Daily Telegraph in Treasonous Slur!

In a shocking departure from faithfully  reprinting corporate press releases word for word, as if that passes for journalism, the Del Tel has launched a scathing and treasonous attack on the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

"There's no greater feeling than saving/ending somebody's life"

From The Daily Mail:

He may be second line to the throne, but Prince William has described his job as a search and rescue pilot as his greatest calling in life.

The Duke of Cambridge has spoken movingly about the emotions of saving lives as an RAF helicopter pilot in never-before-seen footage of him on duty.

Documentary Helicopter Rescue, which is being broadcast tonight, captures footage of Prince William performing daring missions as a Search and Rescue captain in some of the country's most inhospitable regions.

Flt Lt Wales as he is known in the RAF said: 'There's no greater feeling than when you've actually done some good and saved someone's life.

From The Daily Mail:

Prince Harry has been wowing the crowds as part of an Army attack helicopter display team.

Harry, known as Captain Wales in the Army, was part of the Apache Attack Helicopter Display Team  among the aircraft at today's popular RAF Cosford Air Show, in Shropshire.

The 28-year-old, a co-pilot gunner, serves with the RAF's 662 Squadron of the Army Air Corps (AAC) from which the display crew-members have been selected this year...

Harry was among crew selected given his experience in the deadly Apache helicopter, which has seen combat most recently in Libya and Afghanistan.

'Why should we work? Our parents collect tax so we're entitled to benefit': Couple living off £170,000 handouts say working for the minimum wage is "A bit dull, yah?"

From The Daily Mail:

A young couple who receive more than £170,000 a year in benefits appeared on ITV's This Morning to defend their taxpayer-funded lifestyle.

William Windsor, 30, and Kate Middleton, 31, who live in a comfortable twenty-bedroom mansion in Norfolk and are expecting a daughter next year, say they are better off on £170,000 benefits and argue that unless they are able to find jobs that pay £180,000 a year or more, there's no point in working.

The couple also hit back at those who describe them as scroungers, arguing that because their hard-working parents have always collected rent and taxes, they are entitled to continue claiming for themselves.

Kate, who has worked in her parents' greeting card business in the past, said: "I don’t see that we’re living off the taxpayers, we’re entitled to the same money as his parents have been receiving all their lives."

.. and they both lived happily ever after.

Fun Online Polls: Royal Wedding and the AV referendum

The responses to last week's Fun Online Poll were as follows:

If you were in London this week, which of the following would you attend:

None of the [below] - 99 votes
Royal Wedding celebrations - 52 votes
The EDL counter demonstration - 33 votes
Peter Tatchell's counter-counter-demonstration - 10 votes
Other, please specify - 14 votes
The Islamist demonstration - 4 votes

Well, I hope you all had an enjoyable day doing whatever it was you were doing, you certainly had the weather for it, all these events seem to have gone without any major hitches.

For my part, I stayed in bed and watched "The Right Stuff" on the Freeview recorder, then I flicked through the channels until I found something non-wedding related. The next advert was for a Sainsbury's three-cases-of-beer* for £20 offer at which stage I scrambled in the car to whizz round to my nearest Sainsbury's to snap up six of the last few cases (it was restricted to six cases per customer per visit).

* One case = 15 x 440 ml cans.
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And lo, to this week's Fun Online Poll.

I am firmly in the Yes 2 AV camp. They've run an appalling campaign, but so what? It's better than FPTP and that is the end of that AFAIAC. I'm hardly the Lib Dems' biggest fan, but the argument that AV helps them doesn't wash with me, because by any objective standard, FPTP is unfairly stacked against them - more to the point, AV will hurt Labour and the Tories far more than it will help the Lib Dems, so overall, the LibLabConsensus will be weakened, however slightly.

Clearly, I've not convinced many people, and what saddens me are the people who say they'll vote FPTP in protest because AV is a cop-out and they'd prefer full PR. But out of interest, how are you going to vote?

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.

Wills & Kate - Souvenir Plate

Deeply Gratifying Google Searches

Wills and Kate, currently number 2 out of 1.4 million.

More Wills & Kate Fun

From The Times:

A recent scientific study has shown that there is a particular gene, present in two out of every five men, that makes them less likely to form a lasting monogamous relationship. So, certain men are biologically predisposed to cheat. Infidelity is in their DNA...

So, if you get married to somebody whose father and mother both had affairs...

Wills and Kate's faces spotted in pizza

The likeness is uncanny.

Hat tip.

NOW That's what I call cashing in!

Throne Up

Deeply Gratifying Google Searches

I'm not sure what I did to deserve just making it onto the first page of Google search results for Wills & Kate (out of 1.3 million results), apart from doing a cut and paste job on the front page of The Evening Standard, but hey, it's all good.

Wills and Kate Tomfoolery

Fun Online Polls: Wills and Kate; EU-bailouts

With a very good turnout (thanks to everybody who took part), the response to last week's Fun Online Poll Wills and Kate have decided to get married: what do you think? was as follows:

So what? 67%
Who are "Wills and Kate"? 21%
It is a great moment for national celebration! 12%

It seems that we're swimming against the tide on this one, as most of the newspapers devote at least a page every day to the topic, which usually include a brief explanation of who "Wills and Kate" actually are, to wit, a celebrity jobless couple from the South of England.
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The EU 'bailed out' Greece in February of this year, which was supposed to sort out 'financial instability in the Euro-zone' once and for all. It didn't of course, because the banks then go hunting for the next easy target, do a bit of rumour-mongering and short-selling, make a nice profit on the way down and then go running to the EU or the IMF for a bail out.

So next on the list was Ireland/Irish banks (the two are now more or less synonymous), who were successfully cajoled into accepting a bail out at the weekend.

These patterns tend to repeat themselves, I just wonder how good are we at recognising them? So that's the topic for this week's Fun Online Poll: "Which country will the EU 'bail out' next?"

FWIW, my money is on Portugal, as it is easier to bully small countries, even though logic says that Spain are in a bigger mess, relatively, having had a far larger land price bubble. If they try this with Italy, the banks might find that they have bitten off more than they can chew, and there must come a stage where we realise that the European Central Bank emperor is not wearing any clothes.

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.

Wills & Kate

Fun Online Polls: Votes for prisoners, Wills and Kate

Thanks to everybody who took part in last week's Fun Online Poll (a high turnout with 149 votes, but it ran for two days longer than normal). Results as follows:

What do you think of 'votes for prisoners'?

All the more reason to leave the EU (even though this was an ECHR decision) - 41%
I am opposed - 37%
I am not bothered either way - 15%
Other, please specify - 7%

So there we have it. I personally am not bothered either way, but if the issue helps stoke anti-EU sentiment, even if the case was decided by the European Court of Human Rights, which is a quite separate institution, then it's all good.

As far as I can see, as long as we have first-past-the-post, then most people's votes are effectively worthless anyway, so whether prisoners are allowed to cast a worthless vote or not* is neither here nor. Indeed, I lived in Germany for nine years and being a foreigner, wasn't allowed to vote at all, big deal.

* As Leg-Iron points out, it might get a bit icky if all inmates were allowed to vote in the local elections wherever the prison happened to be.
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On a lighter note, apparently a celebrity jobless couple from the South of England, referred to as Wills and Kate by the media have decided to get married at some unspecified point in the future. Our current Prime Minister, possibly the most out-of-touch politician in British history, responded thusly:

"As well as this being a great moment for national celebration, I think we also have to remember that this is two young people who love each other who have made this announcement, who are looking forward to their wedding, and we must give them plenty of space to think about the future and what they are about to do."

How about giving a moment's thought to all the young couples who have jobs and are thinking of 'settling down', and addressing the issue of why they can't afford to buy a house, let alone for Mum to give up work to have kids (unless they are out of work, in which case they would appear to have our Prime Minister's blessing), eh?

So that's this week's (belated) Fun Online Poll: "Wills and Kate have decided to get married: what do you think?"

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.

I am Banksy!