Miners Have a Go at the Iron Lady
The BBC has reported that the Iron Lady film has had protests in Chesterfield, which lost their coal mines, when she was Prime Minister.
My view is straightforward. Coal is a dirty fuel, that causes lots of ill health and is a major cause of global warming. Even with the small number of pits we have now, the death of miners is not unknown.
Mrs. Thatcher may have been the Prime Minister, who actually shut the mines, but in my view it was done about twenty years at least too late.
North Sea oil and gas, gave us the opportunity to abandon coal production and it should have been done in a managed and gradual way. I’d love to know, whether Prime Ministers before Mrs. Thatcher had thought of shutting the mines. After all, when the railways abandoned steam engines, a lot of coal wasn’t needed any more. So do those who want more mining jobs, want steam trains as well? And domestic coal fires, which created the smog of the sixties? Many days, I had to walk home from school in thick pea soup.
I should also say, that I’ve met quite a few people, from mining families and all were advised to get an education and avoid going down the pits.
How have other countries weaned themselves off coal? I found this article about the rise and fall of the German coal industry. It seems that German industry has managed to survive the loss of its prime energy source.
I suspect they have managed the run down of their industry much better. I can remember a proposal in The Guardian to use redundant miners to insulate our rather poor housing stock. Nothing happened, as far as I know!
We don’t learn either! Most of our vehicles are powered by fossil fuel, which don’t help the stopping of global warming. So when we bring forward proposals to help like wind, wave and tidal power, new electricity networks and rail lines, the Nimbys come out in force.
We can’t have it both ways, even if the Americans and the Chinese think they can.
I think I’ll prefer to go to hell on my two legs, a bicycle or a New Bus for London, rather than a fossil-fuel powered handcart.
The Man Who Could Have Changed History
I’m half watching a play about Hitler. But I’m finding it a bit difficult to follow, probably because of the hay fever’s effect on my hearing.
It is set in or about 1930 and I am reminded of another tale. It is in Lord Howard de Walden’s obituary in The Guardian.
He inherited 120 acres of London’s west end and bred and owned the 1985 Derby winner, Slip Anchor. But the story he loved to dine out on was when, as a young Cambridge student fresh out of Eton, he was driving a new car in Munich when a man walked out in front of him and was knocked down. “He was only shaken up,” recalled de Walden. “But had I killed him, it would have changed the history of the world.” The man was Adolf Hitler.
I never actually met him, but I knew a few people who worked for him, who never said any word about him that wasn’t complimentary. My last vision of him was shortly before he died, sitting in state in a wheel-chair at Newmarket races, immaculately turned out ciomplete with apricot coloured socks; his racing colours as suggested by Augustus John.
Germans Book Their Place For The Olympics
I know there is a bit of a stereotype about Germans getting up early to put their towels on loungers.
But then they go and bring their cruise ship, the MS Deutschland, into London Docklands, a whole year ahead of the Olympics.
It did suffer the indignity of having to come in backwards. So is this an omen, that the Germans are going to do well in the rowing?
Waking Up In Cloud-Cuckoo World
I woke at about five this morning and put the radio on to listen to the news. One of my favourite books is The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy
I felt that I’d woken up in a world where everyting was being run by idiots, who had lost their sense of where they were supposed to be, but were still of course getting all of their perks and salaries. Or in the case of various dictators were still milking all their subjects for ever cent they’d got.
The first story was the problems in Syria, where all sane people agree that President Assad must go. The president used to be an opthalmologist, which in my book is a sort of doctor, so why is he blinding some of his people and killing others in an effort to cling to power? And why were we still supporting this despot until recently?
Then there was the story about Greece having a referendum on cuts. Turkeys and Christmas come to mind. Of course they’ll vote yes to the cuts!
The Germans are supposed to be efficient. But they can’t seem to find the source of their e-coli outbreak. So what does the EU do about it, have a meeting?
I could add other stories, where those in charge are going one way and doing their utmost to keep their high-salaried jobs.
Don’t get me going on the NHS, where at present I just need a repeat prescription and it seems to take days at my GP. At the previous one, I sent in an e-mail and either collected the drugs or the signed prescription on the next working day. How many highly-paid civil servants does it take to not impliment that very simple policy?
And now to cap it all, BBC Breakfast is talking about the lack of cuckoos this year. They’re all alive and well and living in politics and government, all over the world!
Tha Andalusian Food Minister Does a John Gummer
Clara Aquilera, the Minister for agriculture in the Spanish region of Andalusia has taken a leaf out of John Gummer’s book and been seen publicly eating a cucumber to prove that they are safe. Admittedly, John got his daughter, Cordelia to eat one with him. But as I write both John and Cordelia, seem to have suffered no ill effects ten years or so later.
Let’s hope Clara is as lucky. Although judging from the pictures, she does seem to have a love for food.
Germany’s Cucumber Problem
I typed “german cucumber joke” into Google and found this site. It’s actually part of a serious German web site called Toy Town Germany, for Germans and others who live in the country who speak English.
Can You Say This to German Guests?
A friend looks after a house that is rented to tourists.
Whilst showing some Germans around,who had booked the house for a week she said, “The coal is in the bunker!” She compounded it by following it with “The baker in the village is Mr.Ovens!”
Are Dictators Stupid?
It would appear that Robert Mugabe has fallen for a scam where a mystic claims he can get diesel out of rock. The story is here in The Times.
So he proves my title for a start.
This is one of my favourite books. The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy
Germans Mess Up A Penalty
Apparently, not all Germans get their penalties right, as this story about the German women’s hockey team in their defeat to England shows.
It also shows that yet another sport is using technology to help its referees. So stop saying “No!”, Mr. Blatter!
My Overdaft Has Been Suspended
I received this scam from someone claiming to be Egg. I also received it four times. And overdraft was spelt the same in each. I don’t have an overdaft. but I suspect they are!
Note that a link in the e-mail points to a German web site. Perhapd, it’s to unsettle English fans before tomorrow. I don’t think it was sent by Germans though, as all the ones I know can spell better than that!
Dear Valued Egg Customer
Due to a recent credit limit check on your Egg Card, we have cancelled your overdaft until further noticed. Logon below to ammend your Egg Card and reactivate your account.
Failure to do this within 24hrs will lead to your online access been suspended.
Sorry for the inconvienence.
Regards,
Egg Card Customer Service
As this e-mail is an automated message, we can’t reply to any e-mails replied.
The Anonymous Widower 