Rants ‘n’ Raves
Rant: An Open Letter to the British Electorate
Dear fellow voters,
I’m sure you enjoyed (as I did) watching the worms at Whitehall squirm as they got their arses roundly kicked in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election yesterday, as they also did in the recent local elections.
I’m certainly no fan of either the government or the Labour party in general, but before we start down the road of handing the next election to the Tories, let’s take a quick stroll down amnesia lane…to the last Tory-held government of 1990 to 1997…
(insert squiggly line scene fade and surreal music here)
+16Rant: Cyclones, Earthquakes and the Olympics
What a noticeable difference between the responses of the Burmese military junta to the recent devastating cyclone that ravaged large parts of the Irrawaddy Delta and the Chinese government response to the 7.8 earthquake that hit Sichuan province earlier this week.
Both countries have been run by totalitarian regimes masquerading as one-party “democracies”. Both governments have a long history of human rights violations and both have not hesitated in the recent past to use lethal force against their own people while the rest of the world mutters “shame” and continues to do not very much at all.
+12Rant: Phorm Storm (or when ISPs become ISPyers)
Would you consent to your phone lines being permanently bugged or all your mail (in and out) being read, so you could be sent advertising leaflets matched to the information gained on your personal interests?
Would you as a business person, allow someone onto your premises (or to bug your phone / read your email) whose ultimate aim was to collect details on how to contact your visitors and customers, in order that your direct business rivals could thus target them with their own advertising?
+24Rant: Terrorism Power Abuses – Off and Running
News this week that Poole council has used legislation designed to combat terrorism, to spy on a family suspected of trying to cheat the school catchment system is the first publicly reported abuse of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA), but I’m sure it won’t be the last…
Civil rights groups such as Liberty (rightly it now appears) have expressed concerns about these powers since the tabloid-led knee-jerk reaction policy frenzy, which followed 9/11 and 7/7 which created acts such as RIPA. They argued that existing anti-terrorist legislation already in place in the UK since the early 1970′s to combat terrorist attacks by IRA cells were still relevant enough to be used to deal with the new threat of Islamic extremism. There was therefore no need to introduce further legislation.
+21Rant: Spare Capacity – a concept of the past?
While driving home on the M4 a couple of weeks ago, I heard a story on the radio that the department of transport is extending use of the hard shoulder to more motorways up and down the UK, in an attempt to reduce congestion.
A week later the news reported that an increasing number of prisoners are now being released, earlier than expected in an effort to reduce overcrowding. An recently, the Ministry of Justice reported that the prison population in England and Wales has exceeded its highest normal level for the first time.
+18NEWSFLASH: Machines join Humans for Sickie Day
Following yesterday’s National Sickie Day where an estimated 300,000 people in the UK skived off work, it seems that today the machines are following suit.
My train into London was delayed this morning due to signal failure. When I finally reached London Waterloo, I discovered that a power failure on the Jubilee line had created the usual tube chaos.
In desperation, I fought my way through the throngs to the Bakerloo line, only to be delayed there due to some unspecified problem or other, for 20 minutes. Eventually I switched back to the Northern line to be told that passenger congestion at bank station (caused by ongoing escalator problems) meant I was delayed further.
+23Rant: British Gas (it’s all cash! cash! cash!)
Friday’s announcement that British Gas is increasing it’s prices by 15% would have been a bit easier to swallow, if it wasn’t for the increase in February 2007, the 12.4% increase in September 2006 and the 14% increase in 2005.
This represents an overall increase of 61% in the last 3 years, with a 37% increase in the last year alone.
+20