Good on ya Bolivia

I was watching the latest round of Climate Change meetings from Cancun (funny how they always find somewhere nice to have these meetings).

The usual bunch of politicians were there, living it up, enjoying the hospitality and proposing an array of new, probably unworkable and badly thought through set of ‘solutions’ to the problem of global warming, most importantly showing some concern to those less well off countries who are, well to  put it bluntly, the victims rather than the perpetrators.

One single ray of hope came from the Bolivian delegation, the single country bold enough to actually say “No, you are not going far enough”. So big ups to Evo Morales for his vision – he is my man of the week!!

The return of Terry Jones

Good old Pastor Terry Jones (I've blogged about him before), he's planning a trip to the UK to hang out with those wonderful people the English Defence League - their own website does not  actually have much.

What a fine bunch of people they are - a religious bigot and a bunch of racist football hooligans. I do hope they have fun together. Neither group should be allowed to steal fresh air meant for sane, tolerant human beings!

Funeral music

I often hear a song and think that it would be a good one for my funeral; one that I have decided is on the list of contenders is 'We never change' by Coldplay

I wanna live life and never be cruel.
I wanna live life and be good to you.

And I wanna fly and never come down.
And live my life and have friends around.

We never change, do we? no, no
We never learn, do we?

So I wanna live in a wooden house.

I wanna live life and always be true.
I wanna live life and be good to you.

And I wanna fly and never come down.
And live my life and have friends around.

We never change, do we? No, no
We never learn, do we?

So I wanna live in a wooden house,
where making more friends would be easy.

Oh, and I don´t have a soul to save.
Yes, and I sin every single day.

We never change, do we?
We never learn, do we?

So I wanna live in a wooden house,
Where making more friends would be easy.
I wanna live where the sun comes out ...

To Russia with love…..

I don’t know if the voting for the World Cup would make a good plot line for a James Bond film – not enough world domination, no sexy Bond girls (Mrs. Beckham? Thanks, but no thanks).

I have never been a big fan of anything English; being born and raised in Scotland does that to you. Living in Thatcher’s testing ground for wondrous things like the Poll Tax makes you slightly anti England. That and the fact that when Scottish athletes (read David Wilkie, Allan Wells) won Olympic medals they suddenly became British but Daley Thompson et. al. were always English. So it might come as a surprise that I am writing something that supports England, and whilst I am at it, Australia (another sporting bunch of Xenophobes)

It came to pass that FIFA has announced the winners of the bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, with biggest surprises being that England received just two votes in the first round of the voting for the 2018 tournament and were rapidly eliminated; Australia actually fared worse gaining just one vote for the 2022 World Cup.

Much has been publicised re. the alleged corruption in the voting process, and living in New Zealand I have not seen the Panorama documentary on the alleged tainting of the process. It goes without saying though that Wikileaks have produced some rather unsurprising allegations about President Putin and his supposed links to organised crime. It is very easy to put two and two together and make four.

Would I have gone to England to see the World Cup – no; will I be going to Russia – hell no!! And as for Qatar the answer is again NO! It must be the smallest population to ever receive one of the world’s biggest sporting events. The prospect of air conditioned, indoor games must have impressed FIFA delegates more than any ‘gifts’ they may have received from one of the most wealthy nations – which also happens to be the biggest producer of greenhouse gases per head of population. Good to see environmental issues are a priority  for FIFA too!

Another evil bitch

The world, it seems to me anyway, is becoming a place where nasty, callous women are taking charge – pretty heavy vitriol from me!! I have mused about Thatcher (dead soon – the sooner the better), Palin (can’t come soon enough) and others, only for me to read about Emma Harrison – who I hear you say?

Well, in the UK unemployment is rising, with the biggest growth being in the long term unemployed. Like New Zealand these are the group that the right leaning governments want to get into work and off benefits. Unlike NZ the UK have decided to allow the private sector to do this important role via a company owned by Emma.

Enter Mrs Harrison who proudly states

"The coalition government's cuts are, in fact, fantastic!... Cutting benefits will put a stop to people making a profession out of being unemployed."

Whoopee, rather than addressing the reasons why they are unemployed, force them on to a programme in the private sector. Rather ironically A4e was initially contracted by the Labour government.

Academics have identified the root causes of poverty, yet governments continue to do their own thing, reacting to the issues rather than having the courage to adequately tax to fund proper poverty reduction and improving learning out comes for students. Indeed the performance of A4e leaves something to be desired, but business must be OK given the plushness of their new HQ.

 

Oh, and don’t say it’ll never happen here – they are already operating in Australia!