U.S. Elections III

Why am I so bothered about the US Elections?

After all, it's not as if I live there, and have any say over who gets elected. I can see why many Americans are getting annoyed at us Europeans complaining and trying to tell them what to do (the Guardian's campaign was massively misjudged - a rare cock-up from a decent paper unfortunately). It's almost as if we don't trust the Americans to decide for themselves.

The problem is, it's not that we don't trust the American people. It's that we don't trust the current administration. We believe they will try and cheat and worm their way back in using whatever methods, fair or foul, to achieve this. The only way to prevent this is to ensure that the Republicans get a complete leathering in the polls.

This isn't going to happen though. So I have resorted to the last refuge of the heathen - I have started to pray. I have reconciled myself to the fact there must be a Supreme Being in Heaven (if only so Rumsfeld can FINALLY get what he deserves when he dies), and am regularly offering up pleas for him to strike down the Republican party. But this probably won't happen. Because as we are often told, God is all-forgiving.

But why am I so bothered?

Partly, it is because I am UTTERLY convinced that if George Bush remains in power for four more years, there WILL be a nuclear attack either on, or by America. Intimations have already been made that the American Department for Defence (the irony!) wants to attack Iran. And they have nuclear capability. As the Americans would say, go figure.

Then there's the fact that the current crusade has made many "less-well-informed" people around the Globe convinced that Islam is synonymous with terrorism. Consequently, now it is appearing that Bush is on a quest to wipe the Islamic faith from the surface of the Earth, (rather like the Imperial British Missionaries in the 19th Century), he is getting far less opposition than he should do, because he has consistently linked terrorism with Islam.

But finally, there's my hope for this country. If Bush goes, we have every hope to believe that a certain person in this country will be brought to account for his errors...

Bugger.

Countdown

No, the title doesn't refer to the strangely compelling antics of Richard Whiteley on Channel 4 (I don't know what time it's on though, which shows that I've not been a student for far too long).

The title refers to the dearly departed "Shat Day" countdown which used to run on my site. Since Shat Day has been and gone, I need a replacement. So I thought I'd turn to you lot out there.

Please note that countdowns should not be obvious, and possibly humourous. Hence why I'm not coming up with the idea...

As a brief mini-countdown, it's four days and counting till "the Fishermen..." gets my full undivided attention once more...

US Elections II

A couple of things that have struck me about the US Elections in this past week.

Firstly, anyone who has been charting my rants against the TV Network that wanted to show an anti-Kerry film fours days before the Election will be relieved to hear this from the Guardian:

"A film linking Kerry's anti-Vietnam campaigning to the torture of captured US soldiers will now not be broadcast. Sinclair Broadcast, the Republican-leaning company that planned to show it, made the announcement after shareholders claimed the programme could harm their investment. Parts of the film will now be shown in a documentary examining the use of such broadcasts in influencing elections. Sinclair's shares fell 23 cents to USD6.26 yesterday, down from a high of more than USD15 in January."

Glad the Shareholders stepped in where the authorities supervising fair elections didn't...Interesting to see how the film is going to be used now however.

On the other hand, I am despondent today. Many things have got me down this week regarding the US - our re-deploying troops so George Bush can keep his Election promise of sending no more American troops to Iraq being just one of them.

However, this morning I heard that a spokesman for the Catholic Church in America has declared that any practicing Catholic who is seen as supporting abortion (that is, voting for John Kerry) will not be able to receive communion (i.e. essentially be ex-communicated). Therefore what the Catholic Church of America has stated is that all Catholics (of which America has one of the highest global populations) must vote for Bush.

I thought there were rules governing the involvement of religion in elections?

It has made me realise that the sheer number of underhand methods and extra forces that the Republican party have been able to employ against the Democrats makes it all but certain he will be President for another four years. Four more years of war. Four more years of big business dominating the world. Four more years of antagonism. Four more years of that evil bastard Rumsfeld.

Neevr mind, given the Republican tendency towards war, we can always hope they launch a Nuclear strike which wipes us out before the four years are up...

Rant of the Week: Helicopters

I have many MANY things annoying me this week, but I'm very busy and am finding it difficult to blog. Commuter Boy takes up most of my spare time. Never mind, when he dies...

But anyway, just a small rant for this week, but something that is annoying me in the way that Robin Williams films annoy people with an aversion to sentimentality, and George W Bush annoys the whole of the world.

Helicopters.

They should be banned.

Actually, they should be shot down using some kind of improvised slingshot until they get the message to stop flying over my head. But that way madness lies.

Admittedly I really didn't choose the most sensible place to work if I wanted to be free of helicopters. I don't mind so much the "special" helicopters that fly into our next door neighbour's house. They're normally come in without much fuss and bog off as soon as possible. But it's the tourist helicopters that are annoying. They fly up around central London and hover over points of interest. Normally near my office.

And above all, perhaps, even more annoying than tourist helicopters, are the media helicopters. Bastard droning whining noisy little bastards. They fly in really low and hover for HOURS while some muppet films eternally uninteresting things on the ground because it looks a bit nice. Yesterday was particularly bad with the Olympic atheletes "homecoming", (don't get me started - the Rugby team had one because they won the World Cup. Our athletes had one because they came about 9th. The Paralympic team were far better coming second, but I bet there were fewer photos of them in the Evening papers).

Today however, there's been a helicopter over our building for about 5 hours, and it's annoying the crap out of me - why is it there? Have they decided "let's piss off Dave today?". It's like having a wasp trapped in your inner ear canal. But it's not only the buzzing. They also have a high pitched whine that pierces your ear too. They should be banned under an Anti-social Behaviour Order.

And joy. Just when it's finally fucked off (though it's still vaguely there in the distance) the bugler next door has started up. I love brass instruments. My dad was a teacher, and I have taught in my time too. 90% of the buglers at the barracks CANNOT PLAY!!! It's painful. It's like listening to a seven year old taking their first tentative steps. They play with all lip, no diaphragm, so it sounds rough, scratchy, and the pitch wanders all over the place. They had a pretty good one on Friday, but this new one's middling to say the least....

Calm...deep...breaths...oh fuck, now the helicopters come back. Someone kill me please...

Dear God save us

I'm thoroughly worried and depressed.

I've had the misfortune of reading through some pro-Republican comments on the Guardian website, basically attacking us for being "yellow-belied liberals". But the crowning glory was some muppet called Chris who said-

"Europe. Always there when they need us."

- following a polemic about the superiority of America.

I hope this man burns in Hell. He probably keeps a gimp chained up in his basement who he releases from time to time to flagellate him (except he probably doesn't undertsand the veb "to flagellate" - it means "whip" monkey boy!)

I am sick of this argument from Right wing Americans that without them we'd be buggered. Yes, they did make two timely interventions in the World War, for which we should be grateful. But the number of times since that we have bailed America out of trouble. Hmmm...lets see...Iraq?!!! While the Americans strolled into a fairly undefended Baghdad, levelling everything as they went, the rest of the coalition actually faced the bulk of the opposition in Basra. Had they not been there, the Americans would have been trapped in Baghdad by the Iraqi troops stationed elsewhere and in all probability massacred.

And I'm sure that the Americans bombing our troops really helped us. At the "official" end of the Iraq war, it transpired that Britain had lost more troops to "friendly fire" from the Americans than to any other group.

Basically, I appreciate these arguments aren't my best, but I just really REALLY wish that people like "Chris" would fuck off and die.

Rant of the Week: Stupid People (pt. III)

Now, far be it from me to criticise the leader of the most powerful nation on Earth, but I think he’s little more than a trained chimpanzee with a severe case of verbal diarrhoea, the natural grace of a one-legged rat, and the social skills of a compulsively masturbating monkey.

Not only that, but he’s a cheating trained chimpanzee with a severe case of verbal diarrhoea, the natural grace of a one-legged rat, and the social skills of a compulsively masturbating monkey.

I’m sure few people have forgotten the fact that, when the Presidential Election was held in 2000, the whole outcome hinged on Florida. Similarly I’m sure that everyone remembers that the Governor of Florida was one Jeb Bush (what kind of an in-bred, stupid name is Jeb anyway? He’s basically a crapper version of Joseph Bonaparte isn’t he?).

And I’m sure that people still remember that votes from the coloured population were destroyed as invalid, as were votes from any minority group, and seemingly anyone who voted Democrat. Fewer people probably remember that a pro-Republican news channel went on record as saying the Republicans had won in Florida before the ballot boxes closed.

I’m sure NO-ONE has forgotten, however, that when all the valid votes were counted many weeks after Bush was declared triumphant, it transpired that Al Gore would have won Florida, and therefore the whole election. Quite why nothing was done to impeach Bush at the time is beyond me.

Then you had “9/11” and the subsequent attempts by Bush to bring democracy to other places in the world (here’s a tip, Mr Bush – bring democracy to your own country first). And now we’re back at election time again.

Despite the Democrats finding virtually the only person in the Universe who struggles to compete with Bush, John Kerry is doing very well, mainly due to the fact that he whips Bush’s arse every time they have a debate (not literally though – that would be hideous). But now we find out that a pro-Republican TV channel has decided to aid Bush this time round in a more sinister way than his brother helped him last time. I quote from the Guardian:

“One of America's biggest television companies has announced plans to broadcast a film days before the presidential election that portrays the Democratic candidate John Kerry as betraying his fellow soldiers in Vietnam.
The conservative Sinclair Broadcast Group will reportedly present the film as news on the 62 local channels it owns nationwide.”

So they’re going to present this as “news” four days before the election.

Hmmm…four days…that leaves SUCH a long time for Kerry to refute the allegations before the election doesn’t it. Crucially, the vast majority of local channels owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group are in swing states. Just think…one bit of bad press and the state goes to GWB. What was that I said about democracy in the US?

I really hope for the sake of the free world that the stations are banned from doing this. I hope even more that Bush is booted out and his like is never seen again. I don’t want to see him elected and face up to the awful reality that within four years we’re going to be participating in a nuclear war led by a chimp.

The Currant Bun

Well, The Sun surpassed itself this weekend didn't it? From the paper which celebrated the death of 400-odd Argentinean sailors with the word "GOTCHA!" to the "YOU SCUM" headline which sees it still ignored in Liverpool, on Saturday we were greeted with "KILL THE BASTARDS".

Now, I'm not prudish about swearing. I swear all the time, and my feeling is "it's only a word, it doesn't mean anything". But having said that, I'm guilty of gross hypocrisy when dealing with newspapers. I don't think it's right that a paper should splash a swear word across its front page, no matter how bad things are. Imagine, you're taking your toddler son / nephew / cousin out for a walk and they say "Mummy / Uncle, what's a bastard?"

But I think it's the fact that the Sun did this that annoys me the most. The fact is, they've been trying to curry favour with the people of Liverpool all year, to try and "atone" for their mistake over Hillsborough (viz. they want more sales, and can't bear to think that a place exists where their paper isn't stocked). My theory is, Ken Bigley was from Liverpool, and so their "...BASTARDS" headline is basically trying to appropriate and jump on the bandwagon of one family's personal tragedy - they hope that by being jingoistic and gung-ho, people will go "hey, the Sun agrees with us, let's go and buy it".

It's sick opportunism, and I hope everyone has seen through it. The fact that it goes against what Ken Bigley's family have repeatedly tried to do, that is, ensure it doesn't damage Muslim-Christian relations in the UK, obviously doesn't matter an inch to the sub-editors at the Sun. Basically, they're not making any attempt to differentiate between the different groups in Iraq, and I think, like countless times in the past, the Sun is guilty of inciting racial hatred.

The most depressing thing though, is the fact that I come from somewhere (North-West England), where the Sun is rarely bought, apart from teenagers at school wanting to look at page 3. Yet here, in the South-East, virtually every single person reads it. It's depressing to think that their uninformed, biased bilge is being pumped into the brains of several million people.

Not that I'm bitter, but I really hope that some day, the Sun meets a really sticky end.

Rant of the Week: So many to choose from...

Hello all,

It's been a while I'm sorry - blame it on work. Even Commuter Boy was held up for a couple of days...

But needless to say many things have been getting my back up this week, as usual. There's the usual suspects (the Tory party, George W Bush), and a few new ones.

Best story of the week has to go to the fact that Rebecca Loos was shown on TV masturbating a boar. I see some kind of bizarre poetic justice in this, given how she became famous in the first place (for those who don't know, it was alleged that she slept with some footballer or other, and seemed as likely as, ooo, a Z-list celebrity being filmed on TV playing with a pig). From what I can gather, she's participating in a programme called "The Farm" on TV which, far from being a fascinating look at those hard-working people who we rarely see, actually consists of plunking a load of has-been and never-had-been "celebrities" in a pile of manure. So far so good, one might say, but I can't believe it's being televised. Much less that I've actually picked up on an event in it. So I'll stop now.

Next on my list is George W. Seemingly the only man in the World, (well, barring Donald "Satan" Rumsfeld, the evil puppetmaster genius who has his hand up Bush's arse) who still believes Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction, and he's not going to let any amount of proof to the contrary get in his way. Perhaps the most depressing thing is that there are people who believe him, denizens of the Deep South who think that the next village is a "for'n" country, and Iraq is somewhere near New York. Perhaps more depressing even that this though, is that the Democrats have managed to find the only person IN THE UNIVERSE who could struggle to beat George Bush.

Lets look at the facts - we have a man who resembles a chimpanzee, has the manners of a chimpanzee, the intelligence and attention span of a goldfish, and believes that anyone who disagrees with him should be shot, nuked, or both. Yet John Kerry has actually managed to fall behind this primal ape in the American polls. Way to go JK!! At least he finally started clawing some ground back in his televised debate, although this wasn't so much to do with his arguments than the fact that both Bush and Kerry were on screen at the same time, and Bush was continually rolling his eyes, not interested and getting annoyed (for those of you who don't know, the Bush administration tried to ban televising the reactions of the person facing the questioning. Needless to say they failed). It remains to be seen how tonight's debate goes, but at the moment, I feel like even Michael Howard could have led a more effective opposition to Bush.

Which brings me neatly on to the Tory party conference. Average age of delegate = 70. Importance to the world = slightly less than Rebecca Loos masturbating a pig. I really don't like them at all, mainly due to the fact that I still can't forgive them for inflicting Thatcher on us, but also because of the gross hypocrisy and pettiness they continually demonstrate. It's never "We would do this if we were in power". It's always "Labour have done this and it's crap". There were some interesting statistics on Today this morning provided by the editors of the Bloomsbury English Dictionary. Of the three top men who lead each major political party in the UK, Michael Howard used the word "I" the most. Now there's someone who's going to selflessly devote himself to the country. Apparently, he also used "immigration" more than anyone else, always in a negative light. Which is interesting, coming from a Romanian immigrant. A Labour party spokesman was quoted as saying "it's alright for his family, but not for anyone else."

But what REALLY got my back up were the soundbites of the Shadow Cabinet detailing the last CD they bought. Everyone, EVERYONE, chose something modern, and perceived as trendy. Scissor Sisters and Keane were the ones which stood out for me. It was so utterly false, and the whole idea was to make the party seem "younger" and "more cool". Bastards. They're going to do exactly the same as Blair does now if they get in - divert all the funding away from Classical and Jazz because it's perceived as "elitist". They totally fail to realise that young people actually DO like Classical and Jazz music. Why couldn't they - just for once in their pitiful lives - be honest? But no, they'd sell their grannies for power.

Which brings me to my final subject, my biggest pet hate of this week. Formula 1, and specifically Bernie Ecclestone. Loathsome oik. Mind you, at least he's basically come clean and implied he doesn't give a shit about the sport, it's just one big cash cow for him. It is U-B's considered opinion that Formula 1 as a "franchise" should die off now. For a long time the imbalance in money has taken away the really spectacle. I don't blame Michael Schumacher - I think he is one of the ultimate sportsmen the world has seen. Everyone seems to forget when saying now that "he has the best car" that his first world championships were won driving an extremely uncompetitive Bennetton. He is unique, and yet if I were him, I would retire and distance myself from the whole farce.

With Ecclestone's perceived desire to move Formula 1 away from the UK, I would really say "let him". Firstly, I think it's a ruse by him to get more money, and secondly I think any money we spent on it would be better put towards establishing a competitive series to rival Formula 1, which is ready to step into the gap left when F1 finally goes belly up. I cannot even believe that Richard Caborn is considering using money from the East Midlands Development Fund to help supply Ecclestone with the money required to host a race. It's ridiculous. Shouldn't the race organisers be paying a fee to rent the circuit, instead of the other way around? And to think that the money will be going towards the empire of a multi-millionaire than say, ooo, housing regeneration, is obscene, and frankly leaves me speechless.

Which is a good note to end on. Hope you've enjoyed it - there will be more next week...

Shat Day

SHAT DAY IS HERE!!!

Quotes of the Month Archive: September 2004

'The bollocks about the North West being all about whippets and fish and chips is put about by southern wankers at London-based newspapers.' (T. Wilson)

'If hunters want us to respect their rural ways of hunting down animals and killing them in a brutal fashion, then they have to respect our urban ways of the Police leathering people with big sticks in a brutal fashion.' (Anonymous)

'Hunters do it because they enjoy the feeling of power from controlling one set of animals to scare the living shit out of another until it's too tired to get away whereupon it is ripped to shreds in the most painful way possible. The funny feeling they receive as their horses move underneath their nether regions is an added bonus.' (Anonymous)

'London consists of five mad people and thousands of people trying to avoid them.' (R. Noble)

'Your typical sports journalist has the intelligence of a dung beetle and a slightly less-pleasant odour and are almost invariably drawn from the ranks of ex-school bullies and dropouts.' (Anonymous)

'Sometimes it takes a dominatrix in your living room to make you sit up and think "what the hell am I doing with my life?"' (T. Max)

'If mediocrity had a theme tune, Athlete wouldn't quite be able to release the B-side' (C. Higgins)

Shat Day is nearly here!

Oh yes.

Shat Day is nearly upon us.

I thought I'd best explain this perverse fascination I have with William Shatner. I'm not a Trekkie by any stretch of the imagination - I don't avidly feel the need to watch every episode. But I do enjoy Star Trek, particularly the original season. William Shatner was essential for this. I won't go into the details of th rumours behind the scenes or indeed during episodes, but anyone who's seen "Galaxy Quest" will have a pretty good idea of what Shatner was like. But this isn't the reason why I like him.

I like him for his willingness to send himself up. He's a big pretentious fool, as is shown by his previous "musical" effort, The Transformed Man, with its legendary cover of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", (which I actually feel has more musical and entertainment value than the original, which I've always found to be a tad plodding, and not one of the Beatles' best efforts). But he is never shy of making a joke at his own expense. He is never afraid to mock his own image. He's also the high prince of cheese, but he KNOWS he's the high prince, and revels in it.

My friend gave me a signed photo of Shatner in his Kirk heyday, which he got off E-bay. This seems to have perversely brough me luck, so it adorns the wall of my office now. People think this is strange - it probably is - but it never ceases to put a smile on people's faces, which is always nice.

"Shat Day" is the name I am using to refer to the day on which Shatner's second album, "Has Been" is released. I am particularly excited about this, because one of my all-time favourite recording artists, Ben Folds, has written, arranged and produced most of this album, as a return favour for when The Shat provided a wonderful contribution to Folds' first solo album, "Fear of Pop vol. 1", playing the role of the spurned lover on "In Love" and "Still in Love". In many ways, I'm viewing it as a Ben Folds solo project on which Shatner guests per track.

It will probably be very strange, and my friends are all thinking I'm a little odd for going with this, but it's something I think will be a musical milestone. The best review I've seen of it finishes with the following lines:

'This CD is beyond good or bad. It is from a world where concepts such as "unique" and "indispensible" live happily alongside "hilariously, brain-tearingly wrong".'

I think that's wonderful.