Sunday 21 November: Why is the Government cutting part of HS2 instead of scrapping it all?

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
Intelligent, polite, good-humoured debate is welcome, whether on or off topic. Differing opinions are encouraged, but rudeness or personal attacks on other posters will not be tolerated. Posts which – in the opinion of the moderators – make this a less than cordial environment, are likely to be removed, without prior warning.  Persistent offenders will be banned.

Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here.

793 thoughts on “Sunday 21 November: Why is the Government cutting part of HS2 instead of scrapping it all?”

        1. Mye av det samme, Peddy. Mye soving, mye stress både på jobb og ifbm Mammas sin demens.

          2. All things go over. But not looking forward to a “do not resuscitate” conversation with the hospital tomorrow.

          3. I had one of those with a registrar & a houseman when i was in hospital 3 years ago. It was done in such a round-about way that I did not twig the coercion until 1/2way through.

          4. Then I had the feeling they were asking me to sign my own death warrant. That was at the stage when they couldn’t decide whether I needed an OP or not. In the end they decided not.

            Och nu är det dags för sängen.

  4. Are the Covid Vaccines Dangerous? Yes, for Some. November 20, 2021 by Larry Johnson.

    Just got some sad news about my great niece. She was compelled to get the Covid jab in order to stay employed. She was pregnant. Within a week of getting the jab she miscarried. Not a coincidence. The New England Journal of Medicine reported in June that if a woman is vaccinated before the fetus passes the 20 week mark of gestation, there is an 80% chance of a miscarriage:

    104 out of 127 women experienced a miscarriage. This means the miscarriage rate of women who received the vaccine in the first or second trimester is actually 81.9%, or 8 out of 10 women – way, way above the national average.

    Of course, those beholden to the pharmaceutical industry are doing their damnedest to knock this data point down and insist there is nothing to worry about. But if you are still putting your faith in the likes of the CDC and Dr. Fauci, you probably qualify as a moron.

    It is not just pregnant women in their first trimester who are at risk, look at what is happening to world class athletes. Sergio “Kun” Aguero, an Argentine who plays soccer for Manchester United, suddenly developed a heart condition after getting the jab.

    The anecdotal evidence about the side effects of these “vaccines” is becoming ever more alarming; not least because they are being denied and suppressed by the Forces of the State. It must be remembered it is early days yet in this process! There is still ample room for catastrophe!

    https://turcopolier.com/are-the-covid-vaccines-dangerous-yes-for-some

    1. ‘Morning, Minty.
      I am coming round faster & faster that I shall skip the booster unless there is a compelling reason why I should have it. After the 2nd jab I had ‘minor changes’, which could be attributed to it, but the last thing I need is a bout of myocarditis.

      1. My beautiful Polish friend is getting over myocarditis after being vaccinated. Not a happy lass, she’s been off work over two months.

          2. & Rastus has told us (3 times) about the 3 17 y.o. students who developed myo-c after their jabs.

          5. It is a pretty shocking story, and bears repeating. Under normal circumstances, that should be headline news.

        2. The owner of this Blog and his wife have both suffered continuous ill health from being vaccinated.

      2. Morning Peddy. When one thinks of the long gestation times of drugs that have been found to be problematical we have hardly begun. There is plenty of time as yet for some pathogen to emerge. It need not be 100%, indeed none of them are, but the numbers involved here would render even a small percentage calamitous.

      3. I just cannot understand why people cannot see what is going on. This so called vaccine has failed. Stop now.

        1. Morning, JN.

          I’ve just put up an interview with a leading scientist who has been arguing that since the beginning. He has, of course, been ignored. His predictions are coming true but the enablers do not want to listen.

        2. They leave the media to do the thinking, Johnny, and we all know where that gets you.
          Morning, btw!

        3. Some are rational, but others are in a cult. Evidence doesn’t matter, as long as the fear keeps flowing.

      4. Even MB – who is less paranoid than I am – is seriously wondering about his mega clot a fortnight to the day after his first jab.

    2. Morning, Araminta.

      Here is a master class presentation on why the mass inoculation programme is causing serious problems. The interviewee destroys an opposing view from another scientist, not by attacking the scientist but the latter’s science, with the simple ‘comparing apples and oranges’ argument. The data are compelling when looking at some USA states: Vermont and Colorado are at high percentages of inoculation and are suffering high levels of infection whereas Wyoming is presenting the very opposite. Nation states around the World are also presenting similar data.

      For what it’s worth, my opinion is that the infection rate is running out of control and the enablers do not have any idea other than doubling down and inoculating further, which in turn exacerbates the problem. It’s a “vaccine” version of a runaway train but the buffers aren’t yet in sight.

      The Highwire – The Geert Vanden Bossche Interview

    4. I raised an issue about the role of the von Willibrand clotting factor in this forum at the early stages of the COVID -19 pandemic before a vaccination program in the UK was underway. I remember some Nottlers commenting on their susceptility to COVID-19 depending on their blood type.

      Here is a more recent publication identifying that those of us will type O blood group are likely to show fewer symptoms after COVID-19 exposure due having a lower von Willibrand factor to start with :

      https://academic.oup.com/jalm/article/6/5/1305/6261079

      The consequences of having one or more COVID-19 vaccinations after viral expozure does complicate arguments about development of serious and morbid side effects of the vaccination/s employed.

        1. Yes, but remains to be clarified.

          Quote from reference:

          Preliminary data from these studies do potentially suggest that the lower vWF levels may be associated with decreased severity of disease in group O patients but more data is needed to clarify this relationship.

    2. A bit frostier than that as I teed off on the 36F Costa Clyde at 08.20 this morning. A clear, calm day. Makes hunting the golf balls much easier.

  8. Morning all from Spain. The rain not on the plain but on us. Sun back today

    Why is the Government cutting part of HS2 instead of scrapping it all?

    SIR – It has been 12 years since HS2 was announced in 2009.

    At that time objectors said it was a ridiculous gimmick of a scheme, and a more effective and much cheaper alternative to building a de facto out-of-date system would be to upgrade the existing system.

    We now have the Prime Minister agreeing with those critics. The HS2 spur to Leeds will be dropped and existing lines upgraded (report, November 18). Can’t Boris Johnson now just drop the whole thing and upgrade the rest of the system?

    E J Judge

    Leeds, West Yorkshire

    SIR – The Government has again reneged on its promises to the North.

    Had the Department for Transport planned HS2 properly, it would have insisted that the work started in the North and progressed towards the South on both sides of the Pennines, with modern links from Liverpool and Manchester to Bradford, Leeds, York and Newcastle. The Transpennine route has long needed upgrading.

    When will London-based civil servants realise that there is a great expanse of land north of Birmingham with many residents who rely on public transport?

    Duncan Taylor

    Cambridge

    SIR – When I was younger “levelling up” meant being honest, telling the truth and apologising when you were wrong.

    Today it is just another Boris Johnson soundbite, which will come back to bite him at the next election.

    Tony Foulds

    Wilmslow, Cheshire

    SIR – It is ironic that people are now complaining about the cancellation of HS2 from Birmingham to Leeds.

    As someone who lives near the horrendous workings of the southern part, I can only tell them that they should be celebrating, grateful that they are not going to have to put up with the further desecration of the countryside for an outdated concept.

    I thought it was accepted that the North needs better connectivity locally, which is what it will now get. The Government should never have persisted with the project. Remember what it has already achieved at the Chesham and Amersham by-election.

    Ruth Leach

    Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire

    SIR – Keith Punshon (Letters, November 19) argues that the curtailment of HS2 in the North is a betrayal of Red Wall voters.

    Some might argue that the preservation of HS2 in the South is a betrayal of Blue Wall voters.

    Nick Hazelton

    Wimborne, Dorset

    SIR – How is it that, in Europe, high-speed rail connections have been constructed across the Continent, yet we are still struggling to build one line?

    Alan Shaw

    Halifax, West Yorkshire

      1. He does sound a bit dim. Still, he is from Yorkshire.

        I have travelled by Car, Train and Aircraft across most of Europe and what you see most of are fields.

        Good morning.

  9. Refusing a jab

    SIR – I must take issue with the argument presented by Silkie Carlo on the subject of vaccinations.

    I would not deny anybody the choice over whether or not to be vaccinated against Covid (or any other infectious disease). However, there are consequences to turning it down: people increase their risk of becoming vectors for transmission, and putting increased pressure on limited healthcare resources – which, in turn, could end up restricting others’ access to potentially lifesaving treatment.

    By refusing vaccination (when not specifically contraindicated), it is the unvaccinated who are creating a two-tier society. Why should an entire population have their liberties taken away when it is only a small proportion who present a higher level of risk?

    Advertisement

    ADVERTISEMENT

    By Abbey Wealth

    It is also worth remembering that those in the unvaccinated tier are not being denied access to the vaccinated tier: they are just exercising their freedom of choice.

    Dr Jeremy Field

    Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk

    SIR – More lockdown privations and draconian regulations appear to be just around the corner for a second year.

    As was the case in 2020, people are not dying in the street. Nor are hospitals going to be overwhelmed, whatever the Government and NHS would have us believe.

    What about when there is another wave at Easter, and another next Christmas? This could continue indefinitely.

    Simon Crowley

    Kemsing, Kent

    1. Unless I have completely misunderstood reports both the ‘Vaccinated’ and the unjabbed can transmit the virus. Additionally large numbers of the ‘vaccinated’ are being admitted to hospitals. Doesn’t this rather destroy Dr Field’s postulations?

      Morning folks. Clear skies here at the moment and the forecast for a sunny day tomorrow.

      1. That’s how it is here. High % vaccinated, yet increasing levels of infection & hospitalisation.

    2. I am not arguing with you, Dr Jeremy “Mengele” Field. Just suggesting you clear right off to some Continental country where democracy is not traditional.

    3. Sorry to be boring but I have to say this again.
      Fully vaccinated people can still get Covid and can pass it on. Non-vaccinated people can get Covid and can pass it on.
      To say that the unvaxxed are the main danger is to tell a massive lie!

  11. High street heyday

    SIR – I am very sorry to read of the decline of Oxford Street (Features, November 19).

    I have not shopped there for years, preferring local towns, but I remember the excitement of buying my school uniform in D H Evans as a child, and later buying my wedding dress in John Lewis.

    Most intriguingly of all, we have a photograph of my great grandmother, Florence Nordberg, shaking hands with Mr Selfridge on his store’s opening day. I think she was the first customer.

    Jacqueline Davies

    Faversham, Kent

    1. Oxford St just like most High St have been in decline for the last 40 years.

      Oxford St is where you find the men selling knock offs from suitcases. They are still doing it. You can observe their behaviour easily enough. They have lookouts and when uniformed plod comes ambling along they vanish. Only to reappear moments later.

      This recent raid is purely for PR. The timing is right what with Christmas coming up but it goes on all year round.

      1. Oxford Street has been a shiite hole for yonks. It is a larger version of most British High Streets.
        I much prefer Spitalfields Market and Jacobs’ Wharf.

        1. I preferred Soho with the hidden away little shops, pattiserie and restaurants. Quiet Squares and of course Neal’s Yard. Not forgetting Wheeler’s of St James’s.

          3. The Things I Learn On NOTTL.
            I gather Karl used the maidservants for more than spot of light dusting.

  12. Part-time MPs

    SIR – Alan Belk (Letters, November 19) criticises his MP for continuing to practise part-time as a dentist.

    Being an MP is a job with uncertain tenure. Professional people such as dentists or doctors may have to return to these careers at short notice. They could not reasonably be expected to let their skills lapse.

    Lesley Snell

    Hoylake, Wirral

    SIR – The argument that MPs should rely only on their parliamentary salaries and not hold other jobs is entirely wrong.

    I recommend Nevil Shute’s autobiography, Slide Rule, where he describes his experiences in the Admiralty. The only desk-bound officers capable of independent decision-making were those with private means.

    We see this all the time in government, the Civil Service, and in state-funded research. If you want promotion and preferment, unless you have a private income you have to go with the narrative. Abolishing the ability to earn money elsewhere would mean that many politicians could only be yes-men.

    J J Hatfield

    Newick, East Sussex

    1. Precisely; which is why the hounding out of most of the hereditary lords was such a malign development.

      2. …only to stuff it with 800+ of mostly failed politicians as a result of ongoing ‘peerage wars’ in the hope of dominating it. Never mind the quality, feel the width.

  13. Good Moaning.
    Wow … and wow again. And a heartfelt “wowsers” to top it off.
    A handicraft obsessed friend and I spent a magical day at the Knitting and Stitching Show in Harrogate.
    Human ingenuity never ceases to amaze me; there were works that were absolutely wonderful but that also made me feel totally inadequate.
    From materials straight from the Arabian Nights via felted wool pictures that could have been produced by Turner to ginormous sewing machines that crossed the controls of a Lancaster bomber with those of a space module (“Houston we have a double quilt), it was all there. Despite my best efforts at self-control, I returned with a couple of rather weighty carrier bags and oodles of business cards.
    As a bonus, it is many years since I’ve pootled about feeling like Twiggy. They’re big girls, those Northern wenches. Like Valkyries but with a sense of humour and an overwhelming desire to chat.

      1. The show is still on today; next week there’s a Christmas show at the conference centre.
        🙂

    2. ‘Moaning, Annie. Glad you had a good time. You and Mrs H J should get together some time, as her crafting skills never cease to amaze me.

    3. Anne, I’m having a problem posting BTL comments. Can you check your BTL comment about spelling of names and see if my comment appears, please?

      Thank you.

      1. Yes, it did.
        But the new format is a classic case of “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.

  14. ‘Morning, Peeps.

    I think it is high time that BTL’s Olivia Wilde is enrolled as a member of the Honourable Company of Nottlrs:

    Olivia Wilde
    1 HR AGO
    So Europe don’t know how to deal with the tens of thousand Illegal migrants streaming Into our continent…
    In my opinion, It’s their fault In the first place that this completely lawless nightmare has unleashed Itself right across our European countries.
    Yes, we damn well should disincentivize the pull here by only providing the bare basics, but are perpetually cowered by the Leftie hand wringers spouting about their human rights.
    Well, what about the majority’s human rights?
    The Western leaders no doubt will continue to bury their heads In the sand, Ignoring the very real existential threat to our country’s cultures being played out In plain sight daily, right under their very noses
    The solution Is simple; SHUT THE B****Y BORDERS!!!!

    Olivia Wilde
    1 HR AGO
    So the Royal family are threatening to boycott the BBC over a “tittle tattle” “documentary over briefing wars within their family, demanding the right to respond.
    This programme was commissioned by a Republican by the name of Amol Rajan, who has stated that our Royal family Is “absurd”.
    Interestingly, that Mr Rajan Is an Indian born Immigrant Into this country.
    What right has this man to come Into this country of ours and so publicly denigrate a national Institution going back centuries, an Integral part of our history and culture?!
    This Is yet another example of a recent arrival’s assault on their adopted country; these people CHOSE to live here, presumably for a better life, yet once here, systematically attack us and our heritage at every opportunity.
    Where’s the gratitude, respect and humility for a country who took you In and yet you capitalise on the freedoms this country affords you by trying to discredit an Intrinsic part of our history?

    2. I agree; if one is born in another country, one should not be campaigning for constitutional change in one’s adopted country. In fact, one should bog off back home (which is happily royalty-free) if not happy!

  15. Kyle Rittenhouse and the hysteria of the elites. Spiked 21November 2021.

    America’s liberal elites are broken. They are now totally deranged and detached from reality. That’s become brutally clear in the past 24 hours. While we all knew it was coming, the collective media and political meltdown over the acquittal of 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse has revealed a ruling class so warped, so unprincipled, so governed by partisan prejudice, that it essentially lives in a parallel universe.

    Since the BBC coverage was essentially the same; a mix of sophistry, misinformation and concealment we must assume the same applies here. They are not “broken” though; like all liars who are exposed they stick to their stories. They still have the power to ruin individual lives and destroy whole peoples. Only the utter collapse of their belief system would see that ended.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/11/20/kyle-rittenhouse-and-the-hysteria-of-the-elites/

  16. Headline in the DT:

    “How Meghan could be stopped from running for US President by a 200-year-old constitutional amendment”

    I bluddy well hope so!

  17. The Sunday Times

    Time for Boris Johnson to serve up a new pact with France and Emmanuel Macron

    Fishing rights and migration across the Channel have strained Anglo-French relations but Johnson wants to make peace

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F551c5116-49fe-11ec-b7b3-a3151c05dcb0.jpg?crop=1600%2C900%2C0%2C0&resize=1200

    Boris Johnson is quietly drawing up plans for a new entente cordiale with France after a bitter war of words over Brexit, fishing, cross-Channel migration and the Aukus defence pact left relations in tatters.

    Senior aides to the prime minister are working on proposals for a new strategic alliance that would go far beyond the defence agreement David Cameron signed with France in 2010.

    They believe this should lead to a deal in which the two key military powers in Europe, who both have seats on the UN security council, can be jointly more assertive after the French presidential election next April.

    Co-operation on nuclear testing, mounting a joint carrier strike capability and mutual co-operation in the Indo-Pacific region are among ideas being discussed at
    *
    *
    *
    Does anyone trust those two?

      1. No! (I’ve lost the thread here. I don’t know what I am rejecting. Just going along to get along, if that’s OK.)

        1. What are they selling?
          Don’t know
          Is it bread do you think?
          Don’t know. I’m hoping it’s socks

    7. Absolutely not. With any luck we will see the backs of these two after their respective elections.

    8. 341883+ up ticks,
      Morning C,
      Be a first for Blighty, a mad rampant turk surrender monkey Pm.

      I did have him pegged long ago as the eu semi reentry three tier missile pilot, may & the wretch cameron the other two tiers.

  18. Good morning from a bright & sunny in Derbyshire with a not quite frosty ½°C outside.
    It seems the mild weather is about to get colder.

  19. 341883+ up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    Sunday 21 November: Why is the Government cutting part of HS2 instead of scrapping it all?

    As posted yesterday I see it in the case of HS2 as new lifestyles were being created / broken in well before any track was laid, then it took the overseers four years to surrender some of those lifestyles, certainly NOT fast tracking as in Tommy Robinson style.

    To loosen the grip on the remaining lifestyles will take a determined peoples action which then leads to, would these Isles be in such dire
    straights if it was populated by such an indigenous force.

  20. In today’s DT, Nigel Kennedy gives the BBC both barrels. Even allowing for the fact that he has a book to flog this is pretty strong stuff, and his ‘cancellation’ must be on the cards:

    Nigel Kennedy: BBC is a pitiful and desperately politically correct institution

    The controversial violinist takes aim at the broadcaster’s ‘self-indulgence’, claiming it will lead to people abandoning TV altogether

    By
    Emily-Jane Heap
    20 November 2021 • 3:40pm

    Nigel Kennedy has released his new memoir, Nigel Kennedy Uncensored!
    Nigel Kennedy has branded the BBC a “pitiful and desperately politically correct institution” as he criticised their woke credentials.

    The violinist took aim at the broadcaster following the release of his new memoir, Nigel Kennedy Uncensored!, lamenting the organisation’s culture of political correctness.

    Kennedy, 63, told the Daily Mail: “Public reaction to this self-indulgence is already taking the shape of even more apathy and resentment, which will inevitably lead to refusal to pay the licence fee and the discarding of TV in general in favour of the internet.”

    ‘Farce Night’ of the Proms

    He even referred to a BBC First Night of the Proms episode as “the Farce Night” after a singer dedicated her performance to transgender people.

    Kennedy said: “What for? Why? That type of irrelevant superficial claptrap was too much to take and had nothing to do with the music she was performing, unless she thought it couldn’t stand up for itself.

    “To think that we pay a licence fee to hear that kind of spouting. I respect everyone whatever their gender, but meritocracy is what we’re looking for. This insistence on quotas and equality of outcome… there should be an equal chance for everyone as long as they’re prepared to work hard.”

    In the wake of the remark, Kennedy revealed that he responded to the singer: “I would like to dedicate my part of the performance to all the forgotten and displaced heterosexuals around the world.”

    However, the joke backfired and Kennedy was met with an “unamused glower” from two viola players “as if heterosexuals shouldn’t be recognised or allowed to celebrate anything”.

    Supporting his son

    His criticism of the BBC isn’t the only controversial topic he touched upon in the interview. He discussed sex, partying, cannabis use and his decision to stand by his son Sark, 25, who was jailed earlier this month after being caught with more than £15,000 worth of cocaine in his car.

    Kennedy, who has been nicknamed “the punk violinist”, said: “He knows that I’m around to offer him an alternative life and he knows that I love him. I’m going to see him [in prison] pretty soon, so I’ll remind him of that. But I’m not going to pull him up by the ear. It’s not my place.”

    1. I’ve never been impressed with his assumed persona but have to admit that in all my years as a season pass holding Prommer, Nigel Kennedy is the only musician I know of to have come round to Door 2 on the Last Night to share a drink with the Prommers after the concert.

    2. Not his place? Some father he is! Whose place does he think it is to pull him up and set him on the straight and narrow? Mind you,the fact he named his son after a small island isn’t encouraging.

    1. Not so much a revelation more confirmation that all those with a functioning open mind have known for a couple of years…

  22. Near my house, there is a building site with one of those big cranes. At 7 am, in the misty half light, there was an entire rookery quietly lined up sitting on top of it!

        1. Weren’t they sitting on a girder eating their lunches?

          Whenever i see that picture it’s enough to give me vertigo.

          5. That picture makes me feel ill.
            Though, like Spikey, I learnt a few years ago that it is actually a studio job.

  24. Giving up fags means I can breathe again — but now I’m a sanctimonious twerp
    Rod Liddle
    Sunday November 21 2021, 12.01am, The Sunday Times

    There’s a nasty drizzle coming down and the afternoon has suddenly got a lot colder. Through the window in my kitchen I can see a hard wooden chair in the little alley that constitutes our back garden. There is a woman sitting on the chair, and as the rain comes down more heavily she is trying and failing to light a cigarette. She is soaked and frozen and the cigarette won’t light. This is my wife.

    She is not allowed in the house because she is a smoker. But she does come in, contrary to the rules, to find a dry lighter.

    “Please return to your little seat,” I say. “I do not wish to breathe in your second-hand smoke. Some of us try to live healthy lives, you know.”

    I stopped smoking six weeks ago, and in lieu of nicotine I am now addicted to a kind of vile, sanctimonious fascism. Hell, we all need something to revel in, no? I’m sure my wife will get used to it.

    OK, I joke a little. In truth she won’t come inside to smoke in a show of solidarity with her husband, which is very kind of her. But when I watch her trudge out into the cold I can’t help but be afflicted with that repulsive feeling of superiority that I suppose all you pious, pencil-necked, sententious non-smokers experience and that I’ve been missing these past 46 years.

    I like the person I have become physically. But mentally — not so much. Not at all. I don’t cough any more, but I’ve become … what’s the word? … a bit of a tosser. Win some, lose some.

    I gave up smoking because I didn’t want to smoke any more. I think it was the inability to breathe that did it — that and the strange black stuff that came up when I coughed, the consequence of about 40 to 50 a day since, oh, the time Pinochet ousted Allende in Chile. I’ve tried to give up before by telling myself that I won’t buy another packet once the current one has run out — but that never works. This time I just kind of knew I would never smoke again, and I left a half-finished packet open on the kitchen counter with a cigarette poking out of it. Never remotely tempted: the packet was still there until my wife finished it off surreptitiously, having told me she was also going to stop by “not buying a new packet”. Never works, that. You need to choose not to smoke.

    The health benefits were — to me, surprisingly — immediate. The ubiquitous tiredness disappeared within six hours, the carbon monoxide no longer present in my bloodstream. I can walk up hills for hours without stopping for a breather (and a fag). No sinus problems, no hacking cough, better circulation and even healthier-looking skin.

    The ancillary stuff is cheering too. I don’t have to force my friends to sit outside the pub in the cold; I don’t have to race for the station entrance to light up after a long train journey. Better still, I save myself about £800 a month. That’s a mortgage, isn’t it?

    But there are unquestionable downsides. Before, if I had a bad cough, or a worrying tightness of the chest, or some other signifier of impending death, I could tell myself it was just the ciggies doing their worst and I’d be right as rain in a bit. What do I tell myself now I don’t smoke? Just because you’ve given up doesn’t mean you’re not going to die. I am smoke-free, but I still think it more likely than not that I will die one day.

    Worse than that, though, is the preening narcissism that attends to all forms of conspicuous self-denial, exemplified by that joke: how can you tell if someone’s a vegan? Don’t worry — they’ll tell you. It is a form of existential virtue-signalling, advertising your superiority over the rest, all for a few extra years alive and the spurious belief that you’re saving the planet. From the Lycra-clad cyclist tearing through a red light to the vegan munching her joyless lentil’n’kale bake, they all exemplify an excessive faith in yourself as an individual — and I’ve never really had that faith.

    There is an app you can get to help you stop smoking. Every hour or so it tells you: “You’ve just saved four trees” or “You have prevented the emission of 500g of carbon dioxide”. Greta would be so proud of me. If I’d known about that app when I stopped, I wouldn’t have stopped, in the hope that the Swedish doom goblin would have found out and been cross. How dare you! Well, I dare because I don’t give a damn. There is something to be said for not giving a damn, for the cavalier rather than the roundhead.

    She’s out on the wooden chair again. All the best people, like my wife, are smokers. I’m just not one of them any more.

    Marr quits BBC

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F0b8228f0-4a26-11ec-b7b3-a3151c05dcb0.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0&resize=860

    Bats of a feather flock together

    Huge congratulations to the pekapeka-tou-roa, which has won the annual New Zealand Bird of the Year award.

    New Zealand is a mysterious hermit kingdom inhabited by very right-on people, which may explain how the pekapeka-tou-roa won this contest. Because it is not a bird at all, but a bat. However, by flying around and stuff, it clearly identifies as a bird.

    “We are delighted by this award,” a pekapeka-tou-roa spokesman told me, “and it should silence once and for all the hurtful comments from cisbirds. As Sartre said, our essence does not determine our existence. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to mask up and swoop around after some moths.”

    Back to the home of battered sausage

    How’s this for a headline? “Drunk whacked penis on women’s car then did poo in street as they sat and ate chips”. It happened in Redcar (of course) in 2018 and was reported on the Teesside Live website — and was one of the reasons I decided to move back to the region where I was brought up. They are a singular people up here.

    More recently we have all been captivated by a chap who had a number of giant concrete penises confiscated by the police from outside his shop. The man then launched a “Free Willy” campaign to have the 4ft todgers returned — which the police, rather wearily, did.

    Latest news is that they have been stolen by thieves. They are intended as eye-catching lawn ornaments, apparently. Otters, gnomes and herons are so passé.

      1. I went cold turkey 21/01/2020. For the next 18 months, I occasionally sucked a lozenge. Nowadays I rely on inhaling Pat’s 2nd hand smoke when she comes over to lunch.

        1. Congratulations! If you can continue to resist the temptation you’ll begin to wonder ‘Why did I ever start?’.

        2. I went from 40 a day to zero overnight in 1973 – no problems, never missed it and the money I saved…………
          I hate being subjected to others smoke and won’t go anywhere where someone is smoking, thankfully that rarely happens these days

          2. Not the ones I use, Spikey. Identified as ‘Virginia Tobacco’ flavour, even Best Beloved, who is a sensitive ex-smoker, says she cannot detect any smell.

          4. MB and our elder son did the same thing; not at the same time.
            They decided they weren’t enjoying it any more and just stopped.

        3. Well done. If you do get the urge i would recommend Nicorette quick mist. An oral spray of nicotine which when sprayed in the side of the mouth goes quickly into the blood stream without any of the nasty substances in cigarettes.

          1. Which is why, Philip, I use e-cigarettes to get my continuing nicotine craving but without all the toasted nasties that go with tobacco.

          2. You may wish to investigate how to lower the dose of nicotine in E-cigs. You can wean yourself off completely if of course you wanted to.

    2. “All the best people, like my wife, are smokers. I’m just not one of them any more.”
      With this (admittedly witty) line, he betrays that he has not crossed the line to becoming a non-smoker! He still pines after feeling special as he huddles in the alley doing something naughty with all the important people. Non-smokers above the age of 17 never give it a thought!

      1. I tried a cigarette when I was 10 and never was tempted to try another.
        My mother smoked until the last few months of her life when she suddenly didn’t like it any more.

        I was brought up on fag smoke and at one time she was a chain – smoker.

        1. My mother gave us a cigarette to try when I was about 6. Of course, we hated it, as she knew we would! But I could always say I’d tried smoking thereafter.

          2. My father started me at age 10. Mother used to give me packets of cigarettes to take to boarding school.

          7. My mother went through a very stressful time – she was widowed, I was four, and she had to suddenly start work full time, and also have her mother living with us. I thought chain-smoking was the normal way it was done……..

          8. My mother smoked a maximum of three cigarettes a day – one before lunch with a glass of sherry, one after lunch with a cup of coffee and one before supper with a glass of whisky. She was not addicted and could take cigarettes or leave them just as I am not addicted to my pipe. She lived to the age of 97.

          9. My mother gave up smoking when the health campaigns started in the late 50s. She never betrayed the smallest craving – she said she had only ever been a social smoker. Do they add stuff to cigarettes to make them more addictive?

        2. My mother smoked, but I never liked the smell nor, on the odd occasion when I tried it, the taste. The smoke made my eyes dry and sore, too.

      2. Further to my post above, I am probably still addicted to cigarettes even though I haven’t had one for nearly 34 years. However I am not addicted to pipe tobacco.

        How many Nottlers are prepared to admit that they are or were addicted cigarette smokers?

      3. I smoked from aged 14 to 24, then switched to roll ups, about 4 a day and only in the evenings and never at work. Oddly, I turned into a sanctimonious ex smoker when I was still smoking!
        I eventually gave up overnight aged 34 with no problems.

    3. The joke that I heard (from a Commodore) was –

      Q – You are attending the Ambassador’s Reception in Washington. How can you tell if a fast jet fighter pilot is in the room?

      A – He’ll tell you.

    2. Excellent – He his our conscience freely expressed. He should be in parliament it would shame the cowed MPs on all sides.

      1. 341883+ up ticks,
        Morning S,
        We had the very same in Gerard Batten as leader of UKIP, success was his and the party’s undoing via it’s own nEc & allies.

  27. Not quite sure why, but when using Chrome, since the last update, to read the letters, when I try to upvote or comment, the page will not allow me to.
    Is anyone else having the same problem?

    1. Even stranger, using Edge I can make comments and upvote but my comments do not appear on the Chrome page!!

    2. I’ve had the same problem with MacOs Safari,I’ve no doubt if I fiddled around long enough I could resolve the problem but I now use the Brave browser ( just lazy) which also stops the bulk of the Ads/Popups

    2. Good morning!

      HS2 has served its purpose. All the multi-billion pound contracts will have been paid. The money has left the public purse and arrived in the accounts of the favoured. Ditto Covid.

    3. The Victorian entrepreneurs constructed a network of railways in a very short time. They did it for money and in response to burgeoning public demand from industry and individuals fed up with stage coaches. What they built still stands and still functions. Unfortunately those entrepreneurs are now dead. We have bureaucrats and a plethora of rules, regulations and all-round objectors. Moreover for most of the mad schemes, such as HS2, there is no need, no sensible “business case” and they can be very damaging to the environment.

      1. The country is so small that by the time the HS2 trains manage to get to full speed, they have to start slowing down again for the only station.

  30. Schwartz Demise

    A coroner was working late one night. It was his job to examine the dead bodies before they were sent off to be buried or cremated.

    As he examined the body of Mr. Schwartz – who was about to be cremated – the coroner made an amazing discovery, Schwartz had the longest, fattest cock the coroner had ever seen.

    “I’m sorry Mr. Schwartz,” said the coroner, “But I can’t send you off to be cremated with a tremendously huge penis like this. It has to be saved for posterity.”

    And with that the coroner used his tools to remove the man’s manhood.

    The coroner stuffed his prize into a briefcase and took it home. The first person he showed it to, was his wife. “I have something to show you that you won’t believe,” he said, and opened his briefcase.

    “Oh my God!” She screamed. “Schwartz is dead!“

  31. Pinched!

    What’s the difference between Kyle Rittenhouse and the Covid-19 “Vaccines”?
    Kyle’s Shots are Effective.

  32. This is one of the most one-sided, slithery, repellent articles the BBC has ever published. It is an overdose of emollient falsehood, a plethora of posturing that ignores history, experience and facts. It is vomit-inducing in its insidious lies, its avoidance of reality in the pursuit of deference to an enemy.
    The muslims bomb us, murder us, attack us, rape our children, and the government owned “news service” publishes this?

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-59359213

    2. Its typical of the Beeb. It completely avoids the atrocity so it doens’t have to discuss Islam at all. Instead it presents a biased, one sided view of positivism.

      Of course, what really happens is because there is no condemnation the muslims feel they can do what they want, as whitey is told to ignore the reality and only consider the view the media wants.

      When this sort of thing is the response all it does is frustrate and anger the people who the muslim terrorist wanted to kill.

  33. PETER HITCHENS: The outgoing UK Border Chief had one job – and he didn’t believe in it
    *
    *
    So I cannot say I agree with the recently retired head of the UK Border Force, Mr Paul Lincoln, that ‘bloody borders’ are ‘just such a pain in the bloody a***’. But at least we now know that the man who was for some years in charge of enforcing the borders of this country, and took a chunky salary for this duty, didn’t actually believe in borders.

    It comes as no surprise. We already have police chiefs who plainly don’t believe in the punishment of crime, teachers who don’t much like education and bishops who don’t believe in God. But this is a bit more specific. Mr Lincoln had one job, and he didn’t believe in it.

    This is not the first revelation of this kind from our new ruling class. As long ago as 2009, the New Labour apparatchik Andrew Neather let slip that his movement had ‘a driving political purpose: that mass immigration was the way that the UK Government was going to make the UK truly multicultural’.

    He recalled coming away from high-level meetings ‘with a clear sense that the policy was intended – even if this wasn’t its main purpose – to rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date’.
    *
    *
    *
    Since the graduates from those universities fanned out into the schools, the BBC, the police and the courts, the same idea has been spread even wider. A large part of the Tory Party, for instance, has been captured by it, especially since the Blairite takeover of the Tories by David Cameron.

    BUT they know it is not popular. So they lie. They announce targets to reduce illegal immigration, which they never meet. They announce other targets, for the deportation of illegal arrivals, which they never fulfil. They send stupid vans round the suburbs, adorned with slogans falsely pretending that illegal migrants face a realistic risk of being caught and returned. A few token victims are actually sent home but they must be incredibly unlucky people.

    And this is typical of all our politics. Our elite says it will be tough on crime, and stops even bothering to prosecute it. It says it will sort out state education, but doggedly persists with the comprehensive schools which have wrecked it.
    *
    *
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-10225659/PETER-HITCHENS-outgoing-UK-Border-Chief-one-job-didnt-believe-it.html

  34. 341883+ up ticks,
    May one say,
    Fact Check False: UK News Publication Claims Kyle Rittenhouse Shot ‘Three Black Men

    That could very well be the cause of innocent peoples getting killed.

      1. 341883+ up ticks,
        S,
        Could we rewrite history then saying if ALL the cavalry ID as red Indians there would have been no massacre.

        Strange world.

        1. 341883+ up ticks,
          O2O,
          Could have had all those participants at the Little Big Horn
          singing “if your going to
          Sanfrancisco”

  35. Good morning all.

    Blue sky , chilly wind and the leaves are golden , orange , yellow and all different shades of brown , has to be the most beautiful Autumn for years .

    Moh wrapped up warm for a golf competition .

    Fingers crossed he will be happy this afternoon , unlike yesterday when Southampton lost against Norwich.

    1. It was blue sky here till about 10 minutes ago – now clouded over, windy and cold.

      The autumn leaves have indeed been beautiful this year – they have lasteed well as it was mild – but I think they will be gone soon now.

      Let’s hope he has a good day on the golf course!

        1. If they lasted forever, you’d stop noticing. Their very transience makes them more beautiful. Like a field of butterflies as against a case of butterflies.

          2. A friend came back from Brunei in 1990 with two cases of big, beautiful – and dead butterflies. They weren’t beautiful, they were incredibly sad: the whole joy of a butterfly is their beauty and gentleness… and then they have flown away, leaving just a memory.

          3. I would have punched his lights out.

            I love butterflies in my garden: I call them “flying flowers”.

          5. I get you totally.

            One of my sisters brought me some pictures made from butterfly wings , from South Africa . I was horrified , shocked and not terribly appreciative.

            People also wear those slim black hair bracelets that are made out of elephant tail hair .. equally shocking.

          9. Damien Hurst’s butterfly pictures gave me the creeps, as did his ones using living butterflies doomed to die in their cage.

          12. An insight from Japanese culture. It is transience that makes natural things beautiful and that is why we treasure them.

          15. In the case of the butterflies the actual living ones are so much more beautiful than the dead ones laid out in their coffin.

            In the same way the “trophy rooms” of the “hunters” who delight in killing beautiful animals for their own pleasure are hideous compared with the living creatures in their natural habitat.

      3. Still bright & sunny up here, so I’m doing a bit more bramble pulling up the hill above the garden.
        But there is cloud forecast for this afternoon.

    2. It has never occurred to me before but the beginning is evocative of geese flying overhead a sure sign that winter is approaching, I wonder if that is my imagination or what was intended?

      Thank you Plum for a really nice version and, good morning to everyone. No lights necessary this morning for the first time in about 5 days, real sun!

  37. Apropos nothing very much – I wonder whether shagger Marr jumped from the beeboids before he was pushed.

    2. His politics aligns directly with their own. He’s a hard Left communist, so is the BBC.

      If Marr starts his radio show with ‘taxes are too damn high!’ and goes on to discuss the social benefit of low taxes then I will be absolutely flabbergasted.

  38. What sort of Christmas gifts are any of you buying this year, and what sort of pressies did you treasure when you were a child ?

    I was given a soft zipped hairy pyjama / nightie case in the shape of a Pekinese dog , I called him Ching Foy. Cuddle factor superb, and very comforting .

    He was stolen when I was about 17years old , had him 10 years .

    1. I have treated myself to a candy floss maker.

      Spending New Year with the neighbours and their friends. Thought it would amuse if i took it along.

        1. Anything for a laugh.

          They play a board game called ‘Crimes against Humanity’. It is outrageous but very funny. Especially if you have had a drink or two.

    2. Good morning Maggiebelle

      I got a beautiful little sailing dinghy for Christmas when I was 8. I went out on Boxing Day and capsized and had to be rescued – my sisters probably wished that I had been drowned!

    3. Last year – new cess pit and sewage pipes. Bought the same for Firstborn this autumn, as his had caved in as well in the spring.

    5. As a kid, I got: “The Book of Knowledge”. Had it for years and was my favourite thing to read as a child.

      This Christmas I ordered a bunch of seeds from South Africa. Some my think that an odd present but plants, especially South African and Australian, are my obsession.

      For other people I usually make Viennese Tortes as gifts. People look forward to them, especially as most of them require whipped cream!

        1. I have no idea what happened to my set. I assume it was cleared out when I left for California.

        2. I’ve still got my set of The Book of Knowledge (Waverley, 8 volumes). My nose was never out of it on rainy days during my childhood.

          [A-Bon, Boo-Cro, Cru-Gera, Germ-Lock, Loco-Ore, Org-Ser, Sev-Zwi, Fact Index. Just written down from memory]

      2. My apologies; I’m very late on parade today.

        I treasured my 10- Volume, American published, “The Book of Knowledge“.

        I guess the date must have been before – or early – 1889 because it featured:

        1) the (fascinating) construction of the yet-to-be completed Forth Rail Bridge, and

        2) A-still-intact Tay Rail Bridge.

        Prices were in Dollars and cents, but the English was remarkably ‘un-American’.

        There were puzzles, tricks – and Lots of Things To Do with matchsticks …

    2. I went there and got this,“Hmm… this page doesn’t exist. Try searching for something else.”

  41. Beautiful sunny day and due to stay that way until dusk. Abandoned any notion of a lie-in to take a walk (mit Hund) up to Rogersceugh. It’s a small glacial drumlin on the Solway Mosses so of no particular height but a great 360 vista including the Caldbeck Fells (with Skiddaw prominent and the peak of Blencathra behind) and Criffel in Dumfries & Galloway to the north west. There used to be a farm at Rogersceugh which was demolished last year by the RSPB/Natural England despite a local campaign to retain it. I was up there yesterday and met a ‘mature’ couple who were staying locally for a week. She had been a displaced person from Poland and lived near the farm between 1948-1950. A fascinating discussion on life at the time, completely out of the blue.

  42. For those without access to the Speccie…

    Jake Wallis Simons
    How does Azeem Rafiq explain his past behaviour?
    20 November 2021, 1:35pm

    Azeem Rafiq is not having a good week. In addition to having to issue a grovelling apology for antisemitic messages, this morning it was reported in the Yorkshire Post that a mobile number belonging to him allegedly sent creepy sexual messages to a teenage girl, declaring a desire to ‘grab you push u up against wall and kiss you.’

    In short, the former Yorkshire and England star has bizarrely managed to find himself at the centre a racism storm, an antisemitism storm and a sex storm all at once – as a victim in the first case and a perpetrator in the second.

    So far, Mr Rafiq hasn’t commented on the young woman’s allegations and his spokesman told the paper it was being investigated. He did, however, more fully address the antisemitism furore with me in a second conversation over video link yesterday, as further storm clouds brewed unnoticed overhead.

    When we spoke on the phone on the day that his antisemitic messages had been revealed by the Times, he offered his unreserved apology to the Jewish community (whom he had offended by making jokes at the age of 19 about a friend having the ‘Jewish’ characteristics of money-grubbing stinginess).

    He had seemed very strung out and distressed, and confided that he had been having trouble sleeping. He didn’t want to pose for a photograph for the Jewish Chronicle, he said, to accompany the interview. He was in too much of a state.

    The next day, however, we spoke on video link and I was able to ask some more probing questions about what exactly had happened, how it could have happened, and what it meant for the legitimacy of his campaign to rid cricket of racism. The conversation was fascinating; it amounted to the fullest and frankest explanation that Mr Rafiq has given so far.
    My first question was simple: are you antisemitic? He replied that he wasn’t any more, but accepted that he did harbour antisemitic attitudes back then, when he was 19. Partly, he said, it was because he didn’t know any Jews, so he didn’t have a sense of the sensitivities surrounding antisemitic tropes. But that, he said, was not meant by way of excuse.

    ‘I’m not trying to play down what I did in any way,’ he said, speaking from the back of a car in a black baseball cap and T-shirt, looking tired but composed. ‘My actions caused a lot of hurt to people and I just want to say that I’m ashamed and deeply sorry.’

    Which brought me to my next question: were his comments just banter? He shook his head. (After all, he could hardly lay claim to the very explanation that he had so vociferously denied those who had abused him.) ‘It wasn’t banter. Racist comments are never banter, they are racism,’ he said. ‘My comments were antisemitic and I take responsibility for that. No excuses.’

    The cricketer was playing a pitch-perfect game, not seeking to swerve in any way the opprobrium of the Jewish community and apparently speaking with humility and grace. It was time for the next difficult question.

    Last May, as Israel defended itself from a thousand Hamas rockets daily that rained down on its population centres, Mr Rafiq had tweeted in support of the Palestinians, using the hashtags #StandwithPalestine and #FreeGaza. Given that Israel unilaterally pulled out of Gaza in 2005, I asked, who exactly did Mr Rafiq seek to free it from? It was notable that he had been open in his support for Hamas-run Gaza, but had expressed no public concern or support for Israel.

    ‘I don’t really know much about the conflict, to be honest,’ he responded. ‘I probably shouldn’t have tweeted about it without knowing more about it.’
    Did he believe in Israel’s right to exist, and its right to defend itself? ‘Yes’, he replied. ‘I believe in the two-state solution.’

    I wondered whether Mr Rafiq saw any differences between the racism he suffered and the antisemitism he articulated. After all, one could hardly compare a few offensive remarks to a targeted campaign of bullying that culminated in having red wine poured down his throat. Right?

    ‘It’s not exactly the same, as I wasn’t making my comments to a Jewish person,’ he pointed out. ‘And these were senior members of my team who were treating me like that.’ Things were getting interesting. Then he added, quickly: ‘But I’m not downplaying what I did. It was a different situation but what I did was wrong and I’ve hurt people and I just want to say sorry.’

    Did he think that there were any difference between anti-Asian racism and antisemitism? ‘No’, he said, quickly. ‘Racism is racism and we need to stamp it out wherever we find it.’ Including, presumably, in his own mind. ‘Yes’, he said.

    To me, it is important to acknowledge that there are key differences between antisemitism and other types of racism. The main distinction is that antisemitism rests on a belief that you are ‘punching up’ against an all-powerful Jewish cabal who mysteriously pull the strings of the international banking system, politics and media.

    This, perhaps, may be one of the reasons why liberal newspapers and commentators instinctively gave Mr Rafiq’s antisemitism the benefit of the doubt, while rushing to slam those who had racially abused him, even before the evidence had come to light (as I argued in these pages yesterday).

    Was Mr Rafiq seeking a forgiveness and understanding that he had failed to offer those who had targeted him? ‘I’ve always said I’m willing to forgive people,’ he told me. ‘All I’m looking for is an apology. What I did was wrong, but I’ve apologised. I’m still waiting for an apology from some of the people at the club.’

    I asked what he would say to those who accused him of hypocrisy. He replied with further expressions of apology.

    The final piece of the puzzle concerned what happens next. Mr Rafiq told me that he was in touch with various communal charities and organisations, and had plans to visit a Jewish school. Did he feel that he had something special to offer to antisemites in the British Muslim community and more widely, I asked, given that he had apparently cured himself of the virus?

    His answer was as expected. He wanted to use his influence to help others to understand that being nasty to any minority was wrong. He’d never let up in his battle against antisemitism and all other forms of racism.

    And that was how it ended. Do we believe him? Certainly he didn’t put a foot wrong. His apology was consistent and seemed heartfelt; he made no excuses; he neither expected forgiveness nor asked for it, but committed himself to winning back the trust of the Jewish community through his actions. Of course, we don’t know – and may never know – whether Mr Rafiq’s expressions of Jew-hatred were a one-off, or part of a more deep-seated bigotry. He told me that he ‘didn’t think’ he had indulged in any further antisemitism in the past, though he acknowledged that he may have made ‘other mistakes’. Perhaps one of them was sending salacious texts to a teenage girl. Maybe there are others. You make up your own mind.

    ***************************************************************************

    Gloomy Northern Boy • 20 hours ago • edited
    …young British Man of Pakistani Muslim origin expresses anti-Semitic views, and (possibly) predatory and sexist ones? Good lord, how amazing…what a surprise!

    1. Those who sit in a glass house do wrong to throw stones about them; besides, the glass house is rather thin, it will break easily, and the interior is anything but a gainly sight. Emma Goldman

      1. He is so arrogant and stupid, he didn’t think that once he kicked off this nonsense people would study his past behaviour in greater detail.

        1. ….and I doubt if he had reckoned with all his lawyers/PR people/support team relieving him of the bulk of the £200,000 compensayshun [sic] which they surely have.

    3. Now Azeem Rafiq is accused of sending ‘creepy’ texts to teenage girl: Woman says cricketer sent her ‘creepy’ WhatsApp messages when she was 16 years old after meeting her on a flight to Dubai six years ago
      Gayathri Ajith claims Azeem Rafiq propositioned her on a flight to Dubai
      She claims the cricketer sent her ‘creepy’ text messages after the flight
      She said Rafiq wanted to ‘push her up against a wall and kiss her’

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10224543/Azeem-Rafiq-accused-sending-creepy-texts-teenage-girl.html

    4. By the time I was Master Rafiq’s age, I had Jewish friends and had worked and studied with Jews and those with Jewish forbears.
      I was not brought up in London or one of the big cities like Manchester and Leeds, just a smallish English market town.
      Would it be impertinent of me to entire why AR’s childhood was so bereft of Jewish contacts?

      3. My childhood was certainly bereft of an Jewish contact. Not many Jews are to be found living in the coalfield villages and small towns of Northern England. My first contact with Jews did not come until I was in my mid 20s.

        1. When I was young, Jews didn’t announce themselves in the way that vegans do these days.

          1. No. Though one of my oldest and closest friends is Jewish. Oddly, it was the Catholics who were segregated at my school. My two old schoolfriends whom I meet for lunch about once a month (and tomorrow) one is Jewish, the other Catholic.

          2. That is true but there were neither Jewish families nor synagogues in the area where I grew up. Most Jewish families tended to live in cities such as Leeds and Manchester with a few in Sheffield.

        2. Oddly enough, Mr. Grizz, Gateshead had the largest Talmudical college outside Israel when I was growing up. I was at school with a lot of Jewish girls, as had my mother been. My father was at school with Lord Peter Taylor, the former Lord Chief Justice, and his brother Arthur.

      4. It might have something to do with being born in Karachi, Pakistan. Which brings me to another point. Why is he counted as “English”?

    5. Quelle surprise.

      Another hypocritical, spoiled petulant I’m special waster.

      We all know he wants to squeal waycism and get a bucket of comp, now he’s been undermined because *he’s exactly the same*. Why can’t this nasty breed just bugger off.

      1. I read that the ECB gave him £10,000 to pay off some of his gambling debts. Don’t know if that’s true.

    7. Might he not think of apologising for all the trouble he has caused for cricket?

      Maybe there would be less racial tension if all sporting teams were mono-ethnic?

      1. Maybe – but wht can’t they just get on – acknowledge their differences and work together? Why should skin colour matter?

        1. Skin colour does not matter. “Racism” is a construct of recent origin. While people may be identified by skin colour (see photographs of any football team for evidence) that is not “racist”. Differences are differences. We prefer brunettes to blondes, or redheads to brunettes, or tall to short and so forth. These preferences and differences are not “racism” until some uppity pseudo intellectual social justice warrior decides to make trouble.

          1. There was an article in H&H that we “need more diversity in racing”. Why? If people are good enough and want to do it and are prepared to work hard enough, they will. To shoehorn somebody in because of their colour, sex or sexual preference is, in my view, demeaning.

          3. Horse and Hound. “The best of my fun I owe to horse and hound” – Whyte Melville. I’ve never read Health & Efficiency – is it good?

          4. TeeHee. I’ve never read Horse and Hound. Although I once attended a Hunt Supporters Ball. (I won a big bag of horse manure in the raffle. I did not collect it.)

          1. I have always said that the “hate” laws passed were a big mistake. People dislike others and that will never change. But making race or religion or sex an exacerbating function is never going to help. It’s like official documents asking for ethnicity. I always ignore it. It shouldn’t matter.

    8. After this I expect the next false flag he will wave will be he has ‘Mental health’ issues.
      I wonder if he’ll be returning his ill gotten gains.

    9. I am more concerned about his part ownership of a restaurant where young girls are said to be trafficked. Why has that disappeared from the question?

      1. All very fishy.

        Rotherham Council under fire for refusing late-night cafe license

        The council has come under fire after its licensing sub-committee rejected a late-night food license application submitted by a Rotherham cafe over concerns that it may contribute to child sexual and criminal exploitation.

        By Danielle Andrews, Local Democracy Reporter
        Thursday, 30th July 2020, 12:27 pm

        An application was received on behalf of Matki Chai Ltd for a premises licence at a container unit in the car park of Pitstop Car Wash on Fitzwilliam Road, Eastwood, to provide hot drinks and snacks on Friday and Saturday nights until 2am, and twice a year for Eid.

        The business, owned by former Yorkshire and England under-19s captain Azeem Rafiq, sells traditional Pakistani cuisine and tea in clay pots, and was represented by Mr Rafiq’s business partner, Khurrum Bhatti, at a virtual meeting of the licensing sub-committee on July 10.

        The cafe already trades until 11pm, but wanted to extend its opening hours to give members of the Asian community, especially women, a place to eat their evening meal and socialise.

        However, concerns were raised at a meeting of the council’s licensing sub-committee, by South Yorkshire Police, Councillor Kathleen Reeder (Valley Ward), and the council’s children and young peoples service and licensing service about increased anti-social behaviour in the area, public nuisance, child sexual exploitation or criminal exploitation, and the area being subject to a Public Spaces Protection Order.

        Keeley Ladlow, senior licensing enforcement officer at Rotherham Council told the meeting of the department’s concerns about the license extension, such as anti-social behaviour, and child sexual exploitation in the area.

        Ms Ludlow said: “The main concern is an increase in anti social behaviour that might occur from the premises being open between 11pm and 2am.

        “Eastwood, and in particular that area of Fitzwilliam Road, has become an area of concern regarding child sexual and criminal exploitation previously.

        “There’s also been significant work in intelligence to suggest that there is the offering of young women to men in vehicles to engage in sexual activity, and also prostitution in the area.”

        Prior to the meeting, the business owners agreed to three conditions with South Yorkshire Police, which were superseded when the application was submitted. The conditions were that the applicants would install CCTV, persons under the age of 18 must be accompanied by an adult after 6pm, and cannot be on the premises past 11pm, and that staff were to undertake safeguarding children training.

        However, the application was refused following a private meeting of councillors Sue Ellis, Christine Beaumont, and John Vjestica of the licensing sub-committee.

        Muhbeen Hussain, the leader of British Muslim Youth called the conditions “absurd”, and asked if the whole community would have to pay for the crimes of a few.

        Mr Hussain said: “I have no words at how Rotherham Council is treating the local Pakistani Muslim Community. For too long, the crimes of few that we all stand against, have been levelled at the whole community.”

        “I have never heard of people being I.D’d for buying a cup of tea. The conditions that were placed on this business are so absurd, and yet everyone on this Licensing Committee including the representatives from the council and the police saw this as perfectly normal. This is why it is so dangerous.”

        “This is what happens when you become a suspect community. Criminals are criminals but will the whole community have to pay a price for a crime they have not committed?”

        Following Mr Hussain’s comments after the meeting, Councillor Sue Ellis, chair of Rotherham Council’s licensing board said: “The committee felt that a late night premises opening until 2am could lead to increased anti-social behaviour and noise nuisance and undermine the work that was being done through the introduction of a Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) within the locality to address these issues.

        “The committee was also aware of the vulnerable residents in the area, and the increased risk which could be brought about by a late-night take-away, or drive-in venture.

        “The licensing board is fully appreciative of entrepreneurs who are working to improve the local economy and we will continue to balance the positive impact of new businesses with the needs of residents who live in the area.”

        ****************************************************

        He;s also got a Barnsley chip shop that’s in the news

        Police investigating racist threats against staff at former cricketer Azeem Rafiq’s Barnsley chip shop

        South Yorkshire Police are investigating reports of threats against staff at the chip shop owned by former cricketer Azeem Rafiq, who is at the centre of the cricket racism scandal.

        https://www.thestar.co.uk/news/crime/police-investigating-racist-threats-against-staff-at-former-

  43. Blowing a gale with “scattered showers”. Chilly. Still, picked a coffee cup of raspberries!

  44. Just back from a bike ride out to a local private wildfowl lake (one I have permission from the owners to visit and take photographs). It was sunny, with a slight breeze, and 7ºC when I set out. When I arrived at the lake dark clouds came over, it started raining and the wind got up. I rode a lot of the way back into a head wind and my specs were drenched.

    I arrived home soggy but utterly exhilarated. My outer clothes are on the clothes-horse drying out but I am glowing with warmth all over. I’ll go out for another ride this afternoon. The temperature will drop as the skies have cleared but a decent pedalling cadence soon warms me up.

    1. You get very much the same sensation when you deliberately set out to go sailing in a dinghy in a Force 5 or 6 wind. On a beam reach when you are planing you have the most exhilarating sensation of speed.

      1. I got my old Mirror to plane once, on my own & with spinnaker up. Fantastic! Then I adjusted a sheet & we came off the plane.

  45. ‘Morning All

    #CovidClownWorld

    https://www.sapeople.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/joke-italy.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a3e09fadb50f0e9d1321a84c5481c7e2739a154b9aa3499ca83725ee6b7affce.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c5af5717dd5abeaa8a42105285e5796bdaadfe47c1d32f44395132d88ff17280.jpg

    https://twitter.com/BurnsideNotTosh/status/1462155616735084545

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/13fde77975378ecd157a0d57371c2b32cf1e8d36b225288f5e374ddad9668cf0.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/90160e674d4132948244988a92ae2b74e1a0244adfd52a1204fae28c03cebbd3.png

  46. “Compulsory vaccine is outlawed under the Public Health Act 1984.

    “It must remain so.” Thunders Tory MP David Jones.

    Also care workers and by next year all front line NHS staff must be vaccinated.

    Do you see the direction of travel here?

    1. next year all front line NHS staff must be vaccinated.

      If you do it to the front-line staff, it should also be done to the myriad of Bosses and Pen Pushers

      All, or choice

      1. I would prefer to live in a country that did not force medical procedures on people that don’t want to have them. I am not anti vax – I have had the jabs, in fact I would argue they are an amazing piece of medical science but personal freedom is far more important to me, I would rather live in a country that tried to persuade people to take a certain course of action but did not demonise them for sticking to what they believed.

    2. next year all front line NHS staff must be vaccinated.

      If you do it to the front-line staff, it should also be done to the myriad of Bosses and Pen Pushers

      All, or choice

        1. Perhaps it will hasten the declaration that Biden is incompetent, and the subsequent takeover by the true winner of the 2016 election – Hillary Clinton! – the day after President Harris coopts Clinton as Vice President and mysteriously dies within 24 hours.

        3. Kenosha teen ‘has a defamation case against president for calling him a white supremacist’ before murder trial says expert who helped Nicholas Sandmann reach settlement
          Kyle Rittenhouse, 18, was acquitted of all charges this week by a jury
          Lawyer Todd McMurtry said the teen could have a case against Joe Biden, who referred to a video of ‘white supremacists’ that contained teen’s image
          The lawyer admitted he didn’t think Rittenhouse would win, but that it was actionable
          McMurtry also represented Nicolas Sandmann, the then-16-year-old who was branded a racist after a picture of him wearing a MAGA hat went viral
          CNN and Washington Post settled lawsuits with Sandmann, who is currently suing other media outlets

          By ALYSSA GUZMAN FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

          PUBLISHED: 17:49, 20 November 2021 | UPDATED: 21:38, 20 November 2021

          Kyle Rittenhouse, who was found not guilty on all charges Friday in a controversial trial that has divided the nation, may possibly have a defamation case against President Joe Biden over reference to ‘white supremacists’ in a video, experts said.

          The video was posted in a September 2020 tweet, which could now possibly cause Biden legal trouble, according to lawyer Todd McMurtry, who helped Nicolas Sandmann sue news outlets for upward of $800 million for defamation. The now-19-year-old famously settled with CNN and The Washington Post after they deemed him a racist when he was seen in viral video footage wearing a MAGA hat.

          Biden, 79, tweeted on September 30, 2020: ‘There’s no other way to put it: the President of the United States [Donald Trump] refused to disavow white supremacists on the debate stage last night.’

          Although Trump was not asked specifically about Rittenhouse’s actions on the debate stage at the time, the 18-year-old was featured in the tweeted video holding a rifle in the streets of Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August 2020.

          ‘What you take from this tweet is that Kyle Rittenhouse was using his rifle and engaging in white supremacist misconduct, so it’s actionable,’ McMurtry told Fox News on Friday after Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges against him.

          The lawyer admitted the 18-year-old was ‘not necessarily going to win’ but it is ‘actionable.’

          Civil rights lawyer Leo Terrell warned Biden on Fox News that the now-president couldn’t justify his remarks and that he’s ‘going to have to pay for and justify’ his actions.

          Biden released a statement following the verdict Friday, saying: ‘While the verdict in Kenosha will leave many Americans feeling angry and concerned, myself included, we must acknowledge that the jury has spoken.’

          The president also said he knew ‘we’re not going to heal our country’s wounds overnight’ but he remains ‘committed’ to doing ‘everything in my power to ensure that every American is treated equally.’

          Vice President Kamala Harris also told reporters that the ‘verdict speaks for itself.’

          ‘It’s clear, there’s still a lot more work to do,’ she said before boarding Air Force One in Columbus, Ohio.

          McMurtry also argues that Sandmann and Rittenhouse have similar cases: both were minors when the event occurred and were private figures at the time.

          Although household names now, without being public figures or celebrities beforehand, Rittenhouse and Sandmann only have to prove Biden’s negligence, instead of a higher burden of proof actual malice, the lawyer said.

          Sandmann has also encouraged Rittenhouse to sue media outlets for defamation as well.

          ‘The parallels between me and Rittenhouse are impossible not to draw,’ Sandmann wrote in an op-ed for DailyMail.com. ‘The attacks on Kyle came from the national news media, just as they came for me.

          ‘So every single label on Kyle as a ‘terrorist’, ‘white supremacist’, and ‘school shooter’ in the streets of Kenosha, will only ever be withdrawn after the damage has been done.

          ‘So, if Kyle is prepared to take on another burden in his early life, with the acceptance that it might result in nothing, I answer, give it a shot and hold the media accountable,’ he wrote for DailyMail.com.

    3. I hope he wins and that the media – note we no longer call them ‘news’ – companies have ot issue apologies live on air.

      I also pity the lad, as he will never again live a normal life. He’ll never be allowed a job, to buy a home. He will have to vanish.

  49. 341883 + up ticks,
    Thing is the party’s should be under pressure from decent peoples so much so that his vote will be deemed to be important, which will sway any deserved justice being metered out.

    Remind me again why do the indigenous support & vote for mass uncontrolled immigration / paedophile umbrella coalition lab/lib/con party’s, just what is the benefit ?

    https://twitter.com/DavidPoulden/status/1462383162282098690

      1. 341883+ up ticks,

        Afternoon OLT,
        Courtesy of lab/lib/con mass uncontrolled immigration / paedophile umbrella coalition cartel
        and the DOVER beach intake, I would imagine has put the mailing list from PIE under stress.

    3. What’s the blasted point of arresting him? Put him in a plane and, at 20,000ft above Europe, push him out.

        1. Possibly, but the lack of knowledge on the part of the twitterer does not give one much confidence in the authenticity of the post.

    2. With regard to the top photo. Do you remember when Marcos was deposed in the Philippians and the people clogged the streets to such an extent that the army and its tanks were completely paralyzed? It was spectacular and a true example of people power if a population is determined. The first non-violent revolution in history. The philippino’s don’t get enough credit for that.

      1. Afternoon Johnathan. My favourite is the balcony scene where Causescu was in effect overthrown. This seems to have been removed by Youtube; probably because it might give the peasants ideas about ridding themselves of his modern equivalents!

        1. The overthrow of the Ceaucescus started with a single booo! from the crowd. Those around took it up and then the whole crowd joined in.

          1. I was going to stick it on the bottom of your comment Johnathan. Alas I could not find it!

      2. The fall of the Berlin Wall was another such event. It followed months of peaceful protests in Leipzig and other cities.

    4. Daughter says most people don’t believe the mandatory vaxx law will be enforced. They think it will scare a lot of people into getting vaxxed, will go to court for months, and will finally be thrown out – but only after a lot of people have been jabbed.
      Many on the demonstration yesterday said they were prepared to do the 40 days in prison. The govt will have a problem if ten thousand people stick to that. This is possible, as so many young people were on the march.
      Apparently there were demonstrations in the regions on Friday evening too.

      Interestingly, the planned antifa demo that was supposed to be a counter demo to yesterday’s, was cancelled. Not clear why, but perhaps the police realised that with so much anger, it would cause trouble.

      Daughter said that when the march passed the Christmas market, which is fenced off, a lot of customers came to the fence to watch it. The markets are 2G, i.e. only vaccinated or recently recovered, and everyone had shown their pass to enter. The marchers booed them.

      1. interesting, isn’t it? That antif, proclaiming their righteousness opposing fascism turn up to oppose a demonstration *against* facism.

        Of course, we all know they’re nasty Lefty fascists but the more they prove it perhaps eventually they’ll be proscribed as the hatefuelled Lefty fascists they are.

    6. The Austrian authorities may be using strong arm (or Arm strong?) tactics to make the public kneel and accept the gene therapy but beware, it may be:

      Just a small prick for man, trans woman, and biological woman BUT it is a very great cock up for the whole of Mankind.

    7. Yes, and until we remind them that they are outnumbered and that they serve us, they will continue to use force.

      Look at the US – Kyle Rittenhouse shot two people attacking him because the state refused to enforce the law – so he did. The state gave up the monopoly of force in it’s favour. Our governments are using force to enforce laws that remove our liberties and freedoms: oppression. The Austrian government has simply become a dictatorship. No amount of blithering that it’s ‘for our own good’ will change the fact that it isn’t – it’s for theirs.

  51. Putin is fomenting war in Europe – a war Britain will be dragged into, says ALICIA KEARNS. 21 November 2021.

    THE West is under attack every day. Our values of freedom of the individual, speech and belief, as well as self-determination and democracy, risk being one generation away from vanishing.

    The above paragraph is absolutely true. In fact these values have already vanished! Unfortunately this has nothing whatsoever to do with Vladimir Putin. It is the fault of UK politicians like Ms. Kearns MP.

    https://www.express.co.uk/comment/expresscomment/1524706/Vladimir-Putin-Bosnia-Bosnian-war-Ukraine-genocide-Milorad-Dodik-Serbia-UK-military

    2. The values have not vanished. There are here now and can be seen, for example, on this blog. They will take more that the creeps attacking us to remove.

      I don’t agree that it is unfortunate that it is not Putin at fault – to get rid of him would be a lot more difficult than consigning the Johnson regime to the oubliette that should become their permanant residence.

      Putin does not need to foment anything just now, he is watching the West as it apparently self-destructs. I do not believe that is going to happen quite as he supposes, but it would be a rash person who could make a firm prediction.

      https://www.tarableu.com/we-cant-say-gates-didnt-warn-us/

      1. What we need is a decent alternative to the Conservative Party but we sall probably get the Labour Party which is even worse.

        1. I keep asking, Richard, that Anne-Marie Waters of ‘For Britain’, Laurence Fox of ‘Reform’ at least, get together, stop vote-splitting and maybe, just maybe, persuade Farage of ‘Reclaim’ to join them together as one party, to provide an alternative to Lib/Lab/Con at the next and/or subsequent elections, be they by or general.

          1. We’ve got a Reform and a Reclaim candidate – in fact, we’ve got fourteen candidates in all. NOTA is going to have a field day!

          3. I doubt they’d listen. The Reform candidate comes from a long line of County Councillors (and her father was leader who, as one of my neighbours pointed out, ‘left under a cloud’). She’s an ex-Con member having previously jumped ship to the Brexit Party. I don’t think we really need someone with a background like that, anyway. Haven’t seen anything about the Reclaim member so it’s difficult to judge.

    3. Does Kearns *really* honestly believe that statement? Does she honestly think it’s Putin preventing discussion about pakistani muslim mechanised gang rape? Muslim terrorism? The invasion of gimmigrants in Dover? The suppression of covid information? The obsession with diversity when it is nothing but divisive?

      Our freedoms are being destroyed by the very state machine she supports. This is just frantic deflection.

    2. How long does the glue last? Maybe the numpties should just be left glued to the road?

      1. Superglue is water soluble, although it takes a while. Ergo, never use superglue for china repairs.

    4. What a vivid picture of ‘Death by Global Corporation.’

      [The corporations fill the supermarket shelves with inedible crap, then Jabba-the-Hutt’s daughters buy it and scoff it.]

      1. If the greeniacs/vegans get their way all those ladies have been condemned to starvation.

        It would also put DFS out of business.

      2. I don’t follow your comment Grizzly. Capitalism is inherent in the human condition, as are markets.

        When Alf found he could grow more, better carrots and Bob more and better cauliflour then it was inevitable that Alf and Bob would sell to one another first as barter, then using a medium of exchange. Lo! Markets.

        Markets are the best method of increasing wealth and prosperity in a resource scarce society. Yes, innate efficiency ensures that the producers meet the demands of the market. In our market maybe we do have too much, but the alternative is a North Korean/ EU style set up of incompetent government control and markets being run by useless bureaucrats and operating inefficiently until they’re forced to stop entirely – of course they don’t, the market just goes underground and evades the oppressive state.

        The problem is when government gets involved forcing resources where the market doesn’t want them to go and you get waste and incompetence. Government can waste private resources because it can use public funds – other people’s money – to buy what it wants and it can take as much of that money, for as long as it wants to to achieve that end.

        This is why government is so expensive and wasteful.

        1. We are on parallel lines, here, Wibbling. I wasn’t criticising capitalism, a concept which I thoroughly understand, comprehend and support to the hilt (but thanks for your lesson anyway).

          My rant is against the massive multi-national global corporations who run the planet and who are pulling the srtings of all the world’s governments. It is they who manufacture and promote every example of unhealthy food sold in our shops and supermarkets. By that I mean all the processed food that is shot through with masses of sugar, carbohydrates (more sugar), trans fats, and chemicals of every shape and hue. Not only do they brainwash the easily brainwashed into eating this crap in billions of tons per day. They also backhand all the world’s various health authorities to induce them to inform that same gullible public that to eat this crap is good for them! They tell you not to eat fat “because it is bad for your health” (it is eminently provable that it is excellent for your health); but happily replace that fat with sugar (since removing that fat has destroyed the flavour).

          That is not capitalism, it is crazed megalomaniacal power over people, governments and health authorities. It is criminally insane corruption. The trouble is, most people (gormless imbeciles) do not care a jot and simply carry on regardless with their heads in the sand.

  54. Lol News from the asylum..

    Stonewall accuses lesbians of sexual racism for not being prepared to have sex with transwomen when they still have male genitalia.

    The self righteous wokerati feasting on each other is always fun to watch.

    3. Surely you should not be prepared to have sex with anyone you don’t want to have sex with? Isn’t that a human right?
      Unadulterated marital bliss is the best solution if you can find it!

  55. Mowgli, Bagheera, Baloo: Rudyard Kipling’s own sketches of the Jungle Book cast revealed. 21 November 2021.

    Evocative drawings that Rudyard Kipling created for The Jungle Book but never used are to be published for the first time.

    Mowgli, the Indian boy raised by wolves, and his mentor Bagheera, the black panther, are among sketches created by the author in helping him to shape the jungle characters that were to enchant generations of readers.

    A favourite from my childhood. I had the huge version! Read it more times than I can count. If I see it in book form I might buy it for Nostalgia’s sake!

    https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/nov/21/mowgli-bagheera-baloo-rudyard-kiplings-own-sketches-of-the-jungle-book-cast-revealed

        1. Never had you down as a fondant fancy type nor indeed lemon drizzle. I guess other Nottlers might come up with some ideas though….?

          1. I bought some luxury deep mince pies from Morrison’s last week. The pastry was like concrete. I managed two by chopping the last in half. I threw the rest away!

          4. As Caroline loves baking and has Coeliac disease all her cakes and puddings are gluten free. She has already made the Christmas cake and will make the marzipan and put on the icing a few days before Christmas Day.

            She is buying the remaining ingredients she needs for the plum pudding this coming week.

          5. We made a Christmas cake but despite correct temperature and timing, it was burned on the base. It was in a greased tin with paper surrounding it and a foil cap. It was on a baking tray in the middle of the oven. Any hints on avoiding peripheral blackening would be very welcome.

    2. “The Jungle Books” have been routinely trashed over the previous decades, by Disney et al. The books were not written for children, but for anyone who cared to read them. Characters, animals, died and sometimes died horribly. I was eight when I received them in a present from an uncle and aunt.
      Illustrated by Stuart Tresilian the characters were real, not cartoons. I still have the book.
      I do become a little effervescent when books are trashed by filmmakers. The’fairy tales” were morality tales and warnings, not merely entertainment.

  56. Andrew Marr ‘wants to be free of BBC rules so he can speak out on climate’. 21 November 2021.

    Writing about the climate crisis in the i newspaper this summer, Marr urged “timid politicians” to leave “vacuous generalities” behind. His words are a taste of what is to come. “Public support on ripping out and replacing domestic boilers, even at a high cost to millions of families, can be won, just as support for mask-wearing and social distancing was,” he argued, adding: “As a lifelong political hack, I now feel we should spend less time on the distracting national puppet show.”

    So speaks the man whose vast wages were extorted out of much poorer people by the medium of the Licence Fee!

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/nov/21/andrew-marr-wants-to-be-free-of-bbc-rules-so-he-can-speak-out-on-climate

    1. So now we know. He wants to tell people they will all die horribly if they don’t replace their boilers.
      Unspeakable creature!

          1. There are many such. It strikes me that a significant proportion head to politics and journalism.
            I guessed you might appreciate the references to Waugh in Oborne’s piece.

          2. Founder’s Port was taken in the Senior Common Room after the hapless Paul Pennyfeather was ducked, debagged and sent down.

            I can call to mind almost as many memorable observations in Decline and Fall as I can in Hamlet. Here are a few:

            I have been in the scholastic profession long enough to know that nobody enters it without reasons he would rather conceal.

            We schoolmasters must temper discretion with deceit.

            “…any one who has been to an English public school will always feel comparatively at home in prison. It is the people brought up in the gay intimacy of the slums who find prison so soul destroying.”

            “The next four weeks of solitary confinement were among the happiest of Paul’s life…It was so exhilarating, he found, never to have to make any decision on any subject, to be wholly relieved from the smallest consideration of time, meals, or clothes, to have no anxiety ever about what kind of impression he was making; in fact, to be free.”

            Things may have changed but I would still advise anyone contemplating teaching in an independent school to to read Decline and Fall. Like many of his generation John Betjeman spent some time teaching in a prep school. When a friend asked him what it was like he said that it was sheer hell but you would never laugh so much ever again in your life.

          3. Briefly visiting a provincial prep school in the 1990s, I was asked by a small boy if I had ever been a Desert Rat.

  57. More News from the asylum…

    Convicts at HMP Altcourse, in Liverpool, have complained about cash,
    photographs, tobacco and drugs being taken from their cells.

      2. Sounds familiar.

        Though the PTB are being very careful not to say the largest group of unvaxxed are Bames.

    3. The Left *are still* fighting that war.

      Without strong leadership, intelligence and a vast amount of democratic representation, we’re heading for war.

  61. Michael Gove speaking at the British Council meeting in Cardiff on the Northern Ireland protocols said he was confident that a deal with the EU could be agreed without triggering Article 16. Lord Cross, on Marr’s programme, told a different story saying the 2 parties were as far apart as ever and Article 16 was still an option. Michael Gove should stop interfering in the process, he is a nuisance. What is our PM’s intention to sort out this problem of his own making. I suspect he will sit on the fence.

    1. “…confident that a deal with the EU could be agreed…” They still haven’t caught on (or are refusing to do so) that the EU will never be reasonable. Their sole purpose is to punish us for being uppity.

    1. Is this another example of the broken American ‘Justice‘ system. What’s with ‘Mail-In Jury Votes‘

      Wasn’t the physical jury in the court the binding finding?

          3. There is an excellent and unmissable documentary on some Northerners at 2100 hrs on BBC4 next Friday.

            Lindisfarne’s Geordie Genius: The Alan Hull Story.

    3. Of course they did (and would). But I didn’t realise the justice system had morphed into a tv-style reality show.

    6. Ah, the Babylon Bee, without which we would be so ignorant of the finer points of life in America!

  65. How Australia stopped the migrant boats.

    Alexander Downer (former Australian high commissioner to the UK).

    Around 20 years ago, people smugglers set up a racket designed to game the Australian asylum system. Australia had – and still has – a rigorous immigration regime. Migrants can come as skilled workers, as part of a family reunion scheme or be re-settled as refugees. In every case they need to get a visa. That way, we can control who comes to our country and the number of people who arrive.

    The people smugglers dreamt up a fourth pathway. For a considerable fee, they brought people to Australia by boat from Indonesia and prepped them on how to be accepted as refugees. The migrants were told to throw away identity documents and make claims that they were being persecuted in some far-off land. This game was not only hugely profitable for the people smugglers but was making a mockery of Australia’s immigration policies.

    Finally, enough was enough. The Australian government decided it wasn’t going to allow this racket to continue. To start with, we tried to persuade the Indonesians not to allow migrants to set off in little boats to Australia. The Indonesians made some effort to stop them but without great success.

    So we knew we had to act ourselves. The key to success was going to be the destruction of the people smugglers’ business model. We had to find a way of stopping potential customers buying passages on boats to Australia. We had to send out a very simple message: under no circumstances would an unauthorised person who paid a smuggler to get to Australia be allowed to settle there.

    Initially, the smugglers told their customers that it would be impossible for Australia to stop the boats. So we did two things.

    First, when the boats were intercepted, we took the asylum seekers to an offshore processing centre. There were two, one in Nauru and the other in Papua New Guinea. If the asylum seeker was found to be a genuine refugee, then we would look for somewhere to resettle them, ideally not in Australia. If the asylum seeker was found not to be a refugee, they would be sent straight back to their country of origin. The advantage was that the smugglers were unable to guarantee to their customers delivery to Australia. The demand for this racket started to decline.

    To supplement this tough approach, the Australian government turned back boats when it was safe to do so. Obviously, if the sea was turbulent or the boat was sinking, it wouldn’t be practical to turn the boat back. The smugglers soon got onto this and gave guidance to asylum seekers on how to sink the boats or sabotage the engines so that they couldn’t be turned back. This was a tough problem to solve. We bought a number of specially designed boats whose engines could not be sabotaged and which could not be sunk by the passengers. We then transferred the asylum seekers to these boats and sent them back to Indonesia.

    The combination of these techniques destroyed the people smugglers’ model and now there are almost no incidences of small boats bringing unauthorised arrivals to Australia.

    To be frank, there was a lot of opposition in Australia to these policies. But the point is: the vast majority of the public were supportive because they wanted the government to decide who should come to Australia to live, not people smugglers.

    This scheme worked because (most) Australian politicians have brains as well as balls. UK politicians possess neither.

        2. The town I lived in in NC had a few emu farms and you often saw emu meat for sale in the supermarkets. I think they were cunning birds as they often escaped to the amusement of the town and the local news. I remember one hilarious video of one legging it up the main route in town being pursued by police who couldn’t catch it. This particular emu got away but was seen no more. My guess is some one potted it and put it in his freezer.

          1. Did you try emu? I often had ostrich in Germany during the Mad Cow Crisis. it was quite tasty.

          2. I didn’t but I did try alligator once. In CT there was a small private airfield which had a restaurant. They had all sorts or unusual things on the menu including rattlesnake and alligator. I was given a tiny piece to sample once when we were there for a meal. It didn’t make much of an impression.

          3. Ditto – when in Florida. At a drinks “do” they were among the nibbles. Tasted exactly as I imagined a handbag would taste!!

      2. Er … the UK consists of its indigenous population, NOT its political hired hands.

        Ask the population if they want migrants.

      3. Australia did want migrants. They allowed them in ‘unfettered’ then realised their mistake. Set about processing claims properly and then got a woke government. Just like the rest of the Westernised world.

        None of those officials are in any danger from Muslim extremists.

      4. The £10 Poms….

        Australia began accepting migrants 1950’s from more than 30 European countries, including: the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Spain and West Germany. The largest national groups to arrive, after the British, were Italian and Greek.

      5. The £10 Poms….

        Australia began accepting migrants 1950’s from more than 30 European countries, including: the Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Spain and West Germany. The largest national groups to arrive, after the British, were Italian and Greek.

    1. Give them food and they breed like rabbits.

      Give them the vaccine and they stop breeding.

      Global depopulation without war.

      Hey !…Can anyone hear me? Is there anyone there?

    3. Germany, the country that sparked the Nuremberg Rallies, followed by the Nuremberg Trials, they sparked the Nuremberg Code, which they now choose to ignore.

      1. The Convid Vaxx secrets will be out in 2075(ish), unless of course the scamdemic continues unabated

    4. We shouldn’t have given the third world the vaccine. It was unfair of us to offer our technology on to countries than haven’t the education or infrastructure. All we do is muck up their development.

  67. ‘Impossible to know’ if asylum seekers converting to Christianity are genuine, says Church
    Questions remain over claims in wake of Liverpool attack that refugees seek to change religion in order to ‘game’ system
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/11/21/impossible-know-asylum-seekers-converting-christianity-genuine/

    Well, CofE, why not start from the standpoint that Muslims are taught that Taqiya (lying to protect Islam) is justifiable, and assume that you are being lied to?

    1. How many non-asylum-seeking Muslims have converted to Christianity? None – hardly surprising that at best they will be ostracised, possibly murdered – so every ‘convert’ will be bogus. How stupid are these church leaders?

      1. There are none so blind as those who do not want to see. We had a refreshing sermon that included both Covid and climate change today. The theme was “what is truth?” (Pilate’s question to Jesus) and both those were mentioned as things we couldn’t know the truth about.

    2. I’ll give you a clue. It isn’t. They’re doing it to get a free house and cash. Heck, if they were honest they wouldn’t have had to get on a boat and arrive here illegally.

    2. “Traumatised by dangerous boat journeys”?????????????

      Did someone force them into the boats?

          7. Only if things deteriorate to the point that the Dads’ Army needs to be reformed. (I’m waiting for my call up papers!)

    4. Those charities aren’t doing anything themselves, and frankly, the buses should be trooping on to a ferry bound for France, with the driver off and the doors locked. No doubt the scum would start smashing the windows.

  70. Covid cases are rising faster than ever in France. Indeed the rise in cases is directly proportionate to the increased number of people who have been ‘vaccinated’.

    Some people might conclude from this that the policy of getting everyone ‘vaccinated’ is a terrible mistake which achieves nothing and is counter-productive. But is there a single politician anywhere in Europe capable of seeing what is so blatantly obvious to so many?

  71. Covid jabs WON’T be mandatory in UK: Sajid Javid rules out Britain following Austria and Germany in making vaccines compulsory – but urges public to get boosters to save Christmas

    I hate to break this to you Javid, but Christmas will still happen whatever you political scum might try.

    1. “Sajid Javid rules out Britain following Austria and Germany in making vaccines compulsory”

      That’s what the spamhead slammer says TODAY. Give him a week and he’ll change his mind – following the “science”. Just you wait.

      1. He drinks alcohol and is married to a Christian, he doesn’t follow his faith, surely he wouldn’t lie…

        2. My answer to that question would offend our beloved Mods…

          I do know from experience in the 1970s that Ministers (and civil servants) would make a categorical statement that something would definitely not happen. A week later that something DID happen. When I challenged them on the volte face, the bland reply was always that, “on the previous occasion there were certainly no plans to do it….. Circumstances have changed.”

      2. The local Co-op, and the Co-op have been in the vanguard of over-enthusiastic Covid tyranny, have removed bossy distancing notices and those sodding floor markers.
        Fingers crossed.

        2. Have they still got the sanitizers in place? I did use them last winter but not since then – it’s terrible stuff for your hands. Morrisons abandoned all the one-way stuff and distancing months ago.

    2. “Sajid Javid rules out Britain following Austria and Germany in making vaccines compulsory”

      That’s what the spamhead slammer says TODAY. Give him a week and he’ll change his mind – following the “science”. Just you wait.

    3. “Sajid Javid rules out Britain following Austria and Germany in making vaccines compulsory”

      That’s what the spamhead slammer says TODAY. Give him a week and he’ll change his mind – following the “science”. Just you wait.

    4. They all need to read How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss. The Grinch thought he’d stop Christmas from coming by stealing all the goodies and decorations from Whoville. He was horrified on Christmas morning to hear the Whos down in Whoville singing carols and he realised that Christmas came anyway. The Grinch’s heart grew three sizes that day, he went down to Whoville, returned all the stuff he’d stolen and the Grinch himself carved the roast beast.
      Fat chance of anyone in this government of having their heart grow three times in size; to start with you need a heart.

        1. It’s a lovely story and I enjoyed reading it to the kids every year. There are some simply wonderful Christmas and Hannukah children’s books.

      2. I always liked Dr Seuss as a child and my children did too. Now he’s being cancelled by the woke I approve of him even more.

        1. The state of Washington tried to ban The Lorax years ago because it was anti logging. Didn’t work. Many of his books are social commentaries like Yertle the Turtle and Horton Hears a Who.

          1. We found that even though they were sometimes “nonsense words” their repetition and loose rhyming made them excellent for teaching children to read confidently and fluently. The pictures were really good fun too.

    5. They do think they’re matter, don’t they? Case in point, the country would be better off without the malignant idiocy of Whitehall and Westminster.

          17. C. Hubert H Parry? Never heard of him.

            I played for the funeral of Elisabeth Parry a few years ago. She was the niece of Joseph Parry, who wrote ‘Myfanwy’ and the hymn tune ‘Aberystwyth’ (Jesu, lover of my soul).

      1. Did you see-BBC 4 ?
        Nigel Kennedy at the BBC 14/11/21 BBC iplayer
        I fell in love with our Nigel when he was about 7years old.

    3. Nigel is an extraordinarily privileged and talented brat.

      The obsessively cultured chip on his shoulder will – eventually – be unable to support his violin …

  75. 341883+ up ticks,

    I do believe that via the instruction manual ( koran) are they not instructed to lie to nonbelievers, so that may well give you a clue

    Dt,
    ‘Impossible to know’ if asylum seekers converting to Christianity are genuine, says Church
    Questions remain over claims in wake of Liverpool attack that refugees seek to change religion in order to ‘game’ system

    Make it carry a capital punishment offence………. they would.

      1. It’s just as well Mr T is currently away taking his medicine otherwise he may not survive such a sight!

          1. Indeed so, Conners. He was the other half of the Spitfire / Typhoon display team in 2015, alongside my friend Dianne’s son, Ben. Saw the display at Fairford, twice. Brilliant…

          2. He’s a good bloke. So is, I hasten to add, Charlie Brown. I haven’t met Millie, so I can’t speak about him.

  79. That’s me done for this shite day. Gales and intermittent rain all day. Horrible.

    Hope tomorrow is better. Have a sooper evening.

    A demain.

    1. Sorry to hear that, Bill. It was glorious sunshine here with hardly a cloud in the sky! Such diversity 🙂

      1. Goodness knows what it will do with it. The EU was warned not to prod the Russian bear and it went along and stabbing it with a giant blunt flag.

    4. My understanding is that NATO is the overall agreement on defence policy.

      Germany and Italy only want us to add our nuclear capability to the cheese-eating surrender monkeys across the channel, because they, the white-flag merchants, are the only EU servant with allowed nuclear capability.

  82. Waiting for copycat thieving here:

    “On Saturday evening, dozens of looters armed with crowbars and other weapons bum-rushed a Nordstrom department store in an upscale community in the outskirts of the San Francisco Bay Area.
    Walnut Creek Police Department told NBC Bay Area that Nordstrom employees were pepper-sprayed and beaten while as many as 80 people ransacked the store.
    The incident occurred around 2046 PST, according to police. A manager of a PF Chang’s said he had to lock the restaurant as a fleet of cars, as many as 25, pulled up in front of Nordstrom, and an army of thieves ran into the retail store, grabbed merchandise, loaded it in waiting cars and drove off.”….

    1. How dare the police interfere with the rights of citizens to liberate goods that they need to feed their hungry children and have somewhere to sleep at night!

    3. Lefty youtube person who I cannot watch without laughing at his idiocy would say that they’re not hurting anyone and should be allowed to take what they like.

      Of course, they are. They’re hurting the shop by robbing it, which has ot pay higher insurance premiums, which means it either puts price up OR lays off staff. The laid off staff are hurt, everyone is hurt by higher premiums and everyone is hurt by higher prices. If it continues to the extreme then the shop will simply close, destroying a lot of wealth in the area.

      I know the Left are facile, but why are they unable to think beyond the incident?

      3. Actually Bill, Walnut Creek is almost 100% white apart from the servants and the gardeners. It’s that sort of place. Even worse is the next town down, Lafayette, It has a special block of flats for the servants to go home to. I’m surprised that there isn’t a curfew in place for them.

        1. Have you read the novel The Help by Kathryn Stockett? It’s set in the deep south but references what you have mentioned.

          1. No haven’t heard of the book. Are you referring to the special block of flats to house the servants in?

          2. It’s a novel about white families in the southern US and their help which are all black women. Not so much the block of flats but all “the help” live well away from their white employers and many of the black maids aren’t even allowed to use the indoor toilets. It’s an eyeopener and was made into a very good movie a few years ago.

    5. I know Walnut Creek very well. My last wife, The Daughter Of The Anti-Christ, lives there. It is an upper middle class town with plenty of money. Nordstrom is on a street that is nicknamed Rodeo Drive by the locals, because it is filled with very expensive stores like the real Rodeo Drive in LA. Gucci, Neiman Marcus, etc. I have to say I take particular delight that they would have been raided. I’m sure there has been a mass outbreak of smelling salt application now that those smug illegitimates have been done over.

        1. Three, first two died, the first is my wife and always will be but there you are. Last was a disaster as you might have gathered from my nickname for her. In fact I refuse to use her real name, would have to wash my mouth out with soap if I did and take a hot bath of disinfectant.

  83. LAST POST

    While laying the supper table, I suddenly realised what the spamhead slammer had meant by saying there would be no compulsory vaccination in England.

    He will simply ensure that the law is in placed to make it impossible for the unvaccinated – or the inadequately vaccinated (eg two jabs but no booster) – to do anything or go anywhere. Simple, really.

    1. Yep. You won’t be forced to be vaccinated, but you won’t be able to work, go out, eat out, go to the cineman unless you are vaccinated as per state mandate.

      It’s intentional deceit.

        2. Did y’all know, that in the original fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm, none of the dwarfs (dwarves?) had names?

          In the 1912 Broadway play, they were given the names: Blick, Flick, Glick, Snick, Plick, Whick and Quee. It wasn’t until 1937 that Walt Disney deemed to give them names that he thought suited a Yank audience; names that had nothing to do, whatsoever, with the Brothers Grimm.

    2. Or, they will just impose the central bank digital currency anyway, and anyone who wants to use it will have to get a digital id. Then they will make the centralised NHS records only accessible via the passport. Everyone will have to get it.
      The vaxx passports are only the gateway to the digital ID. If I were a fascist globalist, I wouldn’t try on the compulsory vaxxes in Britain either, I’d just give them a fait accompli of a CBDC.

      1. Just before it happens, withdraw all your monies in cash.

        See the panic on the bankers’ faces.

    4. Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.

    5. That is what it has been building up to all along. You will be incarcerated if you do not comply.

  84. Evening, all. The govt is still clinging on to its EU dream and can’t let go. After all, it’s only (taxpayers’) money.

  86. Good night all.

    A really hot chicken tikka masala, thick yoghurt & dressed rice.

    Mir sind Rotz, Wasser und Schweiss gelaufen.

    1. I love chicken tikka- have a recipe if you’re interested. But I bet you make a good one yourself.

    3. My reply, since I cannot get to him directly, is:
      “Laurence, for God’s sake, please stop on the vote-splitting path but join together with Anne-Marie Waters of ‘For Britain’ and even, Nigel Farage of ‘Reclaim’ to gave us voters a real party to vote for, against Lib/Lab/Con at all elections, be they bye or General.

        1. Agreed, Lotl, but I don’t think she’d want to lend her name, other than to stand as a candidate, if there is a reasonable party to support.

      2. He is the ‘worse for wear’. I reckon he likely suffers from alcoholism and is shagged out.

        I suspect also that the mountainous guilt heap of his dissembling to the British public has caught up with him. About time too. Good riddance at the soonest.

        Edit: He might do the country a favour and take his useless cabinet of liars and misfits with him.

      3. He is the ‘worse for wear’. I reckon he likely suffers from alcoholism and is shagged out.

        I suspect also that the mountainous guilt heap of his dissembling to the British public has caught up with him. About time too. Good riddance at the soonest.

        Edit: He might do the country a favour and take his useless cabinet of liars and misfits with him.

      1. His wife quite clearly doesn’t have a clue how to look after him .

        He is the type of man who needs nannying , and some one to fuss around him !

  93. An early good morning to the overnight brigade!
    After waking up to pump bilges, now sat up in be with the Dearly Tolerant enjoying a mug of tea each.

    1. ‘Morning, Bob.
      I’ve been up since 03.30, slowly drinking a pint of milk & enjoying some Red Leicester.

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