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The Coffee House Wall – 12th/18th October

Posted on October 12, 2015

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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227 thoughts on “The Coffee House Wall – 12th/18th October”

  1. EC says:
    October 12, 2015 at 10:15 am

    On matters linguistic…

    Complete vs Finished
     
    No dictionary has ever been able to satisfactorily define the difference between ‘complete’ and ‘finished’. However, during a recent conference held in London and attended by some of the best linguists in the world. Samsundar Balgobin, a Guyanese linguist, was a speaker and was asked to make that very distinction.
     
    The question put to him by a colleague in the erudite audience was this: “Some say there is no difference between ‘complete’ and ‘finished.’ Please explain the difference in a way that is easy to understand.”

    Mr. Balgobin’s response: “When you marry the right woman, you are ‘complete.’ If you marry the wrong woman, you are ‘finished.’ And, if the right one catches you with the wrong one, you are ‘completely finished.’”
    His answer received a five minute standing ovation.

  2. Malfleur says:
    October 12, 2015 at 11:02 am

    EC

    I think that is worth circulating to the usual suspects on my email list

    How is that linguist’s surname pronounced by the way?

  3. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 11:37 am

    EC @ 10:15

    Hmmm, the man with the strange name and the clapping audience should have been put on police caution, EC, and that’s the least the coppers should have done. What an insensitive remark to make, a man marrying a woman, so yesterday’s, so passé, so insensitive to the gays, transss, TRFRTs, PLHTRs, UUNBs …… Also, what a claptrap about the right and the wrong woman, absurd in today’s Britain, this is the age of equality, both are equally right it’s just one’s right for one man, the other for another. So bloody obvious it pains Baron to say it.

    The whole of the remark by the man with the strange sounding name is so suspect, your disseminating it, EC, so disappointing Baron suggests you take a longish course in equality training. Will do you good.

  4. EC says:
    October 12, 2015 at 11:38 am

    Malfleur – 11:02

    Don’t know, that’s just the way I received it this morning. It’s one those jokes where the name and nationality are rapidly customisable to suit the occasion.
    [eg. The English toothpaste salesman who was assigned Wales as his territory etc.]

  5. Alexsandr says:
    October 12, 2015 at 12:18 pm

    So a load of old lawyers think we have not let enough criminal migrants in, and wrote an open letter to say so.
    Am I the only one to think not about migrants but to think our judiciary is out of touch and not fit for purpose?

  6. Radford NG says:
    October 12, 2015 at 1:10 pm

    12th. October 2015.The Hundredth Anniversary of the execution of Edith Cavell.

    http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/faith-and-sacrifice-an-irishman-s-diary-on-edith-cavell-1.2387272

  7. Malfleur says:
    October 12, 2015 at 2:12 pm

    Anna Wotana Kaye

    Kick them out!

    Including those responsible for letting them in.

    Ok, New World Order’s vision for a world as a corporate banksters’ sewage farm: Mr. Peter Sutherland:

    Mini-bio 2009
    The first Director-General of the WTO was Peter D. Sutherland, who was previously the director general of GATT, former Attorney General of Ireland, and currently is Chairman of British Petroleum and Goldman Sachs International, as well as being special representative of the United Nations secretary-general for migrations. He is also a member of the board of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum, goodwill ambassador to the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, is a member of the Bilderberg Group, and is European Chairman of the Trilateral Commission, and he was presented with the Robert Schuman Medal for his work on European Integration and the David Rockefeller Award of the Trilateral Commission.] Clearly, the WTO was an organ of the western banking elite to be used as a tool in expanding and institutionalizing their control over world trade. ”

    Fast forward to October 2015 and interview with prominent Struldbrug and tireless worker for the happiness of mankind, Mr. Peter Sutherland:

    “UN News Centre: What is your message to governments?

    Peter Sutherland: I will ask the governments to cooperate, to recognise that sovereignty is an illusion – that sovereignty is an absolute illusion that has to be put behind us. The days of hiding behind borders and fences are long gone…”

    http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=52126#.VhuJk27We should perhaps consider the adoption of the Luggnagg Law.’According to the law of Luggnagg, the struldbrugs become legally dead at 80 and can no longer hold their own property. This is to stop them from taking over the world and holding it forever). But in practice, it also means that the struldbrugs have to beg for all time.’

    Or perhaps just Kick Them Out!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUQ6pndQwCM

  8. EC says:
    October 12, 2015 at 2:25 pm

    Baron – 11:37

    I underwent a 4Ws course in the late 90s, at some council or other, prior to being urgently detained on even more lucrative Y2K work in the private sector. I don’t think that the brainwashing ever took. These days I believe such courses are known as 5Ws as the wahhabis, formerly lumped in with the 2nd W, have their own W, or else…

    Have you heard the one about the English and French gynaecologists comparing notes at a conference in Paris?

  9. Malfleur says:
    October 12, 2015 at 2:34 pm

    Radford NG

    600th anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt on 25th October…

  10. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 3:22 pm

    Radford NG @ 13:10

    Not an anniversary today’s western leaders would like to be reminded of, Radford, the girl Cavell was patriotism pure, not an ersatz version of it promoted today by the stupefying Rose who heads the ‘stay in campaign’, and who said it was patriotic to be a part of the EU. He may like to know he’s in a good company, William Joyce aka Lord Haw Haw also thought it was pa triotic to trash Britain, oppose Winston.

    The other statement the xenomaniac made was that leaving the EU was a leap into the dark. He obviously didn’t come across the Chinese saying Baron’s so fond of that ‘man can predict everything but the future’. It’s equally a leap into the dark if we stay in, nobody buy Him could tell what the future holds, it’s up to all of us to try ensure, as we plod along, as best a future as we c an can .

  11. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 3:29 pm

    EC @ 14:25

    What an enjoyable past, EC, you must miss it alot. Baron was unlucky to reside in Tokyo when the nonsense was taking hold here, and the Japanese are as fond of the PC crap as the Nazis were of the Judaic faith.

    And no, the barbarian hasn’t heard the one you mention, tell us, please.

    PS apologies, and you know well what for. The problem is the key t is too bloody close to the one market y. That’s not an excuse, it’s an explanation. The other errors throughout Baron’s posting s is just poor education.

  12. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 4:04 pm

    Malfleur @ 14:34

    Not the best time of the year to war with the French, Malfleur, but as you well know the battle was the last one in a series of three, in which the English had the upper hand (Crecy in 1346, and Poitiers ten years later were the earlier two).

    The Crecy head-on is of some note for the barbarian for an obvious reason. King John of Bohemia took part in it. Blind, he had to have his horse tied to the horses of his accompanying knights. He, or rather they, charged got slaughtered in no time.

    The son of Edward III, also called Edward, but known better as the Black Prince (why?), was impressed, found the blind madman on the battlefield, picked one of the three ostrich feathers that adored John’s helmet, kept it, later decided to adopt John’s coat of arm of the three ostrich feathers together with the ‘ich dien’ motto – such was the age of chivalry.

    The three feathers and the motto have survived to this day, they sit at 7 0’clcok on the coat of arm of the Prince of Wales. One can also find the three feathers on the reverse of the copper twopence, and that’s something not many people know.

    There’s more to it, but that’s enough for Baron to show off, he reckons.

  13. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 4:08 pm

    The other errors ‘are’ and not ‘is’, it seems it’s more than poor, it’s bloody bad education.

  14. Baron says:
    October 12, 2015 at 4:25 pm

    Malfleur @ 14:12

    Baron bets you, Malfleur, the anointed buffoon wouldn’t be able to list all the directorships he holds that pay him enough to spew this crap. If sovereignty matters not, perhaps we can stop paying taxes here, declare paying taxes in the Cayman Islands like Facebook.

    You may have noticed only 139 hits for his presentation, nobody pays attention, but you’re right, we should, it’s the scheming of old varlets like him that’s more a danger than ISIL. One can bomb the latter to pulp, he or others like him, on the other hand, may go on forever.

  15. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 12, 2015 at 4:40 pm

    To hell with migrants, the judiciary and all politicians, perverted, corrupt and idiotic, the whole damn lot! I am angry because do-gooders, ‘Ealth and Safety merchants and general busybodies are removing any freedoms we once had. Here is an example: I went into a clothing shop and bought some ladies’ garments. At the till, the young assistant asked if I wanted a bag to carry them away. “Naturally.” I replied, “Can I walk through the street with them in my hands?” The response was that I would have to pay 5p for a bag. Now I am not a miser, I spend what little I have on things that make my husband, family and myself happy, and don’t worry about petty amounts. BUT I DO CARE ABOUT MY FREEDOM. Why should this government, like all before it, ignore the pollution on our streets and allow cancer and other diseases to rage unchecked because of rotten air quality and traffic? Why should they allow children to grow up in substandard homes, and let greedy landlords profit from tenants who contract diseases from unfit living quarters? Instead of doing something positive they just legislate on cutting down the use of plastic bags and penalising innocent citizens. Instead, fine those who dump garbage in the streets, rivers an countryside. Employ more street cleaners and check the damage vehicles are causing because of either ignorance or indifference. Employ more officials to stop landlords overcrowding and overcharging desperate citizens. And above all, make sure these officials are not corrupt bastards like the politicians and the judiciary.

  16. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 12, 2015 at 4:40 pm

    Rewritten: To hell with migrants, the judiciary and all politicians, perverted, corrupt and idiotic, the whole damn lot! I am angry because do-gooders, ‘Ealth and Safety merchants and general busybodies are removing any freedoms we once had. Here is an example: I went into a clothing shop and bought some ladies’ garments. At the till, the young assistant asked if I wanted a bag to carry them away. “Naturally.” I replied, “Can I walk through the street with them in my hands?” The response was that I would have to pay 5p for a bag. Now I am not a miser, I spend what little I have on things that make my husband, family and myself happy, and don’t worry about petty amounts. BUT I DO CARE ABOUT MY FREEDOM. Why should this government, like all before it, ignore the pollution on our streets and allow cancer and other diseases to rage unchecked because of rotten air quality and traffic? Why should they allow children to grow up in substandard homes, and let greedy landlords profit from tenants who contract diseases from unfit living quarters? Instead of doing something positive they just legislate on cutting down the use of plastic bags and penalising innocent citizens. Instead, fine those who dump garbage in the streets, rivers an countryside. Employ more street cleaners and check the damage vehicles are causing because of either ignorance or indifference. Employ more officials to stop landlords overcrowding and overcharging desperate citizens. And above all, make sure these officials are not corrupt bastards like the politicians and the judiciary.

  17. EC says:
    October 12, 2015 at 5:16 pm

    Baron,

    Did you watch Putin’s marathon press conference the other day?

    http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/47250

    You can watch the BBC’s John Simpson lecturing Vlad at about 1:47:00
    Putin’s comprehensive and robust reply reduced the Beeboid to a greasy spot on the floor.

    It could be, though, that JS’s question was just a plant…

  18. Frank P says:
    October 12, 2015 at 5:27 pm

    Dominic Cumberbatch demands an audience with the Home Secretary in order too proselytise on behalf of immigrants who wish to improve their lives by bespoiling ours. Who the fuck does this weird looking purveyor of make-believe think he is?

  19. Frank P says:
    October 12, 2015 at 5:40 pm

    A Marks ‘n’ Sparks cast off known as Stuart Rose has appointed himself spokesman of a EUphile pressure group and seems to think that because 2m Brits have decided to live on ‘le continent’ that the rest of us should allow untrammeled immigration into the UK and, moreover, continue to finance and support the behemoth of the Brussels bureaucracy – as the alternative would be a ‘leap in the dark’.
    Fucking twat!!

  20. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 12, 2015 at 6:15 pm

    Cumberbatch.

    Boots. For. Big. Too.

    Stick to prancing about on the stage you preening twat. No one elected you.

  21. EC says:
    October 12, 2015 at 7:23 pm

    Colonel Mustard – 18:15

    The same goes for that child/teen actress, Emily Watson of Harry Potter fame
    The $60,000,000 (& counting) “victim” of cinema’s male hegemony.
    Stupid bitch!

  22. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 12, 2015 at 7:35 pm

    Frank P
    October 12th, 2015 – 17:40
    Stuart Rose who helped to nearly drive M&S into oblivion was made a Lord, Baron Rose of Monewden,(Moneybags) by that awful Gordon Brown, no doubt as a bribe . He is indeed a F***ing Twat with Brass Knobs On! The hard working founders of M&S must be turning in their graves. I remember when the stores sold fine good value, Made in Britain stock, now it is mostly crap from China.

  23. telemachus says:
    October 12, 2015 at 8:22 pm

    Three alleged jihadists who are accused of plotting a Remembrance Day beheading in the name of ISIS stamped on a charity poppy just days before the planned attack, a court has heard.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3269309/Three-men-inspired-truly-chilling-online-fatwa-plotted-Lee-Rigby-style-attack-Britain-s-streets-buying-39-98-Rambo-knife-court-hears.html#ixzz3oNoXtiVm

    *

    “Britain’s youngest terrorist sent messages urging a teenager in Australia to ‘break into someone’s house and get your first taste of beheading’, a court heard today.

    The 15-year-old boy from Blackburn was just 14 when he encouraged Sevdet Besim, 18, to murder an officer, with the two sharing thousands of enthusiastic messages online that also praised ISIS.

    He today admitted inciting Besim to behead…”

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3171865/British-boy-15-pleads-guilty-inciting-terrorism-encouraging-murder-police-officers-Anzac-Day-parade-Australia.html#ixzz3oNkULzl5

    *
    Now last night I happened to be reading an 1865 tract by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) in which there are multiple references incitement to behead in a tract meant for children
    The same polemic connived in encouraging children to acts resulting in them falling down holes in the ground, drinking unknown substances from bottles, eating cakes from unknown sources, harvesting and eating poison mushrooms and smoking hookah’s
    I was so incensed that I stopped reading it to the bairns
    I have since formally complained to the relevant regulator

  24. telemachus says:
    October 12, 2015 at 8:33 pm

    As I continue to reiterate
    We would all be better off if we were to join Putin in bombing ISIS to glory

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbbOyQb14LI

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVoAX2V7Ea8

  25. Frank P says:
    October 12, 2015 at 10:30 pm

    20:53

    If you wish to tautologically ‘continue to reiterate’, do it in the privacy of your own bedroom, please. And while you’re at it, reiterate your absence – and this time, mean it!

  26. Frank P says:
    October 12, 2015 at 10:42 pm

    Anne (19:35)

    A twat by any other name would smell as sour?

    Apologies to the bard.

  27. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:30 am

    Baron @ 16:04

    I think it was because, Armani-like, he wore black armour – but I have not done the usual google check.

    Very interesting on the origin of the three ostrich feathers. Which side was the King of Bohemia fighting on by the way?

  28. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:45 am

    Malfleur @ 01:30

    A rather wild guess on the colour, Malfleur.

    On the losing side of Philip VI, of course, the Bohemians are good avoiding betting on the winning horse, always have been.

  29. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:47 am

    In a fighting mood, are we?

    Btw, what happened to stephen, he hasn’t been heard for some weeks now. Anyone knows anything about his condition? Baron has sent him an e-mail, no answer so far.

  30. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:50 am

    Colonel Mustard @ 18:15

    Not being a woman, Baron’s view on the actor counts for little, but what is it the female garrison finds so attractive on him, he looks rather weird, and his Hamlet didn’t really make it.

  31. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:58 am

    EC @ 17:16

    Thanks for the link, EC, it’s appreciated. The length of it doesn’t allow the barbarian to listen to it from top to bottom, too busy doing other things, he’s only scanned the written minutes, but read fully the answer to JS’s question.

    Putin’s right, there’s little in the reply to JS one would disagree with, the aggressive party has not been Russia, certainly not before February last year. Every country of her size, presided over by a man worthy the name of a national leader, would do everything to protect its sovereignty, if a supposedly friendly nation were to surround it the way the Americans have encircled Russia since the fall of the communist thuggery, to engineer events hostile to it, i.e. the Kiev putsch, impose sanctions targeting the key source of its revenues (oil): ban on credit to Russian banks longer than 90 days, ban on exports to Russia of up-to-date drilling gear.

    The point about the military spend of Russia vis-a-vis the US at about 1 to 10 ratio is exactly was Baron was saying few weeks ago, and that excludes the expenditure of other NATO members.

    Baron sticks to the tested prism through which he dissects events, moves and policies of either side.

    The US political elite senses the US hegemony isn’t what it used to be, instead of adjusting its geo-political, diplomatic and military position towards an accommodation with the newly emerging powers (not necessarily only Russia), it has decided on a course of creating chaos, mayhem, crises wherever it can. It’s aimed at stopping or at least preventing rivals getting stronger. One can hardly blame them for it, they’re batting for America. One can question the wisdom of adopting such doctrine though. One can neither blame the newly emerging powers for resisting it.

    Russia, on the other hand, is still living in a shock from the dismantling of the communist experiment, the construct imploded merely a generation ago. Her political elites are mostly the old cadres, it will take time for new leaders to emerge. It’s both the case of the ‘learning curve’ kicking in, i.e. those in power forced to do things differently from the dark days past, albeit slowly and grudgingly, as well as the ‘forgetting curve’ still being felt i.e. the tendency of the state to control each and every aspect of life. The arrogance of the US treatment of Russia dampens the former, gives a new kick of life to the latter curve.

    It was telling to listen to the questions, Putin’s answers on agriculture, mortgages and stuff. Telling in the sense that people still expect the state to poke its nose into everything, the state is more than willing to oblige.

    It’s unlikely either the Americans or Russia under Putin will embrace each other, the rivalry is likely to go on, China will join it, as will others.

    One can only hope the Syrian crisis doesn’t get blown big to something more sinister. Crushing the ISIL thuggery, turning Syria into a governable entity, stopping the flow of refugees to Europe would do for Baron, then they can continue barking at each other once more.

    Btw, apparently many Syrians from Jordan are returning back, a good start.

  32. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:06 am

    A MAD WORLD MY MASTERS

    Bit of a propaganda setback here for the Caliph of Washington

    “AMID RUSSIAN AIRSTRIKES, A PUTIN CRAZE TAKES HOLD IN MIDEAST”

    http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_MIDEAST_PUTIN?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2015-10-12-14-55-15

    (h/t Drudge Report)

    BUT: could it be part of the Caliph’s game plan, on the instructions of Sir Peter Sutherland of that Ilk,to collapse American sovereignty?

    A 3 point plan:

    1. Restore the American Republic
    2. Re-invigorate the Bill of Rights throughout the United Kingdom
    3. Kick them out!

    Secret Protocol to the 3-Point Plan
    In the event that “push-back” from Sir Peter Sutherland & His Ilk postpones Article 2, the European Union (and its Ilk) will bestow the territory in continental Europe of the former Angevin Empire on the British Crown in acknowledgement that sovereignty is an illusion.

    https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/87/France_1154-en.svg/2000px-France_1154-en.svg.png

  33. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:09 am

    Classic FM has just told Baron a British man was sentenced to 25 lashes in Saudi Arabia, it’s feared the punishment may kill him.

    Just imagine if he were sentenced to receive the same punishment in Russia. The boy, his political, theatrical, and other -ical arselickers, the MSM poodles, well the whole lot of the anointed would insist we nuke Russia, and we probably would. Because it’s the Saudis whom we sell some £3.5bn of killing gear each year, the boy and the rest of the leaders and opinion formers will pretend to be upset about it, but will do FA.

    Still, it’s only lashes, not the butchering of a female on a busy street.

  34. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:13 am

    Baron @ 1:58

    “… they’re batting for America”

    Are you sure?

  35. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:14 am

    Malfleur
    October 13th, 2015 – 02:06

    “President Putin has a distinguished personality and charisma….” Hmmm, aren’t they overdoing it, Malfleur, Putin and charisma in the same sentence?

  36. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:18 am

    I’ve never met him – but he seems to have great nipples.

  37. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:18 am

    Malfleur @ 02:13

    Not perhaps the one in the White House, presidents come and go, but many of the rich and powerful may do, Malfleur, let’s give them the benefit of the of the doubt, shall we.

  38. Baron says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:20 am

    Malfleur @ 02:18

    You are not, are you?

    Listen, Malfleur, Baron has had a busy day, that’s it for him, behave.

  39. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:23 am

    After 3 years of research, I am no longer prepared to do so. My benefit of the doubt is presently pledged to the opposite view.

  40. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:25 am

    No – but I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt on the charisma point 🙂

  41. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 2:27 am

    https://futuristrendcast.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/putin-3.jpg

  42. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 13, 2015 at 7:29 am

    Baron October 12th, 2015 – 16:04

    On the naming of the Black Prince there are conflicting theories. Some maintain that the name was bestowed because of his tournament heraldry – black shield with the three white ostrich feathers, black mantle and black horse caparison similarly decorated.

    Others that it was bestowed on him after leading his devastating twenty mile wide chevauchées deep into the interior of France burning everything in sight.

    Whatever the reason he was a war leader, a Prince with resolve and at ease with the uncompromising conventions of his age. He was wearing armour at the age of eight and in battle at sixteen. He would have made Putin look weedy. Feminists and their modern male dweebs would have not much cared for him. Nor he them.

  43. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 13, 2015 at 7:48 am

    Baron October 13th, 2015 – 01:50

    I am not a woman either or a homosexual so it puzzles me why you think I might know. Much of the “everyone loves him” clamour for flavours of the month is artificially created by the BBC, as with that appallingly persistent nonsense Doctor Who. The privileged Cumbertwat seems to have risen from the contrived and pretentious twaddle of ‘Sherlock’.

    Then they all do Hamlet as a sort of narcissistic right of passage “I, Thespian, have arrived”. The previous BBC-sponsored flavour of the month, the ghastly McChicken, also did it.

    Cumbertwat was recently in trouble with the race hustler and faux outrage cults so maybe his sudden demand to lecture Madam May about gimmegrants is a form of lefty luvvie atonement. Virtue signalling for the Rich and Famous.

    “An anti-racism charity, Show Racism The Red Card, told The Independent that while they applauded Cumberbatch for shining a spotlight on a a very important issue, he “also inadvertently highlighted the issue of appropriate terminology and the evolution of language.” The charity said the term ‘coloured’ is now “outdated and has the potential to cause offense.”

    “The writer Bonnie Greer said: “If he was 80, no one would have noticed. Under 60 — who says “coloured” anymore? It indicates a mindset; a certain circle.”

    “In a statement to People, Cumberbatch said: “I feel the complete fool I am and while I am sorry to have offended people and to learn from my mistakes in such a public manner, please be assured I have. I apologize again to anyone I offended for this thoughtless use of inappropriate language about an issue which affects friends of mine and which I care about deeply.”

    Of course everyone knew what he meant straight away, which just goes to show what a contrivance this continuous race hustling re-invention of the ‘correct’ term is. The ghastly race hustling interventionist Greer is guilty of ageism, amongst other things, but that doesn’t have quite the same cachet when it comes to white guilt.

  44. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:03 am

    Baron, October 13th, 2015 – 01:50

    ” … and his Hamlet didn’t really make it.”

    Yes, by all reports, his performance “didn’t cut the mustard.”
    🙂

  45. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:23 am

    The trouble with actors is that they imagine somehow that reading other people’s lines somehow makes them great too.

    The ghastly Greers of colour, black and grey, were two of the many reasons I gave up watching BBC QT. I wouldn’t bet against the BBC parachuting Cumberbatch into a QT seat as a matter of urgency!

  46. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:31 am

    “Cumbertwat was recently in trouble with the race hustler and faux outrage cults so maybe his sudden demand to lecture Madam May about gimmegrants is a form of lefty luvvie atonement. Virtue signalling for the Rich and Famous.”

    This is the nub of it!

    EC, October 12th, 2015 – 19:23

    I meant “Emma” Watson – UN Wimmin’s Ambassaposeur.
    Apologies to Emily Watson

  47. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:47 am

    With the as yet to be explained and mysterious disappearance of the chest wig with medallion attachment that was Russell Brand, Benedict Cummerbund has spotted a gap in the tween-age market for mock outrage and emoticon politics.
    Alas, poor Yorick…

  48. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:48 am

    Any mention of A Boot Esq. seems to generate amusing controversy hereabouts, so I draw attention to his latest offering, in which he reminds us of a Deayton remember and in the process takes a swipe at the BBC; the non-science of economics – and manages to plug his 2011 book “The Crisis Behind Our Crisis” in the bargain:

    http://alexanderboot.com/content/congratulation-angus-deayton-successful-career-change

    Worth a couple minutes of your time, imho.

  49. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:50 am

    Apropos nothing much, it occurs to me that those socialist scum who like to sneer at our “bile” have no apparent awareness that their excuses, justification and apologies for most forms of so-called anti-social behaviour (not to include spitting at Tories) being the result of “exclusion” or “alienation” or post-colonial oppression or some other right-on twaddle should apply equally to those of us who grew up in one country and now find ourselves living in another without being ever asked if we wanted to.

    So it’s not really “bile” at all but just an expression of true consciousness in the face of their tedious assertions of false consciousness. The Marcusean biter bit if you will.

  50. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:56 am

    “I meant “Emma” Watson – UN Wimmin’s Ambassaposeur.
    Apologies to Emily Watson.”

    Emilentary my dear!

  51. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:57 am

    And I see that the unreasoning cretin of the ‘uman condition, Telemachus, is still patting about this blog, despite the terminally abused and bruised arse that the innumerable kickings from the boots of Frank P, Colonel Mustard and Wallsters’ too many to list have delivered…

  52. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:13 am

    Noa October 13th, 2015 – 09:57

    Ban him. Show the socialist scum that they don’t get a platform in this “safe space”.

  53. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:13 am

    Just turned on the telly only to be immediately and topically assailed by the nauseating Mervyn Barg (he still hasn’t mastered that new set of Hampsteads he acquired some years ago, has he?) in a pre-blurb of the next South Bank Show, featuring dah-dah! – Dominatrix Cumbertwat!

    So THAT’s what it’s all about. Form a daisy chain – the luvvies are at it!

  54. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:15 am

    Odd that the Colonel should mention bile as I have just returned from the National lobbing and gobbing championship, where in completion with Rod Liddle and Frank Dobson, I took part in a series of open events to find Britain’s greatest phlegmigatorists.
    My finest effort, of 10 foot 5 and seve eighth inches; delivered whilst wearing a Guy Fawkes mask and carrying a two week JSA penalty, nevertheless earned me the right to stand in the front rank of British lobbers at the next ‘migrants welcome” demonstration in Parliament Square, where our progressive views will be advanced by a tsunami of expectoration.

  55. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:18 am

    Doh! my post of 10.15 should be competition not completion. The spell check on this MacBook is a tyrant to the political rant!

  56. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:20 am

    Welcome back. Missed your input.

  57. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 10:23 am

    Macbook, eh? I’m impressed.

  58. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 11:06 am

    It’s a heap of junk, Frank. Worse even than Moriarty’s description of Oddball’s Tiger tank in Kelly’s Heroes. I was mis-sold it by a snake oil salesman in PC World.
    Lefties love it for some odd reason; because it’s alternative or progressive. Like the Left it has no delete key.
    It’s going. Very soon.

  59. Noa says:
    October 13, 2015 at 11:53 am

    Redwood on Rose.

    http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2015/10/11/lord-rose-begins-stay-in-campaign-with-threats-and-lies/?utm_content=bufferd64ec&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

  60. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:00 pm

    Criticism and praise of Vladimir Putin needs needs more shading than is allowed by political cartoons:

    “…Putin is an authoritarian. He believes that big problems require the intervention of big government. As such, he has much in common with U.S. President Barack Obama, whose administration is seeking to impose one-size-fits-all solutions to the problems of health care and education, which trample on the rights of religious conscience and parental choice in the name of ideologically driven agendas. Like Obama’s America, Putin’s Russia also has a state-“encouraged” common core curriculum. It is intriguing, however, that three of the major works of the anti-Communist dissident and Nobel Prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn are required reading at all Russian high schools. These three works are the novella “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich,” a harrowing account of the cruelty and barbarism of the Soviet labor camps; “The Gulag Archipelago,” a monumental history of the Soviet prison system and its inherent and endemic injustices; and “Matryona’s House,” a short story about the heroine’s retention of traditional Christian virtue in the face of Communist tyranny.
    …”

    “…Putin cannot be dismissed as a mere reincarnation of the Soviet bogeyman. He inherited a Russia that was economically and morally bankrupt, crippled by the kleptocracy that followed in the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse. He has taken on many of the worst oligarchs, has restored the Russian economy to a position of relative health, and has introduced family and child-friendly policies that have led to a significant increase in birth rates, thereby averting the imminent demographic death of Russia from population implosion. None of this justifies or excuses acts of imperialism on Russia’s borders, but it does demand a more measured approach to our understanding of the Russian president. He is not a saint, and none but a fool would seek to canonize him, but nor is he a tyrant, and none but fools should seek to demonize him.”

    http://www.ibtimes.com/russian-revelations-putting-putin-perspective-1561224

  61. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:37 pm

    NO MORE MR. NICE GUY

    “The clip begins with police officers pushing back German citizens who are preventing the buses from entering the town.

    “You go against your own people, you go in front, we pay your money, our children – their future is ruined – you are ruining this country. Do you have any honor left in your bodies?” says one of the men as the police get more aggressive….”

    http://www.infowars.com/video-irate-germans-attempt-to-block-buses-full-of-migrants/

  62. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:41 pm

    Noa (11:53)

    Good piece by Redwood; excellent assessment of Lord Rose. However, we preempted it yesterday by condensing Mr Redwood’s sentiments about Rose ?into two words: “Fucking twat!!”

    Given Redwood’s backing, you’ll note I’ve added an extra exclamation mark. ☺

    Thanks for the heads up on Macbook. Duly noted. I’ll soldier on with Nexus 7. It’s not without its problems, but I’m now getting used to its intrusive emendations and my middle finger has moulded itself to the shape of my prodder. It still works as a ‘numero uno’ when I need to flip a derisive gesture, albeit now somewhat less emphatically.

  63. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 1:51 pm

    On Monday October 12th, Michael Savage, banned from entry to Britain by a Labour Home Secretary and then a Conservative Home Secretary for being Jewish, recounts his visit to the USS Somerset in Fleet Week.

    Why is it called “USS Somerset”? Tune in the first 10 minutes…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MokOChcz-RQ

  64. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 3:37 pm

    I think that Mr. Cameron of deserving of “!!!”

    “Hate crimes in England and Wales have risen by 18%, Home Office figures have revealed. It comes as Mr Cameron announced that anti-Muslim hate crimes will be recorded as a separate category by all police forces in England and Wales.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34515763

  65. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 3:40 pm

    I think that Mr. Cameron is deserving of a third “!”

    “Hate crimes in England and Wales have risen by 18%, Home Office figures have revealed. It comes as Mr Cameron announced that anti-Muslim hate crimes will be recorded as a separate category by all police forces in England and Wales.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34515763

  66. EC says:
    October 13, 2015 at 3:47 pm

    Why are my comments “awaiting moderation”. Is it because I’m a Macbook Pro user and now, after Noa’s fatwa, considered to be a subversive lefty?

  67. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 4:35 pm

    Pat Condell with one of his best, so far.
    Are you listening Lord Rose of Rose- Tinted Spectacles – how’s that for ‘a leap in the dark’ [feckin’ twat!!!]:

    https://youtu.be/rIcltV7r-nM

  68. Herbert Thornton says:
    October 13, 2015 at 5:38 pm

    Is this a sign of panic in Turkey?

    http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAKCN0S71BF20151013

  69. Frank P says:
    October 13, 2015 at 8:37 pm

    Matt Drudge & Alex Jones in a cross-hand boogie:

    http://americandigest.org/mt-archives/american_studies/matt_drudge_a_rare_interv.php

  70. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 8:45 pm

    Does anyone have any idea if this is based on fact? It sounds like standard New World Order MO:

    http://fortruss.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/fsb-leak-balkanization-of-russia-has-it.html

    (h/t Public Intelligence Blog)

  71. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:01 pm

    Frank P @ 16:35

    First rate, I’m afraid. I thought at one point towards the end Condell was going to call for the recognition of the right to bear arms, and that was certainly the implication of what he said.

    The other implication, which I drew anyway, was that he recognizes that the EU is implementing the New World Order agenda.

    I sent it to a German-American friend of mine in the USA. His response was ‘I started to listen but I am not sure I want to hear it. I will have to have my G&T first’.

    What is to be done?

  72. Malfleur says:
    October 13, 2015 at 9:19 pm

    Herbert Thornton

    ‘We don’t want to fight but by jingo if we do,
    We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men, and got the money too!
    We’ve fought the Bear before and while we’re Britons true
    The Russians shall not have Constantinople.’

    Hm.

    If we had the ships, men and money, and if we didn’t have the New World Order, this might be the moment to reverse the humiliation of 1453. As it is….

  73. Herbert Thornton says:
    October 13, 2015 at 11:32 pm

    Malfleur

    As it is….?

    Reversing the Ottoman takeover of Constantinople may be a Good Idea, but even if Turkey dissolves into anarchy and splits up, I find it hard to believe that Vlad will attempt to annex Constantinople and restore it to Christianity. It sounds as likely as Cameron regaining Calais in order to more effectively prevent Muslim immigration into Britain.

  74. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:19 am

    Colonel Mustard @ 07:29

    Thank you, Colonel, the explanation of the colour black is appreciated, as is your enlargement of the story.

  75. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:26 am

    EC @ 09:23

    Very true, EC, and not only the artists, ‘TV personalities’, other luvvies are guilty here, the foul mouthed singer Church who got endowed with voice that lifted her to a limelight for a while also thinks she can pontificate on everything else. This in itself is questionable. What irritates even more is that the BBC fruitcakes offer her the platform.

  76. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:29 am

    Colonel Mustard @ 07:48

    The American plant you mention, Colonel, Baron cannot stand, she’s so righteous it physically pains to just see her.

  77. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:40 am

    Noa @ 10:15

    What an interesting company you keep, Noa.

    Apart from the two personalities, the rest of what you’v e been saying Baron couldn’t decipher. Could it be a sign of Alzheimer, he wonders?

    Nice of you to visit though, you’re always more than welcome here, but as you may have noticed, some other visitors get a different treatment.

  78. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:06 am

    Malfleur @ 13:00

    Thanks for the link, Malfleur, good piece by a perceptive Joseph Pearce. He got the man in Kremlin well. Not everyone who worked for the KGB or any other institution of the state when the communist thugs were in power was a bastard. The fact Sol backed him (why did Baron forget it?) should carry weight, but it won’t because the great Russian bard turned against the selfish, narcissistic West that ‘cannot be trusted’.

    You recall Baron telling everyone the second most powerful man in NATO since May this year is a Czech general who was a carrying party member, joined the security services two years before before communism imploded in the Republic?

    Has it ever bothered Baron, should it ever worry anyone in the West? Nope. Anyone who was able, ambitious, enjoyed power would have done the same as PP (that’s the general’s initials) or the Mutti, Putin (and there are others of that breed, too).

  79. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:14 am

    EC @ 15:40

    This hate crime business is going to turn Britain into a country of mute informers, EC, afraid to speak out in public, people will listen, grass on those who may object to being bossed about by the officialdom. Sad this.

  80. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:24 am

    Herbert Thornton @ 17:38

    You may have hit on the as yet unnoticed sore of the Syrian conflict, Herbert. On some of the eastern blogs, the talk is about not the Americans, the British but the Turkish F-15s shooting down Russian planes, or at least supplying anti-aircraft gear to anyone who would.

    And you are spot on on Constantinople being in no danger from the Russians.

  81. Malfleur says:
    October 14, 2015 at 3:07 am

    FLIGHT MH-17 – WHO DUNNIT?

    Is this another useful idiot or are we in “who’s-the-useful-idiot-now’ mode?

    http://www.phibetaiota.net/2015/10/breaking-ray-mcgovern-outs-dutch-vassal-state-report-on-mh-17-us-withholding-of-precise-evidence-supporting-russian-claims-of-innocence/
    (h/t Public Intelligence Blog)

    …

    and here, from the Public Intelligence Blog site, is an RT filmed interview with former CIA man, Ray McGovern:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j33tnigYtw8

  82. Malfleur says:
    October 14, 2015 at 3:36 am

    Baron @ 01:14

    Agreed – part of the unfolding policy to divide and rule – how long before hate speech becomes a hate crime?

    What’s wrong with Common Law or did the EU abolish that?

    *****

    http://www.nationalreview.com/article/395200/hate-speech-leads-hate-crimes-ira-straus

  83. Bill Bobbs says:
    October 14, 2015 at 9:17 am

    There’s a great piece about how Obama effectively allied us with Al Qaeda as revenge for his own hurt feelings over his chemical weapons “red line” humiliation in Syria. How did it come to this? Worth a read at: http://john-moloney.blogspot.com/2015/10/russia-spoils-everything.html

  84. Noa says:
    October 14, 2015 at 9:22 am

    Baron, thank you. I’m sorry if my drollery caused incomprehension.
    Due to boredom in retirement I went back to work; earning more as a contractor in the Defence industry than I ever dreamed possible whilst working as a blue chip company employee.
    Unfortunately it has limited my opportunity to engage with those whom I consider to be friends and allies in the great debates.

  85. Fergus Pickering says:
    October 14, 2015 at 9:46 am

    Hands up those who had a Beetle when they were students.

    To a Sinking Volkswagen

    A Volkswagen sinks in tainted ink
    The purple bunny’s been painted pink
    The hare is teetering on the brink
    Of broken limelight square.

    He rings the thing; it starts to sing
    A duckling, suckling teat, goes ping!
    A nettle stings the bunny’s wing;
    The duckling gets no share.

    A shard apart that scarred the heart
    Ripped out the one who passed the start
    And darting past her cart, remarked
    Upon her vacant stare.

    A stare so vast that sticks and lasts;
    She’s passed the post, she’s missed the mast,
    What matters most: what’s passed is past,
    Surrendered into air.
    Hitler are you there?

  86. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:20 am

    Fergus Pickering @ 09:46

    Not bad at all, more than that, Fergus, or whoever you are, so much so the barbarian has copied it into his bank of things worth keeping.

  87. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:35 am

    Noa @ 09:22

    One ought to ensure one has as many eggs in the nest as possible, Noa, the time for a chat with friends will always be there, but it helps if one’s secure financially because when it comes to it’s one’s own eggs that pay the bills.

    Just be careful none of the explosive stuff you deal with does you any harm (only joking).

  88. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:57 am

    Bill Bobbs @ 09:17

    Moloney’s right, Putin cannot win but not only because there isn’t enough ground troops to hold the territory his fighter jets have cleansed, the Iranians are mad enough to furnish the bodies, the Hezbollah, too, could supply thousands.

    He cannot win because the religiously inspired nutters aren’t an easily identified army, no uniform, no nothing that would show them up in a crowd of similarly attired Muslims. The borders are porous, too, many of the ISIL jihadists are already gathering in Turkey, Jordan, neither country would touch them, though for different reasons.

    The best outcome would be to seriously re-draw the jigsaw for the region, but there’s nobody in the international community that would be a moral heavyweight enough to break the Sykes-Picot carving of the place. Not even the Pope, not the current one anyway.

    What Putin may do, however, is find a military man to run Syria, and who knows, may even force Syria and Egypt to join forces. Baron recalls there was support, in Syria anyway, in the early 60s when the pan-Aranbic movement was in vogue, Nasser the leader of it. General, now President Sisi strikes Baron as a man suitable for the job, he has enough men in uniform to clobber the jihadi thugs, and enough courage to tell them to do the clobbering.

  89. Fergus Pickering says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:42 pm

    Baron 10.20
    I love my Golf and although I do not give an SH1 about emissions, I am hacked off that the second hand value has nose dived.

  90. Frank P says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:46 pm

    The shoo-in of Clinton II continued apace last night as the interviewers of and each of her co-canditates gave her an easy ride (as expected, I should add).

    Seems that the FBI have no intention to indict her for the crimes that they have ample evidence already to prove against her. The fix is in.

    The Alinski left gains momentum by the day. It is reflected in the Corbynski phenomenon here. ‘Le Continent’ is already a goner. The electorates on both sides and in the middle are steeped in welfarism. Suck it up folks.

  91. Frank P says:
    October 14, 2015 at 12:47 pm

    … Interviewers of CNN – apologies.

  92. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:34 pm

    Baron
    October 14th, 2015 – 10:35
    Noa @ 09:22
    One ought to ensure one has as many eggs in the nest as possible, Noa, the time for a chat with friends will always be there, but it helps if one’s secure financially because when it comes to it’s one’s own eggs that pay the bills.
    Baron, you are certainly correct about the need to secure oneself financially.
    But alas, a chat with friends will always be there. Most of my dear friends have died, and I miss them and regret the times I said I was too busy to see them.

  93. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:37 pm

    Correction:
    Baron
    October 14th, 2015 – 10:35
    Noa @ 09:22
    the time for a chat with friends will NOT always be there,

  94. Noa says:
    October 14, 2015 at 1:58 pm

    Baron, Anne,

    You are both right, our personal lives are a series of compromises between what we we want and what we need to do. Perhaps that is the root of our ultimate frustration with much of modern politics, where liberal idealism has too long dominated, since the 1900’s and the pragmatism which sustained us until the early 1920’s has taken a back seat.

  95. Frank P says:
    October 14, 2015 at 2:00 pm

    This morning a letter arrived from Anglia Water; the key paragraph is as follows:

    ‘We need to replace your water meter.

    The water meter at your property has been there for some time and needs replacing as it might not be working as well as it should.’

    Needless to say my hackles arose. What are they basing this assertion upon. ‘Might not’ is a somewhat wooly phrase. How did they come to decide on a major project to replace all the water meters in ‘my area’. If the meters have not been working properly – have we all been paying ‘too much’ – or ‘too little’. It cannot possibly be the latter as my water bill is exorbitant. So what’s the scam? Has somebody taken a back-hander from some manufacturer of water meters to supply hundreds of thousands of them to AW punters in the Norfolk region? How will they cover the cost of this except through increased charges?

    With these thoughts in mind I phoned the ‘If you have any questions’ number given, only to find that they the call-centre juvenile had no answers. All he could say is ‘it won’t cost you anything! The company is paying for the exchanges.’ When I asked him whence comes his Company’s revenue – he informed me that he did not know.

    I asked him what manufacturer was supplying the pumps – he did not know.
    I asked him what evidence existed that ‘the meters might not be working properly’. He did not know.

    The latest in a never ending sequence of energy scams? Bet your bollocks on that one. Bastards!

    I shall persevere in order to discover what led to these decisions and cui bono. I suspect Amey’s Army or one of there many associated battalions. I’m still seething over the unnecessary exchange of all the freakin’ lampposts in England.

  96. Radford NG says:
    October 14, 2015 at 2:18 pm

    Today; New Year (al hijra) 1437:and welcome to it.

  97. Radford NG says:
    October 14, 2015 at 2:39 pm

    Cartoon on the muslim invasion of Europe:`The Frog & The Scorpion`.

    http://www.s00.yaplakal.com/pics/pics_original/7/9/6/6177697.jpg

  98. EC says:
    October 14, 2015 at 4:53 pm

    Baron – 10:20

    You have a doggerel bank?

    Fergus Mc Pickering – 12:42

    Those Fokkers at VW, Messrs Schmidt, eh?
    If ye cannae sell it, then there’s nothing else for it but to Stuka it in a Junkers yard, Fergus old bean.

  99. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:13 pm

    Frank P @ 14:00

    You’re rightfully angry, Frank, but it will get you nowhere except to an NHS establishment, if you’re not careful.

    About three or four year ago, Baron had a similar experience with one of the ISPs, TalkTalk, his internet connection was continuously breaking up, it was more than an unpleasantness because he does banking cum little investing over the Net. No telephone calls helped, the barbarian resorted to letters after a visit to a Consumer Advice Bureau.

    He wrote to them, they to him. Fifteen letters altogether. Theirs never came from the man (the woman) who signed the letter Baron was replying to, it was always another Li Pon Dim or Pom Chu Sin (sorry, this doesn’t imply any prejudice, all the letters were signed by Malaysian, Chinese (?) sounding names). They always said they would look into it, asked for more information like ‘how long have been with us’, or ‘any other person using the computer’. Baron answered promptly, but they kept on asking more silly questions, often the same questions they had asked in a letter two or three correspondence steps prior to it.

    In the end, Baron decided to take the ISP to the Small Claim Court. The forms were not as simple as he expected, he had to consult the solicitor’s office, was told the court may not be too sympathetic because it would be hard to prove he had been fobbed off intentionally. The barbarian gave up, learnt months later the ISP was in a major switchover from one system to another, hence the breakdown in connections.

    That is, sadly, the world we live in.

  100. EC says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:13 pm

    Noa – 11:06

    If you’re currently “resting between engagements”, then you should be able to find enough time to RTFM in order to find out about spelling, and also to find out about where the feckin’ “delete” key is and deleting text etc.

    You’re obviously suffering from “Ctrl Alt Del” withdrawal syndrome. Don’t worry, with a Mac you’ll never have the need to hit those keys every five minutes in order to “reboot the damn thing”. Those days are gone for good. 🙂

    I could always drop by, risking life & limb crossing “injun” territory, with a big stick if that would help. Five minutes and you’d never look back. Either that or you’d never play the piano again. However, if you insist on returning to the dark side then after your recent contract you should feel no pain with parting with the Annual Windows Tax – antivirus subscription. Also you’ll be used to the s-l-o-w performance, rebooting every 5 mins, and the BSOD (Blue/Black Screen of Death) often requiring pulling the plug out of the wall.

    Alternatively, I have a very nice Amstrad 1640, running MSDos V6 and Windows 3.1, which I could swap for that nice new Macbook. 🙂 Say what you like about Lord (my arse!) Sugar, that Amstrad was the best, most trouble free, PC that I ever owned or used.

    MS Windows NEVER seems to get any better. Some corporates are STILL running XT Pro because the later offerings were/are so dire! (W7 a slight improvement)
    I still have the “privilege” of maintaining my wife’s and daughter’s laptops, W8.1 & W10 respectively. Both high spec. laptops & <= 18 months old. It's nearly a full time job! (Unfortunately Mrs EC still needs de Windoze laptop PC for de GuvMint Quango contracts dontcha know.)
    Windows? Never again!

    Good luck, Noa, and never forget the contractor's motto, "Carpe Jugulum" or "Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre" depending upon the, cough, nature of the work in hand!

  101. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:23 pm

    EC @ 16:53

    He wouldn’t call it a diggers bank, EC, it’s just a file on his gadget where he keeps stuff he likes, everything from single words to quotes, witty remarks, short stories. He has to, the memory really isn’t up to it anymore.

    Here’s a taster he picked God only knows where, it may have been on this blog: “Empathy is like overindulgence in cakes, feels good when one’s at it, kills in the long run”. Quite fitting for the Germans’ empathy towards the worshippers of Allah, don’t you think?

  102. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:33 pm

    Fergus Pickering @ 09:46

    It may be asking too much, Fergus, but have you ever heard of a man called Ivan Blatny? A poet, born in the same neck of the woods as Baron, but earlier, left the mother country in 1948, came to Britain, spent most of the time here in psychiatric wards not because he was mad (close to it though, he engaged in onanism, wasn’t the only one, it seems it was in the vogue before the war, he kept it going after it), but because he had lodgings, meals for free, had no need for a job. Today, he would be classed as a scrounger, soon after the setting up of the NHS he was tolerated, almost encouraged.

    Baron’s reading a book about him, it’s not in English unfortunately, some of the poems are true gems, impossible to translate however, but you would appreciate them.

  103. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:40 pm

    EC @ 18:13

    Your knowledge of the gadgetry more than amazes, EC.

  104. EC says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:44 pm

    Frank P – 14:00

    As you know, the EC’s got a new water meter about a year ago. We seem to be using more water now than previously. The cost hereabouts of asking for a water meter check is £80!!! [The “smart” Gas & Electric meters are also a cause for concern.]

  105. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:46 pm

    Radford NG @ 14:39

    A good one, Radford.

    Why hasn’t anyone transferred any such cartoons to a T-shirt? It could sell. The Americans are much better at it, as are the Russians. Baron is an owner of a T-shirt, which has the KGB colonel picture, some three inches square, he’s wearing the KGB hat. Baron wore it once to a gathering of a club he’s a member of. Nobody recognised him, not one single person, the guess was mostly the latest Bond guy (the name escapes Baron). So much for the colonel’s fame.

  106. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 6:54 pm

    A news item on the Classic FM:

    “The Navy intercepted a boatload of people off the South coast of England today, the boat was not heading to, but away from the UK, towards the continent, was loaded with white indigenous Brits, all pensioners.

    When asked what they were up to they said they were trying to get to the ME so as to be able to return to the UK as immigrants, be entitled to more benefits than they were receiving as British pensioners who have paid NI contributions thought their working life”.

    Baron’s booked on the next boat, anyone to join him?

    The barbarian has made it up, of course, the hint came from an email from one of his American friends.

  107. David Ossitt says:
    October 14, 2015 at 7:20 pm

    Our local BBC Newsreaders are yet again wringing their hands in mock concern for a family from Bradford-Istan, mum dad and five children leaving home to join ISIS.

    All of the neighbours are saying what a terrible shock that such a lovely family are now on their way to join the Caliphate.

    But with the street full of close family members next door across the street and with a brother of one having done a similar move a short time ago, why are we surprised, I am not.

    I would love it if the entire street joined them in their search for a better life.

  108. Noa says:
    October 14, 2015 at 8:43 pm

    EC

    ROTFLMFAO!
    “Carpe Jugulum” or “Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre” indeed!
    To which I would add “My bill is my bond”.

    But still, If Stevie Jobsworth’s crap is a good as you plead, why is there no fecking delete key, just the backspace?
    BTW I’ver never had any serious problems with MS Orifice.

  109. Noa says:
    October 14, 2015 at 9:05 pm

    David Ossitt

    “I would love it if the entire street joined them in their search for a better life.”

    Indeed the entire town would be better for a mass departure to the cheap property hotspots of Homs and Aleppo.

  110. Herbert Thornton says:
    October 14, 2015 at 9:40 pm

    Turkey was once described as The Sick Man of Europe. It seems to me that Turkey has reached that condition again –

    http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/10/opinions/cagaptay-turkey-political-crisis/index.html

    The only thing in the article that I feel is a bit inaccurate is the claim in the following paragraph that 9/11 “drew the United States together”.

    ““……. Turkey has to fear itself as much as anything else. Unlike 9/11, which drew the United States together, the Ankara attack is likely to leave Turkey divided.”

    So far as 9/11 is concerned, it seems to me that the claim that 9/11 “…. drew the United States together” has been very much exaggerated – just as are claims that the beheading of a British soldier on a busy London street in broad daylight “drew the British population together”.

    In fact far too many people living in Britain and the US – to be more exact, the poisonous mixture of the media, the main political parties and the Establishment, with their devotion to Political Correctness and Liberalism, and their insistence that Islam must be appeased no matter what – continue to shrug their shoulders, and even believe that such atrocities are “understandable”.

    I don’t believe that Vlad has the slightest wish to invade Turkey, but if Turkey does descend into civil war, I hope Russian policy will be to actively support Turkish secularism.

    What, Baron, do you think?

  111. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:37 pm

    Herbert Thornton @ 21:40

    You’re right, Herbert, Turkey has indeed reached a crossroads, but Baron’s knowledge of the country is next to nothing, even though he talks often and in detail to a number of Turks (one has just returned from the country, will not say much, but is a supporter of Erdogan, the other five cannot stand the PM, take him to be a dictator).

    All Baron could get from them is that the urban population, the army, the judiciary, the civil service (and the Kurds to a man) are against Erdogan, the countryside very much for, but this has been bleeding obvious for years.

    Re your point of Russia getting involved in Turkish affairs if a civil war broke out: More than unlikely, Herbert. Putin has neither the money, nor the desire to interfere (Baron’s guess). Turkey is a NATO country, a sizeable one, its armed personnel ranks second in the alliance. More to the point, the Americans would very likely go loopy if the KGB colonel even hinted to get involved.

    They, the Americans, wouldn’t probably mind if Erdogan experiment with islamising the country were to come to an end. Giving their handling of other ‘Arab Springs’, the country would probably mirror what happened in other countries they’ve messed up. God forbid, the flow of refugees would not be numbered in millions, but ten of millions if that were to happen.

    But this you may find of interest, the barbarian has put it together for you, it comes from a variety of sources, all ME local:

    The Americans are withdrawing Patriot rockets from Turkey, a big blow to Erdogan. During his recent visit to Brussels, the Turkish PM lobbied strongly for a no-fly zone over Syria. The EU refused point blank, the Mutti reiterated very powerfully her refusal for Turkey to join the EU.

    The local ME observers are suggesting Russia and the US did find a common language on some issues, the Americans are apparently supplying weapons and ammunition only to the Kurds (YPG) in the north east for the Kurdish final ground push in Rakka.

    The danger to Turkey from the US/Russian partial realignment of policies is in that the Iraqi ‘Kurdistan’ will absorb Turkish Kurdish lands under the patronage of both the US and Russia. The test of the fear is the town of Jarabulus now controlled by ISIL, bombed by Russian fighter jets, which the Kurdish YPG with the help of the Iranian forces may well re-take, soon, and with it a chunk of the Aleppo region (google maps may be helpful here).

    Turkey holds the equivalent of our Parliament elections on November 1. Some 15% of Erdogan’s Islamic party, the AKP, are apparently backing ISIL, some openly. Orhan Pamuk, the Turkish Nobel prize winner is warning Turkey may turn into ‘Pakistan on Europe’s southern border’. A sick country indeed.

    and also this for the military connoisseurs:

    The Russian and American planes meet, but neither side is threatening the other. Let’s hope it stays that way, and Putin doesn’t linger on for too long, does the job, the n buggers off.

    http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/World/2015/Oct-13/318786-us-russia-jets-came-within-visual-range-over-syria-us-military.ashx

  112. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:45 pm

    And another thing, Herbert:

    The Turkish military are saying they know the identities of the two bombers, their names have been released, both have connections to ISIL in Syria. The farther of one of the alleged suspects apparently warned the authorities of his son, wanted them to arrest him.

    Weird as it may seem, the Turkish police also arrested two men who apparently tweeted a day before the bombs went off that a massacre is in the pipeline. They are trying to find out whether the two were linked just to the two bombers, or to the ISIL thuggery.

  113. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:57 pm

    Just been listening to Radio 3’s ‘Free Thinking’ (aka Far From Free Thinking) with Phillip Dodd giving a Kissinger biographer an obviously very partisan hard time. Looked up Dodd and his Wiki entry reveals just the kind of slippery lefty creature the BBC love to peddle as ‘impartial’. Ha!

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Dodd_(broadcaster)

    Yentob protégé. He appears to be one of that clamorous throng of nation denying lefties who presumes to define what English birthright identity should mean.

  114. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 10:58 pm

    Noa @ 20:43

    They are all peddling crap, Noa. What Baron is waiting for is a company that will come up with a simple machine, none of the hundreds of features one never uses clogging up the circuitry.

    You remember when the calculator madness took hold of the industry, one could do on a calculator virtually everything, including brewing a cuppa (well, not really), because they could milk the technology, adding bits, charging a fortune for it. Then, they realised that what the vast majority of people needed (and could learn, comprehend) most of the time was just the four basic functions, began making simple calculators, soon the gadget was a giveaway.

    Some clever Korean of Taiwanese chap may just figure this, begin to make a PC that does again what the vast majority of us needs, will make a fortune, then the box will again be sold for next to nothing. Baron reckons he uses a fraction of his machine can do, and he doesn’t even know what it is it can do.

    Mad world this.

  115. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 11:07 pm

    Colonel Mustard @ 22:57

    The man has helped to shape New Labour’s Cool Britannia rebranding of the the country, Colonel, that’s what it says in his Wiki entry, what else needs to be said?

    Your heart beat is of no concern for you?

  116. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 11:46 pm

    David Ossitt @ 19:20

    It must have been towards the end of last century, Baron left a restaurant in a big central European city, spotted a young man with a large rucksack rummaging in a large street bin. It was after midday. As Baron passed, the man said quite loudly ‘shit’, pulled his hand out, it was covered in some gluey stuff. Almost instinctively, Baron said to him ‘how about wearing gloves’.

    It turned out he was in Chechnya, had no money, was waiting for a friend from Britain to come and rescue him. He didn’t asked for money, Baron offered the equivalent of two quid (the exchange rate was well over 50 of the local currency for a pound, it would buy a decent lunch, Baron felt like a filthily rich banker these days in that neck of the woods). He accepted, was thankful.

    What he did in Chechnya Baron cannot say, he’s either forgotten, or didn’t ask, but Chechnya it was he was coming from. Baron cannot say if he looked like a follower of Allah either, his English was, as far Baron can remember, perfect.

    The point of the story is, he may have gone there to fight, to see a friend, to help to re-built the devastated country, who knows. He may not have been the only one, there may have been other British nationals who went.

    Did anyone in Britain cared about people leaving the country for Chechnya? Baron doesn’t remember for sure, but it’s unlikely. So why are we so concerned about people leaving for Syria today?

    One can pity those who pack up and go. Baron must confess, he almost feels for them, their desire to help fellow Muslims suffering from the thuggery of their co-religionists could be what makes them go. They go knowing they will face danger, perhaps mortal danger, yet they must feel it’s their duty to help.

    If, however, they leave this country because they sympathise with the ISIL thuggery, with its aim of the Caliphate, sharia or whatever, one should feel no pity for them, we should be glad they’re gone.

    Either way, this mawkish concern is misplaced, they are grown ups, they must have thought it through, we should accept their decision.

  117. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 11:48 pm

    And lastly, apologies for the errors in all Baron’s postings todat.

  118. Baron says:
    October 14, 2015 at 11:49 pm

    TODAY, should be the last word at 23.48, sorry.

  119. EC says:
    October 15, 2015 at 12:05 am

    Noa – 20:43

    Hi Noa,

    On the Full Size Mac keyboards there is the traditional forward deleting DEL key as well as the Backspace key. On Macbook Pro keyboards, if it is really required, the DEL key function is achieved by fn + Backspace. I find it quicker to highlight the text to be deleted and hit Backspace. You can use a PC mouse on a Mac if you find that easier, or feel the urge to ‘Right Click’ (you can do that with the Mac ones too)

    I find that the Screens are really very, very ropey on PC laptops as compared to Big Macs & Macbook Pros. This is very important to me as I do a lot of photography now. Also, the Touchpads on Macbooks are far superior and easier to use than the cheap rubbish installed on most PC laptops.

    The main problem with Windows (any version) is that it is such a bag of shit that it spends most of its time downloading and configuring updates/fixes – on an almost daily basis! Also, you can’t run ’em (for long) without anti-virus software, and they grind to a halt if you you do. [I reckon that Apple must’ve hired some MS people as iTunes is becoming a bit of a PITA with updates now coming too frequently – but it is nothing like as bad as the Windiz problem.]

    Having grappled for many years with the differences between mainframe keyboards, and then UK, German, French and US (with Dutch mapping) PC keyboards, I find that in my dribbling dotage I prefer the relative sanity and serenity of using the Mac layout.
    Good luck, and may the farce be with you!

    More importantly, WTF has being going on down in Thanet, Noa? Is this a prelude to another “Der Untergang” mashup?

  120. EC says:
    October 15, 2015 at 12:09 am

    Baron – 22:58

    Lord, formerly Al, Sugar gave us the Amstrad 1640. That’s all a chap ever required. Seriously.

  121. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 2:55 am

    Another cerebral gem from Richard Fernandez, over at The Belmont Club:

    http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2015/10/12/vladimirs-game/

    I’ve always been fascinated by the behaviour of birds and their apparent telepathic senses particular when flocking and flying in unison. It’s one of the reasons I moved back to the county of my maternal forebears where the phenomenon is present in abundance. I have seen similarities in the behaviour of homo sapiens sapiens throughout my life, particularly as regards crowd control and mobbery generally, so Richard’s metaphorical musing in this essay strikes a chord with me. Baron will no doubt opine on Richard’s evaluation of the vulture Vladimir and the blackbird Barack and EC will enjoy the video clip attached to the article as an accomplished twitcher-photographer.

    The comments following the article are pretty sagacious too. Worth your time Wallsters.

  122. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 3:12 am

    … and another word for the Wall’s lexicon … ‘murmuration’.

  123. Chris Morriss says:
    October 15, 2015 at 8:25 am

    Frank P at 02:55 (Obviously not in the UK!)

    Thanks for the link to that US site. An intelligent, but simple to understand article that UK political journalism could learn from.

  124. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 15, 2015 at 8:26 am

    Baron October 14th, 2015 – 23:07

    I found it interesting. Dodd was peddling all the usual presumptive communist-socialist conventions and myths about US foreign policy and instead of challenging those the biographer was attempting to defend Kissinger in the context of a tacit acceptance of those alternative realities.

    Thus the US were the aggressor, supporting a corrupt, repressive regime and the real aggressor, communist North Vietnam, was entirely let off from the same assessment of corrupt, repressive criteria. Dodd’s critical view was in one direction, presuming that insurgency in South Vietnam represented a popular struggle and casting North Vietnam, a totalitarian communist aggressor infiltrating troops, weapons and trouble makers into the South, as liberator. It is that old presumption that a communist-socialist minority, prepared to use any means to secure power, somehow represents the “will of the people”.

    Dodd and his lefty, Grosvenor Square inspired ilk tut tut and finger wag at the US whilst ignoring the realities of regimes under Ho, Mao and Pol Pot. Dodd was even peddling that newly minted communist-socialist myth that the Cold War was a US invention and the dear old Soviet Union was benign with no intention or capability to harm anyone.

    The creation of that alternative reality, the manipulation of language and a surrender to its deceits with merely a defensive, delaying posture, is a meme for the advance of the communist-socialist left in the West. The extent to which the left wing in the West has facilitated, aided and abetted the activities of some of the most corrupt, repressive and aggressive communist regimes passes invisible whilst the presumptions abound. In fact throughout the period under discussion Ho and Mao were vociferous about exporting armed “revolution” across SE Asia. That aggression and subversion of national sovereignties can only be justified or conveniently swept under the carpet by dyed in the wool socialist revolutionaries who believe in the Comintern.

    The enemy is hidden in plain sight. Most of the so-called right still seem to believe they are in some kind of gentlemanly debate rather than up against extremists who will deploy any means to secure total power. You’d think the spitting in Manchester and Corbyn’s dismissal of it whilst other Labourites attempted to justify it might have given a clue about the true nature of their enemy. And the true nature is that loony mob not the facade that appears to “play the game”.

  125. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 9:34 am

    Frank P @ 02:55

    Both the link and the new word that reminds Baron of starting a car with the use of a handle are appreciated, Frank.

  126. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 9:37 am

    EC @ 00:09

    If memory serves, Baron’s son was an owner of this Amstrad box, for rid of it bought a Toshiba. The latter is still in the loft somewhere, if he locates it he’ll let you know what sort of gadget it is.

  127. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 9:39 am

    Colonel Mustard @ 08:26

    If Baron may, he’ll come come to your interesting polemic when the time allows .

  128. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 10:30 am

    Colonel Mustard (08:26)

    Thanks for that illuminating critique; very interesting and a wonderful antidote to the current tsunami of agitprop washing inland on both sides of the Atlantic. I’ve been trying to coin a word or phrase that is the antonym of agitprop; that could encapsulate your coruscating little essays. I know the Russki’s ‘Samizdat’ more or less fills the bill, but an English version?

    I could find only one antonym by surfing: ‘TRUTH’. Excellent, but we still need one to personalise Mustard’s counter-narrative to the bullshit brigade. Suggestions?

  129. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 10:39 am

    Chris Morriss (08:25)

    (“Obviously not in the UK).

    Correction – an insomniac old fart whose exponential list of clinical conditions and probably his conscience – the two may be not unconnected (sic) – keeps him awake o’nights.

  130. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 11:02 am

    Uh-O! Take an extra heart pill before you read this one, my Baronial buddy:

    http://alexanderboot.com/content/throwing-buk-putin

    You will have to at least admit the pun is good, non? 😉

  131. EC says:
    October 15, 2015 at 11:06 am

    Big Climate Murmuration requires 100% compliance!

    http://www.steynonline.com/7231/chance-of-precipitating-the-end-of-your-career-97

  132. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 15, 2015 at 11:08 am

    Karl Andree the pensioner threatened with nearly 400 lashes is a bloody Birk and I have no sympathy for him. He has chosen to live in a barbaric country for very many years and must surely know the law (if it can be called that) in that shithole called Saudi Arabia. Even the moslem scum that swarm into our country and other European lands show no real interest in migrating to that place. We should gather them all up and fly them over to Saudi and parachute them down. That surely is the humane answer 🙂

  133. Malfleur says:
    October 15, 2015 at 12:04 pm

    Frank P @ 11.02

    “Washington’s story makes no sense whatsoever. Only an idiot could believe it.”

    But a useful one.

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-14/paul-craig-roberts-mh-17-report-only-idiot-would-believe-it

  134. telemachus says:
    October 15, 2015 at 1:34 pm

    In the spirit of reason I have to say that it may not be correct to paint the world in black and white terms

    Much has been written about Vietnam and its relation to the politics of Left and Right or the politics of East and West

    In truth, as Kissinger came to realise, it was a simple question of a people aggrieved and wishing self determination

    France latterly needed Empire to bolster its sense of national worthiness, and particularly to restore French pride injured by Germany’s defeat of France back in 1871. The French in Vietnam established monopolies which ground down the people. In 1908, Vietnamese farmers responded to a rise in taxes by marching to the French administration headquarters. For weeks, thousands of peasants picketed the governor’s office in Hue and made passionate pleas for justice. The protest spread, and the French countered with ferocity. Demonstrators were gunned down. Whole villages were razed to the ground. Thousands were arrested, and two Vietnamese scholars who had spoken against French policies were executed

    This the 1908 massacre led to deep seated grievance which resurfaced when the Japanese were slung out in 1945

    Those in the South by and large were supine to the re-establishment of French rule while the North instituted an armed struggle to throw off the colonial yoke, leading to an independence war which culminated in the final battle at Dien Bien Phu – where the French were defeated

    The subsequent Geneva Conference splitting Vietnam was sticking plaster thwarting the desires of the Vietnamese people in the South to be free pending elections

    The time for the elections came and went, as the South egged on by America refused to participate – and they were backed by the US

    Then typically the US waded in with 2 left feet on the grounds that – it needed democracy to be upheld- The subsequent Bush Iraq doctrine

    And look where that has landed us

  135. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 2:44 pm

    More agitprop dribbling down The Wall from the ‘absent’ spurt. As it has already been treated with a preemptive coat of impervious Truth by our counter-counter culture warrior, Colonel M; it is probably sufficient to let the sunlight do it’s job.

    In other words: Fuck off windowlicker!

  136. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 5:39 pm

    Colonel Mustard @ 08:26

    On your bollocking the BBC fruitcake, Colonel, Baron has nothing to say except ‘bravo’, you’re spot on, he behaved as one would expect a BBC man to behave – badly.

    Neither has Baron anything to add to your dissection of the evil communist regimes in China, Vietnam, you may have added the Soviet variety, too, the whole lot was evil, sans humanity, rotten to the core.

    On the issue of the Cold War, the barbarian’s take may differ slightly from yours (as if it mattered).

    Being a simplistic man, Baron reckons that since WW2, it was the H-bomb that has reigned supreme and singlehanded in international relations, it was this awesome power, unimaginable until Hiroshima, that underpinned the behaviour of both the West, the Soviet Empire and anyone else in between.

    The argument that (say) Europe has been peaceful until now is because of the EU, NATO, the presence of the American military within its borders or whatever doesn’t convince Baron. He reckons it was the reality of the nuclear deterrent that did it, the MAD doctrine was the peacekeeper, still is.

    It would have been the same if NATO never existed, only some of the countries that are members today were to have the bomb, then peace in Europe would have been assured, too. If only the US and the Soviet Union were to have even a much smaller number of the grotesquely injurious devices, the other countries were to ally with either power, there would have been no wars amongst the two camps either.

    And here is the core of what the poorly educated Slav reckons the West got so spectacularly wrong about the Soviet Union. (In so far as Baron’s theory stands to scrutiny by the Popper’s falsifiability test, about the Federal Russia of today, too).

    When the communist thugs were in governance, the danger from them to the West wasn’t of military nature. They would have never deliberately started anything that would have provoked the West to also go for a military response. Never, ever. Baron has argued this since he came to Britain with anyone who was interested, and who would listen. Whether he was right, we’ll never know, the evil regime imploded, but the manner of the implosion, it was a matter of days, it was a Full Monty of an implosion, it got accepted by the rulers (with few exceptions), and the ruled ones both in Russia and the East European satellites, should tell you what the underpinning strength of the communist regime must have been – insignificant, minimal, unstable.

    The communist approach to conquering the West, the recipe for luring peoples into their evil arms, the manner of taking over anywhere ‘suitable’ had always been that of subverting the target from within – sabotaging, undermining, contaminating any non-communist entity with the virulent Marxist claptrap or its derivatives. Any country, big or small, would do. They’ve been the greatest opportunists ever.

    Even if fighting erupted somewhere around the world (Africa, Indonesia, South America), the hand of the Soviet Union in it was clear and unambiguous, it was never a direct involvement by the Soviet military, only advisors or proxies were deployed.

    Baron often puzzled, both when he lived over there, and also here, why did the West got it so astonishingly wrong. In the end he figured it happened because there was no money in the barbarian’s slicing of the danger, no much of employment either to accept Baron’s view of the communist menace. Those who benefited when the WW2 was on had no desire to forfeit the juicy profits, the politicians needed people in jobs, the unemployed are unlikely to vote them in.

    Just look at Saudi Arabia, a monster dictatorship, but we stomach it because they buy a lot of military gear from us, it keeps employment higher than it would have been if we cut them off, it boosts the bottom line of the makers, many pension funds hold their shares, the whole country gets to benefit from it.

    Please, nobody even think telling the barbarian ‘ah, but what about Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968 …. ‘

    That’s different, every single use of naked military power by the Soviets was within the sphere of their influence rubber-stamped by the West by the end of WW2. Example (it’s on record): Few days before the Soviet tanks rolled into Prague, Dobrynin (Soviet Ambassador to Washington) paid a visit to Johnson, told him in few sentences the Kremlin were going to invade the piddly country of their westerly Slav neighbours, the invasion would not breach the sovereignty of any NATO country. Johnson thanked him, told him the US will publicly condemn it, but will not interfere, asked whether he would like some refreshment. This took barely five minutes, but they spent almost an hour talking about everything, but the forthcoming invasion.

    Apart from the three breaches of sovereignty in Europe though military invasion, there also is the little matter of Nikita’s Cuban fiasco, but that was merely a change in the geographical placement of military gear, no country was invaded, or even threatened with an invasion.

    There may come a time Baron will bore you explaining why he thought, still thinks the Soviets would have never used its military to start something that would displeased the Americans. And it’s not only because it would have been sheer madness to do so. The Americans were, still are militarily by far superior to the Soviet Union, Putin’s Russia.

    All in all, Baron reckons the Cold War with its trappings of weaponry galore, or rather the way it was sold and implemented both here and there, was a luxury neither side could really afford. It bankrupted the Soviet Union, it burdened the good USofA, the massive debt pile will be hard to service when the cost of money goes up as it must because if interest rates were to remain as low as they’ve been for the last seven years or so it would mean nobody would save, and savings equals investment. There can bee no future for any regime, sovereign entity or culture, without investment.

    The tendency towards the Cold War over-indulgence in military spending hasn’t disappeared neither here nor in Putin’s Russia. It’s madness. Just look at Bill’s example of it below. If it caries on, even the mighty America will fold up.

    Apologies for the long rant, Colonel, but if anyone feels putting Baron’s theory to the test, go ahead.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HrKnF0dwqQ&feature=youtu.be

  137. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 6:04 pm

    EC @ 11:06

    The great Mark is of course great again, EC, but the damage has ben done, the cancer of the AGW has gone beyond the seeding stage, the politicians will not let go, every failure of policy is going to be blamed on global warming.

    You recall the BoE’s Governor telling financiers global warming is going to mess things financial, next in the line will be Jeffrey in the Treasury saying ‘our policies would have worked but for global warming’, the cumryd, too, may get on the act blaming GW for not being able to deliver fried chicken to every household daily …. there’s no end to what the GW is or will be responsible for.

  138. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 6:15 pm

    Frank P @ 11:02

    What would the barbarian need a pill for, Frank?

    It’s utterly unnecessary to go into any details, just an answer to one question by the omni-all Mr. Boot will do – cui bono?

    Amazing, is it not, that he, so deeply versed in Latin, antiquity, Roman philosophy and all the other credentials of our contemporary breed of the overeducated village idiots, has never answered it.

  139. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 6:17 pm

    Malfleur @ 12:04

    Mr. Boot believes it, Malfleur, and one would certainly not call him just plain idiot, some qualifying adjectives are needed, no?

  140. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 6:24 pm

    The bloody errors again, sorry.

  141. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 6:48 pm

    Here’s something completely different, please pay attention, it’s worth it.

    A new book is out by the man Baron admires way above alot, a book that should also please all of you because it echoes what you’ve all admired, lived through, valued but no longer find in this country of yours.

    It’s ‘The Road to Little Dribbling’ by Bill Bryson. Superbly constructed diary of his travels from the South up to the North, wittily written, with nuggets you may not know (you may know the Mount Everest was named after George Everest, but did you know that he ….).

    The book is, in a word, ineffable.

    If you cannot splash out the twenty quid or so, please, please borrow it from the library, your reading it will put a smile on your face, it will tell you that you’re not alone weeping over the lost way of life, but the weeping will, if anything, embolden you to fight even more for what’s left.

    The first chapter “Bugger Bognor’ tells a story of George V. Once he fell ill, his doctor suggested he should spend time at Bognor, he did, recovered, returned to his duties. Six years later, he was once more confined to bed, the same physician comforted him ‘soon, your majesty, you’re be up your feet again, and will be able to go to Bognor once more’. To which the ailing monarch replied: ‘Bugger Bognor’, and passed away.

    This short summary does no justice to the full story in the book, but it gives you the flavour of what to expect.

    Why don’t we drop Fry as the National Treasure, elevate Bryson to the pedestal?

  142. Frank P says:
    October 15, 2015 at 8:19 pm

    A little history that will not be taught in Britain, even in the new Grammar School at Sevenoaks:

    http://www.everyjoe.com/2015/10/14/lifestyle/know-your-history-mohammedanism/#1

  143. Baron says:
    October 15, 2015 at 11:56 pm

    Senator McCain making a prediction, and getting offended by a journalist, in 2013:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jo9Nmeyz5lo

  144. Malfleur says:
    October 15, 2015 at 11:59 pm

    “I’m “really good at killing people” Barack Hussein Obama
    *****

    Drone wars (h/t Drudge Report):

    “The Intercept has obtained a cache of secret documents detailing the inner workings of the U.S. military’s assassination program in Afghanistan, Yemen, and Somalia. The documents, provided by a whistleblower, offer an unprecedented glimpse into Obama’s drone wars.”

    https://theintercept.com/drone-papers

  145. Malfleur says:
    October 16, 2015 at 12:12 am

    Baron @ 23:56

    Vladimir Putin speaking on United States foreign policy four years ago followed your link on McCain:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=932K6tZ5Ea4

  146. Baron says:
    October 16, 2015 at 12:21 am

    Malfleur @ 00:12

    Thanks, Malfleur, it was missed by the barbarian.

    Here’s something for you to savour, Cuban troops are apparently on the ground in Syria fighting a proxy war on behalf of Russia (old habits die hard, it would seem, but how does this square with the honorary Muslim offering an olive branch to the Castro’s children?. Still, the fast speaking Fox guy knows it all, and he’s backing Mr. Boot to the hilt. My, my.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIAbMQY08DI

  147. Malfleur says:
    October 16, 2015 at 12:22 am

    Drone Wars – footnote to my post at 23:59

    “The reason these articles are so important, is not because they are based on intel leaked by an additional whistleblower (i.e., not Snowden), but because you can’t read the information without concluding quite simply that the U.S. empire is completely and totally out of control…. ”

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-15/new-snowden-reveals-obamas-secret-drone-assassination-program

  148. Baron says:
    October 16, 2015 at 12:48 am

    Not many of you ever visit the rag that was our birthplace, this piece by Rod you may enjoy, however, together with some of the postings below it.

    http://new.spectator.co.uk/2015/10/what-the-great-british-bake-off-really-says-about-britain/

  149. Baron says:
    October 16, 2015 at 12:59 am

    Malfleur @ 23:59

    If the report is to be believed, Malfleur, the drone strikes kill more innocent people than those targeted by them, by a ratio of almost 7 to 1. That’s awful, even though Baron cannot say he dislikes the idea of specific assassinations of our enemies. Often one cannot bring them to court, and if one can give them the due process the ‘uman right’ statutes let them off.

  150. Malfleur says:
    October 16, 2015 at 2:48 am

    The critics of Putin would be better employed analysing the bolsheviks in the US Federal government who are setting up the US NKVD:

    http://www.infowars.com/doj-creates-domestic-terrorism-division-previously-labeled-libertarians-conservatives-domestic-extremists/

  151. EC says:
    October 16, 2015 at 10:04 am

    Malfleur – 00:12

    Excellent link, some revealing thoughts and great quotes in there!
    Thanks.

  152. Malfleur says:
    October 16, 2015 at 1:19 pm

    “Refugee Crisis: Czech doctor describes conditions in German hospital”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAOJ2OJfEpY

  153. Baron says:
    October 16, 2015 at 4:30 pm

    To fill the lull in postings you may like to scan the link below. It’s published by a deadly anti-Putin Ukrainian blog, but the source is a Russian Moscow based blogger (the Russian original can be seen at the left side of the bottom of the translation). Baron is posting it to show you that opposition to Vlad is everything but non-existent in Russia.

    http://euromaidanpress.com/2014/07/26/balashov-putin-will-kill-tens-of-thousands/

  154. Baron says:
    October 16, 2015 at 7:18 pm

    Malfleur, it seems this blog’s just for the two of us. Here’s a piece by someone in a poetic mood in serious competition to Fergus’s muse, it comes from the Gates of Vienna:

    The scent of faeces on an autumn morning/Puddles of urine in a sunny street/Your hand in mine as we flee from the riot/An iPhone in the hand of everyone we meet.

    And if that isn’t enough to get the troops out of their caves, would a chance to bid for Mutti’s conscience do it?

    http://www.ebay.de/itm/Verkaufe-Gewissen-von-Angela-Merkel-absolut-rein-da-kaum-verwendet-/301760997432?hash=item46425b6838

  155. telemachus says:
    October 16, 2015 at 8:26 pm

    James Delingpole is a hero to some

    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/oct/15/propaganda-trumps-journalism-in-conservative-media-climate-reporting

  156. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 16, 2015 at 8:46 pm

    Baron and Malfleur: Just to introduce a trivial subject into your far more intellectual postings, I’m writing about the BBC TV1 adverts for a new serial they are starting this coming Monday. It is called “Cops” and the trailers shows various policemen and women in action. They are mainly good-looking, agile and appear intelligent. Quite the opposite, in fact, of the various police chiefs who have been polluting our TV screens with their inane comments and cretin-like faces. I don’t know who are less photogenic, the police or the politicians!

  157. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 16, 2015 at 9:37 pm

    Whilst I’m having a rant about BBC 1 TV, I must mention the terrible advert “If You Love Something Let It Show” There is a most sinister man leering into the camera, positively in a threatening manner. This is followed by a group of young women dancing in a manic fashion, dresses flying in the air and most unedifying. Finally we are shown a couple dancing in an old time manner, the woman with a sickly smile on her face and altogether most definitely not Strictly Come Dancing.

  158. Colonel Mustard says:
    October 16, 2015 at 10:34 pm

    telemachus is trolling again. His latest dog turd is just a deliberate provocation.

    BAN HIM.

  159. Radford NG says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:58 am

    16th March 1555 (460 years ago).
    Masters Latimer and Ridley burnt at the stake.

    Churchill wrote that more men were burnt at the stake in the five years of Mary’s reign then in the whole of Elizabeth’s.

    Under Elizabeth they were only burnt for being enemy agents and/or encompassing the death of the Queen….To begin with Catholic priests were given about two months’ grace to leave the country….Both Elizabeth’s Music Masters (Tallis and Byrd) were Catholics.

    http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/latimer-and-ridley-burned-stake

  160. telemachus says:
    October 17, 2015 at 7:39 am

    Byrd was certainly a Catholic and fined on multiple occasions for being a recusant
    Thomas Tallis is much more interesting
    His patron The Duke of Norfolk, like the rest of the Howard family, was certainly a Catholic (and indeed The Duke was executed for this & treason). Thomas although born into a Catholic family was Chief Composer for The Church of England
    The magnificent Spem in alium was allowed to be wriiten in latin as a direct challenge to the Catholic 40 part motet of Striggio (Ecce beatum lautum)

    Spem in alium is undoubtedly the single most beautiful and important piece of English sacred music

    Further an adaptation in English of Spem in alium was sung at the investiture of the Prince of Wales in 1610

    “Sing and glorify heaven’s high Majesty,Author of this blessed harmony;Sound divine praisesWith melodious graces;This is the day, holy day, happy day,For ever give it greeting, Love and joyheart and voice meeting:Live Henry princely and mighty,Harry live in thy creation happy.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006tn49

  161. EC says:
    October 17, 2015 at 9:23 am

    “Man fined £550 for leaving bin outside Stoke-on-Trent home”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-34548109

    His main problems are wrong ethnicity and/or wrong religion!

  162. EC says:
    October 17, 2015 at 9:58 am

    Colonel Mustard, October 16th, 2015 – 22:34

    The only people who read the Gruaniad are Gruadainistas. That NFP publication and the rest of the MSM (*) are where objectivity, facts and the truth go to die! So therefore the mere existence of Breitbart, which is “like a diamond shining out of a camels arse” must be a continual irritant to them.

    (*) including formerly respectable publications like Scientific American(now Sci-Fi American), Nature, and National Geographic.

    telemachus’ “deposits” here are predictably tiresome, they are not constructive, clever or even faintly amusing. I now think that the editor should Ban the B’stard.

  163. EC says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:03 am

    … or if conscience doesn’t permit at least BIN the B’stard!

  164. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:27 am

    EC

    Yes, return the recidivist to the oubliette. Then those purists who believe in free speech even for crass agitprop agents can visit and read the garbage for the purposes of perverse, masochistic diversion.

    Not sure Peter is listening, though. Haven’t had a peep out of him for days. Are you there, guvnor , or are we on autopilot at the moment?

  165. anne wotana kaye says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:31 am

    EC
    October 17th, 2015 – 09:23
    Now we know why ‘they’ cover their ugly mugs up!

  166. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:38 am

    Here’s an interesting take on Vlad’s strategy. Don’t know whether to be comforted or alarmed, though it’s becoming increasingly difficult to be either, or even have rational notions about anything, given the numbing stench from the garbage that is being emitted from every medium on the planet:

    http://thezman.com/wordpress/?p=5656

    h/t Gerard VdL (as ever)

  167. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:46 am

    Another straw in the wind?

    http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2015/10/17/russia-reportedly-looking-to-remove-itself-from-world-wide-web.html

  168. EC says:
    October 17, 2015 at 11:10 am

    “Big Climate” corruption. You won’t read about this in the Guardian!
    >
    “The Mason-Dippin’ Line”
    Mark Steyn

    http://www.steynonline.com/7239/the-mason-dippin-line

  169. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 11:39 am

    Frank P @ 10:38

    More than just a readable piece, Frank, cool, balanced, so un-MSM, thanks.

    The writer though may be suffering abit from what Baron calls the Nippon syndrome. You recall the wholesale fear the Japanese were taking over the world? They seemed to be so rich, so powerful so sans error, books were published telling us how invincible they are and why, they bought works of art by the bucket, paid for them outrageous prices … Well, they’re nowhere taking over anything today, and Baron reckons that will be the state of affairs (say) around 2040 with the Russians, too.

    Still, two points from the barbarian for you to ignore.

    The Russians (together with their friends) will not be able to beat the thugs, not enough anyway, they, the religiously inspired killers, will hide, re-emerge either in Syria again, or somewhere else. Large numbers of them have already found sanctuary in Jordan and Turkey. They can do so because as Baron said before ‘no uniforms or any other easily identifiable feature’, they are indistinguishable from the indigenous peasantry anywhere in the ME, and the borders are porous.

    What Vlad should do is to flatten as many of them as possible, then bugger off with his military, backing the Iranians & co with just weaponry, ammunition. This, Baron reckons, he’ll not do, will linger on, will get sucked in deeper into the nightmare, withdraw eventually as the beaten one, at huge cost mostly to his exchequer.

    The Iranians will not keep the yoke of the mullahs forever. The two other pyramids of power – the civil service and the military – may tip the balance of power away from them. These people are Persians, not Arabs, the religious fervour has been killing the country for long enough, the time to go for a switchover must come. And if the country over flips, (a military coup is the most likely mechanism for it), the Americans will do what’ve done with Egypt when Sisi took over, condemn it as undemocratic, but make every effort to win them over.

    Russia’s not rich enough to keep pace, it’s been already boxing above its its weight, but so far for for a good reason, one can see it looking at the proximity of ISIL to her southern borders where most of the followers of Allah reside in the -stan members of the Russian Federation.

  170. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 11:59 am

    Radford, tele:

    Quite true, the first Elizabeth was quite lukewarm about Protestantism, it wasn’t insisting so much on people’s following the creed as demanding their fealty. She stayed with Catholic families, kept few old rituals going e.g. the evensongs. set recusancy fines low (until she needed the money to beat the Spanish).

    More to the point, she punished Protestant’s deviants like the puritans or other separatists, too, nobody was safe particularly when ti came to the question of succession, something the Puritans couldn’t stop talking about.

    Bill Bryson, the one who just published ‘The Road to Little Dribbling”, (anyone remembers Baron promoting it?), has this to say about one member of the puritanic crowd:

    “When a prominent Puritan named (all too appropriately, it would seem) John Stubbs criticised the Queen’s mooted marriage to a French Catholic, the Duke of Alencon, his right hand was cut off. Holding up his bloody stump and doffing his hat to the crowd, Stubbs shouted “Good save the Queen”, fell over in a faint, and was carted off to prison for eighteen months.”

    Britain doesn’t make people like that anymore.

  171. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 12:00 pm

    Has anyone heard from, knows anything about Stephen Maybery?

  172. sylvia says:
    October 17, 2015 at 12:34 pm

    Baron @11.39

    I read the Wall regularly, but have never contributed before. However, the Baron’s “two points for you to ignore” are so perceptive about Russia and Iran that I am forced to say well done! This will surely be the outcome, only question is when?

  173. Malfleur says:
    October 17, 2015 at 1:44 pm

    Baron

    But the French still make people like the Duke of Alençon

  174. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 2:10 pm

    Lord Monckton has over recent years explicated soundly on the scams arising from alleged AGW. But this is the first time I’ve come across his fiscal pronouncements. Those of you with a portfolio, or even a pot to pee in, might be interested in this notion:

    http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/10/lord_monckton_the_texas_talent_will_replace_the_dollar.html

  175. Malfleur says:
    October 17, 2015 at 2:17 pm

    ON MONSIEUR’S DEPARTURE
    by Elizabeth I, Queen of England

    I grieve and dare not show my discontent;
    I love, and yet am forced to seem to hate;
    I do, yet dare not say I ever meant;
    I seem stark mute, but inwardly do prate.
    I am, and not; I freeze and yet am burned,
    Since from myself another self I turned.

    My care is like my shadow in the sun—
    Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,
    Stands, and lies by me, doth what I have done;
    His too familiar care doth make me rue it.
    No means I find to rid him from my breast,
    Till by the end of things it be supprest.

    Some gentler passion slide into my mind,
    For I am soft, and made of melting snow;
    Or be more cruel, Love, and so be kind.
    Let me or float or sink, be high or low;
    Or let me live with some more sweet content,
    Or die, and so forget what love e’er meant.

    Written in connection with Monsieur’s final leave-taking in 1582.

  176. EC says:
    October 17, 2015 at 2:51 pm

    “If you must have the last word, choose it with care”
    Ben Macintyre March 23, 2002 (The Times?)
    (NB. e&oe Recovered text: – mangled by MS Windows & MS Internet Explorer)

    The epitaph the late Spike Milligan once selected for his gravestone, “I told you I was ill”, is an important reminder that it is never too early for the celebrated to start preparing their last words.
    History is littered with people who left this crucial act of self-definition far too late, with embarrassing results. Having failed to say anything sufficiently witty, uplifting or profound on their deathbeds, many have had famous last words thrust upon them, some complimentary, some less so. Worse still, there is the well-documented chance of being run over by Time’s Winged Chariot, having just said something they would rather not have repeated. Dylan Thomas, for example, would surely have preferred to come up with a more lyrical line than: “I’ve had eighteen straight whiskeys. I think that’s the record”; William Pitt the Younger plainly had not spotted the Grim Reaper at his shoulder when he ordered one of “Bellamy’s veal pies”, and Lee Harvey Oswald had not noticed Jack Ruby when he said: “Ain’t nobody going to shoot me.”

    Last words are often dismissed as either the rehearsed clichés of people who admired themselves to death or the post-mortem inventions of hagiographers. The dying Karl Marx had a point when asked by his cleaning lady whether he had anything to say for posterity: “Go on, get out! Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough.”

    Yet, as a new book by the American scholar Alan Bisbort demonstrates, last words are often fascinating historical testaments, a chance to make peace, or trouble: they may be enigmatic, defensive, misleading, pompous, religious, didactic, touching or beautiful, but even the most obviously faked or inadvertent last statement can be revealing of the way an individual, as well as supporters or detractors, would like history to see him or her.

    For some, the deathbed is an opportunity to bend the record, and perhaps give Saint Peter a nudge. Casanova, tuckered out after a life of fleshly sin, insisted: “I have lived life as a philosopher and die as a Christian.” Oscar Wilde’s last words were affectingly quotidian and professional; in short, a book review: “This is a fine study of the American politician and possesses the quality of truth in characterisation. What else has the lady written?” But Wildeans expected something a bit pithier, and so created the apocryphal: “Either the wallpaper goes, or I go.”

    Timing is crucial. Lord Melbourne came up with unimproveable: “Die, my dear doctor? That is the last thing I shall do.” But imagine if you said that, lay back satisfied, and then realised you were feeling much better and might have to wait ages, not saying anything else. Lord Byron, very sensibly, laid plans. His last word was probably a banal and rather sweet: “Goodnight”, but earlier he had ensured a more eloquent departure by dictating: “Let not my body be sent to England. Here let my bones moulder. Lay me in the first corner without pomp or nonsense.”

    If you happen to be a king, it may be sensible to have an official version prepared beforehand. This was George V’s mistake, and he has been plagued by the buggery of Bognor ever since. The King quite probably did not suggest this course of action when told that he would be up and about again after a rest in Bognor, but what he did say is endlessly disputed. Imperialists insist he called out: “How goes the Empire?” Detractors, however, claim his mind was on more mundane matters, and he merely muttered: “What’s on at the Empire?” An even more inscrutable version has him declaring: “Don’t shoot the umpire,” which could refer to his kingly duty, or to a cricket match.

    Some of the most remarkable last words are those with the least obvious meaning. The great American writer Henry David Thoreau indisputably muttered “Moose” and “Indian” before dying, and while their precise import has been debated ever since, these were certainly the utterances of one uniquely attuned to the cadences of the American landscape. John Wilkes Booth, Lincoln’s assassin, emerged from a burning barn ambiguously crying “Useless! Useless!” before he too was killed: which may have been an expression of remorse for his actions, or merely regret that he had been caught. Writers and thinkers questioned to the end: “Does nobody understand?” wondered James Joyce, while Gertrude Stein pondered: “What is the answer? In that case, what is the question?” I suspect that Einstein knowingly spoke in German and Disraeli, possibly, Hebrew that was incomprehensible to those in attendance, just to make sure they were not quoted, or misquoted, as they headed off. But some achieved an articulacy before death they never had in life. The spy Mata Hari’s existence was fairly horrible, but her last statement is a lucid declaration of nihilism: “Death is nothing, nor life either, for that matter. To die, to sleep, to pass into nothingness, what does it matter? Everything is an illusion.”

    For most of us, thankfully, last words are not worth worrying about, since we may be lucky enough to die either swiftly, sleepily and wordlessly, or surrounded by generous people who will remember what we said in the fullness of our time, rather than at the last minute.

    Still, there is plenty of inspiration out there if we had to choose some bons mots on the brink. As a sometime author, I am tempted by Bisbort’s suggestion: “Tell Oprah I waited.” But for a journalist, the last words of Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary, surely offer the best approach to a looming deadline. Mortally wounded, Villa was asked to leave behind a message for his followers. With his last breath he gasped: “Tell them I said something interesting.”

  177. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 2:54 pm

    …further to 14:10:

    I suppose the international gnomes of high finance and the scamsters of the world (not ALWAYS the same thing :-)) are already devising ways: on the one hand, to make sure it never gets off the ground or, OTOH, to rip it off wholesale if ever it does.

    But something, sooner or later, has to break, given the increasing chaos caused by Obama’s presidency and the lickspittle following of other Western leaders into the crippling welfarism of vote catching.

    The allegation that Obama has or is about to grant great chunks of land and real estate as collateral to existing and future increased debt to China, is blood curdling. Isn’t it?

  178. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:07 pm

    EC (14:51)

    Excellent! Nice salvaging job. Thanks.

  179. Malfleur says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:19 pm

    “The Humiliation Is Complete: ISIS Fighters Cut Off Beards And Run Away As Russia, Iran Close In”

    Headline in Zero Hedge

  180. Malfleur says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:23 pm

    ‘With US Warships En Route To Islands, China Asks: “What On Earth Makes Them Think We Will Tolerate This?” ‘

    Ditto

  181. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:24 pm

    It would be mean, near taciturn, and so un-gentlmanly if Baron din’t share it with you.

    You ever go for pre-packed foods, the stuff you buy, shove in the microwave, eat after few minutes? The barbarian isn’t very fond of it, but times there are he has to have something quick because of time pressure.

    Today, it happened, time was at a premium, Baron had to buy a pre-packed tray, two trays really, one containing the curry, the other rice bound together in a wrapper saying: Charlie Bigham’s Thai Red Chicken Curry & Fragrant Rice. It sells at Waitrose, he got it for a fiver, a £2 discount, always a variable in his what-to-buy decision making process.

    And what a fantastic buy it turned out to be, the best ever in pre-packaged foods, eat your heart out M&S, it even beats a Harrods fish pie that cost so much Baron may have bought the Scottish fishery that furnished the pisces only few years before he bought the pie. You serve it to your guests, tell them you cooked it, they’ll look upp to you as if you’ve won in a BBC cookery competition, that’s guaranteed.

    Baron knows you dislike his take on things, but trust him on this, it is good even though you have to heat it up in the oven (20-30 minutes), for a fiver you get alot, should you be nibble eaters, two may share it, it’s tasty, the real cream will hit your palate with first bite, you won’t regret. Add to it a glass to two of Merlot, and, boy, what an enjoyment from a simple lunch.

    Should you plunge for it, please let the barbarian know what you thinnk of his judgment on foods pre-packed.

  182. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:30 pm

    Sorry about the errors, pushed on time he definitely is, but it should be no excuse for not checking the posting before hitting the comment button.

  183. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:36 pm

    Malfleur @ 15:23

    Both China and Russia may be flexing their muscle somewhat prematurely, Malfleur, the posturing may bury them both before they’ve matured, be ready to face the Yanks as near equals in the military arena.

  184. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 3:47 pm

    Meanwhile in ‘sleepy socialist Sweden’. Looks like some of them just woke up. Summat else you won’t read or watch via the MSM:

    http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6697/sweden-collapse

    The fact that what they fear has already happened to London and other provincial municipalities seems to have been missed by the writer (not to mention most pundits here, too).

  185. Lesley C. says:
    October 17, 2015 at 4:00 pm

    From today’s Mail;
    ‘We are protecting the freedoms of European citizens’: Hungary defends closing its Croatian border as first busload of migrants reach Slovenia.

    Well done, Hungary. The only country in Europe showing any sense. We owe them a debt of gratitude. These fake “refugees” make me sick, all fit, strong young men, who look to me more like an invading army of thugs than anything else.

  186. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 4:09 pm

    Today, Baron got an invitation from the Economist to subscribe, it was accompanies by the stuff linked below. What shall he do?

    http://discover.economist.com/?a=21643189&cid1=d/dsp/Guardian/dyn/21643189/20151001-00:00am/paid/display-BB/BR-PO/BRPII/n/subs/UK/BR-LIT&cid3=UM

  187. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 4:12 pm

    Lesley C. @ 16:00

    A misplaced sentiment on your part, Lesley, the Americans are to set up a sizeable military base in Hungary, the work has already begun, the PM,Victor Orban won’t last long, the ‘healthy forces’ from without and within the country will see to that.

  188. Radford NG says:
    October 17, 2015 at 4:59 pm

    Rod Liddle has been right stirring things up.

    See Baron;16 Oct at 00-45:re
    `What great British bake off really says about Britain`.Rod Liddle
    This has been taken up and supported by the EDL;and attacked by the Huffington Post.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/10/15/edl-rod-liddle-uncontrolled-immigration-column-muslim-nadiya_n_8300396.html

  189. Radford NG says:
    October 17, 2015 at 5:23 pm

    There was also,apparently,a heated Question Time on Thursday with exchanges between Liddle (and Roger Helmer[UKIP] ) and Simon Schama.

    Liddle (on `refugees`) says he doesn’t care about Schama’s emotions…..and the latter condemns Liddle’s suburban attitudes…….This is addressed in the Spectator by Douglas Murray:”Simon Schama’s use of the word suburban on QT was very revealing”….This exchange can also be found in Huffington;and stirres-up fury else-where on line.

    QT can be found at:
    http://www.is.gd/vUgNbu

  190. Radford NG says:
    October 17, 2015 at 5:37 pm

    And in answer to Simon Schama (who we are told has a very nice property in New York state)…..

    “The poor man really has a stake in the country.The rich man hasn’t;he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht.”~~~~G.K.Chesterton: `The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare`.

    “New Guinea’s off,Dear.”~~~~Radford NG…..and so are many other bolt-holes.

  191. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 5:54 pm

    EC @ 14:51

    The barbarian got to it only now, EC, enjoyed it, it’s writing on par with the likes of Paul Johnson, it may not be right, but didn’t he pen a piece on a similar theme?

    Baron remembers only two quotes from memory: Lenin’s ‘that’s my dog’ meaning as a compliment because the dog brought a dead animal to him deathbed. In Russian, it was ‘vot dog’ which isn’t really ‘that’s my dog’ it’s Baron’s translation, Mr. Boot would do a better job, and one from the antiquity, but by whom he forgot: always listen to your enemies, they are the first to know what your weakness are.

  192. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 5:57 pm

    Radford NG @ 17:37

    Please, try again, Radford, Baron doesn’t get it.

  193. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 5:59 pm

    Frank P @ 15:47

    This must be the revenge for the Vikings fugging up us centuries ago, but why had it wait so long, Frank?

  194. Radford NG says:
    October 17, 2015 at 6:21 pm

    Baron at 17-37.

    New Guinea, like South Africa,is going back to the jungle;so a reference to the great British paean:”Balham Gate-way to the South”.

    “And is there honey still for tea?”
    “Honey’s off,Dear.”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2erj8_NuHY

  195. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 9:33 pm

    Baron (17:59)

    Us?? Not a Freudian slip there, I hope. ☺

  196. Baron says:
    October 17, 2015 at 9:58 pm

    Frank P @ 21:33

    It’s only the first paragraph, Frank, the links at the end of it you may like to read, Britain wasn’t their only destination, continental Europe, Russia they penetrated, too.

    Nobody knows for certain how deeply into Europe they got, there are digs that suggest at least their influence up to eastern Mediterranean, certainly Greece. Viking trading posts existed in Poland, Polish kings hired them as mercenaries, married their daughters to them. In the 9th century, they, the Vikings, took Kiev. Google it, if you must.

    More to the point, how far can you trace the line you’ve travelled on, back to the time of the Vikings? This is not to challenge your pedigree, it’s merely to point out that mixing of genes during massive population movements often leads to totally unexpected findings.

    Any more challenges for the poorly educated Slav?

    https://www.history.org.uk/resources/primary_resource_3867_132.html

  197. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:42 pm

    You had me worried – thought you might be identifying with the current invaders.
    Phew! ☺

    As for my own genes: myriad streams into the watershed. Willy the Conqueror has a lot to answer for. And little doubt we all came out of Africa, anyway. But currently, I like to keep a close eye on who is “uz ‘n’ thems” – culturally speaking, anyway. The nationality has already been breached beyond repair, since I landed on the mortal coil and won the lottery of life by being born English – and on the fertile soil of the fens, to boot (no pun intended).☺

  198. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 10:48 pm

    … Moreover, there are so many Cnuts among our current bunch of leaders, I’m surprised they don’t all claim Viking heritage.

  199. Frank P says:
    October 17, 2015 at 11:11 pm

    A cough from an inside defector from the State Department during Hillary’s stint. Looks like the Dems are dumping her?

    http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/10/syria-civil-war-213242

    h/t Richard Fernandez.

  200. Andy Car Park says:
    October 17, 2015 at 11:45 pm

    On matters linguistic:

    In the Peruvian language, Aymara, the past is what lies in front of you, the future what lies behind, and semantics is aligned accordingly. Think about rowing a boat. The only thing that is visible is the wake.

    Source: “Dying Words” by Nicholas Evans

  201. Frank P says:
    October 18, 2015 at 12:17 am

    This guy is really pissed at the Pallies:

    http://coldfury.com/2015/10/17/subhuman-animals/

  202. Andy Car Park says:
    October 18, 2015 at 12:19 am

    EC (last week): Old Goat and c777 are indeed the stoutest fellows on Breitbart, not just because they are they only ones that upvote Yours Truly. In fact, I suspect O.G.’s protestations that he hangs out in La Belle France with a string of onions round his neck and a slightly skew-whiff stick-on moustache are the merest bollocks. More likely he sits tight in a Fenland bunker, pacing the floor and deliberating on what buggery has to do with it. 😉

  203. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 12:39 am

    What a relief, Frank, Baron worried (only after the posting, the same failure as with his unchecked errors) he may have upset you. It was never his intention. How could he. One blow from you, he would be floored. The revenge gibe (if that is what it was) was stretching it beyond the stretchable.

    What amazes though is that it has been only 80 generations since the start of AD.

  204. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 12:41 am

    Radford NG @ 18:21

    Kind of you , Radford, to enlighten the barbarian, thanks.

  205. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 12:58 am

    Frank P @ 23:11

    A rather confusing piece, Frank, if the man Assad was a hated dictator even before the brutal suppression of the uprising down south in the country, why make any deal with him at all? Why not attack Syria before invading Iraq, invade both? And no mention of Russia in the piece as an Assad backer at all, whilst now we’re told Russia has always been his staunch supporter.

    You may well be right, the Dems may be willing to dump her, are readying Biden for the fight with the GOP.

  206. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:08 am

    Not one of the big players in the ME except Israel, not the Obama clan, not even the EU have any desire to cure the Palestinian boil, it’s the best stick with which to hit the Jewish state.

  207. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:10 am

    Andy Car Park @ 23:45

    Too deep for the poorly educated Slav, Andy, he’s lost.

  208. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:13 am

    The EU has offered Turkey 3bn Euro to cover the cost of looking after refugees, will consider relaxing visa requirements for them, will also think again about Turkey’s membership of the EU.

    Before it’s all over, perhaps even Syria will be in the EU.

  209. Andy Car Park says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:16 am

    Baron – I was responding to a comment from last week’s wall, but the Bb poster, Old Goat, is a retired policeman and “one of the old school” to use a quaint expression.

  210. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:23 am

    Andy Car Park @ 01:16

    Is it a coincidence, Andy, two retired men in blue hitting them hard, or is he the same and the only one? We should be told.

  211. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:32 am

    The content of the top piece ‘Kerry wants…’ worries the barbarian very much, it suggests Vlad may be going to far, it’s a challenge the Americans will have to answer.

    http://tarpley.net

  212. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 1:43 am

    And the last posting on ISIS silencing everyone, but the wise words of Allah from the Koran:

    http://www.rferl.org/content/islamic-state-bans-tv-destroys-satellite-dishes/27199095.html

  213. Frank P says:
    October 18, 2015 at 10:15 am

    ACP and Baron:

    I’m flattered. Sadly, not true! I only promulgate my comparatvely illiterate rubbish under the one moniker and have not devised a way of rejigging my Disquis account, which, because Frasier’s mob blackballed me, refuses to allow me anywhere that uses Disquis, including the Breitbart show. I don’t gatecrash parties to which I haven’t been invited, but I do eavesdrop occasionally to keep an eye on ACP’s, (in his guises various); EC’s (ditto); Austin Barry’s posts – and those of other trenchant wits, including OG, who was probably a contemporary of mine and certainly shares my iconoclastic bent.

  214. Frank P says:
    October 18, 2015 at 10:32 am

    Baron

    Didn’t realise you were a devotee of this Tarpley guy. Whaddaya make of him?He seems a bit – er – intense; a little Ickeian, perhaps?

  215. EC says:
    October 18, 2015 at 10:45 am

    Mm, if this is the case, if we ever meet, then I give your I give you all fair warning!!!

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/black-coffee-psychopath_561baf08e4b0dbb8000f150f

    Yesterday I was musing about which decade mainstream Science actually died. Please can you let me have your suggestions. 1970’s? 80s? or was it much earlier than that?

  216. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 2:36 pm

    Frank P @ 10:32

    Not necessarily a devotee, Frank, an ocasional visitor. There’re so many sites one can choose from, you know it anyway, one can spend the whole evening just moving from one to another without reading them. Tarpley’s not bad, he gets up-to-date stuff other sites either don’t have at all, or have l ate. It’s not the spin he puts on it Baron’s after.

  217. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 3:51 pm

    EC @ 10:45

    Just as well the barbarian never liked black coffee, EC, now he knows why his cover has never been blown.

  218. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 4:49 pm

    Often, Baron finds it hard to sleep, or rather, he does fall asleep, but wakes up in an hour or so, and whatever he does, to return to the dreamland he cannot. Last night was one of such nights. Come 5AM, he was in bed, fully awake, listening to the radio, reading Bryson’s ‘The Road to Little Dribbling’, the book he had told you about.

    The Classic FM news report interrupted the music. It consisted of three major items, and the weather forecast, which, as it turned out, was wrong, as it almost always is (if only those who make weather forecasts looked through the window).

    The Bishops of the Church of England, 54 of them, have written to the boy saying the country should take in 50 and not just 20 thousands Syrian refugees. Then Moira Anderson, the newsreader, said the same boy has set aside £5mn to combat terrorism. Not the lethal stuff where guns are deployed, but that of the mind, helping people not to have racial thoughts. A man from a charitable agency dealing with refugees complained it wasn’t enough, more cash was needed. This was followed by the case of a woman on a bus, who is being taken to court because of her allegedly terrorist outburst.

    Simultaneously to this news broadcast Baron hit a part of the said book that said the following:

    “Looking back, now, I really do think Britain has attained something approaching perfection just around the time of my arrival. (Baron arrived in the same decade, too). It’s a funny thing because Britain was in a terrible state those days. It limped from crisis to crisis. It was known as the Sick Man of Europe. It was in every way poorer than now. Yet, there were flowerbeds on roundabouts, libraries and post offices in every village, cottage hospitals in abundance, council housing for all who needed it. It was a country so comfortable and enlightened that hospitals maintained cricket pitches for their staff, and mental patients lived in Victorian palaces. If we could afford it then, why not now? Someone has to explain to me how it is that the richer Britain gets, the poorer it thinks itself.

    All of the long-term patients at Holloway were quite mad (Bryson was a nurse in a mental hospital) – that’s why they were long-term mental patients, after all – but sufficiently institutionalised on the whole that they could go to the village each day to buy sweets or a newspaper or have a cup train the Tudor Rose. To any outsider it must have seemed extraordinary, a village filled with normal citizens going about their daily business, but also liberally scattered with people who were clearly not right in the head, who conversed in an animated fashion with empty space or stood at the back of the village bakery with their nose pressed to the wall. You cannot have a more civilised community than one in which hospital staff play cricket at the end of a summer’s day and lunatics can wonder and mingle without exciting comment or alarm. It was unsurpassably wonderful. It really was.

    That was the Britain I came to. I wish it could that place again.”

  219. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 4:54 pm

    It is ‘a cup of tea in the Tudor Rose’ of course, the fucking software must have changed it before it got posted, Baron DID check, h e swears.

  220. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 4:57 pm

    The other errors are his, like the missing ‘be’ in ‘I wish it could be that place again. Sorry.

  221. Baron says:
    October 18, 2015 at 5:55 pm

    This has just arrived from an American friend who knows what he’s taking about. The American fly at much higher altitudes, it’s safer, the SU-35s fired rockets seem guided, the drone bombs aren’t, (Baron hasn’t seen any drones in the clip), many civilians will be killed as well. There isn’t much of any ground follow-up, the jihadi fighters are nutters, in a properly co-ordinated attack copters will be sweeping over gunning them down, they are fully exposed, there would be less shouting allah’s great, more dead bodies.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23FklwPEk6A

    Btw, the sound, the mandolin played melody is Russian, Kalinka, you may have heard it before, but not in a clip showing Russian planes bombing Syria.

  222. Frank P says:
    October 18, 2015 at 6:26 pm

    “In the eye of the beholder”, Baron.
    Plus ça change … [to grab a couple of handy mixed meta4s].

    When I am weary and full o’sleep,
    I count my blessings instead o’ sheep;
    Then I fall asleeeeep, counting my bleeess-ings.

    Bing Crosby was still singing that live at the time you cited.

    Still as relevant today, if you ignore the MSM and their bogeymen.

    Bryson’s rose-tinted specs are not a bad prism through which to view this sceptered isle, though.

    And please stop apologizing for e & oe, the bits that appear are sufficiently worthy for the occasional typo to be ignored by your friends; matters not if a slip of the finger, a software intrusion, or a juxtaposition of grammatical nicety. Consider yourself forgiven in advance and worry not. If any pendants happen to drop by – fuck ’em!☺

  223. Frank P says:
    October 18, 2015 at 6:30 pm

    See – my software added an ‘n’ to pedants, without consultation, en route.
    Shit happens!

  224. EC says:
    October 18, 2015 at 10:49 pm

    If anyone gets hit with insomnia tonight then why not crunch a few numbers with Stefan Molyneux?

    “The Truth About Illegal Immigrants: Was Donald Trump Right?”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6NYP9qmjfU

    A sort of an updated take on the excellent presentations given by “The Gumball Guy,” if anybody remembers him.

  225. Frank P says:
    October 19, 2015 at 1:43 am

    EC (22:49)

    Thanks for that fascinating presentation: what’s more I do remember the ‘gumball guy’:

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

    Prophetic! Trouble is, defining the problem merely underlines its almost certain inevitability.

    Listening to the pundits on Fox tonight fervently trying to dismiss Trump as a ‘Roman candle that will burn out as quickly as it ascended’; ‘lacking in substance’; in seriousness, etc. etc. and etcetera – makes me want to ask, “Then who among his adversaries is endowed with the qualities they are advocating? Indeed, who among the previous ten Presidents possessed those qualities?”

    They have all been front men for the political machinery that grinds on, regardless of the occupant of the White House. Trump at least has created a massive property Empire and a TV persona that is indicative of his determination and ability to succeed in his aims, admittedly by fair means or foul, the latter being the m.o. of most politicians, anyway, without any evidence of concomitant ‘substance’, other than bullshit.

    And he certainly won’t make a bigger fuck up as leader of the Western World than has the current incumbent.

    I’d like to see him win just for the pleasure of watching the pundits having to eat crow. Just to watch their cosy symbiotic political construct collapse around their coiffured heads.

  226. Frank P says:
    October 19, 2015 at 2:03 am

    https://youtu.be/_kKkY5EpVpY

    More grist to the mill.

  227. Baron says:
    October 19, 2015 at 12:56 pm

    Frank & EC:

    Thanks for the link, EC, Stefan’s usually quite entertaining but this rant of his goes on for far too long, the gumball man was by far superior, it made just one point, made it brilliantly.

    Just one point of the IQ part of it. It’s not that important whether one ethnic group IQ average is high or low, what matters is whether the group has a mechanism to identify, to spot the high IQ individuals, boost their natural ability, let them into leadership positions.

    There’s a flaw in the argument put forward in Frank’s link. One can reverse the low birth rate, there’s nothing to stop couples of the indigenous culture to have 5 or more kids if they wanted to. It’s the state of mind rather than any ‘technical’ inability.

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