Whatsthatsmell?

One of the Best Political Ads I've Ever Seen

(H/T Liberty Corner )

I Hope Mr. Young will remember...

A band formed by Mike Estes, who played guitar for Lynyrd Skynyrd in the nineties, and Dave Hlubek from Molly Hatchet (who’s since re-joined Molly Hatchet), Skinny Molly, played here at a local pub. 

They played loads of Skynyrd songs, a few originals, a respectable cover of Copperhead Road, and a rock-n-roll version of Dixie.  Kicked major ass, and my wife got to observe me in my full redneck glory.

Made me feel homesick...

Gotta go, I’m running out now to get a Confederate battle flag tattoo...

By the Way...

Happy St. George's Day!

I Should Avoid "Thought for the Day"

on the Today programme on Radio 4.  Some C of E clergyman today began with the idea of how biofuels are an easy target as the scapegoat for the world's food problems, but that it is difficult to balance hunger against our need to tackle "climate change" and our energy needs.

It's not bloody difficult, matey...

You and your ilk made us take on these "climate change" policies on the basis that people could find themselves starving and there will be world anarchy in fifty years if we don't do something, anything!

Well, guess what, bucko?  It's happening now...

Because of your climate change policies.

Heck, even our lefty Chancellor sees there's a problem with biofuels...But no, because the EU will not give way, we must go with them.  (Did someone hear the word sovereignty in there?)

Who cares, you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, can you?

Okay, I'm supporting McCain Now

Despite my previously enumerated issues with McCain, his speech this past week on economic issues and his economic platform has won me over. 

Especially after hearing how Obama and Clinton would automatically seek to raise taxes all around, in the interest of "Fairness", in the debate immediately following McCain's speech.

I think, when it comes to taxation and fiscal policy, McCain knows what's good for America and, subsequently, the rest of the world.

Thank God there is an America, where people who call themselves "conservatives" really are conservatives.  At least the Right in America has not ceded the argument to the Left like they have here in the UK.

I have pretty much given up on Conservative politics here in the UK.  The debate has been framed by the socialists, and I don't see any return from the brink unless there is a coup within the Conservative Party by a charismatic leader.  It strikes me that any "conservative" policies the Conservatives adopt tend to be out of potential vote-winning instead of conviction.  They aren't very convincing, the wets that are in charge right now.

Which is why I am glad that there are countries in the world where the socialists are losing the argument.  Like France, Germany, and the US.

So in front of my meager audience, I am announcing my support for McCain.  I may not agree with him 100%, but 80% is good enough for me.

(For those of you who wonder, I am both a British subject and a US citizen.)

Even More Solzhenitsyn

There’s plenty to blog about, but I don’t really have the discipline to do that on top of schoolwork, paid work, and life...So, here you go, a third helping of Solzhenitsyn from The Gulag Archipelago. And if you ever get a chance, I recommend you read it yourself.

A must read for anyone interested in morality and freedom.

Saw Death Sentence the other night...

Death Sentence is a revenge film wherein Kevin Bacon is the protagonist whose son is randomly killed by a gang-banger in an initiation killing.  Instead of fingering the perpetrator in court and thereby sending him away for 1-5 years on a plea bargain, something flips and he decides to get even.

What ensues is an escalation between Bacon and the gang to which this fine young man belongs.

It was fun to watch, although I think it spent way too much time on character development.  Also, it preached a bit.  By taking it back to the gangbangers the overall PC message running through the film was that Kevin Bacon brings any subsequent misfortune upon himself.  And he "becomes" one of them.  Also there were a few whiny moments where the gangbangers complained about the media not caring if one of them from the wrong side of town was to get killed...No sh** Sherlock.  The difference is that the kid who was killed at the beginning was not a fellow drug dealer, just a guy getting a slurpie in a gas station.

This kind of wound me up a bit, because whether Bacon's character broke the law or not in becoming a vigilante, what he did was not the same as what the gangbangers did to start it.  His character was looking for justice.  The gangsters were looking for trouble.

Maybe I'm mistaken, but I don't remember Death Wish expressing the same sort of PC moral equivalence wherein all violence is wrong even if it is just or in self-defense.

It reminds me of another fun to watch recent violent film featuring Clive Owen: Shoot 'em Up.  That film, like Death Sentence, had some fantastically over-the-top violent action which felt cathartic.  But, get this, the bad guys are a pro-gun rights gun manufacturer and his political stooge.

I mean...FFS...WTF...

I am getting tired of being preached to by people who capitalise on the cinematic portrayal of mindless violence telling me how wrong violence is, especially in self-defense or in aid of justice.

Is it me?  Am I being to sensitive to this crap?

Here we have some major ultra-violence laced with mealy-mouthed platitudes about how wrong it is.

It's not as if the industry of Hollywood is a bastion of morality, anyway.  Members of the most cutthroat, superficial, amoral industry in the world are presuming to be my moral compass.

Puh-LEASE!!!!

Listen Hollywood: If you're going to make millions from a film where the body count from violent means exceeds, say, 5, in the first five minutes of the film, then don't tell me how wrong it is.  I might be so suggestible as to stop watching your crap films altogether.

I'm Baaaack

Had a truly refreshing four-day break at Centerparcs, a.k.a. Butlins for the Middle Classes; instead of little T-Jays and Chantelles running around, we encountered little Tarquins and Indias.

Have to say, it was rather civilised, as well, and actually had us pining for the civility of Frankfurt (but without the Hessische).

When we got to our cabin, it smelled of wet dog, and when we called to complain, they instantly upgraded us.  And this set the tone for the whole trip.  I don't believe I've enjoyed such a consistently positive customer service experience since leaving the US.  Every employee we encountered was genial, chatty, and happy to help.

Normal blogging to commence shortly.

As far as the wet dog smell goes, it appears they reserve the far southwest corner of the park for dog owners, but you wouldn't know that from the web site.  If you ever do decide to reserve, I recommend paying the extra £25 or £35 to ensure a more central location.

It'll be a bit quiet around here...

for a week or two...

Off on a half-term holiday and my own university course starting up again.

Feeling slightly smug of late...

Reading articles like this one...

Families face a £1,300 annual increase in their mortgage payments after the country's biggest building society announced a rise in its lending rates.

Here's why I'm feeling smug...

Four years ago, when we began formulating how much money we could afford to borrow to purchase a house, I calculated how much we could afford to pay, at the time, as a monthly payment even if interest rates went up to 10%.

Based upon that number, that's what we had in mind as the cap to the size of our mortgage.

We also made the unorthodox decision to buy a larger house and share it (live in it) with my wife's parents.

When it came time to apply for the mortgage, we locked into a ten-year fixed rate at 4.89% on the amount of money we thought we could afford to borrow even if we had to pay as high as 10% at some future date.  Which was half the value of the house we purchased with the in-laws.

And more than a few acquaintances thought we were completely nuts on both counts - living with the in-laws and locking into a 10-year fixed rate.

Although it took some adjustment, living with the in-laws has turned out to be one of the best decisions we could have made, especially for our daughter.

And locking into a 10-year fixed rate was another prudent thing to do; and a few people thought we were even nuttier for doing this.

For some of these people, their lifestyle and spending decisions were predicated upon eternal rising house prices and low interest rates with the ability to remortgage cheaply every two years or so.  I imagine this is fairly representative of a large part of the population.  People bought houses on the basis of how much they were allowed to borrow and not on the basis of how much they could actually afford.  And many of them also bought with self-certifying mortgages, so they could stretch the truth a bit about their actual incomes.

Okay, so now house prices are going to take a temporary dip while the market sorts itself out.  But unless something's done about wholesale immigration to the UK or major land use reform, housing prices, at least here in the South East of England, are going to remain rather buoyant.  (If I had known the full extent of immigration to this country, I would have bought back in 1999 or 2000, when I could have afforded it even better, on a contractor's income.)

I have a real problem with the moral hazard being created by the various plans for bailing people out that politicians keep alluding to.  This may sound smug and "uncaring" but I say let the chips fall where they may.

Borrowing money for a house far into the six digits is the most important financial decision any one is going to make in their lives.  There are plenty of free places to find all the information you're ever going to need, to look at it from all angles.

If an increase to the interest rates adds a little over £100 to your monthly mortgage bill, and this is unaffordable, it was you that borrowed too much money.  It's not the fault of the "greedy" banks and mortgage companies, as many of the news stories of late would have you believe.