The vexing problem of cunts middle-lane morons on Britain’s motorways continues to exercise bother those motorists with an IQ above 23.
To ‘undertake’ these hapless twats is against the law.
Yet it is not against the law for these stupidly moronic cunts drivers to block roads, for no other reason than they have forgotten how to move over to Lane 1.
After many years of considering this problemfrom every angle, I have formulated a cunning solution.
It is a breathtakingly simple three-point plan:
Remove the law that says it is illegal to undertake these morons
Erm
That’s it
I’ve driven on Freeways in the US, where it is legal to use all lanes to pass traffic.
These roads are not more unsafe than UK motorways, where idiots reduce three-lane motorways to two-lane motorways through their sheer lack of intellect.
So if these tadpoles of the gene-pool are unable to move to the left, let’s remove the requirement to overtake on the right.
Like many people, I’ve been watching, reading about, and listening to the Leveson enquiry in to press standards, with great interest.
It’s been clear, almost from the start of the testimonies, that there is something so rotten in this particular state of Denmark, that the press landscape stinks more than a barrel of dead fish.
Several surprising revelations have stuck out more than others.
The revelation, from the current chairman of the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), that his organisation is not a regulator or arbiter of standards, would have made many people sit up.
The clue is in the name, but many people would have assumed that, because of its position, the PCC was a watchdog with disciplinary powers.
It isn’t.
It’s a toothless complaints organisation.
And newspapers – such as the Duly Getworse Daily Express and the Daily Spurt Daily Sport, who have walked away from the PCC – can choose to ignore everything the PCC ever says.
For me, the wider question is ‘How can the concept of self-regulation work?’
To be truly effective, doesn’t a regulator have to be *outside* of the industry that it is regulating?
I do find it interesting that the vested interests who have testified to Leveson have all said they feel that statutory regulation would damage, not help their industry.
These are, presumably, the same newspaper publishers who want every other industry independently/statutorily regulated?
The leader of Her Britanic Majesty’s Government and First Lord Of The Treasury – David Cameron, Member of Parliament and leader of the Conservative party – loves a Daily Mail soundbite.
He loves Daily Mail soundbites so much, that he is becoming known as Daily Mail Man.
Mr Cameron makes frequent public announcements, on a variety of ‘hot’ topics, and popular subjects, that his PR consultants have told him we – the public – care deeply about.
David Cameron makes his popular pronouncements often, but his PR strategy is carefully crafted.
For example.
There was, last year (2011) a significant amount of public discontent when, in these financially challenged times, it became widely noticed that chief executives were not only paying themselves massive salaries, they were doubling, trebling and even quadrupling their take-home packages with hyper-inflated ‘bonuses’.
The Government picked up on the public discontent.
During the long summer parliamentary recess, we began to see, in selected newspapers, the usual raft of ‘off the record’ press briefings that, on its return to work, David Cameron’s Government would be keen to clamp down on the issue of ’fat cats’.
This is a classic political manoeuvre; put ‘blind’ statements in to the public domain, just to see how the press and public react.
The press and the public reacted well.
The second stage in David Cameron’s ‘market-testing of public opinions’ swung in to action.
Key Government ministers began cropping up on television and radio. They dipped their toes in to the public water. The sight and sound of senior politicians railing against the ‘unfair’ and ‘unjust’ payments that were being made to ‘fat cats’ (and that phrase was gaining substantial traction in the media by now) by ’fat cats’, became more than a conversation piece, it became a rallying cry.
In the clip below, we see Vince Cable, the Government’s Business Secretary, laying out the Government’s position that shareholders should have the power of veto over fat cat payments
The third stage in this aggressive PR campaign, elevated the issue from ‘rallying call’ to ‘shouting match’.
It was announced, in the radio, TV and press, that Eric Pickles, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, would be writing to the chief executives of all public bodies, to say that no public employee (ie the chief executives) should be paid more than the Prime Minister.
Stage four, in this campaign, began, some weeks after the previous announcement, with Eric Pickles ‘naming and shaming’ those local authority chief executives who dared to accept salaries over and above that of David Cameron.
The chief executives began to fight back. The Local Government Association (essentially, the trade association of the majority of local authorities), outlined why the chief executives of public bodies should receive a market salary. In a nutshell, the LGAs argument was ‘market forces’.
Eric Pickles dug in to the Government’s position with a firm rebuttal that ‘no public employee should receive more than the Prime Minister’. But unfortunately Mr Pickles had no legal power over local authorities, to enforce his view.
The briefings on this subject became more focussed. The media messages moved from ‘off the record’ to ‘official policy statements’.
The press announcements became angry and detailed, as Government ministers (including David Cameron) spoke out, forcibly, on the subject.
The public were being overtaken as leaders on this issue; the Government adopted the argument and turned it in to official policy.
And then, at the end of January 2012, RBS announced that Stephen Hester, their chief executive, would be receiving a bonus – a bonus, not even a salary – of £963,000.
RBS is a bank that is owned by the Government. It is owned by the Government because, owing to horribly awful management decisions by a previous chief executive (not Mr Hester), the Government stepped in to rescue the organisation.
RBS’s ‘toxic assets’ (which, to you and me translates as ‘tens of hundreds of £ millions of bad debts which had previously, somehow, been labelled as ‘assets’ but which were actually completely worthless bad debts, because the debtors had no money to repay the loans’) were stripped out.
The Government absorbed these ‘toxic assets’ in to the national debt, and issued a few hundred million £s of bonds to try and help get some of the value of the ‘toxic assets’ back. This is exactly the same as borrowing money and writing a series of IOUs to make the debt payments.
The ‘non-toxic assets’ (everything else that might be called ‘not a bad debt’) were absorbed in to the new, slimmed-down RBS, which is now 96% owned by the Government.
The Government’s aim is that RBS will become transformed in to a once more profitable company. When it achieves that status, RBS will, we are told, get floated on the stock market.
The total cost of this ‘save the bank at all costs’ exercise? So far, a not inconsiderate £44 billion.
Forty-four billion pounds.
Staggering.
Is it even remotely possibly that the the Government might recoup this £44 billion, if RBS ever becomes fit to be publicly floated?
No, of course it isn’t.
No public float has ever yielded that much capital. Not even if you combined the public floats of BT, British Gas and all of the water and electric companies, would you get close to even half of that £44 billion.
As soon as the announcement of the £963,000 bonus to RBSs chief executive was announced, the public – and the media – went, frankly, bonkers.
Here was a fat cat, a chief executive of a public organisation (that had received massive amounts of public cash just to stay afloat), lining up to take home a bonus of £963,000 – on top of his £1.2m salary.
You might expect, given the five-point PR plan that the Government had rolled out over the previous six months, that our senior politicians would swing in to action to stop this obscene payment to a public employee?
Erm, no.
After 48 hours of deafening silence, Government cabinet members began briefing the press that they would not be interfering with this bonus.
Vince Cable, the UK Government’s Business Secretary even said, on Newsnight, that he was not in a position to stop this payment because it was ‘above my pay grade’.
When the temporarily speechless Jeremy Paxman regained the power of speech, and asked who had an appropriate paygrade to deal with this issue, Mr Cable, first of all, couldn’t answer the question. Then he hedged. And fussed about. And prevaricated. Until he eventually conceded that it was probably within the pay grade of the Cabinet.
Let’s stay focussed on the fact that we are talking about a Government-owned organisation. Which means that the Government are the shareholders. And, as we’ve seen – through his own public announcements – Mr Cameron is big on shareholder power, and big on shareholders being able to stop obscene payments to fat cats.
After four days of political prevarication – four days of no firm policy statement on how the Government (the owner of RBS) was going to deal with the issue of Stephen Hester’s £963,000 bonus – Ian Duncan Smith, the Conservative Work and Pensions Secretary, was wheeled out to give the Government’s view.
For the Government to use its shareholder power to veto the bonus payment would (have) caused chaos. So the Government has decided to allow the payment.
As well as bringing this message, Mr Duncan Smith also issued a number of downright misleading statements.
Other people might say it is a deliberate tissue of lies.
Because, under the contract (which was drawn up by the previous administration), it clearly says that any and all bonuses paid to RBS staff – including the chief executive – is discretionary. The contract also says that the remuneration committee may make the recommendation, on the chief executive’s bonus, to the board, but the board may reject that recommendation.
And who is the board of RBS? Her Britannic Majesty’s Government.
Still, politicians and the truth, eh?
At least we are fortunate to have, in David Cameron, a Prime Minister who makes policy statements and sticks firmly to them.
Like his statement that shareholders and people power will curb fat cat payments.
And like his cabinet-sanctioned statement that no public employee should earn more than the Prime Minister.
Oh.
Wait.
If you feel I’m being unduly harsh towards our political leaders, I’ll add just one point. On 30th January 2012 the policy unit at 10 Downing Street issued a statement that (and I quote) ‘We are not going to micro-manage bonuses’.
So there you have it, straight from the horse’s mouth. Lying horse that it is.
In closing this observation on the duplicity and untrustworthiness of the spineless cretins who have the temerity to believe they are better than we, I’d just like to make one point.
We all get our salaries for ‘doing the job’. A bonus is a recognition of some exceptional achievement.
With this truth in mind, ask yourself if Stephen Hester has restored the ‘toxic asset-less’ RBS back to profitability yet.
The answer, of course, is a resounding ‘no’.
Which begs the question, why was he even considered for a bonus in the first place?
Last night (28th January 2012) was the 2011/12 Event Riders Association Ball.
The venue was Headley Stud, Newbury(ish).
The physical location was the heavily converted indoor arena.
The great and good of the Eventing world were present.
And me.
Obv.
The host (Jules Stiller) and the team of organisers seized every single stop that was capable of being pulled out, and pulled them all out to maximum effect.
The setting was absolutely stunning.
The organisation (from the security through to the table service) was amazing.
And the entertainments were 99.95% awesome.
The live band could have been better, but that’s the only slightly negative comment I could make. The trouble is, when there’s a music journalist (me) at the Ball, I’m just going to notice a little detail like that.
The entire evening/night/morning was a stunning tribute to a team of people who put massive amounts of effort in to making the evening work.
And it really did work.
There are a few (discrete) pictures below but as far as a description of what went on, or what was involved, this is all you’re going to get.
I am the soul of discretion.
The usual rules apply re the photos. Click on an image once, let it load, click on it again and you’ll get the full-size picture.
A thorn between two roses
The ice-sculpture in reception
Ahem, my drinks, before the food began to arrive
Two more roses
Nial and Owen
Hayley
Tor
I am already looking forward to the 2012/13 Event Riders Association Ball!
I am propped up in my lovely, lovely bed with lovely, lovely clean bed-linen and my lovely, lovely new 12.5 Tog duvet.
I have tea.
I have cereal.
The iPod docking station is playing lovely, lovely music. Anemo’s ‘Music Box’, at the moment.
And I am thinking, pensively.
There’s much to do today.
I need to get up, shower, shave, teeth, get dressed and pack for a night away.
I am meeting a friend in Newbury for lunch. When we’re done with that she’ll be off to have things done to her. You know, hair, and all that.
I have to check in to a hotel in Newbury (no, not with the friend, you dirty-minded thing).
At about 6pm I need to do more bathroom-related things, then change in to my dinner suit, dress shirt, bow-tie (I hope I can remember how to tie it!) and shiny shoes.
I’m meeting my friend and a bunch of other people for some pre-event drinks, in the hotel reception.
And then we’re all going out to a Ball.
It’s the ‘Event Riders Association’ Ball.
We have a couple of taxis booked to get us there. And to get us back again afterwards.
Before we all turn in to pumpkins.
Whatever.
But before I can do any of those exciting things, there’s the most mundane – yet difficult – obstacle to overcome.
The ‘getting out of bed’.
Bugger me, it’s difficult.
Especially when ones bed is so comfortable. And warm. And cosy. And the music in here is so good. And…
Wednesday evening I drove a rented van, picked up a couple of items of furniture from Sophie’s flat, delivered them to my house, picked up a couch, delivered it to her flat and came home…
Came home to enjoy the sight of my suite of furniture as Godnature the manufacturers intended – and as originally bought, in the summer of last year.
I have decided to take a leaf out of Young Masher‘s book. I’m sorry about that. I’ll stick it back in with some sellotape.
But I’m also going to keep him company, in a virtual kind of way.
Every February, Young Masher has a stab at publishing one post a day. He was recently moaningwingeingcomplaining saying that he finds it a difficult target to achieve.
How difficult could this be?
Not very (he said to himself, full of naive innocence).
So, starting February 1st I’ll be lobbing one article/blog post a day, for the month, on to the internet.
Some of the posts will be more serious than others. And some posts will be about as serious as navel-lint.
So stay tuned!
It’s all downhill from here. And when I say ‘here’ I mean February 1st.
I’m preparing my feet for the Ball on Saturday. There may be some tripping the light fantastic. Or stumbling the heavy mediocre – that might be more accurate.
Or there may not be. But either way, I want my feet to be uncomplaining about my Dress shoes.
And how is it that my Dress shoes are a 10-1/2 whilst my work shoes are an 11?
But one thing is clear.
For today at least, I had the brightest, shiniest shoes at work.
Anyway.
You know I recently wrote about meeting the redoubtable Twitter friend in UCH last Thursday?
This isn’t Twitter related, but last weekend, whilst in Paris, I met an American girl, Amy-Lee.
I’m not going to write about what happened during the couple of hours we spent together. If you want the details you’ll have to listen to this week’s show (This Reality Podcast, No 199).
What I will say is that today I received a stunningly beautiful email from Amy-Lee. So stunningly beautiful it moved me close to tears.
As a result of a couple of hours in Paris with Amy-Lee, I have an open invitation to visit her in Philadelphia whenever I care, and to stay at her house, as an honoured guest, for an all-expenses paid holiday.
Regular Twitter friends will know that, on Friday, I went in to London to watch the Young Vic’s ‘Hamlet’, featuring Michael Sheen in the title role.
A full and detailed review is in the works, and will be published soon.
However.
Imagine my surprise as, settling down, five minutes before the performance, the stranger seated next to me leaned over, offered me his hand and said ‘It’s Brennig, isn’t it?’
And the world visibly shrank around me, as that list of ‘Random People You Know But Are Never Going To Meet At A Performance Of Hamlet At The Young Vic’ had a line drawn through a name.
Because Twitter is a real-time/near-real-time communications medium, it is remarkably easy to establish relationships with Twitter ‘friends’.
I have been on Twitter since 31st March 2008. Since then 345 people have found and followed me and, because it is a social network, I have (usually) followed them all back.
Social, it definitely is. A network it is too.
I have gone on to physically meet *counts quickly* 40-ish Twitter friends and, without exception, they have all been lovely people.
Yesterday evening I drove in to London, because one of my Twitter friends had been taken ill, whilst at work, and had been admitted to UCL Hospital for tests.
I pitched up outside UCL at 6.15pm and waited in my car, listening to music and, erm, Tweeting, Texting and receiving updates on his progress, as he moved through the medical system.
I’ve had enough hospital admissions to know that medical staff are reluctant to discharge someone from their care, and have that person set out on a significant public transport journey home.
I thought that if he was allowed home, he’d need a lift. It was that simple.
About 9.30pm he was moved to a hospital ward and I was invited up for a chat. I accepted and yes, we physically met for the first time and we chatted about many things.
And he is, indeed, a very nice guy.
As the clock ticked on, the nurses started saying things like ‘And in the morning we’ll do more tests’, so it became clear he wasn’t going to be allowed home.
But we chatted on.
At 11pm a real-life/Twitter friend of his (who was also an unmet Twitter friend of mine) pitched up with overnight supplies for him.
The three of us chatted some more, briefly, before being thrown out by the nursing staff.
I gave the (previously unmet) Twitter friend a lift back to her home in Fulham, then headed back to Witney, getting home about half-past midnight.
I hope he – the Twitter friend in hospital – is good this morning. I hope he’s fit and hope his prognosis is excellent.
But this activity? This is the kind of thing we do for our friends, isn’t it?
