The demise of the British pub

 

I think there are many reasons why British pubs are closing but I don't think the smoking ban introduced in July 2007, is one of the main reasons.

I think most people who use pubs today, would generally agree that the smoking ban was a good thing because far fewer people smoke these days. If they want a cigarette they stand outside and smoke it. J.D. Wetherspoon banned smoking in their pubs before the official ban in 2007 and I don't think they suffered any financial consequences in doing so. Like many pubs, they were adversely affected by the COVID lockdown in 2020.

During the lockdown, when the pubs were closed, alcohol sales were never banned in the UK and more people started buying cans and bottles from the supermarkets which are cheaper and they have continued to do so. The price of a pint of beer has increased astronomically and I think this has led to many pubs closing. Higher energy prices and higher costs generally, have also made it more difficult to keep pubs commercially viable. While the cost of living has spiralled in the UK, and people are feeling the pinch, some pubs are charging in excess of £5 for a pint of beer and many people are not prepared to pay that for it.

Not many weeks ago, I travelled by bus from Ashton-under-Lyne to Oldham town centre. Nearly every pub along Oldham Road had closed. When I called in The Up Steps Inn, the local Wetherspoon’s in Oldham town centre, it was very busy and I'm not really surprised. I was able to buy a pint of hand pumped Green King Abbot Ale for £2.29.

Food is available in Wetherspoon pubs at a reasonable price and there is free Wi-Fi. Families take their children with them.  There is not one fixed price in Wetherspoon pubs and it will vary from area to area. A pint of Abbot Ale in J.D. Wetherspoon, would normally set me back £2.88. Not very long ago, that same pint would've cost me about £2.45.

Steven Seagal and his buddy Vladimir Putin.

 

Joined at the hip - Steven Segal & Vladimir Putin

Steven Seagal was born in Michigan in the U.S.A. and his father was Russian. He's said that his mother was a Russophile and was completely immersed in Russian culture and that he considers himself "one million percent Russian." I believe he now lives in Russia and has become a Russian citizen.

Vladimir Putin awarded Seagal an Order of Friendship medal and he was also appointed a special envoy for Russia. Seagal has campaigned to get the E.U. to lift sanctions against Russia and has described Russia and the Ukraine has one big family. He's accused the U.S. of spending "billions of dollars on disinformation, lies" which was an attempt to "try to discredit, demoralise and destroy the emerging morale of Russia." The American martial arts actor has described Putin has "one of the greatest world leaders, if not the greatest world leaders alive today", a sentiment that is probably shared by Donald Trump who said of Putin, "I have no relationship with him other than he called me a genius." The former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, who is also a fan of Donald Trump, has described Putin "as the world leader I most admire."

It takes a lot of guts or stupidity, or possibly both, to take a political stance against Putin if you're a Russian citizen. Those who have done so, usually finish up dead or incarcerated. Putin, a modern-day Russian Tsar in all but name, has just begun his fifth term as Russia's president and he's not up for re-election until 2030. He's now been in power for nearly 25 years and is the longest serving Kremlin leader since Josef Stalin.

Some Kremlin apologists have said that Putin's unprovoked attack on the Ukraine in February 2022, was brought about because of NATO expansionism Eastwards.  They've also said that NATO and the U.S. are fighting a "proxy war" in the Ukraine. There may be an element of truth in this but I seem to recall that Putin initially called the invasion of the Ukraine a "special operation", that would "denazify" the Ukraine which was led by a Ukrainian Jew called Volodymyr Zelensky. I also recall that following the Russian invasion, Zelensky turned down an offer of help from the United States for him and his family to abandon and leave the capital city of Kyiv.

Some time ago, I watched an interview with Vladimir Putin and Tucker Carlson. He was asked if NATO expansionism towards the East had been a factor in Russia invading the Ukraine. Putin dismissed this at the outset and proceeded to give Carlson a history lesson about Russia and the Ukraine. For Putin, the Ukraine is not a separate country but part of Russia and he's never accepted that the Ukraine is a sovereign country. He's a Russian nationalist and a revanchist who is fighting a war to reclaim lost Russian territory and status.

The Russian annexation of the Crimea in 2014, was in my view, inevitable and understandable. The Russian's were never going to allow the Ukrainians to remove access to their vitally strategic naval bases in the region. Ukrainian troops and irregulars also attacked pro-Russian Ukrainian citizens in the East and committed many atrocities. While this was going on in the Ukraine, most NATO countries remained indifferent and turned a blind eye.

"Napoleon the Great" - Andrew Roberts

 

Napoleon Bonaparte

I've just finished reading 'Napoleon the Great' by the historian Andrew Roberts. Napoleon fought around sixty battles and was sometimes wounded. An English gunner near fort Mulgrave ran a pike into his left thigh and he survived being hit by a bullet at the Battle of Ratisbon. On one occasion, his horse was disembowelled by a howitzer shell. He also saw a number of staff officers killed near to him. He said he'd seen many men perish who were taking to him.

War was declared on Napoleon and France more times than he declared war on others. Before he went to war, Napoleon often sought peace terms. Seven Allied coalitions were formed during the Napoleonic wars to rid Europe of Napoleon and to put the Bourbons back on the throne of France. It has been estimated that the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars cost a total of around 3 million military and one million civilians deaths, of whom, 1.4 million were French. Many of these men died of disease and infections.

Napoleon's regime depended on the maintenance of French power in Europe and he knew it. He was personally responsible for many of these deaths but many Frenchmen were happy to follow the Emperor of France into battle. They admired his courage, had a sense of national pride, and most of the time Napoleon had a good rapport with his troops. He had a sense of familiarity with his soldiers that would've been unthinkable to Arthur Wellesley. He was also ruthless and ambitious. While professing to believe in meritocracy, he put his brothers and family members on the thrones of Europe and made himself a very rich man and the Emperor of the French Republic, which is a contradiction in terms.

At the Battle of Bautzen in 1813, some 21,200 Frenchmen were killed or wounded, whereas the Allies, lost half that number. He told the Empress of France, Marie Louise, that 3,000 men had been killed or wounded but, "no one of any importance." Only hours after writing this to the Empress, his closest friend Geraud Duroc, the Duc de Frioul, was disembowelled by a cannonball in front of him at the Battle of Reichenbach in Poland. A year later, Napoleon spoke about what happened. He said:

"When his bowels were falling out before my eyes, he repeatedly cried to me to have him put out of his misery. I told him: 'I feel pity for you my friend, but there is no remedy but to suffer till the end." Yet, Napoleon was capable of showing kindness even to enemy soldiers if they were Europeans.

After more than 20 years of war, the French people desired peace at any price. After Napoleon's first abdication in 1814, the Allied armies entered Paris by the Saint-Denis gate on April 1, 1814. They were greeted by the populace with the exuberance that victorious armies always tend to receive. The Bonapartist, Lavelette, wrote that he was disgusted by the site of "Women dressed as for a fete, and almost frantic with joy, waving their handkerchiefs crying: "Vive l' Empereur Alexander!" as Cossacks and Russian troops bivouacked on the Champs-Elysees and the Champ de Mars.

As we all know, Napoleon spent his last years in exile on the remote Island of St. Helena. The Prussians and the Bourbons wanted to execute him but he sought political asylum from the British and was granted it. He wrote his memoirs on St Helena and seems to have lived his last years in relative comfort with his staff. He did complain of the humidity, rats, midges, termites, mosquitoes and cockroaches at Longwood. Nevertheless, in the last 3-months of 1816, 3,700 bottles of wine - 830 of them claret - were delivered to Longwood House where lived. During his captivity on St Helena, he spent a total of 1,818,245 francs of his own money. He died of stomach cancer on Saturday May 5, 1821, at 5.49 pm, aged 51.

On the subject of war and humanity, Napoleon had this to say: "If one thinks of humanity and only of humanity, we should give up going to war. I don't know how war is to be conducted on the rosewater plan."

It's politicians and ruling elites that start wars but unlike Napoleon, the big shots don't fight them. It's the hoi polloi who are used as cannon fodder.

Nazi sympathisers - Lord Haw, Haw, & John Amery.

 

William Joyce aka Lord Haw, Haw.

During the Irish War of Independence (1919-1921), William Joyce was an informer for the Black and Tans and had links with MI5. He'd been recruited to work for British military intelligence by Captain Patrick Keating. The IRA suspected Joyce of being an informant and Keating had him transferred to the Norton Barracks in England.

William Joyce had been born in America to Irish parents and was therefore an American citizen. The family moved from America to Ireland and lived in County Galway. Joyce was entitled to Irish citizenship but he never claimed it. He also became a German citizen in 1940. Joyce always claimed that he was a British citizen and he did have a British passport but he'd lied on his passport application to get it. He'd lived in England and had been a Blackshirt fascist. He was a member of Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF).

At his trial, Joyce was charged with three counts of treason because it was claimed that he owed allegiance to King George VI when he was making propaganda broadcasts for Nazi Germany. He was acquitted on two counts but he was convicted on the third charge and sentenced to death. The prosecution argued that even though Joyce lied about his nationality on his passport application, he was entitled to British diplomatic protection in Germany and therefore owed allegiance to the King. The conviction was upheld on appeal to the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords.

In 1916, some of those who participated in the Easter Rising, were executed for treason because of their collaboration with Germany who had armed them. Many Irish men at that time, were serving in the British Army. During WWII, Sean Russell, the IRA chief of staff, collaborated with the Nazis and so did Frank Ryan, a member of the IRA who had fought on the Republican side in Spain. The IRA foolishly seemed to think that if Hitler won the war, he would've given Ireland its independence from British rule.

In Britain, many people will have heard of William Joyce or Lord Haw, Haw, but few will have heard of John Amery who was also hung for treason. Amery also made propaganda broadcasts for Nazi Germany and gave direct support to Benito Mussolini. He was the son of the famous Conservative MP Leo Amery and the brother of Julian Amery who was also a Conservative MP and government minister. When John Amery was captured in Italy by partisans, he was wearing the uniform of the 'Muti Legion', a fascist paramilitary organisation. He was handed over to the Allied authorities. He was taken into custody by a British army officer called Alan Whicker who later became a famous broadcaster.

Despite his Nazi sympathies, John Amery's grandmother, was a Hungarian Jew. He was executed at Wandsworth Prison on 19th December 1945. As he was led to the scaffold, Amery is reputed to have said to the executioner, "I've always wanted to meet you, Mr Pierrepoint, though not of course under these circumstances."

Angela Rayner pleads for the Muslim Labour vote in Ashton.

 

Angela Rayner pleading for Muslim Labour vote

In this video clip (see link), Angela Rayner MP,  the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, can be seen pleading for the Muslim vote in her constituency of Ashton-under-Lyne and Failsworth. Rayner can be heard thanking Muslim voters for getting her "over the line" at the 2019 election.

The footage, is believed to have been shot at an event on Sunday. Angela Rayner - who appears to be the only woman in the room - can be heard calling on Muslim voters to back her and the Labour Party at the General Election on July 4. Rayner told the meeting that Labour would recognise the state of Palestine if it gets elected to government in July and that Labour 'supports' the International Criminal Court (ICC), whose chief prosecutor, Karim Khan KC, is seeking an arrest warrant for the Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and senior Hamas leaders, for war crimes in Gaza. In the video clip, Rayner also said she would commit UK aid to rebuilding Gaza.

The Labour Party under Sir Keir Starmer-oid, have alienated many Muslim Labour voters because of its stance on Gaza and its unequivocal support for Israel. Starmer-oid initially refused to back calls for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and said that Israel had the right to defend itself and had the right to deny energy and water, to the people of Gaza. Some critics said this constituted a war crime and he was accused of supporting collective punishment of the Palestinian people. He's also said that he "supports Zionism without qualification."

Over 36,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 and many of these deaths, have been innocent men, women and children. Although Angela Rayner told the meeting that if "Labour get into power we will recognise Palestine", this doesn't seem to accord with the views of the Labour Party leader. Starmer-oid recently said that he wanted to recognise a Palestinian state if he won power, but added that such a move, would need to come at the right time in the peace process. Ireland, Spain and Norway have already recognised a Palestinian state.

Angela Rayner is vulnerable in her constituency because she's defending a 4,263 majority. George Galloway's Workers Party of Britain (WPB), have threatened to boot her out of her Parliamentary seat in Ashton-under-Lyne and are standing a candidate against her called Aroma Hassan. Galloway has said that his party can "vitally affect" her chances of re-election. Galloway says he has 15,000 supporters in Angela Rayner's constituency. Galloway has said that Tory-lite Starmer-oid and Sunak are two cheeks of the same arse. I entirely agree. A vote for either Labour or Tory is a vote for genocide in Gaza.

Socialism for the rich & capitalism for the rest of us.

 

I think it's true to say the capitalists like Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk don't get rich by running benevolent societies. The source of their wealth is the exploitation of people's labour and labour, as Adam Smith tells us, is the source of all wealth.

You can't defend capitalism on the grounds that it's natural. In the history of man, capitalism, is a fairly recent phenomenon. In Britain, the era of modern capitalism, is associated with the industrial revolution which began in the late 18th century.

The free-marketeers decry 'big government' and yet big business, benefits hugely from taxpayer subsidies and bailouts. We saw that with the COVID pandemic and with the sub-prime mortgage crisis in 2008. Financial institutions almost brought down the global financial capitalist system through risky lending to what were called NINJA borrowers -  "No income, no jobs, no assets." This financial crisis didn't come about because of a war or an economic slump, but was entirely man made. They infected the financial system with toxic worthless debt and the government in both the U.S. and U.K. had to step in to bail many of them out and to prevent the global capitalist system from collapsing. Very few people even saw it coming and were taken completely by surprise.

Lehman Brothers had been heavily involved in sub-prime lending and weren't bailed out and went bankrupt. It's well known that before going out of business, Lehman Brothers had asked George Walker, a non-executive director of Lehman Brothers, to make a call to the Oval Office with a last-ditch appeal for a government bailout. Walker, was a cousin of President Bush. When Bush wouldn't take his call, that was the end of Lehman Brothers.

In 2008, the capitalist system was saved by state intervention. In Britain, big business became Britain's most lavished benefit claimant. More than £1tn of public money was poured into the banks following the financial crash. It has been described as socialism for the rich and capitalism for the rest of us. In the aftermath of the financial crash of 2008, many unemployed people in Britain saw their state benefits being cut to pay for the bailout of bankers.

Lercara Friddi - A Sicilian Mafia Town

 

Mafia Boss - Lucky Luciano

Lercara Friddi in Sicily, translates to English as "cold places". I believe this former mining town gets chilly because of its high altitude. It is 28 miles southeast of Palermo and was known for sulphur mining. It's also known for something called the Lercara Friddi massacre of 1893, when peasants and miners were killed on Christmas Day when protesting about taxes during the Fasci Siciliani dei Lavoratori (Sicilian Workers Leagues), uprising.

When they closed the sulphur mines in the 1950s, a lot of the miners emigrated to Belgium. It's not only the birthplace of Lucky Luciano but also Frank Sinatra's father. It seems that Frank Sinatra refused to acknowledge that his family came from Lercara Friddi and said they came from Catania. He was keen to distance himself publicly from any connections with the Mafia.

The more famous town of Corleone, is about 15 miles from Lercara Friddi and is also synonymous with gangsters and the Mafia.

An American writer called Maria Terrone, from New York, visited Lercara Friddi in 1983, and wrote about it in article entitled 'Sicily: My Enigma." She says that when a relative was asked, "Is the Mafia here?" he replied, "E a tutti banni", (It's Everywhere). Terrone was curious why there were no sit-down restaurants in one particular area that she visited and she was told that nobody would open a new business, because of the fear of extortion. She was told "For pizza, we travel to another town." Another relative from Lercara Friddi, also told her that when she was growing up, the Mafia even controlled the flow of water to the town faucets. She wrote that her own grandfather, a "prosperous store-owner", had left the town in 1907, when he refused to be extorted. Apparently, three armed men had visited him demanding money and he shot and killed one of the Mafioso. He then fled to America.

The "pizzu" or "pizzo", extortion money, is still common in some parts of Italy and Sicily. It has been claimed that the Mafia extorts more than 160 million Euros a year from shops and businesses in the Palermo region. 

Burnhams' Bee Network

 

The Bee Network bus system in Greater Manchester has been beset with problems since its initial launch in Bolton and Wigan in September 2023. Despite all the fanfare and publicity, the official launch of the Network, was said to have been more of a damp squib than a big bang. Bus passengers complained of bus services running late or not turning up at all. They also complained that the Bee Network app wasn't functioning properly. Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, said these were teething problems that would sort themselves out in the long run.

Although it's now eight months since in the initial launch of the Bee Network, bus passengers in Bolton, are still complaining of buses running late. Tom Forth, who previously worked for Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM), is supposed to know all there is about buses. He seems to think that we have far too many bus stops in Greater Manchester and that the Bee Network, would run far smoother if we removed many of them.

This young man, obviously hasn't considered how this might impact on the elderly and people with disabilities, who would have to walk much further to get a bus because there would be fewer bus stops.

I've been using public transport in Greater Manchester for nearly sixty years, and I know that they've not been able to run a decent bus service in Greater Manchester since the deregulation of bus services in 1986. Deregulation didn't lead to greater competition because the small companies got swallowed up or went out of business very quickly. Stagecoach and First dominate bus services in Greater Manchester.  In the days of the clippies, a ten-minute bus service meant a bus service every ten minutes and you could time your watch by the bus services. Despite there being far more bus routes in those days and more buses, bus fares were cheap and bus services were very reliable. More people also used buses to get to work or to get about. In those days, the bus driver also knew where he was going and didn't have to ask the bus passengers for directions.

I frequently use a Stagecoach bus service that is supposed to be every 12 minutes, but it's not unusual, to be waiting for over half an hour for a bus. Sometimes it feels like I'm waiting for Godot. I often feel sorry for the poor bastard that will be waiting for the next bus, because it's not usual, for buses on this 330-route going from Stockport to Ashton, to turn up two at a time. Two days ago, three buses turned up at the same time. When I complain to the bus drivers about this unreliable bus service, they never blame their lateness on there being too many bus stops. Invariably, their excuse is road works or traffic congestion. The situation is made even worse because on this route, there is no other bus provider. Some bus services are one an hour in the evenings and even they can't run on time and sometimes don't even turn up.

I hope Andy Burnham can sort things out quickly with Bee Network because his political reputation and job depends on bus reform being a success in Greater Manchester. Unfortunately, at the moment, it seems to be like business as usual. All the people of Greater Manchester want is a reliable and efficient bus service that is affordable. Andy Burnham promised the people of Greater Manchester a London-style bus system of cheap 'hopper' fares and reliable buses. Have Burnham and his team got the organisational skills to deliver it?

The 'Lavender Scare' & 'Red Scare'- McCarthyism and John Wayne.

 

John Wayne

The famous American actor, John Wayne, tried to play down his involvement in blacklisting and the anti-Communist witch-hunts that took place in the U.S. during the 1940s and '50s, "Red Scare." He did this when Michael Parkinson asked him about it on his British TV show in 1974. He denied that he'd ever blacklisted Hollywood stars or that there had been a blacklist against 'Liberals' who were unfriendly to the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC).

Wayne played a (HUAC) investigator, in the 1952 film, Big Jim McLain. The film is rubbish; cheap anti-Communist propaganda. Wayne was a staunch supporter of Senator Joseph McCarthy and his political persecution of people in the American film industry and elsewhere.

As far as I am aware, the American Communist Party was never banned in America, even at the height of the "red scare" and McCarthy, never found one communist spy. McCarthy's chief red baiter and chief counsel, was the lawyer Roy Cohn, who had prosecuted the Soviet spies Julias and Ethel Rosenberg who went to the electric chair. McCarthy and Cohn also persecuted homosexuals who were government employees.

In April 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower, had signed an executive order banning homosexuals from working for the federal government as they were seen as a security risk. This became known as the "Lavender Scare." Although it was claimed that Roy Cohn was gay, something that he denied, both McCarthy and Cohn, rooted out closet homosexuals working for the government. According to Cohn's cousin, David L Marcus, many Federal employees in Washington D.C. who were outed by Cohn and McCarthy and lost their jobs, committed suicide.

As a New York lawyer, Roy Cohn, had represented Donald Trump and even Mafia figures like John Gotti and Carmine Galante. Another of his clients was Aristotle Onassis and Rupert Murdoch. He referred to Donald Trump as his best friend and was something of a mentor to him. Roy Cohn was also closely acquainted with Nancy Regan, the former CIA director William Casey and J. Edgar Hoover, of the FBI.

Despite having friends in high places, in 1986, Cohn was disbarred by the New York State Supreme Court for unethical and unprofessional conduct. He'd been accused of misappropriation of clients' funds, falsifying a change to a will and lying on a bar application. He died in August 1986 of Aids at the age of 59. After his death, the IRS, seized almost everything that had belonged to Roy Cohn.

It was rumoured that Joseph Stalin had ordered the murder of John Wayne but if this is true, it's very surprising that he lived for as long as he did. Usually, if Stalin ordered your assassination you finished up dead. Stalin possibly murdered more communists than Hitler and he even deported German communists back to Germany. He certainly liquidated many of the old Bolsheviks.

King George II of Britain called for the destruction of all native Americans. Should the Royal Family apologise?

 

King George II

They say that there was nobody more pious than Pizarro the Spanish conquistador, but his arrival in South America, proved to be disastrous for the Inca Empire.

The arrival of British colonisers in the antipodes, in the 18th century, was also disastrous for the aboriginal peoples of Australia and Tasmania. Did we discover Australia or conquer it?

What these colonisers wouldn't have realised at the time, is that they brought diseases with them to these places like the common cold, chicken pox and measles, which the indigenous people had no immunity to. There were also reports of colonisers deliberately seeking to spread diseases like smallpox on blankets that they traded with the Indians, in order to wipe them out. But this wouldn't have been really necessary, as they were likely to become infected by having contact with Europeans.

The native Indians of north America were often in conflict with one another over resources and territory, even though there was really no concept of private property. Many tribes lived an itinerant lifestyle in search of better resources and moved from place to place. Some native Indians were more violent than others and not all of them were particularly hostile to the white man to begin with.

Columbus described the natives that he encountered in 1493 as "fearful and timid... guileless and honest."  He called the inhabitants 'Indians' because he thought he'd found a new route the East, "the Indies" (Asia). He also thought these people could be easily conquered.

The native Americans who encountered the colonists in Jamestown, were curious about their facial hair and how they seemed to walk unsteady on their feet because they still had sea legs after the long voyage. They were also interested in their metal tools and equipment, which they didn't have.

The white people who settled in Appalachia, probably wouldn't have survived had it not been for the help they received from the native American Indians. The Cherokees taught them how to hunt, fish and farm, their new environment and taught them about medicinal plants.

Yet from 1830 to 1838, over 100,000 Native Americans from various tribes were uprooted from their homes and dispersed across the United States. The natives Indians called it the Trail of Tears as many tens of thousands of Indians died on the journey. In the 18th century, King George II of England, called for the destruction of all native American people.

To this day, the ethnic cleansing and genocide of native Americans, is still a touchy subject. The release of the film Soldier Blue in the early 1970s, was controversial because it depicted a massacre of an Indian tribe and the brutal sadism of American soldiers. The commanding officer tells his troops to kill everybody including the children, as nits grow into lice. 

Some Jews participate in pro-Palestinian marches so why does this not get reported on by the British press?

 

We're constantly told that something called the "Jewish Community" doesn't feel safe on the streets of London because of pro-Palestinian marches and demonstrations against genocide and ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

Gideon Falter, the Chief Executive of the pro-Israeli lobby group, the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA), recently staged a cheap political stunt when he tried to cross a London street wearing a yarmulke skull cap when a pro-Palestinian march was passing by. A Met police officer prevented him from doing so because he believed his actions to be provocative and could cause a breach of the peace. When Falter insisted that he only wanted to cross the road, the police officer accused him of being disingenuous and said that he might have to arrest him, but preferred not to do so. Although the police officer offered to escort Falter and his burly minders to another crossing point, Falter refused the offer. He later said: "I was treated like a criminal for being Jewish."

I've been to pro-Palestinian demonstrations and have seen Jewish people present. How did I know they were Jewish? I knew this because they were dressed in religious garb. Nobody assaulted them or threatened them. It's not unusual to see Jewish people supporting these demonstrations and marches. Many Jewish people including religious Jews, condemn the actions of the Israeli government in the West Bank and Gaza, and don't even recognise the state of Israel. This rarely ever gets mentioned in the British press or by the media. 

Some years ago, I attended a pro-Palestinian demonstration in Manchester. It took place outside Marks & Spencer at the Andale Centre. A counter demonstration was also staged by Jewish activists who hurled abuse at us. They were actually shouting directly into our faces and trying to provoke us into hitting them. It was pretty obvious that they were trying to provoke an incident at a peaceful protest, to get the police involved so they could claim they were victims of antisemitism. I actually found their actions hilarious because it was so obvious what they were up to.

Former England cricketer Monty Panesar quits George Galloway's party

 

Monty Panesar

Politically clueless, Monty Panesar, has bailed out of the Workers Party of Britain (WPB) a week after being adopted as their parliamentary candidate for Ealing Southall, in London. The former England spin bowler, says he needs time to mature and to find his political home.

In 2019, Monty wanted to be the Mayor of London and said that he hoped Sadiq Khan would pass the baton to him. He also said that he hoped one day to become UK Prime Minister. When he was recently asked about his party’s position on Gaza and NATO, Monty said foreign policy wasn't his strong point and he passed the baton to George Galloway. He recently announced that he'd never voted before and said, "This is not spin. I expect my politics to played with a straight bat." 

In the past, Panesar has been diagnosed with depression, paranoia and schizophrenia and requires medication to deal with his daily battle against metal illness. In 2013, he was issued with an on the spot fine when he urinated on a night club bouncer in Brighton.

 

Dostoevsky - 'Crime & Punishment'.

 

Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel 'Crime and Punishment,' is a terrific novel and one of the greatest. I don't really like the nihilistic Rodion Raskolnikov and neither did the convicts in the penal settlement. Dostoevsky often chooses a name to indicate something about a character and his name is obviously derived from 'schismatic' or 'dissenter'. The Old Believers or Doukhobors, were known as Raskolnik.

Raskolnikov sees the world as being made up of ordinary and extraordinary individuals like Napoleon. I think the expression 'Napoleon Complex', is used in the novel. For Raskolnikov, the vast majority of people are just passive dupes but, in his mind, there are the exceptional individuals, for whom ordinary laws or moral standards don't apply. They are a law unto themselves. He kills an old woman, a money lender, simply because he can do. He thinks she's worthless and that world would be better off without her. Her sister, who he also kills, just happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The examining magistrate, Porfiry Petrovich - the model for the detective Colombo - as him weighed up early on because he's managed to find an article written by Raskolnikov in which he outlines his philosophy of the Napoleon Complex. He never arrests Raskolnikov because he believes that his conscience will eventually get the better of him and he will surrender himself. There's a part in the book where Raskolnikov asks the magistrate if he knows who killed the old woman and he replies, you did it. He also says to Raskolnikov, who in Russia doesn't think he's a Napoleon. Raskolnikov, admits that many do think they're Napoleon, but only a few exceptional people rise to the top.

I wonder if Nietzsche got his idea of the superman from Dostoevsky? He read Dostoevsky and greatly admired him as a psychological writer. When Raskolnikov is sentenced and convicted, I think the judge says that he killed the old woman during a period of illness, when his mind was disturbed. Raskolnikov was hard up and wasn't eating enough food. This is a way of trying to make sense of why a well-educated young law student, acted in the way he did.

Sonya, the street walker, who is an angel and a devout Christian, shows Raskolnikov the way back to redemption, a favourite topic with Dostoevsky. It's Dostoevsky who tells us in the 'The Brothers Karamazov,' that if God didn't exist, everything would be permitted. Sonya sells her body so that her family will have food on the table because her alcoholic father, Marmeladov, squanders all the money on vodka. She goes to live near Raskolnikov so she can visit him in the penal colony. All the convicts love her and call her little mother.

I don't think Raskolnikov was born without a conscience or lacks compassion. He's really far too clever for his own good and he generally thinks the vast majority of people are stupid and docile. Like Nietzsche, he sees the masses as the "bungled and the botched."

 A significant part of that book is the dream that he had, about an event that he witnessed in his childhood. It was when he saw a drunken peasant flog a horse to death with an iron bar when everyone stood about watching this and started laughing at the peasant. This greatly upset young Roddy, but it says a lot about the Russian character. 

'Joy' the English Cocker Spaniel

 

Joy, the last dog of the Romanovs

King George V of Britain did help some of the Romanovs to escape from Russia but he refused asylum to the Tsar and his family. He thought it could be politically damaging to the House of Windsor if they came to stay in Britain. The Tsar wasn't popular and he was married to a German. He sent HMS Marlborough to evacuate his aunt, Empress Dowager Maria Feodorovna, the mother of Tsar Nicholas, from the Crimea in April 1919. She left the Crimea with 17 other Romanovs including her daughter, Grand Duchess Xenia and five of Xenia's sons as well as six dogs and a canary.

What happened in the Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg, must have been terrible for the victims. They say the Tsar died instantly shot in the head. Many of the others were shot and bayonetted. The Bolshevik assassination squad didn't only murder the Tsar and his family, they also killed their domestic servants. The court physician, Eugene Botkin, was killed along with their chambermaid Anna Demidova, their cook, Ivan Kharitonov and their footman, Alexei Trupp. The only thing the Bolsheviks spared, was the family's English Cocker Spaniel, called Joy.

The assassination squad was led by the Jewish Chekist (secret policeman), called Yakov Yurovsky. They say that a revolution devours its own. Yurovsky is said to have died, in great pain, following health problems arising from a duodenal or peptic ulcer. He'd been hospitalised and unexpectedly transferred to the Kremlin Hospital, which was off limits to most Soviet citizens. It has been claimed by the Russian historian Edvard Radzinsky, that Yurovsky was poisoned by the NKVD shortly before his death in August 1938. It has also been alleged that he was denied adequate medical treatment. That same year, Yurovsky's daughter Rimma, was arrested for being a Trotskyist and deported to the gulag. Her arrest also had a severe impact on his health. His death and the arrest of his daughter, occurred during what is called Stalin's Great purge, which also saw many of Yurovsky's Ural comrades being arrested and executed. In 1952, Yurovsky's son, Alexander, who was a Real Admiral in the Soviet Navy was also arrested, but was released a year after Joseph Stalin's death.

The deaths of the Romanov family must have weighed heavily on the conscience of King George V and he must have felt a certain amount of guilt. As cousins they were very close and looked almost like identical twins. The Tsar's mother, Maria Feodorovna, the sister of Queen Alexandra, could never accept that her son and his wife and her grandchildren, had died in the Ipatiev House. It was something that she could never come to terms with. 

Joy, the cocker spaniel, was adopted by Colonel Pavel Rodzianko, who moved to England after the defeat of the White Army. He took the dog with him and went to live in Windsor. The dog died in the 1920s and was buried in his garden. Rodzianko wrote: "Every time I pass my garden at Windsor, I think of the small dog's tomb in the bushes with the ironical inscription "Here lies Joy." To me, that little stone marks the end of an empire and a way of life."

The site of the grave has now become a parking lot.

Anarchy, William Morris and St Kilda.

 

St Kilda

The five islands called (St Kilda), were eventually abandoned in August 1930 when the last 36 inhabitants were evacuated to Morvern on the Scottish mainland at their own request. Four years earlier (1926), four men had died from influenza and in January 1930, a young woman called Mary Gillies, died of appendicitis. There had also been a series of crop failures in the 1920s. The islanders cultivated barley and potatoes.

The islands problems stem from depopulation through emigration, natural disasters and contact with tourists and visiting ships, who brought disease. The tourists tended to see the islanders as curiosities. The inhabitants lived mainly on sea birds and their eggs but also had sheep. Although the inhabitants of St Kilda had boats, the seas around St Kilda were said to be far too treacherous for fishing. It must have been hard a life on St Kilda but it's said the islands were inhabited for 2000 years. The inhabitants must have all been related genetically.

Their way of life and the society that they lived in, would have fascinated a social anthropologist like Margaret Mead. There's no such thing as government, lawyers, crime, money, employers, a police force, or social classes. But the islanders did have rules and codes of behaviour. Although fines could be issued for misdemeanours, there is no recorded case of a serious crime occurring on St Kilda in four centuries. The islanders had a daily 'parliament' that was held after prayers, in the street every morning and which was attended by all adult males. By all accounts these meetings could be boisterous but they never led to discord and social division. No one led the meeting and all men had the right to speak. This meeting decided the day's activities.

Although the islands were historically owned by the MacLeod's of Harris, who's steward collected rents in kind, once a year, there's really no private property as such, but there was personal property - possessions. It's not a competitive society but a society based on mutual aid, reciprocity, and co-operation. This is a kind of anarchist society that we're told is impossible to construct because it doesn't accord with human nature.

In 1667, a man called Martin Martin, described a vibrant community and noted that:

"The inhabitants of St Kilda, are much happier than the generality of mankind, as being almost the only people in the world who feel the sweetness of true liberty, simplicity and mutual love and cordial friendship, free from solicitous cares, and anxious covetousness, and the consequences that attend them."

William Morris, wrote about an idealised non-governmental socialistic society in his novel called 'News from Nowhere’, published in serial form in the journal 'Commonweal' in 1890. In the novel, a character called Old Hammond, tells the narrator of the story William Guest, that they've turned the House of Commons into place for storing dung. I couldn't think of a more appropriate use for that building.

Lolita (1997) - A film directed by Adrian Lyne.

 

Jeremy Irons & Dominique Swain - Lolita

I never thought that Melanie Griffith's was a particularly good actress but I'm sure that increasing use of drugs and alcohol, wouldn't have helped her career. She's the daughter of Tippi Hedren and the mother of "Fifty Shades of Grey" star, Dakota Johnson. She played the part of Charlotte Haze in the 1997 film 'Lolita' directed by Adrian Lyne. It was considered a controversial and deeply disturbing film because it deals with the subject of paedophilia. The film also stars Jeremy Irons who plays Humbert Humbert, a middle-aged European professor of English literature.

The film is based on Vladimir Nabokov's 1955 novel of the same name. Humbert rents a room in the house of a young widow called Charlotte Haze (Melanie Griffith), after seeing her 12-year-old daughter, Dolores Haze, also called "Lo", while touring the house. Dolores is played by the actress Dominique Swain. The professor is attracted to adolescent girls who he calls "nymphets." He becomes obsessed and sexually attracted to Dolores who he nicknames "Lolita." Humbert marries Charlotte so he can be near to her daughter and control and groom her. One day, Charlotte finds Humbert's diary and discovers that her marriage is a sham and that it's her daughter that Humbert is attracted to and not her. In anger she runs out of the house and gets struck by a car and killed. This leaves Humbert free to sexually exploit Dolores.

After her mother's death, Humbert and Dolores travel the country before settling in the college town of Beardsley where Humbert takes a teaching job. There is a creepy character in the film called Clare Quilty, who is played by the actor Frank Langella. Quilty, a playwright, seems to suspect the real nature of the relationship between Delores and Humbert after meeting them in a hotel where Humbert has taken Delores to rape her. He then follows the pair across the country. Delores eventually runs away or escapes with Quilty and Humbert's search for them is unsuccessful.

Several years later, Humbert receives a letter from her asking for money. He discovers that she's married and pregnant. Delores tells him that Quilty had took her to his home to be exploited for the purposes of child pornography, but had abandoned her, when she refused to be in one of his films. Humbert tracks down Quilty and shoots him to death in his home while chasing him around the house. This part of the film is particularly gruesome. Humbert is arrested and sent to prison where he dies. A month after his death, Delores dies from childbirth complication.

The film met with much controversy in Australia and had difficulty finding an American distributor. Some critics did, however, praise the film and in particular Swain and Irons for their performances in the film, which they thought remained faithful to Nabokov's narrative. Dominique Swain was chosen to play the role of Dolores when she auditioned in 1995, with 2,500 other girls, when she was aged 15.

Rowling accuses Starmer of having a "brass neck" over transgenderism.

 

J.K. Rowling

Sir Keir Starmer-oid can turn on a dime. He does a U-turn on everything. The Harry Potter Author, J.K. Rowling, has accused Starmer-oid of having a "brass neck" over the transgender issue.

Starmer-oid criticised the Labour MP, Rosie Duffield, when she said that only women had a cervix. He said it was wrong to say that only women had a cervix and Duffield was forced to apologise. Duffield was accused of 'transphobia' and some critics, including women, said that her comments would "discourage trans men and non-binary people from having cervical smears", even though, trans men, don't have a cervix. In Scotland, tampons and sanitary towels were put in gents' toilets, so trans men wouldn't feel offended, even though trans men don't menstruate. Although Duffield later apologised, she did say that she was going to Stepford to be "reprogrammed."

Rowling wrote on X, "Male politicians who chose to pander to activists issuing violent threats against their own female MPs enabled and emboldened the toxic culture @ Keir_Starmer now claims to deplore. When your part of the cause, you've got some brass neck putting yourself forward as a cure."

Starmer-oid who wants to be Labour's next UK prime minister, does seem to have a problem with comprehending basic biological facts. Not long ago, he said that 99.9% of women didn't have a penis. Most people think the figure is 100% of women. When Starmer-oid was asked if he would be apologising to Rosie Duffield, he said he didn't want to revisit this "toxic issue."

It's hardly surprising that Labour and Starmer-oid have suddenly changed tack on transgender ideology, when having previously, embraced it wholeheartedly. They've seen how this deadly toxic issue has destroyed the political careers of Nicola Sturgeon and Humza Yousaf in Scotland and Leo Varadkar, in Ireland.

Humza Yousaf Resigns.

 

Humza Yousaf

I suspect that Humza Yousaf (the SNP's continuity candidate), has contrived this whole situation of his resignation to get out of the job of being First Minister for Scotland. After being Scotland's First Minister, for just over twelve months, he's now decided to abandon a sinking ship. He's no fool. What did he think was likely to happen when he ended the SNP's partnership/coalition with the Greens. As a politician, he must have understood the numbers game.

The SNP have become a laughing stock in the eyes of many Scottish people with their Gender Recognition (Scotland) Bill and their Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act. The British government blocked the Gender Recognition Bill because it would've had an adverse effect on UK-wide, equalities legislation. The Hate Crime Bill, also seems to be unworkable, because the police haven't the time or resources to investigate many of the complaints, that are made by all sorts of cranks and social misfits.

The transgender serial rapist, Isla Bryson, (formerly Adam Graham) - who wanted to be sent to a Scottish women's prison - said he/she was a victim of hate crime. The Harry Potter author, J K. Rowling, said the measure was wide open to abuse and she's quite right. The SNP's obsession with identity politics and in particular, 'transgenderism', has finished them off politically. I also suspect that it has finished off any notions about Scottish independence and the Balkanization of Britain.

Clowns, like Humza Yousaf and Nicola Sturgeon, the Wee Jimmie Krankie of Scottish politics, hardly inspire confidence. Scotland's former First Minister, Alex Salmond, who now leads the Alba Party, has said the SNP needs to abandon its fixation with identity cultural politics and focus on the bread-and-butter issues, that really matter to the Scottish people.

BBC announces that 'genderqueer' Sam Smith will headline BBC Proms.

 

Sam Smith

The BBC have announced that the musically mediocre pop star, Sam Smith, will headline this year's 2024 BBC Proms. Smith, describes himself as "non-binary" and "genderqueer," whatever that means. I believe 'non-binary', means he doesn't regard himself as male or female, but the name Sam, seems to give the game away and he's also biologically male.

However, I'm not sure what relevance somebody's sexual predilections have to do with the performing arts. We admire the artistic work of Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Benvenuto Cellini, not because of their sexual preferences, but because we regard them as artistic geniuses. That's what we judge them by.

It seems to me that Smith uses sexual and gender ambiguity as a way of marketing himself. The American rapper, singer and song writer, Azealia Banks, has said that Smith is "Leaning On" sexuality, to "Make Trash Music." She may be right, but I've only heard snippets of his performances and I'm not that impressed. It sounds like garbage to me, but each to their own.

Britain is increasingly beginning to resemble something out of a farce by Gilbert & Sullivan, a topsy-turvy world of disorder and confusion. I bet we're becoming the laughing stock of the world. No wonder children in Britain are growing up confused.