Defence Cuts and Libya

I have looked around everywhere for a post or article on this topic; the SDSR with regards to Libya. It seems that people are avoiding this topic like the plague, perhaps because it is monumentally obvious that if we are going to play any part in military action against Libya then we simply cannot go ahead with certain parts of the SDSR. It simply is not possible, why I will explain in a few minutes. First consider in full, again, the cuts as envisaged in the SDSR courtesy of Wikipedia.

British Army

• Challenger 2 tanks will be cut by 40%.
• The British Army presence in Germany will end by 2020.
• Overall personnel numbers will drop by 7,000 to 95,500.
• The number of Challenger 2 tanks will be cut by 40% to an estimated number of just over 200.
• The number of AS-90 heavy artillery will be cut by 35%to an estimated 87.

Royal Air Force

• The Harrier will be retired in order to maintain the Tornado as the RAF's main strike aircraft until the Typhoon matures. The latter and the F-35 Lightning II will constitute the RAF's fast jet fleet in the future.
• Personnel will be reduced by 5,000 to 33,000.
• Nimrod MRA4 project, after spending £3.2 billion and the first aircraft being completed, to be scrapped. RAF Kinloss, where the aircraft were to be based, will close.
• Future Strategic Tanker Aircraft procurement will go ahead, as will the Airbus A400M. These aircraft, along with the current C-17s, will form the future air transport fleet. The VC10 and TriStars are approaching the end of their service lives and the C-130 fleet will be retired 10 years earlier than planned.
• 12 Boeing Chinooks will be added to the current fleet, a cut to the original order for 22.
• The Harrier GR9 will be withdrawn during 2011.
• The RAF's future fast jet fleet will be based on the Typhoon and the F-35 Lightning II. The latter, which will also be flown by the Royal Navy, will be the more capable and cheaper F-35C version. The UK has originally planned to buy the F-35B, a Short Take Off and Vertical Landing aircraft. The F-35C has longer range, greater payload capability and the MOD envisages life cycle costs to be 25% cheaper than the F-35B.
• The Sentinel R1 will be retired once it is no longer required to support forces in Afghanistan.

Royal Navy

• The Royal Navy flagship aircraft carrier, HMS Ark Royal, will be decommissioned "almost immediately" rather than in 2014. The Joint Force Harrier aircraft will be retired. Both of these measures will save money for the purchase of the Queen Elizabeth class aircraft carriers.
• One of the Albion class landing platform dock ships will be placed at extended readiness.
• Either HMS Ocean or HMS Illustrious to be decommissioned, whichever is least capable as a helicopter carrier.This was decided in December 2010, Liam Fox stated "HMS Ocean should be retained to provide our landing platform helicopter capability for the longer term. HMS Illustrious will be withdrawn from service in 2014".
• One of the Bay class landing ship dock vessels (later identified as RFA Largs Bay) would be decommissioned.
• Replacement of the UK's nuclear deterrent, based on the Vanguard class ballistic missile submarines, will be delayed by four years, deferring £500 million in spending. Changes to the size of the missile tubes will save £250 million.
• 7 Astute class submarines will be built as previously planned.
• The surface fleet of frigates and destroyers will be reduced to nineteen ships; the current thirteen Type 23 frigates, the three active Type 45 destroyers, and the three Type 45 destroyers currently under construction. The remaining Type 22 frigates and Type 42 destroyers are to be disposed of. "As soon as possible after 2020", the Type 23 frigates will be replaced by new Type 26 frigates.
• The strength of the RN will be reduced by 5,000 (to a total of about 30,000)

And that is it, few might wonder why we even bother having an armed force when there is no one in it, not our politicians of course they do not wonder any such sensible thoughts.

What is currently being planned to stop Gaddafi going all 15th century on his people, is to impose a no-fly zone. What is this? A no-fly zone is a territory over which aircraft are not permitted to fly. Such zones are usually set up in a military context, somewhat like a demilitarized zone in the sky.

Now the Geography of Libya is somewhat arduous if we are to contemplate using post-SDSR resources to corner Gaddafi. As you will see from the map on the left, Libya is not exactly surrounded by tea-loving cricket monkeys; Tunisia, Algeria, Niger, Chad, Sudan and Egypt are not our best international allies bluntly put. In the north there is water, a lot of water, so much water in fact that you need a ship. A big ship, something on the scale of an aircraft carrier. Why? Well, the americans have a lot of bases dotted around that region which can accommodate fighters jets of our pedigree, and they also have the tech needed to service them. Moreover the closest ally which uses the Typhoon is Italy, though they might not be over-joyed by the prospect of lending their bases to pesky Brits they would probably relent if leaned upon a bit. But that is a big 'if' and the italians have not been known to favour big expeditionary military missions since about two millennia ago - crossing the Rubicon and all of that. They are more embroiled in their Prime Minister's latest shenanigans. Hence were we to take part in the no-fly zone operation it would almost, without question, be with the help of the Americans. But then one must ask, why should we take part at all when they US Marines boast more fighters jets than our Navy and Airforce combined? Wont we just be in the way of a properly equipped fighting force? Chances are that this would be the case since we have no means of fielding any heavy equipment of our own except for choppers.

We still have a lot of craft which can accommodate choppers, and substantial numbers of them as well; that said a chopper is peanuts compared to a fighter jet and it is like comparing apples and oranges if you are to analyse a no-fly zone whilst only keeping choppers as your option. They are useful for close support but certainly not for patrolling an area four times the size of the UK.

The current UK flag-ship is HMS Albion, a grand lady indeed, but she cannot carry aeroplanes only choppers.

We have sold, scrapped or decommissioned the following Invincible class carriers; HMS Ark Royal and HMS Invincible. What remains is HMS Illustrious due for decommissioning in 2014 after HMS Ocean has undergone extensive refits.

Lets make this abundantly clear to those of you who do not yet realise the significance of an aircraft carrier. It is a floating bit of sovereign space. It is a tiny floating UK which can blow stuff up very quickly should circumstances so require it. Circumstances are not requiring it yet in Libya but if every armed conflict to date is anything to go by, they will. There is a difference between being belligerent and pragmatic and knowing your history and ignoring it. We are terribly good at forgetting our history in the UK and as a result tend to repeat an awful lot of mistakes which could have been avoided if people in command where not being so optimistic about the prospects.

They know that they need Illustrious more than ever, they know that they can halt the sale of HMS Invincible to a Turkish scrapyard and re-install the Rolls-Royce engines at the blink of an eye. But they wont for the simple reason that they will look weak and incompetent for having completed botched the SDSR. If any of them are reading this let me make this very clear; you already look like amateurs for thinking that no aircraft carriers would be needed during an entire decade. It took four months -four months- for your defence review to become obsolete. To save some face, or at the very least, listen to the people in the know, you can reverse some of these decisions. There is waste in the MoD, yes no one denies this, but there is also a time when you have admit and consent that you were wrong. Own up to your shortcomings and move on. These assets are gravely needed for a no-fly zone cannot be established without them, it simply is not possible since no one, down there, likes us enough to lend us their airbases and we would just be in the way of the americans as said.

What is more; the Typhoon cannot fly off aircraft carriers, it is not a carrier jet like the French Mirrage 2000. The Harrier GR9 can, but like everything else useful, it is being scrapped to save money. The Harrier and the Carriers are perhaps our most valuable asset right now, one cannot topple Gaddafi with nuclear submarines nor with Cyber Commands no matter how intriguing the prospect of that might sound.

The Government knows what they have to do in order to remain a significant player in the world, but they wont since they will loose face if they do. We have had so many politicians like that who were afraid to do the right thing, and as a result history only remembers them for their failure to do the right thing. Not for all the good they also did. What will the Coalition be? A Chamberlain or a Churchill?

Update:

Word is catching on...

Since the Libyan crisis began, the Coalition has faced repeated criticism over the decision last year to decommission HMS Ark Royal and the Royal Navy’s Harrier jets, leaving Britain without a functioning aircraft carrier. Dr Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, insisted that such criticism was a “red herring” because the base in Cyprus meant Britain could still operate jets over Libya if required. And would it, pray, still be a "red herring" if this had happened in Zambia instead, where are no conveniently placed RAF stations. I cannot believe that this man is using geography as a defence for scrapping HMS Ark Royal. What an idiot. A five year old could pick holes in that defence.

And for our daily dose of idiotic comments, the Guardian never disappoints when it cannot understand why special forces operations are kept secret and furthermore argues that they should be publicised. Why are lefties so fucking stupid?

Mr. Mercer you EU mong

Mr. Mercer,

As an elected representative of the British people, it is your duty to explain to us why our govt. has agreed to replace the British military with an EU Military, without our approval, consultation, or consent.

In particular, I ask the following:

Why did our govt. sign this EU-SOFA agreement (UK sig. on page 10), which merges the militaries of European nations into an EU Military?

Link: EU-SOFA agreement, signed by UK

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:C:2003:321:0006:0016:EN:PDF

Why did our govt. agree to ATHENA, an EU mechanism to administer the 'common costs' of military operations on behalf of 'Europe' ?

Link: ATHENA

http://www.consilium.europa.eu/showPage.aspx?id=746〈=EN

Why did our govt agree to ERASMUS MILITARE, an EU mechanism to create a common defence culture via exchange of young military officers within training colleges around the EU ?

And why did our govt agree to the EUROPEAN SECURITY and DEFENCE COLLEGE to train military personnel from EU member states for a mission defined as 'To support a Common Security and Defence Policy and to promote a common European security culture.' ?

MP Mercer, this is not only a betrayal, it's a pre-meditated, wilful a betrayal by stealth.

I suspect that there will soon come a day where the British people remind those they perceive as traitors that betrayals of this magnitude have a way of consuming, in very unsavoury ways, those who perpetrate them.

Defence Policy; Coalition vs. UKIP

It must be a bitter pill to swallow for the coalition when "a bunch of fruitcakes and loonies and closet racists" have a more realistic and grown-up defence policy than the government. I sincerely agree with Labour and Jim Murphy, the shadow defence secretary when he added his voice to those calling for the SDSR to be reopened. He said it already looked "out of date" and that many of the assumptions about it had been "shaken over the past month". True, Labour is the majority party responsible for this shambolic state of affairs in the MoD but it was the coalition's choice to slash %7.5 of the annual defence budget, and they decided to do so in one of the most mysterious ways yet known to man; e.g. rip apart newly constructed surveillance aircraft with CAT diggers... WTF? What did the Nimrods ever do to Dr. Fox to deserve such an inglorious end?

Hence I reproduce here the full result, thus far, of the Coalition's approach to defence and if you scroll down a bit further you will see that of UKIP. I know which party I would like in power if my country went to war.

• Reducing the planned purchase of 22 Chinooks to 12
• Delaying Trident for political reasons that will cost billions
• Cancelling Nimrod MRA4
• Reducing armour and artillery, if reports are to be believed, to the bone
• Reducing surface vessels
• Reducing Tornado
• Withdrawn Harrier GR9′s
• Withdrawing Sentinel
• Slashing allowances and expenses
• Setting up the armed forces for a post Afghanistan change in terms and conditions of service
• Implementing a 2 year pay freeze
• Reducing pensions
• Reducing service personnel by 17,000
• Reducing the MoD Civil Service by 25,000 which will likely result in more work for service personnel
• Removing the External Reference group from reporting on the Military Covenant
• Trying to convince everyone that the SDSR was a considered and balanced review (thats my favourite joke of the year)
• Sacking 25% of RAF trainee pilots
• Reducing size of army to an estimated 80,000 troops, after the Afghanistan campaign

And from UKIP's website is the following:

UKIP promises:

• To defend our national interests, maintain the NATO alliance, support our traditional partners. We want to disentangle our forces from the EU and moves towards EU armed forces. UKIP will keep our independence by retaining – always – ultimate command and control over our national forces.

• To stop trying to buy defence on the cheap UKIP will spend an extra 1% GDP per year on defence – an increase of 40% on current budgets ( a £14.76 billion increase ). UKIP believes in establishing a defence budget which will properly sustain Britain’s defence commitments. To keep defence costs down by smarter defence procurement, and with more involvement of British industry wherever possible.

• To increase the Army to at least 125,000 personnel (trained requirement) in order to enable it to cope with its existing deployment and roles. To double the Territorial Army in size from 37,000 to 75,000 soldiers.

• To restore the Navy to its 2001 strength, with 3 new aircraft carriers (one extra), 4 assault ships, 30 destroyers and frigates, 12 Fleet Submarines, 25 coastal vessels and 50 Merlin helicopters, with around 7,000 extra personnel to 42,000 (2003–41,550). UKIP would guarantee the futures of naval ports Plymouth and Portsmouth and base ships permanently in Rosyth and so return it to a proper naval port status.

• To increase the Air Force’s capabilities by enlarging the tanker fleet, modernising the transport fleet, buying more helicopters and 50 extra JSF aircraft, and increasing RAF personnel to 50,000.

• To restore many traditional regiments, such as the Black Watch and Staffords, subsumed as battalions of EU-inspired ‘super-regional’ regiments such as the Royal Welsh, Royal Mercian and Royal Regiment of Scotland, in order to serve in EU battlegroups.

• To renew the Covenant between the Country and those who are asked to risk their lives on its behalf: through better pay, generous compensation for injury, restoration of Crown immunity, private medical and dental care, reinstatement of military hospitals, decent accommodation, an offence of treason for those UK citizens who seriously attack serving personnel, and above all, respect and support. We will also introduce a National Service Medal to be awarded to all servicemen and women to thank those who have seen combat, and those who have not, in their service of their country.

• To reappraise our operations in Afghanistan to a single clear and achievable mission or seek to negotiate a withdrawal with our NATO partners.

• To maintain Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent with existing Trident submarines, and then replace them with four British-built US missile armed submarines.

• To retain and increase Army and Territorial Army personnel through better pay, free medical and dental care for them and their families, retention ‘warrants’, school recruitment and other incentives.

• To introduce a National Defence Medal to recognise ‘Forgotten Heroes’.

One can promise a lot when in opposition, but their mettle can surely not be worse than the Coalition's.

What is all of this born out of? Our pathetic excuse for assisting British nationals in Libya. Utter humiliation. What is becoming more apparent though is that there are no military assets to send out there because it would appear that we have scrapped everything even remotely useful. Word is doing the rounds that a no-fly zone should be imposed on Libya but of course that would necessitate an aircraft carrier as there is no way a country out there would play friendly host to a squadron of British fighter jets. We do not have any aircraft carriers anymore. The coalition in their infinite wisdom scrapped them. You can see whence the argument travels from here.

In essence for every year you travel back in time the probability that we could have managed this shit storm of a situation, professionally and authoritatively, increases exponentially. In 1950 the Royal Navy would have had an entire carrier group out there by now, and in 1980 at least one Invincible class carrier would have watched the Libyans with fiery eyes, Harriers at the ready and Nimrods on the go (though remember 'could' does not imply 'would' since there is geopolitics to take into consideration as well). There would be no beating about the bush, no incompetence, people who risked other people's lives would have been sacked quicker that you can say 'BBC'.

But what is really, truly, amazing is that the news channels are focusing solely on the hardships of a few Brits who are stranded in the back and beyond. I sympathise with them of course but in the background people are being slaughtered for what they believe in. Poor little Brits cannot get out, boho, whereas the Libyan people are having their own armed forces used upon them, mercenaries brought in to make them toe the line, air-to-surface missiles used on a crowds of people, humans, like you and me, non-combatans, non-lethal, non-hostile, or at least not hostile enough to ever warrant the use of laser guided precision weapons, normally employed to neutralise tanks.

No, who cares about that? Lets focus on the gallant HMS Cumberland which has just "rescued" stranded nationals in the most pathetic of manners. To top it off, she is being decommissioned after this final operation. What if this had happened 6 months from now?

Finally do you know what the really tragic thing is? Somewhere someone down the line will have to rebuild all this capacity since this simply wont fly. All of this scrapping is thus pointless and wont save any money in the long term since it will just need to be rebuilt anyway.

Excellent

Think Defence

Labour, EU and the Independent - what the flunk?

Yeah I am as confused as you are.

Celebrity Support?

In my mind there seems to be a logical fallacy somewhere in announcing that you have celebrity support. The AV campaign has committed actors Helena Bonham Carter, Colin Firth and Stephen Fry. And surely others. Sea Shepard, a whaling conservation society, counts among its advisers Pierce Brosnan and Sean Penn.

What the fuck?

What on earth does Pierce Brosnan know about bloody whales to make him qualified to be an 'advisor' to a wildlife conservationist? Is he a marine biologist, is he a scientist, does he attack Japanese whaling ships in his free time? No, he is James Bond and that is it.

Colin Firth backs the AV 'yes' side presumably because he falls for every populist political ploy that the system wants him to back (see his previous support for the LibDems quickly retracted whence they backed the tuition fee rise). But lets assume not. Lets ask this; is he a constitutional historian, does he have a degree in international relations, has he done a dissertation on the merits of AV alongside FPTP? No, he is George VI and over and above that his support for either side should make little or no difference.

Do you know who I count amongst my advisers when I write my scientific reports on the most abstract of concepts? Babar, Lady and the Tramp, Paddington, Doctor Who (obviously), Luke Skywalker (his knowledge of particle physics dynamics is second to none), Darth Vader (Luke's arch nemesis, yes, but give them a cup of tea and Darth will tell you everything there is to know on sub-molecular fission interactions) and how could I forget; the gummy bears - savvier engineers you will not find, their approach to elasticity and aerodynamic viscosity problems would make any thermodynamics professor blush.

Bang on, bang on...

Courtesy of the European Commissions' Eurobarometer. Knowing the EU I can guarantee you that even the above results have been "updated".

Ruled by Retards

We truly are ruled by incompetent fucking retards. Not even Labour were this stupid. This particularly pisses me off, since a fair few of my friends were intending to go down this route. Bloody fucking idiots that is all I can say, the party of the armed forces my fucking arse. This is their record so far, try convince anyone to vote for them come the next election. UKIP are going to have a field day.

• Reducing the planned purchase of 22 Chinooks to 12
• Delaying Trident for political reasons that will cost billions
• Cancelling Nimrod MRA4
• Reducing armour and artillery, if reports are to be believed, to the bone
• Reducing surface vessels
• Reducing Tornado
• Withdrawn Harrier GR9′s
• Withdrawing Sentinel
• Slashing allowances and expenses
• Setting up the armed forces for a post Afghanistan change in terms and conditions of service
• Implementing a 2 year pay freeze
• Reducing pensions
• Reducing service personnel by 17,000
• Reducing the MoD Civil Service by 25,000 which will likely result in more work for service personnel
• Removing the External Reference group from reporting on the Military Covenant
• Trying to convince everyone that the SDSR was a considered and balanced review (thats my favourite joke of the year)
• Sacking 25% of RAF trainee pilots

A conservative is someone who believes in reform. But not now. Just slash and slash and slash until the blood is flowing, and then the wolves will come... I am all for cutting public spending but not at the cost of national security.

Military Procurement; US-style vs. EU-style

This is of course not a commanding example and more sample data is need to draw conclusions, but it is fair to say that when dealing with the US you get more of your stuff in time, on budget and it does what is says on the tin. Again I know that this does not apply to everything (see JSF e.g.) but compared to cooperation projects with other European nations (to foster some spurious belief in a future EU armed forces, and supposedly to reduce costs), the Americans drift across the pond like white feathers whereas the European partners are more like bowling balls (which sink).

Boeing has announced that it has successfully completed -- ahead of schedule -- its industrial participation (IP) programs for the first five C-17 Globemaster III aircraft operated by the Royal Air Force (RAF).

Lets compare this with

According to a February report to the French Senate, the A400M is €5 billion over budget, 3 to 4 years behind schedule, and 12 tons overweight; aerospace experts estimate it is also costing Airbus between €1 billion and €1.5 billion a year.

Not exactly the fiat of business integrity.

British Politicians, the small print and the EU

There is no point in me writing a post on this myself, Mary Riddell has done a fine job of that already.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, rhubarb, rhubarb, order in the House, 'physically ill' and the rest of it. All I can say to the Commons over this votes for prisoners dispute is: just shut up and pull the trigger and get out of the Council of Europe. Or admit you are too timid to pull the trigger, so shut up anyway and submit in the manner that suits men who are cowards.

This noise about how Britain may now stand against to the council's European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is at best naive and in most cases (yes, you, David Cameron) is synthetic. What Cameron has done on this one is pretend this is the crucial line he won't cross. Meanwhile, very much more quietly and apparently without a moment of squeamishness (odd that, how selective the prime minister's stomach is on parliamentary sovereignty), his Government hands over more and more power to the European Union.

What he has done by stirring up this prisoners' votes business is simply give the euro-anxious Tories a different kind of 'European' bone on which to chew. Yet this issue is not the meat. The ECHR and its decisions are not the things most endangering Britain's sovereignty now.

Still, if MPs are really so determined to stop this so-called 'encroachment' by Strasbourg, maybe a technical note first. Britain freely (and foolishly) agreed long ago to give the court at Strasbourg all the powers that the ECHR has since been using. This so-called 'court' at has never invaded Britain -- the supine British opened the gates to all these European 'justices' and their powers to decide Britain's laws.

The angry cries, even among my colleagues, that there has been 'remorseless undermining' of Britain's parliament and courts implies that the ECHR has been tunnelling away under the stone walls of Britain, rather in the manner of medieval seige warfare. It hasn't. The ECHR has done only and exactly what decades of euro-supine British politicians have allowed it to do. The drawbridge has been down all along, with 'We are all Europeans now' written on cloth-of-gold and slung from the battlements.

All parliament has to do if it really does want to stop the powers of this 'court' is just vote to pull out of the Council of Europe, ECHR and all. Then this absurdity of votes for prisoners, and every other ECHR so-called 'human rights' absurdity, goes away; or at least -- and this is what Cameron is hiding in this debate -- until Brussels reminds the United Kingdom that by signing up to Lisbon Treaty and the rest, powers across the Channel can go on imposing these 'human rights' on Britain whether the UK tries to derogate from the ECHR decisions or leaves the Council of Europe altogether.

Cameron, being so very busy having a public relations-designed 'physcal illness' over the issue, won't admit that the problem with exactly this kind of control by foreign powers over Britain's legislation will continue as long as Britain stays in the EU: even if Britain now refuses votes for prisoners -- and it won't; in the end, some man caught with 10,000 child porn images on his laptop will have the liberty to cancel out your vote -- ultimately the EU will have ways of getting the same decision reached in the European Court of Justice (the EU 'court,' this one in Luxembourg with the power to enforce EU law in member states). All that will be necessary is for some other ex-con lowlife to bring another case, this time in Luxembourg not Strasbourg.

The Lisbon Treaty, among many other poisonous things, gave the EU 'legal personality' for the first time. That means it can sign international agreements, not as an agent for a group of 27 sovereign states, but as a state in its own right. And as this new country called Europe, it is going to join the Council of Europe. It will be a member just as the United Kingdom is now.

What that means is that Britain, even if it pulls out of the Council of Europe, will still be bound to the damned thing as a part of the EU: remember, Lisbon made us all 'citizens of the EU' now. If you are a native of England, Scotland Wales or Ireland, your nationality is now 'European' whether you want it or not. The treaty says so, and the treaty, thanks to the refusal by Cameron and William Hague to fight it, is law.

Treaties and other international agreements now signed by the EU will be directly binding on the UK and have primacy over all UK laws and the British constitution. And, no, Britain does not have a veto over most of the things the EU might sign treaties on.

Slightly delicious note: I gather the EU's signing for the membership has been held up because the EU is demanding that decisions of the ECHR cannot over-rule the decisions of the ECJ. In other words, Brussels is demanding that its own court have supremacy over the ECHR, something Britain has surrendered for its own Supreme Court.

So there could be turf conflicts between the euro-courts. As Open Europe notes in its briefing this week on the votes for prisoners dispute, the EU has its own catalogue of justiciable rights -- '' 'the so-called Charter of Fundamental Rights, enshrined in the Lisbon Treaty. The Charter allows citizens to contest rights set down in EU law at the European Court of Justice, and, in future, possibly also the ECHR (when the EU accedes to it).'

This will make it 'increasingly difficult for the UK to negotiate a carve-out from European human rights legislation.'

As for the detail of this particular case of prisoners' votes, 'Withdrawal from the ECHR would allow the UK to ignore ECHR rulings on prisoners votes when it come to general elections. However, as voting rights in European Parliament and local elections are covered by EU law as well as national law, their application in the UK could in future be challenged at the ECHR or the ECJ.'

Oh, and as for the Cameron fudge about limiting the vote to prisoners serving four years or less, the ECHR has already struck down that notion in a similar case, Scoppola v Italy. It decided that the prisoner's rights were violated because Italian law barred him from voting on the basis of his sentence. So they will knock down Cameron's four years, too, and I'd suspect he knows it.

Which is why the noise in the Commons over this is just noise. Either parliament is sovereign or it's not, and until the MPs vote to take Britain out of the EU, it's not: the 'legal personality' called the 'European Union' is sovereign.

So the MPs might as well go home; or go around to the 'Scrubs for a bit of canvassing.

...And back to me. Peter Oborne has this funny statement on his blog

But it just isn’t going to happen. Even if he launched on this kamikaze mission, he wouldn’t complete it. Dominic Grieve, the Attorney General, has already advised Downing Street that banning votes for prisoners is illegal. I guess he would resign, along with Ken Clarke. I am told that most of the supreme court judges would follow Clarke out of the door, launching Britain into a full-scale constitutional crisis. Not only that, Nick Clegg, who has been strangely silent on all this, would walk out of the Coalition.

Who cares if Dominic Grieve, Ken Clarke and the Supreme Court judges walk out? They are doing so on their principles not ours and they are supposed to represent us and our parliament. It is not a constitutional crisis when the people that walk out have no support form the electorate anyway. If they had the support of voters and truly trumpeted the vox populi, the story would be different. Hence I cannot see where this "constitutional crisis" would be coming from, simply because no one would care and a few would cheer.

Privatise universities, or they will do it themselves

This kind of bullshit social engineering is what will lead to widespread privatisation of Britain's top universities.

Thank god this is already in the pipeline for most of the ones still worthy of calling themselves universities.

Cambridge

LSE

Imperial College

To have the cheek to even mention the word "fair" and HE in the same sentence, from minsters who have almost exclusively only ever attended private schools and Oxbridge, is quite frankly beyond belief. What fucking hypocrisy.

Some free advice

Given that the probability that anyone with any form of influence will actually read this blog, is fairly slim. I am fairly comfortable posting my personal advice here for the benefit of politicians who think they know how the real world works.

What has been bothering me as of late is that the government is not able to put across what they really want to do. I do not really care much for their policies (the coalition's) since a) the Liberal Democrats had a hand in writing them, and I despise them as a political entity, b) the Conservative party does not seem to know what it is conserving anymore and might as well re-name itself to something more appropriate akin to the centre left/right policies it now subscribes to.

Me; I am very conservative and never went through the socialist stage which most youngsters seem destined to pass through, as a right of passage, before reaching maturity and embracing a pragmatic and grown-up outlook on the world (and realise that you cannot simply dish-out other people's hard earned money on your bullshit socialist utopia). As the old saying goes, a conservative is a liberal who just got mugged, and a liberal is a conservative who just got arrested. I have never been arrested nor mugged, when I have, I shall update you on my political credence.

But back to the main point behind this post. If you cannot communicate your vision then you will be defined by your enemies. It is a very simple concept. But it seems as if ministers are currently just trying to leave something, anything, just for the sake of changing society, but not saying why they want to change it. Why on earth sell off the forests for example? Who ever asked for that? It is not as if logging is big business in the UK (no it really is not so don't go posting some statistics saying that it is for then I will retort with a statistic from Sweden or Finland, which will dwarf any lumber figure put forth by any of my potential enemies).

It is fairly simple to get past this; formulate what the hell is wrong with the current system be it the armed forces or the NHS. And really hit home why it needs to change. Be a coward and ignore the EU at your own peril, there is still a lot of domestic policy (the EU is domestic policy now as well) which is still quite frankly shit. Noticed lately that no NHS doctors wear white coats? But in every other country in the world with an advanced medical service this is the case. Do some googling on that and you will see for what retard reason those were dropped and subsequently leading to various outbreaks of dangerous viruses. This is a minor issue though; there is a lot more which needs to be changed before the doctors get their coats back. Question is will ministers listen to the people or will they peddle on into oblivion and certain electoral defeat, lest they tell everyone what they are trying to achieve?

Melanchtron takes tone

So let’s see. The government grants a free vote on votes for prisoners (no choice, really). The measure goes down 500 votes against, 80 for. We then have five thousand prisoners complain that their human rights have been violated, and they sue for compensation. The courts rule in their favour at – what shall we say? - £10,000 each including costs? So that’s £50m.

The government then has to decide whether to pay. But in Parliament MPs are already putting down motions forbidding the government from paying any such compensation. The current motion may not get any air time, but someone will soon work out how to deliver such a motion properly, and it will surely pass with a huge majority, since, when families are struggling to pay increased taxes and with their benefits being cut, who is seriously going to vote in favour of paying out tens of millions in pounds to prisoners? So then the courts instruct the government to pay compensation, and Parliament forbids it.

A constitutional crisis, clearly.

Is there a way out? Well, the Council of Europe has already condemned the government for taking more than five years to comply with the 2005 judgement involving John Hirst, giving the government six months to comply. So we can’t just wait and hope it goes away. The British judges will be itching to rule against the government anyway. Surely the only ways forward are to comply or to change Britain’s relationship to the European Court of Human Rights and to the European Convention on Human Rights.

Suppose we could get that latter option past Nick Clegg. We’d then have to get it past the European Council. But complying with the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights is an obligation of the Lisbon Treaty for membership of the Council of Europe, and hence of the EU. I suppose we could just not comply and dare the Council of Europe to kick us out – but then how would we prevent the UK judges from ruling government officials guilty of malfeasance for failing to comply with obligations under a ratified Treaty? The only way to avoid that would appear to renegotiate the Treaty. But could we get that past Nick Clegg?

In the grand scheme of Democracy

Today was another day when I, in my own mind, did something to improve democracy in this country. In my own mind. Let me have that.

I believe in an idea. I believe that there is something fundamentally wrong with a country when it pays a foreign body to make its laws for it. When it has outsourced democracy; when it takes away the 'demos' in democracy and leaves only 'cratos' - power. I believe this is not only bad for the country, the nation, but potentially terminal. But that is just me. A nation cannot survive without its people, for then it is not a nation, it is a mere assembly, an assembly with no common interest or goal. Which seeks not to promote its values but merely lives for the sake of itself. Without dreams or aspirations, just the same old same old. I believe this is wrong.

Am I wrong? Well that is not for me to decide. For all I know outsourcing democracy might be an excellent idea, but that is not important. What is important is that it feels wrong. A small part of you dies every time you see that it has acquired yet more power. Like the Lernaen Hydra it just grows every time you try to cut it down. It prospers from disaster, it feeds on misery; misery for which it is largely to blame. We are becoming disenfranchised.

“Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil” this is how we are told to live our lives with regard to it. We are not to bang on about it, not question it, not disagree with it - just accept it. If we question it we are seen as eccentrics, if we point out the obvious contradictions we are told 'but'. It rules by commandments like Moses, no justification but pointing to a higher source of absolution, as adequate explanation for its intrusions. But this is not the Bible. These are not stories written in metaphors and symbolism, this is happening now but we are refused our voice to question it, to rationalise it down to the fallacy it is. People are being denied their right to speak. History tells us that such a state of affairs has always ended in violence, as will this. Yet we are still called eccentrics.

I handed out another hundred leaflets today in my patch of London. It felt good. Although it wont make a shred of difference, I can at least point back to these days in the future when our children will ask 'why didn't you do anything?'. I can proudly look back and say 'we did, but no one else.' This is and never will be an exercise in satisfying one's ego, to excel to some spurious echelon of self-righteousness. It is not meant to invoke hatred of malice, it is meant to plant an idea. An idea we once had but have now lost. Beneath all this rhetoric there is an idea and ideas are bulletproof. I believe in this idea but my great task is to persuade other's to believe it as well. If I can convince just one person, just a single lonely soul, that my idea is better than what he previously believed then it will all be worth it.

This is not a religion, there are no grand books filled with moral codes of how and why one should live their lives. It is but an idea. It is a very simple idea. I have already stated the idea, you already know what it is; it is in between the lines of this post. It is in you right now or at least it should be. You should have reacted to what was said above in two words which are anathema to each other, outsourcing democracy. Now you know what the idea is that we have lost.

I have not even mentioned it by name, yet you all know what I am talking about. That is a testament to how little control we have over our own lives today. You might be able to change the small things in your life but, in the grand scheme of democracy you are nothing. Because you are nothing, we are nothing and that is how democracy died.

Science and Facebook

Today I threw out 10 old notepads filled with maths; maths, maths and more maths. What joy. But thinking of the actual disposal, got me thinking about a parallel namely the movie known as 'The Social Network'. If you have seen it you will certainly have your own opinions of it, certainly it has it merits, actually it is rather good in my opinion. What I object to is how they seemingly just gloss over the supposed "hacking" bits of it. They have got it wrong, wrong wrong.

Cracker: This is the common term used to describe a malicious hacker. Crackers get into all kinds of mischief, including breaking or "cracking" copy protection on software programs, breaking into systems and causing harm, changing data, or stealing. Hackers regard crackers as a less educated group of individuals that cannot truly create their own work, and simply steal other people's work to cause mischief, or for personal gain."

Mark Zuckerberg is a CRACKER not a HACKER:

Hacker: This is someone that seeks to understand computer, phone or other systems strictly for the satisfaction of having that knowledge. Hackers wonder how things work, and have an incredible curiosity. Hackers will sometimes do questionable legal things, such as breaking into systems, but they generally will not cause harm once they break in. Contrast a hacker to the term cracker.

It is the same with skinheads and boneheads.

Bonehead: What traditional non-racist skinheads began to call scruffy glue-sniffing sleazeballs who pretended to be skinheads in the late 1970s. Now it specifically refers to neo-Nazi/white power skinhead imposters.

Skinhead: A movement started in Britain in the 60s when the mod scene met the hippy scene. The mod scene split, and the "hard mods", the ones who hated hippies, got harder. With a little influence from Jamacian rudeboys, the skinhead was born out of the hard mod. Most of the music was held over from the mod days, but there were ska and reggae imported from the rude boys.

This is not just about semantics, they haven't even remotely understood the concept of computer programming when they call every single person who 'looks like he knows' something a "hacker" - they do not. Programming is hard, most people cannot do it, HTML is not programming, blogger script is not programming. In fact most things which are programming, strictly speaking, are difficult to understand and most people cannot. What is more a hacker will never call himself a hacker, it is an earned term not something you go around and put on your business card or present yourself with 'Hi I am Joe Bloggs - the hacker' no, no, no and a million times no. That is not how it works. Just to give you an insight into the world of science. Oh and also the people who work at the Apple stores and are rather endearingly called 'geniuses' are not. It is common practise in science and engineering departments to take the mickey out of 'geniuses' - they are seen as a lesser form of people when they have that blue t-shirt on. Quite rightly to.

People, if we cannot even get our appellations correct then what is the point?

TSR2

Mr North has an excellent video of the TSR2 which I had not seen before, I shall re-post it here because I simply love this aeroplane which was so viciously clawed from us in what must be one of the lowest points in the 'special relationship' ever seen, at least to my mind (or at the very least in engineering terms).

Here is another very very long piece I wrote some time ago, on the TSR2, which is well worth the read if you are interested in aeronautics. One thing is for sure, Britain does some quite frankly amazing engineering, quite unmatched in any other country in the world. Unfortunately we also have the drawback of creating arguably the worst kind of politicians a country could ever have or need.

Ed Balls will be brilliant. David Cameron should be very afraid

...is this woman actually retarded (no really)?

I thought she was only trying to wind conservatives up, but she actually believes what she writes. I am honestly beginning to think that she is that stupid. I have even dedicated a tag to her now for her ignorance seems to know no bounds, hence they must be rolled out on the internet so people can see just what passes for serious commentary from the left today.

If Mary Riddell does not agree with government policy, that must mean they are doing something right

Poor little lady, she thinks it "wrong" and "reckless" to not give murders, rapists and pedophiles, the vote. Much sympathy from the nation I reckon she wont get.

She is as much a product of the society she claims to have informed opinion on as she is a part of that society, where it is now standard procedure to blame anyone but the perpetrator.

EMA

You think someone who actually wants to be in education is going to drop-out because they are not getting a state handout of £30/week? Labour you are having a fucking laugh, really, you incompetent mongs.

Do you know what we did before EMA? We worked, we took part-time jobs, we earned our way, now I know this will seem like a foreign concept to many of my younger compatriots in this country, but alas such was the awful state of affairs back in the dark ages. 16-year olds were forced to work, the sheer horror I can see on some people's faces when announcing this. The thought; 'Me work? Never, I might get dirty I might actually have to push myself, someone will tell me what to do - oh Lord why did the evil government scrap my "lifeline" that is the EMA'.

Here is some inside information for you, coming from someone who grew up in one of the worst parts of London (no not me); the EMA was used almost exclusively for leisure. Never anything even remotely relevant to study such as pens, books and software (most of which the school gives you anyway and kids these days are so IT savvy that they download anything they need illegally if so needs be - schools tend to have computers by the way, if they don't that's not the EMA's fault). It really would do well if the government just once in a fucking while figured out where all the money went. You know, just have a peak, just a sneak peak, maybe a little market research perhaps? Maybe see if those billions upon billions of pounds are actually having a tangible difference upon British society. Or worse, if they are having a detrimental effect upon the youth of today, who apparently now believe that you can glide through to the top, on the back of a BA in Media Studies (no really).

The worst part of this is not the grant in itself, it is the mere notion/concept that someone should need financial incentive to stay in school. There is something seriously fucking wrong with society if such is the case, where you instead of making the case for further education bribe pupils, in the hope that some will realise for themselves the benefits of knowing more than nothing, the nothing which is currently provided by the GCSEs (I taught GCSE maths last year and it was a bit of a joke lets just leave it at that).

If you could not be bothered to read the above and decided to skip to the end, then my views can be summarised as such; give a man a fish and you will feed him for a day. Teach a man how to fish you will feed him for a lifetime.

Thousands voice concern over Government's NHS reform bill

The pressure group NHS Support Federation said 10,000 members of the public have backed an online statement to voice concerns about the Government's health reforms.

The pressure group called 'The People of the United Kingdom' had roughly 200,000 member of the public back an online statement calling for the reintroduction of military hospitals. Do you know what the government did? They told them to sod off.

Unequivocal Equivocation – an open letter to Dr. Trenberth

A must-read essay for everyone...

The “null hypothesis” in science is the condition that would result if what you are trying to establish is not true. For example, if your hypothesis is that air pressure affects plant growth rates, the null hypothesis is that air pressure has no effect on plant growth rates. Once you have both hypotheses, then you can see which hypothesis is supported by the evidence.

UPDATE: I just sent the above essay to the Climate Change wing of our university, and told them, in no uncertain terms, to get a reality check and stop wasting our tuition fees. I will post their reply when and if I get it.

BBC rapes science reporting again, again and again...

H/T EU Referendum

I hope you will excuse me for being so late in jumping on the posting-bandwagon on this one. Now I think I am fairly well placed to comment on sciency issues, that is after all what I am studying. There will be a lot of professors popping up in the above video and there are a few things to note about the term and title of 'professor'.

You do not have to agree with them because of their position but you sure as hell will respect them. I told our economics lecturer that his entire discipline was pure bullshit in my opinion in my first year of university - but that was only my opinion. If people want to be stupid enough to study something so profoundly boring as economics then you must respect them for that (see; another opinion). Now professors will also have opinions, lo and behold, and they are not paragons of impartial reporting. They like every other human being have built-in bias that they cannot avoid for one reason or another.

With these professors above you are allowed to disagree, equally for those who propagate AGW as a leading truth you are also allowed to disagree and question. This is key; you must question. Do not ever take anything the MSM says as a given truth. It is not. There is far more to anything than one article, and even if you get a thousand, even a hundred thousand articles saying that the glaciers are going to melt in 10 years time that does not make it true. They are only writing what someone else with an intent has told them. Millions upon millions of pieces were written on the supposed Y2K crash of year 2000, that was supposedly going to wipe out the entire global computer network. That did not happen. Of course there was a small band of informed people who said it would not happen but no one listened to them. When they euro was introduced there was a small band of people who said that you cannot have fiscal union without political union for that would lead to a market crash. And look what happened to that; they were ignored as per usual by the media.

Whatever someone says have an autonomous mind. Professors do not know everything and they have opinions like anyone else, and they are highly conscious of getting their work published. Some by any means necessary. Academia is not some abstract castle of infinite good will, the truth is far far more depressing.

Thoughts of the day

Tax pays for those who don't feel like working; god bless 'em. Lucky you we're around otherwise socialism UK PLC (notice the oxymoron) would be buggered.

The Conservatives are "strong" on defence...

Lets see how strong they have been thus far:

• Reducing the planned purchase of 22 Chinooks to 12
• Delaying Trident for political reasons that will cost billions
• Cancelling Nimrod MRA4
• Reducing armour and artillery, if reports are to be believed, to the bone
• Reducing surface vessels
• Reducing Tornado
• Withdrawn Harrier GR9′s
• Withdrawing Sentinel
• Slashing allowances and expenses
• Setting up the armed forces for a post Afghanistan change in terms and conditions of service
• Implementing a 2 year pay freeze
• Reducing pensions
• Reducing service personnel by 17,000
• Reducing the MoD Civil Service by 25,000 which will likely result in more work for service personnel
• Removing the External Reference group from reporting on the Military Covenant
• Trying to convince everyone that the SDSR was a considered and balanced review (thats my favourite joke of the year)

H/T Think Defence

I cannot see any reasons left for anyone to vote Conservative anymore, not that there ever really was one, but I think I can confidently say that most us did not think they were going to be this bad once in government. There is more than one way to balance the books especially when your country it at war...

Prince william should stay out of politics

...and Marry Riddell should implode.

Spot On

I just heard someone say something rather excellent "the Tories are like Palestinians; they never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity" how bang on the money that is.

John McTernan

John McTernan; who is that you might ask? Well, you would be right in asking that question. He is a very pointless person in my opinion, who blogs for the Telegraph. Now if you go to the link that I have provided you will find a short synopsis about Mr. McTernan. It says

John McTernan is a commentator and political strategist who works internationally. He was Political Secretary to Tony Blair and has been an adviser on health, welfare, defence and Scotland.

Smack me senseless and call me Charlie, how on earth can he have been an adviser on health, welfare, defence and Scotland. Is he some kind of super academic, perhaps he holds several PhDs in these areas of interest? Maybe he is a savant? All in all he only has one degree from Edinburgh but maybe we are supposed to believe that it has modulus on everything in the whole wide world, hence he is 'qualified' to do anything.

The depressing truth is that he is just another pointless leftie with no real life-experience which could ever remit him even remotely qualified to 'advise' on the fields he has. It would for example be logical to assume that someone who advised on defence would have some military background, you know so that he could actually bring a qualified opinion to the table otherwise his advise is no more relevant than your average Joe on the street, without any military experience. That at least is what common sense suggests, but as you know, Britain no longer does common sense.

Ministers in important departments often have almost no understanding of the briefs they hold. We have had ministers of agriculture who think slurry is a home county. We have had ministers of defence who think a mess is something they must avoid creating. It is almost compulsory to have chancellors of the exchequer who know nothing about economics. What is really uncalled for, though, is when a government appoints to a semi-official position a politician who is not a minister, so has no responsibility apart from seeking attention, and is let loose on something of which he knows nothing. Simon Heffer is on the ball all right...

Now the only thing I can possibly imagine Mr. McTernan being qualified for is being scottish - his name rings of that, at least a bit. But for all I know he might as well be irish yet he still advised on Scotland for some inexplicable reason. Hopefully he'll one day read this blogpost and make a fuss about it - that would be fun.

It is now tomorrow

It is now tomorrow and it would appear that my prediction, below, was obviously right (how could it not have been?); the government will sail through the EU Bill.

It is odd this predicament we are in yet again, for we have been here before. Whenever the EU comes up for debate in one form or another in parliament we think 'ahh this is the one, the fight back starts now with the this bill, where we tell Brussels to go to hell'. But it never materialises. Now, I have only been doing this i.e. venting my frustrations online for the benefit of other people, for a fairly short period of time and the EU only started to really catch my attention a few years ago when I was still a teenager. But I can but imagine how fatalistic some people twice my age must feel on this issue, where Britain has caved in for 39 consecutive years.

It is strange. How can one not be cynical about the past, present and future British government when the track-record of all of them, is absolutely abhorrent? What is even stranger are those people who cling on to some kind of hope that just once, just this one time, the British Parliament will stand up to the EU and Brussels. But that just never happens does it? Personally I am slowly coming to the understanding that Parliament wont sort this mess out, and we wont stop banging on about the EU because it has never been fixed ergo we have to bang-on about it until it is fixed. But Parliament has no intention whatsoever to that end. They are happy with the current oligarchy which dresses up as democracy.

Most people probably never expected their MPs to actually represent them anyway, given that most people despise the EU, want immigration slashed, want money invested in the armed forces etcetera, they just join in for the merriment that is our charade-exercise in democracy called elections. The really interesting thing is what those at the top will do when presented with a big bag of paper bits, one million or more of those bits. Each bit of paper has a name on it, and each bit of paper represents a view and an opinion. It is a uniform opinion. Each piece of paper represents a person and that person is calling for our membership of the EU to be put to a plebiscite.

But what if they say no?

(Ministers should do their history; what always happens when you consistently ignore the wishes of the people.)

Pastor Martin Niemoller

They came first for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for me and by that time no one was left to speak up.

You do not, and I repeat, you do not remove a political candidate from a venue just because you happen to disagree with his beliefs. That is not democracy. Remember what Orwell said you pathetic autocratic scum; if freedom of speech means anything it means telling people what they don't want to hear. You may not agree with the BNP but this is a slippery slope towards fascism when people are being ostracised for what they believe in, I don't support them either but like Voltaire never said I will defend their right to say it until death.

For the police to use a Nuremberg defence to justify their actions is beyond reproach, that is nothing but despicable. This country is loosing the plot quicker than under New Labour.

A prediction for tomorrow

Here is what I think is going to happen tomorrow, as always: The government is going to sail through the vote on the European Union Bill and it will turn out that all the supposed "rebellion" was only smoke and mirrors. They will even get a comfortable majority. We will all be supremely disappointed for the umpteenth time that these are the people who are supposed to represent us.

Those EU referendums

I am glad to see that Daily Express continues to make noise. Good for them, hopefully the misanthropic, pessimist old-schoolers will get off their fat arses and realise that all is not lost; we can beat the EU but it will require everyone's help. I have started to hand out leaflets in my patch of London, they will probably do sod all but if I can convince just one person who hitherto thought that the EU was a force for good, then that will have made it all worth it.

The broadsheets might scoff at their petty attempts to bring about change, but then I ask what the flying fuck are you doing about it besides from whining that the EU, doing this and that? Do something about it instead. It may well be that our means are fairly limited and our possibilities restricted when it comes to applying pressure on our government. But is this a reason to do nothing? Despair is not an answer. Neither is resignation. Resignation only leads to indifference, which is not merely a sin but a punishment.

An Election Paradox

I am not sure if many people had noticed this but I just thought I would add it here to the general wonderings of things.

Supposedly David Cameron was the man who made the Conservative Party (notice small 'c') electable again. But they did not win the election... Of course people will then argue that if he had not taken the helm then things would have been even worse. That however is a very poor defence.

100,000 voices

Yours truly does apologise for his unseemly long absences from this blog. University is taking its toll particularly since this blogger is attending a real university and doing a real course (which his arrogance never falters to mention). Exams are due after Christmas holidays so this post in itself is an outlier. But nonetheless things need to be said and since our pointless MSM continues to be just that, we have to say it ourselves, we the people.

100,000 voices will be required to get motions debated in parliament. A lot of people do not like this, one of my favourite bloggers Mr. North at EU Referendum does not like it either. Yet one of my favourite politicians Mr. Hannan likes it so it would appear we are having a good old bout of difference of opinion. I like it not because I am naive enough to think that it will actually improve democracy in this country but because it is a very useful tool for politicians to shot themselves in the foot with. And since our ruling class is monumentally stupid as it is, you can be quite sure that given the opportunity to shot themselves in their feet; they will.

Politicians nowadays despise the electorate, our current ruling class is a testament to this fact. No one voted for the coalition yet the coalition now votes for us. That is not democracy and certainly not representative democracy where they are supposed to represent us, instead they represent themselves since under the aegis of 'coalition' they threw out their election manifestos, wrote a new one and forced it onto the people under the guise of 'compromise'. We were stupid enough, as always, to swallow that, line, hook and sinker.

Thankfully the public will always outshine private politicians. We have the benefit of 60 million minds and they only have 646 of our kind, not even our best kind, a rather mediocre staple they come from. With few scholars, officers and entrepreneurs. They are by and large sheep and followers, not leaders. Hence it is not a surprise at all that they now think this gimmick of a measure is going to help shore up their popularity (read 'the LibDems popularity').

What will happen is this: we will suggest loads of things we want debated and changed by our "sovereign" parliament. We will submit the HRA for expulsion from the legislature, we will demand that immigration is significantly reduced, we will demand a referendum on the EU, we will enforce very convincingly our commitment to the Armed Forces, we will demand the termination of the Human Rights Commission and we will most likely demand that a number of services such rail traffic and postal services are returned to the public sector. And many others.

They will of course ignore every single one of our requests, when we come, cap in hand, and beg that our masters listen to us.

But what they do not seem to have factored into this ploy is that there will be a lot of these 'citizen's initiatives' - because we, as a whole, despise our politicians and what they have done to this country. When the hoi polloi start to realise that their vox populi is being ignored en masse, even they will realise that their politicians are not serving their best interests.

Hence it will follow; motion after motion will be rejected because it is truly what the people want, people's disillusionment with the ruling class will only grow and grow, the ruling class will become more and more aware of their disillusionment until they one day feel compelled to act on one of the requests.

Alas, this act is a pointless play to the galleries for is should not be needed, politicians should by definition hold the executive to account. They should by definition have balls and a firm spine. But what this act will do is to force the public balls and spine onto our politicians, and there is not a single thing they can do about it.

Unfortunately we are a nation which is going nowhere.

Very unfair

You will find no one who is more against the current "student" protestors, but introducing water cannons is cheating in my opinion.

The police

The police would do well to remember than when justice is not brought to bear, they are not serving the interests of the public under whose aegis and custodian they serve. When the public feel that the full force of the law is not brought down upon those onto which it was designed, they will take matters into their own hands, to make absolutely sure that vengeance does strike down upon those who pray on the weak.

My fellow "students"

They have done it again. This is nothing but a massive stroke of luck for the Coalition. All these scenes of pathetic vandalism and attacks on the police are music to their ears. Yet again the mindless militant left comes to the rescue. The vast majority of voters will not look at the policies in detail, the ludicrous situation where the English are shafted once again. They will just see the lefty muppets on the telly and support the Government. Cameron will be laughing all the way home.

Of spies, students and universities

The newly announced spy in the House of Commons is most certainly not alone, she is joined by some 1,000 other pass-holders, who are not British citizens, who also are free to roam the halls of our "sovereign parliament" (I hate when they say that, because anyone who ever does instantly displays that he is an academic cock). British security at its finest would you not know.

Now our little spy studied at the 'University of Bradford' that bastion of academic starlight founded in our year of the lord 1966. I happen to know a fair bit about that university, not because I have studied there (roll on academic arrogance and elitism), no because one of my friends has. My friend is very bright. So bright in fact that he got royally ticked of with Bradford and applied to our current university because, lo and behold, Bradford was shit. As it turns out his equivalent course at our university covered the same and more material than they do in one year at Bradford, in three months in London.

Dare I say it? If we introduced a more rigorous academic framework would we be able to weed out all the phonies who seek only to abuse the system? Perhaps that is to autocratic for the liberal-left and socialist-workers-party-supporting people? Nay, I strongly maintain that university is but for the brightest and that only a small proportion of the population should be able to go, as to help the rest of the people who were not served with brilliance at birth. Granted, this would probably result in my not being able to go either (I am most certainly not clever), but that is a small price to pay for a functional and proper higher education system, which incorporates governance of people actually coming here to study under the right premises. This would thus exclude potential russian spies, it would exclude the bogus students from all over the world who come to the UK to study english, it would include the brightest foreign students who should be encouraged to come here and study and funded to that end as well.

Think how productive a craftsman really can be, some of them manage to turn out absolute works of art be it chimneys or glassworks. Think instead how productive a craftsman with a real degree could be - call him an entrepreneur if you will, his economic prowess would be relatively endless seen from the Treasury compared to the current lock, stock and barrel, who are apparently going to drag us all out of recession with their brilliance.

Certainly, one might ask, what cannot 30,000 media-studies graduates do?

There are now roughly 2 million British students at UK universities, and some 0.5 million foreign students including EU students. This is why there is no money left to fund the whole damn higher education system; there are too many fucking students and most of them are not doing anything remotely productive.

Why do we always do it? Why do we always fiddle with the system? We KNOW what the successful system is, we used to have it here before we gave a few dozen politicians the chance to play God with our kids futures. Remember the following:

• Posh Independent
• Grammar
• Comprehensive

• Technical College
• Polytechnic
• University

Put bluntly, the brightest kids went to Eton, smart kids went to Grammar and the mongs went to the Comp.

Brainboxes went to University, technically good kids went to tech and normal kids went to Poly. It worked.

Industry and commerce knew exactly where to find the people it needed and we flourished (and if you think that just because the government has decided that everyone should go to university that means the same for industry, you are utterly wrong. Basically it works like this now; some companies recruit people solely from the G5* universities and some exclusively from the Russell Group - they are blissfully aware that most other universities produce shit graduates because you cannot artificially make the population clever). We made things. Ships, cars, aircraft. We produced scientists, engineers, creatives and entrepreneurs. The rebels could study art and many of them did exceptionally well at it. We ruled the world in fashion, music, photography, film making and art.

IT WORKED.

The Germans have an excellent education system because Politicians can't get their hands on it. It is based on three types of school.

• The Gymnasium is designed to prepare pupils for university education and finishes with the final examination, Abitur, after grade 12 or 13.
• The Realschule has a broader range of emphasis for intermediate pupils and finishes with the final examination, Mittlere Reife, after grade 10
• The Hauptschule prepares pupils for vocational education and finishes with the final examination, Hauptschulabschluss, after grade 9 or 10

See that? And what does Germany produce? Cars, ships, power stations, railways, aircraft, infrastructure. No fucking about in Germany. If you're thick, no WAY are you going to University to study to become a Nail Technician. You'll do an apprenticeship at 17 that will pay pretty much bugger all and then you'll get a job that will keep you and your family fed for life. We used to do the same here until the Socialists decided that was not the way to a progressive future.

And all because Germany has the courage to say to it's citizens

You're smart, you're average and you're thick. Don't worry, we have something for all of you.

And most of all, they keep their education system away from the clutches of Politicians. Their kids are far too important for a few dozen idiots to ruin. It's time we learned to be honest with our population again. We OWE it to them.

Whilst we import German cars, kitchens and machines because they are so fucking excellent, I can see no better argument for a return to sanity in our education system. Who knows, in 30 years, the Germans might be buying our cars whilst they push bits of imaginary paper around a banking system for a living.

* The G5 group of universities consist of: University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, LSE, UCL and Imperial College.

Quote of the day

On similarly aligned bloggers there is Ana, she is good with words:

I love tradition, I love monarchy, I love the ancient folk ways of this country, I love its eccentricity and its differences; I love to hunt on winter mornings and punt on spring days. I dislike reform for the sake of reform, government for the sake of government. If you think I cannot be a libertarian and a conservative you are very much mistaken. A patriot is a person who loves the nation, not the state. And there is a huge difference.

Where is the PC brigade I wonder?

Global Warming Apology?

I suppose it is too much to ask for an apology from the crazy warmists?

Ours is not a 'House of Commons' - commoners have common sense from whence the parlance is derived. Ours is a House of Fools for they do not represent the people and have not represented the people for a few decades now. Whilst the Union is craving for some proper leadership in tune with the fiddles of the people, we are given nothing but pathetic puppets who would not be able to tell the difference between a spine and a crime, where they forced to do so.

Remarkably they seem to harbour under the illusion that the current status quo will continue.

Third Time Student Protests

My parents both worked when they were at university. One of them worked in a pea factory and was a tutor, the other in a pub, as a tutor and a delivery boy. The spare time they had, they had to study. They both left with good degrees and no debt. I work as well during my degree, granted it is not enough but one does try.

Look at all the photos of today's protests and you will see that generally these are people from the 'Socialist Worker's Party' student section. I tore down their posters at my university because they were an incitement of violence. I speculated as to whether I should leave my email or not so that they could contact me, but I decided against it. Somehow I cannot see 'fair-play' being in their dictionary. Yes, I know it does not really square with my liberal tendencies but they are really starting to piss me off right now.

We are not all like this, do remember that, most fellow student bloggers that I know share my disposition and disgust towards our "comrades" who have taken to the streets. These "students" should just get over themselves. Most countries do not pay grants or give loans to students, so they have to pay their own way. Look at America, apart froma very few scholarships, students work their way through college/university, usually at menial jobs. Like my parents, mine is not menial at all, I quite enjoy my job actually, and they are not hard to come by what I do.

What these "students" protestors all have in common is that most of them have probably never done a single days worth of honest labour in their lives. Yet they have the stomach to call for free education. Why they fuck should it be free? If you want it you pay for it.