BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: GUEST,Lizzie Cornish
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 05:46 AM

I think you'll find that Adolf Hitler described The Queen Mum as 'the most dangerous woman in Europe' because of the way she kept the spirits of the British People aflame, during the war...

Al, I would *love* to live in Poundbury..

Poundbury...a short tour


If more architects, planners, put as much thought into the people who live in a village/town, as he has, this country would be a far happier place..

Prince Charles talking about Poundbury

As for 'using his influence' leveller, well, calling that 'bullying' is ridiculous. I sure as hell wish he'd use his influence on President Dilma Rousseff though, for she's about to build SIXTY dams in the Amazon Rainforest and relax the Forest Code, which is going to decimate the Rainforest as never before...and Prince Charles is working his butt off to try to stop this from happening...

You dislike the Royals. Fair enough. But don't spread hatred towards Prince Charles about. He's a good man at heart and he's trying his utmost to make a difference for the BETTER for many, many people...

So, are you telling me that 'using his influence' in his Princes Trust is also bullying? Hell, he's helped tens of thousands of young people to start their own businesses up...and you think this is a shitty thing?

Or are you merely selective in your hatreds?

Forget his family, I'm sure he'd love to...See the man and what he is doing for many people of all ages, of all backgrounds...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 05:47 AM

Maybe, lev, or maybe not ~~ but your suggested anarchist alternative for 'modern society', of no governments or heads of state or any such, is jejune and fatuous in the extreme. Do you really think that nobody would have tried it over the past 7k or so years if it were in any way viable? Don't start off about PNG & Trobriand ~~ been demo'd time & again that Makinowski just got that wrong.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 05:49 AM

MaLinowski, sodit...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 05:50 AM

Sorry, Lizzie, can't stand the bloke: he's an arrogant, pompous twat. But, as I said, it's not about the personalities, it's about the institution.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 05:56 AM

Poundbury is my idea of hell. Here's another view on it:

http://www.nothingtoseehere.net/2008/11/poundbury_dorchester.html

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Megan L
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:00 AM

Since the first cave dwellers the strong (Physically or materially) prey upon the weak.

If we get rid of royalty, if we get rid of government someone else will rise in thier place.

Would the replacement be better? I doubt it power corupts and absolute power corupts absolutely.

Sometimes its better the devil you know.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:01 AM

Well MtheGM, we could argue all day about anarchist theories of socialism, syndicalism, individualism, fereralism etc. but, unfortunately, I haven't the leisure to do so. Let's just say that I disagree with your politics and you disagree with mine. Makes life interesting!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:24 AM

I'd drink to that ~~ except that I don't drink. Still, I have a cup of Darjeeling with a touch of Ceylon beside me at this moment:

so ~~ Here's to it in tea.

Best

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:25 AM

MtheGM, a few part-time, optional-looking "positions" (involving how much work and what hours, I wonder?) flitting in and out of taking fashion pics for posh mags, etc., including working a bit for Mumsie and Papa's outfit, followed by a vague career dissolution for several years before her big day, never settling to anything at all, scarcely add up to productive within the economy, requiring as much dedication, effort and application as any non-manual form of labour, does it now? Coo, I bet she arrived home every night totally wrecked!

"Conniption" has no alternative spelling, so less of the bullshit on that one please. One chooses to use arcane words to make one look clever, one checks how they're spelled first!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: GUEST,Lizzie Cornish
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:26 AM

So, what you're saying is that Poundbury should be covered in graffiti, spit and litter, to give it that certain 'je ne sais quoi' of other English Towns these days....

Added to that it should have hideous, ugly buildings, crammed into tiny spaces, or high rise flat with dark, dank stairwells and alley ways, where drugs users gather and old folks are scared to walk alone..

Gee, how fooking stooopid of me to overlook this!!

Maybe it's because *I* clean up all the shit in my street, used to clean up an entire VILLAGE on Dartmoor where folks didn't give a fook, same as here in Torquay..People shoved into buildings which should have been torn down years back, or that are leased out at vast rents, never painted, cleaned or attended to, for that would mean miserly landlords having to spend money...

Yes, I see what you're getting at now...

He even bothered to put in pub, shops, a farmer's market, creating a community...bothered about removing cars, so people could walk in traffic free streets...even put in a fountain here and there...

Yes, how right you are...God Forbid that ANY English Town should be clean, beautiful, spacious, thought-through, litter free...

God forbid that ANYONE should create a town that people CARE about because the architecture CARES about them.....

Yes, let's keep England filthy, foul and furtive!

Silly, silly me...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 06:43 AM

Sorry, Steve ~~ I copied you a reputable online dict that spells it with one n. So sorry if it's giving you con[n]iptions; you had better take it up with the editor. Perhaps one of those US variants? Having checked further, will ack that two n's the usual dict spelling; shall use it thus in future: thank you for the headsup. Hardly, mind, an archaic word, or particularly 'clever' in its usage? & certainly not accurate to claim the one n variant doesn't exist.

Your "no honest day's work" were best dropped, you know. Never mind about its being, as I said, emotive and tendentious; it's now becoming merely spiteful.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:03 AM

I said arcane, not archaic. I wasn't being arch. Yes, I'll let the matter of the young nouveau-parasitess's severe lack of any gainful employment drop now. Doubtless she'll spend much of the rest of her life flouncing around crowds of appreciative, flag-waving poor persons, preferably in sunny ex-Empire nations, demonstrating that she has legs right up to her pertly-regal bottom (very nice too, I must say...) and raising money for "charities" from said poor persons in spite of her being as rich as Croesus herself. I can see how much this annoys you.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:10 AM

"Coniption?" Of all the online dictionaries, you choose to back up your defective spelling with a quote from the "reputable" Urban Dictionary, whose main priority is not to get spellings right. Bet you can't find your spelling anywhere else!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:27 AM

"Coniption?" Of all the online dictionaries, you choose to back up your defective spelling with a quote from the "reputable" Urban Dictionary, whose main priority is not to get spellings right. Bet you can't find your spelling anywhere else!
If you Google 'coniption', and resist Google's attempt to get you to Google 'conniption'instead you'll get 117,000 hits. So your line Bet you can't find your spelling anywhere else! is a little out.
How large a wager were you suggesting?

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: banjoman
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:30 AM

I think that a lot of people are missing the point here. Not knowing any of the Royal Family personally, I have no axe to grind with any of them. My objection is to the institution of the monarchy and all that that entails in terms of cost and having their "Good Works" thrust down our throats on most days through a very pro royal media.
I know that many ask what would the alternative be. Well, in my view, provided that we have the right to vote in or out our leaders at reasonable intervals, it really does not matter to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:50 AM

Not a particularly arcane word either, for that matter, Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 08:47 AM

Well Nigel, when I google it I find that it says "Did you mean conniption?" and all the entries which include this incorrect spelling are people who have posted questions, called their band a name with the word in it or used it on Twitter or whatever. The Urban Dictionary aside (not exactly my numero uno source for confirming spellings by a long chalk, amusing as it is), you will not find a reputable dictionary that permits "coniption" as an acceptable variant.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 09:02 AM

Steve, in case you don't read your own posts (and who could blame you) what you said was "Coniption?" Of all the online dictionaries, you choose to back up your defective spelling with a quote from the "reputable" Urban Dictionary, whose main priority is not to get spellings right. Bet you can't find your spelling anywhere else!
If you meant 'bet you can't find it in another dictionary' that would have been another matter entirely.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 09:42 AM

Come on, Lizzie, don't be silly. Can't you see that Poundbury is a complete and monstrous fake. I'm surprised that Charlie doesn't employ a peasant in a smock to stand on the street corner and tug his forelock to his 'betters'.

I live in a nice enough village but it does have a combination of new and old houses in very different styles, including the usual 1960s council houses; the remains of the castle were once a real castle; there's a fair smattering of horse and cow shit on the roads (which never seem to get repaired); no-one bothers about the Green Slime Caravan in my drive; the verges are only cut once a year in July to encourage the wild flowers; and the biggest landowner goes around in mucky wellies and boasts that he's got the dirtiest landie in the village.

Places have to look like they're lived in by real people who create their own individual touches (ever been to the 'model village' of Saltaire, for instance?). Fakebury is just a static, tasteless monument to the egotistical intransigence of one man. In fact, I'm surprised he didn't call it Charlesbury.

MtheGM, Steve: con(n)iption - new one on me. I love it when I learn a new word!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Mayet
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 09:53 AM

Liz, (I'm sure you won't mind me calling you that as you yourself like to address others like theleveller with cutesy names like 'levels' and to object would be just a teeny bit hypocritical wouldn't it?), I think you should be aware that in a 2004 study it was found that over three-quarters of residents frequently drive elsewhere to shop and cycling accounts for just 1.9% of journeys to work, public transport 1.8% and that 'THE LEVEL OF CAR USE THERE WAS HIGHER THAN IN THE SURROUNDING RURAL DISTRICT OF WEST DORSET'

'What is unique about Poundbury is that it has sought to recreate a past that never existed - a time machine to go back to when being a child was idyllic,'
From 'Save Truro'

Prince Charles, who actively discourages his subjects from using cars is himself the owner of two Jaguars, an Audi and a Range Rover and the open-topped Aston Martin that was a 21st birthday present from his mum
True, his sports car has been converted to run on surplus wine and is 'used only occasionally for jaunts around the country lanes of Gloucestershire', all necessary journeys I'm sure, and his other cars have been converted to run on bio diesel no doubt the cost of conversion offset by avoiding paying the 62% tax on diesel fuel
Unfortunately, even if we could all afford the cost of conversion there's simply not enough cooking oil in the UK to take over from diesel entirely according to the government's Better Regulation Commission; current waste oil supplies could only feasibly power around one-350th of the UK's cars (not even 'the 1%' then and there is a very real limit on the amount of biofuel the agricultural sector can realistically produce

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:30 AM

If you want some idea of what society would be like without an established hierarchy, and a government, just take a look at how the pecking order has evolved in prisons.
Everybody toadies up to the 'Mr Big' in order to curry favour, and do his bidding in the hopes of garnering a few crumbs that fall from his table.
Now why does that sound familiar?
The fate of those who buck the system is not a pleasant one either.
So while you're outside the tent pissing in, just think on, and be grateful that you can do so without fear of a kicking, from the toadies of the establishment.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:31 AM

"Prince Charles, who actively discourages his subjects" ···

His mother's subjects, in fact; won't be his till she goes.

"MtheGM, your pedantry is legendary" wrote a friend on another forum. In fact, my view is that I m not a pedant, but work on the IMO indisputable basis that 'accuracy matters'. {If you are not accurate, you are liable to get the likes of Steve correcting your spelling ~~~ AAAArrrrGGGGhhhh!!!!!!.}*

~M~

*Or should I have said 'If one is not accurate, one is liable...'?

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:34 AM

Well John, we're not all criminals.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:38 AM

Nigel, you're nitpicking in a most sour-grapey fashion! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: GUEST,Lizzie Cornish
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:41 AM

>>>Liz, (I'm sure you won't mind me calling you that as you yourself like to address others like theleveller with cutesy names like 'levels' and to object would be just a teeny bit hypocritical wouldn't it?),>>>

Actually, I DO mind you calling that. Only one person on Mudcat gets to call me Liz. It is also the name my Dad called me by, so therefore very personal and special.

I've been calling 'leveller' 'levels' for many years now...He has never objected to it. I do not call him by his real name, that NOT being 'leveller' unless he's signed himself as such, and he rarely does. In all this time, he has never once asked me NOT to call him 'levels', either here, on years back on the BBC board. And despite our ranting and raging at each other now and then, we like each other and very often read from the same book entirely. He and his good lady are also on my Myspace page, or were, as I no longer use Myspace, due to the way the new owners have fouled it all up.

So, may I suggest you stick your patronizing comments where the sun don't shine, be it a Royal Arse or mere Peasant's...

Thank you.

And tell me, before you start on Prince Charles and his cars etc, do you approve of Beckham and his Mrs. then?

You see, despite *their* wealth, and *their* thrones, which they both have, I don't see them doing much to save the planet. I do recall Posh sitting on a rubbish dump somewhere in a very poor country, crying her heart out at the little girl who lived on it, scratched around inside it to find rubbish to sell, to feed her family..Then, Posh went home and was busy deciding which £400 handbag to wear for her next photoshoot...

At least Charles is DOING something, running 60 charities, travelling the world to conferences on the Environment, fighting for the Rainforest, for the future of his children and yours, and mine....At least he's damn well speaking out and not sitting on his arse all day preening his latest tattoo, hairstyle, or new dress.....

Yes, I'd prefer it if he were a mere peasant like wot I am, if he gave all his money away...but then there'd be one helluva lot of people down in Cornwall with no jobs, no incomes...His organic fields would be bought up by Corporate Bastards who would fit as many tiny little box houses into them as they could, no thought for ANYONE who actually had to live in them, just thoughts of the Profits made...

Very few new towns are like Poundbury, because they get banged up as cheaply as possible, to make as much profit as possible and to hell with the future, the future of the town, the buildings, the community, the people who have to live there...

ALL that has been thought about in Poundbury and those who live there love it....

It will be there for centuries to come...

Most new towns won't...they'll have been razed to the ground and rebuilt..for yet even MORE profit.....

Thank you
LIZZIE

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:45 AM

Dave, that's a ridiculous example. Prisons are a closed environment controlled by a rigid regime, headed by a governor, constantly overseen by guards, where the inmates do not have freedom of movement, occupation, expression or self-determination. In fact, the exact opposite of what I'm talking about, as mentioned above, such as "socialism, syndicalism, individualism, fereralism etc."

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:47 AM

Steve ~~ re your response to John; why pretend to be such a fool that you can't recognise a simple & pertinent analogy? How much conviction to you think such a pose will bring to your arguments? Unless, of course, you actually ARE such a fool...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 10:56 AM

"fereralism"?

Federalism.

Actually, maybe it should be 'feralism'. Mmmm, I like that!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 11:13 AM

"Dave, that's a ridiculous example."

Apologies, JOHN, that comes of trying to do a dozen things at once.


Mayet, honestly, 'levels' is fine - in fact, it even imbues me with an impression of level-headedness which is, I'm afraid, frequently absent.

Yup, Lizzie and I go back so far we're practically family - which could be why we fight like cat and dog :p

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 11:42 AM

Most prisons are only governed with the consent of the inmates. For it to be otherwise would take a great deal of staff, and/or coercion.
As long as there is not too much strife in a prison, the warders are happy to turn a blind eye to many malpractices, for the sake of a quiet life.
To say that it is governed and controlled is to stretch things somewhat.
As Mike said the prison thing is only an analogy, but the situation is a microcosm of society in the round.
Another analogy. The biggest fiercest lion gets first dibs on the kill. Then those down the hierarchy get a turn.
Society always is, and always will be governed, either by force or by free will.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Mayet
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 11:45 AM

Indeed very few new towns are like Poundbury - it's difficult to think of any others that offer fake bricked up windows for a start or 'artisan's cottages' for about £400k (unfortunately there's little profit in 'affordablr housing') or are so lacking in amenities that car ownership is essential.

Poundbury - an essay in how not to design a new town

Thank you for your usual inevitable invitation to anyone who dares to disagree with your opinions to stick their comments up their arse I do so admire a well thought out intelligent response.
Maybe something a little more original eh?
At least I suppose I should be grateful no root vegetables were abused on this occasion.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 12:11 PM

"the situation is a microcosm of society in the round"

Really? My god, your life must be pretty bleak.

Tell you what, why not turn Poundbury into a prison? Sounds like the communication links are so bad there'd be no way of getting out - and the architecture is even worse than Armley!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 12:20 PM

In that we all inhabit the same space, not that we are all criminals.
But of course you knew that, and were just " 'Avin' a laff"

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 12:56 PM

Nah, but seriously, now....ironically it was reading the ideas of some of the anarchist thinkers, especially Kropotkin, Stirner, Nietzsche (now that IS a bugger to spell) and Oscar Wilde that gave me the real sense of freedom that it is not only alright to be the individual you want to be, but that it is, in fact, the most creative thing you can do. Individualism is the very essence of anarchism as I see it, and if one then chooses to become part of a federation or a syndicate, or whatever, that is one's own decision. What it is primarily about is freedom – to be oneself and to think and act as a free individual.

Damn, I said I wasn't going to get into this discussion. See the power of Mudcat to overcome my free will!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 12:58 PM

If you read The Ballad of Reading Gaol, you'll see what Wilde was getting at.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 02:30 PM

Steve (Shaw) - Agreed. Hence my point. The theory is that they attract tourists and make money. Trouble is, as you point out, they just ain't very good at it. I'll just repeat the word that can turn this around instantly for those who missed it - DISNEY! Just imagine - LizzieWorld, Charlie Burgers, The Wills experience. It could make billions and cut our taxes in half :-)

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: bubblyrat
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 03:04 PM

I take it then , Leveller , that you are not the sort of person who would willingly and eagerly be amongst the first to volunteer for active military service should our dear country ever be threatened with invsaion again ? A shame ,really ; the thought of you being bayonetted to death by some screaming fanatic is somehow rather appealing . Oh well.

God Save The Queen !( but not necessarily everyone else )

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 07:18 PM

Steve ~~ re your response to John; why pretend to be such a fool that you can't recognise a simple & pertinent analogy? How much conviction to you think such a pose will bring to your arguments? Unless, of course, you actually ARE such a fool...

Now MtheGM, ol' bean. I know what a twat I've made you look, what with your pro-royal, mindless contumely and your very dodgy spelling of overly-clever words, but really. You know as well as I do that few analogies are "simple." Oh that they were! There are so many fundamental differences twixt what happens in prison and what happens in wider society that it's perfectly ludicrous to claim that the one is a microcosm of the other (which isn't to say that I deny all potential comparisons). Theleveller said it much better than I could. That's the second time in a day that you've called me naughty names simply because I demur from your lordly opinion on matters which most people would consider to be, at best, controversial. Actually, I was wrong up there. I didn't make you look a twat. You managed it all by yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 12 - 08:44 PM

Well, bubblyrat, I'm as anti-monarchist as they come, but I would be right up there should our beloved nation be threatened with invasion. The two standpoints do not go hand-in-hand. Mind you, I would not be right up there if some third-rate politico was trying to persuade me that a war fought ten thousand miles away to oust a few alleged nutters hiding in a country three times bigger than the UK was going to make me safer, or to invade a sovereign nation on the basis of the nastiness of its leader without any sort of exit strategy whatsoever and utterly heedless of the inevitable massive loss of innocent civilian life. I hope you'll accord me at least some choice in what I theoretically join up for, but at least be assured that pacifism is no part of my creed. Amazing, isn't it, how life isn't always black and white.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 03:01 AM

Steve ~~ I say you are not a fool; you call me a twat. And then you have to gall to accuse me of calling you naughty names. Oh, Mr Shaw, you really are a one!

I am not, btw, particularly pro-royal: a lot of them [Harry with his swastika; Diana with her sex-life; Margaret with her overall snobbish toffenosed general objectionability] can be a terrible embarrassment to those who wish them well. It is just that it happens to be the system we have, & works pragmatically as well as most others one observes; and it is usually best IMO to work on the valuable "if it ain't broke don't fix it" principle, for fear, as I think it was H Belloc who put it, of finding something worse. That is the full extent of my support for the institution.

But, as the judge said to Rumpole when he was trying to influence him re a suitable sentence, "You have your job to do and I have mine"; so we all have our jobs to do and they have theirs: & while they are doing it, surely they will do it most efficiently without constant sniping from mindless [thank you for the word] objectors on dubious principle to the very fact of their existence?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: theleveller
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 04:22 AM

Oh Bubblyrat, you do make me laugh! Apart from the fact that, at 63, it's unlikely that my services would be required, the point is that, if (in the unlikely event, I agree, but there's nothing wrong with demanding the impossible)an anarchisdt system were adopted worldwide, the threat of war and invasion would not arise. Your bloodthirsty, belligerent, bellicose blusterings can't hide the fact that you are, at heart, a snivelling, fauning, arselicker with the backbone of a cucumber.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:13 AM

I yearn for the days when some aspects of me resembled a cucumber....

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:35 AM

That's reminiscent of something Charlie-boy once said to Camilla, innit.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:37 AM

Hmm, I don't think we're talking tzatziki here.
Apart from which, wouldn't you be worried if it was green?

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:55 AM

Steve ~~ I say you are not a fool; you call me a twat.

I said you looked a twat, and, after some musing, I decided that you'd brought that impression upon yourself. You've just called me, in effect, a mindless sniping objector. At least I can agree to two-thirds of that characterisation; I'll let you decide which third I contest. As for their having their job to do, pray tell exactly what that is. I struggle to detect any gainful aspect of their employment. They certainly seem to do an awful lot of swanning around, generally in luxury and at public expense, in some sort of cod-ambassadorial role (ambassadors for what exactly I'm never quite sure about), in between taking extended holidays in vast mansions with enormous private estates where they can hunt 'n' shoot 'n' fish 'n' ride hosses to their hearts' content without our observing them. That would be far too much intrusion!

Finally, apropos of your post, at least Margaret has ceased to become the source of irritation you allude to, as she's well dead, so I hear. Wonder who paid for all her fags and booze...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:56 AM

Ah, I remember now. It wasn't a cucumber Charlie-boy wished to be: 'twas a tampon!

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Musket
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 05:57 AM

On this one, I am at odds with the consensus.

Regardless of what we think about the monarchy as either an institution or indeed the present incumbents, or rather the media image drawn up of them...

1. Far better than having someone who wants the job. (Our Aussie friends made that clear the last time they debated republicanism.)

2. I have been a businessman trading in all four (and the rest) corners of the world. There is a reason why many Johnny Foreigners want to trade with us, visit us, fawn over us, despite our Empire stain. We have everything to not offer them as Belgium does. What's the difference? Can you tell what it is yet?

One of the largest manufacturing orders I ever closed, resulting in 30 sustained new real full time well paid jobs, was to a company in Texas. To this day, I am convinced that my reassurances over prospective quality of goods, delivery schedules and technical support were secondary to the photos of me at a recent Buckingham Palace tea party. That's when he went from being a hard ball CEO to wanting to be my best mate ever....

Royalty sells. Lose it and we are left with fish & chips, drizzle, moaning gits and ill conceived sporting expectations.

Mind you, of course the government are spending more on it than they could have gotten away with, and of course they see it as a distraction to real problems. If that didn't work, we wouldn't have bread and circuses, or soap operas and Hello magazine, as they are now called.

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 06:43 AM

Well, you might call "mindless sniping objector" 'name-calling', of the same order as "twat". I leave it to Catters in general to adjudicate there.

Princes William & Harry are fully-serving officers in the armed services, both of whom have served in areas of combat on the same basis as other servicemen, after the full officer-training at Sandhurst required of all their fellow-officers. I don't expect you have ever been in the services, Steve. I have. It is quite hard work, I assure you. HM & her husband, octo- & nonogenarians, have heavy programmes of official public engagements of the same sort as those performed by all heads of state, however elected or otherwise appointed.

I fear you are making something of a fool of yourself all round with your foolish, doctrinaire asseverations, accusations and animadversions. I think you had best drop it before someone out there starts to wonder which of us it is who is coming over as a what-was-that-word-you-used-of-me-now?

Best regards
~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 06:50 AM

In fact, indeed, Steve, I didn't actually call you a MSO as such: you simply extrapolated the designation from the context on a 'cap·fits?' basis...

Subject: RE: BS: Stuff the Jubilee - No Cuts
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 12 - 07:02 AM

Yes, well they have to do something, eh? Can't see 'em swaggering up to the Cenotaph with fake or no medals, after all. Little danger of either of them coming back in a body bag, I imagine, though I'm not out there to see how well they're guarded. I won't ask if they got to Sandhurst under their own steam (or, indeed, to anywhere else they were educated) because it isn't fair to prejudge. Speculation is useless. "Official public engagements" sounds so hifalutin', eh? I suppose it means that Call-me-Dave and Samcam can have a bit more spare time if nowt else. You say heavy programmes of official public engagements, I say swanning around in luxury...let's call the whole thing off...