2017
February 3 2017
If you check through the archives you will see that I have been grumpily moaning about many things since May 2015. However, I stopped being grumpy, or at
least in written form, at the end of September last year.
I'm back and to restart things one very small moan. I am well aware that the new POTUS has enormous powers and, it would seem, a minute brain. However,
whatever he may tell his adoring public, he cannot ever make America great again. America is a continent, some divide north and south. He is president of a
collection of states in one minor part of that great continent, The states, when they got together, decided they were united so called themselves the United States
of America. Now, it may well have been a printing error and they meant the untied states of America but whichever it was, the country is the United States. That is
its name. The abbreviation POTUS is President of the United States. That is all he is, which may in my eyes be rather too much, but that is all he is.
All he can do is make the United States great again within America and personally I don't think he's on to a winner with that aim anyway.
OK, end of first moan of the new series.
February 10 2017
Let's turn my moan this week to our beloved, by themselves, government. The National Health Service is in crisis. Everyone knows that. The health minister,
Jeremy Hunt, admits some of the situations that occur are unacceptable. But then he starts saying things that really have no bearing, and certainly no effect, on
this mounting crisis.
He says its not just us who have this problem. Does that mean it's acceptable. If I go to my own doctor and tell him I have torn my ankle ligaments, is it
fine for him to tell me that other people have this problem. No. I want him to treat my problem. Much of this is caused by an ageing population. Was this a surprise?
Are we being told that the government, no matter which one, and the civil servants who advise them didn't realise we would all be living longer? Well, I knew.
Shouldn't these people in power, who make, or advise on, decisions have spotted this fact?
Then little frightened Jeremy announced in true Baldrick fashion that he had a cunning plan but unlike Baldrick he hasn't yet told us what it is, possibly
so we don't look at him with incredulity that he could be so stupid.
The facts are simple. People are living longer and many of them need extra care beyond what families can provide. There are more people in this country
than, say, twenty years ago. Therefore, even if only 20% of us need medical care, that is still a greater number than twenty years ago.
Amazingly, simple little me thinks the answer is simple too. We need more doctors, nurses, hospitals, care homes and care workers. What have we got? We
have, and I do know I've been here before, hospital trusts with chair-people and board members and god knows who else all sitting around, taking large salaries
and deciding how best to solve the crisis that is partly of their making. We don't need them, they are not health care professionals. We don't need busy bodies
compiling statistics about how many people were treated in A&E last Shrove Tuesday and how many were caused by frying pans burns. We need a few spare(ish) doctors
and/or nurses that can be called up when these type of events occur and can be called up by other doctors and nurses who are monitoring the events.
I make a habit of not going back and reading my posts for two very good reasons. One, as a perfectionist, I would almost certainly want to change them but
secondly, I don't want to influence myself. I am an open-minded person who can change their mind. I don't want to influence myself in any way. However, I know,
somewhere back in the dim and possibly not too distant pass, I had this moan before. There are too many people, mainly desk job people, who actually contribute
nothing to how services are run.
And, should any of them question me on this, I would merely point out that we are in this mess today, with our National Health Service, because somebody
behind a desk didn't have the brains to plan for the future. It wasn't that hard to spot this crisis coming. I would love to know how much money could be saved
if all trusts, committees, inspectorates, O&M experts and indeed management consultants were obliterated. How many more of the real experts, those who make a
difference to our lives, the doctors and nurses, could we have? I think the answer would be very interesting. Maybe Jeremy Baldrick should think about this.
Oh, and if you are familiar with the Facial Action Coding System, micro-expressions or even just body language, I would ask you to watch again Mr Hunt's
interview with Hugh Pym on BBC.
February 17 2017
I consider myself an intelligent human being. Sometimes these days I look around me and consider myself a very intelligent human being. Therefore, when
I made my decision to vote “leave” in last June's referendum, I had weighed up all the facts. David Cameron had failed to negotiate any meaningful changes to
our membership and I could not see how this “club”, which initially started as a free trade organisation but had now become, or was attempting to become,
a union of 28 different countries, all with different aims, needs and cultures, would ever work. The people of this country were given, stupidly in my opinion,
the chance to decide and we did. Democracy spoke and we were leaving.
Imagine my surprise today when a man who has shown in the past he is totally capable of making a decision without even knowing all the facts, is capable
of ignoring the facts he is given and will ride rough shod over democracy at any opportunity, tells me we should rise up against this democratic decision,
possibly becoming the Jack Cade of the modern world.
Mr Bliar (intentionally misspelt), go away. Hide your face in shame for at least another 20 years. I fully understand that you cannot possibly be
supportive of a party leader who has principles and seems very honest. I am delighted that your ex-colleague, well your ex ex colleague Lord Mandelson is
doing everything he can to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn. I have no idea if he has received a loan from anyone to do this, and forgotten to reveal it, technically
not wrong of course, or if he has received a donation from some Indian and phoned a government department while thinking his private secretary made the call,
again only for 2 minutes and just asking, you know. Let's just say he, like you, has no outstanding track record of honesty and so I think it best if he shuts
up too. I don't have to agree with all Jeremy Corbyn's policies but I do respect the man, I have absolutely no respect for you or the Prince of Darkness. Go away.
Together if you want.
February 24 2017
I am having a bit of a problem at the moment, I detest Donald Trump. I don't like his behaviour, his facial expressions, his attitude of gloating and
how he treats law and order. There are many other things I don't like too but let's not worry about them.
However, his attitude about the press, and fake news, does ring very true. Thanks to how journalists have behaved in the last years, I now no longer
believe anything I read or hear reported. The words, an unnamed spokesman said, or a close friend of X revealed, immediately set off alarm bells. The modern
journalist, or at least many of them, could show Hans Christian Anderson a thing or two. Leave aside the hacking of phones, the hidden microphones etc,
just read the words.
It is fake news although I actually argue as to whether so many things which fill our papers these days are indeed news. Anything a celebrity does
isn't news, it's gossip. Now the beauty, in a way, is that gossip is hearsay. The dictionary definition of gossip is “casual or unconstrained conversation
or reports about other people, typically involving details which are not confirmed as true”.
Need I say more. Our media, news agencies, reporters are no longer feeding us news they are peddling gossip. Donald has got it slightly wrong by calling
it fake news. That's unfair, It is actually just genuine gossip, not proven to be true in any way, shape or form.
And social media has jumped on the bandwagon. Anyone can write anything and idiots, and their following lemmings, will believe it. This behaviour has
completely destroyed the beauty of modern technology and our chance to communicate so much better. So sad.
