Is It Possible?

I'm not a one for physics, but could someone please tell me if it's possible to use someone - say Hazel Blears - as a weapon to attack someone else - say Jacqui Smith - and that they would both end up dead?

I suspect that if I was to pick Blears (also known as "Bleats", and, my personal favourite, "Ginger Haze") up by her legs and swing her around my head (as one would in the Olympic Hammer event) and walk towards Smith to get their heads to connect at great speed, then I should achieve my aim. If anyone has any improvements to this plan that don't involve conventional weaponry or piano wire, use the comments section below. If anyone has any objections, please address them to \dev\null\ or just fuck off.

My ire, you see, has been raised by both these demented women in the space of just 24 hours. Smith for the reasons outlined in the post below (oh, and then claiming that people come up to her "all the time" asking her why they can't have an ID Card now - you want to watch out for those people Jacqui, they're obviously mental). Blears for the comments I read regarding bloggers that I shall outline here.

In a closed meeting, Blears gave a speech - ironically in a meeting about political disengagement - which said that corrosive cynicism, fueled by politically nihilistic blogs and a retreat from dispassionate reporting, is endangering British political discourse and fueling growing political disengagement in Britain.

And that "in recent years commentary has taken over from investigation or news reporting, to the point where commentators are viewed by some as every bit as important as elected politicians, with views as valid as cabinet ministers."

Yes, you did read that correctly. Blears is suggesting that the comments of the general populace of this country shouldn't be viewed as being as important as the delusional wittering of a cabinet minister. That would be the population who votes for the politicians who then go on to become said cabinet ministers, by the way, in case you had forgotten. Said by a woman who has never had a proper job her entire life.

It gets better. Or worse, depending on your cynicism levels.

"Unless and until political blogging adds value to our political culture, by allowing new and disparate voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and despair."

So it's the fault of bloggers that a large percentage of people in this country think politicians are greedy, lying, grasping cunts with no idea - or concern - how their decisions affect real people?

Oh really? I was under the impression that politicians being paid a fucking fortune to do fuck all besides rubber stamp "initiatives" from the EU while simultaneously stuffing their own pockets with "expenses" (despite working in a building with a subsidised bar - where you can still smoke - and restaurant) and looking forward to the best pension scheme in the fucking country, might have caused some of the cynicism love, but that's just me, I guess.

And just how, exactly, do you propose getting "more disparate voices" involved in political blogging, you short chipmunk-faced bint? Political bloggers aren't elected, the popular ones are popular because they report stuff people are interested in. They aren't necessarily sponsored or rich, they're just people who want to complain or praise politicians. The fact more people complain - and more people are interested in the ones who complain - surely suggests there's something going wrong at your end, rather than at ours.

It's not as if there's any way of stopping people setting up a blog and ranting. Oh wait, that's your fucking proposal, isn't it? Funnily enough, something the EU proposed earlier this year, a licence for bloggers.

So to get more "people" (and by that I'm taking that you mean "more people who agree with you") involved in political blogging, you're proposing to introduce lengthy bureaucratic paperwork requiring full disclosure of personal details, and then a fee. A fee which would therefore reduce the number of people blogging? Or a fee you would waive if the person applying agreed with your policies?

But how would you stop people from just blogging anyway? Oh, I see you're proposing to take control of Nominet. So anyone with a .uk domain name could be instantly taken offline (and presumably shot) by the government? Sounds remarkably like state censorship, that, or something North Korea would do.

You are a cunt, Blears, a cunt of the highest proportion. I shall batter Smith to death using you as a mace and I shall be happy, covered in the blood and bone of the pair of you, grinning like a fucking loon. Then I will go after the one eyed son of a manse, and force him to eat the shit that comes out of the corpses of both Smith and Blears. When he is sated - or I've decided he is - I'll cleave his fucking head with a hatchet.

I am the Revolution, keep the fucking country, I'm leaving.

And So It Ends

As probably expected after three days of wrangling, Kevin Keegan has resigned his position of manager of Newcastle United. He claims that he could no longer continue in the post as he felt the position of manager should allow him to buy the players he wanted, rather than have players bought buy those higher up the management chain and then have him try to fit them in.

The Board of NUFC claims that if Keegan wasn't happy, he should have raised his concerns to the club rather than just resigning. What he was doing for three days before finally resigning then, I don't know. And let's face it, Keegan has prior form on walking away from a job that wasn't going his way - NUFC in the 90s, England and then Manchester City.

So what next? Well apart from the utter delight no doubt emanating from the unwashed sector of the North East, and the anger of the rent-a-dick mob (and I'm including former players in that group, not just the nylon covered unemployed outside St James's Park) normally on Sky Sports News when any announcement like this regarding NUFC is made, there's not a great deal that can be done, is there?

Supporters stop going to matches

Well, the terraces would be empty and any new manager (potentially even the hated Wise, seemingly the person responsible for Keegan's resignation) would have a ready made excuse for dismal performances. Also, as the majority of people who actually attend games are season ticket holders, the club has already had the money, so not turning up to watch is actually just annoying yourself at your own expense.

Stop buying merchandise

Bit late in the season for that as I'm sure the majority of people who were likely to buy a Toon shirt etc will have already snapped up the slightly redesigned shirts as soon as they came out. Okay, so the combination of not going to the matches and not buying merchandise like programs and 'refreshments' inside the ground might have some financial effect, the majority of NUFC income doesn't come from these sources.

Go to games and protest

Again, this gives any new manager a ready made excuse for poor results - "the players were distracted" - and does more harm than good. Similarly the option of turning up to the game and watching in utter silence makes very little difference (remember how successful Arsenal were despite playing in the Highbury Library) and could also be used as an excuse by whichever puppet is installed in the manager's job.

Boycott of Sports Direct

While this would be more targetted on Mike Ashley than on NUFC as a whole, I'm not sure the potential purchasing power of NUFC's fan base would actually make much difference to Sports Direct's sales. Ashley is - aside from his purchase of NUFC without knowing the full extent of the debts - a fairly shrewd businessman, so any boycott of one of his businesses would no doubt profit another one somewhere down the line.

Petition the LMA to advise no-one takes the job

Quite an entertaining suggestion this, working on the slightly old-fashioned ideas that a petition actually does anything, and that the League Manager's Association have any power whatsoever. Richard Bevan, chief executive of the League Managers' Association, has already told BBC Radio 4 the Magpies had to resolve this issue.

"You can't have an orchestra with three conductors. You won't be very successful and people will leave," he said.

While it would actually be good if the LMA said, as many people already believe, that NUFC is essentially unmanageable with the current 'structure' in place, many other clubs with far richer owners (Chelsea, Man City) are likely to be more successful with people other than the manager buying the players.

So will I be doing? I'm going to do what I honestly can recommend everyone else does: Shut up about NUFC, not talk about them or offer my opinions any further. There's been too much written about the machinations of the NUFC board and management over the past decade, and precious little good to come out of it on the field of play. When it comes down to it, NUFC are now beyond comment except perhaps as a warning to others.

I shall leave you with a quote from the independent fans website NUFC.com from Tuesday:

"SkySports played their joker on Tuesday afternoon by interviewing Freddy Shepherd live on the phone - a timely reminder that we've been through this pantomime before. The faces (and accents) of the cast may change, but the script remains farcical, scarcely believable and unique to this particular theatre of nightmares."

And those will be my last words on NUFC. Ever.

Hating People

Not specific individuals, per se - although sometimes that does actually take place - but hating people inter alia. I believe it's called misanthropy, from the Greek misein meaning 'to hate' and anthropos meaning 'mankind'. It's not something I suffer from.

No, I positively enjoy it.

I am beginning to hate every single aspect of this country (the UK). I previously used to just hate most of it, but now, I'm hard pushed to think of a single thing I actually like about the place. There are some people I actually like a great deal who live here. Not very many of them, obviously (I could probably hold a meeting of all of them in a phone box if I stacked them properly) but there are a few.

Other than that, nothing. Not one single thing inspires me or gives me a feeling of fondness for this country.

The Olympics should have given me something - even jingoism for beating Australia in the medals table - but no. I was pretty much unmoved by all of it, though having the London 2012 section have as its core a bus that resembled all too eerily the one blown apart on 7/7 did raise some bile. How the newspapers and the Government can call professional athletes who have won a medal 'heroes' is beyond me, surely they're just doing their job? How Gordon Brown can welcome *them* home, but not watch a single body of a fallen soldier return to the UK leaves a bitter taste in the mouth.

The football season? Well we're three games into the Premier League season, NUFC have won one, drawn one and lost one, and I think that's probably the best our record will look all season. There's not a great deal about sport that interests me at the minute. I can't even remember, through a lack of caring, who won Euro 2008. Stupidly well paid people who can't actually do anything other than kick/throw/hit a ball in a better than average fashion doesn't automatically garner my support purely because of the team shirt they're wearing.

Fashion is recycling the eighties, so even walking through city centres is depressing. I lived through the 80s, it was hideous to look at then, and it's even more hideous to look at now: Day-glo orange Reebok trainers will never be a look you can carry off, even ironically. Music too has 'rediscovered' the 80s with the shrill casio tones and repetitive sounds of blandness. Where is the new punk? Where's the feeling of barely repressed anarchy?

The other thing the 80s brought us was rampant Thatcherism - the Tories having surged into power on the back of a failed Labour government that couldn't keep inflation or unemployment under control. Tell me if any of this sounds familiar. Expect us to be involved in a war soon, in a place we'd previously never heard of, for reasons obscure. Oh wait.

I'm reliving the past like a waking nightmare. Does no-one else remember this shit happening before? Was no-one taking notes?