Elections - A bed voters will have to lay in afterwards

It is finally election time in the UK. The date has been set for May 6 and currently there is much talk about the possibility of a ‘hung’ parliament.

This is a parliament where no party has a proper working majority - so basically they are usually pointless, weak, ineffectual and short lived.

There is talk amongst the MSM pundits that some voters may actually be hoping for a ‘hung’ parliament. I wonder if it has been explained to them it does not involve nooses and the lamp posts of Westminster as some sort of public participant entertainment of the type previously associated with Tyburn.

Why? Well it’s since the first televised ‘presidential’ style debate (that were not really debates as such) between the leaders of the parties, Nick Clegg, the leader of the unofficial “None of the above” party. The Liberals, who should not under any circumstances be confused with ‘Laissez faire' Liberals, is benefiting from doing quite well in them and from managing to distance himself from much of the recent corruption and the government’s incompetence.

It is worth noting that there is nothing to stop any, or all, of the parties changing their leaders immediately after the election, as the party leaders are chosen by the parties and are not presidential candidates at all and not voted for by the people.

UK voters, ignorant as many are, should bear in mind they are actually voting for their local MP, who again can switch parties if they wish, just as soon as they are elected if they so desire.

They are not voting for next British Prime Minister.

It will now be in Nick Clegg’s interests to be a little coy as to who he might be willing to do a deal with to help form a government in the event of a hung parliament.

Why? - Because many of his potential votes will be from disaffected Labour and Conservative voters who convince themselves in their disillusionment with their own parties that Liberals are practically the same thing. He will want to keep them all thinking he is the next best thing until after the election. Much like the Welsh and Scots Natonalists who in addition care very little about anyone outside their own areas.

The Liberals can’t be both - and someone will end up being disappointed, possibly both Labour and Conservative supporters who vote Liberal afterwards in the harsh light of day.

Liberals don’t do too badly in local elections where they can’t do harm on a national level with some of their more half-baked ideas.

That is the problem. If we think of it in evolutionary terms, some of the weirder ideas they have tucked away (think harmful genes) have never needed to stand the harsh light of day and never to date had the chance to do any real harm and harm the fitness of the organism that is the UK by becoming active.

I don’t mind what they may do to the Liberals themselves - Mostly keep them out of power since after the first world war so far.

I do care what they do to the UK, as I live in it.

I care in much the same way as I would if I were floating in a small boat taking on some water with some bright spark who thought it might be a good idea to poke holes in it with a screwdriver in order to let the water out…

Suspect attempted mass murderer’s self justification full of holes

I happened to catch the confused pathetic inept and juvenile attempt at self justification of the would be mass murderer Ahmed Abdulla Ali’s so-called ‘martyrdom’ video on TV yesterday.

I noted he was careful to try to address certain points. He was for instance anxious to point out that he had not been ‘brainwashed’ and was "educated to a high standard" and "old enough" to make his own decisions. Though age and education are no bars to ideological blindness and confused, illogical thinking.

Brainwashed? Certainly there is something peculiar, or out of the ordinary in the way strong belief can, in certain individuals, often combined with prejudice, hatred or racism, allow them to justify terrible crimes against others to themselves, that normal decent people would baulk at.

I thought it telling when he said that: ”"This the opportunity to punish and humiliate the kuffar (all non Moslems), to teach them a lesson they will never forget.” this would appear to indicate a deep religiously based hatred of all who do not share his particular beliefs, or surely he would not have used those particular terms. It is reasonable to conclude he felt that Kuffars needed to be taught a damned good lesson, simply for the crime of being Kuffars.

The thing that really struck me as undermining his whole house mental of cards was that he justified the evil he planned on the basis that the public had collectively voted for the government who were apparently oppressing his people’s lands.

His peoples lands? He lived and had made a home in the UK. He had benefited from this. He no doubt expected to enjoy and in fact did and still does benefit from the rights and protections that come with that. Among other things it allows him to plead not guilty in the face of what amounts to his own self made recorded confession.

He complained that the public hadn’t protested sufficiently against, presumably the removal of Saddam Hussein, or possibly the situation in Israel.

That they were willing to pressure the government over fox hunting, but not over his perceived persecution of Moslems. "You don't care about the Muslims that are being killed."

This sounds rather like a set piece of anti Western Democracy rhetoric circulated by hate mongers that he was not bright enough to see through. It is paranoia to suppose that bad things that happen to people who also happen to be Muslims take place because they are Muslims.

It does not follow at all that simply because there were protests and because a fox hunting ban was imposed the British public does not care that Muslims, or anyone else, are being killed. It is a Non-Sequitur and is easily shown to be the lie it is by the outcry over the killing of Muslims in the Balkans when British troops, together with other western troops including American troops, were sent in specifically to prevent this. He conveniently chooses to ignore this, or perhaps never picked it up in the course of his vaunted ‘education’.

Any deaths in Iraq are squarely at the door of the insurgents many coming in from outside the country who seem to be doing to prevent it ever getting on it’s feet. Western troops would have been long gone by now if it were not for this. It is the insurgents who are deliberately slaughtering presumably fellow Muslims wholesale.

If he felt that further demonstrations (because there were demonstrations) might have helped he could have organised a pressure group, peaceful protests, lobbying. He chose not to do this.

He also fails to follow his own distorted logic to it’s conclusion. It is probable he would have had the opportunity to vote. By his own logic he is as ‘responsible’ as any other member of the electorate for the wrongs he apparently perceives. By his own logic he is just as deserving of ‘punishment’.

More threats, allegedly from bin Laden.

A video has been released purportedly from bin Laden. Purportedly, because graphics and computers have come a long way.

For the moment lets go with the idea it really was him though. He is apparently comparing Danish cartoons of Mohamed to the crusades - one is tempted to intemperate language here...

From this one might be forgiven for assuming he is so disconnected from reality that he is incapable of distinguishing the difference between marks on paper and an actual physical conflict, where real people get really injured and killed.

It seems he even blames the Pope - given that only 3% of the population of Denmark is Roman Catholic this is a bit disingenuous, even for bin Laden. Either that, or he is simply displaying contemptuous ignorance; “All you Dhimmies look the same to me”. Given that he visited Europe to sample the’ high life’ as a teen though, probably the former.

Two percent of the Danish population is Moslem, almost as big as the Roman Catholic influence; maybe he ought to commit suicide to get revenge (fingers crossed).

By extension he blames all of Europe, clearly he has problems with rational categorisation.

He nebulously ‘threatens’ a “reckoning”. This of course allows him to claim credit for almost anything at all, as the likes of his organisation have to take what targets they can get.

The weakest targets that no decent human being would consider, even then they need to launch many plots for one to succeed. Still as the IRA once famously observed of the British Government: “You have to be ‘lucky’ all the time, we only need to be ‘lucky’ once”.

Going down this route means they have to be able to justify killing innocent people. They seem to do this by claiming they are not innocent on religious grounds. So that makes it all right then. They don’t seem to consider that they may equally well be bound for eternal damnation, viewed by other religious grounds.

The thing to remember is that you are more likely to be killed, or injured, every time you get behind the wheel of a car. Yes it does happen and if it is you personally, or someone you know or love involved it will have a massive, in the former case possibly terminal, impact.

This risk and many other risks of daily life do not stop the majority of us carrying on with our lives as per normal and does not significantly alter our behaviour. Hopefully nor should the likes of these threats.

Are we becoming increasingly ignorant of and divorced from what we eat?

A poll for ‘British Food Fortnight’ (whatever) billed as; ‘An annual mass movement to excite and educate young people about British food.’ apparently demonstrates a woeful lack of knowledge about regional foods amongst the said ‘young people’.

It seems many were under the impression cheddar cheese comes from the midlands for instance.

This is hardly surprising when a recent survey by the 'Linking Environment And Farming' (LEAF) indicated 22% of adults didn’t know that bacon and the meat in sausages originated on farms. Also 23% didn’t know the main ingredient of bread (wheat) was grown on farms. A staggering 47% hadn’t a clue the main ingredient of porridge (oats) came from farms.

Whether this is down to surveying particularly thick people, or the effects of long term urbanisation on the population, only ever seeing pre packaged and processed supermarket food, or just a narrow and poor education, is difficult to say. Certainly a lack of the most basic knowledge about the geography of the UK.

This is the basic stuff of living, we are not talking logarithms here.

Things like that used to be covered in primary school, mine was not unusual and we visited farms, but that was a while back now. Probably banned on the grounds of health and safety now.

What is really worrying, when you think about it, is that these people are armed (and dangerous) with the vote.

How can they vote sensibly on policies such as farming and the environment, when they have no idea what the actual likely impact and ramifications of those policies may be and lack the basic knowledge to work it out.

We could all end up with no bread, or milk - and more ‘turkey twizzlers’ than you could shake a stick at.

Are voters really pig ignorant?

Just saw a fluff piece on TV. A UK farming organisation (The Linking Environment And Farming organisation) has done a survey. It seems many British people have no idea where a lot of what they eat comes from. Many didn’t know that produce such as bacon, porridge, bread and beer comes from farms.

It seems some 22% of the adults questioned didn’t know that bacon and sausages come from pigs on farms and some 47% of people didn’t know porridge's main ingredient comes from farms.

What is horrifying is that these people can vote. The horrifying part is that they will decide how to cast their vote without basic information that should make a difference on how they vote in relation to issues that impact, on say, farming for instance.

How can someone, so lacking in basic facts about life, have any chance of making a reasonably informed decision? What other basic, but vital, information don't they know?

Making decisions based on partial information and inadequate knowledge would give a massive boost to the law of unintended consequences. Under the wrong circumstances it could actually be dangerous. How can people sleepwalk through life like this?