The hive-mind takes on Hannan

If you’re reading this, you probably read last night’s post on Dan Hannan’s contempt for the NHS. But it wasn’t just me: some of the finest minds on the internet were having a crack at Hannan and his Tory cronies too. Here’s a selected round-up:
First off, a few facts and figures about the system the Washington Times described [...]

Burma: Free Aung San Suu Kyi

As you’ve probably heard, Aung San Suu Kyi was found guilty earlier today in her trial for “violating the conditions of her house arrest”. She was sentenced to another 18 months of house arrest – meaning she’ll still be imprisoned during Burma’s next general election.
Amnesty say: ‘Until she is released unconditionally, there can be no genuine improvement in [...]

What would you like to say to the G20?

Just noticed the Labour Party website has a nifty little ‘message to the G20′ tool on its front page at the moment, go and have a play. I know it’s a difficult question, that’s why the Put People First demo yesterday came up with approximately 35000 different answers! More on that later…

War cabinet minutes to stay secret

I will blog more angrily later. I’m off to experience the virtual phonebank for the first time this evening…god my life is exciting.

I love Tony Benn, Chapter 94

The BBC always loves reporting on itself, so the story about its ridiculous refusal to air an appeal for humanitarian aid in Gaza on behalf of the Disasters Emergency Committee is getting a lot more airtime than the appeal itself ever would have done…even better, however, was the decision to get Tony Benn on the Today programme [...]

Obama orders Guantanamo closure

If you’d asked me two years ago what one thing I wanted to happen to make the world a better place, I think there’s a good chance this would have been it.
It’s so strange…you get all caught up in the election excitement (see for example any of my posts from November) and then you return to good [...]

Also on the Greenpeace website…

…is some work they are doing on mapping the damage being caused by soya production in the Amazon.
Any mention of soya pokes my somewhat-overused guilt button, because, as a vegan, soya makes up around 100% of my diet. However it’s actually a good example of the efficiency of veggie diets over meaty ones: if all [...]

Happy Obama Day one and all!

Will post properly later, but hope you’re all enjoying it

Most advisable headline change ever?

Did I imagine it, or was this story on the MEN website yesterday under the headline ‘Cameron ‘promises’ TIF cash’, or something very similar? Daring use of inverted commas. Even the usual anti-TIF MEN commenters can recognise that “My view is that if you have got good schemes to go ahead with then you should [...]

New Year, same old….

Yes, I’m back. Sorry I haven’t posted in a month, winter makes me depressed. Israel also makes me depressed. I’m sure I have nothing to contribute to any Gaza debate beyond the same outrage everyone else is expressing (and also the cheerless footnote that the crisis is even starting to ruin Obama for us) except [...]