The Coffee House Wall – 5th/11th August

Posted on August 6, 2013

This is the Coffee House Wall for this week. I won’t say that it is your chance to communicate with us, as we are all in this together. It is, nevertheless, the Conservative Blog post that has no particular theme, and where everything is on topic. Let’s just remember that we want to avoid ad hominem attacks on others. We don’t want to engage with trolls. We want to moderate our language ourselves as responsible and mature adults, choosing to use fruity language only where it is necessary. This is our opportunity to show what the Spectator Coffee House Wall could have been like.

Please consider supporting the Coffee House Wall by making a donation of whatever amount, to fund the running of the site using the Paypal donation button provided.


170 thoughts on “The Coffee House Wall – 5th/11th August”

  5. Tuesday, Aug 06 2013 9AM 20°C 12PM 23°C 5-Day Forecast
    Revealed: The real scandal behind a stolen caravan, travellers’ human rights and a betrayal that makes your blood BOIL

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2385116/A-stolen-caravan-Travellers-human-rights-And-betrayal-makes-blood-boil.html#ixzz2bB0teCPb
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

    The good thing about travellers is that blow apart the police line that we are all equal under the law.

  8. Alexsdandr 5th, – 20:24

    “every time i see one of Huhne’s windmills I want to smash his face in. 🙂 ”

    They don’t seem to do birds much good when they fly into them…perhaps we could fit Huhne into one of those ‘human’ cannonball machines and fire him through the arc swept by the blades. And again, if they don’t get him first time…ad infinitum.

  10. O(o) I thought that the medical professional had long abandoned Hippocrates in favour of Plutus.

  12. Once again, brilliant illumination from Clare Lopez:

    http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3912/mosque-religion-politics-dominance

    Executive summary:

    Islamic-style authoritarianism is the dominant characteristic shared by both the military and the Muslim Brotherhood, theocrats and non-theocrats: one or the other must be dominant. They cannot share power. One side or the other must come out on top. Both of these conflicts, in Syria and Egypt, are, at their base, about the inseparability of Mosque and State in Islam, and the burning zeal of those believers who have no tolerance for Arab and Muslim regimes they see as allowing the two to function apart.

    Extract:

    As Yousef al-Qaradawi, the senior jurist of the Muslim Brotherhood, elaborated in a 2006 fatwa [answer to a question about religion],

    “In the life of the prophet there was no distinction between what the people call sacred and secular, or religion and politics: he had no place other than the mosque for politics and other related issues. That established a precedent for his religion. The mosque at the time of the prophet was his propagation center and the headquarters of the state… From ancient times the mosque has had a role in urging jihad for the sake of Allah…”

    Al-Qaradawi’s words echo those of Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who, speaking in 1997, quoted the words of a 1912 poem, “The Soldier’s Prayer,” written by a Turkish poet: “The minarets are our bayonets, the domes our helmets, the mosques our barracks and the faithful our army.”

    [end of extract].

    But please read it all – as the ‘barracks’ of the barbarians spring up daily around the United Kingdom and throughout the United States of America, appaprently with the blessing of our ‘elected’ represetatives. As we know, Continental Europe is already a goner!

  13. Ostrich (occasionally) – 10:02 ‘NHS and the Hippocratic Oath?’

    All we need now is one for Social Services!

    And another for the Police to uphold the Law according to the appropriate English, Welsh, NI and Scottish Law).

    And another for the Laws of the Land to defer to the Laws of Physics, so we can have dependable energy sources.

    And we mustn’t forget one for the Laws of the Lib Dems to leave the Government benches.

  14. It would be great to have a national campaign pointing out that the LibDems want to ban all petrol and diesel vehicles and to tax every lorry so that all of the things we but in the UK will be even more expensive.

    It should go on the buses. It should go on taxis. It should be a banner on every website.

    Vote LibDem and hand in the keys to your car.

    I think that would have a signiicant impact on their support.

  15. btw, please take the time to read Clare’s highlighted links and notations. Then wonder, as I said in a comment to the article,, “Cui bono et cur?” Are the collective foreign policies of the governments of the West madness – or deliberate and chronic treacherous submission?

    As an Englishman I shudder at the knowledge that the credulous Cameron and the vague Hague are planning our future in the thrall of the Arabist traitors of the FCO.

  16. The traitor Peter Hain urges that his backstabbing agreement with the Spanish in 2002 should be revisited so that Spain be granted joint-sovereignty, despite the 99% rejection of any such arrangement by the Gibraltarians. Is he an outrider for a programme that has already been investigated? Can we trust any politicians?

  17. The first signs of revolution in the US; led by a Pennsylvania Police Chief?

    http://ncrenegade.com/editorial/media-blackout-militia-is-holding-pennsylvania-town-hostage/#comments

    A skip through his various video declarations indicates what the future holds?

    Apparently the MSM are giving it a miss. 🙂

    http://ncrenegade.com/editorial/media-blackout-militia-is-holding-pennsylvania-town-hostage/#comments

    And some think we have a problem with UKIP? Hope young Paul Harris doesn’t get to watch these vids. Ideas like those expressed therein that tend to go ‘viral’.

  18. … and while we are on the subject of things ‘going viral’, this Egyptian lady’s message to Obama is making an impression, apparently, perhaps someone will pass it on to Cameron’s new advisor, before the lady in the video decides to do another for our Prime Minister, with an equally catchy tune (and the gyrations are nor bad either):

    http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/08/05/hey-obama-you-are-stupid-bad-man-viral-egyptian-music-video-accuses-obama-of-supporting-terrorism-muslim-brotherhood/

  19. … and the type of upshot that can ensue from bad political decisions – Gerard’s timely annual reminder of something I still remember vividly:

    http://americandigest.org/mt-archives/iwar/nukes_time_for.php

    And we have no idea what currently technology could serve up for us if the idiocy of current politics continues apace.

    ” An’ I sez to myself … what a wunnnerful weeeeerld. Oh Yeahhhhhh…”

  20. Peter from Maidstone@August 6th, 2013 – 12:48

    I heard mr tango on toady this morning. The interviewer was no better.

    the guy from the gibraltar government was far better yesterday.

  21. Am I the only one who screams obscenities at the radio and television when I hear bad English?

    Of late I keep hearing ‘train station’ when the speaker is talking about a specific Railway Station this is but one example of lazy diction.

  22. David Ossitt@August 6th, 2013 – 19:31

    or written stuff

    could of instead of could’ve
    their, there and they’re errors
    apple’s when plural

  23. David Ossitt
    August 6th, 2013 – 19:31
    David, I’ve lost my voice! You know, like my daught-ter is passionite, and we listen to dat Woman Howar (Haitch iz a hard letta to pronunce) all about us woman being impowered. BBC iz the real buziness, passionite!

  24. David Ossitt – 19:31 – That drives me mad, too. Puts me into a steaming rage.
    And I agree with Alexandr. “Could of” infuriates me irrationally.

  25. David Ossitt, 19.31:”Ahead of” instead of before, “can I get” instead of can I have and of course “train station”.

  26. “Of late I keep hearing ‘train station’ when the speaker is talking about a specific Railway Station this is but one example of lazy diction.”

    Yesterday I was at Euston Burger and Crusty Sandwich Mall and had the same feeling.

  28. And so it begins; the BBC1 television news is reporting on a UKIP MEP, who, during a speech where he derides the EU for its foreign aid program, saying that most of it is spent on luxury items, being more specific he said that this happens in ‘Bongo-Bongo’ land.

    Apropos my earlier post on wrong use of English vis-à-vis train station, surely this man should be applauded, not only is he criticising the futility of much of the foreign aid (at least 80% of the population would agree with him) but he uses our language so that he can not be misunderstood, when he says ‘Bongo-Bongo’ land everyone understands exactly what he is saying.

  29. David Ossitt
    August 7th, 2013 – 08:27
    To use the vernacular, the BBC are literally ‘doing their nuts’ and falling out of their trees with horror! Enough to start a British Spring 🙂

  30. David Ossitt
    August 7th, 2013 – 08:27

    And he’s standing by his comments.
    Good man.
    Stick with it and tell them to get lost.

  31. David Ossitt 6th, – 19:31

    “Can I have…?” instead of “May I have…?”

  32. Bongo-bongo land?

    Seems the only ones making tw*ts of themselves are the Grauniad and the Beeb!

  34. Should be:

    I don’t know which is funnier, the clip or the fact that so many have complained about it:

  35. I remember a refreshing drink called Um Bongo. It had the wonderful TV advertising slogan “Um Bongo, they drink it in the Congo.” Created by some knuckle draggers in Cumbria, just over your northern border, Noa! Is it still on sale?

    Then there was Ali Bongo, who was Paul Daniels’s “Jonathan Creek” – except I think he was bald. Ali was a brilliant set designer and illusionist in his own right. He never perfected the wig, though.

    DO @ 08:20 Re: Bongo-Bongo. On this occasion I think I would be tempted to defer to Wilhelm’s definition of the term – which, in the absence of the late Bernard, I’m sure would be more humourous and more accurate than most others.

  36. At the Daily Mail it seems the vast majority of comments are supportive and are getting hundreds of green ticks. There are a lot of comments pointing out that the DM are participating in a crude smear campaign.

  38. Can you get a train to Bongo Bongo Land from Euston?
    Or do you need the Eurostar Terminal at St Pancras?

  40. With Berlusconi back in the news, can we expect some comments about BungaBunga-land?

  41. The best comments in support of Bloom at the DM have almost 7000 green ticks. And they have been forced to change the headline to something more moderate. As usual they have and continue to completely misjudged their audience.

  42. The trademark, Um Bongo, of the fruit drink once advertised as ‘Um Bongo, Um Bongo, they drink it in the Congo’ is still alive, well and unsuppressed by stoat faced apparatchiks of the ‘PC Brigade’. Light in the battle with darkness, indeed.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Um_Bongo

  43. I don’t know in what discipline Dr Tim Stanley earned his spurs, but not in a subject where the evidence of your own eyes is necessary.

    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100230090/islam-is-way-more-english-than-the-edl/

    Islam apparently “venerates woman”, presumably by not poisoning their bodies with ghastly Western anaesthetics before cutting them with a kitchen knife, whilst the EDL are “lawbreaking”, presumably for crashing through cultural sensitivities by protesting about the rich, vibrant practice of public beheadings (in recent months that’s two actual, and two attempted).

    I’ve lived in London for over 30 years, and I never thought I would leave, but being surrounded by so many, as Dr Stanley puts it, “Muslims who cling on to values that were once definitively English” has finally got me ringing my local estate agents.

    Oh, and let’s all join together for a rousing chorus of “Comments are Closed”!

  44. Civil unrest on the streets of Birmingham by stone throwing retards!
    Barry O’s outreach program has failed to find any, but “Where have all the moderate muslims gone?” (cue: Peter, Paul & Mary)

    We have now an answer! 😀

    “I think that (BO’s) the outreach to moderate muslims has been hindered by the fact that most of them have been busy inventing new kinds of mathematics.”
    Scott Ott

    The Trifecta crew discuss BO’s disastrous foreign policy:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLpcM9JWaR4

  45. As some of you will know this past week I dispatched to the knackers yard my much loved old computer that used the ancient Windows XP and bought an all dancing all singing replacement that has compared to the old a huge capacity and Windows 8.

    I am doing far better than I expected but for the life of me I can’t find the indispensable tool that was showing on the toolbar of Word and Outlook namely the ABC spell checker, this new computer does automatically alter minor spelling errors but just underlines in red serious misspellings.

    Any ideas?

  46. Stanley has a PhD in US political history and joined the Labour Party when he was 15. He stood as a Labour Candidate in 2005. Its rather embarassing that he has become a Catholic since he writes the most manifest bilge.

  48. PfM – 15.12

    Thanks for that background – no surprises there then!

    It really is beyond all comprehension that Stanley and too many others loosely called journalists so easily ignore the horror and aberration of these barbaric beheadings and attempted beheadings on our street. Don’t they feel that such aggressive, arrogant barbarisms are more deserving of the opprobrium that they reserve for those properly doing the protesting? Don’t they walk the streets and feel the tensions, discomfort and fear? Why should I have to feel that in my capital city? Parity of esteem? Respect? Don’t make me laugh. The law now means that we are not equal and that if you are of a particular colour or race (go on, have a guess), in any dispute or altercation, there will be a presumption of guilt.
    And if anyone can help me in identifying an Islamic country aglow with recognizably English values, let me know and perhaps I’ll be tempted to stop my search for a new home in Kent or Sussex.

  51. I too have got myself into a right old tizwaz today. I was reading the Daily Telegraph on my iPad and was so impressed by Bryony Gordon’s column that I decided to save it to one of these newfangled ‘Portable Data Files’ so I could share it with the grandchildren. Imagine my surprise when instead of taking a verisimilitudinous copy of Ms Gordon and her column, the naughty, naughty iPad produced a screed of what looked like Sumerian cuneiform, all topped off with a picture of Shami Chakrabarti. Why, it’s enough to make a chap demand his money back !?!

  52. PfM – 15.44

    I’m looking in Kent and East Sussex, but how utterly dispiriting and a profound shame and disgrace on the energy, wisdom and sacrifice of our forebears that I feel the need to look for a cultural enclave of Englishness in England itself.

  54. RobertC
    August 7th, 2013 – 09:40

    Even though a moderate chap of pacific disposition I am forced to conclude that anyone complaining about that advert (there’s more on YouTube btw) should be hung upside in public squares ‘pour discourager les autres’

  55. It’s interesting that after Cameron has announced that he’d had a phone call with the Spanish Prime Minister and everything would be OK, the Spanish Prime Minister responds saying that he hadn’t agreed to anything and has no problem with harrassing Gibraltarians at the border.

  56. Hexhamgeezer (7 August @ 17:10)

    Agreed! And thanks for mentioning that the comic indignation can also be seen on YouTube.

    Actually we have have an old jar of Marmite too – for use in a special emergency.

    What special emergency? One where we find we’ve run out of Vegemite…..

  57. David Ossitt@August 7th, 2013 – 15:52

    right click on the red curly underlined word and you will get suggestions as to correct spellings.

  58. bongo bongo land was used by Alan Clarke

    he could have used TPLAC
    (Tin Pot Little African Country) {Yes minister, the official visit}

  59. alexsandr
    August 7th, 2013 – 18:28

    “right click on the red curly underlined word and you will get suggestions as to correct spellings.”

    alexsandr thank you for your very helpful suggestion, P from M had told me to use the F7key, up until now I was blithely unaware of either method.

    Once again thank you.

  60. I do think that the stupid overreaction by the BBC and The Guardian news paper to that delightfully non-PC Yorkshire MEP’s referral to Bongo-Bongo land has probably done him a lot of good in the eyes of the electorate, it will not have done his party UKIP any harm either.

    Why did I write his party I wonder? (habit I suppose) as both she who must be obeyed and I will certainly vote UKIP in next years European elections.

  61. alexsandr – 18:46 ‘TPLAC – ‘Tin Pot Little African Country’

    I am surprised it has not caused great offense to all little Africans, no matter where they live.

  63. Look at sky news with mr bloom and some lefty female presenter.
    Got to give him credit , he stood up to her well and she didn’t like it up her.

  64. By Nick Allen
    Wednesday 7th August 2013
    Self-styled “soldier of Allah” Major Nidal Hasan, 42, who is representing himself in his trial at the Fort Hood military base in Texas, was said to be “effectively working in concert with the prosecution to achieve the death sentence”.
    His own court-appointed standby counsel, whose job is to advise Hasan on legal matters, made a statement to the judge explaining that a capital sentence was the defendant’s “trial goal.”
    Lt Col Kris Poppe, speaking on the second day of the case, said that was “repugnant” to him as a defence lawyer, and it was “contrary to his professional obligations” to help Hasan die.
    He asked not be required to do so, offering to withdraw if necessary, or to take on full responsibility for the defence which would allow him to fight the death penalty.
    On the opening day Hasan had made a brief statement in which he said “I am the shooter,” and that the evidence would show he carried out the massacre of soldiers at Fort Hood on Nov 5, 2009.
    Lt Col Poppe said that statement had “crystallised” his view that Hasan wanted to die, adding: “It became clear yesterday in his opening statement, and the comments he made, his goal is in fact to remove impediments and obstacles to the death penalty.”
    The lawyer also expressed concern that Hasan had made no effort during jury selection to keep people who questioned capital punishment on the panel.
    Hasan, sitting only a few feet away in court, interrupted and said: “I object, that’s a twist of the facts.”
    But the lawyer maintained he believed the death sentence was Hasan’s intention, and was the “over-riding purpose of Major Hasan’s trial.”

    Why has it taken all this time to come to trial.
    And why does it need to continue .
    Give him what he wants, the sooner the better.

  66. Two British women have had acid thrown in their faces on the east African island of Zanzibar, police say.
    BONGO BONGO LAND!

  67. Apropos last weeks walls remembered English poetry contributions, here are a couple more:-

    The Soldier

    IF I should die, think only this of me:
    That there’s some corner of a foreign field
    That is forever England. There shall be
    In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
    A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
    Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
    A body of England’s, breathing English air,
    Washed by the rivers, blest by the suns of home.
    And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
    A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
    Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
    Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
    And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
    In hearts at peace, under an English heaven. By Rupert Brooke.

    Remember

    Remember me when I am gone away,
    Gone far away into the silent land;
    When you can no more hold me by the hand,
    Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
    Remember me when no more day by day
    You tell me of our future that you plann’d:
    Only remember me; you understand
    It will be late to counsel then or pray.
    Yet if you should forget me for a while
    And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
    For if the darkness and corruption leave
    A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
    Better by far you should forget and smile
    Than that you should remember and be sad.

    By Christina Georgina Rossetti.

  69. We all know where bongo bongo land is, it’s where even the residents want to leave and come to the west.

  70. I didn’t realise that thing had got quite so bad in France ….

    h/t Pat Condell (‏@patcondell)
    “Brave French woman speaks out about Islam. We need more of this from other secular Europeans. Enough sensitivity. Is there anyone in Norway, Sweden, Netherlands, Belgium, Germany willing to follow this example and speak the truth?”

    respect et tolérance : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vke9K_JUu58
    émeutes de Trappes : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMrkv82mPvg

    It appears that everywhere in the western Europe the politicos and journos are in cahoots, and the police have been rendered impotent against all but the indigenous populuation.

  71. Delighted to see Godfrey Bloom treating a TV presenter as they deserve. Pricks with clipboards are not Gods chosen few and its only the cowardice of mainstream politicians that has allowed the likes of Paxman, Humphries and this dickead to evolve.

    Bloom was absolutely right – if the interview is not going to deal with the issue, walk away. I was “PR trained” and saw these TV prats in action for real. They lie and distort then their friends in the tape room cut things to suit. Best to only do live interviews and tell them to stuff it when appropriate.

    Viewers tend to form an opinion blaming the TV people when faced with an empty screen.

  73. Malfleur – Aug 8th 00.18

    We can all now sleep more soundly in our beds thank goodness.

    And I hear that Gove thinks that the subject of Islam should be on the school curriculum and obviously I’m only guessing here, but I have a feeling that whatever will be taught will be more along the lines of the fiction that Dr Tim Stanley invented yesterday in the DT and that Gove’s own book, Celsius 7/7 will not be a set text. In it he says, “The danger of moral relativism for any society faced by an external threat is profound and debilitating. Unless a society has the intellectual and moral resources to know what is worth preserving in its own culture then its values will not endure.”
    “There has been a pernicious tendency in British state practice to privilege the specifically Islamic identity of young Muslims over other allegiances.”
    The real question here is who nobbled Gove? And with what tools?

  77. Is Herbert Thornton reading this? Or any other Canadian?

    The Canadian embassy does not post phone numbers or email addresses and there is absolutely no way to get in touch with them. You can’t even go to an embassy or a consolate and get seen.

  80. Verity I have tried four times to post the link to the Canadian visa section but each time the post will not go on the wall.

    Simply Google Canadian Visa Service and see what you get.

  82. One of my favourite poems, which to me seems to embody “Englishness”, by my favourite poet, Edward Thomas

    THE MANOR FARM

    The rock-like mud unfroze a little and rills

    Ran and sparkled down each side of the road

    Under the catkins wagging in the hedge.

    But earth would have her sleep out, spite of the sun;

    Nor did I value that thin glilding beam

    More than a pretty February thing

    Till I came down to the old Manor Farm,

    And church and yew-tree opposite, in age

    Its equals and in size. The church and yew

    And farmhouse slept slept in a Sunday silentness.

    The air raised not a straw. The steep farm roof,

    With tiles duskily glowing, entertained

    The mid-day sun; and up and down the roof

    White pigeons nestled. There was no sound but one.

    Three cart-horses were looking over a gate

    Drowsily through their forelocks, swishing their tails

    Against a fly, a solitary fly.

    The Winter’s cheek flushed as if he had drained

    Spring, Summer, and Autumn at a draught

    And smiled quietly. But ’twas not Winter—

    Rather a season of bliss unchangeable

    Awakened from farm and church where it had lain

    Safe under tile and thatch for ages since

    This England, Old already, was called Merry.

    Edward Thomas

  83. So we are in Bongo-Bongo Land, but surely there is something about the night in David Cameron…….

  84. I wonder if this is bringing Verity home?

    Home Thoughts from Abroad

    Robert Browning (1812–89)

    I
    OH, to be in England now that April ’s there
    And whoever wakes in England sees, some morning, unaware,
    That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
    Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
    While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough 5
    In England—now!

    II
    And after April, when May follows
    And the white-throat builds, and all the swallows!
    Hark, where my blossom’d pear-tree in the hedge
    Leans to the field and scatters on the clover 10
    Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray’s edge—
    That ’s the wise thrush: he sings each song twice over
    Lest you should think he never could re-capture
    The first fine careless rapture!
    And, though the fields look rough with hoary dew, 15
    All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
    The buttercups, the little children’s dower,
    Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

  85. POPULATION : Recall the murder of Mohammed Saleem in Small Heath for which an Ukranian has been arrested;the Birmingham Post headline is:”….Pensioner never got to see his 23rd. grandchild”. If we crudely extrapolate the figures they would have 12,167 descendants in 100 years;as opposed to an English family with 4 grandchildren who would have 64. In 150 years the figures would be 279,841 to 256 descendants.

  87. I have always liked and appreciated the works of Rudyard Kipling’s in particular his verse and even though he was born in Bombay; he was an Englishman through and through.

    Many years ago I came across a second-hand copy of his Barrack Room Ballads a 1937 sixty-fifth Edition which I purchased for one-shilling, among the gems inside one poem stood out as from the others in that it has nothing to do with soldiering, it was quite beautiful.

    The Gift of the Sea

    The dead child lay in the shroud,
    And the widow watched beside;
    And her mother slept, and the Channel swept
    The gale in the teeth of the tide.

    But the mother laughed at all.
    “I have lost my man in the sea,
    And the child is dead. Be still,” she said,
    “What more can ye do to me?”

    The widow watched the dead,
    And the candle guttered low,
    And she tried to sing the Passing Song
    That bids the poor soul go.

    And “Mary take you now,” she sang,
    “That lay against my heart.”
    And “Mary smooth your crib to-night,”
    But she could not say “Depart.”

    Then came a cry from the sea,
    But the sea-rime blinded the glass,
    And “Heard ye nothing, mother?” she said,
    “‘Tis the child that waits to pass.”

    And the nodding mother sighed:
    “‘Tis a lambing ewe in the whin,
    For why should the christened soul cry out
    That never knew of sin?”

    “O feet I have held in my hand,
    O hands at my heart to catch,
    How should they know the road to go,
    And how should they lift the latch?”

    They laid a sheet to the door,
    With the little quilt atop,
    That it might not hurt from the cold or the dirt,
    But the crying would not stop.

    The widow lifted the latch
    And strained her eyes to see,
    And opened the door on the bitter shore
    To let the soul go free.

    There was neither glimmer nor ghost,
    There was neither spirit nor spark,
    And “Heard ye nothing, mother?” she said,
    “‘Tis crying for me in the dark.”

    And the nodding mother sighed:
    “‘Tis sorrow makes ye dull;
    Have ye yet to learn the cry of the tern,
    Or the wail of the wind-blown gull?”

    “The terns are blown inland,
    The grey gull follows the plough.
    ‘Twas never a bird, the voice I heard,
    O mother, I hear it now!”

    “Lie still, dear lamb, lie still;
    The child is passed from harm,
    ‘Tis the ache in your breast that broke your rest,
    And the feel of an empty arm.”

    She put her mother aside,
    “In Mary’s name let be!
    For the peace of my soul I must go,” she said,
    And she went to the calling sea.

    In the heel of the wind-bit pier,
    Where the twisted weed was piled,
    She came to the life she had missed by an hour,
    For she came to a little child.

    She laid it into her breast,
    And back to her mother she came,
    But it would not feed and it would not heed,
    Though she gave it her own child’s name.

    And the dead child dripped on her breast,
    And her own in the shroud lay stark;
    And “God forgive us, mother,” she said,
    “We let it die in the dark!”

    Rudyard Kipling

  88. Sorry about the apostrophe at the beginning of my post it should have read as Rudyard Kipling.

  89. David Ossitt
    August 8th, 2013 – 19:22
    David, you are a lucky man. Lovely poem, new to me, and I couldn’t understand why since I have The Barrack-Room Ballads, Century Edition) Revised 1997, but it doesn’t appear in it. Forget what I paid for it, it wasn’t cheap. It is Edited with an Intro and Notes by John Whitehead.

  90. Bongo Bongo : A bongo is a large brown antelope with attractive black and white markings on legs and face,and twisted horns,found in central africa………AND : as some one posted elsewhere;it is the drum played by the late,great,Richard Feynman.

  91. It Bingo Bingo Land at the BBC, or should it be Bingo Bingo Country. Everyone wins prizes:

    Met Police’s fraud squad investigating BBC pay-offs scandal
    Detectives from Scotland Yard’s fraud squad are investigating senior members of the BBC’s leadership over allegations of misconduct in public office, The Telegraph can disclose.
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10232189/Met-Police-investigate-BBC-pay-offs-scandal.html

    If you pretend it is happening in another country, and not ours, it’s quite funny!

    Quite when the BBC will crumble is anyone’s guess.

    It cannot be long, can it, especially after JS etc?

  92. RobertC – 22:53 ‘BBC salaries’

    Even if you knock a zero off the figures, the numbers are not that small !!!

  93. AWK1 8th, – 21:38

    re DO’s Kipling poem:

    That’s quite stunning, isn’t it?

  94. Gloomy or uplifting? Either way, undeniably and intensely beautiful:
    THOMAS GRAY. ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD.

    The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
    The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea,
    The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
    And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

    Now fades the glimm’ring landscape on the sight,
    And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
    Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
    And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

    Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow’r
    The moping owl does to the moon complain
    Of such, as wand’ring near her secret bow’r,
    Molest her ancient solitary reign.

    Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade,
    Where heaves the turf in many a mould’ring heap,
    Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
    The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

    The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,
    The swallow twitt’ring from the straw-built shed,
    The cock’s shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
    No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

    For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
    Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
    No children run to lisp their sire’s return,
    Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

    Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
    Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
    How jocund did they drive their team afield!
    How bow’d the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

    Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
    Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
    Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
    The short and simple annals of the poor.

    The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow’r,
    And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
    Awaits alike th’ inevitable hour.
    The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

    Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
    If Mem’ry o’er their tomb no trophies raise,
    Where thro’ the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault
    The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

    Can storied urn or animated bust
    Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
    Can Honour’s voice provoke the silent dust,
    Or Flatt’ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

    Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
    Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;
    Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway’d,
    Or wak’d to ecstasy the living lyre.

    But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page
    Rich with the spoils of time did ne’er unroll;
    Chill Penury repress’d their noble rage,
    And froze the genial current of the soul.

    Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
    The dark unfathom’d caves of ocean bear:
    Full many a flow’r is born to blush unseen,
    And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

    Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast
    The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
    Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
    Some Cromwell guiltless of his country’s blood.

    Th’ applause of list’ning senates to command,
    The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
    To scatter plenty o’er a smiling land,
    And read their hist’ry in a nation’s eyes,

    Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib’d alone
    Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin’d;
    Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,
    And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

    The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
    To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
    Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
    With incense kindled at the Muse’s flame.

    Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife,
    Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray;
    Along the cool sequester’d vale of life
    They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

    Yet ev’n these bones from insult to protect,
    Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
    With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck’d,
    Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

    Their name, their years, spelt by th’ unletter’d muse,
    The place of fame and elegy supply:
    And many a holy text around she strews,
    That teach the rustic moralist to die.

    For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,
    This pleasing anxious being e’er resign’d,
    Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
    Nor cast one longing, ling’ring look behind?

    On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
    Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
    Ev’n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
    Ev’n in our ashes live their wonted fires.

    For thee, who mindful of th’ unhonour’d Dead
    Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
    If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
    Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,

    Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
    “Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
    Brushing with hasty steps the dews away
    To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

    “There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
    That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
    His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
    And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

    “Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
    Mutt’ring his wayward fancies he would rove,
    Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,
    Or craz’d with care, or cross’d in hopeless love.

    “One morn I miss’d him on the custom’d hill,
    Along the heath and near his fav’rite tree;
    Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
    Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

    “The next with dirges due in sad array
    Slow thro’ the church-way path we saw him borne.
    Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay,
    Grav’d on the stone beneath yon aged thorn.”

  95. Frank P :

    That is the best Condell post I’ve yet seen – he is getting angry and in so doing, vocalises the feelings of half the planet.

  96. Email from a close friend of mine from you-know-where:

    If Scotland gains its independence after the forthcoming referendum, the remainder of the United Kingdom will be known as the Former United Kingdom (F.U.K.).
    In a bid to discourage Scots from voting ‘Yes’ in the referendum, Liberal Democrats have now begun a campaign with the slogan:
    “Please Vote No for FUK’s Sake!”
    They feel that Scottish people can relate to this, particularly those of Glaswegian origin.

  97. Verity, I understand the SNP have jumped on the bandwagon and are asking voters for a ‘Yes’ vote to see the F.U.K. off.

    Where will it end? With The Welsh Against The Scots? Perhaps we should join the Scottish Highlands Independent Territory voluntarily before we’re all in it!

  101. For anyone wanting to know what’s actually going down in the world of “Scotland’s jolly fat man”, his SNP Indy campaign, and Glasgwegian bare knuckle tribal politics in general, then I heartily recommend George Laird’s blog. An invaluable view on the alternate reality that is planet Scotland, or “Disneywurld” as RabC might have it. George is often informative, sometimes amusing, never boring! The SNP hate him, which has got to be a good start.

    Latest post: http://glasgowunihumanrights.blogspot.co.uk/

    Here’s one, a real gem, he did last month:

    Dear All
    Awhile ago, I was told by the cybernat community of the Nationalist camp:
    “no one reads your shitty blog” and “your a fat cunt with bad breath and smelly feet.”

    Sadly, they are behind the times. Today, you can find an article I wrote on the Think Scotland website:

    http://www.thinkscotland.org/thinkliving/articles.html?read_full=12259&article=www.thinkscotland.org

  102. Seems the acid attack girls had angered the loveable locals by singing during Ramadan .
    First thought, was why don’t people understand that what you can do in this country is not acceptable in other countries .
    Second thought, was why do we go to these places.
    They don’t want us there and it’s time we started preparing a list of country’s who welcome our help and tourist cash.
    Leave the rest to stew in their medieval attitudes and stay the shit holes they already are.
    We should stop our young people from naively going to these places because the one thing that’s guaranteed is its going to get much worse before anything happens that may make it better.

  103. An Emergency Call Centre worker in London has been dismissed from her job, much to the dismay of colleagues who are reportedly unhappy with her treatment.

    It seems a male caller dialled 999 from a mobile phone stating, “I am depressed and lying here on a railway track. I am waiting for the train to come so I can finally meet Allah.”

    Apparently “remain calm and stay on the line” was not considered to be an appropriate or correct response…

  105. An excellent post by Mr Bishi over on DT

    “… As soon as the middle classes understand that David Cameron has pledged £1.14 BILLION – of our money – to Nigeria to help them with their space race (Nigerian astronauts will soon begin training with Russia), they will flock back to the party.
    The UK’s middle classes cannot possible be anything other than delighted that their contributions to the Nigerian space program have resulted in a huge boom in the consumption of champagne in Nigeria.
    So, you poor huddled masses of UK middle classes, the next time your doctor tells you that the NHS cannot afford your medicine, look up to the sky above and marvel that the Nigerians – and the Indians – have wonderful space programs funded by you…”

    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/matthewholehouse/100230456/tory-footsoldiers-are-deserting-the-battlefield-it-could-cost-them-the-election/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

  107. Noa

    LOOK UP IN THE SKY ABOVE! THE REAL LUFTMENSCHEN ARE CAMERON ET AL AND NOT THE CANNY NIGERIANS!

    luftmensch definition: noun pl. luftmenschen an impractical, unrealistic person Origin: Yiddish < Ger luft, air (see Luftwaffe) + mensch, person…

  109. Alexandrovich
    August 9th, 2013 – 00:09

    The Gray’s Elegy Argument

    The denotation of a denoting phrase is that thing which the denoting phrase stands for. The denotation of the phrase “the president” is the president. The meaning of a phrase denotes its denotation. We might say, then, that the phrase expresses its meaning and only denotes its denotation through the meaning it expresses. The phrase “the president of the United States” denotes Barack Obama only because it expresses a meaning which in its turn picks out Barack Obama.

    Now Russell’s complaint is two-fold.

    First, if the meaning of a phrase denotes that to which the phrase refers, it will turn out that the meaning of a phrase is that to which it refers. And on the other hand if the meaning of a phrase is distinct from that to which it refers, then we will be forced to say that the meaning of the phrase does NOT denote that to which the phrase refers.

    Second, we can never say what the meaning of a phrase is, except by referring to it. (This would threaten an infinite regress.)

    So we want to start by saying that when use a phrase we thereby speak of that to which the phrase refers, but when we mention a phrase we thereby speak of that which the phrase means. To use a phrase I simply utter the phrase as part of a sentence, but to mention a phrase I must quote it.

    Russell’s problem arises when we take a phrase and attempt to speak of the meaning of that phrase. Consider, for instance, the first line of Gray’s Elegy. If I want to speak of the meaning of the first line of Gray’s elegy, I turn out to be asking what is meant by, “The curfew tolls the knell of parting day”. And in general for any phrase, when I ask for the meaning of that phrase, if I USE the phrase itself in the context “the meaning of _______”, then I am speaking of the meaning of the thing to which the phrase refers and not of the meaning of the phrase itself.

    So instead suppose I ask, what is the meaning of ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’? Then what am I asking about? Well that, Russell says, is just the same as asking, what is ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’? In other words, this phrase, [the meaning of ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’], is redundant, and I might as well have said, simply, [‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’]. (Here I use brackets to indicate scope.)

    Now if I speak of the denotation of something, and I use a phrase that refers to it in so speaking, I end up speaking of the denotation of that to which I am referring and not of the denotation of that by means of which I refer to it. Thus the denotation of ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’ is that to whicdh the phrase [‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’] refers, and so the denotation of ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’ is the first line of Grey’s elegy. Perhaps what this rules out is speaking of the meaning of the phrase ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’ by attempting to talk about that to which ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’ refers. Because that to which ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’ refers is the first line of Gray’s Elegy and not the meaning of the phrase ‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’. And why is that? Because this phrase [‘the first line of Gray’s Elegy’] is supposed, because of quotation marks, to stand for the meaning of what is enclosed within the quotation marks wherever it occurs, but then if I ask for that to which a meaning refers, I am asking for the referent of the meaning. I would have to enclose the quoted phrase in quotes again to get something that refers to the meaning. What refers to the meaning of a phrase is a picture of a picture of that phrase, and not a picture of the phrase, apparently.

    Now as I understand it, I agree with Russell on the following point. Consider the following question. — What is the meaning of life? I just asked what life means. I did not ask about the meaning of a phrase. But now what is wrong with this next question? — What is the meaning of ‘life’? Did I not just ask what is meant by a certain phrase? Well according to Russell, what I have just asked is as follows. — What is ‘life’? But now wouldn’t the proper answer to that question be, that ‘life’ is a word? And I did not want to ask whether ‘life’ was a word, but what the word ‘life’ has as its meaning! Life doesn’t refer to anything, and ‘life’ is a word, so in what way is it possible for me now to speak of the meaning of the word?

    So Alexandrovich set us a new conundrum

  111. EC – eh George Laird is none of things you mentioned, he is in fact a disgraced blogger, expelled from the SNP for among other things homophobia. He is regarded politically with disdain by all political types in Scotland

  113. John McLean

    “EC – eh George Laird is none of things you mentioned, he is in fact a disgraced blogger, expelled from the SNP for among other things homophobia. He is regarded politically with disdain by all political types in Scotland”

    What are political types?

    It seams to me that the word homophobia is much over used and wrongly used as is the word racist, it is used in the main to stop legitimate debate and those that use these two words the most are the Lib/Lab/Green Common Purpose fellow travellers and also by those dreadful communists the utterly repugnant SNP and their repulsive leader.

  114. a phobia is an unjustified fear of something. like fear of spiders. people are scared of them but spiders (in the UK) cant harm you

    dislike of homosexuals is not a phobia because there is no fear. its simple prejudice. why do we alloow our language to me mangled like this?

  115. John McLain, this entire subject is illiterate because “homo” simply means “the same” – as in homogenous. Homogenous milk is milk that doesn’t have cream on top, but mixed throughout the whole vessel. It was ignorant gays who misunderstood and picked up on this antonym. A homogenous landscape is a landscape that’s all pretty much the same, for example.

    And one more time to Peter Tatchell – There is no such thing as “homophobia” or a sufferer would never step outside the house because the slabs in pavements are all the same, windows are all the same (transparent), blah blah blah and the gay person would be scared to pieces at everything he encountered.

    I am sick to death of the prefix “homo” having become dedicated to homosexuals. Deserts are homogenous.

    Oddly enough, the term “gay” doesn’t offend me at all, because it came about during the homosexual protest marches in San Francisco 30 or more years ago, when they wisely shortened their wordy marching T-shirt slogan from “GOOD AS YOU” to “GAY”.

    And while we’re at it, Peter Tatchell, “homophobia” doesn’t mean “dislike of” or, even more comical “fear of” gays. Homo is simply the Greek prefix for “the same”.

  116. Mark Steyn at his scintillating best:

    http://www.nationalreview.com/article/355421/know-thine-enemy-mark-steyn

    His punchline last paragraph should be preserved for eternity; inscribed in granite and buried deep in a fracking mine, so as to withstand the holocaust that will surely come from the insanity that his reportage describes; to inform explorers from outer space in the millennia to come, in one paragraph, why and how humanity destroyed itself.

  117. Why do we hear this every summer withot anything being done about it?

    ++++

    Pupils at risk of forced marriage warned about danger of being abducted by their own families

    ++++++
    • Four children a day are spirited out of Britain over summer holidays
    • Cards offering help to those at risk will be handed out to schools and GPs
    ++++++++

    Teachers have been put on alert for pupils who could be taken out of the country and forced to marry strangers.
    It is thought up to four children a day are spirited out of Britain over the summer holidays to be wed against their wishes.
    New cards offering help to those at risk of being forced to marry will be handed out to schools, airports and GPs’ surgeries.
    Aneeta Prem, founder of Freedom Charity, which helps victims of forced marriage, said: ‘The “Marriage: it’s your choice” card is a concise and accessible way to receive information that could save someone’s life.

    It’s vital that young people travelling abroad for a family wedding realise it could be their own wedding – and know who they should contact should they find themselves in danger.’
    Between June and August last year the government’s Forced Marriage Unit had more than 400 reported cases, compared with 1,485 cases for the whole year.
    Crime prevention minister Jeremy Browne said: ‘The rise in forced marriage reports over the school holidays is shocking.
    ‘Teenagers expecting their GCSE or A-level results should be embarking on a bright future, not condemned to a marriage with someone they have never met and do not want to marry.
    ‘This is a serious abuse of human rights and that is why we are legislating to make it illegal.’

    A new law making forced marriage illegal is currently going through Parliament and is expected to become law in March next year.
    At the moment it is not an offence, and police are forced to use linked offences, such as kidnapping, false imprisonment, assault, harassment and making threats to kill.
    Research suggests the number of reported cases of forced marriage in England is between 5,000 and 8,000 a year.

  118. @Verity

    “I am sick to death of the prefix “homo” having become dedicated to homosexuals. Deserts are homogenous. ”

    Understand your point, but the usage of ‘homo’ ans an abbreviation for homosexual goes back, within my knowledge, to the late ’50s and probably a lot further than that. In my little Northern Irish milieu it also avoided any use of a word containing the letters s e & x, NI being a bit puritan, like, where such things were not spoken of! (I think there must have been many virgin births in those days. 🙂 ) I believe the usage of ‘homo’ was nothing to do with a gay lobby, but a simple, lazy abbreviation.

  119. Patriccia Shaw et al
    August 10th, 2013 – 08:07

    If the SS were of any use, they would be warning young girls in this age group and Teachers would be on their guard.

    But neither group are fit for purpose and innocent children are sold into slavery by their parents. This is not culture and it is not racism to attack these vile practices. A group of West Indian nations are seeking to sue the UK and US on the grounds of their enslavement of their forbears, yet no one says a word about these Indian sub-continent c**ts and their disgusting beliefs that women/girls have only half the brainpower of men and are worth no more than cattle and less than camels.

    Where is the outraged Harmen? Where are the Nadines? Where are all the feminist harpies that object to page three yet say sweet fuck all on this matter.

    Useless, sanctimonious cows the lot of ’em.

  121. Clear Memories
    August 10th, 2013 – 10:35
    Absolutely correct, and too sensible for the cretins running the show here. Marxism at its ‘finest’!

  122. John McLean, August 9th, 2013 – 18:35

    I couldn’t disagree more. Your crude attempt to smear George Laird doesn’t detract from content of his blog. Whether one subscribes to his political or other views or not(*), his news digest is, increasingly, the goto site for anybody wanting to read about the wheels falling off the SNP’s Indy bandwagon. The Salmond’s team and the SNP’s Indy “campaign” takes incompetence to new depths. The only thing Salmond has achieved is to make CMD look like a political colossus. (previously thought impossible)

    David Ossitt, August 9th, 2013 – 19:24

    Agreed, 100%

  123. Noa (10.35)

    Yes indeed! Mr Harris encapsulates much of the joint output of this Wall (and its predecessor) since this placenta of a ‘coalition’ usurped the UK government. Actually he answers, rather than asks, what is wrong with Britain’s foreign policy.
    In fact my use of ‘placenta’ is probably an insult to what, after all, is a natural protector of future life; moreover I understand in some countries is considered an edible delicacy – neither description fits our current ‘administration’; the shitty bathwater of an abortion would be a more accurate analogy, perhaps.

    I was about to ask “Who Robin Harris?” But perhaps I’d better Google him/her up and see for myself. He/she reads like a promising addition to our side of the culture war.

  125. Dear All

    I see that John McLean has stated:

    “EC – eh George Laird is none of things you mentioned, he is in fact a disgraced blogger, expelled from the SNP for among other things homophobia. He is regarded politically with disdain by all political types in Scotland”.

    Firstly, I am such a ‘disgraced blogger’ that I have been invited on the BBC, recently I spoke on Newsnight Scotland debate, Independence and the Monarchy.

    I would now like to address some other issues, as you are aware, there is smearing in the Scottish National Party. If you go to google and type in George Laird, you will see in the drop down list it comes up with George Laird racist.

    I did an article on it because such smearing must be challenged openly:

    http://glasgowunihumanrights.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/dear-bedford-reader-welcome-to-blog-can.html

    Please read this and note who else the person does a search on, SNP Euro Candidate Chris Stephens. He stood by while an Asian man was abused at Pollok SNP Candidate selection, the SNP Chief Executive Peter Murrell; the husband of Nicola Sturgeon was fully informed. Just like he was fully informed and sent an email which informed me that I was the victim of a smear campaign, people calling me, a sexual pervert, here is part of the email:

    “George was disposed of quickly, rumours that he was a sexual pervert took hold and the branch treated him accordingly”.

    As to being expelled, when I filed complaints (see above) about how I was treated, I became the subject of a complaint myself accusing me of being homophobic, the person complaining was also organising the hearing against me. Think about that for a moment, Complainer, his name is William Henderson, then SNP National Secretary. Note also when I did complain, my concerns were ignored. I have campaigned for LGBT candidates and have written in support of SSM, l have also support ‘gay’ campaigns on Change.Org; apparently they list want I sign up to support.

    So, to recap so far, I have been smeared as a racist and homophobic, the next expression of hate was to brand me a paedophile and a homosexual. Also there are claims I filmed young girls undressing while at Glasgow University. This episode is now in the hands of Police Scotland, I have filed an official complaint.

    As to being regarded “politically with disdain by all political types in Scotland”.

    When I was in the audience of the BBC for another debate, Anas Sarwar, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland made a point of coming over to speak to me several times at the end, and even remembered my name. Perhaps John McLean could name these ‘political types’, does he mean Tommy Ball who called me a ‘notorious racist’, I outed Ball on Twitter when he stating that British Soldiers were ‘uneducated racist thugs’. Read this:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9129607/SNP-activist-Dead-British-soldiers-are-a-bunch-of-child-killers.html

    Also, if I am such a ‘disgraced blogger’, can someone explain why Think Scotland asked me to do a piece on prisoner’s voting rights?

    That article was in support of the measure:

    http://www.thinkscotland.org/thinkliving/articles.html?read_full=12259&article=www.thinkscotland.org

    During the week, I was called up by the BBC asking if I would be available next month to be part of the audience for another programme on independence.

    I walked away from the SNP in January 2012 because of the way I was treated and smeared within the party, these people are nasty and vile, and the leadership of Alex Salmond, Nicola Sturgeon and Peter Murrell tolerate and failed to act on bullying. Just like they ignored concerns about Bill Walker MSP, see a pattern here regarding complaints?

    Keep an eye out for a Scottish Court Case involving my ‘nationalist stalker’ and me, they will have to supply evidence that I am a paedophile or they are going to be in serious trouble, possibly facing a prison sentence.

    In Scotland, if you speak out against the Scottish National Party, you get what I have received, a prolong and sustained hate campaign.

    Finally, please read the links, do the research and make your own mind up about me.

    Yours sincerely

    George Laird
    The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

  126. The Patriccia Shaw who has recently contributed to this Wall, appears to be a completely different animal to the one who was reviled on Trolltopia for so long and who managed to bring about Melanie’s exit from her erstwhile blog. Please inform us Pat, are you one and the same? On one of your trips to Damascus was there a shining light that cauterised your previous multi-faceted, multi-monikered pro-Palestine, anti-Israel persona. Or are you masquerading as a piss-take under the Shavian flag to upset Telly and his cohorts at the other place? I think we should be told. 🙂

    [Just in case this a ploy in the devious taqiyya tactics in an effort to infiltrate Peter’s stronghold?]

  127. Frank P, August 10th, 2013 – 11:57

    Interesting interview.

    Interviewer: ‘Finally, if you had to define what makes a conservative, on the basis of having written this book, what would you say?’

    Dr Robin Harris: ‘Well, I’d have have to distinguish between conservative with a small “c” and conservative with a big “C”. Because, obviously, it goes without saying, that to be a conservative with a big “C” is to be a member of the Conservative Party, and to be a successful conservative leader is to be somebody who wins elections and runs the country without, as Churchill memorably described it, “getting scuppered – we don’t want to get scuppered.” But actually being a conservative with a small “c”, well, I think that is trying to keep the country recognisable in its identity and secure in its future.’

    According to Dr Robin Harris’s definition, then Cameron is neither a “C” or a “c” !

  129. EC (12:52)

    I thought we were all agreed that he’s definitely a c*** in so many different adjectival ways … e.g. oleaginous; stupid; treasonous; duplicitous; leftist; etc,etc. – add your own favourites as per previous posts.

    Apologies … but you just knew I’d stoop to that, didn’t you?

    . .. and following Austin Barry’s cited idyllic Thomas poem, too. Tut-tut!

  130. Frank P 10th, – 12:23

    My thoughts, almost exactly…but much more eloquently.

  131. Ostrich (Occasionally) – I didn’t refer to the word “homo”, I referred to this constant repetition of the word “gay” to “officially” (soi-disant) define homosexuals and referred to how it came about. Gays themselves use the word, so it is no longer a perjorative. However, I am referring to the use of the word as an official definition by Peter Wossname. As though it were an official word referring to an official group – as in, say, Afro-Caribbean.

    The gays I know use the word unselfconsciously. They adopted it themselves.

    It is the “official” definition of an entire group of people by self-promoters like Peter Tatchell that irritates me. Just because the gays adopted it doesn’t make it official. I have heard black people, referring, among themselves, to themselves as “niggers” but it has not been accepted as the definition of a people. No one in would stand up in Parliament and refer to “the Itis”.

    Gay is a nickname. It is not an offficial grouping. If Peter Tatchell wants to continue his droning promotion of a long-won cause, he should use official wording – “homosexual”, not “gay”.

  138. Anne (15:25)

    He certainly wags mine from time to time; but like all tongues, one day it will be stilled – or swallowed even. The ensuing silence will be lost in the cacophony that continues. Such is life …. and its stoppage.

  139. Naughty niiece tribute time.

    “Once upon a time, in the Kingdom of Heaven , God went missing for six days.
    Eventually, Archangel Michael found him on the seventh day, resting. He
    enquired of God,
    ‘Where have you been?’
    God pointed downwards through the clouds. Archangel Michael looked puzzled
    and said,
    ‘What is it?’
    ‘It’s a planet,’ replied God, ‘and I’ve put LIFE on it. I’m going to call
    it Earth and it’s going to be a great place of balance.’
    ‘Balance?’ inquired Michael, still confused.
    God explained, pointing down to different parts of the Earth. ‘For example,
    North America will be a place of great opportunity and wealth, while South
    America is going to be poor; the Middle East over there will be a hot spot,
    and Russia will be a cold spot. Over there I’ve placed a continent of white
    people and over there is a continent of black people.’
    God continued, pointing to the different countries. This one will be
    extremely hot and arid while this one will be very cold and covered in ice.’
    The Archangel , impressed by God’s work, then pointed to another area of
    land and asked,
    ‘What’s that?’
    ‘Ah,’ said God. That’s the North of England , the most glorious place on
    earth. There are beautiful people, seven Premiership football teams in the North
    West alone, and many impressive cities; it is the home of the world’s finest
    artists, musicians, writers, thinkers, explorers and politicians. The people
    from the North of England are going to be modest, intelligent and humorous
    and they’re going to be found travelling the world. They’ll be extremely
    sociable, hard-working and high-achieving, and they will be known throughout
    the world as speakers of truth.’
    Michael gasped in wonder and admiration but then proclaimed,
    ‘What about balance God, you said there will be BALANCE!’
    God replied very wisely,
    ‘Wait till you see the bunch of tossers I’m putting down South to govern the
    country!’

  141. Frank P
    There are several historical iterations of my Moniker (with different spellings and different leanings) used I suspect by a variety of individuals with a variety of motives.
    I am a free spirit who occasionally contributes to a number of political sites but have never contributed to Melanie’s Blog to my knowledge.

  142. PS
    We could do with a few more leading articles from your goodself on this blog.

  144. Talking of poetry, this one for me, although about a Scot, applies to all the British diaspora. Separation, loss, and love of country in such a few beautiful lines

    (by Iain Crichton Smith)

    All Our Ancestors

    All our ancestors have gone abroad.

    Their boots have other suns on them. They

    died

    in Canada and Africa with God,

    their mouths tasting of exile and of spray.

    But you remained. Your grave is in Argyll

    among the daffodils beside a tree

    feathery and green. A stream runs by,

    varying and oral, and your will

    becomes a part of it, as the azure sky

    trembles within it, not Canadian but

    the brilliant sparklings of pure Highland light.

  145. I am afraid I am unmoved by poetry, but if i may I think we should celebrate the Englishness of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ work. To me ‘The Lark Ascending’ is superb.

  148. This child-snatching is used by opportunists in the care system to systematically rape children, but it is also used by the authorities to close down dissent.

    You have to read between the lines here, but you can see why they targeted this mother. This is pure East Germany (Booker again):

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/mother-tongue/familyadvice/9974950/The-lawyer-mother-who-beat-the-social-workers.html

    When you give anyone too much power they will exploit it and abuse it.

    To hand someone power over a child that is not their own is so grave it should only rarely happen.

    Instead of which, people use the ‘care’ system to abuse children, to intimidate and bully parents and to make a shedload of cash.

    The wretched system has been privatised so pimps can make a pile of cash out of these kids getting raped in care homes:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/supportservices/9029951/Graphite-acquires-National-Fostering-Agency.html

    http://www.forced-adoption.com/cashingin.asp

  149. Alexandr 10/8/13 8pm

    How can you fail to be moved by some of the gems of the English Language such as this beautiful Canadian iteration of Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca’s beautiful poetry?

    Now in Vienna there’s ten pretty women
    There’s a shoulder where Death comes to cry
    There’s a lobby with nine hundred windows
    There’s a tree where the doves go to die
    There’s a piece that was torn from the morning
    And it hangs in the Gallery of Frost

    Oh I want you, I want you, I want you
    On a chair with a dead magazine
    In the cave at the tip of the lily
    In some hallways where love’s never been
    On a bed where the moon has been sweating
    In a cry filled with footsteps and sand

    There’s an attic where children are playing
    Where I’ve got to lie down with you soon
    In a dream of Hungarian lanterns
    In the mist of some sweet afternoon
    And I’ll see what you’ve chained to your sorrow
    All your sheep and your lilies of snow

    And I’ll dance with you in Vienna
    I’ll be wearing a river’s disguise
    The hyacinth wild on my shoulder,
    My mouth on the dew of your thighs
    And I’ll bury my soul in a scrapbook,
    With the photographs there, and the moss
    And I’ll yield to the flood of your beauty
    My cheap violin and my cross
    And you’ll carry me down on your dancing
    To the pools that you lift on your wrist….

  152. Thus spake the D’Ancona weasel:

    ‘Take note, Ukip: political discourse isn’t a free-for-all

    ‘Many floating voters are wary of a politician who presents bigotry as plain speaking. Godfrey Bloom’s remarks are a fork in the road for Nigel Farage’

    If Mr D’Ancona has a racist-ometer, does Godfrey Bloom come above or below turning a blind eye to anti-white murders?

    I suggest Mr Bloom’s remarks would come lower on any racist-ometer than Mehdi Hasan in the pulpit, calling people ‘kuffr’.

    Funny how the media fetes Hasan, isn’t it?

  153. Verity (above) : Gay is an official word in Britain;we are threatened with arrest for it’s misuse.As I have pointed-out `gay` currently means “dull,boring;a pain in the ass ” in Britain [and in New Zealand].Michael Gove has denounced this use and said it is illegal homophobia.AND: The Arch-Druid of Canterbury,Justine Welby,has declared a heresy hunt against it’s use in C of E schools.

  154. In response to the loons at the DM (Verity and Peter,above) : Michael Henshard (The Mayor of Casterbridge) says to Donald Forfar;”You’re a man of science.I’m a rule-of-thumb man ” : meaning ,as a miller,he graded flour by rubbing between thumb and forefinger.

  155. I have seen no truthful commentary of the Bloom stitch up all week.

    All the truth has come from the public.

    Here’s what happened. The Tories know that they’re running out of smear bullets.

    It’s what is known by spin doctors as the diminishing margin of returns. The more you give people something, the more its effects wear off.

    Feed someone a can of Coke. They’ll like it. Feed them two, they’ll like it. Feed them three, they’re feeling bloated. Feed them four. They feel sick.

    If you’re selling ideology or spin smears, the same principle applies.

    Many foolish Tory voters only found out this year when Ken Clarke told them to their faces, just how far the Tory party is prepared to smear them.

    And how they gagged. They finally ‘got it’.

    That is a huge problem for Lynton Crosby. Where do you smear from there?

    Well, there has been a huge clear-the-decks operation.

    Tory spinners have been told to go after UKIP politicians, not the supporters or voters.

    And they’re not to wait until just before the election.

    Dave wants this over and he wants it over now.

    Crosby had the cheek to brief the media last week that Ken Clarke had not cleared with anyone his little smear remarks!

    Rubbish. The Sunday morning TV interviews before any set of national elections is hugely important.

    They will be played on a loop all day.

    The smear was a meme, used by Cameron before, and there is no way Tory spinners would not have had their Final Sunday Strategy worked out to a tee.

    Last week, Crosby was spinning to the effect that: ‘It wasn’t my mistake, oh no. This is how I do it. Look.’

    And lo and behold, we had two bits of footage released of UKIP politicians. Where did this footage come from, Lytnon? Did you perchance have back-room people unearthing it and then feeding it to the news orgaisation with the biggest coverage? The BBC.

    The story wouldn’t have looked so good if it broke in the Telegraph or Mail, because we know they’re Tory rags. But the BBC! Impartial. And ‘concerned about racism’. Yes, if you want ‘impartial’, let the BBC kick things off.

    So Sunday’s footage was just a warm-up. The public were meant to start chattering’ Do you see what some of these UKIP people speak like?’

    And then, what Lynton thought would be a dagger through the heart: the RAAAAYYYCISSST! footage.

    And look where it all started: the BBC Today programme, the show that sets the Orwellian news agenda for the day.

    This was designed by smear spinners to play out with maximum damage.

    And then the big news websites kicked in, and so did Sky, the BBC, and don’t forget Channel 4 ‘News’!

    Make no mistake, to those spin doctors and journalists, that sort of stuff is seen as career killing and they don’t just want Bloom.

    They want UKIP beaten to a pulp before the next General Election.

    If they can get Farage to keep handing them scalps, they will be very pleased, but Farage handled this well.

    It is so important not to let the back-room spin doctors and news editors not run the show.

    Bloom is still in place.

    Most important of all, though, was the public. The ‘Dads’ Army’.

    Actually, I find that description truthful and somewhat moving. The public are people who have nothing.

    They go about their daily lives in fear of saying a thought crime and being suspended or sack by the HR depaartment. Or having the road to promotion blocked.

    Or in fear of the thought police knocking on their door.

    Oh, they know what it’s like to be Godfrey Bloom, all right.

    And, as one, as the Daily Mail, Telegraph and Spectator (I’ll be coming back to that vile rag in a minute), piled in to what they all thought was UKIP’s Waterloo, back came the public!

    No human rights lawyer would defend Bloom’s freedom of speech, no public offical from any body would defend him, no-one.

    And they came in their thousands! ‘I am Spartacus. I am Godfrey Bloom.

    ‘I live with freedom of speech squashed and trampled on every day of my life by HR departments, throught policemen, the undue prominence given to Shami Chakraphoney in the media and so on and so on.’

    The point about last week was the level of its intent and co-ordiantion: destroy UKIP with a ‘racist’ smear and co-ordinate it across the board. Start on the Today programme and destroy from there.

    And if this was the 1990s it would have worked. Where would the counter voice have come from? Nowhere.

    We’d have had a legion of approved commentators, such as Medhi ‘kuffr’ Hasan condemning UKIP and a line of public figures queueing up, as they did, to condemn UKIP.

    UKIP would have been dead by Friday.

    It would have been all over.

    As the Mail, Torygraph, and Spectator piled in with their response articles to the Today interview, smearing their readers, those websites had to do what?

    The unholy Trinity of Paul Dacre, the Barclay twins and Andrew Neil pulled comments by the thousand.

    And then they were forced to commission writers to REFLECT WHAT THEIR READERS HAD TOLD THEM and say, ‘Oh, maybe Godfrey Bloom isn’t the anti-Christ.’

    The Spectator published a full transcript of the interview with sneery commentary and underneath the comments vanished.

    By late Monday afternoon, many of the comments were to the effect: ‘Where has my comment gone?’

    And Ed West was drafted in quickly to soothe the censored readers.

    Why do people bother actually commenting on the Telegraph and Mail?

    They’ll only pull it. It’s all about controlling the debate. ‘You stay here where we can see you. Now, let’s wipe most of those comments. Thanks.’

    LibLabCon know this and are already use trolls where they can. That will get worse.

    This was a very, very big week for UKIP. And a big moment for the public too. They finally gagged on the Kool Aid fed to them by the Mail, Torygraph and Spectator.

    Stop paying money for those, stop giving them comments they can delete.

    It was a truly fabulous week.

  157. As mentioned above, this story about Lyton Crosby is fascinating:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/10222092/David-Cameron-strategy-guru-attacks-Clarkes-Ukip-remarks.html

    That story was put in the Torygraph (house magazine for Tories) to send a reassuring signal to the Tory grassroots. To quote:

    ‘Lynton Crosby, the Australian running Mr Cameron’s 2015 election operation, said Ken Clarke had been “stupid” after the Minister without Portfolio dismissed Ukip voters as closet racists earlier this year.

    ‘Mr Crosby believes that Mr Clarke’s open attack played into Mr Farage’s hands and said that the intervention was not authorised by Downing Street [for Downing Street read Cameron].’

    The translation is: ‘We know we screwed up with Ken Clarke’s smear.

    ‘Please be patient as this latest smear campaign unfolds. We know you will worry that this smear campaign will backfore too, but this is not the same as the last one. No.

    ‘Lynton had nothing to do with the last one. Honest. Expect it to get a bit rough, but don’t panic that we’re overdoing the smearing. Dave’s choice of spin doctor has got it right this time. And don’t hold Dave responsible for Ken’s smear. No, sireee. It’s not like Dave used the same lines before a few years ago.’

    And then we know this is happening. To quote the story again:

    ‘David Cameron’s campaign chief Lynton Crosby has drawn up plans to unmask potential “racists” and “paedophiles” within Ukip’

    And then this is the key (quote from story again):

    ‘It has emerged that Mr Crosby held discussions with a lobbying firm about a “below-the-radar” campaign targeting Ukip.’

    Below the radar.

    Quite.

    Keep the Tory Party’s fingerprints off all this thanks.

    Where did the footage of Dean Perks come from? Why did it appear when it did appear? How convenient that it helped to set the mood music for the Godfrey Bloom tape.

    If I recall correctly the Mail ran the Dean Perks YouTube footage first. Where did the Mail get that story? ‘Off the radar’?

    Dean Perks responds here:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8SyoXF-ong

    And the Bloom story. Where did that footage come from? Why did the story kick off on the Today programme? Off the radar?

    It looks very much like someone went through some footage, and said: ‘This Bloom footage is our strongest chance of a good smear, give the weaker story to the Mail to warm things up a bit and then give this to the BBC.

    ‘The BBC goes strong on racism. If they can call Bloom, tell him they’v got this footage, ask him to come in and defend himself, we can get it on the Today programme and set the news agenda for the week.’

    Where are these tapes coming from? Why are they coming out now? Why did the BBC get the heads up and the exclusivity on effectively breaking that story?

    Off the radar.

  159. Ricci

    “Funny how the media fetes Hasan, isn’t it?””

    Nah! His face resembles a hairy a-hole, so it reminds them of bedtime.

    Otherwise your last two posts cannot be faulted or improved.

  160. Sounds as though the British Socialists are becoming tired of the Eastern European trained armchair Marxist, Milliband. Even Prescott would appear more acceptable to the working man. UKIP should make the most of this discontent and not allow it to fade away.

  161. Ricci-you seem to have a downer on Matt d’Ancona and the DT.

    The rise of Nigel Farage’s party has been one of the main political trends of the past year, prompting fears in Tory ranks of an organic split on the Right. The Ukip leader insists that he should be included in the 2015 leaders’ debates. His party is expected to do well, perhaps even to win, next year’s European elections. So what Ukip’s senior representatives say matters rather more than it used to. The controversy stirred by the MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire deserves its media prominence.

    Who can fault his prose, logic or syntax?

    Farage and his men are the most exciting thing to happen to UK politics since Foot decimated Labour in the 1980’s. We can look forward to an exciting two years culminating in the Tory-UKIP coalition in May 2015. Only then will we actually see action on immigration and Europe. Not only will we finally disengage from the Brussels behemoth but we will finally decide just who we want to live with us. Further I can see us withdrawing the from the European Convention of Human Rights.

  166. McCain was on Fox News Sunday tonight and his general stance (bumbling though it is) justifies Ibrahim’s assertion. It also confirms the excellent analyses of Clare Lopez, Andrew McCarthy and others from Gatestone Institute that have delineated just how deeply the US Government has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood – and this has been going on since the Presidency of Eisenhower. I have posted the articles here consistently and it’s the reason I persisted in requesting the addition of the Gatestone website to the Wall’s blogroll. The naivety of the West’s handling of the recent Egyptian crises is astounding on the face of it, but given the history of the MB’s evolution and it’s successful infiltration of Western Culture, aping Gramsci’s Long March tactics, it makes sense. McCain is cosy with Obama on this issue. Obama is a Marxist and anti-colonialist so his sympathies are in line with the unholy alliance; fuck knows why McCain has joined the club. I suspect the period he spent in incarceration may have caused permanent damage. Let’s face it, it began to seep through during the Presidential race. He was an utter disaster. It was his to lose and he did – with a flourish of utter incompetence.

    His canvassing for intervention in Syria is equally bonkers.

  168. This might bring a Monday morning chuckle.

    THE DEAF MAFIA BOOKKEEPER

    A Mafia Godfather finds out that his bookkeeper, Guido, has cheated him out of $10,000,000.

    His bookkeeper is deaf. That was the reason he got the job in the first place. It was assumed that Guido would hear nothing and would therefore never have to testify in court.

    When the Godfather goes to confront Guido about the missing $10million, he takes along his lawyer, who knows sign language.

    The Godfather tells the lawyer, “Ask him where the money is.”

    The lawyer, using sign language, asks Guido, Where’s the money?

    Guido signs back, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
    The lawyer tells the Godfather, “He says he doesn’t know what you are talking about.”

    The Godfather pulls out a pistol, puts it to Guido’s head and says, “Ask him again or I’ll kill him!”

    The lawyer signs to Guido, “He’ll kill you if you don’t tell him.”

    Guido trembles and signs back, “OK! You win! The money is in a brown briefcase, buried behind the shed at my cousin Bruno’s house..”

    The Godfather asks the lawyer, “What did he say?”

    The lawyer replies, “He says: f ** k you, you don’t have the balls to pull the trigger.”

  170. Puinhoop = ruin/disaster/chaos/balls up (probably an understatement by Geert)

    (BTW He’s safe! Frazier’s Neather regions contain nothing that would attract those carnivorous fish…)

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