Sunday:
Mr Balloon has been causing a real stir with his new hair: first it was on the right, then it was on the left, then it disappeared altogether.
Hope – as they say – springs eternal.
Meanwhile, Mr B has found a whole new way of having no policies: attacking the government's failures in the NHS, instead. This should NOT be a surprise; Lord Blairimort did it when HE was opposition leader!
For Mr Balloon, this is the REALITY TV approach, best summarised as: "say the MADDEST thing you can think of just to get you on the telly".
Of course, this is often VERY SUCCESSFUL. The Press are fascinated by the sort of people who do PERVERSE and BACKWARDS things. They call it things like "audacious". At least to begin with. And you can gain a LOT of publicity… right up to the point where you go all JADE GOODY. At which point you may find that you SERIOUSLY regret the whole business.
So, anyway, the Conservatories now claim that they can save the NHS (?!?!?!?!?!)
Presumably this mean that, having been SAVED, the NHS can DIE and GO TO HEAVEN.
"The Labour have ripped the heart out of the NHS!" says Mr Balloon… oh it's just TOO EASY; fill in your own joke, why don't you.
His plan (if you can call "not doing what the government is doing" a "plan") is to stop reorganisations and scrap targets.
Note to Mr Balloon: you can EITHER stop reorganisations OR you can scrap targets, but scrapping targets needs a reorganisation so you cannot do BOTH! Or did you not really think this through?
You will not be surprised to learn that where this all gets a bit thin is when it comes to the SUBSTANCE. Mr Balloon promises to give the NHS a "human face", to restore its "heart and soul" but WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
The last time the Conservatories HAD an NHS policy it was to allow rich people to grab cash out of the NHS pot so they could cut the cost of going private. Now, you COULD say that that was "putting people back at the heart of the NHS": people (rich ones) get to choose how their health is treated (so long as they can pay). And the devil take the hindmost.
The NHS is a great big socialist scheme (there's no getting away from that) and as such it only works if everyone joins in, rich and poor alike. And it is not like the rich do not benefit from putting in some cash towards keeping poor people from INFECTING THEM with a PLAGUE OF TUBERCULOSIS or the like.
From a liberal perspective, we would have to say that it DOES reduce people's choices (you have to pay the TAX, so you have LESS of you own money to spend on what you want – which might be private health care. Or it might be STICKY BUNS and PRIVATE LIPOSUCTION to remove them.) But the NHS benefits people MORE by giving them freedom from sickness and ill-health.
So instead of the Conservatory approach of "let them sort out their own health care (we're not paying for it)", we would say everyone mucks in so everyone ought to have a say in how it's run. That means more local control and more local accountability.
The Labour's PROBLEM stems from their innate CONTROL-FREAKERY: the need to MICRO-MANAGE every hospital ward and every doctor's surgery from Mrs Hewitt's desk in Whitehall is what has led to the culture of targets and centralisation. The Labour introduced their SCORECARDS and LEAGUE TABLES in order to try and work out where the NHS was going wrong and make those bits better. They did not INTEND to grind people down beneath a welter of paperwork. THAT was just a LETHAL side-effect.
Mr Balloon – ever a man to look at the surface – has analysed the SYMPTOMS of NHS failure without looking for the ROOT CAUSE.
Looking for a "market" solution – something which was originally the Conservatories idea, remember – to make the NHS better means setting up artificial lists of "better" and "worse", and that in turn makes the doctors and nurses concentrate on the artificial targets instead of on the PEOPLE. And treating people as CUSTOMERS – or COMMODITIES! – instead of PATIENTS makes them feel like they are no more than cattle in a truck.
What we need is for patients and carers to come together and work out what can be done better in local health provision. We, as patients, need to feel that we are getting listened to and receiving meaningful feedback. And doctors need to know that they are valued members of the community making a real difference, and not just part of a team in a game of "It's an NHS Knockout" with ARBITRARY rules and a CRAZY referee.
And Mr Balloon – while we're STILL waiting for those policies which I am SURE will be along ANY DAY NOW – get a haircut, boy!
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Day 2267: Invasion time again!
Saturday:
No, not another plug for the terrific Doctor Who DVD staring Mr Pat as Dr Who, this is a return visit to the Doctor Who convention in BARKING for my Daddies.
Last year, I had escaped from Lord Blairimort to the MOON, and had to send my Daddies to investigate the Invasion. Well they must have gotten a TASTE for it, as they are back!
This year was ESPECIALLY exciting as they had very special guest stars of no less than FOUR Dr Whos: Mr Paul from the Radio, Mr Colin from the Big Fish shiny discs, Mr Peter from that sit-com on Thursdays that Daddy thinks is funny, and Mr Trevor… hang on, you say, who the fluff is Mr Trevor. Ahh, I say, he was Doctor Who after Mr Twerpee… at least he was ON THE STAGE in a special play called "Oops, sorry, we've cast Mr Tom".
Because all these Drs were going to be so very popular, they decided there there should be TWO panels, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. This makes good sense from an OVERCROWDING point of view, but did mean that there were fewer things to watch in the hall. Although, this DID give Daddy Alex more queuing time!
Also unfortunate was that Ms Sophie Aldred got caught in a TIME LOOP or the Hammersmith and City line as EARTHLINGS call it, so she could not be on stage either.
Nevertheless, the hall was packed out for the Dr Whos and it was well worth squeezing in. It was interesting how different they were. With Mr Paul he is quiet a lot and you worry that he is not enjoying himself, but then he says something to make you think ooh there is a lot going on inside his brain! Mr Colin is very loud and always worth the money. He is funny and self-disparaging but also very bright and loyal.
Mr Peter has a very dry wit and also two young sons, one of who was having great fun playing with his toy EMPRESS OF THE RACNOSS. Mr Peter made much play of how his sons used to watch him all the time until the new series came along and then they DEFECTED overnight. I think he should know what daddy overheard in the shop earlier, though. Moffetts junior were looking at the Battles in Time cards and one demanded "do they have daddy cards too?" All is not lost, Mr Peter!
Mr Colin and Mr Peter also have a terrific chemistry between them. (Not to mention a shared companion: "What was it like working with Nicola Bryant?" was one question; "Dream on!" declaimed Mr Colin loudly.) They have a playful "didn't you kill me" by-play that they use to bounce off one another. I hope we hear them on a DVD commentary together one day. ("Arc of Infinity" Hint! Hint!)
Mr Trevor – who was of course a very clever stand in for Mr Sylv, who was caught in rehearsals for King Lear – seemed a little detached from the others, possibly because he is not connected to them in the usual regenerative way. Mind you, he still managed to top all of them with his Dame Laurence Olivier story.
The discussion ranged widely, covering favourite scenes and acting heroes who inspired them to get into the profession.
"I saw McCoy on stage…" said Mr Paul
"What SYLVESTER?!?!" cried both Mr Peter and Mr Colin, as one.
"…and I thought 'people get PAID for this?'" continued Mr Paul without missing a beat.
They were also asked about getting the role of Dr Who.
"Well, I was asked to meet a producer for a drink," said Mr Trevor, "and I thought well, that's always a good start."
"I think I ended up taking the job because of the convention that if you're offered a part and turn it down, you can never say, and I'd never have been able to say "I was offered Doctor Who"," said Mr Peter.
"Of course, I was offered the role before Peter Davison…" said Mr Colin at once "… not true, not true!" he quickly added.
And they talked about the different media that they have appeared in: screen, stage and shiny disc. Mr Colin said, as he always does, how Nicola remains as young and beautiful as ever and, thanks to the medium of audio, so does he. But he also had much praise for Maggie Stables and was glad that such a companion could only work on audio as, despite her many talent, Maggies would never qualify as "something for the dads" And Mr Paul spoke insightfully to how Radio is a much overlooked, undervalued medium.
"Radio writers get to write in paragraphs," he said, "television writers write in slogans".
This pleased Daddy Alex very much; he likes to write in paragraphs too!
As I have said, there were two sessions for the four Doctors and my Daddies went to the morning one, so they did not get in to the afternoon session, although people there said that that was probably the better one. Daddy Richard DID manage to loiter around outside though and listen to some of their remarks over the PA.
"Would you appear in the New Series?" was one question, and Mr Colin pooh-poohed it at once.
"They don't need us," he said. "In fact, the minute I get the call from Cardiff I'll be worried that the ratings are on the slide."
"What about Torchwood?" pipes up a voice from the audience.
"Could somebody PLEASE explain to me how Torchwood happened?" demands Mr Peter. "I mean, I think Russell T Davies is a genius and I love what he's done with Doctor Who which is totally brilliant, so how just tell me how they managed to produce Torchwood?"
There were many cheers from the audience in response to this.
"It's the age of re-cycling," murmurs Mr Paul. "Why let all those discarded Doctor Who scripts go to waste…"
Speaking of Torchwood, the final episode of Primeval was really good (even allowing for the Star Trek-esque "oh no we've changed the past and erased Claudia from history" paradox ending). They managed to reveal some of the layers of the relationships between characters in a way that wound up tension rather than deflated it. There were several scenes where the director and the lighting director finally managed to break out of the ITV straight-jacket to give us some interestingly composed, almost expressionist images. The fight between post-human bat-monster and pre-dinosaur Gorgonopsid monster at the end was absolutely tops. And with it keeping up its ratings at a decent six million let us hope that ITV will commission another six episodes for next year.
After the afternoon session with the Dr Whos, there were people on stage from the new series: Nisha Nayar from "Bad Wolf"/"The Parting of the Ways" (who was actually also in the old series – "How old were you when you were in "Paradise Towers"?" / "Do you think I'm going to answer THAT?!") and Raji James from "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday".
They were both MARVELLOUS. They were so enthusiastic for the new series, and so thrilled to have been involved in it. Asked whether it gained them kudos they said "only in the playground". "All my friends were mad with jealously!"
Plus, they both got exterminated by the Daleks.
"Would you rather have been killed by the Cybermen?" one forlorn Cyber-fan asked.
"No!" they both replied. To cheers.
Actually, we learned that the script for "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday" does NOT refer to the Daleks! For example, at the CLIFF-HANGER it just says "the SPHERE opens and… the ENEMY emerge!"
That is the sound of Mr Mad Larry's head EXPLODING that you can hear!
It was very uplifting to hear their positive reports of the production, how everyone involved is keen to go that extra mile just to get it good, better than good, brilliant. And how they always hear back from other friends who have been involved about what a wonderful and above all fun time they have had doing Doctor Who.
"And," said Raji, "now we have collectible cards too!" And he flashed his Battles in Time card. "I can use this as I.D. you know," he claimed.
The last panel of the day was three lovely people who had been supporting actors in the sixties and seventies era of Doctor Who: Mr Derek Ware, stunt coordinator, Mr Alec Linstead, UNIT Sergeant Osgood or villainous henchman Jellicoe, and Mr Michael Kilgarriff, original and real Cyber-controller plus robot K-1 (NOT the dog!).
Mr Alec talked about what a warm and friendly welcome he got from Tom Baker when they were together in "Robot", Mr Tom's first outing! And he said that, er, when he worked with Mr Twerpee it was at the end of rather a long run as Dr Who for him and he was rather tired and Mr Alec HAD kept giggling in their scenes… Mr Michael was, er, rather more blunt about Mr Twerpee. (Daddy says construct a popular phrase or saying out of the following words, not necessarily in this order: "donna prima") He had nothing but praise for Katy Manning, though, who made it her job to see that Mr Twerpee was settled and had everything he needed as well as doing her own acting too!
Mr Derek avoided any awkwardness by telling how he introduced Mr Twerpee to Mr Terry Walsh, famous as Mr Twerpee's EXACT DOUBLE who just LOOKED completely different. Mr Terry worked with Mr Twerpee for all the rest of the Doctor Whos that he did, and then went on tour with him, and THEN doubled for his stunts as Worzel Gummidge. Really did myself out of some work, there, ruminated Mr Derek, with a laugh.
And then it was all over.
Daddy Alex was the last person in the queue to see Mr Dr Paul and then we went home!
Hello to our nice friends who we met in Barking: Mr Dave, Mr Dave, Mr James and Mr Mark. And Mr Peter. Hope you had a fun time too!
No, not another plug for the terrific Doctor Who DVD staring Mr Pat as Dr Who, this is a return visit to the Doctor Who convention in BARKING for my Daddies.
Last year, I had escaped from Lord Blairimort to the MOON, and had to send my Daddies to investigate the Invasion. Well they must have gotten a TASTE for it, as they are back!
This year was ESPECIALLY exciting as they had very special guest stars of no less than FOUR Dr Whos: Mr Paul from the Radio, Mr Colin from the Big Fish shiny discs, Mr Peter from that sit-com on Thursdays that Daddy thinks is funny, and Mr Trevor… hang on, you say, who the fluff is Mr Trevor. Ahh, I say, he was Doctor Who after Mr Twerpee… at least he was ON THE STAGE in a special play called "Oops, sorry, we've cast Mr Tom".
Because all these Drs were going to be so very popular, they decided there there should be TWO panels, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. This makes good sense from an OVERCROWDING point of view, but did mean that there were fewer things to watch in the hall. Although, this DID give Daddy Alex more queuing time!
Also unfortunate was that Ms Sophie Aldred got caught in a TIME LOOP or the Hammersmith and City line as EARTHLINGS call it, so she could not be on stage either.
Nevertheless, the hall was packed out for the Dr Whos and it was well worth squeezing in. It was interesting how different they were. With Mr Paul he is quiet a lot and you worry that he is not enjoying himself, but then he says something to make you think ooh there is a lot going on inside his brain! Mr Colin is very loud and always worth the money. He is funny and self-disparaging but also very bright and loyal.
Mr Peter has a very dry wit and also two young sons, one of who was having great fun playing with his toy EMPRESS OF THE RACNOSS. Mr Peter made much play of how his sons used to watch him all the time until the new series came along and then they DEFECTED overnight. I think he should know what daddy overheard in the shop earlier, though. Moffetts junior were looking at the Battles in Time cards and one demanded "do they have daddy cards too?" All is not lost, Mr Peter!
Mr Colin and Mr Peter also have a terrific chemistry between them. (Not to mention a shared companion: "What was it like working with Nicola Bryant?" was one question; "Dream on!" declaimed Mr Colin loudly.) They have a playful "didn't you kill me" by-play that they use to bounce off one another. I hope we hear them on a DVD commentary together one day. ("Arc of Infinity" Hint! Hint!)
Mr Trevor – who was of course a very clever stand in for Mr Sylv, who was caught in rehearsals for King Lear – seemed a little detached from the others, possibly because he is not connected to them in the usual regenerative way. Mind you, he still managed to top all of them with his Dame Laurence Olivier story.
The discussion ranged widely, covering favourite scenes and acting heroes who inspired them to get into the profession.
"I saw McCoy on stage…" said Mr Paul
"What SYLVESTER?!?!" cried both Mr Peter and Mr Colin, as one.
"…and I thought 'people get PAID for this?'" continued Mr Paul without missing a beat.
They were also asked about getting the role of Dr Who.
"Well, I was asked to meet a producer for a drink," said Mr Trevor, "and I thought well, that's always a good start."
"I think I ended up taking the job because of the convention that if you're offered a part and turn it down, you can never say, and I'd never have been able to say "I was offered Doctor Who"," said Mr Peter.
"Of course, I was offered the role before Peter Davison…" said Mr Colin at once "… not true, not true!" he quickly added.
And they talked about the different media that they have appeared in: screen, stage and shiny disc. Mr Colin said, as he always does, how Nicola remains as young and beautiful as ever and, thanks to the medium of audio, so does he. But he also had much praise for Maggie Stables and was glad that such a companion could only work on audio as, despite her many talent, Maggies would never qualify as "something for the dads" And Mr Paul spoke insightfully to how Radio is a much overlooked, undervalued medium.
"Radio writers get to write in paragraphs," he said, "television writers write in slogans".
This pleased Daddy Alex very much; he likes to write in paragraphs too!
As I have said, there were two sessions for the four Doctors and my Daddies went to the morning one, so they did not get in to the afternoon session, although people there said that that was probably the better one. Daddy Richard DID manage to loiter around outside though and listen to some of their remarks over the PA.
"Would you appear in the New Series?" was one question, and Mr Colin pooh-poohed it at once.
"They don't need us," he said. "In fact, the minute I get the call from Cardiff I'll be worried that the ratings are on the slide."
"What about Torchwood?" pipes up a voice from the audience.
"Could somebody PLEASE explain to me how Torchwood happened?" demands Mr Peter. "I mean, I think Russell T Davies is a genius and I love what he's done with Doctor Who which is totally brilliant, so how just tell me how they managed to produce Torchwood?"
There were many cheers from the audience in response to this.
"It's the age of re-cycling," murmurs Mr Paul. "Why let all those discarded Doctor Who scripts go to waste…"
Speaking of Torchwood, the final episode of Primeval was really good (even allowing for the Star Trek-esque "oh no we've changed the past and erased Claudia from history" paradox ending). They managed to reveal some of the layers of the relationships between characters in a way that wound up tension rather than deflated it. There were several scenes where the director and the lighting director finally managed to break out of the ITV straight-jacket to give us some interestingly composed, almost expressionist images. The fight between post-human bat-monster and pre-dinosaur Gorgonopsid monster at the end was absolutely tops. And with it keeping up its ratings at a decent six million let us hope that ITV will commission another six episodes for next year.
After the afternoon session with the Dr Whos, there were people on stage from the new series: Nisha Nayar from "Bad Wolf"/"The Parting of the Ways" (who was actually also in the old series – "How old were you when you were in "Paradise Towers"?" / "Do you think I'm going to answer THAT?!") and Raji James from "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday".
They were both MARVELLOUS. They were so enthusiastic for the new series, and so thrilled to have been involved in it. Asked whether it gained them kudos they said "only in the playground". "All my friends were mad with jealously!"
Plus, they both got exterminated by the Daleks.
"Would you rather have been killed by the Cybermen?" one forlorn Cyber-fan asked.
"No!" they both replied. To cheers.
Actually, we learned that the script for "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday" does NOT refer to the Daleks! For example, at the CLIFF-HANGER it just says "the SPHERE opens and… the ENEMY emerge!"
That is the sound of Mr Mad Larry's head EXPLODING that you can hear!
It was very uplifting to hear their positive reports of the production, how everyone involved is keen to go that extra mile just to get it good, better than good, brilliant. And how they always hear back from other friends who have been involved about what a wonderful and above all fun time they have had doing Doctor Who.
"And," said Raji, "now we have collectible cards too!" And he flashed his Battles in Time card. "I can use this as I.D. you know," he claimed.
The last panel of the day was three lovely people who had been supporting actors in the sixties and seventies era of Doctor Who: Mr Derek Ware, stunt coordinator, Mr Alec Linstead, UNIT Sergeant Osgood or villainous henchman Jellicoe, and Mr Michael Kilgarriff, original and real Cyber-controller plus robot K-1 (NOT the dog!).
Mr Alec talked about what a warm and friendly welcome he got from Tom Baker when they were together in "Robot", Mr Tom's first outing! And he said that, er, when he worked with Mr Twerpee it was at the end of rather a long run as Dr Who for him and he was rather tired and Mr Alec HAD kept giggling in their scenes… Mr Michael was, er, rather more blunt about Mr Twerpee. (Daddy says construct a popular phrase or saying out of the following words, not necessarily in this order: "donna prima") He had nothing but praise for Katy Manning, though, who made it her job to see that Mr Twerpee was settled and had everything he needed as well as doing her own acting too!
Mr Derek avoided any awkwardness by telling how he introduced Mr Twerpee to Mr Terry Walsh, famous as Mr Twerpee's EXACT DOUBLE who just LOOKED completely different. Mr Terry worked with Mr Twerpee for all the rest of the Doctor Whos that he did, and then went on tour with him, and THEN doubled for his stunts as Worzel Gummidge. Really did myself out of some work, there, ruminated Mr Derek, with a laugh.
And then it was all over.
Daddy Alex was the last person in the queue to see Mr Dr Paul and then we went home!
Hello to our nice friends who we met in Barking: Mr Dave, Mr Dave, Mr James and Mr Mark. And Mr Peter. Hope you had a fun time too!
Day 2266: Power Crazed Alien Lizards, the Comedy Years
Friday:
Do you remember fluffy Mr Sir Alan Sugar and his POWER CRAZED ALIEN LIZARD Apprentices, from last year?
Well, they're back! And this time the space lizards are disguised as CELEBRITIES.
It was all for COMIC RELIEF, and they raised loads of money for Charity, which was good.
But one of the LIZARD CELEBRITIES had ESCAPED over to BBC2: it was my old friend MR FRANK LUNTZ, doing his own COMIC TURN for the Newsnight Show.
Hoping backwards and forwards between channels it was difficult to tell where the comedy began and where the charity telethon ended.
As I am sure you know, Mr Frank's usual shtick is like a magic show – he offers the audience a deck of knaves and then proves that Mr Balloon is the Queen of Hearts.
[R: king, surely?]
It did not quite work out so well for him this time – some people have suggested that this is because the Newsnight Show insisted on picking the clips that he used, some because it was a smaller group and therefore harder to find either the right sound bites or the right group think.
These are VERY MEAN things to say about poor Mr Frank. It is hardly HIS FAULT that Mr Balloon has not been as shiny as billed in, er, that piece that Mr Frank did back at the Conservatory leadership election.
Anyway, he did his best for his favourite toffee nose chum, and he gives it an EVEN BETTER spin here for the Grauniad.
The huge POP ART posters of the leaders were as HILARIOUSLY SUBTLE as ever: Lord Blairimort in the background all in BLUE (old, cold, Conservatory); Mr Balloon on a nice Liberal orange (fresh, new, Liberal); Sir Mr the Merciless on washed out red (old again, blood, pale and lifeless, and linked to the Labour); and Mr Frown foregrounded in poison green (not the GOOD green of life and vibrancy, the NASTY green of jealousy, envy, bitterness and monsters).
I am sure that Mr Frank must have seen them and GROANED that the designer had got all the colours the WRONG WAY AROUND! After all, if you are going to use colours for the Party Leaders, you surely must mean to use the right party colours. Otherwise people might get MIXED MESSAGES and you could be INFLUENCING your sample.
It is interesting too what a difference the editing can make.
On the telly, Sir Mr the Merciless actually got some rather GOOD scores on Mr Frank's funny dial-o-matic machines. (Watching the people using them, it did not seem to take much of a twist to turn up to 100. Do you think that some NUANCE might be lost if you're only really measuring people in states of good bad or indifferent?)
Anyway, Sir Mr the Merciless seemed to be popping up into the eighties from the clip that appeared. Mr Frank cannot have noticed that because he did not comment on it – and he got very excited when Mr Balloon's scores hit a high of a bit above fifty.
In the paper, Mr Frank reduces the remarks about Sir M to '…"yawn", "bland" and "old fart"…'
The comments which the Newsnight Show chose to pick up were those too, but also the youngest member of the panel saying both "I can't believe how ageist you all are" and "Ming is the only one who is trying to do something for young people, fighting tuition fees".
The Newsnight Show showed that Sir Mr the Merciless DOES get caricatured… but also that he can still reach out to people; the newspaper piece does not see beyond the caricature.
Mr Frank picks up on the negative reaction people had to Mr Balloon's webcameron and his photo-ops and stunts. Too much Blair, says the panel, and Mr Frank has to agree. Actually, the panel went into rather more detail about Mr Balloon's shortcomings. "All Spin and NO Substance." Do not say that we haven’t been warning you about this, Mr Balloon. Even YOU would have to admit you are in QUITE A LOT of trouble when Mr Frank is saying it's time to wheel out some policies, I think!
Mind you, when he asserts that "Balloon's policy pronouncements continue to prove that he is not a return to the "old Tories" of the 1980s" I am afraid that Mr Frank is kidding himself.
Sorry Mr Frank but (a) WHAT policy pronouncements? Vague aspirations to cut flying or help families – these are not policies. They are barely even directions of travel!
And (b) flying tax reminded people of stealth taxes; families reminded people of "back to basics". Oops, looks like a return not to the heyday 1980s but to the sleazy, incompetent 1990s.
The last time Mr Frank was on the telly, he was saying how much BETTER the Labour were going to do once Mr Dr Reid was installed in number ten.
"We thankses you, Mr Frank my precious," as the Home Secretary would put it.
Unfortunately, the panel tonight seemed not to have got the memo and were, on the whole, rather warmer towards Mr Frown than Mr Frank would have liked. I think that there was a certain amount of willingness to give him the benefit of the doubt after all his not messing the economy up for the last ten years.
The biggest laugh of the night was, of course, the hilarious drop in all the dials at the moment the Mr Frown clip cut away to Lord Blairimort feigning applause from the sidelines.
So, no winners but one big fat loser. No, not Mr Frank – Lord Blairimort, obviously!
Meanwhile back in the TORCHWOOD TOWER, Mr Sir Alan had hired a CIRCUS for his CLOWNS to perform in. All right, it was a fairground.
He divided his celebrity lizards into two sides. There was a team of GIRLS lead by Trinnie who was a scary robot lady in Doctor Who and Maureen Lipman who was a scary television lady in Doctor Who. And a team of BOYS led by Alistair Henchman and Piers Moron who are scary enough in REAL LIFE.
Trinnie decided that the way to win was to call up all of her INSANELY RICH friends and sting them for thousands (one ticket sold for a hundred and fifty GRAND!). Mr Moron decided that the way to win was to CHEAT.
The incident of the kidnapped chef was NOT a case that needed Sherlock Holmes to solve. In fact Trinnie solved it herself by going downstairs to the boys room and saying "oi, that's my chef!"
In fact, Trinnie lost points with Daddy Alex by threatening the poor chef's job – it was hardly his fault that Mr Moron had locked him in the lavatory, and threatening him that way was just WRONG!
Even so, Mr Moron and Mr Henchman should not have been manhandling her like that, and she was very upset afterwards. They were just like BULLIES in a playground… and based on this I worry that "The Thick of It" may actually be a DOCUMENTARY and not a COMEDY after all!
While Mr Moron was MESSING ABOUT though – promising the Earth and delivering a few grains of dust from the asteroid field – Mr Henchman got down to some serious work.
An early example of Mr Henchman's terrifying power came with the negotiations for who would have which rides and stalls. When the girls revealed that they wanted the dodgems (which the boys wanted too) Mr Henchman said that they could only have the dodgems if the boys got the next THREE picks, and steadfastly refused to reveal any hint of what they would pick.
This gives a rather scary insight into the inner workings of the government where even knowing what you are talking about is a card to be kept secret until you are ready to play it!
Of course, the girls were foolish enough to agree – so the boys gave up one of the things they wanted and came away with all of the other three.
The problem for the boys, though, was that their leaders were just too used to commanding that a thing be done and expecting it be done. They had lost the knack of actually DOING. The key example was Mr Henchman's inability to refill a stapler. So he gave it to Mr Moron to do. Who BROKE the stapler.
And IRONICALLY for men who call themselves movers and shakers – the man behind Lord Blairimort and the man in the Mirror – they just did not think big enough, did not see the big picture.
They got caught up in putting on the best stalls at the fairground, whereas the girls had twigged that the winners would be the ones who brought in the most money. So the girls just shamelessly asked for WHOPPING GREAT DONATIONS. It did not matter that the boys' stalls were all packed out on the night while the girls rides lay empty, nor that the boys sold out of food before the girls – the girls had got tens of thousands of pounds for their tickets and where the boys sold food at a decent mark up, the girls sold it at a totally INDECENT one!
The boys brought in a little under £300,000; the girls rather a lot over £700,000!
Though as Trinnie put it – and won some points back with Daddy Alex for doing so – between them they raised over a million! And then that was doubled on Comic Relief night too!
So kudos to the girls, but who would get fired? They kept us on tenterhooks as log as they could – which was a good thing because we could watch Mr Frank's close up magic on BBC2 while we waited!
It came down to three: Daddy Baker had been responsible for not charging rip-off prices for the food, Mr Henchman had been the team leader, and Mr Moron just because.
I am sorry to say, that Daddy cheered when it was Mr Moron who got it.
"You're fired!" said Mr Sir Alan.
"Again," said Mr Henchman quietly. He'd been waiting for that moment. You could tell.
Sadly, Mr Moron learned nothing from his experience, still blaming spin as he was driven away to the car crusher in Mr Goldfinger's spare car…
Do you remember fluffy Mr Sir Alan Sugar and his POWER CRAZED ALIEN LIZARD Apprentices, from last year?
Well, they're back! And this time the space lizards are disguised as CELEBRITIES.
It was all for COMIC RELIEF, and they raised loads of money for Charity, which was good.
But one of the LIZARD CELEBRITIES had ESCAPED over to BBC2: it was my old friend MR FRANK LUNTZ, doing his own COMIC TURN for the Newsnight Show.
Hoping backwards and forwards between channels it was difficult to tell where the comedy began and where the charity telethon ended.
As I am sure you know, Mr Frank's usual shtick is like a magic show – he offers the audience a deck of knaves and then proves that Mr Balloon is the Queen of Hearts.
[R: king, surely?]
It did not quite work out so well for him this time – some people have suggested that this is because the Newsnight Show insisted on picking the clips that he used, some because it was a smaller group and therefore harder to find either the right sound bites or the right group think.
These are VERY MEAN things to say about poor Mr Frank. It is hardly HIS FAULT that Mr Balloon has not been as shiny as billed in, er, that piece that Mr Frank did back at the Conservatory leadership election.
Anyway, he did his best for his favourite toffee nose chum, and he gives it an EVEN BETTER spin here for the Grauniad.
The huge POP ART posters of the leaders were as HILARIOUSLY SUBTLE as ever: Lord Blairimort in the background all in BLUE (old, cold, Conservatory); Mr Balloon on a nice Liberal orange (fresh, new, Liberal); Sir Mr the Merciless on washed out red (old again, blood, pale and lifeless, and linked to the Labour); and Mr Frown foregrounded in poison green (not the GOOD green of life and vibrancy, the NASTY green of jealousy, envy, bitterness and monsters).
I am sure that Mr Frank must have seen them and GROANED that the designer had got all the colours the WRONG WAY AROUND! After all, if you are going to use colours for the Party Leaders, you surely must mean to use the right party colours. Otherwise people might get MIXED MESSAGES and you could be INFLUENCING your sample.
It is interesting too what a difference the editing can make.
On the telly, Sir Mr the Merciless actually got some rather GOOD scores on Mr Frank's funny dial-o-matic machines. (Watching the people using them, it did not seem to take much of a twist to turn up to 100. Do you think that some NUANCE might be lost if you're only really measuring people in states of good bad or indifferent?)
Anyway, Sir Mr the Merciless seemed to be popping up into the eighties from the clip that appeared. Mr Frank cannot have noticed that because he did not comment on it – and he got very excited when Mr Balloon's scores hit a high of a bit above fifty.
In the paper, Mr Frank reduces the remarks about Sir M to '…"yawn", "bland" and "old fart"…'
The comments which the Newsnight Show chose to pick up were those too, but also the youngest member of the panel saying both "I can't believe how ageist you all are" and "Ming is the only one who is trying to do something for young people, fighting tuition fees".
The Newsnight Show showed that Sir Mr the Merciless DOES get caricatured… but also that he can still reach out to people; the newspaper piece does not see beyond the caricature.
Mr Frank picks up on the negative reaction people had to Mr Balloon's webcameron and his photo-ops and stunts. Too much Blair, says the panel, and Mr Frank has to agree. Actually, the panel went into rather more detail about Mr Balloon's shortcomings. "All Spin and NO Substance." Do not say that we haven’t been warning you about this, Mr Balloon. Even YOU would have to admit you are in QUITE A LOT of trouble when Mr Frank is saying it's time to wheel out some policies, I think!
Mind you, when he asserts that "Balloon's policy pronouncements continue to prove that he is not a return to the "old Tories" of the 1980s" I am afraid that Mr Frank is kidding himself.
Sorry Mr Frank but (a) WHAT policy pronouncements? Vague aspirations to cut flying or help families – these are not policies. They are barely even directions of travel!
And (b) flying tax reminded people of stealth taxes; families reminded people of "back to basics". Oops, looks like a return not to the heyday 1980s but to the sleazy, incompetent 1990s.
The last time Mr Frank was on the telly, he was saying how much BETTER the Labour were going to do once Mr Dr Reid was installed in number ten.
"We thankses you, Mr Frank my precious," as the Home Secretary would put it.
Unfortunately, the panel tonight seemed not to have got the memo and were, on the whole, rather warmer towards Mr Frown than Mr Frank would have liked. I think that there was a certain amount of willingness to give him the benefit of the doubt after all his not messing the economy up for the last ten years.
The biggest laugh of the night was, of course, the hilarious drop in all the dials at the moment the Mr Frown clip cut away to Lord Blairimort feigning applause from the sidelines.
So, no winners but one big fat loser. No, not Mr Frank – Lord Blairimort, obviously!
Meanwhile back in the TORCHWOOD TOWER, Mr Sir Alan had hired a CIRCUS for his CLOWNS to perform in. All right, it was a fairground.
He divided his celebrity lizards into two sides. There was a team of GIRLS lead by Trinnie who was a scary robot lady in Doctor Who and Maureen Lipman who was a scary television lady in Doctor Who. And a team of BOYS led by Alistair Henchman and Piers Moron who are scary enough in REAL LIFE.
Trinnie decided that the way to win was to call up all of her INSANELY RICH friends and sting them for thousands (one ticket sold for a hundred and fifty GRAND!). Mr Moron decided that the way to win was to CHEAT.
The incident of the kidnapped chef was NOT a case that needed Sherlock Holmes to solve. In fact Trinnie solved it herself by going downstairs to the boys room and saying "oi, that's my chef!"
In fact, Trinnie lost points with Daddy Alex by threatening the poor chef's job – it was hardly his fault that Mr Moron had locked him in the lavatory, and threatening him that way was just WRONG!
Even so, Mr Moron and Mr Henchman should not have been manhandling her like that, and she was very upset afterwards. They were just like BULLIES in a playground… and based on this I worry that "The Thick of It" may actually be a DOCUMENTARY and not a COMEDY after all!
While Mr Moron was MESSING ABOUT though – promising the Earth and delivering a few grains of dust from the asteroid field – Mr Henchman got down to some serious work.
An early example of Mr Henchman's terrifying power came with the negotiations for who would have which rides and stalls. When the girls revealed that they wanted the dodgems (which the boys wanted too) Mr Henchman said that they could only have the dodgems if the boys got the next THREE picks, and steadfastly refused to reveal any hint of what they would pick.
This gives a rather scary insight into the inner workings of the government where even knowing what you are talking about is a card to be kept secret until you are ready to play it!
Of course, the girls were foolish enough to agree – so the boys gave up one of the things they wanted and came away with all of the other three.
The problem for the boys, though, was that their leaders were just too used to commanding that a thing be done and expecting it be done. They had lost the knack of actually DOING. The key example was Mr Henchman's inability to refill a stapler. So he gave it to Mr Moron to do. Who BROKE the stapler.
And IRONICALLY for men who call themselves movers and shakers – the man behind Lord Blairimort and the man in the Mirror – they just did not think big enough, did not see the big picture.
They got caught up in putting on the best stalls at the fairground, whereas the girls had twigged that the winners would be the ones who brought in the most money. So the girls just shamelessly asked for WHOPPING GREAT DONATIONS. It did not matter that the boys' stalls were all packed out on the night while the girls rides lay empty, nor that the boys sold out of food before the girls – the girls had got tens of thousands of pounds for their tickets and where the boys sold food at a decent mark up, the girls sold it at a totally INDECENT one!
The boys brought in a little under £300,000; the girls rather a lot over £700,000!
Though as Trinnie put it – and won some points back with Daddy Alex for doing so – between them they raised over a million! And then that was doubled on Comic Relief night too!
So kudos to the girls, but who would get fired? They kept us on tenterhooks as log as they could – which was a good thing because we could watch Mr Frank's close up magic on BBC2 while we waited!
It came down to three: Daddy Baker had been responsible for not charging rip-off prices for the food, Mr Henchman had been the team leader, and Mr Moron just because.
I am sorry to say, that Daddy cheered when it was Mr Moron who got it.
"You're fired!" said Mr Sir Alan.
"Again," said Mr Henchman quietly. He'd been waiting for that moment. You could tell.
Sadly, Mr Moron learned nothing from his experience, still blaming spin as he was driven away to the car crusher in Mr Goldfinger's spare car…
Day 2265: Elect the Elephant, part deux
Thursday:
Last week I told you all about how the MPs had voted to make the House of Lords Club be all elected.
I had a good old look at the numbers and it turned out that the Labour and the Conservatories are split down the middle, Lord Blairimort only bothered to vote once, Mr Balloon is all over the place and only the Liberal Democrats are united and have their act together.
Well, now their worthy lordships have voted too and they are NOT SO KEEN on having to stand for election and let people kick them out if they are rubbish.
So I shall have a look at how the parties divided in the UPPER HOUSE too!
The first thing to say is that EVEN THOUGH the Liberal Democrats were not so united in the House of Lords Club as we were in the House of Commons, we were the ONLY party with a MAJORITY against an all elected Upper House, AND a MAJORITY in favour of an 80% elected or a 100% elected Upper House. While 20 or so of our Lords and Ladies sat this one out, and up to another 15 voted THE WRONG WAY(!) there were at least three or four times as many Liberal Democrats in the lobbies for less PATRONAGE and more DEMOCRACY.
Getting it COMPLETELY the wrong way around, an absolute majority of Conservatory Peers voted FOR unelected and AGAINST every single option for elected lords. In fact this was over 60% of Conservatories in every case, except for the 80% elected option which managed to entice a whole 22 of their ermine-clad number… while two-and-a-half times as many abstained!
United the Conservatories may be, but unfortunately it is in OPPOSITION to their so-called Leader, Mr Balloon, who you may recall voted AGAINST an unelected chamber and FOR 80% and 100%. Perhaps someone got their WIRES CROSSED somewhere. Either that or Mr Balloon cannot control his own party!
(You would have to be FAR MORE CYNICAL than fluffy me to suggest that Mr Balloon merely POSED as pro-democracy, safe in the knowledge that his DINOSAUR TENDENCY would knock it into touch for him!)
The Conservatories – they say one thing in one Place and the opposite in the Other Place.
Not that GRINNING MANIAC Lord Blairimort – strangely not voting in person! – had much to SMILE about either, as his own Peers also declined to follow the script, instead singing their own tune and choosing to go off message. All at once!
With a hundred of the Labour Lords, almost half, voting to remain unelected and another sixty-three not voting, fewer than a quarter actually supported any election at all. In fact fewer than an EIGHTH of the Labour peers were willing to support the 50% or 60% elected options. And only 40 (that's fewer than a fifth) supported the 80% option. (Though in fairness, since Tony hasfilled the House with his cronies entirely fairly increased the representation of the Labour, that was more actual votes in favour than the Lib Dems.)
The vote for 100% elected seems to have been a bit of a special case for the Labour, though. (The Conservatories were OBVIOUSLY massively against!) The Labour, however, were split 60:83 – still a majority against the motion (unlike the Liberal Lords) but much narrower.
The issue is further muddled, though, by sixteen of the Labour – Lord Ahmed, Baroness Andrews, Lord Bassam of Brighton, Lord Cunningham of Felling, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, Lord Harris of Haringey, Baroness Howells of St. Davids, Lord Jones, Lord Maxton, Baroness Morgan of Drefelin, Lord Radice, Lord Rooker, Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, Lord Truscott, Lord Williams of Elvel, Lord Woolmer of Leeds – who managed to vote for a 100% UNELECTED chamber AND for a 100% ELECTED chamber.
Let us be FAIR – it must be very CONFUSING and it was a LONG NIGHT. And three of the Liberal Democrat peers managed to do the SAME: Lord Methuen, Baroness Thomas of Walliswood and Lord Watson of Richmond, I hang my fluffy head in SHAME!
(And while we are at it, FOUR of the ELEVEN Conservatories who voted for a completely democratic House of Lords Club had ALREADY voted for a completely undemocratic one. The Earl of Caithness, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, Lord Inglewood and Lord Lucas were the ones having it BOTH WAYS. Which kind of means only SEVEN Conservatories ACTUALLY MEANT IT!)
This is all a bit BIZARRE. People said that this happened in the Commons vote too, and that some MPs wanted to make the bill the most extreme in order to guarantee that the Lords would block it. Perhaps these Lords have the same idea: are they trying to provoke THE QUEEN into blocking the bill?!
Anyway, the great thing about the House of Lords Club – we are always being told – is that there are more voices to be heard than JUST the "traditional" parties.
Actually, only about half of the crossbenchers gave us the VALUABLE BENEFIT of their non-partisan wisdom by voting. Which is a good advert for how IMPORTANT they themselves think they are to the chamber. They were pretty much 9 to 1 in favour of all appointed and similarly against any percent of elected. The 202 crossbenchers representing an ENTIRELY APPOINTED 28% of the current chamber.
The Lord sitting for the Green-Welly Party and the two Conservatories who defected to the UKPNuts all voted for 100% appointed and then against 50:50. After that, his Green Lordship and one of their UKPNutty Lordships went to bed, though the other UKPNut kept up the votes against increased democracy by voting against 60% and 80% elected before he too called it a night. We might have already guessed that the anarcho-collectivist Green-Eyed-Monster Party would be pro-central control (no LEADERS but a central committee to tell us HOW WE MUST LIVE), but it is NICE to see that restoring powers to the British People from Europe does not go as far as actually restoring powers to the British People, then.
Disappointing as it may have been to have the House of Lords Club vote to remain an archaic institution, undermined by sleaze and overrun by patronage, there were still some refreshing moments.
For those who like the sound of the SCHADENFREUDE SONG, the biggest beating of the night went, once again, to Lord Blairimort and Mr Man O' Straw's preferred option of 50% elected: 50% cash in brown envelope.
Or, on a more POSITIVE note, even though it was defeated, the largest vote in the content lobby (and the smallest majority against) went to the 100% elected option. Yes, their Lordships may be three to one against the idea of elections, but those who are convinced are REALLY convinced. Good for them.
I'm rather afraid that the rest of you are going to have to get ready for the PARLIAMENT ACT.
Last week I told you all about how the MPs had voted to make the House of Lords Club be all elected.
I had a good old look at the numbers and it turned out that the Labour and the Conservatories are split down the middle, Lord Blairimort only bothered to vote once, Mr Balloon is all over the place and only the Liberal Democrats are united and have their act together.
Well, now their worthy lordships have voted too and they are NOT SO KEEN on having to stand for election and let people kick them out if they are rubbish.
So I shall have a look at how the parties divided in the UPPER HOUSE too!
The first thing to say is that EVEN THOUGH the Liberal Democrats were not so united in the House of Lords Club as we were in the House of Commons, we were the ONLY party with a MAJORITY against an all elected Upper House, AND a MAJORITY in favour of an 80% elected or a 100% elected Upper House. While 20 or so of our Lords and Ladies sat this one out, and up to another 15 voted THE WRONG WAY(!) there were at least three or four times as many Liberal Democrats in the lobbies for less PATRONAGE and more DEMOCRACY.
Getting it COMPLETELY the wrong way around, an absolute majority of Conservatory Peers voted FOR unelected and AGAINST every single option for elected lords. In fact this was over 60% of Conservatories in every case, except for the 80% elected option which managed to entice a whole 22 of their ermine-clad number… while two-and-a-half times as many abstained!
United the Conservatories may be, but unfortunately it is in OPPOSITION to their so-called Leader, Mr Balloon, who you may recall voted AGAINST an unelected chamber and FOR 80% and 100%. Perhaps someone got their WIRES CROSSED somewhere. Either that or Mr Balloon cannot control his own party!
(You would have to be FAR MORE CYNICAL than fluffy me to suggest that Mr Balloon merely POSED as pro-democracy, safe in the knowledge that his DINOSAUR TENDENCY would knock it into touch for him!)
The Conservatories – they say one thing in one Place and the opposite in the Other Place.
Not that GRINNING MANIAC Lord Blairimort – strangely not voting in person! – had much to SMILE about either, as his own Peers also declined to follow the script, instead singing their own tune and choosing to go off message. All at once!
With a hundred of the Labour Lords, almost half, voting to remain unelected and another sixty-three not voting, fewer than a quarter actually supported any election at all. In fact fewer than an EIGHTH of the Labour peers were willing to support the 50% or 60% elected options. And only 40 (that's fewer than a fifth) supported the 80% option. (Though in fairness, since Tony has
The vote for 100% elected seems to have been a bit of a special case for the Labour, though. (The Conservatories were OBVIOUSLY massively against!) The Labour, however, were split 60:83 – still a majority against the motion (unlike the Liberal Lords) but much narrower.
The issue is further muddled, though, by sixteen of the Labour – Lord Ahmed, Baroness Andrews, Lord Bassam of Brighton, Lord Cunningham of Felling, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, Lord Harris of Haringey, Baroness Howells of St. Davids, Lord Jones, Lord Maxton, Baroness Morgan of Drefelin, Lord Radice, Lord Rooker, Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, Lord Truscott, Lord Williams of Elvel, Lord Woolmer of Leeds – who managed to vote for a 100% UNELECTED chamber AND for a 100% ELECTED chamber.
Let us be FAIR – it must be very CONFUSING and it was a LONG NIGHT. And three of the Liberal Democrat peers managed to do the SAME: Lord Methuen, Baroness Thomas of Walliswood and Lord Watson of Richmond, I hang my fluffy head in SHAME!
(And while we are at it, FOUR of the ELEVEN Conservatories who voted for a completely democratic House of Lords Club had ALREADY voted for a completely undemocratic one. The Earl of Caithness, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, Lord Inglewood and Lord Lucas were the ones having it BOTH WAYS. Which kind of means only SEVEN Conservatories ACTUALLY MEANT IT!)
This is all a bit BIZARRE. People said that this happened in the Commons vote too, and that some MPs wanted to make the bill the most extreme in order to guarantee that the Lords would block it. Perhaps these Lords have the same idea: are they trying to provoke THE QUEEN into blocking the bill?!
Anyway, the great thing about the House of Lords Club – we are always being told – is that there are more voices to be heard than JUST the "traditional" parties.
Actually, only about half of the crossbenchers gave us the VALUABLE BENEFIT of their non-partisan wisdom by voting. Which is a good advert for how IMPORTANT they themselves think they are to the chamber. They were pretty much 9 to 1 in favour of all appointed and similarly against any percent of elected. The 202 crossbenchers representing an ENTIRELY APPOINTED 28% of the current chamber.
The Lord sitting for the Green-Welly Party and the two Conservatories who defected to the UKPNuts all voted for 100% appointed and then against 50:50. After that, his Green Lordship and one of their UKPNutty Lordships went to bed, though the other UKPNut kept up the votes against increased democracy by voting against 60% and 80% elected before he too called it a night. We might have already guessed that the anarcho-collectivist Green-Eyed-Monster Party would be pro-central control (no LEADERS but a central committee to tell us HOW WE MUST LIVE), but it is NICE to see that restoring powers to the British People from Europe does not go as far as actually restoring powers to the British People, then.
Disappointing as it may have been to have the House of Lords Club vote to remain an archaic institution, undermined by sleaze and overrun by patronage, there were still some refreshing moments.
For those who like the sound of the SCHADENFREUDE SONG, the biggest beating of the night went, once again, to Lord Blairimort and Mr Man O' Straw's preferred option of 50% elected: 50% cash in brown envelope.
Or, on a more POSITIVE note, even though it was defeated, the largest vote in the content lobby (and the smallest majority against) went to the 100% elected option. Yes, their Lordships may be three to one against the idea of elections, but those who are convinced are REALLY convinced. Good for them.
I'm rather afraid that the rest of you are going to have to get ready for the PARLIAMENT ACT.
Day 2264: Balloon and Blairimort: together again
Wednesday:
If there is one thing that we should be repeating OVER AND OVER AND OVER it is the sight of Mr Balloon, so called leader of the "opposition", saying to Lord Blairimort:
"…the Prime Minister has the support of the Conservative party, we can work together…"
That quote PRECISELY.
He's talking about rushing into a decision to build new Trident submarines so that we can have shiny American missiles that we will never ever use.
But it really sums up the whole of the relationship between Lord Blairimort and Mr Balloon. They are ALWAYS of one mind. Because Mr Balloon doesn't seem to HAVE a mind!
The BBC's Mr Assinder thinks that this is all a CUNNING TACTIC by Mr Balloon to EMBARRASS Lord Blairimort. But the TRUTH is it is Mr Balloon who should be EMBARRASSED: there is NO NEED for Mr Balloon or his bunch of Eton wannabes never mind the xenophobic Tombstone DINOSAURS that they are saddled with after years of in-fighting over Europe. They serve no purpose. The reason that they do not have any policies is because a manifesto that consists of giant DITTO marks is NOT WORTH HAVING.
Lord Blairimort is a Thatcherite Prime Minister; he leads a Thatcherite Party. What is Mr Balloon FOR?
Of course, Lord Blairimort also leads a small Socialist Party, too, it is just that the two Labour Parties have not realised it yet. You can tell who this other party consists of because they are called the Rebels.
(This is NOT because they are like Luke Skywalker and the CUTE ROBOTS (all the robots work for Lord Blairimort and they are the scary kind not the cute kind.) No, it is because they are like James Dean – they are WITHOUT A CAUSE.)
Lord Blairimort's plan is spend FIVE BILLION POUNDS a pop on three or four new submarines. Mr Balloon will provide the rubber ducks to go with.
Now, you really ought to be able to tell that there is SOMETHING wrong with your defence policy when swivel-eyed Fantastic Dr Fox is calling it "sound" and "sensible" – Dr Fox's position is probably based on the "sensible" precaution of nuking Brussels, Berlin and Paris. And probably Edinburgh to be on the safe side.
But Lord Blairimort wants to get started RIGHT NOW because he reckons that our atomic subs are going to wear out in seventeen years' time, in spite of us only using each one of them a quarter of the time, when the oldest of them (HMS Vanguard, launched 1993) will be thirty-two years old (and the youngest, HMS Vengeance, a stripling of 26).
Hang on… The Americans seem to think that THEIR atomic submarines – which are in use at least sixty-six percent of the time – will last at least 40 years each. Maybe we should have bought some of their submarines.
(It would certainly go with the missiles that we bought from them. Those ones that if we ever want to use we have to ask the President for the keys first. Assuming HE hasn't already used them "on our behalf".)
Equally, the current threat to what is LAUGHINGLY described as "world peace" comes from conventional conflicts and terrorism, rather than Cold War style Nuclear Stand-offs. (Unless of course you are Mrs Bucket with a scaremongering memo to circulate.)
It is not much use pointing an atom bomb at a terrorist. Especially if he is already on the London Underground!
Resources would be better used for our spies intelligence gathering. And for equipping our soldiers in the field. Or better still, getting our soldier OUT of the field and into some nice comfy barracks back home.
All of this suggests that there is no need to rush to make a decision.
You might call putting off the decision "sitting on the fence" (or at least you might if you are Lord Blairimort replying to Sir Mr the Merciless) but at least when you are sat on the fence you can see a bit further.
So why the rush? Unless of course your time as Prime Minister is drawing ABRUPTLY TO A CLOSE.
What is IRONIC is that this latest GRAB for the LEGACY has once again WEAKENED Lord Blairimort.
"Humiliated" is how Sir Mr the Merciless described him; "a lame duck" was the phrase of Lady Boothroyd, former speaker.
Of course, the rules say that you only have to command a majority of the MPs in the House of Commons. They don't say that they have to be YOUR OWN MPs.
Still, with Mr Balloon on side, the Conservatories pretty much ARE Lord Blairimort's MPs these days.
"…the Prime Minister has the support of the Conservative party, we can work together…"
If there is one thing that we should be repeating OVER AND OVER AND OVER it is the sight of Mr Balloon, so called leader of the "opposition", saying to Lord Blairimort:
"…the Prime Minister has the support of the Conservative party, we can work together…"
That quote PRECISELY.
He's talking about rushing into a decision to build new Trident submarines so that we can have shiny American missiles that we will never ever use.
But it really sums up the whole of the relationship between Lord Blairimort and Mr Balloon. They are ALWAYS of one mind. Because Mr Balloon doesn't seem to HAVE a mind!
The BBC's Mr Assinder thinks that this is all a CUNNING TACTIC by Mr Balloon to EMBARRASS Lord Blairimort. But the TRUTH is it is Mr Balloon who should be EMBARRASSED: there is NO NEED for Mr Balloon or his bunch of Eton wannabes never mind the xenophobic Tombstone DINOSAURS that they are saddled with after years of in-fighting over Europe. They serve no purpose. The reason that they do not have any policies is because a manifesto that consists of giant DITTO marks is NOT WORTH HAVING.
Lord Blairimort is a Thatcherite Prime Minister; he leads a Thatcherite Party. What is Mr Balloon FOR?
Of course, Lord Blairimort also leads a small Socialist Party, too, it is just that the two Labour Parties have not realised it yet. You can tell who this other party consists of because they are called the Rebels.
(This is NOT because they are like Luke Skywalker and the CUTE ROBOTS (all the robots work for Lord Blairimort and they are the scary kind not the cute kind.) No, it is because they are like James Dean – they are WITHOUT A CAUSE.)
Lord Blairimort's plan is spend FIVE BILLION POUNDS a pop on three or four new submarines. Mr Balloon will provide the rubber ducks to go with.
Now, you really ought to be able to tell that there is SOMETHING wrong with your defence policy when swivel-eyed Fantastic Dr Fox is calling it "sound" and "sensible" – Dr Fox's position is probably based on the "sensible" precaution of nuking Brussels, Berlin and Paris. And probably Edinburgh to be on the safe side.
But Lord Blairimort wants to get started RIGHT NOW because he reckons that our atomic subs are going to wear out in seventeen years' time, in spite of us only using each one of them a quarter of the time, when the oldest of them (HMS Vanguard, launched 1993) will be thirty-two years old (and the youngest, HMS Vengeance, a stripling of 26).
Hang on… The Americans seem to think that THEIR atomic submarines – which are in use at least sixty-six percent of the time – will last at least 40 years each. Maybe we should have bought some of their submarines.
(It would certainly go with the missiles that we bought from them. Those ones that if we ever want to use we have to ask the President for the keys first. Assuming HE hasn't already used them "on our behalf".)
Equally, the current threat to what is LAUGHINGLY described as "world peace" comes from conventional conflicts and terrorism, rather than Cold War style Nuclear Stand-offs. (Unless of course you are Mrs Bucket with a scaremongering memo to circulate.)
It is not much use pointing an atom bomb at a terrorist. Especially if he is already on the London Underground!
Resources would be better used for our spies intelligence gathering. And for equipping our soldiers in the field. Or better still, getting our soldier OUT of the field and into some nice comfy barracks back home.
All of this suggests that there is no need to rush to make a decision.
You might call putting off the decision "sitting on the fence" (or at least you might if you are Lord Blairimort replying to Sir Mr the Merciless) but at least when you are sat on the fence you can see a bit further.
So why the rush? Unless of course your time as Prime Minister is drawing ABRUPTLY TO A CLOSE.
What is IRONIC is that this latest GRAB for the LEGACY has once again WEAKENED Lord Blairimort.
"Humiliated" is how Sir Mr the Merciless described him; "a lame duck" was the phrase of Lady Boothroyd, former speaker.
Of course, the rules say that you only have to command a majority of the MPs in the House of Commons. They don't say that they have to be YOUR OWN MPs.
Still, with Mr Balloon on side, the Conservatories pretty much ARE Lord Blairimort's MPs these days.
"…the Prime Minister has the support of the Conservative party, we can work together…"
Day 2263: Bill for Climate Change (£50 billion + tip)
Tuesday:
Oh dear, Mr James has thonked me with a PYRAMID SELLING SCHEME!
I had better wake up Daddy Richard and make him start typing in my diary. WE have a LOT to get through – I wonder if we will finish before Mr Frown starts his budget…
So, after the Liberal Democrats lead the way on Green Policies, tailed by the me-too Conservatories, at last the Labour have brought up some proposals of their own to try and help the environment.
Mr Millipede has announced that the government will cut Carbon Dioxide by setting TARGETS using LEGISLATION.
Is it just me, or does this not sound a TOTALLY NuLabour way of approaching the issue? Almost ANY problem, and their answer is "set some targets and pass more laws".
I bet it will not be long before people are finding CUNNING WAYS to get around the targets that Mr Millipede sets – probably by reclassifying Carbon Dioxide as "Oxygen+" or claiming to be REDUCING emissions by BREATHING IN!
Setting a FIVE YEAR TARGET is all very well – very NuSoviet – but how are you going to go about meeting it? You have not been very good at meeting your own targets so far!
What we need is some SOLID PROPOSALS for things that we can do.
And to be fair the government does plan to investment in low-carbon fuels and technologies, such as carbon capture and storage, wind, wave and solar power. We want to hear MORE about that, though. How much? And how soon?
Mr Frown, too, has some proposals. Taking the opportunity to have a pop at Mr Balloon's not-very-well-thought-out, not-very-well-received "Let's Tax Air" plan, he says he thinks that homes should be greener pointing out that they account for 25% of our Carbon Dioxide emissions, as opposed to aeroplanes that only account for 5%.
(At least 5% SO FAR – that is why we want to arrest the growth in air travel before we burn up the entire sky!)
Of course what Mr Frown really means is that a lot of our Greenhouse Gasses come from the generation of ELECTRICAL POWER – mainly from the burning of GAS.
There are TWO ways to reduce that: number one – everyone get better insulation, long-life bulbs and switch the telly OFF rather than to stand-by; number two – stop burning so much gas and switch to cleaner generating methods like wind or wave or hydroelectric. (Nuclear power also cuts emissions but ONLY if you think highly dangerous radioactive waste that lasts for millions of years does not count as POLLUTION.)
Method number one involves everyone in the country being forced into changing their behaviour, probably with targets to check up our progress and CCTV cameras cross-checked with I.D.iot cards to make sure we are not secretly using the stand-by button.
Method number two requires investment either directly or by applying tax incentives.
Guess which one is Mr Frown's preferred option!
That is NOT TO SAY that we shouldn't be ENCOURAGING people to do their own bit, however small. Simple methods to save power – and save some cash too – can all help the nation cut back on emissions.
This calls for a revival of the GOOD OLD British spirit: EVERYONE pulling together like we did to get through World War Part Two, or the Eurovision Song Contest. Yes, even in time of ADVERSITY we can draw courage from our fellow Brits!
And most people WANT to do good. Young people – who especially connect with the Liberal Democrats – young people are the most in favour of Environmental Action. Not JUST because they want there still to BE a world, but because it is the RIGHT THING TO DO.
So, a bit less of the TARGETS and COMPULSION, Mr Frown. A bit more of the leading by example and setting up projects and not laying down the law.
Oh dear, Mr James has thonked me with a PYRAMID SELLING SCHEME!
I had better wake up Daddy Richard and make him start typing in my diary. WE have a LOT to get through – I wonder if we will finish before Mr Frown starts his budget…
So, after the Liberal Democrats lead the way on Green Policies, tailed by the me-too Conservatories, at last the Labour have brought up some proposals of their own to try and help the environment.
Mr Millipede has announced that the government will cut Carbon Dioxide by setting TARGETS using LEGISLATION.
Is it just me, or does this not sound a TOTALLY NuLabour way of approaching the issue? Almost ANY problem, and their answer is "set some targets and pass more laws".
I bet it will not be long before people are finding CUNNING WAYS to get around the targets that Mr Millipede sets – probably by reclassifying Carbon Dioxide as "Oxygen+" or claiming to be REDUCING emissions by BREATHING IN!
Setting a FIVE YEAR TARGET is all very well – very NuSoviet – but how are you going to go about meeting it? You have not been very good at meeting your own targets so far!
What we need is some SOLID PROPOSALS for things that we can do.
And to be fair the government does plan to investment in low-carbon fuels and technologies, such as carbon capture and storage, wind, wave and solar power. We want to hear MORE about that, though. How much? And how soon?
Mr Frown, too, has some proposals. Taking the opportunity to have a pop at Mr Balloon's not-very-well-thought-out, not-very-well-received "Let's Tax Air" plan, he says he thinks that homes should be greener pointing out that they account for 25% of our Carbon Dioxide emissions, as opposed to aeroplanes that only account for 5%.
(At least 5% SO FAR – that is why we want to arrest the growth in air travel before we burn up the entire sky!)
Of course what Mr Frown really means is that a lot of our Greenhouse Gasses come from the generation of ELECTRICAL POWER – mainly from the burning of GAS.
There are TWO ways to reduce that: number one – everyone get better insulation, long-life bulbs and switch the telly OFF rather than to stand-by; number two – stop burning so much gas and switch to cleaner generating methods like wind or wave or hydroelectric. (Nuclear power also cuts emissions but ONLY if you think highly dangerous radioactive waste that lasts for millions of years does not count as POLLUTION.)
Method number one involves everyone in the country being forced into changing their behaviour, probably with targets to check up our progress and CCTV cameras cross-checked with I.D.iot cards to make sure we are not secretly using the stand-by button.
Method number two requires investment either directly or by applying tax incentives.
Guess which one is Mr Frown's preferred option!
That is NOT TO SAY that we shouldn't be ENCOURAGING people to do their own bit, however small. Simple methods to save power – and save some cash too – can all help the nation cut back on emissions.
This calls for a revival of the GOOD OLD British spirit: EVERYONE pulling together like we did to get through World War Part Two, or the Eurovision Song Contest. Yes, even in time of ADVERSITY we can draw courage from our fellow Brits!
And most people WANT to do good. Young people – who especially connect with the Liberal Democrats – young people are the most in favour of Environmental Action. Not JUST because they want there still to BE a world, but because it is the RIGHT THING TO DO.
So, a bit less of the TARGETS and COMPULSION, Mr Frown. A bit more of the leading by example and setting up projects and not laying down the law.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Day 2262: Skynet launched
Monday:
I do not wish to ALARM anyone, but is not THIS space based military weapons system the same as THIS space based military weapons system that destroys the world in "The Terminator"?
I am not the ONLY paranoid elephant, you know!
I do not wish to ALARM anyone, but is not THIS space based military weapons system the same as THIS space based military weapons system that destroys the world in "The Terminator"?
I am not the ONLY paranoid elephant, you know!
Day 2261: Mr Balloon Fails to Fly
Sunday:
Bit of a PR disaster for the normally sure-footed Mr Balloon today, as his new environment policy failed to get off the ground.
The BBC went to an airport to ask passengers if they'd like Mr Balloon to CANCEL THEIR HOLIDAYS and funnily enough the answers were all pretty NEGATIVE.
In another ASTONISHING move, the airlines have widely condemned the Conservatory plans!
No! Do no LAUGH! Normally we should condemn this sort of reporting.
But if the Conservatories are STUPID enough to make themselves sound like a HIGH TAX PARTY then I say we let them have it!
This is IMPORTANT POLITICS and we need people to know that they have a CHOICE between REAL green action with the Liberal Democrats and some half thought through, half baked me-too band-wagon jumping from the Conservatories.
In addition to looking like they want to RESTRICT flying to the RICH, the Conservatories this week added to the appearance of confusion when they announced plans to have Mr Al Gore fly in and, er, tell them about the evils of flying.
(Fluffy wave to Mr Paul.)
This comes on top of Mr Balloon's new Euro-sceptic allies from the Czech Republic turning out to believe that Global Warming is a "false myth" while the European Peoples' Party that Mr Balloon has turned his back on, led by German Chancellor Ms Angela Meercat, have just managed to secure an historic deal on renewable energy targets.
It is not that Mr Balloon has no GOOD IDEAS AT ALL in there. But they are all of a mish-mash with other stuff and without practical considerations. Targeting unnecessary short-haul flights sounds reasonable, but if you put tax on INTERNAL flights won't that push people into flying London-Dublin-Glasgow instead, which actually makes the problem worse not better. And Green Air Miles might sound like it puts the burden of tax on people who fly more but how are you going to work it? Some monster bureaucracy or maybe electronic tags on everybody's passports?
This all plays up the WISDOM of our own environmental policies: the Green Tax Switch. We emphasised our intention to GIVE MONEY BACK to people – and by spelling out exactly how and who will benefit – and THEN saying that they will have the choice of whether to spend that money on more expensive travel or to look for a cheaper, less polluting alternative or to save it altogether.
Mr Balloon and Mr Boy George had only got the vaguest idea when they nicked the policy, so they end up saying "we'll tax you more" with some meaningless promise to "reduce tax for families" tacked on at the end. People are all too familiar with – and all too cynical about –STEALTH TAXES.
(And don't forget, that although Mr Frown has become the MASTER, it was Conservatory Chancellor Fatty Clarke who first came up with a whole load of hidden taxes to try and balance the budget after Black Wednesday.)
We already know that Mr Balloon is not above MISREPRESENTING us in order to grub for votes. He says that only HE wants to get the Labour out.
Well, that's just not true. He wants to change the names round the cabinet table – BUT HE WANTS THE POLICIES TO CARRY ON THE SAME.
Just this week, for example, we know that he is going to vote FOR the government on Trident – only the Liberal Democrats are offering an alternative. We want to CUT TRIDENT NOW!
And do not forget how Mr Balloon was the one who saved Lord Blairimort's education top-up fees policy. Only the Liberal Democrats believe in helping students – just like we have done in Scotland!
We HAVE to be telling people that the choice is between More-of-the-Same-Labour from Mr Frown and Mr Balloon or a REAL CHANCE OF CHANGE with the Liberal Democrats.
So, on the environment, the message is clear:
The Conservatories are JUST LIKE the Labour – they want to tax you MORE.
Only the Liberal Democrats offer you the tax cut UP FRONT and then trust you to make your own choices on the environment.
Bit of a PR disaster for the normally sure-footed Mr Balloon today, as his new environment policy failed to get off the ground.
The BBC went to an airport to ask passengers if they'd like Mr Balloon to CANCEL THEIR HOLIDAYS and funnily enough the answers were all pretty NEGATIVE.
In another ASTONISHING move, the airlines have widely condemned the Conservatory plans!
No! Do no LAUGH! Normally we should condemn this sort of reporting.
But if the Conservatories are STUPID enough to make themselves sound like a HIGH TAX PARTY then I say we let them have it!
This is IMPORTANT POLITICS and we need people to know that they have a CHOICE between REAL green action with the Liberal Democrats and some half thought through, half baked me-too band-wagon jumping from the Conservatories.
In addition to looking like they want to RESTRICT flying to the RICH, the Conservatories this week added to the appearance of confusion when they announced plans to have Mr Al Gore fly in and, er, tell them about the evils of flying.
(Fluffy wave to Mr Paul.)
This comes on top of Mr Balloon's new Euro-sceptic allies from the Czech Republic turning out to believe that Global Warming is a "false myth" while the European Peoples' Party that Mr Balloon has turned his back on, led by German Chancellor Ms Angela Meercat, have just managed to secure an historic deal on renewable energy targets.
It is not that Mr Balloon has no GOOD IDEAS AT ALL in there. But they are all of a mish-mash with other stuff and without practical considerations. Targeting unnecessary short-haul flights sounds reasonable, but if you put tax on INTERNAL flights won't that push people into flying London-Dublin-Glasgow instead, which actually makes the problem worse not better. And Green Air Miles might sound like it puts the burden of tax on people who fly more but how are you going to work it? Some monster bureaucracy or maybe electronic tags on everybody's passports?
This all plays up the WISDOM of our own environmental policies: the Green Tax Switch. We emphasised our intention to GIVE MONEY BACK to people – and by spelling out exactly how and who will benefit – and THEN saying that they will have the choice of whether to spend that money on more expensive travel or to look for a cheaper, less polluting alternative or to save it altogether.
Mr Balloon and Mr Boy George had only got the vaguest idea when they nicked the policy, so they end up saying "we'll tax you more" with some meaningless promise to "reduce tax for families" tacked on at the end. People are all too familiar with – and all too cynical about –STEALTH TAXES.
(And don't forget, that although Mr Frown has become the MASTER, it was Conservatory Chancellor Fatty Clarke who first came up with a whole load of hidden taxes to try and balance the budget after Black Wednesday.)
We already know that Mr Balloon is not above MISREPRESENTING us in order to grub for votes. He says that only HE wants to get the Labour out.
Well, that's just not true. He wants to change the names round the cabinet table – BUT HE WANTS THE POLICIES TO CARRY ON THE SAME.
Just this week, for example, we know that he is going to vote FOR the government on Trident – only the Liberal Democrats are offering an alternative. We want to CUT TRIDENT NOW!
And do not forget how Mr Balloon was the one who saved Lord Blairimort's education top-up fees policy. Only the Liberal Democrats believe in helping students – just like we have done in Scotland!
We HAVE to be telling people that the choice is between More-of-the-Same-Labour from Mr Frown and Mr Balloon or a REAL CHANCE OF CHANGE with the Liberal Democrats.
So, on the environment, the message is clear:
The Conservatories are JUST LIKE the Labour – they want to tax you MORE.
Only the Liberal Democrats offer you the tax cut UP FRONT and then trust you to make your own choices on the environment.
Day 2260: Worlds Collide
Saturday:
The first new adventure for Dr Who aired tonight! It was a two-parter, shown before and after the trailer for next weeks Eurovision heats, after I'm a Celebrity Fame Academy Get Me Out of Here!
I am not quite sure that I got the WHOLE plot, but it seemed to feature Dr Who and his new friend Martha, and Daddy Alex spotted a background clue to "Vote Saxon" which may be a plot-arc point.
Meanwhile, my OTHER favourite time-travelling scientist, Professor Richard, has been getting into a scrape over whether he or Mr Peter Kay have the Best British Book in the Galaxy, and receiving the FULL IRE of Mr James for doing so.
Now, far be it for me to wag a fluffy foot at Mr James for going off on one about Professor Richard going off on one, but it appears that – like the good Professor – Mr James may have been TAKEN IN by the Grauniad's reporting.
The story, the way the Grauniad puts it, is that Professor Richard singled out one passage from Mr Peter's autobiography…
"I believe in a God of some kind, in some sort of higher being. Personally I find it very comforting."
…in order to heap scorn upon it:
"How can you take seriously someone who likes to believe something because he finds it 'comforting'?"
I have to say that I thought that there was something DEEPLY DODGY about this story right from the get go. It is not terribly in character for Professor Richard to have a go at another author, not even at ones who have a go at him. He is much more likely to POKE FUN at them – because what people who do not bother to listen to what he actually says often do not realise is that Professor Richard is actually VERY FUNNY. He has a very dry sense of humour and enjoys ribbing people, especially his opponents. This makes him very enjoyable company, or to listen to on shiny disc.
The downside is that it is quite easy to find things that he has said and (a) clip them out of the middle so they aren't in context and (b) quote them in flat type that loses the cadences of humour from his spoken comments and PRESTO turns a mild gag into a "stinging attack" (© Grauniad hacks).
So I thought to my fluffy self, hmmm better try and find out what REALLY happened before poking my big fluffy nose into this one.
Because this IS the sort of thing that Professor Richard is wont to say, but usually only in the middle of a bigger explanation.
I had wondered if it wasn't part of a longer sentence, something like:
"Well, there's much there that I enjoyed though, of course, the one part that I would have to take issue with to be at all consistent with my much reported views is the bit about god existing because it's a comfort. I've often said how can you take seriously someone…"
But now, Professor Richard has offered a fulsome apology to Mr Peter in which he reveals that he was NOT AWARE that the quote in question was in fact to do with Mr Peter's book. In fact he hadn't read Mr Peter's book AT ALL and thought that in fact it was the usual stirring about "god" that he's always being asked about.
Now, Professor Richard is a JOLLY BRIGHT FELLOW and so that's not really a complete excuse, because if a journalist gives you a quote to comment on then you probably OUGHT to ask them where they got it from or what the context is before shooting your mouth off.
But to be fair, the same sort of obligation is upon the Grauniad to explain the context of Professor Richard's reply. Though of course if they DID do that then their story would disappear up its own Galaxy Award.
The first new adventure for Dr Who aired tonight! It was a two-parter, shown before and after the trailer for next weeks Eurovision heats, after I'm a Celebrity Fame Academy Get Me Out of Here!
I am not quite sure that I got the WHOLE plot, but it seemed to feature Dr Who and his new friend Martha, and Daddy Alex spotted a background clue to "Vote Saxon" which may be a plot-arc point.
Meanwhile, my OTHER favourite time-travelling scientist, Professor Richard, has been getting into a scrape over whether he or Mr Peter Kay have the Best British Book in the Galaxy, and receiving the FULL IRE of Mr James for doing so.
Now, far be it for me to wag a fluffy foot at Mr James for going off on one about Professor Richard going off on one, but it appears that – like the good Professor – Mr James may have been TAKEN IN by the Grauniad's reporting.
The story, the way the Grauniad puts it, is that Professor Richard singled out one passage from Mr Peter's autobiography…
"I believe in a God of some kind, in some sort of higher being. Personally I find it very comforting."
…in order to heap scorn upon it:
"How can you take seriously someone who likes to believe something because he finds it 'comforting'?"
I have to say that I thought that there was something DEEPLY DODGY about this story right from the get go. It is not terribly in character for Professor Richard to have a go at another author, not even at ones who have a go at him. He is much more likely to POKE FUN at them – because what people who do not bother to listen to what he actually says often do not realise is that Professor Richard is actually VERY FUNNY. He has a very dry sense of humour and enjoys ribbing people, especially his opponents. This makes him very enjoyable company, or to listen to on shiny disc.
The downside is that it is quite easy to find things that he has said and (a) clip them out of the middle so they aren't in context and (b) quote them in flat type that loses the cadences of humour from his spoken comments and PRESTO turns a mild gag into a "stinging attack" (© Grauniad hacks).
So I thought to my fluffy self, hmmm better try and find out what REALLY happened before poking my big fluffy nose into this one.
Because this IS the sort of thing that Professor Richard is wont to say, but usually only in the middle of a bigger explanation.
I had wondered if it wasn't part of a longer sentence, something like:
"Well, there's much there that I enjoyed though, of course, the one part that I would have to take issue with to be at all consistent with my much reported views is the bit about god existing because it's a comfort. I've often said how can you take seriously someone…"
But now, Professor Richard has offered a fulsome apology to Mr Peter in which he reveals that he was NOT AWARE that the quote in question was in fact to do with Mr Peter's book. In fact he hadn't read Mr Peter's book AT ALL and thought that in fact it was the usual stirring about "god" that he's always being asked about.
Now, Professor Richard is a JOLLY BRIGHT FELLOW and so that's not really a complete excuse, because if a journalist gives you a quote to comment on then you probably OUGHT to ask them where they got it from or what the context is before shooting your mouth off.
But to be fair, the same sort of obligation is upon the Grauniad to explain the context of Professor Richard's reply. Though of course if they DID do that then their story would disappear up its own Galaxy Award.
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Day 2258: National Fall on your Sword Day
Thursday:
So farewell then, Sir Patrick Myrka.
You probably weren't a racist; but you probably were a moron.
Neither of which are particularly desirable traits for a top political leader.
So farewell then, Sir Patrick Myrka.
You probably weren't a racist; but you probably were a moron.
Neither of which are particularly desirable traits for a top political leader.
Friday, March 09, 2007
Day 2257: Elect the Elephant!
Wednesday:
The campaign must start today!
A House of Lords Club for the New Millennium. And VICE VERSA!
Yes, I want to get my fluffy bottom on a nice red leather seat. I will BE that elephant in the room! I am the new Lord Woolsack!
There is a SNAG: Lord Blairimort is unlikely to bring in legislation that will allow the standing for parliament by (a) seven-year-olds [R: six-year-olds] (b) elephants (c) soft toys.
Therefore, I have a PLAN! I will HYPNOTISE Daddy Richard into standing for Lordliness and he can act as my PUPPET!
Who wants to help?
Parliament has decided to sweep aside the last remnant of the Old Republic and… hang on… that's backwards. The power to appoint cronies is actually being taken AWAY from the evil emperor and given back to the only people who can really be expected to decide who is best to govern: all of us.
Personally, I was very pleased to see the huge support received for the 100% elected choice. This will make it really rather difficult for Mr Jack Man O' Straw to come back to the Commons with plans for anything less – though I do not doubt he will try to wheedle it back to the 80% option.
Incidentally, that is NOT to do down people who have a GENUINE belief in a small number of appointed peers. It's just that Mr Man O' Straw does not believe in 80% for a moment.
Mr Rob, for example, makes a JOLLY GOOD case for the good work done by hard working appointed lords, particularly from the cross-benches, and suggests that this should be reason to retain them.
But I keep coming back to the idea that if you want to have a say in the laws that run people's lives then you ought to be willing to let those people have a say in whether they want you or not.
Yes, I know that that means that the people who very often succeed are the ones who know oratory or party hackery rather than quantum jacket-potato baking or how to hand rear a rare Guatemalan albino pigmy-lemur, but it is still the CHOICE of the people rather than some distant panel of at-best-vaguely-accountable "great and good".
Or as Mr Balloon's second favourite person after Ms Polly Toytown once put it:
"Democracy is the worst system of government apart from all the others."
Perhaps we could have these people form a PANEL of EXPERT WITNESSES: people who are able to contribute their expertise in the Upper House by speaking in debates or cross-examining on committees but not actually voting. Goodness, we have enough Lordly titles to go around: non-voting experts could be called BARONS (since there won't BE any more barons as they're the NOT HEREDITARY ones).
The VOTING members could just be called PEERS, because that is what they would be: OUR PEERS.
Or maybe that is SILLY and we should not be creating FIRST and SECOND class members of Parliament.
But if you want to HAVE a vote, you ought to let people to VOTE for you.
Mr Man O' Straw, of course, had very precise instructions from Lord Blairimort: give them enough democracy to look like we mean it and not enough to damage my ability topay for the next election govern. Hence his heavily pushing his favoured 50:50 model.
Of course, the 50:50 model was the most HEAVILY DEFEATED vote of the night.
You can imagine the scene on the carpet in the Downing Street BUNKER late last night. Mr Man O' War stands there trembling while Lord Blairimort spells it out:
"Well… Jack… I was, y'know… going to kick you upstairs for your failure, but… gosh… looks like that's no longer an option! Furious eyes. Appointed haircut. Toe-on-the-pedal-that-works-the-piranha-pool twitch."
Ironically, this was also the one vote all night that Lord Blairimort deigned to turn up for in person. This just goes to show that the once ALL-CONQUERING Lord Blairimort is now so fatally out of touch that he can only carry just over a third of the Labour with him on a key policy.
Was his successor any better at judging the mood? Well, Mr Frown allowed himself to be seen in the lobbies voting against the wholly unelected upper chamber and then later to go though the aye lobby for 80%. Principled or canny? Or just a desire to stick one on Lord Blairimort by visibly saying "we should go further than you want, Tony"?
In fact the only potential Prime Minister to vote on each and every division was our own Sir Mr the Merciless.
(Mr Balloon clearly couldn't guess which way the wind was blowing on 60% and had to sit that one out!)
And it's very obvious that the whole Liberal Democratic party was united behind him on this – entirely as it should be since the LONG overdue reform of the British Constitution is a VERY important way to give more protection to people from over-mighty governments like Lord Blairimort's. And indeed, reform of the House of Lords Club is something we were kind of in the middle of when we were, er, asked to sit out the next NINETY YEARS of government. So it's about time we got stuck back in!
The Conservatories, on the other fluffy foot, were entirely ALL OVER THE PLACE and succeeded in being – on balance – AGAINST EVERY SINGLE ONE of the options given. Yes, even on the 80% elected option that Mr Balloon voted for, he only had the following of 80 of his fellows, while 98 were in the lobby against him, merrily cancelling him out.
They were just as split down the middle (80 to 103) on the all elected option, while other options were rejected rather more resoundingly.
So basically, the Conservatories would like either a super-quango or a nearly-properly democratic house but nothing in between and can't actually quite bring themselves to support either preference.
It's so nice to see that they're so FULLY committed to the representative democracy of theTwenty-first Twentieth Nineteenth Century… er… [R: insert famous "Spitting Image" Margaret Thatcher line here!]
Do PLEASE call us when you have made up your minds.
The Labour were no more united – except when it came to giving Mr Man O' War a decent kicking – but the voting did show something of a progression, starting with the Labour members two-to-one rejecting an all elected house and gradually moving into parity so that when it got to the 80% elected option they were 157 in favour to 162 against. A net vote of 5 against. Yes, on the 80% vote, the Labour cancelled themselves out even more effectively than the Conservatories.
This means, if you look at it, that that 38 majority on the call for an 80% elected House of Lords is pretty much ALL Liberal Democrats.
(Thank you also Plaid Cymru, Ms Claire "Independent Labour" Snort and Mr Gorgeous "Respect" Pussycat-Leotard for your various 5 votes in favour.)
Finally there is the HUGE swing around as the Labour turned on their heads and voted two-to-one in favour of a 100% elected chamber.
(This is, of course, quite consistent with the two-to-one vote against a 100% UNelected chamber.)
Mr Alex Salmon parades his troupe of six Scottish Nasties though the aye lobby to make some sort of point (they've been voting No, or possibly Nae, all evening); the Conservatories fall entirely to pieces, the Liberal Democrats remain united and we all go home laughing.
Whatever some people might say about it all being a trick by anti-reformers to wreck any possible House of Lords bill, you have to say it certainly LOOKS consistent with the will of the House being in favour of a fully elected democratic upper chamber.
This seems a pretty obvious step to take if you are moving to a new and democratic second chamber.
So, rather to my fluffy surprise, the measure to abolish the remaining Hereditaries was HEAVILY DEFEATED: 241 in favour to 329 against. Or, more accurately: ALL the Liberals and Conservatories in favour and ALL the Labour against[*].
([*]okay, five Labour did vote for abolition and eight Conservatories did vote against but in context this is almost nothing!)
So, the Labour united to NUKE their OWN suggestion to finish off the my-great-granddad-knew-Nell-Gwynne vote.
Why would they DO that?
Well, with our support Mrs Theresa May-NOT for the Conservatories HAD amended Mr Man O' Straw's proposal slightly so that the last Hereditary Lords would lose their votes only when the newly elected House took their place. Which seems fair enough, doesn't it?
After all, if they all suddenly went TODAY, then – because 42 of them are Conservatories – it would change the balance of the House of Lords Club. In fact, it would give the Labour a majority in the upper House (for the first time ever) and put a stop to any INCONVENIENT checks on Lord Blairimort's ABSOLUTE POWER.
But, NO ONE cold want such an UNFAIR thing to happen, could they?
The campaign must start today!
A House of Lords Club for the New Millennium. And VICE VERSA!
Yes, I want to get my fluffy bottom on a nice red leather seat. I will BE that elephant in the room! I am the new Lord Woolsack!
There is a SNAG: Lord Blairimort is unlikely to bring in legislation that will allow the standing for parliament by (a) seven-year-olds [R: six-year-olds] (b) elephants (c) soft toys.
Therefore, I have a PLAN! I will HYPNOTISE Daddy Richard into standing for Lordliness and he can act as my PUPPET!
Who wants to help?
Parliament has decided to sweep aside the last remnant of the Old Republic and… hang on… that's backwards. The power to appoint cronies is actually being taken AWAY from the evil emperor and given back to the only people who can really be expected to decide who is best to govern: all of us.
Personally, I was very pleased to see the huge support received for the 100% elected choice. This will make it really rather difficult for Mr Jack Man O' Straw to come back to the Commons with plans for anything less – though I do not doubt he will try to wheedle it back to the 80% option.
Incidentally, that is NOT to do down people who have a GENUINE belief in a small number of appointed peers. It's just that Mr Man O' Straw does not believe in 80% for a moment.
Mr Rob, for example, makes a JOLLY GOOD case for the good work done by hard working appointed lords, particularly from the cross-benches, and suggests that this should be reason to retain them.
But I keep coming back to the idea that if you want to have a say in the laws that run people's lives then you ought to be willing to let those people have a say in whether they want you or not.
Yes, I know that that means that the people who very often succeed are the ones who know oratory or party hackery rather than quantum jacket-potato baking or how to hand rear a rare Guatemalan albino pigmy-lemur, but it is still the CHOICE of the people rather than some distant panel of at-best-vaguely-accountable "great and good".
Or as Mr Balloon's second favourite person after Ms Polly Toytown once put it:
"Democracy is the worst system of government apart from all the others."
Perhaps we could have these people form a PANEL of EXPERT WITNESSES: people who are able to contribute their expertise in the Upper House by speaking in debates or cross-examining on committees but not actually voting. Goodness, we have enough Lordly titles to go around: non-voting experts could be called BARONS (since there won't BE any more barons as they're the NOT HEREDITARY ones).
The VOTING members could just be called PEERS, because that is what they would be: OUR PEERS.
Or maybe that is SILLY and we should not be creating FIRST and SECOND class members of Parliament.
But if you want to HAVE a vote, you ought to let people to VOTE for you.
Mr Man O' Straw, of course, had very precise instructions from Lord Blairimort: give them enough democracy to look like we mean it and not enough to damage my ability to
Of course, the 50:50 model was the most HEAVILY DEFEATED vote of the night.
You can imagine the scene on the carpet in the Downing Street BUNKER late last night. Mr Man O' War stands there trembling while Lord Blairimort spells it out:
"Well… Jack… I was, y'know… going to kick you upstairs for your failure, but… gosh… looks like that's no longer an option! Furious eyes. Appointed haircut. Toe-on-the-pedal-that-works-the-piranha-pool twitch."
Ironically, this was also the one vote all night that Lord Blairimort deigned to turn up for in person. This just goes to show that the once ALL-CONQUERING Lord Blairimort is now so fatally out of touch that he can only carry just over a third of the Labour with him on a key policy.
Was his successor any better at judging the mood? Well, Mr Frown allowed himself to be seen in the lobbies voting against the wholly unelected upper chamber and then later to go though the aye lobby for 80%. Principled or canny? Or just a desire to stick one on Lord Blairimort by visibly saying "we should go further than you want, Tony"?
In fact the only potential Prime Minister to vote on each and every division was our own Sir Mr the Merciless.
(Mr Balloon clearly couldn't guess which way the wind was blowing on 60% and had to sit that one out!)
And it's very obvious that the whole Liberal Democratic party was united behind him on this – entirely as it should be since the LONG overdue reform of the British Constitution is a VERY important way to give more protection to people from over-mighty governments like Lord Blairimort's. And indeed, reform of the House of Lords Club is something we were kind of in the middle of when we were, er, asked to sit out the next NINETY YEARS of government. So it's about time we got stuck back in!
The Conservatories, on the other fluffy foot, were entirely ALL OVER THE PLACE and succeeded in being – on balance – AGAINST EVERY SINGLE ONE of the options given. Yes, even on the 80% elected option that Mr Balloon voted for, he only had the following of 80 of his fellows, while 98 were in the lobby against him, merrily cancelling him out.
They were just as split down the middle (80 to 103) on the all elected option, while other options were rejected rather more resoundingly.
So basically, the Conservatories would like either a super-quango or a nearly-properly democratic house but nothing in between and can't actually quite bring themselves to support either preference.
It's so nice to see that they're so FULLY committed to the representative democracy of the
Do PLEASE call us when you have made up your minds.
The Labour were no more united – except when it came to giving Mr Man O' War a decent kicking – but the voting did show something of a progression, starting with the Labour members two-to-one rejecting an all elected house and gradually moving into parity so that when it got to the 80% elected option they were 157 in favour to 162 against. A net vote of 5 against. Yes, on the 80% vote, the Labour cancelled themselves out even more effectively than the Conservatories.
This means, if you look at it, that that 38 majority on the call for an 80% elected House of Lords is pretty much ALL Liberal Democrats.
(Thank you also Plaid Cymru, Ms Claire "Independent Labour" Snort and Mr Gorgeous "Respect" Pussycat-Leotard for your various 5 votes in favour.)
Finally there is the HUGE swing around as the Labour turned on their heads and voted two-to-one in favour of a 100% elected chamber.
(This is, of course, quite consistent with the two-to-one vote against a 100% UNelected chamber.)
Mr Alex Salmon parades his troupe of six Scottish Nasties though the aye lobby to make some sort of point (they've been voting No, or possibly Nae, all evening); the Conservatories fall entirely to pieces, the Liberal Democrats remain united and we all go home laughing.
Whatever some people might say about it all being a trick by anti-reformers to wreck any possible House of Lords bill, you have to say it certainly LOOKS consistent with the will of the House being in favour of a fully elected democratic upper chamber.
PS
Actually, I say we all went home, but in fact there was one last vote on the order paper: the decision on whether to get rid of the remaining 90 (plus 2) Hereditary House of Lords Club members.This seems a pretty obvious step to take if you are moving to a new and democratic second chamber.
So, rather to my fluffy surprise, the measure to abolish the remaining Hereditaries was HEAVILY DEFEATED: 241 in favour to 329 against. Or, more accurately: ALL the Liberals and Conservatories in favour and ALL the Labour against[*].
([*]okay, five Labour did vote for abolition and eight Conservatories did vote against but in context this is almost nothing!)
So, the Labour united to NUKE their OWN suggestion to finish off the my-great-granddad-knew-Nell-Gwynne vote.
Why would they DO that?
Well, with our support Mrs Theresa May-NOT for the Conservatories HAD amended Mr Man O' Straw's proposal slightly so that the last Hereditary Lords would lose their votes only when the newly elected House took their place. Which seems fair enough, doesn't it?
After all, if they all suddenly went TODAY, then – because 42 of them are Conservatories – it would change the balance of the House of Lords Club. In fact, it would give the Labour a majority in the upper House (for the first time ever) and put a stop to any INCONVENIENT checks on Lord Blairimort's ABSOLUTE POWER.
But, NO ONE cold want such an UNFAIR thing to happen, could they?
Thursday, March 08, 2007
Day 2256: Guilty of Perverting the Course of Justice
Tuesday:
Nick, who's a mate of Dave, wanted to say to us that Mr X had said to him that he'd seen a note from Ruth to Jonathan that said that Jonathan should say to Tony that what Michael had said to John wasn't the same as what Ruth had said to John but before Nick could say that to us, John spoke to Peter who spoke to Caroline who told Nick that he couldn't say anything at all, so Nick (and Fiona and Kirsty and Jeremy and Huw) said nothing but Alan went and blabbed it all anyway.
Having cleared that up, here is unrelated news.
[our fluffy legal advisors would like to point out that I have NOT swapped the captions for comic effect!]
The evidence has proved that a senior aide to one of the leaders of the invasion of Iraq was lying to the investigation into wrongdoing by the government.
In America, this gets you set to gaol.
Nick, who's a mate of Dave, wanted to say to us that Mr X had said to him that he'd seen a note from Ruth to Jonathan that said that Jonathan should say to Tony that what Michael had said to John wasn't the same as what Ruth had said to John but before Nick could say that to us, John spoke to Peter who spoke to Caroline who told Nick that he couldn't say anything at all, so Nick (and Fiona and Kirsty and Jeremy and Huw) said nothing but Alan went and blabbed it all anyway.
Having cleared that up, here is unrelated news.
Innocent Until Proved Guilty
Proved Guilty
[our fluffy legal advisors would like to point out that I have NOT swapped the captions for comic effect!]
The evidence has proved that a senior aide to one of the leaders of the invasion of Iraq was lying to the investigation into wrongdoing by the government.
In America, this gets you set to gaol.
Day 2255: Lunar Eclipse NOT proof of divine intervention
Monday:
We stayed up late to watch the moon eclipse. We enjoyed it lots.
But then along comes Mr Clifford Clongley on the The Today Programme's Fart for the Day and says:
"Oooh, pretty – there must be a god!"
Worse than that, he talked about INTELLIGENT DESIGN.
"I don't mean whether it is good science – which I don't believe it is – but whether it is true – which I do believe."
Well, WAKE UP Mr Clongley: Intelligent Design CLAIMS to be a SCIENCE. If you DON'T believe it's good science then you DON'T believe it's true!
(Or possibly you don't know what you are talking about.)
If you're just an old fashioned CREATIONIST, then you believe that all of the different animals and plants and fungi were all individually created by god by hand:
Poof: humans. Poof: elephants. Poof: brontosaurus, no, scratch that one it's not going to fit on this ark plan I've got…
But then along comes PESKY science and says: well, actually there's another explanation which accounts for the reason why some animals are so like one another (like why create lions AND tigers when they are essentially the same evil cat monster?) or why some creatures do the same sort of thing but are totally different (like why create bats when you've already got birds?).
That explanation is called EVOLUTION.
It says (in really basic terms) that all creatures in a family are slightly different, and if some of them have a difference that gives them a better chance of having babies then over time the whole family will come to be more like that. Because different advantages apply in different places (say in one place there's lots of insects and in another there's lots of fruit) this causes what was one family to change into two different families.
This is why some creatures are similar (it's not been long since their families were one family) and why some different creatures end up doing the same thing (they've both been selected from having the right advantages to do that thing).
Evolution is a SCIENTIFIC THEORY. This means that it is a set of rules that are based on observed evidence and makes testable predictions that have been confirmed experimentally.
Creationism is not a scientific theory because you can't test it.
(Actually, Creationism's basic tenet that all life was created in the first six days of the world IS testable in the sense that the appearance of any new species ought to be impossible… except there are SO MANY species that it's difficult to PROVE that.)
Anyway, more importantly (if you are a CRAZED THEOCRAT) Evolution gets taught in SCHOOLS in the science class and Creationism doesn't.
This is true even in America thanks to their Constitution wisely having a SEPARATION of CHURCH AND STATE written into it. (And alarmingly it is not always true HERE where there's nothing to stop Lord Blairimort's bonkers, nutty friend Mr Vardey teaching creationism alongside the national curriculum in his city McAcademies!)
This, however, is a bit of a THREAT to the Creationist way of thinking. What, they correctly realise, will happen if our kids start thinking for themselves. Why ANYTHING could happen!
So they campaign very hard to get evolution banned from being taught or to get biblical creationism taught alongside it or to insist on stupid stickers on textbooks saying "This is only a theory".
(As I have said before, you may try putting the Theory of Gravitation to similar test by jumping out of a window and shouting "this is only a theory… arrrgh splatt!")
And then they hit on a BRILLIANT NEW WHEEZE: Let us create a "Science" that gets creationism into the classroom by the back door. This they called "Intelligent Design".
The wheeze (it's not a theory) goes like this: if you find a watch in the desert it is such a complicated thing that your assumption is that it must have been made by someone and left there; it is certainly more likely than it having appeared spontaneously out of the movement of the sand and wind.
Similarly (THEY SAY) there are some parts of living things that are "too complicated" to have come about by random rearrangement of genes and proteins. So, in the same way, they would have you assume that living things (or at least the "too complicated" bits) must have been made by someone.
Of course, it's NONSENSE. If you find a watch in the desert you assume it's designed BECAUSE YOU KNOW WHAT A WATCH IS AND YOU KNOW THAT THEY ARE DESIGNED!
(And by "KNOW" I mean "have established as a fact based on observation and capable of being proved by reference to evidence" and NOT "a feeling you've got based on a story in an old book"!).
Almost every one of the things that the supporters of I.D. have come up with as "too complicated" or "irreducibly complex" as they call it, have in fact been explained by evolutionary science. Their big favourite used to be the eye and that was explained AGES AGO.
And it's STILL not a proper scientific theory because it STILL doesn't come up with testable predictions. It just gives them something new to whine on about.
So, anyway, for Mr Clongly's benefit: Intelligent Design's BASIC CLAIM is "this is a science" (hence: you must teach this in school).
So if you don't thinks it's a science YOU DON'T THINK IT'S TRUE.
QED
(That's science talk for: Quick Elephant Demolition!)
And meanwhile, we have been very much enjoying Mr Stodge keeping us up to date with the latest mental loop-the-loops in I.D world!
We stayed up late to watch the moon eclipse. We enjoyed it lots.
But then along comes Mr Clifford Clongley on the The Today Programme's Fart for the Day and says:
"Oooh, pretty – there must be a god!"
Worse than that, he talked about INTELLIGENT DESIGN.
"I don't mean whether it is good science – which I don't believe it is – but whether it is true – which I do believe."
Well, WAKE UP Mr Clongley: Intelligent Design CLAIMS to be a SCIENCE. If you DON'T believe it's good science then you DON'T believe it's true!
(Or possibly you don't know what you are talking about.)
If you're just an old fashioned CREATIONIST, then you believe that all of the different animals and plants and fungi were all individually created by god by hand:
Poof: humans. Poof: elephants. Poof: brontosaurus, no, scratch that one it's not going to fit on this ark plan I've got…
But then along comes PESKY science and says: well, actually there's another explanation which accounts for the reason why some animals are so like one another (like why create lions AND tigers when they are essentially the same evil cat monster?) or why some creatures do the same sort of thing but are totally different (like why create bats when you've already got birds?).
That explanation is called EVOLUTION.
It says (in really basic terms) that all creatures in a family are slightly different, and if some of them have a difference that gives them a better chance of having babies then over time the whole family will come to be more like that. Because different advantages apply in different places (say in one place there's lots of insects and in another there's lots of fruit) this causes what was one family to change into two different families.
This is why some creatures are similar (it's not been long since their families were one family) and why some different creatures end up doing the same thing (they've both been selected from having the right advantages to do that thing).
Evolution is a SCIENTIFIC THEORY. This means that it is a set of rules that are based on observed evidence and makes testable predictions that have been confirmed experimentally.
Creationism is not a scientific theory because you can't test it.
(Actually, Creationism's basic tenet that all life was created in the first six days of the world IS testable in the sense that the appearance of any new species ought to be impossible… except there are SO MANY species that it's difficult to PROVE that.)
Anyway, more importantly (if you are a CRAZED THEOCRAT) Evolution gets taught in SCHOOLS in the science class and Creationism doesn't.
This is true even in America thanks to their Constitution wisely having a SEPARATION of CHURCH AND STATE written into it. (And alarmingly it is not always true HERE where there's nothing to stop Lord Blairimort's bonkers, nutty friend Mr Vardey teaching creationism alongside the national curriculum in his city McAcademies!)
This, however, is a bit of a THREAT to the Creationist way of thinking. What, they correctly realise, will happen if our kids start thinking for themselves. Why ANYTHING could happen!
So they campaign very hard to get evolution banned from being taught or to get biblical creationism taught alongside it or to insist on stupid stickers on textbooks saying "This is only a theory".
(As I have said before, you may try putting the Theory of Gravitation to similar test by jumping out of a window and shouting "this is only a theory… arrrgh splatt!")
And then they hit on a BRILLIANT NEW WHEEZE: Let us create a "Science" that gets creationism into the classroom by the back door. This they called "Intelligent Design".
The wheeze (it's not a theory) goes like this: if you find a watch in the desert it is such a complicated thing that your assumption is that it must have been made by someone and left there; it is certainly more likely than it having appeared spontaneously out of the movement of the sand and wind.
Similarly (THEY SAY) there are some parts of living things that are "too complicated" to have come about by random rearrangement of genes and proteins. So, in the same way, they would have you assume that living things (or at least the "too complicated" bits) must have been made by someone.
Of course, it's NONSENSE. If you find a watch in the desert you assume it's designed BECAUSE YOU KNOW WHAT A WATCH IS AND YOU KNOW THAT THEY ARE DESIGNED!
(And by "KNOW" I mean "have established as a fact based on observation and capable of being proved by reference to evidence" and NOT "a feeling you've got based on a story in an old book"!).
Almost every one of the things that the supporters of I.D. have come up with as "too complicated" or "irreducibly complex" as they call it, have in fact been explained by evolutionary science. Their big favourite used to be the eye and that was explained AGES AGO.
And it's STILL not a proper scientific theory because it STILL doesn't come up with testable predictions. It just gives them something new to whine on about.
So, anyway, for Mr Clongly's benefit: Intelligent Design's BASIC CLAIM is "this is a science" (hence: you must teach this in school).
So if you don't thinks it's a science YOU DON'T THINK IT'S TRUE.
QED
(That's science talk for: Quick Elephant Demolition!)
And meanwhile, we have been very much enjoying Mr Stodge keeping us up to date with the latest mental loop-the-loops in I.D world!
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Day 2254: Total Eclipse of the Ming
Sunday:
Well, at LEAST it wasn't the Trident Atomic Missiles that EXPLODED in our faces!
It has been a bit of an up and down few days for Sir Mr the Merciless, hasn't it? First, he did jolly well on Questionable Time, then he walked into a drubbing from the Newsnight Show, but then he turned the Trident debate around leading from the front, only to have his leader's speech overshadowed by confusion over doing a deal with Mr Frown.
(In this context "confusion over policy" can be translated as "we journalists aren't going to admit to taking a wrong steer".)
I have to admit, my first reaction to hearing the "five tests for a coalition with Labour" spin version was a Homer Simpson/Darth Vader-esque:
"Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
Once Daddy Alex had found a stepladder and pried me down off of the ceiling, however, I thought again and decided that I was COMPLETELY RIGHT the first time!
This Labour government is probably about as ILLIBERAL as you can go without ordering black uniforms and shiny boots. The thought of doing a deal with them – not just with them but with one of the principal architects of the NuLabour "Project" – is TOTALLY HORRID!
How can we even THINK of having a coalition with them?
In fact, we have to face TWO important questions:
Is it REALLY conceivable that we could go into government with Mr Frown's Labour?
And
Is it REALLY INconceivable that we could go into government with Mr Balloon's Conservatories?
The DANGER of Sir Mr the Merciless speech is that it looks like answering YES to both questions.
The core of that speech is his quickly INFAMOUS five tests for Mr Frown.
(1. Are you frowning? 2. Do you bite your nails? 3. Is your mouth hanging open? 4. Are you sulking? 5. Do you have the natural charisma of a dead undertaker? If yes to all five, you are Mr Frown!)
We all know that this was a VERY FUNNY joke about Mr Frown's own "five tests": five impossible things to do before breakfast if you want to join the Euro – and in that sense, it is saying "here are five things that Mr Frown will NEVER EVER do which is why were are NEVER EVER entering a coalition with him!"
But HONESTLY, we have had ten years of the Labour in government and they have come up SERIOUSLY WANTING. Do we really need more TESTS?
And dismissing the Conservatories with a single "Are the Conservatories up to this same challenge? Of course not" appears UNBALANCED – and that opens the door a CRACK to letting people think that you favour Mr Frown a wee bit but Mr Balloon not one jot.
The true tests for the Conservatories surely should be the SAME, but with ONE MORE: have some policies so that we can TELL whether you have changed or not!
And maybe we should even just consider calling Mr Balloon's bluff on this one – ask him if HE wouldn't be willing to join US in a coalition. After all, we know already that he thinks that several Liberal Democrat MPs are BETTER than any of his Conservatory candidates.
(Personally, I do not think that the Conservatories could BEAR the idea of being in a coalition with us, so often do they pour scorn upon us, but maybe some of them are a bit more grown up than their more outspoken colleagues. Hmmm, interesting choice for Mr Balloon: irritate a whole load of loud-mouthed Conservatory reactionaries – and simultaneously surrender in every Liberal/Conservatory marginal – or repudiate his whole Liberal Conservatory persona.)
On the other fluffy foot, although we would certainly get some publicity from the SHOCK VALUE of suggesting we might consider a coalition with the Conservatories, we would be giving entirely too much CREDIBILITY to Mr Balloon in advance of him having a policy on anything at all.
(One of Sir Mr the Merciless' BEST moments was on Questionable Time when, as Auntie Maude shrivelled under cross-examination on the Conservatories' latest marriage-related-tax-break whimsy, he said "no wonder they don't have any policies – as soon as they announce something it unravels within 48 hours". In fact, it was less than 24 hours later that Mr Boy George Osborne was already rowing back, saying they HADN'T DECIDED what the policy actually was yet.)
Because that is the problem of talking up coalitions: it stops us talking about OUR agenda and just makes us a support act for one or both of the other two.
We get little enough coverage as it is. Journalists are usually pretty bright sorts of people, but they do seem to have a habit of treating their readers and viewers as though they are FIVE.
Some of us are SEVEN you know! [R: six, but the point still stands.]
You do not need to talk to us like there are only two nice easy choices. We can cope with a third idea! And if a third idea comes along, well it's not got to lean to one side or the other; it can stand on its own.
But we're not doing ourselves any favours if we make picking sides look like something we're interested in. Because it will let them carry on pretending it is all we are about.
The Sainted Oscar may have said: "There's only one thing worse than being talked about and that is not being talked about" but he hadn't thought of the possibility of only being talked about to talk about someone ELSE!
So what SHOULD you say?
"The outcome of a general election is in the hands of the people, and we should trust them to make their decision when the time comes. To ask about horse-trading in a hypothetical hung parliament after an election that hasn't even been called yet is to take the electorate for granted and I'm never going to do that. People want to hear about our policies. Why aren't you asking me about the environment, or crime, or taxation. These are the questions that matter to people. And on the subject of the environment/crime/taxation just this week I've announced new policies to tackle…"
Well, at LEAST it wasn't the Trident Atomic Missiles that EXPLODED in our faces!
It has been a bit of an up and down few days for Sir Mr the Merciless, hasn't it? First, he did jolly well on Questionable Time, then he walked into a drubbing from the Newsnight Show, but then he turned the Trident debate around leading from the front, only to have his leader's speech overshadowed by confusion over doing a deal with Mr Frown.
(In this context "confusion over policy" can be translated as "we journalists aren't going to admit to taking a wrong steer".)
I have to admit, my first reaction to hearing the "five tests for a coalition with Labour" spin version was a Homer Simpson/Darth Vader-esque:
"Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
Once Daddy Alex had found a stepladder and pried me down off of the ceiling, however, I thought again and decided that I was COMPLETELY RIGHT the first time!
This Labour government is probably about as ILLIBERAL as you can go without ordering black uniforms and shiny boots. The thought of doing a deal with them – not just with them but with one of the principal architects of the NuLabour "Project" – is TOTALLY HORRID!
How can we even THINK of having a coalition with them?
In fact, we have to face TWO important questions:
Is it REALLY conceivable that we could go into government with Mr Frown's Labour?
And
Is it REALLY INconceivable that we could go into government with Mr Balloon's Conservatories?
The DANGER of Sir Mr the Merciless speech is that it looks like answering YES to both questions.
The core of that speech is his quickly INFAMOUS five tests for Mr Frown.
(1. Are you frowning? 2. Do you bite your nails? 3. Is your mouth hanging open? 4. Are you sulking? 5. Do you have the natural charisma of a dead undertaker? If yes to all five, you are Mr Frown!)
We all know that this was a VERY FUNNY joke about Mr Frown's own "five tests": five impossible things to do before breakfast if you want to join the Euro – and in that sense, it is saying "here are five things that Mr Frown will NEVER EVER do which is why were are NEVER EVER entering a coalition with him!"
But HONESTLY, we have had ten years of the Labour in government and they have come up SERIOUSLY WANTING. Do we really need more TESTS?
And dismissing the Conservatories with a single "Are the Conservatories up to this same challenge? Of course not" appears UNBALANCED – and that opens the door a CRACK to letting people think that you favour Mr Frown a wee bit but Mr Balloon not one jot.
The true tests for the Conservatories surely should be the SAME, but with ONE MORE: have some policies so that we can TELL whether you have changed or not!
And maybe we should even just consider calling Mr Balloon's bluff on this one – ask him if HE wouldn't be willing to join US in a coalition. After all, we know already that he thinks that several Liberal Democrat MPs are BETTER than any of his Conservatory candidates.
(Personally, I do not think that the Conservatories could BEAR the idea of being in a coalition with us, so often do they pour scorn upon us, but maybe some of them are a bit more grown up than their more outspoken colleagues. Hmmm, interesting choice for Mr Balloon: irritate a whole load of loud-mouthed Conservatory reactionaries – and simultaneously surrender in every Liberal/Conservatory marginal – or repudiate his whole Liberal Conservatory persona.)
On the other fluffy foot, although we would certainly get some publicity from the SHOCK VALUE of suggesting we might consider a coalition with the Conservatories, we would be giving entirely too much CREDIBILITY to Mr Balloon in advance of him having a policy on anything at all.
(One of Sir Mr the Merciless' BEST moments was on Questionable Time when, as Auntie Maude shrivelled under cross-examination on the Conservatories' latest marriage-related-tax-break whimsy, he said "no wonder they don't have any policies – as soon as they announce something it unravels within 48 hours". In fact, it was less than 24 hours later that Mr Boy George Osborne was already rowing back, saying they HADN'T DECIDED what the policy actually was yet.)
Because that is the problem of talking up coalitions: it stops us talking about OUR agenda and just makes us a support act for one or both of the other two.
We get little enough coverage as it is. Journalists are usually pretty bright sorts of people, but they do seem to have a habit of treating their readers and viewers as though they are FIVE.
Some of us are SEVEN you know! [R: six, but the point still stands.]
You do not need to talk to us like there are only two nice easy choices. We can cope with a third idea! And if a third idea comes along, well it's not got to lean to one side or the other; it can stand on its own.
But we're not doing ourselves any favours if we make picking sides look like something we're interested in. Because it will let them carry on pretending it is all we are about.
The Sainted Oscar may have said: "There's only one thing worse than being talked about and that is not being talked about" but he hadn't thought of the possibility of only being talked about to talk about someone ELSE!
Five ways to answer THAT question:
Mr Charles always managed to deflect the "hung parliament question" with aplomb, but then in fairness after 1997 it never looked like the Labour were likely to lose their majority, mainly thanks to the inadequacies of the Conservatories. Right now, though, the outcome of the next election looks like it could be a toss up between Mr Frown squeaking home with a tiny majority – or minority! – or Mr Balloon managing to come in with most seats. And that makes the "hung parliament question" much more of a HOT TOPIC.So what SHOULD you say?
1. Push your own agenda instead
"Well, Kirsty/Jeremy/Ant&Dec, I want to deliver Liberal Democrat policies for the people of Britain. Just this week I'm talking about how We Can Cut Crime/make the Green Tax Switch/…"2. Dismiss the premise
"You already know my answer to this. I'm not interested in making deals after the next election. I'm interested in getting as many votes and as many seat for the Liberal Democrats as I can. And people should know that they can trust us to deliver Liberal Democrat polices in return."3. Differentiate ourselves from the NuToryLabour parties
"At the moment, Mr Balloon looks like he's already in a coalition with Lord Blairimort, supporting the government on education, taxation, benefits, Iraq… Only the Liberal Democrats are a distinctive voice for change, a change that people are crying out for."4. Attack the question
"If this IS a legitimate question, why do you never ask Lord Blairimort or Mr Balloon whether they would try do a deal with us or each other in the event of a hung parliament? Surely it is more urgent to know what THEY would do to get over the winning line.""The outcome of a general election is in the hands of the people, and we should trust them to make their decision when the time comes. To ask about horse-trading in a hypothetical hung parliament after an election that hasn't even been called yet is to take the electorate for granted and I'm never going to do that. People want to hear about our policies. Why aren't you asking me about the environment, or crime, or taxation. These are the questions that matter to people. And on the subject of the environment/crime/taxation just this week I've announced new policies to tackle…"
5. Be Honest
"We would have to wait and see. At the moment we couldn't work with either of them, but things can change. In 1997 I was in favour of a coalition with Labour if it would get rid of the Conservatories and that is no longer the case. There are parts of the Labour Party's agenda that are wholly unacceptable to us – I.D.iot cards, centralisation, all this testing. But the Conservatory policy remains a total mystery to everyone; we hope that Mr Balloon actually spells out his position on the issues, but until then there is just no telling what they stand for. So in the end we might not find ourselves able to work with either of them. In which case we would just continue to do what we've always done – vote on the issues based on our Liberal principles to protect the freedom of the individual and to curb arbitrary power."
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Day 2252: Spot the Difference
Friday:
Yes, one of these images is an ARTIST’S IMPRESSION because the ORIGINAL photo has been BANNED.
Yes, one of these images is an ARTIST’S IMPRESSION because the ORIGINAL photo has been BANNED.
PS
Mr Balloon’s past at Eton isn’t the only thing we’re not allowed to talk about today!Friday, March 02, 2007
Day 2251: Sky(ve) Off – Virgin on the Ridiculous
Thursday:
Viewers of that FLEETING Twenty-First Century Phenomenon, TELEVISION, will probably know that there has been a bit of a FALLING OUT between two of the PYGMIES of British Broadcasting: "Virgin Media" (the cable people) and "BSkyB" (the satellite dish people).
Up until Wednesday, if you were a cable person you could watch SOME of the satellite people's programmes. Now you can't.
Apparently, this is because Sky wanted more money and Virgin didn't think they were worth it.
I will declare an interest: I do not watch Sky television. I do not LIKE Sky television. I will not let Daddy have one of their space-woks stuck to the side of my flat!
[R: not that we want one.]
We quickly got bored with Battleham Galacticake so we don't even watch the free one, Sky Three. I do not like Sky. They have a few decent shows, but they get them unfairly cheap because of their links to Fox in America. Their news channel is ugly and brash and has a right-wing agenda. And they are part of a group – News International – that has gone out of its way to spoil and cheapen newspapers and television. And they have too much influence already.
So, funnily enough – and despite Virgin Media being run by self-aggrandising beardy billionaire Sir Branson Pickle – I don’t have much SYMPATHY with one of the sides in this dispute.
Still, they DO seem to be going out of their way to be annoying. Rather than negotiations, it would appear that Sky have spent the last few days writing big letters to place in all the newspapers, saying how MUCH they love telly and how much they want to bring their "great shows" like "brand new" Simpsons, Lost, 24 and Battleham Galacticake.
We have increased our investment in channels and programmes by 68% they say! (Does this mean that "Hogfather" was FOUR hours long instead of THREE?)
They say that this is why they have provided the top 25 most watch pay-channel programmes in cable homes this year. Although personally (and remembering that "Torchwood" was hailed as the "most watched non-sport digital-channel show" when its launch double bill scored 2.3 millions) I suspect that it is because they have BOUGHT ALL the FOOTBALL.
Sky say that it is ALL Virgin's fault for dropping their channels, as only Virgin can choose what is on their cable.
(I am sure that the Sky people felt the same when they dropped the BBC news from their satellite in the '90s at the behest of the Chinese government.)
The Sky people tried SOOOOO hard to make a deal – they say – even "including proposing a way for Sky to retail channels directly to cable customers in a way that would cost Virgin Media nothing."
Hang on, Sky is saying that they want Virgin to supply and maintain the cables so that Sky can sell their channels and take ALL the money themselves. I wonder why Virgin did not agree to this idea!
Actually, this is not an unfamiliar Sky strategy. Sky have already announced that they will be PULLING their programmes from the FREEVIEW package too, although they spin replacing free telly with a pay-to-view service as "bringing their top shows to terrestrial digital". In this case, Sky want the BBC to play patsy – maintaining the transmitter network for Sky to cream off the profits.
In fact, for people who profess to LOVE television, they have made an AWFUL LOT OF EFFORT over the years to STOP PEOPLE WATCHING: what with grabbing exclusive broadcasts for themselves and trying to deny other channels access to their satellites or burying their channel listings.
You could be forgiven for thinking that when they say "competition keeps us on our toes" they actually mean "we want to see the competition sleeping with the fishes"! Particularly since in 1999 News International were found guilty of anti-competitive practices by the Office of Fair Trade.
Still, I'm sure Virgin Viewers were VERY upset to lose Thursday evening's quadruple bill of "The Simpsons" followed by three hours of reheated American imports about (a) a pathologist and a cop, (b) a fireman, and (c) a team of cops and pathologists.
And this weekend they will be forced to live without Saturday's Primetime offering of a double bill of "The Simpsons in Space" "Futurama"[*] and ANOTHER three hours of reheated American imports, this time about (a) that pathologist and cop again, (b) a psychotic anti-terrorist agent, and (c) a team of plastic surgeons. Oh, not forgetting the highlight of the evening, and Sky's contribution to "original television" for Saturday: 8pm – "Project Catwalk", billed as:
"Kelly Osbourne hosts a search for Britain's hottest new designer, aided by fashion gurus including Julien Macdonald and Ben de Lisi."
How will the Virgin viewers cope without THAT!
[*]Okay, "Futurama" is actually very good – but you can get ALL four seasons of it on DVD; not sure how "brand new" that makes it!
Viewers of that FLEETING Twenty-First Century Phenomenon, TELEVISION, will probably know that there has been a bit of a FALLING OUT between two of the PYGMIES of British Broadcasting: "Virgin Media" (the cable people) and "BSkyB" (the satellite dish people).
Up until Wednesday, if you were a cable person you could watch SOME of the satellite people's programmes. Now you can't.
Apparently, this is because Sky wanted more money and Virgin didn't think they were worth it.
I will declare an interest: I do not watch Sky television. I do not LIKE Sky television. I will not let Daddy have one of their space-woks stuck to the side of my flat!
[R: not that we want one.]
We quickly got bored with Battleham Galacticake so we don't even watch the free one, Sky Three. I do not like Sky. They have a few decent shows, but they get them unfairly cheap because of their links to Fox in America. Their news channel is ugly and brash and has a right-wing agenda. And they are part of a group – News International – that has gone out of its way to spoil and cheapen newspapers and television. And they have too much influence already.
So, funnily enough – and despite Virgin Media being run by self-aggrandising beardy billionaire Sir Branson Pickle – I don’t have much SYMPATHY with one of the sides in this dispute.
Still, they DO seem to be going out of their way to be annoying. Rather than negotiations, it would appear that Sky have spent the last few days writing big letters to place in all the newspapers, saying how MUCH they love telly and how much they want to bring their "great shows" like "brand new" Simpsons, Lost, 24 and Battleham Galacticake.
We have increased our investment in channels and programmes by 68% they say! (Does this mean that "Hogfather" was FOUR hours long instead of THREE?)
They say that this is why they have provided the top 25 most watch pay-channel programmes in cable homes this year. Although personally (and remembering that "Torchwood" was hailed as the "most watched non-sport digital-channel show" when its launch double bill scored 2.3 millions) I suspect that it is because they have BOUGHT ALL the FOOTBALL.
Sky say that it is ALL Virgin's fault for dropping their channels, as only Virgin can choose what is on their cable.
(I am sure that the Sky people felt the same when they dropped the BBC news from their satellite in the '90s at the behest of the Chinese government.)
The Sky people tried SOOOOO hard to make a deal – they say – even "including proposing a way for Sky to retail channels directly to cable customers in a way that would cost Virgin Media nothing."
Hang on, Sky is saying that they want Virgin to supply and maintain the cables so that Sky can sell their channels and take ALL the money themselves. I wonder why Virgin did not agree to this idea!
Actually, this is not an unfamiliar Sky strategy. Sky have already announced that they will be PULLING their programmes from the FREEVIEW package too, although they spin replacing free telly with a pay-to-view service as "bringing their top shows to terrestrial digital". In this case, Sky want the BBC to play patsy – maintaining the transmitter network for Sky to cream off the profits.
In fact, for people who profess to LOVE television, they have made an AWFUL LOT OF EFFORT over the years to STOP PEOPLE WATCHING: what with grabbing exclusive broadcasts for themselves and trying to deny other channels access to their satellites or burying their channel listings.
You could be forgiven for thinking that when they say "competition keeps us on our toes" they actually mean "we want to see the competition sleeping with the fishes"! Particularly since in 1999 News International were found guilty of anti-competitive practices by the Office of Fair Trade.
Still, I'm sure Virgin Viewers were VERY upset to lose Thursday evening's quadruple bill of "The Simpsons" followed by three hours of reheated American imports about (a) a pathologist and a cop, (b) a fireman, and (c) a team of cops and pathologists.
And this weekend they will be forced to live without Saturday's Primetime offering of a double bill of "
"Kelly Osbourne hosts a search for Britain's hottest new designer, aided by fashion gurus including Julien Macdonald and Ben de Lisi."
How will the Virgin viewers cope without THAT!
[*]Okay, "Futurama" is actually very good – but you can get ALL four seasons of it on DVD; not sure how "brand new" that makes it!
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Day 2250: Mysteries of Doctor Who James Bond 007 Why DOES Mr Goldfinger explain Operation Grand Slam to the Hoods when he's going to kill them?
Wednesday:
We all know that GOLDFINGER is the BEST FILM of ALL TIME.
And GOLDFINGER is also the BEST THEME TUNE of ALL TIME.
FACT.
But every now and then, as I watch it, it pains me to admit that I worry a little that some of it does not ENTIRELY make SENSE.
The bit that is hardest to get my fluffy head around is the scene on the Kentucky ranch, subtly named Auric Stud, when half the mafia gangs of America turn up to demand payment for the little jobs that Mr Auric Goldfinger has been having them do.
Mr G invites them all into his RUMPUS ROOM and proceeds to explain to them in complete detail the plan to rob the US Gold Depository at Fort Knox.
The only thing is, five minutes later he gasses the lot of them.
Would it not have been quicker to SKIP the lecture and nobble them straight away?
Daddy Richard has a PRACTICAL explanation.
What Mr Goldfinger REALLY wants to do is GAS the Hoods and get rid of them. But these are DANGEROUS CRIMINALS who are not easily lured into a CONFINED AIRTIGHT BOX.
So instead, he welcomes them into his rumpus room with its big airy windows and open doors. It does not seem DANGEROUS because there are plenty of exits and they can see anyone coming.
Then, once he has them all together, he makes his personal appearance and throws them off balance by offering them ten million dollars each in gold and then he starts playing with his KEN ADAM designed box of tricks: flipping over the billiard table to become a control panel, raising his big toy Fort Knox from the floor, and – SIGNIFICANTLY – shuttering the windows and closing the doors, all under cover of turning the spotlights on to the model.
The Hoods are alarmed, but also confused. They do not feel threatened because Mr Goldfinger is in there, alone and apparently unarmed, certainly outnumbered.
Then Mr Goldfinger does his little spiel:
"Man has climbed Mount Everest. Gone to the bottom of the ocean. He has fired rockets at the Moon. Split the atom. [Blah, blah, evil blah!] Achieved miracles in every field of human endeavour... EXCEPT CRIME!"
He puts them off their guard again and they all relax, thinking about the idea of robbing Fort Knox rather than expecting any trouble.
Now, all Mr Goldfinger needs is a PRETEXT, and handily Mr Solo provides him with one by demanding an out. Mr Solo leaves alone.
(Incidentally, you can tell that Mr Goldfinger is VERY, VERY EVIL because he squashes a PERFECTLY GOOD CAR! It is not like he even NEEDS to too, since his manservant BOB-A-JOB has ALREADY SHOT Mr Solo. In fact, maybe Bob-a-job has a wicked sense of humour since he is really only making it difficult for Mr Goldfinger to get his gold back!)
Anyway, out trots Mr Goldfinger to arrange a ton of gold and a punning death for one crook, and the others are left behind, not realising that they are now inside a BOX. One flip of a switch and it is all NERVE GAS and EXPRESSIONIST LIGHTING. Goodnight Mr Midnight, buckle up Mr Strap.
Well, that might seem like an explanation, but frankly the gangsters are all just a bit too RUBBISH to be worth the effort. Look how they just bumble around going "The gas! The gas! Urrgh! Thump!"
So, Daddy Alex has a PSYCHOLOGICAL explanation.
Daddy has spotted something so subtle it may have gone unnoticed: Mr Goldfinger is a RAVING MONOMANIAC! He loves to hear the sound of his own voice, and loves to show off just how clever he is.
Notice his several moments of SELF-CONGRATULATORY smugness throughout the film: "Oh, I own the club," he says when Bob-a-job has decapitated a statue on the golf course; "we were quite right to keep Mr Bond alive," he preens when the CIA are spotted watching the ranch; and so on.
Most importantly, guess what he says when Mr James is discovered to have been underneath the Fort Knox model:
"Operation Grand Slam," says Mr James, "I did enjoy your briefing."
"Sho did I," says Mr G with a little skip of happiness as he leaves Mr James in the hands of his guards.
That is the key to this explanation. Mr Goldfinger gives his whole lecture for the benefit of HIMSELF. He likes to show off how clever he is and how bold his plan.
Of course, following the old gold adage, if he tells you, then he has to kill you.
(In fact, the fact that Mr James is the ONLY person apart from Mr Goldfinger who knows the WHOLE plan, might also explain how, by telling someone else later, he is able to convert her to his side!)
I think that this is a GOOD explanation, but it turns out that this is not right either!
Because now we have listened to the commentary on my DVD and we know the REAL explanation.
Mr Goldfinger explains the plot… because he is in a MOVIE.
Yes, like the Mitchell and Webb's fourth wall breaking Nazi Stormtroopers, Mr Goldfinger realises that that he is the BADDIE.
And so it is down to him to do the EXPOSITION SCENE so that Mr James – and the audience! – can know what is going on!
Well, that's a bit LAME you might say, but be FAIR: the writers had been doing lots of little tweaks to Mr Fleming's original novel in order to improve things here and there. Mr James's REVERIE about a mission to Mexico becomes the EXCITING (and somewhat more EXPLOSIVE, not to mention "SHOCKING!") mini-adventure of the pre-title sequence. In the book, the fate of Jill Masterson is merely reported to Mr James once he meets her sister in Switzerland; for the film this is transformed into one of THE iconic moments of the cinema – the GOLDEN GIRL.
(And DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME, boys and girls. You may think that it is an URBAN MYTH that people suffocate if their skin is painted, but we watched a television programme recently where they tried this on a scientist and within minutes he was suffering the symptoms of anoxia!)
And Jill's sister Tilly survives rather longer as Bond's helpful sidekick with the pair of them actually being HIRED by Mr Goldfinger to help his plan.
Well, the writers of the movie wanted to turn the tables on Mr James completely at the mid-point of the film, so instead of following the book, they shock everyone by having Bob-a-job KILL Miss Tilly, and instead of Mr Goldfinger being a BIT THICK and hiring Mr James, they make him seem SUPER COOL by having him take Mr James prisoner.
As the commentary says, the logic of most films is turned upside down: instead of Mr Goldfinger being a powerful figure who Mr James gradually builds up to defeating, in Goldfinger, Mr James HUMILIATES Auric G not once, but twice in the first half, meaning that when Mr Goldfinger THEN beats him we REALLY RESPECT the car-crushing, gold-guzzling loon!
Actually, that's another thing that's NOT REALLY TRUE.
All that "He loves only gold!" bit in the theme song. It is a BLUFF!
The central CONCEIT of the film is that Mr Auric Goldfinger is ADDICTED to GOLD. Look at his NAME for goodness' sake. He even says as much to Mr James – while aiming an industrial laser at his wibbly bits.
"This is gold, Mr Bond. All my life I have been in love with it, its divine heaviness."
But this is a FIB.
Mr Goldfinger's REAL addictions are money and power. Gold is merely a means to an end: he is not interested in its acquisition for its own sake.
If he REALLY valued gold above anything else, why would he plan to NUKE so much of it in Fort Knox? He does not even take a single bar as a memento! (Though Daddy Alex has a good explanation for this too – what he calls the CHOCOLATE BAR REASON!)
No, he gives himself away when he – conservatively estimates – a ten times increase in the VALUE of his own gold.
Anyway, never mind THAT. Mr James spoils Mr Goldfinger's card scam; Mr James robs Mr Goldfinger on the gold course; and then Mr Goldfinger totally overwhelms Mr James, smashes up his WONDERFUL CAR, takes him prisoner and never lets him regain the upper hand.
Or as Daddy Richard put it: the first two are what Mr Goldfinger does in his LEISURE TIME; taking over the world is what he does PROFESSIONALLY.
This makes for a GREAT movie. Unfortunately, there is one little snag: since Mr James is no longer pretending to work for Mr Goldfinger, there is no reason for Mr Goldfinger to explain to him the PLOT!
Oh, and the book's got lots of gangsters in it too, better give them a CAMEO before we replace them with sinister Red Chinese.
And so, the rumpus room scene is born.
Now, all you need to add is Ken Adam!
But this is not a problem. She is OBVIOUSLY British Secret Agent MRS CATHY GALE undercover!
Who but MR STEED could put her in a position where she has to say: "My name is Pussy Galore!" with a straight face?
NB: Mrs Gale is the ONLY PERSON IN THE WORLD who can do this!
.
We all know that GOLDFINGER is the BEST FILM of ALL TIME.
And GOLDFINGER is also the BEST THEME TUNE of ALL TIME.
FACT.
But every now and then, as I watch it, it pains me to admit that I worry a little that some of it does not ENTIRELY make SENSE.
The bit that is hardest to get my fluffy head around is the scene on the Kentucky ranch, subtly named Auric Stud, when half the mafia gangs of America turn up to demand payment for the little jobs that Mr Auric Goldfinger has been having them do.
Mr G invites them all into his RUMPUS ROOM and proceeds to explain to them in complete detail the plan to rob the US Gold Depository at Fort Knox.
The only thing is, five minutes later he gasses the lot of them.
Would it not have been quicker to SKIP the lecture and nobble them straight away?
Daddy Richard has a PRACTICAL explanation.
What Mr Goldfinger REALLY wants to do is GAS the Hoods and get rid of them. But these are DANGEROUS CRIMINALS who are not easily lured into a CONFINED AIRTIGHT BOX.
So instead, he welcomes them into his rumpus room with its big airy windows and open doors. It does not seem DANGEROUS because there are plenty of exits and they can see anyone coming.
Then, once he has them all together, he makes his personal appearance and throws them off balance by offering them ten million dollars each in gold and then he starts playing with his KEN ADAM designed box of tricks: flipping over the billiard table to become a control panel, raising his big toy Fort Knox from the floor, and – SIGNIFICANTLY – shuttering the windows and closing the doors, all under cover of turning the spotlights on to the model.
The Hoods are alarmed, but also confused. They do not feel threatened because Mr Goldfinger is in there, alone and apparently unarmed, certainly outnumbered.
Then Mr Goldfinger does his little spiel:
"Man has climbed Mount Everest. Gone to the bottom of the ocean. He has fired rockets at the Moon. Split the atom. [Blah, blah, evil blah!] Achieved miracles in every field of human endeavour... EXCEPT CRIME!"
He puts them off their guard again and they all relax, thinking about the idea of robbing Fort Knox rather than expecting any trouble.
Now, all Mr Goldfinger needs is a PRETEXT, and handily Mr Solo provides him with one by demanding an out. Mr Solo leaves alone.
(Incidentally, you can tell that Mr Goldfinger is VERY, VERY EVIL because he squashes a PERFECTLY GOOD CAR! It is not like he even NEEDS to too, since his manservant BOB-A-JOB has ALREADY SHOT Mr Solo. In fact, maybe Bob-a-job has a wicked sense of humour since he is really only making it difficult for Mr Goldfinger to get his gold back!)
Anyway, out trots Mr Goldfinger to arrange a ton of gold and a punning death for one crook, and the others are left behind, not realising that they are now inside a BOX. One flip of a switch and it is all NERVE GAS and EXPRESSIONIST LIGHTING. Goodnight Mr Midnight, buckle up Mr Strap.
Well, that might seem like an explanation, but frankly the gangsters are all just a bit too RUBBISH to be worth the effort. Look how they just bumble around going "The gas! The gas! Urrgh! Thump!"
So, Daddy Alex has a PSYCHOLOGICAL explanation.
Daddy has spotted something so subtle it may have gone unnoticed: Mr Goldfinger is a RAVING MONOMANIAC! He loves to hear the sound of his own voice, and loves to show off just how clever he is.
Notice his several moments of SELF-CONGRATULATORY smugness throughout the film: "Oh, I own the club," he says when Bob-a-job has decapitated a statue on the golf course; "we were quite right to keep Mr Bond alive," he preens when the CIA are spotted watching the ranch; and so on.
Most importantly, guess what he says when Mr James is discovered to have been underneath the Fort Knox model:
"Operation Grand Slam," says Mr James, "I did enjoy your briefing."
"Sho did I," says Mr G with a little skip of happiness as he leaves Mr James in the hands of his guards.
That is the key to this explanation. Mr Goldfinger gives his whole lecture for the benefit of HIMSELF. He likes to show off how clever he is and how bold his plan.
Of course, following the old gold adage, if he tells you, then he has to kill you.
(In fact, the fact that Mr James is the ONLY person apart from Mr Goldfinger who knows the WHOLE plan, might also explain how, by telling someone else later, he is able to convert her to his side!)
I think that this is a GOOD explanation, but it turns out that this is not right either!
Because now we have listened to the commentary on my DVD and we know the REAL explanation.
Mr Goldfinger explains the plot… because he is in a MOVIE.
Yes, like the Mitchell and Webb's fourth wall breaking Nazi Stormtroopers, Mr Goldfinger realises that that he is the BADDIE.
And so it is down to him to do the EXPOSITION SCENE so that Mr James – and the audience! – can know what is going on!
Well, that's a bit LAME you might say, but be FAIR: the writers had been doing lots of little tweaks to Mr Fleming's original novel in order to improve things here and there. Mr James's REVERIE about a mission to Mexico becomes the EXCITING (and somewhat more EXPLOSIVE, not to mention "SHOCKING!") mini-adventure of the pre-title sequence. In the book, the fate of Jill Masterson is merely reported to Mr James once he meets her sister in Switzerland; for the film this is transformed into one of THE iconic moments of the cinema – the GOLDEN GIRL.
(And DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME, boys and girls. You may think that it is an URBAN MYTH that people suffocate if their skin is painted, but we watched a television programme recently where they tried this on a scientist and within minutes he was suffering the symptoms of anoxia!)
And Jill's sister Tilly survives rather longer as Bond's helpful sidekick with the pair of them actually being HIRED by Mr Goldfinger to help his plan.
Well, the writers of the movie wanted to turn the tables on Mr James completely at the mid-point of the film, so instead of following the book, they shock everyone by having Bob-a-job KILL Miss Tilly, and instead of Mr Goldfinger being a BIT THICK and hiring Mr James, they make him seem SUPER COOL by having him take Mr James prisoner.
As the commentary says, the logic of most films is turned upside down: instead of Mr Goldfinger being a powerful figure who Mr James gradually builds up to defeating, in Goldfinger, Mr James HUMILIATES Auric G not once, but twice in the first half, meaning that when Mr Goldfinger THEN beats him we REALLY RESPECT the car-crushing, gold-guzzling loon!
Actually, that's another thing that's NOT REALLY TRUE.
All that "He loves only gold!" bit in the theme song. It is a BLUFF!
The central CONCEIT of the film is that Mr Auric Goldfinger is ADDICTED to GOLD. Look at his NAME for goodness' sake. He even says as much to Mr James – while aiming an industrial laser at his wibbly bits.
"This is gold, Mr Bond. All my life I have been in love with it, its divine heaviness."
But this is a FIB.
Mr Goldfinger's REAL addictions are money and power. Gold is merely a means to an end: he is not interested in its acquisition for its own sake.
If he REALLY valued gold above anything else, why would he plan to NUKE so much of it in Fort Knox? He does not even take a single bar as a memento! (Though Daddy Alex has a good explanation for this too – what he calls the CHOCOLATE BAR REASON!)
No, he gives himself away when he – conservatively estimates – a ten times increase in the VALUE of his own gold.
Anyway, never mind THAT. Mr James spoils Mr Goldfinger's card scam; Mr James robs Mr Goldfinger on the gold course; and then Mr Goldfinger totally overwhelms Mr James, smashes up his WONDERFUL CAR, takes him prisoner and never lets him regain the upper hand.
Or as Daddy Richard put it: the first two are what Mr Goldfinger does in his LEISURE TIME; taking over the world is what he does PROFESSIONALLY.
This makes for a GREAT movie. Unfortunately, there is one little snag: since Mr James is no longer pretending to work for Mr Goldfinger, there is no reason for Mr Goldfinger to explain to him the PLOT!
Oh, and the book's got lots of gangsters in it too, better give them a CAMEO before we replace them with sinister Red Chinese.
And so, the rumpus room scene is born.
Now, all you need to add is Ken Adam!
PS
Some people wonder why it only takes a BIG SNOG from Mr Sean for Mr Goldfinger's GLAMOROUS sidekick to turn over a new leaf, call in Felix Leiter and save the day.But this is not a problem. She is OBVIOUSLY British Secret Agent MRS CATHY GALE undercover!
Who but MR STEED could put her in a position where she has to say: "My name is Pussy Galore!" with a straight face?
NB: Mrs Gale is the ONLY PERSON IN THE WORLD who can do this!
.
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