The Coffee House Wall – 18th/24th November

Posted on November 18, 2013

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

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300 thoughts on “The Coffee House Wall – 18th/24th November”

  1. Baron,
    I trust you are returned to full health and as quickly as possible.
    That is the important thing, for political convictions and debate are food for the mind, not the body.
    As for Hannan, the solution he propounds, an India-led angloshere seems a high flown essay more in keeping with Cameron’s ‘no limit’ Indian immigration policy than offering any practical benefit to a UK industry and intellectual asset base driven to near destruction by open door political capitalism and cheap Indian and Chinese imports of goods and labour.

  2. PfM – 09:55 “The message cannot be separated from the messenger”

    Are we not getting to the point where any LibLabCon MP wanting to ‘change sides’, either by changing party or changing policy direction, have left it too late to have considered to have done it by coming to their own conclusions, rather than forced by public opinion to jump onto the next band wagon without really coming to terms with what they have done in the past?

    They need to have had an ‘on the road to Damascus’ moment, remembering that we are talking about ancient Damascus, and I think the window of opportunity has closed!

  3. India leads the world in the number and percentage of its population forced to defecate in the street, and is riven by inter-communal violence and tension. It is not in a position to lead us anywhere we would want to go and is an example of the sort of society that socialism leads to. The political elite are never far from indoor plumbing.

  4. Baron
    I see from last week’s CHW that you are not well. Please accept my warmest wishes for your speedy recovery.

  5. Anne Wotana Kaye 1 November 18th, 2013 – 17:08

    Baron I see from last week’s CHW that you are not well. Please accept my warmest wishes for your speedy recovery.

    And mine, get well very soon.

  6. McShane heading for Her Majesties Pleasure then.

    will he keep his MP’s pension?

    Hope they arrest Zahawi next. Bloody thief.

  10. Miulling over the various things that this government has done which weren’t in any manifesto, I recall virtually the first thing they did was legislate for fixed term parliaments. But I can’t see what’s in it for Cameron; a vote of no confidence will still bring an election, but the PM loses a useful weapon – the ability to call a general election at the most advantageous time.
    Can anyone explain this puzzle for me?

  11. Radford NG 21.07: The Mirror has reported on the Lee Rigby trial – not a lot to say so far, just the swearing in of the Jury. I wonder if the defence will claim that the accused will not get a fair trial as it’s such a high profile case.

  12. They do always try that a lot Frank. Although the British media are gagged a lot, the precedent in English case law remains the Rose West case: all the publicity didn’t matter – she had to go on trial.

  13. Denis MacShane – what a piece of work.

    He was the Labour’s backbencher’s backbencher. He was a media attack dog, going round from studio to studio – an a way the top brass never could – accusing various British folk of racism.

    They never want the public to see how much they hate them so that job always had to be delegated.

    Mass immigration is a ‘mistake’ for the mainstream, apart from when MacShane was on a propaganda sniper mission to ruin someone’s life with a racism smear. Then you could see there was no mistake about it.

    Him and that Vicky Pryce – what else did they get up to?

    Proven liars who have ruined the lives of British people.

    And why did the CPS have to be forced to re-think its decision to prosecute?

    The Establishment wouldn’t let the CPS charge him at first. Strings were pulled. Parliamentary privilege was claimed.

    Aye.

    They’ve too many damned privileges in that cesspit.

    The evidence was so overwhelming, though, he pleaded guilty.

    Indeed, when you read the details, you can see why.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2228384/Arrest-Denis-MacShane-It-privilege.html

    And will Mr MacShane’s life be ruined in the way he ruined others with false accusations of racism?

    Of course not.

    He’ll spend a few weeks inside, wear and tag and then probably end up on Question Time like Ms Pryce with the presenter not even bothering to deal with her credentials when it comes to honesty.

    The UK is ruled by liars who cover up for liars.

    Bare-faced liars.

    ‘Mistake’, indeed.

  15. Frank Sutton 22:22 – “Can anyone explain this puzzle for me?”

    David Cameron isn’t one of the brightest lights in the harbour. That is the explanation.

  17. A shooting gallery of some of the specimens currently ‘running’ the country – corrupt, worthless, without honour, shameless… from the excellent and (as far as I know) politically unaligned The Slog.

  18. And here’s another – accurately describing much of higher education as low grade commercial enterprises on a level with driving schools.

  20. Ex-banking chairman Paul Flowers isn’t exactly fragrant! (Apologies, but I just couldn’t resist).

  22. Peter Hitchen’s well-written posts always challenge the conventional view. Here’s his analysis, in 2006, of the erswhile ‘Special Relationship’ between Britain and the United States.
    http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2006/08/the_great_war_b.html

    If there is anything at all to the concept it is to provide the inconsequential prime managers of our decayed and demoralised country with an opportunity to falsely parade themselves as equal partners in the diplomatic maneouvres of the world’s major power, itself now in unexpected decline because of the triumph of liberal socialism.

  23. Frank Sutton-12.21

    Thank you for the link t the Slog; I’ve not seen it it before and it’s a real find.

    In common with the Marxists over at Spiked they share a concern that all of us should hold about the galloping totalitarianism of the Conservative party as, with the connivance of its Liberal Democrat coalition partners, it passes legislation which will make any behaviour perceived to potentially ‘cause nuisance or annoyance’ a criminal offence.

    http://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2013/11/14/uk-2013-police-government-and-party-all-singing-from-the-same-hymn-sheet/

  24. As we say in Lancashire:
    “Never ask a man if he comes from Yorkshire.
    If he does, he’ll tell you.
    If he doesn’t, why humiliate him?”

  25. Noa November 19th, 2013 – 18:24

    “If he doesn’t, why humiliate him?”

    Naughty naughty.

  26. David Ossitt
    November 19th, 2013 – 19:19

    Noa November 19th, 2013 – 18:24

    “If he doesn’t, why humiliate him?”

    Naughty naughty.”

    😉

  27. Noa
    It is a dumb person indeed that does not recognise and bow to those from God’s own county:

    I is i’ truth a coontry youth,
    Nean used to Lunnon fashions;
    Yet vartue guides, an’ still presides
    Ower all my steps an’ passions.
    Nea coortly leer, bud all sincere,
    Nea bribe shall iver blinnd me ;
    If thoo can like a Yorkshire tike,
    A rogue thoo’ll niver finnd me.

    Thof envy’s tongue, so slimly hung,
    Would lee aboot oor coonty,
    Nea men o’ t’ earth boast greater worth,
    Or mair extend their boonty.
    Oor northern breeze wi’ us agrees,
    An’ does for wark weel fit us ;
    I’ public cares, an’ love affairs,
    Wi’ honour We acquit us.

    Sea great a maand(1) is ne’er confaand(2)
    ‘Tiv onny shire or nation,
    They gie un meast praise whea weel displays
    A larned eddication;
    Whaal rancour rolls i’ laatle souls,
    By shallow views dissarnin’,
    They’re nobbut wise at awlus prize
    Good manners, sense, an’ larnin’.

  29. Noa
    At least being in praise of Yorkshireman it survived.
    If it had been in praise of A seventh century Arabian political, military and religious leader it would have been censored.

  30. FP-
    “If it had been in praise of A seventh century Arabian political, military and religious leader it would have been censored.”

    By whom? And for why? Beause it did not scan?
    Excoriated? Yes. Ridiculed? Most certainly!
    But not censored.

  31. Peter from Maidstone
    November 10th, 2013 – 20:36
    I have just removed a very tedious and tendentious ‘poem’ by Fergus Pickering. If there is a great outcry I will restore it but I am getting rather fed up with his/her work.

  32. That is if course another poem passed off as being by FP. He/She is not censored and can express views in support of Islam if desired. But I will remove tendentious poetry by this user. The poem just posted is by someone else altogether.

  33. Fergus

    “If you’ve got something to say
    Why don’t you say it
    If you’ve got something to give
    Why don’t you give it to me
    Day after day i have to say it
    We’re moving further from heaven
    And closer to the deep blue sea

    ‘Cause i have no secrets from you
    And i have nothing left to hide
    And i’m open to all your questions
    Why can’t you reach inside
    Like i have
    Like i have for you

    And all these games that you play
    Don’t tell me how a man should be
    Some would say if you knew
    You wouldn’t be here with me
    I love you
    I still love you
    But i guess it’s time to let you be

    ‘Cause i have no secrets from you
    And i have nothing left to hide
    And i’m so tired of all these questions
    ‘Cause maybe you just changed your mind
    Like i have
    Like i have
    Like i have
    Like i have

    When i was at your doorstep
    You told me to look around
    Said come in
    You and your heart sit down
    But you’d better watch your step
    ‘Cause you’re not far from the ground
    And one fine day this all falls down
    Like i have
    Like i have

    If you’ve got something to say
    Why don’t you say it
    If you’ve got something to give
    Why don’t you give it to me
    Day after day i have to say it
    If we’ve got something to save
    Why don’t we save it ”

    George Michael

  35. Noa. At least you attributed it. Although I would not have imagined you a George Michael fan. My wife got a ticket to the free concert he put on for NHS staff some years ago and managed to get to the front.

  38. Compare and Contrast:

    STEPHEN LAWRENCE, news headlines for 20 years, his parents become millionaires, music concerts to remember him, has a building that includes a gallery and TV studio named after him at Greenwich University. Has the Stephen Lawrence charitable trust, has the Stephen Lawrence Centre, the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard, his mother given a seat in the House of Lords.

    LEE RIGBY, the trial started yesterday….Media silence!…

  39. Fergus Pickering November 19th, 2013 – 20:31

    How dare you post a poem by a fellow Yorkshire man and not credit him with being the auther.

    You are getting to be an embarrassment, others here; have in a variety of ways asked you to stop this nonsense.

    Stop it now.

  41. Clear Memories – 22.38

    Quite. And ne’er a peep about those hundreds of other black teenage boys also murdered in London during the last 20 years. Murdered by other black teenage boys, so for the caring, feeling, compassionate Leftie equality warriors, they might as well have never existed. A contemptible attitude.

    And I knew there were lovers of Renaissance Polyphony in these parts, but more seem to be outing themselves! So, here’s a pick of mine – my life in music started with singing this stuff and it remains a daily necessity – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPpmcw4Nea0

  42. The Slog is an excellent blog.

    It has exposed Tory and Labour over the past five years and has enraged the Establishment.

    There’s plenty on there about Labour and Tory figures, none of whom sue.

    Jeremy Hunt has been shown the very detailed expose of his business dealings there – and still would not sue.

    The thing that you are looking at is the thing that they want to stop.

    New laws about people who ‘cause nuisance or annoyance’ and a new Defamation Bill are all about silencing all the disparate elements on the internet that have exposed the Establishment for what they are.

    Only they’re doing it by the back-door: through a law that is about ‘social behaviour’ and a defamation law.

    They never want their fingerprints on the trigger in the Establishment.

    And the other thing they’re doing is surveilling and logging all this activity – in the name of law and order!

    They know full well the terrorists have moved on from ever trusting any digital device.

    Osama had nothing in his house. You have people who know there’s no point planning atrocities electronically. Just turn up with a meat cleaver and hack the victim’s head off – and yes, the media will go all sotto voce about it.

    And we know the arguments about surveillance for law and order are a lie because this is what they do with real crime:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10460158/Police-officers-routinely-fiddle-crime-figures-MPs-are-told.html

    Cover it up.

    Not interested, guv.

    If it’s not a crime that can be publicised for social engineering causes, they don’t care. They bury it.

    It’s a priority to spy on a fed-up electorate.

    But car been vandalised? Who cares.

    Beaten to a pulp in a city centre. Yes, there is CCTV but we don’t watch you to worry about crimes like that. We’re not bothered.

    That Telegraph link is full of stories I have heard similar to. Over and over.

    And all these stats are manipulated so that people like Medhi Hasan get the chance to scream in debate: ‘But that’s not data’.

    There is no reliable data in the UK anymore.

    That’s the wretched point. And doesn’t Hasan know it.

    You can cover up legions of Islamic rape crimes when the people in charge deliberately don’t gather the data.

    Here’s one comment on that Telegraph link

    lordcubby

    Wow! REALLY – Oh my goodness something should be done!
    Never believed the crime figures.

    In my village my car got smashed up by a drunk. Cops got finger prints, and someone named a suspect but wouldn’t investigate as there was no CCTV footage! lazy beggars.

    My brother got his jaw broken in an unprovoked attack by a man (possibly a squad die) in a city centre – this time there is CCTV footage – no investigation.
    My brother now has to wear a denture as his jaw will not knit.

    Same city:
    A group of guys (in a band) with my colleague were detained after a hotel receptionist wrongly identified them as someone who had smashed a table. Police broke my friends nose and the cheekbone of another whilst they were detained in the back of the van.
    When my colleague went to complain his lawyer said that if he wanted to proceed the police would make his life a misery.

    Same city:
    Outside my flat a young lad naked save his underpants, was screaming and I called the cops. People came out of their houses with blankets and coats to cover this young boy who was deeply distressed.
    Ambulance came and left, then two guys arrived; one in a Merc the other in an Audi, (Both cars top of the range both less than two years old) and took the boy away – I called the cops and asked what was going on – they said they were his social workers – when I asked for their names and departments I was told it was none of my business and to shut up.

    Same city, same area;
    Yardie pimp beats a prostitute on the street. A women who saw everything calls the cops. As the cops arrive she points at the pimp and identifies him as the perpetrator. The cops bungle her back inside her house and tell her to shut up – then they let the pimp go.

  43. David Ossitt
    November 19th, 2013 – 23:19

    There was no intention whatsoever to pass the splendid Yorkshire poem off as my work.
    I have more respect for your intelligence than to think you would not immediately find via Google the origin.
    I do however have feelings and relish Barrie Wade’s adaptation of the age old rhyme:

    Truth
    By Barrie Wade
    Sticks and stones may break my bones,
    but words can also hurt me.
    Stones and sticks break only skin,
    while words are ghosts that haunt me.

    An Honest Yorkshireman by Henry Carey

  45. Fergus Pickering.

    Truth
    By Barrie Wade
    Sticks and stones may break my bones,
    but words can also hurt me.
    Stones and sticks break only skin,
    while words are ghosts that haunt me.

    An Honest Yorkshireman by Henry Carey

    Touché.

  46. Fergus Pickering – November 20th, 2013 – 05:59

    I am in awe of the delicacy of your feelings. I had thought the men east of the Pennines to be made of sterner material; stout woolen broadcloth rather than satin and lace.:-)

    More seriously, how soon will it be before joshing one’s neighbour is considered, if not by him, but by the Plod, to be a ‘Hate crime’, which results in prosecution, a fine, the issue of one of May’s IPNA’s and eventually, imprisonment?

  47. Alexsandr,

    “What about Queen?”

    I’ve never been a fan of Queen. I’ve been listening to Rory Gallagher, Jethro Tull, Camel, Caravan, Tangerine Dream, Rush etc.

    But I also like a lot of classical music especially choral and liturgical works. I have an ambition to form a subscribing society which will commission works of classical music from contemporary composers, especially choral works with a patriotic and traditional theme.

  48. Peter from Maidstone@November 20th, 2013 – 12:16

    I will forgive your not liking Queen because of your like of Jethro Tull.

    On classical, I prefer Beethoven and before. But also find Mendlesohn lovely.

  50. Glancing through next week’s “Radio Times” I see that Esther Rantzen is launching, what she calls, “My New Crusade”. Talk about blowing your own trumpet. Her ‘concern’ for the loneliness of the elderly has lead her to create the “Silver Line”, since she believes the Child Line has been so successful. Successful for whom? All the time her BBC colleagues were abusing little children and young teenagers, we didn’t hear a squeak out of this toothy do-gooder. Was she truly ignorant of what was happening on her own turf??

  51. Anne,
    She knew, they all knew what was going on. What really sickens me about all this is that they are all North London socialists, had the perpetrators been Tories then the squawking would have deafened the nation.

  54. P from M asks. How could Esther Rantzen, the founder of ChildLine, possibly ignore ‘green room gossip’ about Jimmy Savile’s alleged abuse of young girls….

    I have never liked or trusted this woman she persuade a married man and eventually married him.

    She was ruthless in the way she treated her benefactor Bernard Braden and in my humble opinion never does or says anything unless it is for her own benefit.

    As she has aged she has become worse she will do and say anything to get on to the television and her constant talk of personal matters sickens me.

  56. stephen maybery
    November 20th, 2013 – 15.22
    Peter from Maidstone
    David Ossitt
    November 20th, 2013 – 15:48
    Seems I am not alone in despising this vile woman. I am not a prude, nor one who throws the first stone, none of us is perfect, least of all myself. But, moat of us do try to maintain a level fo decency in our lives, and this person lacks the most elementary morality. I don’t usually bother to ‘Google’ media stars, but checked Rantzen out. She has a deplorable history of serial adultery, and considering how ugly she is, I wonder if her success in stealing husbands and climbing the greasy pole of media stardom is because of her personal depravity. As the rumours went around about the late Wallace Simpson, I can only imagine that her terrible face, ghastly teeth and nasty voice were all nil compared to the horrid little tricks she specialised in! That was very catty,I know, but I am very angry at all the hypocrisy.

  60. The ultimate result of such asininity may well result in the choice a monarchy or not.
    After all, if Scotland leaves the UK they may well start a trend by divesting themselves of such non-productive appurtenences.

  62. Mr Boot treats us to his views on how the Church of England might achieve the revival so devoutly to be wished by Archbishop Carey.
    My own view would be that like Mrs Worthington, parents should not put their daughters on that stage.

    http://alexanderboot.com/content/argument-favour-nude-priestesses

    As it searches for a new role to replace its old one we should remember that the Church of England was founded to provide a ‘revolving door’ marriage and divorce service for a libidinous monarch with a similar appetite for beheadings as a Syrian jihadist.
    As the former services are now extremely optional and widely available from a number of sources, including the post, the opportunities for ‘re-roling’ the Church may be extremely limited. Certainly there is a current one-time boom in funerals as the present congregations make their final contributions, but there’s nothing much coming behind along behind that. Last year there were more abortions (@180,000), than christenings (140,000).
    What’s to be done? Mr Boot recommends a hard line, based on Faith and telling the Truth, but these days it seems, few people want the real Truth, even if told to them by one of the few CofE clergy who still believes in God and isn’t a practicising homosexual. So, ultimately, we come back to the Church of England’s uncomfortable pedigree: springing forth as it did from those reswtless, syphilitic, dynasty-seeking lions.
    Perhaps it’s time for the poor old C of E to seek the absolution and foregiveness of its Roman Catholic parent, who so far a least, does hold to its values.

  65. Peter from Maidstone – 18:34

    “Conservatism is monarchial”.

    Really? The American States did not adopt a King when they established the United states constitution. Until the recent failure of Conservatism there that seemed to work fairly well, based as it was on a system of democratic checks and balances.
    Whilst our own ‘Glorious Revolution” saw the return of a monarch that was due as much to the need for the members of the House of Lords to retain their titles, land power and privileges than for any desire other than to put a malleable puppet,stripped of his prerogatives, on the throne. The people of England have been steadily getting the worst of both worlds since, as the Commons has usurped the powers of sovereign and removed the checks formerly provided by the Lords.
    Whilst this has been going on the Nation itself has declined. The Mother of Parliaments, (actually, that was Iceland, but let’s not quibble), has decided it no longer wants to do the difficult job of running the country and has been quietly but steadily transferring sovereignty to our traditional continental enemies for the last forty years, whilst selling off the nation’s assets. Given our bankruptcy once we had emerged from the two disasterous world wars our hereditary politcal class had led us into this was almost certainly inevitable.

    So, Peter, if as you contend, Conservatism is monarchical, should you not be holding it to account; for failing to discharge its responsibilities, by opposing change, by being what you think it is, Conservative?
    For the Monarchy itself has not been Conservative, and in failing to be it has betrayed those British people who are Conservatives and failed those who are not, but neverthess are patriots.
    As for the Prince of Wails; this shameless adulteror, agit-prop warmist, would-be populist and defender of New Labour’s ‘Faiths’, rather than the very Church which defines him, forever seems to seek mere office rather than real responsibility.

    Conservatism, monarchical?
    Monarchy, conservative?

  66. Noa November 20th, 2013 – 17:43
    Hold your hands up if you think its a good idea to have this fellow as the next monarch.

    Anne Wotana Kaye 1 Noa, my hands are firmly deep down in my pockets!

    Peter from Maidstone November 20th, 2013 – 17:46
    “We don’t get the choice. The essence of the monarchy is that it is not a popularity contest.”

    Yes it is a good idea and if you will allow I will explain just why it is.
    Peter is correct “The essence of the monarchy is that it is not a popularity contest” nor should it ever be.

    Our future monarch has in the past delved into areas that as King he would be unable to comment on, in some, he has by doing so; done much good, in others he has attracted derision and scorn for his lack of judgment and his naivety.

    Increasingly he is assuming the role (though not officially) of “Prince-Regent” in order to spare his mother our Queen some of the great burden that she carries, thus we will see and hear less of his opinions (we never hear the Queen’s) until eventually; when and if he is made Prince-Regent and certainly when he is the King he will emulate his mother and keep his thoughts under tight control.

    If we were to play fast and loose with the rules of the succession; that the reigning monarch passes on to the first in line we would be feeding ammunition to the republicans, if we wish that one day William and after him his son George are crowned our king then we best honour that right by respecting that Charles first has a prior claim.

  67. America and Americans cannot be Conservative. The very basis of their state is anti-conservative and their constitution entirely fails to replicate the best of our own, indeed the heights of our own. The presidency is sold to the highest bidder and the Senate and House are the same elected body. That it seems to work is not the character of Conservatism or the Western Christian civilization we are to conserve, but the utilitarianism of socialism and atheism. Has the monarchy, as much as the Lords and the Commons, been corrupted? Of course. And all need to be renewed, and don’t worry, I’ll be doing what I can and am doing what I can.

    But it is impossible to be a Conservative and a Republican just as it is impossible to be a Conservative and anti-Christian (not necessarily a believer though), since the very basis of our Western democracy and civilization is both Christian and naturally monarchial. Indeed it was the envy of Europe as the very best form of Government possible, and its character is rooted in Greek thought about the ideal Government and Constitution.

    All you are doing is pointing to the corruption of our constitution and Government. The tri-partite character needs re-establishing, not removing altogether.

    I am presently researching a writing a book and will be sure to place a copy into the hands of Prince Charles. He is liable to much criticism, but that is not what the nature of monarchy is. It is iconic, not personal. It is representative of the nation and eternal, not popular and a la mode.

  68. David Ossitt
    November 20th, 2013 – 19:36
    I was just being provocative – winding up Peter, who of course is right. 🙂

  69. Noa@November 20th, 2013 – 17:43

    ok he is wrong on MMCC but he is dead right on some of the carbuncles the architectural profession have foisted on our country,

  70. It is nonsensical to argue as you do that
    “America and Americans cannot be Conservative. The very basis of their state is anti-conservative and their constitution entirely fails to replicate the best of our own, indeed the heights of our own.”
    What best?
    What heights?
    When, since 1917, has Britain scaled heights greater than the United States? We have passed each other on the upward and down escalators of power and prestige. Due I contend, for the most part to the respective strengths and weaknesses of our models of government and the opportunities or lack of them, offered to our and their brightest and best.
    The British Constitutional Monarchy is merely one model of Government and I do not accept your view that it provides a superior template.
    You contend that the American Presidency is now bought and sold, which I do not accept, unpalatable though it may be to Republicans and Englisg conservatives, he is the President for four vyears because he received more votes than his opponent. Unlike the next King, who will be monarch because of an accident of birth.
    If you believe being Conservative is to unfailingly and uncritically support the status quo, however ananchronistic and unfitted for its role it may have become, then you and I are from very different schools of conservative thought.
    For me what is important is the rule of law, the equal rights of all citizens (remember that we are subjects in the UK, an important distinction) to freedom of speech, thought and association.
    In sofar as a constitutional monarch recognises, defends and upholds these rights and freedoms, and forebears to sign laws which abrogate them, he holds and discharges a vital constitutional role. When he fails in those responsibilities, he is no longer a vital part of our constitutional safeguards but part of the problem, the legitimising stamp of tyranny.

  71. I don’t see how it is nonsensical. It is certainly the view of a modern Conservative writer whose opinion I respect. How can America or Americans be Conservative? Their state is based on anti-Conservative rebellion and on an anti-Christian seeking after profit and pleasure.

    I think we are from different schools. I think you are a Libertarian rather than a Conservative. There is an overlap. I still respect you.

    The preservation of our civilization and culture is the essence of Conservatism. If you think that monarchy is simply an accident of birth then I really do not think you are a Conservative. If you think that constitutions can be created then you are not a Conservative. Because once a constitution is devised by one body it can be devised again by another, and then another, and so everything is lost. You have no argument to prevent the democratic mob electing Simon Cowell as President, because celebrity is the new monarchy.

    But is isn’t and can never substitute for monarchy which is not a form of Government at all, but the very basis of our society.

  72. David Ossitt 19.36

    David,
    The rules of succession are secondary to the matter of whether or not the monarchy is performing its constitutional responsibilities,as I have alluded above.
    If they are not, then why should an unending line of wealthy privileged freeloaders assume they have an eternal, indeed a divine right, to be monarchs, one after the other; taking their privileges for granted, whilst considering their now vanished responsibilities can be substituted with empty platitudes?

  73. Noa, you are not even speaking like a Conservative when you describe the monarchy so dismissively. How are your views any different to any republican over the last 400 years? And being republican they cannot be Conservative because you do not wish to conserve but eliminate and replace.

  74. Who will elect the celebrity replacement for the Queen? It must surely be by the widest democratic franchise, and there must surely be an elected Lords, since the hereditary principle is rejected by you. So in fact the widest franchise must be the sole basis of Government, and the shortest term advantage of the lowest quality and greatest quantity of voters must dominate all.

    This has nothing in common with Conservatism. It is the rule of the unemployed and immigrant mob over the last remnants of private enterprise and high culture.

    A reduced franchise, an hereditary Lords and an active monarch is the only means of restoring the balance. Removing two of the three parts establishes forever the dictatorship of the plebs inspired by the cult of celebrity.

  75. Peter 20:42

    “I still respect you”.

    Indeed. As I do you. And why should you not?

    You have raised several interesting issues. However other matters require my attention, and I will reply later or tomorrow.

  76. Spending time on the net sometimes some people consider disagreement a mark of disrespect. Or others reading our disagreement might think such. I would not want that to be understood as the case.

  77. Baron’s back, still breathing, and must say your concern has involuntarily moistened the barbarian’s semi-plastic eyes. Totally undeserved, your kind words, thank you.

  78. Alexander Boot’s latest is taking to task Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, who thinks the church could do better if it stopped being ‘boring’. There may be something in it, and Rev Paul Flowers, the former Chairman of the Co-op Bank may have the answer – rent few gay boys, buy some dope, have a party.

  82. Noa November 20th, 2013 – 20:47
    “The rules of succession are secondary to the matter of whether or not the monarchy is performing its constitutional responsibilities, as I have alluded above.”

    Two things, first, only an avid republican would or could suggest or infer that our Monarch Queen Elizabeth, is not fulfilling or performing her constitutional responsibilities, since the death of her father in 1952 she has been our Queen and in that time has fulfilled all of her duties without ever having putt a foot wrong.

    In your disagreements with Peter you or he compare our system with the American kind of presidency, this is plain wrong, should we ever make the mistake of disbanding the monarchy in favour of a republic we would simply have something similar to the Irish Republic where the President is a titular ruler and all power remains with the Prime Minister of the day.

    Your comment “why should an unending line of wealthy privileged freeloaders assume they have an eternal, indeed a divine right, to be monarchs” demeans you and indicates to me (as it has to Peter) that you post here under false colours, in that a Conservative is a Monarchist just as it is also true that a Monarchist must by definition be a Conservative.

    One final thing the Monarchy does much good for us all around the world the benefits that Queen Elizabeth has brought to this country are immeasurable.

    The alternative of having a populist criminal such as Blair or a mad sad bad Brown as our President is quite frankly intolerable.

  84. Hello, AWK — Been at the next door neighbours’ having a drinkie poo. Thank you for the kind thought, though. But the chill in the mountains calls for a drink around the fire. Thank you, though, for your thoughtfulness!

  85. PfM 20th, – 19:16

    “and there will be martyrs and there will be blood shed.”

    If that were to come to pass, I guess it would have to include me, as the tumbril rolls over my dead body.

  86. David Ossitt 20th, – 23:55

    “One final thing the Monarchy does much good for us all around the world the benefits that Queen Elizabeth has brought to this country are immeasurable.

    The alternative of having a populist criminal such as Blair or a mad sad bad Brown as our President is quite frankly intolerable.”

    🙂

    The problem is that the Monarchy is not a ‘shouty’ entity and the good that it does goes unnoticed, not least because the media find it boring, unless they can find an excuse to pin a photo of Kate (and before her, Diana) above their badly written, biased dross.

  87. Ostrich (occasionally)
    November 21st, 2013 – 09:44

    photo of Kate (and before her, Diana) above their badly written, biased dross.

    Well said I agree.

  89. David Ossitt,
    We will I think descend into a pointless ‘yes it is, no it isn’t’ exchange in which much heat and little light is generated.
    It always seems strange to me that people accept the status quo and its implications, in this case the accession to the throne of an embittered self-interested, eco-liberal adulteror at a time when the basic rights, liberties and indeed existance of its citizens (actually, subjects), are under greater threat than at any time since the battle of Ashington.
    What saddens me is the lack of analysis, constructive or otherwise, of the turgid conventionalities served to us by the media on the subject and role of the monarchy. All Acts of Parliament, every one have to receive the Royal assent before coming into law.
    Not one has ever been returned unsigned.
    And so our remaining freedoms are rapidly eroded by a dictatorial Parliament, aided by a vestigial monarchy, no longer performing any of the functions for which it was supposedly retained, whilst facile fingerpointing and infantile accusations of republicanism are hurled at the messager by the increasingly disenfranchised.

    of a stat romedia pap that in As Peter I note but do not comments., but do not accept your have no interest in either

  90. “At, at, at leisure, you poorly educated barbarian” someone should have said. You’re just too English.

    Monarchy or die, Baron reckons. When or perhaps if the monarchical construct fails Britain will become just a rain sodden island with more ‘troughers’ feeding on the taxpayers. This seems the most obvious practical feature of the current set-up. How could one bribe someone who has so much? Also, every large country that abandoned its ancient arrangement of government went through a rather unpleasant phase – Russia, Italy, France.

  91. Noa, again you too closely associate the monarchy with particular monarchs. This is a mistake. The role of the monarchy is not to be an un-elected President. There are bad bishops and archbishops but that does not shake the episcopate in traditional Churches.

    The last monarch to refuse assent to a Bill was several hundred years ago. Her Majesty the Queen can hardly be blamed for doing something that we, her subjects, have manifestly no courage at present to do. We must not be like the employees urging a colleague to stand up to the manager while saying, ‘Don’t worry, we are right behind you!’. Because manifestly we are not. If a few million of us were on the streets then perhaps HM might have a sense of authority to refuse assent to a bill, but where are the people who would support her if she did start to intervene? And how much support could she rely on? Not much from armchair critics who damn her if she does and damn her if she doesn’t. (I don’t mean to include you in that number, this is not personal).

    How many people will fight to the death for the monarchy? I think I would, but would I? Or like everyone else would I shrug my shoulders as another fragment of our Western Christian civilization crumbles.

    Presidents? We would rapidly have a US model. There is no possibility that someone like Tony Blair would be content to be a Prime Minister if he could also be head of state himself. Ireland has tried to emulate the UK. The UK would emulate the US to our great harm. Very quickly we would find ourselves with a Pakistani Muslim head of state put up by the Labour Party.

  92. Noa at 10:02

    You may not be aware of an ancient right of the Queen’s subject. If one gathers together an impressively large number of people willing to sign a petition on any subject one may desire e.g. our quitting the EU, the monarch is obliged to do as the unwashed demand. It’s the last resort, one would have to ensure a noticeable majority backs it.

  93. De Maistre, that exceptional writer in French on political matters says in the 18th century…

    “The true English Constitution is that admirable, unique, and infallible public spirit, beyond all praise, which guides every thing, preserves every thing, saves every thing. That which is written is nothing”.

    “Let us now consider some one political constitution, that of England, for example. It certainly was not made à priori. Her Statesman never assembled themselves together and said, Let us create three powers, balancing them in such a manner, etc. No one of them ever thought of such a thing. The Constitution is the work of circumstances, and the number of these is infinite. Roman laws, ecclesiastical laws, feudal laws; Saxon, Norman, and Danish customs; the privileges, prejudices, and claims of all orders; wars, revolts, revolutions, the Conquest, Crusades; virtues of every kind, and all vices; knowledge of every sort, and all errors and passions;—all these elements, in short, acting together, and forming, by their admixture and reciprocal action, combinations multiplied by myriads of millions, have produced at length, after many centuries, the most complex unity, and happy equilibrium of political powers that the world has ever seen“.

    It is this happy equilibirium which has been disturbed and which we must restore, not further destroy.

  94. Give the devil his due. Keith Vaz is raising a storm asking why no “cutters’ doing FGM have not been prosecuted. Will this mealy=mouthed, moslem arse-crawling government, or indeed any British government actually due anything. Whatever Vaz’s motives, altruistic or selfish, at least he is keeping the problem alive.

  95. PfM 21st, – 09:55

    “The Catholic Church, a renewed and Traditional Catholic Church, will become the Church of England again,”

    It seems I misunderstood this first part of your comment.

  96. Peter from Maidstone – 10:21
    “Very quickly we would find ourselves with a Pakistani Muslim head of state put up by the Labour Party”

    You mean, we would have an elected president, who was a foreigner in that country, supported by hostile collaborators working towards destroying everything the country stands for?

    Unbelievable! Surely, that could never happen?

    Impossible! 🙂

  97. AWK1 – 10:51 ‘Keith Vaz and FGM’

    Although Wikipedia does have him born in Aden (remember that place?), they do also have him down as a Roman Catholic.

  98. On Guido Fawkes Blog, Harriet Harman’s husband Jack Dromey, MP is revealed as pursuing gay black men’s genitals! Shocking revelations, but considering to whom he is married, these gay playmates must be fragrant to say the least.

  99. RobertC
    November 21st, 2013 – 11:30
    Yes, Robert, that is his saving grace. Couldn’t imagine a moslem taking on that cause.

  100. “America and Americans cannot be Conservative.”

    Are you trying to coax “cigar chompin” JJB out……

  102. Peter

    You defend the monarchy uncritically, without in any way addressing the legitimate concerns which I have Identified.
    In essence your argument is better that a flawed character like Charles inherits than Tony Blair as President. Of course this is your argument not mine, and bears no relation whatever to the points I have made. I have not discussed the relevant or otherwise, of a President as a replacement to a monarch. However, el presidente Blair could be voted out, as Obama can and and will be in time. The jug eared tree hugger will linger on until his extinction; given medical advances that may well be in the 22nd century.
    Your fundamental point is that you get no choice with a monarch.
    Well, why should you not?
    If everything else in the country can be privatised and put out to tender, why should we not replace trial by combat with something more suitable to a liberal modern society and invite bids for the role of King? At least the job would have to be defined and the candidates make their cases for selection. The blithe assumption from the oldest product of a depleted gene pool that it should have a lifetime meal ticket to luxury and respect would be abruptly challenged. Let us not forget that in many societies, past and present the role of leader was earned by proving oneself the best available, succession should not be automatic.

    As to your attempts to identify whether I am a Conservative, libertarian or even (heaven forbid!) a republican. They are not relevent. Like Nobby Stiles you are simply trying to play the man and not the ball.
    And yet, whilst you seek to preserve in aspic one failed institution, the monarchy, yet argue that another, no less key to Britain’s constitution, be replaced by its most ancient and bitter enemy! The replacement of the Church of England by the Roman Catholic church would, at a stroke, destroy the present basis for a constiutional monarchy and Parliamentary sovereignty, undoing 500 years of bloodly achieved bitter compromise.
    l am surprised no one has taken you to task on this treacherous heresy yet, Peter, though Ostrich (O) has duly noted it.
    What would succeed such a change one wonders? Well, we’ve already seen a nifty piece of pre-positioning from the erstwhile ‘Defender of Faiths’ a few years ago.
    Obviously, if ‘Paris was worth a mass’, as Louis XIII once said, then London is too, and a imams, shamans and a host of other religious demagogues will be demanding their say as well. So perhaps we may see the King replaced by a Caliph.
    One final point, there have been several comments unfavourably comparing the constitution of the United States with that of the United Kingdom. In particular that it is not ‘conservative’
    and ‘anti-christian’. Would-be students can consider and compare the constitutions in detail elsewhere. They will soon find that the finest minds of ‘the Age of Reason’, American, British and French, applied themselves in study of what worked, and what didn’t in defining a political system of checks and balances, supporting the principle that all men are equal and held inalienable righst. It was modelled on the best of the British system of government and common law and it has since provided a model for over 200 other constitutions.
    That it is not ‘conservative’, is wrong, more importantly it is simply not relevant. In the narrowest sense ‘conservatism’ would have meant the colonists remaining under British rule. Despite Lord North’s duplicious soldiering and negotiations,equalled only in perfidy by Chamberlain’s, the continuation of British rule was not a serious option.
    As to it being ‘anti-christian’,the constitution guarantees freedom of religion, or none of course. A lesson still not absorbed in Britain, where the monarch cannot marry or become, a catholic without destroying the fundament of our constitution.
    I pass over, as unworthy of serious comment, whether, as has been maintained here,the Monarchy is ‘good value’, as though it was an Aldi or a Waitrose.

  103. Baron -I’m pleased to see you back. We were concerned…

    As to your comment that
    “… the monarch is obliged to do as the unwashed demand. It’s the last resort, one would have to ensure a noticeable majority backs it.”

    I simply ask, how?

  104. Noa
    November 21st, 2013 – 10:02 “an embittered self-interested, eco-liberal adulteror(sic)”

    I had determined not to continue this conversation, as we will never ever square the circle in that you are not a monarchist whilst I most decidedly am.

    But I must return to the fray on one point, you keep on referring to our future King as a shameless adulterer and by your lights I suppose that he is, even though his adultery was with the woman that he has loved for all of his adult life and who is now his much loved wife and in all probability our future Queen consort.

    Nor do you acknowledge that he was possibly driven to it by the antics of his batty wife, who by all accounts was a serial shagger prior to, during and after their divorce.

    Adultery is just wrong but it is part of the human condition and if there are degrees to measure how serious is the ‘wrong’ then surely to commit adultery with the singular love of your life who you then marry is way down the list when set against the sins of the sexually avaricious flibbertigibbet that he first married.

  105. David Ossitt 12;53

    It is not so long ago that a monarch’s involvement with a divorcee led to his standing down from the throne.
    Of course the monarchy’s standards, like our own, have fallen from such great principled heights to the general acceptance of a married man, the future head of the CofE conducting an adulterous relationship with his mistress, also a married woman.
    And let us witness the myriad of self-serving excuses in the media, repeated here by you, in order to justify the unjustifiable.
    Why

  106. Noa, the commitment to what works is not conservative and there are no lessons to be learned from the revolutionaries of France or Spain. If you think the constitution can be changed to simply suit the times you are not a conservative. You just want our society to be closer to your personal preferences. That is a justifiable view but it is not conservatism. As for Anglicanism well it was always part of the problem and not the solution. Western Civilization is built on an Apostolic foundation not the crumbling Protestant replacement.

  107. Peter

    “You just want our society to be closer to your personal preferences.”
    That is your position, not mine.
    I look forward to an objective, balanced and sustainable counter argument from you. On current evidence I will continue to be disappointed in this.

  109. Peter,
    I wish to review and re-invigorate each of the elements of our Parliamentary democracy, testing each link and component for integrity and its suitabilty and fitness for purpose. Conservatism keeps what is good and discards the useless, wasteful and irrelevant.

  110. Noa @ 12:42

    If you ask the details of the petition, Baron doesn’t have a clue, he only knows it can be done, the Queen can, if petitioned by a sizeable number of her subjects, dismiss the House, appoint new government, quash treaties. Any lawyer dealing with constitutional matters should advise you how to proceed.

  111. Noa, Peter fM, Anne, David – thanks, but no more from anyone, please, the barbarian finds it awkward, he should have kept his mouth shut.

    Malfleur, of course it wasn’t anything you’ve said, how could you?

  112. Noa @ 14:48

    One would have thought the monarchy is the last part of the set-up that needs re-invigorating.

  113. Baron,
    Laws are made by Parliament. The days of law-making by Royal edict are, mercifully, long gone, otherwise we could expect the premptory destruction of buildings considered to be ‘carbuncles’, additional green taxes and the preemptory confiscation of the assests under our home.

  114. Anne Wotana Kaye 1
    November 21st, 2013 – 11:38
    This nasty information can be found in the Telegraph and other newspapers. In fact, it is nearly everywhere save the BBC. I wonder why?

  115. Baron 14.50
    ‘No more from anyone’?

    No more?
    From anyone?
    Ever?

    I am saddened, but not surprised, that many people are not prepared to re-visit and re-consider their prejuduces and shibolleths. And even to do so embarrases and enrages them.
    Not least because, if they do not, they are ill-prepared to defend them.

  116. I mentioned the other day that labour now has a new “let us all repeat a phrase ad-nausea” the new phrase is ‘on his watch’ I have heard Ed- big-fat-pig-Balls use it twice today.

    They are so dim can’t they see just how juvenile this sort of thing sounds.

  117. Anne Wotana Kaye 1 November 21st, 2013 – 15:00

    “This nasty information can be found in the Telegraph and other newspapers. In fact, it is nearly everywhere save the BBC. I wonder why?”

    Tong in cheek Anne?

    You of course know why; the liberal left can do no wrong in the eyes of the BBC, he would have had to have been caught quite literally with his pants around his ankles in a public loo for them to comment and even then they would try to spin the line that he was only doing it for research.

    I would love to be a fly on the wall when his misses gives him a tongue lashing, mind he probably would enjoy that.

  119. David Ossitt
    November 21st, 2013 – 15:55
    Yes, David, written tongue in cheek. Seriously, the vile Harriet Harman is a pervert equal to her husband. She wants gay sex for youngsters and other revolting things. Seems the whole lot are pervs, Jacqui Smith and her porno- loving spouse, to name one, and on the opposite side we have a certain bald ‘gentleman’ who likes to share hotel rooms with another gentleman, et al.

  121. Noa @ 15:57

    Hand on heart, would you swap your life, whatever it may be, for one of the Queen? Baron wouldn’t. All the riches and privileges can in no way compensate for the freedom to do as he wants. She, or her equivalent, may be pampered, but can any monarch do what Baron can? Go on holiday where and as he pleases, search through charity shops for books he likes, have a pint with friends he chooses, in his garden strip naked to wash in a tub after few ghours of lawn mowing, stop the car whilst driving in the High Suffolk countryside to have a pee …….

  122. Hello? Is that Bernard Hyphen-Howe?

    Who’s speaking?

    Ed here.

    Who?

    Ed Miliband, Leader of the Labour party.

    Oh, THAT Ed. Yes, SIR Bernard Hyphen-Howe here. What can I do for you?

    Well, Bernard, we’ve got a bit of a problem. I’m wondering if there’s some way you can help us.

    Us?

    The Labour Party…y’know.

    Oh, yes. And how can I help you, my son?

    Well, it’s like this…y’know Hattie’s bloke?

    M-hmm?

    Well, it seems someone’s trying to out him for getting up to things he shouldn’t have.

    M-hmm? What kind of things?

    Can’t really say, y’know…naughty things, anyway.

    Oh. And how can I help you? You know, if the press has got it I won’t be able to do anything to stop them…..Not that I believe you’re asking that, OK?

    Of course not, Bernie But we were just wondering if you’d got anything that would blow it off the front pages for now. Any chance?

    Funny you should ask that…as a matter of fact I have. We’re just about ready to call a press conference about a slavery case in South London. Seems three wimmin have just been freed after getting themselves incarcerated for some thirty years. Should make a big splash. Will that do?

    Gee thanks, Bernie; that’ll do fine. Although we may need some follow-up for tomorrow.

    That’s OK, young man, but just now we’ll let tomorrow take care of itself, OK?

    ‘Gulp’ Well, if that’s the best you can do…

    It gives you some time to sort things out at your end. Still, if you need any further help you may call me tomorrow morning…in office hours.

    ‘Sigh’ OK, Sir Bernard. Thanks for all your help. You’re a real brick.

    That’s OK, Laddie, always ready to help a kindred spirit in trouble. Let me know if there’s anything else I can do. I’m sure you can sort things out before morning.

    Fine, Sir Bernard, great to talk to…’click’….brrrrrrr.

  123. Peter from Maidstone @ 13:15

    Well put, Peter, in the spirit of the great guru of Baron’s, Edmund Burke.

    What matters on monarchy isn’t so much the individual who performs the function of the Head of State, there have been good and bad monarchs, it’s the institution itself.

    In a sense, the royal heredity only mimics what we all strive to achieve at different levels of the society. Or is anyone really convinced that the offspring of some of the pop idols of the past, i.e. the Peaches, Biancas or whom have you, is as deserving to emulate their, often talentless but lucky parents?

  124. Noa

    Is there a subliminal aim of republicanism hidden deep in UKIP’s satchel; if not are you in a minority or majority within your chosen political preference in that regard? While I respect your right to any political opinion; it would be helpful to know where it sits with your party?

  125. David Ossitt

    I’ve just noticed your response ( November 21st, 2013 – 12:53) to Noa.

    Obviously I have no personal knowledge whatsoever of either Charles or Diana. My own assessments of of human behaviour have to be based mainly on what I know of my own relatives & friends, and on my own life experiences.

    You portray Charles as a more or less innocent victim.

    Diana, on the other hand, you portray as the very opposite – and way you do it is emotional to the point of being unfair.

    Also – should her closest family read it – it seems to me to be unnecessarily and hurtfully abusive.

  126. I wonder where the Heads of family. Came from in the three women slaves rescued in south London.

  127. I see Melanie returned to the Barclay Bugle today with a bang: every sentence a damning indictment of today’s socialist hypocrisy and debauchery. Sleaze on stilts; as the Speccy has obscured most of the piece with a paywall, I won’t link it; it’s worth a complete facsimile from her blog (which is not paywall protected). Shame she has to demean herself by taking the Barclay buck, but I forgive her, she has to make a living and indeed it puts the other scribblers thereupon to shame. Here it is in full. Enjoy:

    An icon of our time
    Posted by Melanie Phillips

    Spectator: How the ‘crystal Methodist’ got away with it yet again, one particular question has formed on lips up and down the land. How in heaven’s name could so many people have failed to spot such a spectacular abuse of a public position?

    We heard it first in the Jimmy Savile scandal, when the posthumous discovery of half a century of predation left people incredulous that so many had known about but done nothing to stop his serial depravities. Now a similar question needs to be asked about the Revd Paul Flowers, the disgraced Methodist minister and former chairman of the Co-op Bank who was filmed apparently handing over £300 to buy a stash of cocaine and crystal meth and also boasted of using ketamine, cannabis and a club drug, GHB.

    The real scandal, though, is not just that he was a staggeringly incompetent bank chief who knew next to nothing about banking and presided over a bank that somehow fell into a £1.5 billion black hole. It is not even his predilection for cocaine, crystal meth and the occasional ‘two-day, drug-fuelled gay orgy’ (to use his words). The scandal is that no one spotted that he was spectacularly unsuited to the jobs he was given — or if they did, they chose to do nothing about it. Yet again, a public figure with his ethics pinned to his sleeve somehow existed beyond proper scrutiny.

    In the frame alongside the deeply un-fragrant Flowers are various institutions which now have questions to answer. The Co-op Bank, which elected him chairman. The Labour party, which banked his donations. Ed Miliband, who dined with him and appointed him to Labour’s financial and industrial advisory board. And the Methodist Church, which appointed him a ‘superintendent’ minister and designated him a trustee for its investment funds and property — even though he had next to no expertise in business.

    Oh — and he has also been a member of the Advertising Standards Authority, vice-chairman of the National Association of Citizens’ Advice Bureaux and chairman of Manchester Camerata, the city’s chamber orchestra, not to mention chairman of the drug abuse charity Lifeline and the Terrence Higgins Trust. He is an icon of our time.

    So how come none of these bodies ever spotted his spectacular unsuitability to be a member of the Great and the Good?

    His striking unfitness to advise anyone on economic matters was demonstrated at the Treasury select committee earlier this month. Asked to state the Co-op Bank’s total assets, he guessed £3 billion; it was actually £47 billion. His performance may well have caused onlookers to scratch their heads and ask themselves: just what exotic substances is he on?

    It turns out that he was indeed on drugs, even if not on that precise occasion. But it has become increasingly clear that the rise of the Revd Paul Flowers was not due to any banking expertise — which comprised a mere four years’ employment at NatWest, which he had joined at the tender age of 19.

    No, his rise was due to his political connections. He was appointed chairman by the Co-op Bank’s Remuneration and Appointments Committee, which is composed largely of former Labour politicians and Co-op veterans. Jobs for the boys, in other words — or, as Flowers put it, the Co-op ‘had a practice of appointing a democrat from within its own numbers as the chair of that board’. From which we may infer that fitness for office was a synonym for mutual political back-scratching.

    Indeed the Co-op Group, of which Flowers was a director, has underwritten the Labour party by some £34 million over the past two decades. The last £1.2 million loan was agreed in April, a month after Miliband met Flowers in the Commons. Even now, about 30 Labour MPs describe themselves as ‘Labour and Co-operative’ — including Ed Balls, the shadow chancellor.

    The Co-op was hymned by Eds Miliband and Balls for its qualities of stewardship and responsibility, and proclaimed an ‘ethical’ bank — as opposed to all those other supposedly predatory casino banks. This seemed to give rise to the belief that the sole criteria for management was being holier-than-thou about money. But piety is no substitute for financial competence — as was demonstrated during the Co-op’s calamitous acquisition of the Britannia Building Society.

    We knew that deal was a disaster which was to force the Co-op to seek a bailout. What we did not know, until Flowers admitted it to the Treasury select committee this month, was that the bank was egged on to do the deal by Ed Balls when he was part of Gordon Brown’s government, and that he was ‘very supportive of the whole process’. That support turned out to be mutual: Flowers later oversaw a £50,000 donation of Co-op Group money to Balls’s private office in March last year. ‘We believe in supporting political friends,’ he said later.

    It’s amazing how far such friendships can take you in certain circles. The Labour party stayed friendly with Flowers even after his abrupt departure from Bradford Council (‘inappropriate but not illegal adult content’ had been found on his computer). Friendships seem to have elevated the laughably unqualified Flowers to the chairmanship of the Co-op Bank. The Financial Services Authority was supposed to watch out for all this mutual back-scratching — but instead it joined in. Graeme Hardie, one of the FSA’s ‘grey panthers’ who assessed Flowers’s fitness to chair the Co-op Bank, went on become a director at that bank.

    The full extent of this seems to be beginning to dawn even on the Co-operative Group. Len Wardle, its chairman who oversaw Flowers’s recruitment, this week apologised and resigned — recognising the true nature of the scandal which, he said, ‘raised a number of serious questions for both the bank and the group’.

    Now, surely, we are getting closer to the deeper reason why Flowers got away with it. If people knew or suspected his inadequacies when promoting him, they didn’t care because he ticked all the right boxes of what has become the Unchallengeable Consensus of Virtue — even one that turns out to be rotten to the core. Competence and rigour come a poor second to being mates in a cosy cartel devoted to the cause. It’s all about striking an attitude which proclaims your goodness through a series of fashionable shibboleths. This makes you all but invulnerable, because anyone who challenges that attitude is inescapably portrayed as wicked, stupid or bonkers.

    An article written by Flowers about the Co-op, entitled ‘Capturing the Ethical Opportunity’, read as if he had simply ticked off every such shibboleth he could think of. The Co-op ran ‘the UK’s most radical ethical operating plan’. Tick! It was against ‘ corporate greed and speculation’, promoting instead ‘sustainability’ based on an ‘inclusive and socially responsible approach to business’. Tick! Tick! ‘Green Schools’! ‘Healthy food’! ‘Fairtrade’! Tick! Tick! Tick! Thus Flowers created his own mythology, modestly describing himself on the Methodist Church’s website as ‘known for an objective rigour and for asking the questions others might avoid’.

    So what about all those drugs and orgies? The behaviour which even his former rent boy described as ‘debauched’? How could a man with such predilections have got away with being a Methodist minister for 40 years? Flowers claims the pressures of his Co-op role and a family bereavement drove him to do things that were ‘stupid and wrong’. But it emerges that, back in 1981, he was fined for committing an act of gross indecency in a public toilet. The Methodist Church decided he could continue as a minister because he was ‘very contrite’.

    In other words, it’s not that no one knew what he was up to. Some did indeed know — but chose to ignore it. That’s why a Labour MP who passed Flowers in the corridor apparently joked, ‘Have you got a touch of the old Colombian flu?’ It would seem that his drug-taking was a laughing matter amongst his ‘friends’. As for the Lifeline drugs charity he chaired, this takes such a liberal position that its literature effectively normalises drug use through manuals on how to use drugs ‘safely’.

    And now people are shocked that the former chairman of Lifeline turns out to be a rampant drug abuser. Then the Methodists get all judgmental and suspend him for three weeks. Tough, huh? Especially when you consider what they say on their website about drug abusers, that ‘judgmental attitudes are wholly inappropriate’. Even the Methodists are in hock to liberal pieties.

    Incompetence, recklessness, irresponsibility, criminality, decadence — these are all faults found in others, never in you and your cronies. Because you are inclusive, diverse, green, ethical, compassionate, progressive, devoted to equality and above all non-judgmental — except of course when it comes to the Tories, or anyone who wants to enforce the law against illegal drugs.

    And so you are invulnerable. As long as you tick all the right ‘progressive’ boxes, you can get away with anything until someone comes along with a secret camera. And so we got the Revd Paul Flowers, Britain’s first crystal Methodist.

    Posted on: Nov 21st, 2013 – 10:19AM

    One can only listen aghast to the BBC coverage of this, where Flowers is continually described as ‘having a personal problem’.

    No – the fat perverted fuck has a criminal problem: viz. serious crimes against
    the Dangerous Drugs Acts; Gross indecency while operating as a piss-hole pirate; hiding behind a dog collar to embezzle funds from both charities and the bank he was employed to run. Not to mention bunging his political masters wodges of cash from said bank in return for getting a highly paid little number for which he was entirely unqualified. It is the bank depositors and taxpayers who have personal problems with this arsehole, who even a queer rent boy he paid exorbitant sums to sate his depraved sexual appetite, described as ‘debauched’.
    Now there’s a yardstick that is made of pure irony?

    I think whatever ‘personal’ problems this lowlife has are thoroughly deserved. Only one question remains: when will his collar be felt and by whom? As for his co-conspirators in the bank, the charities and the labour party; one hopes they are looking over their shoulders. also. If not, why not?

  128. Frank, you, my blogging friend, or rather your postings, are genuinely irreplaceable. The last but one para after Melanie’s take on the affair had to be read twice by Baron. First, to take in the content, second, to admire your imaginative mind. Superb.

  130. Frank P November 21st, 2013 – 17:15

    “Noa

    Is there a subliminal aim of republicanism hidden deep in UKIP’s satchel; if not are you in a minority or majority within your chosen political preference in that regard? While I respect your right to any political opinion; it would be helpful to know where it sits with your party?”

    Frank
    Whilst I have given my, erm, frank, opinion of the unfitness of the Queen’s successor, proposed a remedy thereto, highlighted the manifest failings of the operations of the constitutional monarchy and defended myself and the US system of government, the happy child of the bloody English one, from various uninformed ad hominen attacks, I can yet find no trace, not a one, of my advocating republicanism in any of my posts yesterday or today.
    It has been simply another totem waved, like a crucifix at a vampire, to avoid even asking themselves, let alone answering, questions to difficult for my critics to even consider, let alone rebut.

    But, if you want to know UKIP’s stand on republicanism, or Labours or the Conservatives, I’m sure a search of their web sites will provide all pertinent information.

    Baron,
    No, my friend, I do not wish to be Queen, exchanging my battered frame for that of an 85(?) year old lady. Who, unlike her son, has always sought to discharge her responsibilities in a manner befitting the Royal household.
    Now, if the offer applied in respect of William, or George, it would probably be a different matter.

  131. Frank p 17.40

    I had been waiting for some trenchent comment from you on John Wesley’s coke snortin’ pervert of a prodigal son, the ethical bank and the trail of financial intercourse between it and t’Labour party and its MPs.

    You didn’t disappoint.

  132. Noa@November 21st, 2013 – 19:12

    but now the co-op bank is owned by financial money men- the hedge funds, it can’t be long before they think about strengthening the banks balance sheet by foreclosing on all Labours borrowing.
    now that could be fun!
    hope they wake up before 2015.

  133. Alexsandr

    You make an excellent point. My initial thought is that, if the Coop Bank forecloses on its loans to the Labour party it will trigger other lenders to do the same and result in a financial crisis.
    This will be resolved in a number of ways:-
    – It will go bankrupt and reform itself, like a company, as Labour 2014 or similar.
    – It will be bailed out by its members, sponsors and/or the Trade Unions.
    – It will seek and obtain direct taxpayer party funding in some shady Leveson type deal with David Cameron.
    In options 1 and 2 it will lurch strongly to the Left, if that is possible.
    Option 3 will institutionalise Socialism into permaanent government, the Scholl’s clog of its Socialistas will stamp forever on the face on the British electorate.

  134. Baron November 21st, 2013 – 16:52

    “stop the car whilst driving in the High Suffolk countryside to have a pee …….”

    This broke a thought, the urge to pee can now (medical condition) be so agonisingly acute that we have devised a method for my peeing alfresco, with the front and rear near-side doors fully open I have the space and privacy to use the receptacle kept in the back of our car, mind ours is a ‘Yeti’ and it is as though the doors were designed for such use.

  136. HerbertThornton November 21st, 2013 – 17:19

    Hello Herbert you state that I portray Charles as a more or less innocent victim, I suppose that I do believe that to some degree though I was not in any way trying to imply this.

    You see I was responding to Noa, who on each post where he was attacked the Royal Family he made mention of Prince Charles by referred to him as this ‘such and such’ adulterer in order to strengthen his arguments for attacking the monarchy and arguing for a republic.

    I merely pointed out that his sin was singular in the extreme in that he had an affair with the one woman with whom he has been in love with for the whole of his adult life and who is now his wife.

    I also pointed out that Noa never mentioned that he might well have had cause seeing that he was married to a woman who was more of serial shagging flibbertigibbet.

  137. Noa

    Forgive me if my skip reading of the last week-or-so’s posts erroneously inferred a touch of the antimonarchist in the general tenor of your thrust; I have been both indisposed and distracted for a few days, failing to keep up with the craic. However, I note that you deftly avoided the thrust of my query. I shall therefore study both your words and the greyer area between the lines and examine more carefully the manifesto of Nige, et al. in order to satisfy myself that I’m not likely to tick the wrong box come the imminent elections. 🙂

    I agree with Spinoza, Monarchy is the lesser of all the other political evils. And our current somewhat curtailed and assimilated occupants of Buckhouse are certainly no worse than any of their predecessors and HM herself is a great gal. As for her mooted successor … let’s wait and see. Eddie VII (aka Burlington Bertie) was received with trepidation at the outset of his stint, but he turned out well. Keep your fingers crossed!

  138. Frank P
    November 21st, 2013 – 17:40

    Thank you Frank I do hope that this will be in this weeks edition.

  139. Noa@November 21st, 2013 – 19:30

    taxpayer funding of politics should be resisted at all costs. A party that cannot support itself from its members has no right to exist.

  140. Noa
    November 21st, 2013 – 19:55

    Excellent post thank you for the link, most informative.

  141. alexsandr
    November 21st, 2013 – 20:13

    A party that cannot support itself from its members has no right to exist.

    Hear Hear.

  142. The Co-op bank and its shadowy doings have been an ongoing theme on the excellent blog by the Slog for months before any disquiet troubled the national press. Its coke-snorting, non gpd fearing, incompetent of a boss is only one of many troubles. I’m juist glad I didn’t invest in any Co-op Bank bonds

  144. Peter from Maidstone, November 21st, 2013 – 11:58

    It is ironic that on many matters Barack Obama is now ruling the USA by means of “Executive Order” without the inconvenience of having to get legislation approved by Congress and the Senate. Er…. ? The Republican GOP is impotent, hence the Tea Party. Up the revolution!

  145. Noa,

    Canard?
    When surrounded by the circular firing squad, DUCK!

    Frank P @ 20:08
    He’s not known as Kim Il Farage for nothing, you know!
    😆

  147. Frank Sutton, you are absolutely right.

    The Slog has run many, many pieces exposing the Co-op over the past 18 months.

    What surprises is why Cameron and Osborne have gone for the fight now.

    It seems to show the desperation of a fighter flailing punches and leaving himself unguarded.

    The Slog’s conclusion about the Tories’ silence on the Co-op was that there was a LibLabCon quid pro quo of omerta: ‘We’ll say nowt about the Co-op if you say nowt about our hedge fund friends and robbing that woman’s grave of half a million.’

    Something has clearly changed.

    But how can Cameron – who doesn’t want to answer questions on his drug use – and Osborne – photographed with hooker and what looks like cocaine – think this won’t haunt them?

    THey look like they’ve had someone covering up for them most of their lives.

    And today there was the clumsy Lynton Crosby Sun plant of ‘Cameron says cut the green xxxp’ (he did this before the last election: ‘I’m on your side. Really. I am.’ only back then he hadn’t enshrined all the green xxxp in law so it can’t be got rid of. It can only be clumsily spun in the Sun that he wants rid of it).

    It just looks like sheer panic from Dave.

    Who does he think he’s kidding?

    Here’s the latest on RAB Capital:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2510296/Cameron-swore-hed-treasure-Green-Belt-What-hollow-promise.html

    Let there by no doubt: developers prefer to build in attractive areas where they can set prices high. They are growing fat on the planning system.

    There are already serious question marks over some of the firms involved and their links to senior politicians.

    The owners of the site at Wisley, who stand to make hundreds of millions of pounds if it is developed into a ‘new town’, are investors with a hedge fund called RAB Capital.

    The organisation bought the site in a fire sale in 2012 after the previous owners went into liquidation.

    The chairman of RAB Capital is Michael Alen-Buckley, who donated £100,000 to the Conservatives before the last General Election.

    The investment company set up to handle the project, Wisley Property Investments Ltd, is based in the Cayman Islands — so the profit to these developers from building homes on this precious Green Belt may not even be taxed in this country.

    The several dozen or so residents in nearby villages are no match for such an outfit.

    Here and elsewhere, the message goes out: ‘Do not oppose us. We have unlimited funds to fight you. We will wear you down.’

  148. Great piece by Melanie.

    I had my own list before I read that: gay mafia, political mafia (Labour and I wouldn’t be surprised if Flowers was Common Purpose), clergy mafia, bankster mafia, and charity mafia (there are no big-scale moral charities any more).

    This man has got into the positions he got into for a reason. Back-scratching. There were clearly quid pro quos for putting him there and for shutting up about him.

    Ticking the boxes is just the tip of the iceberg – although it was all great PR.

    What about the grubby crew he worked with.

    I do not believe there is anyone in senior public or private sector employment in the UK who is not as bent as a nine bob note.

    There were many, many hands in the rise and rise of the stupendously untalented and corrupt Paul Flowers.

    Many, many.

    ‘Beyond authority’

  149. And the drugs.

    People don’t take drugs as a one-off.

    Especially not if they’re a reverend!

    Do people just throw away a lifetime’s purity for three hardcore drugs in one go – oh no!

    Drugs are habit forming, which is why judges sentence so harshly for supply of class A drugs. He was only a recipient, but there is nothing of the one-off about it.

    Who else was he taking drugs with? Who else knew he took drugs.

    This clearly was run-of-the-mill for him.

    His entire careet seems to have been built on being able to cry ‘homeeeephobia’ at the first opportunity should anyone ever say anything – not that they were likely to, given his incestuous little circle of self-helpers.

  150. Bang on, EC.

    Patriotism.

    Wherever it is, I want to see it plugged into the mains.

    Scotland, Spain, Italy – plug it in and watch the EU melt down.

  151. Many of our British guests get upset with my husband whenever they see the Charleville mounted on the wall in our hallway!

    They always want to know if it’s loaded and he tells them, ‘Yes, if that welfare-sponging Kraut on the British throne ever tries to control us again, I’ll give her a history lesson to remind her what free speech is and why no-one likes a layabout – the last time that thing was fired George III was on the throne!’

    He’s never missed living in Britain!

  154. I’m having a cursory glance through the UK news sites and today I have already seen Britain’s first white honour killing – diversity they call it in the Labour Party.

    A seven week old baby battered to death by two parents. They couldn’t work out who did what.

    And a man who murdered someone with a single punch, mainly because all his previous punches had been met with such impunity:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2511302/Teenager-wildly-attacking-strangers-street-days-murdered-man-single-punch-personalised-bomb-attack.html

    Law and order. Reason and morality.

    Wiped out.

  155. Joany November 21st, 2013 – 22:41
    “Yes, if that welfare-sponging Kraut on the British throne ever tries to control us again, I’ll give her a history lesson to remind her what free speech is and why no-one likes a layabout”

    You are quite obviously referring to our much beloved Queen, one or two small points, she is not as you state a German (Kraut) she is an English woman born to an English father and a Scottish mother.

    She has never controlled your benighted nation the last to do so was George the 3rd, our present Queen is the eighth since then.

    She sponges off of no one and as to being a layabout, her work ethic and work-load would be too much for most.

    As to your husband offering to give her a history lesson, to remind her what free speech is, dream on?

    Yours and his impertinence is unbelievable.

  157. David, I join Verity in fully supporting you. fruit flies are annoying, and sometimes sting, but they are really quite below the salt!

  158. We are enmeshed in the coils of the rogue government of the United States which some would stay started with the assasination of John Kennedy 50 years ago and some with the founding of the privately-owned “Federal” “Reserve” “Bank”.

    There has been little gratitude shown to Edward Snowden for disclosing the new style of cages that we are being imprisoned in and some even on this conservative blog have suggested, by rhetorical questions, that Mr. Snowden is a traitor.

    But Mr. Snowden, if he swore an oath to anything, swore to defend the Constitution of the United States, now well subverted and with little sign of resistance from the contemporary epigones of America’s embattled farmers.

    And we? all’s cool, nothing to worry about, even if we read:

    “.

    Britain and the US are the main two partners in the ‘Five-Eyes’ intelligence-sharing alliance, which also includes Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Until now, it had been generally understood that the citizens of each country were protected from surveillance by any of the others.

    But the Snowden material reveals that:

    • In 2007, the rules were changed to allow the NSA to analyse and retain any British citizens’ mobile phone and fax numbers, emails and IP addresses swept up by its dragnet. Previously, this data had been stripped out of NSA databases – “minimized”, in intelligence agency parlance – under rules agreed between the two countries.

    • These communications were “incidentally collected” by the NSA, meaning the individuals were not the initial targets of surveillance operations and therefore were not suspected of wrongdoing.

    • The NSA has been using the UK data to conduct so-called “pattern of life” or “contact-chaining” analyses, under which the agency can look up to three “hops” away from a target of interest – examining the communications of a friend of a friend of a friend. Guardian analysis suggests three hops for a typical Facebook user could pull the data of more than 5 million people into the dragnet.

    • A separate draft memo, marked top-secret and dated from 2005, reveals a proposed NSA procedure for spying on the citizens of the UK and other Five-Eyes nations, even where the partner government has explicitly denied the US permission to do so. The memo makes clear that partner countries must not be informed about this surveillance, or even the procedure itself.

    The 2007 briefing was sent out to all analysts in the NSA’s Signals Intelligence Directorate (SID), which is responsible for collecting, processing, and sharing information gleaned from US surveillance programs.

    Up to this point, the Americans had only been allowed to retain the details of British landline phone numbers that had been collected incidentally in any of their trawls.

    But the memo explains there was a fundamental change in policy that allowed the US to look at and store vast amounts of personal data that would previously have been discarded….”
    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/20/us-uk-secret-deal-surveillance-personal-data
    (h/t Drudge Report)

    At this point, some fathead will stagger to his feet and tell us that if we have nothing to hide, we have nothing to fear.

  160. JoanyNovember 21st, 2013 – 23:15

    “Denis MacShane is dating Vicky Pryce!”

    They should be barred from doing so.

  161. Why are some women – I’m thinking of Vicky Pryce here – fatally attracted to wrong ‘uns? Maybe a woman can explain?

  162. Joany – I think you’re husband is a little confused as to the role, activities and ancestry of the current monarch. That antique firearm could be a dangerous toy by now.

  163. Joany
    November 21st, 2013 – 22:41

    Your husband’s grasp of the political realities in the United States seem as antiquated as the musket on his wall.

    Break it to him gently – the enemy is in the White House already. There has been a coup d’etat while, and because, he was looking in the other direction. How is his Obamacare enrollment going, by the way?

    Noa
    November 21st, 2013 – 14:57

    Baron,
    “Laws are made by Parliament.”

    Erm,,,not really, They are made by a bunch of republicans in Brussels. They used to be made based on common law, the statutes of capable men like Henry II, and tempered by the decisions of the royal court of equity (the conscience of the king).

    ]

    Joany
    November 21st, 2013 – 23:31

    “I’m having a cursory glance through the UK news sites…And a man who murdered someone with a single punch)

    I understand that this has now been elevated into a street game in the cities in your country.

  164. There is an interesting article on the subversion of the American constitution in Breiitbart with some interesting comments here:

    http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/11/20/nuclear-option-Obama-is-a-greater-threat-than-Torontos-crack-mayor

    One of the comments suggest what has already been widely hinted at elsewhere that the decision of Chief Justice Roberts of the United States Supreme Court to characterise Obamacare payment as a tax was brought about by the application of threats and nthuggery.

    This is of course why the blanket gathering of data on citizens is so poisonous and should be rejected vigorously by conservatives.

    We are all more or less aware of what the transvestite head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, was able to accomplish with his files of information. Those files and the means to gather the information in them were modest compared with what is available today.

    Unfortunately the people are asleep or in a stupor.

  165. Some twelve-score years ago the Continental British ( in the American colonies ) split from the Insular British. One side went on to create a dynamic republican form of government (what-ever it’s current malaise). The others maintained a monarchical form of government……..but with the right to elect their King every four years.

  166. “The worst Christian massacre—complete with mass graves, tortured-to-death women and children, and destroyed churches—recently took place in Syria, at the hands of the U.S.-supported jihadi “rebels”; and the U.S. government and its “mainstream media” mouthpiece are, as usual, silent (that is, when not actively trying to minimize matters).”

    Read on: http://frontpagemag.com/2013/raymond-ibrahim/largest-massacre-of-christians-in-syria-ignored/

    And Joany’s husband is ready to use a musket against any attempt by a layabout Kraut woman to control him?

    As Colonel Charles E. Stanton might have said “Lafayette, we are not there,”

  167. Herbert Thornton

    I was in Hong Kong again in the first week of Novemberr. The Foreign Correspondents’ Club is resisting a government attempt to pull down its elegant and historic leased site in the old Ice House in Ice House Street to make way for a green area under a proposed flyover…

    Here’s a general article on the taste for republican Hong Kong to pull down carbuncles to be replaced by jewels of spiritually-resonant 21st century architecture:

    http://www.heritageworldmedia.com/downloads/pdfs/SCMP%20Article.pdf

  170. EC – 17.22

    Well, if Bill Whittle gets rightly angry about the failure of the Obamacare website which cost $600.000, then he can only imagine the furore raised in the UK by the waste of £12billion on the failed NHS IT project.
    Oh hang on, you’re right. There wasn’t a peep. We’ll be waiting a long time in this country before the Hammer of Reality is heard in the land.

  171. Joany’s quite new on here, isn’t she? I wonder if she’s cigar chompin’ JJB’s wife?

    Just a thought.

  172. Ostrich (occasionally) November 22nd, 2013 – 09:18

    “Joany’s quite new on here, isn’t she? I wonder if she’s cigar chompin’ JJB’s wife? Just a thought.”

    I do not think so, in the post where she took leave to insult our beloved Queen she used phrases that brought to mind a picture of her husband.

    This picture for me; has him a ‘red neck’ sat in his rocking chair on the stoop of his house somewhere in the boondocks whittling a walking cane out of a hickory stick, taking an occasional sip from his jug of moonshine, whilst his wife is indoors ironing his KKK uniform.

  173. Untold thousands of Romanians and Bulgarians are poised to flood into this country in January and the Government resolutely refuses to address the threat. If Cameron was any sort of Tory he would prevent this, but the clod is not a Tory, and we all know why, his wife will not let him.

  174. Stephen, the Tories are not conservatives. Throughout the 20th century they were often very happy to be in bed with the Liberals and have usually adopted anti-conservative policies. If the aim is to gain and retain power then it is necessary to increase the electorate and then pander to it. This is destructive and therefore not conservative.

  175. Stephen, also… immigration is not a threat to politicians, it is an opportunity. Even the traitors Straw and Blunkett are only concerned about the effects of Eastern European immigration on their own Pakistani client base.

  177. Hey, it’s 22nd November and they just re-surfaced the piece of road in Dealy Plaza where – really! -… anyone know who killed Kennedy?

  178. Man who murdered 2-month-old baby executed
    By Cao Yin (22 November 2013 10:52)
    A man who murdered a 2-month-old baby in Jilin province was executed on Friday, according to the top court.

    The Supreme People’s Court had approved the execution of Zhou Xijun, who was sentenced to death after he strangled the infant and buried him in the snow on March 4.

    Zhou, 49, stole a parked SUV in Changchun, capital of the province. He discovered the baby in the car’s backseat and murdered him.

    Can anyone here find a problem with this verdict.
    There are some things china could teach us.
    We need someone too.

  179. John birch
    November 22nd, 2013 – 14:57
    There are some things china could teach us.
    We need someone too.Yes, John, you are right. Here a couple have been keeping three women in slavery (wonderful what diversity produces) for thirty years) and the lunatic judiciary and police are allowing them to be on bail. They should be chained to a stone wall and deprived of anything but bread and water until they go to trial. The lunatics in charge here say that taking them to court will take a long time. Like thirty years?

  180. Noa November 22nd, 2013 – 00:46

    “Denis MacShane is dating Vicky Pryce!”

    Which is a euphemism for saying he’s giving her one, or more likely they are at it likes rat’s in a sack.

    What a dreadful picture this conjures up.

  181. John birch @ 14:57

    Seconded, your question about whether anyone’s finding a problem with the Chinese criminal justice system, also that the mandarin speakers could teach us a thing or two, and that we do need someone whose common sense exceeds PC. Soon.

  182. David Ossitt @ 16:04

    David, the dreadful picture of the two bonking that your suggestion to imagine it conjured up prevented the barbarian from enjoying the last spoon of a goat milk yogurt. And he only imaginedd it for a minuscule fraction of a very fast second. if he kept the image going any longer he would have had to ask for a sick bag, possibly call an ambulance.

  183. If you’ve wondered about al those high profile “paedo” arrests you may well find your doubts crystalised on the ever thought provoking The Slog/

  185. I e-mailed a complaint to the BBC yesterday evening, one has to answer a series questions by ticking into a range of multi-choice tick boxes, none of which are available until you cleared the last question, some of these multi-choice do not have your answer and so one has to pick whatever answer is the nearest.

    My complaint was quite simple, I wanted them to desist from using foreign measures during the Look North half of the BBC 6pm news program.

    They will insist on telling us how far something is by expressing this in kilometres, or metres, and weights are always in kilogram.

    This is nonsensical.

  186. Anne Wotana Kaye 1 @ 15:39

    Your idea of the wall, chains and nothing more than water for the vile couple works with Baron just fine.

    Not that long ago people got the rope for stealing next to nothing. Today, rapists. murderers they get life, the overpaid puppet of a judge sentences them to life (so that the MSM tossers could say ‘sentenced to life’) then awards them a laughable tariff. In no time at all. these thugs are out to rape and murder again.

    Recenlty, there was a case of a man who killed three times, and the chances are he’ll again get a tariff and will be able to murder once more. It would be beyond parody if it were not so tragic.

  187. Baron
    November 22nd, 2013 – 16:20

    if he kept the image going any longer he would have had to ask for a sick bag

    Quite so.

  188. Malfleur @ 04:05

    Totally in agreement with the sentiment of yours on the data gathering, Baron is, but when you think about it they (the tossers in charge) have no choice if they don’t want to fall foul of the uman rites nonsense. They cannot target just those who are most likely to do us harm any more than the airports cannot (or is it can in proper English?) go for profiling. If they did (both the data gatherers and airport security) most of those who would be hit would be those of the jihadi phylum, and that would engender a chain of uman rites cases, large payouts to the targeted audience.

    The evil is the uman rites idiocy. Those who came up with the idea in the late 40s last century meant well. After the evidence emerged of what the Nazis did to the Jews, the Slavs, the disabled and others both the Left and the Right wanted to ensure nothing like it happens again. But as is always the case, a law framed in times of high emotions is a rotten law. And so it proved with the uman rites legislation. The sooner we scrap the idiocy the better.

  189. David Ossitt @ 16:28

    Baron applauds your tenacity and gall in trying to educate the BBC.

    By the turn of the last century, Baron bombarded the BBC with letters about the climate change. It cost him a small fortune. He stopped when it became bleeding obvious that the tossers responded with an almost identical answers. To write to them was totally pointless.

    If anything that’s even more the case today. In their near monopolistic position on news and news analysis with well over £5bn to bribe, intimidate or ignore (when it suits them) the BBC reigns supreme without anyone ever casting a vote for them. Most likely they laughed saying ‘not another bigot’ when they opened your letter.

  190. David Ossitt
    November 22nd, 2013 – 09:59
    Ostrich (occasionally) November 22nd, 2013 – 09:18
    “Joany’s quite new on here, isn’t she? I wonder if she’s cigar chompin’ JJB’s wife? Just a thought.”
    …………
    This picture for me; has him a ‘red neck’ sat in his rocking chair on the stoop of his house somewhere in the boondocks whittling a walking cane out of a hickory stick, taking an occasional sip from his jug of moonshine, whilst his wife is indoors ironing his KKK uniform.

    Naughty, naughty, David. You also forgot one essential detail. His baseball cap would either be worn back to front, or right way on, with a quiff of dandruffy hair poking out at the back. 🙂

  191. Baron
    November 22nd, 2013 – 16:29
    Unfortunately the criminally insane judiciary with which we are cursed are canny enough when it comes to filling their pockets. Concerning this slavery scandal, what are the odds that the criminals will have diplomatic immunity and come from a moslem country?

  192. It appears the 2 people holding those women as slaves for 30 years are foreign. but what the hell are they doing out on bail? These scum should be in jail until trial, serve their sentences then be shoved on the next plane home.
    But I suspect this slavery is far far more common than we can imagine. I would start by checking all the Saudis in London.

  193. alexsandr
    November 22nd, 2013 – 18:36
    It’s obvious that the law is bent. The people who have been bailed were questioned back in the ’70s, according to the BBC web. But naturally, the BBC will not say too much, because their corruption is equal to any here!

  194. I think the Met guessed at 4500 slaves here. But they are all using the ‘ordinary British street’ approach. Except a street filled with migrants is not an ordinary British street.

  195. Peter from Maidstone – 16:27 ‘Exploring I$lam’

    “They were told the Years Four and Six children would be looking at religious artefacts …”

    Aren’t Year Four about nine years old? What a coincidence!

    So they should be past the swing stage and onto the religious artefact stage?

    And fancy being labelled ‘wacist for what your parents decide!

  196. AWK1 22nd, – 15:39

    “Here a couple have been keeping three women in slavery (wonderful what diversity produces)”

    Of course they’re diverse…one Malaysian, one Irish, one Brit, three nationalities out of three people…can’t get any more diverse than that. Although my mind’s querying the parentage of the ‘Brit’…was her birth ever registered, has she ever been recorded by our wonderful social security system, whose is she?

  197. Alexsandr November 22nd, 2013 – 18:36
    “I would start by checking all the Saudis in London.”

    If you mean checking all of their homes and residences to interview in private all who work and/or live there then I agree, after which, start on all of the high ranking Pakistani and Bangladeshi households.

    England and I do stress England, needs to tighten up, for far too long we have assumed that because as a people we by instinct and by our very nature play by the rules others will also do so when it is perfectly clear many do not.

  198. David Ossitt 22nd, – 16:04

    “or more likely they are at it likes rat’s in a sack.”

    Definition of noise: Two skeletons at it on a corrugated iron roof in a gale.

    Although DMcS is a bit over well padded for that, isn’t he? Maybe a spell in the nick’ll sort that…sort of ‘porridge’ without the porridge.

  199. RobertC November 22nd, 2013 – 18:57
    Peter from Maidstone – 16:27 ‘Exploring I$lam’

    And fancy being labelled ‘wacist for what your parents decide!

    She, the headmistress has had to send a further letter to all parents involved that cancels the threat to label all who choose not to attend (and pay a fiver) racist, the local authority had a hand in making her retract.

    On the original report, there is shown a copy of the original letter, the photo of this is ever so slightly out of focus so you can’t drag and paste but it is clear enough to read the headmistresses e-mail address, I have sent her an e-mail pointing out that Islam is a creed not a race and therefore how can any child be branded as racist for not wanting to hear about Islam.

  200. Ostrich (occasionally) November 22nd, 2013 – 19:17

    “…sort of ‘porridge’ without the porridge.”

    Or as my beloved said porridge with watery porridge without the cream.

  201. “50 years since the assassination of JFK”

    They make him out to be the greatest President ever.

    When in fact he was a very flawed individual and at best a mediocre President.

  202. Ostrich (occasionally)@November 22nd, 2013 – 19:17

    You have managed to put a vile tableau in my head.

    Thanks 🙁

  204. Ostrich (occasionally)
    November 22nd, 2013 – 19:11
    Nothing is clear here. How do they know the woman in this truly diverse household is British? Is there a birth certificate? Is she the offspring of one of the other two slaves and the man holding them? Truly the stuff that nightmares are made of.

  206. David Ossitt – 19:22 “Islam is a creed not a race”

    Yes, it looks like it was Group Think at the school.

    ‘Creed’ – what a good description!

  208. Frank P
    November 22nd, 2013 – 20:37
    Dear Frank, with all the vile people and happenings today, I was transported back to an age I never really knew, save for in dreams, listening to that witty and erudite Noel Coward. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

  210. I live for tomorrow
    JFK
    Is it all over?
    JFK
    Hope is gone
    JFK
    No, a new dawn is come
    JFK
    The dawn is Martin Luther King
    JFK
    Oh no the 4th April 1968
    JFK
    So Bobby holds the torch
    JFK
    But now Bobby’s gone
    JFK
    This is America

  213. Baron (20:49)

    Brilliant link. ‘Kevin’ Esler will enjoy his name change. It suits him better.
    A seminal essay from Greenfield which encapsulates the cultural idiocy of this fucked up era. The BBC must GO!

  215. RobertC – 22:56 ‘from the same article’

    “Mr Grieve also said the Government was considering how to deal with the expected influx of Bulgarian and Romanian migrants when movement controls are lifted in January. He acknowledged that “the volume if immigrants may pose serious infrastructure issues”.”

    He could have added that the Government are completely powerless to stop it. Well, CMD is!

  216. Frank P @ 22:18

    But Baron has always called Esler Kevin. Amongst the numerous letters to the BBC complaining about things (well, mostly their coverage of the climate issue), few were addressed to Jeremy P, and the only one he replied to was a letter in which the barbarian censured Kevin Esler (for what Baron has forgotten), complimented Jeremy.

    Also, have you spotted the poster Sultan put in for his weekly round-up? Priceless. Baron would be in the market for it if it were available.

    and, of course, the BBC must go. ASAP.

  217. RobertC @ 22:56

    This is pure posturing, RobertC, the Tories are losing membership, the polls indicate strong Labour lead, the gay marriage fiasco is still about, the count gets near hence the noises that, they think, may change few minds. Didn’t they know about it before? Pathetic really.

  218. I have just read the Shariagraph piece on Grieve’s comments and can only conclude that the Tories feel they have – for the moment at least – exhausted the UKIP attacks after the Anna Soubry fiasco, which was part of a prolonged campaign of nastiness towards UKIP.

    Where can that go from here?

    Now, they are just trying to outflank UKIP by talking about issues.

    But that’s all it is. Talk.

    Dave tells the Sun to print that he wants to drop the green xxxp.

    But he can’t. He’s enshrined it in law.

    THere’s a Dept for Energy & Climate Change or some such silly name. That’s not going anywhere.

    Mr Grieve’s words are shocking not because they are true, but because he has chosen now to say them.

    The Pakistani ‘community’ are as corrupt as Mohamed The Prophet, even going for the same age girls he did.

    Taxi drivers, curry houses are all cash in hand and no-one pays any tax on it.

    The tax returns are fiddled, so are the benefit books and the postal votes are the only thing printed faster than Carney’s QE.

    The local political teams study the polling data, work out the majority needed, put out the order to the Pakistani commuinty leaders and they say: ‘We’ll have 30 Khans for you per address in that block, no problem.’

    The Tories never stopped any of it now, despite it going on for decades.

    And you want to talk about corruption Dave.

    What about Nadim Zawahi? Expenses claimed, but more importantly, his quid pro quo with Cameron is: ‘You know I’m talentless and only got this seat because I’m ethnic, but you gave it to me anyway. If you get any incoming flak, you can always rely on me to defend your back.’

    Any time Dave’s in trouble that man Zawahi is spouting off defending him.

    And we had that unelected Warsi over here the other week, telling us how unsophisticated the US is on foreign policy.

    http://www.thecommentator.com/article/4363/baroness_warsi_s_cringeworthy_dumb_america_speech

    She’s more sophisticated. Get rejected by the electorate and then get Dave to bypass them by putting you in the House of Lords and then his cabinet.

    That’s the way she gets things done.

    And Grieve himself has problems in his own backyard.

    He foisted a Sikh school on Stoke Poges, which is in his constituency and the sheeple there have finally woken up to how much the Tories hate them.

    He’s got a fight on his hands for his seat.

    Grieve is a QC and one of Westminster’s most cunning minds and oiliest operators. None of this is off the cuff. This is well planned out.

    Well, it’s all too late, Dave.

  219. I’ve just read that blackmailing letter by that spiteful headmistress.

    What right-thinking non-Muslim would ever let their child go on such a trip. And get ripped off a fiver for it too.

    I know many British parents who have been asked to do such things and simply don’t send their child to school that day.

    That’s why she wrote what she did:

    ‘All absences on this day will be investigated for their credibility’

    What right-thinking person would ever read The Koran and then think that their children – of all people – should be subjected to it?

  220. It strikes me that the Tories are now facing a snowballing effect.

    If UKIP was to be defeated with a magic bullet, it was to be this year.

    Everything has been tried: matching UKIP on policy – nobody believes the Tories.

    Smearing UKIP – noobody believes the Tories or their Press lackeys.

    And now it’s too late.

    The UK is weeks away from the Romanians and Bulgarians waltzing in.

    And then in spring it’s EU Parliamentary elections.

    No matter how many bogus promises on policy they make or how ever many UKIP smears they make, it will not work.

    And if Dominic Grieve wants to appear genuine he will have to speak like that every day of his life for the rest of his life, with the rest of the Tories speaking the same.

    Why has it taken him so long in his parliamentary career to say what people in the street say?

    Because he’s frightened the worm has turned and will never vote for him again.

    And they still won’t get voted in.

    I think people might think better of them as individuals if they all grovellingly apologised.

    But vote Tory ever again?

    Never.

    The Tories can never, ever be trusted again.

    You destroyed your demos.

    Now watch them destroy you.

  221. Melanie’s latest:

    https://www.embooks.com/blog/single/its-1938-all-over-again

    I recall very vividly the day Chamberlain returned from Munich in September 1938. Though only four years old at that time my father’s reaction and his expostulation, as he listened to the ‘piece of paper’ speech from Heston Airport, is still imprinted in the recesses of my memory. Melanie’s excellent summary of the current fiasco in Geneva brought it back in pristine clarity.

    “He might just as well use that as arse paper, for all the good it is.”

    The furious and fearful mien as my old man spoke those words was matched only by his foresight, as the events of exactly one year later proved it to be.

    Plus ca change …

    And the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

    Madness! And vile treason, to boot.

    I wonder whether Dimblebollocks Snr used similar methods to the ones now employed by his eldest brat to foregather a suitable crowd for the propaganda.
    “Hip-hip; hoo-fucking-ray!” Indeed!

    Listen to it again and be afraid … be very afraid

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/ww2outbreak/7907.shtml

    When will they ever learn … when will they learn?

  223. What is it the police seem reluctant to tell us about the two arrested slave owners.
    Seems they are illegal immigrants.
    They were arrested in the 1970s, no details given.
    Seems they have been known to the police for many years.
    At last , it seems they are Asian .
    The location of the house has not been disclosed.
    All seems odd.
    As does the lee rigby trial still not being reported.

  224. John Birch

    Re location
    From BBC
    “had managed to leave a house in Lambeth on 25 October.”
    From The Mail
    “Miss Prem said: ‘I don’t believe the neighbours knew anything about it at all.
    ‘It was an ordinary house in an ordinary street that wouldn’t raise concerns with anybody else.’”

    And
    Re Nationality
    “The couple – described as the ‘heads of the family’ – were being questioned at a south London police station last night.
    Both are understood to be non-British, but police would not comment on suggestions they were Irish.”….
    “Police are examining previous abduction cases of people forced into servitude by Irish travellers.”

  225. Why so important that they are not identified ???

    House search

    Mr Rodhouse said one of the reasons the police had not revealed more information about the couple’s arrest in the 1970s was because it must “take great care not to provide information that could lead to the identification of the subjects”.

  226. Frank P, November 23rd, 2013 – 01:24

    Lest we forget!
    Lovely anecdote, and another chilling reminder from Melanie of the genocidal intentions of Iran’s Theocracy! As to the coming apocalypse – “It’s all over bar the shooting….”

    While we wait, at the micro level, here is another tiny piece in the jigsaw of the global jihad ….

    h/t Pat Condell ‏(@patcondell)
    “Ever decreasing circles. It seems some people have been segregated from common sense. Welcome to the PC madhouse.”

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/10468115/Universities-can-segregate-men-and-women-for-debates.html

  227. IRISHBOY, November 22nd, 2013 – 09:14

    It was $600 million, actually, but who’s counting…. Obama isn’t, and neither is Jeremy Hunt apparently. I can assure you that none of the £12 Billion has come my way! All gone down the gullets of the various bent accounting companies and their so call “independent” management consultancy practices, I suppose.

  229. Jb
    “take great care not to provide information that could lead to the identification of the subjects”.
    Standard disclaimer

  230. John birch
    November 23rd, 2013 – 08:59
    Why so important that they are not identified ???
    To use the politically correct “speak”, the police on the ground are so bloody transparent you can’t even see or hear them!

  231. John Birch 7:07 – It seems the Lee Rigby trial has been postponed, according that august journal News Shopper. Their account seems to be based on shaky foundations – “…The Old Bailey has heard” who from?! – but in the absence of anything in the mainstream media, we must rely on the cobbled together efforts of the penniless press.

  232. Baron – Yesterday – 23:36 ‘pure posturing’

    All that you say in your post may be true, but whether it is effective posturing is another question:

    “Qassim Afzal, the Lib Dem chairman of the party’s Friends of Pakistan group, criticised what he called Mr Grieve’s ‘loose language’.
    He told BBC Radio 5Live: ‘I’m profoundly disturbed at a statement from such a senior Conservative MP against the British Pakistani community.
    ‘This doesn’t help bring communities together.'”

    No, not at all!

    I would say that the forthcoming elections, that affect the livelihoods of politicians, would have more to do it. Politicians can help the oiling of the wheels of business with public money, but corruption in voting is much closer to home for them:

    “Khan and five others were jailed in 2009 for using ‘ghost’ voters to win a local council ballot to oust longstanding Labour councillor Lydia Simmons from her seat on Slough Borough Council.
    The audacious scam in 2007 was described by the Crown Prosecution Service as part of an ‘epidemic’ which threatens to destroy democracy in the UK.”

    I don’t think that is too far from the truth. Just think, while a few African countries are becoming prosperous, why is it that Africans coming here can be so much more successful? It is our infrastructure of specialised groups, in areas ranging from medical, engineering, science, business, marine, mining, energy, politics, military and security that interface with each other in fairly standard non-partisan ways. That does not happen often in Africa, and it is gradually being lost here.

    That is the elephant in the room.

    And they originate from Africa and the Indian subcontinent!

  233. Joany – yesterday – 23:40 ‘This is well planned out’

    Yes, but not by CMD nor the Tory (PPE) SpAds!

    And it won’t help them because they cannot out-UKIP UKIP! UKIP have been around too long to be dismissed.

    I do think that UKIP may, on occasion, temporarily fade from the headlines, because they are the solution and the BBC will find it difficult to give them air time when their own policies are being shown to be clap-trap, but it won’t mean their support is dwindling!

    What will hit the headlines will be the problems! And I don’t think UKIP should be offering detailed, sticking plaster solutions, if only because they have already have in the past, and they need to be found, again, by the public. Empathy with the public, gathering in the information: better for the public to break their own bad news!

    Keep the patient conscious, with regular breathing, and monitor. Gathering information is the name of the game, and trying to sort out what we will still be able to rely on!

  234. Mark Steyn in philosophical, rather than piss-taking, mood in a nice piece peppered with literary allusions:

    http://www.nationalreview.com/article/364659/knockouts-high-and-low-mark-steyn

    Taster:

    “Restraint is an unfashionable concept these day, but it is the indispensable feature of civilized society. To paraphrase my compatriot George Jonas, punching a spinster’s lights out isn’t wrong because it’s illegal, it’s illegal because it’s wrong. But, in a world without restraints, what’s to stop you? If a certain percentage of your population feels no moral revulsion at randomly pulverizing fellow citizens for sport, a million laws will avail you naught: The societal safety lock is off.”

    But please read it all (even if you’re not a CS Lewis aficionado).

  235. What is happening at the Lee Rigby murder trial ? We are told the jury was selected on Mon 18 Nov. Matters were suspenderd till Thur 21 when the case was to come up for a “mention”. The court billing for the day lists the defendants as due in court under the ” contempt of court act,1981 “. Case was suspended to Fri 22 and then till Mon 25. Maybe the defence is playing legal games.

    SEE http://www.demotix.com/news/3294937/accused-lee-rigby-murder-trial-court#media-3294932

  236. The naughty niece has just resurfaced from a combination of indisposition and her noble annual efforts for the Poppy Appeal. A backlog of funnies just landed in my email in tray, I’ll feed them in gradually. Here’s the first:

    The Sensuous (and Smart) Wife.

    “Have you ever seen twenty pounds all crumpled up?”…the
    woman asked her husband.

    “No-o”…said he hesitantly and quizzically replied.

    She gave him a sexy little smile, unbuttoned the top 3 or
    4 buttons of her blouse……and slowly reached down into the cleavage
    created by a soft, silky push-up bra……and pulled out a crumpled twenty
    pound note.

    He took the crumpled twenty pound note from her ……and
    smiled. though somewhat uncertainly.

    “Have you ever seen fifty pounds all crumpled up?”……
    she then asked him?

    “No ..no, I haven’t” ……he said (now with an anxious tone
    in his voice).

    She gave him another sexy little smile, pulled up her
    skirt, and seductively reached into her tight, sheer panties…….and
    pulled out a crumpled fifty pound note.

    He took the crumpled fifty pound note…… and started
    breathing a little quicker with anticipation.

    “Now” …….she said. “Have you ever seen £20,000 all
    crumpled up?”

    “No, never” ……he said (while obviously nonplussed, but nonetheless aroused).

    “Well, go and look in the garage!”…..she said.

  238. RobertC @ 12:34

    Agreed, it is counterproductive, but they are all at it, Labour and the Tories. Let’s hope UKIP does cut into the popu;ar vote of both.

  239. nice joke Frank!

    Tee

    what did she say? ‘I have just driven the car into the garage, dear—- CRUMP!

  240. NEXT IS RECRUITING POLES! Today on BBC Radio 4, “Any Questions”, I learned with disgust that the retailer NEXT is advertising for staff in Polish, in Poland. Whilst English youngsters are unable to find work, NEXT IS RECRUITING POLES! This company should be boycotted by all decent citizens.

  241. So we can now read in:-

    Telegraph Politics.
    By Benedict Brogan 9:41PM GMT 22 Nov 2013
    Corruption in parts of the Pakistani community is “endemic” and a growing problem that politicians have underestimated, the Government’s chief legal adviser has said.
    Dominic Grieve QC, the Attorney General, said ministers should “wake up” to the threat of corruption in public life, which he attributed to “minority communities” that operate a “favour culture”.

    What the F*ck did they expect?

    No, do not answer that fatuous question, it is clear that the stupid fools did not think, they followed the rest of the liberal elite in thinking immigration is good and that those of us who argued the contrary were evil racist Little Englanders.

    Despite their very best efforts they still have not destroyed England not quite, have any of them got the balls to rectify the problem?

  242. David Ossitt@November 23rd, 2013 – 15:31

    If the law enforcement lot get their act together and have a real campaign against those from overseas who do not wish to obey our laws, will they go elsewhere, or learn to behave?

  243. Baron
    November 23rd, 2013 – 14:37

    Heh, heh, heh. Great link – which I’ve bookmarked, not least because of the inventiveness of the comments after the post – a little masterpiece of cartoon computer graphics.

    Btw, following on from the NN piece (as you very neatly did); I have a feeling that the American public is queuing outside the Fed garage to view the crumpled $1.5b or so wasted on the ‘roll out’; one hopes that the sexual feelings aroused will result in O’Bummer (or rather the Dems – he’s now home and dry) getting buggered at the mid-terms.

    I’ve forwarded yours to the NN; that will cheer her up. She’s suffering from temporary blindness caused by over exposure to poppy-red.

  244. One more for the weekend to disperse the gloom of a rainy November day:

    Caveat from NN, validity of facts not checked:

    In the 1400’s a law was set forth in England that a man was allowed to beat his wife with a stick no thicker than his thumb.
    Hence we have ‘the rule of thumb’
    ————
    Many years ago in Scotland , a new game was invented.
    It was ruled ‘Gentlemen Only…Ladies Forbidden’.. . and thus, the word GOLF entered into the English language.
    ————
    The first couple to be shown in bed together on prime time TV was Fred and Wilma Flintstone
    ————
    Coca-Cola was originally green .
    ————
    It is impossible to lick your elbow.
    ————
    The cost of raising a medium-size dog
    to the age of eleven: £ 10,120.00
    ————
    The first novel ever written on a typewriter, Tom Sawyer.
    ————
    Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history:

    Spades – King David

    Hearts – Charlemagne

    Clubs -Alexander, the Great

    Diamonds – Julius Caesar
    ————
    111,111,111 x
    111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321
    ————
    If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle.
    If the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died because of wounds received in battle.
    If the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural causes
    ————
    Q.. If you were to spell out numbers, how far would you have to go until you would find the letter ‘A’?

    A. One thousand
    ————
    Q. What do bulletproof vests, fire escapes, windshield wipers and laser printers have in common?

    A. All were invented by women.
    ————
    Q. What is the only food that doesn’t go rancid?

    A. Honey
    ————
    In Shakespeare’s time, mattresses were secured on bed frames by ropes.
    When you pulled on the ropes, the mattress tightened, making the bed firmer to sleep on.
    Hence the phrase…’Goodnight , sleep tight’
    ————
    It was the accepted practice in Babylon 4,000 years ago that for a month after the wedding, the bride’s father would supply his son-in-law with all the mead he could drink. Mead is a honey beer and because their calendar was lunar based, this period was called the honey month, which we know today as the honeymoon.
    ————
    In English pubs, ale is ordered by pints and quarts….
    So in old England , when customers got unruly, the bartender would yell at them ‘Mind your pints and quarts, and settle down. It’s where we get the phrase: ‘mind your P’s and Q’s’
    ————
    Many years ago in England , pub frequenters had a whistle baked into the rim, or handle, of their ceramic cups. When they needed a refill, they used the whistle to get some service. ‘Wet your whistle’ is the phrase inspired by this practice.
    ————
    At least 75% of people who read this will try to lick their elbow!
    ————
    Don’t delete this just because it looks weird. Believe it or not, you can read it:

    I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg.. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the first and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it wouthit a porbelm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh?
    ————

    YOU KNOW YOU ARE LIVING IN 2013 when…

    1. You accidentally enter your PIN on the microwave.

    2. You haven’t played solitaire with real cards in years.

    3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers to reach your family of three.

    4. You e-mail the person who works at the desk next to you.

    5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that they don’t have e-mail addresses.

    6. You pull up in your own driveway and use your mobile phone to see if anyone is home to help you carry in the groceries…

    7. Every commercial on television has a web site at the bottom of the screen

    8. Leaving the house without your mobile phone, which you didn’t even have the first 20 or 30 (or 60) years of your life, is now a cause for panic and you turn around to go and get it

    10. You get up in the morning and go on line before getting your coffee

    11. You start tilting your head sideways to smile. : )

    12 You’re reading this and nodding and laughing.

    13. Even worse, you know exactly to whom you are going to forward this message.

    14. You are too busy to notice there was no 9 on this list.

    15. You actually scrolled back up to check that there wasn’t
    a 9 on this list

    ~~~~~~~~~~~AND FINALLY~~~~~ ~~~~~~~

    You are now laughing at yourself.

    Go on, forward this to your friends.
    You know you want to!

    … And stop trying to lick your elbow ! 🙂

  245. I had a strange phone call today, this chap who spoke with an accent from the Indian subcontinent claimed to be calling on behalf of Microsoft, because of his accent and because he did not heed my request that he speak up (I am a bit deaf) I found it very difficult to understand him.

    Bur eventually he told me that they were of the opinion that my computer had picked up something very nasty, when I pointed out that I have paid for the very best protection available, he poo-pooed this and it was then that I realised that he expected me to allow him access to my computer.

    I politely told him to bugger off and ended the phone call.

    Any comments?

  247. David Ossitt 23rd, – 16:11

    “he told me that they were of the opinion that my computer had picked up something very nasty…..he poo-pooed this and it was then that I realised that he expected me to allow him access to my computer.”

    Had a couple like that around a year ago. Having been forewarned that this sort of scam was going on I had my spiel ready, which includes (among other disturbing assertions) dire threats that my software has completed its search, the location of his ‘phone has been pinpointed and that he may shortly be expecting a visit from the boys in blue (sorry, hi-vis). I keep the flow going no matter how much he may try to interrupt and just when I’m really getting into the groove and enjoying myself he hangs up!

  249. Alexandr (16:20)

    If you unnecessarily explain one more of the NN’s jokes or pedantically point out a petifogging inaccurate facet of another, I shall crawl through your soubriquet into the labyrinthine intertubes and, emerging from your rig at the other end, thrust my old brown boot four lace-holes up your jacksie.

    We geddit! Read me?

  251. David Ossitt November 23rd, 2013 – 16:11 –

    Like you and Ostrich I was contacted a couple of years ago by a similarly-accented man with a similar story about his being with Microsoft, and asserting that my computer was compromised & that he was calling to help me put it right.

    So I led him on and pretended from time to time not to understand what he was saying and then asked to speak to his supervisor. Another similar-sounding person came on the line and I played him along too, telling him that I didn’t understand English very well and could he please tell me exactly what he wanted me to do, and when he did tell me, I responded that it was far too complicated and that I couldn’t possibly do that because a key on my keyboard didn’t work, or the screen has gone blue. Another ploy with nuisance calls is to keep sating you don’t understand and to ask – what language they are speaking. Then speak to them in some other language if you happen to have one.

    BTW., apropos your again calling poor, dead Diana a flibbertygibbet, I, on the other side of that coin, have similar intentions toward Charlie and Cami-knickers.

    If he becomes King, I shall always refer to him, not as Charles the Third, but as Charles the Turd; and if the Establishment (after taking away Royal status from Diana, the actual mother of Royal Princes and a good mother into the bargain) descends even deeper into the gutter of bad taste and hypocrisy by conferring Royal status on Mistress Cami-knickers as Queen, I shall refer to the pair of them as Charles the Turd and the Queen Concubine.

  252. David Ossitt & OO:
    Gentlemen, I have two responses for nuisance calls. The first is mild, I give them a chance. When they phone, I say “Please hold on a moment as I am deaf” I go away and after a short while they ring off. If they call again, I employ sharper methods. I blow a loud whistle down the phone! They have never called back. 🙂

  253. Tell the truth, and then have to apologise .
    He should have said I stand by every word.
    At least we would respect him then.

  254. David Ossitt – 16:11 ‘Any comments?’

    When they rang me, they said they were from Microsoft Support.

    I asked if it was Microsoft Corp or the Microsoft Support Department (of some shady Indian sub-continent company).

    They put the phone down, so we didn’t get any further!

  255. Anne Wotana Kaye 1@November 23rd, 2013 – 18:49

    far better to treat them as a sex line. you can have loads of fun then!

    I have only dared to do that once. Lasted 1 minute before laughing and spoiling it.

  256. HerbertThornton November 23rd, 2013 – 17:28

    “If he becomes King, I shall always refer to him, not as Charles the Third, but as Charles the Turd”

    Hello Herbert; on this we must agree to differ; that she was a very beautiful high class manipulative scheming unbalanced fornicatrix is proven without any doubt, just as the fact that he Charles has loved the same lady who is now his beloved wife since he was a very young man.

    As to Charles the Third, I do not think so, he was baptised Charles Philip Arthur George and in my opinion he will be crowned as King George VII, his grandfather King George VI was baptised as Albert Frederick Arthur George.

  257. alexsandr
    November 23rd, 2013 – 19:12
    Sounds fun, but I’m afraid I would burst out laughing.

  258. Dominic Grieve is well named. Full of grief for speaking the truth. What dross contemporary politicians are. Not the stuff that heroes are made of.

  259. A few, random thoughts on President Kennedy:

    1. Sad that any man be assassinated.
    2. Can anyone tell me three great things he achieved?
    3. Why is revered as a saintly figure? He was a serial adulterer despite having a family.
    4. In a similar vein, doesn’t the ubiquitous usage of the picture of his young son saluting his dad’s cortège induce emesis?
    5. What is the rationale for holding such widespread memorial services commemorating his death?
    6. Why did the BBC devote such attention to it?
    7. During the Dallas coverage, why did the BBC continually state: “thousands gather at the memorial”. Where were these thousands? I only saw a couple of hundred.
    8. Can we agree that forcing Dallas to “host”, perhaps in the sense of parasite, this event, we all agree that this marks the final act of post-Civil War reparations for the South please?
    9. Why does such a large majority of those Americans of Irish extraction vote Democrat?

  261. Does anyone feel, like me, that the only reason we’re being “allowed” to discuss immigration in any way, is that they’re comfortable they’ve got enough in now such that it doesn’t matter?

    I am fairly confident that the point of no return was reached in 2011 and it’s now very comfortable indeed the the British identity has been obliterated.

  262. Frank P

    Your masterful indictment of the President last week, highlighting his endless list of heinous acts, completely exonerated by the media was superb. My apologies for the lateness of reply: events out with my control.

  263. Which is the bigger danger to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

    1. The current “citizens” from the subcontinent & Africa.

    OR

    2. Our imminent co-Europeans of Roma origin?

  264. Redneck
    November 23rd, 2013 – 21:21
    At this late tragic stage, it is just a question of whom gets most of the carcass, the jackals or the hyenas.

  265. This gem from Melanie Phillips’ blob (re a certain Rev Flowers) “…Britain’s first crystal Methodist”.

  266. Redneck
    November 23rd, 2013 – 21:08

    I think you are probably right. It is a calculated attempt to destroy the nation. Too bad we can’t get names and numbers; but of course “no names, no pack drill” – right, Fraser Nelson? How is your article on Neathergate coming along?

    Thomas Jefferson thought that the only solution to the main race problem in the United States was deportation of the “Afro-Americans”. Liberia was a half-hearted voluntary attempt along those lines- it hasn’t turned out too well as after about 150 years the locals got fed up with the Americo-Liberian leadership in 1980.

    As for the leadership of our country who brought about the deplorable state of affairs: identify, try, punish.

  269. Redneck November 23rd, 2013 – 21:02

    6. Why did the BBC devote such attention to it?

    Simple he was as they are, of the left.

  271. David Ossitt
    November 23, 2013 – 19:34

    Hi there David. I entirely concur that we should agree to differ in the matter of the characters of the people whose liaisons we have been discussing. It was quite enjoyable.

    A few minutes ago I was also savouring Frank Sutton’s mention of Melanie Phillips’ gem about some cleric being Britain’s “first Crystal Methodist”.

    That has put me in a frame of mind almost as good as having discovered that over the last 2 months & without feeling any pangs of starvation, I’ve already lost more than 10lbs.

    If anybody is curious about what has led to this good fortune, Google “Dr. Robert Lustig”.

  272. HerbertThornton November 24th, 2013 – 01:09

    “That has put me in a frame of mind almost as good as having discovered that over the last 2 months & without feeling any pangs of starvation, I’ve already lost more than 10lbs.”

    We also have lost weight in our case over a stone each, how? Simply stopping eating chocolate.

  273. I’d like to have been a fly on the wall of the BBC studios this morning. On BBC Radio 4, at approximately 9:10 a.m. there was a discussion about the Fragrant Mr Flowers. No less than Mark Oaten, of esoteric culinary tastes was dragged out to show how a leopard can change his spots. He is now no longer the old coprophagiac Oates, so perhaps like him we should turn the other cheek. I think not!

  275. If it wasn’t so depressing it would the basis of a satire for our times:-

    “Cult experts said the nature of their captivity showed how political ideologies could act like religious cults;

    Ar’t’a goin’ t’Labour party collective t’neet, comrade? I know tha’s short a skivvy’r two fer fettling the fireside horse brasses thy Dad left thee”.

    Theresa May, the Home Secretary, writing for The Telegraph, warned that slavery was now widespread in modern Britain in places including nail bars.”

    “And Doris, after yer’ve done m’hair extensions bring out new buffing gimp from chest in cellar, me nails are ever such a mess!”

  278. HerbertThornton 23rd, – 17:28

    “I was contacted a couple of years ago by a similarly-accented man with a similar story about his being with Microsoft, and asserting that my computer was compromised & that he was calling to help me put it right.”

    It’s good fun, isn’t it? Until you get bored, or realise you’ve something better to do.

  280. Malfleur @ 23:21

    Just putting the bobbies back on the streets may not be sufficient what with their diversity, PC, multy culty training. All that baggage ought to be scrapped, too, we should go back to what we had before – everyone treated the same regardless one’s colour of skin, religion or anything else.

  281. Anne Wotana Kaye 1 @ 22:20

    An excellent observation, the jackals or hyaenas quip, works with Baron.

  284. Baron November 24th, 2013 – 17:40

    “It’s an old story – over-familiar Prime Minister loses referendum. (9).”

    Someone has solved it, the answer is “Decameron” but I am blessed if I can see why.

    Anyone care to explain?

  285. I shall be unavailable for a week, so trust you all will be snug and warm as you continue to fortify the CHW. 🙂

  286. David, Decameron is the old story, Cameron is the over familiar PM who will lose the referendum on the EU, nine letters altogether.

    Baron though is utterly useless on crossword clues, he never has any clue.

  287. Baron 18:46 – 1729 is the smallest number that can be expressed as the sum of two cubes in two different ways; I believe it is also a significant year in some way. But I can’t see any connection with Frank P’s NN’s intriguing list.
    Re the Xword, I can see Decameron and Cameron but how are the letters D and E derived from the clue? (I’m probably being a bit dim here.)

  288. Frank Sutton, the barbarian isn’t the one to ask really but he thinks that the DE is ‘the old story i.e. DEcameron, the other part of the clue, the ‘over-familiar Prime Minister loses referendum’ is Cameron, and that’s it.

  291. Baron 24th, – 17:47

    “All that baggage ought to be scrapped, too,”

    Dead right! 🙂

  293. Anne Wotana Kaye 1 November 24th, 2013 – 19:46

    “I shall be unavailable for a week, so trust you all will be snug and warm as you continue to fortify the CHW.”

    I do hope all is well Anne and if not, I hope all goes well.

  294. “…Konstantin Dimitrov [the Bulgarian Ambassador to the Court of St. James] said he had never heard of a work permit application being turned down, though Border Agency staff are told to refuse requests if British workers can fill the role.

    The disclosure raised concerns over whether the freedom of movement restrictions on Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants — due to expire on Dec 31 — had ever been working. …”.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/10471736/Bulgarian-immigrants-Home-Office-fails-to-reject-single-request.html

    The phrase in the above extract above ” had ever been working” should however read “had ever been enforced”. “Restrictions” do not “work” or “Not work”. They are enforced or not enforced.They were not ENFORCED.

    O.K. We can start compiling the list for my policy for the Committee for Public Safety of: identify, try, punish.

    But why don’t we first try to recover our sovereignty from Brussels, re-establish our constitution and people it with good men who make good laws and ENFORCE them?

    Then we can listen to Haydn without palpitations.

  295. AWK 20:48 – While I, my dear, met Noel in his dressing room and engaged in engaging badinage with him. He was absolutely fascinating and compelling. Oddly enough, I’d had a pash on him since I was around 11 or 12. And then to meet him in his dressing room, in his gown, mixing around with other stars … well, it was all a bit rich and I never got over it.

  296. David Ossitt
    November 24th, 2013 – 23:22

    Thanks, David, and good wishes!

    comme ci comme ça‎

  298. http://www.robertlanza.com/

    Frank P will be interested:

    to learn that Dr. Robert Lanza takes the view that quantum physics shows that death is an illusion. Or put more positively, quantum physics proves that there is an afterlife. Whether Dr. Lanza believes that God goes with that, I have not read far enough in to know. The other problem is that I am pig ignorant about quantum physics and I fear too late in life to start learning – may be there will be time in the after life, though the point seems to be that quantum physics suggests that time doesn’t exist anyway.

    Hat Tip: http://www.wearenotcattle.net/

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