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Gutter Journalism! I can’t believe this has been the headline news for the last couple of days. Just watched the 10 O’clock “News” disgraceful spin on this non-story.
Mrs Pratt now says she has had only 4 "enquiries" to her Bullying helpline from staff over the past 18 months from the PMs & Deputy PMs department. No details, no complaints, no evidence, no substance just innuendo . Hardly evidence for anything. A disgraceful breach of confidentiality and you must ask what were her motives for doing this with no evidence at all to back up her claims.
This is just a disgraceful orchestrated character assassination and smear campaign with Cameron scoring political points from the sidelines.
Cannot believe that Brown even gets stick for being emotional at the death of his daughter. However I suppose he would have been slated anyway for being hard and uncaring if he had not been emotional. No win situation when the Press are just out to get you.
Agree Corm, the Snow Cross was excellent and I thought it was just me getting irate at that commentator continually getting it wrong and mixing up the competitors.
Looking forwards to the woman’s event in a couple of days
I have to agree with Himself in that Brown appears to me a decent man doing his best. He gets my vote over smarmy Cameron. I have found some of the previous personal attacks on Brown such as on his disability to be very bad taste. Now I read in this thread that there was a “culture of bullying and mob-rule .. endemic in The Labour Party administration over the last 13 years “. Wasn’t Thatcher supposedly a blatant bully who terrorised her cabinet? Isn’t any strong leader going to p**s off someone and get accused of bullying?
Of course the press love to make this a personality contest rather than focus on party policies and the real issues of what the parties are saying. However that would take some real journalism.
Just got this emailed from a friend. Made me chuckle!
Not sure where it came from but suspect an Aussie origin. Whatever it takes the P out of most nations. Enjoy!The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent terrorist threats and have raised their security level from "Miffed" to "Peeved." Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to "Irritated" or even "A Bit Cross."
The English have not been "A Bit Cross" since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies all but ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorized from "Tiresome" to a "Bloody Nuisance." The last time the British issued a "Bloody Nuisance" warning level was during the great fire of 1666.
The Scots raised their threat level from "Pissed Off" to "Let’s get the Ba**ards" They don’t have any other levels. This is the reason they have been used on the front line in the British army for the last 300 years.
The French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from "Run" to "Hide". The only two higher levels in France are "Collaborate" and "Surrender". The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France ’s white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country’s military capability.
Italy has increased the alert level from "Shout loudly and excitedly" to "Elaborate Military Posturing". Two more levels remain: "Ineffective Combat Operations" and "Change Sides."
The Germans also increased their alert stat e from "Disdainful Arrogance" to "Dress in Uniform and Sing Marching Songs". They also have two higher levels: "Invade a Neighbour" and "Lose".
Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual, and the only threat they are worried about is NATO pulling out of Brussels .
The Spanish are all excited to see their new submarines ready to deploy. These beautifully designed subs have glass bottoms so the new Spanish navy can get a really good look at the old Spanish navy.
Americans meanwhile and as usual are carrying out pre-emptive strikes on all of their allies, just in case.
And in the southern hemisphere…
New Zealand has also raised its security levels – from "baaa" to "BAAAA!". Due to continuing defence cutbacks (the air force being a squadron of spotty teenagers flying paper aeroplanes and the navy some toy boats in the Prime Minister’s bath), New Zealand only has one more level of escalation, which is "****, I hope Australia will come and rescue us".
Australia , meanwhile, has raised its security level from "No worries" to "She’ll be right, mate". Three more escalation levels remain: "Crikey!’, "I think we’ll need to cancel the barbie this weekend" and "The barbie is cancelled". So far no situation has ever warranted use of the final escalation level
Does anyone else think both the IRA and Unionist terror organisations might just have been hiding behind a cause? They were and still are fronts for organised crime. They were always businesses with loads of money pouring in from the US other international sources and organised crime. Lots of people did very well and are doing very well from the troubles.
It was not till the US money and support dried up that there was any possibility of a political solution.
Just a thought!
I prefer my whisky wet
Talisker is also my fav but I do not have the pallet to distinguish them by age.
There is a really nice and underrated whisky from just outside Glasgow called Auchentoshan I would recommend. Very smooth and nothing like the island malts but I enjoy it.
I have backed Halcon Genelardais to give me a run for my money with an e/w on Silver by Nature. Lucinda Russell does not travel normally so far to make up numbers and she spoke highly about this horse before Xmas. Whatever it would be great for this good stable to get a good run here.
Good luck All!
Northern Alliance looks likely to slog around today for me. I have Knowhere e/w as well.
So thats the two to avoid for now
Graham,
"If they carry weapons openly then they are not civilians i’d assume".
Weapons in Iraq/Afghanistan are as common as mobile phones over here and they are carried openly out of the major conurbations. They are for sale openly in the street bazaars. Most families have at least an AK47 to defend themselves. Most homes have stashes of weapons including grenades, RPGs etc. If I lived there I would carry a weapon for self defence. Indeed most of the fighting is really from Crime i.e. blood feuds, stealing from each other, drug trafficking etc rather than related to insurgency. There is a bounty on any ISAF forces soldiers’ life. In Iraq this was $10,000. With so much poverty you can understand that is an attractive offer.
Most of the killings of Afghans by far are by Taleban or AQ deliberately targeting civilians. Any ISAF killings of civilians are not intentional.
Paul,
Your retorical question implied logic in the action in Afghanistan v action in Saudi. That was what I took from your statement.
Whether you agree with the UN mandate personally is a mute point. It is the international justifciation for the action and the mission aims appear good.
The point I am making is that the Press are not reporting the conflict in a balanced way. That is my opinion right or wrong.
The British military approach in Ireland was not to pull out and leave the country to fight a civil war.
I am off to watch some racing now.
Paul,
This is just something I feel passionate about.Maybe the 48 Governments line is actually a good reason why we are in there! This action was taken under a UN Mandate not one government. Any number of wrongs do not make a right so I do not see your point in suggesting that we should be invading Saudi or any other state because their terrorists are worse than another bunch. The armchair view of international hypocrisy is not one that holds any water for the troops on the ground.
I think it’s pointless talking about the past just now. I am more interested in the present and the future i.e. Stabilise the country for the Afghans to take over and get our troops out. It is clear to me that the terrorists are playing to the media which is wearing down the revolve of the public which in turn encourages the Taleban.
For my mind changing the tone of the press coverage would cut the head of the Taleban efforts and reduce this conflict by years. Is a bit of balanced reporting showing what ISAF is doing on the ground to much to ask for? Could we have some stories on the majority of Afghans who want ISAF to stay and are frightened of the Taleban coming back? I suppose that is not sensational enough for the press.
War is dirty. If a SAS soldier infiltrated the Taleban and managed to kill a number of them then we would be hailing him as some kind of hero. I can just see the Sun headlines now with the possibility of a VC. However when the same happens to us we are outraged. Sometimes I think that the public think this is some kind of computer game we are involved in. The Taleban are using the same tactics that the IRA did against us for years and no amount of specialist equipment is going to stop us taking more casualties aginst this kind of low technology threat.
"I am not a political person. I cannot understand why we are in Afghanistan except I think we were pushed into it by the USA."
Your honest comment sums up why we are helping the terrorists do their job for them. We are there as part of a NATO UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force along with another 47 countries. The main difference in this Afghan war from previous is that in this conflict ISAF is not trying to conquer Afghanistan. We are trying to stabilise the country and get out ASAP.
Most people have forgotten why we are there. Every bomb the terrorists set off to kill an ISAF soldier is actually aimed at all of us. The terrorist know that the only way they can win such a conflict is to get on TV and in our Press to multiply the effect. Just like Vietnam they win by manipulating fickle public opinion “back home”. Take away the oxygen of publicity and this would be all over relatively quickly.
Indeed you could argue that we are all putting our own troop’s lives in greater danger by our well meaning but naïve view of this conflict. Getting out of Afghanistan now could be a lot bloodier both in the long and short term for our troops.
Whatever if you want to know more about why we are there i.e the ISAF Missions you could try the following hyperlink to the NATO website. I paste a small section below.
http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_8189.htm
"NATO’s main role in Afghanistan is to assist the Afghan Government in exercising and extending its authority and influence across the country, paving the way for reconstruction and effective governance. It does this predominately through its UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force.
Since NATO took command of ISAF in 2003, the Alliance has gradually expanded the reach of its mission, originally limited to Kabul, to cover Afghanistan’s whole territory. The number of ISAF troops has grown accordingly from the initial 5,000 to around 50.000 troops coming from 42 countries, including all 28 NATO members.ISAF missions
ISAF is a key component of the international community’s engagement in Afghanistan, assisting the Afghan authorities in providing security and stability and creating the conditions for reconstruction and development.Security
In accordance with all the relevant Security Council Resolutions, ISAF’s main role is to assist the Afghan government in the establishment of a secure and stable environment. To this end, ISAF forces are conducting security and stability operations throughout the country together with the Afghan National Security Forces and are directly involved in the development of the Afghan National Army through mentoring, training and equipping"Have a nice day
If my memory serves me well wasn’t it the Tories who took us into Europe? Cameron will say anything to get elected. The rest of the party will say nothing to get elected!
Not sure if I can agree with you here AP.
The point many have been making is that Cameron alone is not the Tory party. The same old faces are still there. While Cameron has done well to keep them all quiet and say nothing his big problem comes when he has to start putting real policies out. Hannan, Duncan et al are all the Tory party.
Just wait till they have to put out a policy on Europe for instance and I am pretty sure they will al come out of the wood work.
I cannot see any of the present bunch winning. The winner might be somebody new put into the house.
You miss the point Dave!
The public attention span for politics now appears to be no longer than the sound bite of someone like Nick Robinson giving his views in the grassy area out side of Westminster. That few seconds of contrived hype is what determines most peoples political views. Its all very shallow with the press making the news rather than reporting it.
If you spent as little time studying horse racing form you would not expect to back many winners. Thats why we end up with the politicians we have.
Actually, I can’t be ar**ed talking about this anymore. Going to settle down with a nice little malt and chill studying the form for Hamilton tomorrow night.
Not sure where it came from but suspect an Aussie origin. Whatever it takes the P out of most nations. Enjoy!
