postmodernism is even more whack then multiculturalism

Yeah, Johann gave it the treatment here, here, here and again here. Dribbling bullshit, the lot of it. Shove your chakras and your homeopathy where the sun shineth not.

multiculturalism is stupid

I can't stand the extreme liberals who prosetylise misogyny because its less complicated than standing up to cultural dogma. Fucking peasants. Johann doesn't like them either.

Johann Hari vs The World Bank

Johann turns his attention to this monolith of corruption and state-sponsored, fiscal tyranny. They suck donkey balls.

its a telling moment when soldiers break their silence

So several soldiers, fresh from Iraq, have been breaking their traditional silence over defence policy and have started speaking out against their presence in Iraq. I think this quote sums it up nicely:

"Every patrol we went on we were either shot at or blown up by roadside bombs. It was crazy. . . . . . . .We have overstayed our welcome now. We should speed up the withdrawal. It's a lost battle. We should pull out and call it quits."

Did you get that Tony? If you are, in fact, human and not a lying machine as you appear so convincingly to be, would you now consider bringing these poorly paid, under equipped, unfortunates home?

Americans are stupid - part 2

Because they're letting this happen to their great nation.

Americans are stupid

Yes, its blatantly edited to show all the worst bits but I can't see any English person proposing making a "big, glass crater out of the fucking middle east, for all I care".




Additional:

Oops! I just noticed an anglocentricism in there. My apologies to all the haggis-, sheep- and potato-fuckers out there. I really don't consider myself to be a strawberry-fucker. I am, in fact, a citizen of The United Kingdom (until I can emigrate- thanks Tony!).

Additonal 2

With reflection, I can easily see a British person vomiting the above phrase. That's what the Sun and The Daily Mail have done for the country.

Campaign for Democratically Elected UN

I am in strong support of this.

BAE: The Scum of the Earth

So BAE systems are at it again, using their obscene Whitehall punching power to take swings at people who ask naughty and entirely unreasonable questions of their staff, such as "did you pay bribes to the Saudis to obtain arms contracts?"

The sheer cheek of it! Don't these Luddites know that we have an Empire to protect?

Mark Thomas has an opinion. And more to say on the matter here, such as:

"Let us cast our minds back to the activities of that ardent supporter of "our boys", the arms company BAE Systems (formerly British Aerospace). Back in the 1990s, BAE was helping to arm Saddam Hussein through a company called Arab British Dynamics (ABD). ABD was a joint-venture company formed in 1978 by the Arab Organisation for Industrialisation (an Egyptian- based firm backed by Gulf funding) and BAE, which owned 30 per cent of the venture.

According to Jane's, the defence bible, BAE withdrew from the company in 1992 when the post-Gulf war British government discovered that ABD was helping Saddam Hussein with his Scud missile programme.

More important, though, is ABD's development and marketing of its anti-tank guided missile, called the Swingfire. It appears that BAE provided the technology for the Swingfire, which was developed under British licence. In 1983, the Financial Times noted that Swingfire missiles were supposedly heading to Sudan and Iraq. Jane's has subsequently confirmed Saddam Hussein's possession of the weapons. So BAE helped Saddam with his anti-tank missiles as well as his Scuds. Incredibly, no laws were broken as no parts, equipment or components were exported.

Then, in December 2001, a Daily Telegraph report appeared listing some of the items found at a "cleared" al-Qaeda centre in Afghanistan. Among the items were a "glossy brochure for Arab British Dynamics extolling the benefits of the company's Swingfire guided missile" and an operating manual for the system. Thus, it is possible that al-Qaeda could have Swingfire missiles, thanks to BAE. The government's Export Control Act does not cover the issue of licensed production of arms; so as long as nothing actually leaves the UK, British companies can export their technology and create foreign-based companies to avoid any UK or EU rules governing arms exports.

They can arm the dictators, who will oppress the people, whose liberation will serve as the excuse to send "our boys" to face the missiles they sold and try to bomb the civilians to freedom. You can be sure of one thing: other than family and friends, anyone who shouts "support our boys" is either a fool or a callous cynic of the worst kind."

Tax The Fat revisited

Evidence of why bloaters should be taxed for every kilogram of weight beyond clinical obesity (body mass index > 30).

wormage

Check out my beasties:

how not to fund renewable micro-generation - the UK model

This is utterly farcical. The Stern Report stated unequivocally that sustainability is an opportunity, not a burden. Someone should tell the monkeys who commissioned the report in the first place because they're still deploying the "petulant child" approach.

how to offend the world, by John Bolton

"a broadcast interview with the former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, asked by what right America imposed its "values" by force on foreign states. Bolton did not even try to answer. He jeered, "Try and stop us." I am sure, like his neoconservative confreres, he thought the reply smart and macho. Such people seem blind to the damage their arrogance does to America's image, interest and, ultimately, security abroad."

The guy's a dirty little nazi. Ignorant little white supremacist fuckwit, he must have an even smaller penis than me!

Senate majority leader states that US can't win war in Iraq

Does anyone else find it offensive? I'm talking about the way that US republicans talk about their troops as if they need all the support they can get when they're murdering Iraqi civilians. Why should the troops need support from everyone? They get paid a wage to do a job, don't they? They live in a democracy where it is not illegal to holod an opinion that differs from that of the incumbent junta? Why do the troops need a cuddle and a kiss at night before they can feel capapble of doing their jobs, as the republicans seem to be implying? For Harry Reid to point out the obvious and then to be accused of "not-supporting" the troops is taking hypocrisy to another level! If Bush hadn't sent the troops in there'd be 3000 more of them still walking the earth (not to mention half a million Iraqis) and thousands more would still have arms, legs, hearing, a lack of nightmares, no pieces of Iraqi civilian's brains in the fridge, etc. etc.

What the Stern Report didn't mention . . . .

. . . . was that combatting climate change is economically sensible- yet involves economic heresy as the oxymoron of perpetual growth within a finite space must be abandoned. There's loads of good sheet in this report.

"In the light of these considerations, there is no fundamental reason
to pursue economic growth as a primary objective of policy, or to
consider it as the key indicator of economic performance. Economic
growth does not, in itself, make people’s lives any better."

you can't re-write history

Johann Hari has done an excellent job of drawing attention to Bush's latest regression into fascism.

How not to go about canvassing votes

Yesterday I encountered a bespectacled figure through the frosted glass of my front door trying to shove something through my letter box. I opened the door, as I do to take it from him and was immediately struck by the fact that this was no circular or advert for a takeaway but a bright red leaflet callingupon me to vote for the local labour candidate, Tudor Evans, in the May elections. I politely declined to take the leaflet that he promptly shoved towards me without explanation and stated that I was a member of the Green Party. His resposne, far from acquiescence to my professed personal choice, was to turn his back on me and call over his shoulder, "So you're one of the ones who don't want nuclear power, good luck with all that CO2 then."

How rude!

The canvasser had moved straight onto my neighbours property without stopping to talk, even though I asked his receding back if he would like to discuss the issue. (Ironically enough, I am supportive of the development of new nuclear power stations as there is no other way to meet our obligations to reduce CO2 emissions. Its the lesser of two evils.). This offensive little toad then continued to mutter an offensive commentary under his breath whilst he moved to my neighbour's door which, unfortunately for him, brought him right back to my face as the two doors are right next to each other, thereby providing me with an opportunity to return the offense.

"Yeah, well done on the 650,000 dead Iraqis!"

I think I came out on top in that one.

Newsflash! - UK foriegn policy has produced more terror in the Middle East

Surprised? Nope, me neither. But the more it gets said the greater the chances that Cockweasel-in-Chief Blair might actually start to perceive reality as opposed to the fluffy-bunny fantasy in which he seems to dwell. The Oxfam report looks pretty good but I haven't time to read it now. The Oxford Research Group ones are pretty damning too and come from a very respectable bunch of minds.

Tax the Fat

This documentary amuses me greatly. I am wholeheartedly supportive of such a concept. I also think obese people shouldn't be allowed to vote. If you haven't a good enough grasp of the consequences of abusing your body then you're definitely not informed enough to wield your vote rationally.

I hate fatties and I espeically hate people who decry such "fattism" because its not the fault of the poor little wobblers. Bollocks, it isn't! I'll admit some people are actually ill and others might have some sort of genetic predisposition to sequester subcutaneous flab but there is a solution to this: Don't eat so much, you bloated tub of lard!

human rights- old skool style

Check this profundity (I like the word) in order:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accountability

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_of_Hammurabi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylonian_law


Am I profund or wot?



OH shit yeah!

This totally kicks arse . . . . .

"The Hammurabi Code (1792-1750 BC) - the most important legal compendium of the ancient Near East, drafted earlier than the Biblical laws - found its sources in these essays. The text, which occupies most of the stele, constitutes the raison d'être of the monument. The principal scene depicted shows the king receiving his investiture from Shamash. Remarkable for its legal content, this work is also an exceptional source of information about the society, religion, economy, and history of this period."

The stele is now in the Louvre and I saw it there a couple of weeks ago. The origins of human justice- cool stuff.

What the SDM is up too

I'm still writing my transfer report. Its just that my 2nd supervisor actually wanted me to integrate my 15000 word literature review into my TR to avoid having to repeat the introductory sections that were essential to making the 2nd document stand-alone.

Apart form the fact that that would take me, like, A WEEK MORE!

Fuck!

I cannot complain because my 2S (2nd supervisor) is doing it for (amazingly!) completely altrusitic reasons- she wants me to learn how to construct a research argument before I come to my thesis. I am totally in agreement with her but IT SUCKS that I have to format the two documents from scratch I spent all last week doing it and I am sick of both the fuckers. (although it does now look quite pro-style.

respect-

Tha drunken 1

the eloquence of reason

"To a degree all political leaders over-estimate the efficacy of action. They invariably feel that taking any action--however ill considered--is better than doing nothing. In this they are heavily influenced by the media, who require action--the more ill considered the better. No action, no mess, no story."


This is pervasive throughout Western culture. How do we address this paradox in political representation?

A: Accountability


Additional:

And then I read it again . . . .

"To a degree all political leaders over-estimate the efficacy of action. They invariably feel that taking any action--however ill considered--is better than doing nothing. In this they are heavily influenced by the media, who require action--the more ill considered the better. No action, no mess, no story. Yet when Bobby Kennedy suggested in 1963 that the U.S. do nothing about Vietnam and let the Vietnamese sort out their own destiny, his idea, in hindsight, was simply brilliant.

The United States has, for fifty years, made a career of telling other countries who should lead them, and how; and every single one of these efforts has ultimately blown up in our face. We would not be hated all over Latin America today if we hadn't saddled so many of them for decades with right wing military dictators, repressing every popular movement.

But it isn't just the need to meddle and tinker--it's the ego-maniacal belief that our interventions in the internal affairs of other countries will automatically be good for them, because we're so superior. And our interventions are made even more toxic by the conviction of most American foreign policy makers that the only way to "help" a country is to do violence to it in some way. To bomb it, invade it, assassinate its leaders, orchestrate a military coup, or blockade it. This is characteristic macho thinking, and one of the reasons why "macho" has become a synonym for "stupid"."

Dude! The profundity of this made me sit down and have another drag of my cigarette!

The United Kingdom - according to the C.I.A.

My favourite bit:

"Area - comparative: slightly smaller than Oregon" (but with twenty times the population)



"Land boundries: border countries: Ireland 360 km" (because France, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway - they don't have "borders" (because the US doesn't recognise the United Nations International Convention on The Law of The Sea - I covered it in my Ocean Science minor but can't be arsed to dig my lecture notes out to inform you lazy buggers further, look it up yourself if you are that interested)

"Land use : arable land: 23.23%
permanent crops: 0.2%
other: 76.57% (2005)"

(they forgot to mention weed production: 2%
landfill: 3%
renewable generation: 0.000000000000000000000000001%
U.S. military bases: 5%
Northern Ireland: 8%)

"Natural hazards: winter windstorms; floods" (they forgot chavs, the English 2003 World Cup squad & Tony)


... . . . and on and on 0- its Friday night and I'm druink so I'm going to hang out with me beaches what are staying with me 2nite.

Ciao, roughneck posse.

Another grim warning about the inhumanity of the "business as usual" approach

NEWSFLASH! . . . . People will die if we don't stop fucking with the planet and letting the rich cream off all the profits to spend on BMWs and 2nd homes in Cornwall.

Who Killed The Electric Car? - part 2

Johann posted some of the responses to his review of the film. I want to wade into this one swinging as a lot of the answers are naive or misrepresent facts about sustainable generation so I'm going to kick out some painful truth and send it off to our boy.

is the BBC biased to right-wing opinion?

Johann Hari seems to think so.

I'm inclined to agree, the BBC is very vulnerable to reports in the less principled media of accusations of left-wing bias. This is because much of that media is controleld by right-wing oligarchs keen to push their own conservative agenda. It could reasonably be argued that if the BBC spent all its time fighting unwarranted accusations of liberal bias then it wouldn't have a lot of time left to report the news and make programs.

The problem is that this argument negates the BBC's own reason for existing. Yes, they are there to make TV and radio programs to entertain but the BBC was created to report news objectively. The stated mission of the BBC is "to inform, educate and entertain".

Read the article, see what you think. I'm with Johann on this one.

CCTV and the disembodied voices

Scary shit. And some really profound sociological insight:

"What these two government measures have in common is that they both target the poor and undermine any notion of collective security. Are insider-dealers or tax fraudsters subject to lie detector tests? Or, come to think of it, politicians who say that Iraq has WMD? Of course not. Will the cameras and the loud speakers be focused on cocaine snorting city traders? No."

"The establishment believe society's problems are always caused by the poor and the weak. They are the ones who must be hounded and punished. It will be the people of Mosside not Mayfair that will be threatened. This is the way to divide and conquer while the real cheats and proponents of anti-social behaviour, some of the very richest in our society, get away scot-free."

"So what joins all of these stories up? A society that puts money, private wealth and the economy first. A free market demands a strong state. That's why the government cracks down on the poor."

Yeah, bollocks to Blair and bollocks to The Daily Mail and The Sun.

Hilary Benn vs The World Bank - a fight to save the Congo

Lots of shouting about this all over the news today. A typical product of a World Bank that considers developing countries to be geese that lay golden eggs. A very, very appropriate metaphor, sadly.

I suppose this is Paul Wolfowitz's next "feather" in his cap after being partially responsible for fucking Iraq sideways.

Of Bonuses and House Prices

Another good effort from CiF. This time from one Pamela Welsh, with whom I empathise strongly. My wife and I pull in £40K and we could afford a mortgage if we wanted one. But £120000 does not buy you happiness. I don't fancy living in this arse-pit of a country for the rest fo my life and we are looking at heading back to NZ so bollocks to a battered two and a half bed terrace house in a shit location and YEAY! to a 4 bedroom villa with decking on two sides, a walk-in garage and a hectare of land with bush views that that money will buy you in Kiwi land.

The Inhumanity of the Free Market Economy

I didn't quite understand every word of this piece on CiF by Edward Pearce. However, its language is passionate and bittersweet and I am compelled to read more of his work.

Who Killed The Electric Car?

This film is referred to in Johann Hari's latest contribution. I will read on and, when I've finished running around like a headless chicken over my transfer report, I might compose something a little more profound on the subject.

Migrants

I understand the appeal of my country as a destination for migrants. I support the concept of asylum and the sheltering of those who face violence and persecution in their own countries as part of a broader EU program of humanitarianism. What pisses me off no end are the people who run from the challenges of living in a developing country. Such countries need the support and education of many of these people but instead of staying behind and attempting to engage with their community and push for reform and progression they run away. We have crap education here as it is without those who spend years in education still not being able to find jobs because of the number of "skilled migrants" competing with them for jobs.

Forgive me for misrepresenting the millions of people who find living in squalor and filth acceptable. I find it quite offensive to categorise migrants as being "of net benefit to the economy". This may be the case but if it results from fifteen Indian or Chinese migrants sharing a single room and toilet, working for a fraction of the minmum wage, then I am not convinced of the ethics of such a policy. I am not sure whether this represents more than a fraction of those currently squatting in various camps, centres, hostels and bedsits across Europe, however unresponsible I am for their wellbeing. It can be argued that they are actually going to be better off if they stay in their own country and we provide them with well-managed and distributed development aid than if they try and enter the EU illegally and end up in some cash-in-hand job, being paid a pittance and living in a skip.

Stay at home! Build yourself a better life there, rather than trying it here. We have too many fucking people in the UK already. That doesn't mean I support Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara's fascist anti-immigration methods: Far from it! But we need to engage with the EU to prevent the economic migrants getting into the continent, let alone my own country. Let the falling birth rates of the native population work their blessed magic so that I can finally afford a house.

I found this website and was impressed.

multiple levels of enzyme regulation

This diagram is very cool.

From the online textbook of bacteriology.

Mark Thomas rocks!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oh yes he does. I went to see him at the Lemon Grove in Exeter and bought his book. He is one of my heroes.

I just got back for the lab and needed something to entertain me whilst the girls were watching Eastbenders. I hate soaps and think they should be banned as being a travesty of television programming and a waste of air time and license fees. They should be permanently replaced by re-runs of Red Dwarf, Spaced, Green Wing, Scrubs, South Park and educational programs explaining the likely impacts of climate change. Oh- and reruns of Open University science programs. I love Open University science programs.

frantic transfer report correcting

The university operates a PhD policy whereby you cannot become a PhD student until you've completed a satisfactory MPhil. I have reached the appraisal stage of the MPhil section and am busy sorting all the corrections my supervisor has made on my final report. There were lots of them because I cobbled it together at the last minute through utter slackness. My bad.

Oh well, its not like I've got anything else that urgently needs to get done . . . . . . . well, not more than a couple of things . . . . . . . . . or maybe four . . . . . . . . ten? . . . . . . . . . OK! So I've actually got fuckloads else that I should be doing but bollocks. This was meant to be in on Monday and my 1st supervisor is going away again on wednesday so its got to be wrapped up by 1600 tomorrow.

AAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaRRRGRGRRGRG

more of this: