phillhall

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A blog about politics

http://independentchoices.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/a-new-caledonian-view.html

Brexit obsessives and how Scottish people think Brexiteers are all shite.

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#politics #Brexit

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The Mist TV show

Many years ago, I watched the TV adaptation/series of Stephen King's Colorado Kid, better known round SyFy parts as Haven. It was quite possibly one of the worst pieces of unmitigated shit I have ever watched, but I persevered with it, initially hoping it would get better and then as pure car crash TV, sticking with it, mercilessly, for two series and three episodes before giving up. The joy had gone out of criticising it and it had become so bad it was no longer funny.

Tonight, we watched the first two episodes of Spike's new serial adaptation of the classic King novella The Mist.

The least offensive way of describing this is: I think I would sooner have had Theresa May shit in my mouth, after a night on vindaloos and Guinness than ever have watched this. Seriously THAT BAD.

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Bloggy podcast thingy part 3

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Bloggy podcast thingy part 2

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Bloggy podcast thingy part 1

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Part 2

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The urge to blogcast (or whatever it’s called) was too great...

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Swivel-eyed morons and cretins

Is the only way to describe some of the people who have lurking in the media this week. These complete and utter piss-poor excuses for human beings seem to think that verbally or physically attacking someone different from them is acceptable and it has been legitimised to a certain degree by race hate rags like The Daily Mail, Daily Express, the Sun and the Star.  How can a supposed civilised government allow newspapers such as these produce hate-filled propaganda that drives idiots to doing stupid things, driven by ignorance and fear? What can someone like Paul Dacre at the Mail hope to achieve from this? Does he think we can have a country that is ONLY inhabited by white, middle-class, Conservatives? And if he could have this unrealistic dream, who would do all the menial jobs, such as wiping his arse or choosing his shoes for him? The Tories won’t condemn this kind of hate crime because these newspapers support them. That alone is vulgar and should be stopped. Governments, such as ours and Trump’s, need to realise that they appeal to a relatively small percentage of people - arsehole racists and xenophobes are only effective in large groups. Right-wing media hates the idea of a fairer society led by old men with compassion, yet condones race and cultural hate, pursuing an agenda that shames the nation. The people who condone and foment this kind of shite need to be removed from social media and prominent platforms; this is not a kind of reverse bigotry, it is protecting the ignorant from divisive, hate-filled, morons with their hearts set on a future in flames, where hatred and lies rule. Anyone who promotes hate, violence and division should not be allowed to have a platform. The same applies to these white supremacist cockwombles as it does to the likes of Muslim hate preachers, or anyone who cannot accept diversity.

#hope not hate #ToryLies #support muslims

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Grenfell Fire

For anyone able to help- Please share.

Anyone who is near Latimer Road, West London and is able to help and assist in any way, please do. Due to the fire at Grenfell Tower, people have been left with no clothes, food, toiletries, toys etc.

Every small donation will help someone...

HELP/ DROP OFF POINTS: RUGBY PORTBELLO TRUST 221 Walmer Road, W11 4EY ST CLEMENT'S CHURCH 95 Sirdar Road, W11 4EQ TABERNACLE CHRISTIAN CENTRE Jubilee House, 210 Latimer Road, W10 6QY Please share. And please distinctly mark what the items are so they can be easily distributed.

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I will miss my garden when we move. 

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An unhealthy dose of realism...

Below/above is a 'left wing meme' portraying Theresa May as the 'terrorist' the right wing media claim Jeremy Corbyn to be. The sad truth about this meme and many like them is quite simply the majority of people - whoever they vote for - don't believe it.Nurses and doctors will tell you the NHS is being screwed over and we'll all be having private health care by 2020. The average person does not believe this; to them this is fake news. Even if it wasn't 'fake news' at any given time a large percentage of the voting public won't actually need the NHS. It is an 'out of sight out of mind' issue.Teachers and support workers will tell you that schools and education is being screwed over with funding cuts, but the government are thinking of bringing back grammar schools. The average member of the general public will equate the bringing back of grammar schools as an indication that education is working, not failing. People complaining about schools are obviously left wing scaremongers. Lots of people no longer have school age children, it is not a problem that bothers them; it is an 'out of sight out of mind' issue.When the government say its going to 'rip up the Human Rights Act' to protect the citizens of this country, people believe it will be done for the best, because people are scared of extremism (because they have been told to) and want safe streets. When someone from the left side of politics starts harping on about the bad things that could happen to us if our rights were altered, they are also scaremongering. Most people genuinely believe 'if I have nothing to fear, I have nothing to hide' and that is true. Most people won't need their rights, human or otherwise, until they need them. Rights is an 'out of sight out of mind' issue.When people say the Tories are bad for jobs, bad for the economy and only look after the rich, most people can't remember it not being like this and many people have been indoctrinated to believe that it can only get worse if someone else was in charge. The percentage of people not earning, on zero hours contracts and in unprotected work is far outstripped by those who do not fall into this category. Therefore this is very much an 'out of sight out of mind' issue.When people tell you that the Tories will destroy social care, the public services and treat the disenfranchised like rubbish, most people are all cared out. They are not in this particular demographic therefore it really is an 'out of sight out of mind' issue. People, unless they are friends or relatives of a disenfranchised person, really do not give a good god damn about anyone worse off than themselves. Yes, there are lots of people, good people out there, doing good work on limited resources; but the majority of the population will view them as 'pinko liberals' 'do-gooders' and there so the rest of us don't have to care. It sounds callous and accusatory, but for everyone who wants to help a homeless person, there are ten people who want to intern Muslims or simply let the poor and disabled die, because they contribute nothing to society. You only have to read the comments sections on any national issue to see that we're a lot less 'human' than we were.So, my socialist, Labour, anarchistic, independent minded free-thinking friends. You need to understand; while we think (some truly believe) we have the moral high ground; we don't. Not any more. Years and years of press and media manipulation, of highlighting fear over optimism, of smearing people because they can, has led to a country that no longer knows what it wants, but is pretty sure what it doesn't want.We have to prepare for a world on Friday that will not meet our standards, but will be acceptable to 40% of those who voted. As a Tottenham Hotspur fan of 55 years I can honestly say, 'It is the hope that kills you.' We kind of have to abandon hope at the door and just survive. For many people the next five years lay ahead like a nightmare and the sad thing is a huge swathe of the population really don't care at all and they will continue to not care until something starts to blight their life and even then they are easily swayed to believe that being a turkey and voting for Christmas is the best way forward.The other problem in 2017 is because of social media people do not like to be proved wrong; this is why experts are now shunned and gut feelings rule. I've done my usual amount of meme publishing and promotion, but I don't think I personally have been responsible for changing one single person's mind about voting intention and neither have many of my friends. We preach to the converted in bubbles of like-mindedness and feel a range of negative emotions when we see someone call Corbyn 'a twat' or 'a danger' or 'a terrorist sympathiser'; but all that is doing is proving the media has won. The majority of people want to believe Corbyn is dangerous and that May is the saviour; it is something we lefties cannot fathom, but we have no idea what motivates all of those people, who live behind all of those doors, that we have no way of knowing what their lives are like at all.I expect the Conservatives will win between 360 and 375 seats tomorrow. Labour will win a few as well, some in unusual places and by the end of the day only three parties will have more than single figures of MPs (The SNP will retain Scotland with a smaller majority). But there will be no effective opposition and a host of things that didn't affect people today will affect them in the coming years; but it will be too late to moan, for now.Young voters were badly let down by Brexit; they need to be motivated to vote - because they're going to inherit whatever is left. Old people need to have the dementia tax replayed to them constantly over the next 24 hours and the people who say they don't bother voting should be harangued for more than just their apathy. I'm not suggesting it will change anything, but it's a start.Whatever happens tomorrow, however hopeless you might feel, or angry with your fellow humans, you have to remember that everything is stacked against us from the physical to the existential and we're not all going to die, just yet. Remind people in a week, a month or a year, that people voted for this mess we're in, so they have no one but to blame but themselves for falling for it. If you can do any campaigning between now and 6am tomorrow, remember the only way to make people think is by giving them something that affects them to think about. Thatcher's legacy has been achieved, most people don't care a fig about their neighbours or those worse off than us; our job for the next five years is to make people see there is a better way forward than the one we're going to choose.

#general election #ge2017 #hopenothate

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On her watch!

#mayout #votelabour

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Can you imagine what the internet and especially Facebook would be like if it existed during the 'Troubles' in Ireland? I dread to think of the calls to ban Catholicism; of internment camps for anyone with an Irish accent, unless they sound like Ian Paisley. We'd ban Italians from coming in and we'd have big crosses - X - on the doors of Catholics up and down the country and they'd have to wear something in the street to differentiate them from other - normal - Christians. We'd have to be very cautious of anyone with a pint of Guinness or maybe someone carrying workmans' tools and Sheikh Mohammed would have to have his racehorses trained somewhere else, somewhere less Catholic... In fact, some of Irish people doing normal jobs might be preaching to people who once had an Irish great grandfather that they should join the rebellion; maybe become a martyr for the cause... I know some Druids. I'm amazed they haven't started some kind of violent war so they can besmirch the good name of Druids all over the world. Anyone who wants to equate stuff like this with actual religion is a fucking cockwomble of Theresa May's standard and either needs to shut up or fuck off. It's a criminal act and fuck all to do with religion. Basically, like.

#london #terrorism #terroristattack

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BREXIT

It could well be that Supreme Leader May wants a 50+ majority not to strengthen her arm in Europe but to ensure that in 2019 she has enough MPs prepared to follow her blindly off the cliff. 

The one thing that is slowly emerging since the referendum is that whatever the deal, it's going to hit the public in their pockets and it could take upwards of 10 years for a parity to be restored. 

The Supreme Leader has pretty much the same bargaining weapon as anyone else would have - NONE. She will be given the deal, there will be some horse trading - a tweak here, a tweak there - and she'll bring it back and present it to parliament and if it stinks - which it is likely to - she will have enough to vote it through and prevent a rebellion from her pro-EU fellow Tories.

#votelabour #vote #young voters #brexit

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#may #clown