Wot Tossers

[darkeyes]

Last year as ya may or may not remember I had lil rant or 2 bout the government of the day.. in rolled nice Tory/Lib Dem coalition an Labour out on its arse for being divorced from reality, sleeze, ineptitude, economic mismanagement an of course coppin it for the banks rippin the goolies out of the British (an 2 listen to Cameron an co, the world's economy..)

Well... how things have changed in 10 months.. I would enjoy it if it wasnt so serious.. in fact do enjoy Tory and Lib/Dem discomfiture on a lotta things.. I do not however enjoy watching the heart and soul being ripped out of my country which is what is happening on almost every level.. oddly civil rights so far havent been touched too much.. but I reckon that is about 2 change as unions, students and ordinary people crank up for a summer of discontent over just about everything.. they had a lil warning last year over student fees... worse will come..

...and so on to foreign policy.. where they are making a right pigs ear in particular.. and here I have been heard guffawing loudly at extraordinary incompetence and insensitivity..

Now I know over the other side of the pond in general, where most on site come from, and the US in particular, couldn't give a tinker's cuss about we Brits, and have no interest whatsoever in our politics and what we do in the world, except for areas where we are allied and doing more or less what we are told and falling into line with the dictats from Washington.. but whether you have a like or dislike, a contempt or respect for what the UK is and does, recent British (Government) activity in the middle east... inept, insensitive, self interested and downright bloody shameful and grossly stupid to say the least.. butya do have to laugh.. its just a pity that the lives of human beings are at stake.. so funny it may be.. and we may laugh.. but in reality, funny haha it is not..

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/07/uk-libya-fumbling-in-desert?intcmp=239

[bimurray]

I can relate and sympathise. Much the same has happened here over the last decade, the same song and dance, just started a bit sooner here.
I recently read a book which placed the whole privatisation /financial upheaval in an understandable and, for me at least, a novel way. It's..." I.O.U.- Why Everyone Owes Everyone And No One Can Pay ", by John Lanchester. I'd recommend everyone give it a read and have your eyes opened. The first part, the explanation of the financial instruments /derivatives, I found pretty heavy going, but persevere! Once past that, things get very interesting, putting many recent trends in perspective. I found the reference to the British Rail privatisation particularly illuminating.

[NotLostJustWandering]

least.. butya do have to laugh.. its just a pity that the lives of human beings are at stake.. so funny it may be.. and we may laugh.. but in reality, funny haha it is not..

Well, it might not "really" be funny, but I am laughing my ass off right now!

"Once again Britain has misjudged the nature of what is unfolding in Libya. The mission came James Bond-style by helicopter and left more conventionally by ship."

GREAT article, Fran. Thanks so much for sharing. I'm sorry to report that some of the Bedouin here are actually buying Qadafi's line about the insurrection being something cooked up by foreign powers. This article is among the information I will be showing around to anyone who will listen.

[void()]

I can relate and sympathise. Much the same has happened here over the last decade, the same song and dance, just started a bit sooner here.
I recently read a book which placed the whole privatisation /financial upheaval in an understandable and, for me at least, a novel way. It's..." I.O.U.- Why Everyone Owes Everyone And No One Can Pay ", by John Lanchester. I'd recommend everyone give it a read and have your eyes opened. The first part, the explanation of the financial instruments /derivatives, I found pretty heavy going, but persevere! Once past that, things get very interesting, putting many recent trends in perspective. I found the reference to the British Rail privatisation particularly illuminating.

Often discussed between me and wife, "money is one idea the world ought just forget." We may not hold to Christianity but can recognize the wisdom of the verse saying money is the roots of all evils. But if money vanishes folks wouldn't know how to act. We have a few suggestions but keep them mostly private, to save hassle, ridicule and such. Not everyone can appreciate simplicity.

[NotLostJustWandering]

Often discussed between me and wife, "money is one idea the world ought just forget." We may not hold to Christianity but can recognize the wisdom of the verse saying money is the roots of all evils. But if money vanishes folks wouldn't know how to act. We have a few suggestions but keep them mostly private, to save hassle, ridicule and such. Not everyone can appreciate simplicity.

You're not alone, Voidie; I've long entertained the same fantasy. I think it would require a much simpler life. Afraid all these techno-toys would have to go.

[darkeyes]

I can relate and sympathise. Much the same has happened here over the last decade, the same song and dance, just started a bit sooner here.
I recently read a book which placed the whole privatisation /financial upheaval in an understandable and, for me at least, a novel way. It's..." I.O.U.- Why Everyone Owes Everyone And No One Can Pay ", by John Lanchester. I'd recommend everyone give it a read and have your eyes opened. The first part, the explanation of the financial instruments /derivatives, I found pretty heavy going, but persevere! Once past that, things get very interesting, putting many recent trends in perspective. I found the reference to the British Rail privatisation particularly illuminating.

It had been going on in my country throughout my lifetime, Murray. From the minute Margaret Thatcher entered office a few months before I was born, there has been a cultural, economic and social vandalism and a continuous movement to dismantle everything that made us who we are as a people. This destruction slowed slightly while Blair was in office, at least in social and cultural policy, if not in the economic, yet did not entirely cease.. with the election of Shiny Face Cameron and his alliance with Clegg, this has once again picked up speed and is now running at a rate of knots. Clegg and his Liberal Democrats are prepared to accept any Tory social and economic policy on the holy grail of electoral reform, and it is we the British people who pay the price. Once again everything is up for grabs, and everything is about money.. and everything is about making sure that those who have oodles of it, retain it and make even more..

[darkeyes]

Well, it might not "really" be funny, but I am laughing my ass off right now!

"Once again Britain has misjudged the nature of what is unfolding in Libya. The mission came James Bond-style by helicopter and left more conventionally by ship."

GREAT article, Fran. Thanks so much for sharing. I'm sorry to report that some of the Bedouin here are actually buying Qadafi's line about the insurrection being something cooked up by foreign powers. This article is among the information I will be showing around to anyone who will listen.

Since Obama, Cameron, Sarkozy and others are increasingly determined to involve Nato somehow, they may yet give truth to Gaddifi's claims... now that the insurrection is running into real trouble, western intervention at some level may yet tip the scales.. and so western intervention, for good or ill, may yet undermine the claims that Libya is an arab inspired and conducted revolution for arab people.