January 2009
Geert Wilders - the modern Galileo
Archived Stop Press article
Geert Wilders
Shame on the Dutch. We have always revered the Dutch for their intelligence, liberalism and coolness. Now the Dutch government intends to prosecute Geert Wilders for insulting Islam. Free speech no longer matters. However, this may not be a bad thing. Fitna will get a lot of publicity.
Geert is an intelligent and personable chap and it will be interesting to see him fight against the combined might of the Islamic media machine and its fellow travellers on the left and in the media
The UN's Rapporteur on Human Rights has always been tasked with exposing and shaming those who prevent free speech – including the religious. Recently the council changed this job description so the rapporteur can seek out and condemn "abuses of free expression" including "defamation of religions and prophets". Namely you can say what you like as long as you don't criticise any religion, especially one of an Islamic nature.
Google UN reaction to the Iranian Holocaust Cartoon contest or Hamas' anti-semitic al Aqsa TV and the result is nil.
ETUC - Divide and rule
A race to the bottom
ETUC
fighting for you?
Strikes are breaking out across the UK in support of a mass walkout by energy workers at Lindsey Oil Refinery after French-owned Total gave a £200m contract to an Italian firm. Evidently there are no skilled workers in the UK able to do this work and it has nothing to do with wage levels! At last our union members are worried about their jobs and wages being undercut. No doubt Union leaders on vast wages have been keeping quiet and attending pan-European ETUC meetings and workshops at vast expense. However they, and at least some workers, have known that 'social dumping' has been around for some time.
In December 2007 the EU's highest court ruled that a Swedish trade union picket against cheap Latvian labour was illegal.The ruling said that Swedish unions had breached EU law when they forced a Latvian company to observe local pay deals in the Vaxholm case.There is now concern that the entire Nordic system of collective bargaining whereby employers and workers agree conditions for the workplace – including pay – could be undermined by the judgement. The collective system is seen as underpinning the 'flexicurity' social model in the Nordic countries, which combines easy hiring and firing with high benefits for the unemployed. See[url=http://www.tee2i.org/stop-press/180] here.
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Good news -
Hurrah. they were wrong.
Watts Up With That? has some wonderful news. Climate warming is not happening and Anthony Watts tells us why:
Dr. James Hansen is the chief climate scientist at NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) and is the man who originally raised the alarm on global warming in 1988 in an appearance before congress. He is also the keeper of the most often cited climate data.
Retired senior NASA atmospheric scientist, Dr. John S. Theon, the former supervisor of James Hansen, NASA’s vocal man-made global warming fear soothsayer, has now publicly declared himself a sceptic and declared that Hansen “embarrassed NASA” with his alarming climate claims and said Hansen was “was never muzzled.” Theon joins the rapidly growing ranks of international scientists abandoning the promotion of man-made global warming fears.
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Animal discrimination
farm animals don't count
See CIWF for video link.
Our government and the European Union are spending billions attempting to stop climate change. None of our major politicians even query whether this exists though many ordinary citizens and scientists do have severe doubts. Recently most of the mainstream media have been telling us that Emperor penguins are doomed as the Antarctic melts. Other journalists give a totally contradictory view. See Christopher Booker.
However, whatever your views on climate change, why is it that our media and politicians emote about the perceived problems facing Emperor penguins yet are perfectly happy to allow AND SUBSIDISE with your money, factory farming on a huge scale. Pigs, chickens, cows, ducks, turkeys and geese are often given a brief and brutal existence before being slaughtered for a cheap dinner. The motive force for this is, of course the EU and the Common Agricultural Policy. Amazingly here is an article in the europhile Guardian criticising not only the USA but the EU.
Why don't we care what happens in our country but worry about unlikely threats in far away places. Obviously we should care for all animals but yes we CAN do something about our farm animal welfare regardless of what the rest of the world thinks. Spending billions reducing CO2 levels by a tiny fraction of a percent will not make any difference and even IPCC scientists are having doubts about man made global warming. See here.
Write to your council asking it to use cage free chickens and support Compassion in World Farming and our 'ethical chefs' such as Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Chicken Run. campaign.
The BBC at work
Oh how we laughed
Jonathan Ross
It's three months since the Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand affair; at the time we wrote this post. For those of you who have forgotten, (well you never know!) this was when Brand, usually described as a comedian, and Ross, who is a TV show presenter, phoned semi-retired actor Andrew Sachs so Brand could taunt him about his affair with his grand-daughter Georgina Bailey. Oh, you may say, not that again! Yes indeed, did you ever think it would go away? At the time the Mainstream Media divided into differing camps, one was very anti- Brand and Ross, the other more supportive. The anti B&R media was led by the Daily Mail who, much to the chagrin of many bright young things, showed an ability to push a campaign in the direction that suited them as cleverly as any global warming activist. The supporters of B&R were to be found mainly within the pages of the Guardian and the Independent. That newspapers normally given the liberal/left tag were doing this was to be expected, particularly the Guardian, as they employ Brand as a football correspondent (how very laddish!).
Russell Brand
These two characters are in many ways very different.
The 44th President of the USA
Things can only get better?
Man with stick?
It's heart-sink time. I've just heard BBC radio broadcast the idea the Barack Obama (see right) will "hit the ground running". This is awful as it takes one back to the start of Nulabour when Tony Blair began gurning at the nation and also dropped the remark that his Chancellor, Gordon Brown, would to start us off in the right direction by doing this very same thing. The term 'hit the ground running' may indeed be American and comes, so I'm told, from the world of cartoon characters. When I first heard this saying I struggled to understand it, seeing in my mind only a man running along and holding a stick, periodically beating the ground.
"What's the point of that", I thought, unlike Tony Blair, I could not see the merit in it. I imagine Tony delivering this news, eyes almost the size of dinner plates, staring dreamily into the middle distance, his whole body stiffened by a mixture of conviction and zeal, as if to say: "follow me, I'm the anointed one". Well we all know that went pear shaped; Tony took off to do better things, like making lots of money and left Gordon to save the world on his own. But alas Gordon now looks bruised, battered and crumpled like a man who has fallen over his stick one too many times while running, the dream destroyed. I wish Obama well, I say take care and don't rush about, mind that stick.
Our Ken and beyond
Any body's business any body's guess
Smoke and mirrors?
Will he won't he, will David Cameron give Ken Clarke (see right) a job? Was this the question on our lips for weeks? Actually no it was not. The upset and impact of Cameron bringing Clarke back has always been hard to judge. For many in the mainstream media Clarke has been used as a space filler, yes these are troubled times so for light relief let's go on and on about our Ken.
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Some deaths matter less than others
many dead
Ochola John
LRA victim
The UNHCR replaced the UN's Human Rights Commission in June 2006. Looking at the resolutions passed since then I find 20 resolutions:
Israel 13
Darfur 2
Burma (Myanmar) 1
North Korea 1
DR Congo 1
General food shortages 1
Zimbabwe 0
Tibet 0
Somalia 0
China 0
Uganda 0
Rest of the world 0
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Walls really do have ears now
Nothing to hide, everything to lose.
keep your mouth shut
The powers in the coroners and justice bill will reverse the fundamental data protection principle that information provided to one government agency for one purpose should not normally be used by another for a different purpose. See here.
Bill Thompson from Index on Censorship informs us that:
The UK government’s decision to press forward with implementation of the European Union directive on data retention by communications service providers is hardly surprising given that Britain had pushed hard for its initial adoption.From 15 March Internet service providers and telephone companies will be required to keep records of the communications of their customers.
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Going green, going wrong
Post-neoclassical endogenous growth theory, or so they say (see Footnote)
Things can only get better?
There is a great deal, as one might expect, to read about Baroness Vadera (see right) and her stupid "green shoots" remark, well here is a little more. Vadera is a close confidante of Gordon Brown, indeed he selected her to be an adviser to him on account of her vast intellect. And perhaps that is where it goes wrong. If we go back a long way when Peter Mandelson was working with Gordon Brown to create what we now call Nulabour, the arrival of Tony Blair was secondary. The decision of Mandelson to drop Brown and become a disciple of Blair came after Mandelson's 'conversion', after he saw the light and realised that Blair was the better all round general purpose Messiah, and so more likely to get the Nulabour project off the ground. But originally it was Brown who picked Mandelson. Gaffe-prone Mandelson eventually goes to the EU and, while he is away, Brown selects Vadera, two duds in a row you say. Well indeed, but look who did the picking.