Tuesday 16 March 2010

Porn Director?! Rapist would have been a better metaphor for the Lib Dems



It became apparent in the last week, to much controversy, that Anna Arrowsmith (Lib Dem PPC for Gravesham) used to direct porn films. At last, the nation thought, the Lib Dems may actually be interesting! But no, the story soon died down as the Lib Dems held their own Spring Conference in Brum.

By sharp contrast this was a damp squib. Nothing much happened and the party got almost no media attention as you might expect. The party slogan has actually become something of a joke. It seems that Britain's third party has simply stuck together the other two party's slogans!

Perhaps party supporters should wonder if it's the electoral system that's preventing them getting into power or their own lack of creativity. Have they given up?

Friday 12 March 2010

The BBC News School Report

Just wanted to take the opportunity on here to say what a great success the BBC News Report Day was. I have only seen and heard a few parts of it so far but a particular highlight was school children from Bristol holding an interview/conversation with children of the same age in Kabul, Afghanistan.

I hope that such nationwide events encourage young people to engage more with the world around them.

Tuesday 9 March 2010

Kelvin MacKenzie worse than Richard Littlejohn?!



Yes you heard it here first, unless you were listening to the 'World Tonight' last night.

In the discussion with MacKenzie he clearly gave his support to vigilantism with regard to the James Bulger case to which his 'opponent's' fantastic retort alerted the former Sun editor to a piece Littlejohn had written in the Sun at the time of the killing. In it Littlejohn (uncharacteristically) criticised the calls for 'stringing up the pair from the lamposts' but nevertheless this very much belittled any type of argument Liverpool's no. 1 enemy could muster in his whole 10 minutes!

Sunday 7 March 2010

Labour Pull Two Electioneering Stunts in the Same Week



Labour have quite clearly begun gearing up for the forthcoming election as has been seen by two stunts in the last few days which do little more than get a little media attention at the expense of innocents.

Firstly, Gordon Brown went over to see the troops in Afghanistan to say 'thanks'. I'm not sure about you but this sounds more than a little like a goodbye, perhaps GB knows he won't be coming back to the warzone he leaves behind. Anyway you look at it, a vist to see 'our boys' is even for the least cynical voter nothing more than an appeal for votes. This is not what the army is for.

Meanwhile Jack Straw has agrred to meet the mother of James Bulger, Denise Fergus, but I fail to see what this will achieve. The Justice Secretary cannot reveal what Venables has done and to do so would be a breach of law. The release of such information would only lead to the lynch mobs of the red-top newspapers dragging the ocuntry into disrepute and there would undoubtedly be another case before the European Court of Human Rights. The locus of Denise Fergus with regard to the case has ended and Jack Straw knows this. The minister is tapping into the public fury and the vulnerability of Fergus for votes.

There you have it then, the lengths this untenable government will go to stay in power. How anyone can help them do so is beyong belief.

Thursday 4 March 2010

University of Westminster Protest - A Response



Firstly, major apologies for the lack of blogging activity. Nearly a month since my last blog ffs! I can only put this down to my own laziness to research issues when I finally get a break from my dull law degree.

Anyway, mentioning uni, there's some absolutely insane protest going on against the wholly necessary cuts which we have to make. Of course at the sign of anyone's job getting "slashed" it seems inevitable that the stereotypically student-left jump on the bandwagon. How a campaign can claim to have legitimacy when it has fewer supporters than jobs actually being axed is beyond me but that obviously doesn't concern them.

The reason I've decided to blog on this petty attempt at student activism is because now events have gone a step too far. On the 1st March the protesters stormed the board of governors meeting and have since been in occupation of the vice-chancellors office. Resorting to violence and causing fear and panic across the rest of the university is not something that should be tolerated and it is of little surprise that the campaign has recently added to its demands that "no student or member of staff involved in actions against job cuts faces any repercussions or reprisals"; me thinks our rebels are feeling post-revolution guilt.

The accusation thrown against the university is that the governors are trying to make it run more like a business; well heaven forbid! The campus is based at the top of Regent Street, one of the foremost business areas in London and the world. They continue that because of this and the ensuing cuts that education will suffer. I doubt this somehow. Clearly if there is some sort of thinning down in areas it will be done in an appropriate way so as to not lose business. If the governors were to go too far then no one would go to the university at all and there would be no 'business' left to run. The governors are the best people to know the best ways to save money and indeed the university has in the past had financial trouble and needs to cut back.

Furthermore the government has in the past year or so shown more reluctance towards funding universities across England and with tuition fees set to rise surely the best way to prevent this is to cut back in non-essential areas. Personally I hope that more universities take note of the good work done by the governors and deal with any wannabe revolutions appropriately.

Picture courtesy of Sky Yarlett
www.flickr.com/worldofsky
www.worldofsky.wordpress.com

Comments