Oh dear. I bet Dan Brown can't believe his luck. Writes an unoriginal, formulaic novel and then goes on to world domination. A bit like JK Rowling.
Idiots that have read his tale have started going around vandalising listed buildings.
Hello! Wake up!! It's a work of fiction! Not real. Made up. Capiche? Not only that, it's just a tedious, pot-boiler version of Umberto Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum". Which, in turn, pays homage to Robert Anton Wilson's "Illuminatus! Trilogy". Both of these are, of course, essentially satires on conspiracies, but I presume that people that enjoy The Da Vinci Code don't "do" irony. Unless it's got a winky/smiley avatar at the end of each paragraph. Even worse, there are those who believe in the ludicrous Bronze Age fairy tale that all three of these stories allude to.
Right, I'm off to kick in the back of my wardrobe, to see if there's a magical mystery kingdom on the other side.
Saturday, August 26, 2006
Friday, August 25, 2006
Iran's Nuclear Capabilty
How the hell did Iran get hold of weapons-grade uranium? How did they set up and build their nuclear reactors?
Er, the Americans supplied it all.
Er, the Americans supplied it all.
One Rule For Us, Another Rule For Them...
Pffft. Another mockery of the English legal system.
What are the chances of a member of the public escaping with an absolute discharge?
And this is the day after this.
I'd hope that if I was stabbed in the neck and slashed across the face that the police might actually even take a statement or make some kind of contact with me...
What are the chances of a member of the public escaping with an absolute discharge?
And this is the day after this.
I'd hope that if I was stabbed in the neck and slashed across the face that the police might actually even take a statement or make some kind of contact with me...
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Satan's Trumpet: Cruising for a Losing
I felt compelled to write about tiny Tom Cruise getting fired for being a talentless mentalist, even in comparison with other L. Ron Hubbard lunatics, but thought you might as well take a look at Dave Satan's blog, instead.
Murder On The Dancefloor
The Nazis were, apparently, responsible for yet another reprehensible crime- they gave us Fatboy Slim.
At the very least, it goes some way to explain the chaos that is known as the Moseley Dance Centre.
At the very least, it goes some way to explain the chaos that is known as the Moseley Dance Centre.
Above My Tits
...always good to read a funny, well-written blog like this. It's a shame, because that's the kind of vibe I had originally intended for Jawdrop. Oh well.
Quotations For The Nations
I always enjoy reading decent quotes by the good, the bad, and the ugly - there are some on this blog to check out.
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Kola Boof
I love the internet. Osama Bin Laden polarises opinion, and it's fair to say that I'm most disappointed in him, now I know he likes Whitney Houston, Van Halen, Miami Vice, and MacGyver.
Kola should be applying for a scriptwriting job with The Simpsons, given her flair for inventive, biting satire.
Kola should be applying for a scriptwriting job with The Simpsons, given her flair for inventive, biting satire.
A Load Of Old Cock
I've been vegeterian for 16 years now, but I haven't got any inclination to encourage animal rights. In fact, I've been targeted by animal rights activists for no good reason. Thanks for that. We'd be better off sorting out human rights first, then developing a cheap cure for cancer, and then maybe worrying about how we treat other species. And I'm sure the SSPCA has got better things to do than promote censorship.
Ronglish TV
Enoch Powell and Ron Atkinson have a couple of things in common. Both are infamous for making racially charged comments, both have Midlands connections, and both have encouraged the employment of black people in England at a time when it was frowned upon.
Powell encouraged Commonwealth citizens to come to Britain and work in the NHS, and thus is partially responsible for the evolution of a Black British middle-class.
Big Ron revolutionised football by fielding "The Three Degrees" (Cyrille Regis, Brendon Batson & Laurie Cunningham) at West Bromich Albion, thus allowing a generation of Black British footballers to be employed, regardless of the level of melanin in their skin.
So it was with some vague interest that I watched Big Ron Manager last night. And what a corker. Absolute car-crash TV - essential viewing. Big Ron comes into a lower-league footy club to act as a troubleshooter.
Apparently Sky One had tried to set up the documentary with Iffy Onuora at Swindon Town but Iffy refused to continue with the programme after a month, due to perceived "interference" by Ron.
Next, they allegedly had to pay the chairman of Peterborough Utd, and mate of Big Ron, Barry Fry a £100k sweetener to take on the project.
There's an overview of the series (with spoliers, assuming you don't read the sports pages) in The Mirror.
It's so much better than viewing than the God-awful Excuse My French. Big Ron may have called Marcel Desailly "a fucking lazy, thick nigger", but at least he's fluently bilingual as a sports pundit, eh Ron?
Powell encouraged Commonwealth citizens to come to Britain and work in the NHS, and thus is partially responsible for the evolution of a Black British middle-class.
Big Ron revolutionised football by fielding "The Three Degrees" (Cyrille Regis, Brendon Batson & Laurie Cunningham) at West Bromich Albion, thus allowing a generation of Black British footballers to be employed, regardless of the level of melanin in their skin.
So it was with some vague interest that I watched Big Ron Manager last night. And what a corker. Absolute car-crash TV - essential viewing. Big Ron comes into a lower-league footy club to act as a troubleshooter.
Apparently Sky One had tried to set up the documentary with Iffy Onuora at Swindon Town but Iffy refused to continue with the programme after a month, due to perceived "interference" by Ron.
Next, they allegedly had to pay the chairman of Peterborough Utd, and mate of Big Ron, Barry Fry a £100k sweetener to take on the project.
There's an overview of the series (with spoliers, assuming you don't read the sports pages) in The Mirror.
It's so much better than viewing than the God-awful Excuse My French. Big Ron may have called Marcel Desailly "a fucking lazy, thick nigger", but at least he's fluently bilingual as a sports pundit, eh Ron?
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
More Rivers Of Blood, & Seats Of Comfort
Post-war, Enoch Powell became Tory MP for Wolverhampton South West, which incidentally meant that my beloved Molineux was in his constituency. Equally, indeed perhaps more importantly, he went on to display more progressive thinking.
Powell realised that the Cold War was just a sham, fabricated by America in their (ongoing) quest for world domination. The USSR was dependent on Western food supplies, and were never going to attack us. Hence, he knew that maintaining a nuclear deterrent was another pointless, illogical, unnecessary smokescreen. NATO was just a front, he inferred, for America to control Europe.
Later in his career, he rightly refused to be involved with the National Front, and when he became an Ulster Unionist MP, he refused to join the Orange Order - in your face, Ian Paisley! He went on to declare that it was not the IRA, but the CIA who had killed Lord Mountbatten, and that "MI6 and their friends" had committed multiple political assassinations in Northern Ireland.
As well as being a great learner- learning his 12th language aged 70, he was good friends with Tony Benn, a campaigner for homosexual law reform, and supported the abolition of the death penalty. He opposed British involvement in the 1990 Gulf War, remarking that "Saddam Hussein has a long way to go yet, before his troops come storming up the beaches of Kent or Sussex".
As an aside, I've actually got a chair from the Midland Hotel (don't worry, I haven't half-inched it, they were refurbishing). It might even be the one that Enoch used for his big speech. If you want to own this exciting piece of history, then let me know. Of course, there's no guarantee that his arse has actually rested on it.
Anyway, I didn't buy that signed book in the end, as I mentioned in my previous post. But I'm feeling pleased with myself now because of a guy called Dutch. I'd earmarked Elmore ("Dutch") Leonard as someone on my "must read soon" list. Took a quick look on Amazon, but they didn't have any of his works at a worthwhile discount. So I headed off to another cluster of charity shops in south Birmingham, on the offchance that they might have some. I ended up buying a bag-full of books, including Leonard's Freaky Deaky. Much to my delight, it was only £1.49 - and signed by the author - in your face, Amazon!
Maybe I'll do a sideline in autographed books and "seats of the famous". One day...
Powell realised that the Cold War was just a sham, fabricated by America in their (ongoing) quest for world domination. The USSR was dependent on Western food supplies, and were never going to attack us. Hence, he knew that maintaining a nuclear deterrent was another pointless, illogical, unnecessary smokescreen. NATO was just a front, he inferred, for America to control Europe.
Later in his career, he rightly refused to be involved with the National Front, and when he became an Ulster Unionist MP, he refused to join the Orange Order - in your face, Ian Paisley! He went on to declare that it was not the IRA, but the CIA who had killed Lord Mountbatten, and that "MI6 and their friends" had committed multiple political assassinations in Northern Ireland.
As well as being a great learner- learning his 12th language aged 70, he was good friends with Tony Benn, a campaigner for homosexual law reform, and supported the abolition of the death penalty. He opposed British involvement in the 1990 Gulf War, remarking that "Saddam Hussein has a long way to go yet, before his troops come storming up the beaches of Kent or Sussex".
As an aside, I've actually got a chair from the Midland Hotel (don't worry, I haven't half-inched it, they were refurbishing). It might even be the one that Enoch used for his big speech. If you want to own this exciting piece of history, then let me know. Of course, there's no guarantee that his arse has actually rested on it.
Anyway, I didn't buy that signed book in the end, as I mentioned in my previous post. But I'm feeling pleased with myself now because of a guy called Dutch. I'd earmarked Elmore ("Dutch") Leonard as someone on my "must read soon" list. Took a quick look on Amazon, but they didn't have any of his works at a worthwhile discount. So I headed off to another cluster of charity shops in south Birmingham, on the offchance that they might have some. I ended up buying a bag-full of books, including Leonard's Freaky Deaky. Much to my delight, it was only £1.49 - and signed by the author - in your face, Amazon!
Maybe I'll do a sideline in autographed books and "seats of the famous". One day...
Monday, August 21, 2006
A Rising Tide In The Rivers Of Blood
This story is about a guy called Dutch. But we're going to take a little detour first. I say little. It's more of a road trip. I remember about ten years ago, I was idling a nice day away in Dudley. Yes, that is possible, being an outlet for Batham's, the finest beer in the land, and hence in all of the world.
I was some know-it-all student punk, ambling around the town's cluster of charity shops. I found a book about Enoch Powell, signed by the man himself. I saw him as nothing more than a local celebrity fascist, and so didn't see much point in buying the book- these were the heady days before e-Bay and so forth, so I didn't feel compelled to make a fast buck on it.
Of course, charity shops are like jumble sales- it wasn't advertised as being autographed, because the staff didn't realise that it was.
Inevitably, I'm a little gutted, in hindsight. And, given that we now live in a authoritarian, right-wing state which masquerades as something different, perhaps it's time for me to revise my opinion on the Brummie polemicist.
Infamous for his "Rivers Of Blood" speech, the speech itself arose from the case of a Wolvehampton landlady who refused to rent out her spare room to blacks, depsite the high demand. He was against the introduction of the Race Relations Bill, rather than immigration, as he saw the proposal as a curtailment of freedom of expression. To quote him, "Like the Roman, I seem to see ‘the River Tiber foaming with much blood’".
This was, in fact, a reference to the civil rights unrest in the US, via a reference to Virgil. Standard Tory oratory, if not from an incredibly intelligent background.
Inevitably, though, intelligence isn't always a bedfellow of perception, but I'm surprised that I agree with a lot of his opinions. He was furious with Britain's attempts to appease the Nazis, seeing it as a betrayal of British interests. He was also quick to realise that Russia would end up as a key ally with Britain.
During the war, he came to the conclusion that America had plans to dismantle the Britsh Empire and become the dominant superpower- "I see growing on the horizon the greater peril than Germany or Japan ever were...our terrible enemy, America."
Part 2 coming tomorrow....
I was some know-it-all student punk, ambling around the town's cluster of charity shops. I found a book about Enoch Powell, signed by the man himself. I saw him as nothing more than a local celebrity fascist, and so didn't see much point in buying the book- these were the heady days before e-Bay and so forth, so I didn't feel compelled to make a fast buck on it.
Of course, charity shops are like jumble sales- it wasn't advertised as being autographed, because the staff didn't realise that it was.
Inevitably, I'm a little gutted, in hindsight. And, given that we now live in a authoritarian, right-wing state which masquerades as something different, perhaps it's time for me to revise my opinion on the Brummie polemicist.
Infamous for his "Rivers Of Blood" speech, the speech itself arose from the case of a Wolvehampton landlady who refused to rent out her spare room to blacks, depsite the high demand. He was against the introduction of the Race Relations Bill, rather than immigration, as he saw the proposal as a curtailment of freedom of expression. To quote him, "Like the Roman, I seem to see ‘the River Tiber foaming with much blood’".
This was, in fact, a reference to the civil rights unrest in the US, via a reference to Virgil. Standard Tory oratory, if not from an incredibly intelligent background.
Inevitably, though, intelligence isn't always a bedfellow of perception, but I'm surprised that I agree with a lot of his opinions. He was furious with Britain's attempts to appease the Nazis, seeing it as a betrayal of British interests. He was also quick to realise that Russia would end up as a key ally with Britain.
During the war, he came to the conclusion that America had plans to dismantle the Britsh Empire and become the dominant superpower- "I see growing on the horizon the greater peril than Germany or Japan ever were...our terrible enemy, America."
Part 2 coming tomorrow....
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