…and Fairy Stories don’t come true either!

Immigration. The ‘Third Rail’ of British Politicians.

We heard how “there must be limits to immigration levels because of the impact on public services, the environment and on “community cohesion”,” from David Cameron on the 9th November 2006.

Once more with feeling in 24th July 2009 when he said ‘That’s why we would like to have a proper points system with limits attached to it so we can actually get immigration under control.

We again heard from David Cameron in January 2010 with the words “that he thought net immigration of 200,000 a year – or 2 million a decade – was “too much. We would like to see net immigration in the tens of thousands rather than the hundreds of thousands,” he told BBC1′s Andrew Marr Show.
“I don’t think that’s unrealistic; that’s the sort of figure there was in the 1990s and I think we should see that again.”

So if we asked, with of course due deference, knuckling of brow and doffing our trades-peoples emblems of cloth caps, if he thought he had in fact kept his promises; in the light of the recent statement that Net Migration statistics show that the UK is on course to see an increase in immigration, even if some 100,00 come from Ireland, I wonder what his reply might be?

I also wonder if he would care to comment upon the simple truth that, even if he slammed the doors shut to every would-be leech upon our Social Services & Health Service who was sleazing through the badly-barred gates, he wouldn’t be able to stop any of the floods of bloody Gyppoes from Romania, or the masses of Middle Europe who will be offered an EU Passport care of Hungary’s plans to offer thousands living in Serbia and Bosnia documentation as long as they could ‘prove’ Hungarian ancestry!

Happy Christmas!

“Now remember, Melchior, when we get to the Stable, no more of this “Do you support full marriage rights for lesbians and homosexuals?” when we see the Baby. He’s got plenty of time to sort out the small problems. What I will be asking him will be something along the lines of whether he agrees with the Palestinian Authority’s stance on the Jewish settlement construction activity on the West Bank?”

Keep a’knockin but ya’can’t come in!!

A very long time back, I was selected, (selected that is on the basis of, “who sits there, does that!) to take part in our Grammar School Nativity Play. Now the play itself was quite a big deal in our school, and every year a single theme was chosen, and although the basics, such as Mary, Joseph, Baby etc. remained as constants, the supporting cast altered according to the master who authored that year’s script!So there I was, all togged out in a very ‘natty’ Roman Centurion’s cloak, uniform etc. including a sword which was just a little bit too long for me, as I was only four foot ten tall when I was fifteen! (Late bloomer or something!) My part, which was of course crucial to the plot, was to send a soldier to demand a room at the inn, and to express annoyance at the very idea of a Roman Centurion being turned away from a warm fire etc.!

 

So the soldier returns with the bad news that all the rooms are full, and my line was to step forward while saying, “This is the last straw!” Which would normally have worked except that my sword, which I previously mentioned was rather long, caught some hay as I swept it forwards, so that this big clump of hay landed about four feet in front of me after what I do admit was a rather deft curving motion through the air! Of course this particular piece of theatre brought the house down, much to the displeasure of our headmaster, who got up, halted the play and ranted on for about three minutes about the sanctity of the play, and how we weren’t supposed to laugh at a Nativity Play, and on, and on, and on!

The ONLY person to get off ‘scott free’ was me, as I was deemed innocent! Happy days indeed!

Home for Christmas

Won’t be doing much blogging over the holidays.

So, for any devoted readers who chance to click on ‘me’, I wish you all the best; of peace, of family, of a quiet time.

Something old, something fairly new…

Finished the last of my early christmas cake, from Delia’s recipe book. Darn but that lady knows the things which work! Going to make another one, despite the tremendous damage it does to my diet. After all, it is only once a year!

http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/grandpa1940

Just checked, and that is now all of my books published in various E-book formats on Smashwords; and through them to Amazon, Sony, Mobi and all the others. One smart feature from Amazon is download the PC version of Kindle; you can then check out any sample you fancy. Not only that, all the books are held together, and if you closed one up before closing down, when you boot up again, the page is there waiting for you! Dead clever!

Just(ice) about right

Black…..Check Talented…….N/applicable

Listening this morning to an interview with Herman Ouseley, he of course formerly of the Racial Equality Commission and points southwards, towards the sewage system. As with many ‘politicised’ black people, he is fervently in favour of ‘equality through diversity’ but his version amounts to nothing less than positive discrimination. He was discussing the fact that there are only one or two black managers of football teams in the whole of the Premiership and Championship Leagues, despite there being somewhere around 35 % of all players being either black or brown. A similarly profound set of misunderstandings was published in the Telegraph on the same basis, which is that if there are 35% of black players in professional football, there should automatically be a similar percentage of managers within the same systems.

Now, as I maybe mentioned before, I know very little about Sport in general, and Football in particular; mainly because I just don’t see the point. I also accept that I am, in this respect, very, very much in the minority. But I do not believe that my ignorance of football extends to why someone is chosen to play, coach or manage these teams of delicate flowers whose skill, or lack of the same; is on display every weekend all around our cities and towns. As Football is a cross between a religious occasion and a sporting battle, the talented are chosen, and the lesser fall by the wayside. If a manager is good at his job, motivates his team, gets the cash to spend wisely; he and his team survive and prosper. If he falters, if his team does not do well, it is the fast walk with a P45 for the man who was once a hero!

The last factor in how well a football team is managed should be is the colour of that man’s skin, despite what the likes of Herman Ouseley or Jeremy Wilson believe. If you peel away the nonsense, the hero-worship, the fans and the huge pay packets; what you are left with is a business. It can be either a very lucrative business, or the precursor to bankruptcy, but the choices of managerial staff should and must be left to be made on the basis of talent and proven skills, never on what the colour of your skin is, and whether you might inflate the percentage of a diversity table initiated and controlled by a clown whose entire career has been based on telling other people that they are racist!

The latest of the ‘very few’

The old style of politics and politicians is something which I thought I would never see again. I am talking about the ‘old style’ which clearly stated, for Cabinet Members of Government at least, ‘if something goers awry on your watch’, you take responsibility; you must resign’. An old fashioned term for what is perhaps are old-fashioned ideals; of service, of honour, of rectitude, of courtesy: of an age and a time when politicians accepted that if their conduct, or of their Department, fell below those required standards, one resigned. Forthwith! No shilly-shallying; no ‘wandering around O’Houlihan’s barn, no hesitation.

There have been very, very few ‘honourable’ resignations in modern times, sufficiently few that most can be remembered because they are literally rarer than hen’s teeth. Robin Cook resigned from the Cabinet on principle over the Iraq War. Much earlier, Jack Profumo resigned after apologising for lying to the House.

The resignations for ‘revenge’, such as the gutter-snipe tactics of Geoffrey Howe or Michael Heseltine, who resigned in pique after not getting their own way in Margaret Thatcher’s time, I don’t include in the ‘honourable list’, nor do I include the corrupt and corruptible Peter Mandelson, who was forced to resign twice in dubious circumstances. Tony Bliar resigned because he knew the game wa up, and his wife was always on about making more money from the fools who were still beguiled by his ‘image’, one ideal at least which has come very, very true indeed!

So it is with some surprise that I salute Stewart Stevenson for an action which goes against the new traditions of just about every Party in the land, and is certainly one which I forecast will not be followed by many more; mainly because possibly 97% of the remaining politicians in Britain do not know how to even spell ‘honour’, never mind knowing what it means and represents.

What’s the Time?

This small story comes courtesy of my daughter Alice:-

 

Proudly showing off his newly-leased downtown apartment to a couple  of friends late one night, A drunk Kiwi led the way to his bedroom where there was a big brass  gong hanging on the wall.

‘What’s that big brass gong for?’ one of the friend’s asked.

‘Issss nod a gong. Issss a talking Australian clock’ he drunkenly replied.

‘A talking Australian clock – seriously?’

‘Yup.’ ‘Hmmm (hic).’

‘How’s it work?’ the second friend asked, squinting at it.

‘Just watch’ he said.

He picked up a hammer, gave the gong an ‘ear-shattering bash’ and  stepped back.

His three mates stood looking at one another for a moment in  astounded silence.

Suddenly, an Australian voice from the other side of the wall  screamed, ‘For f*#k’s sake, you stupid Kiwi pri*#. It’s ten past three in the  F**king morning!!!’

 

there’s many a slip….

In amongst all the weeping and gnashing of teeth, regarding the epic and totally predictable outcome of the sleaze-ridden FIFA World Cup 2018/2022 competition, there seem to be few sensible suggestions from the so-called great-and-good of the sporting world as to what to do next. The elite of the footballing world seem to be going around trying to find someone; anyone to blame for the fiasco, where such sporting Illuminati as Prince William, David Beckham and Prime Minister Cameron were wining, dining and even breakfasting the FIFA delegates. Allegedly getting promises of votes from all and sundry, they chose to believe that the same delegates were actually telling the truth, and so got the hopes of the world’s most passionate footballing Nations spiralling up to the heavens.

I always thought that politicians treated those whose favours they were supplicating, as very similar to the fools who had voted for them (the politicians) in the faint hope that the promises made during the election process would be kept, instead of being discarded as surplus once past the neccessary but totally meaningless voting process.

Writing as one who has absolutely no interest in organised sport whatsoever, I would have thought that the best thing that the Football Association should do would be to contact the other footballing authorities in places where we know that a gentleman’s word can be trusted, and find out if there is any interest in starting a parallel competition. The participants would be restricted to those countries whose governments had at least a semblance of democracy, and whose footballing administration had played the game at some time in the past.

Included would be such nations as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, America, some of the Caribbean nations, Brazil, Argentina, the four Home Nations and the Irish Republic. Obviously the list could be expanded, but definitely excluded from participation would be any Arabic or Islamic outfit, along with Russia and any country which counted Russia as a friend. The competion would be called The Freedom Football Cup, choice for the hosting would all be done on a computerised random-access generated algorithm, or else by pulling small numbered blocks out of a hat. Any nation so chosen would be limited as to the amount of money to be spent on stadia, roads and infrastructure, with the specific ruling that no new stadium be built at all. In other words, if football is not a semi-religious occasion in that country, the FFC would not be played there!

So, Prince William and the two Davids, go out and organise that lot!