FFS

I’m typing this on a radio keyboard and I’m cynical as hell because my back’s on fire, and somewhat (read: quite a bit, lol) off my tits on painkillers. With that caveat in mind:

No confidential service should ever provide information publicly that could lead to the identification of its users. Regardless of intentions. I’m sure there are reasonable exceptions and that’s a whole other debate, which is beyond the scope of my current pained keyboard jizz. The recent National Bullying Helpline media ruckus, via its head, Christine Pratt, was started by, essentially, a breach of confidentiality. I won’t recap the affair, I’m sure, unless you’ve given up news, you’re aware of the background.

I don’t think Christine Pratt should be subject to vilification beyond a breach of confidentiality. I don’t think there is much of a story. It was reported, initially, with very few journalists even attempting The Five Ws. The headline should have been “Charity head relates anecdote which may or may not relate to Gordon Brown”.

Gordon Brown could be a massive toss pot, and I’m really not a fan, and wouldn’t vote for him, but in this internets age are anecdotes enough? Is that what constitutes news?

I really can’t attribute any specific blame to journalists, politicians, or people who consume news, but there’s bigger things to address. Like the economy, particularly, the thing that will constrain whichever government is elected. Or minor distractions (at least to me, I’m really not interested in photographing towns and cities, or people – they’re annoying) like photographers being subject to hassle from police under anti-terrorism powers (link via @glinner). Or retarded UK libel laws.

I could segue into some kind of righteous list of stuff that’s more important than anecdotes, but, I don’t know about a lot of things, and, as I have done in the past, would be falling into the trap of talking about complicated things in a simplistic, and somewhat biased way. As is the internets wont.

It could be argued that anecdotes about one of the people in charge of our country are important, that the character of a politician is something we are right to want to know about. Given their personality informs their decisions. My problem with that is that there are a minority of people who are both talented, and arseholes, so judging on personality alone isn’t enough, and can distract from real issues, like the economy, or the police wasting their time with photographers and the like, or other complicated things.

Nick Clegg, and David Cameron did themselves no favours by joining in.

We need a grown up nuanced debate, and what we’ve got is a circus. Professional trolling. Roll on the election. I’m sure it will be very depressing, and I do hope Jeremy Vine gets out his cowboy suit again. Yee har!

I’ve had major problems writing anything, partly distractions, and a particularly bad back, but have kept snippets that I’ve rejected for being flawed or a bit stupid. I’ll stick them up with this caveat so I don’t get angry comments or feel my discomfort is unacknowledged. With rejection notes.

Superior smug internet atheist

I’m an atheist but I’m a self loathing, apathetic, (but wholly convinced) atheist [1]. In social situations I rarely bring up that I’m an atheist [2]. Not because I get problems from religious people, but because it often elicits a stream of boring shit about how stupid religious people are [3], and, further, how wonderful canonical atheist figures are. I don’t care about religion. I only care about it when it gets in the way of rational decision making, in government, or science, or other areas where rational decision making is generally to be encouraged [4].

But religious people? In my experience it’s not as black and white as ‘them and us’. [5] There are religious people in the middle ground between faith and reason [6]. I think it suits those who would like to divide people into neat compartments that religion is seen as all or nothing, or that someone being religious, or an atheist, precludes them from being an arsehole [7]. To wit we, all, every race, every human on the planet, are united by arseholes [8].

I’m not suggesting all judgemental people are cunts [9]. They are.

Rejection notes

[1] Who gives a fuck?
[2] Implies that it comes up often. It doesn’t. I’m more interested in nerd stuff like digital photo sensors or synthesizers than faith issues.
[3] Occasionally. Often enough that it’s annoying, but by no means a general case, don’t want to give religious twats ammunition against atheists.
[4] Implies that I think decisions based on faith are acceptable without drawing the distinction that adults can do what they want. I don’t care.
[5] It is, obviously, matter of atheists and religious people.
[6] Do I mean middle ground or not arseholes? Middle ground is a weasel term.
[7] I’d like to teach the world to sing … twattery.
[8] True that.
[9] I am.

Bash away, like an impotent wank, see what comes out; try to spit paragraphs. Wanky, pretentious as fuck, periphrasis, all wordy, and circular. Round. Firstly – you and I are are sentient, sitting on a chair, in front of a screen, with a mouse in hand. Or not. Maybe, using a mobile device. Or laptop. Warming your lap. (insert cattop joke). Whatever, we’re looking at a screen. We have that in common.

Secondly, you could be a search engine robot. Which would mean the entire last paragraph would be wasted. Crawling web pages; extracting links; weighted contextual databases, and you, along with Tesco, with your plans. I’ve got more self awareness than you (the robots, not you, the meaty reader, obviously, that would be overly presumptuous). Apologies (not to the robots) for calling out the robots on their lack of self awareness. It’s just in case.

Thirdly, there is no third paragraph, so go fuck yourself. I’m knackered.

Kind of stuck on the fourth.

Nope. It’s not irony if you say so.

Yes. (Clickable)

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Fuck off.  No. Oh FFS.

Remakes are fucked.  Thing is, the only successful remakes are where they change it nearly beyond recognition (the Battlestar Galactica method), or, keep it reasonably close, capturing the essential qualities of the original despite modernisation (The Star Trek Next TNG method). If it’s anywhere in between the two you end up with Carry on Columbus, Star Trek Voyager, and virtually every other remake or spin-off, including some I probably haven’t watched.

Watch for yourself on iPlayer (click No above). If you’re abroad, you’re not missing much. Things to note: colour saturation, audio gain on the laughter track, exaggerated facial expressions, minimal distance between gags and punchlines, Reggie’s pseudo existential angst, the difficulty in suspending belief, on top of a grinding feeling that you’re watching the original as interpreted by idiots.

They’ve used some kind of phaser in the new version of the old theme tune.  That’s almost a metaphor for the show.

All my cool photo friends are shooting medium and large format (film). I think I’m now reasonably competent with 35mm SLRs (sorry for not scanning pictures – I can’t be arsed), manual metering etc. – so – on an impulse (it seemed appropriate to bold that) I put a bid on a medium format camera on eBay. The canonical medium format camera (see note 1). Problem was/is that I can’t afford it without cutting back on food, bills, and other things that are generally considered necessary for life. I thought “what the hell! Fuck it, I’ll eat lentils for six months, food and social bollocks are overrated” (e.g. even more of a skinny, back pain ridden, asocial recluse).

The problem was that with eBay you enter the maximum you are prepared to bid. I looked up second hand prices etc. worked out the price somewhere in the lower quartile, and then did something really fucking stupid. I didn’t check the price before I bid. I missed a decimal place. I usually bid with a decimal like seven pence – meaning anyone going for the same price rounded loses. You cannot lower your maximum bid.

My bowels rumbled like the shockwave from a sonic boom, because it would mean borrowing money, from relatives, or banks, and I hate that. Or retracting the bid – which I didn’t want to do because it was still a reasonable price, and retracting a bid seemed a bit silly. Getting loans from banks these days is like getting an income tax rebate. That you have to pay back. With interest. (see note 2)

Luckily it seems medium format camera owners are right up there (down there?) with Leica owners, and someone outbid me. Remember no matter how much of a cunt you feel, there are always bigger cunts than you. That’s, after all, how babies are made. If I was outbid by Ken Rockwell, or people who I think are good, notable, or nice, I renounce the cunt bit.

So I put off getting a medium format camera until I can afford a cheap but reasonable one. I will eat.

Note 1: If any medium format camera manufacturers, or PR companies on their behalf, such as Mamiya, Hasselblad, Pentax, Alpa, Contax, or other, are willing to gift me a camera, we can come to some kind of arrangement. I’ll wear a t-shirt or something. Maybe have the company name tattooed on my knob, and do some tasteful self-shot artistic nudes (in black and white or sepia, and get a nose ring, so it’s art). This doesn’t apply to Seagull or Lomo cameras. Seagull are not awful, but Lomo users are the bizzaro world Leica owners.

Note 2: If any city fat cats want to feel less guilty about being partially responsible for the biggest financial crisis since the fall of communism (which didn’t affect us), and want to do something about your bad karma, see note 1 – minus the t-shirt, tattoo and the nudes. You’ve probably got a Hasselbad in the loft with loads of lenses, going unused – an unwanted stocking filler, or novelty item in banker’s Christmas crackers. Contact me, between bathing in poor peoples tears and eating ocelot.

Seeing is believing.  I think there’s going to be a bit of a Horne & Corden backlash – as reported by Andrew Johnson in today’s Independent.  I think that people should make up their own mind.   Maybe I’m being snobby and elitist (although such accusations are tacit admissions that the show is simple). Maybe I’m some kind of prude.  Maybe I’m jealous.

I really think people should make up their own mind.

So, with no further ado, here’s the show on iPlayer, and for all of you without UK proxies, here’s ‘ Two new fragrances by Fag Le Jay Jean-Peterson‘ (I am not making this up – not my words, not internet irony, not the words of the Westboro Baptist Church,  but the words of BBC 3* ).

On the internet you can slag a television show off merely by telling people to watch it.

* ‘… Tim Goodall, a gay TV journalist, who’s more interested in sipping Pina Colada and discussing how fit the soldiers are in Basra than delivering breaking news …’ – translation: lol, gay – not my words, but the words of BBC 3’s press department.

Years ago, at school – a macho boys school – homo and poof were frequent terms of abuse for anything that seemed effeminate or weak. It was primarily driven by a lack of life experience (ignorance), a kind of lazy, ill-thought out, homophobia. Upon leaving school most people, possessing half a brain or more, and a bit of life experience, rapidly realise that people are generally people regardless of their gender. There are copious amounts of stupid people of every gender. It’s the one thing that unites all nationalities. The basic problem with humour derived from gay stereotypes is pretty much the same as humour derived from any other stereotype. Unless it’s ironic, or has some deeper meaning, it’s obvious, and because it’s obvious, it’s retarded.

I could be missing something about Al Murray’s ‘gay’ Nazi, and Horne & Corden’s ‘gay’ war correspondent, because I don’t think any of the comedians in question are homophobic. In Al Murray’s case he’s got a track record of taking the piss out of homophobia in the form of the pub landlord (‘never confused’). But in the case of the ‘gay’ Nazi and the ‘gay’ war correspondent the humour is derived from some pretty negative homosexual stereotypes. This can be contrasted with Sascha Baron Cohen’s Brüno – here for instance – which is essentially about peoples reactions to absurd situations, and absurd stereotypes, rather than a strict play on stereotypes. If people are just laughing at the stereotype then the comedy is retarded.

I’m not homosexual, and I’ve never experienced the kinds of bullying or discrimination that people have, but I have seen how ignorance about other genders can lead to a kind of lazy, semi-malevolent, homophobia. I’m principally opposed to the ‘gay’ Nazi sketch and Horne & Corden’s ‘gay’ war correspondent sketches because I think they’re retarded sketches, aimed at idiots, and lazy, in some very fundamental ways. People forget that in order to be edgy you have to be smart.

Given how thick people are it should do rather well.

FFS.

Lol at Florida. Lol at the comments.

By the great bollocks of Beelzebub this is depressing. It’s more depressing than a morbidly obese cat trying to catch a mouse. Or the Honey Monster being stung to death by bees, which  subsequently die. So, you’ve been warned.

This

I don’t listen to LBC because they’re shit. I didn’t realise they’re also shits.

I was just about to post the following, with something along the lines of “oh, FFS”:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7836941.stm

The most depressing day of the year my bollocks.

Y’know reporting this sort of shit in the absence of reporting some very bad news regarding share prices of certain things, and what that actually means, may make it the most depressing news day of the year. There are things going on in the financial world that will likely affect you more than the weather and the time of the year. It’s either self-censorship, like I’m doing, or that they’ve decided the morons in front of screens are bored of it.

So bollocks. I’m off away from blogging, back to my grim existential crisis brought on by how completely mental the world is. That and eat some toast.

Today Barrack Obama painted a wall blue in a homeless shelter. There is hope. That or I’m being sarcastic.

My back is killing me but I’ve got to say something.  I’m angry.  This isn’t a matter of left or right.   It isn’t a matter of past bad behaviour by the Tory party. Old things like Official Secrets Act prosecutions for documents leaked in the public interest or industrial action by unions -  wrongs do not justify other wrongs.  This is about now. If you don’t defend the rights of people you disagree with ultimately you’re weakening your own position, because, chances are, there are, or will be, people who disagree with you.  Damian Green has been part of a series of embarrassing leaks on government immigration issues.  As an MP it is his job to hold government to account.

In my opinion his leaks have encouraged casual racism, and aided those who have remarketed themselves as an anti-immigration party.  But – regardless of whether I agree with him, I think the police actions, presumable MPSB, were extremely heavy handed, and signify the steady aggregation of laws that could be used to stifle democracy and freedom of speech. From the police arresting teenagers for holding signs with the world ‘cult’ on them, to routinely detaining protesters under anti-terror legislation, to local councils spying on residents because of secret allegations,  to casual photographers being told they can’t photograph freely,  to prohibition of protest within areas that may cause offence to elected officials, to detention without charge, to the constant drip-drip of scare stories telling us how afraid we should be, to identity cards ripe for official abuse and spying, to hassling journalists at protests,  to proposed databases of your web browsing and email history.

FOR EXAMPLE.

At what point do people of all political stripes speak up?  Is it really OK for those who are left leaning to justify this because it’s a Tory?

Apparently Boris Johnson and Michael Martin knew about this before the Home Secretary.

Amazing…

I’m left leaning/apolitical/probably a wimpy lib-dem voter – but I think I’d like to be someone who speaks out rather than stays quiet.  I sodding hate politics; but I keep getting forced into saying something, because, morally speaking, I think it is right to do so.  You’re welcome to deal with your own conscience.

I’ve intermittently wanked on about the credit crunch for quite some time, in many ways it’s been like watching a railway crash, in that there’s been a fixed trajectory, and from a great distance things don’t appear to be moving that fast. I have a couple of comments; firstly, none of the underlying problems with the affected economies have been solved *, and secondly, there aren’t half some head cases that comment on Robert Peston’s blog. I haven’t blogged about anything financial or economic because it depresses the living fuck out of me (plus typing fucks my back). I have kept up with the situation, and, as a part of that, I’ve read RP’s blog. It’s good. I think RP is a credit to the BBC.  As for Robert Peston having a political bias – bollocks – he’s pissed people off of all stripes, which is an indicator of how good he is.

There are a lot of people who are sane enough to type their mad ideas (how would I know if I was one of them?), and it appears they’re attracted to Robert Peston’s blog like nutters to church. If you’ve got a few minutes you must have a chuckle at the comments on this post. Some of them go from fat-cats to socialist apocalypse faster than Hackney carriage drivers.

* I think there’s a 50/50 chance this will turn into an aggregate cluster fuck rather than a mere cluster fuck. Oh yeah – and nobody has mentioned the affect St Barack’s election in the US has had on British government tax policy, and/or speculated about what that indicates with upcoming US fiscal policy. I suspect the broad direction of fiscal policy was informally discussed well in advance at a well publicised visit to the UK. Lol.

I wasn’t going to comment on the Russell Brand/Jonathan Ross/Andrew Sachs thing, lest I add to press sentiment that ‘prank call’ story is newsworthy.  But I’m going to comment.  The whole thing is ridiculous, and has brought all kinds of unpleasant people out of the woodwork.  Essentially it is a fuss about someone making a joke about fucking someone, you know – that thing lots of adults do for fun  –  but has played out as if Jonathan Ross has somehow tarred Manuel’s adult granddaughter by outing the fact that Russell Brand shagged her at one of his hot tub parties. As if sex is somehow dirty and a taboo.  The headline should be “Man shags woman, tells grumpy elderly relative, incensed newspaper readers foam at the mouth”

Listen for yourself on YouTube here.  Be sure to check out all of the comments from the new puritans, rabid anti BBC-types, armchair moralists, old people of questionable intelligence, and general fuckwits.

I heard the radio show a couple of weeks ago, the morning after it aired. It was mildly amusing.  When Jonathan Ross shouted out “he fwucked your gwanddaughter” I thought – “So?  Who gives a shit – big deal”.  It wasn’t the funniest Russell Brand show.  It wasn’t particularly notable. The show is much funnier when Russell Brand has a foil such as Matt Morgan (or Simon Amstell).  It was broadcast at night, after 9pm.  The telephone call was arranged in advance, Manuel didn’t pick up the phone.  The programme apologised a few days later.

Thing is – it’s funny now.  It wasn’t that funny to begin with but the shitstorm of indignation from the illiterate opinionated twats of Great Britain has made it lolworthy.  It’s been getting funnier by the morally outraged minute.

All of those people that are morally outraged have been trolled hard, and can go fuck themselves.  If that’s the type of people Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross have offended – good.

I’d pay double the license fee if they could annoy idiot newspaper readers twice a month.

Well done BBC – but it’s stupid to suspend people for pissing off an elderly guest of the show.

People really want a right not to be offended but don’t realise the consequences. They’re too stupid.

I love political drama in the UK press because things play out like a soap opera or third-rate thriller. Commentated by people of questionable rationality. Unlike me. If I were in charge of a BBC television channel I would commission a show in which political correspondents commentate on apes. Like A Life of Grime but with apes and Nick Robinson as John Peel. “Hey, if the good ship ape-house were the titanic, and this was a bad metaphor – Julius, alpha chimp, of the political jungle – his body language is telling – he wants to urinate, or stimulate an erection, AND (inhales), the ramifications for the king are spectacular. Look out for ice-bergs! Over to you Sophie”

All apes ever get credit for is fiddling with themselves, lobbing shit at people, picking fleas off each other, and hanging around. I think that is very unfair and my idea for a television programme would solve the issue.

Lol.  My new favourite sitcom character.  Didn’t he break-into the Watergate?

Sometimes it is necessary to be simplistic.

£400,000,000,000

400 billion pounds is a conservative estimate of UK government money going to help troubled financial institutions.

$690,565,489,736.23

At $1.72641 per pound. The current exchange rate. Roughly $690 billion.

60,943,912

Population of the United Kingdom from the CIA World Factbook (July 2008 estimate).

£6563.41

Price per man, woman, and child, in the UK

$11331.14

Price per man, woman, and child, in the UK at $1.72641.

$700,000,000,000

A figure put forward by the US Federal Reserve in a package to rescue troubled financial organisations.

£405,465,677,330

That figure in the Great British Pound.

303,824,640

Population of the United States of America from the CIA World Factbook (July 2008 estimate).

$2304

Price per man, woman, and child, in the United States.

£1334.54

Price per man, woman, and child in the United States in the Great British Pound.

This makes me angry.   The BBC has some really good people, including Robert Peston, so when they talk complete bollocks re: oil prices they’ve got no excuse. Here’s what the BBC has to say about today’s spike in oil prices (believe it or not the biggest spike took place in the space of five minutes!) Keep in mind all commodities are up, not just oil:

Record one-day jump in oil price

The price of oil has jumped by more than $16 to $120.92 a barrel, the biggest one-day gain on record.

The increase in the price of US light, sweet crude was driven by concerns about supply.

Production in the Gulf of Mexico is still affected by Hurricane Ike and Saudi Arabia is cutting production.

Oil traders also believe that the US government’s bank bail-out plan will help the economy and therefore demand for oil.

Last week oil traded as low as $91 a barrel. It had fallen from its peak of $147 a barrel that it reached in July.

The volatility in the price has been exacerbated by the fact that the contract for the supply of oil in October expires on Monday.

From here (I’ve cut and pasted for the purposes of discussion and that the BBC has a tendency to edit articles days later).  In my opinion what they have written is unmitigated bullshit.

Here’s what Bloomberg had to say (I’ve cut and pasted for the purposes of discussion and commentary):

Oil Posts Biggest Gain as Traders Caught in End-Month Squeeze

By Mark Shenk

Sept. 22 (Bloomberg) — Crude oil climbed more than $25 a barrel, the biggest gain ever, as traders scrambled to unwind positions on the October contract’s last day of trading. The more-active November contract rose $6.62.

“This looks like a squeeze play,” said Phil Flynn, senior trader at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago. “All of the contracts are up, but nothing like October. This is the last day of trading and someone is scrambling to guarantee supply.”

Crude oil for October delivery rose $16.37, or 17 percent, to settle at $120.92 a barrel at 2:46 p.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was the highest settlement price since Aug. 21. Futures for November delivery rose 6.4 percent to settle at $109.37 a barrel.

Prices climbed today as traders who sold the October contract last week, when oil dipped close to $90, had to buy the futures back. In a squeeze a trader has gone short by selling contracts hoping the price will decline. In the last days before the contract expires the trader must buy back the same number of futures or be forced to deliver the underlying oil.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt that’s the indication of a huge squeeze,” said Craig Pirrong, director of energy markets for the University of Houston’s Global Energy Management Institute. “It’s just stunning this could happen” given the recent scrutiny in Congress and among U.S. regulators concerning the crude oil markets, he said.

`Yawning Gap’

“It’s a very small pool playing in this market right now, and that’s why you’re seeing those massive differentials” between the October and November contracts, said David Kirsch, an energy markets analyst at PFC Energy in Washington. “Somebody did place a wrong bet and is trying to cover that position.”

“The overarching factor is that the October futures contract expires today,” said Ryan Oatman, an analyst at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey in Houston. “This is a classic short squeeze. What lead up to it was a strong euro, up on concerns U.S. government actions will ultimately result in a greater budget deficit, higher inflation and a weaker dollar.”

Investors looking to hedge against the dollar’s decline earlier this year have helped lead oil, gold, corn and gasoline to records. Oil rose as high as $130 a barrel, up from $104.55 on Sept. 19, as the dollar dropped on concern that a U.S. proposal to buy $700 billion of troubled assets from financial firms will deepen the budget deficit.

The dollar declined 2.4 percent to $1.4817 per euro, from $1.4466 on Sept. 19. It touched $1.4818, the weakest level since Aug. 22.

Hard Assets

“Gold, silver, oil, copper, just about any hard asset, is looking good at this point,” said Michael Fitzpatrick, vice president for energy risk management at MF Global Ltd. in New York. “With the dollar down and stocks getting hit, commodities look like a safe play.”

Oil has risen 33 percent since Sept. 16 as lawmakers pledged fast consideration of the Treasury’s plan to buy devalued mortgage-related securities.

“There’s a flight to quality and the energy markets are benefiting,” said Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy & Economic Research in Winchester, Massachusetts. “The dollar is down again and investors are fleeing to commodities. We are back to the cycle that pushed prices to records earlier this year.”

Hedge-fund managers and other large speculators increased their net-long position in New York crude-oil futures in the week ended Sept. 16, according to U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission data.

Speculative long positions, or bets prices will rise, outnumbered short positions by 19,379 contracts on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the Washington-based commission said in its Commitments of Traders report.

Gasoline

Gasoline for October delivery increased 10.41 cents, or 4 percent, to settle at $2.7038 a gallon in New York. Heating oil rose 14.52 cents, or 5 percent, to settle at $3.043, the biggest single-session gain since June 6.

Regular gasoline, averaged nationwide, declined 1.8 cents to $3.739 a gallon, AAA, the nation’s largest motorist organization, said today on its Web site. Pump prices reached a record $4.114 a gallon on July 17.

Crude oil prices are “too high” because the global economic slowdown may spread and cut consumption, the International Energy Agency’s deputy executive director said.

“The economic slowdown in the U.S., Europe hasn’t gotten into China, India much, but at some point you have to presume it will,” William Ramsay said in an interview in Bangkok today.

The Paris-based IEA, which advises 27 developed nations on energy policy, was set up in 1974 in response to the Arab oil embargo.

Brent crude oil for November settlement rose $6.43, or 6.5 percent, to settle at $106.04 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures Europe exchange.

From here.

Who do you think gives a better idea of what happened today?  The BBC or Bloomberg?

This could be bollocks.  I’m no expert.

The price of oil has jumped today and will continue to rise.  If you remember a while back this year lots of people were talking about how supply and demand was responsible for rising oil prices.  It’s not difficult to find them.  Do a Google search.  There were serious editorials about peak oil, how little had been invested in infrastructure, Chinese demand etc. etc.   The oil demand situation between last Friday and today has not changed.  Yet prices are going up and will continue to do so.  Demand is going to go down.  All commodities are going to go up.  They are going to go up because the Dollar is going to go down and equities are volatile. It will affect inflation as much as a devalued Dollar.

Take a look at the following chart here (via Index Explorer) market cap on loan percentage is an indicator of how much short selling is going on.  People have noticed, here’s FT.com’s Alphaville, and, with all of that in mind, why not browse today’s front pages here?

There are very few people asking if there will be any unintended (or blindingly obvious *cough* inflation) consequences from all this.

If you catch me, in some green and pleasant carbuncle, beating my arms against the earth, face down, febrile, crying “It’s retarded!  For fuck’s sake! Why does it work?  IT MAKES NO SENSE”, you’ll know I’ve been watching too much of the news.  Today’s examples come from John McCain and Barack Obama’s political campaigns.  I have nothing against either of them – it’s the campaigns, I find it extremely dull, and depressing.  Moreover the fact that things like showing your kids waiving at a video screen that has no eyes to see, and public tough talk on foreign policy, can, in themselves, affect public sentiment towards you. It makes baby Jesus weep.  In my head at least.  I’m not suggesting it’s ubiquitous.

It’s like PR: Say, for instance, a star wants to seem more family friendly – it’s arranged so that they’re photographed on a family day out, or eating an ice cream in the park (where have you heard the ice-cream line before?), and, it’s not that it’s fake; it could reflect reality, but that the pictures are just snippets, tiny parts of a picture that you won’t see the whole of.  Because, by necessity, we can’t all know each other. The specific problem is the degree to which people base their judgements on such superficial illustrations of complicated things. The news media shares blame for reporting things in such uncritical terms; by and large, unless the correspondents are total fuckwits, they know it’s a game.  They’re playing it too.  They know how complicated the world is really.

Based on how PR – through ice cream in the park, tough talk, waving at electronics, etc. – affects public image, the public must lap it up.

Are we really that retarded?  Isn’t it all a bit exploitable?  What would happen if people told the truth?  (It’s usually far more complicated than you think, you fucking dolts).  They’d fail.  Hard.  Yeah, I’m that fucking cynical.

And the worst thing?  You’d think celebrity news is inherently more dishonest than coverage of really important things, like the next leader of the free world, but it isn’t.  Celebrity news has evolved to the point where the viewer/consumer is in on the game too, rather than excluded.  Take Perez Hilton or TMZ or MrPaparazzi – they’re honest about PR.   Pictures of Gordon Brown eating an ice cream in the park?   Perez Hilton would draw cocks on the pictures in MS Paint.  The rest of the media would report them unedited.

Simon Singh, author and good egg, is being sued by the British Chiropractic Association (note: it’s not a .org.uk address) because he said chiropractors knowingly promote bogus treatments.  It is lolworthy. Their legal attack will amount to them saying they promote bogus treatments – but not knowingly. Heh.  Chiropractic medicine is based on nonsense, and lacks any solid evidence.  If it had solid evidence it would simply be referred to as medicine.

Read more about it on Holford Watch.

Have a bit of a laugh at the press release they produced saying teens need to worry more about their health – here.  What a bunch of twats.  Their press releases, in my opinion, amount to sales literature.

See also.

Someone needs to set up a “shut up or I’ll sue you blog” documenting people with thin skins suing because they can’t handle debate.

Watch for yourself here.

You know that when a television programme contains Britain in the title it’s attempting to cash-in on a collective sense of identity.  In most cases it’s a bit lazy.  In the case of Britain’s Really Disgusting Foods its symptomatic of the laziness, vacuity, and attempt to cash in on essentialist presumptions about food.   If I were to go down the essentialist route also I could sum-up the show up in a single sentence: The programme has cherry-picked the cheapest foods available to caterers in order to create a straw-man argument, cherry picked experts with vested interests against things like mechanically recovered meat, and created a cloud of brainless confusion aimed at a teenage audience on BBC 3.

The presenter, who’s mildly funny, like dandruff, starts the programmes by saying “I reckon there’s certain things that need answering once and for all, so I’ve composed an email to the meat hygiene service looking for some answers”.  He asks them if ears, eyes, eyelids, noses, brains, lips, nipples, bumholes (rather than anus – the programme is aimed at the youth, man, and they all say bumhole), tail,  testicles, penis, bones, and ballbag, are allowed in sausages.  Testicles appear twice.  Presumably for comedic purposes.  Ha ha.  Twenty minutes later we find out that none of those things are allowed in sausages.  There is, however, a loop hole that means that if you don’t call your meat products sausages they’re allowed 5% meat.  Which I’ll return to.

The programme goes on to discuss the cheapest chicken breasts available to caterers.  Which, surprisingly, or not, as the case may be, are injected with water, salt, and stabilisers.  Partly because they’re frozen.  According to the programme this is disgusting.  A great opportunity to inform the audience is missed  at every opportunity.  Salt, and the associated problems of over consumption are well known, but the chief point the programme makes about the chicken breasts is that they’re disgusting.   Without any qualification of the health ramifications of added salt – or that if consumed sensibly there’s really no problem.  But according to the programme they are disgusting simply because they’ve undergone processing.  Animal welfare can go fuck itself.  It’s not touched upon at all.

Then, at a food trade fair, to demonstrate how disgusting the cheapest, nastiest, cherry-picked faux-sausages are, they give a demonstration of how to make the cheapest, nastiest, faux-sausages. Raising the spectre of mechanically recovered meat.  In order to do this they get Richard Guy – the Real Meat Company founder, who has no conflict of interest at all, an entirely neutral contributor (like fuck)  to give a demonstration of mechanically recovered meat.  Holding up a chicken carcass that had the breast, leg, and other good bits of meat, removed.  Which is exactly what I use to make an excellent chicken soup, using the leftovers from a Sunday roast. He then goes on to explain how the meat – the straggly bits sinew etc. -  is removed in a factory to produce a paste.  They mention the use of ingredients like sodium metabisulfite, and they state, unequivocally, that it “isn’t there to make you live longer, be happier or anything else, it’s there to make a heap of disgusting meat stick together”.

Sodium metabisulfite is familiar to all home brewers.  It is used to sterilise equipment.  It is also a preservative.  It has been used to a very long time, and it has zero side-effects.  You piss it out.  It has absolutely nothing to do with sticking meat together.  It extends the shelf-life of products, and helps prevent food poisoning.  BBC 3 viewers should take what BBC 3 tells them with a pinch of salt.

Shortly after the that programme cuts to a chalk board with “The search for the Worlds Worst Sausage”  the apostrophe is missing from World presumably on purpose, for comedic purposes.  The problem with the board is that technically it’s false advertising.  The cheapest, nastiest, faux sausages they are making are not legally allowed to be called sausages.  No mention is made of the fat-content or salt content.  The two chief problems with the cheapest nastiest food you can cherry pick.  It’s referenced – they mention that fat goes in. But not how much or how much salt goes in.

The programme then consults a nutritionist, who tells us, with minimal elaboration, what we already know about the cheapest nastiest food you can cherry pick.  Nutritionally they’re not very good. Surprise surprise.

They later mention hydrogenated fats.  Hydrogenated fats are bad.  They state that hydrogenated fat “Increases risk of coronary heart disease/contains no nutritional value”.  They do increase the risk of coronary heart disease.  Similar to butter or other natural products that contain saturated fats.  However – they’re wrong about hydrogenated fats containing no nutritional value.  It’s the trans-fats which are a by-product of hydrogenated fats that have no nutritional value.  No mention is made of the problems with saturated fats.  Presumably because telling people their expensive supermarket best sausages can also be bad for their health doesn’t fit their straw-man argument.

They pick on the use of waxy starch in apple pie filling.   Which is no different from using cornflour to thicken things.  But that wouldn’t support the argument.

The programme’s attitude towards E-Numbers is similarly stupid.  At one point the host compares E-Numbers to excrement.  They mention that an E-Number colouring is derived from coal tar.  Like paracetamol used to be, and a whole host of other things utilising organic chemistry.  The idea that anything good can be derived from coal tar is ignored.  To support the argument that the E-number colouring in question is bad they mention that it’s banned in two countries.  I don’t know how many countries it is not banned in, but that doesn’t support the argument, so it’s omitted.

They talk about how marketing people give a false impression of food.  The next time I get a shag out of wearing Lynx deodorant I’ll celebrate by eating a trans-fat laden cake in a park where it’s always sunny and there’s no dog shit.  Marketing gives a misleading idea of what product is/does.  Well I never.  If the argument about misleading advertising were backed up by a coherent argument about unhealthy or disgusting food the programme may have had a point.  Instead it’s an opinion piece of the worst kind.

BBC 3 and Britain’s Most Disgusting Foods are shit.  It’s a broadly misleading programme, aimed at teenagers, that adds nothing to the argument about healthy food, and potentially increases the ignorance of its viewers.  The programme contains nothing about how much salt, saturated fat, and sugar it is healthy to consume.

Here’s Google Archives on the South Ossetia problem in the last decade.   Amazing how many talking heads and pundits on both sides of this tawdry affair are incapable of using a search engine.  Or Lexis-Nexis.  If we don’t pay attention to history the same old retarded shit will happen again and again.  With the same shrill voices cheering-on both sides.

2004.

The New Zealand Chiropractors Association is threatening to sue the New Zealand Medical Journal over an article that was critical of chiropractors written by David Colquhoun.  I’ve picked up on this via Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science blog.  It’s a stupid situation that highlights a few important things.  Firstly the problem with lawyers being used to silence free speech.  In this case the New Zealand Medical Journal is likely equipped to protect itself. But there have been many examples of less well equipped entities caving in to legal threats because of the costs involved with fighting spurious litigation.  I think it’s typical of many groups and individuals with commercial interests attempting to shut down dissent on the Internet.  You don’t need secret police to shut people up – just a good lawyer.

Secondly, in my opinion, this kind of attitude towards critics is endemic among proponents of alternative medicine.  Academics, real academics, in my experience, are an argumentative bunch.  I’ve sat in a room where debates have nearly come to blows.  But that’s acceptable.  Criticism – moreover the ability to rebut criticism – is considered a good thing.  Ph.Ds are tough.  I suspect the reason why many alternative medicine proponents are disproportionately sensitive to criticism is the lack of a solid evidence base.  Without evidence all there is is rhetoric, and opinion. Leading to frustration when confronted with evidence.  If a child could sue their parents for smashing their belief in Santa Claus they probably would.

Thirdly, and this, genuinely, has fuck-all to do with chiropractors in New Zealand, Flight of The Conchords is very good.  Particularly Murray.  Other than lamb, rugby, and penguins Flight of The Conhords is forever linked with New Zealand in my mind.  G’day mates*.  I forgive you for Zane Lowe.

Watch this video to see Murray being cheered up.

* That’s a joke, in case you’re a bit dim.

My next computer is going to be an Apple Mac or souped-up multi-core Linux system. I’ve just about had it with Windows Vista. It’s not that it’s as bad as some people say, it’s just that it can’t be relied upon to do as it is told all of the time. For instance – I had an idea on the back of a headache and got an early night – as a result I’ve been up since six arsing around. Except Vista is doing something in the background and my system is seriously sluggish. I don’t know what it is doing in the background. I’ve launched the resource monitor, looked at the task manager, and I’m fucked if I know. So I’m going to have to ditch Vista. It’s an impediment.

I’m not so keen on having to buy Apple kit. It’s expensive compared to its PC equivalent. What I’m going to do instead is buy a medium priced Asus motherboard, an Intel Core 2 Duo, an 8800g_, and build myself a new system based around Linux. I’ll run XP in something like VMWARE so I can still use Mathcad. I want the system to be fast but not using bleeding edge components. Here’s what I’m thinking:

• ASUS P5KC AiLifestyle Series iP35 Socket 775 8 channel audio ATX Motherboard
• Corsair 4GB Kit (2×2GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 XMS2 Memory Non-ECC Unbuffered CL5(5-5-5-18) Heat Spreader Lifetime Warranty
• Intel Pentium Dual Core E2200 Socket 775 2.2GHz 800FSB Retail Boxed Processor
• Samsung SpinPoint HD501LJ 500GB SATAII Hard Drive 16MB Cache – OEM
• XFX 8800GS 384MB DDR3 (580MHz) Dual DVI TV Out PCI-E Graphics Card
• Coolermaster Elite 330 Black Case With CM eXtreme Power 460W PSU

That’s a list quickly thrown together and subject to change as I read more. That comes to about £350 including VAT, PCs really aren’t that difficult to put together, and Ubuntu is free. The processor will be overclocked – I’ve been told Core 2 based Intel chips are overclockable even with reference fans and at stock voltages.

Sigh.  It’s not the end of the world.

I keep wanting to write about things that don’t matter. But through indignation at the stupidity of other people I keep writing about serious stuff that affects people. Blogging isn’t about writing about serious stuff that affects people. So I’m going to intersperse this post with anecdotes. I’ll let the wider media do their job, because, after all, entirely seriously, without any sense of irony (admitting irony to an audience would mean it isn’t), they’ve been doing somewhat better than apes such a good job.

I jotted this down yesterday night, it is 100% true:

Earlier today I handled a fuck-load of chilli peppers and washed my hands thoroughly afterwards. Obviously not thoroughly enough because a little while later, in the middle of a public place, I rubbed my eyes and cried. It was pure liquid fire. Thus, through streams of tears, I made my way to a bench and sat there, with my eyes closed and tears streaming down my cheeks. Like I was having a public breakdown. And, in a way, this is a sign of a healthy society; a couple asked me if I was OK, and a little crowd formed. Which meant having to explain that I’d gotten chilli juice on my hands and had rubbed my eyes. And that I’d washed my hands. The very worst thing was that they had looks on their faces that suggested they didn’t believe me. It’s not like you can tell some stranger to lick your finger or rub their eyes.

Boris has scrapped the oil deal with Venezuela, here’s the PA wire:

Mayor ends oil deal with Venezuela

Tory London Mayor Boris Johnson has axed a controversial tie-up with Venezuela, spelling the end to half price bus and tram travel for some of the capital’s least well off.
Predecessor Ken Livingstone signed a deal with the south American nation’s state-owned oil company last year to cut 20% of the fuel bill for buses in return for transport advice. The savings were used to offer discount fares to around 250,000 people on income support.
At the launch of his successful campaign to oust the two-term Labour Mayor, Mr Johnson dubbed the deal with Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez as “completely Caracas”. And in a statement he confirmed that it would not be renewed when it concluded in August and said work had already begun to shut down a £67,000 a year office operation in Caracas.

The big question, that, thus far nobody has asked is that what with the fucktarded bubble political opportunism/don’t blame the rush for commodities oil market, oil may be about to substantially increase in cost. Which, and I know this is a great intellectual stretch for some, may quickly mean that the paltry £67,000 saving may be wiped out entirely. Especially with potentially (FFS the number of actual claimants is likely lower than those who could claim) 250,000 people getting half price tickets. Which are going to be continued for six months. They should get half-price tickets. For starters low wages have been unofficially subsidised through things like travel discounts. But it’s going to cost more as fuel increases for reasons of greed.

But with the great economist, Boris Johnson, we’ve pulled the plug on something that has increased in value significantly since all of the mental baseless politically driven speculation concerns about oil supply. I know Venezuela isn’t really in a position to offer other countries oil discounts given its internal poverty, and I know Chavez isn’t some kind of saint, but my attitude is that if people want to offer stupid discounts for political reasons then it’s their problem and we should take it. We could always fuck him over down the line. A 20% discount on fuel that is potentially going to go through the roof is not something to play politics with.

A few weeks back a pub landlord told me off for using their toilets when I wasn’t a customer. So I told them to fuck off and walked out. I’m probably barred. It was a shit pub with dirty toilets anyway.

So, I suppose my question is: Is a £67,000 saving, and smugness that we’re not dealing with Chavez, really worth ditching a 20% discount in a time like this, what with the international situation? Does is make financial sense or are we losing significantly more than £67,000 per annum with the loss of the discount? Frankly, I don’t give a flying fuck, but it seems like the pertinent question. Sounds to me like someone is pointing a gun at their foot and pulling the trigger.

This. The testimony of Michael W. Masters at the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, United States Senate.

No more oil related posts.  I’m obsessing too much.  And, on a very fundamental level, I can’t be arsed.

Alexander Kwiatkowski and Grant Smith on $135pb oil.

Tonight’s local election coverage on BBC News 24 is, aside from David Dimbleby, completely crap.  I am currently watching Jeremy Vine do a really shit American accent, dressed as a cowboy, reading out truly woefully described statistics about the Liberal Democrats.   It’s really difficult to watch.  It’s as if someone has decided that local election coverage needs to be fun.  Fun in the sense of   BBC Children’s Television fun.  My eyes feel soiled.  I hope someone puts the Jeremy Vine clip on YouTube because I did not make this up but doubt anyone will believe me.

I like this classic because it sets up the next sentence, thus saving me words.   This can’t be distinguished from parody.   FFS.

Imagine a world before science: a world of the supernatural - hunches dictating belief, of sun blotting fallacy.  For some seriously lolworthy quackery and pseudoscience watch UFO uHnters.  For fuck’s sake.