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Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

Grandad October 13th, 2011

I had the misfortune to watch the presidential debate last night.

What a shower of fucking tossers! There isn’t one of ‘em deserves to be captain of a rowing boat, let alone president of the country.

McGuinness of course spent his time waffling on about his part in the Peace Process in Norn Iron, totally overlooking the fact that there wouldn’t have been a need for a peace process but for him and his pals in the IRA. The only way to survive his speeches is to count the number of times he uses the word “rayaliddy”. Bonus points are awarded for “rayaliddy of the siteeashun”.

Norris was his usual self, full of bonhomie towards the other candidates. The only problem with him is that he never shuts the fuck up. Once launched, he becomes completely unstable and won’t stop until someone hits him.

Davis blotted her copybook when she was asked about being on the board of a building society that was handing out 100% mortgages. Firstly she couldn’t explain how she got on the board, hotly denying that there was political favouritism, and then said she had no knowledge of the fact that the company was recklessly lending money. She was on the board but didn’t know what was going on? What the fuck was she doing on the board, so?

Gallagher turned out to be a died in the wool Fianna Failer. As far as he is concerned, Fianna Fail’s shite is chocolate. Fuck that!

Higgins just didn’t come across at all. He was like the ghost of Christmas past, blathering on about nothing in particular.

Mitchell was another waffler. If I hear just once more how he and his family come from a humble background, I swear I’ll shoot the fucker myself.

And then there was Dana.

Ah, sweet Dana.

First of all she couldn’t explain how when she was taking out American citizenship that the oath didn’t apply to her when it came to renouncing all other allegiances. The oath was read out to her but she all but said her fingers were crossed when she took it. Then of course there was the Big Dramatic Moment. That came towards the end when she suddenly stepped up to the microphone and read out a pre-prepared script abut some dramatic news that was about to break and how she was denying it all. She was nearly in tears reading her piece, yet when she was asked what the fuck she was talking about, she wouldn’t say. It was either a brilliantly staged attempt at winning the sympathy vote or else she is a brainless paranoid twat. I prefer the latter theory.

There was only one winner last night.

Seven fucking losers and one winner.

I’m voting for Miriam O’Callaghan.

Lets occupy Europe

Grandad October 7th, 2011

I was sniffing around my feed reader yesterday when this popped up.

Now I’m not a very keen news follower as it usually is the same depressing stuff – the Daily Murder, the EU interfering in something or other, or the imminent demise of the world’s finances, so I’m only partially aware that there was something going on in Wall Street.

What Kirk M has found is what may loosely be termed a manifesto, though as Kirk M points out, it’s more a declaration of what pisses them off rather than a set of proposals.

What struck me on reading it is that this is pretty much a list of the gripes we have here. Some of the gripes pertain fairly exclusively to America, but where we remove those, we can add quite a few more about loss of democracy and the devious handing over of power to the EU, not to mention the thousands of new laws and regulations being imposed on us from an unelected bunch of power crazed fuckwits in Brussels.

I wonder if there is any chance of the movement spreading this far?

National revolutions are fairly commonplace but a continental revolution would be a fine beast to behold.

How about it?

And here I reproduce [with no kind permission from Kirk M] the document.

-oOo-

Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.

They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.

They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.

They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.

They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices.

They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.

They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.

They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.

They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.

They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.

They have sold our privacy as a commodity.

They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.

They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.

They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.

They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them.

They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.

They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit.

They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.

They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.

They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.

They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.

They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.

They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

America , Politics , The EU
Comments(19)

The Magnificent Seven

Grandad September 28th, 2011

Some of you who are fortunate enough not to reside on this blighted Island may not be aware that we have a presidential election coming up.

Quite why we have a president, I’m not sure. The only time we ever see him or her is when some Bigwig comes calling or when there is a tragedy overseas and we need someone to mouth the appropriate words of sympathy. In other words, a fucking great waste of money.

There are seven candidates apparently, so I had better tell you who they are so that you too can sit riveted to the television as the results of the election are called. These are they, in alphabetical order.

Mary Davis. I haven’t a fucking clue who she is. Something to do with a charity? Never heard of her before this latest bandwaggon started rolling.

Sean Gallagher. An utter fuckwit. His only claim to fame is that he was on the panel of the Irish version of “Dragon’s Den”. He seems to think this gives him some kind of status in this country. Sadly, it probably does.

Michael D Higgins. He has been representing Galway in the Dail since God was a child. An intellectual but with a very irritating voice. He always talks as if his bollox was trapped in a vice. I don’t know the significance of the “D”. I can only suppose that his parents loved the name Michael so much that they named their sons “Michael A”, “Michael B” and so on, and that our candidate was fourth out of the traps.

Martin McGuinness. Not to be confused with the Martin McGuinness who was the leader of the IRA. The fact that they are the same bloke is apparently irrelevant. No one can understand a word he says anyway unless they are from Derry.

Gay Mitchell. The first of the Gays on the list. Comes from a dynasty of professional politicians. One assumes he is in the race because the Presidency is about the one area the Mitchells haven’t cracked yet.

David Norris. The second Gay on the list which should have a few Good Irish Catholics in a tailspin. Can be very entertaining but insists on talking about James Joyce all the time. Once started, it’s difficult to shut him up.

Dana [aka Rosemary Scallon]. Has made a career out of the fact that she once sang a song in the Eurovision Song Contest back in 1970. Is also a professional religious nutcase.

So they are the seven runners. A lovely selection you must admit.

Who will I be voting for?

Dustin the Turkey, of course.

Politics , Rambles
Comments(20)

Uses for an Aras

Grandad August 3rd, 2011

I wish they would drop this Presidential Election farce.

It’s bad now but it’s going to get a hell of a lot worse.

Yesterday we had Norris dropping out of the race which saddened me a little as he added a lot of colour to the whole affair. Not that I would have voted for him – I wouldn’t have been able to take all the feeble jokes about a queen being a president. I like him as a person but he just ain’t presidential material.

What the fuck do we need a president for anyway? We aren’t even a country any more, just a little back yard in the Fourth Reich. The whole business costs a fortune, and the Aras in the Park could be put to much better use. It would make an excellent brothel? A pub? A dosshouse for the homeless?

aras
The Aras

With Norris out of the way, the dross that’s left doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. There isn’t one who I would be happy to have as my representative, and some that would make me want to hand in my citizenship.

Unless of course you want me to be president?

In which case, forget everything I said.