Monday - January 05, 2009

The British Army in retreat.  Was this the first Dunkirk?

I was supposed to be gone over an hour ago, just shows ya the kind of trouble you get into once you learn to read.  Spelling another matter.
Anyway, I was about to quit and ran across this in the Times of London.

I was familiar with the story but didn’t remember a whole lot and then saw this.  Makes for interesting reading.

The British Army was in retreat from Napoleon’s forces 200 years ago, during a bitter winter in northern Spain. In November 1808 an expeditionary force of 20,000 men under General John Moore marched into Spain to help to drive out the French invaders. But the British were badly equipped and rapidly became outnumbered as Napoleon poured in reinforcements to deliver a crushing defeat.

By late December 1808 Moore realised his dire situation and began a gruelling retreat over 250 miles through the northwestern mountains of Spain to the port of Corunna, near the Bay of Biscay, to escape by sea. Snow, hail and rain storms turned the roads to quagmires, many of the troops died in the perishing cold and stragglers left behind were shown no mercy by the pursuing French. Hungry and demoralised, the Army was on the verge of collapse. However, the French had to battle through the appalling conditions as well, and Napoleon himself led a desperate advance through a mountain pass in a blizzard to pursue the British.

Moore just managed to stay one step ahead and by January 11, 1809, the exhausted remains of his Army arrived in Corunna where they waited for the British fleet.

However, the French soon caught up and even though the British were starved, diseased and frostbitten, they fought a valiant rearguard action. Moore was killed, but the remains of the Army beat off the enemy and boarded the ships home. Several thousand men had been lost, but the Army had been saved from annihilation and would return to Spain to fight again.

BATTLING BRITS

Posted by peiper     on 01/05/2009 at 04:19 PM   
Filed Under: • History • UK •  
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Being League Secretary Sucks

I haven’t posted too much in the way of bowling blogging lately. Been too busy with other stuff.

Well, it’s a mix of good news and bad news. Which is typical.

The good news is that my Monday night team did really well in the position round we had last week. We took all 7 points but it wasn’t easy. We won the first game by over 100 and then we won the second game by about 50. But then the other team woke up and started bowling well, while our team got tired and began rolling poorly. It was neck and neck the whole game, and then we seemed to drop the ball [hur hur, bowling pun] in the 10th frame of the 3rd game. So when it came time for me, the anchor, to roll, we were down by 26. I had a spare in the 9th. Ron, the anchor on the other team, is pretty good. I expected him to go XXX or at least XX-something. Instead he rolled X 7 0, and that was on an open in the 9th. That gave us a small window. My first ball was a strike, which gave us 20 because of my earlier mark. So we’re still down 6. My second ball was a 9, and that was enough. I missed the spare, but it didn’t matter. We won that one by 3, and thus took all 7 points. That moved us up several positions in the standings, so now we’re in 9th place out of 18 teams as we go into the 2nd rotation. This is a very competitive league, but we still have fun. I don’t know if there will be a “Miss Congeniality” prize, but my team will win that if there is. We have such a good time, so nobody gets grumpy when we beat them. Conversely, we don’t get down (too much) when we lose. This is not always the case with some teams!

The bad news concerns my Saturday Night league. While my team is solidly in 1st place there, the league itself is struggling to survive. We lost a lot of teams this year, and have been barely surviving with 5 and a half teams. How can you have half a team? Well, the half team started out as a whole team, but nobody showed up. We didn’t find out until later that all the members had quit the league, at least for this season. Nice of them to tell me this when I went to all the effort of finding out their phone numbers and calling them up. (all our league’s records were lost at the end of last season, so everything had to be rebuilt from the beginning. As Secretary, all of this was my job and my job alone. Great!) Then the alley found us 2 guys who said they’d take over that team. They came for a couple weeks then stopped showing up. Did they call and say, Hey, sorry, we can’t make it anymore? Heck no. They just evaporated. So I had to figure out how to figure in forfeits, which required bending some rules. After 4 weeks of no show, I had to just about force our league president to admit that these guys were gone, which made that team the BYE team. Ok, fine. More work for me, but at least it’s settled. The bowling alley doesn’t like to lose money by having BYE teams - they are an empty slot which brings in no cash - so they told me they found some guy who wanted to join a league, and he had a whole team of friends to bowl with him. Hey, great, come on down!

So the first week the new guy shows up. And nobody else. Uh oh. Here we go again. The second week he shows up. By himself. And then spends an hour on the phone, forfeiting the first game, trying to get his buddies to show up. At last one of them does. His girlfriend. So now we have 2 on that team, but at least one M one W as we are a mixed league after all. So they forfeit one game and bowl 2. This is a difficult thing to enter into the bowling score software, so things got screwed up in the database and I didn’t notice. This last week they both came, hurray!!, and both bowled the full series. Hurray twice! And they paid their money and their sanction fees. Hurray to the third! But the software was really messed up. I spent more than 3 hours today going into the database, going back several weeks, changing scores, rosters, averages, total pins bowled, etc., until I finally got it figured and straightened out. So now everything is perfect, and my hope is that none of the whiners on this league will notice. Which means I’d better get the old standings sheet taken down tonight and put the new one up. But the thing is finally correct, so I’m happy.

Being League Secretary is a lot of work under ordinary circumstances. But when your league is “dynamic” it’s a huge pain in the posterior. And nobody will ever know just how much work it is unless they do it themselves.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/05/2009 at 03:57 PM   
Filed Under: • Bowling Blogging •  
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Post of a more personal nature with thanks to PIXIE.

Last week I posted a story about the treatment of a man aged 101, by the hospital he was in.

BMEWS readers all posted comments of outrage or disgust or bewilderment that anything like that was even possible.

Well, our BMEWS Pixie had one heck of a comment to make and she wasn’t pulling any punches.
Her background as a nurse had her all the more angered as it wasn’t the kind of treatment she and her class would ever have put up with.
But what she had to say reminded me of a personal experience I witnessed in a hospital in Riverside, Ca. some years ago.
Here is part of what Pixie had to say.

I am appalled by this story.........I have been a nurse (now retired) for over 40 years.  Never have I witnessed this type of treatment of a patient.  I have worked OR, as a med-surg staff nurse, a supervisor and for the last 20 years of my career in an Emergency Department.

I have never witnessed this type of negligence.

Posted by Pixie under comments

Pixie,
Good for you and I wish there were more with that attitude. 

The story got to me and reminded me a tiny bit (not quite the same but bad enough) of an experience I personally witnessed at a hosp. in Riverside,Ca. some years ago.

I was recovering from back surgery and in pretty awful shape.  Don’t have to tell you about back surgery I know. Every move agony in the hosp. bed.  So .....

I had a two bed room and they wheeled in an elderly man from surgery for prostate cancer and some other thing I can’t recall.  He was in deplorable condition and drugged out of his skull as you will know.  And lots of moaning poor man.

He came to a few times and asked for water (?) but couldn’t reach the or wasn’t aware of the call button, so I used mine.  It was awhile before a nurse came, they are short handed I know, and she took care of his request, but it almost seemed grudgingly. Now I confess that may not be the case, it was just her look.

I had to get out of bed and oh boy was that an effort, (having to hold onto the wall and anything else handy for support) to use the loo as the Brits call it.
As I passed his bed to get there I noticed a US Navy tattoo on his arm, similar to the one my favorite uncle (more like father) had.  It was the USS Chicago, and of course WW2, so this old guy was a Navy vet and from a well known ship as well.  Wow.  When he came to again (he was in and out) I was calling him “sir.”

I’m too damn long winded so here’s what happened.

This guy was wired up with needles and tubes the like of which I never want to see again. He had them in his nose and in his (ah, you know) and and in his hands and heaven only knows where else. He was tossing and turning and I could see the tubes coming out and the straps that had him secured were beginning to come apart.  He was in some pain but he wasn’t totally conscious, and the moaning was pretty much non-stop for long periods. Like ALL night for the first couple of nights. Finally, at some point I was worried that he’d get hurt or something bad would happen with those loose tubes and things, and I also thought the straps would give and he’d fall out of bed.

This was happening around 2am, the ward was quiet and so I used the call button. Nothing.
Waited and it probably seemed longer then it was but truthfully it was a long wait.  Still no response.  What to do? Surprisingly, I didn’t see any side rails on the bed.  Or maybe they didn’t use them as he was strapped down.

With much pain myself as I hadn’t been out of surgery that long myself, I got out of bed and managed to make my way to the door, and peeked out onto the hallway.  I saw nobody at first. Not a soul.  So I’m hanging on to the door frame when I spotted a nurse coming down the hall and I called to her.  She was quite young and when I told her the situation, she informed me that this wasn’t her floor but she’d see what she could do.  I told her I was worried that he’d somehow get the straps holding him down undone and he might fall out of bed.  This was her word for word reply to that.  I have never forgotten it. 

“WE ALL HAVE TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OUR OWN ACTIONS.”

This old sailor hadn’t been out of surgery for 24 hours yet. This was the first night of the day he came out of surgery.  OK so, she more or less retied the straps while he’s tossing to and fro and not being at all still, so it wasn’t easy for her I realize. But she could have called for help and didn’t.
Think I’m through?  Nope. Because later that morning once again the straps and the wires and the tubes seemed to be falling out and the straps for certain were now undone, but he was slowly coming to but still in pain.

Hitting the call button yet again brought two nurses (this would be around 8 or 9 in the morning by now) and they started to put things back together.  And this really got to me for sheer ...????
I can’t find the word?  Stupidity is one but that doesn’t work for me as I need something stronger.
Here’s what happened next.

You know those horrid hospital gowns patients have to wear, right. They always seem too short and they usually are.
During all his tossing and moving previously, his hospital gown rode up exposing himself a little.
I watched as he tried to lower the damn thing and cover himself which he finally managed to do.
One of the nurses, an older hag says to him ....  “Thank You Very Much.” And I promise you it was said with a great deal of scorn and sarcasm. As though he were some kind of flasher and he exposed himself on purpose.  Why couldn’t she have pulled his gown down a bit?
What the heck kind of attitude was that?  She’s a nurse for gosh sake.  She’s never seen a nude patient before?

I felt very sorry for this guy and who wouldn’t?

I felt even worse when he finally came around a little more and asked me to get his carry bag in the wall closet. Locker?  Whatever. He said he had a 38 cal. in there and didn’t see the point of things anymore. 
That was scary and heartbreaking. 
That could by ill chance also be any one of us. We just never know for sure what the future holds or just what state our body and minds will be in. 

Until then, we should be thankful and grateful for any nurses out there that might be like Pixie.
Our bad luck that there aren’t more, and that ones as described here are still working in the field.

-end-

Posted by peiper     on 01/05/2009 at 01:09 PM   
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It breaks my heart to see Israel’s stupidity.

Surprised me quite a bit to read this by of all ppl, a rabbi.
But then why not?  They have opinions too.
I just can’t understand how it’s possible for this man not to see things through.  He wants talk? Why hell. Why not?
Talk worked very well between Hitler and Chamberlain.  Europe had peace of sorts.
Might not be the best example I could have used but when I read about talking and diplomacy blah,blah, that’s what it reminds me of.

While it’s true that I haven’t known a lot of rabbis, the ones I have known were pretty sharp fellows.
Now this guy may be a very nice person when ya know him but right now I think he is beyond STUPID.  Read what this guy wants.  Oh he has the answer to peace alright.  More like, Israel. Rest in Peace.

Please folks, take time out to read this thing. He’s in some other world.  Or maybe I am.  That is possible.  I was known to be wrong once. Made the news. Maybe you missed it.

Look guys, I have a newspaper right here with a full front page photo that shows Hamas rockets being fired. The photo is NOT stock footage, it’s what is happening NOW.  Would you like to guess just where those rockets are being fired from?  Correct.  Smack dab in the middle of a civilian area. You can see it all very clearly.  You simply can’t fight this type of war, and it is that, where the enemy hides his/her face and uses city or village centers as launching places.
Oh .. but Israel it the bully.  BULL S%$!  Someone on BBC last night (radio) talking about how unreasonably “brutal” Israel was behaving.  What is this?
A schoolyard fight or a nation’s fight for survival?

It has a right to respond to attacks, but will not achieve its ultimate aim - peace - until it stops thinking in military terms
Michael Lerner

Israel’s attempt to wipe out Hamas is understandable, but stupid. No country in the world is going to ignore the provocation of rockets being launched from neighbouring territory day after day. If Mexico had a group of anti-imperialists bombing Texas, imagine how long it would take for America to mobilise a counterattack. Israel has every right to respond.

But the kind of response matters. Killing 500 Palestinians and wounding 2,000 others (at the time of writing) is disproportionate. Hamas can harass, but it cannot pose any threat to the existence of Israel. And just as Hamas’s indiscriminate bombing of population centres is a crime against humanity, so is Israel’s killing of civilians (at least 130 so far in Gaza, not to mention the thousands in the years of the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza).

Hamas had respected the previously negotiated ceasefire except when Israel used it as cover to make assassination raids. Hamas argued that these raids were hardly a manifestation of a ceasefire, and so as symbolic protest it would allow the release of rocket fire (usually hitting no targets). But when the issue of continuing the ceasefire came up, Hamas wanted a guarantee that these assassination raids would stop. And it asked for more. With hundreds of thousands of Palestinians facing acute malnutrition, Hamas insists that the borders be opened so that food can arrive unimpeded. And in return for the captured Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit, it asks for the release of 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.

Hamas has made it clear that it would accept the terms of the Saudi Arabian peace agreement, though it would never formally recognise Israel. It would live peacefully in a two-state arrangement, but it would never acknowledge Israel’s “right to exist”. This position is unnecessarily provocative, and is deeply self-destructive for Palestinians who believe it is the only symbolic weapon they have left.

How do we get out of this destructive spiral? The first step is for the world to demand an immediate ceasefire. That ceasefire should be imposed by the United Nations and backed unequivocally by America. Its terms must include the following:

— Hamas stops all firing of missiles, bombs or any other violent action originating from the West Bank or Gaza, and co-operates in actively jailing anyone from any faction that breaks this ceasefire.

— Israel stops all bombing, targeted assassinations or any other violent actions aimed at activists, militants, or suspected terrorists in the West Bank or Gaza, and uses the full force of its army to prevent any further attacks on Palestinians.

— Israel opens the border with Gaza and allows free access to and from Israel, subject only to full search and seizure of any weapons. Israel allows free travel of food, gas, electricity, water and consumer goods and materials including from land, air, and sea, subject only to full search and seizure of any weapons or materials typically used for weapons.

— Israel releases all Palestinians in detention and returns them to the West Bank or Gaza according to the choice of the detainees or prisoners. Hamas releases Gilad Schalit and anyone else being held by Palestinian forces.

— Both sides invite an international force to implement these agreements

— Both sides agree to end teaching and/or advocacy of violence against the other side in and outside mosques, educational institutions, and the media.

— This ceasefire would last for 20 years. Nato, the UN, and the US all agree to enforce this agreement and impose severe sanctions in the event of any violations.

These steps would make a huge difference, isolate the most radical members of each side from the mainstream, and make it possible to then begin negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians on a broader and deeper set of issues.

The basic condition for creating peace is to help each side feel “safe”. A first and critical step is to speak in a language that is empathic toward the suffering of each people in a climate of discourse in which both sides’ stories are heard and understood.

Yet Israel, as the militarily superior power, ought to take the first steps: implementing a massive Marshall Plan in Gaza and in the West Bank to end poverty and unemployment, rebuild infrastructure and encourage investment; dismantle the settlements or make settlers become citizens of a Palestinian state; accept 30,000 Palestinian refugees annually back into Israel for the next 30 years, apologise for its role in the 1948 expulsions and offer to co-ordinate a worldwide compensation effort for all that Palestinians lost during the Occupation; and recognise a Palestinian state within borders already defined by the Geneva Accord of 2003.

This is the only way Israel will ever achieve security. It is the only way to permanently defeat Hamas and all extremists who wish to see endless war against Israel.

The most significant contribution the new Obama administration could make to Middle East peace would be to embrace a strategy that homeland security is best achieved not by military or economic domination but by generosity and caring for others. If this new way of thinking could become a serious part of US policy, it would have an immense impact on undermining the fearful consciousness of Israelis who still see the world more through the frame of the Holocaust and previous persecutions than through the frame of their actual present power in the world.

It breaks my heart to see the terrible suffering in Gaza and in Israel. As a religious Jew I find it all the worse, because it confirms to me how easy it is to pervert the loving message of Judaism into a message of hatred and domination. I remain in mourning for the Jewish people, for Israel and for the world.

Rabbi Michael Lerner is editor of Tikkun magazine. (rabbilerner@tikkun.org)

I hope you will email this guy. that’s the address above. Not that we’ll change his mind I’m sure.  RCOB

Posted by peiper     on 01/05/2009 at 12:07 PM   
Filed Under: • International • Israel • RoPMA • Terrorists • War On Terror •  
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Politically Corect and Incorrect Fairytales

The following are thought to be not pc enough by many parents . So it’s even come to fairy tales has it?
Not surprised though and you aren’t either I’d bet.

Top 10 fairy tales we no longer read:

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

2. Hansel and Gretel

3. Cinderella

4. Little Red Riding Hood

5. The Gingerbread Man

6. Jack and the Beanstalk

7. Sleeping Beauty

8. Beauty and the Beast

9. Goldilocks and the Three Bears

10. The Emperor’s New Clothes

Traditional fairytales ‘not PC enough’
Parents have stopped reading traditional fairytales to their children because they are too scary and not politically correct, according to research.

By Graeme Paton,
Education Editor
Last Updated: 2:51PM GMT 05 Jan 2009

Top bedtime stories of 2008:

1. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle (1969)

2. Mr Men, Roger Hargreaves (1971)

3. The Gruffalo, Julia Donaldson (1999)

4. Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne (1926)

5. Aliens Love Underpants, Claire Freedman & Ben Cort (2007)

6. Thomas and Friends from The Railway Series, Rev.W.Awdry (1945)

7. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame (1908)

8. What a Noisy Pinky Ponk!, Andrew Davenport (2008)

9. Charlie and Lola, Lauren Child (2001)

10. Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Robert Southey (1837)

Favourites such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella and Rapunzel are being dropped by some families who fear children are being emotionally damaged.

A third of parents refused to read Little Red Riding Hood because she walks through woods alone and finds her grandmother eaten by a wolf.

One in 10 said Snow White should be re-named because “the dwarf reference is not PC”.

Rapunzel was considered “too dark” and Cinderella has been dumped amid fears she is treated like a slave and forced to do all the housework.

MORE STUPID STUFF

nice likeness of the MIL seen here with Snow White.
Yeah .. I guess she is frightening at that.

Posted by peiper     on 01/05/2009 at 11:30 AM   
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   Sunday - January 04, 2009

on a lighter note

I spent the afternoon painting a wall. Painting is another one of those tasks people would rather not do, so instead they hire me. Fine by me!

I actually noticed this earlier this summer, but thought it might be a fluke. I’ve had 4 or 5 painting projects since then, and it’s no fluke. When did paint become so darned thick? I remember paint. It’s that smelly stuff that comes in a can. You have to stir the daylights out of it, but very carefully because the can is filled right up to the brim. Then when you pour some out into the paint roller tray, it flows pretty much like pancake syrup. Well, maybe just a bit thicker than that, but not much. Then you apply the stuff, and when the smell goes away you know the paint is ready for the second coat.

Not anymore. Now paint has almost no smell at all. It doesn’t seem to need mixing. And the stuff is amazingly thick. Thicker than syrup. Thicker than sour cream. Pour out a cupful into the roller tray and it just sits there. It doesn’t even spread out in the tray. And this is fresh paint, from a decent brand, at room temperature. I’ve noticed the same thing with primer too. (But that was Kilz primer, what I affectionately call landlord paint. Kilz is liquid magic. You can put Kilz on over stains, chipped paint, roadkill, fire damage, lasagna stuck to the wall, etc., and it covers perfectly. And the old school, oil-base stuff was even better!) On the positive side, the stuff goes on like glue. It’s just about impossible to overload a roller so that anything drips. And you can roll quite fast without worrying about any spray shooting off the roller. On the negative side, it goes on like glue. I found that I had to apply a good bit more pressure to the roller to even get the paint to come off the roller. (I may not have been using the proper nap roller. Next time I’ll use a shorter nap) Working time seems at least as long as it used to be, but drying time is much less. I laid down a coat, and even though the label said 2 - 4 hours between coats, it was ready for another coat in 90 minutes. And honestly, a second coat probably wasn’t even necessary. I did it because that’s what I always do. Plus I get paid by the hour.

I left the paint can at the client site since there was extra. I didn’t even look, but I’m pretty sure the Valspar paint was an acrylic latex. Certainly low VOC stuff. (ie no smell) It was the standard paint sold at Lowe’s, which turns out to be Valspar’s premium product. I went to Lowe’s because it was close, the customer didn’t care about any special kind of paint, and the guy behind the counter quickly matched the color exactly. Good enough for me.

Now I just have to cajole my customer for some extra work so that the rest of the gallon doesn’t go to waste. I’m sure he’s got another wall around somewhere.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/04/2009 at 10:47 PM   
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A prayer for the IDF

Via IsraellyCool who is almost live-blogging the situation, comes this prayer from Treppenwitz:

Translation:

He Who blessed our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - may He bless the fighters of the Israel Defense Force, who stand guard over our land and the cities of our God from the border of the Lebanon to the desert of Egypt, and from the Great Sea unto the approach of the Aravah, on the land, in the air, and on the sea.

May Hashem cause the enemies who rise up against us to be struck down before them. May the Holy One, Blessed is He, preserve and rescue our fighting men from every trouble and distress and from every plague and illness, and may He send blessing and success in their every endeavor.  May He lead our enemies under their sway and may He grant them salvation and crown them with victory. And may there be fulfilled for them the verse: For it is Hashem, your God, Who goes with you to battle your enemies for you to save you.  Now let us respond: Amen. 



The ground campaign will probably get very nasty very soon. Say a prayer for those fighting this enemy who is our enemy as well.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/04/2009 at 03:04 PM   
Filed Under: • Israel • War On Terror •  
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Divide and Conquer

Israeli ground troops and tanks cut swaths through the Gaza Strip early Sunday, cutting the coastal territory into two and surrounding its biggest city as the new phase of a devastating offensive against Hamas militants gained momentum.

The military used overwhelming firepower from tanks, artillery and aircraft to protect the advancing soldiers, and Gaza officials said at least 31 civilians were killed in the onslaught. The military said troops killed several dozen militants, but Gaza officials could confirm only four dead — in part because rescue teams could not reach the battle zones. One Israeli soldier was killed in the offensive, which so far has been widely popular with the Israeli public.

The ground invasion and live images of the fighting in Gaza drew international condemnations and dominated news coverage on Arab satellite TV stations, many of which aired footage of wounded Palestinians at hospitals. Hamas threatened to turn Gaza into an Israeli “graveyard.”

Thousands of soldiers in three brigade-size formations pushed into Gaza after nightfall Saturday, beginning a long-awaited ground offensive against the area’s Hamas rulers after a week of intense aerial bombardment. Black smoke billowed over Gaza City at first light as bursts of machine gun fire rang out.

The ground operation is the second phase in an offensive that began as a weeklong aerial onslaught aimed at halting Hamas rocket fire that has reached deeper and deeper into Israel, threatening major cities and one-eighth of Israel’s population.

Git ‘er done! 

Until the other side begs for the chance to surrender unconditionally, the fight is not over. While I respect Israel for trying to minimize collateral damage, even if they strip search every Gazan resident and go through every building and tunnel to remove arms caches it will only buy them more time. A matter of months only. The world has watched for decades as one plan for peace after another has failed. At this point only mass extermination or deportation is going to work. I guess the Izzies will just have to push the paleos across the border into one of the neighboring countries so that their “arab brothers” can deal with them. And it won’t be Egypt. Sorry palis. You’ve had ages to work things out and you’ve ALL made the deliberate decision to keep the fight going. Now pay the price.

PS - Isn’t it amazing what one little country can achieve, and in such a short time, when they don’t listen to the idiocy called “world opinion”?

Posted by Drew458     on 01/04/2009 at 02:36 PM   
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For Peiper…

How ‘judgemental’ of you Peiper. Don’t you know that Gypsies are a vital part of the economy?

But every night all the men would come around and lay their money down

Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves

Amazing. Even Cher had to tell the truth about Gypsies.

Posted by Christopher     on 01/04/2009 at 12:08 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics • Illegal-Aliens and Immigration •  
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   Saturday - January 03, 2009

The law of unintended consequences

Ever notice that every time the Government (whether local, State, or Federal) tries to solve a problem it just creates more problems?

Okay, so it’s Terry Pratchett. I still think it’s applicable.

Another interesting fact: this quote is in the footnotes of Soul Music. I’m sure Grumpy will appreciate this post.

[22] Rats had featured largely in the history of Ankh-Morpork. Shortly before the Patrician came to power there was a terrible plague of rats. The city council countered it by offering twenty pence for every rat tail. This did, for a week or two, reduce the number of rats –

Okay, we have the Government response to a problem. Now...on to the unintended consequence…

– and then people were suddenly queuing up with tails, the city treasury was being drained, and no-one seemed to be doing much work. And there still seemed to be a lot of rats around. Lord Vetinari had listened carefully while the problem was explained, and had solved the thing with one memorable phrase which said a lot about him, about the folly of bounty offers, and about the natural instinct of Ankh-Morporkians in any situation involving money: “Tax the rat farms.”

What the Government subsidizes, it gets more of!

Posted by Christopher     on 01/03/2009 at 11:25 PM   
Filed Under: • Government •  
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THE GREAT ENGLISH SELL OUT.  THE WHOLE DARN COUNTRY. AND THE ENGLISH DON’T LIKE IT.

The views of all local comrades will be ignored unless they follow the ‘equality and diversity guidelines’ from the central planning committee. All comrades are entitled to give their opinion but the central planning committee reserves the right to override all public opinion and common sense.

John, London, UK, 3/1/2009 10:04

That BMEWS readers, is one of many like letters to the editor on the issue of Europe’s and the UK’s public cancer.
Gypsies/ Travelers. A blight in human form.

They can set up camp pretty much anywhere and they do. And it’s hell removing them. 
However, the govt. here is insisting that local councils find more camp sites for people who basically are nomadic. But never mind that for now.

This problem is faced by this country mostly due to one man.  The former Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott.  Of course, he isn’t alone but was a prime mover.
He is old fashioned leftist labour, (except for his lifestyle) and Tony Blair needed him to swing the left wing of his party to gain power.  That’s badly put perhaps and if he’s around I think Lyndon can explain it better.

Prescott had as his goal, his life’s desire, his answer to problems, STICK IT TO THE MIDDLE CLASS AND THE WEALTHY.  Make em hurt.
He was a very rough and tumble bruiser who really shined when using strong arm methods against political rallies of opposing political viewpoint. He was the bruiser that broke things up. 
You would not want to meet him on a dark night alone.  Come to think about it, maybe not even in daylight.  He’s been known to deck people.

One of his goals (and his legislation if I can use that term) is in effect now. It was his idea that the south where he perceived ALL the rich and middle class lived should get a taste of lower income housing in their neighborhoods, and so councils have been given a schedule that has to be met and extra housing built.  That is simplistic put that way but I know of no other way to state the case.

To give American a taste of Prescott, here’s one of his quotes.  He is btw, known for mangled sentences.

The objectives remain the same and indeed that has been made clear by the Prime Minister in a speech yesterday that the objectives are clear and the one about the removal of the Taliban is not something we have as a clear objective to implement but it is possible a consequence that will flow from the Taliban clearly giving protection to Bin Laden and the UN resolution made it absolutely clear that anyone that finds them in that position declares themselves an enemy and that clearly is a matter for these objectives.

GYPSIES AND TRAVELERS (difference?) ARE A RACIAL GROUP

By Paul Bracchi
Last updated at 10:43 AM on 03rd January 2009
Daily Mail

This idyllic corner of England is where council chiefs want to put a new gipsy camp.

Historic: The Old Mill, at Stotfold in Bedfordshire which was restored after it was destroyed by a fire in 1992. A gipsy camp has been earmarked for land bordering the old buildings

‘Housing crisis’ in the gipsy community

Six towns and villages have been earmarked for the camps - Stotfold (four pitches), Pulloxhill (eight), Greenfield (one), Arlesey (four), Upper Caldecote (five).

It would be difficult to imagine a policy which has caused so much anxiety and anger for local people. Much of that anger, understandably, is directed at the council.

‘Racism’ aside, you have only to visit the authority’s own website to understand the reason.

The council says it is trying to dispel some of the myths about gipsies and travellers. Information is one thing, propaganda another.

Anyone, apart from travellers themselves, could be in little doubt into which category the council’s ‘research’ falls.

Do gipsies and travellers work or pay taxes, asks one rhetorical question? Of course they do - ‘VAT is also paid on everything they buy’.

Presumably, the camp at Crays Hill in Essex is the exception that proves the rule, then.

A recent report, commissioned by the local council in Essex, found that people on the site were claiming almost £250,000 a year in dole money.

In other words, they were being funded by the taxpayer by an average of about £7,650 per plot annually.

Nevertheless, many of the Crays Hill fraternity owned expensive cars and vans.

But back to those other ‘myths’. Living in a caravan is not just ‘a lifestyle choice’ for many gipsies, insists Mid-Bedfordshire council, ‘but part of their social and cultural heritage’.

No mention of the fact that many of the gipsies at Cottenham in Cambridgeshire also have palatial second homes back in Ireland.

Then there is this gem. ‘Media reports and images are often inaccurate and discriminatory. In particular there is no evidence of higher crimes rates among gipsies and travellers.’

No doubt Gary Alderson and his team were unaware of the police raid on a gipsy camp near Market Harborough, Leicestershire, last year during which £1 million cash was found buried underground, stashed in cupboards and stuffed inside cuddly toys. Almost £5,000 was also discovered in a dishwasher.

The fortune came from illegally altering the mileometers on highmileage cars - bought at auction for next to nothing - and selling stolen caravans.

In fact, evidence contradicting the claims by Mid-Bedfordshire District Council - the kind which cannot be dismissed as ‘inaccurate and discriminatory’ - is to be found much closer to home.

At a site, in fact, run by the council itself in the village of Potton.

‘Betrayed’

In 2002, a couple living 200 yards from the Potton camp took the authority to court after enduring a decade of lawless and anti-social behaviour at the hands of travellers who raced cars, dumped and burned vehicles, set rubbish alight and threatened residents.

The judge ruled that the council had not done enough to tackle the ‘nuisance’ which had blighted the lives of the couple. They were later awarded up to £30,000.

Little, it seems, has changed. In November, detectives arrested two men at Potton following an armed robbery at a supermarket.

Meanwhile, life-saving equipment stolen from local fire stations was discovered near the camp. The police helicopter now flies over the site day and night.

Is it any surprise that the people of Mid-Bedfordshire felt betrayed by the council long before those letters accusing them of racism started landing on their doormats?

One comment was not sent back to the council on one of its questionnaires, but is worth repeating nonetheless.

‘Many of these so-called travellers seem to think it is perfectly OK for them to cause mayhem in area, to go burgling, thieving, breaking into vehicles, causing all kinds of trouble including defecating in the doorways of firms and so on, and getting away with it.’

Guess who was speaking? It was Jack Straw, the former Home Secretary, in 1999 - shortly before the amendment to the race laws.

His comments were aimed at travellers like those at Potton, not Romanies.

So it seems its all right for a Home Secretary to make such observations, but not those people whose lives will be most seriously affected by the new traveller sites.

‘It is insulting to be branded a racist,’ said Brian Collier, 66, who is also chairman of Stotfold Council.

‘I trained as a teacher in London and the first school I worked in was in Chiswick where most of the children were non-white.

‘I have worked in schools in which there have been members of ethnic communities almost all my career.

‘I have served on the town council for 20 years and I have been in the Liberal Party since I was 23.

‘I come from a Lancastrian Methodist background and I am not a racist in any way. I have also lived in Stotfold for 28 years and I can tell you it is not a place that would attract any support for the BNP.

‘Our town council simply expressed the concerns of the people it represents. They have a genuine concern about crime.

‘They see what has happened at the Potton site and are fearful the same thing could happen here. Local people, the police, the courts, and Mid-Bedfordshire District Council are all well aware of the long history of serious criminality at this site.

‘The proposed site in Stotfold backs onto a planned nature reserve and is not far from the local Scout and Guide hut.

‘At the moment the proposal is for four pitches in Stotfold. It would mean around eight caravans - but the entire site actually comprises 44 acres so there is concern that as time goes by it will get bigger.’

Back at Huckleberry Cottage, the same sentiments are echoed by Frances and Gordon Huckle.

‘I love the town and want it to retain its charm,’ explains Mr Huckle. ‘My ancestors lived in this house in the 1880s and it is a very pleasant place to live.

‘Many families move here from London to enjoy a bit of peace and quiet, and we don’t want that to be ruined.’

In Britain 2009, it seems, and in Bedfordshire in particular, voicing such sentiments, quite simply, makes you a racist.

MORE GYPSIES

Due to the length of the article, I have done a lot of editing. For the entire story in proper form, see the link.

Posted by peiper     on 01/03/2009 at 02:50 PM   
Filed Under: • Oppression • Outrageous • UK •  
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Honourable way Britain dealt with Irish terrorism.  Israel needs to do the same? This guy thinks so

British lesson about terrorism
By Peter Oborne
Daily Mail

Defenders of the Israeli government have spent the past week claiming that Britain would behave just as ruthlessly if it came under attack from, say, a neighbouring territory in the same way that Israel has been targeted by militants in Gaza.

This analogy is utterly false. As we all know, Britain was attacked over a period of 30 years by the IRA, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of innocent people and the near annihilation of the Cabinet.

But ministers never ordered the bombing of the Falls Road in Belfast, the town of Dundalk or any of the other Republican strongholds. The one exception, when indiscriminate deaths resulted during the events of Bloody Sunday in 1969, has been the subject of a public inquiry. On the contrary, the British reaction to terrorist attacks on our own soil has focused on sensible policing and the opening up of lines of communication with the enemy. The eventual outcome was a peaceful end to a terrible conflict.

Israel has a great deal to learn from the honourable way Britain dealt with Irish terrorism.

OBORNE

Well this was short sweet and to the point. I also think he’s nuts.  Brits finally talked to who? Or is that whom?
Murderous thugs who wantonly killed and maimed with bombs thrown into public places?  Killing ppl who did no more then question tactics of murder?
I’m a bit thick on this subject.  Hamas has a goal. It’s Jew killing, period.  Only my opinion but I really believe that if Israel caved in on everything Hamas says it wants, that still would not be enough. 

Would like to hear from Brits on the subject.  Lyndon? Chris? Anyone else?

Posted by peiper     on 01/03/2009 at 01:57 PM   
Filed Under: • Israel • Middle-East • Miscellaneous • Terrorists •  
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The reason you can not tell me anything new is because I already know all there is to know.

Ran into one of those types right here in our own house just today.  And not one but TWO! Two, in the same place on the same day. I guess they come in pairs now.

This is another (not unexpected) TROLL RANT and once again although the Trolls are different then the ones I ranted about a couple of months ago,
they are from the same health care agency.  This has less to do with national health then just plain MoonBat STUPID!
And oh golly gee whiz ... is this pair dumb!

WHAT’S ANOTHER TROLL OR TWO AMONG FRIENDS?
-or-

I KNOW IT ALL ALREADY.  THERE’S NOTHING MORE FOR ME TO LEARN.

January 3rd 2009

About a month or so ago I did a post about people known professionally as Care Givers. I wasn’t writing about the profession itself but about two in particular who I referred to as, “Trolls.”

In our particular case, these ppl come from an agency that supplies trained (not necessarily all well schooled) folks who attend to the disabled.
They also help a family like ours, where someone is old and bedridden.  My wife can’t do it all on her own, and her mother requires diaper changes up to four times a day.  These people also will bathe the patient and generally see to comfort where they are able.  Their reason for being is to help folks in my wife’s situation, and make it a little easier for her to cope with the physical side of things. 

Well, that’s the theory anyway and mostly it works.  Mostly.
As all things in life without getting overly philosophical about it, there are exceptions.
Those exceptions are known as ‘Trolls’ to me although you might have other applications that are more descriptive and to the point and maybe less personal.

Steady readers may also recall I ended that rant with the words Stay Tuned.  And why not as there’s always more.  How can there not be when we’re dealing with people and especially those of extreme ignorance.  While I do like the sound of the word troll, Stupid Idiots and Morons are closer to the facts.
How else may I describe people who see just one way, and refuse point blank to even consider there might be another way, or that someone else might have a better way of doing the same thing?

I have some explaining to do.  Some of this is gross and some may want to quit reading at this point.  It’s my self appointed job to keep on going, so I have to read it.

My wife’s 93 year old mother is bed bound and incontinent.  Her diet is not a big one and her appetite even less.  A lot of words to say she really doesn’t eat that much.  Most of what she does consume is soft or liquid.  But oh boy, do her bowels move.  And often as not, it might be liquid.  So let your imagination run away with this and you will have it nailed.

She is enclosed in not one but two diapers. There is also a pad under her, and I think they might be called crib sheets in the US. This pad however is used on top of the sheet, is disposable and can absorb a lot of water thereby protecting sheets and mattress.  In our case, one pad can normally be used up to four days, due to double wrapping.  That is, the wearing of two diapers. 

There is a certain skill in removing one diaper that’s soiled and leaving the second in place and retaining the crib sheet. (pad) They are very costly. 

I have said there is a skill to removing the diaper and keeping the pad clean.  And there is because my wife does it in the morning.  All on her own with no help and I really don’t understand how she does it.  I don’t understand how women cope with a lot of things that most men (I do include myself) would choose to ignore and would not cope with as well.  If at all.  You couldn’t pay me enough to change anyone’s diaper.  But wait, this isn’t me or my abilities or lack of them.  It’s about dumb Trolls who work as “care givers.” Back to the subject matter.

The first diaper change is done by the wife around 8:30 to 9 in the morning.
That means if there is anything in that diaper it’s been going on through the night and she, my wife, has quite a lot to clean up in the morning sometimes.  Sometimes there isn’t anything there to clean up.  But not too often.

Her mother offers no help and becomes quite rigid or else simply dead weight. She has a difficult time hearing and when she does hear you, it is often doubtful that she understands what it is you are asking of her.  So that morning change is pretty hard to do and it gets done because it has to. 

THE TROLL FOLLIES.

This all brings me to today’s episode of the Troll Follies.  The care crew of two were due at 10:30, and were on time.  That isn’t always easy given emergencies and traffic and the fact that the agency will often send one CG to a far distant part of town and then bring her all the way back to this end.  They give them 5 minutes between calls which is silly to start with as it can often take a half hour to get between one call and another.
And this is funny.  They are not considered late until a full half hour passes beyond when they’re due.

So, our two TROLLS arrived on time and proceeded to do their job.  Oh hang on a minute. I can’t resist describing one of them. Not that it’s her fault poor lady. And it’s way off topic here I know.  One of them is very hard to look at when your speaking to her, (mostly you’re listening anyway as she doesn’t shut up long enough to hear what you’re saying) because you don’t know where to look when listening to her.
You see, she ‘s permanently cross-eyed.  No wait.  One eye is crossed all by itself and she appears to be looking …. ? At herself ?  Don’t know. It’s kind of distracting not knowing where to look when listening to her so I usually follow the sound best as I can.  May as well mention the other TROLL.  I’m convinced the thing sitting on her head is a wig and not her own hair.  It does not matter really except that it usually looks askew like a hat that isn’t worn straight.  She’s an older woman of 50 but hard for me to tell.  Wife says no, she’s younger. ? She has a pudgy face and nose but it’s the hair that stands out.  It’s skewed darn it. My eyes are fixed on this tilted wig (I am sure it is) and my fear grows that if I stare too long I too will become cross-eyed.

And she’s the one who already knows all things.  All mysteries are revealed to her and she no longer has anything new to learn. In her tiny world, there isn’t anything new since the Titanic. But I digress. 

After a few minutes the one with the one crossed eye comes out of the room the MIL resides in and veers in my direction saying the pad needed changing.  But it didn’t need it two hours before so the question became, how was my wife able to do it all alone without getting crap on it, and two trained Care Givers could not?  Could my wife be doing something a bit different?

Once the CGs had finished and were about to leave I brought up the subject of pad changes and asked if it couldn’t be done in a way so as to save it from becoming useless.  I started to say that my wife .......  and at that point the Troll of the crossed eye who will now be known as Troll #1, starts to shriek.  But we can’t reuse a dirty bed pad, it’s also against regulations and we can’t leave a dirty pad on the bed. We can’t leave a dirty pad … yadda,yadda.
Now readers, please keep reading that last line oh maybe 10 times because that’s exactly what Troll #1 is doing.  It’s like she was chanting and as I tried to tell her I wasn’t asking that, she kept right on in a fairly high pitched voice saying they couldn’t blah, blah.  She hadn’t heard anything I said.  So there I am in the hall with these two and I’m saying, can I say something?  Would you please listen? You aren’t paying any attention to what I’m trying to say.  But she kept on and on and finally I managed to say, I didn’t ask that they reuse a dirty pad at all.  I am asking if it can’t be done another way.  That’s when Troll #2 who’d been listening asked, “Are you saying we’re doing our job wrong?” And you could see in that bug eyed pudgy face that she’d just love a confrontation. To which I replied no.  “I am trying to say that there can be two ways of doing the same thing.” “ But your friend here won’t let me get a word in. My wife says she’s found a better way.” To which Troll 2 said, “Then you’re saying we don’t know our job.”

Since my wife can’t handle this task four times a day, we can’t tell anyone to screw themselves and buzz off.

Back comes Troll #1 with the mantra, “ but we can’t leave a dirty pad” …blah, blah.
And she starts all over again.  I wanted to tell her to shut the BLANK up.  The ‘F’ word did come to mind but I didn’t use it. 

So one troll wasn’t listening to the same conversation, and the other troll already knew all there was to know and needed no further knowledge on the subject. 

The solution found after this exchange of “ideas” was to simply buy a cheaper bed pad as suggested by Troll #2.

That was her solution, as opposed to leaning something different.

Stay Tuned

Posted by peiper     on 01/03/2009 at 10:34 AM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous • Stoopid-People •  
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   Friday - January 02, 2009

Not Everything Is In Recession

[late breaking update] The French press reported that the Interior Ministry released a final “verified” count of 1,147 vehicles burned in France over New Year’s Eve. The number is up 30.64% from last year’s total, 878.

[early version of story] REUTERS - At least 445 cars were torched over the night of New Year’s Eve in France, a 20 percent rise on last year, but there were relatively few clashes with police, the Interior Ministry and police said on Thursday.

Car burnings are regular occurrences in France but the registering the New Year’s Eve total has become something of a tradition since they achieved symbolic status in the violent rioting that shook many of the country’s poor suburbs in 2005.

With riots in Athens heightening worries that the economic crisis might spark a resurgence of the violence seen in the run-down “banlieues” then, 35,000 police were mobilised on New Year’s Eve, some 7,000 more than last year.

Officials were also on guard against possible attacks after five sticks of dynamite were left in a Paris department store just before Christmas by a so-far unidentified group demanding a withdrawal of French troops from Afghanistan.

An Interior Ministry official said that as of 6:00 a.m. (0500 GMT), 445 car burnings had been registered, against 372 at the same time a year before and police had made 288 arrests, compared with 259 on Dec. 31, 2007.

“There were few ‘contacts’ with police, gendarmes and fire services but an increase in the number of burnings for which we don’t have an explanation at the moment,” the official said.

There were around 50 burnings in the eastern city of Strasbourg, where police made 17 arrests, including four people caught while setting fire to cars.

In the southern city of Toulouse, 12 cars were burned in areas at the edge of the city limits, while in Nantes, around 10 cars were torched although police in the western city said New Year’s Eve had been “pretty calm”.

I have no idea if this means that there are more “disaffected youths” in the country, or that the lower price of gas has made this hobby easier for more folks to enjoy. But if I was a fwench car insurance company, I’d write all my policies in Germany.


Time seems to think car burning there is now a “new tradition” practiced as “a regular form of expression for disenfranchised suburban youths” along with a bit of insurance scamming. And besides, this isn’t such a big deal; over 40,000 cars per year get the match up. Merde!

Posted by Drew458     on 01/02/2009 at 04:35 PM   
Filed Under: • Crime • EUro-peons •  
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