Off to buy some whitewash

The report into the leaked emails has been published and the verdict is as expected- a total whitewash.
I despair.
Read Antony Watts post here
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/30/results-of-the-climategate-paliamentary-inquiry-in-the-uk/#more-17952
Here's the press release

"Phil Willis MP, Committee Chair, said:
“Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable. What this inquiry revealed was that climate scientists need to take steps to make available all the data that support their work and full methodological workings, including their computer codes. Had both been available, many of the problems at CRU could have been avoided.”
The focus on Professor Jones and CRU has been largely misplaced. On the accusations relating to Professor Jones’s refusal to share raw data and computer codes, the Committee considers that his actions were in line with common practice in the climate science community but that those practices need to change.
On the much cited phrases in the leaked e-mails-”trick” and “hiding the decline”-the Committee considers that they were colloquial terms used in private e-mails and the balance of evidence is that they were not part of a systematic attempt to mislead.
Insofar as the Committee was able to consider accusations of dishonesty against CRU, the Committee considers that there is no case to answer.
The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.
On the mishandling of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests, the Committee considers that much of the responsibility should lie with the University, not CRU. The leaked e-mails appear to show a culture of non-disclosure at CRU and instances where information may have been deleted to avoid disclosure, particularly to climate change sceptics. The failure of the University to grasp fully the potential damage this could do and did was regrettable. The University needs to re-assess how it can support academics whose expertise in FoI requests is limited."


Nothing to see here. Move along please.


But wait a minute. This is our money they're spending. And they're going to tax us into the stone ages if they get their way.


You can't build the truth using a lie for foundations.
And there ain't no right way to do a wrong thing.
Who gains from all this? Follow the money.

I will continue to ignore everything the government and global warming scientists publish because unless they can convince me that their motives are good, the science is clear and unambiguous and has been subject to rigorous scrutiny by both sides of the argument, and when the sponsors of this new religion practise what they preach, as far as I'm concerned it's just hot air and spin.

Spin spin and more spin

I'm a bit late responding to this, as the original article was published in the Daily Mail yesterday
You can read it here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1261290/HEATHER-BROOKE-The-great-razzle-dazzle-rip-off.html

The government is the biggest advertiser on tv. I've stopped watching them because they are almost all factually incorrect or biased or downright lies. Global warming, passive smoking, obesity, all designed to keep the population fearful and/or guilty.
The police, the NHS and local government spent countless millions every year on spin. Nobody in any of these organisations is allowed to speak to the media without the permission of the relevant press office.
This is from the Mail yesterday

"The TaxPayers' Alliance, the campaign group for lower taxes, trawled through 445 annual reports just for 2008 and then all those for previous years to compare spending.
The 2008 report revealed the average local authority spent £971,985 on publicity, with the total local authority publicity bill being £430million. Six local authorities each spend more than £5million annually on publicity, including Birmingham City Council, which spent more than £9million. Tower Hamlets, my old council and one of Britain's most deprived boroughs, spent £2,354,000 in 2007-08 on Press and PR - an increase of 82.6 per cent from ten years before."

Inspector Gadget reports that Northumbria Police nominated themselves and won a public relations award "for the way they handled the media after the tragedy of a schoolgirl knocked down and killed by a speeding patrol car."

I encourage you to visit his blogsite and read the article. You'll be astonished and appalled

 

http://inspectorgadget.wordpress.com/2010/03/24/hayley-adamson-is-dead-but-nprthumbria-win-gold/

All this money being spent on press officers and media advisors instead of front line services. Thousands upon thousands of Comical Alis defending the indefensible.

Now you'll know where all those media studies and political science graduates got jobs. Very cosy.

Ayn Rand quotes

"We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force. "


"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil."

 "Potentially, a government is the most dangerous threat to man's rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims"

"So you think that money is the root of all evil. Have you ever asked what is the root of all money? "

"The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody had decided not to see. " 

 "The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws."

More here-
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/ayn_rand.html 


 

Policing with the public's consent

If you google "Peelian principles" you will discover that Sir Robert Peel, the founder of the modern day police force enshrined a number of principles. Here they are-

1. The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder.
2. The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon the public approval of police actions.
3. Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observation of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public.
4. The degree of co-operation of the public that can be secured diminishes proportionately to the necessity of the use of physical force.
5. Police seek and preserve public favour not by catering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law.
6. Police use physical force to the extent necessary to secure observance of the law or to restore order only when the exercise of persuasion, advice, and warning is found to be insufficient.
7. Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent upon every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
8. Police should always direct their action strictly towards their functions, and never appear to usurp the powers of the judiciary.
9. The test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with it

A few years back when I was involved in our local Community Association we had a local bobby. It sounds unbelievable I know but only fifteen years ago the Police used to assign a full time Police Officer (not a PCSO) to our part of town. He'd patrol the area, visit the local schools, pubs and shops and be a visible presence. He even attended our meetings, as his bosses said it was a good idea. All that changed when the new Chief Constable came in. All the police were assigned to a central pool and allocated as required, which meant that we never saw a policeman or woman again as they were all in Northampton.
Our community policeman had a mantra which he'd repeat at every opportunity.
"The Police only police with the public's consent."

Which explains a lot. It explains why travellers can set up camp anywhere and terrorise whole towns. It explains why the police won't enter a gypsy camp to recover stolen goods even if they have cast iron proof that the villains are there with the loot. It explains why Peterborough is overrun with Eastern Europeans who are killing and eating all the wildlife along the Riven Nene. It explains why the huge travellers camp to the north of the city is a no-go area.

The inhabitants of these illegal camps won't consent to being policed, and the Police only police those who consent.

It explains why have a go heroes are arrested and jailed while the villains go free. It's because they don't consent to being policed you see?

And now the government want us to spy on each other and report illegal activities to the police.
Well I don't consent.

Ayn Rand was right all along

The Devils Kitchen blog has an interesting post. He's commenting on the number of laws that Labour have passed in the last thirteen years. It's 4000 plus and still rising.
I've often said that the law will make criminals of us all, and it appears to be looming closer each day.
DK quotes from Ayn Rand's 1957 masterpiece "Atlas Shrugged", and I've copied the quote for you to read
""Did you really think that we want those laws to be observed?" said Dr. Ferris. "We want them broken. You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're up against—then you'll know that this is not the age for beautiful gestures. We're after power and we mean it. You fellows were pikers, but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be enforced nor objectively interpreted—and you create a nation of law-breakers—and then you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system, Mr Rearden, that's the game, and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with."

So now you know. Governments rule by guilt and fear. They have to have a bogeyman to keep you in line. Once upon a time it was the "reds under the bed", now it's climate change.
Don't believe a single solitary word. Ever.
And wake up to the fact that we are facing enslavement.

West ham Utd & UK Plc

I happened to watch West Ham Utd get beaten by Wolves earlier this week. They are in a mess. Whatever your football allegiance, you have to admit that if they go down, they will fall a long way, further than Leeds Utd. If they stay up, they may survive.
This is David Sullivan and David Gold's press conference when they took over the club. Listen to them. The cupboard is bare. There will be no money coming in for years. The previous owners have borrowed and borrowed, using season ticket income for the next two seasons. Any money they get for selling players will only go to service debt.


It's like UK Plc in miniature. West Ham owe more money than most people can imagine, but it's nothing compared to what UK Plc currently owes. UK Plc doesn't have any assets. It no longer owns any part of the infrastructure. It owes trillions. The only thing going for it is its AAA credit rating, which is a bit like Premier League football status. Lose that, and you go into freefall.


I watched a bit of the budget yesterday. In the end I gave up in disgust. Such lies, amounting to treason.
The electorate are in denial. They don't want to hear about how bad it really is. Like West Ham supporters, they feed on past glories and believe that the good times are just around the corner.
It may just be that Labour pull it off and get re-elected. It may be that West Ham surive and live to fight another day. However, the debt is still there. It won't go away.


I can easily envisage a press conference in the near futuure where the new Prime Minister and his Chancellor sit down and tell it like it is, just like Messrs Sullivan and Gold did.


No I can't. For all their unsavoury background in pornography and sex aids, Sullivan & Gold are more honourable and more honest than any politician sitting in the house. And I never thought I'd ever think that. Dream on people, the good times are just around the corner.

Combatting scepticism by shouting loudly

Biased-BBC pointed me to an interesting article on this site
http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/03/combating-the-growing-influence-of-climate-sceptics/




Now I'm an AGW sceptic. As far as I can see, global warming or climate change is all about money. There's money to be had by trading on people's fears and taxing them as punishment.
When the "climategate" story broke, it revealed to the world that the figures quoted by all the "authorities" were in fact made up. The antics of the warmists and their refusal to countenance any deviation from the party line, followed by calling us "denialists" only made me more convinced of the shakiness of their argument. The science is not settled, and when one party in a debate has to resort to name calling, then he has lost the debate, full stop.


The BBC and the Met Office are central to their cause. This was highlighted in a recent report commissioned by fake charity and political lobby group Oxfam . My eye was drawn to this line on the Leftfootforward site, which sums them up -
"Oh, and remember to check out James Delingpole’s column at the Telegraph. If any of it makes you angry, you might like to let him know. Did I say be polite? Scratch that."

So, more encouragement to be rude towards sceptics. You don't win arguments by shouting louder than everyone else.
Here's a handy little diagram that accompanies the article.

Click on it to enlarge it.

The truth about rubbish

The Daily Mail is running an article about the possibility of households being fined up to £1000 for putting the wrong rubbish in their bins. Of course, this is the Daily Mail and they've never knowingly underhyped a story, but it's worth investigating a bit. The story is here

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1258755/Families-face-fine-using-wrong-bin-household-waste-crackdown.html


There is a simple way to counter this of course and that's to make sure that you leave no identifying items in your bin and just empty the bin in the street and phone the fly-tipping hot line and ask the council to come and pick it up. Not that I'm suggesting any such thing of course.
Local councils must be made to understand that they are the servants of the people and not the other way around. We pay a lot of money in council tax and we expect a good service. The knee jerk reaction of local authorities when their ivory tower existence is threatened is to pull the "washington monument" trick. Cut front line services while keeping their won overpaid and overbloated existence unchanged.

I note that this rule only applies to household waste. In my day job as office manager of a solicitor's firm I have to deal with the disposal of the waste that we generate. In our town we buy blue rubbish bags from the council. They are currently about £1.50 each. Being a good citizen and mindful of the need to avoid putting recyclable items into landfill, I asked if the council would take our cardboard and paper separately.
The answer amazed me. No they wouldn't. They have no facility for separating trade waste. They had no plans to instigate separate collections or even provide a collection point for my cardboard and old newspapers. They weren't interested. So, we have a double standard in the heart of local council's recycling policy. If you're a household, you separate everything, if you're a business you can't. Not "don't have to" but "can't". That's crazy.
I refuse to pay the council to take away paper and cardboard that could easily be recycled. The council will quite happily fill up its landfill sites with trade waste , whilst fleecing the householder and wringing its hands and making us all feel guilty about some european directive or other.
Admittedly we are a small firm and we can easily recycle within the office.Our confidential waste has to be securely disposed of, but old envelopes and newspapers and spam faxes about lease cars and drinks machines can be boxed up and taken to the local public tip every month or so. we recycle our cardboard and cans through our houselhold collections and we've cut our trade waste to one bag per week.
Recycling and recycling policy- it's all rubbish, designed to extract more cash so that the council fatcats can get their gold plated pensions.
Local government officials used to be called public servants. When did that change? As far as I'm concerned it never has.

Cash-Gordon

Wind farm contract cancelled

At last, some sense regarding wind farms. They are an expensive eyesore and are bad for your health and for the local wildlife. They only work if the wind is blowing and won't work at all if the wind is too strong. You still have to have a backup in the form of coal fired or nuclear power stations.

Denmark is held up to be the shining example of renewable energy. It's a myth. Most of the time they have to buy electricity from neighbouring countries. Any electricity that is produced is way too expensive. Renewable energy is just another scam, and only exists in order to claim the generous subsidies on offer.
One of the comments on Wattsupwiththat-
"Denmark, the world’s most wind-intensive nation, with more than 6,000 turbines generating 19% of its electricity, has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant. It requires 50% more coal-generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability, and pollution and carbon dioxide emissions have risen (by 36% in 2006 alone).
Flemming Nissen, the head of development at West Danish generating company ELSAM (one of Denmark’s largest energy utilities) tells us that “wind turbines do not reduce carbon dioxide emissions.” The German experience is no different. Der Spiegel reports that “Germany’s CO2 emissions haven’t been reduced by even a single gram,” and additional coal- and gas-fired plants have been constructed to ensure reliable delivery… "

Someone wrote that green energy is not green if it requires a subsidy. Amen to that.

So here's the news from the US
"In a statement made last Friday by EDF Energies Nouvelles (French Green Power Company), a power purchase agreement was terminated without explanation by Indianapolis Power and Light Company regarding the supply of wind energy by enXco, a local EDF company. The contract was unilaterally terminated by IPL, and more than 10 days later, EDF has acknowledged it to the market."

Somebody woke up to the fact that as well as erecting scores of unsightly turbines, they'd also have to build a new back up generating facility. So why have the windfarm at all?

Every week we hear of more plans to desecrate our countryside with windfarms. This part of the UK is not known for being windy- far from it. So why do they persist? It couldn't be for the subsidies on offer could it?
Full story here
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/15/indianapolis-wind-power-contract-canceled/

Get rid of the non jobs

The public sector Unison has recently launched a video that claims that cuts to public spending will hit front line services. This is called the Washington Monument Syndrome. Defined on Wiki as
"Washington Monument Syndrome, also called the "Mount Rushmore Syndrome", is the name of a political tactic used by bureaucrats when faced with reductions in the rate of projected increases in budget or actual budget cuts. The most visible and most appreciated service that is provided by that entity is the first to be put on the chopping block. The name derives from the National Park Service's habit of saying that any cuts to its projected increases would lead to an immediate closure of the wildly popular (and not very expensive to maintain) Washington Monument.

The Taxpayers Alliance have issued their version of Unison's video. It shows that public expenditure can be reduced without harming front line services
Check it out here

Even Google can't cope with Kettering Town Centre

I was bored so I decided to look at our house on Google Streetview. After I'd done that I decided to look at the street where I work. It's right in the town centre and in the middle of Kettering's notorious one way system. It seems that the street isn't on Street view. OK, no problem. I rather expected that. After all, the traffic system is a trap for the unwary.
The traffic mess all began about twenty years ago when a branch of Wilkinsons opened. They very conveniently placed a pedestrian crossing between Wilkinsons and the shopping centre doors. The street was the main north-south thoroughfare through town.
The inevitable result was gridlock in the town centre. Cars just couldn't make any progress along Newland St without shoppers walking straight into the road and bringing traffic to a halt.
The simple and cheap solution would have been a pelican crossing linked to the traffic lights fifty yards away. It would have cost a few thousand at most. But no, this is Kettering Borough Council that we're talking about.
They appointed consultants with a brief to stop traffic from clogging up the town centre. The result was staggering both in terms of the cost and the ineptitude of those who carried it out. Overnight it made rat runs of previously sleepy and traffic free streets. If you didn't know the town it was impossible to travel from south to north without either driving through a pedestrian precinct or through one of the rat runs. It was a fiasco.
Eventually the Council caved in to pressure and asked the consultants to revisit the brief. One expensive consultation later and they came back and said that they'd fulfilled the brief to the letter, therefore there was no problem.
They were asked to stop the traffic from clogging up the town centre and they had. The fact that it now clogged up the side streets was neither here nor there.

Sometime last March a google car tried to negotiate the town centre traffic system. The driver failed and the evidence is there for everyone to see.
Type NN16 0BN and follow the arrows. The driver should have turned right into Montagu Street but instead made an illegal left turn into Gold St. He continued along the pedestrianised street to the junction with Meeting Lane. He must have got confused because Streetview stops there. I wonder if the poor chap is still driving around and around, trying to get out?

Whatever it is- I'm against it

Groucho Marx's wonderful satire on grundyism*.

The Marx Brothers began their careers during one of the craziest periods in US history- the prohibition era. It's now acknowledged that alcohol consumption went up during the "dry" years, and it allowed organised crime to control the supply and reap the profits. The US government had to reinforce the ban and had no revenue from liquor sales to pay for the enforcement.All brought on following an outbreak of grundyism.
The same this is happening today re the smoking ban. People still smoke as much and much of it is contraband. So the government has all the hassle of upholding an unjust law with none of the revenue. Added to that is the fact that pubs are closing down everywhere and the government is losing VAT and tax revenue that way.
And all because of a few Mrs Grundies who hate the idea that people might actually be enjoying themselves and put every obstacle in their paths to stop it.
So when he sang this song back in 1932, did all the Mrs Grundys realise he was taking the piss out of them?

Just listen to the words of this song that's less than a minute long.


*Wikipaedia defines Mrs Grundy as "a feared dispenser of disapproval"

Nick Hogan

The blogosphere has been busy commenting about Nick Hogan, who has been jailed for allowing customers to smoke in his pub. The story is here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1254126/Pub-landlord-Nick-Hogan-given-smoking-ban-jail-sentence.html

I've never smoked and so you might think that I was in favour of the ban. Far from it. I think that it's outrageous that one minority can dictate to another how they should behave. Apparently the smoking ban is an EU directive. Go into bars in eastern Europe or Spain and see if they're taking any notice. They're not.
And quite rightly so. Since when is it the task of government (and an unrepresentative and unelected one at that) to define whether private establishments should allow smoking on their premises?
I wouldn't mind, but smoking is allowed in the bars in the Houses of Parliament. It's one rule for them and another for us.
If the majority of members of a private club decide to allow smoking, what right is it of anyone else to interfere? If a pub chooses to ban smoking, that's up to the pub. The customers will vote with their feet. Likewise, if it chooses to allow smoking, those who object can go elsewhere. This is what markets are about, surely?

Despite what the anti-smoking brigade may say, the evidence against secondary smoking is flimsy to non-existent. They say- what about Roy Castle? Didn't he die of lung cancer?
Yes he did. And yes he did work in smoky clubs a long time ago. But so did I. Both my parents smoked and the smoke hung in a cloud in the living room. You could taste it. However, I'm still here and still healthy. My dad died of cancer and yes he was a smoker. Did smoking kill him? I don't think so. When he was a young man he worked on the railway and they used to lag the boilers of the engines with asbestos. He told me they used have snowball fights with the stuff. That's more likely to be the reason.

I'm against a blanket ban on smoking because I believe that the individual should have the right to choose. I don't believe for one moment that the state has any right to impose bans like this. Prohibition didn't work and this won't work either.

I live next door to a pub. Before the ban you'd never know it was there. Since the ban, the noise from the beer garden and smoking shelter disturbs the peace- my peace. What do I do? Do I complain about the noise? If I do and he closes down as a result, then I'm just part of the problem instead of part of the solution.

I'm a musician and my livelihood has been affected by the ban. Pubs are closing at an alarming rate. If I do get a booking then I play to a half full room, because the audience are outside smoking. The ban is hurting the entertainment industry but we must shut up and lump it.

Soon they are saying that they will ban smoking in the home. Surely that's my decision, not the government's?

Meanwhile Nick Hogan is in jail- as a lesson to others. He has no income and no way of paying his fine. His wife can't get to see him. If you feel strongly about this, please go to Old Holborn's site
http://bastardoldholborn.blogspot.com/
where you can donate to pay his fine. It now stands at over £2000.
And lobby your MP