Sim-O

Telegraph:

Companies should take special precautions when dealing in Britain because they face a substantial risk of becoming entangled in corruption, the group [OECD] will say.

The body’s conclusions follow a strongly-worded letter it sent to the Government during the summer. It complained that Britain had failed repeatedly to update its anti-corruption laws, despite having pledged to do so for years. Britain has failed to take action over a single case of overseas bribery, the letter added.

The group is to warn that Britain’s Serious Fraud Office is also set to focus even less on its duty to tackle corruption overseas in favour of more regular commercial crime.

Bloggerheads:

In fact the PCC had never even heard of the magazine until I called them. At all.

I don’t need a long paragraph here explaining that politics is a particularly sensitive, volatile, and high stakes media field, do I?

No? Good. Let’s move on, then…

Here is the later confirmation of this disgraceful state of affairs from the PCC:

I can confirm that the current position is that Total Politics does not formally subscribe to the system of regulation overseen by the PCC.

Over 98% of titles do subscribe to the PCC and the Code. We also handle complaints informally against titles that do not subscribe.

That Iain Dale, eh? A true innovator. Who else but the Blogfather would’ve thought of running a magazine like a blog?

If someone makes a complaint to me about an abusive comment – or something I have writen which they believe is incorrect or offensive – I look it up and then decide whether to remove it, amend it or leave it as it is. If people don’t agree with my decision they don’t come back to my blog. It’s a simple, free market, and it works.

Genius!

BBC:

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has told MPs that plans to extend terror detention to 42 days will be dropped from the Counter-Terrorism Bill.

It follows a heavy defeat for the government in the House of Lords, which threw out the plan by 309 votes to 118.

Ms Smith said instead the measure would be in a separate piece of legislation to be brought to Parliament if needed.

The Tories said she should just say she was abandoning 42 days. The Lib Dems said it was a “humiliating retreat”.

The Spectator is requesting nominations for its’ Parliamentarian of the Year award and guess who’s been nominated…

Richard Hamilton proposes Nadine Dorries. Hamilton commends Dorries for addressing the issue of term limits for abortion with a ‘tenaciousness and passion that caught the public’s attention in a remarkable way’. He applauds her for explaining how the 1967 legislation has resulted, against the intent of the original act, in half a million abortions being carried out each year and for her courage in carrying on in the face of hostility from her opponents.

For carrying out her campaign with the help of lies, bullshit, half-truths and a blinkered single minded determination that comes from knowing that you are right and everyone who disagrees with you is either a vicious nasty bastard that is out to get you and not just pointing out where you are mistaken or a vicious nasy bastard that wants to kill babies and not protect the welfare of women.

Bloomberg:

Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling used anti-terrorism rules to take control of assets held in Britain by a troubled Icelandic bank.

I don’t know what it says more about. The blanket coverage of the anti-terrorism laws, that the government are trying to expand as we speak, or the governments’ abuse of laws.

A beaut of a rant from In Through The Out Door But Then Back In Again III:

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no beardy-weirdy, tree-hugging, hemp-snorting, mung-bean sex machine. I recycle, but only because the council’ll fine me if I don’t. And I use energy-saving light bulbs not because they’re easier on the earth, but because I’m a skinflint and they save me money. I’m sure I could do more … if I gave much of a shit, which I don’t.

But the difference betwixt a shitbag like me and the major corporations is I don’t pretend to be saving the world when I am, in fact, pissing all over it. I don’t boast – like they do – that I’m up there with the likes of Alec Baldwin and Sting and the recently deceased Paul Newman, because I’m not. They, on the other hand, pretend they’re saints of the environmental movement … and then go off on an orgy of eco raping and pillaging and hope nobody notices what liars and hypocrites they really are.

…is the response I got to this question.

No surprises as Iain doesn’t ‘diss’ mates.

The Devils Kitchen:

Wandering over, I saw Nadine talking to Dizzy and overheard her say something like, “I suppose that Devil’s Kitchen person isn’t here yet.”

“Ahem.”

Dizzy turned to introduce me, and Nad and I shook hands. “I’m not talking to you,” she said, “You called me a liar.”

“Well, yes. But you did lie.”

“I got those figures from [such-and-such] a hospital.”

“It was rather more the Hand of Hope picture that I was referring to.”

“It was a great picture.”

“Yes, but the point is that it didn’t depict what you said it did. The actual surgeon who did the operation said that the child was anaesthetised and that he pulled the arm out. The baby did not reach out and clutch onto his finger.”

“They are doing that operation more and more. I am going into my local hospital to see it done: I hope to get some pictures.”

“That doesn’t alter the fact that that picture did not, and does not, depict what you said it did.”

And so on and so on; having rehearsed this circular argument for some time, we bloggers wandered out for a cigarette and Mad Nad and I didn’t really talk much after that, or nothing more than desultory pleasantries. There seemed very little point…

The Independent:

Mr Mandelson will leave his post as a European Trade Commissioner in Brussels and return to London to join the Cabinet for the third time in his career. He was forced out of Government under controversial circumstances in 1998 and 2001.

He will be given a peerage and take up his old job as Secretary of State for Business as Mr Brown reshapes his Government to reassure people he is tackling the international financial crisis

So an ex-MP that had to resign twice due to corruption gets a plum job in the cabinet, without having to go through that awful rigmarol of being elected by being given a peerage.
No wonder Labours reforms of the House of Lords is taking its’ time.

I have a new post up at The Sun – Tabloid Lies

The site No Rock And Roll Fun has just appeared on my radar, and you could say, they don’t hold Gordon Smart in very high esteem.

Their first post about him, when he took over in November 2007, was a good one:

And so the Sun rises on a new era, with Gordon Smart taking over the controls at the paper’s Bizarre column.

Hey… he’s called Gordon, and you know who else is called Gordon?

Yes, yes, the “moron” in Jilted John’s hit, but you know who else?

Yes, the Prime Minister. But it’s not a thought they’d push, is it?

Prime Minister of showbiz … new man Gordon

Oh. They are.

Read Gordon’s manifesto

And push it, and push it.

WE are both Scottish and called Gordon – but that’s where the similarities between the Prime Minister and me end.

Well, yes. Gordon Brown doesn’t look like he’s one of the guys who turn up at the end of Homes Under The Hammer saying “I would value this property at £137,000…”, for a start