Ten More Things That Are Just So WRONG!

In November last year, I had a little rant about ten things that are just so wrong and got a lot of hits. Time for another ten, then. I might do this every three months. Or every two...or one. Depends on how cross I get.

1) US / UK Extradition: "Land of the Free / Home of the Brave" and of the puppet-masters. Put in simple terms, the US can extradite any UK citizen of whom they have a "reasonable suspicion" of having done something that might represent an illegal act under federal US law or, in some cases, even individual state laws if the 'Feds' deem it of interest to the whole. On the other side of this poorly-minted coin, the UK, if it wished to extradite a person from the US to face charges under our laws, needs to demonstrate "Probable cause".

This means that, as demonstrated by recent cases (Tappin / McKinnon / O'Dwyer etc.), that agencies in the USA can extradite UK citizens on a whim, but for us to "grab a yank" that we might suspect of criminality over here, we have to go through a legal minefield to show "probable cause" in front of a US judge. This all came about after the 2003 Extradition Act and various Home Secretaries (Blunkett, Reid and latterly, May) have failed to stand up to the US administrations that pertained. Lord Justice Baker, when asked by Theresa May to review the issue, was of the opinion that "Reasonable Suspicion" and "Probable Cause" tests had "no significant differences". But they do. The difference is that the USA can extradite our citizens with consummate ease and we can't extradite theirs. WRONG!

Abu Q: Not in Jordan
(Lucky girl, then)

On a slightly different but related subject... is the whole Abu Qatada question: The UK doesn't seem able to agree to extradition of Qatada to Jordan - where he faces the justice that was meted out upon him in his absence. The courts in Jordan have found him guilty of terrorist offences and associated conspiracies for which he will be banged up for life with hard labour and, in Jordan (an enlightened Arab state, surely?), life probably means life, and possibly a very shitty one. The UK cannot extradite Qatada to Jordan because the ECoHC have decided that the Jordanian authorities might have secured evidence against Qatada by way of torture of witnesses. But the US can extradite, charge, try and ultimately bang up British citizens on the basis that they have a "reasonable supsicion" of an offence. Like they just made it up...for fun. But that's not considered to be something that the "accused" can defend under any Human Rights legislation. However, if I had wanted to extradite George W Bush a few years back because I had a "reasonable suspicion" that he was a war criminal responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent arabs along with his own troops and some of ours, the State Department of the US would have probably extradited me to the US on the basis of a "reasonable suspicion" that I presented a "real and present danger" to the PoTUS. WRONG!!!!!!!!

2) Smug Bastards on Bicycles: Cycling is great, isn't it? It's green, it's a great fitness regime, in some of our cities it's quicker than public transport, and it can be a very cheap mode of transport. That's it. Leave it there. Do your thing but don't ram it down our throats. Don't make the assumption that you are better than everyone else or that I can see you in my wing mirror just because you're dressed as a lycra banana. And don't ride four abreast. And don't jump traffic lights. And don't ride on the pavement like it's your preserve. And don't put your kids in a basket trailer on the back. And just don't be smug, because that's WRONG!

Ha! Ha! Ha!
Wish you had a car?

Just because you can ride a bike and tick all the "lifestyle" boxes that you assume our society wants you to tick, does not make you better than the poor saps who either can't ride a bike (after all, it takes some skill) or don't want to, or can't afford it, or just wish to get around in the way that suits them...even if that's in a car. Leave the rest of us alone, please.

3) London 2012 Olympic Games: It's coming. It's only a few months away...just after the Brit-fart that is the queen's diamond jubilee (where we can all celebrate sixty, sickening years since the in-bred toffs stuck a jewel-encrusted hat on a woman that we're supposed to acknowledge as our Head of State just because her forebears had won some wars, amassed wealth an property that wasn't theirs in the first place, and that their god said it was OK).

For a few billion pounds that we can't afford to spend, there will be thousands of people running around, jumping, standing still, throwing things, riding things and doing things in water...and bloody cycling. There will be thousands more watching them do all this stuff and then measuring them. And then millions more just watching. And to what purpose? The Corinthian spirit ceased to exist decades ago. Sport is a business and its particpants no more than grunts on the shop floor. In 1948, when London last hosted the Summer Olympics, the opening ceremony consisted of a few post-WW2 miltary marching bands and the release of a few cages of pigeons. This year, Danny Boyle has been given millions of pounds to direct and present a programme to open the games that will be based on one line from Shakespeare's 'Tempest' that has suggested to Boyle and some other idiotic arty-farty types that the UK can be the "Isles of Wonder".

Some politicians must be shitting their collective pants. If it all goes horribly wrong, then Boris can blame Ken and Dave can blame Blair, seeing as the games were awarded in 2005 during the heady days of New Labour, and Ken's ordinary, more preferable Labour. If it's all lovely, then the Tories will take the accolades without having done any of the work. Apart from the Olympics having been reduced to a commercial opportunity, the fact that Dave and Boris have a get-out-of-jail free card if it goes tits-up is WRONG!

4) Fashion Weeks: What the fuck are these all about? Every day in the papers (even, and so disappointingly, in the Grauniad) there are photographs of skeletal women wearing stupid clothes, hats and shoes. Occasionally, there are pics of some worryingly odd-looking boys doing the same.

WTF...? This is
just so unremittingly
wrong...

And we're supposed to believe that this is newsworthy. We're also supposed to believe that the ridiculous outfits will be "setting trends" for the next year...like we'll all be wanting to buy some god-awful frocks for two thousand pounds, a pair of shoes with fifteen-inch heels for a similar price and have the desire to walk down the street looking like a complete arsehole. Nooooo. These "Fashion Weeks" are just an excuse for the rich and their attendant sycophants to go to Paris, Monaco, London, New York etc., get pissed and air-kiss all the people they hate. To even suggest that these luvvie-infested jamborees have the slightest connection with what the majority of us buy at Primark, Next or Marks & Spencer after the products have been imported from the Asian sweatshops is the thing that's WRONG.  Not only that, but doesn't Karl Largerfirled look like a complete twat?

"I'll tear that out with a spoon soon enough...
...Fellow Buller or no Fellow Buller"

5) Lansley's "Reforms" of the NHS: Just sign the petition. WRONG!

6) Boris Johnson: I am influenced currently by two things when it comes to Boris Johnson. The first (which I should ignore because of its partisan elements) is Ken Livingstone's excellent memoirs in which he describes Boris as - and I paraphrase - inept, uninfomed beyond headlines and, ultimately, shallow. The second thing is his background. OK, he can't help the fact that Stanley (his Dad) managed to have the wherewithal to provide Boris with a private education (Eton) and after that, the inevitable Oxbridge stuff happened and then UK and European parliamentary jobs, writing for and editing Tory rags while riding the storms of media exposure of peccadilloes and then becoming Mayor of London with responsibility for the management of infrastructures for almost eight per cent of the UK population without very much interference form central government...and doing all of it by the seat of his pants that are usually either on fire or round his ankles. On just so many levels, Boris Johnson is WRONG! And bookies will probably be offering very short odds soon enough on BJ becoming PM. OMG...Not LOL and, how does this keyboard characterisation thing work...?

:-( Is that it?

7) Movie Award Ceremonies: Yes, we should celebrate achievements in the film and television arts, but not Streep playing Thatcher. That's all. WRONG!

8) : David Starkey: WRONG! Even more wrong than Ant and/or Dec! Starkey will insist on a rational argument from me as to why I believe that he is so completely wrong about just about everything, because that's what he does. However, I'm not going to give him one (an argument), as that would only encourage the twat. (Unfortunately, Starkey is quite often right about stuff but let's face it, it's his attitude and his objection to anyone that disagrees with him that gets on everyone's tits, and the 'fact' that he really believes that he is right about everything and unless you agree with him, you're an idiot.)

9) Tony Blair's "A Journey": Jesus H Christ! Has the man no shame? Well, actually, no, he hasn't, as is proven by page after page of this polemic against everyone that thought he was a charlatan and everything that he wishes now not to take the blame for, which is...well, everything.

There and Back? NO!
Please...not Back!

And why do people's lives now have to be "journeys", anyway? I walk, get on a bus or a train or, when I have amassed sufficient wealth to buy a litre of petrol for the car, I travel from where I am to somewhere else and then, if it's all OK, back again. That's a journey, or maybe two journeys. Starting my life in a privileged household, going to a posh school, university and then to the bar, after which I go into politics and somehow become Prime Minister for over ten years, start some wars and then walk away when everything goes tits-up and leave my erstwhile "best mate" in the shit...that's not a journey. That's a political career, OK?

And on almost every page of his bloody book, he mentions "history" and how he was / is part of it  and how he made it / is it. What a patronising, self-agrandising arse. WRONG!

10) Po-facedness About "Corruption": Why do we get so pissed off and po-faced about corruption? It's always been there and always will. The "Willingness to Act Dishonestly in Return for Money or Personal Gain" (OED) is just part of the human condition and I would contend that the vast majority of human beings, given half a chance, would go for it. The question is, as always, of degree.

For example, Giddy Osborne  goes off to some oligarch's yacht off the coast of Italy and negotiates, while he's there (possibly on a whim) for some funding for the Tories. That's not corruption. That's a holiday...which involved a "journey", like many of Blair's since he started on the speaker-circuit and became an emissary for peace in the Middle East. It could be argued that he had that in mind when he started wars there and was therefore playing the long game for personal gain, but that would be churlish.

Some MP thinks he or she can claim allowances for two homes when maybe, just maybe, if their moral compass had been properly aligned, they might not have done, because the two homes are across the road from each other. That's not corruption either...it's, er, a misunderstanding of the rules that pertained at the time and blind eyes were conveniently turned by the people that should have said 'tut-tut'.

A shit-load of money is sent to some tin-pot state in the third world for the purposes of aid to the poor and needy. The tin-pot state's dictator trousers the money and spends it on a Ferrari, whores, diamonds and a yacht. That's not corruption either. It's theft.

TEN MORE THINGS THAT ARE WRONG NEXT MONTH!!!!!!!! (Or when I can be arsed)

WATCH THIS SPACE!!!!!!!

MORE EXCLAMATION MARKS LIKELY!!!!!!!

NOT AVAILABLE IN THE "SUN ON SUNDAY" !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I might even do ten things that are just so right, instead....such as kittens, red wine and toasted cheese...