Beyond Irony

From Fox News:-

Famed global warming activist James Schneider and a journalist friend were both found frozen to death on Saturday, about 90 miles from South Pole Station, by the pilot of a ski plane practicing emergency evacuation procedures.

McKellen on His Award

On his icon award, Sir Ian McKellen said: "I've played iconic parts - I think that's the point. I played Gandalf the Grey and the White and Magneto. So their lustre rubs off on me rather than the other way round."

That's very modest. His portrayal of Magneto is brilliant. In my opinion, it's McKellen who made that portrayal as memorable as it was.

Tweedy

From The Press and Journal:-

Sales of Harris Tweed are expected to be boosted by the new Doctor Who, who will don a jacket made from the fabric during the new series.

So, like most old people, he's going to stink of piss?

Those Enlightened, Global Warming Believing Europeans

Germans are losing their fear of climate change, according to a survey, with just 42 percent worried about global warming.

Or maybe not.

Clueless

From The Letter Pages of The Times

Barristers are self-employed, so the headlines show gross figures from which they have to pay all expenses, leaving a net of somewhere around £40 an hour. They have no sick pay, no holiday pay, no private health insurance and no pension, they have no perks of any kind; all or any of those have to come out of what’s left of the £40 after tax. And now Mr Straw wants to cut those rates by 18 per cent.

You can’t get your car fixed for £60 an hour, yet the Government seems to think that barristers who protect the reputations, livelihoods and liberty of those accused — but not convicted — of crime are not even worth that.

Well, Paul Mendelle (from the Bar Association), it might well be argued that people who protect us every day on the road are worth just as much. Frankly I don't like the insinuation that somehow, barristers are "better" than mechanics.

But let's look at some things here: all of those costs you mention also apply to a mechanic business, but unlike them, they've got a whole bunch of costs you don't have. Costs of supplies , costs of tools, costs of machinery, premises that are larger than a small office, higher insurance costs, higher public liability costs. They typically need to have cover (in terms of extra staff) because of people being off sick.

Barristers have to undergo five years of training and professional qualification before they can begin to practice and most come to the Bar saddled with debts of £40,000 to £50,000. Mr Straw claims there are too many barristers, saying there were 2,500 in the 1970s. There are more than 12,000 barristers in England and Wales, which had a population of 54 million in 2008. In 1900 there were more than 9,500 barristers when the population was 32 million, so there are now fewer barristers per head than a hundred years ago.

Well, barely. It's now 2.2/10,000 people compared to 2.9/10,000 people in 1900. Are barristers saying that they haven't improved their productivity by 25% in 110 years?

We could also consider that a garage man doesn't get the advantage of protecting his trade by high barriers to entry and fixed prices for his work and typically has at least 5 years before starting out on his own.

Kurosawa 100

Today would have been Akira Kurosawa's 100th Birthday. Along with Google, I offer my salute to one of the greatest directors to ever have lived. A man who influenced just about everyone. If you've seen A Fistful of Dollars, The Magnificent Seven, A Bug's Life or Battle Beyond The Stars, you've seen films that are remakes of Kurosawa stories. If you've seen Star Wars, you've seen a film heavily influenced by his work. The guys who influenced everyone that followed, from Bergman to Scorsese to Werner Herzog were influenced by Kurosawa.

For me, he just shot brilliant cinema that few can match. I'll give you this badass scene from Yojimbo as a taster:-

David Cameron (Part 253)

I never know what to make of David Cameron and there's a number of interpretations of his behaviour. A favourite one of the more Thatcherite wing of the Conservative Party is that he really is a proper Thatcherite, but you'll just have to sit through all of this waffle and once he gets into power, he'll start slowly turning things around. Another is that he's genuinely more of a social Conservative.

But I'm tempted to say that the guy is a massive fool who has happened to have got the job because of 1 Newsnight programme, raised the polls because he looks nice in a suit and no-one is going to oppose him.

Because ConservativeHome is reporting:-

CCHQ has confirmed the story IS true. The Trade Union Modernisation Fund will continue if Cameron becomes Prime Minister.

I don't know what shit a Conservative would have to be on to continue with a programme to channel taxpayer's money into trade unions (and therefore into the Labour party). Setting aside the obvious political advantage of putting Labour out of business, there's a bigger ideological point that this is people's hard-earned cash and if they want to give it to unions, that should be their choice.

The Cons seem to be staggeringly naive. Cameron appears in The Graun occassionally, despite the fact that you are, at best, going to get a few dozen readers to convert. Likewise, no-one much likes the unions except for hardened socialists.

Twat.