So, what exactly is this rant all about? Perhaps it’s hard to explain but, simply put, it’s about that one thing that politicians treat as though it were debatable – the truth.
Ah but, you say, we both have truths are mine the same as yours.
Fair enough, I respond… but, and this is the rub… I will try and deal in truth that finds its base in fact.
Before I go on I will make a very important confession – There will be times when those ‘facts’ themselves are the subject of dispute and on such occasions I shall try and point this out. However, if you can prove me wrong about anything (note the word ‘prove’) then I will be absolutely delighted to correct anything I write.
Otherwise, I welcome any comments / abuse / ranting about anything you may see here.
So what sort of ‘truths’ should you look out for here? I hope that I will be able to provide truths behind stories that you think you already know or the facts that contradict the statements of politicians. I would also be delighted if anyone out there has something to bring to this little party because you’re all welcome.
Don’t worry too much – this isn’t all politics (except in the sense that most human activity has a political bias somewhere) I also hope to look at other aspects of life in Britain at the beginning of the 21st century and maybe even have a giggle from time to time

I would, however, like to begin with a political idea that in itself has expression in the mainstream news today.
As usual there are people using the senseless death of a Police Officer to further their own agenda (you could argue that I’ve just become one of them!).
On this occasion it’s the old chestnut of arming the police as a knee-jerk reaction to a specific event. In some respects it’s an easy argument to make. But, does it not reach into the very heart of modern politics that the response to anything bad is more of the same. If our doctors acted like our politicians then we would have some serious health issues to deal with.
Modern politics seems to have very little interest in progressive ideas – or dare I say, ideals. Instead it reacts reflexively to any event by prescribing more of the same or on bad days proscribing more of the same.
We live in a system of politics in the West which has existed in varying forms for centuries and barring the obvious – abolishing slavery etc – has not led to any great benefits for a majority of people. I realise that many people will throw their hands up at such a simplification but blogs are limited by their very existence. However, I ask you instead to look carefully at the past twenty or so years when the disconnect between those who lead and follow has grown ever greater.
People don’t want to work ‘til they drop and yet it is to be imposed from above. Why? The reasons are really quite simple – Your government has consistently lied to you and has aided and abetted big business in devaluing the money that you have handed over from your own wages. The chance of a decent pension for all is about priorities and choice, not about money. Think of the options you have been offered – You work longer or you get nowt. They call it the ‘politics of the possible’, I call it the politics of the greedy. How many company directors have pension problems? And, why aren’t you asking where the hell your money went? You paid, they spent and somehow it’s your fault. In any other area of life it would be called fraud. Why do I always feel that I missed a meeting somewhere along the line?
Are you happy? Do you see your loved ones as much as you would like? Do you have the mythical ‘work life balance’ or are you just another creature in harness to a system that intends, quite cynically, to milk you like a cow?
Can you honestly say that society is better now than it was? By the way, I’m not trying to look at the world through a cutely tinted pair of specs… I threw those out years ago.
We are fighting a war based on nothing but the lies and hubris. We have families in this country to whom a loved one has been lost, not because their was a great cause that needed defending or a threat we needed to respond to but because we have a prime minister in thrall to the most odious occupant the White House has ever seen and Iraq has massive stores, not only of oil but of gas… and we all know which country has just run out of natural gas!
In your name (and, with great, great shame, mine) horrors are being perpetrated on a people we are led to believe have already suffered more than their fair share of horrors and indignity. The use of White Phosphorous has been admitted by the US during an operation where we held the coats. This is a weapon of a ferocity so awful that it goes as far as using the water in a human body as fuel. The only way to stop the burning (as revealed by a Sky journalist (is that itself a tautology?) who was embedded during the assault on Fallujah) is to cut out the flesh where the phosphorous has landed. That’s okay say the Americans and by extension our own sickeningly complicit government, because it was only used on ‘insurgents’. That is a lie – plain and simple. A big fat Greek wedding of a lie. Yes, civilians were told to leave. How generous we are – become homeless and destitute and we won’t set fire to your flesh. But, even this is a lie. Any male – insurgent or otherwise – between the ages of 15 and 55 was not allowed to leave. This was enforced by US machine gun positions stationed along the river bank who shot anyone attempting to swim to safety. And perhaps we only need to take a short trip through time to find that even in the US evacuating a city simply doesn’t work and New Orleans was not in the middle of a war zone. So, it’s a lie.
By the way, Mr Blair, holding the coats is sufficient to make you complicit in that horror and one day you will be held responsible for your actions.
I’m sorry to have executed this piece in such a scattergun way but hopefully I will regain focus for future posts about such wonders as depression, benefits, war, and jokes. In the meantime…
Thanks for looking, you’ve made my day.