Signing In. Back From the Pub.

Snow delays aside I'm basically reporting that there is nothing to report. I suppose then it's a good time to update you all on the problems I've been having with my domestic situation.

As the Court of Protection ruled against me there has been no change in my grandmother's situation. She's still being prescribed inappropriate medication and is therefore suffering the effects of long term drug abuse, mainly impaired judgement. I've been able to work some of my top secret, extra special "magic" to mitigate the situation and through the Court process I've been able to bring her spending down to a manageable rate.

Demonstrating that sometimes it's the journey rather then the destination that matters although unsuccessful the statutory nuisance proceedings have severely reduced the tactical options available to the Notting Hill Housing Group's "henhouse." Therefore since the October 12th Court date their harassment has been limited to turning the TV in my backroom on and off with a universal remote control. They've done this so many times that they actually broke the TV about two weeks ago forcing me to listen to music instead. They're unable to interfere with the music system so for now the biggest problem I have to put up with from them is their silent fury at not having any influence whatsoever.

It's Snowing!

Well in the UK at least. It's actually been snowing in some parts of the country for about a week but today (30/11) around 70mm settled in London. As London is a large city in the south of the country if it snows there it normally means that it's snowing across the entire country.

Funnily enough this meant that the N30 student protests didn't really get started. Around 100 people protested in Birmingham, 400 in Liverpool and 1000 in London. There the police did everything they could to provoke trouble by suddenly going back on an agreement with protest organisers that they could march from Trafalgar Square to Parliament Square via Whitehall by placing a cordon across Whitehall. However the low turnout meant that there was no confrontation and the protesters dispersed in small groups. This meant that all that really happened was a large of police officers spent the day standing around looking really cold.

Last night (29/11) there was a similarly over-hyped demonstration in the South London borough of Lewisham. Here around 100 people gathered to witness a vote on the local council budget. They weren't allowed in leading to some pushing and shoving between the protesters, the building security and the local police. Once everything had died down the Territorial Support Group (TSG) were deployed mainly so the Metropolitan police could issue a press release saying they'd been forced to send in the riot squad.

Also there's currently an emergency ambulance parked outside the front of my property but I have no idea why because it's certainly not nothing to do with me.

Here We Go Again.

Today, November 29th, the 16th Conference of Parties Summit (COP16) begins in Cancun, Mexico. Running until December 10th COP16 gathers together delegations from most nations on earth to discuss the causes of and how to solve the problems created by global warming and climate change.

The mere fact that this summit is being held is a victory in itself because there are a lot of powerful people who had hoped that the entire COP process would die a death in Copenhagen. That means that the first objective of the summit is to make sure that none of the delegates are driven to suicide by frustration at the sheer lunacy of it all. Beyond that I am looking for a commitment that there will be a COP17 summit, a sharing of climate data between nations, a discussion of how to mitigate the effects of climate change and hopefully an increase in signatories to the Copenhagen Accord.

It will be interesting though to see if the summit will even get time to discuss these matters because there's already so much else going on in the world at the moment.

Ireland's Bailout. Yesterday (28/11) the International Monetary Fund (IMF) formally announced a seven year economic recovery plan for the Republic of Ireland. The plan will see Ireland receive a total of E85bn in loans from the IMF (E22.5bn), European Financial Stability Mechanism (E22.5bn), the European Financial Stability Fund (E22.5bn) and Ireland itself (17.5bn) all which will be charged an interest rate of 5.8%. The bailout is dependent of the Irish government passing it's budget on December 7th. That budget includes plans to increase to Ireland's carbon tax creating a discussion about a carbon tax versus a cap n' trade style system of carbon pricing.

North and South Korea. On November 28th US/South Korea military exercises began and China called for a resumption of stalled six party talks while the North and South Korean governments exchanged verbal insults. I refer to my original post on the matter entitled; "That's not good."

Haiti's Election. Held on November 28th the results are not expected for a couple of days. However it immediately apparent that the election was an utter shambles. With almost 10% of the countries electorate having been killed or incapacitated through illness, another 20% being displaced and no real functioning state to speak of it was almost impossible to tell who was eligible to vote and where. That meant that a lot of people were unable to vote while others took advantage of the chaos to vote multiple times. As a result whoever wins will have little credibility with voters and the RNDP are already accusing the USA of rigging the election to install Jude Celestin as a puppet president. This is a shame because if the Americans had actually gone to the trouble of rigging Haiti's election it would be much less chaotic then this.

Wikileaks. Starting on November 28th the whistleblower website, Wikileaks, is planning to release 250,000 diplomatic cables between the US government and their embassies overseas. These are rumoured to include some very sensitive information such as what US diplomats really think of foreign diplomats and governments. Although I've only been able to read the 220 documents that have been posted on the website so far which contain nothing really juicy it's obvious that these documents are much more serious then the Iraq and Afghanistan war logs. For example 08STATE116392 explains exactly what sort of intelligence US diplomats are expected to gather on the Palestinians and the Israel/Palestine peace talks. Therefore I'm worried about how explosive documents released during the COP16 will be. I'm especially worried because Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, is currently being investigated by the Swedish authorities over some less then credible allegations of rape. That means that even by simple provocation alone the Swedish Monarchy has great influence over what Wikileaks will publish and when.

Iran Bombings. On November 29th Iran had one of it's nuclear scientists killed and another seriously injured in two seperate bomb attacks. Almost automatically Iran has blamed these attacks on US and Israeli intelligence agencies. Although I haven't looked at it in great detail the attacks are probably the work of Baluchistan separatists operating with intelligence support from either Britain, Israel or Saudi Arabia. Given the proximity to the COP16 and the Wikileaks story Britain or Saudi Arabia are the most likely suspects.

Student Protests. On November 30th UK students plan to hold a third day of protest against increases to university tuition fees. Incredibly disrespectfully they are calling this protests "N30." This name should sound familiar to a lot of people because the original N30 protests were an important event in modern history. On November 30th 1999 the World Trade Organisation held it's summit in Seattle, USA. What followed was three days of unprecedented protest and rioting that saw the public unveiling of the anti-capitalist/anti-globalisation movement. By tricking the students into holding a large and possibly violent demonstration under the N30 banner Britain is trying to send the false message to the COP16 that the public will not tolerate globalised summits. So I can only apologise for the protesters in advance. After all they are just students.

Ravi Gurumurthy. As a director of the Notting Hill Housing Group Gurumurthy has played a key role in the troubles I've been having over the last year. He is also the head of strategy on climate change for the British government. I've not checked to see if he's actually attending the COP16 but if he is he's only there to draw attention to himself. Therefore if you're not prepared to actually punch him in the face he's best ignored.

Britain's Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR). Technically old news but I missed it at the time. Britain's CSR changed the way that revenue from something called the Crown Estate is distributed. Basically the Crown Estate is all non-privately owned land in the UK including the sea bed in UK territorial waters. Previously money generated by this land was paid to something called the Civil List which distributed it between minor Royals, Dukes, Lords, Bishops etc. The CSR changed that and now the money is paid directly to the Queen's personal fortune. Short version; if Britain builds off-shore wind turbines the Queen will make about £800million. So while I don't think the British delegation's position on global warming has changed dramatically at COP16 I expect them to be very big on wind.

Now I hope everyone's stocked up on aspirin, paracetamol and ibuprofen because I feel more then one headache coming on.

Haiti's Election is Here.

After months of hype Haitians will go to the polls on November 28th to choose their next President. As I'm sure you can imagine there is really just one issue in Haitian politics at the moment. How best to rebuild the country after January's earthquake.

It is a bitter irony then that the election itself has delayed and will continue to delay the reconstruction efforts. Even without Wyclef Jean there are 19 individual candidates for the Presidency. This vast choice coupled with and expected low voter turn out due to the country's Cholera epidemic and the general post-'quake chaos mean that there is expected to be no clear winner. Instead Haiti will have to once again hold it's breath and wait until January 15th for a run-off vote between the two most popular candidates.

Mirlande Manigat. The wife of ex-President Leslie Manigat who was deposed in the 1988 coup that led to the introduction of Haiti's constitution it is no surprise that the main plank of Mrs Manigat's campaign is to do away with the constitution that did away with her husband. Educated in Paris in the late 1960's and a founder member of Haiti's Assembly of Progressive National Democrats (RNDP) Party Mirlande Manigat is a career Marxist theorist who has published many books on women's rights, international relations and political reform. An ally of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez the main aim of the RNDP are to bring the variety of international aid agencies in the country under government control and increase the role of the state in what passes for an economy in Haiti.

Jude Celestin. A 48 year bachelor with limited social skills Jude Celestin is the ultimate technocratic nerd. With an advanced degree in mechanical engineering from Switzerland Celestin has pretty much dedicated his life to his career. He is the founder and until recently the head of Haiti's National Centre for Equipment (CNE) which provides trucks and heavy machinery that were essential in clearing up the rubble and burying the dead after the earthquake. A member of the governing Unity Party (INITE) Celestin has the endorsement of the successful, but not that popular, outgoing President Rene Preval. His main aims are to continue Preval's good work by working with international aid agencies and the UN to attract money and talent to help build a better future for Haiti.

Although a certain level of corruption has to be expected in Haitian politics the candidate that worries me most is Mirlande Manigat. Her Marxist agenda is going to terrify potential aid donors and make it near impossible for the Haitian government to work with international development bodies like the UN and the World Bank. Also her links to Hugo Chavez mean that her election as President pretty much guarantees that Haiti will receive no further help from the United States.

Plus I have also heard strong rumours that the RNDP caused the recent rioting by spreading the lie that MINUSTAH caused Haiti's Cholera outbreak. This was done to damage the election chances of INITE who have strong links with MINUSTAH and the UN. Those riots killed ten people, stopped aid flights arriving on the island and prevented thousands of people receiving medical treatment for Cholera. Any political party or Presidential candidate that is prepared to do something like that to win power simply does not deserve to be elected because they clearly don't have Haiti's best interests at heart.

So if I was able to vote I would vote for Jude Celestin.

Wednesday's Student Protests

As advertised on November 24th British students again took to the streets to protest against an increase in university tuition fees and other changes to the education system. There were at least four large demonstrations in cities across the UK and a dozen smaller protests in towns and university campuses across the country. Obviously it's going to take me ages to report on exactly what happened on every single one of them so for now I'll concentrate on the protest that received the most media attention. The London protest.

The day began at around 11:00 when students walked out of universities, higher education colleges and schools across the capital. In groups of 50-100 they then made their way to Trafalgar Square to join up for a single, large march at around 12:00. The plan was for this group of around 5000 to march down Whitehall to Parliament Square and on to LibDem headquarters in Cowley Street before returning to Trafalgar Square. The problem was that as the group made it's way down Whitehall the Metropolitan police had left one of the old pattern Mercedes Sprinter vans that they're in the process of phasing out locked but totally unattended in the middle of the street. Something which is a major breach of the police's standard operating procedure.

As the group surrounded this van as they were walking past it the police decided that this was such a sign of impending violence that they deployed officers in riot gear to instigate crowd containment procedures. This led to two kettles being formed, one between Parliament Square and Horse Guards Parade and one between Horse Guards Parade and Trafalgar Square. Once kettled the protesters who were prepared for property damage turned their attention to the police van, street furniture and the surrounding buildings. Bored and frustrated at being unable to continue their protest march or leave the area protesters who would otherwise have been peaceful began fighting with the police in attempts to escape the kettle. As a result there was a bit of pushing and shoving and a few windows got smashed. However as no-one tried to use the abandoned police van as a battering ram to break through police lines I don't think anyone was that seriously intent on violence.

The police's decision to contain the protest in Whitehall was simply ridiculous. At one end of Whitehall you have Parliament Square. As the name suggest this is just a square where a large crowd can be contained on a patch of grass in such a way as they pose a threat to nothing but the grass. At the other end of Whitehall you have Trafalgar Square, scene of the famous 1990 Poll Tax riot. After that riot the layout of Trafalgar Square was extensively redesigned with the specific purpose of turning it into a space where a violent crowd of up 50,000 people could be contained in order to prevent widespread disorder. This is why most protests in London end with a rally in Trafalgar Square.

Instead of using these two purpose built containment areas the police decided to hold the demonstration in Whitehall itself. In terms of politics Whitehall is probably the most important street in the UK. Not only does it contain the entrance to Downing Street, home to the Prime Minister and Chancellor, it also contains the Cabinet Office, the Foreign Office, the Ministry of Defence and the Department of Health. So if you wanted to go and smash up the buildings, politicians and civil servants that make up the British state Whitehall is exactly where you would want to be. Therefore while there are always people who turn up to public events looking for a fight I would say that the reason why there was violence in London yesterday was because the Metropolitan police wanted there to be violence.

The reason for this is that on November 10th the Metropolitan police were completely humiliated when protesters caused £1million worth of damage to Millbank Tower, caused members of MI5 and GCHQ to lock themselves in their offices and prevented members of the House of Lords turning up to claim their expenses. This meant that senior police officers came in for serious criticism from the sort of the powerful people who could seriously affect their careers. Also there has been an unfounded rumour circulating that the police allowed the events of November 10th to take place as a way of making their own protest about government cuts to police budgets. Therefore the police needed another student riot to show that they could contain a student riot and prove their loyalty to the Crown by showing they were prepared to give protesters a damn good thrashing.

This fits is with a wider policy across the British state of trying to provoke protest and disorder. Despite the 24 hour rolling news coverage of how absolutely brilliantly Britain is doing in reality the country is facing at least ten years of serious economic misery. For at least five of those years Britain is also going to have to endure a Conservative government intent on waging a class war against it's population. This means that there are going to be plenty of riots and protests still to come. Driven by the ghost of Marget Thatcher the state's strategy to deal with this is to provoke these battles early so the opposition burns itself out before the really nasty stuff is introduced.

Ireland's Rescue Package.

On November 22nd the Republic of Ireland formally applied to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for an economic bailout to be supported by the European Union (EU). Much like when you apply for a bank loan Ireland have submitted all the paperwork and is just waiting for the IMF to agree the terms and conditions of the loan. This means that no official announcement has been made and no firm details have been released.

However from the rumours that have been circulating it is believed that the IMF will make a low interest loan of between 75 and 90bn Euros with the best guess being E85bn. The vast majority of this money will be used to recapitalise Ireland's banks. This makes perfect sense because Ireland's recession has been a property driven recession. That means that during the boom years Irish banks made lots of loans to property developments that went bust. It is the high number of these bad loans that are undermining confidence in the Irish economy. Increasing the amount of capital held in reserves increases the amount of these bad loans that Irish banks can absorb without collapsing restoring confidence in the economy as a whole. The rest on the money will be used to help the Irish government meet it's day to day expenses. Without it the Irish government would be forced to raise this money from the international bond markets at a much higher cost if they can raise it at all.

In return the IMF has asked Ireland to make E20bn in savings but has given the Irish government great freedom to choose where exactly those savings come from. This means that Ireland gets to keep its low 12.5% corporate tax rate. However the Irish government have today (24/11) have released a 4 year recovery plan which shows it intends to reach that E20bn figure through E15bn of spending cuts and E5bn of tax increases. This recovery plan will form the basis for the government's next budget. The main proposed tax increases are;

• An increase in the rate of Value Added Tax (VAT) to 23% by 2014.
• Changes to the income tax system which I don't know enough about to comment on but are expected to raise E1.2bn.
  
• A new property tax of around E200 per year to be paid by people who own property.

The main spending cuts will be;

• 25,000 public sector jobs to be cut.
• Pay freezes for public sector workers.
• A 10% pay cut for new public sector employees.
• A new, less generous public sector pension scheme.

Although harsh, especially on top of existing austerity measures, these proposals seem to be quite fair and most importantly necessary. The only real area of concern I have is over rumoured proposals to change the unemployment benefit system so that payments are reduced and eventually stopped after someone has been out of work for six months. This is the American welfare model and highlights the problems with the IMF's often one size fits all approach to economic development. Although Ireland has high levels of unemployment this is mainly caused by an historic failure of the Irish economy to generate jobs rather then an overly generous welfare state. In the past this lack of employment has forced vast numbers of Irish men and women to migrate to other countries in order to find work. This is such a feature of the Irish economy that people often used to joke that Ireland's two main exports were guinness and people. So if unemployment payments are cut and the E1 cut to the minimum wage doesn't generate enough jobs Ireland faces a possible brain drain as large numbers of their talented people move to other EU countries to find work. This sort of migration will obviously also have a negative impact on those other countries own attempts to reduce their unemployment rates. So I hope that the IMF is prepared to have some flexibility on this proposal.

Unappealing as this all is it's important to remember that it wasn't the IMF that ruined the Irish economy. It was the Irish government that ruined the Irish economy. The fact that yesterday one of Ireland's major newspapers ran a front page featuring a picture of the Prime Minister alongside the headline "Go Now You Gobshite!" suggests that the Irish people have more then already worked that out for themselves. This has led to one of the parties in the governing coalition to threaten to bring down the government unless a General Election is called by February 2011. Sadly this actually creates more problems then it solves because if the Irish Parliament fails to pass the Prime Ministers rescue plan the IMF bailout disappears and Ireland's economic problems get much worse.

So I think that while the Ireland's politicians should rigorously question these economic proposals in order to get the most effective plan they should avoid party political grandstanding and unite to pass Ireland's budget because it would make a fitting epitaph to Brian Cowen's political career.

More Student Protests

As you may have heard on November 10th 2010 British students held a protest against a 300% increase in university tuition fees. The day ended with a riot at Millbank Tower, the HQ of the governing Conservative Party.

Tomorrow, November 24th the students will be trying to build on that, I suppose, success by holding a second day of protests. However this time rather then gathering 50,000 people from around the country to converge on London and the Metropolitan Police's 20 strong Forward Intelligence Team (FIT) they plan to hold 36 separate demonstrations and walkouts across the country that will be covered by FIT teams from 12 police forces. No serious violence or disorder is expected but at least 24 young men are predicted to be caught on camera trying to impress a much smaller number of young women.

In preparation for the protest a group called FITWatch began by getting their website shut down by the police on an unsupported allegation of attempting to pervert the course of justice. They then moved to another web server and posted some very long and complicated advice on what the students should do if arrested and how to deal with the FIT teams. This advice included wearing masks, carrying large placards to block the police cameras, photographing the police photographers and following the FIT officers around aggressively demanding their names and shoulder numbers.

As tomorrow is expected to be one of the coldest days of the year I would have thought the best advice would have been to simply wear a scarf. Better yet would to not go in the first place because let me guess. The person who suggested these regional demos was a little bit older then everyone else in the group, had a bit more money and seems able to get on with almost everyone by telling stories about how radical they were during the Iraq war protests.

That's Not Good.

Today (23/11) the Americans and the Chinese are meeting to discuss how best to get North Korea to give up it's nuclear weapon(s). The North Koreans have not been invited to this meeting.

Obviously angered by the perceived snub the North Koreans have responded by firing over 200 artillery shells into South Korea killing 3 South Korean Marines, injuring 17 more and at least 3 civilians. As North Korea and South Korea are technically still at war with each other this has got a lot of people very worried because this incident certainly breaches the ceasefire agreement and artillery barrages are normally the sort of thing that turn cold wars into shooting wars. When at least one side has nuclear weapons this is generally considered a very bad thing.

While this is clearly a very tense situation there shouldn't be too much to worry about because this is the sort of unsophisticated diplomacy that everyone's come to expect from North Korea. Whenever the North Korean government wants something, be it attention or more usually money, they go and do something dangerous, provocative and downright silly. This gets the World to focus on them and puts other countries under great pressure to give them things in order to stop them doing dangerous, provocative and silly things. This particular instance is more dramatic then most because North Korea is in the process of grooming Kim Jong-un to take over power from his father Kim Jong-il. As such the North Korean military are using this as an opportunity to school the younger Kim in their particular way of doing business. Also people have recently been comparing North Korea to Britain. This has offended the North Koreans because not even they would be prepared to put up with the crap the British tolerate from their own dear leaders.

Hopefully what will happen now is that the Americans will discreetly speak to the South Koreans and the Chinese will discreetly speak to the North Koreans to make sure that this doesn't escalate any further. So with a bit of luck this will calm down again right up until the North Koreans decide they want something else.

How Exciting. News About Me.

• November 17th: Emailed the Court of Protection (COP) to tell them that I won't be paying their £500 fee demand so if they wish to pursue it they should take appropriate action. I think the exact quote was something along the lines of: "If you feel this proceeding has not caused you enough embarrassment...." The COP are currently seeking advice on how to proceed if they proceed at all. Until they make their decision it's not my problem.

• November 10th: Received a letter from the Notting Hill Housing Group (NHHG) acknowledging they'd received the 21 notice I sent them on November 4th. The fact the letter is from NNHG confirms that they have fully absorbed Presentation Housing Association into their company along with all the legal liability that entails.

• November 18th: Received a letter from Marson informing me that they will no longer be acting as NNHG's legal firm. If I had to guess I would say that this decision was mutual. Sending a barrister to a Magistrates hearing is like sending the SAS to issue a speeding ticket so NHHG have realised they can only afford to do it once. Also Marsons appear to have lied in Court at least once in this matter. Attempting it again would be seriously pushing their luck. However in true lawyer fashion Marsons have indicated that they would be prepared to represent me provided they get paid.

• November 18th: Received a letter from Ewa Phelan at NHHG informing me that they would be unable to discuss the matter until November 25th, a clear attempt to force the issue onto the agenda for the COP16 Summit. I simply emailed back pointing out that if a 21 day notice was issued on November 4th it expires on November 25th. Therefore if they wish to discuss the matter they have to do so before November 25th.

So basically the twenty minutes I've spent posting all this up on the Internet has increased the amount of time I've spent on it by about 400%. At some point in the future I am very seriously considering investigating whether or not I could use Twitter or Facebook to speed up the process.

More Misery For Haiti.

In January 2010 Haiti was hit by an earthquake that killed 250,000 people. Then in October it suffered an isolated Cholera outbreak. In November hurricane Tomas brought with it torrential rain and flooding that spread the Cholera bacteria meaning that now the entire country is at risk of infection.

So far there have been 17,000 Cholera cases causing 1,100 deaths. Normally Cholera kills 1 of every 2 people it infects. The fact that Haiti's outbreak is only killing around 1 in every 15 people means that despite the deaths MINUSTAH and the other aid agencies in the country are doing a fantastic job treating the outbreak.

This good work is being made almost impossible because Haitians are starting to panic and riot. Already this week this violence has killed at least 10 more people, prevented aid agencies from going into certain neighbourhoods to treat patients and has forced the closure of the country's airport stopping medical supplies being delivered. The reason for the panic is that the strain of Cholera has recently been identified as the South East Asian strain. Some of the UN peacekeepers in Haiti are from Nepal in Central Asia so some people believe that the UN peacekeepers brought Cholera to Haiti on purpose.

This is simply not true. The strain of Cholera (Vibrio Cholerae 0319) is only known as South East Asian Cholera because it was first identified by scientists working in a laboratory in Japan. They were working on samples taken from a Cholera outbreak in Indonesia which is about 40,000km away from Nepal.

Ogawa Cholera, as it's more properly known, is normally transmitted between countries by the bacteria moving through water either in the sea in the rain. This means that it is the most common strain of Cholera in the World with outbreaks in every continent on the earth including the outbreaks in Zimbabwe in Africa in 2003 and 2008.

Wherever it breaks out the only way that Cholera can be defeated is by people practicing good personal hygiene. This means following four simple rules;

1. Do not shit in the water supply. All human feces need to be buried in the ground at least 30m away from the nearest river or well.

2. Boil all water before use. This includes water used for washing, brushing teeth and cleaning cooking pots. If aid agencies are able to give out water purification products follow the instructions given out with those products. Once treated keep the clean water in sealed, clean containers.

3. Do not eat raw meat, fish or vegetables. If you have not seen it being prepared safely do not eat it.

4. Wash your hands as often as possible. If soap is not available first scrub your hands with sand or ash from a fire before rinsing them with boiled water. This needs to be done after every time you use the toilet of touch someone infected with Cholera.

Another Irsih Economic Crisis

Along with Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain Ireland is one of the Eurozone countries left most exposed to the global economic crisis. Despite a program of robust austerity measures a recent flurry of bond selling has pushed Ireland's borrowing costs to an all time high. In turn this has created a very real if slightly overstated risk that the Irish government will soon run out of money. Having learnt the lessons from the Greek crisis the European Union (EU) has prepared a very reasonable economic bailout package. The only problem is that Ireland are stubbornly refusing to accept that package.

Part of the reason for this is good old fashioned pride. The main reason though is that Britain has warned Ireland that the bailout could further damage the Irish economy by forcing it to raise it's very low corporate tax rate to parity with other Eurozone Countries. Sadly Ireland appears to have believed them without realising that Britain is aggressively pursuing an anti-Euro agenda in order to further it's own economic and political objectives. By refusing the bailout Ireland is causing fears to grow over the debts of other Eurozone Countries which is undermining the value of the Euro to the point that the single European currency that the Conservatives despise so much may actually collapse destroying the economies of the countries that use it. There is even a rumour that Britain has actually been behind some of the bond selling that has caused interests rates to spike.

How's This For Cruel and Unusual?

Once upon a time I used to have a life. Fair point it was small and chaotic but it was mine and it had great scope for improvement. Then in 2006 this was deemed unacceptable and it was all stolen from me. Now every year I get forced to celebrate the fact that I'm getting older while my existence is frozen in time.

This years instrument of torture was an Italian restaurant in South Croydon. While the food was good the evening was as socially awkward as it was dull. By way of a present my brother gave me a copy of the first season of the new V tv show on DVD so I feel I should probably write a letter of apology.

Today the Court of Protection (COP) has sent me a £500 bill for a hearing fee. I think the idea is that this will provoke me into a big argument about why a hearing shouldn't have been called in the first place. The problem is that a fee exemption has already been granted for the case so while I'll have to speak to them there is nothing to get excited about. Basically the COP is now behaving like a troublesome ex-girlfriend that just can't accept that the relationship is over.

Rememberence Day

Took place on November 14th. Always held on the first Sunday after Armistice Day this is when the UK armed forces stop to mourn their friends and colleagues killed in conflict. On this day of the dead the links between the Crown, the Church and the Military are at their most pronounced. As you would expect the events of the day a carefully planned and tightly regimented;

10:30 - 12:00: Assemble at local war memorial for wreath laying ceremony and two minutes silence.

12:00 - 15:00: Assemble at regimental association/mess for a stiffening drink followed by lunch.

15:00 -17:00: Assemble at regimental Chapel for memorial service.

17:00 - 19:00: Assemble at pub/mess for wind down.

So looking at the news output for that day. At around 12:00 it was announced that Britain had successfully rescued Paul and Rachel Chandler from the clutches of those dastardly Somali pirates without having to pay a ransom.* Then in the evening kick off Chelsea football club were thrashed 3-0 by Everton football club.

Also the English Defence League decided to honour the day but getting drunk and shouting abuse at a Mosque in Portsmouth. Personally I think they're just upset that earlier in the week they got shown how to do this riot stuff by a bunch of scrawny students.




*Britain doesn't pay ransoms to kidnappers. However they do pay large sums of money to the Somali government and then give the Somalis the authority to use whatever means they see fit to ensure that the hostages are released. Likewise Britain doesn't pay hush money to prisoners they've tortured.

The Seige of Millbank.

That's the name being given to the events of November 1oth that saw British students clash with police at 30 Millbank Tower. Having taken at a closer look at those events the level of damage done, the number of people involved and the level of disorder means that as far as I'm concerned it qualified as a small but very real riot.

In order to understand how that riot came to be you have to understand the role that student tuition fees play in British politics. Prior to 2010's General Election the Liberal Democrat (LibDem) Party were the only party that promised not to increase the fees that students pay for university tuition. Some including the Party leader, Nick Clegg even went so far as to personally sign a public pledge to vote against any attempts to raise tuition fees regardless of who won the election. This stance meant that the LibDems attracted lots of support from students, their parents and the parents of children who would soon become students. It was these votes that helped the LibDems to their strong showing at the election and left them holding the balance of power in the formation of the coalition government.

Then when the LibDems, or the Yellow Tories as they're now known, got into power their leader, Nick Clegg turned round to these voters and basically said; "F*** You! I get to be deputy Prime Minister." by announcing that they would be tripling tuition fees. So it was hardly surprising that when around 4000 of these voters found themselves marching past Tory party HQ they pretty much spontaneously decided to return the sentiment. With only around 50 police officers initially guarding the office complex this led to a six hour riot that saw £1million worth of damage being done to the building, 40 police officers (mostly lightly) injured and 60 arrests so far.

To make matters worse Millbank Tower not only houses the Conservative Party HQ it is also home to London offices of the spy agency GCHQ. Staff there along with their colleagues at MI5 headquarters a few doors down were forced to spend the afternoon locked inside their offices in order to protect themselves from the rioters. For a security service that is about as humiliating as it gets.

Having been visibly shaken by the riot the British state in it's entirety is now expected is to launch into something of a vendetta against the perpetrators. The first stage of this, which happened almost immediately, was to claim that the legitimate National Union of Students (NUS) march had been hijacked by anarchists who committed the disorder. The main purpose of this tactic is to create a split amongst the students and their supporters by making a distinction between "Good" protesters who engage in ineffective protest and "Bad" protesters who engage in effective protest. The secondary purpose is to provide reassurance. If the rioting was orchestrated by a small group of anarchists and left-wing radicals then the activities of these small groups can easily be disrupted preventing the threat of future disorder. However if the rioting was simply ordinary people spontaneously resorting to insurrection in response to the spending cuts then it is much harder to control meaning that the state has a very big problem indeed.

The second part of the vendetta will be to identify those involved in the rioting and then punish them either judicially or extra-judicially. To this end some British newspapers have been forced into publishing photographs and setting up tiplines to help identify people while other British newspapers didn't need any encouragement. I also suspect there will be a special edition of the BBC's "Crimewatch" TV show just to deal with that one protest. I'm not sure how successful this will be because while even the police hate grasses a vast number of the protesters were inexperienced enough to be caught on camera committing criminal acts without even taking the basic precaution of wearing a mask to disguise their identity which does rather rule out serious anarchist involvement. One of the first things intelligence will be looking at is who decided to route the march past Millbank Tower in the first place even though most marches routed through Westminster pass Millbank Tower at some point.

With all the debate about the polices tactics and whether the protesters have damaged or enhanced their cause still raging I can't help but think that the most depressing part of the day was that it was carried out by university students. These are meant to be some of the brightest and best young minds in Britain yet they can't seem to work out that a recent defence pact between the UK and France means that it might not be the best idea to march to the beat of the French drum. As a result they've decided to move on from this success adopting the failed Iraq War strategy of marching everyone into submissive boredom with another march where the police spotters will no doubt be out in force.

The Cargo Bomb Plot.

On October 29th British Intelligence released, in dramatic fashion, details of a plot to transport bombs to the United States aboard cargo planes. One these bombs was intercepted at East Midlands airport in the UK, a second was intercepted at Cologne airport in Germany and the chaos forced the Americans to ground and search aircraft in Philadelphia and Newark. British intelligence have since claimed that both of these bombs, hidden in printer cartridges, were timed to detonate in mid-air over the eastern seaboard of the United States.

Like the Christmas day, Detroit bomb plot Britain has claimed that these bombs, also made of PETN, were the work of a bomb maker called Ibrahim al-Asiri, a Saudi belonging to the Al-Qada affiliate Al-Qada in the Arab Peninsula (AQAP). As there are serious doubts as to the very existence of AQAP rather then being a legitimate terrorist attack this was, like the Detroit bomb plot, a British false flag operation. However unlike the Detroit plot this operation had a very immediate and specific purpose - to influence the outcome of the US mid-term elections that were to be held four days after the plot was uncovered. The idea being that a big, dramatic but foiled terrorist attack would convince American voters that Barack Obama and his Democrat Party couldn't be trusted on national security prompting them to vote for the rival Republican Party in droves.

Obviously even the Republican voting members of the US establishment take a very dim view of foreign powers trying to influence the outcome of their elections especially when those attempts involve loading bombs onto planes and flying them to the US. Therefore the British also included elements in the plot designed to cause as much stress and confusion to the Americans in order to distract them from the true purpose of the operation. The main part of this was to release incomplete information at the last possible moment in order to convince the Americans that they were facing a ticking bomb scenario with bombs on any number of planes in American skies that could explode at any moment killing thousands of people. If this wasn't distracting enough the plot also included details that could be confused for code about me and my situation. For example regular readers of this blog will know that in my dealings with the Court of Protection I've had lots of trouble printing out documents due to inexplicable problems with printer cartridges. Also the decision to ground and search the aeroplane at East Midlands airport was made at the time I was expected to publish my long awaited post about the US mid-term elections. This meant that as I was putting the finishing touches to that post there was a dialogue going on between the UK and the US along the lines of "Have you found it yet? What's in it? Is it going to explode?" etc. In fact the UK police gave the "All clear" message just five minutes after I published that post.

As to why the British wanted the Republican Party to dominate at the US elections the answer is really twofold. Firstly it is ideological. Saying that Britain is a bit right-wing is like saying Hitler was a bit naughty. Therefore Britain would like the rest of the World to be run by people who share it's worldview. In America that means the Republicans even if the British think they're a bit too liberal. The Republican Party are also especially important to the British because they draw some of their core support from Protestant fundamentalists. These people share the same religious belief that under pins the UK Monarchy - that Protestants are on mission from God to provoke a holy war with all the other religions in order to bring about the end of the World and fulfill a misinterpretation of the Biblical prophecy of Judgement day. By having these people elected to power in the United States Britain effectively gets to control America and it's vast wealth and power. On a related note up until about 1950 Britain wasn't just a country it was an Empire. Britain has never come to terms with the loss of that empire and desperately wants it back. The problem is that they don't have the wealth or strength to regain it. America does though so if Britain can convince America that terrorists are trying to attack them from former British colonies it can get America to go in an help Britain re-colonise those nations.

The second reason is purely economic. As previously mentioned the last eight years of Republican rule caused an unprecedented global economic disaster that meant it will be 2012/13 before the US economy recovers. To put that in perspective the Brazilian, German and Chinese economies actually grew stronger during that period and Britain's economy is not expected to recover until 2018/19 at the earliest. So unless Britain can find some way to sabotage everyone else's economy and slow down their recoveries Britain faces getting relegated down to the third tier of World powers. Although it doesn't look like it or feel like it at the moment Obama's Presidency has actually being quite strong on the economy in exceptionally difficult conditions. By contrast the Republican's economic plans that include reducing the deficit by cutting taxes and maintaining spending along with their obsession with starting a currency war with China are idiotic to the point of being suicidal. Therefore if the Republicans were to gain power in 2012 the American and by extension the World economy would be looking at another decade of financial misery which would allow Britain to make up ground and give them a get out of jail free card for their own economic incompetence.

The economic element of the cargo bomb plot is probably best demonstrated through the mis-fortunes of Britain's national airline, British Airways (BA). For the last year or so BA have been under investigation for keeping the cost of shipping air cargo artificially high and were fined £90million on November 10th for that offence. The increased security costs that are expected to follow this latest scare story give BA the perfect excuse to hike their prices back up again.

The COP Judgement.

As previously mentioned I received a copy of Senior Judge Lush's judgment on November 9th. I am seriously considering applying to the Court to make a section 91(2) that would allow publication of this judgement. However if you were able to read a copy of the judgment you would see why the Judge is unlikely to open his decision up to public scrutiny.

Suffice to say it not only gives great breadth for the judgment to be overturned on appeal it also gives grounds from the Judge to be sacked and possibly face criminal prosecution. These are now two things that I will require as part of any settlement however I'm not sure why I should bother pursue them. After all without my input this situation is just the Brits inflicting pain on an old lady because they enjoy it.

However in the coming days I will contact the Legal Aid Board. If they are prepared to provide funding for a full and sufficient legal team to insulate me from the proceedings then I may consider further action.

That Wasn't In the Script

Today (10/11) the National Union of Students (NUS) staged a march through Westminster, central London to protest against a proposed tripling of university tuition fees. What was meant to be a rather tame A-B march ended with a rally at around 13:00.

Then a group of about 1000 protesters decided to march on Millbank tower, which houses the offices of the governing Conservative party. This took the police completely by suprise and the protesters were able to break through thin police lines and smash their way into the building through the glass frontage. They are now occupying the building and the street outside while setting fires and breaking things. The police are currently calling up re-enforcements from across London while they attempt to surround the building and contain the protest. Given that Millbank tower is quite a large building with multiple exists they're going to require a lot of officers to achieve that.

Ah Would You Look at That.

The Americans have just sent a large trade delegation to India and Britain have sent an even larger trade delegation to China and the Court of Protection has returned it's verdict.

It's decided to throw out my application. This verdict was returned as part of a lengthy judgement still have to read however I suspect and hope that it contains vast grounds to appeal. After all by now even the Brits should have worked out that this wasn't being done for my benefit.


Edited to Add@ 17:12: I'm not going to go into detail about the COP judgement because of trade matters. However the final paragraph of the judgement reads:

"For the purposes of the law relating to contempt of Court, information relating to proceedings held in private may be published where the Court makes an order under rule 91(2) of the Court of Protection rules 2007. I have made no such order in this case, and accordingly no information relating to these proceedings may be published."

So that's a clear attempt to suppress then.

This is Getting Boring.

On November 4th I received a copy of the judgement in the Statutory Nuisance case from Croydon Magistrates Court. To no-one's surprise it made no reference to the non-existent Supreme Court ruling. Instead it states that the case was thrown out because the defendant (Presentation Housing Association) had not received written notification of the prosecution a minimum of three days before it began. Of course the defence were notified on July 20th and the prosecution didn't officially begin until August 19th which, to my mind, is a gap of thirty days. Therefore I could mount an expensive and time consuming appeal on the grounds that even that reasoning is seriously faulty.

Instead I sent Presentation Housing Association another 21 day notification on November 4th. That means they have until November 25th to voluntarily make good or we're all going back to Court again and by then even the Brits should have worked this one out.

Since then I've mainly been asleep so it's probably time for me to go and do something that vaguely resembles work.

US Election Coverage

..Will have to wait because today has been my big and exciting day at the Court of Protection and you'll never guess what. It was a complete waste of time with the Court massively overstepping it's bounds by trying to act as a mediator.

Despite of a London Underground strike making things extra difficult my father and I travelled to the Court separately. We did not speak before the hearing and we did not speak after the hearing. During the hearing the Judge just read out the evidence submitted in witness statements and asked us to confirm those statements. My father tried to make a great deal of his "connections" but stayed just the right side of sounding like a Walter Mitty style fantasist who believed himself to be on some super secret spy mission. There was some discussion over what I thought of my fathers statements and vice versa but there was nothing said that hadn't already being said, written or shouted. Having wasted two hours of everybody's time the Judge decided he was going to review all the paper evidence and post us a copy of his judgement in a few weeks time. That's what a paper hearing is and the fact he's now going to do that only serves to underline the pointlessness of holding an oral hearing in the first place.

We did however learn two interesting things. The first being that the solicitor, David White has now retired from the legal profession saving me the trouble of having him thrown out of the legal profession. The second thing is that the Judge is the sort of man who set's up Google Alerts to tell him everytime someone uses his name on the internet so this blog is now fully entered into evidence.

No excuse then for people to not know that due to this act of childish insubordination the price has now gone up. Not only will a significant monetary sum now need to be signed over specific people will now have to serve jail time.