Claims of bribes, kickbacks and false accounting at Italy’s oldest bank, Monte dei Paschi (MPS) based in Tuscany – a bank closely associated with the left wing Democratic Party which hoped to win next month’s elections on a pro EU “save the Eurozone” ticket. Indeed until a few days ago it was run by a leading socialist, Giuseppe Mussari

Moreover questions are now being asked about the head of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, who was in charge of the Bank of Italy in 2010 back when regulators went through the MPS books and claimed it was all kosher. Draghi is supposed to be the big cheese who will control the revamped Eurozone via the ECB so this brings into question his powers of judgement.

MPS is closely linked with liberal/left elite of Tuscany, the Italian equivalent of the high minds of WaPo/NYT in the US and Guardian/BBC in the UK so Berlusconi (loathed by the left) and other Italian politicians suspicious of EU schemes to prop up the Eurozone are rubbing their hands with glee.

Bribery, corruption and lies from the Italian left? Nothing new in that……

£30b, 20 years to completion – see what happens when politicians get seduced into vanity projects like HS2. Plenty of photo-ops of ministers poring over maps, futuristic graphics, promises of reviving the north….don’t they just love it.

Of course we can predict the reality – costs will double/treble, incompetent management will cause delays, unions will blackmail progress and, by 2032 technology might well have made the whole caboodle outdated.

But just, for a moment, imagine what we could do to improve our shambolic infrastructure with £30b over five years – improve thousands of choke point road junctions with right turn lanes, mini roundabouts, traffic lights. Upgrade existing track and signalling on our existing railway network. Above all convert the A11 into a motorway into the heart of East Anglia. Ensure that the pathetic A303, supposedly the main route between London and South West England, becomes a dual carriageway along its entire length with no roundabouts or junctions. Do the same with the A30 and A38 into the heart of Cornwall and, while you’re at it create a south coast expressway using the A27 and A35.

Our road network has remained frozen for the last thirty years – nothing much has changed (apart from the completion of the M25) since 1980 – which was the year I first began driving regularly in France. In those days the Autoroute network was fairly limited and centred almost exclusively on Paris – and few towns had a bypass. Since then the French have embarked on a steady programme of motorway development and traffic circulation projects that has transformed the whole transport system – as well as a state of the art intercity rail network.

Meanwhile Britain has been asleep at the wheel – often literally.

Still at least we can maybe invest now in a ticket to Leeds by HS2 and bequeath it to our heirs yet unborn to enjoy at some vague time in the future.

That sound? Don’t worry – its Brunel turning in his grave….

In the months since November and the Romney debacle it would appear that Hot Air has almost become zombieville if you look at the number of comments generated by each post. Maybe it’s because many became embarrassed by the shameless shilling for Romney on HA (remember Erika Johnsen claiming that everyone was so pumped for Romney? How Allah seemed to be kept away from Romney posts?). Or maybe it has just lost the spark with Ed and co just going through the motions.

But this weekend the site came alive – with a post by Allah on Sarah Palin’s reported decision to refuse to renew her contract with Fox. An assortment of the palinphobe regulars came out of the woodwork saying how irrelevant she was…..so yesterday….

Yep – so irrelevant that the post smashed through the thousand comment barrier.

That Sarah Palin – such a has been…….lol…

There is a time in politics as well as in all things when one must eat one’s words (or some of them) and give credit where it is due. David Cameron’s speech was a good one, carefully crafted to bring out some home truths without sneering at our European partners as a bunch of Johnny Foreigners smelling of garlic and trying to seduce our women and steal our silver. By offering a straightforward in/out referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU in 2017 on the basis of a negotiated repatriation of certain powers he made a bold, and honest, commitment. There are none of the familiar weasel word which politicians conventionally use when making public promises – “almost certainly”, “certain circumstances”, subject to these conditions”.

There are always voices saying “don’t ask the difficult questions.”
But it’s essential for Europe – and for Britain – that we do because there are three major challenges confronting us today.
First, the problems in the Eurozone are driving fundamental change in Europe.
Second, there is a crisis of European competitiveness, as other nations across the world soar ahead. And third, there is a gap between the EU and its citizens which has grown dramatically in recent years. And which represents a lack of democratic accountability and consent that is – yes – felt particularly acutely in Britain.

For once it was Cameron as Thatcher, not Cameron as Blair.

It‘s a canny move. It might well have for the moment shot the UKIP fox, which had been threatening to bite at Tory heels – though I suspect that puttting a bet on predicting Nigel Farage’s political demise would not be the wisest of moves.Indeed one could argue that Cameron’s offer has been forced on him by the impact of Farage And UKIP. However Dave has left Labour in complete disarray. As for the Liberal Democrats, who in 2007 were supporting a referendum, they are busily backpedalling, calling the idea unhelpful.

This must be sweet music to Tory ears – those champions of the “people” Clegg and Milliband boxing themselves into a corner and saying actually we, the great and the good, not the public, should decide these matters.

The fact that political has beens like Mandelson, Clarke and Heseltine are against a referendum is clearly a badge of honour considering that all three were once fervent advocates of joining the Euro. Add the French and President Obama to the mix and it must be drinks all round.

The only voice that matters in all this is the one that emanates from Berlin and Cameron must be pleased that Angela Merkel is not going negative on the idea of having a second look at the power relationship between the EU and member states.

Maybe, just maybe, Dave might have a bit of backbone after all……

UKIP’s leader Nigel Farage has a letter box mouth, eyes that look as if they will pop out on stalks at any moment and a face that seems to pull in different directions on the cusp of every grin. When he speaks he sounds very much like an on course bookmaker shouting the odds. His views are disdained by the media elite and the political class and you are unlikely to find him at any North London dinner party. He is a PR consultant’s nightmare….

….and yet he and the party he leads, long dismissed as a collection of nutcases, fruitloops and pub bores is edging near to 20% in opinion polls. When he appears on BBC Question Time, for years the graveyard of right wing pundits thanks to its chattering class chairman and an audience carefully selected to skew leftwards, he always goes down well. He also proves more than a match for the great and the good on the panel who discover much to their chagrin, that he is remarkably articulate and skilful in debate.

It’s not so much his euro sceptic views that win him support (though that must never be dismissed as a factor) but his very lack of smoothness, his everyman persona that immediately detaches him from our ruling class, the wealthy, soft figures like Cameron, Milliband and Clegg who have never really had long term experience of work outside politics and who began their rise to the top three quarters of the way up the ladder thanks to influential families and friends.

It is these characters and their cheerleaders in the media who paint Farage and his party as buffoons who could never be trusted to make tough decisions and run the country in an effective and efficient manner – as if their years of governing have not been years of failure consisting mainly of short term, short sighted and flashy “initiatives” threaded with lies and undelivered (and often undeliverable) promises.

Farage is an outsider, he is not of the political class and is not constrained by the conventions of that class. Have a look at this video – unlike many featuring Farage it is not a two minute sound bite designed to make public impact. Forget the cartoony face and the odd diction – just concentrate on what he is saying and then ask yourself if this man is speaking for you rather than speaking at you.

You might be surprised at your reaction.

This man may be political gold.

Whenever we grind to a halt as a result of a bit of snow and we see all those motoring slithering about because they expect to be able to drive as if it’s a sunny day in August I always think of this Teeside bus driver giving us a masterclass in how to handle a vehicle in icy conditions….

Unbelievable – why is it that when some people get into a car they immediately lose every shred of rationality, common sense and awareness of the needs of others?

Ice gritting trucks are being targeted by impatient motorists – who have been pelting their vehicles with rocks.Staff at Northamptonshire Council revealed they have come under a barrage of missiles while out on their rounds.
They said disgruntled drivers stuck behind their vehicles have been pulling over to throw stones and bricks at them – because they’re driving too slowly.A spokesman for Northamptonshire Highways said there had been a number of attacks:
“Unfortunately, some of our drivers have had stones and bricks thrown at them.“Our drivers are out two to three times day, trying to keep the county’s roads safe.”Unfortunately, people have been getting impatient and started to throw things at the vehicles.

In true Z list celebrity style some even try to justify this attitude.

‘They are such a pain. They scratch the paintwork on my car and they drive so slow. They should go out in the middle of the night when nobody is around.’

Could it be that constant exposure to The X Factor, Big Brother and similar TV fare has, in some cases, shrunk the brain to the size of a peanut and shifted it to the rectum?

Or maybe the Neanderthals never really died out but just stayed out of sight until gritting lorries appeared.

I think we should be told…..

h/t for pic

I have always liked reading Julie Burchill. I rarely agree with her left wing feminist views but she writes with spirit and passion. I would love to meet up with her in a pub and have a good old fashioned political argument over a few pints and a pork pie.

Lynne Featherstone is a Liberal Democrat MP who is minister for International Development in the Cameron/Clegg coalition = in other words she has been given a non job with a sack of taxpayers money to waste so that Guardian readers can feel good about themselves. She is a strident humourless feminist in the mould of Harriet Harman. I would rather stick my head in a bucket of sheep dip than meet her anywhere.

Burchill recently came to the defence of Suzanne Moore, another left wing feminist

Burchill took up the cudgels on behalf of her friend and colleague Suzanne Moore who was being monstered by the militant ‘trans’ lobby.
In a magazine article, Moore had remarked that modern women were coming under pressure to look like Brazilian transsexuals. Innocuous enough, but it sparked a firestorm of self-righteous anger and unpleasantness on Twitter, forcing Moore to close her account.

Burchill doesn’t do nuance.

Suggesting that “a gaggle of transsexuals telling Suzanne Moore how to write looks a lot like how I’d imagine the Black and White Minstrels telling Usain Bolt how to run would look”, Burchill proceeded to launch a stinging attack against the ‘trans lobby’, denouncing them as “screaming mimis”, “Shims, shemales, whatever you’re calling yourselves these days”, and “bed-wetting transsexuals” who “have your c**k cut off and then plead special privileges as women”.

Twitter erupted in rage – or rather the Transsexual lobby and its fellow travellers within sections of the gay community had a hissy fit. The rest of us sat back and enjoyed the mud wrestling.

But then it became sinister

Ms Featherstone pursed her lips and tweeted

Julie Birchill rant against transgender community is absolutely disgusting – a bigoted vomit for which the Observer should sack her.

A few hours later the editor of The Observer DELETED BURCHILL’S PIECE FROM ITS WEBSITE.

So welcome to the Age of Leveson where a craven editor is so spooked by the public displeasure of a government minister that he spikes a story and grovels for forgiveness. It’s not Burchill who should be sacked – it should be the witch hunting neo NVKD Featherstone. How dare she use her position to censor a journalist for merely speaking her mind in a perfectly legal manner.

It’s just the tip of the iceberg. Strident lobbies will increasingly franchise politicians to crush free speech – which is why we must act now

I DEMAND THAT DAVID CAMERON SACK FEATHERSTONE FROM HIS GOVERNMENT FOR HER BIGOTED VOMIT AGAINST OUR BASIC RIGHT TO ENGAGE IN POLEMICAL DEBATE.

Assuming, of course, that he has the balls to do it…….

Fascinating thread at Legal Insurrection on the “alleged” fading of the Tea Party Movement after the high water mark of 2010

The best comment came from Midwest Rhino who gave a common sense down to earth analysis of the TP, it’s appeal and it’s fault lines…and if anything proved his/her point it was some of the other comments on the thread about abortion and Ron Paul.
It is interesting to note that, although Sarah Palin is a staunch opponent of abortion she appeared never to have brought that into any speech she made at a TP event – instead the recurring theme was fiscal sanity, small govt and the dangers of crony capitalism…..

More than anything, the decline in numbers shows the power of the left to control the message.
When Santelli first did his rant, the “Tea Party” was a big hit. As the grass roots movement developed, the left saw the threat and aimed their big guns at it to bombard it with rhetoric of racism, ignorance, and hate.
Working from the other side, the hard evangelicals saw it as an opportunity to usurp some vitality and new people (and a threat to their grip on the GOP). They infiltrated with demands on prayer and abortion. This part, I believe, was the more effective “killer” of the young movement.

I’d like to see Rasmussen break down what people think the tea party stands for. It seems many think Akin was Tea Party, just because of his hard and stupid statements on abortion.

Hopefully Cruz will learn to say abortion laws are above his pay grade, or some such thing. He may not believe in ANY abortion, but laws for other beliefs are a decision for judges in high courts. Tea partiers are about a restrained government and fiscal sanity. NOT about religion forcing less “tolerance” on “evil unbelievers”. (though the inhumanity of late term abortions might have some traction)

The Democrats and evangelicals effectively cut the tea party baby in half by dividing it on religion, and tarring everyone as racist and ignorant. Palin (yes, she’s wonderful) was used as the personification of this, and she’s still being attacked by Leno et. al., apparently to continue driving the stake in.

Divide on a contentious issue … it’s an old trick.

It couldn’t have happened to a nastier guy – pompous, self righteous media slimeball Piers Morgan (aka Piers Moron) only had a day or so to enjoy the plaudits of his Tina Brown/BBC/Guardian groupies after radio wingnut oddball Alex Jones imploded on his CNN show when the Moron himself was skewered and toasted by Breitbart.com’s Ben Shapiro

As Roger Kimball pointed out

Morgan is, as Ben says, a bully of the first water, a man whose delight in mud slinging was too much even for the bottom-feeding British tabloid the Daily Mirror, which fired him for publishing fake photos of British soldiers supposedly abusing Iraqi prisoners. Morgan is one of those liberals whose unshakable self-infatuation compels him to treat disagreement as a sort of moral heresy. His contemptuous—and contemptible—treatment of his guests makes for intermittently entertaining, if also cringe-making, television. But as Ben demonstrates, Morgan’s habit of contempt renders him a pathetic, deeply unserious mountebank.

Very true, Roger….which is why his departure from our scepter’d isle to the further shores of CNN was such a day of jubilation over here….