Labi Siffre - Into The Light

Dr Johnson Was Mistaken

God is the last refuge of a scoundrel

Patriotism merely the penultimate

 

 

 

[ USA  UK  Poland  Hungary  Russia

Saudi Arabia   Ireland  Iran  Turkey

North Korea   Vatican City   Nigeria

and more ...

Theism is Politics

That's all]

 

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Woke To Being Politically Correct

Politically correct (as brought to general public view) began as merely pointing out that words have meaning and subtext; and that sometimes the subtext can be harmful.

 

For example:

The definition of Homo sapiens as "Mankind"; the harmful subtext being the exclusion of women and girls (approximately 51% of the human race).

The "Politically correct" suggestion was to use "Humankind" in order to describe Homo sapiens; thereby including and respecting women, girls, sisters, aunts, wives, grandmothers, mothers.

 

Outraged by the suggestion that they could be in error, UK right wing oligarch newspaper owners (exclusively male) through the pages of a predominantly right wing UK press e.g. The Sun, News of the World, Telegraph and The Express, re-defined "Politically Correct" to mean "lacking the courage to speak your mind".

 

Incidentally, a Google search reveals the current definition of "woke" as "Alert to injustice in society". To me that sounds like a worthwhile aspiration and more: a duty.

 

Be woke to the fact that definitions can be and often are weaponised. For example, the word "woke".

 

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Moving Forward

When voters accept
Collective responsibility
For the policies and practices
Of governments
They collectively elect
Democracy will have made
Much needed progress
PS
Whether you vote or not
If you have the franchise
You’re compromised

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Casual Lies

Casual lies are now the norm.

The agenda is to remove the concepts of

Facts

Truth

Accuracy

Details

Things that ARE

(And can be verified as so)

Thus making "the people”

Even easier to manipulate

As everything those

In positions of responsibility say

Or do

Becomes instantly deniable.

 

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MAKING EXCUSES FOR GOD

Free will?

OK

Hold your breath

Till day after tomorrow

Then call me

And we’ll discuss it

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WHAT IS ATHEISM?

Atheism is not “merely the absence of belief”

It is a positive affirmation that

Facts and Evidence exist

And Evidence should take precedence over Belief

(An attitude an innocent person

On trial in a court of law

Would agree with

As would an uncorrupted judge

In pursuit of justice).

 

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(Love Is Love Is Love) Why Isn't Love Enough?

1 "Love is
2 Something
3 Every
4 Body needs"

A New Single
From me, Labi Siffre
Fab? (I don’t use “Awesome")
Yes It is
But I would say that (cos it’s true)
“(Love Is Love Is Love) Why isn’t Love Enough?”

Check it here:
https://smarturl.it/Love_Is_Love_Is_Love

 

 

SOVEREIGNTY

The only way to be Sovereign
As a Person
Or Nation
Is to be
The Only
Person
Or Nation

If you love someone
Or something
You can't be free

If you deal with others
You can be sovereign only by
Total War
And suffer
The consequences

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Covid-19, "The Big Lie", The UK, USA & How History Doesn't Go Away

Matt Hancock, yes
“The nation is rising to this challenge”
But the government did not
Until AT LEAST a month too late
And has still not adequately done so.

The Boris Johnson/Dominic Cummings
Conservative Government
Has NHS and civilian blood on its hands.

Its core members continue the tactic of
Lie > Obfuscate > Evade > Repeat Mantra
A tactic that after 1,316 days
From the 15th of Dec 2015
To the 23rd of July 2019
Gamed them power.

"The Big Lie” strategy worked
Brilliantly
(On both shores of the Atlantic)
And Paul Joseph Goebbels
From 1933 to 1945
Adolf Hitler’s Reich Minister of Propaganda
Witnessing the world-wide
21st Century success
Of his methods
Is Grinning In His Grave

~

Matt Hancock: UK Secretary of State for Health & Social Care 2020

Boris Johnson: UK Prime Minister 2020

Dominic Cummings: Chief Advisor/Special Advisor to UK PM Boris Johnson 2020

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Odd Indeed

So politicians needn’t be
But pop singers and footballers
MUST be
Role models.
So Politically powerful
Expenses fiddlers
Tax evaders
Serial evaders of questions asked
on behalf of the people
A serial liar PM
And demagogue propaganda tabloids
Get a free UK ride.
Odd, don’t you think?

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BOOK TITLE

Transatlantic Hubris Nationalism Populism Complacency -

The Encouragement Of Wilful Ignorance (Evidence?

Experts? Science? Bah!) & The Rise Of The Wilfully Ignorant

Led By Those Who Despise An Electorate They View As

Gullible & Easy To Manipulate With Lies & Scapegoats

 

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Armour For Those Told They Are Over-Reacting re Covid-19

When government says it’s a problem: it’s serious.
When they say it’s serious: it’s an emergency.
When they say it’s an emergency: Put your head between your legs and kiss your arse goodbye.

In my lifetime I’ve never heard a PM tell us to expect some of our loved one’s to die. This PM, B.Johnson, is a serial liar and an arsehole but clearly his scientific and medical advisors have impressed upon him the need (at least for his own legacy reputation) to be able to say “I warned you”. The government is advised to expect over a million deaths. I repeat, over a million deaths.

People can call that over-reaction if they wish. But we’ve been told.

 

–––

My Thanks To JSB

Depressed
by the manner of our species
(And his de facto complicity)
He seeks refuge in
The Art of Fugue
It works
For a while
Then we drown it out
By being

Birds are singing
Trees are green the sky where he is
is blue
Criss-crossed with vapour trails; He is currently
“Safe"
After reading of another scapegoat killed
By the self-proclaimed “threatened” yet overwhelming majority;
God fearing to a man and like God
Living productive lives in fear of self-reflection

These days are like so many others
Yet the numbers game colours this pandemic-ly;
He tries to smile
After all, the meme goes,
Optimism is the cure-all
And lucky he was born in a rich nation,
World leaders, chest beaters, rough sleepers, praise Jesus
He rises for coffee-making (hug the drug)
Appropriately served in a celebratory mug
While at the vacated computer desk
The smile
Hasn’t arrived

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BREXIT LOGIC

A slim majority were scammed into voting for self-harm (Brexit) thus damaging the prospects of the nation’s young and generations to come; thus geopolitically further de-stabilising the balance of power in favour of China, Russia and their ilk (the likes of Donald Trump) forces that have no use for democracy and instead favour despotism rather than the people and their freedoms.

 

We are told, by the scammed and the scammers, that those who opposed that lack of wisdom (Brexit) should now agree with and support it.

 

Brexit continues to be

Absurdity on absurdity

 

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THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

Great Britain fought WW2 in a Multi-Nation, Multi-Culture, Multi-Ethnic, Multi-Colour, Multi-Language force. No one did it alone. No one does it alone. As then we’re better together.

The Fantasy That Is Brexit Is An Ambush.

#StopBrexit 

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STROLLING IN THE PARK

"The insignificant
For example
Putin
Trump
Farage
Pol Pot
Widdecombe
Wilders
Xi Jinping
Boris Johnson
Le Pen
Victor Orban
Kim Jong-un
Are of no account;
But their followers
Are of interest.”

“Why so?”

“Because after thousands
Of years they have
Learned
Nothing. That
Isn’t easy to do.”

 

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AVOIDANCE COPING

In 1948, given the biggest share
Of Marshall Aid
GB wasted it
Clinging to Empire
While Germany invested
In Industrial Modernisation.

North Sea oil revenue?
GB wasted it
On tax cuts
While Norway invested it
With a North Sea Oil Sovereign wealth fund
(Now the world's largest)
For its people
Who because of that
Are now more secure
Than ours.

In answer to
The 2007/2008 US-made crash?
GB chose austerity
And more austerity
(Top down? You must be joking!)

And none of this
None of this
None of this
Had a jot to do
With the EU

So, the wilfully ignorant
GB lashing out response is Brexit
After all
We beat the Germans
All On Our Own
In two world wars
(really? All on our own?)
Then beat 'em again
In the '66 world cup

For twenty years, thanks to Rupert Murdoch and other robber barons, Brits have been taught to hate the EU (for things it hasn't done) by The Sun, The Mail, The Express (newspapers) and their ilk; but isn't it really Germany we hate, for doing what GB should have done after WW2 but didn't? And is it perhaps that, still with the hubris of Empire, we hate mirrors even more than we hate the Germans?
*
["Britain received more than a third more Marshall Aid than West Germany - $2.7 billion as against $1.7 billion. Britain pocketed the largest share of any European nation"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/hist…/british/modern/marshall_01.shtml]
*
["Had Thatcher been a truly visionary politician, she would have established a wealth fund for the oil windfall, not squandered it on tax cuts and current spending."
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/04/thatcher-and-north-sea-oil-–-failure-invest-britain?fbclid=IwAR0OF5zyvez7FtEXx3gMmlssK-PnHbxaoqTxfruYmGjwQyozVaaUHmTGH0A]
*
[In Britain, Austerity Is Changing Everything
After eight years of budget cutting, Britain is looking less like the rest of Europe and more like the United States, with a shrinking welfare state and spreading poverty.
[https://www.nytimes.com/…/…/europe/uk-austerity-poverty.html]

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Brexit - Winners & Losers

For a start, it isn't a competition. We are not in the playground. We are supposed to be fighting to protect the vulnerable. We have a duty to do so. Those earning the average income circa £28,000 a year, or earning less or much less and those just getting by, according to the government's own estimation will be harmed by Brexit; any Brexit. No version of Brexit will leave us in a situation as beneficial as remaining in the EU. That, as far as I am concerned, is where the conversation starts.

 

As for "get over the referendum vote”, "be optimistic" and "see a glass that is half full”: in this age in which water wars, violent conflicts over water, are already raging: I see a glass that is half full for those who can afford to pay for it and a glass that is much less full for those who cannot. I also see a glass that is overflowing for Boris Johnson, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Iain Duncan Smith, Nigel Farage, Viscount Rothermere, The Barclay Brothers and Rupert Murdoch. The robber barons inciting this one sided self-harming UK insanity will glide through Brexit their fortunes enhanced. Large numbers of those who voted for Brexit will be very very much less fortunate. The fight against Brexit is a fight for the wellbeing of Leavers and Remainers alike because the aforementioned “not wealthy” are, “all in it together” … and in the case of Brexit, the “it” stinks.

 

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BLAMELESS

Cos homo sapiens
Is a lazy
(intellectually)
Wilfully ignorant
Species
We look
For easy answers

And cos we want easy
Answers
We made, make and remake
God
(The easy answer to
and for
everything)

And cos we hate most
To be found
Guilty
Responsibility isn’t our bag
So what we make, we say we found
Cos what we find
Was left behind
By something or someone else:
God

So we
Can’t be
Responsible for it
Nor for what we say it says
Nor for what we say it does
Nor for what we say it demands
And thus we achieve our primary goal:
To be blameless

Best of all
On its behalf
As faithful servants
We can demand
Others behave
In the way we say
God demands

And on God’s behalf
We penalise those
Who disobey it/us
And still remain
Blameless

The perfect path to éminence grise
Political power
While we claim, as always,
To be merely
“Believers"

BREXIT - "TRADE IS IMPORTANT, BUT … "

(UK Foreign Sec J Hunt BBC Radio4 the “Today” program 15/4/19).

 

That "but" is appropriate if you are attempting to conceal "The Brexit Dividend” the effect of reduced national wealth that Brexit will bring to those British People already not wealthy, to the NHS, social care, policing, the price of affordable justice, schools, security and adequately paid jobs.

 

Don't be fooled by promises of how easy it will be, how optimism will overcome all problems. This is real life not an uplifting heart-warming movie. Brexit means 2008 financial crash austerity will be followed by Brexit austerity.

 

Except for our competitors and enemies (Putin’s Russia, China and the circling vultures of Donald Trump’s USA) nations pursuing global economic stability want the UK to “Remain". Our enemies and competitors realise that when no longer a member of the EU (the world's largest Trading Bloc) the UK will be weaker. We will certainly be at the mercy of and much easier prey for US demands to lower our standards and economic defences in any “Free” Trade Deal negotiation. On top of that we'll be more vulnerable to demands for access from China, Saudi-Arabia and India in exchange for what our government of the day will describe as … "favourable deals" ... (favourable to who?).

 

Brexit will also weaken the EU and Western Europe, again making Russia and China and the USA stronger, again making us weaker in influence and economically. Brexit is in the best interests of our competitors and enemies. Collectively, the UK made an EU referendum mistake. The fault will be our collective lack of courage to admit that mistake and collectively rectify that error.

 

Don't be fooled by promises of how we will win and survive as we won and survived the second world war. Our parents and grandparents won WW2 as part of a multi-nation, multi-culture, multi-ethnic, multi-colour, multi-language enterprise. We wisely subsumed our individual sovereignties into a force able to endure setbacks and achieve victory. No one did it alone. No one does it alone. Then as now it is vital to realise we're better together.

 

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Brexit Self-Harm Writ Large

Theresa May says, "No government could give a blank cheque to commit to an outcome without knowing what it is.”
That is exactly what she and her government did on the 29th of March 2017 when they invoked Article 50.

UK citizens must fight, democratically, to revoke Article 50.

It is Parliament's duty to protect citizens, especially the vulnerable, not to slavishly kowtow to their whimsical view that the EU is responsible for our problems of austerity and serious shortage of resources (cash) leading to the 5th or currently 6th richest nation having a health and social care system not fit for purpose, a seriously depleted police force and a council cashflow inability to fill potholes.

Our problems of austerity and our serious shortage of resources (cash) were caused by the relaxation of USA & UK banking rules by President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher; yes, history has a very very very long reach. These relaxations led to roulette bank practices which in turn lead to the 2008 crash, from which we and other nations are still recovering and because of which, UK governments CHOSE austerity. None of this is due to the EU.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47689415

Incidentally: Under European Parliament and Council Directive 2004/38/EC, EU member states can repatriate EU nationals after three months if they have not found a job or do not have the means to support themselves.
Unlike other EU member states, the UK does not use this directive. Why not?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/31/britain-take-back-control-immigration-eu-directive-brexit?

 

 

"Terrorists Don't Have A Religion”?

On the contrary, evidence strongly suggests that there have been few, if any, terrorist attacks by atheists in the past forty years. Even so called “militant” atheists choose debate and computer keyboards, not guns.

In the past forty years, terrorism has been almost exclusively religious-terrorism inspired by and wielded in the cause, defence and name of religion.

Claims that "terrorists do not represent our religion" and all religions are "religions of peace" are the craven responses of hubris ridden, self-aggrandisers claiming, with no evidence, that there is a perfect, all powerful supernatural being which above all else loves and justifies them, personally; the subtext being that If everything is God's will, humans (especially believers) conveniently cannot be guilty of anything.

More craven still is the subtext which more than implies that theists, the religious, those who believe in God, by definition cannot BE terrorists. Convenient indeed.

"Terrorists Don't Have A Religion”? On the contrary, in our lifetime they are rarely, if ever, without one.

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THE BASIS OF BIGOTRY

How dare you be different from me

How dare you not look, talk, think,

Feel

As I do

How dare you constantly suggest

As you do by being other

That I

What I think

What I feel

What I am

Is wrong

 

How dare you suggest

As you do by being other

That I am not the standard

By which all should be judged

How dare you

As you do by being other

Make me feel uneasy

Insecure

“Uncomfortable”

 

I will hurt you for your insult

Of not being like me

I will punish you for this affront

I will righteously condemn you for your crime

Of existing

As “other”:

How dare you be different from me

How DARE you be DIFFERENT from me

 

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DEMOCRACY

The US Electoral College makes
The USA less
Democratic than the UK of GB's
Parliamentary Democracy

Though the UK's First Past The Post
System makes the UK less
Democratic than any nation employing
The Single Transferable Vote
The most democratic hope

***

How Democratic Are We?
Find out here: https://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/voting-systems/types-of-voting-system/

 

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The Nature Of Things

Expect little applause
For facts or fact based
Evidence; superstition
Usually wins
The popular vote

Or it is perhaps that
An age of reason
Followed by ages of superstition
Intellectual laziness and lashing out
Is as inevitable as "Boom & Bust”:
"The Economic Cycle”

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