Shit telly

"Shit telly" is almost a tautology - so much of what is produced is not only shit, but deliberately shit. That's because people are idiots, and they like shit.

Take "Deal or No Deal". I can't watch it without immediately falling into an uncontrollable rage, which is quite unfortunate given the maddening frequency with which it seems to be on. I hate it for two reasons - firstly, it's a pointless game of chance, and secondly, the utter shitstains who go on it.

It's a game of chance that entails morons opening boxes containing sums of money, being offered a sum of money by the "banker" to end their game in case their box contains a hefty sum, which is invariably (tearfully) rejected, only for the greedy halfwit in question to end up settling for a lot less later in the show when whatever passes for their brain fails to alert them to the mathematical likelihood of failure. What the fuck is interesting about people opening boxes? People opening boxes is boring and rubbish, unless those boxes contain something exciting like mustard gas, a naked Charlotte Church, or maybe a velociraptor. Take note, Endemol.

Now, people answering questions, that's okay. You can play along at home, if that is your preference. And answering questions entails a skill, which opening boxes doesn't. Unless you were born with no arms. Which most of us aren't.

Which leads me onto the wretched specimens that invariably populate this dismal cackfest. There are invariably fat women of indeterminate age and hair-colouring, weeping and wailing as they open boxes. There are spanners entrusting with opening these boxes, earnestly offering (unerringly terrible) advice. There's always someone ostentatiously gay. There's a sagely old bloke, a teenager with pink hair, a mumsy housewife. Always.

But worst are the box-deciders, fretting and agonising over which sodding box to choose, as though they can somehow influence a random outcome. YOU CAN'T, you gibbering moron. Just pick a box, STOP CRYING, be grateful if you're offered some decent cash and then fuck the fuck off my screen.

I hate it. Really, really hate it - typical lowest-common-denominator television, idiots on show for consumption by other idiots.

And Noel Edmonds is a smug twat.

Look at this man

This is Gordon Brown, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, as pictured in today's Times.

Do you look well, Gordon? Are you enjoying the job you've schemed and plotted your whole life for, Gordon? Do you realise we all hate you, Gordon?

The answer to all three must be a resounding "no", although in time, once he's left office in the most complete misery, me may realise that we all do hate him.

Yet looking at that, I almost feel sorry for him. Yes, he's a hateful, vengeful socialist whose ideals would impoverish us all, shackling us to his nightmarish vision of a Big Brother surveillance society where only officially authorised behaviour is permitted, and only when people like him say so, economically and emotionally tied to the state.

But...the sun is shining, my workload for the day is pleasingly modest, and looking at this shattered image of a man facing ruin and derision for centuries to come, I almost - I said almost - feel for him.

Just go, Gordon. Go now, for "health reasons", and while we'll all know you went because you couldn't stomach an electoral apocalypse in 2010, at least we might feel a bit sorry for you, rather than dancing on your political grave in a couple of years.

Stamp them out

The Government is terribly vexed about house prices. They're falling, you see - and much of the pyramid scheme upon which Gordon Brown built our economy depends on this not happening.

So what do they propose?

Something peculiar called a "stamp duty holiday". This isn't even a proper tax cut, and we all know there's no such thing as a bad tax cut. Rather, it's a temporary cut. Oh, but only if the property in question is £175,000 or less.

This will apparently cost £600m, which has not been accounted for and sounds terribly dramatic, but in a trillion-pound economy, it's tantamount to losing 50p down the back of the sofa.

No; the obvious problem is more mundane - what happens if you're trying to sell a house for about £200,000 today, having been trying to flog it for a year or so? Chances are you've already cut it be 10% to match falling prices. Who on earth will now offer anything over £174,999 for anything? So your £220,000 house is now likely to sell for£175,000, or it won't sell. A drop of around a quarter, hastening the national drop in house prices they're so anxious to avoid.

You stupid, stupid bastards.

As our soggy summer ends...

...here's a fine explanation of how the AGW "consensus" is looking increasingly unwell.

And to think the soppy tarts who run our country still believe devoutly in this fantasy, and would harm our economy in support of it.

Just admit you're wrong, okay? We'll try not to be TOO smug, I promise. Because the longer you leave it, the angrier people will be...

A girl, in charge?

Why not? It worked here - Mrs Thatcher remains unassailably as the finest peacetime Prime Minister of all time. Now, John McCain has picked Sarah Palin to his running mate for the American Presidency.

Although Sarah Palin wouldn't actually be in charge, unless John McCain (72 today) turns out to be, erm, well, not quite up to being the President halfway through his eighth decade.

It's an interesting move though. I'm not too fussed who wins the contest - as a right-wing libertarian, the cloying social conservatives of the Republicans is as bad as the fucktarded leftiness of the Democrats. Rather like when Leeds United play Chelsea, the best you can hope for us them to both lose in the most fabulously demeaning fashion imaginable. Preferably to the backdrop of the entire stadium being teargassed. And truncheoned.

However - while being no Julie Kirkbride, she's pretty hot, so I think I'll go with John McCain. It seems the fairest way to decide.

Gordon Brown: doing the right thing

There's a title I wasn't expecting to be composing too often when I started up this repository for ranting. It's inspired by this:

Gordon Brown to reject energy windfall tax

Gordon Brown is set to defy Labour MPs and public opinion by rejecting a multi-billion pound windfall tax on energy firms.

Remarkable - one must have thought the temptation of a left-wing Prime Minister to remove money from Evil Profiteering Companies would be nigh on irresistible. Particularly when we consider this:

Dozens of Labour MPs are backing a big windfall tax and a poll yesterday suggested that the majority of voters agree.

...

The YouGov poll, commissioned by the left-wing Compass pressure group, showed that 67 per cent of voters support a major one-off tax on energy firms' profits.

I'm not all that surprised a majority of people support such a move, however fabulously ill-conceived it is. Big companies are easy to view as an easy target to steal from (sorry, tax) - and with them being both large enough to withstand it and sufficiently Evil as to deserve it, it should therefore be done.

Jon Cruddas, a former Labour deputy leadership candidate and Compass member said the tax would allow Labour to differentiate itself from the Conservatives.

Mr Cruddas is, of course, a dribbling lefty halfwit, and would think that. If he thinks differentiating Labour from the Tories by being even more left-wing is a good thing, one can only assume he desire electoral apocalypse.

However, Mr Brown is understood to have concluded that a multi-billion pound tax on energy firms at a time when the UK economy stands on the brink of recession would be politically and economically risky. John Hutton, the Business Secretary, has also privately opposed the tax.

Indeed he has. By the dismal standards of Labour frontbencher, John Hutton is one of the few who appear remotely acquainted with the real world, and how it works.

Cruddas, and other dimwitted dinosaurs of the Leftism of old, think that money can simply be taken from profitable companies with no downside. But there is, and it's explained quite beautifully here by the excellent Martin Vander Weyer in the Speccie:

We’ve estimated that over the next ten to 12 years the UK will need up to £100 billion of new investment in our energy infrastructure,’ he told me the other day. ‘That investment is mobile - it can go anywhere it will get a decent rate of return. You’ve always got to structure your tax policy against that background. That’s the new reality. We’ve got to show that the tax framework is as competitive as it possibly can be and I know the Chancellor wants to make sure that it is.’

Genuine long-term thinking is quite rare in politics, and turning down a plan down just because it's wrong is depressingly uncommon - particularly when there is a good deal of (misplaced) support for it. Well done John Hutton. Well done (begrudgingly) Gordon Brown. Shut the fuck up, Jon Cruddas.

"An end to boom and bust"

Or so went Gordon Brown's favourite saying, rattled off in that dreadful monotone so reminiscent of Soviet era politicans droning about increasing tractor production while the people starved.

Now we see an end to "an end to boom and bust":

UK economic growth ground to a halt between April and June, according to the latest official data.

The Office for National Statistics said economic growth was unchanged in the second quarter from the first, revising an earlier estimate of 0.2% growth.

This also renders obsolete another of his beloved sayings: "x consecutive quarters of growth", where x is a very large number whose origins (unspoken, of course) are under the last Tory government, who can take credit for those on their own watch and probably all of them under Brown's time too.

But now the house of cards of is crumbling:

"The figures are very weak and suggest the UK economy is already in recession," said George Buckley, an economist at Deutsche Bank.

Your humble scribe is no economist, and will leave the more forensic destructions of Gordon Brown's abysmal record to them. Although I probably know about it than Gordon Brown, who for some unfathomable reason appears to think that he, and he alone, can make socialist tax-and-spend fuckwittedness work, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Now he must reap what he has sown. A perfect economic storm awaits - the economy is likely to worsen for at least another eighteen months, which will neatly incorporate the next General Election. Labour is certain to be obliterated, and Gordon Brown will take his deserved place at the head of future lists of "Really, Really Shit Prime Ministers".

His personal and professional destruction will make for enjoyable viewing - but only for those who manage to ride it out. Unfortunately we must all reap what he has sown. And while seeing this shower of shits out of power for a generation is an appealing prospect, the pain the country must suffer in order for this to happen may not make it worthwhile.

What an absolute twat.

Up yours, comandante

Via ConservativeHome, three cheers for Boris Johnson:

gingeral: Are you going to cancel Ken Livingstone's planned celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution next year (bearing in mind that Castro killed more people in his first three years in office than Pinochet managed in seventeen!)?

You can rest assured this is a dead plan. It is no more, it has ceased to be, it is an ex-plan! My administration will not be treating taxpayer’s money with the lax attitude of the previous administration.

Marvellous.

Of course, it won't help any of the people imprisoned by Castro for such crimes being gay or disagreeing with his regime, or bring back those killed by his deranged murderer-in-chief Che Guevara - but Boris' decision raises a little smile nonetheless...

Brrr....

The BBC, a fully paid up member of the anthropogenic global warming fantasy, sulkily reports:

This year appears set to be the coolest globally this century.

Data from the UK Met Office shows that temperatures in the first half of the year have been more than 0.1 Celsius cooler than any year since 2000.

But...how can this be? Everyone knows that the world is on the very precipice of a fiery death. At some conveniently indeterminate yet IMMINENT point in the future.

"The big thing that's been happening this year is La Nina, which has lowered global temperatures somewhat," said John Kennedy, climate monitoring and research scientist at the Met Office's Hadley Centre.

Aah, I knew there'd be a simple answer. And not an admission of "err, actually it turns out we're a bunch of total fucking idiots who need to do some serious apologising and backtracking" right now." Although these people really need to start considering that now's the best time to fess up, because the longer this goes on the more ugly and embarrassing will be their eventual retraction.

Go read the rest of the article - it reads a bit like a kid being caught red-handed scrumping apples tearfully spluttering "but, but, but, but..."

It's like ten thousand spoons

Yvette Cooper has been chirruping away in a lefty newspaper about our future Prime Minister. It seems that David Cameron is actually going to be a total disaster, and his economic ideas will ruin us all. She even coins a cute term for the impending cataclysm: "Cameronimcs". Disaster, thy name is known.

Luckily, we still have a couple of years before the end of days, during which time the Great Helmsman will be steering us through the choppy waters. Or so his comrades would have us believe - those who actually know what they're talking about seem to think things aren't quite as rosy:

Recession looms in the UK in the next six to nine months as firms face "a difficult and risky climate", the British Chambers of Commerce warns.

Gordon Brown, of course, told us that "boom and bust" had been abolished - as though somehow the economic cycle didn't apply to him. So how can this be?

Well, Ms Cooper may rail against something of which she's only guessing about, but we already know what Brownonomics is. It's gone a bit like this:

• inherit an economy in good and improving shape
• raise taxes
• spend lots of money
• borrow money
• spend more money
• raise taxes some more
• spend even more money
  
• shit yourself when the economy take a down-turn
• borrow money
• continue spending
• look puzzled when the money runs out
  

It's a favoured phrase of many that Labour governments always end with the money running out, and we shouldn't be surprised. Socialism has been tested to destruction, and anyone who thinks it's worth another try should be kept firmly away from the country's finances. And hit, often, with large sticks.

But what WILL Cameronomics look like? The Tory right want lots of juicy tax cuts and public spending slashed to bits. As do I - taxes are too high, public spending is wildly out of control. I can almost picture the manic gleam in John Redwood's eye as he decimates the obscenely bloated public sector.

Unfortunately Gordon Brown is pursuing a scorched earth policy, making a bad situation intentionally worse. The finances that David Cameron inherits are certain to be worse than those bequeathed by Sir John Major to Tony Blair. This is certain to tie Cameron's hands quite considerably with his scope for swift tax cuts, although long term the frankly immoral portion of our earnings the government steals simply has to come down. This will annoy the Tory right, and indeed anyone else who knows the first thing about economics - how Dave deals with this in his first term will be the most interesting test of Ms Cooper's "Cameronomics".

Two little letters

We've mentioned before the difficulty the EU had in comprehending Ireland's response to their invitation to ratify the Lisbon Constitution.

It appears that stupidity is contagious.

In common with over 26,000 others, I signed a petition asking the Government to take the scarcely contentious decision to respect the decision of the Irish and decline to continue with our own ratification.

They've responded:

In the UK, the Lisbon Treaty has now completed its passage through both Houses of Parliament in the UK following 25 days of debate. The Bill received Royal Assent on 19 June and the UK ratified the treaty on 16 July.

We believe the treaty would be good for the UK and good for the EU. This treaty adjusts existing treaties, in the same way as previous EU amending treaties.

If it's that great, why not set and the case and then ask us? You know, as you promised in your own manifesto?

However, European treaty change rightly requires unanimity across all EU Member States. That is why the ‘no’ vote on the treaty in the Irish referendum on 12 June is important, and needs to be respected.

You don't respect someone's decision by ignoring it. That's so obvious one marvels that it requires pointing out.

The Irish government has made it clear that they need time to analyse the result and its implications, and to consult widely at home and abroad.

The Irish Government, pro-EU, apparently needs time to analyse the word "no".

The British Government is apparently sympathetic to this desire for additional time to decipher a two-letter word.

Further comment seems entirely superfluous.

Breaking up is never easy...

So, Georgia appears to have been trounced by Russia. Little surprise - it's as equal a contest as if the Starship Enterprise was assailed by some people with sharp sticks and a nice line in supernatural incantations.

I do not propose to spend too much time apportioning blame, though whenever it's Russia v someone, "Russia" is generally the correct answer. Their attitude to anything remotely related to peace, prosperity, freedom is fucking despicable, and that they're continuing to sulk about losing the Cold War and their abominable Soviet empire is really quite contemptible.

No; what intrigued me was a place called South Ossetia, which I cannot recall every hearing of before.

It wants independence from pro-Western Georgia in order to cuddle up to Russia. You may consider that a curious wish, but sometimes it's better to be in cahoots with the nasty bastard in the playground instead of the nice, clever, pasty-faced speccy kid.

South Ossetia is smaller than Kent, and less populous than Lincoln. One cannot imagine Lincoln making a particularly compelling case for independence from the United Kingdom, nor can you envisage its people wishing it.

But how small CAN you create viable countries? Some in Scotland wish independence from the UK. Whether you can construct a functioning modern economy on deep friend Mars bars is open to debate, though I can almost hear the smug retort of Alex Salmond dribbling on about oil, as though there's a infinity quantity of the stuff.

Would Scotland work as a fully independent country, with its own economy, army, justice system and all the other trappings of statehood? My guess is that with a population of five million, several major cities and plenty of space, it could. Whether it should, given that it'd probably become a laboratory for fuckwitted socialists inflicting upon their countrymen a socialist utopia, with the 100% failure rate of such experiments, is another matter. But if they want to try, on balance I'd say good luck to them. At least it'd stop people recommending Rangers and Celtic join the Premier League.

But who else may not wish to be part of the UK? The Welsh? Smaller, less populous and with less of a nationalist tendency, they probably wouldn't want to. But COULD they? Could an independent Wales, with its spittle-flecked language and incessant rain, really conceivably break away from the English taxpayer and become independent? My guess is probably not.

Who next? Cornwall, population 500,000, is the next likely candidate. It's frankly impossible to imagine a country called Cornwall. But how about the kind of autonomy favoured by some as an intermediate option? Some examples are citied - Catalunya, the Basque country, and so on. Maybe. It seems to have some of the best aspects of both outcomes. No severing of the monies provided by the central government, but a vague sense of self-determination in enough trifling matters as to create the notion of "independence".

It's hard to look beyond there. Yorkshire has the strongest regional identity of the other counties, but it's very hard to believe that'd ever happen.

So will we ever see the final break-up of the UK? My guess is yes. Scotland seems to be on a course towards independence, and the English taxpayer doesn't seem too aghast at the prospect of no longer subsidising chippy Scots. Wales - less likely, but it already has a devolved Assembly and the transfer of powers to it is likely to increase rather than decrease throughout time.

The rest? Nah.

Of course, this could lead us onto the fascinating paradox between the increasing worldwide tendency towards smaller states and the fucking EU trying to meld one gigantic unwieldy superstate, but perhaps another time...

Some auntie

I hate the BBC.

Most people don't; it continues to enjoy a fuzzy sense of admiration from many, and enduringly misguided loyalty.

I have absolutely no idea why. Imagine hearing of an equivalent elsewhere: a left-wing state broadcaster employing 28,000 people, possessing an annual budget of £4bn, funded by a compulsory television tax. You'd snort with derision. Yet here, we speak warmly of "Auntie Beeb".

Its bias is so obvious it has even been forced to admit it. In spite of the principles of public broadcasting, it engages in the same mad dash for ratings that makes ITV wholly unwatchable. The crucial difference is that we don't pay for ITV to exist - it pays for itself, and while its schedule is filled with abysmal lowest-common-denominator rubbish, at least it does this off its own back.

So should the BBC be privatised?

Why not. Just to see what happens. Just to see how this fat, lazy, complacent organisation copes when exposed to the real world. Just to see how many of those 28,500 staff it actually does need. Just to see whether £4bn is the actual cost of its operations. Just to see the wails of horror from its pro-EU, AGW-fantasy-propagating, Tories-are-all-evil correspondents.

And best of all, having spent so long rubbishing the Conservatives, their backs are up. It's too late to back-track and make amends. Any right-wing party worth its salt should be opposed to a monumental waste of public money such as the British Broadcasting Corporation, let alone one that so palpably hates it. Revenge is in the air, and the Tories are likely to have a long time in office in which to settle a few scores.

This would be a great place to start.

Don't tell Al Gore...

The Devil's Kitchen flags up this intriguing climate snippet in the Scotsman:

THE last ice age 13,000 years ago took hold in just one year, more than ten times quicker than previously believed, scientists have warned.

Rather than a gradual cooling over a decade, the ice age plunged Europe into the deep freeze, German Research Centre for Geosciences at Potsdam said.

Cold, stormy conditions caused by an abrupt shift in atmospheric circulation froze the continent almost instantly during the Younger Dryas less than 13,000 years ago – a very recent period on a geological scale.

The new findings will add to fears of a serious risk of this happening again in the UK and western Europe – and soon.

Imagine that - the whole continent freezing in a single year. How would we cope with disaster on such a monumental scale? It'd certainly render irrelevant the trivia and froth that occupies us. Even the hugely entertaining sight of Gordon Brown's life's work lying in ruins would be pushed to one side. Though hopefully not completely, as it really IS very entertaining. Anyway...

We already know the earth has been cooling for a few years. Obviously, anyone with any sense (anthropogenic global warming believers are not among such a group, and may leave via the door marked "idiots") will know that a few years of very minor cooling is no more important than the few years of very minor warming we've recently had. A 4,000,000,000 year old planet is very obviously going to have fluctuations of temperature, governed by a series of interconnecting cycles, many of whose timescales are so immense we cannot really hope to wrap our minds around them.

However, the notion of a sudden, catastrophic shift in climate in the "other" direction is quite arresting. The human race is very good at coping, adapting and thriving, and I've no doubt that we'd manage even in such unpromising conditions, although if it were to happen any time soon we'd all probably all spend the rest of our lives struggling to cope.

And yet, it is still possible to find so many fuckwits who believe we should all be obsessing over man-made global warming and knackering up the economy even more in order to "combat it". The mind boggles.

Back to basics...

Memories of John Major's dog days still linger. The cones hotline. Sleaze. Europe. Most of all, Back to Basics, the petard upon which so much hoisting occurred.

For few things are more maddening than sanctimonious politicians telling us how to live our lives. So it was with dismay that I read of Michael Gove's comments on lad's mags:

"I believe we need to ask tough questions about the instant-hit hedonism celebrated by the modern men's magazines targeted at younger males. Titles such as Nuts and Zoo paint a picture of women as permanently, lasciviously, uncomplicatedly available. We should ask those who make profits out of revelling in, or encouraging, selfish irresponsibility among young men what they think they're doing."

Men In Enjoying Pictures Of Naked Women Shocker.

I do not read Nuts and Zoo. This is because they are both shit. Laddish humour need not be devoid of style and wit, which is why FHM occasionally accompanies me on long train journeys, and those two never do. Similarly, I'll sometimes browse through Loaded when the Spectator or Private Eye seem just a bit too tough at 6am. And to my knowledge, it's not yet turned me into a despicable misogynist, absent-father-of-the-future and all-round lowlife scumbag. No more than was already the case, at least.

Hedonism is fun. Naked women are fun. Stupid laddish humour, in the correct doses (ie, those determined by the individual, not the politician), is fun.

Mr Gove is not fun. Of course, he's not in politics to be fun. But he shouldn't be in politics to stop everyone else's fun either.

When no doesn't mean no

Q: When does "no" not mean "no"?

A: When you say no to the EU.

In June, Ireland said "no" to the EU. No, we don't want your constitution, whatever you want to call it, whatever you want to pretend it does, and more importantly, whatever you want to pretend it doesn't do. No.

Unfortunately the EU doesn't do democracy - indeed, it is a notable opponent of it. Ireland only voted because its troublesome constitution compelled a plebiscite; elsewhere in Europe, the people were denied the right of consultation about the transfer of power and authority from national capitals to the famously corrupt EU.

That three million Irish voters were able to hobble the "progress" of the EU did not go down well. Nicolas Sarkozy's reaction was particularly contemptible, stating that the Irish would have to vote again. Just what part of "no" don't you understand, you stupid French twat?

There are two reasons this is an appalling idea. Firstly, if it's so important that the Irish should have to vote again, why should everyone else not get a say? The notion of Ireland getting two votes and the rest of us getting none is ridiculous.

Secondly, and most pressingly for M Sarkozy and his loathsome friends in Brussels, it's a vote he'd lose. 71% of the Irish are opposed to a re-vote. The No lobby is certain to vote no again. There must be a portion of the Yes vote that will be embarrassed at what is being done in its name and will either stay away or vote for the original result to be upheld. And the undecideds? Which way are they likely to swing? No-one likes being bullied, and it's hard to imagine anything other than a majority of them lining up to say no.

So while we can rail until the end of time about the EU and its vile tactics, we can at least celebrate the fact that they are likely to backfire horribly. And this, of course, is before the incoming Conservative government is able to gleefully announce its own referendum, the result of which is a foregone conclusion.

The Irish have said no. So too have the French and Dutch in previous referenda. We British are certain to say no. If the EU has any sense of self-preservation, they would learn that no really must mean no.

When something must be done...

Norman Baker is a curious fellow. Liberal Democrats tend to be a bit peculiar at the best of times, but Mr Baker appears to enjoy taking it to interesting extremes.

An opponent of such nefarious and unconnected evils as the monarchy and Brighton & Hove Albion FC, he is now to be heard railing against airlines:

Airlines which fail to get at least 95% of passengers through check-in within 15 minutes should be fined, the Liberal Democrats have said.

Transport spokesman Norman Baker said queues had to be minimised at Gatwick and Heathrow to ensure a "smooth and efficient journey".

No-one likes queues, we'll give him that. And smoothness and efficiency, yes, we're all big fans of that.

But he added that no penalty existed for excessive queues at check-ins run by airlines.

Presumably because it's none of the government's business how companies choose to treat their customers, nor do they have a remit to act as the Queue Police.

Those failing to deal with at least 95% of passengers within 15 minutes should be fined by the Civil Aviation Authority, Mr Baker said.

I would be fascinated to learn who WILL act as the Queue Police, however. One hopes the Civil Aviation Authority choose to focus their activities on more important topics than spewing out lots of clipboard-wielding aspirant traffic wardens to officiously declare such abominations as only 94.78% of passengers being processed within the permitted time period. Horror of horrors.

"Delays should not hold up planes for long periods of time on the runway, nor should flights be left stacking over cities, wasting time and creating significantly increased carbon emissions. Unfortunately this is not the case at present."

I am no expert on aviation, but I am willing to bet that jet fuel is not at its cheapest right now. It is therefore no great leap of imagination to suppose that airlines are not exactly going to be keen on keeping their aeroplanes in the air much longer than necessary. The incentive already exists for them to not waste time, and it's better than the earnest intonations of a notoriously odd politician.

Mr Baker's report also calls for the carbon emissions details of passengers' journeys to be printed on tickets.

Oh for crying out loud. What exactly does he think will be achieved by this? "Oh dear, my flight to the south of France is going to emit 0.2kg of carbon dioxide per mile, I'd hate to be seen as a advocate of polar bear genocide, best cancel the booking and go on a nice cycling holiday in Pembrokeshire instead".

Or more likely, it's an attempt at futile guilt-tripping, allowing another AGW fantasist to take the moral high ground about the Impending Global Cataclysm that's been due to occur "any day now" for about twenty years.

Better the devil you knew?

Tony Blair won three General Elections as Labour leader. This is a feat without precedent; given the likelihood of a Conservative government occupying most of the 2010s, it's an achievement some of us may not be around for the next time it happens. Indeed, if you follow the gloomy predictions of Fraser Nelson and Ian Martin, Labour may not survive the next decade as a serious party of government, an deliciously amusing prospect. Now more comedy comes from a Telegraph poll feasting on the richly entertaining despair of Gordon Brown, observing:

In fact, the only Labour figure who could significantly narrow the gap with the Tories is the man the party forced out of office last year: Tony Blair. Yet even with Mr Blair as leader, Labour would trail the Conservatives by 32 per cent to 41 per cent.

I do not much care for Tony Blair - a vain, shallow man with a messiah complex whose legacy may be starkly at odds with his own view of himself. But his capacity for charm is incontestable. Eleven years on from the first of his two landslides, a slightly revisionist view has crept in that he was only awarded such a handsome victory because of the revulsion shown for John Major's Tories.

Nonsense. Tony Blair was genuinely popular to point of being beloved, and those who seek to claim otherwise are letting his subsequent failure to live up to his own promise impair their recollection. Even in the midst of the Iraq war, New Labour's growing sense of tarnishment, increasing frustration with the government, Tony Blair remained a winner in 2005. People voted for him time after time.

Historians will mull over this and think "just what the fuck were they doing when they kicked him out for Gordon Brown?" A flawed winner, replaced by a serial election-dodger, a moody, uncommunicative socialist automaton, whose answer to everything is either sulking, hiding, lying or dully churinng out tractor production figures. Or a combination of the three.

And it's not as though there wasn't ample evidence of his unsuitability BEFORE he took office. The superb Political Betting shows quite clearly that he was not the public's favoured option when up against David Cameron. This data will have been known to Labour MPs. And still they crowned him, without a vote, and sent him out to a distrusting and restless public which is beginning to realise it didn't mind that nice Mr Blair so much after all.

Truly, they reap what they sow. And as for Tony, he has kept his counsel well. But you can almost see the old rogue's winsome smile as he surveys the post-Blair Labour party.

If you've got nothing to hide...

I've just finished reading this book:

Readable. Not much more, but more than I've ever done, so let's not start off in too curmudgeonly a fashion. The premise is excellent: set in 1937, Mosley becomes Prime Minister after the King refuses to abdicate, Britain becomes fascist and cosies up to Hitler's Germany, and only one heroic ex-Tory MP and Great War veteran can stop him.

Sadly what doesn't follow doesn't quite do this premise justice. However, there are some neat touches. The portrait of 1930s Britain is excellently drawn - and it is this that produces the book's most arresting situation. It is when a policeman, the archetypal 1930s English constable, now plunged into the nightmare of working for a fascist madman, compels our hero to produce "his papers".

Imagine it - the friendly neighbourhood copper, helper of old ladies, scourge of local ruffians, sporter of luxurious moustache, barking out commands at the behest of a crazed fascist dictatorship. Ugly isn't it?

Which makes this Government's intention to introduce ID cards, and a colossal accompanying database, even less appealing.

• They cost a fortune - some say £18bn, at a time when the economy is in poor shape
• They failed to stop the Madrid bombings, the Conservative point out
• The giant database storing our details will be a hacker's wet dream

Those are compelling reasons to halt this idiocy now. Any vaguely intelliegent government would have done so. But I am more vexed by the fundamental alteration in the relationship between state and citizen.

This is a free country, despite the palpable hostility of numerous Home Secretaries down the years. I do not have to prove my identity to the state or any its agents. Compelling me to do so makes this a less free country. It really is a simple as that.

Perhaps the ex-Communists in the Labour Party think that's a good thing though.

Nanny knows best

"Fat reports on children to be sent to parents", claims the Telegraph's website.

Not a promising headline, is it?

The subtitle offers little further encouragement:

Parents are to get school "fat reports" detailing their children's weight as part of the fight against childhood obesity.

Actually consider that term: "fat reports". When I went to school - and yes, that hasn't happened for over ten years - we used to get school reports, broken down into subsections for recording one's prowess (or otherwise) in maths, English, history, PE and so on. Nowhere did mine contain a box for my long-suffering teachers to comment upon my tubbiness. Which would have been redundant anyway - when I was at school we had this revolutionary approach to staying in shape by not eating too much and doing some exercise. Amazing, eh? And it worked! Perhaps I should make my fortune marketing this as the latest fad diet to gullible women in the Daily Mail's FeMail section?

On with the article:

Rules to be introduced at the start of the academic year in September will see the parents of all children aged between four and five, and 10 and 11 receive the reports, after Government-commissioned research suggested the weight problem among Britain's children is worse than originally thought.

The most recent figures available show that one in 10 children aged between four and five are obese and 13 per cent are overweight, with the figures rising to 17.5 per cent and 14.2 per cent by age 11.

Children are getting fatter. Now, this is not good. There are plenty of reasons why children shouldn't be fat. This evidently vexes the Government; much more than teaching them to read or write seems to. The difference being that state education is there to impart literacy and numeracy, not engage in this creepy monitoring of pre-pubescent porkiness. Fascinating prioritisation.

The research for the Department of Health reported that despite a well-publicised campaign to tackle childhood obesity and produce a comprehensive picture of the problem, the results "may underestimate the true population prevalence of obesity and overweight at national, regional and local level".

A Department of Health spokesman last night (SUN) said: "If you do not opt out and your child is measured at school you will automatically get feedback."

I am instantly suspicious whenever some bright spark pipes up with "yes, but you can opt out". The presumption should be that you already are opted out, unless you actively choose to opt in. Not the other way around. I am not surprised to hear that the Government is totally oblivious to this.

The British Medical Association is already warning that a quarter of all children in the UK will be obese by 2020, resulting in them having a shorter life expectancy than their parents.

Then perhaps those parents should, I dunno, stop feeding them so many chips and send them off to the park more often? It's called parental responsibility.

Paul Sacher, a paediatric dietician at the Childhood Nutrition Research Centre in London, said many parents needed help in identifying that their children were overweight in the first place.

"If I was a parent I would want to know if my child was overweight or obese, then I could do something about it," he said.

What?! Seriously - what? You'd want to know if your child was overweight or obese? Have you tried using your fucking eyes?

What kind of total moron cannot see that their OWN CHILDREN are overweight? What type of utter blithering idiot is incapable of assessing their own flesh and blood to see if there's a bit too much of the former flopping around? Words (nearly) fail me.

"There is a major problem with parents' perception of their children's weight. As all children are getting bigger, it is becoming more difficult for parents to work out whether their children are overweight by just looking at them and comparing them to other kids. The only way we can work out whether children are getting bigger is to weigh them all."

No it isn't. Being overweight is an absolute condition, not a relative one. If you cannot spot it by the simple process of looking for a few seconds, it's a wonder you ever had children in the first place. I, for instance, can work out that Mr Sacher is a total idiot by looking at what he says. If I placed him alongside lots of other imbeciles this wouldn't somehow cancel out his own stupidity.

The Conservatives have opposed the plan, saying it should be left to parents to regulate the weight of their children.

Quite.