Mule sets the social standard

Maybe its me, but I can’t help feeling that there is something a bit off in holding a charity fundraiser to ‘celebrate’ the sadly short life of an habitual cocaine user who died after being hit by a tube train while he was four times over the drink drive limit.

Things are different in the sports media world though.

Tom Maynard the cricketer was stopped by police just before his death and ran off to evade arrest. Besides the alcohol found in his body he also had levels of cocaine and ecstasy levels that suggested regular use. Yet the events surrounding his death don’t even get mentioned in this Western Mail article.

If something positive can come out of a tragic and pointless death then I'm all for it. But I can just imagine what kind of coverage the Newspaper of Wales would have given to a booze-up to remember a 23 year old from the Gurnos who had died under similar circumstances.

What goes around ...

I see that Tony Blair is upset that people are partying over the death of Maggie Thatcher. Apparently he thinks that celebrations are in bad taste.

Speaking personally, I think the murdering bastard should reconcile himself to the fact that there will be quite a few jigs danced around the UK as well when he finally pops his clogs.

Meanwhile, party on!!!

Different perspectives or just shit-stirring?

Same story but a different emphasis by the BBC when it comes to their Welsh audiences.

The headline England-only laws 'need majority from English MPs' is changed to McKay Commission: Welsh MPs' role could be limited.

A couple of questions come to mind: 

(1) What is this sudden streak of nationalist insurgency at the Beeb that drives editors to portray the obvious consequence of devolution into something that downgrades Welsh interests? 

(2) Why doesn't the same story even merit a mention on the Corporation's Scottish and NI news websites?

Thankfully, a more grown-up version can be found on the Wales Media website.

Or you could read the Daily Mail ... I won't tell anyone.

England slammed - ain't that grand! (updated)

Now that the anaesthetic has just about worn off and after the fifth consecutive replay of Saturdays game I feel capable of discharging my mind on said historic result. I like to think of myself as vaguely tolerant of the English; I put this trait down to the strong possibility that I was conceived on a day trip to Weston Super Mare. Yet I found myself going demented in the latter stages of the game and screaming some markedly racist sentiments as I hunkered down in my seat at the Bogarth Arms to join the team in defending the Welsh try line from Anglo-Saxon encroachment.

There was something thrilling in an out-of-body sort of sense as I clamoured with bloody-eyed passion in urging a clinical Wales to deny the English enemy the consolation of a late try. The teams of old would have taken things down a notch but not this crowd of cyborgs. It was breathtaking and frighteningly wonderful to behold.

It wasn't a case of "as long as we beat the English". Oh no, it was a deliberate and prolonged poke in the rear for the champagne swilling tweedy tosspots who have been lounging in posh Cardiff hotel lobbies since Thursday, loudly addressing Tristram or Oliver and who can now all fuck off back to the shires with the sound of "Hymns & Arias" haunting them into a troubled and fitful sleep.

OK God, I'm ready to go now.

Chavez was never going to be another Allende

I have no idea if Hugo Chavez was a socialist hero or astute politician or maybe both. To be honest I'm not sure if it matters. All I know is that a man who gets re-elected through the democratic process for 14 years and dies in office rather than at the hands of a CIA-sponsored right-wing coup must have had something going for him.

From what I've read, it strikes me that Chavez was determined to learn from what happened to left-wing governments in Chile and Nicaragua. He saw interventionist US foreign policy in Latin America for what it was and for what it continues to be. He upturned the arrogance of Washington governments who perceive that anywhere south of their national border was a messy backyard which needs to get cleaned out from time to time.

Some dipstick US senator commented today that it was "good riddance to a dictator". He was wrong on both counts.

What a difference a space makes

why do juries in Llanelli needs a brain?

Seeing Red

It's not often that I concern myself in sporting matters east of Bryncoch but reading the story of a possible enforced name change for Cardiff City FC prompted a frenetic grab for the keyboard.

I'm hoping that the Western Mail story that majority shareholder Vincent Tan wants to rename the club as 'Cardiff Dragons' is BBC manufactured fantasy. If it turns out to be true then I suspect that fans will go into meltdown. I've actually been known to speak to Cardiff supporters in the past. Those who offered an opinion about their team playing in red were pragmatic about a colour change.

But as much as entrance to the premiership gives worldwide audiences and for all the Asian media markets involved I cannot see anyone with Bluebird blood running through their veins ever giving up their birthright.
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The logo shown above in from the Memphis Redbirds - a minor league baseball team.

Good Morning Wales v Swans

At last some grudging recognition for the Swans success by BBC Wales (online). Not a bad article actually and its about time that the constructive role played by supporters over the last decade was properly recognised.

What a difference from the mealy mouthed tosspot on Good Morning Wales who wondered aloud yesterday if Swansea winning the League Cup was "anything like as important as Cardiff getting promotion". The sports presenter he asked naturally felt that Cardiff getting into the premiership would be an added boost for Wales. Most Swans football supporters would agree (under duress with the aid of mind-altering drugs and through gritted teeth).

What struck me was why the question was framed that way in the first place. How is it that a good outcome for both clubs never figured as a scenario?

Will the BBC in Wales ever loosen the corporate elastic that keeps them and their outlook firmly tied to a 10 mile radius of Llandaff? Now that would be a result.

Tesco aren't good enough to rate as crap

Just been reading on Sky News that Tesco comes out bottom of a customer satisfaction survey. They should have asked me and I would have put them in a minus position. Over-priced, habitually under-stocked and managed by plonkers, I go there nowadays under protest expecting a downbeat experience and rarely being disappointed.

Staff are by far the worst problem in my experience. I've given up asking where I might find something as I know the answer will be a shrug or a "dunno, mate". As for enquiring why something you bought last month is now mysteriously no longer stocked - an all too regular occurrence in my store - the response is "no call for it" thus confirming that my preferences do not figure in the big corporate retail picture.

Then there's the way that you suddenly turn invisible at the check-out getting only the briefest of acknowledgements when you ask the sullen operator to stop throwing around the goods you're about to pay for. But the people at the top of my shit-list are the pig ignorant 'personal shoppers' who use their green trollies like armoured crowd-control vehicles as they wield their intimidate bleeping scanners at customers.

And don't get me started on all those two for one scams. I mean, some of the contrived bollocks passed off as savings are enough to make you choke on your horseburger. 

Tesco's success is based on market domination. i.e. quantity not quality. They pervade cities and suburbs like Japanese knotweed and people put up with the crap because there is often limited alternative choice. 

For me, the company's response to the survey that "millions of people shop at Tesco" confirms my opinion that they don't rate customers highly enough to put even a little bit of effort into their bullshit.

Get real, bach

I do try to be understanding. I really do. Let's be honest, we all screw up somewhere sometime in life. We all have are own excruciating memories of the time we did something really stupid and worse still got found out. No matter how exemplary the rest of our lives have been, it's the bad shit that sticks sic. Evans the Sheep-shagger (old joke).

As a species, we have a inbuilt ability to mess up, screw the pooch, drop a bollock, commit a blunder, have a senior moment, act the plonker, engender a faux pas or make a gaffe. So why is it that politicians occupy a different universe in which they have 'moments of madness' or lapses of judgement? What on earth makes the media tosspots think we would accept that getting done for being twice over the drink-drive limit is Bethan Jenkins way of making a 'cry for help' (who the fuck writes her stuff anyway?)

As it happens an acquaintance of mine, let's call him 'Jocky', was done for drinking driving on Christmas Day just gone. He made the classic mistake of going for a pre-lunch drink with his neighbours and giving everyone a lift to the pub. He was stopped by Plod on the way back with the inevitable results.

When I saw him a few weeks later at the rugby, his explanation on events was quite simple and to the point.

"I was a twat", he told me and that was it.

Jocky heads up the accounts department at a factory about 15 miles away. He kept his job and relies on lifts from mates who live nearby to get to work. He seems to be coping but he is not making a song and dance about it.

It's only my opinion but I think that I would have more respect of politicians if they displayed the same contrition and sense of accountability as Jocky and just got on with it. It would be more palatable that the sight of them baring their flawed and troubled souls to the media.

Land of opportunity?

As much as I would like to foster the cover story that it is my latent misogyny which has stopped me from commenting over the breakfast table on the argument in favour of having more women AMs, the less macho reason is that I've learned that there are few things more likely to set Mrs Sid off on a dangerous rant than a hint of positive gender discrimination. Therefore I have opted for the scenario whereby I avoid ending up with my porridge bowl in my lap.

But the common ground between us is that we both had the same thoughts about Louise Kelton who is now a US marshall in the Middle District of Tennessee. Namely what would be the chances of a 57 year old black woman from Butetown ever holding a senior police position in the UK let alone South Wales?

A language on life-support

I’m suppressing a strong urge to say ‘I told you so’ having read that the number of Welsh speakers has dropped overall despite an increase in population. OK, a decrease in 14,000 to about 14% is by no means a huge decline but it does put some of the recent calls for language parity in a different perspective don’t it?

As your average English-speaking monoglot, I don’t feel particularly moved one way or the other about today’s census findings. There is a mild regret on my part that I’m probably better equipped, for reasons of practicality, to order a drink in Spanish than in Welsh but that’s as far as it goes.

Whenever someone talks about the decline of the language I think about Martin who can be found playing his own unique version of pool in the side room at the Bogarth Arms. He has two children, one in university in Birmingham and the other working somewhere around Leeds. He speaks conversational Welsh to his wife and to his Dad. He sometimes chats in Welsh to Gillian behind the bar but the sprinkling of English involved means that even I can get the gist of what they’re saying.

He can get passionate about Cymraeg but I remember the time when we were at a game in Neath and the S4C chap came over for some crowd reaction and Martin declined saying his “Welsh wasn’t good enough” (whatever that means).

I have no idea how much is spent on sustaining the Welsh language in Wales but my neighbor who works for the DVLA claims that their translation costs alone could build a new primary school every year.

I don’t think there is an argument to be made that the fostering of Welsh should be measured simply in terms of value for money. But given that it is effectively the lesser language of Wales when it comes to usage (even if it does have equal legal status) we should think twice before allowing it to be austerity-proofed when there are other priorities to be considered.

Have I got news for Hislop

I was really unimpressed by the dismissive bollocks coming from Ian Hislop that government action forcing the press to self-regulate would be a such terrible outcome. The Private Eye editor was ranting on the box last night about how all the awful things done by News of the World and others was illegal and that it was the lack of will by police and courts to crack down on such practices which was the root of the problem.

Maybe so, but it is not the first inclination for the rest of us who lack his educated and erudite qualities to run off to the courts if we feel that press coverage has been unfair or intrusive. We simply want an independently-appointed and independently-run body of people to act on our behalf.

The idea of legislation is not to enforce state control but make sure that editors & proprietors don't slip back into their old ways when they think no-one is watching. I don't believe for a moment that Hislop and company don't get this. Their agenda is that they don't want to see our freedom of privacy extended at the expense of their freedom to invade it.

Happy Days

I've been deluged this morning by nostalgic media froth about sixty years of music charts in the UK. Funny though how no-one has once mentioned the influence of 'payola' - the practice of paying DJs to give songs air-time - during this glorious period.

How fortunate that we now live in a time when money never changes hands in order to get your band's name on the download playlists.

A voter's lot is not a happy one

Just had the postal vote ballot delivered for the police commissioner thingy elections. I haven't opened it. It's sitting on the kitchen worktop amid a pile of other junk mail offering cheaper versions of stuff I don't need or I've already got.

A result of having a relative in the business, so to speak, is that I'm probably part of the minority of people who knew that there was already such a thing as a police authority. I also had a vague idea that its purpose was to nod through whatever the chief constable wanted. The day to day relevance for your average punter though is on a par with knowing what formation that Juventus will play this Saturday.

The latest ideology has it that the current arrangement is all wrong. Apparently we need something more streamlined with accountable and directly elected individuals in charge. In charge of what, I ask myself? But only in the brief time it takes to sweep the detritus off the worktop and into the bin.

I am not convinced and I doubt the convictions of the people behind the change.

What doesn't relegate you makes you stronger

As incredibly difficult as it is not to gloat over last night's game in which Swansea gave Liverpool a lesson in cup football, my idle post-celebratory thoughts have since turned to considering ways that events like could reach a broader partisan TV audience.

Is it conceivable that S4C - under the auspices of BBC patronage - might be able to bid to provide live or recorded full length coverage of Swansea and Cardiff games played in Wales? With Newport and Wrexham knocking on the door for re-entry into the league, the potential audiences and advertising revenue should help advance a decent enough business case.

Something for Mr Jones to consider.

Whatever

You gotta love these politicians. Blackie was so keen to promote himself his private members bill on his blog is morning that he accidently slipped into the third person halfway through.

A classic sign of an under achiever desperate for recognition or just a twonk?

Payback in first class

I admit that the social fabric of the country is not going to fall part just because chancellor George Osborne sat in a first class carriage when he only had a standard ticket. What pisses me off is that some jumped up aide initially refused to pay the extra.

I'm delighted to hear that the bastard was made to cough up - even though it's me and other taxpayers who end up forking out for the surcharge. It's worth it just to think of the contemptible pack of weasels getting sweaty as they got off to face the press in Euston.

I especially liked that it all happened on a Virgin train. Good opportunity for Branson to do to the government what they've been doing to his company in recent months.

Why I've stopped laughing at 'In the Thick of It'

It says everything about the spun-out state of UK politics when the prime minister's big talk about tackling confusion over energy tariffs ends up creating more confusion. The twonk obviously had nothing substantial to say after his unproductive meeting with Osborne, Clegg and Beaker. But things being what they are, and in light of the the build up in the press about an 'energy summit', he had to come out with something that sounded that it was in the interest of the plebs consumers.

Where he went wrong though is that he thought he was still in the time when he could pass off any old sound-bite as policy. Things have changed. People ask questions nowadays and they want details when prime ministers make announcements.

My problem is that it all reads like a script in which Malcom Tucker says, this government is more f****d up than a f*****g f**k-up. And I'm not laughing anymore.

Information overload

I couldn’t help but smile when I read the Beeb report that Welsh councils are having problems in coping with the cost of handling Freedom of Information requests.

I particularly liked the bit: “the number has risen from 3,530 in 2005 to 9,304 last year, according to figures obtained by BBC Wales.”

Um … and how what this information "obtained", I wonder.

Tosspot ex-Sun editor tries it on

I thought I had reached an age (I won’t say maturity) where I could recognise the sheer pointlessness of shouting obscenities at the computer screen. My problem is that I hadn’t counted on getting provoked by that objectionable muck-raking tosspot Kelvin MacKenzie.

The ex-Sun editor wants an apology from South Yorkshire police for misleading his paper, through a news agency, about the Hillsborough tragedy.

After publishing untrue and malicious claims about the conduct of Liverpool fans and trashing the reputation of the victims, MacKenzie complains 23 years later that he would be in “mortal danger” should he ever venture to the city. Two words and a brick through the windscreen should suffice by way of reply.

Speaking personally, I would dearly love to see the scumbag caught up in Operation Twatting (or whatever) for bunging someone to get information. That would be justice.

Do we care what Nick Clegg thinks?

The big- hoo-hah on BBC Wales this morning is that Nick Clegg has criticised the decision by Welsh education minister Leighton Andrews to order a re-grading of some GCSE English papers in Wales.


The soundbite coming out of the Lib Dem leader is that the move was "shifting goalposts" for children in Wales - which is pretty good coming from someone with his own disposable set of values.


Here's my multiple choice exam question:  Are the expressed views of Mr Clegg (a) irrelevant (b) uninformed (c) none of his business (d) all of the above.

Send your answers to Kirsty Williams.

No listening skills at BBC Wales

Chaos in the Maison Sid kitchen this morning as I managed to spray the breakfast table with porridge oats in spluttered outrage. What got me choking was the appalling interrogation conducted by BBC Radio Wales' Bethan Rhys Roberts upon Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood.

I'm all in favour of interviewers striving to stop politicians from waffling on air - I only wish they did it more often with Jane Hutt - but poor Leanne barley got five seconds to give her responses before being interrupted (or contradicted) by an up-herself presenter who probably couldn't find the toilet seat without a researcher.

I am sure that Ms Rhys Roberts will state that her job is to ask questions on our behalf. No problem there and we appreciate her efforts. But we'd like to hear the fucking answers occasionally too.

Why do I worry about this stuff?

I read this morning that the boss of GCHQ says that hackers are so adept these days that they could actually be secretly running company computer systems. My first thoughts were about the risks of buying stuff on-line. But the problem goes a lot deeper and costs a shitload of cash to companies and consumers.

Cybercrime, hacking or whatever is on the increase. So there was this big conference where people like William Hague and Theresa May described the seriousness of the situation. Then industry people talked about cases where patents had been stolen. In fact, everybody agreed that there was a big-ass problem. 

So now the plan is get small companies to advise MI5 and GCHQ on how to come up with ideas to combat the situation.

Perhaps I’m not getting the full picture here, but how will they know that the companies providing this advice are not the same ones doing the hacking?

Quote of the day

Best quote so far on Cameron’s soft shoe re-shuffle

Ministers you’ve never heard of will be bumped from jobs you didn’t know they held to accommodate politicians who are barely household names in their own flats

Kevin Maguire – Daily Mirror