Rogering the News

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Yes, we do have both!

That delight of Tony Blair, Moammar Gadhafi, leader of a nation that not only redefines democracy, but also human rights (no, really, check out the Cairo Convention on Human Rights) has called for a “jihad” against Switzerland, which he called an “infidel state” that was “destroying mosques”.

Destroying mosques?

The darned things are springing up everywhere. There’s hardly an Alp these days without at least one skulking away in its shadow, and as for destroying them, I fail to see why objecting to the ‘in your face’ minaret’s (soon to be followed no doubt by the horrible caterwauling ‘azhan’ by some promoter of a pre-medieval thing utterly out of place especially in Switzerland) could be classed as destroying mosques.

But Blair’s mate didn’t leave it at that.

“Any Muslim in any part of the world who works with Switzerland is an apostate, is against Mohammad, God and the Koran,”

“The masses of Muslims must go to all airports in the Islamic world and prevent any Swiss plane landing, to all harbors and prevent any Swiss ships docking, inspect all shops and markets to stop any Swiss goods being sold,”

And why. No, why REALLY.

It’s about loss of face.

One of Moammar’s kids beat seven bells out of two of their servants while they were staying at a Swiss hotel. The police were called by the hotel management, statements were taken, and Moammar’s lad and his misses were banged up’

Long time THAT lasted for those who can and do use diplomatic immunity as a get out of jail of anything card, so out they came.

In short order the victims then wished to withdraw all charges after money had changed hands and in many places that would have been it.

Not here.

The Swiss don’t work that way. If there’s been an assault the law takes its course and the guilty pay.

So Moammar’s brat and his better half (any half would be a better half in his case) did a runner.

Thing is it’s not as if it was a first offence.

In 2005, the lad was busted in Paris for allegedly assaulting his ‘compagnon de nuit’ in a hotel, and in addition several times the police nabbed him for speeding at the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, hardly a place to speed at the best of times.

So not content with the shame of having his kid exposed acting as a thug in a civilised country Moammar then had two Swiss nationals arrested in Libya on trumped up (and patently so) charges, demanding compensation for the ‘insult’ of having his thug son busted. He even wanted the police who were just doing their job prosecuted for — just doing their job. Dealing with an uncivilized thug.

What’s more he then soon after formally demanded in the UN that Switzerland should be dismantled and split between the ‘Erics’, the Austrians, and the Italians.

Blair’s friend.

Rog

Sutcliffe (AKA The Yorkshire Ripper) is seeking to have a limit placed on his life sentence for murdering at least 13 women so that he can get back into society. And of course at the Tax Payers expense and supported by Blair’s Human Rights legislation.

There’s even a school of thought that Sutcliffe’s conviction for murder may be wrong, and that he should have been detained on the basis that he was mentally ill at the time of his conviction so reducing the charges to manslaughter at most if at all.

Sutcliffe, an HGV driver, targeted prostitutes in his campaign against a thing he found offensive and subsequently claimed he was on a mission from God. But in my opinion probably only when he saw such a claim as a ticket to ‘soft time’ in Broadmoor ‘hospital’ for the criminally insane rather than in jail where he was subject to summery justice from decent honest criminals.

When I read the news item it reminded me of the fairly recent case of another serial killer from Ipswich who had a downer on ‘Brass’. Another HGV driver though at the time of his (known) killing spree employed as a fork lift truck driver. Investigations into other killings he may have been involved in continue —.

And not just the UK, In the US a truck driver name of Mendenhall, was arrested in Nashville at the same interstate truck stop where 25-year-old Sara Hulbert had been found fatally shot and then admitted to murdering an additional five people.

Closer to home HGV driver Volker Eckert was arrested in Cologne 2006 after an alleged six-year killing spree across the continent. This time the number of victims is at least five — and counting.

And those are just some of many where job and ‘oddness’ go hand in hand.

Remember Jeremy Clarkson with his infamous quip about HGV driving ‘You’ve got to change gear, change gear, change gear, check mirror… murder a prostitute. Change gear, change gear. That’s a lot of effort in a day.’ ?

Maybe he inadvertently identified a worrying connectivity between HGV driving and mental instability, because even a casual tranche of the ‘net comes up with what looks like a cluster of statistics linking HGV driving with odd behaviour to say the least.

Could it be the hours of constant vibration from the road and engine being conducted through the seat to the brain thus causing brain damage? Could it be the sense of superiority that so many seem to develop maybe from driving a large vehicle amongst much smaller ones? That is possible even though in reality driving an HGV requires little more than being semi skilled rather than skilled or professional in the real meaning of the word. Or that stress and fatigue play a role?

Whatever,

Whether some people seem to think that because they are semi skilled sufficiently to drive a wagon, the size of the thing relative to other road users makes up for their deficiencies in other dimensions, and behave accordingly in the same way a ‘yob’ thinks his Pit Bull makes him a man.

Or the possibility that hours ‘in the saddle’ does cause brain damage as a result of RSI conducted through the spine, there does seem to be a correlation between HGV driving and abnormal behaviour and human relationships.

From bullying on and off the road to becoming pure unadulterated psychopaths there does seem to be more than a coincidental association between the job and the people who do it. Not an absolute one to one correspondence perhaps, but certainly indications of a correlation.

Some research has been conducted including that by the University of Queensland in Australia which shows a correlation between HGV driving and mental health (should that be ill health) but the findings are inconclusive as to the precise cause of such ill health and the form it takes, just that there is a correlation.

Sutcliffe? If he IS ‘cured’ then send him back to ‘proper’ prison and throw away the key say I.

Rog

As I’ve said in the past I do avoid commenting on Israel because it is such an emotional issue involving so many fixed ideas and raw bigotry from all quarters but in spite of that sometimes, just sometimes ——-

There’s a concentrated push taking place in Afghanistan. In my opinion it shouldn’t be taking place for a shed load of reasons but let’s leave that as it is.

What I DO note is that the action that is taking place has one unavoidable similarity with what took place in Operation Cast Lead against Hamas terrorists who had spent years attacking Israel.

Not that the Taliban had been lobbing bombs at the UK let alone America, that would have at least provided some justification, but in the nature of the fighting that is taking place and the tactics being employed.

Take the recent incident where a house was struck by a rocket and several kids were killed.

At first it was ‘spun’ by interested parties that it was a rogue missile, but now it emerges the house was deliberately targeted as it was being used as a firing point by the Taliban and the presence of civilians in the building was unknown.

One really does have to ask why this incident is being reported as an “accident” whereas when the same thing was taking place in Gaza it was being reported as a “war crime”.

And this is not one solitary incident. Use of civilians, some willingly, some under duress as human shields is commonplace in Afghanistan as it was in Gaza and yet —- when a soldier is facing a guy with an AK47 and a woman and child as a shield what is he expected to do? Stand there and be shot?

And when a Taliban becomes a civilian by discretely dropping his weapon as is happening, and as repeatedly happened in Gaza.

And when even after warning the Taliban that an attack was imminent they kept their shields who’s the guilty party? It depends if it’s being done in Gaza or Afghanistan apparently.

Funny how perception changes how a thing looks.

Rog

The British Government sank to a new low with the 2008 finance act which included retrospective anti tax-avoidance legislation

Not anti tax evasion legislation, that would have proved too difficult to enforce, but anti tax avoidance. That thing whereby perfectly legitimate means exist to minimise tax liability.

It has resulted in some situations whereby anyone who had used existing legislation to avoid the punitive taxation imposed by HMG is now subject to a tax demand for taxes that were not due when the existing legislation. and prosecution if they didn’t cough up.

Even though they have paid all then taxes due under the law at the time and have done nothing illegal.

If that’s not theft by HMG then I’m a Dutchman.

In a recent test case a self-employed IT consultant (not me!) brought a test case against the retrospective application of the law claiming that it breached his human rights.

But the inglorious —- whatever —– Mr Justice Kenneth Parker, sitting in London, ruled the backdating of demands was ‘in the relevant circumstances proportionate’ and did not breach human rights.

So what ARE the relevant circumstances that allow theft to be undertaken by a Government? Desperation? Playing to an audience? Diverting attention? Window dressing?

Certainly the sum involved is so trivial in the overall scheme of things, and such draconian and morally WRONG measures as the use of a retrospective law are totally indefensible by any standards.

In the particular case where an appeal was being made by the victim the judge went on to say that the fact that the government had not carried out an assessment ‘of how individual taxpayers might be affected financially’ could not affect the proportionality of the retrospective legislation.

In this test case the at the time LEGAL and LEGITIMATE and moreover entirely MORALLY JUST tax avoidance arrangements had saved the guy who had challenged the ruling around £85 grand in income tax over seven years, a trivial one grand a month.

And why should he not have done so? The law was there to be used, he used it. Nothing more, he did nothing wrong, and yet now he and thousands of others will have their bank accounts burgled by the British government.

Retrospective legislation is a terribly dangerous weapon for a government to introduce. It should be used only in the most extreme cases and usually only where injury to a person has taken place.

It should NEVER be used in issues such as this.

This disgusting action by HMG will result in around 3,000 people being hammered, many will end up loosing their livelihoods, homes and probably families in spite of having done nothing wrong and paid all the taxes due.

And all for a total of around 200 million pounds in what can only be described as a thing beyond a stealth tax, this is a theft tax.

Some people wonder why entrepreneurs and the like have been leaving the UK in droves and are now doing at an ever increasing rate. Talk about killing the goose.

I’m hearing mutterings that even Unilever, one of the VERY few remaining Blue Chip British companies are seriously looking at if, how, and when to ‘up sticks’ and move out of the UK and they are one of many.

Now I see another story has hit the headlines. A man who meets the Treasury requirement about being absent from the UK for the requisite number of days per year is being lumbered with a huge tax bill —- because a court has found that he fails to meet the ‘spirit’ of not having the UK as his home. This in spite of having his home and principle abode in the Seychelles and having done so for decades.

So that’s it then. Play by the rules and still loose out. And people still wonder why in spite of being ‘illegal’ tax evasion is so preferable to tax avoidance.

At least in the case of the former you don’t get taxed for obeying the law.

My God, what has New Labour done?

Rog

Especially when they expect others to pay for them. For a variety of reasons the Greek economy is in one hell of a mess.

Not least is seemingly uncontrolled government largesse to the population in the expectation that the other Eurozone countries would rally round and underwrite the Greek governments generosity in an attempt to buy popularity, and more than a little speculation by Greek banks and other financial institutions who saw an opportunity to ride the wave.

One particularly dodgy activity, even in a buoyant and safe economy is the so called ‘Repo’ Market* that the banks have increasingly been playing in. That’s what’s going to sink ‘em without government intervention, and government intervention won’t be allowed to happen.

The response to this potential catastrophe has been serious concern within the Euro Powerhouse nations, and a growing determination to let the Greek banks fail, and on top of that to insist that the Greek government curtail spending on social services even to the extent of parachuting in people to force the Greek government to make these much needed cuts.

In fact Greece is facing what Britain faced some time ago, but unlike Britain being able to pass on the debt to future generations in order for Blubberer Brown not to be shown up as the incompetent cretin he is, the Greek government are to be brought to book by the European Central Bank.

The people who will suffer are of course the Greek public, but as they have been living ‘high on the hog’ as a result of their lousy government and delusional state as a result of their government refusing to admit the true situation, it seems only fair that those who ate the meal should pay the waiter.

Unlike in Britain and the US where the people who have eaten the meal are passing the waiter’s bill to their kids, grandkids, and even further down the line as a result of the dishonesty of their governments.

But it’s not just Greece. The EU PIGS group (Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Spain) are all in the same mess created by governments spending what they don’t have and their populations being encouraged to do the same.

The effect has been to see the Euro fall against the standard Basket of Currencies because of this weakness in the PIGS states. (forget the US$, that’s based on vapour-wealth)

Now it might be expected that a fall in the Euro would see a rise in Sterling against it, but actually because it’s the expectation amongst the Money Men is that the UK will soon be joining the Eurozone, and that option provides the safety net for Sterling, (nothing else does) a fall in the Euro is also a fall for Sterling.

The Dollar?

Dead man walking. China will soon see to that.

And there’s no Bretton Woods town in China, nor any Mount Washington Hotel in China, nor any desire to establish either in the near future.

(Google ‘Bretton Woods’ to see how things were sorted out last time a situation of this magnitude was taking place)

* The Repo Market

• The ‘Repo’ Market. It works like this. I own a bond, an IOU issued by a third party. I want money. I ‘sell’ this bond to another person with the promise to buy it back after a short period plus interest.

• With the cash I get I ‘buy’ a bond from someone else for a short time on the basis HE will buy it back from me with interest.

• End of time he buys his bond back with interest, I buy MY bond back paying interest but I’ve charged MORE interest than I’ve paid for mine – unless the economy is on the up and up it will eventually fall like a house of cards. It’s one reason why a growth economy is so vital to banks and bankers.

As for ‘hedge funds’, so popular in the UK in the past, were being dealt with in a way that was let us simply say cavalier. Recent changes in the international law as well as European law will see their ability to provide a significant income to the UK treasury disappear as will many of the loop holes and nefarious activities that London were allowed (encouraged) to engage in. So there’s another source of income that was being used to enable the export market of real exports to be ignored and with it the UK real manufacturing sector under NuLabour and Brown’s dreadful mismanagement.

Just look out for recession Mk.2.

It’s now well on its way and it will make recession Mk.1 look like a hiccup.

Rog

(With apologies to Martin Niemöller)

Not content with creating an environment is which banks and bankers did what any businessman would do – maximise profits and shareholder value – Brown then set about penalising those who had earned, yes EARNED what he presented as excessive commission payments by introducing punitive taxation and so disincentives the very people best placed to speed recovery of the banking sector.

Not only that but it puts the skids under UK based banks who are now in the process up upping sticks and moving to places where the best performing employees are NOT treated as pariahs and so yet another reason to bail out of the UK.

And believe me, they are.

But now the next bit of window dressing insanity. The Treasury is about to start a purge that initially deliberately targets the medical profession in the UK. The intent is to threaten and cajole medical staff who have undeclared and so untaxed earnings.

The proposal is that if a person has earned a few quid ‘cash in hand’ and has not declared it, if they do so by the end of March they’ll simply have to pay it plus a 10% ‘penalty’. After the end of this so called amnesty if they do not ‘come clean’ — and get found out they will be prosecuted.

It strikes me that since the UK is finding it hard enough to get medical professionals to work in the UK in the first place for a whole raft of reasons, to now engage in a pogrom against those who do work in the UK is bordering on lunacy.

In both cases there is a better way.

In the case of the government created banking free-for-all in which the government collaborated in bilking the market a tightening up of regulations would more than have resolved the problems caused by letting foxes run wild in the hen coop.

In the case of some medical professionals trousering cash one very obvious solution would have been to make payments for private medical care tax deductible and so prevented what really is a chicken feed tax leakage in the first place.

But of course because neither solution would have satisfied the government created public demand for blood, nor would they have the same ‘umami’ that presenting a simple solution to a complex problem offers to the vast majority of the general public, who of course fail entirely to see that the solutions offered actually create other problems.

In both the banking and the medical profession huge problems for the country, and far more damaging than which is claimed to being fixed.

Sheesh. What a shower.

Rog

Fishing is a cruel activity.

Fish DO feel pain.

Proven fact.

That is why the utter hypocrisy over the condemnation of fox hunting by the NuLab government and their banning of it was and remains so wrong. If there really was an animal welfare issue then long before fox hunting was even considered sport angling should have been banned.

It serves no purpose, it inflicts great pain on fish and often results in horrible mutilation to their mouths, and what ends up on the bank or in the keep net is inedible unless your taste runs to a mouthful of muddy tasteless flesh and bones.

But did NuLabour go on a mission to condemn let alone ban sport angling? Nah. Too many votes to be lost compared to so many votes to be won by going after what is thought to be a cruel and pointless activity, an activity that is widely misunderstood, almost universally misrepresented, and oh such a cause celebre, fox hunting. No matter that Peter Bradley (ten) MP, the parliamentary private secretary to Alun Michael, who was the rural affairs minister, has let slip that the real reason that Labour MPs feel so strongly about the ban is because it is aimed at killing ‘the old order’.

He continued that is the first time in history that a Labour government has taken on ‘the gentry’.

In short, a matter of the class war on a new battlefield with the victims the innocent bystanders, this time the foxes.

So on those grounds who are responsible for the greatest cruelty in culling a pest?

Those who arrange for the numbers to be kept in check by the culling of the old and the weak in a way that ensures a very rapid death?

Or those who in pursuit of their politics have created a situation where thousands of foxes are now culled by nature in the form of disease and starvation?

Or by being left to slow and agonizing deaths from poisons that will then be released into the environment continuing to kill by being ingested by the eaters of carrion in the foodchain?

Or die agonizing deaths from wounds received from being shot. Keep in mind that to kill a fox outright with a shotgun would requires the fox to be within twenty-five yards and there’s damm few foxes that would allow themselves within fifty yards of anyone.

Much more probable the poor things are wounded and take days to succumb to the wounds from septicemia and or gangrene.

But instead of allowing facts and reality to rule, NuLab instead chose to play to the public imagination of what Fox Hunts are all about. An imagination that in most cases, is about as far from reality as could be.

Rather than go on a crusade against an activity that really IS cruel and pointless they condemned thousands, by now probably hundreds of thousands of highly sentient mammals to lives of starvation, disease, and death from singularly inappropriate means of culling of any population of pests.

And yet, an activity that results in the purchase of specialist clothing, expensive equipment, is oftentimes a social activity with the hunters forming in clubs that compete within the clubs and between clubs to see how many animals can be trapped in a terribly cruel manner simply to see who can catch most, is left untouched.

Because there’s no votes to be won by banning it, in fact just the opposite.

One of the first bit of animal welfare legislation that the incoming government should enact is to get rid of the ban of hunting of foxes with dogs and crack down big time on so called sports angling.

Now that WOULD be a step forward for animal protection and welfare.

For fish, for fowl, — and for fox.

Rog

A Merchant Banker and a salmon

It’s wrong to pile the blame for what’s gone down on the Bankers. – They were just doing their job which was to make money for the shareholders in the banks.

It’s also wrong to keep banging on about ‘bonuses’ – The money paid to front office staff and to middle management may well have been performance related pay, or even bonuses in the real meaning of the word, but the really big bucks paid out wasn’t bonus payments, it was commission.

Even to complain about that is wrong because it is wrong to sl*g off the banks for paying what they do, or to the people who get paid what they do, because a very great deal of what takes place in making money is down to networking between individuals.

It’s often said that ‘it’s not what you know, it’s who you know’ and in high finance it is far closer to reality than in just about any other sector and what the banks are paying is not only commission as a percentage of profit made but also to keep in-house a vital link to the world of banking. A bank pays for that vital link just as it pays for other data links essential for it to do business.

So if it’s not the bankers, and it’s not unreasonable ‘bonuses’ and the huge amounts are justified, who IS to blame?

In the case of the UK it’s Gordon Brown first and foremost because he was single handedly responsible for breaking the banking structure within the UK when he ‘liberated’ the Bank of England.

In so doing he broke the system of bank regulation and the means to deploy sanctions on those who didn’t adhere to the rules and so created open season on chasing shareholder value.

And with shareholders who didn’t give a four x for anything other than short term return what happened was inevitable as soon as Carpetbaggers came in with their worthless scrip and fractional reserve banking strategies.

Worthless scrip worth only trading with but never opening up.

So IS there a Merchant Banker responsible for the mess I the UK?

Oh yes, there certainly is.

It reminds me of an old joke:

Moshe was walking down the street when he was met by Rubin.

‘Moshe’, says Ruben, ‘Here I have some wonderful smoked salmon! Yours for five pounds!’

Soon Moshe was walking down the street when he met Danny.

‘Danny,’ says Moshe, ‘Here I have some wonderful smoked salmon, yours for six pounds!’.

Soon Danny was walking down the street when he met Joe.

‘Joe,’ says Danny, ‘Here I have some wonderful smoked salmon, yours for ten pounds!’.

Danny took the side of salmon home.

Soon Joe was walking down the street when he met Danny.

‘Danny,’ says Joe, ‘That salmon was dreadful! We threw most of it away!’

‘You ate it?’ asked Danny, astounded at what he had heard —‘ Joe, that salmon wasn’t for eating, it was for selling!’

Rog

The announced closure of the Teeside steelworks is of course a tragedy for the people who will now be out of work, for their families, for those who depended on their wages buying goods from local businesses, and for the suppliers of goods and services to the steelworks with all the knock on effects that will create.

But it’s unavoidable. It’s also the right thing to happen.

Where is the justification in pouring money into somewhere making something no one wants? And when even those who do want to buy steel can buy at lower price and closer to where it will be used.

Corus is a victim of a changing world. It’s also a victim to decades of blackmail by unions that eventually saw the costs overtake the price that what it produced could be sold in order to be competitive. The unions that have crippled this British industry are victims of their own success.

Unsurprisingly the whines start “What about the bankers”?

No consideration that it is generally commission not bonus that is being paid to people working in the banking sector, a commission based on a percentage of the profits that the people had made for their employers.

The question of the manner in which banking was and is being conducted being right and proper, well that’s a different matter, and one that lays directly with the government who have chosen not to address it as it’s been too much to their advantage not to do so.

No thought that what Corus made was too expensive and in the wrong place. Just “What about the bankers”. Never “What about the government and the mess that they’ve got the whole country in”.

But there is more to the failure of Corus than the obvious.

One legitimate question is not why has it failed now, but why was it not allowed to fail when it became clear that market forces had now moved the demand for steel along with the production of steel half a world away.

Another is how come the renege on the agreement to buy slab from Corus Teeside was well known and well understood early this year, yet the closure of the works has only just been announced citing the failure in the four party framework agreement as the cause.

A failure that was well known early this year.

Another VERY pertinent question is what UK government grants and other arrangements have been made thus far to Tata, the owner of Corus, not least the 2,3 billion pound ‘loan’ fund to provide for the development of an all electric car, the first factory for which would be built —– in Norway.

There is something that smells a damm sight worse than a steel works involved here, and it’s originating not from Teeside but from Westminster.

It IS right that Corus Teeside closes, it should have closed long since, the question is why did it not, and what have the costs been to the UK Tax payer of it not having done so.

Rog

It is an accepted adage that “He who pays the piper, calls the tune”.

Generally, one would listen to a piper’s repertoire and playing ability prior to employing him and would then feel free to choose from that repertoire during his period of employment.

Politics isn’t like that – you choose the whole band on the basis that they tell you what they intend to play – regardless of what they actually can or do play – and they choose the piper, regardless of his playing ability.  You as the employer have no say in the matter until they, the band, decide to leave.  (or until their five year contract  is up).

Well, for the British government, that five years is almost up.  Their music hasn’t been particularly good, they have lied and cheated  and few people are likely ever to employ this particular piper again – not even his own band…

So, we might reasonably expect that the present band – complete with their flawed piper – will be given their marching orders by the electorate.

That said, you might expect that the only other big band available for this particular gig – the Conservative Party – would be a shoe-in.

Is that actually likely?

For the Conservatives to win an overall majority at the next general election will require one of the biggest swings in UK electoral history  – certainly in the last 100 years.  Not impossible but a massive task given that the electoral system is heavily biased against them.

Why so?  Simply because the electoral boundary system favours urban areas far more so than rural areas where the Conservatives have traditionally drawn their support.  There have been some changes in these boundaries since the last general election which will marginally help the Conservatives, but they still require an overal swing of around 9% – 10% to win a very small majority. Fact is, it still requires many more Conservative voters to elect an MP than it does Labour voters.

The expenses scandal has resulted in many MP’s deciding not to present themselves for re-election – perhaps wisely so – which means there will be many new faces at the hustings. How this will play out is one of the big questions.  The other of course is how many people believe the system is now so tainted that they will not bother to vote.

Of course, some people will always vote for ‘their’ party.  This favours Labour because many in the old industrial regions would walk on hot coals before they would vote Conservative whereas natural Conservative voters will often vote for a candidate rather than a party.  Likewise, many who have grown up on a culture of benefit and sickness payments may feel too threatened by the possibility of change to consider a Conservative step into the unknown.

What about the Lib Dems and the fringe parties?  Probably the Lib Dems will hold their core vote but there is no sign that they are building on it, while parties like UKIP and the BNP are in a much stronger position to attract traditional Labour voters who want to make a protest, but one without rocking the boat too much.

Do those fringe votes matter?  If the election is close then they may well hold the balance of power. Is that what the voters want?

The other factor which may effect the result is the voting power of the ‘new’ immigrant (bearing in mind that some are now third generation citizens).  Despite the perceptions of some on the far Left and Right, they are just as concerned about uncontroled immigration, poor education and social policing as any ‘White’ Briton.  The way they vote may have a very profound effect on the composition of the next government.

So, an election too close to call?  Perhaps not, but if results are close then the UK will end up with a weak government which will fall apart within the first six months.  Does anyone want an ‘Italian’ or ‘Israeli’ style of back room deals and a concensus which suits the powerful?

If a “week is a long time in politics” then the next five months may seem like a lifetime.

Swan song for the lonely piper?