...and don't let the door hit you on the way out!

Hate. The nastiest of all human behaviours and yet, under certain unique circumstances, it is understandable, even forgivable. Who can find fault with someone disgusted with grapefruit juice? And who got upset when the Brussel Sprout Appreciation Society was raided and its founders publically executed? No, hatred can at times be justified.

Take this year 2014, for example. Now, I’m not big year hater. I was a huge fan of 1985, and who could ever be upset with that cuddly ol’ 1996? However, 2014 has been an insufferable cad of a year! It allowed ISIS to run amok, Boko Haram to kidnap those schoolgirls, and Israel to nearly crush Palestine under its military’s might.

It also gave Vladimir Putin a free hand in picking up some prime real estate on the Black Sea for nearly nothing. It stood idly by as Ebola killed over seven thousand and, as for airline disasters? Well, let’s just say it was a good year to make sure your boarding pass didn’t say Malaysia Airlines.  

Yes 2014, stood by and did nothing when a lone gunman held the patrons of a Sydney coffee shop hostage, eventully killing two innocent people. In the states, there were over fifty shootings involving three or more fatalities, communities were rocked by violence in connection with police officer shootings of members of the public, and one-hundred and fourteen police officers died in the line of duty (over half as a result of gunfire, assault, or vehicular assault.)

And obviously 2014 was seriously pissed-off with those who made us laugh: Robin Williams, Rik Mayall, Joan Rivers, southern comic and singer Tim Wilson, and Harold Ramis all passed on. Others who entertained us, but apparently also had a falling out with 2014 at some point were: James Garner, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and Lauren Bacall.

Not sure where to mention this, but I also lost my Batman Pez dispenser back in June.

Oh, you was a year that begged to be hated. 

Good riddance 2014, and take 1977 with you!

Reading, Writing, and Weapons Appreciation

If South Carolina state Representative Alan Clemmons has his way, students attending state schools would be taught an awareness course focused upon citizen rights to keep and bear arms. The Republican lawmaker has introduced a bill before the state assembly that would require the course, written by the National Rifle Association, which consists of one period of instruction every day for three weeks and a Second Amendment Awareness Day, to take place on December 15.

Students would also be offered the chance to participate in a poster and essay contest called The Right to Bear Arms: One American Right Protecting All Others. December 15th is the day after the anniversary of the Sandy Hook, New Jersey school massacre where twenty-six people, mostly children, were killed by a lone gunman armed with an assualt-style weapon and a semi-automatic pistol.

No one with common sense could be reached for comment.





Read more about it:
http://www.thestate.com/2014/12/20/3885678_the-buzz-a-sandy-hook-school-day.html?rh=1

Some of My Best Friends Are Idiot Politicians

Britain's election of 2015 is just over five months away and bits are already falling off the much publicised UKIP bandwagon. Nigel Farage recently went on radio to defend the indefensible,saying that "chinky" is commonly used and therefore, his candidates should not be judged for doing so. Really? Perhaps he wasn't even aware how close this sounds to the old "Everybody does it " defense made popular in American politics, usually when some politico is caught in a bribery or sex scandal. (Milbank, 2009)

In the current political landscape, we see the missteps of the Tories and the malaise that has gripped Labour, in addition to the fact that Britain's famous third party under Nick Clegg has found itself a rudderless non-entity hopelessly bobbing toward next year's election. Into this morass strides UKIP, whose raison d’être is merely that it is none of the major parties.  Its platform is built around an anti-Europe, anti-foreigner platform which no one seems to have the temerity to call what it really is, xenophobia, which gives it something in common with other progressive, all inclusive groups like BNP and EDL. These points would normally not be enough to convince an educated populace to support en masse. Unless, of course, the year is 1933 and we are discussing the Weimar Republic.
 
The newspapers have made much of the purple party's chances, but shouldn't anyone who has seen more than one election have predicted the party's current misfortunes?A flawed machine like this can only go so many miles before the cracks begin to show.

Right now, the other parties' campaigns don't seem to know what to do but, from this observer's point of view, it seems painfully obvious: the Tories need to focus on thier success in the recovering economy, Labour needs to jettison Wallace Miliband and find a more charismatic leader with a clear vision for his party, the Liberal Democrats need to re-invent themselves completely and all three need to paint UKIP as a one-issue party of xenophobes, political turncoats, and opportunists who have no real vision for Britain's future.

Or they could just do nothing and let UKIP, under the leadership of a re-booted Enoch Powell to continue in its race toward self-destruction.


Source:

Milbank, D., (2009) Washington Sketch, Jefferson's Everybody Does It  Defense, Available online from: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/29/AR2009072903169.html
Accessed 22-12-2014

For further reading:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/12/19/nigel-farage-defends-use-of-words-chinky-and-poofter_n_6353102.html

Greetings From The Siege

The idea of taking a selfie at a crime scene, or in this case a seige location, is something the most shocking cringe humour television show might resort to for a cheap laugh. That it could really happen is disturbing; proving once again that, though society is getting more technologically advanced,  provincial behaviour and bad taste are still with us. 


Read more:

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/martin-place-siege-people-share-selfies-and-jokes-on-twitter-20141215-127mn4.html