[the saint] george gives his blessing

George Soros says the worst is yet to come and when he speaks, I do believe we ought to sit up and listen, if only to read between the lines. As one close to the action, he is well placed to speak on this issue and I, for one, would like to know what is planned for us:

Mr Soros believes that central bankers are partly to blame for the credit crunch because of their past behaviour in bailing out the financial sector whenever it got into trouble for over-lending, the so-called moral hazard problem.

He said that the central banks should explicitly target asset bubbles such as housing booms and try to stop them getting out of control, which is something they have resisted doing so far.

And he said that tougher but smarter regulation would be needed in the future in order to reduce the excess supply of credit in the economy.

Probably, George and you might also altruistically add that funding insurgency in Latin America, exploiting women in Eastern Europe and contributing to crashes in Asia, not to mention the narcotics and porn rackets should be rigorously quashed by vigilante groups headed by people like ... well ... like yourself.

[bumper pre-hiatus quiz] perhaps

Tonight's quiz:

1. Which is the most unusual name:

a] Negroponte
b] Slartibartfast
c] Brown

2. Which food is best for you:

a] Death by chocolate
b] Frog's legs
c] Big Mac

3. Who is the best singer ever:

a] William Shatner
b] Kate Bush
c] Louis Armstrong

4. Who is an absolute fruitcake:

a] Bjork
b] A fruitcake
c] Ultrachav

5. Who has the best body:

a] Woody Allen
b] Jabba the Hutt
c] Brown

D'you think there are any I've left out?

[arthur] the grail, defenders of the faith and so on

The Quest for the Grail

Is Defender of the Faith the same as Defender of the Faiths? Will Charles and Camilla defend the faith or the faiths? Is the evidence for the latter his royal princeness's own words or is it:

...it has become increasingly common to see the prince donning both Jewish and Muslim skullcaps in visits to Jewish and Muslim communal events and putting on religious ceremonial garb for the openings of Sikh and Hindu temples...

Well, I've actually done the first two myself but was I worshipping another G-d? I don't think so. Moving on, did the following dialogue take place at his investiture as Prince of Wales?

Queen Elizabeth II: "This dragon gives you your power, your throne and your own authority." Charles: "I am now your Liege-man, and worthy of your earthly worship."

Is this by any chance based on Revelations 13:2?

"And the dragon gave him his power and his throne and great authority."

Nah, has to be a different other dragon. After all, the dragon is associated with Wales and Wales with the Britons, the Britons with Arthur and Arthur with Graham Chapman. That's all right then.

Speaking of Arthur:

Charles [Charles Philip Arthur George] and William [William Arthur Philip Louis] are both Arthurs ... although Arthurs generally come a cropper vis a vis the kingship.

And would it be Charles anyway? The Queen has the right to abdicate but not to hand the throne to William. On the other hand, age does come into it, twenty years from now.

Will Arthur return in Britain's hour of need?

Could this [below] have been the fabled round table? Is Arthur actually this man, thereby fulfilling the tale of the strolling minstrel? And what's the connection with Sparta?



Best stop or this will go on forever.

[thought for the day] tuesday evening

My best friend in this country has a particular set against the humble cucumber and I find him supported in this by Samuel Johnson, who said, on the 5th of October, 1773:

A cucumber should be well sliced and dressed with pepper and vinegar and then thrown out as good for nothing.

Well I don't know about that - I'm quite partial to the odd cucumber and a lady friend of mine seems quite partial to them as well.

Clearly this is a debate without resolution.

[hiatus] admin and guest posters needed

Here is the original Higham Guest Posting "Team" and it needs updating:

Ruthie Not Saussure FlyingRodent dirty dingus Gracchi Croydonian Matt Martin CityUnslicker Praguetory Tom Paine Trixy Devil's Kitchen Ian Appleby Welshcakes Limoncello Colin Campbell Bryan Appleyard Mr Eugenides jmb Reactionary Snob

Some fine people here have departed the sphere and yet others might be shocked to find themselves here at all. Clearly it's time to add to the list, taking into account recent regulars to this site and also taking into account the hiatus starting late Sunday afternoon, May 25th.

If you feel you could do a post or two - many bloggers see it as an opportunity to post unusual things they might not otherwise get around to on their own blogs - this will carry us through the hiatus and would be interesting to readers.

If you would be willing to help out, please e-mail me at jameshigham@mail.com before the weekend and I'll send the invitation.

What I'd ask is that if you do post, please use the justify function and double space between paragraphs and could you keep the graphics to under 80kb and maximum width 500px? Bigger pics should not be uploaded "Left" as text tends to creep up the right side and looks ugly. Better to upload "Center", even if it is only 350px wide.

I'll need to have an admin during that time as well who can edit things and it needs to be a blog savvy person who comes here pretty regularly. Tom Paine did a sterling job last time.

If you're willing to lumber yourself with that task, could you please also e-mail me?

Big ask but the result might be good, as it was last time:

Bryan Appleyard - Help!
Buckeye - Indianapolis
Buckeye - Lay off Sauce
CityUnslicker - Short Trip
Colin Campbell - Public
Colin Campbell - Strap
Delicolor - Gordon Brown
Delicolor - Kingdom Keys
Delicolor - Shading Obscur
Deogolwulf - Nothing Avails
Devil's Kitchen - Flooding
Devil's Kitchen - Prions
Fabian - Marketizing
Flying Rodent - Love PM
Flying Rodent - The Ref
Gracchi - Celebrity
Gracchi - Football WW2
Gracchi - Spell Aisle
Gracchi - Wallace & G
Ian Appleby - Loveletter
James at Ellee's [1]
James at Ellee's [2]
JMB - Funerals & Life
JMB - Immigrant Exp
JMB - The Latin
Lord Nazh - Gaza
L'Ombre - African Obscur
L'Ombre - Blue Wave
L'Ombre - Price of Oil
L'Ombre - Stem Cells
Martin - Brit Economy
Martin - Hypermobility
Martin - NW Order
Martin - Productivity
Mr Eugenides - Greece
Praguetory - Moscow
Ruthie - True Journalism
Tom Paine - Elderly
Tom Paine - EU
Tom Paine - Why Blog?
Trixy - Probably Should
Welshcakes - Epistle
Welshcakes - Moving Day
Welshcakes - Urban Wet

Hope you enjoy some of these.

England's Problem Wife

Pic courtesy Theo


Martin Kelly leaps into print again with a timely reminder on an LPW:

The recent brouhaha concerning concerning Cherie Blair's memoirs places the lady quite firmly in that dubious historical category marked 'Leaders' Problem Wives'.

Some LPW's, such as Marie-Antoinette, achieve the status by being at best misunderstood by, or at worst indifferent to, the people. The late Queen of the French was never guilty of being the bloodthirsty incestuous lesbian she was widely thought to be; other LPW's like, say, Winnie Mandela and Madame Mao, might have a slightly harder time beating their respective historical raps.

Mrs. Blair joins the club for no other reason than that she has thought herself and her doings to be of some interest. Whether this has been motivated by vanity, or just the simple character fault, common amongst lawyers, of not knowing when not to talk, is anyone's guess; and it seems to have been a gross mistake against taste and good sense.

However, the apparent peculation and lack of discretion she has broadcast at the top of her voice, from a mouth as wide as the Mersey, show her to be not unlike the LPW she succeeded as the New Girl in the Club.

That was Hillary Rodham Clinton. Just a thought...

[down on the farm] and all that

About bloody time.

[liberty] precious commodity increasingly rationed

There are those who smile at this statue being represented as an icon of personal freedom. That's for you to decide.

I think it was my old mate Simeon Strunsky, in 1944, who said:

Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly...

... and this can be taken for various dialectics as well, for example the Hegelian, which is nearly always misrepresented, as stated by Heinrich Moritz Chalybäus ...

... a thesis, giving rise to its reaction, an antithesis which contradicts or negates the thesis, the tension between the two resolved by a synthesis.

This, in turn, also gives rise to an interpretation which some are wont to call the Hegelian dialectic, which states that governments and virtually any higher body who want to bring in some policy do so via a threefold progression:

1. create a crisis;
2. people demand a solution;
3. government propose a solution which includes the policy they wanted in the first place.

In turn, this idea can be refined to read this way:

1. think of a policy you want, e.g. ID cards and the restriction of personal freedom;
2. go to a group of people designated as the baddies, known for going off the deep end easily and stir them up on their home patch;
3. when they commit atrocities, which somehow they most surprisingly get past your defences to do:
4. wait for the community reaction;
5. draft general draconian laws to counter the perceived threat;
6. thereby put in place that which you wanted in 1. above.

Governments are only the outward manifestation of the people of power behind them. Many of these people take the point of view expressed by Hegel himself, this time correctly quoted from 1830:

Only in the state does man have a rational existence ... Man owes his entire existence to the state and has his being within it alone.

Needless to say I reject this utterly or if not utterly, in large part. Such a philosophy gives rise to tyranny and the constant attempt to reduce the common man to a serf and a malleable serf and that is what we're seeing right now.

Whether you are a businessman just needing the right to trade freely or you are an individual just needing the right to express your opinion without being vilified by powerful lobbies or incarcerated by the state, the desire is the same:

Liberty.

[interim report] die is cast

There are two issues - what the heck I was going to do if I was to be turfed out of the country by the new law and how to stay alive with at least one meal a day for the next few months.

The first has been resolved in principle through a very kind offer from one of our bloggers and that will be publicized as soon as it can be brought to fruition. This blogger and I will make a joint report to our regular readers as and when it happens next week.

There is still a battle going on this week at this end to try to get immigration to reverse it's stand.

The second, the financial side - I have a stay of execution for now but it looks uneasy. Having had June/July taken away [my main earners] plus not being eligible for my holiday pay now, with this neat little new regulation in place, I have to be working and earning.

Three bloggers have suggested I put up Paypal on this site but I've resisted that, reasoning that if I go into hiatus, no one is going to donate to a dead cause. It's more appropriate to assure close people here that any largesse on their part is a loan I'll repay as soon as I'm earning in a new place.

So there's enough to leave here but not enough to go on after that and it might be necessary to do something through this page for a short period until the first pay comes in. Also, the longer I survive, the greater the chance of unlocking the frozen funds back home and that would solve all problems.

So I'm loathe to ask for now as any incoming money is a debt I'll have to repay later. Those kind bloggers who offered - be careful as I might ask for your help next week in a new place. I'd like to openly say here [and will e-mail you personally later] that your kindness has been touching and somehow I think this thing will be traversed though hardly resolved.

May I keep those offers as a rain check please?

I tell you one thing - if I do get set up again, you're going to be invited as an honoured guest as soon as I'm able.

[thought for the day] monday evening

“It's snowing still," said Eeyore gloomily.

"So it is."

"And freezing."

"Is it?"

"Yes," said Eeyore. "However," he said, brightening up a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately.”