New Oxford Dictionary of National Biography launched. Surely it wasn’t Stephen Lawrence that changed policing, but his murderer or murderers, the police themselves and the campaigners that worked on that issue? Poor Stephen Lawrence was just another teenager going about his own business, not someone who helped to form the nation by his own hands.
Category: current affairs
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RIP
Brian Clough, 1935-2004, and manager of Brighton and Hove Albion for a few months in 1974.
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Ivan Man
Smells of Eubank, which is a fairly horrific concept.
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tempus fugit
I’m having one of those days when, whenever I look at the clock, another whole hour has scooted by with very little actually being achieved. This hasn’t been helped by having to take at least 40 minutes out of my day to update software in order to avoid miscreants trying to do unspeakable things with my lovely data.
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The peas process?
From Nick Assinder’s report on today’s PMQs:
…there were two fairly straight answers.
One was to Charles Kennedy who is pressing for the Gurkhas to be given British citizenship. The prime minister said he had no problem with it and would give a full answer soon.
The other was to backbencher Andrew Turner who asked what the prime minister was going to do about mange tout – forgive me for not noting down why.
Mr Blair hesitated, looked at his notes and declared: "I don’t know. But I’m sure we are doing something." -
Shocking
As another journalist dies in Iraq, evidence suggests that US military reporting of events may not be entirely accurate. Now there’s a surprise. I wonder how widely this aspect of the news will be reported in the US?
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Meat and two veg
Remember the BBC online picture comedy caption writer? I think he’s still at large.
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Beslan, Bill and Bush
Anyone else reckon that Dubya’s presidential campaign will have been strengthened by the events in Beslan? Any act involving terrorists and schoolchildren is likely to strengthen his appeal amongst American voters, as his stance on terrorism is one of his strongest policy elements as perceived by many people.
Kerry’s campaign will also have undoubtedly taken a knock with the news that Bill Clinton is effectively out of it now whilst he undergoes treatment for a heart condition.
So, at the moment, and much as it pains me, my money would be on George to retain the presidency, albeit by a slim margin. -
Comedy headline
From this week’s Littlehampton Gazette, a headline on a story about a fire at a washeteria:
My Smouldering LaunderetteArf!
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Showers moving west
Goodbye to magnetic clouds, and all that. I think this is rather sad, as I’ve grown up with the familiar three-lobed cloud shapes. It’s possible to look at a BBC weather chart and instantly discern the prevailing conditions, without having to read the accompanying text or listen to the forecaster (although one should always listen to Rob McElwee as he is a minor deity after all – "There’s a deep depression moving in from the Atlantic, and we ALL know what that means, don’t we?"). I also wonder if this will mean the end of the traditional opening of the forecast (well, in days of old at least, and occasionally still today) with a North Atlantic synoptic chart – which, for anyone with even a basic A-level grounding in meteorology, provides enough information to get the general gist of how the weather will be.