Hi people, its been a while but time for the ol’ Beatbeast to boom one out at you! You may not care about anything I have to say and that’s ok – you don’t have to read it – but if we meet and it gives us something to argue about then that is a good thing and if I put the grain of an idea in your mind then that is good to. These are my thoughts and I offer them for free – no need to answer back and no slight taken on either side.
First off, a question: what was the single biggest story of the weekend? The sad death of a pop star whose life was blighted by too many people trying to make a living off her fragile grip on reality? A lone right-wing saddo who was bright enough to work out where the most targets could be found for the least danger to himself? The rumblings of the fading echoes of parliamentary careers as politicians with too much hubris took on some genuinely tough businesspeeps and rolled over as they were lied to? (Getting Rebeka Brookes to admit she had a diary was not exactly a major win). All this as well as the total absorption by the press for weeks of the ‘Phone Hacking Scandal’ as though it meant a damn thing. But the head of the Metropolitan Police and the head of London’s counter-terrorism team have been forced to resign, leaving a gaping hole at the head of London’s police force and every other top-cop in the land defocusing from their real work in order to try and jockey into the role. Think about it - a few celebs had their phone messages listened to because they were too lazy or stupid to clear them down and the police, reasonably, considered it was of so little importance that they pretty well ignored it – mistake but not a crisis for crissakes. Messing with Milly Dowler’s voicemail was criminal because it interfered with the investigation but SHE WAS ALREADY DEAD!
SENSE OF PERSPECTIVE TIME GUYS – why are we surprised when we begin to dig into the dirt and guess what? A few coppers are guilty of taking bungs from lazy journos, a couple of political appointments have been made to mates and someone got a mate’s daughter a job for which she was well suited. What the hell would we expect? When the Macmillan government nearly fell in 1963 it was because the Minister for War denied, to the parliament, that he was shagging a prostitute shared with a spy of a country at which we were at war. This was a scandal – a proper scandal and it took some real journalistic digging to get to the bottom of it; and no doubt a few palms got greased along the way and a few favours got called in but that is was and is the way that news is got. Rumour here and a bit of skulduggery there and you start to get a glimpse at the truth. Problem here is that the truth is so bloody insignificant as to be not worth hearing.
No, the real story, and the one that seems to have shown up almost nowhere in the last few weeks is that the US Economy is about to default on its debts . Proper scary time chaps and chapesses – the US Dollar backs up nearly every other currency in the world – if America defaults on its debts we could be deeper in the shitter than we have ever been – the recent ‘Credit Crunch’ and the recession that followed it could be as minor, in comparison, as a gnat bite in the middle of a stampede. And all this because a few US Republicans are angling for a short term deal that will raise itself up again next year just before the Presidential election. The US Economy is seriously in trouble, same as the UK and same as the Eurozone, but it is recoverable – only not if the politicians allow it to fall apart to score a few points – anyone bought into Gold lately? Anyone notice that today the price of gold went through the $1650 per ounce mark – once again congratulations to Chancellor/Prime Minister/Saviour of the worlds enconomies (in his mind at least) Gordon Brown, for selling the UK’s gold reserves at the bottom of the market and advertising the fact which forced the price down even further – the difference between what he sold it for and what it is now worth would pay off the debt that he and his government left us with FIVEFOLD! Give this man the peerage he so richly deserves – sorry, I mean make him work for us for nothing until it is all paid for – shouldn’t take more than a thousand years or so.
For those living in London here is something to consider: the last two London Mayors have been fanatically anti-car. Ken Livingstone tried to tax us all to pay for ridiculous buses that can’t even turn some of the corners in the centre of town (after promising to keep the Routemaster) and changed all the traffic light phasing to ensure that traffic couldn’t possibly flow along the main thoroughfares and he=is successor introduced ‘Cycle Superhighways’ that cut three lane roads to a single lane for the fastest moving traffic without reducing the amount of that traffic one jot. Between them they managed to introduce rules that say that cyclists can whizz unimpeded through red lights and travel the wrong way up any one way street they like. These same two idiots are standing for London Mayor again next year – do you think it will get any better? Look very carefully at the list of possible candidates (there will eventually be more than the two idiots) and ask them all the same question “What are you going to do to get the cars and vans moving again?”London needs a combination of Tubes, buses, cars, vans, cycles and motorbikes and pedestrians but it needs them in balance.
We don’t need a pro-car mayor or an anti-bike one but it does need one to understand that the Tube is pretty well at capacity and that the buses can’t get around when they have to leave the bus lanes to overtake cycles and that sometimes driving in and parking your car is the best option. When the election comes think about your choices and don’t just vote for an idiot!
Next summer there is going to be a city that could reasonably be described as hell on earth to its inhabitants. The transportation system is going to fail, the smog and pollution is going to be causing respiratory issues to millions of people, work will suffer as this particular city grinds to a halt and the city government and the organizing committee of the London Olympiad will declare these games the greatest in history.
There is a capacity problem on the tubes and buses NOW – if 10% more people take to using public transport it will collapse – not my words but those of the Mayors office. WE ARE AT CAPACITY. But next year we are going to see ‘Olympic’ travel lanes cutting down the capacity of the main thoroughfares, millions more tourists, Crossrail still causing massive disruption. If a single car breaks down in the wrong place the traffic jams will take days to clear. If you are a Londoner and you love your city BE SOMEWHERE ELSE for the two weeks of the Olympics. If 10% of Londoners go somewhere else for that two weeks maybe the city will have the space to absorb the influx. If 15% do then that should be enough to ensure that London actually does have the most successful games in history – do the patriotic thing and go away for the Olympics.
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