My Royal Wedding Pix

Well, at least I got a couple of tickets for the Royal Wedding. However, you know me, I wanted to go with the press pack and get some nice snaps. So I gave my tickets away to a couple of mates and took these lovely pictures.

Ahhh, So sweet.

Good old sing song.

Bless.

Blair-Brown Snub: “Advised by Government”

Today at 5.20 GMT on the BBC radio, The World Today, Clarence House appeared to distance themselves from the decision to not invite former Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, and to pin the responsibility for this snub on Downing Street.

In a live interview, Coleen Harris, the former PR manager to Prince William, Henry and Charles, was asked about the decision to not invite Blair and Brown, the PR professional replied, “Yes, it does look rather odd, but the reason for it is that William is a member of the Order of the Garter, and there are only 24 members, and he wanted them to come as guests. Although this is a public event, it is a private wedding and not a state event. So there isn’t a requirement to invite former prime ministers, but the government advised on the guest list.”

When asked how many of those 1,900 guests does she think were invited by the couple themselves, she replied, “I think that several hundred were personal guests, close family, close friends, and some others that they wanted to acknowledge. William’s charities are represented, alongside members of his household. For Kate, people from her local village. But they also have to take into account that it is a public event, so they took advice from government and invited heads of mission and some other dignitaries as well.”

Although Ms Harris is not currently on the staff of the Princes, she spoke with confidence and put her answers forward as fact. She repeated her point that the government advised on the list and this was said in reply to the question of the snub to Mr Brown and Mr Blair.

Unless Clarence House wishes to distance themselves from Ms Harris, it remains for Downing Street to explain why they objected to the invitation of the two former Labour Prime Ministers.

The interview is here at 18 minutes.

Nasty Dave and the Wedding Snub

The Royal Wedding snub of the two former Labour Prime Ministers tends to support the view that David Cameron suffers from a vindictive streak.

It would be ridiculous to suggest that Downing Street had no input to the guest list for this year’s most high profile public event in the whole world.

Operation Disingenuous goes from Bad to Worse

A ten-strong team of intelligence, signals and logistics experts will help set up an opposition headquarters to take on Colonel Gaddafi’s forces, but the government denies claims of “mission creep”.

According to the Daily Mail, a senior government source said, ‘At most it is mission twitch.’

Not only is this bizarre, but it is also at odds with what the military are saying.

Major General Patrick Cordingley, commander of the Desert Rats in the 1991 Gulf War, said, “The danger of putting advisers on the ground is that you are making it crystal clear that you are supporting the rebels and stoking up a civil war.’

So if a Major General is saying that British actions makes it “crystal clear” that we are “stoking up a civil war”, then what possible justification could the British government have for this policy?

Foreign secretary William Hague: ‘Our officers will not be involved in training or arming the opposition. Nor will they be involved in the planning or execution or any other form of operational military advice.’

So what on earth are they doing there? Making the tea? Socialising perhaps?

In an attempt to justify this development under the defensive restrictions of Resolution 1972, an MoD source said: ‘We’re not teaching them how to attack. We’re teaching them how not to get killed.’

In case the MoD has missed the pictures on the television news, maybe someone should point out that the rebel army doesn’t need any lessons in how to run away.

Senior sources have told the Mail that the terms of the military advice will remain under review and concede that further steps may be necessary if the rebels ‘needed another nudge’.

However, there is a distinction to be made between “a nudge”, and bombing a foreign country from 30,000 feet. One is a subtle hint, while the other involves bombing them from 30,000 feet.

Meanwhile resentment is building, in the military, at the sheer cost of this operation. Admiral Sir Sandy Woodward, who led the Falklands Taskforce in 1982, has written to the Ministry of Defence deploring the cost, which includes a £30 million weekly bill for using air bases in Italy and Cyprus.

Woodward considers it was wrong to scrap the Ark Royal carrier and its Harrier jump jets, pointing out that the Libyan adventure will cost about £1billion over six months. This is ‘three times the cost of running a carrier plus the Harriers for four whole years’.

Further to this sorry state of affairs, it is now becoming apparent that the British are alone in their desire to continue this mission. Sources said there are problems at Nato command where some of Britain’s allies are ‘acting as a brake’ on the targeting of Gaddafi’s forces.

‘We are keeping up a high tempo of operations,’ one source said. ‘I wish we could say the same about some of the others. The French talk a good game but they are not doing as much as people think.’

Great. So now it seems we’re alone in stoking up a civil war. Far from being “mission twitch”, it’s more like “lonely twitch”. It seems that every other country has seen sense and only the British want to get more deeply embroiled in this potential Vietnam.

Operation Disingenuous goes from bad to worse.

Cameron’s Nervous Tick over Libya

In the run up to the Gulf war, from the summer of 1990, to the air attack early 1991, much of the media coverage concerned the war of bluff between George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein.

American Intelligence officers used to observe news footage of Saddam and count his blink rate to try to establish if he was becoming nervous as the pressure built.

If Colonel Gaddafi were to look at news footage of David Cameron these days, he’d see a similar nervous tick. However, with Cameron, it’s not a “blink rate”, but a “Lick rate”.

During this interview with Sky, on 17th April, he licks his lips three times while answering questions about Libya, but this doesn’t occur when he is interviewed about the AV referendum.

The charitable among you may say that perhaps he’d had a drink the night before and was just slightly dehydrated or nervous. But the original interview was much longer and I can positively confirm that he didn’t lick his lips once during the rest of the interview. It was only when he was speaking about Libya.

The reason this is interesting is that the greatest talent of David Cameron is his outward appearance of super self-confidence. For a politician, being able to persuade others that you have conviction is a vital characteristic.

What we see here is that outward display of confidence cracking under pressure, as his ill-advised military adventure, goes pear-shaped.

Tory Right Plot to remove Cameron

The right-wing of the Parliamentary Conservative Party is plotting the removal of Cameron and an early election if Yes to AV wins on May 5th.

The purpose of the coup would be to reverse the legislative before it becomes law.

They believe that a sufficient number of Labour MPs would cooperate in order that the Liberal Democrat vote is countered and the bill can be struck off before it reaches the statute book.

They realise that an election would be the inevitable outcome arising from the combination of minority government and a prime minister without mandate. However, they be believe that this is a price worth paying, since they believe that the Conservative Party will never achieve majority government again, if AV is implemented.

David Davies is already campaigning for a future leadership bid, by creating a manifesto and inviting back-benchers to contribute a policy. Those that make a contribution effectively endorse him as candidate. Included in this pseudo manifesto is a promise to slow down the deficit reduction program in order to avoid recession. An interesting insight to their true thoughts.

At this point it is not know which other Conservative MPs would also run.

With the No 2 AV camp apparently uninspired by the debate; there is a strong chance that they will suffer a low turnout, while the enthusiastic Yes 2 AV camp is highly likely to vote, meaning the odds are on for a Yes win.

For further details on resentment in the Conservative Party towards David Cameron, read my previous post, The Cameron Collapse Scenario.

This plot considerably increases the drama of a so-far bitter, but dull referendum debate.

Tory Right Plot to remove Cameron

The right-wing of the Parliamentary Conservative Party is plotting the removal of Cameron and an early election if Yes to AV wins on May 5th.

The purpose of the coup would be to reverse the legislative before it becomes law.

They believe that a sufficient number of Labour MPs would cooperate in order that the Liberal Democrat vote is countered and the bill can be struck off before it reaches the statute book.

They realise that an election would be the inevitable outcome arising from the combination of minority government and a prime minister without mandate. However, they be believe that this is a price worth paying, since they believe that the Conservative Party will never achieve majority government again, if AV is implemented.

David Davies is already campaigning for a future leadership bid, by creating a manifesto and inviting back-benchers to contribute a policy. Those that make a contribution effectively endorse him as candidate. Included in this pseudo manifesto is a promise to slow down the deficit reduction program in order to avoid recession. An interesting insight to their true thoughts.

At this point it is not know which other Conservative MPs would also run.

With the No 2 AV camp apparently uninspired by the debate; there is a strong chance that they will suffer a low turnout, while the enthusiastic Yes 2 AV camp is highly likely to vote, meaning the odds are on for a Yes win.

For further details on resentment in the Conservative Party towards David Cameron, read my previous post, The Cameron Collapse Scenario.

This plot considerably increases the drama of a so-far bitter, but dull referendum debate.

De-coding the Policy of Obama

In an extraordinary exposition of international policy, three of the world’s most powerful leaders, David Cameron, Barack Obama and Nicolas Sarkozy, today published a joint letter in their respective national newspapers, The Times, USA Today and La Figaro.

Below is an extract which highlights their main points. However, what is far more interesting is what they are saying between the lines.

Alongside the extract, I have provided a humorous interpretation of each statements true meaning. While at the end, I comment on a development in Obama’s Foreign Policy which is both consistent, yet extraordinary.

Carry On Bombing!

David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy have adopted their very own belligerent Arab city, along with several belligerent Arab towns; in total, the entire population of eastern Libya. Whether they like it or not, if they walk away from the situation now, they will be responsible for every act of the regime’s retribution, every arrest made and every life taken.

For Britain and France, to turn their backs on the people of Benghazi, would be the equivalent of a mother who refuses food to her baby, or a doctor who refuses treatment to his patient. When a politician starts a war, he is responsible for those on the ground, who will suffer the consequences of the military action.

Ed Miliband needs to get Mad as Hell!

Peter Finch won Best Actor Oscar due to this speech in the 1976 film, Network. In the depths of a recession, he plays a News Anchor who spontaneously tells the audience that “Nothing’s gonna change until you get mad!” And calls upon them to stand up and shout, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not gonna take this anymore!”

We’ve got a new recession in this country and one that is entirely the fault of the Tory government’s policy of squeezing the demand-side of the economy. Just when the policies of the last Labour government were achieving sustainable growth, we’ve now been thrown back into misery.