The Iranian Schindler
I wonder what the leaders of modern Iran will make of this story.
An Iranian diplomat saves fellow Iranians, who just happen to be Jews from the Nazi death camps. So to both Jews and Iranians he should be a hero. It also is a good story about Iran and a Muslim, who showed the civilised humanitarian values we expect from everyone.
Piers Morgan At The Leveson Enquiry
I’ve been listening to the Leveson Enquiry as Piers Morgan is being questioned
It is fascinating stuff, with words like hook and squirm coming to mind.
Interesting Comments On North Korea
Some wag has posted this as a comment to this article on The Times website.
What next? Simple. Send an X Box, PS3 and Iphone 4 to the young Kim with all the games available. Like any other Korean kid he will get addicted and leave the North Koreans alone. £2000 well spent.
He’d obviously need to be supplied with a decent broadband connection, but the South has some of the best in the world and I’m sure they could find a solution.
And here’s another one.
” I told you I was Kim Jong Il.”
(Apologies to the late, great Spike Milligan.)
There are lots more.
A Good Sign In Morpeth
I have various Google Alerts setup and one found this story from Morpeth in Northumberland.
Let’s hope it works and improves footfall to the shops.
As I found on my trip around all 92 League clubs, in many places signs are non-existent or downright useless. Many seem to have been designed by those, who have no idea what a visitor wants to do.
Good Riddance Kim Jong-il
Is there anything else to say after his death?
Except possibly the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t.
Farewell Vaclav Havel
The death of Vaclav Havel was not unexpected given his health problems. It is very sad and he will be missed by many. He would be on any sensible person’s list of the greatest of the twentieth century.
If I look at countries that have thrown off dictatorships successfully in the last few decades, they seem to have needed a figure to whom they could rally. The charismatic Havel was a supreme example as he took Czechoslovakia from under the heel of the Russians to a free and proud country.
He was no mean playwright either!
When we lived in that flat in St. John’s Wood, we had no television, but we did have a radio and often listened to it, after the children had gone to bed. Some nights we listened to the play on Radio 4.
One night, I can remembering listening to a play called The Memorandum by a Czech author. It may have starred Donald Pleasance, but I can’t find any reference to the production.
It is a superb play and one of the best I’ve heard on radio.
The author, who was unknown to both C and myself, was Vaclav Havel.
How many politicians, even the good ones, will be missed for what they did outside politics? Not many!
This Should Never Happen Again
The case of Dr. Eva Michalak should never happen again. Reading the story in The Times and on the BBC, it seems that the doctor did nothing wrong in her work, except decide to have a baby. That seemed to arouse the ire and vindictiveness of her colleagues and quite rightly, she has got a settlement to compensate for the career they destroyed.
My main problem with this case, is that it would appear that none of her colleagues, have been disciplined in any way. That may not be the case, but as in so many cases like this secrecy may have been used to protect the guilty.
Every person, who runs a large company or organisation, has a duty to all their employees to make sure things like this don’t happen. It could also be argued that they must manage the organisation, so that no employee is pushed into a position, that will cost their company a lot of money. Is the Chief Executive still employed by the Trust? I hope not!
Take a New Routemaster to Romantic Clapton Pond on the 20th of February 2012
I’d thought that the new Routemaster was going to be introduced on the route 38 between Victoria and Clapton Pond and today it was confirmed that they’ll start on the 20th of February. Initially, they’ll just be eight of them.
I went to a presentation on the bus some months ago and I think it will be a good addition to London’s bus fleet.
The choice of route 38 is an interesting one. But in my view a correct one.
At the southern end, it starts at Victoria, which is a major transport interchange, where lots of visitors arrive. I hope that they make sure that the route keeps its prime stop in front of the station. I doubt anybody with any marketing nouse would do anything, except make it more obvious.
It then goes straight through the West End, past or close to, some of London’s most important places and landmarks, like Buck House, Green Park, Piccadilly Circus, many of the theatres on Shaftesbury Avenue, and the British Museum. The route in this area, is only a short walk from places like Soho, Covent Garden, Bloomsbury, and Leicester and Trafalgar Squares. So I think, if they get the hop-on/hop-off right in this section, I think it will be a very valuable addition to the transport landscape of this part of London. As I have experienced several times, getting a bus in this area at times is often a long wait because of all the traffic that shouldn’t be there. But at least with a hop-on/hop-off bus, you won’t have to wait for the stop. But even when it is working as a normal bus, it’ll have an extra door, which will mean that it unloads and loads quicker.
After Bloomsbury, the route does its more mundane work, through Clerkenwell, Islington and down the Essex Road to Dalston and on to Hackney and eventually to Clapton Pond. This is where I use the route a lot as none of the Underground or Overground lines, really get you from Hackney to Islington or on to the West End. Having seen the inside of the mock-up, I feel that the bus will suit this part of the route well, as passengers often have large amounts of shopping and cases and I have a feeling that New Routemasters might be better at handling, this type of passenger, as they have three entrances and two staircases, which will enable the more mobile and unencumbered passengers to get quickly and easily upstairs and out of the way.
As an aside here, it will be interesting to see if two staircases, raise the average loading on the top deck.
Hackney and Clapton are not really leisure destinations in London. But could putting New Routemasters on the major route to the area, help in that direction. Clapton Pond, may not sound romantic, but if you were say walking the Lea Valley, it is one place to start. Uniquely, the 38 bus terminus at Clapton is in the middle of a roundabout, which means it is easy to turn the buses back to Victoria.
If I was Hackney Council, I’d put a very small amount of work into the roundabout, as the arrival of the buses, will attract bus anoraks from all over the world, if the scrum in Trafalgar Square last night is anything to go by. Note the link is from the Belfast Telegraph.
Newt Gingrich
Newt Gingrich says he is pro-life with respect to abortion.
Does that mean that he is against the death penalty?
I doubt it!
He has one of those special mirrors so he can shave both of his faces at the same time.
Farewell Christopher Hitchens
I didn’t agree with everything Christopher Hitchens said, but at least he had it right about religion and was always worth reading.
The world will be a worse place without him.
Probably if he hadn’t smoked he’d still be here.
In some ways smoking is the most selfish vice, as it annoys all the people around you and then when it kills you, it leaves your family in total distress.
He was eminently quotable.
The governor of Texas, who, when asked if the Bible should also be taught in Spanish, replied that ‘if English was good enough for Jesus, then it’s good enough for me.
[Mother Teresa] was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction.
Owners of dogs will have noticed that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they will think you are god. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are gods.
To terrify children with the image of hell, to consider women an inferior creation—is that good for the world?
There are lots more like these.
The Anonymous Widower 