Birdie.

State v Personal Planning.

Looking At What May Has Done - Would A Treason Charge Now Be Appropriate?

The EU has stated there is 'no other possible deal'.
Translation - 'We, the EU have beaten Brexit'.

The Messenger.

I Suppose We Must Now UNbelieve All The Things Science Had Told Us That We Had To Believe

We’re ALL related: How whole of mankind descends from ONE couple 200,000 years ago

MODERN humans descend from a single couple who mated up to 200,000 years ago, scientists have claimed.

The stunning conclusion was reached by researchers who surveyed millions of genetic ‘bar codes’ of 100,000 different species - including humans - and believe that one particular union resulted in billions of humans being born through centuries. They say reproduction by the solitary pair who lived about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago happened after a catastrophic event which nearly wiped out the entire human race. Mark Stoeckle and David Thaler who led the study conducted by the Rockefeller University and the University of Basel arrived at the conclusion after examining mitochondrial DNA which mothers pass down from generation to generation. 

This, the scientists claim, showed the “absence of human exceptionalism” and showed humans are actually “low to average in genetic diversity”.

Dr Stoeckle said: “One might have thought that, due to their high population numbers and wide geographic distribution, humans might have led to greater genetic diversity than other animal species. 

He added:  “At a time when humans place so much emphasis on individual and group differences, maybe we should spend more time on the ways in which we resemble one another and the rest of the animal kingdom.”

Dr Stoeckle even claimed that despite humans being intrinsically different from animals, in terms of basic biology “we’re like the birds”.

 Express.

Conservation, Predators & Pine Martens.

I was fascinated to learn that Dr Emma Sheehy is investigating the apparent fact that Pine Martens really like eating grey squirrels but are not so keen on red ones.

Should we be inviting them South of the border, I wonder?

Jesus Was NOT 'Only Recognised As God' Years After The Events, As Claimed By Some Heretics.

Historian Jaroslav Pelikan indicates that the oldest Christian sermon,the oldest account of a Christian martyr, the oldest pagan report of The Church and the oldest liturgical prayer - 1 Corinthians 16:22 ALL refer to Jesus as 'Lord and God'.

This was not some bolt-on idea. It was the absolute reality of the early Church and the Gospel writers.

Gaius Vibius Maximus, Roman Prefect of Egypt.

The census at the time of Jesus's birth has been mocked as ridiculous by those who hate truth. Their claim is that the absurdity of people having to travel to their original family homes cannot stand scrutiny.

Sadly for them, the aforementioned gentleman has been revealed to have sent out a decree:

" ... it is necessary to compel all those who for any cause whatsoever are residing out of their provinces to return to their own homes that they may ... carry out the regular order of the census."

I know it is ungracious but how I yearn to say "Yah, boo sucks!" - but I shall resist the temptation!

Bloody Conservation - Interesting Points About.

The bloody truth about conservation: we need to talk about killing

Mary Colwell

A civilised debate on predator control is the first step towards protecting Britain’s ever declining number of wild species

Mon 28 May 2018 06.00 BSTLast modified on Tue 29 May 2018 13.41 BST

A gamekeeper on a Scottish grouse moor. ‘Throughout the UK, farmers, gamekeepers and nature reserve managers kill an awful lot of animals so that others may live.’ Photograph: Chris Watt/ReutersEverything eats to live, but some creatures compete with human interests. They eat our crops and livestock, attack the wildlife that we want to protect, or the game that we want to shoot. The most common predators we routinely cull are foxes and crows followed by stoats, weasels, magpies and rooks. But other species protected by law are increasingly under the spotlight – including ravens, buzzards and badgers.

Golden eagle suspected of being killed and dumped at sea near Edinburgh

Read more

There is an imbalance in the UK’s suite of predators. We have disrupted the natural order over centuries, by taking out many, if not all, of the top predators – wolves, bears, eagles, goshawks etc – that would naturally keep the others in check. Today the question of which predators we kill, where we kill them, how many we kill and who decides all this is one of the most divisive that conservationists face.

Predator control is often brutal and bloody. It means killing some species so that others may live. It may mean shooting a fox that is hunting to feed cubs, so that a colony of Arctic terns can nest. It might require killing hundreds of crows so that sheep can lamb in peace. A life for a life.

During the recent warm weather I went on a train journey. We slowed down in the middle of large fields. Close to the track was a Larsen, or “calling bird”, trap: a spring-loaded device for catching magpies and crows. The sun beat down on the steel cage with its lone prisoner. It was a stark image amid the heat shimmer and the short, green crops. The train lurched forward and the scene receded, but the image stayed with me because I knew what would happen to the corvids that answered the call of the captive and entered the trap. Either their necks would be broken or their heads smashed against a wall or the side of a vehicle by the farmer or gamekeeper.

 A fox with a rabbit. ‘Foxes can have a devastating effect on ground-nesting birds, such as curlew and lapwing, birds in serious decline.’ Photograph: AlamyIt is a quick and, I hope, painless death if done well, but it is still disturbing to picture birds killed in this way. The decoy is used time and again until it ceases to be effective. It too is then killed and a new bird takes its place. It is an efficient way of catching “pests” or “vermin”, as corvids Crow populations now stand at around 1 million breeding pairs throughout the UK. Their numbers have risen steadily since the 1960s. They have readily adapted to our intensively managed landscapes, and numbers are on the up – as are Larsen traps.The same tension between pragmatism and compassion is found in our attitudes to foxes. Around a quarter of a million now live in the cities and wider countryside. Many tens of thousands are shot each year, including those that are rounded up from city streets and released “humanely” into the green belt. Foxes can have a devastating effect on colonies of ground-nesting birds, such as curlew and lapwing, birds in serious decline, as well as poultry and lambs.Throughout the UK, farmers, gamekeepers and nature reserve managers kill an awful lot of animals so that others may live, and many nature lovers rail against this slaughter of our native wildlife. Compassionate conservationists, as they are called, say crows and foxes are not to blame; the problem is the way we use the land, and we should put that right rather than kill anything. An easy first step, many believe, is for the game industry to stop the release of 35m pheasants into the countryside each year, boosting numbers of predators by providing easy-to-hunt food and roadkill for them all year round.

Foxes can have a devastating effect on colonies of ground-nesting birds, such as curlew and lapwing

We live in a small country with myriad interests and cultural biases and where 75% of the land is farmed, much of it intensively. The harsh reality of our stewardship of nature is an ever declining number of wild species. Picking all this apart is incredibly difficult, and this is a void to be filled. The world of conservation is sorely lacking strong, honest, courageous and visionary leadership that speaks the truth and is unafraid of opening dialogue. At present it doesn’t come from the wildlife NGOs, which worry that membership may fall if the realities of predator control – which sometimes they have to practise – are widely known.To help start a civilised conversation, we need a common language that eradicates derogatory terms such as “vermin” and “pest”, which degrade wildlife. The dialogue, currently polarised between the shooting, landowning interests and anti-shooting voices, should instead be positive and inclusive, not accusatory and finger-pointing. A very good starting place is the recognition that we all want the same thing – a nature-rich country – and we must work together despite our differences to overcome the challenges of climate change, a growing human population and If we are to tackle our reputation as one of the most nature-depleted countries on earth, a civilised debate on predator control is badly needed.Mary Colwell is the author of Curlew Moon                                                             

The one point about foxes, grey squirrels and corvidae 'not being to blame' is the only point I cannot stomach. It is demonstrably untrue! 

The term 'compassionate conservationist', far too often, is an oxymoron.BTW - pests and vermin are pests and vermin whatever politically correct labels you stick on them!I have known of animal rights activists in our locality trying to stop the extermination of rats!

As for the cursed magpies, here in S13 - we have had a bumper crop of young this year. I have never seen so many.Not very good news for our rapidly dwindling songbird population, is it?

Birdie.

Badger Numbers ...

... increased from twenty fold from 50,000 in the UK in the 80s to over a million now.

Ever wondered where all the hedgehogs are going?

Down Brock's gullet!

Badgers get too good a Press!

God Helps Those Who Request Him To.

Melanie Talking Sense On Brexit.

Has there ever been a more hopeless, pathetic bunch of political clowns than Britain’s parliamentary Brexiteers?

The people of Britain have voted to leave the EU. Theresa May’s government is poised to spit in their faces by preventing that from happening through a sleight-of-hand deal which would be Brexit in name only, leaving the UK as a “vassal” state still in thrall to Brussels.

Rather than uniting behind a strategy and leader to fight this betrayal, the Brexiteers in parliament have been fighting each other like ferrets in a sack. Unable to agree on whether Mrs May should be brought down or stay on as Prime Minister, still hung up on the always impossible prospect of negotiating terms with the EU that would benefit Britain and consumed by personal leadership ambitions rather than concern for the national interest, the Brexiteers have allowed those set upon betraying democracy to put them onto the back foot.

The result of their farcical havering over whether or not to bring down the Prime Minister has allowed two potentially disastrous things to happen.

Rather than being seen correctly as someone who is about to betray the people and sign the death warrant for national self-government, Ms May is now being viewed sympathetically as doggedly carrying on in the face of bullying by both her fellow Tory MPs and the EU’s negotiators.

And while the Brexiteers have been marching themselves up the hill and down again over Mrs May, they have allowed the view that no-deal would be a disaster to go unchallenged.

In fact, the only realistic way in which the UK will be able to leave the EU is through no-deal. Yet the majority in parliament – and possibly in the country – are so thoroughly spooked by no-deal they oppose it. But there are good, cogent, evidence-based arguments why no-deal would not be a disaster but would be entirely manageable.

The tariff hit from leaving the EU on WTO rules would not only be liveable-with but would in time become nugatory given the economic advantages to Britain of being able to make free-trade deals. Moreover, it is very much in the interests of the EU’s member states to do bilateral “side” deals with British organisations and institutions to minimise disruption when Brexit actually happens; indeed, such deals are being discussed even now to safeguard the City of London, for example.

The relative silence about this while Brexiteers fixate upon Mrs May is intolerable. That silence has itself become a powerful threat to Brexit. It is a matter of the utmost urgency that the public case for no-deal should now be made, and as loudly and thoroughly as possible.

England Stagger And Then Fight Back Mightily On Day Two of The Test.

Of the last three England wickets, two were wantonly cast away and so England were only able to add a further 24 runs to their overnight score.
At 173 for 1 in reply, as catches were not being taken, Sri Lanka were rapidly chasing down the England first innings total of 336.
 Step forward Adil Rashid with his excellent legspin and 5 - 49. The gutsy Ben Stokes, with his bouncers, did most of the rest of the damage.
 In the third session, wicket after wicket tumbled in what must have been the direst batting session in Sri Lankan history.
 England posted a handsome lead of 96 runs.

The Disaster Which Is Political Understanding In The UK.

https://unherd.com/2018/11/corbynomics-winning-britain/

Less Santa - More Jesus!

‘Less Santa, more Jesus;’ Churches observing ‘Bless Friday’ instead of ‘Black Friday’.

We Get Pathetically Little From May's Brexit.

Jonathan Arnott MEP‏ @JonathanArnott 16h16 hours ago 

Another way of looking at Theresa May's Brexit deal: If immigration is your no.1 reason for wanting Brexit, you'll get that control back. Eventually. If anything else is - trade, sovereignty, independence, fishing, you'll be bitterly disappointed. Delivers on immigration ONLY

Now Pro-Life!

Former Planned Parenthood manager says evangelical church saved her life

BY SAMUEL SMITH

A former Planned Parenthood clinic manager says that joining a small nondenominational evangelical church “saved her life” and helped equip her to leave the nation’s largest abortion provider. Christian Post.

Birdie.

Follow God's Will!

But - How Many Times Have We Heard These Kind of Promises Before From Tories?

Theresa May to curb low-skilled migration with announcement due on eve of crucial Brexit vote!

312 - for Seven.

A pretty good first day for an England side which had seen skipper Joe Root win an essential toss against Sri Lanka.
This was his EIGHTH consecutive correct call.
(Only one more needed to equal Colin Cowdrey's world record.)
Jonny Bairstow made a super hundred and Stokes made a rather rickety-rackety fifty.

 Set up for a fascinating day, tomorrow!