[death of a government] a musical tribute

So, on with the Doc Martens, boys and girls and let's help this government out of its misery ...

[By the way, top backing band, the Blockheads, didn't you think?]

[thought for the day] friday evening

Oh liberty, what crimes are committed in thy name!

[Mme Roland, de Lamartine, 1847]

[caroline flint] is it true?

My favourite pollie - no, no! Is it true she's gone? All right, her mind might be stuffed with socialist maggots and she might say some amazingly stupid things but she can be looked at, let's be honest, in a George Harrison/Spice Girls sort of way.

Dear oh dear. Caroline? !

Sob.

Blognor Regis on the situation.

Si salvi chi puo'!

This is the best take on it I've seen.  It shows Flint to have been at once naive and opportunistic, as well as self-centred enough to think Labour owed her a place in the inner circle.  There is also the fact that she has been one of the co-conspirators holding meetings about that very topic.

[boris] has he thinned down a bit?

[weekend poll] sexiest brit public figure

1 Anne "Hope You Die Happy" Robinson

2 Kate Middleton with best pal

3 Julia "Beyond Authority" Middleton

4 Cherie Blair [thanks Bloggerheads]

5 Harriet Harman with best pal

6 Ann Widdecombe

7 Jacqui Smith [being investigated for porn connections]

8 The Chipmunk

9 Polly Toynbee - Blogger advises that posting photos of this lady breaches its terms and conditions


10 Gordo 'I love England' Brown

Free Web poll for your Web site - freepolls.com

[oh my goodness] the price of delusion

BBC:

Defence Secretary John Hutton, another leading Blairite, said Mr Purnell had made "the wrong decision" and Mr Brown was "the right man to lead our party and our country".

[sotomayor] and subjective views of reality

Under the heading ‘Sotomayor Racist Comments Controversy Spreads Through Battle Lines’ one article says:

Sotomayor's extreme likelihood of confirmation almost makes these alleged racist comments unlikely to make a big difference. Yet it will take up a few news cycles as Sotomayor faces racist comment charges while preparing for her hearings.

Sotomayor has been vetted and considered as a Supreme Court justice before, and was the favorite to be nominated this time for weeks, so foes have had a lot of time to find something.

That's as maybe but it doesn't seem to me that the issue is really her racist comments but her record of judgements and just why she is the darling of Obama. This is a pure power game going on here with the stacking of the Supreme Court and that's why the right is up in arms.

Having said that, I thought Gingrich and Co. and the Starr Scandal brought the level of political debate to an all time low [before Obama], much as this blog holds no brief whatsoever for Clinton. There was just too much of the Andy Johnson stitch-up in that and Gingrich's credentials rightly became zero.

With that also having been said, Cassandra makes some good points about subjectivism and objectivism:

The blatant class justice and 'reverse' racism on display all over the Western hemisphere and how this is apparently the natural standard for entire cohorts of postmodernists, is reaching fever pitch! Case in point: Sonio Sotomayor, Obama's pick for the US Supreme Court.

In modern times the notion was introduced by Immanuel Kant. He stopped just short of proposing the possibility of personal 'realities'. Instead he posited social subjectivism, the collectivist idea that social groups create their own realities.

Followers carried the idea to further extremes: there is no reason why mankind should not consist of competing groups, each with their own type of consciousness, vying with others for the control of reality.

Postmodernism (now mainstream) furnished ethnic groups with their own mental constitution, a racial or cultural version of subjective 'truth,' that may be invalid for others. This is what present day multiculturalists term 'the narrative'.

A multicultural society is a socially subjective political system: an archipelago of distinct autononous cultural and racial islets (others would say, ghettos). Although politicians like to present the doctrine as synonymous with 'a society consisting of multiple cultures' this is emphatically not the case. On the contrary, it is legalized segregation and the diametrical opposite of 'melting pot.'

Now this last paragraph is the issue here and it is explained further:

As long as all groups abide by the principle that each and every culture is equally valid and autonomous in its own right, it is just the dissenters, apostates and outcasts who are thrown under the bus. But as soon as one tribe starts developing theories about its own supremacy, or becomes envious of more successful ones, or becomes predatory - to mention but a few wildly speculative possibilities - it's back to the drawing board of human civilization for the survivors (if any).

In a social or political setting the objective approach seeks to apply equal rules and treatment for all concerned, without regard of the individual involved - baron or beggar - or his particular circumstances or background: murder is murder, no matter who committed it.

Objectivity has been the highest standard of moral judgment for a very long time.

I'm sure you've latched on to the bottom line – that Obama and similar thinking people have created urban myths of their own, each group wrapped in their own subjective idea of reality when in fact, the thing is bollocks. There are certain facts and figures – population, GDP etc., which just ARE.

We could go into the rewriting of history but it would make the post too long [and I am going to post on the revisionist redating of the gospels if I can condense all the material] but suffice it to say that:

Sotomayor was racist in her remark, however innocuous.

Whether that should exclude her or not is not really the point here. The point is – the rule should equally apply to all and, as Cassandra wrote: 'This is emphatically not the case.' There is also the question of her character and personal fitness or not to hold that office.

[truth] obama style

Obama:

He cited the Koran as saying: "Be conscious of God and speak always the truth."

That's interesting. There's an element to the Christian faith [and no doubt in the Muslim too] that if you know something to be true but you deliberately lie, especially when backsliding from your faith, you're headed for the hot place:

“I’ve always been a Christian,” the Illinois Democrat responded. “I have never practiced [Islam].”Note: The newspaper editors had to add the word, “Islam.”

In his autobiography, “Dreams From My Father,” Obama mentions studying the Quran. He was enrolled in two Jakarta schools as a Muslim. His teacher Tine Hahiyary said that she remembered that he had studied “mengaji” (recitation of the Quran).” Classmate Rony Amiris described Obama as being a very devout Muslim, saying, “Barry was previously quite religious in Islam.”

Another classmate, Emirsyah Satar, now the CEO of Garuda Indonesia, was quoted as saying, “He (Obama) was often in the prayer room wearing a ’sarong.’” (See Obama’s Education.) Yet, on his official campaign website, Obama has posted this statement, “Barack has never been a Muslim or practiced any other faith besides Christianity.”

Is this the sort of 'speak always the truth' he's referring to?

[wind turbine] at home in your front yard

Look what you could have today if you wanted.

[quick quiz] for the hell of it

1. Who quipped about recognizing old age when the policemen on the street look so young?

2. What was Richard Nixon's daughter's dog named?

3. What's the curved surface of water in a container referred to as?

4. What did Bernard Bosanquet invent - in India it's called a doosra?

5. What's a name for intricately carved wood panelling, especially a room made from this?

Answers

Seymour Hicks, Checkers, meniscus, googly or bosie, boiserie