When it comes to elections I've always been a keen supporter of the 'none of the above' candidate. I have, at different stages of my political evolution, voted with a spoilt ballot paper, Green, Labour. That was a long time ago, and even then it was more of 'vote Labour with no illusions' idea that was predeominant on the far Left. Later, when I started thinking rather than knee-jerking, I stopped voting for a long time simply because there was nobody that was even close.
More recently I voted for UKIP, but again it was more of a 'vote UKIP with no illusions' thing that is common with people pissed off with the other three. And so this time round I've got the same dilemma. But now, thanks to a stream of election leaflets from the Lib Dems I've made up my mind to sling my vote at one of the big three. You see, I would be inclined to go for the UKIP protest vote again - but I can't say this with any great joy. There's more that I like in UKIP then the others, but there's also a lot I don't like. But I live in the constituency of a Lib Dem cabinet minister - and thanks to his party's electioneering I now know that the polling shows it's a straigh race between the Tory and the Lib Dem.
And therefore I am now poised to do something I never imagined muself doing - come May 7th I will vote Conservative. Not through any great love for David Cameron or even the personal qualities of the Tory candidate. Nope, it's a simple vote to punish the Lib Dems, who are a poisonous presence. This is about a vote against their statism, there climate change mania, their pro-Europe stance, the anti-science idiocies of their energy policies and more. So, this time it's going to be 'vote Conservative with no illusions' for me.
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Monday, January 26, 2015
Greek Election - Wait and See
While the program on which Syriza was elected appears to be utterly and irrevocably broken, we can at least enjoy the prospect of maximum levels of discomfort in the rest of the EU. The Greeks have given the finger to the Troika and colonial misrule from Brussels. They've done that thing that French situationists used to recommend: 'demand the impossible'.
Take one look at what Syriza is asking for and you'll see that it's economically illiterate in the extreme. It's a mishmash of red-green demands that's heavy on the rhetoric but light on anything that is concrete. Rather than demand economic development to get people into work and freed from the shackles of the state, it's all about 'sustainability', 'a new model' etc. In other words more of the same - top-down state control and central planning in the 'common good'.
It's the same with the core demand. Tell the EU to get stuffed but stay in the Euro. The radical demand would have been to drop the Euro and tell the EU to get stuffed. The conservatives campaigned on the fear of leaving the Euro and the EU, but Syriza didn't tackled that head-on, they just insisted that they could renegotiate and stay in the Euro.
Still, better a victory for Syriza than more of the same - despite the economic illiteracy and the environmentalist orthodoxies. At the very least it has excited a mood for radical change in the population that will be hard for the bureaucrats to deal with.
Take one look at what Syriza is asking for and you'll see that it's economically illiterate in the extreme. It's a mishmash of red-green demands that's heavy on the rhetoric but light on anything that is concrete. Rather than demand economic development to get people into work and freed from the shackles of the state, it's all about 'sustainability', 'a new model' etc. In other words more of the same - top-down state control and central planning in the 'common good'.
It's the same with the core demand. Tell the EU to get stuffed but stay in the Euro. The radical demand would have been to drop the Euro and tell the EU to get stuffed. The conservatives campaigned on the fear of leaving the Euro and the EU, but Syriza didn't tackled that head-on, they just insisted that they could renegotiate and stay in the Euro.
Still, better a victory for Syriza than more of the same - despite the economic illiteracy and the environmentalist orthodoxies. At the very least it has excited a mood for radical change in the population that will be hard for the bureaucrats to deal with.
Monday, December 22, 2014
Climate Alarmist Paper Retracted Due To Fake Peer Review
A favourite taunt of climate alarmists is that The Science has spoken and it's spoken in a decidedly alarmed and warmist fashion. But as we saw in the Climategate emails, subverting the process of peer review has been a key tactic of the warmists. Sometimes this subversion is through the process of pal review, sometimes it's through applying pressure to keep stray editors in line and sometimes, as in this case, it's outright dishonesty.
Pakistani economist Khalid Zaman has just has a tranche of publications retracted by Elsevier because of faked peer review. In all 16 papers have been withdrawn according to Retraction Watch, due to irregularities in the peer review process. In this case Zaman had set up fake email accounts which he then used to create fake peer reviewers. These fake peer reviewers, were surprisingly open to Zaman's work for some inexplicable reason.
Of the 16 papers retracted, one stands out in particular: Causal links between greenhouse gas emissions, economic growth and energy consumption in Pakistan: A fatal disorder of society. In this paper Zaman and co-authors set out to show that carbon emissions are destroying Pakistani society. The abstract concludes:
Pakistani economist Khalid Zaman has just has a tranche of publications retracted by Elsevier because of faked peer review. In all 16 papers have been withdrawn according to Retraction Watch, due to irregularities in the peer review process. In this case Zaman had set up fake email accounts which he then used to create fake peer reviewers. These fake peer reviewers, were surprisingly open to Zaman's work for some inexplicable reason.
Of the 16 papers retracted, one stands out in particular: Causal links between greenhouse gas emissions, economic growth and energy consumption in Pakistan: A fatal disorder of society. In this paper Zaman and co-authors set out to show that carbon emissions are destroying Pakistani society. The abstract concludes:
...emissions caused by consuming the energy [sic] is causing harm to the society by enlarge, and it reaches to the conclusion where we are heading toward a systematic fatal disorder of our society.So, just to get the story right, according to the good Professor, it's not poverty, rampant corruption, military interference in politics, the Taliban, terrorism, Islamic fundamentalism or proxy war with India that is destroying Pakistan, it's too much CO2. No wonder he had to make up his own peer reviewers. No sane person would have let that one go...
Tuesday, December 16, 2014
Peshawar School Massacre
The latest count of the dead shows 132 children and 12 adults. It's a massacre in true Islamist 'let God sort them out style'. Of course we can expect that there will be plenty out there assuring us that Islam is the religion of peace and that the slaughter of innocents is not approved of. And there will be those who will seek conspiracies to explain the massacre - it was a false flag operation to turn the Pakistanis against the Taliban, it was the CIA/Mossad etc.Or worse than the barking mad conspiracy theorists we can also expect those who will assign moral responsibility on the West. If we hadn't done x, y or z then this would never have happened.
It's bullshit, all of it. Anything but facing the fact that there are significant numbers of Islamists motivated and supported by their religious leaders to slaughter indiscriminately in the name of Allah. The problem is in Islam, and seeking excuses just shifts the blame away from those responsible.
It's bullshit, all of it. Anything but facing the fact that there are significant numbers of Islamists motivated and supported by their religious leaders to slaughter indiscriminately in the name of Allah. The problem is in Islam, and seeking excuses just shifts the blame away from those responsible.
Thursday, December 11, 2014
Maoist Sex Slaves
It was just over a year ago that the story broke about the "Domestic Slavery" case in Brixton. I guessed at the time that the likely culprit was Ara Balakrishnan and his Workers Institue of Mao Tse Tung Thought. Well, the story is in the news again today when the police revealed that charges are to be brought. It turns out that Comrade Balakrishnan is being charged with:
...one count of cruelty to a person under 16, four counts of rape and 19 counts of indecent assault.
Of course there's plenty of precedence for this. Did not the Great Helmsman himself not have a little harem of young women to satisfy his need for dialectics? On a smaller scale there have also been well-publicised cases of sexual exploitation by comrade Gerald Healy (WRP), and lots of stuff going on the in the SWP.
Still, the court case should be interesting...
...one count of cruelty to a person under 16, four counts of rape and 19 counts of indecent assault.
Of course there's plenty of precedence for this. Did not the Great Helmsman himself not have a little harem of young women to satisfy his need for dialectics? On a smaller scale there have also been well-publicised cases of sexual exploitation by comrade Gerald Healy (WRP), and lots of stuff going on the in the SWP.
Still, the court case should be interesting...
Friday, December 05, 2014
Scotland Lowers Drink-Drive Limit
According to the BBC this morning, Scotland is lowering the drink-drive level to below that of the rest of the UK. Well, this is the revenge of the SNP - pay-back time for not supporting Yes in the referendum. And they've reduced it not by a tiny bit but by a fairly big chunk (80mg to 50mg in every 100ml of blood).
Well, let's make some predictions then...
1. There will be a rise in the takings in pubs just south of the border.
2. In five years time there will be nobody in Scotland in possession of a valid driving licence except Muslim taxi drivers
3. This is will make practically no difference to death or accident rates on roads in Scotland
4. Activists in England will be demanding that we meet or exceed the lower Scottish limit
5. There will be a rise in the number of junk science 'public health' research papers that will seek to show that the Scots are healthier, wealthier and wiser because of the change
Well, let's make some predictions then...
1. There will be a rise in the takings in pubs just south of the border.
2. In five years time there will be nobody in Scotland in possession of a valid driving licence except Muslim taxi drivers
3. This is will make practically no difference to death or accident rates on roads in Scotland
4. Activists in England will be demanding that we meet or exceed the lower Scottish limit
5. There will be a rise in the number of junk science 'public health' research papers that will seek to show that the Scots are healthier, wealthier and wiser because of the change
Friday, November 21, 2014
Rochester's poop-powered BioBus
The people of Rochester, Kent, are today celebrating their newest contribution to the rest of the UK. They have announced a new Biobus - a vehicle completely powered by methane and human waste. Reporters were stunned by the arrival of the bus, which was preceded by the LibDem candidate losing his deposit after the party garnered less than 400 votes in the bye-election won by UKIP.
It is hoped that the Rochester example is followed in the rest of the country.
Ched Evans - Twitterati Victory Again
It was bound to happen - the onslaught of the Twitterati mob was bound to win out in the end. It needs balls to stand up to the mob, and it seems balls are a commodity that is scarce in the UK at the moment.
For those not in the UK Ched Evans is a professional soccer player who, along with another man, was accused of raping a woman in a hotel room. The woman herself did not report rape. There was no physical evidence of rape. There was no corroborating evidence. The facts are pretty much not in dispute - she was drunk, agreed to have sex with the first man, asked for oral sex from Ched Evans. She later passed out. In the morning she was upset because she could not remember what happened. When she went to the police she did not report rape. The police suggested it was rape because she was so drunk she could not have consented to sex in their opinion. When asked both men agreed that they had had consensual sex with her. The police decided a crime had been committed, and it went to court. The jury found the first man not guilty, Ched Evans they found guilty. He was sentenced to prison, served his sentence and was released.
Now I'll admit that I think this sounds a lot like a miscarriage of justice to me. The whole thing is suspect. But let's just accept that he is a rapist who was found guilty and has served his sentence.
Since his release his attempts to get back into football have been dogged with controversy. The mob have decided that it's not enough that he has done time, he has to be made to suffer permanent disgrace. If he was convicted of a violent rape or an abduction it would be understandable. But that's not the case. At worse he has had sex with a woman who was too drunk to make a decision. She didn't struggle. She didn't say no. There is no suggestion of coercion or violence.
But the mantra is 'rape is rape' -- it's another of those simplistic slogans so beloved of the left as it does not leave room for ambiguity, complexity or thought. It effectively short-circuits any kind of consideration of evidence or doubt. And that's why it - like 'tax the rich', 'the war on Islam' and the rest - are so dangerous.
For those not in the UK Ched Evans is a professional soccer player who, along with another man, was accused of raping a woman in a hotel room. The woman herself did not report rape. There was no physical evidence of rape. There was no corroborating evidence. The facts are pretty much not in dispute - she was drunk, agreed to have sex with the first man, asked for oral sex from Ched Evans. She later passed out. In the morning she was upset because she could not remember what happened. When she went to the police she did not report rape. The police suggested it was rape because she was so drunk she could not have consented to sex in their opinion. When asked both men agreed that they had had consensual sex with her. The police decided a crime had been committed, and it went to court. The jury found the first man not guilty, Ched Evans they found guilty. He was sentenced to prison, served his sentence and was released.
Now I'll admit that I think this sounds a lot like a miscarriage of justice to me. The whole thing is suspect. But let's just accept that he is a rapist who was found guilty and has served his sentence.
Since his release his attempts to get back into football have been dogged with controversy. The mob have decided that it's not enough that he has done time, he has to be made to suffer permanent disgrace. If he was convicted of a violent rape or an abduction it would be understandable. But that's not the case. At worse he has had sex with a woman who was too drunk to make a decision. She didn't struggle. She didn't say no. There is no suggestion of coercion or violence.
But the mantra is 'rape is rape' -- it's another of those simplistic slogans so beloved of the left as it does not leave room for ambiguity, complexity or thought. It effectively short-circuits any kind of consideration of evidence or doubt. And that's why it - like 'tax the rich', 'the war on Islam' and the rest - are so dangerous.
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