Diana Watch

Dear Moany Football Managers,

                         Both teams have to play on the same surface, stop moaning. You lost because the other side scored more goals than you not because the grass hated you.

                                                Martyn Norris

Can you guess which paper has had Princess Diana on the front this week? Of course you can, now you have GCSE Media studies, it’s the Sunday Express,

 I'm not going to take up too much off your time this week because I have got some homework for you.

 Now I'm not saying that you have to read them all the way though because they are really, really dull but here are links to the main parties (and UKIP's) manifestos

Tory, Lib Dem, Green, UKIP, Plaid Cymru

The BNP

There doesn’t seem to be a manifesto for this election on their website but on past performances I think that we can safely assume that it would basically be “Go home Darkies” and would use the word Indigenous a lot without ever spelling out what that means.

The SNP

I can't find a manifesto on their website but they claim to have one. It may possibly be this though,

 Thank you to the BBC for providing this list of all the parties standing and links to information about them.

 OK, that is hard work I know so let's just get on with the awards,

The Award for the World's Most Self Destructive Snack,

 Are you scared of American Imperialism? Worried that the rise of the Religious Right in the US threatens rationalism in that country? Don't understand the appeal of Glee? If I was you I wouldn't worry too much because they will all be dead soon.

 Ladies and Gentleman I give you the KFC Double Down.

 The bread of this bacon and cheese sandwich has been replaced with deep-fried breaded/battered chicken burgery things. 

 If a heart attack could be represented as a food stuff, this is what it would look like.

 The Award Naked Opportunism of the Week,

 This goes to both the Conservatives and the Lib Dems.

 The Government sent out a leaflet saying that the excellent 2 week guarantee for woman with suspected breast cancer to see a specialist was under threat for Tory plans.

 These leaflets were delivered to thousands of homes and, naturally, some of the people who got one had had breast cancer or know someone who has (a bit like how cold reading works). Because people are stupid and self-centred they assumed that the leaflets were targeted at them and have complained about it.

 They were not targeted at anyone, it was just a statistical certainty that this would happen but that didn't stop both the parties weighing in.

 David Cameron called for an apology and called the tactic “sick” despite the fact that it wasn't a “tactic”. Even the mighty Vince Cable wasn't above lowering himself to getting involved and said there needed to be an investigation to see if there had been any abuse of data protection laws. No there doesn't.

The Award for Having a Dig at a Fellow Sportsman of the Week,

 Golfist Phil Mickelson won the US masters on Sunday. This competition was the much written about return of serial philanderer Tiger Woods to professional golf and the expectation was very high. It blanketed out pretty much everything else in the coverage but he did not win.

 On winning one of the worlds more pointless sports Mr Mickelson dedicated it to his wife.  

The Award for Self Important Self Appointed Busy Body of the Week,

Jim Gamble is the Director of Child Exploitation and Online Protection (Ceop). He has decided, with the help of the Daily Mail, that Facebook is the devil.

 Despite the fact that there is no proof that his idea about having a “panic button” on the social networking site will make any difference to the safety of children using it, he still manages to get himself on the various news programmes and into newspapers to promote himself, sorry, his idea.

The Award for Having the Worst PR Department in all of the Known World,

More good work by the people who work for the Catholic Church this week (I'm getting a little bored of this now. 4^th week in a row that I have to mention child rapists and those that covered up for them).

 They have blamed the Devil, they have blamed the Press and now they blame..... The Gays. Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Pope's number 2, has said that Homosexuality was to blame for most of the “problems” that the Church has been having with continually employing child rapists and not the whole celibacy thing.

 Whilst in Chile he said “Many psychologists and psychiatrists have demonstrated that there is no relationship between celibacy and paedophilia. But many others have demonstrated, I have been told recently, that there is a relationship between homosexuality and paedophilia. That is true. That is the problem.” Oh FFS. What century are you living in? Oh yes, I remember, sometime in the 18^th.

 I understand why they are trying this Blame Others approach. They are attempting to show the faithful that it is the things that the Church preach against that are the problem in a kind of “See, we told you so” sort of way, but it will not wash with the rest of us.

 Don’t expect any change in their policy any time soon though as the Church has only just forgiven John Lennon for his “bigger than Jesus” thing in 1966.

Oh, I supposed I ought to mention a bit of news.

Did you watch the Election Debate? OK, it was a bit dull and they had all “met” far too many people (David Cameron also claimed to have met a black man but I think that that is unlikely) but it does seem to have gone really rather well for Nick Clegg.

 I’m not going to criticize their performances to much though because it was the first ever debate and no one really knew what they where doing. Clearly they had watched the U.S. debates and had noted the tendency to use a heart warming or point making anecdote. Unfortunately they all went over the top and answered almost ever question with a little folksy story. Now all they have to do is practise winking to camera and saying “Y’all”.

 The other problem was the moderator. Alistair Stewart was rubbish. He barely gave them time to answer or rebut and bellowed over the top of them. I’m not sure if Tory loving Adam Boulton on Sky News will be any better though.

Some planes are unable to fly because of a massive cloud of volcanic ash covering most of Northern Europe.

 Whilst most of the papers were concentrating on the effects on travellers and trade, both the Mail and Express decided that the cloud, which is mostly at 25,000ft, will kill you.

 So if you are stuck somewhere and can't get home I do feel a bit sorry for you but to all of those moaning and scare-mongering in the press about food shortages can fuck right off. So what we don't have any asparagus imported from Egypt or lettuce from somewhere in Africa? How about buying British and seasonal? You may remember what food is supposed to taste like and maybe those countries can grow some food for themselves.

 “But I’ve got a business meeting to go to!” yeah, will I have Skype and can talk to people all over the world, on video, for free. Give it a try, you might like it rather than selfishly flying round the world for no good reason.

Oh and I am loving the stories from people who live around airports and can't believe their luck with all the peace and quiet that they are having this weekend.

 Please stop moaning, no one has or will die.

Do you think that your job is dangerous?

 Have a good week and enjoy the sunny weather (as long as it carries on obviously, it's not like you can fly to somewhere sunnier.)

Diana Watch

There really is only one story that I want to talk about this week. It is one of the most talked about and life changing events of the week (well in our house anyway). It could alter the way we live our lives for years to come. If we do not act now, history will judge us to have failed.

 As of July a Scrabble rule change will mean that you are allowed to use proper nouns! You will be able to put company names and the names of celebrities.

 A company spokesman said "This is one of a number of twists and challenges included that we believe existing fans will enjoy and will also enable younger fans and families to get involved." I'm sorry? What?

 Why do you think that young people need to be patronised by making the game easier? It is fun because it is hard, that is the point. Do we encourage children to play football by making the goals bigger? Do we get children to play “Battleships” by making the board smaller? Do we make teenagers seem more clever by making GCSEs easier? Ok, bad example (and I’m not sure if that is actually true) but my point still stands; making things easier does not make them more appealing. It does, however, make them less valuable. Have you ever been allowed to win by someone else, at anything, not just games? It is a totally empty feeling, even children understand this and they are stupid.

 JFK said “We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard” He could have been talking about playing Scrabble.

 They also said that the changes will “introduce an element of popular culture into the game". Why is that a good thing?! I don’t want to have my scrabble board looking like a copy of Heat magazine. I want it to look like a scrabble board.

  Significant Other and I have discussed it and this is a rule change that we will not be implementing in the Norris household.

Ok, I suppose there was something else of some importance that happened this week. Gordon Brown has been to see the Queen and asked her if he can have an election and she said Yes (Do you think that she has an option? Could she say “No, cos I think that you will loose and I don’t want that twat Cameron in charge”? It seems unlikely).

 A clear Tory policy has emerged of not telling the truth about Nation Insurance. “We will not implement this 1% NI rise because it is a tax on jobs.” No, you will only raise it by 0.5% won’t you and “a tax on jobs”? Now this is a revelling line.

 What they mean by this is that it is a tax on businesses (rich people who fund the Tory party) but they have no problem with a rise in Income tax because that only affects workers.

 James Caan (out of off of Dragons Den) pointed out on Newsnight that the 1% rise will cost about £15 a month per employee. Will that stop a business employing a person? He said not. If they want a person they will employ them. He also pointed out that the NI rise only comes in when the employee earns about £20,000, how many shop workers earn that much? The job that I applied for at Millets (and didn’t get) paid £6 per hour, I don't think that I would have earn that much. So is the Tory plan nonsense and are their business friends only trying to preserve their profits? Yes, yes they are.

 The business men who queued up to side with their puppet, did I say puppet I meant Party, and say that Gordon Brown was wrong didn’t really fool anyone, despite David Cameron referring constantly to them.

 One of the people supporting the Tories was Sir Stuart Rose of Marks and Spencer whose company, this week, posted a health profit for last quarter of the year and estimates that it’s full year profit will be between £620m-£630m. Not really struggling then in the recession. They probably can afford an extra 1% on employees earning over £20,000 and not really notice it.

 Combine this with their calls for a reduction in Health and Safety legislation to make it easier for companies to kill you, their lack serious plans for increased regulation of the City and plans to reduce Inheritance Tax and you have to ask yourself, whose side are they on? I don’t think that it is yours.

 They are also a little hypocritical (I know this will come as no surprise) over income tax. On Tuesday the new top rate of income tax came in to force going up to 50% for those earning over £150,000. The Conservatives criticised this ferociously and, with various business groups, said that high earners would leave the country. Well they had one years notice and it seems that they haven’t.

 Despite this friend-protecting rhetoric they have no plans to reduce it.

 Whilst we are talking about tax and benefit changes can I bring your attention to these?

 Mothers will now be able to donate all or part of their maternity leave to their husband/partners. At the moment mother can take up to 52 weeks of fathers get 2 weeks but now the mother will be able to take 6 months and then go back to work and the father/partner can take the next 6 months.

ISA limits have been raised to £10,500 per year (so good for small savers then).

Sick notes have now been replaced with Fit notes. Instead of just being signed off sick your GP will be able to suggest what work you are fit for. Whilst there are a few problems with this, GP are not Occupational Health specialists for instance, overall this is great. Research seems to suggest that the sooner people get back to work the quicker they get better.

Now, as I have said before, I am no fan of Labour. I have watched my civil liberties disappear faster then the Twin Towers came down since 2001, they have taken us into 2 wars, 1 of which may be illegal and the Digital Economy bill is a disgrace but all of the above ARE great things and they should be applauded for these things.

And while I’m talking about Government achievement, the economy may do much better than predicted. 

According to the OECD the UK economy may grow at an annualised rate of 3.1% for the second quarter of 2010 which is much better than most other countries in the G7.

 Let me continue, if I may, with more slightly dull economic numbers.

 Many analysts say that The Markets are “jittery” about the possibility of a hung Parliament or the Countries credit rating being downgraded over the size of the deficit (this is so unlikely as to not be worth talking about). If this is true then The Markets are reacting in a very strange way. They are going up. The FTSE closed on Friday at 5770.98, up 58.28 points on the day. For the year they are up from their lowest point of 3968.40 points, that is a rise of 68%! Does that sound like a market that is concerned about how Labour are running the economy to you because it certainly doesn’t to me.

 Sorry, that was a bit dull but the points had to be made.

The scary thing about the pre-election is the blood lust that the 2 main parties have got up for cutting things.

Alistair “those aren't his real eyebrows” Darling said that they would have to cut harder and deeper (he was also writing porn dialogue at the same time) then anything done by Margaret Thatcher. Really? Fuck off. You are a Labour chancellor. What are you doing trying to keep up with the Osborne’s?

 And then they all try to hide other cuts in euphemism, “We will make efficiency savings”. So you are absolutely sure that these are not cuts then because when big companies merge they make “efficiency savings”. Shortly afterwards an awful lot of people loose their jobs and those that remain have their terms and conditions shredded. So I ask you once again, are you absolutely, completely and utterly sure that these “efficiency savings” are definitely, definitely not cuts?

The Award for Using Words in an Article That Only Newspapers Use,

There are some words that don’t get used enough in modern day English, such as bobbins and poppycock (which is my favourite word in all of the language), and there are some words that are only used by tabloid newspapers. The word “romp” for instance is only used by red top newspapers when they are referring to sex, i.e. “The footballer romped with the model”

 The mighty Daily Mail has decided to bring back a word that hasn’t been used in its correct context since Queen Victoria sat upon the throne. They claimed in an article about the New Dr Who assistant Amy Pond “that viewers were left scandalised” by her short skirt. Scandalised? Really? By some legs?

 Now I would link to the original article but I’m not clever enough and the Daily Mail on-line is like the Ministry of Truth in Orwell’s 1984, it is constantly changing things that have been printed to closer reflect the views of it’s witless commentators (and the Google Cached thing doesn’t seem to work for that paper). The article no longer includes that word because they probably realised that it has been used since the “Lady Chatterley” trial.

 I would just like to say to people who were upset, or indeed scandalised, by the sight of Karen Gillan’s (not even bare legs, although that might be the issue, oh I don’t know) legs that they should avoid nearly all female professional sport and it is probably best if you stay indoors for the summer (especially around May the 6^th sort of time).

The Award for Trying to Get Something Really Rather Wrong on to a Plane,

Two women have been caught trying to smuggle a dead bloke in a wheel chair on to a plane at Liverpool's John Lennon Airport. It really is as simple as that.

 They claimed that he was asleep and put sunglasses on him and then attempted to board a plane.

They also travelled to the airport in a Taxi. That is how observant taxi drivers are people, you can pop a dead bloke in one and they won’t notice.

The Award Sticking Your Head In the Sand and Placing Your Fingers in Your Ears,

 For the third week in a row I am forced, mostly by their own stupidity and trying to make out that problems don't exist, to mention the Catholic Church.

 Now I am not a religious man, well actually I am an atheist, and the activities of the worlds various religions are not of a great deal of interest to me except if they are justifying flying planes into buildings or telling AIDS ravaged countries that condoms actually make the problems worse or….., oh ok, I do take a bit of any interest but the Catholic Church is really trying to push the boat out at the moment.

 The Associated Press is reporting that it has a letter that is signed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who is now Pope Benedict XVI, in which he resists the defrocking of a convicted sex offender.  Cardinal Ratzinger said the "good of the universal Church" should be considered in such cases.

 Rev Stephen Kiesle was convicted in 1978 for lewd conduct with two young boys in San Francisco and was sentenced to 3 years probation. His diocese, Oakland, had recommended Kiesle's removal in 1981 but it didn't happen until 1987.  Cardinal Ratzinger took over the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the department that deals that sort of thing, in 1981 and this letter was written in 1985.

 So here is another bit of evidence that shows that Cardinal Ratzinger was aware of the abuse and attempted to cover it up and what did his spokesman, Rev Federico Lombardi, say? Why he tried to play it down of course, saying “The press office doesn't believe it is necessary to respond to every single document taken out of context regarding particular legal situations."

Let’s end with a song to lift your spirits as I have gone on a bit this week.

I know that everyone else of a skeptical bent has linked to this or embedded it and that I am a little behind the curve here (as I am with so many things, I hear those Beatles are pretty good, you should check them out) but here is The Daily Mail Song by Dan and Dan,

Have a good week. The sun is out and the sky is blue, enjoy yourselves whilst you can as soon we may have a Tory Government.

Re-engaging with Politics

If you were watching the Television on Saturday night and managed to drag yourself away from “So You Think You Can Dance” or “Take Me Out” you might have been watching BBC2. If you were you would have seen a program about the election campaign of who is now President but was then Senator Obama. It’s called “By The People” and it may still be on the Iplayer.

The thing that struck me most during this excellent documentary was the vast number of the activists who seemed to be under 30, possibly even under 25. Yes, there were middle aged men in suits on the campaign but those out on the streets and making the phone calls were young, really young. Can you imagine that happening here? It wasn't wall to wall inspiration though. There were a few annoying characters. I don't think, for instance, that you would catch many English people doing a motivational dance based on a scene from “The Fresh Prince of Bell Air”.
How did they do this? OK, so Senator Obama was different to just about every other Presidential candidate ever. He was a young and black but it simply can't be that. He also wasn't President Bush which seemed to be to his advantage but then, neither was John McCain. But there seemed to be something else. There was something that got people excited about him before he started going on about “Hope”, a lot, or quoting Bob the Builder. As I'm on the wrong side of the pond it is hard to say but might it be the he spoke to people as if they were adults. As if they are clever enough to understand the problems and that sometimes there aren't simple solutions and that some things take time.
Whilst the 24hr news channels on both sides of the ideological isle were screeching and squawking about anything and everything and delivering every story as if it was the end of the world, Senator Obama was calm and made his point in a way that tried to avoid hyperbole or as he put it “Never to high or to low”. Ok, his big set piece speeches were filled with the sort of “Eagle soaring over the Great Plains” imagery so beloved by the US political speech writer, (although his main speech writer Jon Favreau is only 29) most of the time he was relatively sensible. He managed to get his sensible tone across despite the media.

And there lies our problem. How can we engage our youth? (That sentence makes me sound so old but, hey, I am). Again I think that, whilst politicians have to shoulder some of the blame for the public disconnect with the body politic, the media, both print and broadcast, have done an amazing job in turning us off for politics. It has got to the point that a politician has to point out that they think that people are grown ups and can cope with nuanced argument rather then being able to go on the radio and assume that the Today program is listened to by adults. The British press has reached a place were the subtlety of argument is almost impossible. They just want to deal in black and white, well some newspapers it is only the white. They want fear and emotion. The want to describe all politicians as on the make or croaked in some way, when, in fact, most members of parliament are there because they want to help people and they believe in what their party stands for. They encourage cynicism about politics and politicians and then act surprised when we have a low turn out on Election Day.
TV news is no better. Despite the fact that it is on for 24hrs a day they still seem to be in a hurry. All news readers have now taken the Paxman approach to interviewing which is less about extracting useful information and having a debate and more about showing that they have a lack of deference and showing how big you balls are, and this includes the woman. This is the reason that our leaders (and those that wish to lead us) go on the soft programs like GMTV or end up chatting on Mumsnet, they are able to get a word in edgeways, although this doesn't save them from being misreported, I give the Gordon Brown biscuit incident as evidence for this. It was reported in our papers that he is such a ditherer that he could even answer a question on which was his favourite biscuit. What a fool. The thing is, this isn't what happened. According to the founder of Mumsnet the question was asked but due to a technical error the Prime Minister didn't see the question hence no answer. However, despite the fact that it is untrue, I saw this being used this week in a newspaper as a fact.
The problems of reductionism are not just the fault of the press; Politicians must share the blame too. Take the problem that we have with drinking. The cost to the NHS and to the police. According to the papers it's binge drinking that's the problem. Extended licensing hours, yes, that's to blame. And it's all young people. As I record this the Tories are blaming the Term units of alcohol and want to bring in Centilitres of alcohol like they have in Europe, I don't think they've run this idea past the whole party, “like they have in Europe, I think not, on principle”. The Government are also looking at labelling but also at a mandatory minimum price per unit for alcohol. So the same people are being punished by both sides here with simple easy to understand and totally useless plans. No one talking about the at home drinkers who drink every night and in large quantities doing serious long term damage to themselves and much more importantly then all of those things, no one is asking why people drink so much. And why aren't they asking? Because it is a hard question to answer. There are no simple solutions and it won't fit easily into a press release.
Our press would have you believe that people care not for politics because, after the expenses scandle, we have found out that our politicians are corrupt. Personally I would say human, taking advantage of a lax system is human but they would say corrupt. But if this is the reason then why do Americans get so excited about their politics? Whether they admit it or not (and I don't think they will) their system is incredibly corrupt and their press is considerably more divisive then ours. Elections there are all about who can raise the most money and voting in the house and the senate is influenced (to a greater or lesser extent) by which lobby group has paid the money to the representative's election war chest.

So, again, we are left with the question, why where so many people excited by Barack Obama? Did they think that he was, like episode 4, a new hope? Coming to sweep away all that has gone before because that seems unlikely, people have noticed how slowly politics changes. Or maybe they just mistook it for a giant reality show in which they could get involved. That would explain the vast number of young people involved. Perhaps they were interested more in his “journey” than in his policies. Is this a bad thing? Maybe not. If they were interested enough to make phone calls and delivery leaflets maybe they might have read them and become a little more informed.

We are forever hearing ways that might encourage people to vote. We could do it at Supermarkets or by text or by post or by pressing the red button (oh no, that was Dr Who extra, but my point stands). Armando Iannucci described this in his book, The Audacity of Hype, as process replacing content. Giving people more ways to vote isn't really the answer to their lack of enthusiasm; you need to give them more reasons to vote.
But maybe way can see a way ahead because we are going to have pre-election debates. Finally all 3 main parties have agreed to have a US style debate and this can only be a good thing. The 3 leaders will have time to discuss their visions for the country on Prime time television, 3 times. I would imagine that Nick Clegg leapt at this opportunity and grabbed it with both hands, as he should. Whilst there will be questions from the moderator they will get time to make their point, without being interrupted by an imbecile, well David Cameron might say something. It will be 3 men standing up and discussing their point of view in the middle of the evening, hopefully with a minimum of fussing and extraneous nonsense, although I can't image that Sky will be able to do it without covering the screen the screen with a news crawler and up to the second live Polls and weather up dates. This is why we all need bigger televisions, it's so we can see the little tiny picture in the middle of the screen a little better. But back to some sort of point, is this the sort of thing that will help people start to re-engage with the political system? A couple of hours of, hopefully, decent debate not viewed through the cynical prism of the British Press, let's hope so. The reason that parties like the BNP did well in the local and European elections is 2 fold. Firstly people are disconnected from the main parties because they are not dealing directly with their hopes and fears (mostly fears that are prayed upon and exaggerated by the opportunistic hate mongers) and secondly their voters are highly motivated and go out and vote. European and local elections use proportional representation which leads to minority parties doing better over all. Whilst the General election will continue to use the first past the post system, which will make it much harder for smaller parties to have anything the impact they did before, if you do not vote then you have no one else to blame but yourself if the wrong person becomes your MP.

In short, I have no answers. We are in this state because we have allowed ourselves to get here. We have bought nasty, cynical newspapers and we have not complained when our Television news is uninformative and treats us like idiots.
Let us hope that we find a way to re-engage the populaces because if we don't only about 40% of those entitled to vote, if we are lucky, will vote in the next general election. This means that if the winning party gets, say 45%, only 18% of the people who could have voted voted for the party of Government. Hardly a ringing endorsement.

Election?

Dear Kim-Jon-Il,
Congratulations on your election victory. I mean, really very impressive victory. 100% of the vote that was cast was for you. Outstanding work you strange little man.
I do have little point to make. If you are going to fix an election, not that I am suggesting that you did, I’m sure everyone who is starving to death in your country really loves you, try and make it look at least a little bit believable. Try randomly generating a number that gives you a victory but makes it look like the others (and there’s another suggestion, try having another person in the election so you beat someone) at least had a bit of a chance.
Oh well, continue enjoying your movies,

Yours Slightly Amused,
Martyn xx