is discovering that the pain-free limit from one acupuncture session = a week. Not bad at all. Am going back today. But OWWW MY BLOODY BACK! # .@stevedownes1973 Who wrote the "Chase is on for new Canaries boss" headline? NEVER use the word 'Chase' in the context of City! *shudders* # "I demand a tumbler full of gin and a fainting couch" The Questionable Content webcomic goes briefly Victorian/steampunk http://bit.ly/xb7sJ # A favour to ask: could you visit http://www.screechowlsanctuary.co.uk and tell me whether the site is up or not? Cheers. # Thanks for help with owls' site: visible in Cambridge, ...
For those of you who aren't interested in my very long hyperpost series, here's some links to things other people are saying: Holly has written about listening to Test Match Special. It's better than when she insists on watching the bloody football, anyway... Amypoodle has a rather good analysis of Ghost World (the comic, not the film), ...
That title got a few of my readers thinking, but I want to highlight the Scottish Roundup blog. Scottish Roundup is a regular digest of Scottish blogging, podcasts, video blogging and citizen and social media in general. Visit every Sunday for the latest on what bloggers have to say about politics (blue roundups). Visit monthly for what bloggers have to say about life in general (red roundups). Each week there is a different editor and this week was Duncan Stephen, of doctorvee fame. Scottish Roundup is run by Duncan with regular help from Will Patterson and a team of Scottish ...
I called on Queen Caron of the house of Haggis, Neeps and Liberalism on Friday night. When I called at the Royal residence I said that I thought, correctly it turns out, that this would make it into the top seven of this week's Lib Dem Voice Golden Dozen. It is not in my opinion my best blog entry of the week, I'd say instead that these two about the release of Abdelbaset Ali al-Magrahi are far better pieces of blogging, and indeed got a far broader (geographical and political spectrum) selection of readers. I was looking at my google ...
Or perhaps it is. I've listened with care but growing annoyance to the torrent of comment on the release of Al Megrahi. I don't doubt that there have been some discussions on trade and suchlike in the background. Trade underpins international relations and has done for as long as I can see in my limited studies of history. But it's not the whole story, I'm sure. Life is more complex than
In response to a blog I wrote about the Harman debate, Kathryn Jones posted an interesting comment referring to a video about women in USA politics, and reasons for their lack of involvement in the political system. This blog will act as a summary of the video, as well as a comparison with the UK political system, as many of the themes that are discussed in the video ring true of the UK political system. For example, the USA political system only has 16% elected women, which is similar to our 126 of the 645 MPs being women. The video ...
According to Forbes Magazine, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel has risen significantly up the charts of the most powerful women in the world. Actually, one doesn't really need an American publication to tell us that: here in Europe it is bleeding obvious. At least, one would have thought so. But apparently that is not the case ...
blockquote>THIS IS AN IMAGINARY STORY (WHICH MAY NEVER HAPPEN, BUT THEN AGAIN MAY) ABOUT A MAN WHO CAME FROM THE SKY IN A BIG BLUE BOX AND DID ONLY GOOD. IT TELLS OF HIS TWILIGHT, WHEN THE GREAT BATTLES WERE OVER AND THE GREAT MIRACLES LONG SINCE PERFORMED, OF HIS HIS ENEMIES CONSPIRED AGAINST HIM ...
I vote of thanks to a resident in Blundell Drive. He lives near by The Green and the Gas Governor housing there. Everytime some anti social person paints graffiti on it he is out there with his can of paint to remove it. Thank you
2o members of the Birkdale Youth supported and encouraged by the local community bobby have worked to create the garden displayed at the Flower Show. The video below explains more about the project. What it does not say is thatthe plan-funding permitting is to be installed in Bedford Park. Well done to all concerned Photos by Richard Hands
We had 2 big jobs at work that needed to be finished by June and July. After everything else that has gone on we struggled to get then done but hours to spare we managed it. It was a welcome relief to get away for 10 days. We went to Southern France which I used to visit a lot in my 20's. I fell in love with the place all over again. The food, the wine, the cheese..... could easily live there. When I came back my good friend Tony was in the process of being moved out of Hillingdon ...
The Daily Telegraph reports; "The controversial scheme will include the creation of a Hunt Regulatory Authority (HRA) to police the behaviour of hunts and was drawn up by senior lawyers along with the Countryside Alliance. The plans have the backing of influential Tories including William Hague and Edward Garnier, the shadow justice minister and could lead to ...
There is a disadvantage to going on a camping holiday to the most beautiful place on earth (Fowey, since you ask). Or perhaps I should rephrase that. There is a disadvantage as a Vodafone subscriber going on holiday to the.... One likes to keep up with the news. But with Vodafone, one finds oneself holding up one's phone just to get one bar for two minutes to surf the interweb thingey. Then you go into the local garage and the girl behind the counter says: "Oh no, you need Orange for Cornwall". And you go into the Fishing tackle shop ...
With around sixty stops in six days I start my fourth Summer Tour of the constituency tomorrow. to bend my ear in person come and join me at any of the following locations... Monday 24th August 8.45 - 9.10am - Masterton Primary School (outside school gates) 9.25 - 9.55am - Ali's Mini Market, Thane Place, Dunfermline 10.15 - 10.45am - John Connelly Court, Dunfermline 11.05 - 11.35am - Hanover Court, Kilmartin Way, Dunfermline 12.10 - 1.10pm - Kingsgate Shopping Centre, Dunfermline 2.10 - 2.40pm - Seath House, 5 Transy Place, Dunfermline 2.55 - 3.30pm - St. Leonards Primary School, Dunfermline ...
1) Sultana bread. I made this with white flour, sultanas and cinnamon, although I couldn't actually taste the cinnamon in the finished bread. It was delicious, though, and worked with both sweet and savoury toppings. 2) Honey bread - my basic white sourdough recipe, with honey instead of sugar. Didn't taste much different from the ordinary white loaf until I used some of it with garlic butter as an accompaniment to stuffed peppers, at which point it suddenly became quite obvious (but still yummy.)
I subscribe to Mankiw's blog. It is fairly unashamedly conservative: linking whenever it can to stories that indicate scepticism about publicly-funded health or fiscal stimulus. But I am surprised by the spin he chooses to put on this excellent article in the NY Times. In brief, the authors describe how the monumental increases in wealth inequality that have been seen in the US since 1979 are likely to have been substantially reversed in the last two years. Is this dreadful news (less of that trickle-down effect) or in some sense are we in a zero-sum game - all that concentration ...
Progressive conservatism has been in the news recently. The linking of conservatism with the idea of progress has been made before but as we head towards a potential Cameron government the media is looking closely at the characteristics of, what Cameron calls, liberal conservatism. The conservative political philosophy is usually associated with tradition, not progress. So it seems odd that members of the Conservative party, Tories, would claim the mantle of progress. A cynic might think this is all about reclaiming the change narrative from New Labour. By saying you are a movement of progress you are taking the territory ...
Welcome to the 131st of our weekly round-ups from the Lib Dem blogosphere, featuring the seven most popular stories according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (16th August – 22nd August 2009), together with a hand-picked quintet, partly courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed. Don't forget, by the way, you can now sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox – just click here – ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging. As ever, let's start with the most popular post, and work our way down: 1. Mark Oaten does ...
Many congratulations to the England cricket team on winning back the Ashes! I can hardly believe it! I had to ignore this particular match because I was afraid of disappointment. Special mention must go to Andrew Strauss who has proved himself as a superb captain. Also well done Monty Panesaar for his last stand at Cardiff which was perhaps the most crucial point of the series.
Further to my earlier post about the plans for a new central library, a planning application has now been submitted. The height has been reduced by one storey to reflect concerns raised during the consultation about its height and tiered steps are now suggested around the proposed ampitheatre in Centenary Square.Other aspects of the desgin include publicly accessible terraces at the third and
Wel, I'm smiling! Half an hour ago I would have been typing this through tears! As a Brawn fan I'd have been thrilled with either of the drivers winning, but as a Rubens Barrichello fan of some 16 years' standing, I'm ecstatic that he's had his first victory for the Brawn team. He hasn't stood on the top step of the podium since China in 2004, a year when he also won at Monza, but more of that later. As I said yesterday, he was in a very strong position, being heavier on fuel and was in fact the true ...
After reports around the Tory who only selects women if they are attractive, there seems to be a heavy media agenda around women today. On the whole, the coverage is pleasing, as there is a great deal of concern expressed for the lack of women in top jobs, such as an article in The Guardian that rightly argues, the glass ceiling exists in law but not in reality. The articles point to how the battle against gender inequality is far from over, as Feminism is needed to tackle the new as well as old types of gender inequality that are/have ...
Guido Fawkes has his Where's Gordon and now I am honoured to introduce Where's Andrew, as it seems the Tory PPC for Pendle has vanished. Weeks have passed and Andrew Stephenson has not put out a leaflet, could it be that the attention by Gordon Prentice on the matter has put him off leaflets? Andrew Stephenson does seem to be active, according to the Pendle Tory website he has been travelling but the problem is why no leaflet? I am sure the Tories could have prepared a leaflet without Andrew being in Pendle but it seems they haven't, could Lord ...
In 1858, the last great Mughal ruler of India was violently sent into exile into Burma where he eventually died in exile in 1862. A liberal, cultured and deeply cohesive community in Delhi which was nurtured by Bahadur Shah Zafar, (the last Mughal of the line of the Timur (Tamerlaine) line which had been in India for over 320 years), was fractured. The fabric of Indo-Islamic civilisation which had been stitched together by the Mughals so that Hindu and Muslim rights were protected, was violently torn apart by the England based East India Trading Company. Yet what was the cause ...
Foreign policy is one of the areas where politics being the 'art of the possible' really hits home; it is an area where whether you like it or not you have to deal with the world as it is not as you would wish it was and how it is being well beyond your sphere ...
Given this blog's recent interest in Swindon and Richard Jefferies, there is only one song to choose. I mentioned this song in passing when I chose Me and the Farmer by the Housemartins. Now Swindon's finest get top billing. You can read more about Swindon's finest on the Chalkhills site, but XTC are not the the town's claim to musical fame. In the early 1960s Rick Davies from Supertramp and Gilbert O'Sullivan were in the same band at Swindon College. Davies was also a friend of the artist Ken White, who painted the mural I admired the other day.
Now that I've found a spare minute I've had time to go through Jo Swinson's practical but unfortunately titled "Real Women" website. To be honest I like it a lot. There's practical advice helping women get the information they need in the work place, in law courts, to raise a family, for single parent support and all sorts. The blurb reads: Women face pressure from all directions these days. Hit hard by the recession, trying to juggle family commitments with work and home life, it's easy to feel like you're running just to stand still. The media screams out an ...
Channel 4's new series Benefit Busters has reopened the debate on how (depending on your point of view) we best support the most vulnerable people find work, or stop wasting billions on a welfare system that has engendered a culture of dependency. Last week the Telegraph and Express revealed that the UK Exchequer will pay out more in benefits this year than it receives in Income Tax. As the recession continues it is inevitable that this huge area of public spending will come under further scrutiny and is likely to be a major battleground in next year's General Election. This ...
Well we know they are in favour of the NHS, but does enough of the public know our views? With a poll showing that we have lost 4 points, at the expense of the Tories and Labour, and showing the Tories are trusted the most with the NHS, it is interesting to consider the media reporting of the NHS on the public. What this shows is one of two things. Either, the Liberal Democrats have been trying to get their view across to the media regarding the NHS, and due to the adversarial political system, we have failed to get ...
It's not always that I disagree with Darrell Goodliffe but today is an exception, Darrell has blogged about how he thinks people don't tend to be interested in internal fighting in the opposition party but let me assure him that is not the case. If you are a campaigner from say the Labour party, and you end up on the doorstep with someone making the Conservatives out to be a Godly party what do you do? You wait for them to finish and you tell them about how Iain Dale (who they have never heard off) is a top Tory ...
One of the aspects of rural campaigning that I have had to adapt to is, and those of you who live outside of a town will doubtless recognise, the idea that the houses aren't always conveniently next to each other. For example, in Creeting St Peter, there are one hundred and five houses on the register. Seventy-eight of them are in the village, which is fairly easy. The other twenty-seven are scattered across the parish so, if I wanted to deliver to them, I could walk around, but it would take quite some time. So, instead of a delivery walk, ...
A Comment is Free article has really got we wound up, a writer for the Guardian family of papers has written an article about MP expenses and about how one MP is spending the summer getting another job, and travelling from one event to another. The problem is that the reporter has done a niece piece of shoddy journalism; because you can't claim all MPs are spending their summers getting other jobs, and going to festivals but many are. It seems that Gordon Prentice is taking the summer off, his car seems to not be in or around the office ...
I recently asked for a progress report from the City Council's City Development Department on the proposed Riverside Nature Park and use of the use of Vacant and Derelict Land fund monies to improve the site and hopefully lead to its public opening. I have received the following update : "I can confirm that the nature park project is progressing well and we are still on track to achieve full spend by March 2011. At present, we are in the process of finalising the ecological design, which will inform the final land uses and the Leisure and Communities Department are ...
Another first for me, blogging about and also the ability to watch zapcat racing. This weekend is the Zapcat Edinburgh Grand Prix and has been a two day event in Leith Harbour, apparently the first time it has ever taken place there. You can read news of the racing here. This is the view from my balcony of Leith Harbour and if you squint, you can make out the boats.
Iain Dale asks this question of Conservative bloggers on his blogs. I can understand why Iain is weary of making the Conservatives appear split and dis-unified given one factor that fatally undermined the Major government was the 'Europe wars' that ravaged his Cabinet. However, I think the first thing to say is that governments tend ...
Observer journalist Carole Cadwalladr manages the feat of writing a piece that actually reaches the right conclusion, but in such an absurd and ludicrous way that the casual reader would be tempted to dismiss it as utter garbage. It's about how our MPs should be working hard over the summer on legislation rather than having a break. Unfortunately, Carole uses a tactic that even a Daily Mail journalist would be a little ashamed of: reporting on a conversation with one MP - just one - and generalising from that to make a point about all 600 plus of them. Apparently ...
I'm one of those odd people who likes getting advertising. Basically, it's the marketing and campaigning background in me, as I always hope to find a really clever idea that I can pinch. One thing I've never really got to grips with though is online advertising. Today though I received this brilliant email inviting me ...
Back on the 16th of this month I did a blog posting about this wonderful billionaire's plaything, a wonderful yacht called Le Grand Bleu - you can read it here. Read the comments though as it is tracked on it's route from Edinburgh to Wick Harbour, then Pentland Firth then onto Stornoway, Campbeltown and then Oban at it's latest sighting.
In the last couple of months I have been working in the Wild West - Newport in Wales. I always knew Wendover is a good place to live in. However, working and sleeping in a gray town where to get good food one need a car to go to Cardiff, makes me appreciate the quality of life we have here. I miss the green gardens, the picturesque houses, the ability to cycle to the center and to the Gym. When we came here, we thought the choice of food was limited compared to what we got used to in Vienna ...
I said in my post the other day that I hoped that Libya wouldn't go over the top in its welcome to Abdelbasset Ali Mohmed Al-Megrahi when he was set free and returned to Libya. Of course that was always going to be a forlorn hope. The scenes of saltires waving, cheering and the parading of Megrahi on tv meeting Gadaffi and his relatives was cringeworthy, sickening and, sadly, entirely predictable. Having said that, I still hold to my point of view that it was correct to send Megrahi home to die. If it's a matter of policy that people ...
[IMG: Overgrown plant beds outside Charter Court] One of our most visible successes of the last few years was encouraging the Council to replant the beds by the Stroud Green Road and Upper Tollington Park junction (by Nandos). The area was looking really rundown until it was given a bit of long-overdue attention a few years ago. However, getting Haringey to maintain these area is always a challenge. I walked passed earlier this week and noticed the plant beds were getting really overgrown again – with weeds now spreading on to the pavement and pushing up through the gaps in ...
Despite the assurances from Blair and Mandelson, Conservative shadow foreign secretary William Hague said that ministers should now release all documentation of their meetings with Gaddafi and his son, to prove beyond doubt that the fate of Megrahi had not been part of a deal. So can we assume from this that if the Tories win the next election and Hague becomes Foreign Secretary, we can expect him to release every bit of documentation on everything he does in the Foreign Office to prove beyond doubt he's not making any deals we might not like? I look forward to this ...
It's a couple of weeks now since the Republican right in the USA dragged the NHS into their own arguments over healthcare, with a series of bizarre lies about our NHS, such as that people over 60 don't get treatment. This has not been helped by leading Conservative Daniel Hannan telling Fox TV his views ...
[IMG: Doctor Who: The Time Meddler] Late last year there was a flurry of rumours that Patrick Stewart was being signed up to appear in Doctor Who, reprising the role of the Meddling Monk. The Monk, who only appeared in The Time Meddler and The Daleks' Master Plan, was the first person other than the Doctor who ... well, I won't complete that sentence in case you don't know and are going to watch The Time Meddler. In fact, if you don't know what happens in this William Hartnell story, make sure you avoid most reviews and the blurb in ...
Martin Bright has done a couple of posts recently where he has highlighted Phillip Hammond's use of an intern and also his justification of this by claiming it would be an abuse of taxpayer's money not to use the free labour available. Over the years I have seen this issue pop up from time to time. The main problem is that when a company to utilises free labour, the intern is effectively subsidising the company for a while. They can only do this if they have independent means and the young people who are able to tend to be from ...
Well my post on the release of al-Megrahi caused a little bit of a reaction over the weekend. Including this from an American reader (I've deleted the expletives): "As an American I would just like to say.....You release a convicted murderer and then you blog about how the people in the states just don't understand how compassionate you are? F*** all of you highlander, lowlander, gaelic-wanna be, kilt-wearing, eurotrash. Thank God my ancestors left your stinking s***-hole of an island!" As Callum replied in the comments 'Thanks for your constructive comment Lincoln County. Not showing a lot of compassion with ...
A letter in the Observer today caught my eye. Not, as it happens, for it's main topic - yet another rather tedious sally by our opponents over the Michael Brown donation - but another comment. The author writes of the Lib Dems as: ...a party that perpetually claims to occupy the high moral ground in British politicsIt's become a common mantra from our opponents - to paint the party as holier-than-thou on the outside but venal and nasty behind the facade. The question is - does it have any truth to it? To an obvious extent, all parties claim the ...
When the new war memorial – which I love – was unveiled at Islington Green, once of the criticisms made was that it did not have the names of the war dead. This was despite the fact that the previous war memorial had not had names, and neither do many others, notably the Cenotaph. It's also ...
Do you know, you can name anything that's remotely pleasant in life and somebody is bound to come along at some point and say that it's somehow dangerous, or bad for you. Today the humble candle comes under the spotlight, not for anything to do with fire, but, apparently, if you breathe in too many of their fumes, they might give you Cancer and Asthma. Like walking down a busy road, which most of us do every day, won't. I have a hunch that if you locked yourself in an unventilated room lit only by hundreds of candles for days ...
Tom Livingstone wrote a blog the other day taking a quick glance at the Cardiff Central constituency. The Tories have selected former Welsh Woman of the year Karen Robson – Tom thinks it is a sign that the Tories are going to start taking the seat seriously. I think it's a sign that they aren't supporting talented female candidates. The Tories got 9.5% of the vote in Cardiff Central last time. In 1999 the Lib Dems substantially increased their number of Cllr's and won the assembly seat. By 2004 they had won every single seat in the consituency in the ...
The rest of The Voice's Daily View team may have decided to have a lie in each morning during August, but we're made of sterner stuff here on the Sunday slot. And as it's a Sunday, it's also time for the now traditional bonus musical extra. Big Stories The release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation has blasted Scotland for releasing Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi saying the decision "gives comfort to terrorists." In a letter to Scottish Minster Kenny MacAskill dated August 21, FBI Director Robert Mueller said he was "outraged" at the ...
If I were asked to name any group of people I admire above any other it is the blind. When ever I see someone using a white stick to guide themselves to their place of work in total blindness I am amazed at their ability to live such normal lives with a disability that I cannot comprehend. Now it is well known that when someone is deprived of their senses they then find their other senses become more finely tuned, with smell and hearing becoming far more sensative as the brain develops these areas. And there can be no greater ...
The second health motion that will be debated at Welsh Liberal Democrat Conference in October is on prescription charges. In March at the Spring Conference in Cardiff we staged a consultation which showed a majority of members present as being in favour of free prescriptions. The wider response has also demonstrated that the view of the majority of health organisations and pressure groups in Wales is that free prescriptions has generally been a welcome move. It is the case that only 12% of prescriptions were chargeable before the introduction of free prescriptions in April 2007. Just before the Assembly elections ...
Its half past four in the morning and this blog is open; you can't get more open all hour convenience then that? Anyway, following a poll by ComRes and the reporting of the poll by Tom Harris I have some issues that I would like to raise with the general public. Why is it that when asked, if they agreed with the following statement "The NHS would be safer under Labour than the Conservatives" only 47% agreed. Now is it just me or has the rest of the general public got the Tory fever? I wouldn't trust the Tories with ...
When I saw the newspaper hoardings announcing Plymouth Argyle had launched a bid to host World Cup matches I thought they must mean the Subbuteo World Cup - for the table football game.But no, the loc...
Sun 23rd
01:14
Hypertime, Continuity, Doctor Who, The Prismatic Age Etc. (Prelude - On The Subject Of Canon)
ou'll probably have noticed that I've been noticeably quiet about both comics and Doctor Who recently. That's because I've been thinking about stuff – there's a whole series of connected essays I've been working on in the back of my mind for quite a while. I've had to revise some of them a bit recently ...
The New York Times has this rather damming indictment of the Afghan Presidential elections; "KABUL, Afghanistan — Reports of fraud and intimidation in Afghanistan's presidential election continued to mount Saturday, with anecdotal but widespread accounts of ballot-box stuffing, a lack of impartiality among election workers and voters casting ballots for others. A particular concern was the notably ...
If you have read a few blogs of mine before, you will no doubt know that I am a keen promoter of women's rights. A specific blog I want to draw your attention to is one I wrote about the Harman debate. I found it extremely interesting that the media, including our own party with Opik, reflected all attention away from the crux and importance of her argument, to a debate about how if a woman is 'shagable', then she is hireable. This is exactly the type of attitude that has been reflected in the remarks made by Conservative Alan ...
Some idiot American policeman has decided to pontificate on the recent release of Mr. Megrahi on compassionate grounds from prison. The fuckwit said:" Your action gives comfort to terrorists around the world who now believe that regardless of the quality of the investigation, the conviction by jury after the defendant is given all due process, and sentence appropriate to the crime, the terrorist will be freed by one man's exercise of 'compassion'. "Of course, if he'd been in possession of the facts and not just mouthing off like the ignorant little cunt that he is he'd have noted that Mr. ...
When I think of a subject for a blog I don't want to write about something that has made the headlines and is something that I agree with. My motivation comes from opinions that sound correct but I don't agree with them. This is what politics should be about. If you get politicians saying the same thing then you don't get a choice. So following on from yesterday's blog I found some comments that differ from mine. "It isn't immoral for companies to donate to parties in exchange for policies". That's a good start. Take this to the extreme and ...
