You may have seen the recent campaign on Sky (TV) for this ‘Leaders’ Debate.

Now I get very uncomfortable when a tabloid channel like Sky starts using its muscle to stage a beauty competition which will undoubtedly go some way in determining the direction of our Country for the next four years.

Will the debate happen… well it’s all about Murdoch at the end of the day?

Murdoch is a man that tends to get what he wants and has an uncanny knack of backing winners… he sided with Thatcher and Blair.

Recently Cameron accepted free flights to hold private talks and attend private parties with Murdoch on his yacht, where I would think, they dreamed up this genius plan to turn our political voting process into the Fucking X Factor.

What next, strictly Politics… fuck it, lets have Political cage fighting or just ‘cut to the quick’ and see which of them has the biggest dick…hmmm.

Brown is now in an impossible position, if he says no he will be portrayed by the Murdoch media machine as a coward and this decision will be shoved in our faces right up to polling day… If he says yes, he will be at the mercy of the Sky editors who will destroy him on camera and the heavily edited clips of him performing badly will serve only to further boost Murdoch… sorry, Cameron!

If there is going to be a debate it needs to be ‘network’ wide and run by an independent body… done properly.

We actually have a place for political debate… it called the Houses of Parliament, you can’t miss it… big building in Westminster.

Have a happy damn Tuesday    

I posted a blog a week or so ago with regards to Payment Terms.

An issue that I know many feel pretty strongly about.

The petition that I logged has been accepted and now requires signatures.

We will need at least 200 signatures for consideration but around a 1000 signatures to make a real impact.

If you feel that this is something worth spending a couple of minutes on I would really appreciate it if you could hit the link at the bottom and add your name to the list. Please feel free to pass the link to anybody that you think would benefit from this proposal.

I will be leaving updates on the MySpace and the word-press site below.

Please don’t hesitate in contacting me if you have any questions or comments:

http://quadie.wordpress.com/

Proposing:

Introduce an industry standard contractual payment term of no greater than 28 days from receipt of invoice.

http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/PaymentTerms/

Have a Grand weekend

I hate the train companies…

Now this may be as a result of the shitty service that’s lodged in my memory, a service that never justified the amount paid for a ticket. I know that this has changed but I also know that this continues to ring true in many areas.

But the thing that is really pissing me off at the moment is this recent posturing and baulking by the rail companies at the thought of ticket prices being forced lower come January next year (Ticket prices are linked to the Retail Price Index, which is expected to dip below zero by July,  when next year's prices are calculated).

So here is the thing, all the time that inflation has been on the up tickets have risen... but not just with inflation, above the rate of inflation, that’s ABOVE the rate of inflation.

Now the rail companies want to sever the link between themselves and the RPI (funny that) saying that a reduction would cause the service to enforce service reduction and redundancies… Bollocks, utter bollocks.

These are typical fucking scare tactics and comments of a small group of greedy fucks desperate to protect their six figure bonuses.

These companies have more cash stuffed in the mattress than you can wave a stick at… and do you know why? Well, it may be something to do with the British commuter having been paying the highest train fares in Europe for years… up to four times as high in some areas.

So, we now have the rail companies kicking off at the prospect of someone saving £40 on a £2000 annual season ticket… the sheer arrogance of some of these companies never ceases to amaze me.

Considering how much I’m pissed off about this I thought I kept the swear count quite low!!

OK… I love Thursdays, so I hope you have a damn good one.

(does anyone else think that Jamie Carragher is the Scouse-est man on the planet!?)

I’m not too sure if any of you have a Facebook account… I have. I guess, if you enjoy the internet and bouncing around you will try most things.

But to be honest, I just don’t get Facebook… You spend an absolute age trying to find people that you once knew and surprise, surprise… you still have absolutely nothing in common with them. In fact, the only thing that you ‘ever’ had in common with most of these people was that you went to the same school.

Then there is the time spent just… well looking at the damn site, it has got to be the biggest killer of time ever and I have been as guilty of this as anyone…

But this is what makes me chuckle more than anything about this site, the time invested in avoiding actually socialising with people. Now believe me, everybody does this.

There is a little button that you hit to take yourself on or off line… you hit the button to see who is online, 98% of the time there is either no one you want to chat to or no one at all, then you hit it again, quickly, to get yourself off line just in case someone dare try to talk to you!

Social Network my arse!

Have a happy Damn Tuesday

I have recently been on Jury service and I can tell you, it has had a profound effect on me.

The case I was on has left me sick to the pit of my stomach… not because of the detail in the case but because of the decision that we arrived at (by majority 10 to 2-I was in the minority). The conclusion of which meant letting a previously convicted sex offender walk free. I may go into this in some detail at a later date.

But I can now say, with a fair degree of confidence, that there are people that are called into Jury Duty that just shouldn’t be there, stating the obvious I know.

Some of the Jurors lacked attention span, common sense, rational thinking and basic intellect.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that I’m some fucking genius but I do possess the basic tools to analyse and evaluate… unlike other members of the Jury that I was on.

What is evident is that the Jury system needs some thought, I’m not suggesting that we have ‘professional’ Jurors… that would cause a huge conflict and rightly so (prosecuted by the crown and the facts presided over by a Jury paid by the crown… hmmm!).

There needs to be a process in place for sorting out the incapable and the uninterested… even if it’s a questionnaire that comes with the summons. I’m sure there is some bright fucking spark out there that can put together 20 questions that will go some way in determine whether  the candidate is suitable or not.

I am assuming that most of you that read this are of sound mind and hold a fair degree of common sense, if you are called upon to attend Jury Duty… GO, the system needs you to maintain the balance between the good and the damn right shite!!

I feel a petition coming on!
Anyway, have a happy Damn weekend

There is no denying that on occasion I have wished for more than prison for some convicted criminals… I even blogged about how unhappy I was that Huntley didn't quite pull off his suicide attempt…

And I understand why the families of the five women murdered in Ipswich are calling for that monster (Wright) to be executed, who's to say I wouldn't feel the same if something similar happened to a member of my family 

But do I really believe that the death penalty should return… no.

See, the way I see it is that the death penalty should be, like any other penalty, a deterrent and I am not convinced that it is. Look to the countries that that still practice the death penalty, do you see year on year falls in crime as a result on the maximum punishment being handed out… no.

And I know you could argue that if the death penalty didn't exist that crime would be higher but I am still not convinced.

I think that monsters like Huntley, Wright and Sutcliffe etc. would have still killed whether the death penalty was still around as the last they had on their mind was consequence, as they were/are sick and deranged.

This is not to say that I am completely happy with which the way they are treated in prison… I think that their existence should be just that… a mere existence, no press exposure when one of these sick fucks gets a kicking and when they get life, it means life and add to that just three privileges eat, shit and sleep.

Really sorry for being so grim on a Friday… believe it or not, I actually feel pretty 'chipper' today!

Anyway, have a blindin weekend and have a happy damn Friday