Best talk between songs ever: This song is from is my mom’s favourite out of the four records. Because I don’t scream on it. My dad prefers it when I scream but my mom prefers it when I…sing pretty. So this song is my mom’s favourite. It’s called “Damaged from the Start”. (And later in…
Read More DryHave we talked about James Reason? I don’t think we have. So he’s a Manchester University cognitive psychologist, best known for the Swiss-cheese model of accidents, which he developed in the context of aviation human factors research. Imagine a block of Swiss cheese. To get to an accident, we need to pass through it; the…
Read More Would we know if a financial crisis nearly happened tomorrow?Alex Massie may be a Tory, but on this one, he kills: Is there anything more pathetic, more risible than rich and privileged Britons whining that their cadre fails to receive a fair shake in the matter of admissions to this country’s most prestigious universities? Oh, sure, I suppose there must be but the smugness…
Read More more pathetic, more risibleRemember Kam Air, fabulous Afghan airline, repeatedly blogged here? Sure you do. The U.S. military has blacklisted Afghanistan’s largest private airline, alleging it is smuggling “bulk” quantities of opium on civilian flights to Tajikistan, a corridor through which the drugs reach the rest of the world. Kam Air was barred this month from receiving U.S.…
Read More Kam AirWell, I’m on record as saying that since June, 2010, I’m all in with Team Desiccated Calculating Machine. And wouldn’t that be a good name for a blog. So, here’s a bland and technocratic thing. The Health Service Journal reports Andy Burnham’s NHS speech, and seems to think it’s pretty good. The key points are…
Read More Sensible ideas.Remember the magic lie-detector voice analyzer? It’s baaack. Also, Cornish Tory councillor Fiona Ferguson is a mensch. Here’s the story; it seems the council hired Capita aka Crapita to put the fear of God into people claiming single person’s council tax discount (THE BASTARDS!). Capita, which is the sole UK distributor of 100% guaranteed pure…
Read More Not this shit again. In which I praise a ToryCold War nuts should follow Mike Kenner’s Twitter feed if they’re not already. His key shtick is getting interesting documents under FOIA and tweeting them bit by bit. This week, he’s got the national war instructions for the police, from 1977, codenamed POLWIN. This is some pretty bleak stuff, obviously; I can’t imagine instructions on…
Read More …and give reasons in writingSo, Create Streets. Inside Housing has the story, pointing out that the thing campaigning for knocking down high-rise social housing in south London is basically a group of Tories. But there’s a bit more, or less, to it than that. Their wesbite won’t tell you whether they are a company, a charity, a lobby, or…
Read More A slightly less simple plan.A quick post, too long for twitter. @danielblaney @tobyperkinsmp @OwenJones84 I supported overthrow of Saddam Hussein. Rather proud of that. Pity ppl who didn't. — Luke Akehurst (@lukeakehurst) January 20, 2013 The problem with telling me that you got it wrong about Iraq because you’re such a nice guy is that all I hear is…
Read More A very short post about IraqThe Daily Mirror mocks Lord Freud’s overhoused condition and quotes Owen Jones: We’re told this is about bringing down the £21billion housing benefit bill. But we’d save much more if we stopped using housing benefit to line the pockets of private landlords charging absurd rents. Building homes would create jobs, and if we brought rents…
Read More house music all night long.