Barefoot Reporting

letter to the local paper about the town's controversial - and pretty useless - wifi system

2012-01-24T12:34:00.001Z

Dear Sir

With regard to the Glastonbury WiFi system

As an IT professional since 1996, I was sceptical when the town WiFi
system was installed. Due to the extraordinarily long time between
inception and delivery (three years, which is an age in the world of
IT) there were only a few possible outcomes: it would be obsolete,
overpriced, or both.

By the time it was turned on in 2008, many cafes had already installed
free WiFi for their customers; and the price of broadband connections
had plummeted. It was therefore unlikely that the town WiFi system
would offer improved access to the internet for residents or visitors.
We simply didn't need it.

Although few usage figures have been released - despite promises made
at the initial public meeting in 2008 - it is clear from the low usage
that there is little or no demand for this service, which is paid for
out of one public purse or another. Given that there are health risks
associated with the kind of radiation emitted by these masts, isn't it
time to accept that even the slightest risk isn't worth taking when it
offers so little benefit?

In short: nobody uses it, it costs us money, and it might make you
ill. Please, just turn it off.

a story a day: day 1, 24th Jan 2012

2012-01-24T10:56:00.004Z

i'm away from my usual haunts for five weeks, and i've got a lot of time on my hands. i'm going to try to write a story a day. here's the first. i have no idea if it's any good but please feel free to leave comments or ask questions

here ya go

==============

it was early: the blackbird, always the first to start the chorus, had become his wake-up call. it was a spring morning that smelled of wild garlic and mist. it was very green: that spring green the hazels become. no wind, but if you look at the round hazel leaves, held out like the hands of a supplicant, you can see that they move, even when it's dead calm like now. no two mornings are quite alike in the woods.

he hadn't needed the burner in the mornings, and there was condensation on the underside of the tarp. it was nice with the sides open again. the birds were really going for it now, and he could hear the woodpecker having her morning face-off with her neighbour. it's silly, he thought, i've taken sides with the one who lives closest, in the ash. maybe that's how it is when you make friends with wild creatures. they're individuals.

later on, they'd be all over the bird tables. maybe the sparrowhawk would visit, like the other day. he whizzed past in a shallow downward glide, like a shot from a gun, with wings straight and body flattened so it looked like a yellow-eyed charcoaled streak of pure hunter. he's magnificent.

but the lingering pleasure was from seeing the signs: the panicked alarm calls, and the impressive synchronised crash-dive into the bushes, a wave of small birds, all flashing their brightest feathers. he'd looked in the right direction like a reflex, followed by an instant whoosh! of a bright sensation: of being alive, totally fucking alive, and plugged by the feet into the green, woody world around him. maybe it's the sparrowhawk doing it. it seems to ripple around him when he's hunting. everyone should feel it at least once, he thought. things might be better if they did.

he didn't hurry getting up. the sleeping bag was nice and warm. no rush. that's a funny sounding bird, he thought, it sounds just like my alarm clock...

...and when he woke to turn it off, and looked around at the flat white walls of the bedroom, the deep physical need to go back to the woods had returned. there are too many people round here, he thought, and sometimes they don't make much sense.

new year's stuff...

2011-12-28T11:55:00.002Z

not so much resolutions as intentions because you can't break an intention :)

help out on an eco-build, preferably a roundhouse with a reciprocating roof

spend some time living in the woods

take some more wildlife pictures

do some more spoon carving

maybe visit Occupy the London Stock Exchange and help out there for a while

spend less time on the computer

reflect...on how to give others more time to reflect

'abusive' Observer article about the Occupy movement blocked from Facebook...?

2011-11-06T10:27:00.006Z

This article

"How to Occupy the moral and political high ground"

has been blocked by Facebook: this is what comes up when i try to share the link

it seems that someone is doing their best to stop people posting Occupy articles by labelling them as 'abusive'

Here's the article in full: if i've breached any copyright i apologise, but this kind of backdoor censorship must be countered
=========================
How to Occupy the moral and political high ground

The worldwide protest can be a critical force for change if it follows some simple rules

As UK citizens are being told once again to "trust" the gatekeepers of the global banking system and as US citizens are realising that, despite a first amendment that guarantees freedom of speech and assembly, they are facing potentially lethal rubber bullets in Oakland and police brutality ranging from Tulsa, Oklahoma, to the streets of Manhattan, what is becoming clear is that a game-changing global shift is taking place. The conflict is no longer between right and left, but between the "one per cent" – a corporatocracy that, without transparency or accountability, is claiming the lion's share of the planet's resources and capital, while disregarding democratic processes – and, well, the rest of us.'

This single global family, transcending national boundaries, just wants a peaceful life, a sustainable future, economic justice and basic democracy. On the other side, the global corporatocracy, also transcending national boundaries, has purchased governments and legislative processes, developed its own military, mercenary or quasi-military enforcers, engaged in systemic economic fraud and plundered treasuries and ecosystems.

What should global protest movements learn from what's happening around the world and what lessons should they draw from their own experiences? My study of successful protest movements leads me to suggest the following:

■ Democracy is disruptive. Around the world, peaceful protesters are being demonised for this, but there is no right in a democratic civil society to be free of disruption. Protesters ideally should read Gandhi and King and dedicate themselves to disciplined, long-term, non-violent disruption of business as usual – especially disruption of traffic. If they are peaceful, they can't be infiltrated by provocateurs as easily, while the unjust militarisation of the police response is more transparent. Also, the winning protest movements of the past were a matter of months or years, not days or hours; they involved sitting down or "occupying" areas for the long haul.

■ Protesters need to raise their own money and use it to hire their own lawyers. The corporatocracy is terrified that citizens will get their hands on the mechanism of the law.

■ Protesters should make their own media and not rely on mainstream media to cover them. They should learn to write opinion pieces and press releases, blog about and document their experiences and create web platforms where cases of police abuse (and the abusers) are logged and documented. Protesters should use their cameras and video cameras religiously. There are, unfortunately, many documented cases of violent provocateurs in demonstrations. This is why it is so important not to cover one's face in a protest: provocateurs need to be photographed and logged.

■ Protesters in democracies should create email lists locally, sync the email lists nationally and start registering voters. They need to email their representatives the list of Occupy-registered voters in each district and commit to getting out the vote in congressional or parliamentary elections for Occupy-supporting candidates – while working to defeat Occupy-bashing candidates.

In Oakland, California, the right has started a recall effort to force the mayor from office for being "soft on the protesters". Protest groups need to organise to oust politicians who are brutal to or suppressive of protesters. This tips the scale: in Albany, New York, for instance, police and the district attorney refused to crack down on protesters and chose to support their first amendment rights.

■ The movement has been shy of identifying leaders, but I believe this is a mistake. A leader does not have to be a top-down hierarchist: a leader can be a simple representative. Protesters should elect representatives – for a given term just like in any democracy – and train them to talk to the press and to negotiate with politicians. These should span the spectrum: young people and grandparents, truckers and teachers and businesspeople. It is hard to cover the protest effectively if there are no spokespeople.

■ Protests should be scenes not of clashes but instead should model the kind of civil society this emerging human family wants to live in. In Zuccotti Park, in Manhattan, for instance, there is a kitchen, food is donated for free, kids are invited to sleep over and there are teach-ins organised. Musicians should bring instruments, the vibe should be joyful and positive. If there is mess, protesters should clean it up themselves. The idea is to build a new city within the corrupt city and show that this is a reflection of the majority of society, not a marginal destructive element.

■ Finally, we should understand that it is not a "list of demands" that is so profound about any of these protest movements; it is the very infrastructure of a common humanity that is being created. For decades, the global family has been told to keep its head down and leave leadership to the elites; in wealthy countries, to zone out in front of TV or at the mall; in the rest of the world, to submit to poverty and drudgery. What is transformative about the protest movement is that people are emerging and encountering one another face to face and remembering the habits of freedom: face to face, they build new institutions, new relationships and new organisations.

And, I hope, pass laws sooner rather than later to demilitarise the police; ban Tasers and rubber bullets; criminalise police and politician violence against free speech activities; demand prosecutions for financial fraud; compel the corporate books that unaccountably swallow billions in tax revenue to be audited; investigate torturers; bring home soldiers from corporate wars of choice – and rebuild society, this time from the grassroots up, accountably, lawfully and democratically.

=========================

someone asked why i'm leaving facebook...

2011-09-24T09:51:00.003+01:00

every time they make a change, then a small slice of privacy disappears. this time, it's a big one: have a read here

http://facebookprivacyandsecurity.wordpress.com/2011/09/23/temporary-retraction-facebook-to-respond-to-subscribe-issues/

people have been seeing comments on their posts from people they don't know...let alone strangers being able to read them in the first place!

one comment from the article sums it up:

"I think in most cases it isn’t showing stuff that people can’t see, but they’d have to go to your profile and hunt out the information previously. Now, everything you do is plastered there scrolling past on all of your friends newsfeeds. I object to having no control over that – how hard would it be for them to give you the option of saying ‘no, I don’t want my comments and likes to appear in the ticker’. Instead, I am relying on every single one of my friends to be bothered to deselect this option for me, and I have to do the same for all my friends so as to not have to see them commenting on things that have absolutely nothing to do with me"

and to stop this happening, *every* *one* of your friends has to go through a sequence of clicks to correct this problem, which is caused by your friends' interactions with you being displayed in *their* 'ticker' for their friends to see and comment on...get it?

furthermore, everything you have ever done on facebook will soon be displayed in a 'Timeline' and you can't disable it: but you will have time to tidy up your old posts that you don't want displayed. and how many people are going to do that? many people can't even figure out the privacy options

and as for the privacy options: they've been grossly simplfied and are very opaque, even for a geek like me

add to that the loss of clear, simple controls of the now very busy, overly dense newsfeed, and i think it's a disaster. facebook now decides which posts are a priority and my guess is that they will skew it towards advertising, which is where they make their money

i might be able to figure this out but when my privacy depends on other people doing the same, it's as good as non-existent. they're sheperding people into a walled garden where anything of value will be extracted from you and used for their purposes

so i'm gone...

Farcebook's latest changes: some thoughts

2011-09-22T09:00:00.003+01:00

Facebook's recent evolution mirrors the evolution of lots of other software, including websites: here's what happens
- someone gets a great idea that makes something easier and/or generic, which was otherwise difficult and/or specific
- it becomes a success because it does exactly what it says on the tin and the users build a consistent mental model of how it works. the people who developed the idea do a good job because they're the ones who use it, so they know what works
- the marketeers see an opportunity: but because they have a mindset that sees money and markets, they add features and increase complexity to the point where the mental model is becomes inconsistent and opaque to the end user, mainly because it's not the end user's needs that are being met, but the needs of ambitious people in the business
- people start complaining and looking for alternatives
- then someone gets a great idea that does just what it says on the tin and provides a consistent, non-annoying experience. the first company then collapses

they're also going against one of the most basic rules of the web: it's a road, not a train on rails. the user is in the driving seat and they can choose to follow any path they like. Facebook is in some ways attempting to put the user on rails, with more limited and pre-defined options, rather than simply a set of signposts they can follow if they wish. that's a big failure and many, many other sites have suffered, because the basic rule of the web is one of active user choice. i reckon that in a boxing match, Marshall McLuhan would trounce Zuckerberg every time :)

i don't care whether facebook survives or not: but it does surprise me that they haven't learned from the mistakes people have made in the past. however, i can tell from Google's evolution that they have learned this lesson: that's exactly how they took a massive market share from Altavista in the late 90s.

btw: does anyone remember Altavista? it was once the search engine everyone used :)

The Hunter - a story

2011-09-13T10:46:00.006+01:00

"I think there's one just down the road, dear." I'm sure she used that sardonic tone to irritate me. It's a matter of seconds if you want to get a good score and she knows how seriously i take it. If she could get her eyes off that handheld, with its incessant stream of inane gossip...ah fuck it. Thats' where she got the tip, no doubt. I rushed out onto the balcony.

There he was: two blocks down, in the Harper building, looking out from the open platform on the 23rd floor. I could see him without binoculars or the scope on the P22. Jumping platforms aren't strictly legal, by the way, but the landlords always found a way around that by putting a few bins there and making up something about them needing to be open because of the smell. This was going to be a tough shot: the sun reflects off those windows at this time of day. I'm a serious player so I don't use that auto-filtering crap and a self-aimer like a lightweight. It's a matter of honour and nobody in the main Ladder (yours truly is now in 79th place and rising) would be caught using one. Good points to be had here.

I shouldered the P22 and took a closer look. Male, underweight (I'd say a BMI of about 32) and ready to go, by the looks of things. He'd got the usual twitches and tics and he must have hit hard times because there's no shortage of Averin and it was only about 30 creds for a week's supply, unless you'd been mixing it with Zero-Cola. They say the high's good, but what goes up, must come down, and when your intake rises tenfold every two weeks, I reckon it would bankrupt most ordinary people within a year. So you stop...and when you do, most people end up jumping. There are other ways, of course, but at least this way, you go out quickly and your loved ones get some creds. We always have a whip-round and while it's not compulsory to contribute, nobody who wants to be taken seriously on the Ladder would dream of not helping out. It helps the sport, after all.

The polariser on the scope kicked in and cut out the reflections. Here he goes...to the edge: I took up first pressure. I'll take him when he's level: i reckon about 20 feet of lead. Too high and he's too easy a target, too low and someone else will get him. Some people buy their way to a good score by renting apartments on the lower levels, which means plenty of time, but there's no artistry in that. Anyone with the money can get a south-side low-level in the Valleys - Christ knows there are enough empty offices, after the computers took over the trading floor. Money and the right connections can get you a weapon with all sorts of fancy automatic shit but there's no art in that. Manual is where's it's at: anything more than an aimer and you won't get any kind of rank, but it's mostly about self-respect. That's why it's important to get a flat shot rather than a high or low one: it's about the angles. While the jumper's high up, they're a small target, for sure, but they're not crossing your field of vision very fast and you've got plenty of time. Likewise with the low ones, except for the time - and anyway, someone further up will get them first, if they're any good. A flat shot gets you a better score (and more respect) than anything else: they're moving fast past you and even the best aimbot would be no use because you can't keep up. That's where the real skill lies. You've got to shoot on instinct.

Of course you could always use a smart round - well, we all do, but not that kind. The kind of smart flechette the military uses that can go round six corners, through a concrete wall, and into a target's neck without even spraying blood on their pillow would do the job, for sure. Anyone could do that. The only approved round is a Hawking round and that's that. Anything else and we'd be either half-arsed or shut down right away. All it does is disintegrate within a metre of anything that isn't made of flesh and moving fast. They say it was that wheelchair guy who figured out the principle - I'm damned if I know how they work - but we couldn't do this if they didn't do that. There'd be no windows in the Manhattan Valley blocks and the sport would not exist. We're on the edge of illegal as it is but nobody has ever been successfully prosecuted for shooting someone who'd just jumped to their death. Even so, if it weren't for a bit of pressure from the landlords, who live quite nicely on the rents they can get downtown for defunct office buildings, we'd be fucked and there'd be no ladder. I'd have to go back to hunting deer a couple of times a year, and to be honest, i never liked the exercise and the cold.

He was moving to the edge: it couldn't be long now. I could see the usual blank stare they get when the Averin wears off but God only knows what's going on in his head. The arms and shoulders were twitching and I could see him sway back and forth as I held first pressure. There's no laser on this sight but it's 220 yards to that platform. I knew the settings by heart for all seven I could see from my balcony. Zoom out with a frame-in-frame. I don't know if my heart can take this kind of excitement much longer...

Small frame: there he goes! He was a falling silhouette against the mirror glass and there were a couple of cracks followed by self-destructed puffs of dust as a couple of noobs had a go and missed. It was too early for my main rival Bucky: this guy was mine, for sure. I let one go - only one - as he passed the eleventh and i saw him spin with the impact. The spin continued for a few milliseconds and then he was free game for the rest: they'd waited too long, as usual. Fucking losers...anyway, before he hit the ground, there wasn't much left. They wouldn't get the score. I was already uploading the vid to the Ladder and this one was mine. Bucky wasn't there, but this was a classic, so even if I don't advance, I'll get the kudos. The angle of the sun made for a really good sequence and it'll confirmed as a matter of course. One of those dumb fucks on the forum will start bleating about saying prayers for his immortal soul, but we have to tolerate the fuckers because they help keep our guns legal. I just wish they'd shut up.

She was still sitting reading that celebrity crap while she chatted on Twype. At least she had the good sense to let me know one was ready but then again the widget i'd put on her handheld would snitch if she'd known and hadn't said.

Oh well...back to work. I switched the machines off auto and there'd been no alerts, probably because Indonesia was still fast asleep. Working from home is one of the perks of being a drone pilot.

==========

The Hunter is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

why i don't like this ad

2011-06-19T09:30:00.002+01:00

i recently had an altercation on a social networking website - you can guess which one - about this advertisement:

some people assumed that i was offended by it, but in fact i was more disturbed than offended: disturbed by the way otherwise intelligent people could be manipulated, as that's what advertising is - often very clever manipulation

it seems to appeal to women in the same way Nuts magazine and the like appeal to some men: and it seems to me that women who fall for the appeal of the man in it are basically the same type who whoop and slaver in the front row of a Chippendales performance. what surprises me is that the woman i fell out with would be one of the first to condemn mags like Nuts and Loaded but is somehow unaware of how she's fallen for the same 'sex sells' trick, just with her as the target audience. she'd posted it on her wall and when i challenged her about the sexist attitude within it - sexism in women towards men - she defended it on the grounds that it was a parody of sorts. that's one reason why it's so clever and effective: it packages a poison pill of attitudes to sexuality and body image in a pretty sugar coating

and then there's the use of images, which are cleverly juxtaposed with the text in order to sweeten the pill. it's a fact that images are much more effective than speech or text when it comes to getting a message across: a picture tells a thousand words, as the saying goes, and those words can be deceiptful and manipulative in just as high a degree as a cleverly constructed text. the difference in this case is that while text and speech can be reflected upon and dissected easily by most, a video image is delivered within a timeline which enables some clever manipulation via juxtaposition and less obvious signals. in this case, a body ideal is sneaked in beneath the critical faculties by the use of some very clever video effects which, on their own, would be very appealing, if it not for the fact that the point of this whole thing is to sell Old Spice (which i happen to like very much, by the way...and always have, ever since i used to nick a splash of my dad's when i was young).

the attitude within it, designed to get under the radar of otherwise sensible people's critical faculties, is pretty much overtly stated in the first part: be dissatisfied with yourself and/or your husband. the irony of the narrative and imagery mask this by making it look as if it's not projecting a certain kind of image. it's very clever. the marketing and advertising companies don't employ psychologists at high rates of pay for nothing!

am i the only person around here who can see the problem? we've got generations of women who know and understand how damaging the projection of similar female images can be to especially girls and young women. am i the only one who can see that the marketing of cosmetics and suchlike to men is taking a similar path? as the Story of Stuff creator Annie Leonard puts it so well: "Advertising basically says 'You Suck'" and how better to create that deep dissatisfaction with one's own body image than to bombard people with sexually appealing images of something unattainable? i'm 52 and grew up in a world where marketing wasn't anywhere as clever as it is today. these days, many people actually find ads entertaining (and it's no surprise, as there's often more money spent on the 30 second ad than on an hour's TV). maybe one day, they'll get people to enjoy the taste of arsenic on their cornflakes?

eating disorders are on the increase amongst men and boys. anyone who has had eating disorders at close hand knows what suffering and pain they cause and my heart goes out to anyone who suffers from one, either themselves or in their loved ones. i'm not saying that this kind of imagery is the sole or even the prime cause of such problems, but it's part of the picture and the problem too. dissatisfaction with one's own body is probably the most common factor in eating disorders

the woman who posted this on her wall wouldn't approve of something which used similar female imagery, even if it's wrapped in something which is supposedly humorous. she seems to have fallen for it anyway. i find that as depressing as when i hear of young women getting into porn and lapdancing believing that it' an expression of their own empowerment. commodification of sex, which surely is one of the greatest and most beautiful expressions of love and tenderness (and which can also be a great healer) disturbs me deeply: and that, to me, is what this is about too. i find this unhealthy on so many levels

i know that this is only a simple and hurried look at something which is more complex: hopefully we can continue the discussion and i can become wiser along the way

btw: i'm far from being prude, as anyone who knows me well will tell you. i feel that sex is most at home within a sphere of intimacy...

random ramblings...

2011-01-06T00:28:00.001Z

if this is rambling, i need some new boots

======

Fret Level 5

i'm burning all my credit cards to stay awake
the broadband has gone mouldy
a whole pack of sanity towels is blocking the road
but there's drugs to lock us up
and prisons to keep us sane
hooray

i've bought lots of nothing at a very good price
people who value nothing will buy it
i'll borrow some more from the bank
of the last river on earth
where i'll phish your identity
take that

next week there will be timebombs
and incendiary pauses
and all the words you can ever eat
so let's imprison some tourerists
in a maze of twisted logic
last orders please

i'm waiting for last year's great sensation
to arrive on the back of a cataclysm
i apologise for not being afraid
tesco value and the x-factor should fix it
and a raised fret level too
bye bye

and some more...

2011-01-03T01:25:00.003Z

...poetry. it just keeps coming out. don't ask me how, i don't know

============

shellfishness

and there i was, openhearted but wound-up and bewildered
when it came, that...that scalding emotional lavaflow
vomited from some dark, blinding place bleached black
it's there but you give it no name
your something-something
you shocked me
i'm a bit of a first-timer
every single time

i don't know what to do
there's hurt in all directions
and something in me closed up hard and brittle
and i don't know what to do

we're so shellfish
we drift at the mercy of the sea
until we find a rock to cling to
a place to let life flow through us
to stop wanting and start having
whatever life the tide brings
we keep ourselves in a hard shell
until its safe to open up

that sounds all wrong
i really should say

i'm so shellfish
i drifted at the mercy of the sea
and now i've found a rock to cling to
a place to let life flow through me
to stop wanting and start having
whatever life the tide brings
i kept myself in a hard shell
until it was safe to open up

i'm such a coward
with these things
but i'm trying

we need clean water to thrive
if it's gritty we get all clogged up
and stop growing
it takes a lot of effort to clean all that crap out
and you feel really dirty inside
but there is a bright side
it does produce the odd pearl
and my shell's shut tight

and i still don't know what to do
and i'm sorry i'm so busy
i'm in a good place
and it feels really sad but
i'm not where you are
and i don't really know where i'm going
and our paths might not cross
but i have to go there
and if i didn't, i wouldn't be me any more
and you don't want that
so i have to go
and i'm so sorry
my love

this just in...

2011-01-01T20:46:00.003Z

...from somewhere. i wrote it in about half an hour and i have no idea where it came from

===========

Sharing The Fire

the fire and love
bring us together and keep us warm
let's come closer and see the firelight
in each other's eyes and dazzle our hearts
that would be great

but it's not always like that
the spark of love needs dry, well-chosen tinder
must be sheltered from the wind, the rain and the cold earth
kindling must lie waiting and the heart must glow bright
as the breath feeds it

don't light your fire on a rocky spot
the rocks will crack angrily and hot splinters burn
cold wet spots bore it to death with a bottomless chill
a kindly place where the soul and nature rests is best

feed your fire with good timber
too green, and it gives no heat
too weathered and the flames die fast
learn to recognise the good stuff
don't worry about the hard work
cutting and gathering
listening and giving
in time, you will grow stronger
and it will warm you just as well

others will come to share your beautiful fire
let them tend it too
there are many ways to tend it
and you'll never know them all
share it well
you get warmer, not colder, when it's shared with a friend
a stranger knows it as the greatest gift of all
and will bring you blessings

there may be times when fuel is hard to find
or your fire dies from lack of attention
don't worry
you'll know better what to expect
don't rush
dark embers can burn and reawake
if the hearth is still warm
and they like to do it
when you're looking the other way
life is for living, don't dwell
do what you love

fire and love are very alike
they need the same things and live well together
but they're not the same, oh no
fire is a good servant, but a bad master
with love, it's the other way around

The Night Before Christmas (sort-of)

2010-12-22T22:46:00.001Z

i wrote this a week or so ago with the intention of performing it at Glastonbury Assembly Rooms yesterday night, where we had a great Winter Solstice Community Gathering. i didn't though: i hadn't taken the trouble to learn it - and i think reading on stage is really naff. anyway, it's to the meter of The Night Before Christmas. i hope you enjoy it

==============

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
just one creature was stirring - he was clicking a mouse
the flatscreen was glowing, for political geeks
found the holes in the cover and out sprang Wikileaks

but this christmas was bleak, Dad had just lost his job
over joining the union, and not shutting his gob
and his sister the student, protesting the cuts
got beaten with truncheons, no if and no buts...

so no presents this year, not festive and jolly
some dickhead had stolen their tree and the holly
and mistletoe, well, he'd tried it for weeks
but the girls at his school just don't go for geeks

but this won't be a tale of intrigue and scandal
or the crown of a holy tree lopped by a vandal
whose currency was an exchange of pure ire
aimed perhaps at an ex-mayor whose arse is on fire

and it won't be about all the crap you can buy
while the soap on the telly brings a tear to your eye
or the turkey you stuffed and are eating for dinner
or some bloke in a dress telling you you're a sinner

our geeky friend loaded his weapon of choice
a laptop computer that gave him a voice
not a riot, he thought there's a cleverer way
and it's just like a game...and i like to play

so he got on a chatroom and with a few clicks
he found out how to pull off some pretty neat tricks
bombarded some websites with masses of data
so for everything else there's...bye! see you later

his low orbit ion cannon blasted like hell
the targets he aimed at wobbled and fell
but he wasn't alone. there was a knock at the door
who could it be? and at half past four?

a man and a woman was what he saw there
the woman was pregnant, the man had white hair
no sleigh and no reindeer, no stocking and orange
but the king of the geeks - it was Julian Assange!

he said 'hello mate, i know how this looks
but the motel is full and they think i'm a crook
so now we're reduced to asking a stranger
cos no way is my kid being born in a manger!

but Julian! he cried, you're arrested for rape!
he replied, with some things, i'm an ignorant ape
i fell for her charms, but i should have known better
cos one leak i don't like is a broken french letter

look on the bright side, he said, it's a mess
but for once in my life, i've got an address!
and people now know i'm a red-blooded male
and i'm discovering all of the leaks in that jail!

so he opened the door and invited them in
i don't care, he thought, if they say it's a sin
he's my hero, he thought, and he might have his faults
but no way should the bastards have dragged him to court!

he gave them his bed and made them some tea
and they talked about what it might mean to be free
of the burden of debt and the misery caused
by the bankers who dictate our government's laws

and the mess we're all in, when it's amply apparent
that things only get better when it's all transparent!
stuff the lies and deception and disinformation
and the horrors committed 'neath the flag of this nation

where the good people try to be good to each other
while some others cash in and would sell their own mother
if it suited them. and they talked until late
when suddenly Julian said 'hey, this is great
but i've work to do. i'm not one for slacking
let me borrow your laptop, and i'll do me some hacking

so Julian sat up and put things in order
while the Three Wise Men got detained at the border
no baby was born, no need for a doctor
no star in the sky, just a black helicopter...

when our geeky friend woke the next day, they were gone
did he dream it all up? no, he couldn't have done
the note on the desk was real, and the chair
had a sweaty bum-print, and a lot of white hair...

and later that day, well what a surprise!
a courier van full of parcels arrived
full of presents and food, and a christmas tree too
it was clear that someone had sent it, but who?

so he looked at the note that he'd brushed to the floor
it said 'thankyou mate' and, what was more
'merry Christmas to your dad and your sis and your mother
but mostly to you, for helping a brother'

'the gifts are all paid for, so don't lose any sleep
i hope they're the right ones, and nothing was cheap
my bank account's frozen, so i couldn't pay
but those tax-dodgers Vodaphone sent some my way. hey hey!'

so merry Solstice and Christmas and Hannukah too
we're just here for the love and the peace and it's true
that while we may be in a small spot of bother
there's nothing that can stop us being good to each other

the story of an 'abandoned' police van

2010-11-25T10:53:00.008Z

you might have followed the media coverage of the students demonstrating all over the country yesterday:
here's one of the images that was widely used: as you can see, it looks like a bunch of masked hoodlums out for a bit of 'bovver'. however, i think things are not what they seem. it may be that some young people smashed up a police vehicle: but why was it left there? where are the other vans? why was it left unattended right in the path of a demo?

ever been fishing? i think this van was left as 'bait', in the same way that, during the G20 business last year, about the only shopfront not boarded up on the demo route was - guess what? a branch of RBS, who were profligate gamblers of the worst sort, before they were bailed out with squillions of our quids. smashing up banks and police vans makes for good pictures in the Daily Mail and the rest of the 'yellow press'

anyway, here's another pic of the same van:

in the Guardian, this was originally captioned something like "Protesters try to stop a ploice van from moving", since changed to the more accurate "Students in London try to stop a police van from being attacked". the young people in this picture probably know what any sensible activist knows: that violence tends to alienate the very people you've got common ground with. that's why the road protestors in the mid-90s were almost never violent: they stood their ground, often with a struggle, but didn't use violence in the process. eventually, even the right-wing the press couldn't keep printing crap about them - the lies didn't work, and the protestors gained widespread sympathy, including in arch-Tory organs like the Telegraph and, believe it or not, Country Life.

anyway, here's the picture that really caught my eye (and not just for the obvious reasons):

five pretty young women pose for the camera with their fashion accessories in perfect order. what was the demo to them? did it turn into their chance for catwalk fame? they're not exactly dressed for a demo on what was a chilly day - and i wonder if they've brought their make-up with them?

is this what demos have become? has Big Brother come out of the house and done a mind-meld with his namesake, who lives among the securocrats?

i'm wondering whether to be happy or depressed about this last image. are they showing that they're empowered and making their own decisions, including looking good on a demo? or have they swallowed the oxymoronic 'celebrity culture' blue pill and intent on getting noticed? is the demo just another photo-op? i'm still wondering

well, at least they took the trouble to turn up instead of staying at home with a copy of Elle. and hats off to all the young people who got off their arses - i'm pleased to see that they're not the bunch of depoliticised, feckless, drunken twits parts of the media will have us think they are

FIT officer loses his hat

2010-11-24T20:47:00.002Z

Student Demonstration Time:

i respect these kids: they've really got their shit together, as you can hear from the chants

Captain SKA - Liar Liar

2010-11-18T17:15:00.002Z

Captain Ska says:

Dark days have arrived in Britain. The coalition government and their toxic flotilla of cuts are ruthlessly hacking away jobs, damaging vulnerable lives and chipping away at the very fabric of our society. We cannot afford to stand by and let this country sail towards a future of inequality.

Fear Not! Captain SKA and his ship have arrived to fight this coalition, but more crew members are urgently required, there is strength in numbers.Pass this video on to other potential shipmates.

and now for the amazing Henry Rollins on a similar subject:

Fitwatch is up and running again

2010-11-18T12:15:00.003Z

Fitwatch - www.fitwatch.org.uk - is now up and running again, hopefully somewhere where the Met can't feel their collar.

just a reminder: Forward Intelligence Teams collect information on activists who have not necessarily committed any crime - they're just activists, like the ones who put their lives on the line to achieve, amongst other things, the right to vote and equal rights for women.

They're part of ACPO, the Association of Chief Police Officers, which is a private company (mostly funded directly by the Home Office, so it's in essence a government body) and as such exempt from Freedom of Information act requests. hard to believe, but true. if that sounds like something from a police state, well...?

Fitwatch closed, but here's their last post

2010-11-16T13:58:00.004Z

The Metropolitan Police have closed Fitwatch:

Here's their last post:

=======

Resisting the Forward Intelligence Teams – the cops who harass protesters

Fitwatch website has been suspended for “attempting to pervert the course of justice” after host were contacted by the Met. Pass On PLEASE This is all we know at this time.. If you saved know any one who saved any content please please get in touch..

The Blog was suspended on request of Acting Detective Inspector Will Hodgeson from CO11 as part of Op Malone.

The cops always give fucking stupid names to their operations to find rioters so in the tradition of OPERATION CARNABY to find the poll tax rioters the hunt for the Millbank rioters is named OPERATION MALONE. Private Eye had it right in the 80s when they named the police operation that led to the Brixton riots OPERATION WOGSMASHER.

More information and new web address to follow soon.

Fitwatch – e-mail: info@fitwatch.org

http://webcache.googleusercontent.co…client=mozilla

After last weeks events at Millbank during the student demonstrations fitwatch.com published some advice for those worried they had appeared in the press and may face arrest. The piece called Beating police repression after the student occupation can be read on this blog http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com and now, thanks to the bungling Met a growing number of sites across the internet.

The piece has been removed and the fitwatch site closed down on request of Acting Detective Inspector Will Hodgeson from http://twitter.com/#!/CO11MetPolice. Early reports suggest that this was happened due to a request from the police to the site’s host complaining the site by be involved in perverting the cause of justice. This is a worrying development. Whilst we will doubtless know more tomorrow, as yet it does not seem a Court Order had been issued which means the filth are now bullying internet hosting companies into removing material which upsets them. The Police say they requested #fitwatch domain hosts – JustHost.com you mean intimidated them to take it down.

The good news is that the offending piece can be found at:

http://dirt.thevacuumcleaner.co.uk/2010/11/beating-police-repression-after-student.html

http://norfolknonaligned.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/beating-police-repression-after-the-student-occupation/

http://bryanspygar.blogspot.com/2010/11/beating-police-repression-after-student.html
http://truth-reason-liberty.blogspot.com/2010/11/police-take-fitwatch-down-as-they-go-on.html

http://barnsdale.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/fitwatch-suspended-time-for-solidarity-make-sure-the-students-are-well-advised

http://ianbone.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/sussex-university-occupied/

The remarkable and brilliant student action at Millbank has produced some predictable frothing at the mouth from the establishment and right wing press. Cameron has called for the ‘full weight of the law’ to fall on those who had caused tens of thousands of pounds of damage to the expensive decor at Tory party HQ. Responsibility is being placed on ‘a violent faction’, after the march was ‘infiltrated’ by anarchists.

There are an encouraging number of intiatives to show solidarity with the arrested students – something that is vital if they are to avoid the sort of punitive ‘deterrent’ sentences handed out to the Gaza demonstrators. A legal support group has been established and the National Campaign against Cuts and Fees has started a support campaign. Goldsmiths lecturers union has publicly commended the students for a ‘magnificent demonstration’ .

This is all much needed, as the establishment is clearly on the march with this one. The Torygraph has published an irresponsible and frenzied ‘shop-a-student’ piece and the Met are clearly under pressure to produce ‘results’ after what they have admitted was a policing ‘embarrassment’.

51 people have been arrested so far, and the police have claimed they took the details of a further 250 people in the kettle using powers under the Police Reform Act. There may be more arrests to come.

Students who are worried should consider taking the following actions:

If you have been arrested, or had your details taken – contact the legal support campaign. As a group you can support each other, and mount a coherent campaign.

If you fear you may be arrested as a result of identification by CCTV, FIT or press photography;

DONT panic. Press photos are not necessarily conclusive evidence, and just because the police have a photo of you doesn’t mean they know who you are.

DONT hand yourself in. The police often use the psychological pressure of knowing they have your picture to persuade you to ‘come forward’. Unless you have a very pressing reason to do otherwise, let them come and find you, if they know who you are.

DO get rid of your clothes. There is no chance of suggesting the bloke in the video is not you if the clothes he is wearing have been found in your wardrobe. Get rid of ALL clothes you were wearing at the demo, including YOUR SHOES, your bag, and any distinctive jewellery you were wearing at the time. Yes, this is difficult, especially if it is your only warm coat or decent pair of boots. But it will be harder still if finding these clothes in your flat gets you convicted of violent disorder.

DONT assume that because you can identify yourself in a video, a judge will be able to as well. ‘That isn’t me’ has got many a person off before now.

DO keep away from other demos for a while. The police will be on the look-out at other demos, especially student ones, for people they have put on their ‘wanted’ list. Keep a low profile.

DO think about changing your appearance. Perhaps now is a good time for a make-over. Get a haircut and colour, grow a beard, wear glasses. It isn’t a guarantee, but may help throw them off the scent.

DO keep your house clean. Get rid of spray cans, demo related stuff, and dodgy texts / photos on your phone. Don’t make life easy for them by having drugs, weapons or anything illegal in the house.

DO get the name and number of a good lawyer you can call if things go badly. The support group has the names of recommended lawyers on their site. Take a bit of time to read up on your rights in custody, especially the benefits of not commenting in interview.

DO be careful who you speak about this to. Admit your involvement in criminal damage / disorder ONLY to people you really trust.

DO try and control the nerves and panic. Waiting for a knock on the door is stressful in the extreme, but you need to find a way to get on with business as normal.

Otherwise you’ll be serving the sentence before you are even arrested.
The role of the police is not to “keep the peace,” or even to “uphold the law.” It is to ensure that the balance of power is maintained and that dissent remains containable and controllable. If our goal is to resist the attacks upon our class, rather than simply appear to do so, then we must also resist police repression and show solidarity with all who suffer it.

As well as UK indymedia, Bristol indymedia and Scotland indymedia as well as being linked to on facebook pages, republished in forums etc.

And of course google.

All in just two hours, please join in, republish and show the Met the internet will not be censored. Add links to anywhere else you’ve spotted it in the comments below.

Fitwatch have said they ain’t going fucking anywhere and will be back online soon, in the meantime you can catch them on facebook

this post can also be found here:

The article that apparently disturbed the cops so much can now be found on the following sites…

projectsheffield.wordpress.com

dirt.thevacuumcleaner.co.uk

norfolknonaligned.wordpress.com

bryanspygar.blogspot.com

truth-reason-liberty.blogspot.com

barnsdale.wordpress.com

johhnyvoid.wordpress.com

policestate.co.uk

libcom.org

permanentrevolution.net

urban75.net

bristle.wordpress.com

cambridgeanarchists.wordpress.com

edinburghanarchists.noflag.org.uk

isle-of-avalon.co.uk

blog.voyou.org

thanks to http://fitwatch.tiltingatwindmills.org.uk/2010/11/16/more-on-the-fitwatch-website-closure/

so what is there to write about?

2010-09-26T13:57:00.002+01:00

hello dear reader (i'm assuming there's one, at least)

i'm presently doing some research about some strange goings-on related to property and planning permissions. these are local issues, but at least one of them is "a local issue of national importance".

this sort of thing won't endear me to our local district councillors as they've been making some rather odd decisions, which i hope to shine a light on

i'll do my best to write clearly, but i'm learning as i go along, so please bear with me and correct any errors, if you see them

there'll be the odd rant too :)

i've also dropped the unnecessary use of capital letters...sorry if you don't like it

i've had a nice rest, so now i'm starting again

2010-08-17T02:42:00.004+01:00

i discovered Facebook a while back, and have spent a while being quite active there to see what it's like and how it works. more on that later...

i can really recommend this book, available in full online here: A People's History of America. it's pretty good stuff, if you like that sort of thing (which i do)

Other priorities

2010-03-02T18:32:00.000Z

This blog is on the shelf for the foreseeable future as I have other priorities.

So who gives a toss?

2010-01-25T03:18:00.001Z

I'm going to kill this blog. Who gives a toss about anything these days? They're all munching burgers and tv dinners in front of 42" plasma screens that feed them crap that turns their brains to mush. Fuck it

Tesno, Newport Pagnell

2010-01-18T20:50:00.002Z

Here's a good site:

Tesno

FOE Campaign

What a silly comment

2010-01-16T01:31:00.002Z

Someone left a comment - in Chinese - which consisted of a load of links. Google Translate said:

Erotic adult sex stories erotic sex erotic self-timer patch area erotic videos erotic sex orgasm erotic videos download erotic videos download erotic videos share erotic theater district erotic video erotic video clips erotic video of the Kingdom CD-ROM video erotica erotic video-sharing networks to download erotic video erotic video erotic Center Studios to the erotic harem erotic network adult erotic sex erotic erotic massage erotic list erotic send Xiao-game situation Color of the most erotic home videos forum erotic sharp appreciation of erotic literature and martial arts studios erotic download erotic download erotic games erotic star erotic incest stories erotic Mayday exchange zone erotic erotic erotic friends who love his wife Color comic erotic comic free erotic Japanese

I wonder what he was up to? :)

The Trap - Adam Curtis documentary series

2010-01-16T00:47:00.003Z

I've been a fan of Adam Curtis for a few years now. I believe he's the best - or the only? - documentary filmmaker we've got in these times.

I'd like to recommend this series to you: The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom

Part 1: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-142285137762134414

Part 2: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-142285137762134414

Part 3: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7581348588228662817

It's not always easy going but it's worth it.

Max Keiser

2009-12-26T11:23:00.001Z

He's the bloke on the right. Have a listen to what he says.

and again:

Someone else's Christmas Post

2009-12-24T20:10:00.003Z

I read The Guardian. This post is from a commenter called TheThunkWorks who has spoken thus:

My Christmas Post (previously placed on a dead thread to Dean Baker's latest article on Cif America re Ben Bernanke, Time magazine's Man Of The Year)...

...and introducing a word new to me (and to the online Cambridge English Dictionary, but real for all that; at least, I found a definition on Wiktionary): Kakistocracy (with thanks to zoomtube, for making me aware of it)...

TheThunkWorks' CHRISTMAS POST:

What most citizens (both UK and US), and those (honest few?) policy-makers who are not bought-and-paid-for mouths of the financial services industry, cannot seem to bring themselves to grasp is that The Great Economic Collapse of 2008 resulted from endemic crime, not from exuberant carelessness...perhaps, because the enormity of it makes it too great a truth to admit without shaking to their very foundations our common beliefs about how our cultures/societies function.

It is too much. Too great a shock of betrayal...and of guilt at our failure to see.

From the deceitful sales pitches to sub-prime mortgage loan customers, through the forging of details on loan agreements by mortgage loan companies and the selling on up-the-line of the same; to the bundling-up of those sub-primes with other debt-obligation papers (CDOs) and the AAA-rating of same by ratings agencies; up to the selling on of those bundles as guaranteed profit-makers by the biggest-of-the-big, whose operations were audited and approved by accountancy companies reliant on fees from those biggest-of-the-big (too big to fail), which biggest-of-the-big were betting on the failure of those bundles by taking out insurance on them (CDSs) with companies without the reserves to meet the claim if called on (eg, AIG-FP), right on into the back-room deals and back-channel fundings that marked the bail-out transfer of trillions of public money into private coffers...all of it has been marked by systematic fraud and deceit.

It is too much. Too great a shock of betrayal...and of guilt at our failure to see.

And it is a shallow error to dismiss this with a snort of 'conspiracy, ha!'. There is no need to invoke an over-arching conspiracy. A consensus is all that is needed (within which conspiracies, in their true sense, amongst different groups of 'players' can coalesce and dissipate, as and when they succeed or fail).

The consensus within finance (and corporatism generally, too) was an approval and rewarding of deceit and fraud; an institutionalisation of racketeering; the internalisation of the values of organised crime (it is no coincidence that, long before the adoption of bowdlerisations of Sun Tzu's The Art Of War as a 'bible' of financial (corporate) 'power players' and 'wanna-be's', the must-read amongst executive climbers was Mario Puzo's The Godfather).

It is a product of the (much-dismissed by 'serious' politicians and political analysts, certainly in the UK) Culture War. And a culture of corruption (of anything and everything, for the prize of billions for any winning 'player') won dominance.

That dominance remains, as is shown by the continuing cynical abuse of public support (which I illustrate with...[link now below] re multi-million taxpayer funding of the new Goldman Sachs World Headquarters building in New York, whilst that bank slices up the shares to be taken by its 'players' from its $23billion bonus pool...derived from easy profits made possible only by the full-spectrum of the public bail-out of the private financial sector).

This is a crime story, as William K Black (a US Federal financial regulator who investigated the 1980s Savings-and-Loan scandal, and who might now be called a 'forensic economist') explains again in the interview I link to...[links now below]

In the US, the RICO (Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organisation) Act is finally being invoked ('though, not by any law enforcement agency with the necessary muscle). RICO was intended as a legal weapon against organised crime. That is how bad this all is.

zoomtube has it right. This is kakistocracy...'rule by the worst [of men]' (who thought that I or anyone here would need to know such a word?).

Happy Christmas and a safe New Year to all (even Guardian Cif Tech-nerds).

Links:

Goldman Sachs new headquarters:

http://rawstory.com/2009/12/taxpayers-goldmans-office-tower/

William K Black interview:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yk2Yugp0ANQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1xo3xV2ypY

Excellent.

Not entertaining or funny at all

2009-12-23T23:02:00.002Z

Just seen the film "Orwell Rolls in his Grave": here it is.

I wonder if we'll learn the truth after 2012? :)

Moonbat does it again

2009-12-15T13:09:00.002Z

George Monbiot says it again

While economies grow, social justice is unnecessary, as lives can be improved without redistribution. While economies grow, people need not confront their elites. While economies grow, we can keep buying our way out of trouble. But, like the bankers, we stave off trouble today only by multiplying it tomorrow. Through economic growth we are borrowing time at punitive rates of interest. It ensures that any cuts agreed at Copenhagen will eventually be outstripped. Even if we manage to prevent climate breakdown, growth means that it's only a matter of time before we hit a new constraint, which demands a new global response: oil, water, phosphate, soil. We will lurch from crisis to existential crisis unless we address the underlying cause: perpetual growth cannot be accommodated on a finite planet.

Invent your own currency

2009-12-10T17:52:00.001Z

Ever wanted to have your own currency? Here's a (PDF) how-to guide.

Lewes Pound How to Guide

Is anyone reading this?

2009-12-09T18:17:00.002Z

Dear reader

My plans are to spend some more time and energy writing about issues I feel are important, and publishing here.

It sometimes feels like speaking on a stage where I'm unable to see if there's anyone in the theatre. For that reason, I'd like to know if anyone is reading this. I'd be pleased if you could either leave a short comment below, letting me know what you think, and if there are any local issues that could benefit from a bit more attention. Alternatively, you can send me an email at rchisnall AT gmail DOT com.

Thanks.

Oneplace - info about your local authority

2009-12-09T11:17:00.002Z

There's this new site called Oneplace which has info and data from every local authority in the country.

Here is Somerset's (geek joke: it's area 404!). The overview says

Somerset has identified the following priorities for the area:

Making a positive contribution
Living sustainably
Ensuring Economic Well Being
Enjoying and Achieving
Staying safe
Being Healthy
Motherhood and Apple Pie (that's my little joke)

It will be interesting how they approach the second point. It mentions renewable energy generation in schools, which they're apparently cutting.

Open letter to Somerset County Council

2009-12-08T19:30:00.003Z

I sent this letter today to the Central Somerset Gazette.

Dear Somerset County Council

Right now, world leaders are meeting to try to organise a more
sustainable future for everyone. Only time will tell whether their
plans will succeed, but there is a general acceptance that "business
as usual" cannot continue. The interconnected ''Three E's" of
environment, energy and economy are becoming increasingly unstable
with potentially grave consequences for all of us - especially in
relation to where our food comes from.

Apparently Somerset County Council have decided to go against this
general trend and are threatening to axe many sustainability projects.
These include the Somerset Landscape Scheme, which provides grants to
farmers and landowners to help conserve and restore our landscape, and
renewable energy generation in schools and elsewhere, which also serve
to raise awareness of sustainable energy use.

Far more serious than this is the apparent plan to sell off all our
County Farms, which provide opportunities for people to learn about
farming and growing food. Since there are 60 farms of about 7200 acres
in all, it's a tempting economic asset - but selling them off will
deprive our communities of the the very opportunities we need to meet
the challenges of an uncertain future. As energy prices rise alongside
world food demand, we will probably need to grow more of our own food,
closer to where it's eaten and the County Farms are too valuable an
asset to sell in order to plug a short-term fiscal problem.

All these projects are aimed towards sustainability, which really
means securing a decent future for ourselves and our children. It's
obvious: cutting them back and selling them off is, in the long term,
unsustainable.

What irony that these plans have been hatched by an administration
which calls itself Conservative. With a name like that, one could be
forgiven for believing that issues of conservation and sustainability
would be close to their hearts.

I bet the letters editor is getting tired of me. I've written quite a few recently.

Planning officer's report about the proposed Tesco in Glastonbury

2009-12-08T02:00:00.004Z

Mendip District Council's planning officer, a Mr Edward Baker (whose proper title is Development Control Team Manager Area West [ooph!]) recommended that planning permission for the proposed Tesco between B&Q and Wollens be refused.

This is the report he submitted to the planning board.

Planning Officer's Report

Cynical blogger charmed by baby hedgehog

2009-12-06T21:19:00.003Z

Got this in my inbox:

Hello to all you car drivers everywhere

I have come here to tell you to be so very careful when you are driving

Because this is the time of year when I am just learning to walk

So please don't run me over

Just look how sweet I am

Thank you

Planning advice website

2009-12-02T11:41:00.001Z

Planning Aid

"Planning Aid provides free, independent and professional help, advice and support on planning issues to people and communities who cannot afford to hire a planning consultant. Planning Aid complements the work of local authorities but is wholly independent of them."

Tesco stuff again

2009-12-01T17:58:00.002Z

Some links to tesconbury.blogspot.com:

Public Inquiry details

Do we need it (whether we want it or not)?

Other considerations and resources

The Freeconomy Community - justfortheloveofit.org

2009-12-01T12:53:00.002Z

From the Facebook group about <subj>

The Freeconomy Community's aim is to help reconnect people in their local communities through the simple act of sharing. Not only is sharing our resources better for the environment, it saves you money and builds friendships with those people who live closest to you. It is what we call a WIN-WIN-WIN situation.

Everything is shared for FREE on Freeconomy, and no money changes hands between members.

**************

Why no-money?

One of the critical reasons that we have so many major issues in the world today - such as climate change, sweatshops, wars over oil reserves, factory farms, polluted oceans and rivers - is because we never have to see the direct repercussions that our purchases have on the people, environment and animals they affect. The degrees of separation between the consumer and the consumed have increased so much that it now, conveniently, means that people are completely unaware of the levels of destruction and suffering involved in the making of the 'stuff' they purchase. We have no longer any idea how much embodied energy has gone into the things we consume. The main reason we have no appreciation for this energy is because we are so disconnected from what we buy. The tool that has enabled us to be so disconnected, so separated from what we consume, is money, especially in it modern globalised format.

Take this for an example. If we grew our own food, we wouldn't waste a third of it as we do today. If we made our own tables and chairs, we wouldn't throw them out the moment we changed the interior decor. If we had to clean our own drinking water, we probably wouldn't defecate in it.

If we could see the child working under military presence in a sweatshop, we would probably think twice about buying that new pair of jeans on the High St. If we could see the face of the mother in Iraq as her child lies dead from a cluster bomb, we'd probably think twice about going on an oil-guzzling cheap flight for the weekend. If we could see the size of the landfill sites where our 'stuff' goes, we would probably have a lot more respect for what we have and use.

Money, as a method of easily storing wealth, has also enabled humans to bank exploitation - of people, the environment and animals - and has also replaced communities, friendships and families as the No.1 source of security for people.

****************

What's our 'pay-it-forward'

The philosofree behind the Freeconomy community differentiates it from other forms of alternative economy.

Whilst others are still focused on the concept of exchange, Freeconomy is based on 'Pay-it-forward' principles and economics. One week someone who you have never helped may share their time, skills, tools or spare spaces with you for free; another week someone who has never helped you may ask you to do the same. Every time you help someone you just ask him or her to 'pay the favour forward'.

Not only do you then still have access to a huge resource, you also build the trust and friendships in communities that inevitably form when someone does something 'just for the love of it'.

This is our point - if somebody needs help, why do we need to get anything in return? Is the fact that another human being needs your help not excuse enough?

*******************

So what is it all about?

It's about helping others and providing an opportunity for others to help you.
It's about sharing the skills you have learnt through your life and learning those you haven't for a time when you may need them.
It's about sharing your tools so you can have access to all the tools under the sun without it costing the earth.
It's about using any free space you have to either benefit positive, ethical and local projects, or to enable volunteers to keep doing their amazing work for free.
It's about getting to know people in your own community.
It's about learning to help each other again.
It's about getting ready for a post peak oil world.
It's about making dinner for a friend who was yesterday a stranger.
It's about putting the soul back into society.
It's about helping each other not for profit, but just-for-the-love-of-it...

Bank full of sand...

2009-11-30T12:44:00.000Z

We've had the massive bank bailouts and I'm sure you know about that. We're in debt to the tune of £13,000 each because our leaders, in their wisdom, decided that reinflating a burst balloon was the way to go.

Barclay's didn't take the state shilling, though. They went to the Gulf instead:

Barclays under fire for letting Middle East states take 30% stake

Now they're fucked too:

Dubai shares plummet as crisis continues

• Abu Dhabi stock market suffers worst day's trading ever
• IMF urges UAE central bank to hammer out a rescue plan
• In London, the FTSE 100 loses 50 points at one stage

Interesting times indeed.

The Hidden Cost of the Biofuels Stations proposed for Bristol and for sites across Britain.

2009-11-30T11:40:00.002Z

Posting this for others to get the word out there - please share.

Public Meeting

The Hidden Cost of the Biofuels Stations proposed for Bristol and for sites across Britain.

THURSDAY 3RD DECEMBER
7:00pm to 9:00pm
3rd Floor, Bush House (Above the Arnolfini), 72 Prince St.,Bristol, BS1 4QD

Simply attending this meeting would hugely improve our chances of preventing this proposal from going through - please spread the word far and wide!

Background
A company called W4B Renewable Energy want to build a 50 MW power station at Avonmouth Docks in Bristol, which would burn 90,000 tonnes of vegetable oil, most likely palm oil, every year. More than 22,000 hectares of oil palm plantations would be required to feed this one power station, and even more land if other feedstock was used. W4B have mentioned jatropha as well as palm oil, yet jatropha is not yet commercially available, many plantings are failing, yet thousands of people have already lost their land and livelihood for jatropha plantations to feed Europe’s biofuel market. Peat expert Professor Siegert of Munich University has said about palm oil power stations in Germany: “We were able to prove that the making of these plantations and the burning of the rainforests and peat areas emits many thousands of times as much CO2 as we then are able to prevent by using palm oil. And that is a disastrous balance for the climate.” (tinyurl.com/y9xel3g)

Ever more communities in countries like Colombia, Malaysia, Indonesia and Ecuador are losing their land to palm oil companies, with plantation expansion to a large extent driven by Europe’s biofuel policies. Avonmouth local residents will be affected by increased levels of nitrogen oxide and small particulates which are linked to respiratory and cardiac disease in an area that already has high levels of pollution.

In agreement with Europe's biofuel policies, the UK GOVERNMENT HAS COMMITTED TO INCREASE UK BIOFUEL CONSUMPTION ON A YEARLY BASIS. IT PROVIDES LARGE FINANCIAL INCENTIVES TO STIMULATE THE CONTINUED GROWTH OF THE BIOFUEL MARKET IN THE UK: In 2008, Biodiesel received a 20 pence per litre fuel duty incentive and Biofuel sales were approximately 1100 million litres (UK Report to the European Commission under Article 4 of the Biofuels Directive (2003/30/EC)) and are targetted to rise.

Why its important to attend this meeting!
Whether you would like to learn more or want to make your views heard, then please attend the meeting. Politicians and the press have been invited so we can make those in power aware of our concerns by showing strength in numbers. Planning proposals for the Avonmouth biofuel plant will be considered early in 2010 and plans exist to build a number of similar 'agrofuel' (biofuels from industrial agriculture) power plants around the UK. There are sustainable alternatives to biofuel! The more of us who show support NOW, by attending the public meeting, the greater our chance of halting biofuel plant development in the interests of more sustainable fuel sources.

An Open Letter to President Obama from Michael Moore

2009-11-30T10:59:00.000Z

Got this in my inbox:

Monday, November 30th, 2009

Dear President Obama,

Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they've always heard is true -- that all politicians are alike. I simply can't believe you're about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn't so.

It is not your job to do what the generals tell you to do. We are a civilian-run government. WE tell the Joint Chiefs what to do, not the other way around. That's the way General Washington insisted it must be. That's what President Truman told General MacArthur when MacArthur wanted to invade China. "You're fired!," said Truman, and that was that. And you should have fired Gen. McChrystal when he went to the press to preempt you, telling the press what YOU had to do. Let me be blunt: We love our kids in the armed services, but we f*#&in' hate these generals, from Westmoreland in Vietnam to, yes, even Colin Powell for lying to the UN with his made-up drawings of WMD (he has since sought redemption).

So now you feel backed into a corner. 30 years ago this past Thursday (Thanksgiving) the Soviet generals had a cool idea -- "Let's invade Afghanistan!" Well, that turned out to be the final nail in the USSR coffin.

There's a reason they don't call Afghanistan the "Garden State" (though they probably should, seeing how the corrupt President Karzai, whom we back, has his brother in the heroin trade

raising poppies). Afghanistan's nickname is the "Graveyard of Empires." If you don't believe it, give the British a call. I'd have you call Genghis Khan but I lost his number. I do have Gorbachev's number though. It's + 41 22 789 1662

. I'm sure he could give you an earful about the historic blunder

you're about to commit.

With our economic collapse still in full swing and our precious young men and women being sacrificed on the altar of arrogance and greed, the breakdown of this great civilization we call America will head, full throttle, into oblivion if you become the "war president." Empires never think the end is near, until the end is here. Empires think that more evil will force the heathens to toe the line -- and yet it never works. The heathens usually tear them to shreds.

Choose carefully, President Obama. You of all people know that it doesn't have to be this way. You still have a few hours to listen to your heart, and your own clear thinking. You know that nothing good can come from sending more troops halfway around the world to a place neither you nor they understand, to achieve an objective that neither you nor they understand, in a country that does not want us there. You can feel it in your bones.

I know you know that there are LESS than a hundred al-Qaeda left in Afghanistan! A hundred thousand troops trying to crush a hundred guys living in caves? Are you serious? Have you drunk Bush's Kool-Aid? I refuse to believe it.

Your potential decision to expand the war (while saying that you're doing it so you can "end the war") will do more to set your legacy in stone than any of the great things you've said and done in your first year. One more throwing a bone from you to the Republicans and the coalition of the hopeful and the hopeless may be gone -- and this nation will be back in the hands of the haters quicker than you can shout "tea bag!"

Choose carefully, Mr. President. Your corporate backers are going to abandon you as soon as it is clear you are a one-term president and that the nation will be safely back in the hands of the usual idiots who do their bidding. That could be Wednesday morning.

We the people still love you. We the people still have a sliver of hope. But we the people can't take it anymore. We can't take your caving in, over and over, when we elected you by a big, wide margin of millions to get in there and get the job done. What part of "landslide victory" don't you understand?

Don't be deceived into thinking that sending a few more troops into Afghanistan will make a difference, or earn you the respect of the haters. They will not stop until this country is torn asunder and every last dollar is extracted from the poor and soon-to-be poor. You could send a million troops over there and the crazy Right still wouldn't be happy. You would still be the victim of their incessant venom on hate radio and television because no matter what you do, you can't change the one thing about yourself that sends them over the edge.

The haters were not the ones who elected you, and they can't be won over by abandoning the rest of us.

President Obama, it's time to come home. Ask your neighbors in Chicago and the parents of the young men and women doing the fighting and dying if they want more billions and more troops sent to Afghanistan. Do you think they will say, "No, we don't need health care, we don't need jobs, we don't need homes. You go on ahead, Mr. President, and send our wealth and our sons and daughters overseas, 'cause we don't need them, either."

What would Martin Luther King, Jr. do? What would your grandmother do? Not send more poor people to kill other poor people who pose no threat to them, that's what they'd do. Not spend billions and trillions to wage war while American children are sleeping on the streets and standing in bread lines.

All of us that voted and prayed for you and cried the night of your victory have endured an Orwellian hell of eight years of crimes committed in our name: torture, rendition, suspension of the bill of rights, invading nations who had not attacked us, blowing up neighborhoods that Saddam "might" be in (but never was), slaughtering wedding parties in Afghanistan. We watched as hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were slaughtered and tens of thousands of our brave young men and women were killed, maimed, or endured mental anguish -- the full terror of which we scarcely know.

When we elected you we didn't expect miracles. We didn't even expect much change. But we expected some. We thought you would stop the madness. Stop the killing. Stop the insane idea that men with guns can reorganize a nation that doesn't even function as a nation and never, ever has.

Stop, stop, stop! For the sake of the lives of young Americans and Afghan civilians, stop. For the sake of your presidency, hope, and the future of our nation, stop. For God's sake, stop.

Tonight we still have hope.

Tomorrow, we shall see. The ball is in your court. You DON'T have to do this. You can be a profile in courage. You can be your mother's son.

We're counting on you.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

P.S. There's still time to have your voice heard. Call the White House at 202-456-1111 or email the President

Ozymandias

2009-11-27T22:45:00.002Z

I've always loved this poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away".

Think the Gherkin or maybe Dubai...

Desiderata

2009-11-26T23:37:00.000Z

written by Max Ehrmann in the 1920s

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Stop and search numbers fall

2009-11-26T14:39:00.002Z

Grauniad article:

Big fall in police use of stop-and search powers after outcry

Home office figures show that only tiny proportion of anti-terror searches lead to arrests

Quote:

There has been a sharp fall this year in the police use of counter-terror stop and search powers in the wake of a public outcry over their discriminatory nature, according to Home Office figures.

But the statistics still show that only a tiny proportion – 0.6% – of the searches carried out under anti-terror laws led to an arrest.

During 2008-09 more than 256,000 people were stopped in the street and searched by the police without the need for reasonable grounds of suspicion under section 44 of the Terrorism 2000 Act. This record level of police activity followed the failed bomb attack on a London nightclub in 2007. Only 1,452 of these searches led to an arrest or other action, and the vast majority on matters unrelated to terrorism.

'Mission Creep' is still a big issue with regard to much of ~~ZaNu~~Labour's paranoid, misguided legislation. The cynic in me is thinking that perhaps this is a small change, while the bigger issues (the laws themselves and their potential for abuse) aren't addressed. 42 days? Right to silence? Control orders? One-sided extradition to the US with few legal safeguards? I could go on...

It's been an interesting day for news...

2009-11-26T02:20:00.002Z

What's the news today? We'll start here:

Court backs banks on overdraft charges

In blow to consumers, supreme court rules OFT does not have power to decide whether unauthorised charges are fair

Hm. Damn...that's really bad. It couldn't come at a worse time, considering the changing public attitude to banks. They already look like greedy litle piggies...and then

G20 report lays down the law to police on use of force

A blueprint for wholesale reform of British policing to create a service "anchored in public consent" was unveiled today by the inquiry prompted by Scotland Yard's controversial handling of the G20 protests in London.

Denis O'Connor, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Constabulary, used his report to demand wide-ranging reforms and a return to an ideal of policing based on "approachability, impartiality, accountability and … minimum force".

[...]

The report – instigated after the Guardian revealed that a newspaper seller, Ian Tomlinson, had died after an attack by a police officer – was broader and more critical than many had expected.

O'Connor warned of a "hardening" of policing style in recent years and the erosion of the British approach to policing developed by the 19th-century prime minister Sir Robert Peel and based on consent.

Bloody hell. The police are really getting it in the neck. It remains to be seen if his recommendations are implemented. It would be nice but I'm not holding my breath.

Then this:

Banks forced to reveal numbers of millionaire staff

New laws created in the wake of Sir David Walker's report will compel banks to say how many of their staff earn more than £1m, but 'high end' earners' names will not be revealed

They're going to wriggle out of it somehow...I'll bet they left a big loophole in that one.

Labour plans to dismantle Whitehall.

Afghanistan campaign 'mishandled'
Ex-MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove criticises army's under-resourcing, and failure to explain war to public

Iraq intelligence 'patchy', inquiry told
Officials say ministers were repeatedly warned over limits of information about Iraq's military capability

Mandelson hobnobs with Gaddafi Jr
Business secretary joined Libyan leader's son and Cherie Blair at shooting party hosted by Rothschilds

It's enough to make your head spin.

A Wordle

2009-11-23T11:39:00.004Z

...is one of these things.

Click on it to see a bigger version.

Thanks to Wordle for the great app.

CCTV in Glastonbury

2009-11-22T20:31:00.001Z

...well almost.

[later...]

It appears to be offline right now, so I've changed it from the Town Hall camera to the new Tor one.

I'm no fan of CCTV 'insecurity' cameras. But...since there are more than 4 million CCTV cameras in this country, it's practically speaking impossible for people to be watching all of them. Maybe some are recorded. I've always felt that they were about making people feel unsafe rather than the opposite, their presence being a reminder of a) the street is dangerous! Go home and hide under the covers! and b) if you're even thinking of doing something naughty, our advanced brain-reading imaging software will convict you of thoughtcrime before you've even pulled your hoodie up - if there's anyone watching, which I doubt.

Incidentally, the people who watch the CCTV cameras in Glastonbury (of which we have at least 4 - on the town hall, by the Oxfam shop, outside Labyrinth Books, and across the road from 3 Silver Street, otherwise known as the Robert Barton Trust - let me know if I've missed any 'official' ones) are sworn to secrecy regarding the address of the monitoring station. How hard would it be to find out where it is? Not particularly. The people running the system must be really paranoid.

At last, someone warns about Ketamine

2009-11-22T02:50:00.002Z

The Guardian has this article today. It's about time someone raised this issue. How the hell can this drug still be classified as class C? Anyone who's seen someone K'd out of their heads can tell you how awful it is - and now the health risks are becoming clear.

Quote:

Ketamine, a powerful tranquilliser used on horses, is being taken in growing number by young people in the UK, causing crippling health problems.

Some addicts have needed to have their bladders removed and must now wear catheters. Other users have suffered serious kidney problems, breathing difficulties, addiction, bouts of unconsciousness and trouble with urinating. The drug also involves a heightened risk of heart attack.

Some users also end up with cocaine-style damage to the inside of their nose, because the drug is often snorted in powder form, though it can also be injected, taken as a pill or swallowed as a liquid.

It's amazing that this can be class C when cannabis is class B, and - even more stupidly - psylocybin mushrooms are class A. No wonder kids don't give a toss about health warnings when they're not based on evidence.

Come back Dr Nutt, your country needs you.

Some random quotes and thoughts

2009-11-21T11:13:00.002Z

The future's already here - it's just unevenly distributed. (Attributed to William Gibson.)

We need to reduce our standard of living in order to improve our quality of life. (That's by me.)

For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. (H L Mencken)

The big picture, the long term, and the common good. (Should be the basis for every decision we make.)

Nobody wins unless everybody wins (from a Canadian politician in Michael Moore's film Bowling for Columbine)

Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under. (H L Mencken)

The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function. (Albert Allen Bartlett)

Speaking of which: here's Bartlett's amazing polemic about our unsustainable lifestyle:

It's one of 8 videos which I highly recommend.

Tesco'ed into action

2009-11-20T16:46:00.006Z

Ouch! Every little hurts...but at least I've got something to blog about again.

I've written a bit about the Tesco planning application.

Things have moved on since then. Mendip District Council's Planning Board went against the advice of Edward Baker, their planning officer, and gave Tesco permission to build on the Avalon Plastics site. Of course Avalon Plastics have to move off first, supposedly to a new on the adjacent Morlands site - which hasn't been built yet.

Apparently when a council Planning Board disagrees with a planning officer, the application automatically gets referred to a higher, regional instance - and so it was.

It's gone further than that. Secretary of State for DEFRA Hilary Benn has 'called in' the planning application.

Now I might be infringing copyright with this next bit, but until such time as someone informs me otherwise, I'll assume 'fair use'. It's the full text from an article in the Central Somerset Gazette, which isn't on their website (yet):

Controversial Tesco plan is called in for public inquiry

Laura Linham, Central Somerset Gazette central@midsomnews.co.uk

The Secretary of State [for DEFRA] is to have the final decision on a flagship Tesco store on the outskirts of Glastonbury.

Speaking at a meeting of Glastonbury Town Council this week, Councillor Jim Barron reported that decision had been "called in" by the secretary of state [for DEFRA], Hilary Benn.

Most planning applications are decided locally by the district or other council, but Mr Benn has reserve powers to direct the council to refer an application to him for decision - a 'called-in' application.

Each year many thousands of applications are made but the secretary of state only calls in about 50.

Generally, he will only call in an application if he thinks there are planning issues of more than local importance.

These include a development conflicts [sic] with national planning policy on important matters, or a development that could have wide effects beyond its immediate locality.

Tesco's application for a store on the site of the Avalon Plastics factory in Beckery New Road [sic] was approved by Mendip District Council's planning board in August, despite continued fears for the impact it would have on local businesses in both Street and Glastonbury.

The Planning Board voted 11 to one in favour of the new development - against the recommendation of their own planning officer - on the current site of Avalon Plastics at Beckery New Road, near the B&Q store.

The move allowed Avalon Plastics could move next door [sic] to the Morlands Enterprise Park, securing the jobs of 150 employees and allowing for further expansion and investment.

The proposed new Tesco would include 41,000 square feet of shop floor space built on stilts, with 324 parking spaces underneath.

A spokewoman for Mendip District Council confirmed that the application would now go to a public inquiry, but added that the Government Office for the South West had not yet organised a date for the hearing.

Why did it get 'called in'? Probably because it goes against a Planning Policy Statement. I don't know yet.

It could be that Hilary will shame his father and rush an approval through just before ~~ZaNu~~Labour gets trounced in the next election. Who knows?

Meanwhile, I'm getting tooled up for the struggle - it's going to be a war of words. Bring it on!

This is too good not to re-post:

Oh yeah there's this too - Tesconbury. Just hope it doesn't get mired in conspiracy theories...

To blog or not to blog?

2009-11-11T19:33:00.003Z

I suppose I'm not the first or last person who has started a blog and then not updated it very often. It's not because I've not got anything to say - here's my comments on the Guardian's website - I've just lost focus. If anything, I get too many ideas for what to write and, like a swordfish trying to find a single victim in a huge shoal, they all get away. Writer's glut is as bad as writer's block.

Anyway here's a poem by Charles Bukowski. I hope I don't get sued for posting it :)

tough company

poems like gunslingers
sit around and shoot holes in my windows
chew on my toilet paper
read the race results
take the phone off the hook.

poems like gunslingers
ask me what the hell my game is,
and would I like to shoot it out?

take it easy, I say,
the race is not to the swift.

the poem sitting at the south end of the couch draws, says balls off for that one!

take it easy, pardner. I have plans for you.
plans, huh! what plans?
The New Yorker, pard.
he puts his iron away.

the poem sitting in the chair near the door stretches, looks at me: you know, fat boy,
you been pretty lazy lately

f--- off, I say. who’s running this game?

we’re running this game, say all the gunslingers
drawing iron: get with it!

so here you are:
this poem was the one who was sitting on top
of the refrigerator flipping beercaps.

and now I’ve got him out of the way
and all the others are sitting around
pointing their weapons at me and saying:
I’m next, I’m next, I’m next!

I suppose that when I die
the leftovers will jump some
other poor son of a bitch.

A hero of mine

2009-11-10T11:27:00.002Z

Noam Chomsky, here interviewed by Andrew Marr, who gets perhaps a little more than he bargained for.

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

More Ireland...

2009-09-15T14:34:00.006+01:00

Current location: Kenmare

I was in Kinsale for four days (via Dungarvan which has a bay full of wading birds, and Cork which is a big town). This was where the Transition movement began and it seems that they're doing OK.

Then on to Baltimore, which has an interesting history. You can read a bit more here and here (although the last gets it all mixed up with Islamic extremism).

The weather's good! It's dry, sunny and warm with a cool breeze. I camped last night by a lovely little stream with a waterfall and a pool. Ahhh...

Here's a few pics:

From sculpture on Kinsale harbour.

Where I camped by Lough Hyne.

Lough Hyne from the hill above it.

Skoleskibet Danmark (link in Danish)

Cork...

2009-09-05T14:05:00.002+01:00

Now in Cork after having spent the night by the sea in Dungarvan. It's a charming little town with a beautiful bay which is full of wading birds - curlew, dunlin, oystercatchers, turnstones, a few egrets, and brent geese in the winter.

(I'd spent the previous night in my hammock by near a factory called Genzyme in Waterford. It seems manufacturing drugs is a big thing here.)

I'd imagined that hitching in Ireland was dead easy: after all, the Irish have a reputation for being open and hospitable. I don't know if it's me, or if it's because buses are cheap here, but I've found it difficult - I've had to wait far longer than I would in the UK. One driver told me that it's due to the boom of the last ten years, which has made people more affluent and changed atttudes. I don't know. Having said that, the lifts have been very friendly and chatty, and have more often than not gone out of their way to drop me somewhere convenient.

Next destination: Blarney, so I can kiss the Blarney Stone.

The swallows are gathering on the wires, ready to leave...

Coed Hills images

2009-09-03T16:14:00.001+01:00

Here's what I couldn't post the other day. The mosaics are for Simon and Emma :)

Coed Hills and Ireland images...

2009-09-03T15:37:00.004+01:00

Current location: Waterford, which has an area called Christendom. I wonder if Jesus is going to visit there sometime?

I got to Wexford the day before yesterday after getting rained on (again) on the way from Rosslare. Guess what? It rained. It pissed in at a 30 degree angle from a variety of directions yesterday - but at least the night was dry. I could hear fish - probably mullet - splashing in the water from where I slept.

I'd pitched my tarp well enough but sometimes you just have to accept that the weather has got the better of you. I gave in at about two in the afternoon and spent the night in a nice cheap hostel in Wexford.

Here's some pics from Rosslare and Wexford. I hung out on the quay at Wexford, while the weather held, but got accosted by some stupidly drunken Polish (I think) seaman who was offended by my refusal of a swig of cooking sherry. I was worried that at one point I'd have to slap him to make him go away but he saw sense...I guess "Fuck off!" in a loud voice is pretty international.

My neighbours the seals were much nicer. As you can see, they had a little conference about me :)

Wexford is a bit depressing. The Credit Crunch has hit Ireland quite hard and the result can be seen along the seafront, where half the shops are closed. It's a bit better on the main shopping street but the radio is reporting 12-13% unemployment.

The nice chap who gave me a lift to Waterford mentioned that I should establish my Irish credentials right away with people - my maternal grandfather was a McCarthy from Dublin, and that's about all I know - as according to him, there were still some funny people around this country.

The landscape is beginning to look very nice...very green but with the odd mountain here and there. I'm thinking of heading out west to a marine nature reserve called Lough Hyne which looks very nice...

Ireland...

2009-09-01T13:07:00.003+01:00

First time in Ireland and...it's wet. The radio said that it's the wettest summer since 1866 when records began. I'm currently in Wexford Library, where they won't let me upload any images so they'll have to wait.

I got there via Coed Hills, which is a great place full of nice people. They've got a good thing going there, especially the Yurt-making bit.

I was waiting around at the western end of the M4 when this old hippy type (called Keith) saw me and offered me a lift - to Carmarthen - where I'd hoped to hook up with Will and Ed, buskers extraordinaire for a few days walking and singing. As it happened, I got a lift straight to Fishguard that afternoon, after Keith had dropped me off. Keith chained-smoked spliffs as he drove and gave me one to smoke later, which made the ferfy journey from Fishguard to Rosslare a relaxing one.

I arrived in Rosslare at 6am Saturday morning, having forgotten to change any money. I'm in no rush so I whiled away a couple of days on the beach at Rosslare, which was a bit damp but OK (I have a funny feeling that dampness is going to feature strongly on this trip). The landscape there is beautiful but the best bit of all was the seals: a dozen or so at any one time live near this reef. Seals are naturally curious and while I was watching them, I learned a new trick. A bloke came walking down the beach and stopped by a small group of seals and made a howling noise, similar to a dog or suchlike. The seals seemed attracted to it...

I tried this later and it works! If you give it a go, make sure you stand absolutely still. The seal that approached me was about 15 yards away when I reached for my camera. He didn't like the movement and swam off with a huge splash, which must be their 'alarm' sign.

Hitching out of Rosslare yesterday was hard. It was bucketing down, between bouts of heavy drizzle. Eventually it stopped and I ended up walking a few miles out of town and spending a (dry) night under my tarp by a hedge in a field: probably the only bit of land round here that isn't waterlogged.

I'll try to upload the pics I took another day.

Sunrise Off-Grid Festival

2009-08-26T11:38:00.003+01:00

I've just come back (sort-of) from the Sunrise Off-Grid Festival. It was great! You can find some pics here or below...

It's a small festie (about 1000 people or so, I'd guess) in a field outside Shepton Mallett. The nice thing about being so small is that you get to recognise the same faces around and about, there isn't an "us and them" feel with ugly security bods checking your armband all the time, and the one or two lunchouts who drink too much get politely reminded not to spoil it for everyone else.

My feeling is that small, local, and theme-focused is the way to go. The whole thing was run on solar and wind (I only heard one very quiet generator). There was plenty of space for kids to fly kites and play and dogs too!

I worked my ticket as a steward/litter-picker which essentially meant I had nothing to do, as there wasn't any litter. I spent most of my time helping people out and sorting tangled kite-strings :)

Fake?

2009-08-14T10:50:00.003+01:00

Amazing but fake, methinks. It's a good fake, though!

(later...) Turns out it's an ad for Microsoft Office or something.

Beautiful

2009-08-13T15:01:00.000+01:00

Amazing. Pretty girl too ;)

Obama and Google

2009-08-13T01:41:00.002+01:00

Barack Obama posthumously awarded the assassinated Gay Rights activist Harvey Milk a very big gong. The US religious right must be foaming at the mouth, just like Big Pharma is.

I was wondering why Barack Obama would pick two major fights at once. Either he's a fool, or he's incredibly brave, or...he knows he's going to win.

Everybody knows what a bunch of loonies the right-wingers are. Sometimes they're so far out that parody would be impossible...

Big Pharma have let the attack dogs loose.

Obama's not a fool. He's been waiting for this fight for years. He's got some very tough guys around him who aren't afraid of taking the fight to the opponent, to let them flail their rabid arms around and look thoroughly stupid. One of their mouthpieces will probably suggest killing him.

The Bush years have provided him with a legal framework that allows the state to do what the hell they like as long as it's about 'Terrorism'. I think he's a decent guy who's turning nasty to get the bullies off his back and as soon as some nutcase says 'shoot him', then we'll find lots of them being outed as gays, adulterers, embezzlers, paedophiles and terrorists too. The Oklahoma City bombing and other cases of domestic terrorism will be in the news again. You get the picture.

I hope Obama knows how and when to stop a fight.

And then there's Google, They've got some vapourware, it seems. Ho hum.

So how can I afford to take two months off?

2009-08-12T23:59:00.006+01:00

I found this amazing website and forum:

Wild About Britain

"Wild About Britain is home to hundreds of thousands of pages about British wildlife, the Environment and the Great Outdoors; from birds, butterflies, fungi and trees to climate change, marine life, astronomy and the weather. We're also a huge online community with 30,000 members and more than 2.5 million unique visitors a year."

Good stuff!

If anyone's reading this, I suppose they're wondering how it is that I can afford to spend two months hitchhiking about without working. It's not too hard if you know how, and don't have any commitments. I have no commitments that can't handle a 10 week absence.

I've just moved as my old landlady wanted the house back - and I didn't want to stay there anyway, as she's a bit strange at times. People sometimes act selfishly when they own property (I call it The Propertarian Mindset), but she's a bit further out than that.

Anyway, I moved at the beginning of the month and knew very quickly that it wasn't going to work out, but I was in the middle of a (English to Danish) translation that was taking far longer than I'd expected. The good thing was that I'd just been paid handsomely for another translation I'd done a few weeks ago. Either I'd spend it on rent for somewhere I didn't want to live, or just go on the road for a bit.

I told the people who take care of things in this, my temporary abode, how things were and they didn't mind if I left in the middle of the month, which is what I'm doing.

Would you do a thing like that? It's funny but I don't consider it a hard thing to do: if you've got the gear and the mindset for it, and are reasonably fit, it's quite comfortable. The key is to take your time. Just forget about being busy or trying to achieve something and slow down a bit. Wisdom can be like a wild animal: if you charge around trying to find it, you'll scare it away and, more crucially, your eyes will miss the signs of its presence. If you just sit down and enjoy where you are, which is what happens to me when I'm hitchhiking, you'll find it easier to let go and tread lightly around your mind. Heavy thoughts have ruined more journeys then heavy rucsacks.

Never feel anxious again!

2009-08-12T21:18:00.001+01:00

I like this site:

Anxiety Culture

:)

I got 'moderated'...

2009-08-12T10:21:00.002+01:00

I comment on articles on The Guardian's website now and then. They remove comments they deem unsuitable and that just happened to me. It looked like this:

====

Mandelson casts the Tories as the party of cuts

Is that a spelling mistake?

====

Oh well.

Tesco stuff again

2009-08-11T01:36:00.002+01:00

Good old George Monbiot does it again:

"My town is menaced by a superstore. So why are we not free to fight it off? People know a Tesco will suck the marrow from us. Yet the decision is left in the hands of a remote and frightened council"

We've got our own Tesco planning hearing on Wednesday. Luckily the council's planning officr recommends a refusal: he says a supermarket of that size which also sells lots of non-food will be detrimental to both Glastonbury and Street. However, the council don't have to heed his advice. We're going to have to remind them that they're elected...

Monbiot points out that Tesco has the financial muscle to really hurt a council in court if they appeal. I hope that doesn't scare the councillors.

Myspace

2009-08-09T13:24:00.005+01:00

I got myself a myspace profile: myspace.com/barefootreporting.

I like the social side of teh intertubes but stuff like Facebook, Myspace etc are such a rich source of information for snoopers - be they governments, employers or anyone who hasn't got your best interests at heart - that I believe we should think long and hard about what we reveal on them. Facebook groups for activism are just plain stupid.

Facebook only works if you use your real name so it's a gift for anyone trying to protect the status quo in these 'interesting' times. We seem to be engaged in the type of constant warfare Orwell described in the book 1984. War (in the book) was necessary to keep the vast majority of people in poverty and ignorance. Governments like our own are now using war as one part of a strategy to keep us in fear of some great disaster (terrorist, social, economic, and possibly environmental): and that if we don't give them ever greater powers to snoop on 'dangerous individuals', then all our babies will eaten or somesuch. 'The Enemy Within'; it's ground-level fascism.

What government with a surveillance agenda like our own, or the US govt., could resist the lure of something like Facebook? That's too good a source of info, and guess what, it's free and people have already made it Facebook's property - to do with as they wish.

Something I read about Facebook made me think. Normally, if someone starts a project like that, and somebody who should have had a share gets screwed - for example someone who had the idea before you, and which you just ran off and developed - then it goes to a huge high-profile court case and the media have a field day. Have you noticed how the disputes around Facebook's origins and shareholdings have been solved oh-so discreetly? Could it be that some agency or other has been whispering in their ears and applying a bit of pressure? Of course we don't know, as it's all secret.

Btw: overheard the following odd utterance in a cafe: "I don't know if we've met. Are we friends yet?" Facebook ones, y'understand...

A bit more detail about my journey

2009-08-08T21:02:00.012+01:00

Hitchhike around and collect stories. It's a very simple idea and can be done in many ways. I'm going to do it on an absolute shoestring, and when I travel I enjoy bushcraft-style camping right in the wilds. Here's some examples:

That was on Chesil Beach in 2007. Here's the rest of the pictures from that trip.

Last year I walked a tiny portion of the Southwest Coast Path from Exmouth to West Bexington.

Here's another seaside "Basha" shelter:

So that's the sort of place I'm going to sleep. What I love about using a 'basha' rather than a tent is the contact with the open air at all times. If you use a tent you might feel safer (and stay drier - or so you might think) but the fact is that if you tuck your tarp or basha into the right place - using the natural features - you'll be every bit as dry as with a tent.

So what about safety? Look at it this way. You can't really see out of a tent, and being inside it also means you hear less. A tent has also got a clear profile and size. That makes it harder to make it vanish in the landscape.

The basha is a different proposition. You've got clear vision around you (which also means you see the wildlife in the late evenings and early mornings) and I guarantee you that if someone comes towards you in the night, you'll become aware of them long before they know you're there.

Another advantage is space: both the space you need to pitch it and the living space you get for it. You can take advantage of natural features both to conceal your shelter and to fasten it. I really enjoy the little challenge towards the end of each day of finding a nice spot and you actually need a lot less space than a tent. You don't need to find somewhere flat either. Under a tarp you've got so much more space than in a tent too. Moving around under it is so much easier too: you don't always bump into the sides of the tent.

However, my advice is to avoid pitching in the dark (unless you can't help it). Places look very different during the day!

Cooking under a tarp/basha is a breeze. Cooking in a tent is a nightmare!

Tarps are much lighter than tents. Tarps are easier to camouflage. Tarps are simple and easy to repair. Tarps are flexible.

Mine is a British Army standard issue one. My advice is to buy a decent secondhand one from an Army Surplus store. I've yet to see a new 'real' one for sale. The big difference between the real ones and the copies is the materials, the quality of construction and and the coating. The army ones are silicon-impregnated and the fabric itself is tough as old boots and doesn't absorb water, so if it's wet for a few days, it doesn't mildew anywhere near as readily. All in all, if squaddies can't fuck it up then it has to be OK.

I'm not a closet weekend warrior or anything but I do like being inconspicuous. The camouflage pattern is really good and military stuff is tough, although a bit heavier. I've got army goretex waterproofs as well for these reasons - as well as them being dirt cheap. You can get a jacket & trousers for about 70 quid. Look out for the better jackets and trousers: the jacket has pockets on the front, and the trousers have zippers on the legs, which are also double on the front from above the knee to the hem.

I'll write some more about gear later.

Ray Jardine is an amazing bloke who's taken the simple approach to the limit...

Plans for the next few months

2009-08-08T12:03:00.002+01:00

I don't know if anyone's reading this, but here you go.

I'm going to spend the next few months travelling, beginning in Ireland. I'll be doing some barefoot reporting, of course.

What i plan to do is to hitchhike around and collect people's stories. I'll film them and then put them online here for you to experience too.

What stories will they be? I have no idea. I'm guessing that Irish people still know how to tell a story or two...

Folk Against Fascism

2009-08-07T22:38:00.003+01:00

I'm a bit of a (not that good) folkie: not the finger-in-yer-ear type though, even though I do sing some traditional songs.

Turns out those racist bar-stewards the British ~~Nazi~~ National Party have been using folk music to raise money and give their poisonous message a nicer feel, and many folkies are unhappy about that. I'd be livid if they ever used anything I wrote in that way. (I wouldn't mind them slagging me off though! It's fun to hear criticism from people who just don't get it.)

So Folk against Fascism was born. Good one!

This bloke can tell you more.

Phoney excuses for a war

2009-08-07T18:40:00.007+01:00

I was reading today about this poor bugger who's being screwed by the MoD after they'd fucked up...not only by sending him out in a vehicle which couldn't protect him against home-made Afghan land mines, but also by putting almost £50k in his bank account by mistake. Like any sensible bloke in his situation, he paid off his mortgage with it.

I don't like violence. I don't think it ever really solves anything: that being said, I have a lot of respect for decent honest soldiers. They're doing what they feel is right and I've known a fair few young tearaways who've responded positively to the kind of military discipline the armed forces provide. I've known more who've been totally fucked up by it too and come out with untreated PTSD but that's a whole 'nother story.

That's why it irks me when our sort-of elected leaders send them into unwinnable wars on phoney pretexts. The War in Afghanistan isn't really about terrorism and drugs. OK, it's logical that scumbags who want to blow up civilians in the name of a skewed interpretation of some holy book or other (and you can put Israel in that bag too) will eventually retreat to an area like the Afghan-Pakistani border if you chase them hard enough. Likewise, it's the ideal place to grow opium, which has after all been traditional in these parts since long before our civilisation was even a twinkle in Aristotle's eye. Nobody has ever been able to control that place against the will of the local people.

The real reason that this war is - peddled on a ticket of Drugs! and Terrorism! - being fought is energy. There are huge oil and gas reserves east of the Caspian and Uncle Sam needs to make sure he can get his fix without the hands of those nasty Russians or sneaky Chinese on the tap. (Of course you could always avoid that by piping it through Iran ... yeah right.)

You don't believe me? Have a read of this. And this. Hands up all of you who've seen the pipeline mentioned on the news.

And so you have some poor sod whose legs have been blown to bits getting screwed twice. Once by being sent to 'war' on a false pretext, and now by the very people who should have taken care of him afterwards.

Excuse me while I vomit.

The 6th of August should be remembered?

2009-08-06T09:39:00.002+01:00

Do you know why? If not, click here and find out.

I remember what the 80s felt like: we were really shit scared that someone would fuck up and fumble their way to nuclear war. August the 6th always reawakes remnants of that feeling of utter dread.

Somerset man arrested...and his goods handed to private company

2009-08-05T14:24:00.004+01:00

If you're in any doubt that we're living in a what George Monbiot calls a "Captive State", then here's your proof.

British man arrested for role in running FileSoup file sharing website

So: An association of private companies called FACT (Federation Against Copyright Theft Ltd) now sends the police to do their bidding. Copyright infringement (which is what Megacorp says filesharing is, under law) used to be a civil matter but now it appears to be in a grey area between civil and criminal law.

The guy's stuff was seized, he was released on bail (but not charged), and - get this - his stuff was handed over to FACT.

One commentator (on the Guardian article) put it well:

I don't care about the rights and wrongs of the site, I care about the rights and wrongs of letting private entities breach a persons human rights. That is something ONLY the police should have the power to do. It should not be allowed for FACT to purchase a warrant or buy a prosecution.

So what next? Extradition to the US on an allegation that you've downloaded a film? Welcome to the other side of the looking glass.

Relax, it's satire...

2009-08-04T09:42:00.001+01:00

In The Know: Is The Government Spying On Paranoid Schizophrenics Enough?

It's satire - today.

Big Green Cockup og Big Green Conspiracy?

2009-08-04T08:50:00.003+01:00

Here's a couple of interesting Guardian articles:

Is the Big Green Gathering another victim of the crackdown on dissent?

and

Protesters warned that measures from the criminal justice bill would be turned against the wider population. We were right

OK, The Big Green wasn't ~~screwed~~ closed on the background of the CJA but you can see the tendency, right?

It looks to me like any experience not mediated by some commercial exchange (preferably through some big business) is being made more and more difficult. It doesn't surprise this grumpy old cynic: after all, when big companies effectively dictate terms to the government (ever wondered why so many business regulations are "voluntary codes of conduct" these days?) then they'll use their influence in any way they can. Levels and squares, aprons and sashes...no, they don't do funny handshakes.

Still incompetent, just slightly less so...

2009-08-03T16:50:00.002+01:00

It turns out that the previous post was about a silly mistake: the council employee screwed up and sent the letter out in oh-such-a-terrible hurry that she forgot to put the right dates on. Oh dear.

The meeting is on the 12th of August, not the 29th of July.

I'm not sure which I prefer: incompetence of that nature or sneaky conspiracies to disenfranchise people. Hanlon's Razor again..."Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity". Ho hum.

It's bloody raining again.

A conspiracy of incompetence?

2009-08-01T10:41:00.007+01:00

I've had a nice snooze (for about 7 months) and it's about time I posted something. Here's a fictional story . It's fictional, remember? Really, truly it is. Nothing like this could happen in reality - whatever that is.

There once was a ~~nice~~ supermarket company called Tesco. In its drive for total domination of all levels of the food supply in this country, it decided to set up shop in the small town of Avalon, and submitted a planning application. It chose a plot at the other end of the Morlands site. The plot belongs to Avalon Plastics. The good bit about this (depending on your point of view) is that Avalon Plastics had already received planning permission (with conditions) for something like a supermarket on that very site. I suppose that was a major contributor to the economics of their planned move onto the Morlands site.

Anyway, word got out and people - including myself - started writing letters to the local rag, mostly against the proposed development. If you want to know why I'm against supermarkets, read Shopped by Joanna Blythman. The few 'pro' people kept going on about jobs: but Martin Caraher held a lecture recently in which he pointed out that for every 20 jobs Tesco 'creates', 30 disappear in the local area. So much for creating jobs.

Anyway, if you check out the Mendip planning website above, you can submit your comments to a planning application there...in theory. For some strange reason, it didn't work. Maybe they've fixed it now, but it didn't work then. It's also very hard to find the application itself unless you know exactly what you're looking for.

(Here's a link that will show you what the store might look like: http://tinyurl.com/l3y2m4. Be patient, it takes a while.)

Mendip District Council were shamed in the Central Somerset Gazette into admitting their incompetence and allowed people to submit comments via email - and extended the timeframe by a week or so.

My friend Jane submitted a comment or two and asked to be kept up to date with any public meetings etc and received a letter on 31st July. It invited her to a meeting which took place on the 29th of July.

OK, so maybe they're incompetent and 'forgot' to send it in time? Maybe so: but the funny thing is that they actually dated the letter 31st July. To add insult to injury, the letter states that you have to submit your comment the day before the meeting. Here it is:

So there we have it. Mendip Council could be accused of using incompetence as a tool for getting around difficult issues. You couldn't submit comments. You get invited to a meeting two days too late - and you haven't even taken the trouble to backdate the letter so it looks like it's been lost in the post. I'm not accusing them of overt dodgy dealing but it does seem rather convenient. Hanlon's Razor applies.

Charlie Brooker does it again

2009-03-02T11:26:00.004Z

Some people might dismiss Charlie Brooker as a lightweight cynic but he's actually a very serious bloke with a savage sense of humour.

His latest rant in the Guardian is a peach. I wish I could rant like that.

If he was ever foolish enough to run for parliament, he'd get my vote.

Have a read:

They do what they want, these people, and you and I are cut out of the conversation. I'm sure they're dimly aware we still exist. They must spot us occasionally, through the window, jumping up and down in the cold with our funny placards . . . although come to think of it, they can't even see us through the window, since they banned peaceful protest within a mile of Parliament.

...

It's all over. The politicians have finally shut us out of their game for good and we have nowhere left to turn. We're not part of their world any more. We don't even speak the same language. We're the ants in their garden. The bacteria in their stools. They have nothing but contempt for us. They snivel and lie and duck questions on torture - on torture, for Christ's sake - while demanding we respect their authority. They monitor our every belch and fart, and insist it's all for our own good.

A Farm for the Future - BBC Programme

2009-02-24T21:56:00.002Z

This is great. Watch it. Do it now!
A Farm for the Future

...and then get planting. I know, you're doing that already...

Google spreadsheet art

2009-02-23T09:52:00.001Z

A bit of geeky fun. I'm a fan of Google Docs: they may well have found the Killer App for our times.

The Abolition of Freedom Act 2009

2009-02-21T21:39:00.002Z

Download a pdf copy here.

Modern Liberty in Bristol

2009-02-21T21:15:00.003Z

Get yer arse to the Convention on Modern Liberty: I'm going to the Bristol one.

How to build an H-Bomb!

2009-02-21T20:38:00.005Z

We're in a recession so why not build something that'll sell for megabucks? It's easier than getting on yer bike and begging for a job. All sorts of dodgy governments will beat a path to your door and maybe you'll even get on the X Factor!

Seriously: this post should perhaps be called "How to get kidnapped, imprisoned for several years, and tortured."

If you're wondering why I'm posting this, then read this article and maybe this one too. Sorry about the iffy formatting. I'm too lazy to fix it.


HOW TO BUILD AN H-BOMB

======================

Making and owning an H-bomb is the kind of challenge real
Americans seek. Who wants to be a passive victim of nuclear war when
with a little effort you can be an active participant? Bomb shelters
are for losers. Who wants to huddle together underground eating canned
Spam? Winners want to push the button themselves. Making your own H-
bomb is a big step in nuclear assertiveness training - it's called
Taking Charge. We're sure you'll enjoy the risks and the heady thrill
of playing nuclear chicken.

INTRODUCTION
============
When the Feds clamped down on The Progressive magazine for
attempting to publish an article on the manufacture of the hydrogen
bomb, it piqued our curiosity. Was it really true that atomic and
hydrogen bomb technology was so simple you could build an H-bomb in
your own kitchen? Seven Days decided to find out. Food editor Barbara
Ehrenreich, investigative reporter Peter Biskind, Photographer Jane
Melnick and nuclear scientist Michio Kaku were given three days to
cook up a workable H-bomb. They did and we have decided to share their
culinary secrets with you.
Not that Seven Days supports nuclear terrorism. We don't. We
would prefer to die slowly from familiar poisons like low-level
radiation, microwaves, DDT, DBCP, aflatoxins, PBBs, PBCs, or food
dyes, rather than unexpectedly, say as hostage to a Latvian
nationalist brandishing a homemade bomb. In our view the real
terrorists are the governments, American, Soviet, French, Chinese, and
British, that are hoarding H-bombs for their own use, and worse still,
those governments (U.S., French and German) that are eagerly peddling
advanced nuclear technology to countries like South Africa, Brazil,
and Argentina so that they can make their own bombs. When these bombs
are used, and they will be, it will be the world's big-time nuclear
peddlers, along with corporate suppliers like General Electric,
Westinghouse, and Gulf Oil, that we can thank for it. Gagging The
Progressive will do no more for national security than backyard bomb
shelters because like it or not the news is out. The heart of the
successful H-bomb is the successful A-bomb. Once you've got your A-
bombs made the rest if frosting on the cake. All you have to do is set
them up so that when they detonate they'll start off a hydrogen-fusion
reaction.

PART I

MAKING YOUR BOMB
================
1. GETTING THE INGREDIENTS
Uranium is the basic ingredient of the A-bomb. When a uranium
atom's nucleus splits apart it releases a tremendous amount of energy
(for its size). And it emits neutrons which go on to split other
nearby uranium nuclei, releasing more energy, in what is called a
'chain reaction'. (When atoms split matter is converted into energy
according to Einstein's equation E=mc2. What better way to mark his
centennial than with your own atomic fireworks?)
There are two kinds (isotopes) of uranium: the rare U-235, used
in bombs, and the more common, heavier, but useless U-238. Natural
uranium contains less than 1 percent U-235 and in order to be usable
in bombs it has to be 'enriched' to 90 percent U-235 and only 10
percent U-238. Plutonium-239 can also be used in bombs as a substitute
for U-235. Ten pounds of U-235 (or slightly less plutonium) is all
that is necessary for a bomb. Less than ten pounds won't give you a
critical mass. So purifying or enriching naturally occurring uranium
is likely to be your first big hurdle. It is infinitely easy to steal
ready-to-use enriched uranium or plutonium than to enrich some
yourself. And stealing uranium is not as hard as it sounds.
There are at least three sources of enriched uranium or
plutonium..
Enriched uranium is manufactured at a gaseous diffusion plant in
Portsmouth Ohio. From there it is shipped in 10 liter bottles by
airplane and trucks to conversion plants that turn it into uranium
oxide or uranium metal. Each 10 liter bottle contains 7 kilograms of
U-235, and there are 20 bottles to a typical shipment. Conversion
facilities exist at Hematite, Missouri, Apollo, Pennsylvania, and
Erwin, Tennessee. The Kerr-McGee plant at Crescent Oklahoma, where
Karen Silkwood worked, was a conversion plant that 'lost' 40 lbs of
plutonium. Enriched uranium can be stolen from these plants or from
fuel-fabricating plants like those in New Haven, San Diego, or
Lynchburg, Virginia. (A former Kerr-McGee supervisor, James V. Smith,
when asked at the Silkwood trial if there were any security
precautions at the plant to prevent theft, testified that 'There were
none of any kind, no guards, no fences, no nothing.')
Plutonium can be obtained from places like United Nuclear in
Pawling, New York, Nuclear Fuel Services in Erwin, Tennessee, General
Electric in Pleasanton, California, Westinghouse in Cheswick,
Pennsylvania, Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) in
Leechburg, Pennsylvania, and plants in Hanfford, Washington and
Morris, Illinois. According to Rolling Stone magazine the Isrealis
were involved in the theft of plutonium from NUMEC.
Finally you can steal enriched uranium or plutonium while it's
en-route from conversion plants to fuel fabricating plants. It is
usually transported (by air or truck) in the form of uranium oxide, a
brownish powder resembling instant coffee, or as a metal, coming in
small chunks called 'broken buttons.' Both forms are shipped in small
cans stacked in 5-inch cylinders braced with welded struts in the
center of ordinary 55 gallon steel drums. The drums weigh about 100
pounds and are clearly marked 'Fissible Material' or 'Danger,
Plutonium.' A typical shipment might go from the enrichment plant at
Portsmouth, Ohio to the conversion plant in Hematite Missouri then to
Kansas City by truck where it would be flown to Los Angeles and then
trucked down to the General Atomic plant in San Diego. The plans for
the General Atomic plant are on file at the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission's reading room at 1717 H Street NW Washington. A Xerox
machine is provided for the convenience of the public.
If you can't get hold of any enriched uranium you'll have to
settle for commercial grade (20 percent U-235). This can be stolen
from university reactors of a type called TRIGA Mark II, where
security is even more casual than at commercial plants. If stealing
uranium seems too tacky you can buy it. Unenriched uranium is
available at any chemical supply house for $23 a pound.
Commercial,grade (3 to 20 percent enriched) is available for $40 a
pound from Gulf Atomic. You'll have to enrich it further yourself.
Quite frankly this can be something of a pain in the ass. You'll need
to start with a little more than 50 pounds of commercial-grade uranium
(it's only 20 percent U-235 at best, and you need 10 pounds of U-235
so...). But with a little kitchen-table chemistry you'll be able to
convert the solid uranium oxide you've purchased into a liquid form.
Once you've done that, you'll be able to separate the U-235 that
you'll need from the U-238.
First pour a few gallons of concentrated hydrofluoric acid into
your uranium oxide, converting it to uranium tetrafluoride. (Safety
note: Concentrated hydrofluoric acid is so corrosive that it will eat
its way through glass, so store it only in plastic. Used 2-gallon
plastic milk containers will do.) Now you have to convert your uranium
tetrafluoride to uranium hexafluoride, the gaseous form of uranium,
which is convenient for separating out the isotope U-235 from U-238.
To get the hexafluoride form, bubble fluorine gas into your
container of uranium tetrafluoride. Fluorine is available in
pressurized tanks from chemical-supply firms. Be careful how you use
it though because fluorine is several times more deadly than chlorine,
the classic World War I poison gas. Chemists recommend that you carry
out this step under a stove hood (the kind used to remove unpleasant
cooking odors).
If you've done your chemistry right you should now have a
generous supply of uranium hexafluoride ready for enriching. In the
old horse-and-buggy days of A-bomb manufacture the enrichment was
carried out by passing the uranium hexafluoride through hundreds of
miles of pipes, tubes, and membranes, until the U-235 was eventually
separated from the U-238. This gaseous-diffusion process, as it was
called is difficult, time-consuming, and expensive. Gaseous-diffusion
plants cover hundreds of acres and cost in the neighborhood of $2-
billion each. So forget it. There are easier and cheaper ways to
enrich your uranium.
First transform the gas into a liquid by subjecting it to
pressure. You can use a bicycle pump for this. Then make a simple home
centrifuge. Fill a standard-size bucket one-quarter full of liquid
uranium hexafluoride. Attach a six-foot rope to the bucket handle. Now
swing the rope (and attached bucket) around your head as fast as
possible. Keep this up for about 45 minutes. Slow down gradually, and
very gently put the bucket on the floor. The U-235, which is lighter,
will have risen to the top, where it can be skimmed off like cream.
Repeat this step until you have the required 10 pounds of uranium.
(Safety note: Don't put all your enriched uranium hexafluoride in one
bucket. Use at least two or three buckets and keep them in separate
corners of the room. This will prevent the premature build-up of a
critical mass.)
Now it's time to convert your enriched uranium back to metal
form. This is easily enough accomplished by spooning several ladlefuls
of calcium (available in tablet form from your drugstore) into each
bucket of uranium. The calcium will react with the uranium
hexafluoride to produce calcium fluoride, a colorless salt which can
be easily be separated from your pure enriched uranium metal.
A few precautions. Uranium is not dangerously radioactive in the
amounts you'll be handling. If you plan to make more than one bomb it
might be wise to wear gloves and a lead apron, the kind you can buy in
dental supply stores. Plutonium is one of the most toxic substances
known. If inhaled a thousandth of a gram can cause massive fibrosis of
the lungs, a painful way to go. Even a millionth of a gram in the
lungs will cause cancer. If eaten plutonium is metabolized like
calcium. It goes straight to the bones where it gives out alpha
particles preventing bone marrow from manufacturing red blood cells.
The best way to avoid inhaling plutonium is to hold your breath while
handling it. If this is too difficult wear a mask. To avoid ingesting
plutonium orally follow this simple rule: never make an A-bomb on an
empty stomach.
If you find yourself dozing off while you're working or if you
begin to glow in the dark, it might be wise to take a blood count.
Prick your finger with a sterile pin, place a drop of blood on a
microscope slide, cover it with a cover slip, and examine under a
microscope (best results are got in the early morning). When you get
leukemia, immature cells are released into the bloodstream, and
usually the number of white cells increases (though this increase
might take almost 2 weeks). Red blood cells look kind of like donuts
(without the hole), and are slightly smaller than the white cells,
each of which has a nucleus. Immature red cells look similar to white
cells (ie. slightly larger and have a nucleus). If you have more than
about 1 white cell (including immatures) to 400 red cells then start
to worry. But depending upon your eventual use of the bomb, a short
life expectancy might not be a problem.

2. ASSEMBLING THE A-BOMB
Now that you've acquired the enriched uranium, all that's left is
to assemble your A-bomb. Go find a couple of stainless steel salad
bowls. You also want to separate your 10 pounds of U-235 into two
hunks (keep them apart!). The idea is to push each half your uranium
into the inside of a bowl.

Take one hunk of your uranium and beat it into the inside of the
first bowl. Uranium is malleable, like gold, so you should have no
trouble hammering it into the bowl to get a good fit. Take another
five-pound hunk of uranium and fit it into a second stainless steel
bowl. These two bowls of U-235 are the 'subcritical masses' which
together forcefully will provide the critical mass that makes your A-
bomb go. Keep them a respectful distance apart while working because
you don't want them to 'go critical' on you.. at least not yet.
Now hollow out the body of an old vacuum cleaner and place your
two hemispherical bowls inside, open ends facing each other, no less
than seven inches apart, using masking tape to set them up in
position. The reason for the steel bowls and the vacuum cleaner, in
case you're wondering, is that these help reflect the neutrons back
into the uranium for a more efficient explosion. 'A loose neutron is a
useless neutron' as the A-bomb pioneers used to say.
As far as the A-bomb goes you're almost done. The final problem
is to figure out how to get the two U-235 hemispheres to smash into
each other with sufficient force to set off a truly effective fission
reaction. Almost any type of explosive can be used to drive them
together. Gunpowder, for example, is easily made at home from
potassium nitrate, sulfur, and carbon. Or you can get some blasting
caps or TNT, buy them or steal them from a construction site. Best of
all is C4 plastic explosive. You can mold it around your bowls and
it's fairly safe to work with (but it might be wise to shape it around
an extra salad bowl in another room and then fit it to your stainless
steel bowls).
Once the explosives are in place all you need to do is hook up a
simple detonation device with a few batteries, a switch, and some
wire. Remember though that it is essential that the two charges, one
on each side of the casing, go off at once. Now put the whole thing in
the casing of an old Hoover vacuum cleaner and you're finished with
this part of the process. The rest is easy.

3. MAKE THREE MORE A-BOMBS FOLLOWING THE DIRECTIONS ABOVE

A WORD TO THE WISE ABOUT WASTES
===============================
After your A-bomb is completed you'll have a pile of moderately
fatal radioactive wastes like U-238. These are not dangerous, but you
do have to get rid of them. You can flush leftovers down the toilet
(don't worry about polluting the ocean, there is already so much
radioactive waste there, a few more bucketfuls won't make waves), or
if your the fastidious type, the kind who never leaves gum under their
seat at the movies, you can seal the nasty stuff in coffee cans and
bury it in the backyard, just like Uncle Sam does. If the neighbors'
kids have a habit of trampling the lawn, tell them to play over by the
waste. You'll soon find that they're spending most of their time in
bed.

GOING FIRST CLASS
=================
If you're like us, you're feeling the economic pinch, and you'll
want to make your bomb as inexpensively as possible, consonant of
course with reasonable yield. The recipe we've given is for a budget,
pleasing H-bomb, no frills, no flourishes, just your basic 5-megaton
bomb, capable of wiping out the New York metropolitan area, the Bay
area, or Boston. But don't forget, your H-bomb will only be as good as
the A-bombs in it.
If you want to spend a little more money you can punch-up your A-
bomb considerably. Instead of centrifuging your uranium by hand, you
can buy a commercial centrifuge (Fisher Scientific sells one for about
$1000). You also might want to be fussier about your design. The
Hiroshima bomb, a relatively crude one, only fissioned 1 percent of
it's uranium and yielded only 13 kilotons. In order to fission more of
the uranium, the force of your explosive 'trigger' has got to be
evenly diffused around the sphere, the same pressure has to be exerted
on every point of the sphere simultaneously. (It was a technique for
producing this sort of simultaneous detonation by fashioning the
explosives into lenses that the government accused Julius and Ethel
Rosenberg of trying to steal).

PART II

PUTTING YOUR H-BOMB TOGETHER
============================
The heart of the H-bomb is the fusion process. Several A-bombs
are detonated in such a way as to create the extremely high
temperature (100 million degrees C) necessary to fuse lithium
deuteride (LiD) into helium. When the lithium nucleus slams into the
deuterium nucleus, two helium nuclei are created, and if this happens
to enough deuterium nuclei rapidly enough the result is an enormous
amount of energy, the energy of the H-bomb. And you don't have to
worry about stealing lithium deuteride, it can be purchased from any
chemical-supply house. It costs $1000 a pound. If your budget won't
allow it you can substitute lithium hydride at $40 a pound. You will
need at least 100 pounds. It's a corrosive and toxic powder so be
careful.
Place the lithium deuteride or hydride in glass jars and surround
it with four A-bombs in their casings. Attach them to the same
detonator so that they will go off simultaneously. The container for
the whole thing is no problem. They can be placed anywhere (inside an
old stereo console, a discarded refrigerator, etc.).
When the detonator sets off the four A-bombs all eight
hemispheres of fissionable material will slam into each other at the
same time creating four critical masses and four detonations. This
will raise the temperature of the lithium deuteride to 100 million
degrees C fast enough (a few billionths of a second) so that the
lithium will not be blown all over the neighborhood before the nuclei
have time to fuse. The result, at least 1000 times the punch of the
puny A-bomb that leveled Hiroshima (20 million tons of TNT vs. 20
thousand tons.)

PART III

WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR BOMB
=========================
Now that you have a fully assembled H-bomb housed in an
attractive console of your choice you may be wondering, What should I
do with it? Every family will have to answer this question according
to its own tastes and preferences but you may want to explore some
possibilities which have been successfully pioneered by the American
government.
1. SELL YOUR BOMB AND MAKE A PILE OF MONEY
In these days of rising inflation, rising unemployment, and an
uncertain economic outlook, few businesses make as much sense as
weapons production. If your career forecast is cloudy, bomb sales may
be the only sure way to avoid the humiliation of receiving welfare or
unemployment. At any income level a home H-bomb business can be an
invaluable income supplement, and certainly a profitable alternative
to selling Tupperware or pirated Girl Scout cookies.
Unfortunately for the family bomb business, big government has
already cornered a large part of the world market. But this does not
mean that there is a shortage of potential customers. The raid on
Entebee was the Waterloo of hijacking, and many nationalist groups are
now on the alert for new means to get their message across. They'd
jump at the chance to get hold of an H-bomb. Emerging nations that
can't ante up enough rice or sugar to buy themselves a reactor from
G.E. or Westinghouse are also shopping around.
You may wonder about the ethics of selling to nations or groups
whose goal you disapprove of. But here again take a tip from our
government, forget ideology - it's cash that counts. And remember, H-
bomb sales have a way of escalating, almost like a chain reaction.
Suppose you make a sale to South Yemen which you believe to be a
Soviet puppet. Well within a few days some discrete inquiries from
North Yemen and possibly the Saudis, the Egyptians and the Ethiopians
as well can be expected. Similarly, a sale to the IRA will generate a
sale to the Ulster government, a sale to the Tanzanians will bring the
Ugandans running and so forth.
It doesn't matter which side you're on, only how many sides there
are. Don't forget about the possibility of repeat sales to the same
customer. As the experience of the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. has shown,
each individual nation has a potentially infinite need for H-bombs. No
customer, no matter how small, can ever have too many.
2. USE YOUR BOMB AT HOME
Many families are attracted to the H-bomb simply as a
'deterrent'. A discrete sticker on the door or on the living room
window saying 'This Home Protected by H-bomb' will discourage IRS
investigators, census takers, and Jehovah's Witnesses. You'll be
surprised how fast the crime rate will go down and property values
will go up. And once the news gets out that you are a home H-bomb
owner you'll find that you have unexpected leverage in neighborhood
disputes over everything from parking places and stereo noise levels
to school tax rates. So relax and enjoy the pride and excitement of
home H-bomb ownership!
IS IT FOR YOU?
==============
Let's be honest. The H-bomb isn't for everyone. Frankly there
are people who can't handle it. They break out in hives at the very
mention of mega-deaths, fallout, radiation sickness.
The following quiz will help you find out whether you have what
it takes for home H-bomb ownership. If you can answer 'yes' to six or
more of these questions, then your emotionally eligible to join the
nuclear club. If not, a more conventional weapon may be more your cup
of tea, try botulism-toxin, laser rays, or nerve gas.
1. I ignore the demands of others.
2. I subscribe to one or more of the following: Soldier of
Fortune, Hustler, Popular Mechanics, Self.
3. Though I have many interesting acquaintances, I am my own best
friend.
4. I know what to say after you say 'Hello', but I am seldom
interested in pursuing the conversation.
5. I have seen the movie 'The Deer Hunter' more than once.
6. I know that everyone can be a winner if they want to, and I
resent whiners.
7. I own one or more of the following: handgun, video game,
trash compactor, snowmobile.
8. I am convinced that leukemia is psychosomatic.
9. I am aware that most vegetarians are sexually impotent.
10. I have read evidence that solar energy is a Communist
conspiracy.
MYTHS ABOUT NUCLEAR WAR
=======================
Ever since the first mushroom cloud over Hiroshima ushered in the
atomic age a small group of nay-sayers and doom-mongers has lobbied,
campaigned and demonstrated to convince Americans that H-bomb
ownership, along with nuclear power is dangerous and unhealthy. Using
their virtual stranglehold over the media these people have tried to
discredit everything nuclear from energy to war. They have vastly
overrated the risks of nuclear bombs and left many americans feeling
demoralized and indecisive, not sure where the truth lies. Well, here
are the myths, and here are the facts.
Myth: After a nuclear exchange the earth will no longer be
suitable for human habitation.
Fact: This is completely false. According to one scientist
(quoted in John McPee's The Curve of Binding Energy)' The
largest bomb that has ever been exploded anywhere was 60
megatons, and that is one-thousandth the force of an
earthquake, one-thousandth the force of a hurricane. We
have lived with earthquakes and hurricanes for a long time.'
Another scientist adds, 'It is often assumed that a full
blown nuclear war would be the end of life on earth. That
is far from the truth. To end life on earth would take at
least a thousand times the total yield of all the nuclear
explosives existing in the world, and probably alot more.'
Even if humans succumbed, many forms of life would survive a
nuclear free-for-all, cockroaches, certain forms of
bacteria, and lichens.
Myth: Radiation is bad for you.
Fact: Everything is bad for you if you have too much of it. If
you eat too many bananas you'll get a stomach-ache. If you
get too much sun you can get sunburned (or even skin
cancer). Same thing with radiation. Too much may make you
feel under the weather, but nuclear industry officials
insist that there is no evidence that low-level radiation
has any really serious adverse effects. And, high-level
radiation may bring unexpected benefits. It speeds up
evolution by weeding out unwanted genetic types and creating
new ones. (Remember the old saying, 'Two heads are better
than one.') Nearer home it's plain that radiation will get
rid of pesky crab grass and weeds, and teenagers will find
that brief exposure to a nuclear burst vaporizes acne and
other skin blemishes. (Many survivors of the Hiroshima bomb
found that they were free from skin and it's attendant
problems forever.)

The Big Picture - about energy

2009-02-21T12:42:00.001Z

There are more people on the earth than ever before, and our global energy consumption is rising. It's no longer in doubt that using fossil fuels to run our high-energy society has contributed significantly to climate change - and the effects are being felt everywhere.

Developing countries are using the same model we have used to get to where we are today. The problem is that the fossil fuels - oil, coal and natural gas - that provided energy for our industrial revolution are no longer present in the same quantities and are becoming more difficult to extract. Rising demand and diminishing supplies mean higher prices - it's a fact.

Energy is still relatively cheap but it won't stay that way for very long. The change to a low-energy society will come - whether we like it or not. Preparation is the key.

We can reduce our energy needs - and avoid the effects of rapid changes in the cost of energy - by looking at our habits now, before we are forced to. It's easy when you know how and you'll save money too! But - it's also about the big picture, the long term, and the common good. Yes, we can...

Minutes of Morlands Executive Groups meeting, 30th Jan 2009

2009-02-20T13:51:00.003Z

Morlands Executive Group finally got round to publishing the minutes of the last meeting. Note the presence of Jim Barron and Les Bennett - agreed at the extraordinary council meeting last month.

MORLANDS EXECUTIVE GROUP
30 JANUARY, 2009 - COUNTY HALL, TAUNTON

Attendees:
Kay Allen - Head of Community Regeneration, SCC
Cllr Harvey Siggs - Leader, MDC
Malcolm Williams - Director, Community & Regeneration, MDC
Cllr Alvin Horsfall - Portfolio Holder for Economic Development, SCC
Cllr Les Bennett - Chair, West Mendip Community Partnership
Cllr Jim Barron - Glastonbury Town Council
Cllr Tom Billing - Glastonbury Town Council
Carl Budden - Area Head of Regeneration, SWRDA
Paul Calvert - Asset Manager, SWRDA

1.. Welcome & Introductions
CB welcomed everyone to the meeting. TB explained that JB had been nominated as Glastonbury Town Council's representative on the MEG. TB would attend MEG meetings periodically in his capacity as Mayor.

AH queried the reason for the SWRDA meeting with Cllrs Harvey Siggs and Ken Maddock following the MEG meeting on 1 December 2008. CB explained that this was a "one off" meeting arranged out of courtesy to brief both Cllrs as neither could attend the December meeting.

Membership of the MEG was discussed and in particular whether Street should be represented. It was agreed that this is not necessary; LB as Chair of WMCP would represent the views of Street.

Additional agenda items were agreed as follows:

Mendip DC land
Land at Wearyall Hill
Land adjacent to Skatepark site

2.. Apologies

No apologies were received

3.. Notes of last meeting and matters arising
It was agreed that the notes of the meeting held on 1 December, 2008 accurately reflected the matters reported and discussed. AH reinforced his view that consideration should be given to the use of micro hydro power in the Northover Mill renovation project. SWRDA will discuss this with BIRT and the SWRDA Renewable Energy Team.

4.. Urban Splash update
US are drawing up detailed proposals for the renovation of the two listed (Baily's) buildings and for the new build office units on plots E1 and E2. They propose to submit a full detailed planning application for this first phase of development by April. Plots E1 & E2 also offer the opportunity to secure a development for Strode College and US have been in discussion with Strode and their advisors regarding this. At the same time they will submit an outline application for the redbrick/Bauhaus site (Plots B1 / B2). They will carry out a detailed feasibility study to determine the viability of retaining the redbrick building.

In addition to the normal planning process, US are preparing a Community Consultation Plan and propose to hold a "walk in" public exhibition in Glastonbury which will give them the opportunity to engage with Glastonbury and Street residents on their vision and proposals for Morlands.

There followed a detailed discussion on the risks, costs and problems of retaining the redbrick buildings given SWRDA's concerns over Health & Safety, the decision to demolish the building and the subsequent decision to put the demolition contract on hold following the "sit in" by a group of protesters. The firm view of all elected representatives on the MEG was that the building should be demolished.

5.. Priority Sites update.
There has been no significant change since the December meeting. Priority Sites is 51% owned by RBS and 49% by the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) and this creates some uncertainty regarding their ongoing development remit. However, the local management say they are still committed to Morlands and will get on site as soon as they can. Members of MEG questioned how long SWRDA were prepared to give Priority Sites to deliver their scheme for which they have detailed planning permission. CB explained that there was still a reasonable prospect that Priority Sites would start work soon and SWRDA were therefore happy to continue working with them for the time being.

6.. CPG/Avalon Plastics update.
Contracts have finally been exchanged with CPG and a press release has been agreed with Avalon. CPG will now submit a detailed planning application and expect to start on site by April/May 2009

7.. Other Disposals update
Plot G. Discussions are ongoing regarding a possible hotel/restaurant scheme on this site. This use received unanimous approval from MEG members.

Plot E3. There is continued interest from two local businesses. Varlin are arranging for their consultants to view the site and advise them on development options.

JB asked why local car dealer Percy's had been rejected by SWRDA. Although retail is not permitted they could still have a workshop/servicing facility on site. CB explained that this use did not fit in with the Enterprise Park.

8. Beckery Cottages. (Mendip Housing) update.
SWRDA had been expecting to announce that contracts had been exchanged with Mendip Housing. Unfortunately there has been a further legal delay but SWRDA's solicitors have assured them that exchange is imminent.

9. Northover Mill (BIRT) update.
SWRDA has agreed to transfer the Freehold of the property to BIRT immediately rather than wait for them to secure funding for the total renovation project cost. Owning the FH should put BIRT in a better position to secure project funding and will also allow them to utilise volunteer labour to carry out some of the works.

10. Skatepark (Mendip District Council) update.
Solicitors have been instructed regarding the land transfer.

11. Chapel Fields (Somerset County Council)
Solicitors have been instructed regarding the land transfer.

12. Estate Management update.
A site meeting was being arranged with local builder D Cribb & Son to look at building security options

13. Public Relations - Review and update.
The PR protocol (January 2009) was circulated for comments.

14. AOB - additional agenda items.
Wearyall Hill: Mendip DC is happy for this land to be transferred to Glastonbury Town Council.
Land adjacent to Skatepark: Town Council to put a proposal to Mendip DC regarding the future use of this land
Mendip DC land: The clean up costs for the heavily contaminated northern part of this site are estimated to be several million pounds. However, there are only "hot spots" of contamination on the southern part of the site and the council has received a number of enquiries for low grade employment uses such as storage. It is recognised that such uses might be in conflict with the proposals for the re-use of the listed buildings. Mendip DC also has a housing duty to the travellers currently camped on this site and until this issue is resolved proposals for the Mendip DC land are on hold.

15. Date of next meeting.
27 April 2009, 10.00am, County Hall, Taunton.

So what is this Transition business about?

2009-02-09T15:19:00.002Z

Hopefully, the document below (which can also be downloaded here - pdf) can explain a thing or two.

Mr Monbiot gets it right

2009-02-04T23:44:00.003Z

I don't always like what George Monbiot writes: it's not so much where he's coming from, as it's clear to me that he's a good bloke, really. But he does have a 'profile' and I suspect that when he's writing, his 'profile' sometimes counts as much as what he's writing about...and I wish I could write as well as he does.

Anyway, enough waffle: he's hit the bloody nail on the head this time. Get this:

Politics is broken, so what do we do? We leave it to the politicians

...
We are trapped in a spiral of political alienation. Politics isn't working for us, so we leave it to the politicians. The political vacuum is then filled with heartless, soulless, gutless technocrats: under what other circumstances could political ghosts like Jack Straw, Geoff Hoon, Alistair Darling, Hazel Blears, Peter Mandelson or John Hutton remain in office? Unmolested by the public, corporate lobbyists collaborate with this empty political class to turn parliament into a conspiracy against the public. Revolted by these phantoms, seeing nowhere to turn, we withdraw altogether, granting them even richer opportunities to exploit us.

And later on, he writes about a bloke who's started one of those 'I wish I had thought of that' projects that the Intertubes turns out now and then. It's called Do Something About It - www.DoSomethingAboutIt.org.uk and I'm not going to tell you any more - visit the site and sign up. Do Something About It!

(Well done Mr Monbiot. All is forgiven!)

Transition Glastonbury

2009-02-03T13:28:00.004Z

I'm active in Transition Glastonbury. If you don't know what a Transition Town is, then follow the link, or maybe view this pretty good video clip from the BBC about a West Midlands town. I like some of the music: REM's 'The End Of The World As We Know It' and also a tiny bit of Peter Gabriel's 'No Self Control'.

I'll be covering more Transition stuff as time goes by: in the meantime, you can also visit Rob Hopkins' blogsite Transition Culture.

Share and Enjoy!

Nine Meals from Anarchy

2009-02-02T14:13:00.005Z

It's snowing outside. Yeah right big deal, thinks I, who lived for 20 years in Scandinavia where a foot of snow overnight was no problem...yet here, we get a piddling few inches and the whole country grinds to a halt.

That got me thinking: what if the snow continued for a month? What would we do? We'd probably survive, with a few casualties: dodgy buildings collapsing, and some old people not getting what they need.

Nine Meals from Anarchy looks at a scenario where the trucks stop rolling. I've taken the liberty of embedding it below.

Share and Enjoy!

Urban Splash and Artists

2009-02-02T13:13:00.002Z

As I've mentioned before, my mate Simon Cauty is an artist who has studio space in an Urban Splash development ar Royal William Yard in Plymouth, and very nice it is too. It was part of the development remit to provide spaces for art.

So you might be wondering what to do with the Red Brick Building? Here's an idea.

ArtspaceLifespace are, as they put it "an artist led initiative that recycles vacant, under used and often semi derelict urban and rural sites into thriving active creative arts resources."

There's more:

Bridewell Island located in Bristol's city centre will be our new space and base for future projects. We are turning the island into a fully functioning community arts space. We aim to provide space for all manner of creative individuals and groups as well as a performance/exhibition space for hosting city centre events.

Further Information: The property is owned by Urban Splash, a British company which regenerates decaying industrial buildings.

So ... ArtspaceLifespace live in Bristol, which is a bit too far for them to take over the running of the Red Brick Building, but close enough for the fine folk of Avalon to form an affiliate. I'm sure Urban Splash would be OK with it (even though they don't actually own the Red Brick Building yet), as they already deal with ArtspaceLifespace.

How's that for an idea? Answers on a postcard please :)

Taking Liberties: The Movie

2009-01-31T22:20:00.004Z

I saw an interesting film last night. It's called Taking Liberties.

We go about our daily lives and not much big stuff happens, really: and it lulls us into a false sense of security. I don't mean security against crime, or anti-social behaviour - I mean security with regard to the state's intrusion into our private affairs. But, little by little, our civil liberties have been steadily eroded over the last 25-odd years, and when you see it all piled up like in this film, the result is quite shocking.

Here it is:

...or here if you prefer.

Oh yeah: here's IMDB's info on it: although imdb.com lacks a bit of credibility for me, when it's got predigested mush like The Shawshank Redemption at 1# on it's top 250 list.

News that gets 'buried'...

2009-01-30T13:56:00.002Z

Fos some strange reason, this story didn't seem to make the front pages, or BBC Radio news.

Quote:

Huge crowds have taken to the streets in France to protest over the handling of the economic crisis, causing disruption to rail and air services.

Unions said 2.5m workers had rallied to demand action to protect wages and jobs. Police put the total at 1m.

President Nicolas Sarkozy said concerns over the crisis were legitimate and the government had to listen and act.

He will meet union and business leaders next month to discuss what programme of reforms to follow this year, he said.

Overall, the government estimated that a quarter of the country's public sector workers had joined the action, which was called by eight major French unions. The unions put the figure higher.

A spokesman for the CGT union told AFP that 2.5m people across the country had taken part in the day's protests. French police put the number at just over 1m.

At least a million, probably more...and it wasn't given any prominence?

I can just picture them sitting in Davos muttering "shhh
...don't scare the horses".

Some credit crunch stuff

2009-01-29T21:06:00.002Z

I've been interested in how money works for a good while: here are a couple of things which I've found helpful.

Ever wondered where money comes from? The answer's in Paul Grignon's animated film: Money as Debt. Excellent.

The recent credit crunch is explained in this Guardian interactive thingy: Global recession - where did all the money go? This is part of their Road to Ruin series.

Woolworths goes bankrupt, becomes bankrupt country instead...

2009-01-29T15:40:00.004Z

'Word' on the street is: the now defunct Woolworths shop at the top end of the High Street is to become an Iceland store. [note, later: I've since found the source of this rumour and it could well be untrue]

Iceland sells frozen food, which isn't exactly good for your carbon footprint, or your local farmer. Here's some info:

www.foodcarbon.co.uk/reductions.html

Quote:

Chilled or frozen food require much more energy for storage (and hence a higher carbon footprint). Frozen foods also tend to be stored for longer and so will have accumulated a higher carbon footprint by the time they are consumed. If you are concerned about freshness, try buying local food from farmers markets!

Although not included in the food carbon footprint calculator, carbon may be emitted during transport to and from the supermarket. Try walking or cycling, home delivery has also been shown to result in lower emissions.

OK, kudos to Iceland for removing GM foods from their cabinets (they say), but anyway...freezing, transporting and storing frozen food is energy-intensive and won't exactly help in reducing our energy needs as a society.

So who knows what might happen? Direct action outside Iceland's purported new home in Avalon? Watch this space...

Public Meeting: first reaction (Posted on 21/1/2009)

2009-01-29T15:39:00.000Z

I've just come back from a turbulent and rather messy town council meeting which SWRDA, in the form of Carl Budden, Paul Calvert and James Harper, attended.

My first impression: what a lot of questions! 81 on the sheet the Council had prepared, and 10 more from Paul Lund which had somehow been forgotten in the rush.

The meeting progressed pretty well at first: Rory Weightman, who was spokesperson for the Morlands Crew, submitted the groups views, which predictably suggested that the Red Brick Building be saved and converted to a space for the community with artists studio, facilities for young people, and for the community.

Ted Higgins then spoke of his fears that the whole project would drag on too long and asked who would be paying for any community space. Unfortunately he rather ungraciously let his prejudices slip with regard to the protest group and smeared them, by suggesting that they didn't want to pay for anything, to audible protests from the floor.

Carl Budden went over what he said at last weeks council meeting (see an earlier post for details).

I'll leave this post right here for now: it's late and I'm tired. My thoughts are that the Mayor could have kept the meeting on a shorter leash: while people need to express their feelings, not much was achieved and many, many questions weren't addressed. I asked Paul Lund, founder and director of the Sustainable Environment Company, if any of his questions had been answered: he gave me a one-word answer and I'll leave you to guess what that was.

Preamble to Town Hall meeting

2009-01-20T12:52:00.002Z

As mentioned earlier, there's a public Town Council meeting in Glastonbury Town Hall about the future of the Morlands site. It was called (by the mayor of Glastonbury) at very short notice, which some suspect was a tactic to wrong-foot the protest group and the people of the town. Only written questions from the public would be allowed. The deadline for questions was very short (5 days). This left the protest group, with whom I have close contacts, very little time to agitate and concoct a strategy, which I'm not alone in suspecting was the general idea.

I was active in formulating and distributing a neutrally-worded leaflet which explained the situation and allowed people to write a question on the reverse.

Anyway, the deadline passed yesterday at noon. That leaves just over 48 hours for the town clerk to look through the submitted questions, chuck out the anonymous/illegible ones, de-duplicate and collate the similar ones (I bet there are quite a few "where's the money gone?" submissions), and then forward them to the relevant parties. It's only right that SWRDA get to see them beforehand and get some time to prepare: there would be little point in letting SWRDA get off the hook by saying "we need time to answer this, we'll get back to you" and all that...

I suspected from the start that the choice of the earliest possible time for a public meeting (council meetings are required by law to be announced publicly a week before they take place) was a risky tactic that could turn round and bite SWRDA on the......rear end: they only have a couple of days at the very most to get their answers sorted out. Lots of questions could be a bit of a problem as mistakes occur when you're in a hurry.

So I bet you're wondering: how many questions are there?

Lots, apparently: I've seen ten separate and detailed questions from one local sustainable development organisation alone. I've heard on the grapevine that there are more than 20 different questions, which is an awful lot for a meeting that begins at 7pm. Somehow I don't think there will be time for questions from the floor.

I love this town. I'll admit that it looks a bit 'different' to the casual observer, but scratch the surface and you'll find lots of really good people and a strong, renascent community. Well done, the people of Glastonbury. We might just wag the dog...

A comment on no-fee lawyers and health and safety run riot...

2009-01-19T13:12:00.002Z

Got this from an internet forum. I don't agree with everything - smoking is bad for you, as were lead paint and playground bullies - but whoever wrote it has got a point.

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL MY FRIENDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE 1940's, 50's, 60's and 70's !

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us and lived in houses made of asbestos.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer.

Then after that trauma, our baby cots were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets or shoes, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.

Take away food was limited to fish and chips, no pizza shops, McDonalds, KFC, Subway or Nandos.

Even though all the shops closed at 6.00pm and didn't open on the weekends, somehow we didn't starve to death!

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We could collect old drink bottles and cash them in at the corner store and buy Toffees, Gobstoppers, Bubble Gum and some firecrackers.

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank soft drinks with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because......

WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.!

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of old prams and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and dens and played in river beds with matchbox cars.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo Wii, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 999 channels on SKY, no video/dvd films, no mobile phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms..........WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no Lawsuits from these accidents.

Only girls had pierced ears!

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

You could only buy Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns at Easter time...

We were given air guns and catapults for our 10th birthdays,

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!

Mum didn't have to go to work to help dad make ends meet!

RUGBY and CRICKET had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! Getting into the team was based on MERIT

Our teachers used to hit us with canes and gym shoes and bullys always ruled the playground at school.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

Our parents didn't invent stupid names for their kids like 'Kiora' and 'Blade' and 'Ridge' and 'Vanilla'

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!

And YOU are one of them!

CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good.

And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were.

PS -The big type is because your eyes are not too good at your age anymore

Sigh...I suppose I'm going to get some no-win no-fee ~~weasel~~ lawyer on my case now :)

Modern Liberty

2009-01-18T13:10:00.004Z

I don't usually join organisations but I'm joining Modern Liberty. It's about time.

Read this Guardian article to find out more, and check out the British Library's excellent collection of information about the history of the struggle for our liberties.

And remember: the only rights you can count on are the ones you are prepared to fight for and defend.

An almost-poem which isn't really a Morlands thing...almost

2009-01-16T18:37:00.000Z

... but it started like this on Gwell, a Glastonbury online forum. Anita (Marcella) posted this:

I think this is SUCH a good idea - what about the Morlands site ...?

which isnt zoned for housing - but if a variety of Ecohouses were built as display , that might be possible

All the things we are supposed to be recycling and are carefully seperating - are piling up in warehouses
as pictured on the front page of the Sunday Mail last week
it would be an interesting challenge to see how they could be used for building

[...further down...]
ps - Im working on a design based on a chalet I stayed in when I was in the Pleiades - it is make of spun starshine on a pyramid of dreams
- but pebbledashed with discarded chewing gum to deflect the omega rays - it should be nice and cosy ; )

Later, she also wrote the text below: I like the way it teeters on a fine line between prose and blank verse...

I dont know if it would be allowed to happen
but I know that if it did - it would be a success
because it ticks so many boxes
and would work for different kinds of people

I dont hardly see the TV but last time it was on it was an episode of
Top Gear - with some blokes on teeny motorbikes travelling through Vietnam
and then there was a bit where thy had to construct something to get
to an island
and came up with various contraptions

at the risk of sounding like an old codger
though I dont swear unless I hit myself with a hammer
when i was young we had open plan - flat roofs - weird designs

Now from Wearyall/Wirrall hill looking down - the new house all look
just like the square plastic ones on a Monopoly board

my mum's friend had a bubble car
the roof hinged up and you got into it that way
I would have thought people would have been wafting around in silver
bubbles by now
the Internet has changed many things beyond what we could have imagined
but housing and transport is what we had in the sixties - but worse
and duller and more traffic and people cant even think of what to do
with a mountain of paper
- and Innovation is just that small glossy magazine that falls out
of papers and tells you about another way to heat your slippers or
clean your venetian blinds or repel cats - it is just sad

there has to be some way of enabling the fun and design energy of -
say - Top Gear
without the TrashIt approach

but the possibility that some things sink /fall down/ go mouldy is
part of experimenting
and to know what works and what doesnt

but the imagination and skills are out there ( as go into the Carnival
floats ! and/or the Piltdown festival )
nOT to mention te endless creativity of children which doesnt have
near enough outlets except mischief

and the media enthusiasm for Eco things AND challenges of all sorts

- and the need for somewhere interesting to take the kids in wet
weather and something for them to get involved with - its a a nobrainer

Well, you can look down on Morlands from Wearyall Hill. And it could have been so good...
Many thanks to Anita (Marcella)

On the front page of Fosse Way magazine

2009-01-16T16:00:00.000Z

Fosse Way magazine (free local weekly publication) carried this article on its front page today:

Squatters win stay of execution for derelict factory

January 16 2009

Quote:

PROTESTORS have persuaded developers to hold fire on the demolition of a derelict factory building.

Squatters moved into what is know as the red brick building on the Morlands site between Glastonbury and Street last week after the South West Regional Development Agency (RDA) announced plans to demolish it because of safety concerns.

Morlands Crew protest group believes the large building, constructed in the early 1900s, is sound and should not be flattened just to stop break-ins.

Around 15 people from the group accessed the building and refused to leave until the RDA promised to complete a thorough consultation about the viability of the building and its future use.

Protestors have now left the building following a meeting with RDA officials on Monday. As a result, RDA representatives will attend a special meeting of Glastonbury Town Council on Wednesday evening and members of the public are welcome.

Remember this: written questions only for the council meeting! You can find the details of the meeting right here.

Central Somerset Gazette report from Council meeting

2009-01-15T19:02:00.000Z

Some kind soul posted a comment with a link to this article in the Central Somerset Gazette:

Public to have their say on Morlands.

Thanks for the heads-up, whoever you are.

Not about Morlands but...

2009-01-15T18:49:00.001Z

... the fashion for not giving out any information is catching on.

Government exempts MPs' expenses from freedom of information.

Note that this story was 'buried' under the Heathrow 3rd Runway decision (cue a groan like Krusty the Clown).