nourishing obscurity

It had to come: Copyright Fight Ensues Over Rebecca Black’s ‘Friday’ Well, I had happily kept this blog entirely free of stories about Rebecca Black and the song “Friday.” If, somehow, you’ve been living under a near total pop culture rock for the last few weeks, you can catch up on the basics of the [...]

8 Comments »
Filed under: Diversions

I’ve no objection to Tim Berners-Lee being there to discuss the future of the Internet but WTF was Gordon Brown doing there, the global apologist? TBL’s contribution to the web: After helping create the web in 1989 and guiding its technological development, the British scientist, who is director of the World Wide Web Foundation, is [...]

Comments Off
Filed under: Politics & economics, Technology & ideas

Some nice comments on that intolerant religious bigot, Richard Dawkins [re the Templeton]: Iain Carstairs The amusing thing is that Dawkins should be intolerant not only of religions, but the idea of their working with science, when the stated aim on his website is to promote tolerance. At the moment, it is unscientific to denounce [...]

11 Comments »
Filed under: Society & human issues

We we we so excited!

Comments Off
Filed under: Diversions

Hope your eardrums are in good working order and you’re up for a sustained assault:

3 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

1.  What’s the most stolen car in the UK?  In the U.S.? 2.  Who is bringing down the joke budget in the U.S.? 3.  Who’s about to take to the oceans in a sub? 4.  Which American yesterday received France’s highest honour? 5.  What’s Ruby the Heartbreaker’s real name? Answers:  BMW X5 [1995 Honda Civic], [...]

4 Comments »
Filed under: Diversions

The UK today Admittedly, this comes from the socialist press, yet it still makes some essential points about the Cameron Party: A whistleblower said staff at his jobcentre were given targets of three people a week to refer for sanctions, where benefits are removed for up to six months. He said it was part of [...]

9 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

3 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

From the 1976 book Rio: Reshaping the International Order: A Report to the Club of Rome [via IPJ]: “Many in the RIO group believe that this equitable social order could best be described as humanistic socialism…” – 63 “At the highest level, the level of world affairs, international institutions must form the prime movers of [...]

3 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

In the course of reading about the new agreement on relations between the EU and Russia [courtesy of the Albion Alliance presents]: EESC welcomes the Joint Statement on the Partnership for Modernisation (PfM) adopted at the EU-Russia summit in Rostov-on-Don (31 May – 1 June 2010), including an appeal to civil society to foster its [...]

Comments Off
Filed under: Politics & economics

4 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

Sigh.  I should have known the Telegraph’s misleading headline would mean precisely the opposite: Italian women seek compensation from Silvio Berlusconi Just knew it was utter rubbish.  When you click on the article, it tells the real story in the first paragraph: An Italian women’s rights group has asked the court overseeing Silvio Berlusconi’s sex [...]

3 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics, Society & human issues

The first part of this can hardly be argued with: It is time that it is recognised the political elite will never, ever, return those “freedoms” which, over the decades, they have usurped – or allowed to be usurped by their “agents”, aka “Charities” – and that there ultimately is only one option left if [...]

3 Comments »
Filed under: Politics & economics

Adolph’s reaction to the Rebecca Black song: Possibly the sanest reaction:

Comments Off
Filed under: Politics & economics

In just two paragraphs, Roger Bootle at The Telegraph raises so many issues: The present government is embarked upon a radical shake-up of the NHS but it is far from clear that this will deliver the depth of reform that is needed… Damned right it won’t. Quite apart from government’s legerdemain in their actual agenda, [...]

Comments Off
Filed under: Politics & economics