London’s Street Joggers can ‘Jog On’!

I don’t drive and, as a result, I can be found walking or bussing around London. If I am not on the street walking, I am watching pedestrians at bus stops form a traditional orderly British queue to get into the bus. When I arrived in London some 22 years ago, I remember trying to board a bus in Kent before it was my turn only to find a large gruff bearded Kentish man behind me who thundered “Oi! It’s not your turn mate!”

Since then I have respected the orderly British way of boarding a bus and they way we abide by escalator etiquette on the Underground and “stand on the right”! I don’t see why we should suddenly have this tradition rudely interrupted by sweaty spandex-clad folk who seem to be rather upset by actual pedestrians interrupting their fitness routines. I wonder if perhaps they refer to us as ‘street walkers’!

Riots in London: The stark gap between mob rule and community spirit

Very sad today.

Reading about - and listening to - the small business owners, and those who live above them, scraping along nobly in our Big Society only to have the already threadbare rug of life and livelihood whipped so cruelly, so thoughtlessly, from beneath them by unthinking youths brought up to be resentful of enterprise and of business and of authority (any authority) by parents and community leaders too willing to provide them with an excuse, an alibi, for why they are spectators of, and not participants in, our society - big or otherwise.

The reaction?

On the one hand, we have the baying mob - those who shout for water cannon, for plastic bullets, for the army. The eye-for-an-eye mob, those whose only response to a counter-argument, is to say "yes, but if you were affected, you would feel differently" - than you? Who are also not affected, yet who have this opinion? I resent that people think I would be so weak-minded and weak of character and unconfident in my opinions, that they think I would waver, much less change my opinion, if I were "on the other side".

Why the Burqa ban is wrong: An Irishman's view.

On October 6, Jacques Hakim wrote a letter to the Wall Street Journal why he believed in the Burqua ban that has just been approved in France.

Let's demolish his arguments shall we?

Before we begin, let's remember this law is intended to protect French state secularity - not prevent crime or protect public safety. People who believe this to be the intention of the law are people who believe Muslims are a dangerous race. So let's begin:

Not once are the words Muslim or Islam used in the text of the law: OK, but I don't see non-Muslims wearing Burqas. This is a law aimed only at Muslims - as we'll see.