Howdy there y' all

I suppose that I never really believed it when everybody who has visited the USA insisted on how friendly the people all are out here. It is true and second only to that is the excellent sense of service shown by everybody in a way only seldom seen in England. Congratulations to them!
We clearly have lessons to learn as a nation in matters of basic politeness.

Good old Joe.

Joe Arpaio, my hero and Sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona keeps on doing the business out here around Phoenix.
Jailbirds here live in tent city and wear a fetching pink ensemble.
[We passed the aforementioned facility yesterday.]
His attitude is "If you don't like it here - don't come!"
Not cruel and only arguably harsh as a regime; fair; extremely basic only but still better than what the American troops have had to endure in Iraq.
Rights? - They are for those who do not break the law.

Recidivism rate - I won't say. You guess!

ADVERTISING abortion now - how low can we go?

LINK: http://www.ccfon.org/mediacentre.php?avid=186&avap=1

Great news!

'One of the Tories' biggest donors was kicked out of the party by David Cameron last night after he backed the rival UK Independence Party.
The Tory leader acted within hours of learning that millionaire Stuart Wheeler had given £100,000 to Eurosceptic UKIP and said he would vote for them at Euro elections in June.'

Bad news!

'The outspoken Bishop of Rochester will step down from the position on September 1, it was announced today.
Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, the first non-white diocesan bishop in the Church of England, has been in the post for 15 years.'

He WILL be missed - a voice of Christian common sense.

Toilets.

If California can supply public toilets everywhere - or restrooms as they call them here - why can't British councils do the same?

Preventing war: causing war?

"The EU will prevent war" idea is a fantasy. Consider how many wars, revolutions and coups have taken place when national groups have sought the right to rule themselves.
We are seeing built a federal state which will guarantee the rise of nationalistic groups of extreme right to be regaled as freedom fighters and leftwing groups in counterbalance. So my view differs to the europhile claim.
[Little wonder Europol has been formed with technically more powers than Himmler's Gestapo.
"Ah, but they don't use them" do I hear you say? - Once a power exists it WILL be used - be under no illusions.]
I may be wrong here, but the odds are probably greatly in favour of my scary scenario - predictions are not exact science and are dependent on the 'circumstances' point made by Macmillan, I think.

A message in artichokes.

I might have entitled this posting 'Letter from America' - but I think that it has been done.

Watching the Mexican workers in the fields of artichokes around Castroville, I became aware of the main reason why there is a fifth column in both the UK and the USA where the employment of cheap labour - whether legal or illegal, matters not - is concerned.

As ever, I have no problem with people from other countries wanting to better themselves; it is their entitlement but the question which must be asked is 'Are there really any vacancies?'

That such low wage people are claimed 'To do the jobs our own people will not do' - on both sides of the Atlantic - is shameful.

We live in some sort of meritocracy wherein you learn the rules from very young that if you want 'a good job' then you must get the best education you can.

If you fail to play by the rules, you are in no position to complain later when others have 'the good jobs' and you are looking at the dirty, tedious, horrible, but nonetheless essential, tasks which our society needs done.

Where immigration is fundamentally immoral, is in the fact that it allows this social stratum to go unchecked - and of course now that group will claim that 'there are no jobs' and the population of the country has grown unnaturally with the immigrants brought in to protect such people. Many hardworking immigrants are now also out of work! Social disasters multiply.

The problems mount and must be laid at the door of successive, gutless governments with less moral fibre than a raspberry blancmange.

Free speech is no more.

'The vote to keep free speech was lost by 328 votes to 174 last night in the House of Commons with the vote being whipped rather than a free vote. The clause was initially proposed by Lord Waddington, as part of last year’s Criminal Justice and Immigration Act, in an attempt to permit legitimate discussion of sexual practice. This is a vital freedom for Christians who are called to love every individual no matter what their sexual orientation but must be free to speak out on biblical sexual ethics.'

CCFON.

Pro-Life Alliance - NICE ONE!

'On 17 March 2009, the ProLife Alliance represented by leading barrister Paul Diamond, won a significant victory before the Information Tribunal. Paul Diamond succeeded in convincing the Tribunal that the Department of Health must find a witness by 21 April 2009, who would agree to give evidence on Government abortion statistics, without anonymity. The hearing will not be held in public, but the ProLife Alliance will be given the opportunity to cross-examine the witness. The hearing continues.'

Higgledy Piggledy.

Postings on this Blog are unlikely to be as 'daily' as I normally claim them to be for a week or two.
There will definitely be no posting tomorrow and thereafter, items will be somewhat sporadic until the 9th of April. Apologies to all for the loss of continuity and I hope that you will find much of interest in the now rather vast archive which has accumulated here and which numbers just a few under 2,000! Any topic of particular interest will surface if you simply put key words into the search engine.
Regards to all.

EON

Last Autumn I was directed by USwitch.com to EON as the best value gas/electricity provider.

I signed up for a deal which held my prices at a specified rate until November 2009. My prices have shot up, nevertheless.

After two fruitless and lengthy calls over months and empty promises not fulfilled, I was forced yesterday to ring for a third time when a rather irritating lady explained in carefully prepared gobbledygook how what I had been told actually meant something totally different and was because I had booked it online. [????]

I shall be quitting this mendacious provider at the very first opportunity - and suggest others who use EON check what these odious people are up to and act accordingly. Now is a good time to switch companies!

Oh dear!

'A Christian minister from Heston United Reformed Church, West London, has been assaulted by three Muslim men who ripped off his cross and warned: ‘If you go back to the studio, we’ll break your legs.’

The Reverend Noble Samuel, a Pakistan-born Christian, 48, was educated by Christian missionaries and moved to Britain in 1994. He holds debates with Muslims on his TV Gospel show. The incident occurred, as he was driving to his studio one morning to do his programme. A car pulled over in front of him and a man got out as if to ask him directions.
.
Rev. Samuel said: ‘He put his hand into my window, which was half open, and grabbed my hair and opened the door. He started slapping my face and punching my neck. He was trying to smash my head on the steering wheel.'

LINK: http://www.christianlegalcentre.com/view.php?id=706

Always five years or multiples thereof.

I have just read a piece suggesting that a dramatic new treatment is 'just five years away' for Alzheimers.

Why are these 'miracle cures' always described thus?

Why are they never 'eighteen months away', for example?

Why do we not get press coverage when they actually arrive?

I am afraid that tabloid sensationalism must build an awful lot of false hope for a great many people.

A church divided.

"With no effective restraint, a counterfeit Christianity has established itself within the Anglican Communion, pushing well beyond the boundaries of orthodox faith and morality in North America with the British Isles not far behind. Adherence to legal form means that ecclesiastical law can nonetheless be used aggressively to deprive orthodox congregations of their assets while those who encourage the law suits – some 60 in the United States alone – continue to participate in endless ‘conversation’. "

Charles Raven.

Bête noires?

Sir Fred Goodwin the erstwhile Chief Executive of HBOS has become a love-to-hate figure for large sectors of the population.

You may feel that he has gained this status rather more deservedly than he has the millions he is being paid for his general incompetence.

The Brown government is delighted with this development, however. Goodwin is just one portion of a much bigger problem - and that is that this government has 'fiddled whilst the economy crashed and burned'.

No. The government are simply chuffed silly that such a welcome diversion has fallen so easily into their lap.

Labour supporting newspapers such as The Mirror do not have a clue how to assess all of this because they have praised the 'Brown phenomenon' to high heaven at the same time as the rest of us have been issuing warnings, Cassandra-style, of what was really happening.

The Guardian & Independent are getting off slightly easier by lending support (albeit rather belatedly) to the new guru, Vince Cable, who has emerged from all of this with reputation enhanced.

School reports scam.

That school reports should encourage is one thing but I recall when still involved in comprehensive education how staff were instructed that all reports had to be fully positive.

I largely ignored this, preferring to tell the truth rather than to deceive parents or to hide negatives under clusters of euphemisms.

The crass stupidity of this kind of 'right-on thinking' hardly needs explanation here.

More higher education nonsense from Labour.

The possibility of big increases in university tuition fees is an absolute disgrace.
Of course the country cannot afford to subsidise all the countless students we now have.
The last time I heard a statistic, student numbers were in excess of 40% of young people, with an ultimate target of 50%.
Anybody who has taught the second quartile; those school pupils who barely achieve their 5 passes at GCSE, must know that it is extreme folly to send these youngsters en masse into higher education.
The only possible results are 'dumbing down' of courses and astronomically high graduate unemployment in the long term with all the resultant debt and disappointments for a whole generation - or longer unless we reverse this ridiculous policy.

LINKS: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1162577/New-threat-middle-classes-Universities-plan-double-student-fees-leave-millions-debt-50s.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1162791/Less-3-000-year--university-graduates-paltry-pay-premium.html

"How goes your soul?"

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great 19th century preacher, was fond of stopping people in the street to ask questions like the above.

He was the kind of preacher who reminded people that 'we are not promised tomorrow'.

We can do with more of his like today. Where are the preachers who will tell the 'lost' that they are lost; why they are lost; who can save them and that repentance is part of the process?

Oh dear! Can't do that. It's a bit 'in your face, isn't it'?

Sorry Christians. What was The Great Commission again that we are all required to enact?

Cost Benefit Analysis.

The secrecy and lack of transparency of the European Union is the stuff of legend.

Critics of this august body have demanded a Cost Benefit Analysis - a most reasonable response. Let the people know just how much the thing costs. The government however, will not permit this and the Conservatives and Lib Dems remain tight-lipped.

If you, as a ranting europhile, have nothing to hide - you would merrily undertake such a study to show people what a wonderful bargain they are getting - well, wouldn't you?

[Incidentally, The Bruges Group suggests a heartstopping, annual figure of 55 billion quid may be pretty close!]

Liam Donaldson.

In a democracy, measures to control the behaviour of the populace have tremendous possibilities for misuse.

As a senior health official, Liam Donaldson is most influential in government circles.

His point that our population consumes too much alcohol is quite correct - his response, which is to tax and tax and tax again, is a total disgrace.

Moderate alcohol consumption is a part of our culture and his approach would of course, penalise the poorer members of society.

Has not this government already overseen the closing of many thousands of valuable, social gathering centres called pubs?

His solution smacks of the ever burgeoning 'nanny state'; it is a scam to bleed ever more taxes from a public which is overtaxed to unbelievable levels and worse still, it punishes the innocent to try to get at the alcohol abusers.

Repugnant thinking.

Come on you ranting evolutionists - are Africans a different species?

Neanderthal skulls had on average 100ml more brain space than the modern humans. Gene studies really confirm Neanderthals were fully human and should not even be considered a different species. The fact that they had a gene variation now found only in Africans simply means that the variation was much more widespread and it has died out in Europe – unless any one wants to claim that present day Africans are a different species!

My thanks to Creation Research.

Michael Gordon Peterson.

The prisoner Michael Gordon Peterson, otherwise known as Bronson, is the subject of a new film.

Perhaps I should live in Tonbridge Wells - because I am certainly disgusted.

No matter how this film is made - and I shall certainly not be going to see it - it must end up to some extent, by glorifying the man who is rightly referred to as the 'most dangerous' in Britain. Another good argument for restoration of the death penalty.

Feel good on your computer.

HOW TO START EACH DAY WITH A POSITIVE OUTLOOK
1. Open a new file in your computer.
2. Name it "Robert Mugabe".
3. Send it to the Recycle Bin.
4. Empty the Recycle Bin.
5. Your PC will ask you. "Do you really want to get rid of "Robert Mugabe ?"
6. Firmly Click "Yes."
7. Feel better?

[Thanks, Jack!]

Silly arguments.

Logically, the nature of God cannot and could not disprove the existence of God yet this is the most frequently voiced argument posed by would-be atheists.

Put another way, "I do not like what God appears to be ergo He does not exist."

Jeremiah?

I do not wish to worry anybody with doom and gloom but respected financial forecaster, Numis is predicting a further massive fall in house prices of up to 55%!
The same group refers to the 'probability' of Britain going bankrupt.
Happy days!

LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1161317/House-prices-drop-55-leave-Britain-bankrupt.html

A fond farewell.

On Monday I travelled to Stoke for the funeral of a decent man.
Fred Johnson was by trade a pottery painter - and a very good one indeed.
Fred was kind, genial, good company and a wonderful family man.
He will be missed by a great many.
He was younger than me and it is times such as this when we are brought face to face with our own mortality.
So often we fail to spot the importance of life and death in the hustle and bustle of our daily lives.

Our social priorities right again, I see.

Last year, ten hospitals spent less on breakfast, lunch and an evening meal than the £2.12 a day allocated for food by the prison service.
One hospital spent just £1.

Academic decline to continue.

I have just been sent an E Mail offering me a chance to improve my qualifications.
Liverpool Hope University is to launch a Masters Degree in Beatles Studies!
That one student might offer a thesis on the Beatles is perhaps justifiable - at a stretch - but for this to be systematic 'study' is an academic absurdity.
If you hadn't believed me when I have talked of 'dumbing down' in past articles - perhaps now you will!

No apologies. Christianity DOES offend. Get used to it!

'The senior chaplain at Sandhurst military academy has dropped the Apostles' Creed from Anglican services saying it might offend religious minorities.
The Daily Mail reported on 31st January that centuries of religious tradition have been sacrificed for the sake of political correctness.
Reverend Jonathan Gough dropped the Christian declaration of faith in God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit when he took office last month.
A fellow Chaplain said it had been removed 'to stop upsetting cadets who do not believe in God'. This is despite the fact that attendance is not compulsory. Non-believing Sandhurst cadets can and do opt out of church.
The Ministry of Defence said the Creed had been withdrawn from services at the Royal Memorial Chapel to make the church 'more inclusive'. Figures showing how the massive increase of attendance at church by cadets from other faiths and none since the service was made more 'inclusive' by hiding what Christians believe have not yet been released.'

Source: Christian Voice.

Skewed thinking.

Migration to the UK is 3 times the world average. No matter that England is a tiny nation and the UK is not just full but bulging. No matter the social problems caused, the major parties and greens still believe that speaking out against this nonsense is the province of racists!
LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1160481/UK-migrant-total-times-world-average.html

Bad language.

Okay. I admit it. I am not without sin in this area. Few of us are when the hammer hits the thumb but I am really fed up [think what I might have said] with all the bad language on TV at the moment.

Last night I turned to watch the "2 Pints of Lager ..." on Comic Relief, a programme which has often sailed close to the wind in the past but could argue at least, that it has been funny and clever.

Well, last night's effort was persistently crude and foul-mouthed without a single redeeming feature. Hardly a sentence escaped without 'effing and blinding'. I am no prude but this was simply appalling and the cast seemed to think it the height of wit.

I then caught a programme called "Extreme fishing" with Robson Green which I had long been intending to watch. I soon realised that the 'extreme' was nothing to do with difficult fishing conditions but was just a bucketload of expletives from this appalling man.

It is little wonder that so many 8 year olds are walking around using, what in my day, would have been called 'industrial language'.

This can and must be stopped!

Jade.

It appears that Jade Goody, in her last few days of life, has finally recognised the need for the Lord Jesus.

If genuine - then let us rejoice!

Censored: Labour opinions of Harperson.

'A prominent Left-wing think-tank was yesterday accused of censoring one of its own surveys which showed that Labour Party members do not like Harriet Harman and support plans to curb welfare scroungers.
A report of a poll commissioned by the Compass group and published in the Labour-supporting Guardian newspaper last week said party members ‘roundly rejected’ plans by Business Secretary Peter Mandelson to part-privatise Royal Mail by three to one.'

What could I possibly add?

Mail.

Diseases in hospitals.

There is an extremely simple measure which could be taken in hospitals to cut the levels of infections and cut costs at the same time.

TURN THE HEATING DOWN!

Why on earth are those places so festeringly and unhealthily hot?

I cannot remember the last time I went into a hospital which was not stuffy. This is a breeding ground for bacteria, germs and viruses.

I would lay good odds that MRSA multiplies more quickly at higher temperatures.

Hobsbawm.

It is not just Ted Kennedy who gets unmerited honours from this wretched government. Hobsbawm - poisoned pen darling of the extreme left - is also rewarded.

This marxist historian despises us and his past is not unchequered.

Read the link for the whole picture.

LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1160129/STEPHEN-GLOVER-Why-honour-loathe-Britain.html

Orgreave: the battle of.

I live no more than three quarters of a mile from where the old Orgreave pit has now disappeared entirely from the landscape.

I was fascinated to see a letter on Teletext this week from a self-labelled 'soft southerner'.

It spoke of the miners' strike 25 years ago and referred to the negative role of the police.

I walked down to Orgreave during the clashes and did so to see for myself, from a distance, what was happening.

The police were magnificent: ordered, calm, restrained. The striking miners behaved appallingly badly.

How does history get so twisted, I ask? Well - so much of it is written by leftwingers whose grasp on both truth and reality can be rather slender.

'Holy' Blair.

"One of the most important doctrines of Christianity is the idea of ‘witness’ — namely, that believers will carry out actions in line with their faith regardless of whether they are personally damaging or costly.
It was surely in this context that Tony Blair said this week that we should stick up for our Christian values.
But why didn’t he say as much during his years in Downing Street, when his words might really have counted for something?" Peter Oborne.

'Social justice'.

I return for the first time in a long time to the question of 'Social justice'. This is a phrase which resounds with righteousness, compassion, decency, morality and integrity.
Tragically, it is anything but. Do not be misled, dear reader, into thinking that any of those virtues can be associated with this idea.
The phrase is a device, calculatedly used by the left to give the erroneous impression which you receive at first sight.
The actual meaning of the phrase is 'the entire leftwing agenda' - nothing more, nothing less.
If you are a raving leftie - you are free to use it as before. If you are not - then separate out the virtues we have identified and divorce them from this odious phrase.
It is very similar to the situation where " ... any country with the word 'democratic' in its title, is guaranteed to be a communist state."

No effect on unemployment at all.

"A million workers from outside the EU have taken jobs in Britain since Labour came to power, according to official analysis.
Although they have no automatic right to work in this country, they have filled almost half of all the jobs created since 1997."

PHEW! And magically this figure has no bearing on unemployment levels. We know that this is true because so many lefties tell us that it is!

A pause for thought.

King David's Prayer from 1 Chronicles 29:

10] David praised the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, saying:

"Praise be to you, O LORD, God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.
11] Yours, LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendour, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O LORD, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all.
12] Wealth and honor come from you; you are the ruler of all things. In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all.
13] Now, our God, we give you thanks, and praise your glorious name."

'Rights for women' and feminism are not the same.

Last night I enjoyed an excellent evening out at the Rotherham Civic watching a superb version of Harold Brighouse's play 'Hobson's Choice'.

Written in World War One and set in 1880, it gives a clear and fair demonstration of why women should have equal rights to men.

The character Willie Mossop [a man - or at least, very nearly] is also transformed into something stronger and better in the process.

I do wish that the emasculating, feminist harridans who still infect the higher echelons of liberal-left politics could be forced to watch this play - if only for a sense of balance and proportion.

Our government revolts me!

Many readers will be too young to remember the scandal at Chappaquidik Creek when the egregious and adulterous Edward Kennedy abandoned his lover to drown in an overturned car and then lied through his teeth about what he had done.

Yet another amoral Kennedy.

The picture and caption are hardhitting but I make no apologies for reminding us. This made him unable to be elected president. What a relief!

He also stuck his unwanted, rebel-supporting snout into the affairs of N. Ireland.

For this - Brown & co award this low life a knighthood. He should fit in well with 'hissy-fit' Elton John, pub singer Tom Jones and assorted rock stars with drugs convictions.

Single issues.

The enemies of UKIP have long propounded misinformation claiming that the party is based on 'a single issue'.

Let them keep stating this nonsense as the EU voting approaches in June.

After all - it is a 'single issue election'!

Pre-packaged thought.

I am continuously astonished by the numbers of people who either do not think at all or simply rely on ready-processed soundbites.
It is a rare and wonderful pleasure when you meet a younger person - a product of seriouly 'dumbed down'education - who is capable of true thought.
Too many people I have met - even many with degrees - have excellent brains but just do not use them.
Older and middle aged people with lesser qualifications so often have more depth. This could be explained away as originating from 'life experience' - but I doubt that this would be sufficient to explain the phenomenon.

A recipe for social disaster.

Do leopards ever change their spots? - It would seem not.

'The independent statistics body for Britain has a 'sinister' attitude to immigration, a minister has claimed.
Phil Woolas questioned the motives of the Office for National Statistics in publishing figures showing one in nine UK residents was born abroad. The immigration minister revealed that he had tried to prevent the organisation publishing the data and accused it of playing politics'.

This is simply appalling on so many levels!
Firstly, there is no suggestion that these figures are anything but basically accurate. [Possibly an underestimate, of course, with unknown numbers of illegals everywhere.]
That a minister - a servant of the people[?] - might think that we should not be permitted to know uncomfortable facts is what is truly sinister. [It reminds us of when murder figures were suppressed after the abolition of the death penalty.]
Clearly, Woolas is embarrassed by what his government has done.
The figures themselves reveal an absolute failure of government to control our borders.
He is protecting the EU and its horrendously dangerous Schengen Agreement.
He implies that we the people, are not to be trusted with these facts.
He tries to divert attention by accusing others of 'playing politics'.

All of this is a recipe for social disaster - and he wants us kept in ignorance. Utterly deplorable.
Mind you - would the liberal left politicians in the other two, larger parties have acted any differently?

LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1158958/Immigration-minister-attacks-Office-National-Statistics-publishing-sinister-race-numbers-tried-suppress.html

Human wrongs.

The 1998 so called Human Rights Act [of euro origin, of course] has inevitably reduced our freedoms.Used to prevent the deportation of the undesirable and the dangerous, it means that WE are the ones who pay the price in terms of ever more intrusive measures of snooping and surveillance by government.

Prayer required.

There are so many things to pray for in the world.
After the massacre in Pakistan, so many attacks on Christians, dreadful politicians over years. Perhaps Pakistan should be a prayerful target for believers.

Dependency.

A number of unexplained power cuts at home has made me all too aware of how dependent we have become on certain things. Not only are we like a fish out of water without electricity but think too how much we rely on motor vehicles and computers.
We do not produce even 1% of our own food. Think how vulnerable this all makes us.
Oh. And I am writing this on a borrowed computer - my new one has died and my spare is dead!
Well at least the car works and we have food!

Civil liberties.

The old NCCL [National Council for Civil Liberties] became Liberty. Rightly or wrongly, I have always felt that this was a group designed to reinforce the freedoms of leftists and their acolytes to continue their efforts to undermine our social structure.

I would much prefer to look at the work of The Magna Carta Society, UKIP, The Freedom Association, The Democracy Movement, Civitas et al which are concerned with both the rights of the individual and social responsibility.

I respect much of what is done by The Libertarian Alliance but as a Christian I sometimes feel the need to draw lines.

The truth is that politicians have never been more self-serving and untrustworthy. Against this backcloth we have seen countless measures from government to shackle the rights of people to make their own decisions. Europhiles are slow to admit that the bulk of this has its origin in a 'simple trading group' called the European Union with its ever powerful bureaucrats, Eurojust and Europol which form the small tip of a giant iceberg.

It appears that for Suzanne Moore, the penny is starting to drop! An interesting article but one which perhaps fails to grasp where all this Orwellian nightmare junk originates.

LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1157994/Suzanne-Moore-Joni-Mitchell-right-dont-know-youve-got-till-gone.html