Thursday, May 31, 2007

How British are you?

Most readers will be well aware of the new requirement for a British citizenship test for those immigrants who would seek to join our ‘British values’ and want to integrate into ‘our way of life’. A few days ago I heared somebody talking about these tests and how exceptionally difficult they were, that even the Queen herself would struggle to answer them. Allegedly, there was even one question on the Republic of Eire although I couldn’t figure out how this was connected to ‘Britishness’ as it did not involve drinking an alcoholic beverage known as Guinness. I decided to investigate for myself. How relevant are the questions to the infamous British values? Test yourself here with Kebz’s Britishness quiz:

In the 1980s who were not the largest immigrant groups to come to the United Kingdom?

A.


Americans

B.


Australians

C.


South Africans

D.


Indians

How many children (under 18) are estimated to be working in the United Kingdom at any one time? [Depends what time of day you are talking about surely?]

A.


1 million

B.


2 million

C.


3 million

D.


4 million


[Surely everybody knows this?] Since 1971 the United Kingdom’s population has grown by..

A.


17%

B.


10%

C.


7.70%

D.


5.10%

In which order do the UK national days fall? [I don’t have a clue]

A.


St Patrick's Day, St George's Day, St David's Day, St Andrew's Day

B.


St George's Day, St David's Day, St Patrick's Day, St Andrew's Day

C.


St David's Day, St Andrew's Day, St Patrick's Day, St George's Day

D.


St David's Day, St Patrick's Day, St George's Day, St Andrew's Day

[This made me laugh] What are the two key features of the civil service?

A.


Neutrality

B.


Favouritism

C.


Efficiency

D.


Professionalism

[You are only British if you know how to pay your council tax]

What options do you have when paying the council tax? (Select 3 answers)

A.


You can pay it in one payment

B.


You can pay it in two instalments

C.


You can pay it over 2 year period

D.


You can pay it in 10 instalments

Who is eligible for free dental treatment? (select 3 answers)

A.


People under 18 (except in Wales)

B.


Pregnant women and women with babies under 12 months old

C.


People over 45

D.


People on income support, Jobseekers’ allowance or Pension Credit Guarantee.

Who is eligible for a free knighthood? (select 3 answers)

A.


People with establishment connections

B.


Pregnant women and women with babies under 12 months old

C.


People with a huge wad of cash to donate to the governing party

D.


People who can turn donations into soft ‘loans’ with an indefinite time to repay

[OK, I admit I made that one up, but it is the most relevant of the lot]

Monday, May 28, 2007

The untouchables

Powerful front page from the Indie. The plight of refugees rarely makes the front pages and this is a particularly dramatic example of the callous attitude of the West against poor African migrants.

http://www.independent.co.uk/

Sunday, May 27, 2007

The benefits of US intervention in Haiti


80% Haitians Below Poverty Line
Every day the queues form early outside a remote Haiti dispensary where crowds of sick people jostle for a precious ticket granting them virtually free treatment and medicine.
Many have trekked by foot for hours to reach the dispensary in the far southwest village of Carrefour-Charles, which was set up in August by Medecins du Monde (Doctors of the World), but has quickly become swamped by patients.
“I walked for three hours to get here, because I knew I would be well cared for and wouldn’t be charged very much,“ said 76-year-old farmer, Vincent Accius, who was suffering from a high fever, and still clearly exhausted by his ordeal, reported AFP.
Each patient is only charged some 25 gourdes (50 cents) for treatment and medicine, while pregnant women and children under five go free.
But the scheme, aimed at helping some of the impoverished Caribbean nation’s poorest and most isolated people get access to badly-needed health care, is now groaning under the weight of its patients, with the numbers having quadrupled since last year.
“We are completely overwhelmed. We can’t take more than 40 people a day. Sometimes we have to send as many as 80 away, and we give them tickets for the next day,“ said senior nurse Marie-Jeanne Felix.
A sea of hands stretches out in desperation every morning as the nurses hand out consultation tickets to the waiting queue: last ticket, last hope of being seen that day.
The journey from the tiny town of Jeremie, 30-kilometre (18-mile) further west along the peninsula, to the clinic had taken Ginette Voltaire, 31, seven hours.
She and her sick 11-year-old son had driven part of the way along bumpy dirt tracks before the road ran out and the pair had to pick their way by foot across open countryside.
“There is a dispensary closer to my house, but I would have had to pay and I don’t have any money,“ Voltaire said.
“This is going to quickly become a problem“ said Jean-Khit Dely, the regional coordinator for Medecins du Monde.
The United Nations estimates that 80 percent of the Haitian population lives below the poverty line on less than two dollars a day.
“At Carrefour-Charles we don’t have enough human resources and we simply don’t have enough space to do more than 40 consultations a day,“ Dely added.
“Free treatment should be spread to other dispensaries to spread access to services more fairly and more equally.“
Most of the country’s health services are concentrated in the capital, Port-au-Prince, and some 80 percent of the population will first turn to traditional doctors for treatment before committing themselves to a journey to a hospital. Link to source


Saturday, May 26, 2007

Resisting Arrest

A leader of the Mahdi army Wissam Abu Qader, has been shot dead by Iraqi 'special forces' and 'backed by' British troops. Another classic explanation here:
A British army spokesman said he died while trying to resist arrest.
An Iraqi military intelligence officer said he was travelling in a car with two other men when it came under fire.

I don't know about you but I had no idea that travelling in a car constitutes resisting arrest. Basically he was murdered after leaving friday prayers, in a car that came under heavy fire. Why do they have to dress it up? He was 'suspected' of weapons trafficking, theft and assassinations, intimidation and participating in attacks. Is this policy going to arrive in the UK, where suspects are shot dead whilst travelling in a car with no right to plead their guilt or defence. Sorry, I completely forgot that if you are an unarmed Brazilian travelling on the London underground, the same policy applies.
According to the army:
'200 British troops from the 2nd Battalion the Duke of Lancaster's Regiment and 4th Battalion the Rifles "present as advisers"
That adds up to a hell of lot of 'advisers'. Perhaps they need two hundred voices simultanously shouting 'fire' because they Iraqi special forces are apt to forget that they needed to 'arrest' the bad man in the car by filling it full of bullets. In fact, I am surprised that the Gruniad actually put 'present as advisors' in quote marks considering their current level of performance.

Thursday, May 24, 2007

Sexing up the Iranian threat

The grunaid has been caught out spreading US propaganda against Iran. Simon Tisdall assistant editor published a piece a couple of days ago that was full of information from anonymous and multiple 'sources'. The article was totally ridiculous for example suggesting that there was a legitimate tie-up between Al-Qaeda (allegedly a extremist wahabi sunni sect) and the shia government of Iran. It also put the blame on Iran for a huge number of attacks on occupation troops.
"Iran is fighting a proxy war in Iraq and it's a very dangerous course for them to be following. They are already committing daily acts of war against US and British forces," a senior US official in Baghdad warned. "They [Iran] are behind a lot of high-profile attacks meant to undermine US will and British will, such as the rocket attacks on Basra palace and the Green Zone [in Baghdad]. The attacks are directed by the Revolutionary Guard who are connected right to the top [of the Iranian government]."

Put simply, it was a front page piece of propaganda using information from secret sources connected to the US goverment (which has not been shy in threatening and bullying Iran). The intention? Obviously to demonise and portray Iran as an imminent threat, not unlike pre-war Iraq. It beggars belief that somebody could be so stupid as to be taken in by such lies again. Why did the Grundian publish this ridiculous piece? Perhaps they thought they could do Blair one more favour as he was on his way out. After all Rusbridger has done plenty for Blair before. Rusbridger and Tisdall have been rather taken aback by the volume and ferocity of the complaints against the bullshit they published. Tisdall hit back at one correspondent telling him to 'concentrate a little harder', a childish insult suggesting that the reader hadn't manage to interpret the article correctly. Another editor, Murray Armstrong suggested on his blog that the critics had their 'own agenda'. Of course they do, you tosser. The agenda's stopping wankers like you writing lies on front pages and stopping thousands more innocents being murdered.

The campaign doesn't stop there. Perhaps the furore over that front page will die down but the Grundian keeps on churning out the propaganda. News sniffer reveals that yesterday's article on Iran versus the IAEA had been spiced up to mention how many weapons Iran could potentially produce:

Earlier article:
The UN security council has twice imposed sanctions on Iran, starting last December, when Tehran rejected an offer of aid in exchange for a halt in uranium enrichment.
With the council's latest deadline for Iranian compliance ending tomorrow, today's report could pave the way for a new round of talks on fresh measures within days.
"Unless Iran addresses long-outstanding verification issues, and implements ... required transparency measures, the agency will not be able to fully reconstruct the history of Iran's nuclear programme and provide assurances about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran or about the exclusively peaceful nature of that programme," the report said.

The later article adds:
At the underground enrichment facility in Natanz, the only site now open to full IAEA monitoring, Iran's ultimate stated goal is to run 54,000 centrifuges to churn out enriched uranium - enough for dozens of nuclear weapons a year, should Tehran choose to go along that route.
The report noted Iran's continued refusal, since unilaterally curtailing an agreement with the agency earlier this year, to allow inspectors to visit a heavy water reactor and linked facilities now under construction at Arak.
Once completed some time in the next decade, that complex will produce plutonium waste, which, like enriched uranium, can be used to make nuclear weapons.

So the upshot is that this is not an isolated incident. It was not a miscalculation by Rusbridger and Tisdall to run the scandalous lead page, but was a deliberate act designed to assist the UK and USA in their relentless campaign against Iran based upon lies. That campaign continues as this liberal rag takes any opportunity to paint Iran up as a threat including adding on sentences about how many weapons Iran could produce from Uranium and Plutonium.

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Do you speak the language of torture? Just the job for u

CAT 1 Arab Linguist

Provide operational contract linguist support to reconstruction efforts in Iraq. Provide general linguistic support for military operations and interpret during interviews, meeting, and conferences. Interpret and translate written and spoken communications. Transcribe and analyze verbal communications. Perform document exploitation. Scan, research, and analyze foreign language documents for key information. Translate and gist foreign language documents. Identify and extract information components meeting military information requirement list criteria. Provide input to reports. Linguists are required to work 12-hour shifts and in excess of 60-hour weeks in order to provide continuous contract linguist support that this 24 x 7 operation requires. Linguists must be available for worldwide deployment as the mission dictates.

Minimum required: Native proficiency in the Arabic/Iraqi dialect, (Interagency Language Roundtable skill level 4-5). Must be capable of providing idiomatic translations of non-technical material using correct syntax and expression from English to the native language or vice versa; ability to conduct consecutive, accurate translations/interpretation of on going conversations/activities; must be capable of providing cultural social, ethnic context of translations and interpretations, and advise supported organization on the cultural, social and ethnic significance of conversations, situations, documents, etc., in one or more Iraqi cultural traditions and or regions; must be familiar with the local culture, conduct oneself in accordance with local customs, and deal unobtrusively with the populace; must be familiar with and adhere to U.S. Army standards of conduct and the laws of the host nation in performing work assignments; must have good interpersonal skills and ability to work as part of a civil-military team in an unstructured environment; must be willing and capable to live and work in a harsh environment. Desired: University degree from accredited North American or European university.

UK demonstrates its sympathy

The British ambassador expresses sympathy for a sole Israeli victim of the current wave of violence on the Gaza-Israel border:

Tom Phillips, Britain's ambassador to Israel visited Sderot, "to understand the impact of these latest Qassam attacks and personally to express the sympathy of my government to the people of Sderot". He said: "The Palestinians must stop these attacks. Israel ... has the right to defend itself from such attacks against its civilians. But any response should be in accordance with international law ..."
The context:

Israeli missile attacks, airstrikes and shelling have killed 50 people so far. In the same newspaper, tucked away in 'News in brief', Rory McCarthy reports that the attacks have cut off electricity supplies to about 50000 people. You may remember the previous Israeli destruction of civilian infrastructure including electrical installations that left hundreds of thousands without power or water - a widely documented war crime. Where was Phillips then? Does International law allow countries to bombard civilian populations, to deny them water, food and medicine? Does International law say that killing 50 people before one of yours is killed is proportionate assuming that your attacks are reprisals? Does international law allow you to seize the homes and businesses of the legitimate owners and throw them out because of their race? Does International law allow you to build a giant wall through Arab villages on Palestinian land and to build huge settlements on Palestinian land whilst stealing Palestinian water supplies? Tom Phillips is a total wanker who should be locked up, preferably within range of Israeli missiles.

Sunday, May 20, 2007

No Water for Gaza

Not content with stoking war by allowing in armed Fatah militia to fight with Hamas, the Israeli government has continued its bombardment of Gaza citizens. Water is a weapon of war in the 21st century. This is Netanyahu's prescription for the Arab residents of Gaza - let them be thirsty. This is not only a clear advocation of a war crime but an indication of the merciless and criminal thinking in Israeli politics that is ignored by our politicians and media. It is not an empty threat either as residents in the Bedouin town of Arara have found out. They have been without water for three days allegedly because of unpaid water bills owed to Israeli supplier Mekerot, according to Haaretz.

Friday, May 18, 2007

Blair admits relationship


Tony Blair has finally outed himself, revealing all about his gay relationship with George Bush as the dominant partner. "I may have been on my knees but I did what I thought was right for Britain", he insisted.

"Some may think, I was wrong but given the chance I would do it all over again", said the departing prime minister.

The Zionist occupation of cyberspace

The zionists are not satisfied with stealing palestinian properties and driving them out of Hebron and East Jerusalem. The zionazi and their supporters continue to harass and hound pro-palestinian bloggers who were posting at Daily Kos. The Daily Kos administrators have bowed to the pressure of zionazi accusations of anti-semitism and other unfounded allegations to ban these bloggers. Haitham reveals the tactics of the zionazis in cyberspace. So much for the values of free speech.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Politician's Bandwagon

Is it just me or does anybody else think that the politicians are being more disgusting than ever by so publicly exploiting the McCann kidnapping case? They clambered over each other in parliament to express their sincerity and sympathy and queued to be photographed with the Aunt of Madeleine. Yes the family has been campaigning but this is always the kind of photo-op the politicians love. This disgusting opportunism shows the level of this cesspit of human excrement. What will be achieved by them being photographed and oozing their fake concern whilst trying to make out that they are helping the investigation. How many other girls are there who are missing and not in the headlines. A quick check reveals that 15 other girls are listed as missing this year including a three year old. Why don't they speak up for them instead? There is already a massive reward on offer for information thanks to celebs like Beckham, so this opportunism cannot really raise the profile any further. Like flies on a turd they will swarm onto any issue that makes headlines. No wonder Brown made it to PM without a contest! Parliament is full of spineless greasy nobodies without a shred of decency.

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Revenge is sweet

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Stealing in Gaza

What happens when you imprison a population of millions and deny them international aid, enforce an embargo that prevent even food from traveling easily and maintain severe economic sanctions? For the answer you have to travel to the slums of Gaza, the world’s largest open air prison, where a population of 3 million Palestinians is imprisoned by a brutal Zionist reshime. Amidst internal strife between warring armed factions – again promoted by the zionsists through supply of weapons to one side and bombings – children roam the streets selling whatever they can to help maintain their families. In many of these cases, the men who were traditional providers have been kidnapped, tortured and imprisoned in Israel. More than half the population is unemployed so the desperate plight of the families means that children become the bread winners. They often brave reckless and deliberate Israeli gunfire directed at them to steal bits from old settlements in Gaza. Israel alone designates what it calls ‘no go’ zones with no marking as to where these start or end. Some children turn to stealing from other families. In a society where crime was rare, children steal to entertain themselves out of boredom as well as to provide food for themselves and large families. Other children are selling cigarettes on street corners. The official Palestinian prohibition against child labour is a joke, because it cannot be enforced and desperate families have no other options.

The western refusal to allow aid is causing this economic hardship because they continue to support their Zionist friends who demand ‘recognition’ of a military racist state that has no defined boundaries and continues to expel people from Palestinian areas at an alarming rate. Ethnic cleansing is still in action and still ignored by the European and USA elite and media. Next time they come to ask for your vote, ask them what they are doing about this situation. In fact write to the fuckers and protest.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Job share

God runs electromagnets by wave theory on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and the Devil runs them by Quantum theory on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
Sir William Bragg

Even electromagnets get a day off on Sunday.

Friday, May 11, 2007

Occupied

Did you know Iraq is an occupied country with insurgent-occupied cities? The native Iraqi americans want them to leave their country but the occupation will not listen:

Moreover, Lieutenant Kallop, who arrived in the town after the roadside bomb had killed Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, said his platoon had been told that Haditha was “an insurgent-controlled-and-occupied city.”

Meanwhile the Zionazis expand their occupation of Palestine, forcing out Palestinians in East Jerusalem and replacing them with rabid settlers, thus making impossible the two-state solution envisaged by many as the only hope for peace. No sound or whimper of protest from the US or UK over this gross violation of the so called 'road map'. Two-faced bastards!

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

The Practice

It’s a daily trial for hundreds of thousands of people in the UK. Each day, early in the morning, these people ring the same telephone number, get a busy tone for an eternity and then hang up in frustration. They know full-well that every man and his dog are trying the same number at the same time. The lucky few after ringing continuously for upwards of half-an-hour, are connected to a nasty old witch who guards the holy book, with the ferocity of a bad-tempered fire-breathing dragon guarding a gold treasure. If you are lucky and the witch grants you an audience, then you may see your GP on the same day.

Don’t you dare to ask if appointments that are available later for next week – that practice was almost extinct a long time ago. Non-urgent appointments are harder to obtain than a bone from a rabid pit-bull. The receptionist is almost always rude and argumentative and asks you what is wrong with you, as if she is able to judge the severity of the problem, from the symptoms described over a telephone. If you do manage to make it to see the GP, they will ask you again anyway so it is not for his/her benefit either. Perhaps the receptionists get together at tea break and laugh at people’s embarrassing illnesses. Given the sadistic nature of the species, it would not be surprising at all. If you are late, then in some practices you can actually be fined or named and shamed. On the other hand, if you turn up on time and await your appointment time, it’s not unusual for you to be seen up to an hour late. After all sick people are just lazy layabouts who have nothing better to do with their time than bothering receptionists and lying in bed seeking sympathy. In contrast, the patient’s time is expendable and they can also be freely insulted. Clearly, none have urgent tasks such as picking children up from Nursery school or caring for elderly or even more sick people at home. A few years ago, with a previous practice, I was granted an audience with a female GP. Without so much as a ‘hello’ or a ‘how are you’, she snapped, “what’s the problem?” After describing the symptoms she interrupted while I was telling her what the illness was. “I don’t need you tell me what the bloody diagnosis is,” she snarled, extremely aggressively for no particular reason. I probably knew more about the subject than she did, but I let it pass when I saw her face. If there was such a thing as a past-life, she must have been a concentration camp guard because she jabbed me extremely hard a couple of minutes later, when giving me an injection. I put it down to temporary PMT, but according to other patients, she seemed to have it every day of the month. Talking to people around the country my experiences are not unusual.

FFS, why the hell should do we have to put up with this? What sense does it make to have the practice phones going beserk at 8.30 am each morning with hundreds of people ringing at the same time, as soon as the answering machine is switched off? If you try to do the sensible thing and wait until 9.15am, there are no appointments left and you are told to ring back in the morning. I think, I will suggest that my practice put their appointment book online so that patients can book an available appointment at their leisure. Then again, I may not because I'm a coward.

Monday, May 07, 2007

How to attract millions to your blog

According to Zeitgeist the most popular search terms this week on google are: american idol, nfl draft, brady quinn, kentucky derby, alycia lane, cinco de mayo, suzy shuster, josh hancock, spiderman 3 and golden state warriors. Now if this theory is correct, I should get a few hundred million hits on this blog within hours. Hopefully this will crowd out the dodgy people who have been turning up at J4P blog looking for pictures of dead kids and body parts.

Saturday, May 05, 2007

Will Britain one day be Muslim?

The disgusting bag of shit that is The Daily Mail continues its relentless campaign demonising Islam and Muslims. Quote:

In my many conversations with like-minded people about the threat that radical Islam poses to the British way of lifen - and, indeed, to European civilisation - we frequently end by despairingly agreeing that the West seems intent on committing political and cultural suicide.

When we look starkly at the demographic statistics, the wimpishness of our Establishment in the face of the threat, the perversions perpetrated by political correctness and our own passivity, it's hard to avoid the conclusion that within a couple of generations, Islam will be in control in Europe.

It's hard to work out what kind of an environment bastards like author Ruth Dudley Edwards, live in. The BNP seems positively sane compared with nutters like her. She continues her rant:

Meanwhile, we are importing large numbers of unemployed youths from abroad in order to maintain our standard of living, yet many of these newcomers have nothing but contempt for our way of life and some even wish to destroy it.

Steyn sees this as a civil war which Europe is too timid even to acknowledge, let alone win. He says: "Islam has youth and will, Europe has age and welfare."

It's hard not to agree with Mark Steyn, especially as every day seems to bring more evidence that as a society we are terminally mad.

Watch out everybody these unemployed youths from abroad are out to destroy our way of life and eat our babies. They breed like rabbits you know! And they hate our freedom and way of life too! No doubt she will be campaigning for them to be neutered, so she can continue to enjoy her freedom to demonise other minorities.

Children of Palestine

Thursday, May 03, 2007

Democracy Sham-ocracy

Iraq is now the shining democracy that cannot have a say on whether a wall can divide its capital. Despite Prime Minister Al-Maliki’s protests, the USA have taken no notice. To those bastards who proclaimed Iraq as a democracy, how do you explain this?

Anger in Baghdad as Americans finish wall

Last Updated: 2:04am BST 03/05/2007

American forces have completed construction of a concrete wall around the Baghdad district of Adhamiya despite protests from the Iraqi prime minister and local residents who claim that they are now at the mercy of militants. The wall was intended to help control the activities of militants in the predominantly Sunni Muslim district. But it remains a bastion of extremist al-Qa'eda linked groups. Parts of the district are so thick with armed militants that they are no-go zones to coalition forces.

Capt Mohammad Jasim, an Iraqi soldier manning a checkpoint on the Adhamiya bridge, said: "The Americans did not listen to us. We think this wall has made the area inside the wall more dangerous for people.

Um Doraid, a middle-aged housewife, said: "We here inside the wall are still as vulnerable as ever."

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Beneficial Indigenous Microbes

Most of the time bad news seems to dominate blog output. Here for a change is a good news story. Good old bacteria are being used by ordinary farmers to reduce their dependence on commercial pesticides and fertilisers. Sometimes experts are just way behind the times:
By learning how to cultivate microorganisms, growers become able to meet their needs with what exists on the farm and can stop buying amendments from chemical companies (purveyors who, some might argue, are the real peddlers in modern farming). The technology was born of ingenuity, but it has spread by financial necessity, primarily among farmers in developing countries for whom agricultural chemicals are painfully expensive.
The tools of the trade are simple: A combination of sugar, vodka, milk, garlic, mango, rice and other easily available local products. The aim being to cultivate microorganisms in solutions that can be diluted and sprayed on compost to increase fermentation. They can also improve nutrient uptake by plants and reduce plant disease. Forget the old NPK formula, this stuff works and as any microbiologist will tell you, bacteria have been doing it for plants for a long time.



Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Secular Fundamentalist Turkeys