[fuel crisis] why not go maritime?

There was some great reading yesterday with Jam's story of the Cagots but today is equally interesting, with Gallimaufry's take on steam-powered vehicles. William Gruff came in with an interesting comment and an idea occurred to me, spurious at first, I admit but then I saw the possibilities.

It might just work.

1. All new road projects become canals, which take far less investment to construct - not the narrow canals of the past but broad "four lane" jobs with locks for the hills.

2. Existing roads can be converted over a twenty year period, thereby spreading the cost.

3. Small craft of the catamaran and junk sail [or lug sail] variety would be built cheaply, far cheaper than new cars and can ply the canals which link major waterways.

Objections

1. The fuel and construction sectors would never abide it.

Answer: They would if they had a stake in the canalization of the whole country ... plus fuel is simply losing all appeal as an investment. For those who didn't want to sail, crop fuelled putt-putts could be used as well.

2. The transport and cargo sectors would be decimated.

Answer; Why? Look how much more could be moved by water.

3. The whole pace of life would slow down unbearably, transport times, ordering of goods from another centre would triple in time and so on.

Answer: Yes. And what?

4. People would be forced into the very new-feudalism which libertarians are now railing against.

Answer: Yes, that's so. Three acres and a cow again. So, for that very reason, the globalists might just go for it, with available fuel swung into defence.

If one thinks about it, you could see how it would improve the whole mood of the nation - the noise, pollution, stress for the average person ... plus the globalists would be happy.

Also, Britain has a maritime history, the people are no strangers to inland waters. So why not?

[one question quiz] are you educated?

Who is Google's biggest client? [This means single user and including any new clients of the last few days.]

Answer is below in white.

The NSW Department of Education

[suez] end of an empire

This is the Wiki article abridged and paraphrased . You can read the whole thing through, view the summary below or just click out with a sigh. :)


The Suez Canal was opened in 1869, having been financed by the French and Egyptian governments. Technically, the territory of the canal proper was sovereign Egyptian territory, and the operating company, the Universal Company of the Suez Maritime Canal (Suez Canal Company) was an Egyptian-chartered company, originally part of the Ottoman Turkish Empire.

To the British, the canal was the ocean link with its colonies in India, the Far East, Australia, and New Zealand and the area as a whole became strategically important. Thus, in 1875, the British government of Benjamin Disraeli bought the Egyptian share of the operating company, obtaining partial control of the canal's operations and sharing it with mostly-French private investors.

In 1882, during the invasion and occupation of Egypt, the United Kingdom took de facto control of the canal proper, finance and operation. The Convention of Constantinople (1888) declared the canal a neutral zone under British protection. In ratifying it, the Ottoman Empire agreed to permit international shipping to freely pass through the canal, in time of war and peace.

In 1948, the British Mandate of Palestine ended, the British forces withdrew from Palestine, and Israel declared independence. Britain's military strength was spread throughout the region, including the vast military complex at Suez with a garrison of some 80,000.

[Then came the Islamic rise in Egypt and increasingly frosty post-war relations between Britain and Egypt.]

In October 1951, the Egyptian government unilaterally abrogated the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian treaty, the terms of which granted Britain lease on the Suez base for 20 years. Britain refused to withdraw from Suez. The price of such a course of action was a steady escalation in increasingly violent hostility towards Britain.

[Now followed the removal of the Egyptian monarchy, increasing Arab obstruction of the canal and a 1953-54 attempt by Britain to mend relations. They would withdraw the garrison gradually if they could influence the canal zone. Nasser was unpopular at home for this agreement and Egypt also saw Jordan and Iraq as a threat, those two being friendly towards Britain.

Now came Nasser's civil unrest and obstruction of Britain across the arab world, coupled with the Czechoslovakian arms deals, bringing vast weapons reserves to the middle-east and cutting the reliance on western arms.]

On May 16th, 1956, Nasser officially recognized the People's Republic of China. Washington withdrew all American financial aid for the Aswan Dam project on July 19th. Nasser's response was the nationalization of the Suez Canal.

After the American government didn't support the British protests, the British government decided for the military intervention against Egypt to avoid the complete collapse of British prestige in the region.

However, direct military intervention ran the risk of angering Washington and damaging Anglo-Arab relations. As a result, the British government concluded a secret military pact with France and Israel that aimed at regaining the Suez Canal.

[Now followed various meetings and then ...]

Three months after Egypt's nationalization of the canal company, a secret meeting took place at Sèvres, outside Paris. Britain and France enlisted Israeli support for an alliance against Egypt.

The parties agreed that Israel would invade the Sinai. Britain and France would then intervene, instructing that both the Israeli and Egyptian armies withdraw their forces to a distance of 16 km from either side of the canal.

The British and French would then argue that Egypt's control of such an important route was too tenuous, and that it needed be placed under Anglo-French management.

[Britain failed to inform the U.S., expecting that it would accede to the fait accompli. Israel began the attack on October 29th, 1956. It was messy but came to this point ...]

On November 3, 20 F4U-7 Corsairs from the 14.F and 15.F Aéronavale taking off from the French carriers Arromanches and La Fayette, attacked the Cairo aerodrome. Nasser responded by sinking all 40 ships present in the canal, closing it to further shipping until early 1957.

[However ...]

The operation to take the canal was highly successful from a military point of view, but was a political disaster due to external forces.

The Eisenhower administration forced a cease-fire on Britain, Israel, and France which it had previously told the Allies it would not do. The U.S. demanded that the invasion stop and sponsored resolutions in the UN Security Council ...

Part of the pressure that the United States and the rest of NATO used against Britain was financial, as President Eisenhower threatened to sell the United States reserves of the British pound and thereby precipitate a collapse of the British currency.

[Various embargos and the criticism by the Commonwealth at a time when this represented the last vestige of the Empire also pressured Britain. The pound was pressured and Eden resigned.

The main fallout was that France and Britain were weakened in international eyes, world power effectively shifted to the superpowers and France fell out with its allies, with some justification this time, promoting its own interests and supposedly giving nuclear secrets to Israel.

Could Britain have played it better?

Yes, of course. The leadership relied on the old Empire clout too much but that was understandable, given the history of Britain in Palestine and Suez. In this blogger's eyes, the most significant factor though was the refusal of the U.S. to help, coupled with its out and out obstruction in the end.

If Britain had brought the U.S. into the game, I doubt it would have altered much. There would have been equal hostility to America and though the military operation still would have been successful, Britain would have to have conceded the whip hand to the U.S. This was a slap in the face of Britain's prestige, which MacMillan acknowledged was the new reality in his willingness to accommodate the Americans from that point forward.

It would be nice to think that a Churchill, Thatcher or Ian Botham type could have steered a better course with a lot of "side" to it but one wonders how much better they would have done.]

[non news] sky beats it into shape

We were watching Sky News last night and this Anna Jones was trying to beat up the Los Angeles quake yesterday.

Well, it's not as if it is the first time its happened - I mean they were sort of forewarned, weren't they?

She had a local radio station type online and was asking if people were terrified or injured or whatever and he kept replying with words like "mild", "normal" and so on. She tried a few more descriptive words like "major quake" and "loss of life" but it was clear the local wasn't buying so she brought out her trump:

"Is this the one before the Big One Los Angleles has been expecting?"

... or words to that effect. We were smiling at her attempts to beat it up, all the while nice scenic shots of the city and environs were being shown. Suddenly the camera zoomed in on a puddle at a crossroads - could this have been due to the quake?

Giving up on that, Sky cut to Belgrade and waited for the 50 or so hooligans to attack the riot police. Again the reporter wasn't buying the sensationalist line. He spoke of expecting it and that it was far fewer people than the last time, mostly well behaved.

Poor old Sky went to commercial then came back with the 7.5 seconds when the police actually were using truncheons on hooligans who'd thrown bricks and a line like "violent clashes on the streets of Belgrade".

Reminds me of Python's Ralph Mellish sketch:

Scarcely able to believe his eyes, Ralph Mellish looked down. But one glance confirmed his suspicions. Behind a bush, on the side of the road, there was no severed arm, no dismembered trunk of a man in his late fifties, no head in a bag – nothing - not a sausage.

For Ralph Mellish, this was not to be the start of any trail of events which would not, in no time at all, involve him in neither a tangled knot of suspicion, nor any web of lies, which would, had he been involved, surely have led him to no other place, than the central criminal court of the Old Bailey.

Quality Aussie Poems Mate

I know that James likes poetry, so I thought he might like this.

While lions have their pride
Elephants take you for a ride
But a llama could be calmer
For a farmer who seeks karma

Beaut Mate

More here and thanks Authorblog: Verse And Worse

Whilst we're on a theme of roses...

Whilst we're on a theme of roses...

I proudly present the White Rose, the Yorkshire flag.



Further to this, John, here.

Griselda writes of rugger, roses and rubbers

Introducing Griselda again, readers. You can catch her previous two posts here and here. Her website is here. A very warm welcome again to the columnist from the Greater Titcup Echo, in the west country.


More advice for the lovelorn

Dear Griselda,

You seem like a sensible sort of girl, a good sort a man could get along with – a girl with common sense. So perhaps you could explain my lady love’s recent moods.

I just don’t understand her any more. Only the other day, for instance, she went into a sulk forever because I hadn’t noticed her change in hair style. All right, it used to be waist length and brunette and now it’s cropped and a golden colour but still … how is a busy man supposed to notice these things?

Lately she keeps asking me what colour her eyes are – well, how should I know that? I hardly stare at them, do I? Even last weekend, she went beserk when she found that the Aber Rugger Club’s annual do was players and officials only and she’d gone and spent £500 on some dressy thing which hit the wallet pretty badly, I can tell you.

It took ages calming her down and I missed the sports results on the Beeb, damn it.

Everything came to a head yesterday when she asked me if I loved her and I said she was a part of me, almost part of the furniture, in fact. For some reason I had a chair thrown at me for that and it just missed poking my eye out.

I really don’t want to make a mistake now her birthday’s coming up sometime (she keeps dropping hints) and I’m at a loss what to buy. I thought maybe some Aber Rugger Club earmuffs might go well with her new evening dressy thing.

What do you think, Griselda? I’m at my wits’ end. If you can sort this one out for me, there’s a pint of Brains coming your way.

Dai Llewellyn-Jones

Well, Dai

I think I too would have been a little put out to be compared to furniture and you were probably quite lucky it was only a chair. My best advice is to watch this video below and by the way, mine is a Pimms N1, boyo.

Griselda

Dear Griselda

I’d prefer to keep my identity to myself if you don’t mind but the thing is, it’s all so tedious.

Well, I suppose I should start at the beginning, yes. It’s all well and fine, you know, his ex-wife moaning about three in a marriage but those were exciting times, being the other woman, you might say.

And now?

I knew public life was never going to be a bed of roses, what with his sense of destiny and so on but I feel more than a little sympathy with Cecilia Sarkozy, I can tell you.

You’re probably wondering why I would be writing to a provincial rag like yours but your fame has spread beyond Lower Titcup, you have to understand – my son and yourself are both budding cookery writers, after all.

So the thing is – what to do? Perhaps you could throw this open to your readers.

Ex-Gloucestershire Lady

Dear Ex-Gloucestershire Lady

Well, as you say, it’s best to throw this open to the readers and without further ado, over to you, readers.

Love and kisses,

Griselda


And finally, Griselda’s household tip to sign off with, stolen from Woman's Realm: Tips and Wrinkles [Pan, 1972]

Rubbers and how to use them. Make rubber gloves last twice as long: turn them inside out and stick plasters on the tips of the fingers. Before throwing them away, cut the cuffs into strips and they make wonderful rubber bands. Lastly, if you put a few drops of glycerine in water, this makes the rubber more flexible.

See you soon.

[illegal immigrants] to exclude or to house?

Please look at Welshcakes' current post on the incidents in the Cathedral. Illegal immigrants went into a church and occupied it, from which action police were then involved. Welshcakes concludes:

Does a country have a right, or even a duty, to look after its own citizens first? On the other hand, surely everyone has a right to be treated with some human dignity? What would any of us do if we suddenly found ourselves homeless through no fault of our own?

Many, many questions to think on and I have others too. I was reading in La Sicilia [dead wood version] how in Genoa there is also a bunfight over a proposed mosque being built.

Phew!

Am I an extremist? I hope not, I really do, as I lived among muslims for 13 years, worked with and for them and can only say they were fine people in my eyes. There's no ingratitude here. There were mosques everywhere and I sometimes went into them with muslims and discussed their religion.

More recently, some readers know I was close to some Indonesian friends [and still consider myself a friend.]

One of the reasons for the Italian intransigence on Islam coming in is their observation of what went wrong in Britain. Having said that, I have now invited trouble upon myself. So be it. On the other hand, the plight of the refugees is a humanitarian one - these people need to have something to eat, they need to have the dignity to be able to just wash or lay the head down somewhere.

They are mainly muslim and their desperation to flee their countries or die is an indictment of those countries. I strongly suspect that the powers that be in those countries know full well what they're doing through their oppression - both offloading excess population and indirectly bringing Islam back into southern Italy.

Welshcakes took the point of view - how can a country say yes to a Christian church, yes to a Buddhist and Jewish but no to a mosque? My answer is that you have to look at the track records of each of these. I ask you now - would most Brits feel that the Jewish synagogue was a major threat to Britain? How about a Christian church? And so on. Of course not.

And why not? Assimilation of the group - most groups coming in do assimilate with the local society. Not necessarily adopting all so-called "British culture" per se but certainly willing to get on with life here as a Brit.

They don't demand special rooms during Ramadan or refuse to accept public housing because it is not to their specifications. Most religions and other groups coming in don't have houses of worship in which trouble is stirred up by extremists. Most don't even have extremists.

And don't forget the question of sheer numbers.

In the end, this question comes down to two things - firstly, are all religions and cultures equivalent or are there, possibly, some groups which really do have a track record of trouble coming out of them and export that trouble en masse? Secondly - is democracy their inalienable right, the right to incite etc.?

Or does the classic liberal maxim apply - freedom to do anything as long as it doesn't impinge on anyone else? The Italians have a fierce attachment to democracy but they've drawn the line at Islamic inroads along the British pattern. That's their decision. Democracy yes - but for registered citizens.

So to return to the poor boat people in the cathedral. Why would they have chosen to go to a Christian cathedral and not, say, to the local police station or hostel or mission for homeless people? Why would a group of muslims choose a Christian church to occupy? Minor point perhaps.

I don't believe we can trot out relativistic and equivalent positions without also considering track records of certain populations. For example, the Somalis are well known here for their intransigence. They can argue this out with the Italians - I'm just mentioning it. I'm certainly not getting into the Roms.

Whilst reasonable people would surely concede that the trouble comes from a small proportion of a population, it still happens though, doesn't it?

The Italians have decided that they don't want a bar of it and this is a proud nation which reveres its tolerance in these matters, which is evident in all other dealings with the Clandestini. But now a state of emergency has been declared in this country and no one really knows what to do.

I certainly don't know either.

You might like to look at my previous post on the Clandestini and Tony Sharp's post link within it.

[the doha dodo] logically impossible

The whole point in trade is that you get access to their markets and can access their technology, whilst protecting your own producers, e.g. in grain and minerals.

At a meeting like Doha, it's slightly ridiculous because each side is never going to concede protection of its farmers but at the same time, it wants access to the other nations' markets.

Pascal Lamy's 12% protection proposal is fraught because the very 12% each nation protects is precisely the one which the other countries wish to access. No one's going to settle for second best and offer their best to partners. China in particular is not going to do that.

Therefore Doha is still a Dodo, even before its official close.

[bart simpson] now the exhibition

From late July to August, you can see the exhibition inspired by Bart Simpson.

All you have to do is motor up to Glasgow, catch a flight to Iceland and ask at the nearest bar. Should be well worth going to see.

Presuming you're crazy about Bart that is, as seen through Icelandic eyes.