An English Shooters Blog

For the last two days I have had entries with the opening line “Is any one surprised” or somthing to that effect so I think we will continue with this story.

The Houses of Parliament, Downing Street and other parts of Whitehall are infested with vermin, according to official reports.

See: Parliament infested with vermin

I wonder if this post could be classed as fuelling a culture of cynicism about politics?

One of the hallmarks of a free society is the ability for people to have differing opinions, you may not like what is being said but you have the right to reply and argue the point. 

I read in The Mail that “Police have been accused of supporting homophobic music by allowing a Jamaican reggae singer to perform in London this weekend.” And this is utter clap trap they have supported free speech & expression if they had not allowed the performance then they would have been guilty of censorship and that would be 100% worse in my books. 

See: Met accused of supporting homophobic music by allowing ‘gay-hate’ singer’s concert  

And so they should, it is interesting that they have taken exception at Government plans to use them as “guinea pigs” in its latest drive in it’s ID card scheme I would love to see them take time out to make this protest and I hope that people will see that ID cards are a real invasion and not welcome. 

See: Pilots threaten strike over ID card plan

Now it looks like the BNP have had its membership list published on the internet and I have mixed feeling about this story. 

The BNP are calling for an investigation and not too happy, I can imagine that there are some public servants that could feel a little off colour this morning and as a result of recent soundings from the Government even fear for their jobs, and this if where my mixed feelings come in. 

One part of me believes that peoples political membership should be a public thing, if you hold views you should not be afraid to voice them but in this country if you voice your views and they are BNP then you will be open to all sorts of discrimination some of that is sanctioned and even sponsored by the Government, as I have said in previous posts I have no time for the BNP but I do feel for them they hold political views, I may not like or agree with them but that is no reason for it’s members to be in fear this morning. 

I am sure that there will be some very self important  sniggering at people today but they should remember that singeing someone out for political beliefs is just as wrong as the BNP party in the first place in fact it is worse.

See: Thousands in fear after BNP members list leak

And any other news outlet.

While catching up on some of my favorite blogs the Quote of the Day on The England Project, it is:

There is no hope for Britian. Civilisations dont die, they commit suicide. And before they commit suicide, they read and believe the Guardian.

Well it put a smile on my face, anyway I took a look at the link to see where it came from and the rest of the letter was just stunning,  so I thought I would steal it and share with you all.

Dear Ms Featherstone

I think the people who should truly say sorry for such events are the opinion leaders of the Guardian. Please allow me to explain.

Last week I visited (as a doctor) a family in a council estate. The mother was concerned about her 12 year old son. She was very pleased that her older son was now on incapacity and would therefore do well for himself in terms of money. There is nothing wrong with this older boy that makes him incapacitated, but that is another story. She also had a 14 year old daughter, who while I was there, constantly argued with her mother demanding money for cigarettes. The three children had three different fathers, all absent. The kids, while I could see were still children, gleamed with malignant insolence. I can see them turning into damaged adults. I feel sorry for the trap they are in – the trap created directly by the welfare state whereby the family, and all those in the neighbourhood, see welfare as a lifestyle option. They live in squalor but have more wealth than most people I knew in India; they certainly have more material comforts than I ever had growing up in Delhi.

The Guardian describes such families as poor. The Labour party wants to throw money at the family. The Guardian readers blame Margaret Thatcher for this state of affairs, smug in their modern pieties, their intellectual laziness, and their stupidity masquerading as sanctimonious concern. I used to work with slum children in Delhi; they had very little, but even the most physically disabled amongst them made an effort.

There is no hope for Britian. Civilisations dont die, they commit suicide. And before they commit suicide, they read and believe the Guardian.

I truly and deeply feel sorry for all the children who are the victims of the welfare state. Things are much, much worse for the slum children in India, I saw more dignity among them and certainly greater hope.

I am not sure if you will understand this message. I am too tired to explain further. Either you will get or you wont. Either way, it will make no difference to anything.

To see it’s real context please visit: Who will resign for Baby P?

It looks like a cold front is heading towards us and we may have snow at the weekend, I love the snow and can’t wait.

So who is up for a white Christmas?

See: Arctic winds will spark cold snap which could see temperatures plunging as low as -5C

I find this an interesting article, if you put aside the arguments about target lead culture for a moment and think about what is being said and what the results of this are.

So only 49% of violent crime is solved by the police service, this is quite a low figure and possibly worthy of comment but what we should be looking at are two other figures the number of police & the number of violent crimes, if you put those two numbers together on a graph perhaps you will begin to see why the detection is so low and I am not too sure it is the fault of the police.

Now the government has come clean about the rise in violent crime since it came to power you will see that the violent crime rate had grown, police numbers have not grown at the same rate, I am not talking about the plastic police or CSO’s but real police so if the numbers of crime is growing at a rapid rate and the numbers of police has not grown to keep up with it then how do you expect the police to  solve the same number of crimes as X years ago when the numbers where more favorable.

The second issue is one of accountability as the chance of detection falls the chance of getting away with it increases, with this increase comes a willingness to take a chance with that comes more violent crime and with that the detection rates go down even more and the spiral starts again. 

So how do you stop it?

Considering violent crime is a crime perpetrated on an individual perhaps giving that individual the ability to defend themselves would increase the chance of self defense & detection, everyone is a winner, after a time people are not exposed to violent crime as much, the level of violent crime go down and police detection rates go up.

See: Fewer than half of violent crimes now solved, figures show

Again is anyone too surprised, banning handguns did not stop handgun crime and hand guns unlike knives are not already found in every home up and down the country.

Banning is not the way forward perhaps a relaxation of the silly bans put in place over the last few years along with a program of education will remove the status this and other governments have afforded lumps of metal, then again that will take time and cost money.

One point to note that Mr Vaz said that the strategy is ‘clearly not working’ he first talked about identifying ‘effective responses’, by improving the availability of data and offender profiles and then about parents educating their five & six year olds.

I would have thought education should have come before yet another database.

See: Labour’s Keith Vaz admits knife crime strategy is ‘clearly not working’ after string of murders

On the face of it this cannot be a good thing, the poor little lamb playing on a game and then bang convulsions and what appeared to be an epileptic seizure, so simple ban the game but they you read a little more:

A schoolboy collapsed and went into convulsions after playing a new version of the World of Warcraft computer game for 24 hours straight.

The report then goes on to talk about game addiction and how this is a bad thing for social interaction, for crying out loud get a grip, it is simple parents do not allow you children uncontrolled access to computers and or the internet, unplug the box when you go to bed, get a dog and take the dog & kids out for a walk.

See: Boy collapses after playing World of Warcraft for 24 hours straight

A few days ago in a posting “Blears attacks political bloggers” we read about Hazel Blears spoke about Political blogs are fuelling a culture of cynicism about politics.

This morning I wrote about the proposed £1000.00 Christmas present for the “poor” and today Lord Mandelson has hinted that taxes will have to rise to pay for a huge programme of public spending and tax cuts before Christmas.

Well it is nice to see that Lord Mandelson is able to be a little bit realistic about paying for the Christmas give away it will need to be paid for by someone and as a government has no money with the exception of that it can raise from tax it is becoming a little clearer how the government will be paying for the Christmas giveaway.

So just who will the government deem worthy enough or poor enough to get some of this £1000.00 I guess the fairest way of to ensure that through the tax system that everyone who is working gets £1000.00 in their December pay packet but as with everything this government talks about that is more to it than that and this is why I reminded you of Hazel Blears comments.

Now I work quite hard and I pay quite a bit of tax as a result of the work I put in I am not on any benefits or tax credit and to be honest I do not know if I am entitled to be on tax credits, after reading about the cock-up’s and people having money taken out of their pockets to pay back the tax credit awards I thought it is best to work with what I have rather than taking the risk and I am not alone in that thought.

So back to the question who will the government deem worthy?

“Gordon Brown is preparing to rush through plans for tax breaks which are almost certain to target low-income families, probably through the tax credit and winter fuel payment systems.”

Well that just about counts me out then, so who will pay for the giveaway well it will those who are stupid enough to pay tax, oh yes that would be me.

So many people like me are cutting their cloth for the festive season will end up paying for the government’s planned good Christmas to those who are able & willing to take advantage of the tax credit and winter fuel payment systems.

As Hazel Blears is so concerned about political blogs are fuelling a culture of cynicism about politics, perhaps she can explain to my children just why our family is cutting it’s cloth when “poor” families are about to be given a nice Christmas bonus.

It would appear to me that the government is not interested in those who foot the bill just those who put & keep them in power, is that cynicism I don’t know and to be honest I don’t much care today.

It is not the Bloggers who are creating this of cynicism about politics it is the gross unfairness of of the policies that this Government is hell bent on going after that are doing that, all bloggers do is give it a voice.