BRENDA'S BIN (out of granthamnewtown@blogspot.com)

It's as if the 1930s never happened as mankind simply refuses to learn!  At times of strife and financial hardship far right maniacs emerge intent on whipping up the masses by offering up one group supposedly to blame for all the ills. Hitler rounded on the Jews. Today's ignorant, uncaring, thick and dangerous generation of mindless rabble rousers have focused in on a new and yet similar minority - immigrants. The lunatic Trump has just told a rally of fanatical cult members that immigrants are "poisoning the blood of our country". Suella Braverman similarly dog whistled by claiming multiculturalism had failed - her being from a family of immigrants from Africa/Asia and having risen to the office of Home Secretary - and the UK faced a "hurricane" of incoming migrants. Now Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has topped her insane drive to victimise. Sunak, AGAIN from a family of recent immigrants from Africa, dished out just what his audience wanted at a meeting of fa...

Why, oh why, oh why do programme makers assume that people left at home on Saturday nights are knuckle-dragging Neanderthals with the intelligence of a thrre-pin plug? Ok, a lot of them are, but that's not the point. While millions of our compatriots get ABSOLUTELY blind pisssed BEFORE heading out on the town to start fights in pubs, shag in bus shelters, throw up in taxis and head to casualty with a range of facial wounds, some of us poor bastards are left at home to make our own entertainment. For those of us who don't have a fucking piano or an interest in charades, Trivial Persuit, pass-the-bastard-parcel or pin-the-bleeding-tail-on-the-sodding-donkey.........or any fucking friends.........there is just one recourse to time-passing - the Devil's Lantern. Sadly, the TV programmers have decided to cater for those out causing alcohol-fuelled mayhem and not those left behind. Pither finds himself one of the "left-behinders" on this Saturday night and the televisio...

The headline screamed: "Ukranian Councillor Injures 26 After Setting Off Three Hand Grenades At Village Meeting!" As a former hack of 30 years' standing I have covered countless parish council meetings and you know what? I kinda know how he must have felt!

Former Trinity Mirror CEO Sylvia "Sly" Bailey and professional dickhead Piers Morgan have at least two things in common: 1. They both have faces you would like to slap. 2. They both knew phone hacking was going on at The Daily Mirror, a judge has concluded. PHONE HACKING, unless carried out permissibly by a government agency, IS ILLEGAL. Glenn Mulcaire was jailed for six months when he was found to have violated the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 in the News of the World scandal. The judge mentioned above, who sat on the civil case against The Mirror, was told that the paper was still hacking phones during the Leveson Inquiry into......into.....urmm........that News of the World phone hacking! Police are said to be considering the evidence and findings of the civil action brought against The Mirror and, even though the required standard of proof is higher in a criminal court, Bailey and Morgan must surely be charged? Put the evidence before a jury. Let them decid...

A financial crisis at the country's biggest water company, Thames Water, has shone a bright light on the insanity of privatising public utilities. The situation at Thames came to light when executives fessed up to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee this week. The MPs heard that the company was sitting on a £14.7 BILLION debt pile and currently was not able to make its next loan repayment of £190 million. A cursory bit of investigation found latest available figures show the nation's 15 privatised water companies, many owned by foreign investors and with somewhat unclear, precise ownership, have run up debts totalling £60.6 BILLION from two years after they were privatised in 1989 up until March last year. (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-06-30/rising-inflation-means-british-water-companies-are-leaking-money). The firms have, meanwhile, paid out £57 BILLION to shareholders from 1991 to 2019 - ALMOST HALF THE AMOUNT SPENT ON REPAIRING AND IMPROVING PIP...

One hilarious outcome of the Rwanda vote is already known, hours before the division bell sounds in the House of Commons. Members of the International Development Committee were scheduled to visit the Caribbean but the "business" trip has been cancelled so all MPs are on hand to take part in the crucial vote Tory nutters hope will get asylum seekers dumped in Rwanda. I love the irony of it. The Tories are so desperate to see flighs take off that they've cancelled one!  Those poor IDC members. Still, I believe their "fact finding" trips are still on to the the Chessington World of Adventure, Disneyland and Alton Towers.

Dubai, one of the world's largest oil producers, is hosting COP 28. With that logic, any future Truth and Reconciliation meetings should be held at Jeffrey Archer's House! So, what exactly, is COP (Conference of the Parties). Well: 1. It's aim is to internationally assess progress made by the "parties" towards limiting climate change against the overall goal of the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) - overall, to stop global temperatures rising by 1.5C. 2. Burning of fossil fuels is by far the largest contributor to climate change,  accounting for more than 75 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions. So, what does COP 28 do? It draws up an "agreement" which FAILS to include a demand made by the majority of the world's nations for the use of fossil fuels to be "phased out". Supposedly an international body, COP'S massive cop out was brought about by th...

Trust the 100 or so hard right loons among the Tory MPs in government to name their totally unrecognised or official cabal of supposed legal advisors the "Star Chamber". It says SO much about these fanatics and how completely out of touch they are with reality in the UK. The press has dubbed this gaggle of far right MPs "The Five Families" in a nod to the Mafia's running of New York. Ain't that apposite! Back to Star Chamer. The original Court of Star Chamber was set up in the 15th Century - Jacob Rees-Mogg's vision for Britain where he and his pals think they do, or should, reside. Also, the original Court was " used later on in its history as an instrument of  oppression  rather than for the purpose of  justice  for which it was intended." Ring any bells? If that ain't the aim and record of the Tory right then I don't know what is. Surprisingly, this grandiose-sounding bag of donkey's doo-dahs has concluded Sunak's Rwanda Bill...

The rise of market Capitalism has seen the fall of some our biggest industries and journalism can be added to that list. As a former scribe I can attest to how, like shipbuilders, coalminers, steelworkers et al, our jobs left us, rather than us leaving our jobs. The decline of reporting has been a slow bleed of strength, prevalence and professionalism and I have railed before against the tumbling standards of many reporters and news desks these days (sub-editors long since having been replaced by computer programmes). The tired practice of asking and at the same time answering questions of interviewees is just one example. You know, "How disastrous is this?" and "How unwelcome is that?" Tautology is another. "So, here I am, outside OF Mogadishu" and "He met WITH the Prime Minister". One that has recently caught my eye is the ridiculous practice of bellowing questions from 30 yards away behind a police cordon at someone as they walk into a meeting...