Fleeing an outraged husband

Was this Brazilian clip staged or did it all really happen? Given what I know about Latin America all I can say is that the crazier it seems the more likely it is to have really happened.

Support the Faroe Islands

The Faroe Islands, population just under 50,000, are being threatened with economic sanctions by the European Union. Although under the Danish crown the Faroes have complete autonomy and are not part of the European Union. Fish make up 95 percent of their exports and the fishing industry amounts to fully twenty percent of the GDP. The territory has increased the quota of mackerel  that Faroese boats can catch and now Brussels wants to starve them into submission with a threat not to allow fish to be exported from the Faroes into the EU. To her eternal shame, Scotland has sided with the EU over this, obviously forgetting that is the country becomes independent then Edinburgh may very well want to control her own waters in the interests of her own fishermen, which is all that the Faroes are trying to do. 

Hopefully the Faroes government will find new markets for the fish that the EU will soon no longer buy. Hopefully also people will rally behind this rather brave small nation as is stands four square against the bullies from Brussels.

Is a leftist UKIP possible?

Professor Doctor Alan Sked, who founded UKIP twenty years ago, has been interviewed by the Sunday Telegraph. He argues that the party really is full of headbangers, and goes on to speculate that a new, leftist anti-EU party is needed. This is my take on his argument:

The chances of a leftist UKIP being created are about nil, I should think. Given that the Liberals messed up the whole idea of electoral reform for at least another generation, that is probably no bad thing as any such party would get nowhere.

I accept Alan Sked's point that UKIP is in many ways the party of those sad arsed losers who dream that Mummie Maggie is going to return and make everything right for them. I found that out to my cost when I joined in the gloating at the old harridan's death and had my candidacy for the recent elections removed. So, yes, the party has to decide if if is a fan club for that creature, or a coalition that wants to get our country out of the EU.

If the former is the case then UKIP is doomed, because working class people on council estates are not going to vote for a Thatcherite party. If the latter becomes true then the party needs to start living up to its claimed belief in localism and leave local parties to fight local campaigns. The people of Surrey may very well love their privatised world, but Oldham never voted to lose its collectivist municipal services and would probably vote to have them back.

This amounts to having two parties, one working class and the other not, under one roof. As has been pointed out to me before now, that will not hold in the long run, but as I reply, in the long run we are all dead, anyway. If it holds long enough to force the referendum to be held on the EU, then UKIP will have served its purpose.

An investigation is currently being mounted by the party into my treatment. I shall await the outcome of that before deciding if UKIP really can become the electorally successful coalition that I want to see.

Why did Labour open the doors?

That Labour betrayed its own supporters after 1997 by allowing tens of thousands of people into the country is a simple fact, but we are still left to debate the reason why the policy was created. Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail thinks that it was because Labour could no longer take the working class for granted and needed to import a new working class that would vote Labour. 

The problem with that argument is that Labour had to get elected in the first place, so the idea that it had to introduce new voters having just been put in power by the old ones strikes me as an idea that is ludicrous in the extreme. Not only that, but during the Thatcher years the Tory Party went from being a competitive force in Scotland, Wales and Northern England to near extinction. Today the Tories have one solitary MP in Scotland, just eight in Wales and hardly any in the great cities of  Northern England. Furthermore, the days when people in those cities voted Tory at local level seems to have ended, and a party that cannot win council seats is very much a spent force. So if Labour did not open the doors to the world's flotsam for electoral reasons, why did it order them to be opened?

In opposition prior to 1997 Labour strategists had argued that what destroyed previous Labour governments was wage inflation. The way to prevent that happening, ran the argument, was to allow mass immigration. This rather forces us to ask the question why did the Labour Party rank and file not object as their wages were undermined by the party when it got into power.

The obvious answer must be that Labour members are no longer employed in manual jobs in the private sector, they are lower middle class polytechnic graduates who enjoy cushy numbers in the teaching trade, social work  industry or as generic managers in local government. These people are pretty much insulated from all and any trade cycles, and are more likely to want to patronise the new comers to prove how liberal they are. The fact that those newcomers also provided these middle class types with cheap nannies, gardeners and tradesmen goes without saying. Members of the middle class are past masters at concealing their self interest behind a wall of sanctimonious self-righteousness.

We need to also remember that the Blair regime really believed that it had cured boom and bust. They  presided over a country where pretty much anyone who wanted a job, outside of the urban black spots that is, could have one. The few naysayers around were more or less silenced by the cry of "racism," which mouthy middle class Labourites were encouraged to parrot at every opportunity. 

Was revenge a factor?  Andrew Neather said that  "rubbing the right's noses in diversity" was involved in the policy, and I suspect that the people he had in mind were the Loadsamoney chancers of the Thatcher era who were genuinely loathed by most leftists.

However, basing a government strategy on doing over a few thousand Essex Men makes no sense, and neither does the idea that it was all about replacing the old working class with a new one.

What does make sense is the notion that Labour wanted to ensure that wage inflation did not damage the government, coupled with the hubristic notion that they had cured the trade cycle.

What also makes sense is that Labour is no longer fit to claim any working man's vote.

Nigel Farage & the Scottish Question

So Nigel Farage went to Edinburgh yesterday and was barracked by fifty or so middle class types who disrupted his press conference. The police were called and he had to leave in the back of a police van, before telling anyone who would listen that the demonstrators were "fascist scum," and the matter is still rumbling. My guess is that our Nige will emerge the victor in all this in the eyes of ordinary people who tend to regard students as a privileged rabble who should really keep their gobs shut around normal people.

Now, clearly the rabble may have been scum, but they were not fascist by any stretch of the imagination. They are just the children of privilege  who think that their puerile views are of interest to the rest of us. Once they graduate they will go off and earn a fortune in the City, but in the meantime they are letting off steam. What they have managed to do over the past couple of decades is to define certain terms and concepts themselves and then judge other people by the yardsticks that they have created. So they accused Farage of being xenophobic on the grounds that they said he was xenophobic. The fact that he is married to a German and speaks German fluently is neither here nor there: these people set the terms, remember?

The question is why do we allow them to set the terms of debate? The sensible thing to do would be to ignore them and let the voting figures do the talking. It would also help if Farage took a leaf out of the others parties' books and held his meetings in secure venues, guarded by party stewards.

Eleanor Jackson, English councillor, ashamed of England's flag

Meet Eleanor Jackson, a university lecturer, and a member of not one, but two councils. She sits on Bath and North-East Somerset Council as well as Radstock Town Council. In the latter role she announced to the assembled body that Radstock should not buy an English flag to fly over the small town  Her reasons were fairly straightforward: “My big problem is that it is offensive to some Muslims, but even more so that it has been hijacked by the far right. My thoughts are we ought to drop it for 20 years."  

Now, the fact that there are exactly 16 Muslims in Radstock is neither here nor there, and why the press is running around interviewing them is anyone's guess. What is important is that this is England's flag and an English councillor is ashamed of it.

This woman is a Labour councillor but that is not important, either. What she represents is not a particular party, but a particular middle class mindset. People with this mindset are riddled with self-loathing and filled with a desire to abase themselves as some weird act of penance for the perceived wrongs of their fathers. They are also filled with hatred for the drink beer, shag women, hate the boss British working men, whom they dismiss, sotto voce,  as chavs.

Come the next election I hope that a fine representative of Chavdom stands in this harridan's seat and takes it.

Sign the Stephanie Bottrill Petition

This is Stephanie Bottrill, a 53 year old grandmother who was driven to kill herself by the bedroom tax.

This is a petition that has been got up to try and pressure Ian Duncan Smith into resigning. Why him? Well, he is  the Tory who created the polices that led Stephanie to kill herself.

Obviously he will ignore the petition but you will feel good about yourself once you have signed it and distanced yourself from Tory scum and everything that they stand for.

Imprisoning the poor

Imprisoning the poor without trial helps keep the privatised American prison system in customers as this Russia Today report from Ohio shows.

Could it ever happen here? Best to remember the old adage that what America does today, the British do twenty years down the road. If that is the case, then this is  what is waiting for us in about 2030

Who has Cameron fucked the most?

Says it all really, doesn't it?

The Future of UKIP, Part Two

If neither of the two main parties splits, then history has shown that the future for a third party is bleak indeed. However, the lesson of the Liberal party in the 1950s, when with less than three percent of the national vote, it still managed to get six MPs elected, does give some hope to UKIP.

The Liberals managed to do that because their tiny vote was concentrated in specific areas of Scotland and Wales. UKIP, by way of contrast, has a vote that seems to be spread evenly across the country, and on that basis the party will not gain any MPs at all in 2015.

Would it not be a good idea for UKIP to copy the post-war Liberals and concentrate on a particular region? The party gains roughly two percent of its vote in Scotland and about six percent in Wales, with over 23 percent coming from England. Not only that but a massive 27 percent of UKIP voters are from the D and E social classes - the traditional unskilled and semi-skilled working class in other words that has been abandoned by Labour. These people are concentrated on northern council estates, and spend their lives doing McJobs that are interspersed with long spells of unemployment. They used to be Labour's bedrock, but now the party treats them with derision, with the result that many do not vote.

Basing a strategy on people who do not vote is dangerous in the extreme, but following the election of 2015 when UKIP will wake up to find that it has no MPs, it may very well turn out to be the only policy that is worthwhile.

It would mean turning UKIP into something akin to the Labour Party that existed when the Liberals only had their six MPs. The party would be socially conservative and economically radical. It would advocate taxing the middle class to pay for the national investment needed to get British industry working again once the country has left the European Union.

Would that be enough to get a majority in the Commons? Of course not, but that is not the point. It would be enough to gain a sizeable number of MP's for the party and on that basis deals could be cut with either Labour or Conservative, depending on which party was willing to offer UKIP the necessary  number of political goodies.

The alternative is probably political oblivion.

The Future of UKIP, Part One

Far too many UKIP supporters are dreaming of great victories at the European elections next year and then on to the general election in 2015 where, so the dream has it, the party will pick up enough seats to be able to dictate terms to anyone wishing to form a government. UKIP will do well in 2014, but it is unlikely on present trends to have any seats at Westminster in 2015. In fact, as this calculation shows, UKIP would have to gain at least 23 percent of the vote nationwide to have any MPs at all.

Third parties who seek to break the mould of British politics invariably have it broken over their heads by the existing parties as they cast them into nothingness. That is what happened to the Social Democratic Party when it tried to muscle past Labour in the 1980s, as Labour took on board many SDP policies and simply undercut the whole need for that party. So realignments can happen within parties, without the party system being disturbed. Thus, for instance, the American Democratic Party is now the voice of of civil rights, whereas before 1860 it was the party that wanted to extend slavery into the territories.

The exception to this is when one or the other main political parties suffers a schism which allows a new party to come forward and take its place. In the United States that would be the Whig Party which fell apart in 1850, and in Britain the Liberals who suffered a similar fate during the Great War. The Americans did not have a ready made alternative the the Whigs so it took about four years for the newly minted Republicans to emerge from the wreckage, but in Britain the Labour Party was ready and waiting to step into the electoral breach that the Liberal split had created.

Labour's pre-war growth had been with the support of the Liberals, but had the latter not split there is not evidence to suggest that Labour would have been able to force its way through to become the main alternative to the Tories for government. A more likely explanation would be to think of the Liberals taking on board the more popular Labour polices and keeping that party in a firmly subordinate role, if not extinguishing it altogether.

Today there are no signs that either of the two main parties are about to split, but quite a few that show the Tories moving into UKIP territory with the offer of a referendum on the European Union. David Cameron has shown that he is a master at such stunts, just look at the vote on proportional representation that he duped the Liberal-Democrats into agreeing to, before helping to squash the whole idea very firmly indeed.

Come 2015 and an awful lot of old Tories will be quite happy with that promise and will go back to the fold. It will not please the hardline Europhobes, but it doesn't have to, does it?

Thatcher's Grave a Health & Safety Risk!

Would that this were true:

Margaret Thatcher's grave could pose a health and safety risk if too many people turn up wanting to dance on it, said a spokesman for the Health & Safety Executive: 

“We’re concerned about levels of overcrowding and also the slipperiness as people fulfil their secondary aim of urinating on the former PM’s remains. It’s a potential disaster zone. Thatcher’s grave could be the biggest threat to the NHS since Thatcher.”

Bingo!

Charles Ramsay Songified

Charles Ramsay was eating a burger when he heard a girl screaming from the house next door, so he went to investigate. The rest is now history and Charles is a hero.

Zombie Thatcher

She said that society didn't exist and now the evil old whore is back to make sure that it doesn't! Just when you thought that it was safe to go outdoors, you find Zombie Thatcher by Bronwen Winter Phoenix has arrived to disturb your sleep.

It's a short story full of wonderful characters like Norman, the unemployed son of an ex-miner from the South Yorkshire village of Goldthorpe, and the surreal Sylvia, as they struggle to survive in a terrifying new zombie-riddled UK. Their worlds turn upside down as, at the centre of it all, Zombie Thatcher makes her way towards London.

What a brilliant way to cash in on the old harridan's death, and at the same time laugh at the losers who are still weeping that Mummy Maggie is no more. At less that two quid, this short story is well worth having for that entertainment value alone.

Daily Mail: Ken the cripple hates cripples!

The Daily Mail has a wonderful piece that has just been brought to my attention which says that I have "been accused of ridiculing the disabled." People, I have never been accused of anything of the sort, besides which I am disabled! I walk very badly with a stick, as you can see from the photo of me with Nigel Farage. I receive Disability Living Allowance to help me get around, and if anyone thinks that I am swinging the lead, then all I can say is that you cannot fake either my arthritis or my emphysema as they both show up on X-rays. 

Not only that, but I help crippled neighbours to complete the incredibly complicated benefit claim forms that the government gives to people like us. Does any of this make sense to you as anything other than a clumsy smear?

Earth to Fred McGlade: If you are going to brief against people at least get some of your facts right!

On being chatted up by the other parties

It is still less than a month since Thatcher shuffled off to be toasted by hell's fires, but since that day I have not only had various journalists put on my back by dear old Fred, but no less than three political parties have been in touch seeking to profit from UKIP's self-inflicted wound.

Labour were the first to call within a week of Fred's brain fart, with the local party secretary trying to recruit me back into the party and a promise that I could say whatever I liked about any Tory at any time. I thought that was a decent offer until I saw young Miliband looking all soulful at the old hag's funeral. At the end of the day he is as middle class as the rest of his party, so will have more in common with the likes of Thatcher than he ever will with a bloke like me. All the more reason to give Labour a body swerve from now on.

Next up were the British National Party who just wanted confirmation of a couple of points of the narrative, having obviously been well briefed by someone. As I pointed out in my last post, the briefings against me were pretty intense during the last couple of weeks, so I suppose that I should not be shocked that the BNP were on the same list.

Finally, and most engagingly, were the three calls I received from the Tories. They wanted briefings on future UKIP policy, which I could not give them, and then began to broaden the topic to discuss did I see the party developing along lines more congenial to me? I had no answer to that, either, but it was nice to chat.

One thing did stick in my mind. I said to one of my questioners that all this had begun because of my comment about the dead Margaret - did he not find it hard to chat to a leftist like me? He replied that she was yesterday's news, and all he cared about was tomorrow. I found that comment very telling: Fred McGlade may weep over his lost love but the Tories have ice water for blood and will deal with anyone if it is in their interests.

Yes, all in all a very interesting couple of weeks.

Fred and his fantasies

Oh what a tangled web we weave,

When first we practise to deceive.

Sir Walter Scott had it right as poor old Fred McGlade will shortly have to admit. The pity for him is that he decided to change his story about my so-called suspension so many times that even his fellow regional officers are starting to distance themselves from him. One such organiser even went so far to describe McGlade as "a fool," in a private conversation, which suggests to me that the wind is now blowing in my direction.

The full story can be read in my earlier postings, but for now I just need to make it clear that I spoke to nobody about McGalde's 8th April brain fart as I was frankly too stunned to think properly. I certainly did not speak to any websites or journalists, but somebody did because by Friday 12th April this fascist website was running the full story. If you read the account it is basically the truth about what happened, with some nasty adjectives thrown in for good measure. Who briefed the website so well? It was not me and the only other people who knew were McGlade and the press officer.

Later that same day I got a phone call from the Daily Telegraph who claimed that Tory Central Office had fed them the story. If true how did the Tories get the tale? If false, how did the Telegraph get it? I have no idea what the answers are to those questions, so why not ask Fred McGlade?

The Telegraph were only interested in the Thatcher angle and their questions were designed to get me to become embarrassed at my contempt for her. I told them that as far as I was concerned my comment had been very mild because as Nye Bevan once said, Tories and the class they speak for are just "lower then vermin." That was the end of that conversation and the Telegraph did not run the story. 

All went quiet until the following week when he spoke to the BBC who then got in touch with me with his claim that it was not about Thatcher, it was about some "offensive" emails that were sent to one "female activist" who was actually a member of the Socialist Workers Party, although for some reason Fred neglected to mention that bit of information. It is not clear why he decided to change the story. It may be because it was becoming clear just how many people loathed the old hag and were not sorry to see her toasting hell's furnaces, but change things he did and that is when it started to go pear shaped.

Within a couple of days he was talking to the Lancashire Telegraph and the political activist had become "a lady" and  my messages had been "obscene." This then changed again when he told the Nelson Leader that I had left "women feeling frightened and intimidated."

In other words it starts off as offensive to an activist, goes on to become obscene to a lady, and then ends up as intimidating to many women! This is frankly very silly indeed, and it is made even sillier by the fact that if McGlade continues with this story he will be forced to admit that he is aiding the SWP by his actions.

I quite cheerfully invite McGlade to produce his evidence that anything that I wrote to a Trotyskyite would be seen as obscene or even offensive to any normal woman - most of who treat Trots with utter contempt. I also invite him to answer why if it is about some Trot was I photographed with Nigel Farage just a few days before, which was after the Trot incident was over, but before Thatcher died?

In the meantime, today is local election day for large parts of the country. Thanks to Fred and and his devotion to Margaret Thatcher or the SWP - delete whichever does not apply - the good people of Pendle Central have been denied a chance to vote for the party that pays his wages, and that same party is £230 in the hole thanks to his eagerness to pay me off.

Nice work Fred: now for your next trick?