Tax cuts and rises

The cut in VAT and the increases planned for the future are, it seems to me, just pure politics.  They are desigend to make it look as if something's being done, even if it isn't.  The really cynical and political part is that if the gamble doesn't work, the people who cooked it up just get booted out of power and have to manage on a generous pension paid for by the rest of us.  If it "works" they get more time holding the levers of power and gambling with our cash and our futures.  Nice work if you can get it.

Misery Memoirs

It seems that the Mum of the "mother" of misery memoirs (at least here in the UK) denies it all and says she didn't do most (or possibly any) of the wicked things alleged in the book.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/7735651.stm

 

This case continues, but it raises some interesting questions - if Mum wins and wins big damages, she'll receive money from sales of a book about stuff that she says didn't happen.  If the court rules that most or all of the allegations in the book were indeed ficticious, will purchasers ask for their money back because they only bought it on the basis that it was true?

 

Of course, it may be that it's all true - only the author and her Mum really know for sure.  If it is, but the Court decides it wasn't that will be extremely unfortunate.  I wonder if this case may open (to coin a cliche) the floodgates for the alleged perpetrators named in misery memoirs to sue the authors, claiming it's all fiction?

Hands Off My Organs

I have carried a donor card for mopre than 25 years, because I believe in it.  This was against the wishes of my Mother, who when I lived at home, used to destroy my card.  

 

If we move to presumed consent I will make it abundantly clear to everyone I know that I no longer wish to donate any organs at all after my death.  Gordon Brown thinks he knows better and that my organs should become property of the State; he can go and stick his presumed consent.

Bose Headphones

I have a particularly boring repetitive task to do so I am listening to music on my iPod, though the Bose ie-ear phones I bought a while ago.  I have just heard a bit of piano in "Do anything you wanna do" by Eddie and the Hot Rods that I'd never noticed before.  In fact I had to go back and listen several times just to make sure - it's definitely there, but it is so faint it sounds like someone in an adjacent studio mucking about on a piano (as indeed it may well be).