Maybe people are starting to get a little angry now. During what could be the most expensive police operation in British history protesters could provide a real sense-of-humour test for the authorities.
Commander Bob Broadhurst, who is responsible for the operation (with a bill estimated at up to £10 million) said, “These are innovative people and we must be innovative as well. It will be an exciting couple of days, to say the least” (Guardian).
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Contact your local elected officials - for free
by Alexander Curzon
20 Mar 2009 at 14:11
I just wish JOE THE PLUMBER would get CROSS!!
by kiki-dread
20 Mar 2009 at 14:11
I’m not falling for that one… However, communications being what they were in the days when news traveled by foot, many people did not receive the news for several years. Others, the more obstinate crowd, refused to accept the new calendar and continued to celebrate the new year on April 1. These backward folk were labeled as “fools” by the general populace. They were subject to some ridicule, and were often sent on “fools errands” or were made the butt of other practical jokes.
by kiki-dread
20 Mar 2009 at 14:58
Sometimes I get stuck for words? link
My complaint about The Government
I would like to draw a picture of what we conceive of under the word “roentgenographic”. To plunge right into it, The Government claims to be supportive of my plan to address the legitimate anger, fear, and alienation of people who have been mobilized by The Government because they saw no other options for change. Don’t trust it, though; The Government’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Before you know it, it’ll exert more and more control over other individuals. Not only that, but The Government’s adulators avouch that The Government can walk on water. I say to them, “Prove it”—not that they’ll be able to, of course, but because if you study The Government’s sniffish apothegms long enough, you’ll come to the inescapable conclusion that it plans to distract people from making a serious analysis of the situation. The result will be an amalgam of overweening immoralism and capricious sectarianism, if such a monster can be imagined. I have no problem with the manifestly obvious statement that The Government masterminded last year’s now-infamous attempt to violate the basic tenets of journalism and scholarship. I have no problem with the idea that my efforts to wage war on radicalism lead it to pray for my effacement as fervently as I pray for its. And I have no problem with the special privileges occasionally granted to drugged-out hoodwinkers. What I do have a problem with are its jaded words. To wrap up, I’ll just hit the key elements of this letter one last time. First, it would be downright intellectually challenged for The Government to caricature and stereotype people from other cultures. Second, it and others of its ilk are symbols of vengeful libertinism. And finally, I try to avoid blanket statements and broad generalizations when I propose that different people often see the same subject in different lights.
Why do you have a complaint about my company on your Web page?
by Jericoa
21 Mar 2009 at 12:51
Good gimmick but a shame April 1st falls on a wednesday, still the weather is warming up, politically and physically people will start to come out of their winter shelters and onto the street as the year wears on.
Collectively we are still in the ‘denial’ stage of grief (grief for having lost our way of life.
Psychiatrists will tell you that anger comes next and is usually triggered by the ‘loss’ actually impacting on your ‘real’ life in some way, thus shifting from the intellectual to the physical state.
When enough people have lost their jobs / savings / house etc who are of a social class where that was an event they never anticipated would ever happen to them..then and only then will you see real anger, there are isolated patches of it but it is not big enough yet to trouble anyone.
Once that anger breaks it needs to be caught quickly and channelled in a positive direction.
It is going to be along hot summer.
I made the decision today to voluntarily move to shorter working hours starting next month. I think we can afford it if I work 9 days in 10, many of my colleagues have had to accept such an arrangement (or even shorter arrangements) already and it will give me a bit more time.
Feeling a bit washed out at the moment, done nothing on the ‘viral’ e-mail as yet this weekend.
Simon
by kiki-dread
21 Mar 2009 at 23:47
Jericoa
loss of jobs / savings / house etc
will also mean a loss of freedom / options / state or peace of mind /
future employment opportunities / dreams and plans in life
a quick descent does not result in a quick recovery, it is the new position of where we are at
There may be a slow recovery in the future, but businesses are failing for entrepreneurs. The anger is a permanent part of your personality
by Jericoa
22 Mar 2009 at 03:26
This is not ‘on topic’ but I am going to copy it here just in case it does not get onto paul masons Blog. See #13 on his blog. He is the only one that engages with the people who comment. I is definately him, I recognise the writing style. interesting how there are quite a few attacks on his work in the postings.
I am going to vote for Paul on rob -rockets site.
#13
Paul I dont think your public service motives are in doubt, but what of your employer?
Here is a tricky little journalistic test of impartiality for the Newsnight team to have a go at.
How about a piece investigating the primetime news editorial policies of the BBC? A good interview for Jeremy to interview the head of BBC news perhaps? Oer maybe he will ‘decline’ to appear or ‘not be available’?
Here is a question for jeremy to ask (10 times if needs be).
”How come on a day that there are further revelations about Lord Myners competance and appropriatness for his office and allegations concerning the behaviour of lawyers acting against the NHS does the BBC news headlines run with the death of Jade Goody?”
Don’t get me wrong, any death of one so young with young children is a tragedy (ask anyone in Africa) but what exactly is being served in the public interest by making a positive editorial decision to run this as the top story, i.e. the most important bit of news the nation needs to know this day in the opinion of the BBC, public service broadcaster to the nation , paid for as a tax on the people of this nation.
Think about that for a moment or two.
Surely the public interest would better be served by concentrating on relentlesesly researching and exposing the backgrounds and activities of our political, finacial and legal ruling elite?
That really would serve the public interest and who knows what we may find that could be put a stop to.
Now that really is worth paying a TV license fee for.
Jericoa