The Coffee House Wall – 3rd/9th March

Posted on March 3, 2014

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.

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296 thoughts on “The Coffee House Wall – 3rd/9th March”

  4. Frank P – 08:53 ‘A succinct summary of why the West is fucked’

    No!

    This is why it is doomed:
    The DT has put the headline for the Oscars ABOVE that of the Ukraine crisis report.

    At least Ukraine is still on the front page!

  5. RobertC – 09:26

    “The DT has put the headline for the Oscars ABOVE that of the Ukraine crisis report.
    At least Ukraine is still on the front page!”

    Only because the sub editor thought the film was “12 Years a Slav”,

    I’ll get my balaclava….

  7. Stephen Maybury.

    I doubt I’d be able to afford the rent on the suite…appreciate the thought though.

  8. Telemachus -drivel, yawn, Blair yawn, Gordon Brown, saviour of the universe …zzzzzzz

    Great post! Bwahhaaaaaaa!

  9. Noa

    I see tory ministers are taking the opportunity to try and make political capital against Ed Miliband, by blaming him for Russian aggression, encouraged by the anti Syrian military action vote in Parliament.

    I hold no brief for the odious creation of Nick Park with associated Union bullies. To make such an accusation is laughable, Britains’s remaining armed forces now offer no credible deterrent or threat even to Luxembourg. Even to imply that Bomber Cameron, the fearless ‘Butcher of Bengazi’, might have mounted anti-Russian air strikes, with ground and sea intervention, support of Cathy’s policy of EU expansionism is sufficient to cause greater laughter than Les Dawson’s mother in law.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2571733/Was-Eds-Syria-vote-green-light-Putin-Tories-claim-Labour-leaders-vote-against-military-action-encouraged-Russia-invade.html

  10. I have just read an article in the Spectator of a couple of week’s back (I’m behind on my reading) written by Alain de Botton where he decries the fact the ‘The Mail Online’ is the most read internet News Paper.

    In response he is; or has, set up a web paper identical in every way to the Mail website so much so that it will only differ in content by in his opinion giving proper acceptable news.

    Is it not odd that a man supposedly to be well above the average in intelligence and a philosopher to boot is so fundamentally stupid?

    The Mail on Line is read for its content and the people who read it want and agree with both content and opinion, and so an imitation with news from the philosophical perspective of de Botton is doomed to failure.

  12. What I found most amusing about attacks on Ed Miliband and his unwittingly causing the prospective invasion of Ukraine by the Russians due to his own failure to invade Syria, was the idea that Putin has any idea of who Ed is or could care less.

  14. Noa @10:09

    Meanwhile, over at the other place, Alex Massie is frothing at the mouth again!

  15. Nick Parki?? What for? His name hasn’t come up in the Savile investigation, has it?. Mind you – fronting for that funeral insurance scam is a bit iffy … so it wouldn’t surprise me if he got his collar feel for gulling old folk.

  18. Alexander Boot today is excellent on what friendship with America does to nations.

  20. Windows 8 has just done an automatic upgrade and now this page and font size is much smaller.

    How can I permanently increase the size back to what it was?

  21. Frank P @ 09:09

    You may have missed it, Frank, but there was no movie celebrating the enriching lives of the gay community.

  22. EC
    Dan Hodges also waves the waycist banner over at DT, Austin Berry’s riposte is true as ever. (Welcome back Skywalker!)

    Austin Barry to Esmerelda Weatherwax • 2 hours ago

    “The traitors are ‘afraid’?

    I’d say terrified: terrified of a seething electorate. Dan is reflecting that terror with his silly attack of Leftish vapours and nonsensical hyperbole e.g “Ukip is now an overtly racist and extremist party.”

    Bilge.”

  24. David Ossitt (3rd March – 15:03) –

    “Windows 8 has just done an automatic upgrade and now this page and font size is much smaller….How can I permanently increase the size back to what it was?”

    The answer can depend on which web browser you’re using. I’ve found that Chromium is best with Firefox a close second – with either you can adjust the page and font sizes to whatever you like.

    I’ve gone even better than that – I’ve abandoned Windows and now use Linux Mint 16 XFCE. Close behind is Linux Peppermint 4. Unlike the exorbitant price of Windows, both those Linux operating systems are completely free – and installation of Chromium is either automatic or very easy.

    You can download both Mint and Peppermint from Distrowatch –
    http://distrowatch.com/

  28. Ukraine crisis: Angry Angela Merkel questions whether Putin is ‘in touch with reality’
    German newspaper claims that in a conversation between Angela Merkel and Barack Obama she was heard to question the Russian President’s grip on reality
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10673235/Ukraine-crisis-Angry-Angela-Merkel-questions-whether-Putin-is-in-touch-with-reality.html

    Obviously, Putin hasn’t yet bought into the Brussels agenda of make believe!

    Send in the Belgian Army. It’s their turn!

  29. RobertC – 19:11 ‘Ukraine’

    From the above article:
    “The two leaders [Angela Merkel and Barack Obama,] roundly criticised Mr Putin in their [telephone] conversation [with each other] and agreed that Russia’s military intervention in Crimea was in violation of international law.
    …
    Both were said to be in favour of sending an immediate fact finding mission to Ukraine and backed the idea of setting up of a contact group, possibly overseen by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, with the aim of ending the crisis through political dialogue.
    …
    The two also pledged to find ways to help Ukraine out of its current acute financial dilemma.”

    How, and with whose money?

  30. RobertC @ 20:06

    Do you have to ask, Robert? Ours, of course, we have plenty of it. The baldy man from Yorkshire has already pledged £10mn.

    And your suggestion to send in the Belgian troops made Baron laugh. Do they have any?

  31. The new government in Kiev has today appointed two new governors for the Eastern region, the area around Donetsk that borders with Russia. Both are oligarchs, one with assets over £4bn, the other poorer with only half a billion to his name. That spells an end of corruption for certain.

  33. Noa

    Yes, an article of the first order by Peter Hitchens fusing passion and history in a ruthless put down of Euro-American diplomacy.

    Hitchens recognizes that “globalism” is the problem, the first major commentator in the traditional media that I have seen do so. Those who have feared being denounced as “conspiracy theorists” may now feel encouraged to identify and openly denounce the globalists.

    In the meantime, his article is a call to rally to the defence of Russia in this affair. I am of course thousands of miles away and so must restrain my instinct to call for demonstrations by the British people in support of Russia in the streets of London.

  35. Noa @ 22:05

    you are too generous in your take on Baron’s knowledge and ability to judge the great Hitchens. Overall, no disagreement except perhaps on few minor points like whether Neville should or shouldn’t have signed the piece of paper. From British point of view, he should have. The country wasn’t ready.

    He’s right, too, that the Czech Republic exists on paper only, it’s trade is essentially with Germany (85% of the total), Russia also having a major stake mostly in rear estate, the city of Karlsbad being almost totally in Russian hands. He may be wrong criticising the Czechs’ treatment of the Sudeten Germans after the war. During it the Germans, both in the border lands and everywhere else, behaved even more disgracefully.

    What Peter Hitchens doesn’t address, and what’s beyond the issue under discussion is what Czechoslovakia should have done when threatened by the Austrian corporal. Not that it’s relevant here, but Baron view has always been the country should have isolated the leaders of the Henlein’s Sudeten German Home Front, and attack Hitler’s Germany. There may be a chance to have a fuller debate about this at some point.

  36. Many thanks for sharing your thoughts Baron. I read AJP Taylor’s ‘Origins of WW2’ recently. It is a fascinating and provocative essay which whilst not condoning Hitler, places much (all?) of his foreign policy in the mainstream of German policy and seeks to pierce the illogicality and ignorance about it which prevents proper understanding.
    I also recommend it, for its exposure British incompetance and ineffectiveness; the loss of Stalin’s Russia as an ally in 1939, our sunsequent near war with Russia when Finland was invaded, putting ourselves and europe hostage to war at the decisin of an unpleasent, intransigent Polish dictatorship.
    But I digress. My point was about Chechoslovakia, whose President Edvard Beneš, went to see Hitler and in accepting abject terms, and unlike Poland, at least knowingly protected his country from wholesale military destruction during the war.

  37. Malfleur 23.31.

    Whilst the British people may have no taste for demonstrating in support of Russia, I believe they are also deeply war weary and suspicious of war mongering politicians, whose military adventurism is seen for the self aggrandisment and manipulation by the USA and Saudi oil that it is.
    People feel Ukraine is none of our business. they are right.
    As I’m sure the Coalition government recognises, indeed has apparantly leaked so to the press, there is no foolish intention of deploying troops or assets. If there was, demonstration might well occur-against the EU and the government.
    Indeed the EU has over-reached and any attempt to deploy ‘EU’ troops might well spark widespread anti-EU unreast and riots through out Europe. Maybe just a gut feeling, but anti-EU sentiment is gaining more strength on the continent than here possibly-witness the rise of Le Pen, Wilders, AfD, Golden Dawn etc.
    If the weakly led USA has turned to isolationism then so has even more wekly led Britain. indeed more so I think. The bombing of Libya made people angry and disgusted, even more so when Ghaddifi’s bayonetorectomy became available to all on the internent.
    We had simply, and at great expense, replaced one old savage with a host of new completely uncontrollable ones, in order to provide a pouting cameron with a photo call.
    So the reaction to the proposed neo-con intervention in Syria was pleasing but perhaps unsurprising, when one remembers that eveyone know knows a dismembered serviceman from Afghanistan or Iraq. Those symbols of US subservience and Blair chicanary, that served no useful purpose other than to pour petrol on the fire of global jihadism.
    If we

  38. Noa, March 3rd, 2014 – 15:23

    Those two blogs attracted a massive response: I think that the great British public (gawd bless ’em) might finally be waking up to the likes of Massie and Hodges et al who play the racist/xenophobe card to smear people who are not “on message” regarding their left/liberal agenda on the immigration, mult-kulti, and the EU.

    This is resulting in a huge backlash against the lack of real choice between the main political parties. With Lib/Lab/Con cabal we effectively have a one party state. HOWEVER, Unless UKIP can press home their advantage in the european elections in May then they are finished, and so will be subtle charade of democracy in the UK. Better not cock it up, eh?

  40. h/t Pat Condell ‏(@patcondell)

    “If you had any lingering doubts that the Iranian regime is clinically insane, this should put them to rest. Savages. ”

    “A 34-year-old Iranian man is in imminent danger of hanging for allegedly “insulting the Prophet” in a recorded private joke that security forces found on his personal computer.”

    http://mohabatnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8274:man-faces-execution-for-alleged-mockery-of-prophet-&catid=35:inside-iran&Itemid=278

  41. EC
    A massive burden of hope and expectation is being placed upon UKIP, a small party without a single Parliamentary seat.
    Would any individual or party be able to live up to that, other than the communist party?

  43. EC
    Not at all. i thnk UKIP will do very well in May in the EU elections and make good but not startling progress in the local elections.
    But people should be cautious in the expectations, what can the odd UKIP MEP or town councillor actually do? They will be mariginalised and in a minority when dealing with the controlling Labour or Conservative machines.
    Public disappointment may lead to a reaction against UKIP’s ‘performance’ in office.
    After all we live in a time when Sleb TV and instant gratification are the norm, making real changes in the mirey stalemate that is British politics is difficult, to say the least.

  44. UKIP.

    Ofcom issued a report (3rd March) saying in the Euro elections that UKIP has to be regarded as a Major Party in broadcasts aimed through-out Great Britain,or to England,or to Wales:but not to Scotland.

    This doesn’t apply to local elections,or Parliamentary elections.

    The report can be found below.Scroll down for details and charts of election results.

    http://www.stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/consultations/parties2014/statement/Major_Parties_Statement.pdf

  45. TRY;
    stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/consultations/parties2014/statement/Major_Parties_Statement.pdf

  47. Blazeaway posted in the Massie debate at t’other place. The following was my response on one of his points, which I thought might be of interest to Wallsters.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    “So why do they – a small minority it has to be said – now wear Arab clothes that have no tradition in Pakistan or Bangladesh?”

    Is it ‘a small minority’? My experience is that the great majority now do so. Several reasons occur:-
    – There are now many separate and exclusive Indian , Bangladeshi and Pakistani muslim settlements in the old post industrial English towns and cities. Very often they are from one or two extended clans and families in India and interact closely with their parent families in the home country. Coming here to earn money and retire back to the sub continent. As they have grown larger in numbers and taken over the streets and districts in which they live increasingly refllect the culture, law, prejudices and fueds of home.
    This progressive colonisation is described in detail in “The Islamic Republic of Dewsbury”, It is a higly effective system of ethnic cleansing which operates throughout Britain and indeed Europe.
    – There has been an increasingly militant ethos within the muslim immigrant population, since the riot about the Salman Rushdie fatwa in the early 1990’s when the earliest activists’ started to realise their power and exploit the weaknesses of of our open but decayed democracy, with the active assistance of the existing political parties, both of whom sought their votes to break the existing stalemate. As they realise they are often the arbiters of power these clans have ruthlessly exploited the democratic process to leverage their power and influence well beyond their original numbers. They now dominate the Labour party and have made significany inroads into both the Conservative and labour parties.
    – A third contributing factor has been the increasing militancy and separation from western values and aspiration of second and third generation immigrants. Called ‘British asians’, despite originating or coming from the Indian sub-continent a great many, perhaps most of them are anything but. Influenced by 9/11, living exclusively muslim districts, educated in Deobandian principles, speaking English as a second language. They live in England by happenstance, continuing to import wives or husbands from their home country, for convenience for the welfare and benefits which they consider to be jizyah, a tax on infidels and taquiyya the religiously sanctioned right to lie, to obtain it.
    It is this population, now officially estimated to be at least 5% of the population but accounting for over 1 in 10 births, that is expected to exceed the indigenous population by 2050/60.
    What are the consequences of injecting this entirely alien and violent culture into British society? Given the precedents in both the UK and elsewhere they are very potentially troubling indeed. Widespread civil disorder at one level, to civil war as we have witnessed in the Lebanon.
    Yet no government or party has had the courage to even acknowledge the unknown present annd future conseqences of their disastrous policies of mass third world muslim immigration. To raise the legitimate concerns which British people have is to attract the abuse and accusation of being bigots by self congratulating, fabian apologists for ethnic and cultural cleansing, like Messrs Massie and Hodges.

    Until they and the political elite and supporting media recognise that trying to silence concerns does not eradicate their causes, they are doomed to failure.
    Ethnic and inter-cultural tensions will simply grow and be concentrated, not dissipated. Reputable, courageous and honest journalists should seek to promote honest disagreement and debate. To silence it is the tactic of the Ministry of Truth.

  52. Noa
    March 4th, 2014 – 01:24

    The British, apart from a few stalwarts in the English Defence League, have no taste for demonstrating in support of anyone or anything. They are not yet war weary of our professional armed forces going abroad to fight for a US adventure.That adventurism is not so much self aggrandisment and manipulation by the USA and Saudi oil, as consequent on the imperatives of the arms market (imho). As an arms negotiator, you may have some helpful insights into how this kind of commercial logic plays out in political terms.

    Accordingly, as between the two views which I have seen of the causes of events in Kiev these last few weeks, I am inclined to give less importance to the scenario of a pre-emptive bid by elements under Russian orders to control pro-European leanings of the Ukraine by appearing to support them. More credible to my mind, based on such facts as I have read, is that this is a putsch led by neo-nazi and Chechen islamist elements financed and directed by forces that are not happy to see the Ukraine outside the magic circle into which we, the EU and the USA is drawn, and financed expressly by the State Department and more covertly by bankrolls fed through diverse Non Governmental Organizations.

    There has always been an isolationist thread in American history, but it is I think a mistake to say that “the weakly led USA has turned to isolationism” when the country has been incessantly involved in wars for twenty years and no resistance has shown itself anywhere other than occasionally in the talking shops. What has in facr driven the country are the forces whose logic requires continual wars and those forces have so far succeeded only too well in suppressing any meaningful opposition. And what cannot be doubted is that the arms factories have not been short of orders as a result of American or British leadership whether weak or strong.

    One would at least have thought that the British people could have made common cause with the Russians in opposing the dragging of its neighbour and close relative into integration with the European Union . One hoped indeed to hear UKIP speak on this theme.

    Russia has been Britain’s ally in the three great upheavals in the last two hundred years aimed by continental European powers at dominating the world. Is it really unthinkable that we should not ally ourselves,people to people, with the Russian people and so confound the knavish tricks of the globalists this time around? Would such support not also undermine the unnatural and deceptively named Shanghai Cooperation Organisation?

    Perhaps it is, perhaps it is too late, perhaps “the European Union” has won and we must all dance to that piper’s tune.

  53. Russia’s statement that there is no need to use force in the Ukraine wrong-foots “the West”. Could it be that in Syria last August and now again today Russia has refused to be baited into war?

  54. Malfleur 13:12

    Quite simply, the Syrian and Ukranian incidents have highlighted the political intelligence deficit between Russia and the West.

  55. Having watched the last two thirds of Putin’s press conference on RT (the coverage on SKY was interrupted and distracting – intercut with the South African circus) – and without having fully reconciled the propaganda from all sides of the jar of Ukrainian worms; one thing emerged clearly: on all fronts, the grasp of Putin on the propaganda, the politics, the economics and the power play – not to mention his military resolve and readiness; as compared to the puerile crap emanating from Western ‘ leaders’, is stark and disturbing. Despite his somewhat vertically challenged physique he stands head and shoulders above them all in perspicacity and ruthless cunning. Now he has quietly stated his position – while our MSM were concentrating on a few shots fired at a Russian air base. Without the aid of a ping-pong teleprompter he sat, legs akimbo, and made is case. He cooly called the US/EU bluff and left them in a dissembling heap.

    Your shout – or should we say “Your whimper, Obullshitter!”

  57. Alex Boot vies with the Rev Peter Mullen on the morality and practicalities of the Ukrainian crisis:

    http://www.revpetermullen.com

    I dunno about Ukrainian crisis – it’s becoming a U- cranium matter for me

    My fucking head hurts! 🙂

  59. RobertC
    March 4th, 2014 – 12:02
    Intelligent man! Too bright for the Torie.

  62. No comment. !!!

    The Huffington Post UK 04/03/2014
    A Conservative councillor has been given the boot by the Tory Party for mocking burkas in a post on Facebook that compared them to bin liners.

    The photo shared by Enfield Council’s Chris Joannides showed a woman and a girl dressed in burkas walking next to two bin bags, captioned: “I saw her standing there and I told her she had three beautiful children. She didn’t have to get all pissed off and threaten me. It was an honest mistake!”

  63. Thanks Peter. I just cut and pasted the link from Alex’s blog. Obviously different software, as the link worked from there.

  65. Here you have an RT anchorwoman openly blasting Putin’s intervention in the Ukraine, pity she forgot to kick the armed mobsters who ousted Yanukovych, a man who, as we now know was corrupt to the core, but who was elected.

    For Baron, this was the key event. One should never allow a change of government by means other than the ballot box. The Kiev switchover sends a lethal signal to one of democracy’s essential ingredients, that of changing the governance by the will of the whole people, not by a coup.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZolXrjGIBJs

  66. The Russian side can be seen at Russia Today.

    They report the Kiev rebel government has appointed two billionaires to variously govern the important industrial areas in the east of Donetsk and of Dnepropetrovsk.

    The Mayor of Tallin (capital of the EU state of Estonia) has said the Kiev rebels are illegetimate and should not be aided…….in contrast to Tristram Hunt (?) on Radio 4 who declared if Putin gets away with it in Crimea he may threaten the Baltic States.

    http://www.rt.com

  68. Frank P @ 14:27

    That’s how Baron feels, too. He’s giving up, it’s just madness, a 24-carat lunacy. If we are not careful, we may get globally warmed the wrong way sooner than anyone has ever expected, and for fugging what? The insatiable urge of the EU apparatchiks to enlarge the undemocratic empire come what may.

    There hasn’t been yet much of any criticism of the Brussels nomenclature, but if anything ever gave us a reason to curb their powers, the events in Kiev tht led to the putsch should be it. The leaders of the member countries should finally realise the danger of appointing a bunch of imbecilic tossers to positions where they can not only embarrass themselves, but do a serious harm to the 500mn unwashed living within Europe. The sooner the ghastly woman whose brief is to represent the EU gets the boot, the better. All the others should follow.

  69. John birch @ 15:14

    Robert has thankfully furnished the picture – see above John. Frankly, it’s impossible to tell the difference. The joke was on the woman.

  70. Peter from Maidstone @ 13:57

    If baron comes across anyone who gets deeply into -cism this and -cism that Baron loses interest.

    The barbarian reckons Putin’s much simpler than that, ruthless, determined, cunning, calculated, vein ….. but simple. To be popular, he knows he has to do everything that restores as much as possible the lost pride the Russians felt when the Gulag was an admired (for space exploration), admired (for free health, education and stuff at the point of delivery), feared (for the nukes) …., and he does it. He doesn’t strike as someone with the ambition to rule the world, his neighbour to the East, by far more powerful than Russia, would put a short stop to it at a stroke.

    More to the point of the Zubrin’s rant, Russia has always had a large share of crackpots of one sort or another, Dugin fits the bill well.

  71. Kerry’s waffle at his Ukrainian ‘press conference’! Utter cant! Prolix bollocks! Lies and distortion. His rising and risible rhetoric, laced with hypocritical sentimental gush is nauseating. Who let this Heinz heiress gigolo until a key ‘diplomatic’ global role? He even makes the Clinton witch look competent. Grrrr!

  72. Frank P @ 13:45

    The man though lacks charisma, totally, feels cold to the point of freezing, it sends shivers down Baron’s spine just to watch him, no sound on.

  73. Baron 4th, – 16:06

    “One should never allow a change of government by means other than the ballot box.”

    Yes, I agree with you, to a point. But we have a precedent in Mohamed Morsi. Here was a man who was elected on a manifesto and then blatantly repudiated that manifesto, and was fiddling the electoral system so that it would, in future, be impossible for any but Moslem Brotherhood supporters to stand for election. In such a case, where their sole legitimate means of protest, at the ballot box, was about to be ripped from their hands it seems to me reasonable that the was ousted in the manner he was. Now whether Yanukovich was involved in similar shenanigans I don’t know; I wasn’t paying attention at the time. But it takes something for a recently elected leader, on 48% of the vote (who did the other 52% vote for? Were there more than two candidates?) to so arouse the ire of his people that the Kiev protests could have been sustained for so long, and in Winter too!

  74. Frank P 4th, – 16:36

    “Kerry’s waffle at his Ukrainian ‘press conference’!”

    Didn’t he stand for president at some election or other? Who beat him? Not George Dubya, surely?

    🙂

  77. Baron @ 16:06

    ” One should never allow a change of government by means other than the ballot box. ”

    I think we might make an exception in the case of the Obama administration – just to prove the rule.

  78. Baron @ 16:06

    ” One should never allow a change of government by means other than the ballot box. ”

    I think we might make an exception in the case of the Obama administration – just to prove the rule.

    May need to here in the UK as well at some point.

  79. Ostrich (occasionally) @ 16:42

    That’s an excellent point, Ostrich, and one of some significance, but Baron’s cranium is not up to it to give an answer that would withstand scrutiny, or be universally applicable except perhaps to suggest that if an institution of the State such the military, the judiciary, the House, the Head of State (the Queen here) judges the executive branch to be not fit for purpose, they can dislodge the administration, tweak the rules of the game (the constitution, the election process) in a referendum, then hold new elections as soon as possible. This however excludes the ousting of an elected government by a group of opponents of it, however sizeable, by violent means.

    Baron’stotally fed up with the power of such groups. In the Ukrainian case, Baron may have been found backing the opponents of Yanukovych on the barricades, but only peacefully. After the demonstrations grew nasty, Baron would have been gone preferring the distribution of leaflets, or convincing people in pubs to vote differently to get rid of the rotters.

    Here, we suffer from similar phenomenon, well meaning doctors convincing the Government to ban smoking to an extent that many suffers, it cannot do the old time smokers any good to smoke in the cold; the gay lobby pushing and getting a new marriage act, the followers of Allah shouting for a change in the blasphemy laws; even the Lumley’s blackmail for the Gurkhas (Baron’s their batting team) wasn’t fully kosher, in Baron’s view.

  80. Malfleur @ 18:06, Peter from Maidstone @ 18:07

    Boys, Baron’s as fed up, disgusted even as you’re with the messiah over to the west, the boys here, but no, he cannot join you here. It never ends well if one resorts to violence, almost always it’s the innocent who get hurt. Baron is a great believer in the elections, the ‘collective wisdom of individual ignorance’, in the end, it never fails to deliver.

  81. From Russia Today.

    Informative item on;”New Law Code to protect traditional family,religious values-Key lawmaker”.——-This also gives to items on `gay rights` and `paedophillia`.

    http://on.rt.com/fi1bc2

  82. Frank P, March 4th, 2014 – 16:36

    “Kerry’s waffle at his Ukrainian ‘press conference’! Utter cant! Prolix bollocks! Lies and distortion. His rising and risible rhetoric, laced with hypocritical sentimental gush is nauseating. Who let this Heinz heiress gigolo until a key ‘diplomatic’ global role? He even makes the Clinton witch look competent. Grrrr!”

    You will remember all the misinformation, bluster and guff we got from Kerry on Syria. He is capable of nothing else. Only two years left to nail Hillary on Benghazi.

  83. Baron has just watched the confrontation between the Ukrainian airmen and a Russian unit surrounding their base. What the British commentator who accompanied the marching Ukrainians didn’t spot (he obviously doesn’t speak Russian) was the men on the opposing sides knew each other well, one of the marching Ukrainians was shouting to another one on the Russian side: ‘Anton, not another beer then?’

    It breaks Baron’s heart, not because he comes from the Slavonic phylum, or has any any time for Putin, any other of the autocrats there, but because of his admiration for the maligned Ivan, the simple, ordinary man, who for centuries had known nothing but suffering, pain and often death, most recently in WW2 when he lost more men, women and children than any other race. Not that the conditions under which he lives todayy are so fundamentally different, but they are unquestionably better, better than at any time before going back centuries.

    And the fugging Brussels apparatchiks must engineer a friction between what essentially are the same peoples. Baron isn’t a vengeful man, never has been, but this is different. Plague and pestilence on the bastards, he prays.

  85. Tonight I listened to a young woman speaking to the BBC 1 reporter in Kiev. She spoke, in English, of how her grandparents dreamed of a better life for young Ukrainians. No mention of the EU whatsoever. The reporter repeated what she said, but added that she had said all Ukrainians wanted to be in the EU! How much money has the BBC been paid from the EU to be their mouth (ass) piece?

  86. EC @ 18:45

    The man looks and talks like a partially gassed badger. (c: Rod Liddle).

    The West is totally void of a true statesman today, someone who exudes confidence, certainty, pride in our achievements, historic or present, someone for whom one may be willing to put one’s life in harm’s way if the need arose. Instead, they’re all worse than second hand car salesmen.

  87. Baron 4th, – 18:25

    Yes, in general I would abhor coups d’etat, particularly since they rarely have majority support (I can’t call them democratic, since the electorate hasn’t been consulted.) and I don’t know how far I would go in protesting, if I saw it was starting to turn violent; thankfully I have never and probably will never be pushed that far. But sometimes, just sometimes, push really does come to shove.

    Oh, and I wholly agree with your doubts about Lumley. Time was, a Gurkha was a rich man in his own country, his wages, and later his pension, being used to support a considerable extended family. That’s why jobs in the British Army were so sought after. Now, resident in the UK, paying silly UK prices for things that cost peanuts in Nepal, unable to send the same amount of money home, nobody’s a winner, except the fragrant Ms. Lumley’s image. AND they have to put up with British weather!

  91. A Muslim Crimea?

    Several people have mentioned the likelihood, if Ukraine or part of it joins the EC, of yet more migrants immediately heading for Britain.

    But has anybody considered what sort of migrants might head for Ukraine?

    That question occurred to me when considering that before the 1853-1856 Crimean war, Crimea was part of the Ottoman Empire. That in turn reminded me that Osama bin Laden (I think it was) who asserted that because much of Spain was once ruled by the Moors, but was now in infidel hands, it followed that Muslims had the right and duty to reclaim it for Islam. We know that Crimea even now still has a partially Tatar population, who have shown themselves hostile to Russia and supportive of the de facto government in Kiev.

    Having reached this point I ask myself whether one of Putin’s reasons for being concerned about Ukraine linking up with the E.C. – and about Crimea in particular doing so – is the likelihood of Muslim immigration followed by Muslim infiltration into areas right next to the Russian border. Would it lead eventually lead to Islam claiming that it was the right and duty of Muslims to rule Crimea?

    It also makes me wonder about the Chinese – who take a far longer view of the future than our politicians do. Does Chinese recognition of the dire consequences that eventually follow from the presence in a country of Islam account, at least in part, for their expressing support for Putin?

    The more I think about it, the more foolish the so-called Human rights and immigration policies of the E.U. (not to mention those of the U.S.) seem to be and the more I feel that Putin is acting very wisely.

    Thoughts anybody?

  93. Baron
    March 4th, 2014 – 18:36

    Which is why no-one ever moved against Alois Schicklgruber of course.

    Fortunately, the American military are sworn to defend the constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It is natural that they may be a bit slow to recognize which fall into the latter category, though it has become pretty plain in the past couple of years.

  94. Baron,

    Speaking of badgers, has anybody seen anything of the rodent featured Baroness (my arse!) Ashton this week? Surely after her recent Triumph in Tehran the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy will have no trouble appeasing Vlad…

  96. Telegraph blog: 22.20 “The US is talking about imposing sanctions on Russia within days but there’s real anxiety in Washington about whether the Europeans can be rallied to the cause. The photographed Number 10 document, indicating British reluctance to cut Russia out of London’s financial markets, is one source of concern. Another is whether Germany, Europe’s economic powerhouse, can be relied upon given how dependent it is on Russia for its natural gas supplies.”

    Why are they so anxious?

    After all, with friends like the Churchill-bust-removing-POTUS, the Boot-on-the-throat-of-British-Petroleum-(sic)-POTUS, who needs enemies? (Shouldn’t it be sick-POTUS?)

    And if he cannot support his under attack ambassador in Libya, what is there to talk about?

  97. Herbert Thornton

    We are in many ways witnessing a clash of ideals which bear new names, ‘globalism’ and ‘internationalism’ but are in many ways simply a redressing of international communism’s conflict with the distinct national, racial and religious identies to which all peoples naturally adhere.
    This conflict manifests itself in the world’s geo-political faultlines; the Ukraine crisis is simply the latest arising from the old national borders of eastern europe, following the series of leaping sparks in the Maghreb and the Sino-Chinese tensions in the East.
    I have been reading a post by Hitchens last year which seems to me to identify the problems arising from the attempts of the new post marxist world order, in the States and the West, to impose these notions through the doctrines of human rights, mass population transfer, the abolition of sovereignty through the ‘responsibility to protect’ doctrine and the subsequent rash of western sponsored ethnic wars.

    A short extract here suffices, but the article examines the doctrine Blair declaimed in detail, and considers its consequences. The heir to Blair follows this gospel without deviation, which is why we see Britain involving itself in conflicts which are of no apparant relevance to our interest. I commend it to Wallsters as an explanation of the political philosophy by which the West’s political elites operate.

    “..National sovereignty, a thing all previous British prime ministers had at least claimed to value, was now to be dismissed as ‘isolationism’ and ‘protectionism’. What had previously been normal was now redefined as a discredited dogma. Those who had for years seen Communism as the great revolutionary force in the world were now able to transfer their allegiance to a globalised, multicultural USA. That’s why you find so many Marxists cheering on the missiles…”

    http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2013/09/why-do-sixties-peaceniks-turn-into-21st-century-warmongers.html

    , lash The Ukraine

  98. con’t’d

    In the West the disconnection between the people, who are proudly nationalist and inherently conservative, and their internationalist political elites, is now almost total.

    That is why Putin’s actions, nationalist, self-interested, protectionist, traditional resonate with so many and why our elites, who he has out-thought, out-maneouvred and are held in contempt by us, are reduced to frustrated, inchoate rage.

  99. Noa,

    Thanks for the link to Hitchens’ blog. I hadn’t read it before and I enjoyed every line.

  101. RobertC
    March 4th, 2014 – 23:46

    Telegraph blog: 22.20 “The US is talking about imposing sanctions on Russia within days but there’s real anxiety in Washington about whether the Europeans can be rallied to the cause. The photographed Number 10 document, indicating British reluctance to cut Russia out of London’s financial markets, is one source of concern. Another is whether Germany, Europe’s economic powerhouse, can be relied upon given how dependent it is on Russia for its natural gas supplies.”

    The Downing Street document said Britain should:

    • “Not support, for now, trade sanctions … or close London’s financial centre to Russians.”

    • “Discourage any discussions (eg at Nato) of contingency military preparations.”

    • Specific threats to Russia should be “contingent and used for private messaging” while public statements should “stick to generic” point.

    • Draw up a technical assistance package for Ukraine “ideally jointly with Germany”.

    • Pursue the “deployment of OSCE and/or UN (but not EU) monitors in Crimea and eastern Ukraine”.

    • Push the “UN secretary general Ban to take the lead in calling and creating a forum for engaging Russia on Ukraine”.

    To my mind this policy document has not only our interests at heart but reflects an reasonable view that Putin is acting proportionately and reasonably to the Kiev Putch.

    On this as on many world affairs today we have common cause with Angela Merkel

  102. Enter The Dragon!

    http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/03/05/hillary-clinton-compares-putin-ukraine-action-to-nazi-heim-ins-reich-policy/

    Despots: White House vs Kremlin

    Pointless name calling. Both despotic regimes, the murkiness is only a matter of degree. Americans obviously don’t ‘do’ Irony.

    “On this as on many world affairs today we have common cause with Angela Merkel”
    Bollocks! Ironic, though, that Germany’s Achilles Heel should turn out to be Gas.

  105. postergirl @ 19:49

    What’s being done to your military borders on the criminal. Hopefully, next time round with the long haired Clinton woman nailed by the Benghazi affair, the next man in charge will let the truth out. With both Russia and China arming up, your military budget is heading south. It’s one reason the barbarian from the east minds not his advanced age.

    What about the cold, postergirl, any better or still -40deg C? Incidentally, and you may know it anyway, it’s the temperature the two scales meet, -40deg C is equal -40 deg F. You keep warm and safe.

  106. Herbert Thornton @ 22:25

    You are not alone thinking what you’re thinking. Well before the Ukrainian boil burst Baron has come across a large essay arguing the likelihood of Russia and China combining forces if only transiently for both have unfinished business close to their borders (Taiwan for China, Ukraine for Russia). Baron cannot locate the essay, now, he looked. Pity, the argument was quite persuasive.

  107. EC @ 23:26

    You are right, they’ve gone quiet, haven’t they, others on other blogs have noticed it, too. Just as well, they fugged up bigger than big, the next stage of their defenestration should follow. The ghastly woman should be pensioned of, she must have accumulated enough to live in luxury for the rest of her life.

  108. Malfleur @ 23:33

    Contrary what Peter’s friend Mr. Boot thinks, Baron sides very much with you on this, Malfleur, Russia would be a good fit for partnership, huge market, plenty of opportunity, and the Russians seem to like us more than any other world country.

    (Mr. Boot believes it’s not China, the Islamic threat but Russia that’s close to taking over the world – his response to the cleric’ s take on the Ukrainian boil (Rev Dr, Peter Mullen) is worth reading. Baron commented, his posting went to moderation, hasn’t appeared yet. It looks it got censored. Funny, for Mr. Boot complains often and alot about censorship in Putin’s Russia).

  110. Noa @ 23:52

    At some point in the future, and we not be that far from it, the ‘world sans borders’ worshippers may get a shock.

    The top elites, because they have breakfast in London, lunch in NY, dinner in LA think the world needs no borders, nations are superfluous, sovereignty a concept of the barbaric past. The unwashed are pushing in the opposite direction, Scotland is the last but one example, in other countries the mood is similar modified only by the hope the Empire builders, like the EU or Putin, will throw money their way.

  111. Peter from Maidstone @ 10:57

    On Peter Mullen’s website, Peter, one cannot comment anywhere else on Mr. Boot’s postings.

    And it ain’t blaming Mr. Boot for anything, it’s merely pointing out he publishes on a site that censors, is critical of Putin who does the same.

    Look, the last thing Baron wants is to fall out with anyone, you in particular. It may well be he barbarian’s point didn’t fit, he doesn’t complain, regrets now he raised it. Can we forget about it, please.

  112. telemachus @ 06:28

    Another sensible post, telemachus, except for the ‘common course with Germany’ bit, we better watch out here.

  113. Baron
    “The top elites, because they have breakfast in London, lunch in NY, dinner in LA think the world needs no borders, nations are superfluous, sovereignty a concept of the barbaric past..”
    Yes, well caught,that thought.
    Jonathan Raban, the excellent travel writer, described such people in one of his books as “Air People”, six mile above reality. And having lived that lifestyle for twenty odd years I understand perfectly the disconnect it provides between fantasy and reality.
    There is a two tier world, always has been, always will. The Air people are normally insulated from it, though every so often the unwashed horde in some partof the world smashes down the Mansion gates and gawps in the window at the gold taps, whilst gnawing at their turnips.

  114. EC @ 07:55

    That’s the way Baron sees it, too, EC, not a Rizla paper difference between the two.

    It often feels the elites are totally de-coupled from sanity, they can blab out sentences that are void of logic, rational thought, even facts, and get away with it.

    At his press conference in Geneva, the partially gas badger aka John Kerry said: “You just don’t in the 21st century behave in 19th-century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pretext.”

    Unbelievable.

  115. Ed West hit the EU’s coffin nail on the head at t’other place.

    “…The EU is a post-national, universalist dream based on an idea of indiscriminate altruism. A great idea, so long as everyone else on earth practises it, but unfortunately in the real world no one else does. Not Russia, not China, not the states of the Middle East. And soft power only works so long as it is backed up by an army and an economy to fund it, something that the Europeans, cosseted for two generations by American military protection, have forgotten.
    The irony is that lots of people love Europe, but it is a Europe that the Commission finds repulsive; the real Europe, that of Greece, Rome and, most of all, Christendom, not a post-national world without borders but one that has always identified itself by its separation from the lands of Islam and to a lesser extent the Asiatic empire of Moscow…”

    http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/edwest/2014/03/how-many-people-would-lay-down-their-lives-for-the-european-union/

  116. EC March 5th, 2014 – 08:55

    Gives a link to a web-site that he titles “Sharia Law for dhimmis Dummies”
    I thought it worthwhile to bring it across to ‘The Wall’ see below.

    What is sharia or Islamic law? Sharia law is followed by millions of people in Islam-dominant countries. Below are the popular elements of sharia law purportedly ordained by Islamic holy writings, including the Quran and sahih hadiths, as asserted by many Muslim authorities over the centuries. Although the law differs from one Muslim country to the next, many devout Muslims – they object to the word “radical” or “extremist” – concur with one or all of these elements as part of Islamic or sharia law and, ultimately, as the core of Islam itself. If you disagree with these Muslim spokespeople, please feel free to tell them that. You can find these devout Muslims discussing these subjects in the videos below.

    Sharia Law, Beheadings. Stoning’s. Hangings. Crucifixions. Honour killings. Genocide. Supremacy/global domination. Warfare/conquest. Beatings. Torture. Limb amputations. Genital mutilation. Death to apostates. Forced conversion. Slavery. Sex slavery and rape. Misogyny/sexism. Women enslavement. Wife beating. Child marriage/rape. Brutality against homosexuals. Censorship. Dictatorship. Bigotry and hatred. Robbery and pillage. Extortion of nonbelievers. Persecution and/or death for blasphemy/atheism. Animal cruelty. Prohibition of music/singing. Destruction of pre-Islamic antiquities.

  117. Baron at 10-45.

    You need to look up your link to the DISCUS dashboard [which you probably have]to see the status of your comment to Peter Mullen’s private blog.

  119. I see Hillary Clinton has invoved Godwin’s Rule to describe Putin and so automatically loses the debate, as well as offending all Russians.

    “…Hillary Clinton has reportedly compared Vladimir Putin’s actions over Ukraine to those of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s. The former US secretary of state and Democratic frontrunner for the 2016 US presidential election was quoted as saying that Mr Putin is a man “who believes his mission is to restore Russian greatness”.

    “Now if this sounds familiar, it’s what Hitler did back in the 30s,” the Press Telegram quoted Clinton as telling attendees at a fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Long Beach, California.”

    H/T Daily Mail

  121. Baron apologizes for bothering you with the Ukrainian boil, but here is something that could be a game changer.

    The snipers were apparently not hired by Yaukovych, but someone from the new coalition, and killed both policemen and protesters. That’s democracy for you the EU backs. The remark comes towards the end of the clip, but it’s worth listening to the lot to get an idea of EU non-intereferce. It’s between the ghastly EU woman and the Estonian Foreign Secretary.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEgJ0oo3OA8#t=564

  122. Forecast news flashes

    1. Mid-March – Cameron questioned in House of Commons about rumoured top secret meeting of Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Argentina, India and unnamed participants. Cameron denounces rumours as irresponsible.

    2.Chinese navy land troops on Diaoyu  Islands. Three Japanese destroyers sunk. China simultaneously invades Taiwan; takes control of Taipei.

    3. Crimean republic requests incorporation into Russia and is accepted. Russian forces enter the remainder of former Ukraine and advance with little opposition to the western border. Putin appoints temporary Ukranian President who issues edict for a general election within 30 days. Video of Herman Van Rompuy stamping feet, blaming Nigel Farage and calling for his prosecution for treason.

    4. Pakistani nuclear missile detonated over New Delhi. Al Qaeda claims responsibility. In response India nukes Islamabad, Abbottabad, Karachi and much of Waziristan.

    5. Iran launches several large rockets into Israel. Most destroyed by Iron Dome system, but Tel Aviv hit by two nuclear explosions. Israel expected to retaliate within next few hours.

    5. Argentina again invades Falklands. Video of Cameron bursting into tears.

    6. North Korean army invades South. Seoul largely destroyed by nuclear blast. Kim declares that world situation has created this divine opportunity and says – I don’t give a damn about China. “Seattle and Tokyo, and if necessary Beijing, are next.” Video of Obama bursting into tears.

    7. Savage riots in several Muslim enclaves on Britain: suicide bombers destroy many churches, schools and shopping centres. Estimated that 70,000 people have been stabbed to death and many decapitated in the streets. Video of Cameron saying it is all due to intolerance and misunderstandings and again bursting into tears.

    8 Full scale civil wars suddenly break out in Nigeria, Turkey, Egypt, Sudan and Somalia.

    9. April 1st – Items 2 to 8 of above all happen simultaneously.

  126. Herbert Thornton @ 19:09

    You certainly know how to cheer one up. Baron half expected 10 to say ‘those few left in the world burst into tears’.

  128. Richard North on the Ukraine crisis

    “…One might have thought by now that the EU hierarchy might have learned some lessons from the experience, and backed off from “poking the bear”, having realised that there could only be one outcome.
    However, even with tension at its height, we have in the European Commission the demeanour of the Bourbons, who have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.
    These catastrophic traits are currently embodied in Štefan Füle, by name and nature. As Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy, he has been up-front in negotiating with Ukraine its putative entry into the European Union, and is doing exactly the same thing with Georgia…”

    http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=84763

  129. The Business section of the DT has Barclays boss saying he had to boost bonuses to stop top investment people leaving the bank, but won’t do it again whatever happens in the future.

    Barclays reported earning of less than £0.5bn last fiscal year. Its competitor, the US Goldman Sachs’s earning to December 2013 over $8bn even though its bond desk suffered massively from a drop in revenue.

    Before the politicians, MSM and the anti-capitalistic fruitcakes decimated the banking sector here after the near meltdown, the earnings of the two companies were neck and neck. Now, Barclays have been reduced to the level of the Bank of Essex, the Treasury deprived of large tax revenues, the entitlement culture continues, the Government has to keep borrowing.

    Private Fraser had it about right, we are doomed.

  130. Baron

    The US government has been punitively and hypocritically fining Barclays, HSBC and other British banks and companies, like BP and BAE in a manner, which 100 years ago would have led to trade sanctions, naval blockade and probably, war.
    A sclerotic UK is no longer in any position to defend itself from this rampant theft of shareholder assets and personal savings, nor has it the will to do so. And the EU has happily joined in this game of robbery too.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/epic/ftse100/9876466/Fears-over-extortionate-US-fines-on-British-firms.html

  131. Noa – 20:17
    “These catastrophic traits are currently embodied in Štefan Füle, by name and nature. As Commissioner for Enlargement ….”

    Has he been the one sending me emails about ….

  132. This may be rather unfair to ask.

    Baron has been trying to contact the EU to find out about long term regular surveys of opinion within the set-up. Not that long ago, there was a mention of it in the MSM suggesting the EU approval by the EU burghers is currently around 30% far below the level in the year 2000.

    Baron filled all he was asked to fill including the security code, then he pressed the submit button. The e-mail didn’t go through, but another security code appeared. After some dozen attempts to send the e-mail, Baron gave up.

    The EU contact page link is below. If anyone has a minute could you have a go, ask the EU whatever you want, tell me whether you experience the same problem?

    Many thanks

    http://europa.eu/europedirect/write_to_us/index_en.htm

  133. Noa @ 20:36

    Quite, you absolutely right.

    Baron has felt it himself. Years ago, he bought few shares in Sportingbet, the company did well, but then a group of US lawmakers attached a bill that outlawed paying for bets by a credit card to another bill that had nothing to do with betting, the share price of Sportingbet lost over 90% in a day.

  134. The site is badly designed and gives no indication that a message has been sent, but mine obviously was since I received this immediately…

    This is an automated message.
    Please do not reply.

    Thank you for your e-mail. We expect to respond in three working days on average. For more complex or specific queries, responses may take longer.

    With kind regards,

    EUROPE DIRECT Contact Centre

  135. Peter from Maidstone @ 21:07

    Peter, Baron is grateful, thank you for spending the time on it, he thought he was blacklisted, or rather his ip address was. He will try again.

  138. RobertC, March 6th, 2014 – 00:07

    Quite right, but we ALL also have a right to say it!
    Check out the video in the link below. Every libtard apologist for this BARBARIC practice should be forced to watch it. How a small percentage of the UK population can insist that the rest of us have to eat meat from animals killed by this barbaric method beats me. Our leaders will do nothing about it. They Kowtow before the Islamic supremacists.
    As I said last week:

    Peter From Maidtone. Seen this?
    http://www.change.org/petitions/david-cameron-ban-halal-practices-in-the-uk
    h/t Pat Condell [## Warning ## The embedded video contains distressing scenes]
    I’ve not got much time for the “meat is murder” brigade but Halal slaughter is disgusting and BARBARIC.

  139. Peter From Maidstone,

    You have researched the topic of the disgusting halal meat trade more than anyone on this site. I know that you are a busy chap but wouldn’t a permanent page detailing your findings, and giving links others be of use?

    Similarly, other topics might benefit from having a permanent page. Permanent “pages” would also help provide a timeline with a permanent record of links. This would be really useful.

  142. A quick skip through my various news and information sources on the intertubes this morning has convinced me, beyond reasonable doubt, that the levers of world power are being manipulated entirely by charlatans, thieves and idiots; in most cases by a permutation of all three.

    Cue Sir Richard Mottram, whose famous imprecation to Tony Blair remains as pertinent today as it did when he coined it. By the way, I leave it to you Wallsters to decide which of the three categories he falls into.

  144. RobertC 5th, – 23:26

    “Noa – 20:36 ‘USA fairness?’
    They haven’t stopped!”

    I guess, since Lockheed, they’ve become better at hiding their own bribery!

  145. Frank P, March 6th, 2014 – 09:04

    “Cue Sir Richard Mottram ….. I leave it to you Wallsters to decide which of the three categories he falls into.”

    Given his association with Amey plc, and their role in their costly role in floodlighting every square inch of Norfolk, I’d guess that he is one of the “illuminati” ….
    🙂

  147. So, should we give up our nuclear arsenal?

    Read this before even thinking about it:

    “In December 1994, Ukraine signed the Budapest Memorandum, an agreement with the United States, Russia, and Great Britain to give up its nuclear weapons, leftovers from the collapse of the Soviet Union, in exchange for a guarantee of territorial integrity. Because it is not a treaty, neither the U.S. nor NATO is obligated to militarily defend Ukraine, but now with the Russian aggression, I would wager the Ukrainians regret that decision. If they still had their nuclear arsenal, they would still have the Crimea.”
    http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/03/only_americans_fear_obama.html

    It makes one think that little bit harder, doesn’t it?

    The article doesn’t put Obama in a very good light either, but then, what truthful article could?

  148. Let’s lighten up a bit! 🙂 🙂

    Though the article is about banning posters to avoid offending religious beliefs, it has to be said, the report only mentions the officials “taking the allegation very seriously”.

    Free speech outcry as images of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are banned from London South Bank University for offending religious people
    “The offending poster was put up at London South Bank University last week by non-religious students from the South Bank Atheist Society, only for it to be reportedly removed by student union officials for being “religiously offensive”.
    …
    Barbara Ahland, the president of London South Bank University’s student union, said: “The Students Union has been made aware of an alleged incident that took place at the Refreshers’ Fayre last week. We are taking the allegation very seriously and an investigation is taking place.” ”

    http://www.independent.co.uk/student/news/free-speech-outcry-as-images-of-the-flying-spaghetti-monster-are-banned-from-london-south-bank-university-for-offending-religious-people-9119958.html

    Very seriously?

    No doubt, it takes a very unusual person, with lots of training, to become an ‘official’.

  149. It’s old news, but I do need to bring your attention to the great strides made in gaining freedom for followers of non-indigenous religious beliefs, even though I do not follow them myself:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2014553/Pastafarian-wins-right-wear-sieve-head-driving-licence-photo-does-belong-Church-Flying-Spaghetti-Monster.html

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2382465/Im-Pastafarian-Man-claims-religion-forces-wear-sieve-head-given-permission-wear-official-identity-card-picture.html

  150. EC (10:11 & 10:13)

    “…one of the Illuminati ” 🙂
    You’re in fine fettle today – must be that extra cup o’ coffee!
    Btw – his illuminating projects aren’t just confined to Norfolk; they’re working the same scam throughout the UK and Yurrop at large. Don’t suppose much light will be shed on the sinecures of the Great & Good in the process. Particularly as all three political parties are ganging up on Old Bill, if this morning’s portentous bollocks from Mrs May and Mrs Balls is any guide.

  152. From the web:

    Putin: “Knock,knock.”

    Obama: “Who’se there?.”

    Putin: “Crimea.”

    Obama: “Crimea who?”

    Putin:”Crimea River !”

  155. Don’t ya all wan’ a record deel like this?

    White Dee looks for da big time with ‘Your (sic) to blame’. No not her.It could never be her.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2574610/Buy-White-Dees-record-come-OFF-benefits-Agent-claims-cash-rap-let-stop-scrounging-state-joins-world-tour-France.html

    And for those who care, or don’t, it’s the last episode in the current series of ‘Coach Trip’ tonight. For those who haven’t seen it, its producers have paraded a moving kaliedoscope of modern British characters for our delight and enjoyment.
    To watch the colected assemblage of gay Devonians, workless illiterate Geordies, in-progress trans-sexuals and the genuinely and deeply stupid, be transported throughout Europe, to the polite amazement of the locals, as they vote against each other every night to see who remains on the trip, has become hideously absorbing.

  156. RobertC @ 11:07

    You reckon the Ukrainians would deploy the nukes if they possess them if Putin were to populate the Crimea with troops? Would we use them if (say) the Scots were to annex the North of England, the French Cornwall? I know the examples are silly, the point though is detonating a nuclear bomb could hurt the defender and the attacker equally, make the lands contaminated for centuries.

  157. RobertC @ 12:02

    The article doesn’t say who exactly got offended, does it? Baron would be interested in the religion of those who pulled the poster down.

  158. Frank P @ 12:54

    Ganging up on Old Bill, ha? Did you know, Frank, that the first two policemen recruited into the Met were both later sacked for drunkenness on the street?

  159. RobertC @ 12:13

    The worshipers of this new religion consider pirates ‘divine beings’.

    This reminds Baron of a political party in Prague called Pirates. The barbarian cannot tell you anything about their manifesto, except that they’ve asked for donation to buy a small boat for pursuing piracy (didn’t say where), but they got short of 3% of the vote in the regional election, no seat.

    And you think it’s only England that breeds eccentrics.

  160. Noa @ 15:18

    You’ve got to admire the woman, she’s articulate, no shame, may end up rich. Good on her.

  161. Good news is becoming scarce, but this item seems more optimistic than most –

    http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCABREA251HI20140306

    I’m also intrigued to see that part of item 3 in my spoof forecast (5 March 19:09) seems to be actually happening – and even earlier that I’d suggested.

    It leads me to fantasize that if (or should that be when?) Argentina again seizes the Falklands, then instead of busting into tears, Cameron will propose that Argentina be invited to join the E.U.

  162. Baron

    To see her with Black Dee on a ‘Celebrity Coach Trip’ would be my dream programme.

    Have Wallsters any other thoughts on who might join them? Dave and Nick come to mind, perhaps Barack and Vladimir. Chris Bryant and Assad?

  163. Thank G-d Doreen Lawrence’s long struggle is at last proving she was right. Fools have urged her to “allow closure and move on” whatever that that platitude may mean. She has toiled alone, her marriage breaking up under the strain, a valiant mother determined that those who protected her son’s murder should not escape justice. May she now find a measure of tranquility.

  165. Baron knows next to nothing abbout what’s going on in Turkey except that the Army has lost the power it once had, a process of islamisation is creeping in backed by Erdogan.

    Are you, or anyone else better briefed on the country?

  166. From Mark Steyn’s column today:

    “America can’t send gunboats to the Crimea because it’s too busy sending checks to China. The Weekly Standard reports:

    New analysis by the Senate Budget Committee Republican staff finds that, under President Obama’s proposed budget, interest payments on debt will exceed the defense budget in just 5 years”.

    Also, apparently, Putin is one of the contenders for the Nobel Peace Prize. As was the case when Obama got one before doing nothing, one would be hard to come up with it.

  167. Baron 16:32

    Yes. Moreover, almost all the original detectives of the new fangled CID were nicked for corruption. But they still made a better job of keeping a grip on villains of the Metrollups than today’s politicized specimens. Watching Commissioner Dick-hyphenated-Head performing on Newsnight last night made me cringe. The Scottish dwarf-witch, Krusty Squawk had her way with him. Can you imagine her doing the same to Sir Robert Mark? Or even Joe Simpson. Grrrr!

  169. Baron

    ““America can’t send gunboats to the Crimea …” Mark Steyn

    “US destroyer en route to Black Sea for ‘routine’ drills… ” Drudge Report

  173. Malfleur @ 21:25

    Baron’s certain the Russians are shaking in their boots as the the American dingy nears the Black Sea.

    A superpower should have enough military gear not to use it except for a few cases to show that it can impose its will. At times the Republic has deployed its forces, which are formidable, it has never been to secure a visible success. Just look at all the theatres of engagements since and including Vietnam, it was all half baked, bad news for us, good news for the likes of Putin, the Mandarin speakers.

  175. Baron

    “Ukraine crisis: America sends F-16 fighter jets to Poland” (Daily Telegraph)

  176. Frank P @ 21:13

    Baron remembers Sir Robert Mark well saying something like ‘I hope to to arrest more criminals than we employ’. Great man, we need someone like him now more than ever. Under his stewardship the politicisation of the police would have been unthinkable, plebgate could not have happened, the bobby would be still the one institution law abiding people could turn to, trust.

  177. Malfleur @ 22:52

    Instead of exercising ove r the Florida Keys, the jets will burn fuel over the North Sea with the Poles for a couple of weeks. A change of scenery, definitely, a threat to Russia? Hmmm

  179. What puzzles Baron is the KGB, or whatever the new name is for Putin’s former employer, hasn’t yet apprehended one of the snipers, put him in front of the cameras repenting the evil deed of shooting protesters, policemen. The KGB ain’t what it used to be, heads should roll.

  180. The Crimean Government says it would hold a referendum within ten days, the American are apparently objecting on the grounds it breaches international law, only a referendum of all Ukraine will do.

    Someone should tell Alex Salmond he’s on a hiding to nothing with his referendum unless the whole of the UK gets to vote.

  181. Baron

    “…the Chinese government regards Washington as an insane asylum. They think they’re completely insane. If Putin comes to this conclusion too, he may say, ‘OK, I’m not going to take any risk with these crazy people’ and simply occupy Ukraine…But the hope in this situation is that this breaks up NATO. The Americans are about to put another independent country and the birthplace of Joseph Stalin, Georgia, into NATO…Well, NATO doesn’t want a madman in Georgia starting a war with Russia if it’s a NATO member because it involves them. So the NATO members might just say, ‘We don’t want anything more to do with this. These people are crazy and they are going to get the whole world blown up.’” ”

    Don’t the American military take an oath to defend the Constitution? What action in Washington might be consistent with honouring their word?

  184. Malfleur @ 23:03

    OK, Malfleur, that’s it then, Baron’s convinced, from now on, no food whatsoever. Will that help the barbarian to live longer than long?

  186. Baron
    March 6th, 2014 – 23:44

    I had expected you to suggest the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) might propose the cultivation of sugar beet or sugar cane in place of the opium poppy.The traffickers inside the American government agencies would then be able openly to publish their participation in the growth of sugar exports instead of suppressing their handling of the heroin traffic in their saccharine press releases.

    How about sugar, sigar?

  189. Pepys’ Diary – Wednesday 6 March 1660/61:

    “…then to Whitehall with Captn. Cuttle, and there I did some business with Mr. Coventry, and after that home, thinking to have had Sir W. Batten, &c., to have eat a wigg at my house at night. But my Lady being come home out of the country ill by reason of much rain that has fallen lately, and the waters being very high, we could not, and so I home and to bed.”

    Wigg, a kind of north country bun or tea-cake, still so called, to my knowledge, in Staffordshire. — M. B. 1893

    Any Wallster north of the line here of this kind of bun today?

  190. Malfleur, March 6th, 2014 – 23:45

    “Those who admire Alex Jones and are not of the sneerers’ party may be interested to know that he has decided not to speak at the Oxford Union next week and why.
    About 10 minutes in:”

    Oh no it wasn’t! The trouble with Alex Jones is that he never makes a five minute video when he can make one lasting three hours and five minutes long! Life’s too short to sift through that looking for the brief clip you mentioned, Malfleur! Three hours and five minutes? Not up to the Gorbachev standards but, given the surname, definitely in the Neil Kinnock ballpark. The TV over there must really be crap for you to sit in your hotel room watching that on the laptop, Malfleur me old china. Tried postal chess? 😉

  191. The notification of the impending death of the site are proving remarkably premature. Not only are the number of comments per week back up to about 300 or more, the number of visitors continues to increase…..

    I guess we could increase them exponentially by robust debate.

    I would like to see a tract perhaps from Noa to tell us why Ukip should not be proscribed as a racist organisation.

    And Baron could tell us why George Bush, and perhaps Tony Blair, should not now be in the dock in the Hague.

    And our moderator could tell us why we are not standing shoulder to shoulder with our Orthodox brethren in Moscow against the fascist Putch in Kiev.

  192. So Telemachus who has oft griped about his own propaganda being moderated, would have an entire nascent political party proscribed – and on a false premise, to Boot? Interesting.

  193. So Telemachus, he of the poncy Greek moniker would have UKIP proscribed. Has he never heard of the Bill of Rights 1689 This guarantees the freedom of speech, a freedom from which all others spring. There are a lot of things and people I would like to see banned including the metropolitan socialist who display an absolute contempt for all opinions not of their liking, but I have to live amongst such individuals, for respect of their opinions protects mine.

  194. Takes two sides for a debate, Telemachus. So perhaps, in order to demonstrate your new found enthusiasm, you would be kind enough to submit your own “tract” first in order that Noa might respond.

  195. Re: Lawrences vs The Met’. How many, increasingly tangential and tendentious, inquiries does it take for a saga to become a vendetta?

    With “friends” like Theresa May, who needs enemies!

  196. Hitchens latest blog. Is he a paid Kremlin agent?

    I also regard my own country’s sovereignty as more or less non-existent, and what’s left of it fast disappearing. It’s just a statement of fact. The issue only arises because Russia, uniquely, still more or less has a large population, certainly has oil and gas, and still possesses nuclear weapons and a security council veto, plus a well-educated professional diplomatic corps trained in the pursuit of national self-interest and good intelligence services. It also has sizeable armed forces, though how these measure up against (say)those of the USA is open to question. Thus it can still function as a medium-sized power, despite the existence of the two superpowers China and the USA.

    http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/

  197. Re: “Bill of Rights 1689”

    Abolished, I’m afraid, by the nefarious works of Blair, Irvine, Falconer et al. Added to which Harman’s legislation(May 2010), waved thru by Dave before the election put the final nail in the coffin. Now any “Free” speech, including comedy, that might give offence to even to a third party, is effectively proscribed.

  198. EC
    “…perhaps, in order to demonstrate your new found enthusiasm, you would be kind enough to submit your own “tract” first in order that Noa might respond.”

    Telemachus as literary lion rather than cybersite hyena?

    That involves logic, thought, basic knowledge and a sense of objectivity, an ability to research, an application for work and the ability for self criticism. The ability to state an argument logically and to critique it.

    There’s a first time for everything but, like you I suspect, I’m not holding my breath in anticipation of his first magnum o’puss.

  200. EC March 7th, 2014 – 10:11

    “Now any “Free” speech, including comedy, that might give offence to even to a third party, is effectively proscribed.”

    I recommend that you do as my beloved and I do, that is to say, we say it as it is, we give our honest opinions on any subject at all times.

    I have lost count of the times our (grown up) children have said to us you can’t say that, our reply is usually we can and we have.

    Over lunch with our grown up grandchildren we will be told, that’s racist/homophobic/ageist/ sexist/etcetera, we point out that in our eighth decade we do not intend to change thought patters and opinions of a lifetime just to meet the ever changing quagmire of politically correct zeitgeist and doublespeak.

    Try it, it feels great and so liberating.

  201. David Ossitt 11:20

    Well said Sir!

    Those of us who have grown up with the right to free speech, within the boundaries of good manners, reasonableness and public order, object to its arbitrary removal in order to cover for the evils and wrongs committed by foolish politicians.

  202. Only an H.M. Bateman cartoon could do justice to the excoriation by last night’s outraged Question Time audience of the homeless Cockney who had the temerity to suggest that perhaps immigration was not entirely beneficial to Barking or his personal circumstances.

  203. EC
    March 7th, 2014 – 07:36

    You seem happy in your views. Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise.

    Mr. Jones programmes are packed with meat, but are perhaps not for vegetarians.

    How much time each day do you spend finding out what is going on in the world where liberty and slavery, and war and peace, are at stake? And what are your sources I wonder?

    And how is your statement “Oh no it wasn’t!” connected grammatically or otherwise to my comment? Someone who doesn’t pay careful attention to the small things will probably misunderstand the big.

    B-, Mr. EC Writer.

  204. “About 10 minutes in:”

    “Oh no it wasn’t!”

    In fact you are absolutely correct, EC. Great point. Not at all “About 10 mins in” but 12.20mins in to be precise and I do apologize for raising the attention deficit ceiling by those extra 2.20 mins.

  205. David Ossitt @11:20

    Yes indeed. No Surrender! (If I might be allowed to say that – in a strictly non-sectarian sense) Yes indeed, I, too, am no stranger to “You can’t say that…” and the “Oh Dad!” scenario. My SOH, and frequently sardonic observations on current affairs are not always fully appreciated.

    It’s not the childrens’ fault as they been brainwashed, but I’m quite surprised at how many adults have been cowed into silence by the PC thought police. I suppose it is because that one word out of place in the modern work place and HR will have you branded as whatever “-ist” or “-phobe” as they think fit, and you will be out of the door fighting a lost cause at an employment tribunal.

  207. Austin Barry, March 7th, 2014 – 12:08

    Following your tip, I’ve just watched QT on iPlayer. Recommended!

    It was surreal, even by normal standards, as Aaronovitch told the confused complainant “cockney” that he wasn’t in fact homeless or unemployed, but that was only “his perception” of his circumstances. Aaronovitch, a real piece of work, then went on the make up a lot of stuff, that the “cockney” never actually said! The fiction being Aaronovitch’s perception of the views of homeless, unemployed indigenes, obviously.

  209. “ll” @13:35

    “B-, Mr. EC Writer.”

    Thanks, Tele, many here would agree that’s a PB for me!
    (btw – loved the pun)

    “Someone who doesn’t pay careful attention to the small things will probably misunderstand the big”

    Sadly, your lack of attention to bold text in my reply to Malfleur made your big finish crash and burn. What do you want, Braille?

  210. David Ossitt
    March 7th, 2014 – 11:20

    “….. I recommend that you do as my beloved and I do, that is to say, we say it as it is, we give our honest opinions on any subject at all times.

    I have lost count of the times our (grown up) children have said to us you can’t say that, our reply is usually we can and we have…..”

    Oh how I agree with you, David. I’ve lost count of the number of times I and my husband have been lectured by our (middle-aged) children on being racist, homophobic, etc. Now the lectures are all about our not being “green” enough, because I was overheard saying “sod the environment”. Much as I love our children and grandchildren, on these issues we will always have to disagree.

  211. Lesley C. March 7th, 2014 – 15:45 and others!

    “Now the lectures are all about our not being “green” enough, because I was overheard saying “sod the environment”. Much as I love our children and grandchildren, on these issues we will always have to disagree.”

    The sad thing is that we are most decidedly in the right and they are echoing the ever so popular doublespeak.

    Those who preach on the green issues are more strident and angry than all of the other gender-phobe’s and ism’s put together.

  212. I am glad that only one of my children seems infected with political correctness. My wife is the one who asks how I can say such things when I have a particular career, or that I am too political or will get arrested.

  214. Results of local Council bi-election on Thursday.

    1,179 Labour
    1,025 Conservative
    536 UKIP (local business man)
    67 Bus-pass Elvis Party:Lord Biro
    56 Lib Dems (ex-councillor)

    `Lord Biro`came 11th at the Eastleigh bi-election.He says he may stand against the Lib Dems in Broxtowe (Ann Soubrey’s seat) or Skegness. His policy is the legalization of brothels with a 30% reduction for pensioners.

    http://www.nottinghampost.com/Bus-pass-Elvis-speaks-time-beating-Lib-Dems/story-20778854-detail/story.html

  215. P from M @ 16.26

    Oh so that’s what it is. I clicked onto Google this morning and the Google name was full of dancing crosses. I thought, ‘ What’s this ? Are they marking Lent ? ‘

  219. Peter from Maidstone March 7th, 2014 – 16:26

    “I am also glad that we have introduced International Women’s Day from the Soviet Bloc. I look forward to celebrating White Men’s History week in due course.”

    Wouldn’t that be nice!

    But I do not think it will ever happen.

  221. Radford NG March 7th, 2014 – 16:28

    “`Lord Biro`came 11th at the Eastleigh bi-election.He says he may stand against the Lib Dems in Broxtowe (Ann Soubrey’s seat) or Skegness. His policy is the legalization of brothels with a 30% reduction for pensioners.”

    Bugger that for a game of soldiers 50% off Tues/Wed/Thursdays for OAP’s last I heard?

  224. Peter from Maidstone@March 7th, 2014 – 19:15

    lets just set a date here and hope it grows.

  225. EC
    March 7th, 2014 – 09:43

    “Takes two sides for a debate, Telemachus. So perhaps, in order to demonstrate your new found enthusiasm, you would be kind enough to submit your own “tract” first in order that Noa might respond.”

    UKIP sits at the far right of UK politics

    Michael Hestletine last October said on the BBC “Of course its racist”

    Is this correct?

    Start with Dan Hodges in the DT

    “I’ve been looking at the reports emerging from Ukip’s national spring conference. And it’s clear I was wrong. Ukip is now a racist and extremist party…At the end of the conference the delegates assembled for their gala dinner, where they were entertained by a comedian called Paul Eastwood. Referring to the Olympics, Eastwood said: “Poland did well. They took home bronze, silver, gold, lead, copper – anything they could get their hands on.”
    “Team Somalia – they did well, didn’t they? They had to apologise. Didn’t realise sailing and shooting were two different events.”

    Any mainstream party leader would immediately disown such comments. Given the opportunity to do so Nigel Farage, pointedly, chose to defend them. “I’m not going to comment on individual jokes, but I think we’re in huge danger here. This was a guy telling jokes about national stereotypes, not racial stereotypes.”

    Christopher Monckton, UKIP’s Scotland Leader and Head of Policy Unit invited the now-defunct British Freedom Party – an amalgamation of mostly breakaway BNP members led by a former Ukip candidate until January 2013 – to join Ukip: “I would very much like them to come back and join us and we stand together.”
    Farage refused to vote to oppose moves for the European Union to fund the BNP.

    Indeed their views on immigration may be further right still

    Pamela Preedy, secretary of UKIP’s Redcar branch, wrote: ‘The image of Stephen Lawrence has been promoted to sainthood, with his own memorial site, constant invocation of his name in any discussion of racism; even to close down a discussion about immigration when the issue bore no relevance to his murder’.

    Ms Preedy then accused David Cameron of ‘worshipping at the shrine of Saint Stephen’, complaining that ‘we are supposed to publicly mark the anniversaries of his death .  .  . Please give it a rest!’
    Ms Preedy added in the message, left last year: ‘I’m sure his mother still grieves for him, but it’s time she did it privately without setting him up as some kind of media icon. She risks .  .  . boring us all to tears.’

    A UKIP prospective MP candidate writes: “A removal of multi-culturalism and assimilation of these people needs to be done to save them from the abyss of exclusion and welfare. Above all, one should not shy away of contemplating forced repatriation, or threatening it to further assimilation, as a result of their lack of economic contribution to the UK.”

    “Our traditional values have been undermined. Children are taught to be ashamed of our past. Multiculturalism has split our society.”

    Another UKIP member complained about the impact of immigration on the NHS, writing: “I am informed by past media that Black Caribbean and not Black African have a higher instance of schizophrenia.“I wonder if this is due to inbreeding on these small islands in slave times or is it due to ¬smoking grass.”

    Farage again“On the question of Islamification, we have to do a bit more to teach our children of the values of our Judeo-Christian society.” A recent manifesto commitment to “tackle extremist Islam by banning the burqa or veiled niqab in public buildings and certain private buildings” was further explained by Farage: “I can’t go into a bank with a motorcycle helmet on. I can’t wear a balaclava going round the District and Circle line.”

    Ukip peer Lord Pearson stated: “The Muslims are breeding ten times faster than us,” … “I don’t know at what point they reach such a number we are no longer able to resist the rest of their demands”

    Now I challenge you to name any political party bidding for high office that would tolerate any of this

    Would any reasonable person vote for these folk

  226. telemachus@March 7th, 2014 – 20:11

    they sound better then defecit denying, paedophile loving, borrowing from our grandkids, ever increasing government, nanny state lying labour, a party with a plastocene model as leader, thanks.

  231. No demonstrations yet in the United Kingdom on the crisis in the Ukraine whether for or against either Russia or the United States! Is it that, like God under New Labour, we don’t do demonstrations? Or perhaps we have no principles?

    Where at the very least is the Left’s Rent-a-Crowd of yesteryear? Où sont les neiges d’antan? Surely they have a dog in this fight? Who has decided not to fund them to bring them out on to the streets?

    Conservatives? Forget them, descending to the streets is beneath them. Or embarrassing. Among the working class, only the English Defence League had the ethical centre to take to the street, and that indeed triggered the red and green fascist opposition to mobilize against them. England has no equivalent of the middle class matrons of Paris who turned the tide, for better or worse, after de Gaulle had scuttled, banging their saucepans along the Champs-Élysées‎. It does not have the moral passion which brought hundreds of thousands out more recently in the French capital to show their view of laws on “same-sex marriage”.

    The English upper class have taken out citizenship in Cosmopolitanania where only self-interest rules.

    It is perhaps understandable that there is no fervour aroused by the Ukrainian crisis in those still politically conscious to rally to the cause of the corrupt American administration busily at wiork dismantling the American republic and fresh from subverting the democratically elected government of the Ukraine.

    One can also perhaps see why no one can be f—–d to get off their behinds to show support for Russia’s sovereignty and to oppose its being encroached upon through the manipulation of countries adjacent to Russia into the arms of the authoritarian European Union and its military arm, the NATO of Wesley Clark wackos who would like to see nuclear missiles on Russia’s borders. After all, they have already allowed that battle to be lost in England, so who the hell cares about Russia or the Ukraine and where are those places anyway?

    But then we read headlines like that in the Daily Telegraph today, “Putin mocks the West and threatens to turn off European gas supplies”. Or we see the article by Paul Craig Roberts, who has a background in Russian and East European affairs, with a book published as early as 1971 on the Soviet economy, and whose career included a period Assistant Secretary of the United States Treasury in the days when there was some treasure there, writing :

    “…Washington has seen that its incompetence has lost the Crimea. So Washington has now put these oligarch billionaires, who have their own private militias, in charge of the governments of the cities in eastern Ukraine…

    … there are elements in Washington who are still angry at Ronald Reagan for not getting into a war with Russia, and for ending the Cold War peacefully rather than nuking Russia, which is what these crazy individuals wanted Reagan to do. However, they are still in control in Washington. Wherever you look, these people are in charge….

    …I don’t know what Putin will do when he realizes that trying to be reasonable has resulted in the Russian elements in eastern Ukraine being suppressed. He may decide he’s not going to put up with that because he promised these people protection, and he may invade Ukraine…

    …what would the Americans do? They would have to save face. They would have to stop threatening sanctions and actually do something. So this is probably the greatest threat the world has ever known.

    All of this was brought on by these extreme elements that run Washington, who want to exercise hegemony over the entire world — over Russia, China, Iran, etc.. They engineered this coup, lost control, and have now placed these billionaire oligarchs in control of eastern Ukraine. …”.
    (King World News)

    Or the interview at the same site today Gerald Celente works the theme that the United States is now attempting to destroy Russia – and even Rand Paul in an interview with Fox News at CPAC took a hawkish line on Russia.

    Yet with the situation barreling towards dissaster, the British people keep calm and carry on. They stay off the streets. That’s for football hooligans, right? Anyhow, we don’t have strong views. Keep calm, settle down…

    Whether this is because they are stoic or because they are comatose is unclear.

    But whichever, may be they are right. We should leave it to the politicians. That’s what they are paid for. They know best. They have our interests at heart. All will turn out for the best. It’s a funny old world,
    iinit? Zzzzzzzzzz….

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpiQdC9wSF8

  234. Now as to accusations that Alex Jones shows are merely Kinnockian windbaggery, how to refute this fatuous allegation by EC Writer?

    Let’s take the same programme I previously cited in which Jones explained (about 10 mins in) why he had decided not to travel to England next week to address the Oxford Union.

    OK. You don’t want me listing and analysing every bit of news and interpretation of news that this show handles.

    So just sample the interview of Stefan Molyneoux (who he?) and then tell me why this could possibly be called Kinnockian windbaggery.

    Or rather, don’t go there!. Don’t watch it! If you watch it, don’t listen! If you listen, don’t hear! If you hear, don’t understand! Keep calm and carry on! Settle down! Keep mum Walls have ears.The government is your friend.

    Don’t go here to listen to Alex Jones talking with Stefan Molyneux, it’s just ranting, Kinnockian windbaggery – your government will love you even better if you stay away and plug yourselves in to David Bumblerby, the DT and Speccie (hear it for the Barclay brothers!), or the DM:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nACUhDYU2RY

    (1:11 – 3:05 hrs in [about])

  236. Noa 0020
    Do you not sleep?

    In 8 short minutes Hitchens, a Labour turncoat, describes in an amusing way the desirable future for Britain
    I guess the only difference between thee and me is that I think what he decries about Blair and team is what I see as universal good and caring policy and practice
    Fortunately your party will facilitate its achievement by delivering the 43 Tory marginals to the forces of reason 15 short months hence

  237. tellymachus:

    March 7th, 2014 – 13:35 &
    March 8th, 2014 – 03:19
    “Mr. Jones programmes are packed with meat, but are perhaps not for vegetarians.”

    They are like a catering size tin of corned beef. Too much corn with only a hint of beef.

    HOWEVER despite his diet, or maybe because of it, Alex does seem to know which way the wind is blowing with regard to the creeping Paramilitarisation of the Police in the USA, and that we are now witnessing in the UK.

    Also, you’ll be unsurprised to learn, that I fully approve of Alex’s robust stance on Americans’ 2nd Amendment rights, and I have a deal of sympathy anybody that wants to deport Piers Morgan from their shores. (except we don’t want him back here!)

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWQPZ-taYBs

    For all Piers’ “fans” out there – 14:50mins of Alex bashing Piers.
    🙂

  238. EC
    “..I have a deal of sympathy anybody that wants to deport Piers Morgan from their shores. ..”
    Isn’t he back already? (Oyi vey!)
    Maybe moored off our shores somewhere, Brighton, perhaps.

  239. EC
    March 8th, 2014 – 08:38

    Fascinating

    I am accused of being

    Mallfleur
    Fergus Pickering
    Mynydd
    Dalai Guevara
    David Lindsay

    And probably others I have forgotten or missed

    By yourself, UkipNoa, Nicholas Mustard and others

    I must truly be superman

  241. Yes Peter
    But not the above
    I am curious as to why Mallfleur was even thought to be me since the style and substance is foreign to my being
    Leviathan of course but that was long ago

  242. Sounds possible that the religion of peace could have involvement in the 777 that’s gone down on the way to china.

  243. Watching that silly but often amusing ‘Room 101’ program last night I was amazed that the producers had allowed the labour loving actor Charles Dance to include George Osborn the Chancellor of the Exchequer as one of his items selected to be booted into ‘Room 101’ not only that but he was steered towards expressing his loathing for George Osborn.

    One of the other panellists Laurence Roderick Llewelyn-Bowen was clearly embarrassed and suggested that all ‘Chancellors’ were unpopular but Charles Dance was having none of it and remarked that his dislike was boundless, that the chairman put ‘George’ into the 101 just furthered the insult to a normal decent man.

    Had someone suggested Blair or even better Gordon Brown it would not have got past the producers and would never have been shown?

    The sheer nastiness of the left never ceases to amaze me.

  244. “…style and substance is foreign to my being…”

    Almost uniquely we are in accord.

  245. John birch@March 8th, 2014 – 10:49

    ‘Sounds possible that the religion of peace could have involvement in the 777 that’s gone down on the way to china.’

    where did you hear that, john? nowt on BBC

  246. Well, that’s it from me fo a while folks.
    Cumnrod tilly’s cut and pasties and assine filosorfikal postings have reminded me that I have better things to do with my life than be insulted here by a brainless soviet cretin. I’ll look in from time to time.

  247. telemachus @ 20:11

    Baron’s out for a while, you seem to be running riots.

    What’s wrong with the two jokes, the one about shooting and sailing in particular, it’s humour, tele, humour, one is permitted to exaggerate, insinuate, allude, one must.

    You on the Left seem to be totally void of the one human trait that’s a part of one’s survival package, humour lets off steam, it lowers tension, it relieves one’s anger, frustration, fear, whether real or perceived, laughter can be a cure, often is, and you and your lot turn it far too easily into one of your -isms. Just get real, will you.

  248. Noa @ 13:20

    If you’re serious about having a time off, Noa, Baron will miss you, alot. Your witty, to the point fewliners were a joy to read.

    To be frank, Baron often feels as you do, he began ‘putting the world right’ when the Spectator open its server to blogging, most of the old timers have gone, Lupus occasionally looks in, but that’s about it.

    TThe poorly educated Slav has also slowed down, isn’t as keen as he was to hit the keyboard, takes days off…

    You should, Noa, at least look in, put in a word here and there.

  249. Noa March 8th, 2014 – 13:11

    “…style and substance is foreign to my being…”

    Almost uniquely we are in accord.

    I will second that Noa.

  250. Telemachus: “Would any reasonable person vote for these folk?’

    Yup, Baron will.

    The beauty of a movement that leans towards the extreme is that the main parties have to shift to steal some of those like Baron, who vote UKIP not because they share their views completely, but because they hope the centreground of politics moves in the direction of the extreme.

    Baron’s not as alarmed as others at the immigration tsunami, the ‘healthy core of Englishness’ will deal with it in time, but he reckons enough’s enough, someone has to put a stop to it, it’s far too many in too short a space of time. The forgetting curve of the indigenous unwashed kicks in, the large numbers strain cohesion of the community, may lead to more than just pockets of unrest.

  252. Noa @ 09:08

    St Helena for Morgan, for the rest of his life; Baron will never forgive the slimebag for the fake pictures of our boys mistreating the Iraqis. How did he get away with it?

  253. David Ossitt @ 11:10

    The good news is the non-payment of the license will be decriminalised, David. Baron wonders what the BBC monstrosity will do when its cash evaporates, he very much hopes he makes it to the day the law kicks in.

  254. Peter’s friend, Mr. Boot two latest posts are, as always, written amusingly well, the one of Putin’s nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize slices the KGB colonel and Russia as viciously but wittily as he did so often before. The one on the recent case of bestiality makes one wonder why indeed we still criminalise it.

  255. Baron 8th, – 15:30

    “St Helena for Morgan,”

    Only person who has treated Morgan as he deserves is Clarkson.

  256. Baron March 8th, 2014 – 15:34

    “The good news is the non-payment of the license will be decriminalised,”

    We no longer have to pay since my beloved reached the age of 74, I even think that we got a small refund.

  257. 1. “This ship will get to Eilat and the truth will become fully known,” Netanyahu told Israel’s Channel 10 TV on Friday. “This is the real face of Iran.”

    http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCABREA270JR20140308

    I think Netanyahu is being too optimistic. When Israel announces the finding of the arms and shows the world the pictures of them, Iran will say that Israelis are pirates and the arms aren’t from Iran or that there were no arms on board and that the pictures are Israeli fakes. Then the Muslim world, politically correct westerners, and everybody else who is who is hostile to Israel will automatically believe Iran’s version and say that Israel has violated international law.

    2. Thanks to Noa for posting this –

    http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/islamophobic-hate-groups-become-more-prominent-in-germany-a-956801.html

    After considering it, what can any rational person do but emulate Enoch Powell and ask – “What’s wrong with Islamophobia?”

  258. The latest news about the missing Malaysian Airliner is that two of the passengers were using stolen or fake passports.

    Does anybody now doubt that they were Muslim suicide bombers?

  259. Baron 8th, – 15:30

    “Baron will never forgive the slimebag for the fake pictures of our boys mistreating the Iraqis.”

    I don’t think he did ‘get away’ with it. Once it was confirmed that the photos were fake he was out the door of the DM without his feet touching the floor.

    But it was exceedingly sloppy journalism. Any competent editor would have insisted on knowing the source, confirming its reliability and a few other checks before publishing. But I believe his mind was blinded by his hate for HM services. It didn’t take much of a level of expertise to be able to debunk the photos; I was mighty suspicious about them from the start, despite having had no connection with any of the forces for close on thirty years (at the time).

  260. Ostrich (occasionally) @ 18:52

    True, he has lost his job at the DM, but it didn’t dent his career much, did it, Ostrich. The man needs to be dismissed from public view forever. He or rather either his stupidity or his deviousness has caused harm.

  261. David Ossitt @ 16:40

    Lucky you, David. Come to think of it, Baron hasn’t got that far tto go either. If the festering Ukrainian boil doesn’t morph into a fully blown and spreading cancerous growth, and he’ll make it to the next year, he’ll be in your camp, too.

  262. It one of the Russian independent papers it says the EU is considering granting Ukrainians a visa free entry int to the EU. Doesn’t it make one rejoice at our generosity?

  263. The confused party has just adopted a resolution at their annual conference, which they say will be their top priority if they have to go into a coalition after 2015: the threshold for paying tax should be raised to £12,500.

    Baron, like everyone else, should welcome it except that it’s deadly expensive for the country, and we are broke, and it does FA to help the lowest paid because everyone gets it, even the footballing star Rooney who is on £300,000 per week. Madness, but then, it’s not their money, so why not, we can still borrow, just.

  264. Baron 8th, – 22:15

    “He or rather either his stupidity or his deviousness has caused harm.”

    Indeed. Can’t argue with that. As might have been inferred from my earlier suggestion, Clarkson’s only failure was in being insufficiently extreme.

  265. Noa, March 8th, 2014 – 13:20,

    I shall up your way for “a bit of a do” in the coming weeks. So I’ll see you at the hustings then? (failing that keep an eye on Booths’ notice board) Good luck with the Euros.

  266. Baron@March 8th, 2014 – 22:43

    no baron, they adjust the allowances for those on higher rate tax bands to compensate so only those not paying higher rate benefit.
    The big scandal is how the 40% rate threshold has not even kept place with inflation so more and more people are paying this higher rate tax, so with NI their incremental tax rate is well over half.
    £41k isnt ‘rich’ – we should be looking to move the start of this band to nearer £50k.

  268. Peter from Maidstone March 9th, 2014 – 13:52

    What are others doing?

    It is gloriously sunny and quite warm here in West Yorkshire, my beloved is tidying two flower beds and I have just showered and will shortly open a bottle of something nice to drink whilst I read the papers.

  270. P.o.M.
    Peter. I am working on my latest opus, the place is stacked with cases of baked beans and I am not going out until it is finished. By the way, I am green with envy, I would love to see the Antonine Wall although I understand there is not much to see.

  271. Bright,mild,sunny afternoon; `Whisky Galore`on Radio 4 Extra:much coming and going by the neighbouring Christadelphians;probably as it’s the First Sunday in Lent.

  272. Taking the day off today. Been in my studio this week, working on a landscape picture. It got much better when I added a pinkish-yellow strip along the horizon, against the grey cloud.

  274. Peter from Maidstone March 9th, 2014 – 13:52
    “What are others doing?”

    Glorious Sunshine, and warm! I have recently got back from a 3 hour walk around some local woods looking at butterflies, birds and “bumblies”. With the exception of one family out for a walk I had the whole place to myself.

    Great photo. Can anybody attach a photo to a post? If so, how is it done?

  275. Peter from Maidstone March 9th, 2014 – 13:52

    “What are others doing?”

    Gloriously sunny and warm down here. I recently returned from a three hour walk around some local woods where I was looking at butterflies, birds and “bumblies”.
    With the exception of a family of four out for a walk I had the whole place to myself!

    Hark now! What’s that? Now, as sit here typing this, in a nearby garden, I think I can hear the unmistakeable sound….. YES, it’s the first lawnmower of spring!

  276. Went to Suffolk Coast today in beautiful weather.
    So many people in aldbourgh that the fish and chip shops were overwhelmed with hungry customers.
    Decided the wait was going to be far too long so now back at home cooking a chicken.

  277. On the beach just south of Amble. Haven’t been on that particular beach since before winter…crikey there’s been some erosion; I reckon it’s lost over a foot of sand, there are stones and shingle exposed that I’ve never seen before. But…the birds are getting on with life, black headed gulls getting their breeding plumage, redshank and oystercatchers poking the sand at the water’s edge, couple of bar-tailed godwits delaying heading to the high Arctic to breed, also on the adjacent freshwater ponds are still widgeon and teal… Good day, in all.

  278. Herbert Thornton @ 04:11

    If Osama’s mortgaged mansion causes such upheaval in Pakistan’s finance the country must be in a real shite.

  279. Peter from Maidstone @ 13:52

    Not perhaps the smartest move on your part, Peter, to visit the land of haggis and whisky when the south is basking in the sun.

    Baron fell asleep in the garden after lunch, feels like boiled alive, now. The temperature in the sun 24.5deg C. Lovely, but will it last.

  280. alexsandr @ 09:57

    Point take, even though Baron’s still rather confused how it’s done. Do they lower the level at which the 40% rate is levied? Is that it?

    But you’re right, more and more people get trapped by the 40% level, regretfully, Baron ain’t one of them.

  281. Baron, I am visiting my wife’s family. Her mother had a stroke in the Summer and she has been going home regularly. I thought I should go with her this time but the weather is consistently Scottish.

  282. Peter from Maidstone@March 9th, 2014 – 17:33

    better now that waiting for the mozzie season…

  284. Peter from Maidstone@March 9th, 2014 – 17:57

    the pheromone is called being human. I reckon they get everyone except chain smokers.

  285. Mikhail Khodorkovsky, remember him, the man imprisoned by Putin for failing to pay taxes (allegedly), then amnestied, kicked out of Russia, has visited Kiev today as the Ukrainians celebrate 200th anniversary of their ‎national hero Taras Shevchenko, made a speech at Maidan, tears rolling down his cheeks, stressed the unity of Russia and Ukraine as the crowds shouted “Russia, wake up’. A strong, direct challenge to Putin.

    His speech is reported today prominently in one of Russian independent papers Novya Gazeta.

  286. Peter from Maidstone @ 17:33

    Enjoy it, Peter, the sunny weather down south isn’t going to last, we should go back to what we get most of – bloody rain.

  289. Baron@March 9th, 2014 – 20:22

    I am not on arsebook. I consider its data protection to be inadequate.

    I also resent the BBC keep doing product placement for twatter and arsebook. they are private american organisations and to dont need free adverts from the BBC.

  290. PfM 9th, – 17:57

    “a pheromone that attracts them!”

    This ‘pheromone’…it’s CO2. You’ll just have to stop breathing!

  291. Good stuff by Dr. Edward Group in March 6 Alex Jones Show on the worldwide abuse of psychotropic drugs by their prescription by doctors.

    You’re nuts – take an anti-depressant and settle down.

    And on disease created by toxins and heavy metals in the food, air and water –

    generating the pharmaceutical market and social control.

    And designating mental disease in children 0-3 – and causing it too of course…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CULHu4SVso4&feature=player_embedded

  292. What were others doing on Sunday? I was working but at 5.00pm went to Bonifacio High Street where the last hour of a three-day British Festival was being played out (Morgan cars, Marks & Sparks, Beatles music… etc) to see my daughter dancing around in a tutu. One piece of music kicked in the nostalgia juice: Daaa, Dee Daaa, Dee Da Da Da Da (repeat), Da Dee Da Da Daaa Dee Da Da Da Da etc. That was the Home Service theme music, wasn’t it? In Town Tonight? (“violets dear? luvverly violets”) No. That was Eric Coates….

    Anybody who can bear to take a walk down Nostalgia Boulevard, will probably find the tune here – and lots of other things – including a sample of the duet introduction to Much Binding in the Mars…

    http://www.turnipnet.com/whirligig/radio/

    But back to the present.

    It looks as though the US dollar will be devalued this week. And Paul Craig Roberts on King World News is arguing that we are on the brink of nuclear war.

    Don’t you just love big government?

  293. Ostrich, my wife has a special pheromone. If we go out for a walk in the Summer the rest of the party are protected while the little buzzers attack my wife! We might be heading to Crieff today, and then home tomorrow.

    At least there are clear skies today but it is pretty nippy here.

  296. Just turned Rory Bremner off. He was on The One Show, which I don’t watch. But for some reason he thought it appropriate to say that Nigel Farage had no substance and when in a room full of Asians must have felt very uncomfortable. All lies. And from a “comedian” with no authority to speak of politics at all.

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