African Democracy

The name Lansané Conte might not mean much to you but he was, until his death yesterday, the president of Guinea since 1984. He was 74 years old, reputedly a chain smoker, had diabetes and leukaemia.

(A point to note; Evil tongues will say that it was smoking that killed him..not the diabetes, his advanced age or the leukaemia, otherwise he would have lived forever, as every anti-smoker knows.. sorry.. digression ends. Where’s my pipe?).

He was a bit of a dictator, our Lansané, having ensured his staying in power by making frequent use of his army in the face of protest against his regime. A kind of mini-Mugabe. The world is probably better off without him.
However, that’s not the really interesting bit. Hours after his death, a group calling themselves “The National Council for Democracy”, dressed in military uniforms, promptly seized everything they could get their grubby hands on and declared themselves in charge of the country, the courts and the parliament.

One dictator is promptly replaced by another. This dictator is like all the other dictators in Africa. Which is why Africa will never get off the ground. The strange thing is, that they all call themselves democrats.

This National Council for Democracy has acted in the truly African democratic way. The mindset is simple; I grab the power, the army is behind me and so then, are the people. At least, the ones that don’t want to be shot dead, raped, arrested and tortured to death or otherwise be molested by the state are.

I wonder when Guinea will be holding it’s first “democratic” election? Surely, that must be the goal of the National Council for Democracy?

Don’t hold your breath while you’re waiting.

Cold Earth

It hasn’t been a good day for the greenies. While the EU greenies have been banging the drum and yahooing over the great environmental victory in Poland, the news came out that the planet is getting colder (again, for the ninth year running) and that 2008 will be the coldest year since 1999.
In fact, since 1999, there has been no global warming. Just cooling.

Of course, the greenies have the explanation ready. It’s El Niña. Which is like El Niño in reverse. Apparently this “El” sucks the warmth from the earth like an arctic wind up your trouser leg.  And talking of the Arctic; More bad news. You remember the disappearing polar ice round the North Pole? Well, it isn’t actually disappearing.  It’s increasing in size daily. The Polar bears are apparently jubilant. Not to mention a few Eskimos, who are proclaiming that it’s really nice and cold right now.

I’m sure that governments around the world will ignore this but in the light of this unfortunate truth, I wonder;
Why am I paying all that extra tax for something that isn’t happening?

Mr. Gore?

Please?

Not Our Militants…

Speaking in Islamabad, Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister, of whom I am not a great fan, has been criticising Pakistan openly about it’s terrorist population. He seems to have been, for once, well advised. I read the article linked below in the Timesonline, and found the following two paragraphs:

“Three quarters of the most serious plots investigated by the British authorities have links to al-Qaeda in Pakistan,” said Mr Brown in a press conference alongside Mr Zardari in the presidential palace in Islamabad. “The time has come for action, not words.”

And just what action would that be, Mr. Brown? What would you expect when you receive such a reply, as follows here?

However he was rebuffed at the press conference by President Zardari, who refused to acknowledge Pakistani militants’ involvement in the Mumbai attacks. Pakistani officials admit that “non-state actors” in Pakistan may have been involved, but say they must tread carefully to prevent a backlash from the Pakistani public or from the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency, Pakistan’s military-run spy organisation.

They also say they are growing increasingly frustrated that Indian authorities have yet to show them any evidence against the Pakistani militants they been under pressure to arrest.

President Zardari, the terrorists, the Pakistani public and the Inter-services Intelligence agency all appear to be in the same corner of the ring.

Now why doesn’t that surprise me?

Because, and let’s be honest here, Pakistan is the main actor in the terrorist war. They are not our allies. They are housing, fuelling, financing, feeding, training and arming the terrorists as a proxy army and have been doing so for the past ten years.

Why should it be necessary for India to have to “produce evidence” before Pakistan can arrest it’s militants? Is militancy an accepted and respected occupation in Pakistan? It’s a crime anywhere else.

Oh yes. We need some action Mr. Brown. But who’s going to invade Pakistan now?

Timesonline.

How to Beat the Recession

I’m sure by now that we’re all pretty clear over the situation in what we laughingly call the global economy. As if the globe ever had an economy as such. It’s in what money people like to call recession. I have bad news for them. My economy has been in recession for years but I’ve learned to live with it. This global recession is going to hurt a lot of people, me included, and therefore I am looking at new ways to improve my financial well being. I think I may have come up with something. It’s a plan so sneaky, you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel.

See, we all know that global warming is worrying a lot of people, even though it seems to have stopped and has very little to do with any and all human activity. We all also know, that if one incorporates a green element in anything these days, money will come rolling at it like melting snow down a mountain in avalanche season. People, even poor people, will consider throwing hard earned money at anything that will reduce the amount of CO2 gathering in our industrially violated and over heated atmosphere and thereby save the planet. Recession or not, this is pretty much fact. Unlike man made global warming, which isn’t. And so, I have the basis for a really good scam environmentally sound project that will help me millions. It involves trees and virtually no expense to set up.

This is what you do. Create a website. Offer to plant trees in some remote part of Africa on behalf of both the environment and starving millions of children who have no clothes, parents or trees to climb. Include pictures of these famished and impoverished children in a desert landscape with no trees. Point out that their misery is caused by man made global warming and only man made global warming, which is, of course, our fault and that we are responsible for their plight. Also, make a strong case for trees as a way of reducing the man made and evil CO2.
Include a selection of trees available for planting. The trees must be available in varying price ranges so that even the most destitute can afford one. Hook it up with Paypal or something similar to get easy payment.
Have pictures of a plant nursery in Africa with loads of baby trees just waiting to be planted. Explain that planting trees costs money and that the money people donate will ensure that their very own tree gets put into fertile soil and will be taken care of by highly trained orphans who now have food, clothes, a job for life and are otherwise benefiting from this fiscal support while dramatically reducing levels of CO2.

Then sit back and let the cash roll in. Ha, I hear you say. It can’t be done. Nobody would fall for that one. Well, here’s where I got the idea and they’re going for a billion dollars, one dollar at a time. Who’s laughing now then?

If that doesn’t work, then apply for a United Nations grant to help you study “The effects of man made global warming on the failure of tree planting schemes to generate extra cash flow in the private sector”.

Either one should be an earner…!

Good Cop – Bad Cop

I couldn’t help feeling a bit miffed at the news today concerning the police in South Jutland. They have been told by their bosses to drop everything else and concentrate on writing traffic tickets all through December. Why? Well, it’s all very simple. They have a quota to fill and they are about 150 tickets short of reaching their “goal”.

This does’t really surprise me, as I have known for years that the police here are self financing and that there is no money in catching the real criminals. However, the streets are full of cars and it is surprisingly easy to grab anyone driving one and criminalise them. There is always something. A light that doesn’t work, no seat belt, driving without your license in your pocket, speeding, tyre tread depth, failing to indicate, even if you are the only on the road for miles and so on. There are a myriad of things a policeman could use against you and the vehicle you are driving. Declaring your innocence, or difference of opinion, only increases the size of your inevitable fine and may get you arrested. For which, you may be fined again.

All this may have gone unnoticed but for the outspoken police shop stewards in the South Jutland area. They find the whole affair distasteful to say the least. Not because they get to nick a few more drivers, that’s acceptable, but to do so at the expense of clearing up the real serious crime is really rather pushing things a bit.

Local police union spokesmen are claiming that some pretty serious cases are being relegated to the back of the queue in preference to policing the traffic. Cases concerning break-ins, drug pushing and incest are being left to wither on the vine while the boys in blue are out chasing the unwary and probably non-violent, well heeled, motorists.

All this makes me wonder a bit. Since when did crime and policing become quota related? Do the real criminals know that they are only allowed a certain amount of criminal acts a year before their quota is used up? What action do the police take when they have fulfilled the quota on rape charges and burglary? Stop investigating them? Is the violent crime quota higher or lower that the traffic violation quota? How are the quotas assigned priority? This is all very worrying.

I can hear the morning briefing at the local bobby shop;

“Enough rape lads, concentrate on bag snatchers now. We’ve only had three so far this year and that’s way under the mark. And we’re a bit behind on litterbugs too so keep an eye on those evil pedestrians. By the way, no more drug pushers, we’re way over the quota as it is. The burglar we clobbered last night is of no use to us either because we met that target number last week, but we might be able to cut a deal and persuade him to bang his sister after we turn him loose and then we can meet the incest quota, so let’s work on that one. Now take care out there, and let’s do it to them before they do it to us.”

Theme from “New York Blues” plays in the background…..

What ever happened to the good old days when the police really were the police and not just tax collectors?