According to a new report in Britain schoolchildren could soon “swear an allegiance” to the Queen. I can hear the cries of “hogwash” ringing around the realm now; rising only slightly above the hysterical laughter.

To what do we owe this latest lunacy?

To promote Britishness of course!

And to whom do we owe these pearls of wisdom?

Gordon Brown and former Attorney General Lord Goldsmith!

Under the proposals a new public holiday will be created in time for the Olympics in 2012 and that (and I quote)” schoolchildren should take part in the same kind of ceremonies for foreigners taking British nationality.”

Please reread the above paragraph and see if you see the same glaring flaw that hits me in the face like a dead and decomposing fish……

How do you promote “Britishness” by copying foreigners?

To the Crazy Englishman; Britishness was the stuff of Thomas Savery, Sir Issac Newton or Aneurin Bevan to name only a tiny few.

Savery gave the world the steam engine; Newton’s gift to the world was physics and Aneurin Bevan’s vision was a free quality health service copied throughout .the world.

Just three from an enormous cast of British heroes renowned throughout the world yet we apparently need to copy someone else’s ideas…

What a wonderful suggestion from a government which still fails to acknowledge the English as a race. I have another; declare St. Georges day as a public holiday and recognise the English before you celebrate “Britishness” without them.

Lets see how this so called pledge of Allegiance could possibly go…..

I pledge allegiance to the Queen of Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Commonwealth and the European Union and any other “Johnny Come Lately.”

And to the Monarchy, For which it Stands.

Multitudes of races (but not the English,) under millions of gods; idols; and despots (delete as applicable)

Divided (unless we forgot somebody)

With liberty and justice for all (except the English but including everyone else)

Doesn’t have quite the same ring does it? T.T.F.N.

So the charge count against O. J. Simpson is up to eleven and he could spend the rest of his life in prison; but am I the only one who suspects that the long distance phone lines betwixt California and Nevada have been buzzing?

I sometimes wonder if I am the only person in the world who holds to the fact that he was found not guilty of murder and despite what anyone thinks he is therefore not guilty. I know all of the arguments, I have heard them ad nauseum but I have to ask; if any of us (mere mortals) were in the same position as he was with the same resources as he had would any of us acted differently? I have my own opinions as to his guilt or innocence but at the conclusion of the (so called) “Trial of the Century” he was found not guilty by a jury of his peers.

I remember watching this trial in London (where it completely filled the prime time news hours) and the thing I most remember about it was the repulsive sight of Ron Goldman giving a press conference rabidly declaring the guilt of the defendant as the jury was in the process of deliberating the verdict.

As I watched I soon realised that there is much to recommend the “sub judice” laws in other countries including England. For those not familiar; after charges are made and until a verdict and sentencing are reached nobody is allowed to discuss the case.

Instinctively I reacted with disgust to the sight of this man clearly trying to influence either the verdict or the possible sentence and that (I have to say) has affected my opinion of not only Goldman but O.J. Simpson ever since.

In that moment (in my eyes) Goldman made O. J. a victim and himself a persecutor.

How Goldman must be rubbing his hands with glee at Simpson’s latest predicament but I don’t see his happiness lasting.

The case against Simpson seems to be badly flawed; not one of the witness’s is what would be known as an “upstanding citizen” and no two stories seem to match.

Simpson can at least take some comfort from the fact that at least (even in Las Vegas) the balance of the evidence must be more than 51% against him and from the smirk on his face as he was bundled into the police car he’s betting on it!

T.T.F.N.

Click

As CNN keep boasting tonight’s YouTube debate was a “first.”: It was a shame that the suits controlling this white heat cutting edge format were all made of asbestos.

The debate opened with the increasingly shoddy Anderson Cooper showing why certain video questions had been rejected. After telling us for several months how unusual and original these questions would be because of the format he then tells us that questions from people “in disguise” were persona non grata. So who was the snowman?

It would have been nice for the viewer at home to be able to see the video’s of the questioners but for some unknown reason CNN seemed to think that a far shot of the same screen that the candidates were seeing was acceptable. From what I saw they might as well have allowed disguised questions because a lot of the time most of video was as dark and poorly defined as to be anonymous.

Of the questions themselves; there was very little that wasn’t a variation on the same sort of theme that has already be asked and answered before.

Anderson Cooper who couldn’t have moderated a debate in a Benedictine monastery had about as much control of the candidates as an alcoholic in a brewery; he could be heard calling “time” about as often as I heard my father doing the same with the only difference being that in my father’s public house……Time meant time.

When these candidates heard Anderson say “time” they obviously thought that he was giving them more.

Obviously there are front runners in this race but in watching this debate I seriously began to worry that I was suffering from tunnel vision as Anderson seemed to direct almost all of the questioning to these front runners who were conveniently centre stage causing Mike Gravel to make several cutting comments and probably cut his own throat in the process.

Next comes the Republican YouTube debates and I swear; I can see Rudy and crew shaking in their collective thousand dollar boots.

I could start by saying that the “silly season” of political correctness in England continues unabated, but as it now seems to be an all year round event, I can’t.

Now those “frightfully nice” denizens of Horsham, Sussex find themselves in the headlines for their 15 minutes of stupidity. I am indebted to my friend and fellow contributor Syd for this story.

It seems that 16 year old Lydia Playfoot is taking her old school to the High Court for banning a “purity ring” which she claims is a breech of her human rights.

The Millais school claims that the ring is not an essential part of her Christian faith but does make allowances for students of other religions. The ring (according to the headmistress) breaks “Uniform Rules”

I would like to suggest that this school is not educating its students properly; except in the time honoured subjects of rigidity and narrow mindedness and is failing with an “E” in the all important lesson in common sense.

The cult of “The Silver Ring Thing” has spread across the United States and its devotees are showing symbolically that they will abstain from sexual relationships. In part sponsored by the Bush administration the rings are as much a symbol of the growth of the evangelical right wing as the administration itself.

The jury is still out on whether this latest fad actually works but in the British Isles where it is not unheard of for eleven and twelve year old girls to become pregnant I would have thought that any device which discourages promiscuity in the under age population would be welcomed by one and all.

When reading this story I quickly formed an opinion that the ring wasn’t so much the problem as its connections with Christianity and that this mess is similar to the incident at British Airways recently where a ticketing agent complained that she had been told to stop wearing a silver cross.

When will these politically correct idiots learn that if you are to make an exception for one belief system then you must apply that exception to all?

If the “purity ring” only encourages the young to think twice about possibly ruining their lives then I would say; “a nod’s as good as a wink to a blind bat” where the uniform “uniform rules” are concerned.

In the Socialist Republic of California something wicked this way comes.

The “Govenator” Arnold Schwarzenegger recently gave his thoughts to a gaggle of Hispanic journalists in San Jose.

He told the journalists that immigrants in the United States should switch off their Spanish language televisions and radio’s and stop reading Spanish language newspapers if they want to learn English.

Alex Nogales, president and chief executive of the National Hispanic Media Coalition said; ” “I’m sitting shaking my head not believing that someone would be so naive and out of it that he would say something like that,”

Obviously the “politically correct sunshine” has gone to someone’s head and I personally don’t think that it is Arnies.

Now L.U.LA.C. (League of United Latin American Citizens) has weighed in screaming hysterically about taking him to a court of human rights or somesuch….

Has it ever occurred to these fighters for the right to line their own pockets that if anyone in the United States had the right to address this subject it was the Governor of California!

An Austrian immigrant to the United States he has used every advantage that this country has to offer to become a worldwide megastar and Governor of the worlds 5^th largest economy.

Far from being “naïve and out of it” Arnie chose this occasion to pass on some of the wisdom learned from his journey of life. He went on to say; “You’re just forced to speak English, and that just makes you learn the language faster,” He also said that he rarely spoke German.

From my perspective I can’t really see what all the fuss is about because I often feel like telling Americans to switch of their televisions. It might cause them to learn to speak English Faster.

I’ll be back!

On Saturday I was watching the F.A. cup final on pay per view at my home in Texas when at half time a video was shown that caught me by surprise.

The video was an appeal to help in the search for 4 year old Madeleine McCann who went missing from the Portuguese village of Praia da Luz on the Algarve whilst the family were on holiday.

Madeleine disappeared on May 3^rd and frankly seems to have vanished from the face of the earth. The police have interviewed and released people but seem no closer to finding Madeleine or discovering what happened to her.

A reward of 2.6 million pounds ($5.2,000,000) has been posted

I have a four year old son and this video transmitted so expectedly caused me to reflect on every parent’s nightmare: What if this was my child?

I occurred to me that nothing is impossible; even the possibility that she might have been brought here to the United States.

If this was your child wouldn’t you want everything possible to be checked however remote?

Please lend your support and follow this link!

The Official Website to find Madeleine McCann

According to the Office of National Statistics Great Britain’s population grew by 185,000 during 2005.

So what you say; but the interesting thing about this statistic is that it is not from a record of births and deaths.

The report states that 380,000 people left Britain in 2005 to make their homes in other countries for more than a year and 198,000 of them were British citizens which is an increase of 25% since 2001.

During the same period 565,000 people arrived in Britain stating an intention to stay for more than one year or an average of 1,500 every day.

The immigration figures (which are better than ten times what they were when the Labour government came to power in 1997) are finally beginning to cause alarm in the deeply carpeted corridors of power with the Immigration Minister Liam Byrne making a somewhat contradictory statement. He stated that while globalisation and migration had made Britain richer it had “deeply unsettled” the country. He further stated that the policy risked damaging poorer parts of the community and hindered Labours attempts to improve education standards in deprived areas.

I think the Americans have a word which sums this situation up perfectly; “Duh”

Could it be possible that the British Citizens (myself included) leaving the country have already reached that conclusion and (reluctantly) no longer see much of a future in their homeland?

It doesn’t take a mathematician to work out what will happen if this trend is allowed to continue and from my experience most people in Great Britain did not need this report because they could see it in their communities.

The ethnic mix in the country does not upset the endemic population nearly as much as the storm trooper environment of political correctness which effectively places them into the category of second class citizens. The government is right about the educational problems but they don’t seem to understand the situation and how it affects the endemic population. How do you educate bright students when the process is stunted by other students who arrive into the system without the ability to speak the language and largely due to the atmosphere of political correctness have no incentive to master it?

There are now ten times the numbers of people who no longer see a future in Great Britain than there was when I left for some of the same reasons less than a generation ago and the endemic population is now beginning to vote with its feet. I remember conversations with my parents who (quite rightly) said that “whatever was happening in England would probably happen wherever I was going” and my answer was that the difference is that at least I was accepting whatever situation I was going to rather than have it foisted upon me.

Happy Saint George’s Day every one

To join a campaign to have April 23rd recognised as a public holiday in England please visit:

http://www.stgeorgesday.com/home

Enjoy the day of the patron saint of England.

The Crazy Englishman

I have spent part of the evening watching CNN (an organisation that should be sued for misleading advertising if ever there was one….. News????)
About a week ago an American “shock jock” Don Imus made a remark about a women’s basketball team on television. The comment was racial and derogatory to women (and while I may be The Crazy Englishman I am not crazy enough to repeat it.)

The celebrity gaff was immediately picked up by the media and has garnered wall to wall coverage on CNN despite the fact that Imus was sacked by his employers more than 24 hours ago.

It is a given that Imus was wrong to say what he said and he has since apologised to the ladies concerned. Imus is the latest in a long line of recent outbursts by celebrities such as Mel Gibson and Michael Ritchie and unfortunately he failed to learn the lesson of those who passed before him. Enter rehab! Do not pass go! Do not collect $200! Go straight to rehab!

The latest celebrity trend in this country is to go into rehab the moment you goof up. Mel Gibson; Michael Ritchie, Miss America have all disappeared possibly off the face of this earth. Going into rehab seems to be the American equivalent of falling on your sword. It has become such an “A list” fashion that Britney Spears tried to get in four times in ten days before finally being accepted and she hadn’t even done much of anything.

If you ask most Americans what they are most proud of about their country they will immediately offer up the right of Freedom of Speech but as Imus and ilk have proved that as soon as someone says something offensive out come the censorship brigade.

In this land of free speech we have specially sanitised music courtesy of Wall Mart and Tipper Gore and the so called shock jocks moving to subscription radio faster that Ms Spears can try a new rehab clinic. The most trusted name in news (according to their own advertising) offer unending coverage of these incidents while completely ignoring the fact that outside of its examination of its navel fluff real people are living and dying in the real world and in just about every country outside of the United States those events are considered news.

Of course, I couldn’t use the term 24/7 for CNN and its like because in this country there is no such thing; of either news or navel fluff examination. After the sun falls in the Eastern and Central time zones CNN and its sister station (the laughingly named) Headline News together with Fox news runs “magazine style” programming because murders, wars terrorist tube bombings and comets possibly colliding with the Earth never happen after dark do they? These programmes treat their audience as morons by re running stories that ran 48 hours earlier and running them again 48 hours after that whilst presenting them as new. Of course in case breaking news might require someone to do some work these shows are repeated again through the small hours while the rest of the world goes on.

It’s free speech if you have nothing else to say and are prepared to bore your audience to tears with it.