Elephant in the Garden

Weekend Edition

PRATS4JUSTICE

Geoffrey Hibbert, 48, of Farnborough in Hampshire, is at the time of writing still perched on top of a gantry across the M25 dressed as Batman (a Batman who has clearly eaten all the Batpies). He is a member of Fathers4Justice, the organisation of dads denied access to their children.

This proves just one thing.

If Geoffrey Hibbert is capable of this, his ex-partner is almost certainly right not to let him see his children.

THE PREMIER LEAGUE KICKS OFF

Those who thought they'd slipped into a parallel universe when they saw Roy Keane saying players should treat officials with respect (see him doing this when he was a player, above) needn't worry. Everything, I predict, will be boringly familiar in 2008-2009.

Manchester United or Chelsea will win the title. Liverpool and Arsenal will be right behind them. The team in fifth place (probably Spurs) will be at least 10 points further back. Two of the three teams that came up will go back down. West Brom will stay up. The third relegation place will be fought over by Blackburn, Middlesbrough, Bolton, Fulham and West Ham.

Fergie will whinge, Arsene will shrug his shoulders and whinge, Scolari will chuckle, shrug his shoulders and whinge and Rafa will be out on his ear by Christmas so it doesn't matter whether he whinges or not.

Oh and predictions for the January transfer window? Both Lampard and Ronaldo will be off to the clubs they really want to play for.

COWARDLY BROWN'S GIANT
PANDERING TO CHINA

ANIMAL welfare groups have reacted angrily to news that two giant pandas are to be shipped from China to Edinburgh Zoo.

Such a loan deal requires approval at the highest government level, which means this needless transportation of these animals is sanctioned by none other than Gordon Brown himself.

The capture and incarceration of giant pandas has little or no conservation value at all, according to the international animal welfare organisation, the Born Free Foundation.

Will Travers, CEO of the Born Free Foundation, said: “Having made a serious error of judgement in supporting China's application to be a major ivory trader, the Government looks like it is to compound the situation and increase its reputation as an 'anything goes when it comes to China'.

“Regarded by serious conservationists as serving little or no conservation value, Whitehall watchers observe that this is pure politics with these unfortunate animals the unwitting diplomatic pawns.

“While countries such as India declared some years ago that such meaningless exploitation would end, the UK's approach seems stuck in the colonial era when animals were treated as no more than goods and chattels, there to serve often obscure objectives of so-called national interest.

“Once more the UK lags behind more enlightened countries by clinging to the past instead of thinking about and acting in the best interests of wildlife's future.”

So once again cowardly Gordon Brown stands accused of abandoning his core principles because he's scared of China.

He has already reneged on his climate change commitment by not censuring the Chinese government for its proliferation of coal-fired power stations (in fact, he's so taken with China he's reversed Britain's policy and is starting to build ne coal-fired stations here again!)

He has abdicated any interest he pretended to have in human rights by agreeing to attend the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics and take tea with the brutal dictators who deny people freedom of speech and movement. An imporvement in China's human rights record was a pre-condition of them getting the Games. That record is as shameful as it ever was, yet Brown and othe cowering Western leadesrs will do nothing about it because they are all terrified of China's power.

Now it appears animal abuse is OK as long as it's China doing the abusing.

Brown's only saving grace was his commitment to core humanitarian values. Now he has no saving grace.

Pandas as they should be . . .

QUESTIONS THERE’S NO ANSWER TO

Try answering these questions conclusively. You can’t!

“Are you in a state of denial?”

Answer yes and you’re not. Answer no and you are!

“Do you lie all the time?”

Answer yes and you don’t. Those that do have to answer No.

SAY CHEESE

So Barack Obama has finished his whirlwind tour of the Middle East and Europe. Meanwhile Republican opponent John McCain delivers his latest speech from a cheese aisle in a 24-hour supermarket.

It showed, said American political observers, that McCain is more in touch with the “kitchen table” issues that are top of the American people’s agenda at the moment. In other words, Yanks care more about the price of cheese than they do about ending the killing of their sons and daughters in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The more you hear about America, the less you want to go there.

TRUE COLOURS

Good to see Radovan Karadzic showing his true colours. His decision to appeal against extradition to face a war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands is laughable. If he believes so much in the political philosophy that massacring entire ethnic groups is a good thing, why hasn’t he the courage to stand up and says so now? Because all dictators reveal their true selves when power is stripped away. They are cowards.

July 10, 2008

BADGER REPRIEVE 'IS RIGHT'

THE Government is regularly knocked in these columns and rightly so. But when it comes up with the goods it deserves to be praised. And today is such a day.

DEFRA, under Hilary Benn’s direction, has decided to stand up to farmers’ hysterical blood lust and is refusing to implement a recommended badger cull to combat bovine TB. While a link between bovine TB, badgers and other wildlife has been shown to exist, previous culls have had no effect on the disease.

In fact in areas where badgers were culled, instances of bovine TB actually rose. Ask your local farmer to explain that. He or she can’t.

DEFRA commissioned a trial costing taxpayers £50 million in which just under 11,000 badgers were culled between 1998 and early 2006. It was designed by the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB (ISG) and investigated how bovine TB spread between cattle, badgers and other wildlife. Their conclusion was that while badgers are a source of bovine TB in cattle, badger culling can make no meaningful contribution to cattle TB control in Britain.

But once farmers get something in their heads, it’s difficult to shake them off their chosen path. All that working next to nature and being answerable to no-one that does it, I reckon.

DEFRA had made exactly the right decision. Culling badgers on the scale farmers are demanding would be tantamount to genocide.

The RSPCA has called Hilary Benn’s decision the “correct one for both badgers and cattle". Dr Rob Atkinson, RSPCA Head of Wildlife Science, said: “This would be the right decision based on compelling evidence, particularly because the most authoritative scientific research ever undertaken on the subject recommended against badger culling as an effective way of controlling TB.

“Evidence indicates that the vast majority of badgers are not infected with TB. Our opposition to a badger cull is based on solid science not sentiment. The RSPCA cares as much about cattle welfare as badgers. We are keen to work with farmers and governments to find positive solutions to the challenge of TB in cattle.”

It’s not often you get a victory for common sense in this day and age. Perhaps that’s why it feels so great.

GO LEWIS! LEWIS? ER, LEWIS!!??

WELL done to Lewis Hamilton for winning the British Grand Prix. He revved.up for the big day by appearing in that clever little Santander TV ad where he's glued together s part of a model kit for his F1 car.

Mmm. Lewis as a a grey, humourless, inaminate action figure. Wonder how they could possibly have come up with that idea.

LABOUR'S NHS CLAIM IS A SICK BOAST

SO the government says its new charter for the NHS, which this week becomes a pensioner, will shift control back into the hands of patients and out of the Trust suits and accountants who decide whether we're worth saving or can die.

Utter hogwash. The NHS is no more safe in Labour's hands than in Thatcher's. It's another example of dealing with an Elephant in the Garden. You pretend it's not there. Alan Johnson has closed the curtains and said The elephant is gone. Well, we know it hasn't.

The suits will still decide who lives and who dies based on a Health Trust balance sheet and until that system is scrapped the patients will NEVER be in control of their own treatment.

Whatever Alan Johnson says and however many times he goes on Richard and Judy and says it.

Every British citizen who needs an operation, course of treatment or medication for an illness should get it free at the point of need. That's what the health service is all about. Anything less is a betrayal.

The people who come on and say we can't afford these operations are lying. We can find billions to blow up Baghdad but not to ease the pain of our sick and elderly. Of course we can afford it, if everyone stops wanting to own five houses and run four cars.

This government found billions of taxpayers' money to shore up a private bank which chose to play fast and loose with the global banking markets like it was on some casino bender. But not our sick and elderly.

A young woman actually said on BBC Breakfast this morning (Thu) that £18,000 for an ear implant which helps deaf children to hear was "extortionate". "I could buy three cars for that," she moaned.

If she is an example of the next generation coming through, we're all up Northern Rock creek without a paddle.

It's a shameful dereliction of duty by this Labour government. And still they have the nerve to pretend that patients are in control.

WHY THE IRISH VOTED
YES FOR LISBON TREATY

Now let's get this straight. Ireland voted in favour of the Lisbon Treaty in its recent referendum. Why has nobody latched onto this?

The maths are simple. Just over 40 per cent of those eligible to vote bothered to vote. Just over half of that 40 per cent voted No to the Treaty. As with all referendums (and this is what makes them so ridiculously undemocratic) ALL who are angered by the treaty will have made damned sure they voted. So that means a fraction over 20 per cent of Ireland's voters are unhappy with it. That is the Noes total vote.

The nigh-on 60 per cent who didn't bother to vote? Well, when you ask a question and don't get an answer, how often have you said: "Well, I'll take that as a yes then". The phrase didn't happen just by accident. There is a lot of truth in it. People who couldn't care less about the treaty (and are therefore quite happy with it) are not going to bother voting. But they are saying Yes.

So it;'s quite acceptable for the Irish government and everyone else pro-Lisbon to say the referendum proved that almost 80 per cent of the irish electorate have no problem with the Lisbon Treaty.

Now what's all the fuss about?

THE FUNNIEST SKETCH IN
THE HISTORY OF COMEDY
No particular reason . . . just for the hell of it!

FOOTBALLERS WANT
MORE MONEY SHOCK!

The outrage and indignation filling the sports pages this weekend concerning the comments by Emmanuel Adebayor and Cristiano Ronaldo reeks of hypocrisy on a level never witnessed before.

The players have admitted that they are considering bigger offers from Spanish clubs and will go unless their current clubs cough up a similar wad of dosh. They are professionals and will go where the highest bidder is.

This has appalled our noble soccer scribes -- which seems odd. Every last one of them has switched papers for loadsamoney in the past 15 years. Those that have stayed where they were have only done so when their employers matched what was being offered elsewhere.

So good luck Adebayor and Ronaldo. Go where you can get the biggest bucks. Your critics did.

THE FUNNIEST SKETCH IN THE HISTORY OF COMEDY No particular reason . . . just for the hell of it!

THE FUNNIEST SKETCH IN
THE HISTORY OF COMEDY
No particular reason . . . just for the hell of it!