 |
|
Howdy Bartana! Andrew Hammerschmiedt, jumped-up pantry boy, active atheist, Tory, social commentator and bon viveur writes the hammersteen.info blog. Alongside haphazard philosophy on all aspects of life expect art to be mentioned. You are invited to comment by clicking the photograph above. |
 |
 Monday, September 14, 2009 6:34pmI regret having to announce that I am not putting any more content up here for the time being. If anyone is interested (which I doubt) - my Twitter feed badge is clickable and has the potential to provide access to insights of the third kind to billions of humans. |
| Wednesday, July 29, 2009 2:16pm These days I am so busy (or so dripping wet, since it is high summer) during the day, I switch off my best mate (the pc whose nickname I shall not reveal) around 10pm and check out how the pillow smells. But I caught this in a semi-lucid haze, probably on Newsnight: “The Tories are the party of the rich and successful.” The first charge I can easily refute by show of bank statement, the second is simply weird. And then someone (haze, remember) said - I think last night on Newsnight, too: “As much as it pains me, the last prime minister who believed in something was Margaret Thatcher.” Maybe I have been dreaming. |
 |
| Tuesday, July 7, 2009 6:26pm As is obvious from the badge above, I have changed my mind about joining Twitter. About a year ago I blogged that I would not register - two reasons why I relented. I have been reading some people's Tweets for a while and it was starting to become cumbersome. Now they all neatly bundled together. Additionally, the option to update my facebook status is much more efficient than waiting for half a billion elements to load to type a brief comment. |
| Sunday, June 28, 2009 11:00pm Glastonbury has this year, well frankly, confused me. There were kids singing along to Crosby, Stills, Nash, Jones, Young, Christie and plenty of others of my parent's generation. And there were kids singing along to my generation's incomplete Specials, Madness and Blur. And Status Quo ffs. I am all for eclecticism but sixteen year olds knowing the Wooden Ships lyrics is a bit odd. So much for modernisation so bravely implemented last year when tickets sold as fast as An Audience With Gordon Brown would. Anyway, I am amazed nobody has picked up the Woodstock anniversary which has come around every decade when it is in its last year without fail. Maybe 1999 and the violence served as a lesson. 1969 kids smoked pot and made love instead of war. The only thing which is absolutely certain is that forty years later they still smoke pot. Enthusiastically. |
Don't Make Fun Of Daddy's Voice |
Sunday, June 28, 2009 12:15pm I have resisted to blog about MP3's expenses (apart from a brief note a few weeks back) and vowed to hold my tongue forever for several reasons. There has been no news value in the “revelations” the Telegraph has spoilt us with. I know a teeny weeny bit about politics. I was not scandalised by anything. Honestly, nothing. The agenda which has driven the “revelations” is clearly to undermine the political class even further. Shame the outrage is usually limited to a few days and never actually amounts to anything which could be used as a libretto resembling the Les Miserables one. Things might be different if courgettes were to double in price at Walmart. The whole kill the ruling class, kill them now sentiment is odd since few seem outraged over MEPs or how much tax cash is squandered by the most profligate administration even I (and I have European experience and pedigree) can remember. The latest socialist spin is to say MP3s are so busy, they could not possibly do anything else but fall over exhausted and dehydrated at the end of the day. John Redwood sets things straight: This broken Parliament is part time. My reaction was no faeces, Sherlock and I broke my habit of not commenting on other sites: “Considering Mondays do not start until mid-afternoon and Thursdays are dedicated to Business when most MPs are on their way home, are we not talking three days a week for the average MP? If so, it reduces the actual count to 105 days a year. £667 a day based on a £70k p/a salary. The underlying reason for the lack of work is of course that only twenty percent of legislation is made in Westminster now.” We should accept one fact first. Politicians are walking, talking I shall digress a little at this stage to underpin my general argument. I was lucky enough to spend a weekend in the company of world famous philosophers a couple of years ago. Simon Blackburn had a swipe at Richard Dawkins so the man who is scared of nothing, of almost nothing (I am afraid of quite a lot actually, but let us not go there) asked a simple question which I paraphrase. “Is it wrong for a zoologist to write a bestseller, call himself a philosopher and further the cause of atheism?”. Both question and reply caused titillation. But the most poignant answer came from the eternally awesome (and I used this word before American kids discovered it, so leave me alone) Lisa Bortolotti who complimented me in the bar after Saturday's proceedings saying that my question was a good one. However, she said, philosophers undergo specific and rigorous training. I have to agree and this leads me back to politicians and their training. If the public wants to elect hundreds of Esther Rantzens because they are angry about a duck house - fine. Another popular outbreak of gripe centres around a moat. Funny that the populist media does not concentrate on blatant fraud as much. I wrote a paper a couple of years back using a simple analogy. Would you be happy for someone who has never driven a high speed train to have a go? Would you volunteer to be a passenger? I presume the answer would be no. Would be happy for bored and rapidly ageing self-publicist Esther Rantzen to have a go at representing a constituency? Before anyone says it - I am aware no qualifications at all are required to become a professional politician - otherwise John Leslie Prescott's “career” would be inexplicable. For all his faults, and he consists of nothing but - nay, defines fault - at least he did a little bit of work before becoming a very rich Jaguar tamer. I too object to midwives saying: “Congratulations, Mrs Miliband, it's a minister.” If you go down the pub - let me rephrase - if you could afford going down the pub as you could ten years ago before chemically enhanced (?) water became so laughably dear everybody gets hammered before going out, who do you meet? Political pundits. How would Dave who lives at the local Wetherspoons (and let us face facts, most males are called Dave) do at a departmental meeting? Would he deploy his bulbous nose to sniff out wastrels, rascals and deceitful junkies? Or have a sip of strong cider before disseminating stuff like “I'm sure something will pop into my head”. Go Esther. A select committee and very, very mundane fare awaits. |
| Thursday, June 25, 2009 12:08pm Unison's general secretary Dave Prentis said: “Members are fed up with feeding the hand that bites them”. Somehow this re-arranged version of the idiom does not quite work. But I wholeheartedly support the underlying sentiment. |
| Tuesday, June 16, 2009 8:41am Coach Trip is hilarious because it is so completely pointless. The best moment of the current series occurred when one of the brain-dead Yorkshire women complained that she and her sister were “treated like leopards”. Another instance of pointlessness was this. I had Sky News on. They reported on what they commendably called Brown Crisis for days. Suddenly Breaking News flashed up. A car was shown. The caption read “Blair leaving his house at Connaught Square”. News is a very malleable term indeed. |
Berkshire Poppies |
Thursday, June 11, 2009 3:50pm It is not 4pm yet and I feel like going to bed. Post-election fatigue, Wine Flu, you decide. Luckily there is Traffic and anyway, Heaven is in my mind. Stoned was one of two movies last Sunday. If nothing else, Jones must be winner of best hairdo every year since 1967. There are no challengers. Not even me. Recommended. The other film I watched was Todesspiel. This, too, is now officially recommended by me. I am aware this is meaningless, thanks. I remember the summer of '77. Punk, leftist and muslim terrorism plus The Spy Who Loved Me. What really caught my attention was the comment of one of the terrorists (no, not former terrorist) that she recommended destroying the tapes they had recorded because it would shine a bad light on those asking the questions. |
Kicking Sand From Beach To Beach |
Thursday, June 11, 2009 11:43am Clare Short is an old-fashioned socialist and taliban-style feminist, the type I remember from the Seventies. Her accent is on the verge of being unbearable. Yet I find it hard to dislike her. She would undoubtedly dislike me, though. Roger Alton is the editor of The Independent Newspaper. Steve Richards is of course never off the telly when a station wants to buy a left-wing comment, which is frightengly often. Johann Hari I used to read before I was banned from the site for calling him on the hard left. Blogged on this last year. Never got an answer why I was banned. Have not read the Independent since. That the paper cannot go on haemorrhaging money forever is a given but would it not be funny if they took the website down with them. Why do I blog about the leftist lefties from Leftland in the first place? I was in Birmingham for a meeting and hung around for a debate on democracy. The one shock - but maybe a useful one - was that Patrick Burns, local BBC political dude, referred to us. I had him down as a pretty decent fellah but once again the sBBC has proved to be above party politics and completely, utterly and totally independent. In other news. Also went to my local surgery re: prescription. My GP has retired and there is someone new looking after the well-being of my toes, mind and intestines. She is Spanish and very fanciable. Your GP stinks. HaHa. Greetings from Nelson Muntz. Off to make an appointment. I need more tablets. |
We're Heading For Venus |
Saturday, May 30, 2009 5:36pm It has been a beautiful sunny day. I sat on a bench with the mayor of Nuneaton for a bit. Huge mistake, he loves talking. I should have stuck to handing out leaflets. Only kidding. I have experienced much more hostility when campaigning. Maybe it was the EU balloons which pacified the four year old voters. There were people complaining that Tory candidates had not delivered their leaflets yet. Join, help and have sore hamstrings in the morning. Seriously, please do. You would be most welcome. It also seems that my strategy of being half an hour late for every event is working well but I could be wrong. It was the same bunch of Conservative MEPs and candidates whom I bumped into at university yesterday where I attended an event with Eddie Izzard. Before anyone does it on my behalf, I am coming clean. For the first time in my long and pointless life I handed over money to brand new labour. Technically, anyway, since they extort it wherever you go and waste it at their leisure in any case. Following Billy Bragg in the Eighties does not count. It is not the same party and anyway - two words: St Swithin's Day. Technically this might count as three words. I forked out £3 but Fabian (the organiser of the event, an affable man whom I rate) assured me it was for room rental. Only one thing for him to sort out next time - when people are asked to punch in their card details, in 2009 (!) it should go without saying that the site is secure. The last time I encountered a non-https site asking for such information was six years ago. Never mind, socialists lose your information anyway, even if it is meant to be secure. When I looked for details of the event I came across this: Labour's European Candidates ... Our Price: £100.00 ... (per 1). Bargain. No need to tell me to add to basket. I am adding as we speak. Stocks may not last. I enjoyed the do but the fact that after a bit of politics the main themes were cross-dressing, gay rights and ever popular lesbianism was confusing. Well, Cashman is mainly a taxpayer-sponsored campaigner on those issues posing as an MEP who keeps saying I used to be in Eastenders, don't you know scaringly similar to the cock-er-nees in The Fast Show. That everybody watches and everybody has always watched Eastenders is a false belief. Strange that he still tries to get mileage out of something he did before the majority of the audience's parents had an accident. Coronation Street man, me. A couple of nights back I went to a more intimate meeting organised by the socialist party. Apart from myself there were three activists in the audience. Why did I bother? It was a public meeting on the patch where I am standing and I am actually interested in political ideas. The speaker was notorious Dave Nellist who can still orate for England. Orate is not a word but should be. Seriously, I have much more respect for a passionate socialist than a bogus Tory like the clown who bored everyone to tears at the Izzard/Cashman event. This is a serious blog which checks facts. Unfortunately I cannot since there is complete radio silence. I might name the perfect specimen of what I call a robotic retweeter, the kind of person universities pump out, later. Every time that fellah spoke - for minutes on end - I thought the same: We know you know the policies dictated by the politburo by heart. My question to Mr Nellist - taken straight away for once (admittedly not that surprising given the surroundings) - was a simple one: “Your former friend (or colleague) Gordon Brown said “British jobs for British workers” and nazi Griffin says the same. What unionists did when Portuguese workers turned up was in the same spirit. So is there a difference between socialists and national socialists?”. Being an old pro he came up with exactly the right answer. “We are internationalists”. Unfortunately, this clashes with trade union activists appearing oblivious to this and the fact that the meeting was about saying no to the EU. Much of the left may have never received this information. But marxists frequently contradict themselves. Careful, kids when playing with ideology. I started pressing him on the issue. The fellah sitting next to me started staring. If they had known who I am I would have probably been treated slightly rougher. Or lynched. Anyway, as the meeting progressed, the miner strike was repeatedly mentioned and I thought to myself: Open a mine yourselves instead of reminiscing about what happened twenty-five years ago. There is a humongous market for coal. Nutshell time. We are talking a good political meeting all the same. It really felt like the Eighties all over again. Which is similar to a deja vu experience, according to one political philosopher named Giovanni. Internationalists. One of my least favourite Style Council tracks ever. Another street stall last Saturday, too, and I was lucky enough to lunch with a couple of European candidates on that occasion, one was our top MEP. The names are immaterial. That is what you say when you cannot remember them. |
| Tuesday, May 26, 2009 9:09pm The third semi-final. Let us think about this for a moment. Is there not a hint in the word semi? As soon as we are talking Britain has absolutely no talent whatsoever. Seriously. None., I am on telly. I shall probably only make the fourteenth semi-final but I always try. |
| Monday, May 25, 2009 10:44am A new Woodstock movie. Great, but do not forget that the Baby Boomers have been the most selfish generation ever, kids. Peace, man. I should expand on this when I have time. Ken Loach, too, has made a new film. There are only two proper legends. Georgie Best. Then a long silence. And Eric Cantona. Oops, Giggsy Boy, now considered an elderly gentleman. What does that make me? Peace, man. I should not expand on this at all. |
Hoochie Coochie Man |
Friday, May 22, 2009 12:51pm There I was yesterday, rained on in front of a voter who sat in the dry of his garage with his yapping dog. I felt transported to Tennessee. This looked and sounded like fertile ground for a Tory Blues Man canvasser. I introduced myself and gave him my campaign leaflet. “Not gonna bother this time. You're all the bloody same.”. Then he sat on my leaflet. I pointed out that I have never received a penny in politics, au contraire, mon ami I am one of those who pay, walk around for hours and hours and get no benefit. For the record, I did not use the French bit to be on the safe side. The reply was: “You're all the bloody same.”. I obviously did not get through to this particular Telegraph reader. As I walked away, he muttered: “You're all the bloody same.”. Now I started suffering from internal aggravation but thought maybe he just likes saying “you're all the bloody same.” which calmed me down. Nuneaton Wem Brook Division Banks, Melanie Louise - Green Deacon, Yvonne Jeanette - British National Party Hammerschmiedt, Barack De Pfeffel - Conservative Tandy, June Anne - Labour I would go for the Tory with the funny name if I was you. Or were you. You decide. |
| Thursday, May 21, 2009 8:00pm Been listening to the new Madness album for about ten times. I find it hard to judge because there is always the danger of glorifying yesteryear. Entertaining throughout though no masterpiece. But no Madness longplayer ever was. Now in tin helmet mode I bravely say Madness have always been a singles band who have not used all their singles. See Mrs Hutchinson and I could name ten or fifteen more. Idiot Child is the favourite. The song I can identify with, obviously. Playing it over and over. |
Bigmouth Strikes Again |
Thursday, May 21, 2009 6:41pm Two Q&As last week, one soothing, the other endangering my life by sending my blood pressure soaring. David Cameron came to town, to the college across the tracks, to be precise. I walked down the road when a 4x4 pulled up and he got out. I waved and continued not expecting anything but recognition but heard him shout “Hiya, you alright?”. I have met him before and the closer he gets to being Prime Minister the cooler (as in more relaxed) he seems to get. Can anyone imagine the one whose growth of interpersonal skills must have been stunted early (I hope he is not dangerous or we are all in trouble) shouting “Hiya!” and seem completely natural? If Eton gives you so much confidence yet keeps you so grounded at the same time should not all schools be like it? Enough questions. Or enough questions already, as Baltimorians would put it. No idea why this additional word is necessary when they otherwise speak in acronyms. Interlude over. Over already. All assorted leftie nutters assembled. David batted away their questions with ease. My standard joke that he is awfully young still does not work. In one case not even when I explained it. The other session I attended was with the vice-president of the European Commission, so - yes, we are talking power. And no, you are not alone. I had to look her up, too. Wallström by name, Margot by nature. Her majesty arrived and cracked a few jokes about arthritis and gout aimed to break the ice with the youngsters the event was aimed at. I tried to ask: “It is good to meet an unelected member of the European elite. An election must be imminent. Arthritis and gout - as far as I know - are very painful diseases. I hope you are never going to suffer from either. Anyway, do you believe that when the electorate of this sceptred isle opted for joining an economic community in the Seventies they expected to be governed by Swedish socialists?” Even when I was the only one trying to get called I was ignored. There was an eerie consensus in the hall. Unlike my silly self, who thought there was a clue in the name, the woman expressed the sentiment that there are no geographical boundaries as far as Europe was concerned and yes, accession celebrations are such fun, more Babycham here, luv. The last bit was paraphrased. Invented already, Bostonians would argue. Right, I thought, I nominate Australia. She was fast by looking forward to welcoming Turkey into the fold. In my mind I raised a Morocco. She shot me down by opening negotiations with Sri Lanka. She then complained that nobody around here cares how German socialists do European-electionwise and coverage of European elections was largely negative. They - European socialists represented by the left and the SDP in this country - mean it, people. The federal state is only one referendum away. Aforementioned Mr Cameron could be the saviour of Europe if it was not for Blair's successor (he is so irrelevant, the name escapes me) hanging on - by what I do not know with because the fingernails have long gone - until the last minute twelve months from now. Anyway, at least the Birmingham Council chamber seats, nay armchairs, so few get to sit in are so comfy I really did not mind waiting for the late Margot. Half an hour late, she is not dead. |
| Tuesday, May 19, 2009 12:07pm Fare thee well, Michael Martin, the most biased Speaker I have ever known. Taxi! Chauffeur-driven limo to Parkhead! Andrew comments Tuesday, May 19, 2009 4:00pm An afterthought. Many of those defending Gorbals Mick have one thing in common. What gladdens me is that this Joker in the house of cards is likely to be the first of the socialist Cosa Nostra which has ruled Britain with an iron fist for twelve years to tumble. Imagine this unbearable torrent of Scottish noises being reduced to a babbling brook. Those Caledonian clowns can always retire to the devolved talking shop the English paid for and they have feigned to be so fond of but found not lucrative enough for themselves. |
| Sunday, May 17, 2009 2:14pm Peter Hitchens - whom I have a lot of time for - argued that we should return to how politics were before “... the Fabians took over everything.” on Sky News this morning. Although he is prone to hyperbole he has a point. What he justifiably attacks is the politically correct consensus. But what he deliberately omits is that thirty percent of the electorate vote socialist, another third Tory and another twenty percent for splinter groups no matter what happens. This hands all power to floating voters who - in a first-past-the-post system - then decide who reigns. What Hitchens pretends not to comprehend (and he knows this perfectly well) is that once in office the governing party can shift and implement its agenda which may well (at least partly) please him. Thatcher understood this. Cameron demonstrates he understands this on a daily basis. Blair did not. |
Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before |
Wednesday, May 13, 2009 6:09pm I have been reviewing my attitude towards the BNP for a couple of days now. Ever since I watched its leader on The Daily Politics to be accurate. There is no greater defender of free speech than me and I have been saying that it is odd that tiresomely verbose socialists re-iterating their outdated mantras get to speak non-stop whilst national socialists are shunned by the mainstream media. Censorship of thought irks me. As a Libertarian I wish to listen to arguments. Bad arguments disqualify themselves in a free market of ideas whereas politically correct - and the question is and always has been who decides what is and is not correct - prohibition on discussion martyrs and mythologises those with bad arguments having to vent their spleens from twilit positions. I also respect voters and their decisions and Nuneaton voters elected a couple of BNP councillors, one of which writes a blog. I have been reading it for a while and - unlike my good self - he is not a great writer but making the effort of publishing a blog should in itself be applauded. Sadly, as we approach the June elections it is back to the favourite topic, the threat whites face. The BNP's defence of the purity of white christian blood and its member's attempts to assure that this Green And Pleasant Land remains Anglo-Saxon territory must no doubt sound noble and laudable to those inclined to be attracted to such notions. Unfortunately, we are talking Anglo-Saxon as in Saxony located in Germany. Its inhabitants were invited by the Romans to fight the tedious savages but sadly found them attractive and fought them not but mated instead. Sometimes policies go really wrong. Romans were obviously disappointed and some left. The rest stayed and mingled. The Angles came to settle from northern Germany and gave England its name. There is also a lot of Viking blood pelting through “indigenous white” veins at at times frightening speeds often caused by coital rituals. I shall not go into the evolutionary history of Europeans, that may upset purists even more. The case of home-grown christianity is dubious,too, since protestantism is dominant because a king wanted rid of his wife. Otherwise a German in a dress tottering about in Italy would be the current head honcho of those who elevate Britain over any other country. Lucky escape, methinks. What BNP ideologues (ideology is another concept I need to catch up with) appear to miss - and at long last I am making my central point - is the difference between race and culture. They conflate the two concepts which is problematic since race merely reduces a person to their deoxyribonucleic acid which determines skin colour and all other physical characteristics which should not be that hard to grasp. Ashley Montagu, for example, writes in this context that “... if the body of a black were to be deprived of all superficial features ... I do not think that any anatomist could say for certain ... whether he was dealing with the body of a black or a European.” Quite. Apart from assuming that anatomists are male (as a feminist I have to protest) he succinctly makes the point that detesting someone for their genes may not be terribly clever and being of a certain colour may not be that fantastic an achievement. It must therefore be the potentially adverse influence of culture - admittedly often the concomitant of skin colour but in no causal relation to it - which BNP activists so frequently raise as an issue. If this distinction is agreed we can have a sensible discussion, otherwise we cannot. Simon Heffer calls Britain an Old Country in a book on Conservatism in which he defends the traditionalist Tory wing. My understanding of what he means is that (at times very intricate) conventions of how her Majesty's subjects treat each other and how they should behave have evolved over centuries and should not be discarded willy-nilly. In the same spirit, the equally brilliant David Starkey declared on Channel4 News recently: “I may be an atheist but I am an anglican one.” I suspect fellow atheist Heffer would subscribe to this view as enthusiastically as I. British culture - the sole topic under scrutiny here - is worth defending against leftist anything-goes multiculturalism. But that is nothing to do with being white. |
To A Buck-toothed Girl In Luxembourg |
Monday, May 11, 2009 10:19am Over the last few weeks I have written several thousands of words but I have to be elective about what I publish. I appreciate the visitors who have not talked to me for fifteen years or more. Mercie, Cherie (how could I resist this Eurovision week), Ciao and Grazie, Servus and Danke, Ola and Gracias, Goede Middag and Dank U Wel etc. And those who have not been here at all and never will be - never mind, all appreciated. There has been a lack of commenting on contemporary politics. If voters realised that eighty percent of rules are made in Brussels or Strasbourg (wherever the travelling circus happens to stop), they would re-consider just how important internal (or should that be domestic?) political debates are. Not very. Got it in one. Do we really need to talk about £115 claimed for asking an electrician to look at the wiring when mind-boggling amounts are stealthily paid out every second? |
| Saturday, May 2, 2009 8:18pm Cat Stevens has a new album out - under the pseudonym Yusuf, not Yusuf Islam as he had insisted on being addressed as for years. I bet it was a condition for his record contract. Hilarious. |
James versus Theodorus Kapsalis versus Mike and Steve |
Wednesday, April 29, 2009 10:43am Whether The Streets of San Francisco or Kojak was the first caper series I was allowed to stay up for I cannot be sure about. It was one or the other. A few years back I re-watched Malden and Douglas and found it exciting again. I am currently re-watching Savalas and it is equally superb. Contrast that with The Wire. Frankly, I found it hard to follow the black characters - those of the criminal variety, to avoid confusion. Dialogues went something like “[unintelligible] nigger, yo.”. “Yo, nigger, [unintelligible].”. Every episode left me confused. As I declared back in the Eighties, it says nothing to me about my life. And that was my verdict on hip-hop. McNulty, Kojak, Stone, Keller? The Seventies win hands down. |
Are People Named Andrew Particularly Incompetent? |
Monday, April 20, 2009 3:48pm The minister for culture, sport and scousers, the brilliant and immensely talented Andy Burnham, just admitted in the House that he has no idea about the basics of the internet. When questioned, he appeared flummoxed by the term “throttling bandwidth”, consequently casting doubt on whether this was “a technical expression”. Jeez. He is also an Evertonian but has been in overdrive mode to appease Liverpool supporting scousers for a week now. This is clearly part of operation We Shall Need Every Vote Next May. In a totally unrelated matter I unusually commented on a Times piece about Andrew Adonis beginning an investigation into the state of the railways. I commented that it was too late, they (multi-talented John Leslie Prescott and his successors) have had twelve years and there was no point embarking on another initiative with a few weeks to go before they leave office. I considered this rather tame but it was clearly too raunchy for the spotty kid who decides what is published. The most astonishing facts in this short piece are (1) the clown “left his cagoule and camera” behind not once but twice. He is clearly lost without his ministerial driver. And (2) he believes a weekly ticket costing £375 is good value. He believes that £54 a day represents a bargain. I expect kids will flock to get one of those for their hols. He got his on expenses, natch. |
| Sunday, April 5, 2009 4:16pm After a week of Fiona “you've lost me now”, “sorry, you've lost me again” Philips “replacing” the knowledgeable and witty Simon Mayonnaise on Five Live I find it hard to decide. Is she even dumber than Lowry Turner? The race to dumbest woman on Earth is wide, wide open again and it is currently too close to call. The recent resurfacing of the atrociously dim Brown acolyte dimmer than before is obviously making things difficult. This might come down to a photo finish. |
Can You Squeeze Me Into An Empty Page Of Your Diary? |
Saturday, April 4, 2009 7:57pm I went to the Coventry Locarno yesterday where I sat down and looked at the surroundings. It was the perfect location and the perfect size for a club and live venue. Burn the books and get all of The Specials to reform there in a cataclysmic gig, I say! Anyway, as I looked around, Michael Palin's Diaries 1969-79 caught my attention. I ended up sitting there perusing the six-hundred plus pages strong tome and forgot the time. In fact, I consequently missed my train. Diaries can be very interesting. They can if the person who writes them is interesting and/or writes interestingly. There must be content which has the stamina to endure. “It's a drizzly, grey day etc etc yadah yadah” is not content. That is Twitter-fodder which makes that particular tool so pointless in this respect. Palin's stories of the Seventies, when the Pythons made serious money, are of course amusing* but written in a surprisingly matter-of-fact way. As with the similarly engaging diaries of the irrepressible Kenneth Williams the reader is ultimately forced to make up their own jokes. My theory regarding such terseness is that diaries are often written as a personal (or in the case of Williams very personal, recording each Barclays Bank as he does) summary of the day just gone in two hundred words before falling asleep. What I have outlined is very different from a blog which is personal but too public to become too personal. Unlike diaries, blogs do not usually deal with what mood the author has spent their morning in and what they had for lunch. Entries represent (more often than not) little essays on any topic they deem worth writing about thus removing the inevitable egocentricity of a diary. Early blogs may have been true online diaries - and I remember them and remember asking myself what the hell the point of them was - but blogs have evolved and grown up. I have a record of every relevant day of my life since the mid-1980s but that is nothing or at least little to do with the blogs of varying quality and forms I have been writing for years. Even the thought of transcribing and editing my diaries fills me with dread. The idea of compiling such volumes emphasises once again how a little at a time over a long period is usually superior to herculean efforts. But that is another topic. * I particularly recommend the story of him hosting Saturday Night Live and the calamitous journey using Concorde, a contraption designed to shorten travel lengthening his trip to days. |
| Saturday, March 28, 2009 8:06pm My old favourite Keith Vaz, who is not corrupt at all, committed a wonderful faux-pas in the Commons on Monday when he asked “Does he not accept that it is the cheapness of alcohol that has caused the binge drinking culture in our Committee?”. Not only is our Keith a beacon of propriety but also a fountain of mirth which never runs dry. |
| Saturday, March 28, 2009 7:10pm Slowly catching up with what I could not watch over the last few weeks due to scarcity of time. Eyes of Laura Mars is not a great movie. Manhattan looks more decadent than anything even Tinto Brass could conjure up. The spooky thing about the film is how well I knew the soundtrack which is astounding since I was twelve when this came out. Pure Studio 54 material. The other flick was It's Alive which could be used to define B-movie horror for film students. A baby(!) kills lots of people. A cult classic, apparently. |
| Monday, March 16, 2009 12:13pm Rory Stewart was on Sky News' Sunday programme yesterday morning. What he said was noteworthy: “... in a sense, Pakistan is much more important than Afghanistan. Five times the population, it's got a nuclear bomb. Most of the terrorist threats against the United States and Britain will come from Pakistan, not from Afghanistan and I think we need to acknowledge that. People are gonna turn round and say: why we are pumping in tens of billions of Dollars and Pounds into Afghanistan when the real threat to the region and the world is on the other side of the border - in Pakistan.” Exactly what I have been saying for years from a man who lives in Afghanistan and America. The interview is not very long and really worth watching. It is rare that someone who commands respect and not just hates people from Bradford speaks out against the absurd notion that Bagistaan is the West's best friend. |
| Sunday, March 8, 2009 12:18pm If this was a proper blog entry it would have been cleverly headlined Marr Asks Morrissey Question. Andrew Marr demanded clarification from Marianne Faithfull as to whether she once snubbed The Mighty Morissette. What a thriller. A worthy precursor to Lord Rumba of Rio (© The Mighty Heffer) speaking about whatever he wanted for half an hour - largely uninterrupted, naturally (or bien sur, to use Brussels-centric, Guacamole-tinged brand new labour lingo). Yet another AM Show without a single Tory and not even Vince Cable or any other view from the camp his tent is currently pitched in despite the fact that sandalists congregate* this weekend. My recommendation to next summer's new government would be to not provide any talking heads at all. This would starve the socialist propaganda show of anyone in office and leave them with an opposition which has just been blown into small factions by a crushing general election defeat which viewers would find completely irrelevant and Sixties protest singers Marr always wanted to meet rather than bringing decision-maker's vistas to Sunday mornings. I wonder whether the sBBC would persevere with a prominent programme full of the perspective from South Africa/Rhodesia/Baggistaan, liblab figures nobody is interested in, hardcore leftist actoaars and Marianne Faithfull type has-beens. Oh, btw, Harwoman is the guest on The Politics Show mentally implementing the feminist policies she has been dreaming about since her university days as I scribble. SNAP! Now Meg Hillier is on donning a Clare Short type scarf. What is the issue with feminist necks? Lesbian love bites? Boy. * “to gather together in a large group of people or animals”. I use the Cambridge Dictionary; its editors are cruel, not me. |
| Monday, March 2, 2009 10:10am I very rarely blog on local politics but I make an exception for this quote from a Tory councillor who speaks like a Tory: “Coun Des O’Brien, a cabinet portfolio holder for leisure, said: “... it is not the borough council’s responsibility to look after children when they are not at school.”” The full article resides here. The state is not responsible for every aspect of your life ... not a novel notion but all to rarely expressed explicitly. |
| Thursday, January 12, 2009 4:23pm John Leslie Prescott has now become the socialist Vince Cable. He is ubiquitous and a blogger and all that and master of t'Internet or whatcha-call it. Do they really believe by wheeling out the disgraced oaf and allowing the born incompetent dunce to rant about bankers and Tories they can salvage left-wing credibility? David C is right, they are taking people for fools. The game has been up for years. I shall actually pinpoint when it happened when I finally get some time to resume blogging properly. Entertainment news now. The new Minder is superb. Great escapism, well researched and well made. Far too seldom do I get the opportunity to form such an opinion these days. |
| Friday, January 6, 2009 7:26pm “Science flies you to the moon. Religion flies you into buildings” says Victor Stenger. I do not know who he is, no. But an outstanding point made succinctly all the same. |
| Sunday, January 1, 2009 6:14pm I have been incredibly bad for over two weeks, thanks for not asking. But I managed to pick up an amazing fact. It would take Concorde nearly thirty hours to go round the Earth. Well, we are glued to the surface of two planets forged into one after all. We simply cannot comprehend the distances the Universe presents us with. “But that's ok, let's return to windmills and wait for extinction.” recommend greens. Their lack of ambition is breathtaking. It was also fantastic to see Sir David Attenborough explaining effortlessly, authoritatively and calmly why no gods are required and life and its interrelatedness has been explained by fanciers of the outdoors like Mendel, Wallace and Darwin. Classy. |
Does Life Tend To Come And Go? |
Saturday, January 31, 2009 5:53pm Strangeways, Here We Come given an outing. Judging from my recollection of the Eighties the number of times I have done this must be ten times or so. I may well misunderguestimate the figure since I listened to it more than twice a day when it came out. That is not the point anyway. The new Morrissey album represents the same mediocre noise we have sadly come to expect. Yet for some idiotic reason I keep hoping for something wonderful and unearthly. A bit like a catholic. Nah, not going there now. The lyrics are up to the usual standard though being explicit and especially implicit about non-traditional matters concerning the anus. It is astonishing how much the man who denied he is Dotty's mate for decades wants to inform us about all perspectives rectal. Worried about the use of italics? After years of refusal I have adopted the wonky word technique. Deal with it as best as you can. What has been missing from Morrissey's work for years now, specifically since he returned from the wilderness of the Nineties is intricacy (see, told you. i t a l i c s). Boz Borer (yet another brilliant snipe very few will get) does not do jingle-jangle. He has one heavily distorted guitar sound. A Marr he is not. Note that I did not say intricacy has always been missing since the Smiths disbanded. Morrissey's early solo work is documented on Bona Drag, a record whose possession is the precondition for a person desiring to warrant inclusion in civil society. |
| Friday, January 30, 2009 12:49pm Instead of contesting “we have huge plans for the country in the drawer classified the massive social engineering policy” Tories should simply say we are The Do Nothing Party, acknowledge and thank the socialist who invented the slogan. So would John Locke, I am sure. And Adam Smith. And others who have the capacity to apply cognizance. Back to basics. |
| Thursday, January 29, 2009 11:59am The awful Scot depriving someone impartial to be Speaker just slapped down the Mastermind supremo David Lammy. Remember him? Mohammed Obama's best mate and - like Diane Abbot - in Parliament because he is black. What is going on? Is there a precedence for not letting socialists slag off Tories at will? |
| Sunday, January 25, 2009 12:22pm The best known obese sailor in the West, not-quite-Lord-yet-Prescott, is to become the supreme even-toed ungulate scribe, the unchallenged ruler of the blogosphere. click to despair There litiraly is no limmid to what the |
| Saturday, January 17, 2009 6:17pm The BBC is getting giddy about the impending inauguration of the President-elect, the candidate it proudly supported. I have witnessed the event before, it is not that exciting. The first president whose time in office I remember was Gerald Ford. Therefore the swearing-in ceremony of the bible-bashing, peanut-farming Democrat of whom the Iranians were not scared at all must have been the first I watched. Let us hope that our Mohammed does not slip up and declares “so help me allah”. |
| Monday, January 5, 2009 12:46pm I usually read Matthew Parris and then agree with him but in the case of this article and specifically the section entitled “off message” I did not. I consequently remarked “Does Reductio Ad Absurdum (RAA) not mean reducing arguments to a contradiction like “Matthew understands logic and Matthew does not understand logic”? The concept you seem to further here is making a specific action pointless which is quite distinct.” However, the moderator must have been off and no comments appeared so I post it here instead. |
I'm Throwing My Arms Around Paris |
Friday, January 2, 2009 1:11pm Just heard the new Morrissey single for the first time. It makes me optimistic about Years Of Refusal again produced by Jerry Finn after the Visconti interlude. If it is on a par with You Are The Quarry or above it is an album to look forward to. I had a very scary MRI scan last year to which I brought You Are The Quarry. I Have Forgiven Jesus made me giggle and so stopped me from panicking. Zeus knows what the technician made of the cover showing Morrissey wielding a machine gun, though. |
Previous years |
| can be found here. |
Links |
 Jamie Whyte Julian Baggini Richard Dawkins A C Grayling Daniel C Dennett The Philosophers' Magazine National Secular Society NASA Web Cameron University of Birmingham Conservative Future Boris Johnson TaxPayers' Alliance George Galloway Galaxy Zoo The Albert Hofmann Foundation Douglas Adams Project Gutenberg K-Meleon Broadcast Soul Source Event Calendar |