Red Leader: Enemy activity has been slight

hello

its late innit

and so here we go

not been around this late for aaaages

Woohoo!

700 visitors and 1,822 page views.

And I've not even written anything.

Behold ME for I am Become God.

Tremble before your leader.

Sing Hosannahs in the...

Oh.

The stats machine is busted.

Bollocks.

Woohoo!

Took kid for tour of Anfield on his birthday on Saturday.

FANTASTIC!

Sat in Stevie G's place in the dressing rooms, (which were surprisingly basic), walked down the tunnel, touched the "This IS ANFIELD" sign, sat in Rafa's seat in the dugout, had photy taken with fifth Champions League cup, toured museum and generally had a fab time.

Stadium looked TINY when empty, which is something I've never seen before.

Tour guide pointed out the directors' box in the stands and said, "that's were directors, friends, guests and injured players sit - so Harry Kewell's got his own kettle in there!"

Poor Shambo.

What a bunch of w*nkers those coppers looked last night.

The fist-brained arm of the law strikes again.

Bastards.

Let's hear a cheer for America's New Rich, the top one per cent of earners in the wealthiest nation the planet has ever known.

This tiny elite is taking home $1.35 trillion a year, a figure in excess of the take-home pay of the whole of France, Italy or Canada.

But these people had not just been getting richer during the Bush years they have been creating for themselves a separate country, a state within a state closed to those with a net worth under $10m.

A new book out by Robert Frank calls this country "Richistan."

This American plutonomy had also created an unusual inversion in normal market forces.

If you were to appeal to the Richistanis with a service or a product, the more you charged for it, the more likely they were to buy it.

Cutting prices and margins not only began to seem like an irrelevance in 70 per cent of the market, it threatened to be commercial suicide.

The fastest-selling watches in Richistan are not Rolexes - they do not make it into the top 10 brands.

The number one sellers are watches made by a newcomer called Franck Muller who had realised that Rolexes were way too cheap.

A Muller watch sells for nearly $750,000.

Ajay Kapur, Citigroup's head of global strategy, came up with one other world economy where the inequality gap was so high that the principles of plutonomy had begun to apply:

The UK.

Well that's just great, isn't it?

Britain is now officially recognised as a tax haven.

But only for the rich.

AND SO TO THE NEW "COLD WAR"

Many of the super rich now larging it in the Capital are from the "new" Russia.

So-called oligarchs who seized once nationalised assets and took them for themselves under deals with Yeltsin.

It's been the Blair way not to ask to many questions about where this mountain of money came from nor whether it was "clean."

Dirty money attracts dirty work.

Now British public figures from the Foreign Secretary downwards have targeted their displeasure on Vladimir Putin's administration after the discovery of yet another plot to kill a prominent Russian in London.

Unlike Alexander Litvinenko, murdered with polonium-210 last year, Boris Berezovsky escaped assassination

When Putin, Yeltsin's successor, threw off Berezovsky's embrace in 2000 he won popular acclaim.

Berezovsky quickly scooted over to London, gaining formal status as a political refugee and suggesting that Russia's authoritarian regime could be brought to an end only by force.

Sooo...

Russian prosecutors insist they have good grounds for putting him on trial for his commercial activities; they have repeatedly called for his extradition.

Each request has been rebuffed by the FO.

The Kremlin, years before it started arguing that it is constitutionally prohibited from extraditing its citizens, sought a reciprocal relationship with London.

It never happened.

So is it so surprising that Andrei Lugovoy, the principal suspect in the Litvinenko murder investigation, has not been delivered into British custody?

And is it really so strange that Russian hitmen are prowling the streets of London?

Fuck off!

That surely would be the reaction of any normal person upon reading the latest piece of breath-taking self-righteous bleating from the CBI - or 'the bosses' group' as they like to call themselves.

"Business leaders are to deliver a tough warning to the government that employees are spending millions of hours a year sitting in doctors' waiting rooms during office hours because of the lack of weekend GP clinics.

"Three and a half million working days were lost last year because employees went to see a doctor during working hours, according to the Confederation of British Industry."

Aw.

Shame, eh?

Lazy bastard workers being ill in business hours and thus taking some vitally-needed profits away from the greasy fat-arsed slimeballs?

Surely The Unelected Big Clunking Scots Fist and his grisly band of nanny-cronies will make it illegal to be sick at times when it doesn't suit the bosses and order us instead to use our precious weekends to see our GPs?

I know something like that would get MY vote.

I felt bad yesterday when, ordering drinks at the bar of a fairly rough alehouse, I saw an old friend who has fallen on hard times staggering towards me grinning broadly.

I turned to my colleague and quietly said "Oh fucking hell! NO!" or words to that effect.

Upon which, my old friend stopped in his tracks, looked hurt and shambled back to his table without saying a word.

I don't like blithely upsetting people and I hate being rude.

But it was a gut reaction and it was too late to take it back.

I didn't feel quite so bad a few minutes later though.

Sitting it the "beer garden" (piece of ragged concrete with a few tatty tables) surrounded by office workers and families with kids, I was horrified to see my rat-arsed old mate roll out of the bar, unzip his flies and take a long, no-hands piss in the grid!

In fact, I gave thanks that he HAD taken offence and so avoided sitting next to us when he decided to relieve himself.

Because...

I've been burnt by the white heat of the technology revolution and got wireless broadband in my humble hovel.

Now I can be online 24/7 and never have to meet, see or even talk to anyone in real life ever again.

Help me.

*ponders wisdom of white heat enthusiasm*

Oh here we go...

A "Big Brother" plan to automatically hand the police details of the daily journeys of millions of motorists tracked by road pricing cameras across the country were inadvertently disclosed by the Home Office last night.

Leaked Whitehall papers reveal that Home Office and transport ministers have clashed over plans for legislation this autumn enabling the police to get automatic "real-time" access to the bulk data from the traffic cameras now going into operation.

The Home Office says the police need the data from the cameras, which can read and store every passing numberplate, "for all crime fighting purposes".

The police "need the data"?

Who says?

Oh, yeah. THE POLICE.

I believe the police have already been granted enough "new powers" under this authoritarian government without the need to give them yet more.

Is there to be no such thing as privacy any more then?

Are we to see the creeping sureveillance of the State intrude into every nook and cranny of our lives all under the bogus catch-all of The War Against Terrrr?

Bollocks.

This is going to be interesting...

Just noticed I have nowt left in my inhaler and I have a hideous feeling there's an asthma event about to happen.

I'm a good eight miles from the nearest safety.

Oh fuck.

Calm.

Breathe.

CALM!!!!!

*panics*

The shortage of human organs for transplant means doctors should be able to take them from any dead body unless the person has registered their refusal, the chief medical officer said today.

The NHS needs three times the number of organ donors on its register, Sir Liam Donaldson said.

Back in 2003, doctors proposed a radical change in medical law to allow the NHS to buy organs from live donors in Britain and Europe.

It was debated in closed session by the British Medical Association, the powerful organisation representing doctors throughout the UK. It was overruled.

I have to say I automatically recoil from the idea of our bodies being donated to the State as a matter of course.

It is for an individual to decide, in a deliberate and dignified way, whether they want to donate organs.

It is not for the State to assume it may chop up our bodies as it pleases.

The establishment seems to be under the impression we are toiling under a Marxist regime that can alter the laws of humanity overnight - without debate or question.

Has this executive no respect for the individual any more?

For no other reason than respect and a sense of proportion.

Ninety years ago, between the months of July and November, more than half a million men died in the rain-sodden fields of Belgium in World War One's last great attritional battle.

Passchendaele was the third battle at Ypres, the bloodiest and biggest for the British army and its empire forces. It started on July 13, 1917.

The mud stopped tanks and all but immobilised infantry who were decimated by a new battlefield horror - mustard gas.

The village of Passchendaele was finally taken on November 6.

The offensive cost the British about 310,000 casualties, while around 260,000 Germans were killed.

"A more terrible sound now reached my ears. From the darkness on all sides came the groans and wails of wounded men, faint, long sobbing moans of agony and despairing shrieks. It was horribly obvious that dozens of men with serious wounds must have crawled for safety into shell holes and now the water was rising about them, and powerless to move, they were slowly drowning. And we could do nothing to help them."

Soldier of the line at Hellfire Corner, Ypres Salient, October, 1917

The terrible stench of body odour, cheese and onion crisps, cheap aftershave, toilet disinfectant and mouldy carpets has replaced the smell of cigarette smoke in the local pubs around here.

Barstaff stand around idly, wondering what on earth to do to fill the time - there are hardly any customers to serve, after all.

Once-busy bars are putting the towels up at 9pm.

There is little doubt in my mind that the back street boozer will become a thing of the past, so many will go to the wall.

The health zealots have won their victory but, like with so many other grand schemes of politicians, no one has any idea what to do after Mission Accomplished.

The law of unforseen consequences takes over and we're left with a mess.

Isn't it time to say the total war on smoking has achieved a pyhrric victory, and that having a ciggy should be allowed again in designated pubs?

A TERRIBLE THING HAPPENS IF YOU DON'T PROMOTE
                                                                                                           nothing

Sign on Sid Bernstein's office wall in the World Trade Center, NYC, 1982

In the early 80s, there used to be a giant piece of graffiti on a wall near Princess Park Gates in Toxteth that read "Rock Against Bad Weather Reports"

It was a surrealistic piss take of all the "Rock Against The Ring Road" and "Rock Against Rapists" (really) that was going on at that time.

It used to make me laugh every time I walked past it.

Who'd have thought 25 years later that the BBC would devote 15 hours of weekend television to exactly that?

Live Earth, anybody?

The Union Jack now flutters above 10 Downing Street as Gordon Brown begins his campaign to make the British people stand together, be united and resolute and strong.

Apparently Union flags will be permanently raised at town halls and government buildings throughout the land.

He is obsessed with "Britishness" and keeps banging on about it in a demented kind of way.

I think any real sense of nationhood evaported a long time ago. And that might not be such a bad thing.

After all, it's only MPs and PMs who keep going on about it.

It's only MPs and PMs who can come out with lines like: "I know the British people will stand united, resolute and strong," when faced with a new (failed) terrrrrrr attack.

This brainwashing for us to constantly assert our Britishness is incredibly irritating.

I hate being coralled and pushed around like a sheep.

If I wanted to celebrate being British (which is frankly not very likely - not that I'm ashamed of it, just that, being British, I don't like to make a big fuss about stuff like that) I will.

I don't need the bloody State telling me what to do, think and say all the time.

Soon they will want us to fly the flag from our homes, like the Americans do.

No doubt not flying the flag will be banned!

There will be flag police handing out on-the-spot fines to "Britishness Deniers."

Notices will go up saying "It is illegal not to fly the flag from this building".

You think I'm joking, but mark my words, friends, mark my words.

I've been sent some shite in my time but this has left me lost for words:

UK-based GoCarbonFree Ltd has 'greened' Gordon Brown's ministerial Jaguar XJ V8 in a bid to raise awareness of climate change.

Gordon Brown has chosen a 4.2 litre Jaguar XJ V8 which falls into the Government's own top band of gas-guzzlers with an emissions ratio of 269 grammes of carbon per kilometre, or just over one kilo for every four kilometres.

With an estimated usage of 8,000 miles per year, Brown's Jaguar will emit 3.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide every twelve months.

GoCarbonFree will present Gordon Brown with four Gold Standard carbon credits that will offset his Jaguar XJ V8 and eliminate his car's carbon footprint.

Hubertus Thylmann, Managing Director of GoCarbonFree, says: "This is a perfect example of shoppers clubbing together to raise awareness of climate change and, most importantly, trying to do something about it. We hope that Gordon Brown acknowledges the effort by a group of shoppers to 'green' his car."

This is apropos of nowt, but driving round ten minutes ago I got behind a Bassett's wagon with a massive red and yellow warning sign on its tailgate.

It said: "CAUTION! Jellybabies On Board"

Dunno, just made me laugh.

Now, is it just me but...

Up to 90% of people carrying out electrical work in their home may be unwittingly breaking the law.

Independent research commissioned by the Electrical Safety Council reveals that only 10% of people are aware of the Part P building regulations that govern who can carry out electrical work in the home.

The nanny battering goes on unabated and relentlessly.

Pretty soon there won't be a single thing one can do without "unwittingly breaking the law".

Amidst the angst and gloom, a ray of light from Jack Dee:

"I met a woman in a bar and she said to me, my name is Carmen, because I love fast cars and I also love men. What's your name?"

"Charlie Beercunt."

There's an excellent new survey out which has the recycling zealots wringing their hands in frustrated fury.

For it turns out that "despite the consensus of scientists" (Oh yeah? What consensus?)more than 60 per cent of the British public are more concerned about dog dirt on their pavements than they are about "the imminent extinction of the planet through global warming".

I find that tremendously cheering.

While all the dustbin Gestapo are working themsleves into a muck sweat by tearing our trash apart to ensure we're not disposing of the wrong sort of lettuce or whatever, the British are smiling to themselves and watching the loonies go about their demented work with bemused tolerance.

Does anyone else think that the whole global warming community is beginning to sound like a bunch of religious fundamentalists?

Along with the anti-smokers and recyclers?

At least there is some provable evidence that dog shit actually exists!

Well.

Wouldn't it be nice after a twat of a day to go and have a couple pints and a smoke in my favourite bar.

You know, like I have been doing for 20 years.

Jeez.

When was it decided that the most important person in them was the annoying wretch behind the bar?

I was in my local with a contact on Friday evening; it's a place I go to almost every day and between me and the rest of my colleagues, we must spend a good two hundred quid a week in there.

So I order a couple of drinks and tell the carefully groomed gum-chewer struggling to understand the till to put it on a tab. I'd not seen him in there before, I noted.

"Weeers yer card?" he spat, to the guffaws of his unemployable mates scrounging free drinks behind the owner's back.

"I'm sorry?" I said.

"No card, no ale."

I was taken aback at the time and timidly handed my banker's card to the gooning moron.

I should of course have told him to fuck right off and walked out.

But the bar was crowded with his mates, the sound system was blasting out his music, and he obviously believed the business existed purely to enhance his ego and compensate him finacially for not studying as hard as the rest of us at school.

So I was caught off guard.

Needless to say, I won't be going there again.

To hear the politicians, media and police rattling their clanging gobs you'd think we were back in the Blitz.

Brown using a newsflash on Sunday night as if the Luftwaffe had just discharged a few thousand tons of High Explosives over London and this was our darkest hour.

We must be resolute, strong, vigilant, united etc etc.

Even when the Provos were doing their murderous best to maim and kill, we seemed to manage to maintain a better sense of perspective.

Yes, the country might be under attack from a handful of nutters, but let's not start weeping and wailing as if we're weak and helpless victims unable to avert our fate.

It's racheting up the "Terrrrr" (to quote dubya) so the government can get away with blue murder in the coming months by unravelling yet more of our civil liberties and claiming it's for our own good.

I am sick and tired of being pummelled by all this unbearable nanny batter.

God, I wanna go the pub and have a f*cking big drink and smoke a hundred fags.

But that's verbotten too.

It would be funny if it wasn't so upsettingly tragic.