Friday, November 20, 2009

Layer 224 . . . More Bullshit Bingo, Strangling, European Union and Parliamentary Standards

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More synchronicity . . .

Following on from yesterday's musings, I came across this piece about The Stranglers:
When did you first realise that The Guildford Stranglers, as you were then called, had the makings of a really good band?

JJ Burnel: Well, not for quite a while, because the very few places we could get booked into usually asked us never to return again, or they'd pull the plugs on us! We tried a variety of different musicians, but nothing really clicked. Then we advertised for a keyboard player. We thought that was the extra voice that we needed. Hugh and I had been writing all the songs and they were starting to take shape, but it wasn't until Dave joined us a year later in 1975 that things really clicked. He sounded great and really reminded us of Ray Manzarek from The Doors. But Dave had never heard about them then. It was all down to synchronicity really. From then on, we started writing a lot more.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/totp2/artists/s/stranglers/located/page1.shtml

 He's right of course - Ray Manzarek was one of the best and one of the most well-known keyboards players in the Sixties, and obviously The Doors were one of the very best bands. It always seemed me that those guys had a very similar keyboard style, playing in what were in some ways similar bands – capable of hard rock but also writing great original songs with terrific melodies and good lyrics.

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Who's Talking?

More bullshit bingo. Heard on the radio this morning -

“We need to look at how we drive more efficiency out of the business . . . ”


Leaving aside the small point that the correct grammar should be “drive more efficiency INTO the business” - this is still technobullshit. The key word here, of course, is DRIVING. Powerful people have to drive – like they're in a powerful vehicle. And of course they're the one with their hands on the steering wheel, putting the pedal to the metal.

So who is this talking? Obviously a top businessman or woman, or a top civil servant who's in charge of A  Business or A System?

No. The guy talking runs the Association of Chief Police Officers. The Top Cop. And I'd put a very large bet on whether he, and most top cops these days, have at some stage been to a business school to get an MBA. Or is this jargon just something he's picked up from his dealings with Home Office officials who've been down that route and therefore habitually talk this bullshit?

He went on to say -
“You can deliver accountability, but you can't deliver policing under direct political control.”
“. . . the savings we need to deliver out of the back end of the business.”

He even talked about “a British brand of policing”!!!
Aaaaarrrrggghhhh!

How does anyone 'deliver' accountability? How does anyone 'deliver' policing? When did people start talking like this?

It's that macho thing again. It's maximum macho. I think the first time I heard this word 'deliver' it was in connection with the local Co-Op bringing a boxful of groceries to our house. The second time must have been at school during prayers - “Deliver us from evil”. So delivering is also something God or gods do. Is that how he sees himself? Or is he seeing himself as some kind of grocer? I think not. It's definitely an all-powerful omnipotence thing.

He went on to say,
“I would not want to lead a police force that was being told how to deliver policing.”
Of course he wouldn't. He wouldn't want to be told how to do anything.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8369000/8369748.stm

Probably quite right too. Maybe the top man at the national association of headteachers should have said many years ago that he would rather resign than bow down to politicians and bureaucrats who thought they had a right to micro-manage schools - people who invariably, by virtue of having climbed to the top of the political or bureaucratic greasy pole, are full of ambition and ego, and are determined to manipulate and maneuver their way to positions of power and authority. Usually ignoramuses who haven't a clue what goes on in schools. Just like the New Labour bastards who are now claiming they will guarantee 'delivery' of this and that in schools from now on.
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European Union

Bloody hell – Lady Ashton has a regional accent! And she was appointed by the Socialist Group in the European Parliament! How many people even knew there was a 'socialist' group!
Grew up near Skelmersdale and Wigan. She didn't go to Oxbridge either.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Ashton,_Baroness_Ashton_of_Upholland


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/19/lady-cathy-ashton
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article6923856.ece

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Parliamentary Standards

David Curry's the guy who was appointed to oversee the Parliamentary Standards committee. Yesterday he referred himself to – the Parliamentary Standards Committee.

On November 19th, 2009 Curry stood down from his position as chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Standards and Privileges after claims from the Telegraph newspaper regarding his expenses and has reportedly referred himself to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority for investigation.[2] - Wikipedia

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/6609018/MPs-expenses-David-Curry-quits-as-standards-chief-over-new-Telegraph-disclosures.html

You couldn't make it up.
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