Is Hastings an option?

Yesterday I drove over to Hastings stopping off at Bexhill on the way. The gossip in Brighton is often that Hastings is an option. A sort of cross between how Brighton is supposed to be and a fall back position. Brightonians argue through the ideas that Brighton has become too expensive, trendy, busy, full of tourists….(take your pick) and that Hastings may be an option.

War Cafe

Hastings has excellent architecture, lots of interesting passages and back streets and, indeed, it seems that the alternative set may be moving in if one judges alternative by cowboy hats, chopper trikes, idiosyncratic shops and sartorial inelegance – not that I decry such inelegance; on occasion I admire it.

We ate in a nice little restaurant which was perhaps a tad too expensive. (£18 for a steak – in Hastings?! With my reputation?!) though the fish was good value and the ambiance excellent. Later we had coffee in a quaint though ghastly little sea front cafe which appeared to have been decorated by some kind of second world was appreciation society. Churchill and Union Jacks everywhere.

approaching Ditchling Beacon

As we drove back Ditchling Beacon looked very impressive on the horizon.

Any discussion regarding relocating to Hastings usually ends with the observation that there is no work there and the rail and road connections are not good. That, then, usually is the end of the matter. However, perhaps there is another reason. On arriving back in Brighton we drove down Grand Avenue and the city felt busy and switched on. It was dark and the lights beckoned us to the pubs. To be sure, Hastings, is a nice little town but it is just that. A little town. One gets the feeling that after frequenting the gaggle of little shops and pubs downtown for a year or so one might feel a little constricted. It lacks the anonymity of a city. As Brighton does to some extend compared to London. This is not necessarily a bad thing but it is, perhaps, difficult when one is not used to it.

Of course, this is not the end of the debate. With me, it is rather like my yen to emigrate to America or move back to London. A constant theme which will, most likely, rattle around my head until the day I die.

It is the curse of those who have travelled and lived in different places to always feel  dissatisfied as everywhere will lack something from somewhere else. A city will feel too big or a village too small. Africa will feel too foreign while England too mundane. Many years ago I attended The Isle of Man TT motorbike racing and we did some pubbing with the locals. They told us that The Island full of retired ex-pats who the locals term “When I’s” because they preface most statements by the words “When I” - As in “When I was in Bahrain” or “When I was in Aden”.

A friend is about to go to AntArctica to live for a few months. When he returns, will he yearn for the interminable bitter cold? Perhaps not but he’s bound to miss something.

Halloween

Halloween in the UK seems to be growing in popularity. A fancy dress shop in Brighton seemed to be doing a roaring trade on Saturday.

Halloween

Revamp Fancy Dress
11 Sydney Street
Brighton BN1 4EN
01273 623 288
info@revampfancydress.co.uk

Alien

Obama blows reputation by cave in to U.S. Jewish lobby

Jewish lobby blocks progress

To be a Palestinians must be to be very very cynical. When Barack Obama gained the presidency of the United States The Palestinians must have seen a glimmer of hope. Despite stupidly surrendering Jerusalem in a speech to AIPAC, Obama did appear to be less prone to automatic support of Israel. Indeed the Obama government demanded that Israel stop all building on Palestinian land prior to negotiations recommencing.

Of course we do not know what pressure Obama is under but I cannot say that I am surprised that he has caved in to the American Jewish lobby. The news media is reporting that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has just visited the middle east and backed down on the demands that Israel should stop building.

Think about that.

The Palestinians are driven from much of their land to create the state of Israel. Irrespective of the Jews historic claims to the land this was their home. They had a historic claim too. The Palestinians are damned as terrorists when they resist. They rise up in an Intifada and are brutally suppressed. They are forced to live as second class citizens in their own land while Israel builds modern settlement for fundamentalists Jews on the remaining part of the land allocated by the U.N.

 

Israeli settlement

Now they are told that they must negotiate even while Israel continues to consolidate it’s land grab and settle more religious fundamentalist on Palestinians land. This is obscene!

 

What nation would agree to negotiate while their opponents continue their aggression?

It is the settlements activity that gives the lie to the Israeli claims to be the victim in this conflict. It is the settlements that show that Israel support fundamentalist religion lunatics just as much as Hamas. The United States has been a solid friend of Israel over the years and ending settlement activity now would go some small way to returning this friendship as it would allow the United Statesto claim a symbolic success in it’s leadership of the peace process. But Israel gives nothing to anybody.

The Jewish lobby in America is misguided and, by it’s mindless and amoral support of settlement activity, is standing in the way of a resolution of this conflict. Obama’s reputation in the Muslim world must have rested  on whether he can stop the  settlement activity and it looks like he can’t. Israel has had everything it wants for  so long that it is now like a spoilt child who simply throws a tantrum whenever it is opposed. It’s time that Israel grew up and The United States Jewish lobby realised that supporting Israel doesn’t have to mean supporting settlements.

What Has He Got In His Pocketses?

Mobile phones, electronic keys, credit cards, debits card. We were told that all these things would make our lives easier. Give us a sense of freedom. Yet I carry around more junk these days than I ever did. I remember around the year 1980 when I carried just one key, a wallet with only notes and some loose change.

But don’t complain. Keep smiling like everyone in The Twilight Zone episode It’s a Good Life. Pretend that all this stuff is helping us. Pretend that it’s vital to be able to talk to anyone immediately. Pretend that debt is good for us.

Freedom or encumbrance?

Freedom or encumbrance?

Labour plumb new depths of cynicism

Michael Kaminski

On Thursday, 29 October 2009on BBC Radio 4’s Today program James Naughtie interviewed the British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and the Conservative shadow Foreign secretary William Hague. Mr. Miliband accused the Conservatives of allying themselves with a far right party in Poland and based this on comments in the New Statesmen magazine by Polish MEP, Michal Kaminski from the Law and Justice party.

Mr. Miliband quoted The New Statesman and Mr. Hague quoted Poland’s Chief Rabbi, Michael Schudrich and cited the Israeli government as two sources who supported Mr Kaminski.

Mr. Milband would not back off and pushed home his accusation that the Tories were fraternising with Nazis.

The following day on the Today program James Naughtie interviewed Poland’s Chief Rabbi where he admitted that Mr. Kaminski had been a member of a far right party in his youth but had more recently rejected that path and was now “a strong friend of Israel”.

He went on to say that the “no one here in Poland would consider the Law and Justice party as a fringe far right party”

Mr. Naughtie asked whether the question over an apology for the massacre of hundreds or thousands of Jews was, for Poland, akin to the questions over whether Britain should apologise for the colonial era or the crusades and Mr. Schudrich agreed that this was the case although he obviously had reservations regarding “the way it was expressed”
Mr. Schudrich suggested that this attack on Mr. Kaminski played to the stereotype that all poles are anti-semitic which he claimed was false.

On Thursday the new Statesman had placed an article on it’s web site defending it’s report and suggested that Mr. Schudrich has been under pressure from the Polish authorities.

So what are we to make of this? Is Michal Kaminski a member of a far right party or did Rabbi Schudrich, shoot off an angry email and then regret it afterwords?

We should remember the context of this debate. The Labour government is trying desperately to defend itself from accusations that it’s reputation on the economy is in tatters and simultaneously Labour is finding it hard to score hits against the Tories.

We should remember that New Labour came to power on a wave of media manipulation and spin. Over ten years later, it is obvious that this is all they ever had. Their ideas and judgement has been proved worthless (No More Boom and Bust!).

When Gordon brown called upon his arch-enemy from the Blair years, the twice disgraced Peter Mandelson to rejoin the government he was signalling that he needed Mandy’s manipulation skills back in the government for, without that, they had nothing.

I suggest that this palaver over this Polish MP is more of Mandelson’s spin. With Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time fresh in the public consciousness  Mr. Mandelson decided to play the race card. He thought that he could smear the Tories. Remember that this is Mandelson’s profession. He was not brought in to government for his knowledge of business or economics; the only career he knows is the media. A basic rule of journalism is “simplify and emphasise” and this is what he has done in relation to this Polish politician.

The politics of all countries are complex and a country such as Poland, newly emerged from occupation and  which sees itself as conquered by the Germans and betrayed by the British and the Russians must be tortuous. To pick up on a one paragraph email to a pro-Labour magazine and use this for a public accusation of fraternising with Nazis shows to what levels new Labour will sink as they thrash around to stay afloat.

Blair for president? – Don’t look at his reputation says Brown

Don't look at his past says Brown

Gordon bloody Brown was on TV again last night banging on about having Tony Blair for president of the EU. When asked why we should have Blair considering his history Brown remarked that we should not be looking backward but forward.

What sort of nonsense is this?

When deciding on which individual should be trusted with the presidency of such as large and powerful organisation we necessarily need to understand if that person is fit for the job. How are we to do this if we cannot look at his past performance? Mr. Brown suggests that we should consider the future but, lacking precognitive powers and a crystal ball, I know nothing of Blair’s future.

We have too look at Blair history. We have to consider his reputation for spin, conniving and lies along with his appalling lack of judgement. Are these the attributes which we want in a president? I think not.

Another infuriating thing about this talk of Blair for president is that it all seems to be arranged behind closed doors. Nobody is arguing about whether he can gain a two third majority of the votes in North Rhine-Westphalia or whether he can rely on support from the Italian Constitutional Democratic Party because the presidency will not be decided democratically.

I don’t understand why is Blair’s name is even on the agenda. Who put it there? Is there even a list of nominees? I have not heard of one. There appears to be no formal process by which a president is appointed; a situation which would not be tolerated for a county cricket club, let alone a supra national organisation with tax raising powers and a budget running into the billions of Euros!

All this serves only to underline the inadequacy of EU institutions and the complacency of the national governments. Let us not forget this is not some ancient institution in need of updating. This is the presidency created in the latest fiasco of rule making now known as the Lisbon Treaty.

The political elite would have us believe that we can have the EU or we can have democracy but we can’t have both. They are talking bollocks. We can have both, we can have a democratic Europe. The obstacle for this is entrenched vested interests and until these are overcome and the EU is democratised we should keep it at arm’s length and definitely not put a power hungry incompetent in charge.

iPhone Language Translator

Looks like the future is coming fast:

Bun Fight – Question Time with Nick Griffin

Ill Informed Ranting

I listened to Any Questions last week with the BNP leader Nick Griffin. I’d previously blogged about this and a friend email me to say that she thought that, contrary to my opinion, some people were too stupid to be exposed to Griffin’s sort of talk.

I’d respond that, while it’s true that stupid people are more susceptible to the ill informed rantings of racists (IIROR) they ar also more susceptible to the ill informed rantings of non-racists.

And good grief there was a lot of ill informed ranting on both sides in last week’s Question Time. It was a bun fight as I had predicted. Nobody let Nick Griffin finish a sentence. Everyone condemned him before he had a chance to condemn himself. I thought it was a missed opportunity to let the bloke show himself for what he was.

Someone asked him why he visited a Ku Klux Klan leader in America and he started to explain and said that this particular group were “almost totally non-violent” which I thought was a little gem but nobody was able to pull him up on this as no sooner had he uttered the words than the other panellists were asking him other questions and deriding his smile and they never actually picked up on this “almost totally..”.

It frustrates me that the self riotous lefties cannot bare for anyone to hear their opponents opinions. It’s as if they have no confidence in their own argument or opinions.

Bonnie Greer is a black American cultural commentator who usually appears on Newsnight reviewing films or theatre. She sat to Griffin’s left and he seemed constantly to be turning to her for approval.

Griffin made the point that everyone dismisses the idea that Britain has an “indigenous” people but they would not dare deny that Australian Aboriginals or Soux Indians are indigenous. I usually find Ms. Greer intelligent but last Thursday night she seemed determined to talk as much bollocks as everyone else. Pursuant to this she claimed that Britain does not have an indigenous population because it had an ice age! – Amazing.

I think much of the world had an ice age and if you’re going to claim that ice killed everyone off and so people had to immigrate into Britain then you could argue that for everyone in the world. There is even a respectable theory that organic compounds arrived on earth via comet debris and so you could argue that there are no indigenous people on Earth – If you want to be talking bollocks.

Chris Huhne, Sayeeda Warsi, Jack Straw, David Dimbleby, Nick Griffin and Bonnie Greer

Jack Straw sat to Dimbleby’s right. I quite respect Mr Straw and he normally talks sense but he too joined in with the spirit of the evening. He said that he came from a line of immigrants of Jewish origin and during World War 2 all ethnic groups in Britain had pulled together and fought off the Hun. This is the sort of thing we British like, a mongrel breed that’s pulls together in a pinch.

However, Griffin popped his balloon quite quickly by pointing out that Straw’s dad had been a conscientious objector during the war whereas Griffin’s dad had been in the Royal Airforce.

Straw bemoaned Griffin’s anti-semitism but later, when Griffin was trying to say that he wanted to support the “indigenous” people of Britain and that colour was not important, Straw kept shouting “you mean white, you mean white”. Straw is as white as Griffin on my TV so he can’t claim to be discriminated against by Griffin just because he’s a Jew and then accuse Griffin of limiting indigenous people of Britain to whites.

People become idiots when it comes to racism and think it means hating black people. The point is that Griffin was telling the truth when he said that colour is not important. Griffin hates Poles as well as Indians. Czechs as well as Nigerians. But he was not given time to say so as the angry mob just kept yelling that he hated blacks.

One black guy from the audience said that he was born in England, it was the only country he knew and he loved this country. He then asked Griffin where he should go and Griffin said that he was quite happy for the guy to stay in England. This answer seemed to disappoint everyone present.

It was interesting that after spending 90% of the program on baiting Griffin they then turned to other questions and some black guy from the audience complained that New Labour had lost control of immigration. Straw then spouted some platitudes about implementing a points system before  Conservative MP  Sayeeda Warsi joined in the criticism of New Labour on immigration.

I guess this was encouraging in a way. That, though there was real concern about the numbers of people immigrating to the UK, nobody was drawn to be sympathetic to Griffin or to blame the immigrants themselves.

The next question was about a gay pop singer who had died in Spain and how a newspaper had written something..not sure what….I think it was supposed to be insulting to gay people. The question was about free speech in the news papers.

After not letting Griffen finnish a single sentence the hypocrites then pontificated in favour of the freedom of the press to print whatever they like.

The evening was spent trying to put words in Griffin’s mouth and then getting angry when he refused to agree with them. The whole thing was a farce.

A more evenly argued review of the program than this one was published in The Independent the next day.

Jumping robot

There was a great vid on the BBC web site today of a little Japanese robot that walks and jumps. It moves very organically and  the blurb says it can balance but I don’t know whether it’s just executing a routine or whether it is adjusting for it’s environemnt.

 

Jumping Robot