WHO'S THE PLEB?

A bit harsh, but perhaps it's where Plebs belong

Just so that we're all clear about one of the abbreviated words "attributed to" but "not said" by the Coalition's Chief Whip, Andrew Mitchell to a police officer at the gates of Downing Street...

plebeian:

adj.

1. Of or relating to the common people of ancient Rome: a plebeian magistrate.

2. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of commoners.

3. Unrefined or coarse in nature or manner; common or vulgar: plebeian tastes.

n.

1. One of the common people of ancient Rome.

2. A member of the lower classes.

3. A vulgar or coarse person.

If we consider some of the other words "attributed to" Mitchell...

"Best you learn your fucking place...you don’t run this fucking government...You’re fucking plebs."

...then I would suggest that someone using these phrases would fall under definition 3. above; certainly relating to the noun and, arguably, the adjective, which further suggests that Mitchell himself is a plebeian. The police officers attending the gates were not behaving like plebeians at the time if the record from the notebooks are accurate and given the overall compensation packages for police officers these days, they could hardly be described as 'lower class'.

On the other hand, as they say, "...it takes one to know one..."

NEWS OF TEN (Things)

In a week when it's been easy to bury other news (good or bad), here are ten things that haven't had the coverage in the UK that perhaps they deserved. It's all here: Romney, Frackers, Tits, Baccalaureates, Useless Philosophers, Eugenics, First Aid, Badgers, Nigel Farage and Jesus

 

International - News from the USA

 

Phew! The rest of thew world can breathe their collective sighs of relief with the news that Mitt Romney is a totally useless, bigoted twat. To be fair, anyone that hadn't buried their head in a sand pit made by the Republican Tea Party knew that anyway. But now even the ultra-conservative, ultra-rich Republicans are having doubts that Romney was a good choice to face down Obama in November. All the US President has to do for the next few weeks is make sure he doesn't shag an intern and he can look forward to another four years believing he is the "Leader of the Free World".

 

The President of the United States of America
Really...he is!

Romney's naivety suggested to him that a private fund-raising dinner couldn't be hacked or infiltrated, so he decided to 'tell it like it is' to an audience of rich funders, explaining that half of americans were spongers that expected something for nothing. It was sort of Norman Tebbit on a massive dose of steroids. Romney then demonstrated a Bush-like grasp of world affairs and geography by opening up a non-existent border between a largely non-existent Palestine and Iran. If we think that the privileged, privately-educated, independently wealthy Cameron and Osborne are out of touch with the reality of living in the UK, then spare a thought for the ordinary american citizen that was faced with the prospect of a Romney presidency. Thankfully for them and the rest of the planet, that looks like it will never happen. It's a worrying old world when we realise that the Republicans would have been better off with Rick Santorum...

 

And in Texas, a shale-gas fracking business lost a seven-inch radioactive rod somewhere in the desert. It was there when the lorry left Pecos, but it wasn't there later on when it got to its destination, several hundred miles away. The rod, made of Americium 241 laced with Beryllium was in a box with a huge warning on it that would leave no-one but the thickest person in any doubt that it might be best to tell the authorities if it was found. However, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission went into overdrive, telling everyone in Texas that the rod could "cause death" to a human being if he or she was in close proximity to it for eight weeks or, if he or she held it for eight hours. In any event, people were told to stay "at least eight meters away". I know that just over half of the american people (and about two-thirds of Texans) voted in George Bush (twice), but just how thick does the NRS think Texans are?

 

Typical Texan Idiot

International - France & Ireland

 

Closer Magazine and the Irish Daily Star published blurry pictures of some posh totty with her tits out. And everyone went mental. And everyone started showing photographs of some other posh totty that got killed in a car crash in Paris, presumably so we could all make the assumption that the French wanted to destroy all royals (again, after more than two hundred years) by either death or shame. Then we learn that the royals (that's the alive ones) were suing the French magazine or something by issuing writs from a pacific island where every woman has her tits out all the time. What the media failed to point out was that the alive royals were having another holiday at my expense. Free-loading bastards.

 

Home News - Education

 

Michael Gove is dumping GCSEs and bringing in the E-Baccalaureate. He is doing this presumably because the under-class have been passing exams in the last few years and are getting ideas above their stations in life, and that just isn't how he wants to do things in Dave's Britain. Gove also agreed (or was told) to take David Laws into his department so that the Liberal Democrat could take the flak and get sacked again, while agreeing with Nick (as everyone used to) that it might not have been wise to promise that university tuition fees would be removed / reduced / not increased - delete as appropriate to manifesto timings.

 

Grayling: If you gave this man £54,000, what would
he give in return - Discuss....

And on the subject of universities, the New College of the Humanities (NCHUM) has failed spectacularly to understand that there would be very very few people attracted to their courses at £54,000 over three years. Well there's a fucking surprise. The philosopher, AC Grayling, set up NCHUM this year in the mistaken belief that he and his elitist colleagues would simply have to put their names to a prospectus and the rich and privileged would send their offspring to his seat of learning in their droves. Well, they didn't...only sixty applicants have taken it up and of the several hundred that applied, most took offers from Oxbridge at half the cost. Of course they did. Having lined up such academic luminaries as Richard Dawkins and Howard Jacobson, Grayling was of the misguided opinion that that would be enough. For a philosopher, he didn't really think it through, did he?

 

Home News - Health

 

It was announced this week that some scientists have been experimenting with "Triple DNA" IVF. Genes from the two parents are being mixed in a soup with some other DNA that might halt congenitive defects being passed on...or something like that. What might appear, on the face of it, as a potentially good idea is, in fact, just Frankenstein eugenics. Stop this madness now!

 

It seems that 140,000 deaths in the UK each year could be prevented if everyone knew basic first aid. Conveniently for the headline writers, 140,000 is about the same number that succumb to cancer annually. It seems that only 18% of us know any life-saving skills. I was suprised it was that many. Knowing how to apply CPR, use a defibralator or do the Heimlich maneouvre is one thing but putting it into practice is another entirely. Doubtless the homeopathy fan and Secretary of State for Health, Jeremy Hunt, will introduce compulsory life-saving classes for everyone in the mistaken belief that this will result in massive savings to the NHS when in reality it would add to the bill as health workers repair the havoc wreaked by amateur A&E practitioners.

 

Home News - Environment

 

Former Queen guitarist and astrophysicist, Brian May, has got all angry about DEFRA's authorisation of pilot schemes for a badger cull that started this week. Badgers will be shot by trained marksmen. He has threatened to support animal rights activists in direct action. Presumably this will involve May stalking the marksmen playing "Death on Two Legs" and then "Another One Bites the Dust" when each badger dies. The arguments on each side are so polarised as to make Sarah Palin's objections to Ahmedinajad's policies look close to agreement. How can one lobby be so wrong and the other so right? And we all know that there wouldn't be such a hue and cry if it had been rats that were the alleged culprits in the spreading of Bovine TB. As in all things anthropomorphic, I blame Kenneth Grahame...

 

"Who wants to live forever...?"

Home News - Politics

 

Everyone's favourite Euro-bater Nigel Farage, is hoping to attract millions of pounds to the UKIP coffers from former Tory donors that are pissed off with Cameron. Having successfully persuaded some of the electorate and a good slice of politcial commentators that UKIP is not a far-right loony party, the next and inevitable step in his being taken seriously is the attraction of significant donations. We used to think that Farage and UKIP were shouting from the sidelines and had no chance of getting anywhere near government. But we used to say that about the Liberal Democrats too, didn't we? Watch this space...

 

World News - Religion

 

Some divinity academic called Karen King has unearthed a papyrus from the fourth century CE that refers to Jesus "talking" about his wife. Cue experts giving their opinions on the authenticity of the tract and on the language of the time, that might call the assertion into doubt or confirm it, depending on their own agendas. Among these, was a commentary from  Jim West, a professor and Baptist pastor from Tennessee, who said, “A statement on a papyrus fragment isn’t proof of anything. It’s nothing more than a statement in thin air, without substantial context.”

 

So that's the bible fucked then, Jim....

 

Jesus and his missus:
What happened next?
Answers on a post card, please, to:
Prof. R Dawkins, New College
of the Humanities, London

 

Dorries: "KILL CAMERON..." It's Conference Open Season!

Of course, Nadine Dorries' rallying cry to "KIll Cameron" was entirely metaphorical. She qualified her commentary on the launch of the Fox / Davies vehicle "Conservative Voice", by confirming that her intention is to "...kill Cameronism...". She's not lining up with Liam Fox and  David Davis, either, as she claims that what is needed is a "strategy" to deal with Cameron, rather than just a "voice".

In the lead up to the conference season, new Chief Whip, Andrew "Thrasher" Mitchell has his work cut out to get the likes of Dorries to toe the party line; which she won't. Neither will Fox or Davis, as all three of them and many others besides are beginning to believe that Cameron will not survive as party leader until the next general election and fancy themselves as the next PM. Another of the whips, new boy Jo Johnson, might also be well-advised to have a word with his brother Boris about the London Mayor's plans to deliver the keynote address for Conservative Home fringe meeting the night before Dave's to the main conference at the ICC Birmingham. Tim Montgomerie, the creator of Conservative Home, one-time chief of staff for Iain Duncan Smith and founder of the Conservative Christian Fellowship is not a Cameron fan. He's a Boris fan, as is Dorries (for the time being).

Spot the difference....?
No, neither did I....

The conference fringe event being hosted by Conservative Home will focus on Boris and his "Olympotastic" summer. Yes...that word is actually being used by Montgomerie to promote it. It's a new word that may yet get included in the OED, as did "amazeballs" this year. Oh, dear. Anyway, the olympotatstic event is likely to be amazeballs and receive more media attention than the dull Dave's recessionastic miseryballs address scheduled for the following day. And just to demonstrate how bang up-to-date Conservative Home is, it's current leading articles feature John Major's opinions and Norman Lamont "...busting some myths about the ERM...". How current.

With Boris's star in the ascendant, Fox, Davis and all of the other wannabe leaders might as well pack up. The Fourth Column has already looked into a future of  Boris's Britain , and it isn't pretty. Cameron doesn't appear to have released any attack dogs on the simmering Boris campaign but it's probably too early to do so while Johnson rides the olympotastic wave. An opportunity did come up in the last few days, however. After the chilling revelations over Hillsborough, I was suprised not to see many references to Johnson's editorial in the Spectator from 2004 labelling Liverpudlians in general as people who preferred to wallow in grief and the football fans in 1989 as drunks that were instrumental in the disaster. Johnson has apologised (again) but in the midst of so many other apologies from public figures that it made little difference and no headlines. Hardly anybody buys The Sun in Liverpool and a similar number are likely to vote for a Boris-led Tory party but I doubt that will perturb the man any. Johnson appears indestructable.

The only thing Dave can do is to explain, carefully, that being mayor of London, fronting the olympic shows, being a jolly good chap and speaking latin fluently are not qualifiers for the role of Prime Minister. But Dave might as well be pissing in the wind. The Boris juggernaut is only just revving up, and it will crush Cameron under its wheels come 2013. And Dave cannot rely on his chief policies providing the electorate with a  viable alternative to Borisism. Hunt will simply continue where Lansley left off (plus compulsory homeopathy for all), Gove is determined to take us all back to to the 1960s and whilst IDS's Universal Credit is probably a very good idea, it's almost impossible to implement in the face of facile criticisms from the left and is not scheduled to roll out until 2017 anyway. On top of that, Osborne's mismanagement of economic recovery has been total.

With the Liberal Democrats dead in the water, that just leaves us with Labour to stop Boris becoming PM (the small matter of him not being an MP will be resolved by Zac Goldsmith or some other sap giving up their seat for him). So what do the Eds have to offer after more than two years in Opposition? Not much. Tory bungling, u-turns and wonky policies have offered so many opportunities for Miliband to savage the right...and as many have been eschewed by him. Why?

OK, maybe Miliband isn't as useless as I used to think to but if he's biding his time before striking then he'd better do it soon. Cameron is vulnerable. The Tory conference doesn't look like an opportunity for him to recover significant ground either, at least not while he continues to give Osborne the keys to the safe. But if Cameron falters critically and Johnson weighs in, Ed will have little chance of victory over the Tories in 2015 before Johnson is found out for the lightweight he is. It's all about timing, now...

One day, Dave...all of this will be mine.
Tomorrow, with a bit of luck...

THAT CABINET (RE)SHUFFLE - IN PICTURES!

Dave has rewarded and punished his Coalition Cabinet. Here, in the Fourth Column, are the real reasons why the shuffle happened in the way that it did

And it's IN PICTURES!

 

KEPT!
Danny Alexander keeps his job as Chief Secretary to
The Treasury because he ticks all the diversity boxes:
1) Once had a real job. 2) Ginger. 3) Foreign (after 2014).
4) Quite intelligent. 5) Muppet.

GONE!
Clarke has fallen asleep during PMQs
on no less than one hundred and thirty-two
occasions, including once when he was
deputising for the PM. The Lords beckons...

KEPT!
Eric Pickles' position as Communities Minister was
secured once Cameron discovered various communities
living in Eric's navel and under his fourth chin. The
gypsies that were found in his arse-crack were deported -
all three hundred and thirty of them.

 

RETAINED!
This young chap kept his job as Foreign Secretary,
and will be working on new wars with his mum...

LEADER of the HOUSE of LORDS!
James Corden takes over from Lord Strathclyde...possibly

 

NEW!
Jo Johnson has been appointed to the Whips' Office.
Cameron will introduce legislation in the next session
outlawing brothers serving in the same Government.

KEPT!
Cameron likes to wear hats, but has 'felt' unable to
do so for fear of media piss-taking. Cable has been
retained in Cabinet as the "Hat Decoy".

THROWN OUT!
Although Cameron likes everyone to be
much smaller than him, it was decided that
Warsi was, on balance, just too tiny.
And a woman. And a Muslim. And just a
bit crap at interviews. And from Yorkshire.
She had to go.

 

NO LONGER IN  THE PINK!
Justine Greening is taken out of the Department for Tranport
and demoted to Cabinet barrista. "Double skinny machiato for
Dave and an espresso with a double shot of blood for Ollie
...there's a good girl...chop chop!"

GRAYLING!
This is the only pic of the new Justice Secretary
without his human disguise.
Be afraid...be very afraid...

WHATEVER...
Someone you've never heard of took over from someone
else you've never heard of at a government department
you don't really care about....

RETAINED!
Ollie Letwin stays on as Minister of State for the Cabinet
Office with the added portfolio as "Head of Tory Salutes"
(Here he is demonstrating his first attempt...)

FUTURE PM?
As new co-chair of the Tory Party, Grant Shapps
considers how best to approach fund-raising, with
particular regard to access to David Cameron

AAAAAARGH!
Gove was able to celebrate retaining his position as Secretary
of State for Education, despite his being a complete twat...
 

NEW JOB!
Theresa Masy turns up for her first day in her
new job; keeping us all safe from Islamists and
US Teapartyists...

CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER
Mr R Madillum-Vulgare was selected by Dave to
take over at the Treasury as he was deemed to have
significantly more brain cells, better manners and
infinitely greater voter credibility than the previous
incumbent. Good choice all round then...

 

HEALTH WARNING!
Jeremy Hunt was given the Health brief in the hope that
he will eagerly take responsibility for the collapse of the
NHS in the same way he did for the success of the Olympics.

 

And, of course...

A VERY SPECIAL JOB...

"You see, er, Nick, isn't it? There are
all these lawns to cut and the roses to
look after. How about £7.25 an hour...
will that do? Plus some overalls and
some wellies, of course"