these deadly weapons and almost one a week being killed. We know where these armed gangs live. Please IDF, come and bomb Southwark, Lambeth, Hackney, Harlesden and Willesden for starters, then parts of Manchester, Liverpool etc. We need your help here, if you wouldn't mind, after you've flattened Gaza.
Let's start by robo-phoning everyone in Brixton (have to start somewhere) and telling them that homes with knives and guns will be hit by missile strikes and artillery fire. Playgrounds, high streets, marketplaces, pubs and hospitals from where these killings have originated must be destroyed.
Of course we know which places store the weapons - it's the schools, the clubs, the churches, the blocks of flats. We think we know the individual flats in the estates from where these armed gangs operate. But let's robo-phone everyone anyway, so nobody can say they were not warned.
We can pound Brixton from the air for say five days, before bombarding it with artillery and sending in the tanks and bulldozers. Let's not stop till the scourge of knife and gun killings is eradicated. No country on earth would stand for this.
Feargal Mooney
No country on earth would tolerate this daily risk to its people, 7 million Londoners in range of these deadly weapons and almost one a week being killed. We know where these armed gangs live. Please IDF, come and bomb Southwark, Lambeth, Hackney, Harlesden and Willesden for starters, then parts of Manchester, Liverpool etc. We need your help here, if you wouldn't mind, after you've flattened Gaza.
Let's start by robo-phoning everyone in Brixton (have to start somewhere) and telling them that homes with knives and guns will be hit by missile strikes and artillery fire. Playgrounds, high streets, marketplaces, pubs and hospitals from where these killings have originated must be destroyed.
Of course we know which places store the weapons - it's the schools, the clubs, the churches, the blocks of flats. We think we know the individual flats in the estates from where these armed gangs operate. But let's robo-phone everyone anyway, so nobody can say they were not warned.
We can pound Brixton from the air for say five days, before bombarding it with artillery and sending in the tanks and bulldozers. Let's not stop till the scourge of knife and gun killings is eradicated. No country on earth would stand for this.
Feargal Mooney
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Double-decaf skinny frappuccino mocha latte. The end
Pulp Net Short Story Cafe
Mon 12 January 7-8pm, £5/£3
In association with Costa, Pulp Net launches the Short Story Cafe at Costa Piccadilly
An hour of short stories a month in the comfort of a London coffee-house – what more could you ask for? In the first of this event series Pulp Net presents: award-winning short story author Helen Simpson, story writer and debut novelist Chris Killen, Costa writer-in-residence Davey Spens and Willesden’s finest, Stephen Moran.
Run time: 7.30pm – 8.30pm.
A suggested donation on the door of £3 is requested towards running costs. Note: Places are limited to 40, assigned on a first-come first-served basis from 7.15pm.
Lower Ground Floor, Costa Coffee, 15 Lower Regent Street, SW1Y
Saturday, January 03, 2009
Now incorporating...
Publishing typhoon Red Woodward announces incorporation of the struggling Zozimus journal into the Willesden Herald. Zoz has been providing cartoons for the Herald for some time. Ossian's supposedly literary posts from Sloe Wine are moving in here as well to simplify things further.
Ed.
Ed.
Local diary, under attack by F-16 warplanes
(Saturday 27 December)...Later I am at home with my family. We've just received a phone call on our land line. It's the Israeli defence ministry, and they say that any house that has guns or weapons will be targeted next, without warning and without any announcement. Just to let you know, we don't have any weapons in our house. If we die please defend my family.
(Sunday 28 December) I wake up at 7am after an Israeli F-16 attack. Our house is shaking. We all try to imagine what has happened, but we want to at least know where the attack was. It is so scary. We try to open the main door to our flat, but it's stuck shut after the attack. I have to climb out of the window to leave the house. I am shocked when I find out our neighbour's pharmacy was the target. It is just 60 metres from our house. They targeted a pharmacy. I still can't believe it.
From Gaza diary: Do Israel pilots feel happy killing innocent women and children? World news guardian.co.uk
Newsdesk
(Sunday 28 December) I wake up at 7am after an Israeli F-16 attack. Our house is shaking. We all try to imagine what has happened, but we want to at least know where the attack was. It is so scary. We try to open the main door to our flat, but it's stuck shut after the attack. I have to climb out of the window to leave the house. I am shocked when I find out our neighbour's pharmacy was the target. It is just 60 metres from our house. They targeted a pharmacy. I still can't believe it.
From Gaza diary: Do Israel pilots feel happy killing innocent women and children? World news guardian.co.uk
Newsdesk
Friday, January 02, 2009
Whadyacallit, y'know, where they learns 'em? Well it ain't
Word 'school' is out for Sheffield primary
"A new £4.7m primary school in Sheffield is facing criticism for dropping the word 'school' from its title after governors decided the term had 'negative connotations'." (Guardian)
Not "criticism" please:- constructive but rigorous feedback, I think you mean.
Zoz
"A new £4.7m primary school in Sheffield is facing criticism for dropping the word 'school' from its title after governors decided the term had 'negative connotations'." (Guardian)
Not "criticism" please:- constructive but rigorous feedback, I think you mean.
Zoz
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
National Demonstration: London Saturday 3 January
Copied from: Stop the War Coalition
"Israel is committing a shocking series of atrocities by using modern weaponry against a defenceless population - attacking a population that has been enduring a severe blockade for many months." (The UN Human Rights Council)
Stop Gaza Massacre
Hands Off Gaza: Stop the Bombing: Free Palestine
Assemble 12:30pm Embankment, WC2
Nearest tube Embankment.
**Important Update: Please note change of Gaza demonstration time and assembly point.**
Called by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War Coalition, British Muslim Initiative and many other organisations.
Israel has launched a terror bombing against the people of Gaza, with over 350 dead and many more injured.
Not content after 3 days of devastating slaughter, the Israeli government promises more barbarity to come.
The head of the Israeli military says, "This is only the beginning".
The people of Gaza are asking, if this is only the beginning, what will the end look like?
Download the leaflet here
For details of daily demonstrations in London and actions around the country, click here.
Newsdesk
"Israel is committing a shocking series of atrocities by using modern weaponry against a defenceless population - attacking a population that has been enduring a severe blockade for many months." (The UN Human Rights Council)
Stop Gaza Massacre
Hands Off Gaza: Stop the Bombing: Free Palestine
Assemble 12:30pm Embankment, WC2
Nearest tube Embankment.
**Important Update: Please note change of Gaza demonstration time and assembly point.**
Called by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War Coalition, British Muslim Initiative and many other organisations.
Israel has launched a terror bombing against the people of Gaza, with over 350 dead and many more injured.
Not content after 3 days of devastating slaughter, the Israeli government promises more barbarity to come.
The head of the Israeli military says, "This is only the beginning".
The people of Gaza are asking, if this is only the beginning, what will the end look like?
Download the leaflet here
For details of daily demonstrations in London and actions around the country, click here.
Newsdesk
He uses the same toothpaste
"He uses the same toothpaste"/Man holds drip for child bomb victim
Britain's "peace envoy to the Middle East" has never been to Gaza.
Business as usual
Business as usual/Refugee convoy bombed, mother dying
"...the original, legal owners of the Israeli land on which Hamas rockets are detonating live in Gaza. That is why Gaza exists: because the Palestinians who lived in Ashkelon and the fields around it – Askalaan in Arabic – were dispossessed from their lands in 1948 when Israel was created and ended up on the beaches of Gaza. They – or their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren – are among the one and a half million Palestinian refugees crammed into the cesspool of Gaza, 80 per cent of whose families once lived in what is now Israel. This, historically, is the real story: most of the people of Gaza don't come from Gaza. But watching the news shows, you'd think that history began yesterday, that a bunch of bearded anti-Semitic Islamist lunatics suddenly popped up in the slums of Gaza – a rubbish dump of destitute people of no origin – and began firing missiles into peace-loving, democratic Israel, only to meet with the righteous vengeance of the Israeli air force. The fact that the five sisters killed in Jabalya camp had grandparents who came from the very land whose more recent owners have now bombed them to death simply does not appear in the story. (Robert Fisk: Why bombing Ashkelon is the most tragic irony)
Sunday, December 28, 2008
A short story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A Private Experience
"Two women caught up in a violent street riot take shelter in an abandoned shop. A short story by the Orange Prize-winning author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie" (Observer)
There is so much that could be said about this wonderful short story, but I am not the one and this is not the place to do it justice.
Ossian
"Two women caught up in a violent street riot take shelter in an abandoned shop. A short story by the Orange Prize-winning author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie" (Observer)
There is so much that could be said about this wonderful short story, but I am not the one and this is not the place to do it justice.
Ossian
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Count Arthur Strong's Christmas radio show
If you need a good laugh
This guy has a direct connection to the laughter centre in my brain (if there is such a thing, the titteralamus?). I'm totally poleaxed by everything he says. "Never mind playstations. The people in the Bible would've considered themselves lucky if Father Christmas had brought them a tangerine and Cluedo." (Count the ways in which that is wrong.) He tells the story of Mary and Judas's (sic) journey to Bethlehem and how they couldn't find anywhere to stay because it was Christmas, and had to settle for a pigsty. He's had a similar experience himself in Brighton.
Ossian
This guy has a direct connection to the laughter centre in my brain (if there is such a thing, the titteralamus?). I'm totally poleaxed by everything he says. "Never mind playstations. The people in the Bible would've considered themselves lucky if Father Christmas had brought them a tangerine and Cluedo." (Count the ways in which that is wrong.) He tells the story of Mary and Judas's (sic) journey to Bethlehem and how they couldn't find anywhere to stay because it was Christmas, and had to settle for a pigsty. He's had a similar experience himself in Brighton.
Ossian
Friday, December 26, 2008
Harold Pinter (1930 - 2008)
Video of Harold Pinter's lecture on the occasion of being awarded the Nobel prize in Literature (46 min.)
Text of Harold Pinter's Nobel lecture
I remember seeing The Caretaker at the Tricycle in Kilburn last year and being duly impressed by it. The production was taut and somewhat reminiscent of Beckett in the rundown sets and characters. There was a continuous sense of imminent menace or violence, and a sort of case study in bullying. [After I posted this I remembered thinking that three or four of the lines clunked a bit in one scene, where there was a sense of the voice of the author coming through rather than a particular character.]
He wrote about power, its fluctuations, development and interactions. In the film the Servant, power migrates with feeble resistance from the ineffectual employer to the butler, through his inexorable and merciless coercion.
Those are the two productions I remember. There were those late, angry political essays and poems that I saw as well from time to time, in Granta for example. You can find examples of his poetry and make your own mind up about it: here.
His Nobel lecture is fascinating both in the introductory remarks about the inspirations for his literary work and separately, when it turns to politics. Others are far better qualified to comment on what he says, and have done and continue to do so. All I will say is that he has me convinced, and I was convinced anyway from bits of what Chomsky and others had already said. For all the good it does.
Ossian
Text of Harold Pinter's Nobel lecture
I remember seeing The Caretaker at the Tricycle in Kilburn last year and being duly impressed by it. The production was taut and somewhat reminiscent of Beckett in the rundown sets and characters. There was a continuous sense of imminent menace or violence, and a sort of case study in bullying. [After I posted this I remembered thinking that three or four of the lines clunked a bit in one scene, where there was a sense of the voice of the author coming through rather than a particular character.]
He wrote about power, its fluctuations, development and interactions. In the film the Servant, power migrates with feeble resistance from the ineffectual employer to the butler, through his inexorable and merciless coercion.
Those are the two productions I remember. There were those late, angry political essays and poems that I saw as well from time to time, in Granta for example. You can find examples of his poetry and make your own mind up about it: here.
His Nobel lecture is fascinating both in the introductory remarks about the inspirations for his literary work and separately, when it turns to politics. Others are far better qualified to comment on what he says, and have done and continue to do so. All I will say is that he has me convinced, and I was convinced anyway from bits of what Chomsky and others had already said. For all the good it does.
Ossian
All comments on Chinese ambassador's article deleted
Telegraph.co.uk, the website of the Daily Telegraph newspaper has quietly deleted the comments posted by readers in response to an article by the Chinese ambassador to Britain prior to the Beijing Olympics. The article is headed "Chinese ambassador Fu Ying: Western media has demonised China" and sub-titled by the Telegraph "News: Chinese ambassador says Britain 'lacks respect'" (April 13th, 2008).
I was searching for a comment I posted there, because I remembered saying that we needed a period of "just and necessary austerity" and it appears we have since landed in one. (I don't think that any part of the EU should trade with any other country that has labour conditions, human rights or freedoms less than the minimum acceptable within the EU. It's not unprincipled protectionism, it's not unfettered globalisation, it is a policy to ensure the advancement of rights and conditions throughout the world. It should also enable us to become more self-sufficient, without going overboard about it. Anyway, what do I know?)
A Google search for "just and necessary austerity" produced one item, a link to the current article in the Telegraph online sans comments, and a cached impression of the original page, complete with comments including the one I was looking for, which was this:
Why does the Telegraph provide a platform for the corrupt tyranny that holds over a billion people in ignorance and servitude? How can there be a celebration of goodwill with a regime that treats people worse than animals, and who treat animals abominably too? We have mobile libraries, they have mobile execution chambers. Look at the pictures of women being dragged through the streets to their deaths with garottes around their necks, by smirking uniformed assassins who will later shoot them in the back of the heads. Would it have been acceptable for a contingent of Nazi guards to jog through the streets of London guarding their olympic torch on its way to the Berlin olympics of 1936? The Communist Party dictatorship in China has been responsible for deaths in the many millions and continues its absolute denial of freedom and even information to its people. It has decreed that there shall never again be any such thing as a brother or a sister (the one child policy). In the past it decreed that all sparrows be exterminated. It is time that the atrocious tyranny itself was abolished, and until then there should be no phoney celebrations, and no trade either. Let us accept a just and necessary austerity here until tyranny is starved out of business.
I know that some will say this comment falls foul of that "law" that predicts that every debate is likely to deteriorate to such a level that eventually one party will compare their opponents to the Nazis, but in this case I think the comparison is justifiable.
In case the page and comments disappear from Google's cache, here is a picture of them (pdf).
Ossian
I was searching for a comment I posted there, because I remembered saying that we needed a period of "just and necessary austerity" and it appears we have since landed in one. (I don't think that any part of the EU should trade with any other country that has labour conditions, human rights or freedoms less than the minimum acceptable within the EU. It's not unprincipled protectionism, it's not unfettered globalisation, it is a policy to ensure the advancement of rights and conditions throughout the world. It should also enable us to become more self-sufficient, without going overboard about it. Anyway, what do I know?)
A Google search for "just and necessary austerity" produced one item, a link to the current article in the Telegraph online sans comments, and a cached impression of the original page, complete with comments including the one I was looking for, which was this:
Why does the Telegraph provide a platform for the corrupt tyranny that holds over a billion people in ignorance and servitude? How can there be a celebration of goodwill with a regime that treats people worse than animals, and who treat animals abominably too? We have mobile libraries, they have mobile execution chambers. Look at the pictures of women being dragged through the streets to their deaths with garottes around their necks, by smirking uniformed assassins who will later shoot them in the back of the heads. Would it have been acceptable for a contingent of Nazi guards to jog through the streets of London guarding their olympic torch on its way to the Berlin olympics of 1936? The Communist Party dictatorship in China has been responsible for deaths in the many millions and continues its absolute denial of freedom and even information to its people. It has decreed that there shall never again be any such thing as a brother or a sister (the one child policy). In the past it decreed that all sparrows be exterminated. It is time that the atrocious tyranny itself was abolished, and until then there should be no phoney celebrations, and no trade either. Let us accept a just and necessary austerity here until tyranny is starved out of business.
I know that some will say this comment falls foul of that "law" that predicts that every debate is likely to deteriorate to such a level that eventually one party will compare their opponents to the Nazis, but in this case I think the comparison is justifiable.
In case the page and comments disappear from Google's cache, here is a picture of them (pdf).
Ossian
Thanks for the fun
An Englishman needs time - Eartha Kitt
One of those people you could call "a life force", Eartha Kitt died yesterday, aged 81. Follow the links for other, better known clips from the same session. A true but sweet coquette. Check this for a very girlish bit of clowning around: I want to be evil. There is a very spicy vein of comedy in everything she does, almost like an early music-hall songstress. Here is her most famous I want an old-fashioned millionaire. She looks marvellous in it, despite some leaden camera work, when we finally get to see her after some dreary shots of a vast and terribly literal set.
Newsmusic Desk
Boxing day roundup
Treetops Nursery refurbishment, 26 December 2008. Sphagnum
2:39 pm, a clear sky. The winter sun is defiant in the south, facing into an incessant, freezing north wind in a death battle for the season.
The north wind lands with a flurry of lefts and rights to the body. The sun counters with a roundhouse haymaker, but the north wind takes it and comes back for more. How long can they keep up this pace?! The frost is melting when they're in the open, but on the ropes the iceman has the advantage. Sunny's stance is impeccable, bent but with guard high. Will the iceman blow himself out or will sunny wear him out with the rope-a-dope? And now a word from our sponsor.
Rinso Macari
Thursday, December 25, 2008
The Dolls' Hospital [reprint]
Bless the beasts and the children - Carpenters
There's a dolls' hospital in Dublin
Where shellshocked Actionmen rest
And dollies wait for limb transpops.
It's where ragdolls come to get stitches
And bears undergo kiddie dialysis.
Barbie is believed to have botox
Privately in the outpatients daycentre,
But Ken won't say. His lips are sealed.
Sindy is terminal in the hospice
Watching Sunset Boulevard on a loop.
There's a bench with a plaque dedicated
To the great Robinson Golliwog (
Killed by the cruel marmalade trade)
Where tin soldiers wear their rusty legs
And music box ballerinas lean
Forever akimbo, forever hopeful.
They'll soon be returning to their careers.
--
Stephen Moran
Next >>
There's a dolls' hospital in Dublin
Where shellshocked Actionmen rest
And dollies wait for limb transpops.
It's where ragdolls come to get stitches
And bears undergo kiddie dialysis.
Barbie is believed to have botox
Privately in the outpatients daycentre,
But Ken won't say. His lips are sealed.
Sindy is terminal in the hospice
Watching Sunset Boulevard on a loop.
There's a bench with a plaque dedicated
To the great Robinson Golliwog (
Killed by the cruel marmalade trade)
Where tin soldiers wear their rusty legs
And music box ballerinas lean
Forever akimbo, forever hopeful.
They'll soon be returning to their careers.
--
Stephen Moran
Next >>
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
"All the shops were closed and shuttered"
Sinéad O'Connor - Scarlet ribbons
If you're having that "Scarlet Ribbons" moment, get yourself down to --------. There are two good bikes remaining out of three that were there yesterday (the bigger one has gone). They are both about 28 inches high, one is pink and the other is dark coloured. They are standing in the street waiting for anybody to pick up. Actually, one of them has fallen over now - they were all standing in a line yesterday.
Let us know if you do?
Newsmusic Desk
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