Does anyone know why when I switch my laptop on and it slows down a lot with CPU usage under System Idle Process that that process should have a series of port maps ( this is what I'm guessing they are - tell me if you know better ) including one to a web site developer who works for the Liberal Democrats ? ( And has done most of the Lib Dem web sites ? )
Any ideas or leads ?
Remember when the MOD clamped down on soldier sending video clips back etc ? They have made it hard for some UK journalists to get out to Afghanistan.
I've just read this dispatch from the American Michael Yon who was embedded with British Forces, but has been ejected by the MoD ( so there's stuff they would rather you didn't read here ).
his writing style is hard to follow at times, but you get a picture and its not one the MSM is delivering to us here.
Read his post Bad Medicine here.
I note that elsewhere he accuses the MOD of trying to hide the causality rate in the current fighting.
In more general terms I not yet quite sure of what to make of his writing, except to confirm the respect we all have for our people on the ground and the suspicion we have about the MoD and our current politicians.
Go a read Dan Hannan's excellent rebuff to the media games and smear campaign waged by Labour in the Daily Telegraph here.
Personnelly I think he's onto something really important, and I hope he's right about David Cameron understanding it.
It appears that the Americans may well have had enough of Hamid Karzai*. If so given there has been one British casualty for every vote from the area captured from the Taliban in the so called panther claw assault its time to start wondering (again) what is going on ?
There is no leadership from our government, accept to try not to make decisions and to hide critical reports on MOD equipment procurement.
If there is no objective that is achievable in a near time scale (say 1-3 years) then Afghanistan fails the Just War test as a no brainer ....
The Labour government need to start doing some explaining very quickly indeed.
The English public will not put up with much more of this ( David Cameron take note ).
PS As I mentioned a few days ago - it may be that the reasons for the war haven't been shared with us as our current political leaders don't think we would accept them, but the "War on Terrorism" meme is easier to push.
Update: Read this article "Bun Fight in the Badlands" by David Gill for The First Post to get a real feel for what we are spending our money and young lives on.
Today The Sun gives Gordon Brown both barrels over his disgraceful and snivelling failure of our troops and country over Afghanistan. Worth a read.
The new top 100 Centre right blog list is in from Iain Dale's empire. This blog didn't make the cut this year of the main category I would have been interested in the top 100 Centre Right. There are a lot of new blogs in there, and a lot of the old guard are slipping down the table - so maybe I shouldn't feel too bad.
Oddly the interaction and visitor frequency has been up over the last 6 months or so, with Silly Week a definite hit ( a lesson for the future perhaps - people love humour, even when the message is serious ).
I've seen a number of blogs run their course this year, and more threaten to call it a day - as we must all do eventually. But this blog remains sufficiently fuelled by anger at Labour's betrayal of our nation on so many levels that I think you'll still be hearing from me until at least June 2010, unless the No 10 bus, or those squirrels outside my shed, gets me first.
Update: OK self petty tempered by only a slight reduction in the Top 100 Conservative rating ( there must be a lot of UKIP and Libertarian blogs out there ).
Cartoon by William Warren from GetLiberty.org
You can see the same thing being done with anyone who questions the NHS and its outcomes.
The problem I have with the left is they see politics the same way a holigan sees football - as a great chance for a fight.
They don't care what happens, as long as they win. Hence they're just not intrested in the dicussion and learning something - just winning the deabte using their bully heavy handed tactics.
These have been misfiring for the Labour party recently as I've commented on Conservative home. But still Labour still have their heads stuck in the sand.
I have to conclude that many of them just don't understand or are too selfish to admit to the obvious failure of the last 12 years. ( Maybe a few are hardened revolutionaries who are trying to drag us all down so that their beloved revolution and its inevitable terror can come about ).
I just watched this US interview over at play political and think its worth taking a look. I can't help thinking that Dan Hannan will be a very influential figure in out politics over the coming decades.
Update: There is of course a political row about this with the usual intellectual thuggery and intimation from Labour because Hannan mentions Enoch Powell and the NHS. Labour will do anything and I mean anything for votes - if it means trying to close down debate and destroy democracy then you can rely on the parasitic careerist of the Labour party to do the smearing and misrepresentation needed to hold onto their fat salaries and gold plated pensions that they would never ever earn in the real world.
Further: Guido has the a fuller story on this and Labour knee jerk reaction and why it is so dump and contemptible ( as usual I have to say ). Apparently the interview took place a month ago - before the Labour smear and spin machine had its first go at revenge on our man Dan.
And Tim Montgomerie gives his reaction over at Conservative home.
Sorry, despite the BBC's love in and Gordon's tears I have this man marked down as an implacable enemy of our country.
Only the self loathing Labour party could make such a man a knight.
Maybe he had good points ( driving in a straight line over bridges clearly not being one of them ), but as a UK citizen I'm not sad to see the back of the political enemy he represented.
May he rest in peace, but I refuse to mourn.
See also: Adrian Michaels: "Spare me the beatification of Teddy Kennedy".
And Wat Tyler is somewhat less than convinced about St Ted also....
Ed West "IRA sympathiser Ted Kennedy was no friend of Britain ",
The Daily Mail Comment "Ted Kennedy loathed Britain - so why did Gordon Brown knight him?"
There are repeated rumours that many of the newspaper sites will soon have to operate by subscription. [ See article in The First Post by Harry Underwood ]
On one hand I have sympathy with the idea of paying for what you use, but on the other I don't want to be tied to subscription to just one paper ( and I won't be buying more than one - if that ).
I also think the MSM might find its not as important online as it likes to think it is. Much of the news could be conveyed by others or directly from the agencies.
People like Yahoo and Google. Reuters and AFP. Even bloggers and political parties ( whom would love to achieve a higher footfall on their sites ).
This risk of failure for the papers is high.
Can I suggest a different model then. That in the same way rail income is allocated between operators a newspaper annual passport subscription is sold, but the papers get money in proportion to where these passport holders spend their time. An industry association would need to administer it, but it would keep that new stand decision and independence that customers value.
All I can say to the MSM guys is get this wrong and you'll be writing blogs for free in your spare time whislt doing another job also ....
Any other ideas ? Or should the dead tree press just follow the dinosaurs ?
Right - I'm back from 5 of the best days weather England has been handing our for quite some time. Given what appears to be happening in the cricket I'm having to pinch myself. But to confirm I am back to reality lets deal with two enormous lies that our government and its agencies are telling.
They are lies that fool no one. Not the foreign powers they deal with, not the politicians. Yet the falsehoods are used as fig leaves to hide the truth.
The lies are:
1) The release of Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi was about compassion.
2) The war in Afghanistan is about Terrorism.
The first point is blindingly obvious. The only question is which bunch of socialist (and therefore by definition immoral) are most to blame ? The SNP and their adolescent its "Scottish" posturing and playing for attention or the Machiavellian dark cynical arts of the Labour party as they trample over the system of justice. Personally I suspect this was in part a trap for the SNP who have blundered into it, with Labour hoping to be the main beneficiary.
It all happens in August when Parliament is away, and with Brown trying to pretend none of its to do with him.
The governments apologists for the ongoing War in Afghanistan can no longer hold the "its the War with Terrorism" line as an excuse for what's going on our there as we are bled white of young lives and treasure for the current odious regime. The dead tree press is slowly catching on, as the leader in this weeks UK edition of the Economist shows. The Economist comes close to accusing the politicians of lying to their people about the reasons for the ongoing war and outlines the many failures and how the 'successes' in Iraq may be hard to reproduce.
What do these two issues have in common ?
The lies are just holding patterns used by the Labour government to avoid telling people what is really going on. Labour have been obsessed by the media and controlling it. Their strength in this matter has recently been shown In the NHS witch hunt where their supporters in the MSM have been busy trying to cook up the Tory splits on NHS story. Labour deny, smear and then lie and misdirect - its an instinct now hard wired into their DNA.
But this does matter - its our country that suffers and our democracy and rule of law that is defiled by Labour and all its supporters.
There will be consequences.
In the first case the US may never again settle for the UK or anyone else getting to have jurisdiction over a mass murder of their civilians. ( Do this though experiment - imagine another US airlines is blown up over Scotland. Do you think the US will ever rest with the UK handling the justice process and any detention that results ? ).
In Afghanistan the blood and treasure lost can't be afforded by this country any more. Labour has also destroyed the infrastructure and assets of our armed forces ( perhaps that's their deliberate aim ). One day we may come to very much regret that waste.
The common thread is Labour are unfit for government of our nation. They only know how to pursue their own agendas and in the case of many key political figures make themselves very rich indeed.
Update: See Gerald Warner here - here's a brief extract:
Back to savage socialism and all its works in a weeks time. ( Sorry not to be able to wade into this nasty smear fest the Labour party is trying to run right now on the NHS - but I'm sure someone else can do the job. ).
In the mean time comment moderation is back on and any comments will be approved when I get back.
PS Camping in England with the family is a good idea right ?
About 4 years ago immigration was a taboo subject as was criticising multiculturalism.
Now Labour ministers are falling over themselves to appear tough on immigration and to demand community cohesion.
The left uses its smears and artificial manufactured outrage to prevent any discussion of issues it knows it is vulnerable on.
The mother of all these sacred cows is the NHS- not free health care at the point of need - but the soviet system of delivery.
Remember the "24 hrs to save the NHS" party political add by Labour in 1997 ? Labour then went on to dismantle the market reforms in the NHS - recognised, but finally at great expense to all of us became educated enough about the problem to have to reintroduce the internal market ( but using different Labour Orwellian spin of course ).
Its true Labour fired vast sums of cash at the NHS - but the personal battle for career advancement high in the Labour cabinet prevent any reforms from stopping much of that money being wasted - and we now know that the money in the tax system came from a giant private sector debt ponzi scheme which is now being replaced with unsustainable state debt ( just for a few more months of the career of the current prime minster ).
Labour just see things like welfare and the NHS and guaranteed votes (remember Hazel Blears and her NHS heat map ?). They see poverty and failure as their hinterland returning them to the horn of public plenty where they grab money and pensions pretending to have ordinary peoples interests at heart. They are the parasite party - and the most immoral gutless and disgusting.
And the tragedy is this could all be done better. More peoples lives could be saved ( cancer and stroke recovery rate comaprisons with other country's prve this beyond doubt ).
What stops this from happening ? The left of British politics. They are the traitors.
Which is more than can be said for the BBC and left wing spin and smear machine that's swinging into action for its traditional Tory Witch hunt.
He makes his case about what he actually said here..
The NHS is not beyond criticism and those who claim it isn't are looking to gain political advantage out of the suffering of the people they refuse to help by making the NHS better ( which requires open political debate ).
Its Labour who are the enemy of the sick and dying with their refusal to do the things to improve our health service that would have an impact because of narrow political advantage and the personal finances of their rich life bleeding the public sector dry.
Questions are starting to be asked about what is really going on with the Arctic Sea hijack.
Apparently this ship sailed through the straights of Dover under duress, but some reports seem to suggest the hijackers had left before.
The Russians certainly want the vessel back - but no one else seems that bothered.
This vessel is floating around in NATO's garden pond.
Maybe the Royal Navy can't afford the fuel and RAF Nimrod's are unflight worthy.
But if some pillock in a bath tub was lost crossing the Atlantic everyone and his sea dog would be out looking.
Yet the silence if deafening here...
Its been suggested that something else may have been aboard the Arctic Sea appart from timber. Something we should be worried about perhaps ?
You can be sure that the most immoral and incompetent government in UK history isn't going to tell you unless the have to. The fact they haven't said much means either its news we really wouldn't like ( think nuclear weapons being stolen from Russia ) or that our armed forced are so run down that they now can't even handle a simple hijack of a merchant vessel. Neither is much fun and both would fit Labour history of misrule.
Finally the BBC invites John Redwood onto Newsnight.
We had some ex-member of the MPC, followed by Angela Eagle and the ever BBC present Red Vince Cable - giving variations on how wonderful things are - but not explaining the problem to the public.
Then came an quietly angry John Redwood.
First he explained that he was the only one of the 4 people being interviewed to take a different line from the govt ( good side swipe at the BBC there John ) and how where we are today is a result of people like him not being listened to. Kirsty Walk tried to give Angela Eagle a chance to knock that down, but John was having none of that - he wanted to make his point.
And his point was the banks aren't lending because another branch of the government - the regulator - is telling them not to.
A point of such power that immediately everyone else had to agree with it - although Red Vince did his best to distance himself from the brand of John Redwood.
What struck me about this was:
1) At last an angry right win commentator wins through by being forceful.
2) A basic and key point about the crisis was being hidden by the BBC film introduction and all three left of centre commentators. A point they all had to acknowledge once it had been made.
Well done to John Redwood - I'd like to see more of this sort of aggressive and insightful debating style. Angela Eagle was made to look wooden and Vince Cable out of his depth with the BBC looking complicit in a pro-Govt stitch up.
A good nights work.
Update: A full report is available on John Redwood's blog here.
This is my contribution to Culture Wars day ( I migth be a week late here ).
North West Frontier used to be on almost every few months on the BBC, or so it seemed. But that was before we had the disruption of 9/11 and everything that came with it.
This film addresses the issue of underlying loyalties ( but is of course mostly and adventure ). Its a colonial era film, which we've all been programmed to blush at the idea of. But the point that I suspect will make it unshowable in our "diversity supporting" community cohesion challenged society is what it says about peoples deeper loyalties.
I'm not going to spell it out here - but you may have to buy the film to understand, as I'm guessing you won't see it on the BBC again. ( But I could of course be wrong here - feel free to set me right ).
Wikipedia has a film description with a plot spoiler here.
Did "having nothing to do" drive some vandals to attack a Citroen Picasso one sunny afternoon between 5 and 6:15 pm ?
Hazel Blears says that what she believes.
Clearly "being bored" leads to crime in Hazel's mind - even when she's the victim.
There's no issue of morality that springs to her mind.
And that's what's wrong with the liberal left - even when they are victims of vandalism they don't understand that's what it is.
Hazel - you can look forward to being sent a leaflet on "Victim support" as the highlight of the normal police response - from my personal experience. Though as a member of the establishment you might get a little better service.
Labour aren't just soft on crime - they create the circumstances where they can't even condemn it for what it is. So another of Tony's sound bites comes to bite back "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime ".
Update: Interesting to note that the ever helpful BBC reports Blears saying:
"This was an act of anti-social behaviour by some youths, the same kind of anti-social behaviour unfortunately many of my constituents have to put up with.
"I was canvassing nearby at the time and returned to my car to find the damage.
"I had earlier seen a gang of kids hanging around the car. This was pathetic and cowardly."
We English tolerate a lot of eccentricity. Train spotters perhaps get a hard time, but what about Train collectors ? Well I spend yesterday looking over such a collection at Mangapps near Burnham-on-Crouch run by the Jolly family.
In the words of its own web site
So we have the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors ( who usually predict a rising property market - even just before the crash - I wonder why ? ) saying the housing market is off again ( their spokesperson almost certainly has their fingers crossed behind their back ) and the *government funded* National Institute for Economic and Social Research saying the recovery is coming. ( The Guardian and BBC are lapping this stuff up of course ).
Mean while the Bank of England hits the panic button again for another £50billion of government spending - sorry Quantitative easing due to the their view that UK recession "appears to have been deeper than previously thought".
The Bank of England is not independent - its board have been appointed under Labour.
What Labour want is a recovery to hold a general election in - whatever the disastrous consequences of doing so.
There is now a very large pile of cash being held on deposit at the Bank of England by the banks.
All the BoE needs to do to trigger its rapid dispersal into the economy is to start charging for the service of looking after it.
That would create a temporary blip in the economy just at the time of an election.
The Con could be on.
Further: Jeff Randal seems to get it.
Well that was that. Thanks to a large amount of unsolicited help ( the best sort ) things seem to have gone well for Silly Week. Special mentions in dispatches go to James Higham and GOT for their help in publicity - I know I'm missing out a few people but its harder than you think trying to track down what's being going on.
It turns out that being Silly is far more popular on this blog than being serious ( or at least trying ) - even when you get really cross ( which this blog is frequently ). However normal service will be resumed soon - though I might go a bit dark over August.
As I type this I still haven't finally decided who to award the Silly Film to.
My contenders are :
Right - this is going to be the "reward" for the best contribution to Silly Week as determined by whatever method I dream up.
This film probably makes Battle Field Earth look good. It answers questions like what does Dinosaur taste like ( you already know the answer ) .
Jules Vern's estate should sue, and might Tolkien's - not for copying but for deformation.
What amazes me is that they get money to make this sort of thing ....
But it is very, very, ever so Silly... so there you go ... ( picked up at a school Fete for 20p or such ).
I'm going to make an intermittent update of the posts people have let me know about in comments sometime soon, and will then try to make a definitive guide post (a day or two later ). But the family is trying to drag me to the back of the house to do something called gardening so it may have to wait ...
Political blogs
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Diary of a Westminster Bag-Carrier
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Guido Fawkes (order order)
Spotlight on Woking and Surrey
A Clockwork Clegg
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