wise words

my wife to sprog miller: "even if you put a poo in a pink box and a pink ribbon, it is still poo...just like people."

Fine parenting skills there!

TOM HARRIS KICKED OUT

...well he will be if he keeps having such sensible thoughts like this one on product placement

Not unique

HowManyOfMe.com

There are people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Apparently my wife has two people with her name!

ht: Leg Iron

STAR WARS???

I'm really not going to comment

Click here

ANOTHER BRICK....

“There is a false debate around exam results from people who forget that we have moved from a system that was preparing an elite to run society to public expectation that a very large number of people will gain good qualifications.

John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders attacking claims of grade inflation.

I'm sorry but what?

I'll repeat the quote

“There is a false debate around exam results from people who forget that we have moved from a system that was preparing an elite to run society to public expectation that a very large number of people will gain good qualifications.

What planet is this bloke on?

In a briliant article in the Sunday Times, this quote just lept up at me yesterday,
"There is an expectation that a very large number of people will gain good qualifications" ?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

I am a parent and my expectations for my daughter is that she will get the best education available - if she gets the best education then results should follow.

I want education to be elitist - that is tailored to the best abilities of each child, not dumbed down to such a lower level that they have to tinker with gradings to hide the intellectual deficit that is being served up - our children deserve better then the dross that is being served up by self-interested parties such as Dunford.

Elsewhere in the paper there was a claim that a child's reading age and ability to count develop a month earlier for every extra £100 a month in family income, according to a government-funded study to be unveiled this week.

It quotes Harriet Harman as saying

“[The report] provides an incontrovertible basis for us to move beyond inaccurate assertions made by the opposition ... David Cameron says that the differences in child outcomes between a child born in poverty and a child born in wealth are statistically insignificant when both have been raised by confident and able parents."

Oh dear, Cameroon has essentially said that a lot of how a child develops is to do with the parents and not the state - naughty David

She added: "But what he fails to say is that you can’t separate out good parenting skills from family income. The two are so strongly correlated. So this is an utterly misleading portrayal of the evidence.”

YES YOU BLOODY CAN YOU! How dare she say this. Why does Labour insist on servitude of the poorer classes? This woman from St Paul's for Girls has the nerve of claiming that because you are poor you may not have good parenting skills.

Let me tell you Harridan Harperson, I know plenty of good, intelligent people who were born and bred in poverty and thank their parents for introducing them to books, newspapers and civil society. I also know plenty of people who have been born silver-spooned, who in my opinion are some of the thickest, selfish, evil people you could come across.

Money does not equate good parenting - good parents equate with good parenting, be it married, partnerships or single parents.

BUY NOKIA

Gordon Brown will give evidence to the Iraq Inquiry before the general election, the BBC understands.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahhaha...ah

Buy Nokia shares, there'll be a few replacements needed at Mr Chicken's house!



( yeah I know the pic is of an i-phone but images used are for illustrative purposes only...er or summat!)

BBC

The BBC did its best yesterday reminding people how evil Tories are with the Jeremey Vine show debating what was worse, Thatcher's '81 recession vs Brown's 2009-? recession.

And it really annoys me.

If the polls are right then I would expect the Conservatives to really go for the Beeb since it seems to be on a self-destruct course.

The thing is I am a massive fan of the BBC. If you have seen US tv, until the likes of HBO came along and forced channels to raise their game, it was crap.

We got the cream of US tv, people seem to forget for every Hill Street Blues and Cheers,we also got Who's the Boss. It was part of a package - ITV, Ch4 and BBC had to take rubbish which was syphoned to a dead-end as well as the quality programmes.

The BBC has it's problems like any public organisation.

What is the percentage of managers, diversity officers etc, compared to the creators - you know the people who are meant to be there - same with health, education etc.

Sack all those people and get the Beeb back to being (to use a sickening phrase) the "people's broadcaster"

It is a jewel that is frantically trying to kill itself and it's a shame

HEALTH

So a cardio-surgeon want to cut the use of butter does he?

Other better bloggers have posted on this but there seems to be an abiding problem with healthcare at the moment.

Thanks to playing rugby I have a re-occuring knee problem which occasionally results in having to use a walking stick.

Why don't I go to my GP? I hear you ask.

Well the last time I went to the GP, I was worried I had a chest infection as both my wife and child were suffering from one. That month was particularly busy and I could not take anytime off so thought pre-emption would be the best avenue.

What I got instead was a typical tick-box appointment. Eventually the GP did listen to my chest but only because I said I smoked. Indeed she was bitterly disappointed that I had a clear chest and good lungs - hey what can i say, I've got efficient lungs, be pleased Doc.

She also wanted me to go for a blood test at a hospital - scuse me? What's that got to do with what I came in for? Ah yes, money for referrals. Ridiculous.

You are a doctor, I come in about a chest infection, see if there's an issue then treat the problem, don't start tick-boxing so you can generate more income for the practice. Oh, and while we're at it, do on-call - I have to in my profession, others have to in their's, why can't you?

Hell, when my dad was a GP, they didn't have mobiles. As a result, after seeing a patient after-hours, he would have to drive home to see if there were any other patients to see and then go out again - and that was for a lot less money then some of you 9-5ers are getting nowadays!

Quote of the day:

When will you doctors come to terms with the fact that in your line of work you're going encounter an unusually large number of sick people?

The Devil

PENSIONS

The pension deficit for local councils in England and Wales could hit £60bn this year according to the Lib Dems.

Apart from a firm case of NSS there are other important factors about this.

Firstly - Like the misguided FRS17, this does not mean councils are going to go bust. Don't panic. The defecit figures are a snapshot based on one particular day and that valuation of shares, bonds etc held by a pension fund versus if every single member of that pension fund retiring that day.

What this does mean is that there will have to be siginificant shifts in the portfolio value to pay for those who retire.

Which leads me to-
Secondly - the fundamental flaw in civil service pensions. They are protected by law, which means that there needs to be an act of Parliament before any siginificant change to provision can be applied.

Which means you and I pay for it, either through cut services or higher tax bills.

This two-tier system has been flawed for quite a number of years and I have blogged about it in the past.

The State can no longer give such gold plated schemes to non-income generators - ie: they spend the money we give them, they do not generate the income of the country.

State-employed wages have rocketed in the past 13 years and the original excuse of poor wages versus life service can no longer apply. Sure there are still lowly paid council workers but there are lowly paid private workers - why should council workers get better deals?

GIVE ME STRENGTH

TV character Peppa Pig will be seen wearing a seatbelt in future episodes, after parents raised concerns over children following her example.

Oh give me strength it's a cartoon which originally decided against putting seatbelts in because it would restrict movement in the CARTOON. Surely parents can enforce seatbelt wearing...oh...

But [Astley Baker Davies] reversed its stance after a parent complained that her daughter had refused to wear a seatbelt because Peppa did not.

Sheesh

STAR WARS BURLESQUE

I make no comment...


More here

BEER

Sigh, so the Tories are going to war against high volume alcohol. As others have blogged extensively about this, I won't but I will say one thing -

Exactly how does a nanny-state confer responsibility to the individual? If someone wants to go out and get bladdered that is their choice as long as it's legal surely?

I am having a hard time reconciling the ideals spouted by Cameroon with what is actually coming out from his party.

I want a party of smaller, more efficient state. I want a party that will treat adults as adults. I want a party that will let me as an adult make my own decisions for myself and my family and I want a party that allows for upward mobility and chances and not one that drags every one down into a serfdom, tucking its forelock to those that "know better".

The only thing I can see about voting for Dave at the moment is that he is not the disaster zone that is Brown.

6 MAY

According to foot-in-mouth minister, Chris Bryant. the election will be 6 May, the same date as the local elections

Is that a Nokia I can hear breaking?

h/t tory politico

SLEEPTALKING

Courtesy of Dizzy alovely blog where a wife posts her husband's sleep mutterings including:
"Oompa loompas don't sing in heaven. They tidy up the clouds."

"Legs time! Everybody get your legs!"

See here!

GORDO's BOTTLE

I am amused by the latest revelations from Former Labour General Secretary Peter Watt that Gordo bottled the election.

Not only did they have 1.5m leaflets printed but had a fleet of limos circling Parliament Square to whisk ministers away to campaign.

However, anyone who was in the village or knew people in the village in 97 have their own stories to tell about the farce that was the election that wasn't.

For instance I know of at least four PR professionals who had already started being paid retainers and had been granted absence of leave for the election.

Also there was one poor constituency that was ordered the morning of the expected announcement to ditch targetted leaflets and posters that had costed them £100,000 to produce.

And that constituency happened to have a cabinet minister as its MP!

CLIMATE

After the events of December I decided to have a break and recharge but now I am back.

So as everyone slithers around like Charlie Chaplin permanently going round corners I was amused to read that the House of Lords closed early on Wednesday and cancelled a scheduled debate.

The subject?

Global Warming