Corbyn not the only politician who wants to control the media

Corbyn is endowed with a quality that one can describe as either brave honesty or naive stupidity. In coming clean with his desire to see the State establish control not only of mainstream broadcast and print media but also social media he is only saying what many of the political class both left and right only dream about. 

Corbyn's Big Idea is a nationalised British Digital Corporation, to ration our bandwidth and licence and monitor bloggers and authors of private websites, to broadcast State News, with its own PeoplesPedia to replace Wiki, and a British National search engine, that can filter out all those inconvenient references to Fabians advocating the gassing of the poor or the mentally ill, or saint Nye Bevan's gulag apologies when Stalin was slaughtering millions in the Holodomor. Somewhere in Corbyn's twisted reasoning, I'm sure, the entire internet is the work of 'Zionists' and must be purged to provide a home for Socialist purity. 

Finding a government or opposition front bencher who speaks for freedom of thought, speech and expression is as rare as finding teeth in a hen. If you're a politician, generally you loathe and fear not only the press but these days the ease with which anyone can post an opinion and even the proles get the same 280 characters as a cabinet minister. The dags and liggers of the old, dead politics equate universal media access with the rise of populism; not only are the wrong sort of people using democracy, they aver, but ordinary people are discussing things without our moderation!  

Well, the genie is out of the bottle and won't be recorked. They may look to China's grip on the internet all they like - it's too late for the West. About four hundred year too late. You see, Lilburne, Winstanley, the Levellers and many others already laid their necks on the block to secure such rights - and we will not see Parliament erode them. 

Brexit for Freedom - the next battles

Not all readers of this blog voted Brexit, and that's fine. Not all readers are members of political parties, but among those that align with UKIP or Conservatives, one or two of you are Old Labour, and that's fine, too. Because those things that unite us are far more important than those things that divide us. It was a paragraph in Sherelle Jacobs' Telegraph column today that gave me cause to pause and think about those values - those common values that keep me writing here and stimulate you to respond. She wrote -

.. we need to talk about “grassroots activism”. From verbal puritans turning free speech into a hate crime and invasions into our online privacy to our boarded-up high streets, people feel their personal agency and sense of belonging slipping away. Brexiteers should be campaigning for individual freedom, not just from Europe but in the humdrum of everyday life. They should be redefining community in local terms.

Well, as a Localist and a democrat, that chimes with me. My use yesterday of the term 'Patricians' for those we oppose is neither novel nor original. We were also reminded (hat tip Mr Drew) of Cicero's support of the elite patrician class against Caesar, whose leadership of the populares brought change to Rome that presaged her greatest years. 

Above all, Brexit offers hope to the young, those worst affected by the bigoted illiberal authoritarianism of the new puritans that seeks to censor, forbid, restrict, govern, ration and throttle what they say, think, listen and respond to on their 5G devices. Robert Nisbet was an American sociologist inspired by Burke and de Tocqueville  rather than by Marx or Engels;

Revolt has trumped tradition, and the price is paid daily with distinctively modern pathologies such as social isolation, moral uncertainty, and personal anxiety. True freedom, Nisbet insists, is not found in the empty spaces of an omnipotent state, but in a pluralistic society where a variety of social groups and institutions intermediate to the individual and the central state have real functions or responsibilities and, by definition, enough autonomy to carry them out, thus offering individuals a sense of purpose, identity, and belonging. The continual weakening of human association bonded by kinship, ethnicity, faith, work, locality, voluntarism, private pursuit, or shared interest by a jealous, power-hungry state creates what Nisbet calls “loose individuals.” These are untethered or atomized souls drifting from the safe harbor of community into the torrents of an impersonal, bureaucratized state that cannot, from its elevated seat of vertical power, replace the intermediary social bonds and moral community it has dissolved in ever pressing its claim for still greater responsibility for each of its subjects or citizens.

It is for the victims of the well-meaning but suffocating State that Brexit stands - again, mostly the young. The obsession of the modern state, here and in Europe perhaps more than anywhere, with constructed 'equalities', rights but not responsibilities, freedoms 'to' defined behaviours but not freedoms 'from' interference and restriction, multiculturalism and diversity, all of which actually rob the individual of the freedom to seek and form alliances and social institutions that have both authority and effectiveness. The modern citizen has become the casualty of an increasingly interventionist, paternalistic state always seeking to increase its power and influence for the sake of 'the Public Good'.

Nisbet wrote;

The greatest single revolution of the last century in the political sphere has been the transfer of effective power over human lives from the constitutionally visible offices of government, the nominally sovereign offices, to the vast network that has been brought into being in the name of protection of the people from their exploiters. It is this kind of power that Justice Brandeis warned against in a decision nearly half a century ago: "Experience should teach us to be most on guard to protect liberty when the governments' purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachments by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding."

When I look at the capos of the EU, at the Patrician class in the UK, at our political, judicial, public service and journalistic elites, I see these well-meaning zealots that simply don't understand the harm they have done, the freedom they have destroyed, the young lives they have manacled to their altars of illiberal authoritarianism. 

If Brexit means anything it means not only throwing off the chains of the EU, but emancipating the people of Britain, our youth and our future, from the slavery of these well-meaning inquisitors. With legislated fire and regulatory torture, they destroy lives whilst seeking to conform the human spirit into their didactic ideals of perfection.

Brexit is not the end of our battle. It is the start of another campaign.

Hague joins Leadership debate

William Hague joins the Conservative leadership debate with a plea not to make Boris Johnson leader by changing the rule book. It is a cri de couer from the deeply establishment ex-leader of a predominantly Remain parliamentary party to an overwhelmingly (and growing) Leave party membership. It also acknowledges unwittingly that party members can force rule changes if the parliamentary party remains unwilling to change; Arron Banks did not pluck the figure of 10,000 new ex-UKIP Conservative members out of the air; it is also the size of petition specified in the party constitution needed to trigger the start of a rule-change process, and I believe a coded warning.

Hague instead asks the party to trust its MPs to make the right choice of Leader.

However, the party Board may hold an easier and quicker answer to changing the process used by the '22 Committee - which opens the possibility of a compromise that may not be the 20-member open ticket, but will not be a process that excludes Boris from the membership ballot.

Given recent choices by the parliamentary party, Hague's plea is a big ask. Hague is also opposed to the involvement of members in 'open primaries' on the basis that the adoption of the process in the US gave America Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton - what he calls 'appalling' choices. Yes, William - but popular. His plea is deeply patrician, wholly establishment and antithetic to change, and will no doubt find favour amongst supporters such as the CBI and the global corporates. I doubt it will find much support amongst a Conservative grass roots membership who may themselves find the actions of many in the parliamentary party equally 'appalling'.

Robbins No.2, Jonathan Black, in power stance, selling the Robbins Plan to Cabinet members

PTSD Adonis and 'Howler' Grayling - your pain is real

You know I really wasn't jesting when I dubbed Adonis and Grayling with their blog monikers. I have the evidence of semi-hysterical radio and TV interviews with pitched, stressed quavery voices, staccato delivery, mental confusion and so on. Plus an assortment of tweets so ill-advised, jejune and illiberal that only some dreadful cerebral confusion could have caused them. And Since neither of these fine gentlemen could have been at the pharmaceuticals, I reasoned, they must have been overwhelmed at the Brexit vote collapsing their secure little universe.

Now it seems I am academically vindicated - Poltico EU claims

For Britain’s pro-European middle classes, Brexit is akin to a psychological trauma which has left many unable to behave rationally, according to two leading experts. Far from being hyper-rational observers concerned only with what is economically sensible, many have morphed into the “Remainiacs” of Brexiteer disdain.

They are acting no differently to what psychologists would expect from those suffering from chronic anxiety caused by loss of control and insecurity, Dr. Philip Corr, professor of psychology and behavioural economics at the University of London, and Dr. Simon Stuart, a clinical psychologist, told POLITICO.

The shrinks have even coined a clinical term for the condition - Brexit Anxiety Disorder, or BAD. But is it curable, or will 'PTSD' and 'Howler' stay that way for life?

Those suffering anxiety might return to more ‘normal,’ ‘rational’ behaviour if the context around them changes,” he said. Clinically, however, this is often a forlorn hope, because contexts don’t usually tend to change enough.

“In that case, what I’d try to do is help the person become more flexible — in short, to learn how to live with the anxiety, tolerate the uncertainty, and work out how they can continue to engage with what truly matters to them in life, rather than getting caught up trying to change things they can’t change.”

In other words, Remainers may just need to relax and get over it.

Modifying the powers of the 1922 Committee

Apologies for a techy Conservative Party post, but I suspect this will be of interest to all other new or rejoining members. The Party Constitution is a fairly simple document for anyone used to dealing with commercial or construction contracts. In relation to election of a Leader, s.3 of Schedule 2 requires;

Upon the initiation of an election for the Leader, it shall be the duty of the 1922 Committee to present to the Party, as soon as reasonably practicable, a choice of candidates for election as Leader. The rules for deciding the procedure by which the 1922 Committee selects candidates for submission for election shall be determined by the Executive Committee of the 1922 Committee after consultation of the Board.

In other words, as suggested below, the 1922 Committee could currently conspire to withhold from the Party membership as a whole the most popular candidates.

Christopher Hope reports in the Telegraph about efforts by a fellow Party member, John Strafford, to amend the rule to allow any MP with more than 20 nominations from fellow MPs to go on the ballot paper to the membership.  

I am sure all MPs and members of the party who, as I am, are committed to openness, transparency and full democracy will support these fair, equitable and sensible rule changes, which will benefit the image and electability of our Party and of our candidates.

PUSHBACK

The launch by Leave Means Leave of a concerted campaign to regain control of Brexit marks a turning point in the August Stasis. The Telegraph published an opening salvo from founders Richard Tice and John Longworth yesterday, and today Nigel Farage fires off a broadside from the same broadsheet. We're not being asked to do anything as yet except signify support or donate - http://www.leavemeansleave.eu - but I guess up to 18 million voters are ready for some Brexit leadership, sadly absent from the Parliamentary Conservative Party. John Vasc explained succinctly the dilemna in a previous comment and I hope he will forgive me for quoting him here;

The Party rules on a new leadership election virtually guarantee that two Remainers would be selected by the current parliamentary party of majority remainer MPs, to be duly 'offered' as a 'choice' to the angry (majority pro-brexit) party members. Javid and Hunt, for example.

This balance would only change if a General Election were to sweep away some of the remainer MPs from their leaver constituencies - but the party is controlled by May and Lewis, so de-selection and replacement is unlikely to happen, and votes will then go to Ukip, which will lead to a Labour victory. 

The ERG know all this - it's a Gordian knot that cannot be untied - or even cut through.

And this leads us to the next stage. Taking back our party. 

The Conservative Party was the last party of which I was a member. Our club in Ipswich had a decent and well used bar and  a full-sized snooker table dominated by a monochrome print of Churchill. I was amongst a million or so members who left the party between 1979 and 1997 - in my case in the early 80s. It wasn't by any means a protest, but the blessed Margaret, for all her fine qualities, was also a ruthless centraliser who robbed Conservative local government and local associations of much of their purpose. So we left in droves. 

Well, I have now rejoined. That little biographical box heading the right column must be edited. Mrs May and Mr Lewis will be pleased to hear that I am back - and determined to join with my fellow Conservatives in regaining control of not only our Party but also our nation. 

Have a good weekend, all. 

Enjoy the Summer - and get ready for a rollercoaster Autumn

If  you can't take excitement, I recommend this Autumn that you rent a lonely cottage on the Norfolk coast, stock up with heavyweight biographies, a dog, and logs for the cool evenings and go into purdah until 2019. The rest of us will I suspect be glued to our screens and social media as the most event packed months I've ever known roll out.

Party politics is in turmoil, with both Labour and Conservative parties split, and conferences coming up from next month at which both leaders will be fighting for their lives.  Corbyn can't shake the anti-semitism charges - he's an eternal 19 year old undergraduate,  perennially emotionally immature, selling his smudgy Marxist agitprop outside the Union bar. May only remains in office whilst her successors decide the best time to defenestrate her. If I were Theresa, I'd already have moved my kit back to Maidenhead from Number 10 apart from a couple of suitcases. 

Our own economy is on the turn, with a downturn in London house prices the signal for a national bubble-bursting episode as the world economy goes into recession. Whilst US bib-and-brace jobs and wages are now doing well, silicon valley and its asset-less billionaires may be on the verge of crashing; facebook, twitter, google, instagram are all slowing and showing signs of vulnerability. It looks like cryptocurrencies are reaching a final crash and burn. The end of QE in the US and its coming end in Europe has already knocked billions from Lesser Developed Nations including Turkey, and Italy is set for a showdown in the coming months (£). 

Brexit talks are set to resume, with the Robbins plan already in tatters and recriminations from Brussels about British espionage. I should bloody well hope we are spying on them. At home the hystericals PTSD Adonis and 'Howler' Grayling are whining even more loudly, Remainer delusional skewed polls are still being churned out to bolster the faithful, Soros money is encouraging even more desperate legal challenges and every global corporate with a foothold in the UK is going all-out to sabotage the Brexit process. Even Alastair Campbell poor love is doing the rounds of the TV studios bullying anyone he can find into silence - but these aren't the Blair years any more, and folk just see a red-faced shouty buffoon rather than a whippet-lean SJW. Mandelson looks like an effete bloated degenerate just back from a Tunisian resort staffed by gazelle-eyed ganymedes and Major is known only to the young as like the old duffer from the post office who shouts at people who drop litter.  

Spain, with 34% youth unemployment, is being told by globalist puppet and convicted criminal Christine Lagarde that it needs 5m more African and maghrebi immigrants to sell cheap Chinese tat to tourists now being excluded from Europe's most popular destinations as local carrying capacity has been crashed. Good luck with that policy move, Christine. Sweden's forthcoming election is also likely to follow the trend throughout Europe of taking back control from the globalist elites and will upset a few more unelected EU officials. Juncker's sciatica is also getting worse, coming on just after his breakfast cognac and peaking at social events as he sways and stumbles through photo-opportunities.

I suspect there will be no shortage of events on which to comment between now and Christmas, but for now, enjoy the Sun, drink some wine and chill.

A NATO member can't be besties with Putin

I am a firm believer that NATO and Russia face greater common enemies than eachother, and there will come a time when we must make common cause against common threats. But that time is not yet here, so we are forced into a low-cost reprise of the cold war. Russia's gangster oligarchy has crossed the line with the Salisbury poisonings, and the matter is not yet ended. And as much as I deprecate the arrogant aggression of the EU in attempting to extend the Federasty eastwards, the EU after each provocation running to hide under the skirts of the US, the stupidity of Brussels doesn't lessen Russia's threat.

Two years ago I wrote "Let's admit it - Turkey is an enemy state". 

Already, a score or more of the most senior military officers arrested following the coup attempt have reportedly died in jail in mysterious circumstances. Typhus, no doubt. Or heart attacks. Franco was also very experienced at disappearing thousands of dangerous democrats, people who had won elections and those who stood for the rule of law and democracy. Erdogan's tyranny has been so blatant, so outrageous, that even the purblind fools in Brussels could no longer ignore it; media closed, journalists arrested, courts purged. Erdogan's reaction has been a petulant tantrum; the EU had already stalled on his earlier ultimatum to allow Turks open travel in the Schengen area, now this week they have voted to suspend accession talks.

This is a far more nuanced matter than the bare facts allow. I know, in London, many fine and upright citizens who are first or second generation Turks, from Cyprus or from the mainland. They run the vast majority of our kebab shops and are the backbone of Uber drivers at the basic level, but also contribute greatly to culture, society, arts, business and trade. Turkey becoming an enemy will leave many fine people dreadfully conflicted - though none I know would support Erdogan's repression.

Since then, the Islamification of the Turkish state has continued, Erdogan has given himself sweeping powers and he has increasingly turned to Putin's Russia as an ally. No doubt Erdogan and Putin can chat amicably about their respective gulags, methods of suppressing free speech and so on. This is simply unacceptable behaviour from a NATO member, more egregious than Erdogan's son's deep involvement in the stolen petroleum trade with ISIS, more dangerous than Erdogan's attempted theft of Syrian territory and more treacherous than use of a migrant tsunami to threaten Greece. 

Well, it seems Mr Trump has had enough. America's actions are pretty much destroying the Turkish economy. Erdogan will now no doubt demand more danegeld from the EU or else and seek greater formal ties with Putin. Either way, he confirms Turkey's status as an enemy state that must now be expelled from NATO. I suggest the US moves its nuclear base from Incirlik to either Greece or Cyprus. We can also shut down Western Union and halt billions of Euros leaving Europe. The die is cast.

Nice whistle

Congrats to whichever Boris fans have found and distributed this meme - it's a decent photo, the suit fits, the hair is combed. He looks ... different.

Hmm. 

The vindictive spite of the PTSD Remainers

Many of you will know our fellow blogger Pete North, and whether you agree with him or not on Brexit I doubt there are many who would deny him a voice in the debate. Except of course those of the hysterical, vindictive and spiteful Remain side, who pay scant regard to democratic open debate or free speech. 'Howler' Grayling's legal serfs are pursuing Pete North for damages he certainly hasn't got - read the full story on his blog at  http://peterjnorth.blogspot.com/2018/08/ac-grayling-when-eccentricity-becomes.html

M'learned friends are welcome to scour this blog, but to save them the trouble, my own mentions of the carpet-chewer include the following;

...Barnier, and rude mechanicals and noises off as Andrew Adonis, AC Grayling and the other establishment PTSD casualties set up a louder than usual whine. Blair of course will be spreading his poison from Brussels today... 1.3.18

There is a concerted remainer media offensive this week; AC Grayling continues his painful public meltdown and so is deemed unfit to face the camera or microphones, but Andrew Adonis has already delivered a rather hysterical and disconnected plea on the 'Today' programme..4.1.18

At home PTSD Andrew Adonis and AC Grayling are ever closer to complete meltdown, Adonis throwing petulant tantrums at the BBC for no longer being 'binary' in its output; i.e. for no longer reporting that 'Remain' has an equal chance of winning. 9.4.18

... those of whom to be suspicious are the hysterics, carpet-chewers and effete womblies such as PTSD Adonis or 'Howler' Grayling who support the vile federasts ...23.6.18

"British sovereign self-government must be restored"

"British sovereign self-government must be restored". So writes AEP in the Telegraph this morning (£). The gist of the piece is

1. The EU is essentially a lawless criminal cabal with an ethos of rule-breaking utterly antithetical to more honest, principled Brits; a sclerotic Empire focused solely on its own interests. There is no international law, no solemn contract, no bilateral treaty and no legal obligation that they will not breach, ignore, twist or pervert to their own ends, using their corrupt Freisler-court the ECJ to whitewash the crime scenes.

2. Theresa May is a wet hen without the nous to run a whelk stall. The 1922 committee should ditch her pronto and select a Leader willing to fight for Britain. Boris fits the bill.

'The cold reality for Brexiteers is that if they do not like Chequers [the Robbins Plan - Ed], they must mobilise and fight. Shanker Singham, a former WTO negotiator at the Institute of Economic Affairs, says nothing can be achieved as long as Britain clings to the EU’s regulatory structure and the perennial Acquis.  “We’re prevented from doing any deals until we have clearly taken the customs union and the single market off the table. Nobody wants to talk to us. The moment Chequers came out we ceased to be of any relevance to the US,” he said.

“We need a leader who is willing to get out of this halfway house, blast through the barriers, and play hardball with the EU. At that point the cohesion in Europe will break down,” he said.'

Well, Tory remainers have shown already how much they are spooked by Boris. The well-concerted efforts supported by May yesterday over his innocuous Burqa comments. And there could be no greater vote of confidence in Boris' ability than Dominic Grieves's promise to quit the party if Boris wins. I'd love to be a bluebottle on Anna Soubry's gin glass to catch her response.

And though Michael Gove will be back next month with his colon newly pressure-washed, his zits squeezed and forty new words in his vocabulary book, Boris has learnt his lesson and will keep the Govelet at arm-plus-dagger length. Particularly when his back is turned.

This is turning out to be a duck-August after all; the turbid waters beneath the surface of Tory tranquillity may well break, to our nation's benefit. 

Boris is just telling a simple truth

Boris Johnson is neither a Muslim-hating bigot, a Corbynst-type passive-aggressive racist nor, as the smaller and more hysterical of the Guardian's hacks would have it, a fascist. As the cartoon below says so clearly, our culture finds sinister those who hide their faces. Women who wear the Niqab or Burqa are seen as hostile, threatening, to be feared. Sadly, many Muslim women know this and use their silly costumes like cultural weapons - the reason they are now banned in so many European countries. 

There you have it. Boris was just telling a simple truth. There will be those desperate for confirmation and endorsement of their own delusions who will seek to interpret his words as a condemnation of the whole of Islam - but rest easy, it isn't. 

Logistics - if 3m are to march on London this Autumn

After having spent all my adult life quietly at my hearth, I marched in protest for a first and second time and not again since. Those protests were the two largest protests that London has ever seen - the Countryside Alliance march, and the Anti Blair Iraq march. The first was not about fox hunting, but a cry of anger against the central state nannying that treated resilient, self-sufficient Britons like children. The second was against a deaf and corrupt government launching the nation on an unlawful adventure that would leave Blair with the blood of a quarter of a million innocents on his hands. 

With speculation now intense over a Brexit betrayal in the autumn, with an outcome even more egregious than the Robbins Plan that the mandarins have sent the Cabinet to sell across Europe this summer, it seems I may have to march for a third time. Michael Gove has in the past visited the Mayr clinic in Klagenfurt for the annual hosing-out of his rectum, but no reports have reached me this year that the Gove bowel-flushings have hit the Wörthersee kanal, so he may have been sent elsewhere in Europe to deposit his stale excreta. 

A suspension of Article 50 or worse this autumn would have the potential to bring three million of us out on the street in protest. There is a feeling one has in one's bones, which I had twice in the past and now have again but in spades. A Brexit betrayal will give London, the remainer capital, the most massive street protest ever seen in this country. 

It's possible but not probable that the government will seek to ban the march in advance as (a) too large and disruptive, even on a Saturday (b) for health and safety concerns (c) potential for violent conflict with remoaner zealots. But I don't think any government would actually dare to try to cork such anger. Realistically, the government will be planning even now to make such a march as difficult as possible, if not impossible. Central London Crossrail road closures will be arranged, Network Rail major engineering works planned, resurfacing of the M4 scheduled. The logistics of getting 3m people into London, marching us to Hyde Park and getting us home again are not inconsiderable. Transport. Routes. Water. Toilets. First Aid. Stewarding. Emergency Services. Sound stages and speeches. Local co-ordination. 

However, I have great faith that the Leave side has so many thousands of years of accumulated senior management, HM armed forces and skilled professional expertise at its command that such an event can be planned and arranged for a Saturday in September, October or November if required. Perhaps readers could make tentative enquiries of local coach companies now. 

I also have great faith that we can be peaceful. On the CA march, police were not even needed and the only time I saw the Stewards was as we processed up Whitehall, calling "Caps off, gentlemen please, as you pass the Cenotaph". Sure, the march will attract the race-hate morons who, like ill-disciplined dogs, will want to fight any folk with brown faces, but we can work with the police to isolate and contain them. Every far-right nutter in the land will also seek to hijack the event - but as I guess 2/3rds of the marchers will be ex-Labour supporters - from mining, engineering and steelworking towns and suchlike - this must be prevented from the start. 

So C'mon lads and lasses. Get planning.

Brexit will cause these 20 things to happen

CHEESE
Only British made cheese will be allowed to be sold in the shops after Brexit. The government will publish recipes for baked Lymeswold, Dairylea Raclette and for drying Cheddar to grate for a pasta topping. American tinned and aerosol cheese will be expected to fill any supply gaps, and New Zealand Cheddar imports will increase by 500%
CONDOMS
After Brexit, condom size will no longer governed by Directive EU 15/8454. The UK will therefore be free to both manufacture and import condoms in the larger sizes that British men have long been keen to use. Old stocks of sub-sized EU-standard prophylactics can be send to Asia as grant-aid in lieu of money.
DOGS
French bulldogs, German shepherds, Rottweilers, Schnauzers, Pyrenean mountain dogs and other Euro breeds will have to be renamed

UK government leads 'fake news' & cyber manipulation - new report

If you listened to the noises coming from Whitehall, Westminster and the MSM about the manipulation of social media, you'd be forgiven for thinking it was all being distorted by Aaron Banks and the Russians pumping out fake news and running thousands of bots. This is indeed the rationale being drawn, the narrative the government is seeking to establish, in order to introduce draconian controls over the armies of Burke's little platoons such as this blog that offer a countervailing voice to the mandarins' Big Lies. 

In fact, lost in the silly season, is a new and authoritative report from the prestigious Oxford Internet Institute that finds that the UK government is itself in the forefront of social media manipulation through 'fake' content creation, distraction, trolling and harassment, using around 1,500 Full Time Equivalent staff to distort, manipulate and pollute social media. It's not we, private citizens, that need to be regulated - it's Whitehall and Westminster. 

Clicky to make bigger

The report finds internationally that five nations - Cambodia, China, Iran, Israel and the US - lead the league in government-controlled cyber-manipulation, but that the UK comes in second tier place, alongside Ecuador, Malaysia, North Korea, Russia, Syria and Venezuela. Fine company we're keeping. 

Apart from this report having bypassed the DCMS Select Committee that should have taken this evidence instead of itself distorting evidence in a vindictive campaign against 'Leave' actors, one must question whether the government's methods are even legal. The report finds that the UK uses both human agents operating fake accounts and automated fake accounts to manipulate social media - and does so across all categories of distortion, omission, deviation and fake content creation. 

clicky to make bigger

It may suit the MSM to lose this vital report in the Summer silliness, but I urge you all to download it. Come September, we need to shove our Parliamentarians' noses into it.

Vaz disgraces our democracy, says MP

Andrew Bridgen MP is not impressed by 'Teflon' Keith Vaz's latest ugly headlines; "The problem with Keith Vaz is that although the charge sheet against him gets ever longer, justice seems to get no nearer. It is difficult to believe that the public’s perception of politicians will ever improve while he remains a member of the House of Commons."

Well, Andrew, I think Vaz is amongst the most egregious of the liggers, dags, liars, peculators, barrators, narcissists, fools and knaves polluting our Parliament, but you blew your chance of winning back public trust in politics when you decided on a self-interested cover-up following the expenses scandal. We haven't forgotten the B&O TVs and hi-fis, crystal grapefruit bowls, duck houses, fine art, hand woven carpets and all the rest of the bling stolen by your colleagues, many of whom are still sitting, from our taxes.

No, not all MPs are bent - but too many are, even after the great scandal. Deal not only with Vaz but with all those you let slip under the radar and our minds might change.

Second Referendum?

The pressure from Remain is now for a second referendum - preferably a single question, three choice version designed to split the Leave vote.

Well, if we're to gamble, let it be at least fair. Best to refuse a second referendum altogether - but as Mrs May has already categorically said we won't have one, you can be sure it's on the cards. My suggestion for a fair format below. 

Is tiny Brexit puppet Minister Raab taking Steroids?

The one thing that struck folk most about Dominic Raab's appearance alongside his Brexit boss Oliver Robbins at last week's Select Committee appearance is how small he is. His boss towered over him not just intellectually but physically. 

And although being the Remain elite's puppet Brexit minister can't be wholly stress-free, tiny minister Raab, we're told, was tough - a Judo black belt, no less. Perhaps he joins William Hague in sweaty naked man-wrestling in the Commons basement gym. We aren't told. These pastimes are often enthusiastically followed by diminutive men; one wouldn't be surprised to find Speaker Bercow in a karate robe. 

Gyms, narcissism and little men go together. So the revelations in the Express by a good time girl who briefly worked for Raab are interesting. He was more interested in achieving his gym-bod than in his ministerial work, she claims. And also that he flew into uncontrollable rages at the most minor irritations. 

Well, gyms, narcissism and uncontrollable rages also frequently go together - and when they do, they are frequently symptomatic of Steroid use. I think Mr Raab should tell us whether our puppet Brexit minister is taking these stimulants or not. I think journalists should ask him. We should know.   

 

Cameron's £9.3m tax 'diversion' to Remain campaign to be investigated?

The DCMS Committee has called for the donor of 'Britain's biggest ever campaign donation' to be investigated by the police.

That would be the £9.3m diverted from UK tax funds to the Remain campaign by David Cameron, then. 

REMAIN SPEND: £28,359,066
LEAVE SPEND: £13,436,241

Selmayr determined to inflict 'punishment beating' on UK

Robert Hardman in the Mail profiles Martin Selmayr this morning. Amongst the revelations that we already suspected is that "(Selmayr) will certainly play a key role in determining the sort of Brexit we are offered. As one Brussels insider put it to me: 'If Martin has his way, it will be not so much a deal as a punishment beating.' "

I was looking back this week at a collection of lithographs on flimsy paper published in December 1918 - almost a century ago - by a Belgian artist who had been confined along with French and British soldiers in a German POW camp. Turning the fragile leaves, one is immediately struck by the extent to which these German WWI POW camps were a rehearsal for the concentration camps of the NSDAP era. The brutality, the wire, the watch towers, the starvation, the random shooting of prisoners and, yes, the punishment beatings are all there - a prototype for Dachau, Belsen and Theresienstadt.

Here is a lithograph titled  'der Schlag'. It is, no doubt, illustrative of the sort of punishment beating that this 'modern' German Chief Official would like to administer to Britain. With Selmayr, Europe has regressed one hundred years.

Martin Selmayr attends to the UK?

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Postscript - additional image