Blackbird in the garden

We have a Blackbird in our garden - or perhaps its "his" garden. He gets excited about us using it or working in it anyway. As I type this he's sat on the grass about ten feet away letting me know in no uncertain terms that I'm intruding.

As for what he's saying to poor old Madam Paddy Cat who only came out to check the bird bath was full and the water met her quality standards - well, I suspect its not polite.

American Diplomacy?

Mrs Clinton has certainly sunk even further in my opinion. It was pretty low anyway, but now its probably subterranean. Why? Quite simple really, how do you offend the British?

Refer to the Falkland Islands as "Los Malvinas" when addressing a British audience and then lecture us on "returning them to the Argentinians." Patently this arrogant woman is as ignorant of history as she is devoid of sense.

It is not form her, Washington, Buenos Aires or, indeed, Whitehall to decide who the Falklands belong to. The people there are the only opinion that counts and they wish to be British and remain British.

Public Service?

Regular readers will know I don't like civil servants or politicians. It's not that they are deliberately evil, obstructive or incompetent, it's just that they have collectively reduced Western Civilisation to a morass of garbled ideologies, unnecessary legislation and thrown away everything that was good or even valuable in the process.

Witterings from Whitney has an excellent video clip speech by a man we should all listen to carefully.

What he says about the mythology that has grown up to defend the passage of ideologues from University, through a Quango, Parliamentary internship and thence directly to senior office in a Civil Service post or as an elected politician without ever having worked in the real world is well worth hearing. Thomas Sowell knows what he is talking about.

Now perhaps someone will tell us why working for a fat salary, bloated pension and 'Honours' available only to bureaucrats should be considered any more of a "public service" than Joe, the Rag and Bone man who collects and recycles all the junk we're too lazy to take down to the dump? OK, so Joe can and sometimes does make a million out of doing the work for himself - its still a damned sight more of a "Public Service" than the toad in Whitehall who steeples his fingers and quotes "Treasury Rules" at you when you ask for some assistance in negotiating the tangled web of ideologically inspired and frequently contradictory legislation that same toad drafted, but now blames on "The Minister."

Seems to me its time to do a Mao Tse Tung and send all these folk to Labour Camps...

Extreme Weather ...

The appalling images of the tornado that swept through the city of Joplin in Missouri yesterday speak loudly of the power of nature. I'm sure though that someone is already blaming it all on "Anthropomorphic Global Warming" and building the propaganda campaign for the "Climate Change" hysterics of Greenpeace et al. The truth is that the particular region of the US is known as "Tornado Alley" for a reason - it gets tornadoes on a regular basis annually. What does vary year on year is the number of such storms and the strength of the twisters they generate.

For some time now there have been predictions that sooner or later a big one would hit a town or city. Joplin may not be one of the major cities, but I think everyone now has a fair idea of what to expect the day one does hit Kansas City or one of the other major centres.

I think two things are at work here. The climate is certainly a part of it and it certainly is changing, but how much influence mankind has on that is what is, in my mind, very much open to debate. I am not convinced that reducing our CO2 output - and thereby reducing the world atmospheric CO2 level by something of the order of 0.0001% - will have any impact at all. The primary force at work here, according to the Climatologists whose work I am prepared to trust, is the North Atlantic Ocillation and a similar System at work over the North Pacific basin. It has all shifted slightly westward in the last couple of years and this has moved the jet streams - and they generate the weather.

One thing is certain, mankind has a lot to learn about our planet, our climate mechanisms actually operate. Reading up on the research behind what we do know (Or think we do) suggests that changes tend to take place on near geological time scales rather than in decades or even centuries. The second thing we need to take into account is the manner in which our ever increasing numbers place ever more people where they will be affected by extreme weather. A hundred years ago we didn't have anything like the numbers now living in flood plains, tornado alleys or on earthquake faults and the photographs from Japan, Thailand and New Zealand give us plenty to think about in terms of earthquakes. For me the image of a brick-built fire station torn apart, the appliance still inside but smashed to scrap says more loudly than anything else that we have no power whatsoever to divert or influence Mother Nature...

Warm and Sunny...

At least some of our planets like the warm and dry weather. These very colourful plants close at night and in rain, so they at least appreciate the sunny weather we're currently having. I'm afraid a lot of other plants aren't.

I expect the volcano currently sending vast clouds of ash and CO2 into the atmosphere will, eventually, have an impact on the weather in these latitudes, an ash cloud usually does. Will it accelerate the melting of the Arctic Ice or slow it? Will it bring us another cooler than average summer? Another colder than average winter? If the geologists are right, probably all of the above.

I wonder of the IPCC and all the "The Climate is Changing, we're all gonna die ..." mob will finally acknowledge that these volcanoes actually do more to make things change climatically than we human fleas ever can...

Waiting for rain ...

We've been promised rain now for the last four days, but, apart from a few drops occasionally, we haven't had any. We've watched in hope as thunder clouds have built to the west of us, then swept majestically past on either side. On Friday it rained in the valley below us - heavily - but not a drop up here on our moutain top.

So now we've used the lawn sprinklers. Even that didn't encourage the rain ...

Ah well, the weather forecast says it "might" rain next Thursday. I'll believe it when I see it. In the meantime people to the south of us have had more than they wanted or needed. At least it will put some more water into the rivers.

An absence of understanding ...

Seems to dominate the latest Obama Administrations proposal for a "Peace Settlement" in Israel/Palestine. If Mrs Clinton had taken the trouble to read a little more history than the condensed version from the back of a postage stamp, she might have come to realise that the 1967 boundaries were the result of an Arab sneak attack in 1956 that saw an invasion from Syria, Jordan and Egypt seize Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. A little more research and perhaps understanding instead of her preconceived notions and prejudices, might also lead her to realise that Israel will not surrender the one city above all others which is absolutely central to their identity as a nation. They will never consent to a partition of the city either or allow the Arabs to control their access to the Temple Mount.

It is time for Western politicians to stop meddling in matters they do not understand, or think they have some 'right' to interfere in.The 1967 boundaries allowed the Syrians to shell any town in Northern Israel from the Golan Heights, Gaza is a running sore, a cesspit that should be cleared and the murderous Hamas frontmen brought to the International War Crimes Court for trial. This latest "initiative" by Mrs Clinton should never have been given an airing, it will do nothing but incite the Palestinians and legitimise their continuing murder of Israelis.

I hope Mr Obama and his Administration will be prepared to accept the responsibility for the escalation when it commences, as I expect it will, within the next few months.