Airstrip One

40 days ago

As Record A level Grades are announced in Airstrip One the Ministry of Truth reminds us that there is no grade inflation

The chart below is, the Ministry of Truth reminds us, testimony to the hard work of teachers and students alike. Suggestions that we have seen massive grade inflation since results were driven not by kids actually sitting exams but by teacher assessment are vicious lies spread by Emmanuel Goldstein. Thanks to Big Brother more and more of our young people will win more and more prizes for educational excellence.

54 days ago

Photo from back in Wales - sheltering from a Thunderstorm

Not Byron and Cam Hobhouse in Zitsa but cats Sian and Quincey back in Wales and snapped by a kind friend who went round to talk to them. No doubt someone in Holt will be dobbing them in on the village facebook group for non mask wearing and a failure to social distance. These cats are what i miss most about life back in Blighty which tells you a lot about how Airstrip One appears from abroad right now.

56 days ago

The mask jihadis of Holt insist that I hate this entire village near Wrexham – I am their Emmanuel Goldstein

I should stress that there are few out and out loons in the village of Holt in which I live when not here in Greece. But, as there are in every village in England and Wales, there are some and the covid scandemic has allowed such souls to flourish showing virtue as they boast of wearing masks in the bath and tut tutting at anyone who dares question the cult. As I did yesterday with my “modest proposal.”

89 days ago

So the Trump supporters handed out flyers on campus with named photos of academics and a cartoon of a woman holding a gun

Alt-right bastards screamed the liberal left, this is an incitement to violence. The students responsible must be chucked out of the University, this is a threat to free speech. You can just feel the outrage, the self-righteous anger, the calls to ruin the careers of the young folk responsible, the BBC and the Guardian jerking off as more alt-right hate is exposed and they can somehow say all Trump voters are guilty by association. You know the story… except…

96 days ago

Tom Winnifrith Bearcast: Paul Atherley do you really think this EU fake news will help you pull young women, even in Islington?

I start with the 4 week delay to what is laughably called Freedom Day here in Airstrip One. It makes me so angry as there is no justification for it. Next up more woke nonsense from Pensana (PRE), before a look at Colin Bird’s quartet of mining juniors and asking if it is worth the risk? Finally Tavistock Investments (TAVI) – too good to be true?

102 days ago

Woman says women have vaginas - found NOT Guilty of hate crime

Cripes next up in Airstrip One a man who said 2+2 = 4 will also escape punishment as will the chap who opined that day follows night. What a world we live in. The “crime” of Lisa Keogh which saw her suspended by Abertay University in Scotland was stating what is, or should be, an undisputed fact. But in this mad world of trans rights, apparently some women have penises. Whatever. What should be the subject of a full enquiry is why this poor woman was put through the ordeal in the first place. Those who instigated it have no place in academia, a world which once cherished free expression.

127 days ago

The Envy of the fecking world, the NHS, reckons men can get pregnant...another round of applause needed

It seems that it is not just in the socialist hell hole that is Canada but also in the work bureaucracies of the UK public sector where folks push biological lies in order to pander to sensitive trans snowflakes. On a day when we hear that Lisa Keogh, a student at a Scottish University Abertay in Dundee, faces possible expulsion for stating that women have vaginas and those born men are, ceteris paribus, stronger than those born with vaginas, both hard proven biological facts, East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust shows us how to behave. In East Lancs, it is not just women who get pregnant, anyone can.

250 days ago

Feck off Boris Johnson, Feck off Mark Drakeford: Birthday photo article of the Winnifrith multi-crime family

It is my birthday so the entire family became a criminal family to celebrate. I reckon it was five crimes under the new lockdown laws and with the Orwellian North Wales Police and the Orwellian West Mercia rozzers to cope with it, it is lucky we were not all arrested and deported to Australia. In order we:

265 days ago

Protect The NHS – Do not leave your house in England & Wales today under any circumstances ahead of Bella

There may be ice on the road and pavements today or even snow as Bella sweeps the country. You may slip. You might hurt yourself. Your car may skid. You may be injured. It is vital that we all protect the NHS by agreeing to 24 hours of house arrest. Surely, even though ICU bed usage across the country is at lower levels than it was this time last year, such a National clampdown ahead of a  dose of global warming, is the logical extension of the policies of bonkers Boris, the little twit Matt Hancock and Mad Mark Drakeford since March.

328 days ago

Tampax - of course men have periods, whatever you say you woke cretins

Of course folks born as men will start having periods when they start to identify as women. That is fine if you want to believe that but please do not tell me it is a fact, as Tampax does. Because it is not something that has happened. It is a lie.

371 days ago

I despair for my profession of journalism - meet Ramsha Khan

I bring you the tweet below from Ms Ramsha Khan, which fills me with utter despair for the vocation of journalism.

422 days ago

Debate is hatred - Alt Left MP Nadia Whittome wants to trample on free speech

Nadia Whittome MP is an uber woke member of the Alt Left, who today has waded into bat for the rights of the trans community. She offers up a terrifying vision of the Orwellian state she wishes to create.

462 days ago

First they came for the statues, then they came for the comedians, now the book burning has started...

Last week started with the woke mob coming for the statues. Often they got the wrong guy, as in this case, but we live in a post fact era. Then they came for the comedians. I had thought that the book burnings would not get underway for a fortnight or so but, as ever, the inolerance of the Marxist Madrassas formerly known as British Universities continues to be world leading.

467 days ago

Who is going to tell Sadiq Khan that 1984 was a warning not a blueprint?

In stab City, the lawless moral cesspit that is the capital of Airstrip One, hapless Mayor Sadiq Khan has waded into the slavery row with predictable vigour.

507 days ago

What will the increasingly authoritarian Police crack down on next? Norfolk plod and the death mask wearer

The Coronavirus crisis here in Airstrip One has given elements of the Old Bill license to act in an increasingly authoritarian manner. Often asistsed by a GroupThink mob keen to snitch on their neighbours to enforce house arrest, sorry lockdown we see Journalists pulled over for filming nothing at all. Citizens are warned for sitting on a park bench or playing soccer in their own garden. And now from Norfolk a new insanity.

939 days ago

Twitter shows in does not believe in free speech if you dare to challenge the liberal orthodoxy

The thread below is self explanatory. George Orwell would be proud of twitter. Greetings from Airstrip One...

1135 days ago

Welcome to Airstrip One - cartoon on free speech in the UK today

Hat tip to the IEA which tweeted this out yesterday.

1210 days ago

The man in jail since Friday who we cant name but you all know - reasons for us all to be fearful

Since Friday a young man, whose name you must all know by now, has been languishing in prison in very real danger of being attacked by his fellow inmates. I cannot say who he is because the Judge who sent him down for thirteen months has imposed draconian reporting restrictions. But you all know his name - it is all over social media and a video of his arrest has been watched 1.5 million times on youtube already.

1272 days ago

No Hannah Winterbourne you have not always been a woman you used to have a penis

The Sun Newspaper stands accused of transphobia for running a story about a man who used to be a woman marrying a woman who used to be a man. Hannah Winterbourne, a soldier, who is the bride says the story is untrue because she has always been a woman and her husband always been a man. I guess this is a timely refresher on the Orwellian world of 1984. You see I use Oldspeak..

1276 days ago

Boris Johnson may sound like an intellectual (sometimes) but his #Russia2018 #Berlin1936 comments are those of a clown

He gets a tough question and the man sacked as a journalist for making up a quote but who is now our Foreign Secretary replies in Latin with an apposite quote from Tacitus and we are all supposed to think how jolly clever is Boris. But then he says the dumbest of things...

1484 days ago

We live in utterly Orwellian Times - I am moved to despair

My father and I chat every day about urgent matters such as the GCSE's of my uber smug daughter Olaf and less critical matters such as how the world is going to pot. Being keen on history my father is a big supporter of General Lee statues noting that - unlike say George Washington - Lee opposed and hated slavery. He also opposed the secession of the South and agreed only to join its army as he wished to stand shoulder to shoulder with his fellow Virginians.

1497 days ago

Its that time of the year again - don't bash hard working students and teachers say left wing women who look like hippos

There is a change to the annual ritual. For about thirty years A level grades got steadily higher. Those of us who had to interview those with A*s at History who thought that Waterloo was a train station named after an Abba song knew that was because they were getting easier but when pointing this out were ritually abused as insulting hard working students and teachers who were so stressed out that they need 15 weeks holiday a year. This year the ritual is being tweaked.

1534 days ago

To our shame, being racist in 2017 Britain is acceptable as long as its the Jews you hate: Ebrahim Bham speaks tomorrow

Following on from the "Jews caused Grenfell Tower" Al Quds day march you would have thought that the British Authorities might try to put a temporary ban on public demonstrations of overt Jew hating. Oh no. This form of racism appears to be perfectly acceptable in Britain today. Is it any wonder that across Western Europe Jews are packing up and heading to the one place they feel safe, the only democracy in the Middle East: Israel?

1807 days ago

Tom Winnifrith Postcard: This is 1984 and here in Airstrip One we are being lied to about Syria on a monumental scale

From start to finish we in Britain and the USA have been lied to about what is happening in Syria. The past week's coverage of Aleppo has been the worst example of this. I am not saying President Assad is a saint. far from it. But you are being lied to by our leaders and a pliant media on a monumental scale as the West plays a dangerous and immoral game.

1888 days ago

The Jury said not guilty but the Police can now get a man labelled as a sex offender anyway

Truly life in Airstrip One gets more terrifying each day. Moving on from the Orwellian antics of PC Plod in Nottinghamshire described earlier, we now discover how the filth in North Yorkshire are dealing with those found innocent by juries who they don't like. Meet the man who needs Police permission, 24 hours in advance, to have sex.

1905 days ago

An evening that was a farewell to Kambos until December

Lovely Eleni's Kourounis taverna has still not reopened. But the hardcore clientele led by Nicho the communist and Vangelis in his pink shirt still sit resolutely on its outside tables, using its internet link and chatting with the wider Eleni family. Rather naughtily I have discovered that I can use the Kourounis wi-fi while sitting in Miranda's next door and did that as i tucked into a last meal of Mani sausage and courgettes.

And then I said farewell to Miranda explaining, in Greek, that I was going to England tomorrow. Yes you heard that correctly I spoke a few words of fucking Greek. And then back to Elenis where I explained why I was leaving. I showed them all the picture of the Mrs at Mistras and they understood...

Vangelis talked of drinking.

2407 days ago

Blocking someone on twitter is NOT free speech denial

Anyone can set up a twitter account in minutes. And once on twitter you can shout out to the world what you want. Of course if you call a Police Horse gay, tweet a burning poppy or insult David Cameron the Old Bill might feel your collar if you happen to live in Airstrip One. But if your sole purpose is to insult non-celebs (i.e. Tom Winnifrith, rather than Tom Daley) you can tweet pretty much what you please.

And so it should be. I support free speech to the hilt. Some of the interventions by the Old Bill are disgraceful, a matter I have highlighted here before.

But free speech does not mean that I have to read what folks tweet.

2762 days ago

Lee Rigby’s Killers – The Circus Fills Me with Contempt for (nearly) all

So Michael Adebolajo will spent the rest of his life in prison while Michael Adebowale will spent 45 years inside and be out at 67. The sentencing of the vile butchers of Sergeant Lee Rigby was a circus which fills me with contempt for (nearly) all concerned. 

I exempt from the contempt the family of Lee Rigby. They have every right to express their anger in whatever way they feel. 

Outside the court the Nazis of the BNP erected a mock noose. Would they have done so had the killers been white? Had this been a less high profile religion inspired butchering – perhaps of a white killer of an Asian would the sort of folk who normally appear on the Jeremy Kyle show have been marching? I doubt it. We shall turn to the matter of a suitable penalty later but the BNP’s gesture was a populist one which does nothing to make this country a better place. 

The defence lawyers, paid for with taxpayer’s cash argued for softer sentences as we should not make martyrs of the killers. As they head back to plus residences in places where this sort of crime is not really an issue I hope they realise the stupidity of their claims.  Certain elements of young Britons will become radicalised Islamofascist killers whatever happened in Court today. That is just a sad fact of life in Airstrip One today.

To the dismay of the silly liberal lawyers,

2764 days ago

The New Media Thought Police March once again in Margate, Kent.

Once again the fascist bully boys of the Kent Police are stamping out on new media thought crime. This force has “form” when it comes to Orwellian oppression of thought crime but in Margate this week they have surpassed themselves. 

In the sleepy seaside town there is a plan to build a new Tesco. As ever in such matters, opinion is divided. The plebs want cheap turkey twizzlers and jobs and so are in favour. The middle classes fear that the small stores where they pay over the odds for their sundried Tuscan tomatoes may be shut down and so are against. Such was the debate in my parents’ home town of Shipston last year where my deluded lefty father and step-mother were naturally wanting to screw the poor along with their fellow Guardian readers who, for once, stood firm alongside Nimby Tory Toffs. Sadly this unholy alliance prevailed and so the shops where they buy their quail has been saved while the folks on the Council Estates are deprived of both consumer choice and jobs. Chianti’s all round.

Over in Margate battle lines are similar

2970 days ago

Do you have an ashtray? Er…

It was late in the evening at Real Man Pizza in Clerkenwell and another hectic day at our quirky Celtic Italian restaurant was drawing to a close when this couple wandered in. They ordered and then asked if they could sit outside. Sure – no problem. And then the bloke asked for an ashtray!

How very European. When the smoking ban came in we, like all bars and restaurants, got rid of our ashtrays. Keeping hold of them would in today’s puritan climate be like stashing hard corn porn behind the counter. I may be a smoker but I have to accept that I am a filthy, disgusting human being guilty of the greatest crime on this planet.

And so when folks smoke outside Real Man they just drop the butts on the pavement. Camden Council pisses away thousands of quid a week sending round vans with posters saying that if you drop a butt on the street you can get fined £80 or whatever but that is what folks do. Because in Aitstrip One ashtrays are just another relic of the 20^th century.

2996 days ago

John Inverdale, Women’s Tennis and the disappearing lesbians

Like most folk with the exception of Steve Moore I have zero interest in watching Tennis. If I can summon up the energy the men’s game has more power and skill and is what I would watch if forced. The women’s game? If most of us (men) are honest we watch it if a good looking bird is playing. Even then our attention span is limited.

And that brings me to Ann Jones and the lesbians but first to John Inverdale (the laddish TV presenter) who is in the soup for stating about the new ladies champion:

3025 days ago

Now the UK Government wants to ban the press from reporting on how it helped the US spy on UK citizens

The British Government is threatening journalists with jail if they report on how the British Government helped the US Government to spy on you and me – innocent British citizens. Oh, and it has also threatened journalists with jail if they report on the fact that they are being threatened with jail.  1984 in Airstrip One – this is surreal. And terrifying.

The background is that it emerged last week that the US PRISM programme where US intelligence services snooped (illegally) on millions of emails, Facebook postings, etc. of ordinary US citizens actually operated in the UK too thanks to the folk at GCHQ.

President Obama thinks it is okay to snoop on anyone in the interests of National Security. But under this administration other Government agencies have been used for expressly political purposes. The IRS (the US taxman) has been shown to have explicitly targeted and abused those folk who contributed to Republican and Right Wing groups. Do I trust a State agency to always act fairly? Never. Do I trust one under Obama’s stewardship? Never, never, never.

What is chilling is that the same sort of abuse is going on in the UK. And the Government is doing its utmost to stop you finding out about it. While GCHQ is set to report to MPs as soon as next week on what it did do I trust a criminal to report on himself? So far it has been the much maligned press making all the running.

And that brings me to June 7^th when the British Defence Ministry press advisory committee, reacting to a flurry of revelations in the American press about massive warrantless US government electronic surveillance programs, warned UK organizations Friday not to publish British national security information.

Defiance of the June 7^th “DA-Notice” could make British journalists vulnerable to prosecution under the Official Secrets Act.  And it gets better – that DA notice was itself marked confidential and so revealing its existence is a breach of the Official Secrets Act.

The DA-Notice accepted that the U.S. National Security Agency was indeed working with spooks in the UK but said that our spooks are worried about revelations of their involvement. Too frigging right. They should be worried. This is a scandal and another sprint down the road to 1984 here in Airstrip One.

 The DA Notice states:

"There have been a number of articles recently in connection with some of the ways in which the UK Intelligence Services obtain information from foreign sources," said the notice issued by the Defence Advisory Committee, a joint body with media organizations.

"Although none of these recent articles has contravened any of the guidelines contained within the Defence Advisory Notice System, the intelligence services are concerned that further developments of this same theme may begin to jeopardize both national security and possibly UK personnel," it said.

The notice is marked "Private and Confidential: Not for publication, broadcast or use on social media."  

Well this blog is anti-social media.  If the spooks want to arrest me I have just sent an email to myself marked Barack Obama is a c*** which has details of where I shall be this weekend.; No doubt they can hack into gmail and find out where to get me.

3030 days ago

Weekly Video Postcard Number 35

Recorded on the occasion of the first anniversary of this site, a day when it attracted a record 42,020 page impressions, this is a short message of thanks but also on one of my big themes of the past twelve months: free speech and the increasingly Orwellian nature of Britain

I start with the Downing Street affair and what it says about how the establishment want certain information kept within the political classes and the “bubble.”  I do not care who shagged who but I care that “they all know” and are using taxpayers cash to stop “us” knowing. They will fail.

I move onto Secret Courts and the way the Police are used to clamp down on freedom of expression in Airstrip One.

Thank you for watching.

My weekly financial video postcard appears on Shareprophets.com here

3038 days ago

Bang her up – the 86 year old cheese maker & the Old Bill

For once it is not Kent Police who stand accused of being Fascist morons in Airstrip One. It is the Gloucestershire Old Bill, the force which failed to capture serial killer Fred West for so many years. But fear not citizens of Gloucester when it comes to real villains your boys in blue are on the ball.

Diana Smart is an 86 year old maker of cheeses. She makes the 3lb Double Gloucester cheeses that are rolled down Cooper’s Hill Gloucester in an annual ritual dating back to the 19^th century.

But the Old Bill do not approve. ‘elf n safey and all that. You see there has not be an official organiser since 2009 so what happens if someone attending the event of their own volition gets hit by a runaway cheese? Who to prosecute? Of course. The cheese maker. And so this poor old granny has been duly warned.

Jeepers. How about just putting up a sign saying “You attend the cheese roll at your own risk and if you are knocked over by a cheese, trip over a daisy, etc it is your own look out. There will be no Policeman on duty as they will all be attending a diversity awareness course, oops I meant to say out catching villains.”

3098 days ago

Serious question: When did global warming become climate change?

I often feel like I am in 1984. “We are at war with Eastasia. We've always been at war with Eastasia.” And so I am asked to believe that the loons have always told us that man-made emissions cause climate change. They have always said that they caused climate change.

I do not recollect it being that way. I am sure that in the early years of this scare we were told that man-made carbon emissions caused global warming.  And that there was a proven link and Big Brother reminded us that 99% of scientists told us that the world was going to get much warmer unless we changed our ways, handing over more of our money and liberties to the State.

But the world has, as we know, not got warmer since 1997. In fact it appears to be a tad cooler. Certainly it is frigging cold where I am here in Airstrip One.  And so this, we are now told, is clear evidence of climate change. 

Except that, again in my dim and distant memory, I remember it snowing in March and indeed on my sister’s birthday in April back in the era before Big Brother told us all that we were suffering from global warming. Ooops. “We are suffering from climate change, we have always been suffering from climate change, we were never suffering global warming.” Silly me. Off to room 101 for TW.

So a serious question from me, answers in the comments section below: “When did the loons stop officially referring to global warming and start referring to climate change?”

3106 days ago

The Death of Freedom, I am hacked off with Airstrip One – but am I covered? Is Guido covered?

Yesterday David Cameron climbed down and agreed to the demands of Labour, the Lib Dems and Hacked off Campaigners like Hugh Grant (who was not at the time getting a blow job from a roadside hooker) and has agreed to State regulation of the press. Indeed it is worse than that since the new body set up will also cover anyone who publishes news related information in the UK. So that might get my Dad involved. The Shipston on Stour Parish newsletter is within the scope of this new legislation and should my father wish to moralise about the domestic arrangements of local celebs Tessa Jowell MP and David Mills, now happy reconciled as of one week after she stepped down from front line politics, Jowell could in theory report my poor father to the new regulator. And any blog is potentially within this remit if its primary discussion matter is news related – which includes celebs and hookers.
The press were not involved in agreeing the new Royal Charter and oppose it. But most big news organisations will eventually sign up to the code although the Telegraph appears to be. If you do not and the political stooges who manage it find you have breached you could face company destroying damages. And as things stand you may have to pay damages if you are hauled before the new body and found innocent.

This is therefore a fundamental assault not just on the press but on free speech.

It is a sad day. It will make it easier for the same MPs who have pushed through this legislation to lie, cheat and steal. It will make it easier for celebs to portray one image and get you to buy their merchandise while doing whatever they wish on the side. It will make it less likely that the crimes of future Jimmy Savile’s, expense fiddling MPs, hooker using politicians (Archer) or celebs (Grant) will be exposed. It truly marks an acceleration towards the world of Airstrip One.

However,

3107 days ago

A free press will today be killed by a corrupt elite – but freedom will thrive online

Today the three party leaders will sit down and agree to ever tighter controls on the press. Assuming that he is not getting a blow job from a hooker at the time, Hugh Grant will then invoke the name of Milly Dowler and a 300 year tradition of a free press will draw to a close.

If you trust your politicians to behave with honesty and integrity that is perhaps fine. If you are happy for celebs like Grant to give you the hard sell on their latest movies or useless designer products without knowing why their public image is a sham that is again fine. If you are happy for scandals involving taxpayers cash being wasted, paedophile rings run within local councils and at the BBC to stay hidden and protected, then that is fine.

I suspect that none of us are happy that scandal and corruption will now become harder to expose. I am not.

The established press has done itself no favours. Phone hacking was a disgrace. It was also illegal under existing laws. There is no need for a new law to (in due course) get the collar of Piers Moron and others felt. And the press/Westminster cosy club

3108 days ago

Bethan Tichborne Deluded Lefty – but (ref Voltaire) I stand with you so: David Cameron you have blood your hands

Bethan Tichborne is a prize deluded lefty. This 28 year old attended a demonstration in Oxfordshire against Call Me Dave and the wiucked Tory cuts (i.e. public spending going up) and carried a placard which stated that Cameron had “blood in his hands” for cutting spending on folks with disabilities. She appears to have shouted the same message to Dave.

And she has now been accused and found guilty of using threatening words or behaviour likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress. Judge Tim Pattinson said when convicted Bethan that her comments that Cameron "had blood on his hands" could "hardly be more insulting to anyone, whether a politician or not".

Bethan also tried to climb a barrier at which point the Police allegedly beat her up. I shall take that one with a pinch of salt.

Bethan and I disagree violently on cutting benefits. I do not think Call Me Dave has blood on his hands on this count. Bethan is wrong. But, on the Voltaire principle I also believe in free speech and it is quite disgraceful that she was arrested, charged and convicted for making a politically motivated comment. I am not sure where Bethan stands on the Iraq war but I believe that for that Tony Blair certainly has blood on his hands for that episode. In a free society we have to be allowed to make such comments.

The case of Bethan Tichborne suggests that life in Airstrip One is ever less free.

Just to make my point I shall tweet this article to David Cameron. @David_Cameron – Mr Cameron you have blood on your hands. PS you are a spineless and hopeless Prime Minister to boot. Bring back Maggie.

3112 days ago

It is National No Smoking day in Airstrip One – Light up in Solidarity

Last week was International wimmins day, next week is International smelly, bearded, jobless and selfish cyclists day and today is National No Smoking Day. The common thread: it is the State (or State’s getting together) telling you what to do and who to idolise and who to demonise. I regard the whole exercise as a costly piece of thought control and would scrap all these days. If we have to have them how about “Hard working taxpayer’s day,” “International never claimed a cent in welfare day”, “National entrepreneurs, job and wealth creators day.”

Sorry big brother you were right all along. I will learn what I should put into my body and shall lambast myself for being a heterosexual, hard working, tax paying and generating white male. I am ashamed of all of the above.

Smoking is a filthy habit. I will quit one day. But I shall do so when I want to not when a state that discourages me only slightly from drinking does not discourage me at all from smoking pot, runs limited campaigns pointing out the dire health implications of having unprotected anal sex in bathhouses bashes me yet again ( with taxpayers cash) about the fact that I smoke cigarettes. This is the one day of the year that you can guarantee that I shall not quit smoking.

In solidarity, all non-smokers should scrounge a fag off a smoker today to have just one drag. It won’t kill you but it is the suitable two fingers to nanny state. I could go on but I am off for a cigarette.

3115 days ago

Secret Courts an illiberal abomination – what is Nick Clegg thinking of?

I am not sure what the Lib Dems are meant to stand for these days and in a couple of years’ time they will be an electoral irrelevancy anyway. But I always thought that a party with the word Liberal in its name might have some sort of core beliefs in the liberty of the citizen against an all-powerful state. Unless I have read my John Stuart Mill very incorrectly I think that should be the case.

However, under current plans which the Lib Dems in parliament have largely supported, the law will change to extend secret hearings across the civil justice system. In a secret hearing defendants or claimants will not be allowed to be present, know or challenge the case against them and must be represented by a security-cleared special advocate, rather than their own lawyer. Right now these procedures are used in tiny numbers of immigration and deportation hearings, but the Government wants to extend them across the civil courts in cases deemed to involve national security.

Now, I am sure you can spot the flaw in this proposal. It is the State that decides when the security of the State is threatened. In a country where burning a poppy on twitter and where calling a police horse “gay” have both been deemed by the State to be offences, I simply do not trust the State.

That may trivialise the point. What about the whistleblower? The David Kelly figure. As the law stands now he is just murdered in the woods, sorry I meant allowed a public trial if charged. But as the law may stand in future someone who exposed how a crazed leader started an illegal war with a pack of lies about Weapons of Mass Destruction

3233 days ago

The Kent Police are Fascists – arrest me too ( I have not burned any poppies)

Kent Police have arrested a man for posting a picture of a burning poppy on twitter. This is fascism. It is not what folks died to protect in World War Two. It is not justifiable and if Kent Police wish to arrest me as well for calling them Fascists I shall be at 91-95 Clerkenwell Road, London EC1r 5BX on Wednesday at noon. I shall see you then.

The Fascists, sorry Kent Police force, released an official statement saying that the man, from Aylesham, was detained on Sunday night on suspicion of making malicious telecommunications and that he was in custody awaiting interview.

You will note that burning a poppy, though distasteful, is not illegal.

3244 days ago

Post Ken Clarke Prison Service Newspeak in Airstrip One

Figures out today show that Ken Clarke’s sentencing reforms will mean fewer criminals going to prison. No surprises there. Predictably this has not gone well anywhere, except in what we should probably refer to as the “criminal community.” Soft on crime, soft on the causes of crime. That was Ken Clarke. But this is not about bashing the old Euro-loon. It is the comments from the Ministry of Justice about this which are the real hoot. A true exercise in Orwellian Newspeak.

3244 days ago

Trenton Oldfield – a Pussy Riot case back in Airstrip One

Almost everyone outside Moscow agrees that the jailing of the incredibly untalented Russian all girl punk band Pussy Riot for producing music (I use the term loosely) that attacked President Putin and the Orthodox Church was wrong. No arguments there. But arguably back here in Airstrip One we are guilty of the same sort of behaviour. I refer to Trenton Oldfield, the Aussie born dickhead who swam in from of the eights to disrupt the 158th Oxford Cambridge boat race. I do not agree with what he did but a six month jail sentence raises alarming issues.

Oldfield was protesting against elitism. Having read his political views I disagree with almost all of them. He is a moronic middle class lefty and he deserves to be punished for an idiotic act. But six months?

3297 days ago

Big Brother will watch you as never before - the evil Communications Data bill

I sense that I am a bit off the pace here but I have only just twigged that David Cameron is attempting to pass the most illiberal piece of legislation in British history. Indeed, The Communications Data Bill is the sort of fascist measure that East Germany’s Stasi would have found of great interest.

3297 days ago

What is it with Network Rail and daft signs?

I noted upon my return to Airstrip One, the obsession of Network Rail with bossy signs. But there are also the pointless ones that litter the stations, as if they breed like some genetically modified rabbit. And thus walking into a mainline station in London I am informed by a specially erected sign “There have been 13 accidents on this escalator in the past 3 months.” Unlucky for some I guess.

But how do you define an accident?

3314 days ago

56% of British Shoppers are Mad or Pathetic or Both

A survey by Which reveals that 56% of English and Scottish shoppers want supermarkets to charge 5p per plastic bag sold in order to discourage us all from using too many plastic bags. The average shopper users 120 plastic bags a year and supermarkets hand out 8 billion bags a year. Bags cost more or less nothing for a supermarket to order in bulk.

So what this survey says is that 56% of Britons would like to boost the profits of the big supermarkets by around £400 million a year by each handing over £6 a year. Admittedly