“It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see..."

"You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?"

"No," said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, "nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."

"Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."

"I did," said Ford. "It is."

"So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't people get rid of the lizards?"

"It honestly doesn't occur to them," said Ford. "They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates to the government they want."

"You mean they actually vote for the lizards?"

"Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course."

"But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"

"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard," said Ford, "the wrong lizard might get in. Got any gin?"

This is the last chance in our lifetimes to go for the anti-Lizard vote. It's worth twenty five quid. Register as a Labour Supporter

Last chance to register as a Labour supporter and vote for that nice Mr Corbyn. (or someone else, if you are a big fan of nukes and austerity.)

We have to win this one, or it's a choice between a Lizard and another Lizard for the rest of our lives.

No more anti immigrant mugs!

http://www.labour.org.uk/pages/labour-party-leadership-election-2016

Dear The Right

This kind of thing makes me raise my voice, roll my eyes and use dismissive body language. I trust you can personally guarantee it won't happen again this time around?

Andrew

A voter writes...

From: Louise Brown 

Sent: 04 July 2016 

To: Membership; 

Subject: [UK Labour Party] 

Is it still possible to register as a supporter and vote in the next leadership election?

Dear Louise

Thank you for your email.

There is no leadership contest. The Labour Party’s rules state that in the event of a leadership election being called the Labour Party’s National Executive Committee will set out the rules and guidelines of the contest at that time, including rules for members and supporters. All members are eligible to vote in internal elections. Supporters may be able to vote subject to the NEC's approval but at present we are only accepting Affiliated Supporters, which you can sign up for at support.labour.org.uk. 

Kind regards,

Ben Markham

Membership Team

The Labour Party

From: Louise Brown

Date: 14 July 2016

To: Labour Membership

My query was expressed as being about the rules for the next contest whenever that might be.

Events have as I anticipated overtaken my query. 

Given the ever changing rules any answer would be sadly pointless. 

I voted Labour for the first time ever this year. 

Partly because I was impressed by the Bristol mayoral candidate but also because I believe Jeremy Corbyn was offering a real alternative based on actual political beliefs I could support and a more thoughtful and reasoned approach to the issues. 

I found his balanced approach to the issue of leave/remain far preferable to the misrepresentations and hysteria from elsewhere. 

I am a former Liberal Democrat supporter and have never seen myself as "left wing". However I believe in voting for the good of the whole of society not myself or my socio-economic group. 

For example I am happy to pay more tax if it leads to a society that is wealthier overall by providing a decent standard of living for all rather than just those of us fortunate enough to be able to buy healthcare, education etc. 

The behaviour around the recent referendum has highlighted that there are many people who feel angry, frustrated and frightened. 

Many of my formerly non-political friends who broadly share my views on the need for a fairer and more caring society and a more adult approach to politics were considering  supporting labour under Corbyn

I have spoken to many people from the legal profession and several doctors who were considering a Labour vote for the first time. 

However the current shenanigans by MPs who appear determined to oust Corbyn have left me and many I have spoken to disappointed. 

Can they not see that his appeal is not just to the left but to those of us who do not necessarily define ourselves politically but have become increasingly disillusioned with the current government's failure to address the problems of social and financial inequality, diminished access to justice and the problems faced by the NHS to name but a few.

However the most recent events e.g. the almost surreal new rules on members/supporters and voting apparently designed to ensure that only the more wealthy supporters vote have left me feeling that the current PLP is not something I could support.

My enthusiasm for Jeremy Corbyn and what he stands for remains. 

The majority of your MPs have sadly misjudged the situation and squandered the most exciting opportunity for many years

Yours in disappointment 

Louise Brown. 

Note

Results of Labour Leadership election, Sep 2015

Labour Members :
Jeremy Corbyn - 49.59%
Next most popular candidate - 22.69%

Affiliated Members (Trades Unions, etc)
Jeremy Corbyn - 57.61%
Next most popular candidate - 26%

Registered Supporters -- so called "£3 members")
Jeremy Corbyn - 83.76%
Next most popular candidate - 7.97%

Overall results:
Jeremy Corbyn -  59.5%
Next most popular candidate - 19%

Overall results with "£3 members" eliminated:
Jeremy Corbyn - 55.9%
Next most popular candidate - 27.17%

Last year I joined a political party because I liked and agreed with the leader and wanted him to have a shot at being PM. 

This I now realize was a shameful thing to have done. 

What is the solution? Perhaps political parties should be like the Christian Union, with detailed statements of orthodoxy that you have to sign before you are allowed to vote. Perhaps they should be like the I-Spy club where you get a coupon each time you go to a meeting, and are only allowed to join when you have 26 stickers. Or just go back to the old system, where the local party nominates the candidate, and the MPs chose the leader? 

I don't know. We certainly can't carry on letting people like me join parties because we like and agree with the leader and want him to have a shot at being PM.

I am sorry for what I did. Like a recovering alcoholic, I should have known better than to start paying attention to current affairs again. I take it too personally.

I TOLD YOU SO

What do I fear? Myself? There's non else by.
Richard loves Richard: that is, I am I.
          Shakespeare, Richard III

Gandalf as ring-lord would have been far worse than Sauron. Sauron multiplied evil, he left "good" clearly distinguishable from it. Gandalf would have made good detestable and seem evil.

             Letter, Tolkien

1997: Blair's authoritarianism

1998: Blair's regressive welfare policy

1998: Blair's statism

11th September 2001

2002: Blair's drive to war

2003: Aftermath of Blair's war

2004: Arrest of Saddam Hussein

2006: Blair's Madness (1) - Leadership

2006: Blair's madness (2): Social Policy

2007: Killing of Saddam Hussein

2010: Blair defends drive to war

It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But a half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.

          Sandman

I've been doing this for nearly 20 years. Please, put a couple of quid in the tin to show me I've not been wasting my time, okay? 

by backing me on patreon, you agree to pay me 50p or more every time I write an article (up to a maximum you specify). It only takes a minute or so to register. If everyone who reads my stuff chipped in, it would make a real different to my beer consumption standard of living.

I don't care to belong to any party that would accept me as a member

I normally avoid politics on social media, but I have been embroiled in some discussions about the implosion of the Labour Party in the wake of the Calamity. Some of my fan-base (Sid and Doris Bonkers) asked that I assemble my comments in a single piece. I hope this makes sense. 

The discussion began when it turned out that my MP, who I had voted for, was one of those who had tabled a vote of no-confidence in Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party. I said that I honestly wondered if people like me were welcome in the party. I have been quite open about have been one of the "three pound members" who registered as a supporter in order to support his leadership bid; and who became a full member of the party literally minutes after his election. An old friend, who has been an active member of the Party for many years, asked, not unreasonably: "Did you join a party, or join a person?"

I believe in trade unions, libraries, nationalized utilities, redistribution of wealth from rich to poor. I believe in welfare payments to the unemployed and family allowances to mothers, old age pensions and student grants. I believe that no-one should be denied medical treatment through lack of means. I don’t think criminals should be hanged and I don’t think children should be hit. I believe in maternity and paternity leave and positive discrimination to overcome built-in prejudices. I am against genocide, and am against wasting money on weapons of mass destruction. I am not against all wars, but I am, like President Obama, against dumb wars. I don’t think countries and borders matter all that much, and I don’t think race matters at all. I am in favour of free movement; I live and work in a multi-cultural community. I am in favour of equal marriage, although I admit it took me a while to come round to that. 

I rejoined the Labour Party when it elected a leader who believed what I believe. If the next leader believes what I believe, I will stay in the party. But I fear that if Corbyn is ousted, New Labour wing will denounce anybody who believes in what I believe as a Trot. There will be no place for Socialists in that Labour party, and I will have the same choice that I have had since 1992: the choice between two Tory parties, and not voting at all. 

The Idealist believes in things, gives their support to the political party that believes in those things, and tries to persuade other people that she should believe in those things too. The...what shall we call him? political wonk? party man? activist?...wants his team to win, and thinks that his team should adopt whatever beliefs will deliver that victory.

Sure, there are such things as political tactics and honest compromises: but when Polly Toynbee starts saying (and I paraphrase) "well, it seems the Working Class are quite racist, so Labour needs to be a more racist to win the working class vote" I walk away. 

Very few of us are 100% Idealist or 100% Wonk in real life, of course. 

Tony Blair wore the right rosette and won elections, but he had no point of connection, that I could spot, with any of the things I believe. 

I suspect -- and I am sorry to go all serious here -- that this is actually a religious question. I am a Socialist because Socialism seems to be the best chance we have of applying Jesus's moral principals to the complicated and messy political world. Which is not the same thing as saying that Jesus was a socialist, or that all Christians have to be Labour, or that moral principals are the most important thing about Jesus. Giles Fraser does not have a point. This is why Christians like me can feel drawn to Marxists like Jeremy Corbyn and Billy Bragg: we all start from the position that something is fundamentally broken in the world, that a CEO being paid 100 times more than his cleaner is not so much a sign of a healthy, competitive economy, as a moral outrage. 

"The main requirement for a political party is delivering the things it believes in; not just wanting them"; yes, of course, but if that ever becomes "the main requirement is being elected, which we can only do by not trying to deliver those things" then, against, I walk away. 

I don’t think that “prevent the Tories winning a third term” is Labour’s main objective. I don’t think that “We are not the Tories” is a sufficient selling point to justify Labour's existence. 

I can picture three outcomes for the next election. 

Best outcome: Progressive government; Conservative opposition

Second best outcome: Conservative government; Progressive opposition.

Worst outcome: Conservative government, Conservative opposition.

It makes very little difference whether, in the worst case scenario, the conservative government has the label “Conservative Party” or “New Labour”. Either way, the poor are fucked. But only me and the Queen Mother think like that. and she's dead. 

You don’t get to implement your ideas by jetizoning them. There is no point in becoming the Tories in order to defeat the Tories. Labour is a moral crusade, or it is nothing.

I have a set of political beliefs about how I think a country should be run. Those political beliefs derive from a more deeply held set of moral beliefs (Christian, in my case, but that is incidental to the argument) and lead to me giving my support to a party. I support the party that reflects my political beliefs, and I hold political beliefs because they are a way of implementing my moral beliefs. I sort of assume that people go into politics because they also have political beliefs, based on moral beliefs, and want to persuade other people that their beliefs are the best. I even hope that they have thought there political beliefs through more carefully than I have.  

Why do we want to prevent a third Tory government? 

There are two possible answers: 

a: We don't want a Tory government because we don't want a Tory government because we don't want a Tory government. Those are the rules of the game: if a guy with a Labour badge gets in, our team wins. It’s a bypass. You’ve got to build bypasses. 

b: We don't want a Tory government because we think that the Tory government will do bad things or that a Labour government will do better things. "Good" and "Bad" are here defined by our political beliefs which come from our moral beliefs.

The idea that a political party might shape its agenda (as opposed to its presentation of that agenda, or its propaganda) based on what will win elections implies 

a: that you can pick up and put down political beliefs at will, like picking a new tie 

b: that it's quite all right to SAY that you believe the thing that will win the election, even if you actually believe the other thing

c: that winning elections, rather than doing what is right, is the object of the exercise. 

This seems to be to psychotic, if not actually evil.

Politics is not only about what you think should happen; it's about making detailed plans and policies to ensure that it does happen -- about expertise and competence as well as belief. Candidate A and B might be united in their belief that everyone should get medical care when they need it; but honestly differ about whether socialized medicine or subsidized private insurance is the best way of achieving that. If you think Candidate A is on the wrong side of the argument, it  would be better to say "Candidate A has not done his sums right" rather than "Candidate A obviously wants poor people to die long, agonizing deaths". I think that the point at which someone says "Socialized medicine is better because socialized medicine is better and I don't care about the sums" is the point when you can fairly accuse them of being obsessed with ideological purity.

If I run a dairy farm, I might very well get marketing people in to tell me how to get punters to buy my milk. "You need to sell it in different kinds of cartons; you need to look at selling flavoured milk and skimmed milk; maybe you need to come up with a company mascot the kids can related to" are all good suggestions. "I think you should concrete it over and sell motorcycles", not so much.

If selling milk is your objective. If making money is your objective, then the motorcycles plan might be a very good one.

Is the Labour Party about selling milk or manufacturing motorcycles?

The question about whether the Labour Party is "too far to the left" or "too far to the right" is a moral one. You can show me that my morals are wrong ("you say that killing is always wrong, but have you considered the following circumstances...") or you can show that my political beliefs don't reflect my morals as well as I thought they did ("you think that paying benefit alleviates poverty, but did you consider…”) but you can't ask me chose my morals or my politics based on what will win elections. It's like asking a judge to consider the possibility that murder is a bit less naughty this week than it was last week.

A new Labour Leader who believes in being nasty to criminals, nasty to immigrants, nasty to the unemployed, and wasting money on WMDs that we will never use might (perhaps) be able to win an election. But I come back to my first question: in what way would that be better than a Tory government?

No-one is being charged for this article, but if you think this page is worthwhile, please consider supporting it on Patreon.

Bring Them Into the Light!

And at last Ar-Pharazôn came even to Aman, the Blessed Realm, and the coasts of Valinor; and still all was silent, and doom hung by a thread. 

For Ar-Pharazôn wavered at the end, and almost he turned back. 

His heart misgave him when he looked upon the soundless shores and saw Taniquetil shining, whiter than snow, colder than death, silent, immutable, terrible as the shadow of the light of Ilúvatar. 

But pride was now his master, and at last he left his ship and strode upon the shore, claiming the land for his own, if none should do battle for it. 

And a host of the Númenóreans encamped in might about Túna, whence all the Eldar had fled.

"By God..."

When someone says that they don't like Furriners coming over here, then I am inclined to think that they have a problem with Furriners. The exact species of Furriner changes: it may be Polish people taking our jobs or Muslim people taking our Christmas decoration or Bleck people out breeding us (you know that they say about Bleck men) and causing us to concrete over this once green and pleasant land. Me have hobby, it called breeding, white man pay for baby feeding, remember?

The Nasty Press has spent the better part of the last decade winding Voters up. There are swamps, floods and swarms of furriners coming over here until the "indigenous" people are a minority in their own land. And stopping "us" from celebrating Christmas and consuming HP sauce. And getting lots and lots of freebies. A lady on Newsnight yesterday opined "A new person comes in they get everything their houses things like that you know they get new beds new you know like everything television TV licence paid for now and again you know like and basically what do we get?"

Anyone, in any country, at any time, might say "The law about residency, naturalisation, right of entry, political asylum, and the eligibility of foreign nationals to claim welfare says 'X', I think it should say 'Y', because...."And someone else might reply "On the contrary, I think it should say 'Z'." Technically and lexically, they would be "having a debate about immigration." It's certainly true that if you transfer 100 unemployed persons from Paris to London, that's 100 less people for France to worry about, and a 100 more for England to worry about, and England might reasonably enough have words to say to France on this subject.

But that's not what "having a debate on immigration" means, because that's not what immigration means. Immigration is a shout word, a code word, a whole bundle of confused ideas bundled up in four syllables. (Where are these people handing out beds to furriners but denying them to indigenous folk?)

So Gordon meets a Voter, who is doubtless a reader of the Nasty Press. (Mr. Prescott appears to think that the Nasty Press might have put her up to it.) "You can't say anything about immigrants," she says apparently forgetting that the Nasty Press have been going on and on about little else for year. "If you say that, you're...."

If you say what, Mrs Voter? What is it that you want to say about immigrants, and what is it that you fear will happen to you if do? I suppose it's possible that Mrs Voter felt that she couldn't say that Immigrants make a real and valuable contribution to the vibrancy of our culture but feared that if she did she would be called a pinko by the Nasty Press. But I don't think that was what she had in mind. I don't think that was what she had in mind at all.

Inexplicably, Gordon Brown chooses to fight an election on terms which have been set by the Nasty Press, as if getting positive coverage from wierdo hang em flog em expatriates was possible or desirable. Maybe he really, really still believes that The Sun Backed Blair because The Sun had undergone a sudden conversion to Socialism, and is hurt and confused because lovely, lovely, Rupert has turned against him. He's not the first person to make off-record comments into a live mic. John Major described his colleagues as bastards. Tony grovelled to that nasty Texan thicko. It really, really, really, isn't news that politicians say one thing to peoples faces and another thing behind their backs. It's called "good manners". (And it really, really isn't sensible for John Prescott to say that broadcasting an off-record remark by the P.M is on the same level has hacking private phone conversations.)

The big question is this. Why does Gordon dance to Rupert's tune and spend an hour and a half apologizing? How is it that his first instinct once he starts running scared of the Libdems is to start accusing them of being "soft" -- soft (that is, liberal, progressive) on crime; soft (that is, liberal progressive) on nuclear weapons; soft (that is, liberal, progressive) on immigration? How is it that the only policy that the left wing party can think of is to look as nasty and right wing as possible?

I'm fine with him saying rude things about voters behind their back. I'm particularly fine with him saying rude things about the kind of voter who would like to say nasty things about furriners but feels she can't cos of plickle krecness. But when he gets caught out he should damn well have the decency to say that he called Mrs Voter a bigot because that's what he thought she was.

NOTE: He says that he called Mrs Voter a bigot because he had misheard something she had said. Does anyone want to look at the transcript and tell me what it was that he thought she had said?

"The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again..."

When the hated Blair regime seized power 13 years ago, the Daily Mail (The Paper That Supported Hitler) fairly wet itself with joy because he said that the free ride was over, and that he would cut unemployment benefits for those who refuse to work. ("We'll make them work" was the headline.)

This morning, the Daily Mail ("Hooray For the Blackshirts!") is fairly wetting itself with joy because David Cameron has said that the free ride is over, and that he will cut unemployment benefits for those who refuse to work.

It need hardly be said that it has always been a condition of claiming unemployment benefit that the claimant can prove that he is making a reasonable effort to look for work, and that he doesn't turn down any reasonable job offer. It should also be said that unemployment benefit -- £60 a week -- is (rightly) calculated as the very minimum that anyone can be expected to live on, so if you were really going cut people's benefit, you would, by definition, be creating more homelessness and crime.

But the scary, scary, scary thing is that both parties, to appeal to the Daily Mail continue to make laws, or at any rate, policies, intended to slay fictitious dragons: fictitious schools which have fictitiously banned competitive sports; fictitious human rights laws; fictitious health and safety laws and fictitious legions of lazy unemployed people living in luxury during the kind of recession when there are thousands of and thousands of jobs for them to take, even though the fictitious hoards of fictitious immigrants have come over here and taken them all. British jobs for British workers! Hooray for black shirts! Vote for nobody!

On Monday, P.C. Plod had tea with his friend, Harry Callahan.

"Burglar Bill is a very bad man," says Harry.

"He certainly is a very bad man indeed," says P.C. Plod.

"I think the best thing would be if he were killed," says Harry.

"I think killing Burglar Bill would be a very good thing indeed," says P.C Plod.
 

On Tuesday, P.C Plod is out on patrol.

Who should he see but Burglar Bill!

P.C. Plod calls up Sgt Goldsmith on his walkie talkie, because this was in the olden days before there were mobile phones.

"I've seen Burglar Bill!" says P.C Plod.

"He's a bad man," says Sgt Goldsmith.

"A very, very bad man," says P.C. Plod

"A very bad man indeed," says Sgt. Goldsmith.

"Can I kill him, huh, huh, huh, can I kill him, can I?" says P.C. Plod.

"Certainly not," says Sgt Goldsmith "We haven't had the death penalty in Toytown for years and years and years, and even if we did, you couldn't just shoot him, you'd have to arrest him and fill out all the necessary paper work."

"Wait a minute," says P.C Plod "If Burglar Bill had a gun, would it be legal for me to kill him?"

"Well," says Sgt Goldsmith "If he had a gun and if he was threatening you or the citizens of Toytown, then it might be legal for you to kill him."

"What an astonishing coincidence," says P.C Plod "I've just noticed that Burglar Bill has a gun, and is going to shoot me and several of the citizens of Toytown, unless I act very quickly."

Bang, bang, bang, goes P.C. Plod's gun.


On Wednesday, the Mayor of Toytown sends for P.C. Plod.

"I hear that you killed poor William Burglar," says the Mayor. "This is very bad, and you will have to sit on the naughty step till tea time."

"But I only killed him in self-defence!" says P.C Plod "He had a gun, and was threatening the people of Toytown."

"Oh, that's all right then," says Mr Mayor.


On Thursday, Doctor Bob knocks on Mr. Mayor's door.

"After P.C. Plod shot Burglar Bill, a concerned citizen called for me, and I came jolly quickly on my bicycle with my little black bag to try to patch him up with vinegar and brown paper. And guess what?"

"What?" says the Mayor.

"Burglar Bill didn't have a gun at all!"

"Oh dear," says the Mayor.

So he calls back P.C.Plod and tells him that he did kill Burglar Bill and would have to sit on the naughty step until tea time after all.

"I have already told you" says P.C Plod "That I killed him in self defence, because he had a gun."

"But he didn't have a gun," says the Mayor.

"I know he didn't have a gun," says P.C Plod "Who on earth said he did have a gun? But I thought he had a gun, and so did everyone else and so would you have done if you had been there. It turned out that the thing he was waving at the citizens of Toytown was a table leg and not a gun at all. But if it had been a gun, he would have shot me, so you can't blame me for making such a Terrible Mistake."

"That's fair enough," says the Mayor.


But on Friday, several of the citizens of Toytown go and knock on the Mayor's door.

"Mr Your Worship The Mayor" say the Citizens, who know the proper way of talking to a Mayor, "We were there when P.C. Plod killed Burglar Bill, and we can tell you that Burglar Bill didn't have a gun, or even a chair leg, and he certainly wasn't threatening to shoot anyone. In fact, before P.C Plod's gun went bang bang bang, we both shouted 'Oh P.C Plod, please do not shoot Burglar Bill, for he is unarmed!' "

"Oh dear," says the Mayor, who is beginning to think that he is trapped in an extended metaphor, and sends for P.C Plod again.

"You killed Burglar Bill, go and sit on the naughty step," says the Mayor.

"We have been through this before," says P.C Plod. "I have admitted that I made a terrible mistake in shooting an unarmed burglar, but it was an honest mistake because I thought that he had a gun, and burglars sometimes do have guns so it is better to be safe than sorry."

"But you didn't think he had a gun," says the Mayor. "At least, the several of the citizens of Toytown say that he was unarmed at the time. So there is no way that you can say that it was a self defence."

"Who ever mentioned self-defence?" says P.C Plod. "Why on earth do you keep going on about self-defence, and bringing guns into it? Burglar Bill was a very bad man, so even if I had known that he didn't have a gun, which I didn't, I would still have shot him, because Toytown is much safer without him and you should be very pleased that he is dead."

"Whether I am pleased or not has nothing to do with it!" says the Mayor, crossly. "You asked Sgt Goldsmith for permission to kill him, and he told you quite clearly that if he didn't have a gun it would be illegal to kill him however bad a man he was."

"I realise that we are never going to agree on this," says P.C Plod "And I, you know, totally respect your right to hold a, you know, different point of view, but I formed the view that Toytown would be better off without Burglar Bill, so I took the decision to remove him because I really, honestly, sincerely, in my heart of hearts, believed that it was the right thing to do."

"Oh, well, that's all right then," says the Mayor.


On Saturday, P.C Plod knocks on the Mayor's door.

"You know what I said yesterday, about how it was right for me to kill Burglar Bill because I sincerely believed that killing Burglar Bill was the right thing to do?"

"Yes," says the Mayor, whose head was spinning a bit by this time.

"Well, I think that I may have chosen my words badly. What I think I meant to say was that I really, genuinely, and sincerely believed that it would have been right to kill him if he had had a gun, but that, since bad men do sometimes have guns and since you can't ever be sure which ones do and which ones don't  the best way to make sure that he didn't have gun was to kill him, so killing him because he had a gun and killing him because he was a bad man are really the same thing, and it was self defence even if I knew he didn't have a gun, which I didn't, because he might have got a gun afterwards."

"I'm glad we've got that sorted out," says the Mayor.


On Sunday, P.C Plod has tea with his friend Harry Callahan.

"Burglar Joe is a very bad man," says Harry.  

Important, but brief, note, regarding Barack Obama, Paterson Joseph, and Benjamin Zephaniah

Typical. You wait 450 years for a black man to be appointed to an important position, and then three come along all at once.

Another Important Note For Everyone

I was walking home the other day, and a total stranger came up to me and asked if I ever had a the kind of day which just makes me what to go up to someone and hug them. I hadn't, but she had, and so she did.

I then went into a corner shop to purchase a loaf of bread and some semi-skimmed milk, and the man behind the counter, who I had precisely once before, greeted me like a long-lost friend, asked if I had had a nice day at work, and turning to the elderly gentleman who was counting out some loose change rather slowly, added "You take your time, Pops."

I am as pleased as anyone that George W Bush is going to stop being President of Americaland, but the sooner everyone gets back to being miserable and cynical, the better I shall like it.

It's obvious when you put it like that...

BRISTOL CELEBRATES FALL OF CAPITALISM BY OPENING HUGE NEW SHOPPING MALL

"It's exactly the same as every other shopping mall on earth!" exclaim punters.

"Buy stuff! Buy stuff! We get to buy stuff!"

Making eight in all.



Solving the obesity crisis one cake at a time



I don't think all my ties cost £65



Exciting new House of Fraser department store



Exciting empty building where House of Fraser department store used to be

All her merchants stand with wonder,
What is this that comes to pass:
Murm'ring like the distant thunder,
Crying, "Oh alas, alas."
Swell the sound, ye kings and nobles,
Priest and people, rich and poor;
Babylon is fallen
is fallen
is fallen
Babylon is fallen
to rise no more.

Surely what matters is the manner of Mehdi Kazemi's execution? We've already established that New Labour has no problem with handing people over to foreign states which are planning to execute them without a proper trial for crimes which would not be capital offenses in the UK, providing they are polite to them on the scaffold.

And here's another one

This time, we manage to go from "People sometimes support football teams from towns where they don't live" to "The Government has a policy to stamp out History and Geography" via "Children don't know dates and maps as well as they did in the Olden Days. Is this some kind of complex multi-layered parody, do you think?