Andy's Glasses

Our beloved Harry Kane, leader of the line for the one and only Tottenham Hotspur, captain of this fine nation’s almost best ever national football team and man of all (Premiership) seasons, has faced some tough scrapes in his life. He played for Millwall FFS where just arriving at the car park is a trauma. He’s been kicked, bitten, butted, punched, studded, all manner of horrible shit that are the knocks of top-flight football. But nothing could have prepared him for the shit-storm that has followed him after the birth of his baby this week.

Harry tweeted that he was ‘so proud of his wife for delivering a lovely baby with no anaesthetic’.

Oh dear. You can be proud of your new baby (or grand-baby), you can be proud of your wife for the almost inhuman trauma that is ironically the most humanly thing ever in delivering a baby. But you simply CANNOT be proud that she used no anaesthetic. Because that implies, according to lots and lots of women, that those who may have had some degree of medication during their own childbirthing, are somehow inferior.

And this was not just the usual feminazis, my own daughter voiced concern when she saw Harry’s tweet. Because when she delivered the world’s most perfect baby, it was far from the perfect birth. Never mind anaesthetic, there were nine consultants, fifteen other doctors, 6 midwives, 26 nurses and 3 delivery guys from Dominos. And not all were gathered because they knew that ‘the next messiah’ was about to be born. No. They were there because my daughter was in big trouble and needed serious help (God bless NHS teaching hospitals). Did that make anyone less proud of her? No, probably the opposite. Yet that’s not the point.

But this was Harry Kane. Not Boris Johnson, not me, not anyone with a great facility with the written word. Or, let’s be frank, a wonderful understanding of the world. So I reckon what Harry meant was: ‘so proud of my wife, delivered a lovely baby; oh, and she didn’t even have any meds’. You can read any sentence 15 different ways. Unless its written by Boris, obviously. Harry probably went to some NCT classes which tell you again and again how children born unaided (regardless of how much suffering and near-death experience the mother might encounter) will be ‘better’ than those born ‘less naturally’. And thus thought it might resonate to include the ‘anaesthetic’ bit. Who knows?

All I know is, Harry Kane is as qualified as any man to comment on the intricacies of childbirth (unless that man is an obstetrician). He’s a footballer, FFS. To attack him (2 hour feminist radio program last night about just that) is grossly unfair. To do so when he’s trying to enjoy the wonders of new baby time is worse. But to do so just when the new football season is starting is totally unforgivable. Must have been Arsenal women on the radio.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

Its interesting just how… interesting, some lives can be. Makes you wonder how you can do so much in so little time. Take, f’rinstance, Lewis Ludlow (who???), the man accused of plotting a terrorist attack on Oxford Street, Madame Tussaud’s or St Pauls, aiming to murder ‘about 100’ (not sure of the maths involved in such a calculation, but bow to his superior… errr…) people in the name of IS.

Young Lewis, (26 now) converted to Islam when he was 16. Ok, so far so good. But prior to that he’d been a confirmed Neo-nazi. Who obviously adheres to the ethos ‘if ya can’t beat ’em, join ’em’ and decided that hating (among others) Muslims and waving a swastika around wasn’t as much fun or anything like as zeitgeisty as actually becoming a jihadi. So he was radicalised. Can’t have been hard to do. I reckon anyone offering the chance of more hate, more death and Lewis would’a been asking where to sign. Which makes you wonder what had happened in this poor kid’s life to poison him so much that he sought only organisations of hatred. I’m sure that the word ‘ideology’ is an alien concept to the Lewis Ludlows of this world. Its the ‘glamour’ that is the lure. I honestly doubt he can spell ‘ideology’. Not sure I could without a spellchecker but I’m dyslexic with (little or) no murderous tendencies, so leave me alone.

Lewis calls himself ‘the eagle’. I have no idea why. He certainly doesn’t look like an eagle. He looks like a loser. Maybe he eats mice? Who knows nor cares. He’s goin’ daaarn. Sentenced in November. Good fucking riddance.

The powers that be have decided that Boris Johnson (fat blond Judas type politico pig who changes allegiances like most of us change socks) cannot be charged with any form of racism for his comments about the burka the other day. Though he has been told to do some form of stupidly PC, wrist-slappy kind of ‘sensitivity to minorities training’ or some such neo-liberal bollocks. They’ve been talking about it all morning of the radio. And its all rather strange.

Because although the accusations and debate are about perceived Islamaphobia (which it isn’t) or appropriate level of comments for a Member of Her Majesty’s parliament and whether Boris should be sacked, shot or just hated, its actually become altogether different.

Its become another debate about Brexit. On all the phone-ins, Remainers want the wrath of God meted out upon that ugly blond head whereas Brexiteers find him innocent of all charges and think he should be knighted for ‘having the honesty to speak about such a ridiculously taboo-ified subject. I personally think that the most hurtful, damaging, nasty thing you could ever do to Boris would be to simply ignore him. He’d fucking hate that.

Great win for Spurs today in the first match of their season. Ok, let me re-phrase: a win for Spurs today, which is great. More accurate. We’ll take the points anyway.

Happy first Saturday of the new football season

A xxxx

Lila was sent home from ‘school’ on Tuesday. Selling drugs behind the pram-sheds. Singing football songs in prayers. She beat up a little boy who stole her Lego; she used the Ben Stokes ‘self defence’ plea but to no avail. Ok, she had a temperature. A hot one. That’s the real reason. And she’s been poorly since, poor little thing. So the world’s ‘most perfect baby’ (well, MY world’s most perfect baby) who never wakes up in the night, who never cries, moans or does anything that isn’t ‘perfect’ (most of the time), other than make more mess that 65,000 football fans, was seriously ‘under the weather’ for our weekly Lila day. She went to bed in our house, as usual, about 7. Then woke up at 9, not usual. Went back to sleep, we continued with our bridge game, but not for long. Until she became really unhappy, needed much more attention and bridge had to be abandoned for sustained child-care. And that’s how the night continued. Up, down, asleep, crying, more sleep, more waking. Very un-Lila.

But she’s small. When adults get flu they feel deathly, horrible, ill, rotten. And they understand what’s happening. Poor little Lila lacks such experience and understanding (even though she’s fucking BRILLIANT). So she just carries on as usual until it doesn’t work. Its hard to understand illness in all its cause and effect when you can’t even put your socks on.

(PS. The drug she would have been selling at school was Calpol.)

And speaking of temperatures, I’ve heard that the sun gets even than hotter that Lila-with-an-infection. Wow. I’ve never taken its temperature but ‘hotter-than-hell!!!!’ goes nowhere near close enough for our own Sun. And now we’re gonna fly there. I’m guessing that the Parker solar probe is likely to be unmanned. As where its going, a mere 3.83 million miles from the sun’s surface (which is just about ‘the house next door’ in universe terms) reaches temperatures of 1.66 million degrees Celsius. That’s really hot. Hotter than Oxford Street last week and that was REALLY hot. It makes you wonder what kind of wood they’re gonna use for the space ship with all that heat flying around. I mean; Icarus went there a couple thousand years ago, but the wax holding his wings on melted. Bummer. And he hadn’t got off the ground in Crete when that happened. (Loser).

So this probe will tell us lots about our Sun, which is fab. But the amazing thing is that due to some very clever people, the instruments inside the probe, even right there in the Corona, will remain at 29.4 degrees. How can they do that? 1.66 million degrees outside and 29.4 inside. Yet they can’t even PUT AIR CONDITIONING IN FUCKING TUBE TRAINS!!!!

I think some research needs to be redirected from the wonderfully theoretically informative to the more pragmatic and realistic domains.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

I would not choose to ban Boris Johnson. Even though he looks like a fat pink pig wearing a cheap blonde wig. Or a blow-up sex doll that’s been almost catastrophically over-inflated.(Denmark has banned him.)

Ahhhhh, Boris Johnson. What do we do about Boris? However far he falls he just keeps grabbing the headlines, for all the wrong reasons.

Would I apologise to Boris for writing that opening sentence? No. But I don’t have to, I’m not a member of parliament. I’m barely a member of society. But, because it is insulting and possibly hurtful (to fat pigs, if not to rather thick-skinned, or thick-rinded, Boris) then I SHOULD apologise.

Boris refuses to apologise for stating that he would NOT ban the burka, BUT (and its a really big but) they look stupid, like letterboxes or bank robbers. That’s what he wrote. Yes, wrote. So there’s no ambiguity, it was in the Daily Telegraph, the most ambiguity-free organ in the world.

But never underestimate Boris Johnson and his limitless ability for subterfuge.

You can’t claim ‘Islamophobia’ because he’s stating he would NOT ban the burka. So the statement following; letterboxes, bank robbers, etc, is just a ‘casual observation’, a ‘joke’.

And, putting aside our PC hats/caps/kippas/scarves for a moment; it is funny. Because full face coverings are, to western eyes, stupid. We all frown at Boris but at some level, we have to agree. Half the muslims in the world also agree. Because the headscarf and full-facing thing is NOT a muslim precept. Its not in the Quran. Its just an extreme interpretation which started in Saudi Arabia as a cultural thing and spread around the Islamic world as a sign of extreme dedication. Not to Islam, as stated, but to the cultural interpretation by the most brutal, sexist group of misogynists ever to grace the world. Women can say they do it ‘for themselves; it liberates them’ but quite frankly that is bollox. Its like chaining yourself naked to the floor spreadeagled and claiming ’empowerment’. The Quran speaks only of ‘modesty’, the rest is just interpretation. Modesty where I grew up meant when you piss in public you do it against a wall rather than waving it passing cars.

But the argument is not about the merits of the burka. Its about whether its appropriate for a politician to make silly jokes about a group of people who share a very strong belief. ‘Taking the piss’, as its known.

Though Boris, as ever, chooses a very clever target and a very clever time. He wants to lead the party, he wants to be PM, this is no news to anyone. And he knows that his ‘core’ supporters are to the right of the Tory party. Who are all like him. Slightly xenophobic, mildly anti-immigration, pro-Brexit. Who will love his comments dearly, upset caused or not.

Boris is a tosser. And even if he did apologise, he wouldn’t mean it.

Happy Thursday

A xxxx

I come to bury Ben, not to praise him… but…

Ben Stokes is an England cricketer. Probably, currently, The England Cricketer. And much as you ‘can choose your friends but not your family’, so you can’t either choose who the greatest player of a generation, who is probably the only man in England who can single-handedly win a test match and who is the person that England cricket depends upon more than all others. Big players step up in Big games. And Ben Stokes does that.

Unfortunately, what he also does is drink too much at night and become totally obnoxious, abusive, insulting and use his not insubstantial build to bully and punch people outside nightclubs. And he’s stupid enough to do so whilst being filmed. Not that he knew. He didn’t know much of anything, other than he wanted to get into a nightclub that had closed its admission at 2am. So after offering ‘300 quid’ to the doorman as a bribe and been rejected, he vented his anger and frustration on all and sundry, culminating in the systematic beating of 2 guys.

He can deny it, his QC can offer all sorts of arguments, but its hard to plead ‘self-defence’ when you’re on film chasing someone across the street with your fists primed. And he’s guilty as hell and horrible as satan/corbyn/pick-your-hate-figure (then add tattoos) and must surely be found so by the court.

Yet there is some mitigation in sentencing, surely? You hear that drivers can’t get banned for speeding because they need their cars to take sick mothers for chemotherapy every week. Or custodial time reduced to community service and suspended sentence because of ‘this person’s value to society’.

Well, much as I kind’a hate Ben Stokes, if nothing else, for lacking the imagination to be a person beyond the scowling, inked-up scum-bag thug persona he likes to project, I think there are questions about banging him up (if found guilty, obvs) for his errors. Because if some petty crim gets off because the company he owns employs 27 people who will all suffer as a consequence, should he be incarcerated, then Ben Stokes, as he did last week, is capable of ending the suffering of an entire cricketing nation. He put a smile on the face of millions of people. Ok, not Indian people but that’s sport, not racism.

Without Stokes, as shown in the Ashes series, we can’t win. With him, we do. So PLEASE your honour, give him a big fine. A suspended sentence. Give him one of those tracker things to wear round his ankle that gives him 50,000 volts if he stays out past 9 o’clock or drinks alcohol. As long as it doesn’t affect his bowling. But if you send him to prison (where he absolutely fucking belongs) then do it after the cricket season. Otherwise its just… not cricket.

Happy lenient Wednesday

A xxxx

There was an old gun in the ‘wild west’ that was called a ‘Peacemaker’. In America that’s not an ironic name. That’s how they see peace coming about. By shooting all the un-peaceful people. You want peace; buy a gun. They still think like that.

And I think that’s Trump’s model for his role as ‘international peacemaker in chief’. He makes threats, then he cosies up for a little ‘tete-a-tete’, praises how successful the meeting was, then either does nothing (North Korea) or changes his tune and resumes the accusation-hurling (Russia). He never quite made the trip to Iran, where I’m sure his popularity would almost exceed that of the British public, but its a similar pattern. Act nasty, then act pally, then impose international sanctions that puts the (peacemaker’s) bullet into economic head of that nation. The coup de gras for a country almost on its knees.

And I have great sympathy for the Iranian people. Yet virtually none for the ‘state of Iran’ who are horrible, hostile, warlike and the nation I would least like to see armed with nukes.

The British have identified 2 ‘interesting parties’ regarding the Novichok poisonings. Surprisingly, both are Russians. Who’d’a guessed that? CCTV footage has been analysed (presumably at GREAT length as Salisbury was about 4 months ago) and two suspects identified. Extradition requests have begun.

What a total waste of fucking money and effort.

Russia don’t extradite. Particularly killers who are on the government payroll. That wouldn’t be very loyal. Could even be construed as ‘unfair dismissal’ and Poot’n would have to face an employment tribunal. We’re still waiting for Andrei Lugavoy to be extradited for the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in 2007. He never arrived to face charges. Instead he was a national hero back home in Russia and became an MP.

The world’s in a total mess. Only football can save us. And, as luck would have it, football has finally arrived home. Or will do on Saturday. Well, I suppose that the ‘season’ officially started last weekend when the Championship was played. But as no-one (other than Ali) watches that the rest of us have had to endure yet another footy-less week. 2 days to go in the new, shortened transfer window and Spurs have bought… and sold…

Not been a busy time for transfers. Hope we don’t regret that. Though there’s still 2 days to go and that is certainly ‘Levy-time’.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

According to a new study in Iowa, (that’s in the middle of America, grows corn, nothing else of any interest within a thousand miles in any direction of it) as we get older we become less likely to admit our mistakes. Oh yes, its true. Proven beyond doubt. Though that ‘doubt’ has more to do with arbitrary measures of ‘statistical significance’ than it has with anything in the real world. But without being too cynical… older people (over 60, grrrrr) acknowledged their errors 63% of the time compared to younger people’s (under 30) 75% of the time. The problem being that if you don’t realise or accept a mistake then you have nothing to correct or solve.

I think they should name this ‘amazing’ phenomenon ‘Corbyn’s Law’. Just to show how damaging it is and how much worse any situation becomes if mistakes are not acknowledged. And Corbyn’s fucking old.

He denied any issues with anti-semitism in his party for 2 years. Instead of addressing the errors, he called in Shami Chakrabarti to whitewash (no pun) the whole thing and declare emphatically: “I can find absolutely no evidence of anti-semitism within the Labour party. Can I have my peerage now? Oops, should’a turned the mike off…”

Had JC actually stated that there were big issues with his party and with Momentum and their hate-filled trolling activities and seemed to have been taking action against such practices, it ‘MAY’ have blown over. But he didn’t and so people looked deeper into the wondrous new ‘thing’ that was Jeremy Corbyn. And found his history. Not that of his party or supporters (both of which were bad enough) but JC personally. That he had ‘shared platforms’ with virtually anyone in the world who espoused Jew-hate. As long as some of it could be directed at Israel, Jezza would ignore the rest and put his arm over their robed shoulders and embrace them. As long as he refused to accept the problem, to admit the mistakes, they dug deeper. And its not hard, everything is on public record, which is why I said ‘may’. It probably would have emerged at some point anyway.

But now he’s made a video to apologise. In fact to use the same worthless and now meaningless rhetoric he’s been using for the last 2 years. Although he is now actually using ‘anti-semitism’ as a case in point rather than his blanket ‘abhor all forms of racism’ because that blanket has worn so thin.

So yes, he intends to address these matters, just a few years too late. But he can never wipe away his past. Or that of McDonnell or many of the others which all shows, by their own actions and choice of friends, that they are, at best, pre-disposed to join hands with known anti-semites at every opportunity.

So rebuilding ‘trust’? That would possibly only happen upon his death. Possibly.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Tennis is not a violent game. Can be explosive, can even be fast and furious but its not famous for violence. But that’s because I don’t play Aussie Johnno very often. Probably because he’s an Aussie (these days) and lives ‘over there’, even though he was the Bulawayo (white) boys champion tennis player of 1972. Or 3. But he was here and we played and look what happened to my lip. Ok, I managed to smash myself in the face with my own racquet but he was right there; at the opposite side of the net, just 40 yards away, the viscous bastard. And I managed to miss the ball completely. Though anyone slightly less superhuman (or slightly more intelligent) wouldn’t have gone for it in the first place.

And this is interesting. Vince Cable, vile and smarmy leader of the Lib-Dems, and Patrick Collins, ex-speech writer for Tony Blair and currently political writer on the Times, are considering a Lib-Lab pact/new party/alliance/allegiance/something in which the pathetic Liberals, for their 9 seats in parliament, would join forces with the right wing of the Labour party; the sane ones who don’t like Corbyn and his band of extremist, Marxist comrades, and form a kind’a new party. Kind’a.

Yet it makes sense in so many ways. Because anyone vaguely Blairish can only be massively unhappy with the new leadership and its bullying, undemocratic brand of hard-sell socialism. And thus are far closer aligned to the (apparent) centrism of the Liberals. The question really is why a hundred, maybe hundred-and-fifty disgruntled Labourites would have any need for the Liberals paltry contribution in terms of seats, for which they’d have to sit at times in the same room as uber-tosser Vince Cable.

And yet in the Tories too there’s noises of a ‘split’. Probably along brexit/remain lines because they just can’t get past that, over that, around that or beyond that. So you could have Rees-Mogg and the brexiteers in the pompous, almost-BNP camp, with Nigel Farage (who is actually involved in the plans for this along with Steve Bannon??? go work that one out) and the remainder of the remainers in the other.

The good news would be that we’d have a totally new political structure, replacing the almost defunct if barely functioning ‘2-party-system’ with a totally unworkable and quasi-ridiculous 4/5 party system which at least seems to offer a broader span of the political spectrum. We could, ironically, leave Europe at the same time as joining them in the formation of worthless and ineffective coalitions in place of proper governments.

Best of all would be an alliance between Corbyn’s new Anti-Semite-Communist-Workers-Union-Party and Rees-Mogg’s Upper-class-bowler-hat-white-person’s-Party. That’d be interesting.

Happy fat-lip Sunday

A xxxx

Ahhh, so Jeremy Corbyn finally comes out and admits there is a problem with anti-semitism in the Labour Party. Well, not actually ‘finally’ in that the much-hyped article in today’s Guardian is actually a re-hash of virtually the same article published in the Evening Standard in April. So in terms of immediacy of intentions, I think he’s shot himself in the foot by re-using the words in April which were so heartfelt that we have to have the exact same conversation today, four months later, following precisely… no action whatsoever. You know, ‘action’ wot speaks louder than words.

But heh, its a start. Isn’t it?

I’ve just spent Saturday morning listening to debates on the radio about this very topic. On my way to tai chi, coming home, before going to tennis, after tennis… and its interesting. Mainly in how many people use ‘Jews’ and ‘Israel’ as synonymous terms. So to clarify: I am a Jew. We’re (almost) human in appearance, fairly autonomous (but check that with my wife) and I’m very beautiful. Israel is a self-governing, independent, democratic state. A country in the middle east. It looks nothing like me, nor like anyone I know. Though also has beauty.

Yet people were saying how ‘Jews kill innocent Palestinians’. What all of us? Together or separately, I wonder. But really that is the essence. That people ‘like Corbyn’ conflate Jews and Israel. And they hate Israel so ergo, they hate Jews. Simplistic but true. Because all Jews, whilst questioning and disagreeing with a lot of Israel’s politics and policies, feel a burning need for it to exist. Ironically and in rather circular fashion, because should Jeremy Corbyn ever (heaven forbid) come to power, we’d have a safe haven to run to.

Then you have to wonder why Israel is hated. I know why Jeremy Corbyn hates it, because of its ties to his main enemy, America. And because he seems to want to befriend anyone and everyone who wants to see Israel wiped off the face of the Earth. The rest of the text used by Corbyn’s mates in Hamas and Hezbollah stating a similar fate for all Jews, by the way. But I know Israel does things which make its staunchest supporter cringe at times. And there’s another difference. When Israel gets heavy-handed the Jews of the world wince. When the Lockerbie bomber returns to Lybia he’s cheered as a hero.

But you’re allowed to criticise anything that causes death, particularly to ‘innocent civilians’ (though apparently the raining bombs of Hamas on Israeli farms doesn’t count in this), as long as you do it consistently.

The UN has passed more resolutions against Israel than against North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Syria and Russia all put together. In Syria and Yemen alone hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed, hundreds of thousands more displaced. And that’s interesting. Because if you complain disproportionately about Israel then that can only be accounted for by the fact that they’re looking to have a go at Israel specifically. And why would you do that if you didn’t start with a predisposition against Jews. And that also sounds overly simplistic. But how else could you account for it.

And so, once again, we await Le Corbyn’s next move to ‘rebuild confidence with the Jewish community’. The only advice I can give him, despite the usual ‘I abhor racism and there’s no place for anti-semitism’ soundbytes, is ‘don’t hold yer breath’.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

Ok, they’ve put the Bank of England interest rate up by 0.25%, so we need to consider all the implications and ramifications of how, precisely, this will affect me, you, the normal working man, the abnormal working man, the abnormally working women, the clinically depressed, the upwardly mobile, the cross-gender and the postman.

So I’ve made a summary that’s really neat and simple and understand. Based on the primary 2 assumptions, pivotal in economic thought. 1. A quarter of one percent is not a very big thing. And 2, all banks are total fucking bastards.

So the bank lending rate will obviously have to rise to reflect the bank’s new rate. Mortgage rates, in response to the 0.25% rate hike, will rise by 9.7%. Whilst the savings rate, the return you get on all your money piled in the bank’s vaults, will go up by 0.0003% (less tax, obvs).

So that’s good news all round. Except the bad news for most of us.

How fascinating that having mentioned the Grand Imperial Wizard of the KKK yesterday in relation to Tommy Robinson and his extreme right winginess, where you’d really expect the KKK to be residing, today’s revelation is that the very same (ex)-whatever of the KKK, David Duke (who also endorsed Trump, by the way), commended the re-election of Jeremy Corbyn after his leadership battle in the Labour party. Commended him on winning despite all the anti-semitism “smears” that were, even then, becoming a problem for Labour. “Great that people are recognising Zionist power and ultimately Jewish power in Britain and the western world”. Yeah David, it is great that they are. Maybe we should form our own army and just take over. As (according to Alexa, who went and counted each one personally for me) there are 300,000 jews in Britain out of population of 60 million souls. (I’ll include Labour members with the ‘souls’ thing just for temporary mathematical convenience).

But what’s interesting is this conflation of common ground between the extreme right and extreme left of the political spectrum. And that common ground is jew-hate. So where should Jews vote? For whom?? Well, logically, as central as you can get. But that would be the Lib Dems and they’re horrible too with a history of… well, Jenny Tonge, can’t get much more anti-semite than her.

Therefore I’m starting a new movement, just like all the other ‘victims’ and I’ve just ordered 300,000 t-shirts with the logo ‘Me Jew’ on them. In Spurs colours.

Happy Friday

A xxxx