Wednesday, October 6, 2010
How democracy works in Ireland.
Democracy in Ireland works by holding referendums on important constitutional issues and then allowing the government to judge the result. If the government thinks the result is wrong, the referendums are held again until the government gets the results it wants.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Sinn Fein History
Are you aware of the following little snippet of Sinn Fein history. I came across it in a book by Professor Donal McCracken “The Irish Pro-Boers 1877-1902” p.162 whilst researching the history of the Irish in South Africa;
“To [Arthur] Griffith the Boer leaders were the caliber of those Ireland had produced in the past. His later organization, Sinn Fein, which he founded in 1905, was more than just the physical heir of the Irish Transvaal Committee for he built it on the guiding philosophy of national self-sufficiency, undoubtedly inspired by his experience of living in the Transvaal among the self-reliant Boers”.
The Irish Pro-Boer movement started in 1877 when Britain first annexed the Transvaal. It was from that movement that the Irish Transvaal Committee was formed in Dublin at the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899. One of it's main aims was to oppose recruitment by the British Army to fight the Boer. It's chief activists were James Connolly, Maud Gonne, Arthur Griffith and John O'Leary. It also supported the two Irish Brigades which were formed to fight on the side of the Boers against the British. One of the Irish Brigade leaders was John McBride.
Ironical isn't it, that shortly after John McBride was executed after the Easter uprising in 1916, the Boer General Jan Smuts, his erstwhile brother in arms, became a member of the British War Cabinet.
“To [Arthur] Griffith the Boer leaders were the caliber of those Ireland had produced in the past. His later organization, Sinn Fein, which he founded in 1905, was more than just the physical heir of the Irish Transvaal Committee for he built it on the guiding philosophy of national self-sufficiency, undoubtedly inspired by his experience of living in the Transvaal among the self-reliant Boers”.
The Irish Pro-Boer movement started in 1877 when Britain first annexed the Transvaal. It was from that movement that the Irish Transvaal Committee was formed in Dublin at the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899. One of it's main aims was to oppose recruitment by the British Army to fight the Boer. It's chief activists were James Connolly, Maud Gonne, Arthur Griffith and John O'Leary. It also supported the two Irish Brigades which were formed to fight on the side of the Boers against the British. One of the Irish Brigade leaders was John McBride.
Ironical isn't it, that shortly after John McBride was executed after the Easter uprising in 1916, the Boer General Jan Smuts, his erstwhile brother in arms, became a member of the British War Cabinet.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Irish Politics For Visitors
I rather liked this and though it worth publishing. Author is unknown.
Ireland is an island to the west of Britain but Northern Ireland is just off the mainland – not the Irish mainland, the British mainland.
The capital of Ireland is Dublin. It has a population of a million people, all of whom will be shopping in Newry this afternoon. They travel to Newry because it is in the North, which is not part of Ireland, but they still pay in Euros.
Under the Irish constitution, the North used to be in Ireland, but a successful 30 year campaign of violence for Irish unity ensured that it is now definitely in the UK. Had the campaign lasted longer the North might now be in France.
Belfast is the capital of Northern Ireland. It has a population of half a million, half of whom have houses in Donegal. Donegal is in the north but not in the North. It is in the South. No, not the south, the South.
There are two parliaments in Ireland. The Dublin parliament is called the Dáil, (pronounced “Doyle”), an Irish word meaning a place where banks receive taxpayers’ money. The one in Belfast is called Stormont, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning placebo, or deliberately ineffective drug.
Their respective jurisdictions are defined by the border, an imaginary line on the map to show fuel launderers where to dump chemical waste.
Protestants are in favour of the border, which generates millions of pounds in smuggling for Catholics, who are opposed to it.
Travel between the two states is complicated because Ireland is the only country in the world with two M1 motorways. The one in the North goes west to avoid the south and the one in the South goes north to avoid the price of drink.
We have two types of democracy in Ireland. Dublin democracy works by holding a referendum and then allowing the government to judge the result. If the government thinks the result is wrong, the referendum is held again. Twice in recent years the government decided the people’s choice was wrong and ordered a new referendum.
Belfast democracy works differently. It has a parliament with no opposition, so the government is always right. This system generates envy in many world capitals, especially Dublin .
Ireland has three economies – northern, southern and black. Only the black economy is in the black. The other two are in the red.
All versions of the IRA claim to be the real IRA but only one of them is the Real IRA. The North’s biggest industry is the production of IRAs. Consequently, we now have the Provisional, Continuity and Real IRA. The Real IRA is by far the most popular among young graffiti writers simply because it is the easiest to spell.
Ireland is an island to the west of Britain but Northern Ireland is just off the mainland – not the Irish mainland, the British mainland.
The capital of Ireland is Dublin. It has a population of a million people, all of whom will be shopping in Newry this afternoon. They travel to Newry because it is in the North, which is not part of Ireland, but they still pay in Euros.
Under the Irish constitution, the North used to be in Ireland, but a successful 30 year campaign of violence for Irish unity ensured that it is now definitely in the UK. Had the campaign lasted longer the North might now be in France.
Belfast is the capital of Northern Ireland. It has a population of half a million, half of whom have houses in Donegal. Donegal is in the north but not in the North. It is in the South. No, not the south, the South.
There are two parliaments in Ireland. The Dublin parliament is called the Dáil, (pronounced “Doyle”), an Irish word meaning a place where banks receive taxpayers’ money. The one in Belfast is called Stormont, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning placebo, or deliberately ineffective drug.
Their respective jurisdictions are defined by the border, an imaginary line on the map to show fuel launderers where to dump chemical waste.
Protestants are in favour of the border, which generates millions of pounds in smuggling for Catholics, who are opposed to it.
Travel between the two states is complicated because Ireland is the only country in the world with two M1 motorways. The one in the North goes west to avoid the south and the one in the South goes north to avoid the price of drink.
We have two types of democracy in Ireland. Dublin democracy works by holding a referendum and then allowing the government to judge the result. If the government thinks the result is wrong, the referendum is held again. Twice in recent years the government decided the people’s choice was wrong and ordered a new referendum.
Belfast democracy works differently. It has a parliament with no opposition, so the government is always right. This system generates envy in many world capitals, especially Dublin .
Ireland has three economies – northern, southern and black. Only the black economy is in the black. The other two are in the red.
All versions of the IRA claim to be the real IRA but only one of them is the Real IRA. The North’s biggest industry is the production of IRAs. Consequently, we now have the Provisional, Continuity and Real IRA. The Real IRA is by far the most popular among young graffiti writers simply because it is the easiest to spell.
Friday, March 26, 2010
The Military
It's the soldier, not the reporter who has given us the freedom of the Press.
It's the soldier, not the poet who has given us the freedom of speech.
It's the soldier, not the politicians that ensures our right to Life, Liberty , and the pursuit of Happiness.
It's the soldier, that salutes the flag, that serves beneath it, who's coffins are draped by it.
And pray for the men and women who have served and are currently serving their country and pray for those who have given the ultimate sacrifice for freedom.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
The Failing State of England
Rarely in our world have we had the opportunity to watch, first hand, as a major Western power comes crumbling down in such a spectacular fashion as we are about to see with the final collapse of England.
England is already a failed state at many levels, from the collapse of its economy, its broken society and its greatly reduced military capability and compounded when linked to its moral collapse.
The failure is most visible in the financial sphere. England is now a debtor nation, who while lecturing Iceland and Greece on their failed economies, is itself running a 12.6% deficit, as opposed to the one of Greece, at 12.7%. Worse, England is running a 0% interest rate, ruining the retirement of millions of its own pensioners.
Control wise, the government of Blair/Brown and their shills of a so called opposition, have installed twice as many cameras as people. Everything is cataloged and tracked, from personal movements, to drives on the motorways. Informants are everywhere, neighbour snitching on neighbour, friend on friend, family on family. Now comes the news that the state will even keep dossiers on children as young as five who use or exhibit "racist" or "intolerant" behavior.
The mass migration of alien cultures into the U.K. has been staggering and now word has come out that the ruling elites and their shills did this on purpose. Imagine, an elite who have taken radical steps to, in effect, exterminate the very society that allowed them to climb to the level that they are at. In most other societies, there would be pitch forks and fire brands, but not in England, only mildly worded letters of protest from the general public. All this, as alien cultural types, rape and murder at will and the police never seeming to know what is going on.
Vigilantism will not be tolerated, smacks too much of individualism and must be crushed. Thus the non Christian and the half feral yobs, run wild and victimize the rest of society. The London underground system, smaller than Moscow's and serving a city half the population of Moscow, had 33 murders in 2009, as opposed to Moscow's 10.
But this should be no surprise, when considering that the Church of England, itself a failing religion, leads the lost and befuddled population into Hell and Damnation and the English are happy to follow and spit blissfully into the eyes of their God.
Meanwhile bishops in the Church of England are pushing for gay marriages and are busy defending the religion of non Christians. These alien religions seek to introduce alien laws which will result in the extinction of the Christian Church. Is it any wonder that the Eastern Orthodox Church is growing in the UK, while whole congregations have petitioned the Pope to join the Roman Catholic Church?
Even the vaunted National Healthcare System is broken and killing by neglect. A report, just out, shows that some 50,000 or more a year are dying from direct neglect in the hospital system. In 2008, 6 000 women gave birth in corridors, lifts and taxis, when lack of beds and doctors forced them away from the hospital at the last moment before birth. The fact that the English tolerate this neglect and have not risen past indignation and strongly worded notes, shows how befitting of total collapse, English society is.
And where are the Royals? Where are the God chosen defenders of the English faith, their culture and laws? Where are those, supposedly designated by God to rule and stop this insanity? Maybe they are drunk and drugged into a stupor? A sorrier lot is hard to imagine.
So what will it take to finally bring this rotting wreck of humanity tumbling down? Will it be the upcoming war with Argentina over the Falklands? England is stretched bare in Afghanistan helping the Yanks. The very same Yanks who are now siding with the financially broke and corrupt Argentinians, over the financially broke and corrupt Anglo Saxons. There is simply no way that England could mount a task force as it did in 1982, to retain the Falklands and its potential oil wealth. This loss may finally bring the whole rotting edifice tumbling down.
But there may be some hope in the small political parties and independents gaining ground in the forthcoming general election and putting a scare into the mainstream political parties. The average English voter have all but given up on politics, so these chaps will have their work cut out for them and frankly they may be way too late.
Good luck my English friends, you're going to need it.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Irish State's Abysmal Record of Child Abuse
Just because Ireland is geographically close to England it does not mean that Irish social workers need to ape their social norms. Read the following extract from Kevin Meyers and tell me that Irish social workers are not every bit as capable of child abuse as their English counterparts?
From Kevin Myers - Irish Independent Columnist
This State has had a few interesting periods in its 88 years of existence, but last week must be up there amongst the best.
By Friday, I no longer knew the difference between Tracey Fay, Danny Talbot and the somewhat inadequately named House of Horrors, wherein the mother found her husband raping their teenage son. Perhaps she found this inspirational, because she went on to rape her 13-year-old son.
Tracey Fay didn't need to be raped by a family member, because one way or another, the Republic of Ireland was, in its own idiosyncratic way, doing a pretty good job on her and her life. Ditto Danny Talbot.
You probably have some trouble remembering which is which. Was it Danny Talbot who had his teeth knocked while he was in care? And was it an undernourished and filthy Tracey Fay who was found covered in lice, urine and faeces? No, that was Danny's brother, Joe. Or was it David Foley?
No, on second thoughts, not him, because that poor teenager was already dead of a drugs overdose. And not Kim O'Donovan either: aged 15, she fatally overdosed. What they all had in common was that they were wards of the Health Service Executive (Ireland).
It is not good enough that the HSE did not pursue its lawful and constitutional obligations to protect children in the House of Horrors case, merely because of one court order which it could have opposed through legal methods.
Moreover, we know that this mysterious creature, the Irish 'social worker', generally speaking, has an office-bound existence which ceases on a Friday evening, when she goes home. And yes, for the most part, it is a she. Remember. On Tracey Fay's first night of being homeless in 1998, the 15-year-old asked a social worker to stay with her until the out-of-hours social worker arrived. The social worker refused and left her alone at a shopping centre at 6.40pm.
Tracey -- whose mother had knocked her teeth out when she was seven and who was the victim of five 'non-accidental' injuries before she reached the age of four -- then made her own way to Coolock garda station.
Well, a constitutional amendment would certainly have prevented that kind of carry-on!
That, dear readers, is a rhetorical device known as sarcasm. Which is perhaps the only tool capable of coping with this leviathan called the HSE, with its 100,000 employees (who, on average, each take 12 days' sick leave a year) and which cannot even be entrusted with a much-abused 15-year-old girl at 6.40pm without abandoning her.
Naturally, the HSE cannot say whether any social workers have been disciplined or had their careers in any way impaired, by the litany of failures associated with the death of the 23 young people who have died in their charge. Probably not.
For just being a social worker in HSE-land is a career in itself. Occupational duties are a purely voluntary addition to the existing pay-and-promotion structure.
From Kevin Myers - Irish Independent Columnist
This State has had a few interesting periods in its 88 years of existence, but last week must be up there amongst the best.
By Friday, I no longer knew the difference between Tracey Fay, Danny Talbot and the somewhat inadequately named House of Horrors, wherein the mother found her husband raping their teenage son. Perhaps she found this inspirational, because she went on to rape her 13-year-old son.
Tracey Fay didn't need to be raped by a family member, because one way or another, the Republic of Ireland was, in its own idiosyncratic way, doing a pretty good job on her and her life. Ditto Danny Talbot.
You probably have some trouble remembering which is which. Was it Danny Talbot who had his teeth knocked while he was in care? And was it an undernourished and filthy Tracey Fay who was found covered in lice, urine and faeces? No, that was Danny's brother, Joe. Or was it David Foley?
No, on second thoughts, not him, because that poor teenager was already dead of a drugs overdose. And not Kim O'Donovan either: aged 15, she fatally overdosed. What they all had in common was that they were wards of the Health Service Executive (Ireland).
It is not good enough that the HSE did not pursue its lawful and constitutional obligations to protect children in the House of Horrors case, merely because of one court order which it could have opposed through legal methods.
Moreover, we know that this mysterious creature, the Irish 'social worker', generally speaking, has an office-bound existence which ceases on a Friday evening, when she goes home. And yes, for the most part, it is a she. Remember. On Tracey Fay's first night of being homeless in 1998, the 15-year-old asked a social worker to stay with her until the out-of-hours social worker arrived. The social worker refused and left her alone at a shopping centre at 6.40pm.
Tracey -- whose mother had knocked her teeth out when she was seven and who was the victim of five 'non-accidental' injuries before she reached the age of four -- then made her own way to Coolock garda station.
Well, a constitutional amendment would certainly have prevented that kind of carry-on!
That, dear readers, is a rhetorical device known as sarcasm. Which is perhaps the only tool capable of coping with this leviathan called the HSE, with its 100,000 employees (who, on average, each take 12 days' sick leave a year) and which cannot even be entrusted with a much-abused 15-year-old girl at 6.40pm without abandoning her.
Naturally, the HSE cannot say whether any social workers have been disciplined or had their careers in any way impaired, by the litany of failures associated with the death of the 23 young people who have died in their charge. Probably not.
For just being a social worker in HSE-land is a career in itself. Occupational duties are a purely voluntary addition to the existing pay-and-promotion structure.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
The British Empire
It was once claimed that "the sun never set on the British Empire". There is no doubt that this was true until recent decades.
However, it took an unknown Irish humorist to come up with the answer as to why "the sun never set on the British Empire". It was because God could not trust the English in the dark.
However, it took an unknown Irish humorist to come up with the answer as to why "the sun never set on the British Empire". It was because God could not trust the English in the dark.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
WE WANT OUR CELTLAND BACK
One must admit that whoever wrote the following song did not know much about the history or the politics of the Celtic fringe. And maybe there's a touch of hypocrisy about it.
WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK
Goodbye to my England, So long my old friend
Your days are numbered, being brought to an end
To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine
But don't say you're English, that's way out of line.
The French and the Germans may call themselves such
So may Norwegians, the Swedes and the Dutch
You can say you are Russian or maybe a Dane
But don't say you're English ever again.
At Broadcasting House the word is taboo
In Brussels it's scrapped, in Parliament too
Even schools are affected, staff do as they're told
They must not teach children about England of old.
Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Shaw
The pupils don't learn about them anymore
How about Agincourt, Hastings, Arnhem or Mons?
When England lost hosts of her very brave sons.
We are not Europeans, how can we be?
Europe is miles away over the sea
We're the English from England, let's all be proud
Stand up and be counted - Shout it out loud!
Let's tell our Government and Brussels too
We're proud of our heritage and the Red, White and Blue
Fly the flag of Saint George or the Union Jack
Let the world know - WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK !!!!
In this respect the English have not been much different from the Europeans and London, like Brussels, has rode roughshod for many centuries over all attempts by the Celtic countries to retain some vestige of independence
The following statements are well known facts which I have obtained from various sources and are easily confirmed by all who have access to the internet.
We should not forget that it was the English who first forced the Welsh, then the Scots and finally the Irish into the political union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. This was achieved by the application of overwhelming force against the wishes of the majority of the Celtic peoples by the more numerous and agressive English. It has also left an enduring bitterness amongst the Celtic peoples of the Isles.
Wales was incorporated into England by the English Parliament, with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, creating the legal entity known today as England and Wales. The Kingdom of Scotland was an independent state until 1 May 1707 when it joined in a political union with the Kingdom of England to create a united Kingdom of Great Britain. There were widespread protest across Scotland against this action. In 1800, the British and Irish Parliaments passed the Act of Union which, in 1801, merged the Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, (now the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). This was done at the insistence of the English Parliament , to whom the Irish Parliament was subservient and it was done against the wishes of the vast majority of the Irish people.
We should also remember that it was the forcible imposition of English laws over the past 900 years that led to the almost total destruction of the Celtic languages and cultures of Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Laws, by the way, that were not only anti Celtic but which declared that the practice of Celtic culture would be an illegal act. Not a great deal different from what Brussels have been doing to the English over recent years and who are also showing as much a dislike to such legal coersions as the Celts did to the imposition of coersive English laws. All that remains, is for us to see if the English are willing to fight as long and as hard against overwhelming odds, as did the Scots and Irish.
It was only in the latter half of the last century that the advent of a human rights culture and at the behest of the European Union, which has allowed the Celtic countries to express their pride and re-emphasise their own unique and un-English cultures.
And all this should help explain why "To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine". It was at the insistence of the English that there is an United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the first place and therefore the line "But don't say you're English, that's way out of line" is of their own making.
It would be right for the English to "Fly the flag of Saint George" but if they really mean to express their Englishness, they should not fly "the Union Jack", as it's made up of the cross not only of St. George, but also the crosses of St. Andrew and St. Patrick.
I think that the only way for England to be recognised as an separate entity and to be officially known as England, is to start dissolving the various acts of union which originally set the United Kingdom up.
But then maybe one should expect the Cornish to demand their independence. One may also have Cumbria and Cumberland joining on the bandwagon. And I can't count the number of times that the good men of Yorkshire have informed me that they are not Englishmen but Yorkshiremen.
Oh! and by the way, if we're to believe Professors Sykes and Oppenheimer, both geneticists at Oxford University, the ancestry of the people of the Isles mainly traces back to the prehistoric Palaeolithic Iberian people. In fact the Celts, Romans, Anglo Saxons, Vikings and Normans are all relative newcomers to the Isles and their genes, which we all share in differing amounts, are only a very small part of our genetic inheritance. Much as some may not like it, we are much more closely related then you think.
In Origins of the British (2006), Stephen Oppenheimer states (pages 375 and 378):
"By far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia (Spain and Portugal), ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales and 93% Castlerea, Ireland. On average only 30% of gene types in England derive from north-west Europe. Even without dating the earlier waves of north-west European immigration, this invalidates the Anglo-Saxon wipeout theory..."
"...75-95% of British Isles (genetic) matches derive from Iberia... Ireland, coastal Wales, and central and west-coast Scotland are almost entirely made up from Iberian founders, while the rest of the non-English parts of the British Isles have similarly high rates. England has rather lower rates of Iberian types with marked heterogeneity, but no English sample has less than 58% of Iberian samples..."
WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK
Goodbye to my England, So long my old friend
Your days are numbered, being brought to an end
To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine
But don't say you're English, that's way out of line.
The French and the Germans may call themselves such
So may Norwegians, the Swedes and the Dutch
You can say you are Russian or maybe a Dane
But don't say you're English ever again.
At Broadcasting House the word is taboo
In Brussels it's scrapped, in Parliament too
Even schools are affected, staff do as they're told
They must not teach children about England of old.
Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Shaw
The pupils don't learn about them anymore
How about Agincourt, Hastings, Arnhem or Mons?
When England lost hosts of her very brave sons.
We are not Europeans, how can we be?
Europe is miles away over the sea
We're the English from England, let's all be proud
Stand up and be counted - Shout it out loud!
Let's tell our Government and Brussels too
We're proud of our heritage and the Red, White and Blue
Fly the flag of Saint George or the Union Jack
Let the world know - WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK !!!!
In this respect the English have not been much different from the Europeans and London, like Brussels, has rode roughshod for many centuries over all attempts by the Celtic countries to retain some vestige of independence
The following statements are well known facts which I have obtained from various sources and are easily confirmed by all who have access to the internet.
We should not forget that it was the English who first forced the Welsh, then the Scots and finally the Irish into the political union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. This was achieved by the application of overwhelming force against the wishes of the majority of the Celtic peoples by the more numerous and agressive English. It has also left an enduring bitterness amongst the Celtic peoples of the Isles.
Wales was incorporated into England by the English Parliament, with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, creating the legal entity known today as England and Wales. The Kingdom of Scotland was an independent state until 1 May 1707 when it joined in a political union with the Kingdom of England to create a united Kingdom of Great Britain. There were widespread protest across Scotland against this action. In 1800, the British and Irish Parliaments passed the Act of Union which, in 1801, merged the Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, (now the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). This was done at the insistence of the English Parliament , to whom the Irish Parliament was subservient and it was done against the wishes of the vast majority of the Irish people.
We should also remember that it was the forcible imposition of English laws over the past 900 years that led to the almost total destruction of the Celtic languages and cultures of Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Laws, by the way, that were not only anti Celtic but which declared that the practice of Celtic culture would be an illegal act. Not a great deal different from what Brussels have been doing to the English over recent years and who are also showing as much a dislike to such legal coersions as the Celts did to the imposition of coersive English laws. All that remains, is for us to see if the English are willing to fight as long and as hard against overwhelming odds, as did the Scots and Irish.
It was only in the latter half of the last century that the advent of a human rights culture and at the behest of the European Union, which has allowed the Celtic countries to express their pride and re-emphasise their own unique and un-English cultures.
And all this should help explain why "To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine". It was at the insistence of the English that there is an United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the first place and therefore the line "But don't say you're English, that's way out of line" is of their own making.
It would be right for the English to "Fly the flag of Saint George" but if they really mean to express their Englishness, they should not fly "the Union Jack", as it's made up of the cross not only of St. George, but also the crosses of St. Andrew and St. Patrick.
I think that the only way for England to be recognised as an separate entity and to be officially known as England, is to start dissolving the various acts of union which originally set the United Kingdom up.
But then maybe one should expect the Cornish to demand their independence. One may also have Cumbria and Cumberland joining on the bandwagon. And I can't count the number of times that the good men of Yorkshire have informed me that they are not Englishmen but Yorkshiremen.
Oh! and by the way, if we're to believe Professors Sykes and Oppenheimer, both geneticists at Oxford University, the ancestry of the people of the Isles mainly traces back to the prehistoric Palaeolithic Iberian people. In fact the Celts, Romans, Anglo Saxons, Vikings and Normans are all relative newcomers to the Isles and their genes, which we all share in differing amounts, are only a very small part of our genetic inheritance. Much as some may not like it, we are much more closely related then you think.
In Origins of the British (2006), Stephen Oppenheimer states (pages 375 and 378):
"By far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia (Spain and Portugal), ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales and 93% Castlerea, Ireland. On average only 30% of gene types in England derive from north-west Europe. Even without dating the earlier waves of north-west European immigration, this invalidates the Anglo-Saxon wipeout theory..."
"...75-95% of British Isles (genetic) matches derive from Iberia... Ireland, coastal Wales, and central and west-coast Scotland are almost entirely made up from Iberian founders, while the rest of the non-English parts of the British Isles have similarly high rates. England has rather lower rates of Iberian types with marked heterogeneity, but no English sample has less than 58% of Iberian samples..."
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Foley/Supple family’s female genetic roots
The Foley and Supple family’s, female genetic roots go back to a time when northern Europe was still covered in ice and no modern human foot had trodden it.
Research on our genetic roots using modern DNA sequencing has scientifically established that our maternal great great ------ grandmother was born about 45,000 years ago and lived near a place that would become the classical site of Delphi, in what became know as Greece. That’s about 2000 generations ago.
To overcome the clinical coldness of scientific nomenclature, Professor Sykes of Oxford University has given her the name of Ursula. She is one of seven women who have been scientifically identified by their Mitochondrial DNA (mDNA) as the Clan mothers of 95% of all Europeans.
Although all the offspring of Eileen Kelly, née Foley, will all have the Ursula mDNA, it is only going to be passed on by the females in the family. Therefore there is only one immediate family member who has it and that is Eaodine (hope I’ve spelled your name right my dear, my spell-check wants to spell it iodine).
We do have a near relation who also has the Ursula mDNA and that is our first cousin Maureen O’Brien. She will have passed it on to her daughter Anne Marie who will in turn have passed it on to her daughter.
These two young ladies now bear a huge responsibility in that they are the only ones who will be able to pass it on to their female descendents and continue our mDNA line of descent. Amazing considering that by my latest reckoning there are 43 surviving descendents of Eileen and Michael Kelly. Three are deceased and there are six adopted children in the family
It is of course possible, that the sisters and maternal aunts of our maternal grandmother Julia Foley, nee Supple, also had daughters and that they in turn had daughters. Sadly that part of our family history is unknown to me.
Should you wish to know more about Ursula and her descendents and how they found their way into north-western Europe and Ireland you can read Professor Syke's book The Seven Daughters Of Eve or click on;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryan_Sykes
Gwen wants to know why I have left out the other female members of the family. Well, I think it highly unlikely that my two sisters Theresa and Sheila will have any more babies. But who knows what modern science can do. I excluded Kerry, Gail and Tina as I'm reluctant to ask them what their future family plans are. None of the other females in the family carry the Foley/Supple mDNA.
Ursula would have grown up in a society where the men hunted wild animals for protein and fat and where the women scratched around in the vegetation for edible roots, nuts and fruit. These people would become known to historians as hunter gatherers.
She would have lived 35,000 years before the invention of agriculture and the domestication of animals. She also lived in a time before man discovered and used metals. Her people would have used stone tools and would therefore be classified by historians as Stone Age people.
As the climate warmed up and the ice began to retreat, Ursula’s descendents began to migrate. It is believed that the route of migration was along the southern coast of Europe bordering the Mediterranean, eventually arriving in Iberia (modern Spain).
From there they turned north along the western coast of Europe bordering the Atlantic. They eventually arrived about 14,000 years ago in an area of north-west Europe, which as the glaciers and ice covering Europe melted and the sea level rose was to become an archipelago of islands in the north west Atlantic. This archipelago, known geographically as the British Isles from the original Celtic inhabitants, is today politically unacceptable. Political Correctness reigns supreme.
The skeleton remains of one of Ursula’s earliest descendents in the British Isles and now known as Cheddar Man, was found in a cave in Somerset in 1998. It has been carbon dated to be 9,000 years old.
I have searched the data bases for the same mDNA sequences as ours and found only two with an exact match so far. One is in Texas and she is from German descent and the other lives in Belgium. Interestingly Belgium got its name from the Celtic tribe called the Belgae, who occupied parts of Europe that later became known as England and France.
Ursula would have lived at a time when Neanderthals, a member of the genus Homo but not a modern human, would also have roamed in the same areas as Ursula’s bands. Although Neanderthal people eventually fade from history, scientists are not yet ready to declare if they interbred with Ursula’s people or were wiped out by them or otherwise. Political correctness would have us believe that it was our ancestors who wiped them out and by our connection to them our conscience would dictate that we must therefore be guilty of genocide.
Research on our genetic roots using modern DNA sequencing has scientifically established that our maternal great great ------ grandmother was born about 45,000 years ago and lived near a place that would become the classical site of Delphi, in what became know as Greece. That’s about 2000 generations ago.
To overcome the clinical coldness of scientific nomenclature, Professor Sykes of Oxford University has given her the name of Ursula. She is one of seven women who have been scientifically identified by their Mitochondrial DNA (mDNA) as the Clan mothers of 95% of all Europeans.
Although all the offspring of Eileen Kelly, née Foley, will all have the Ursula mDNA, it is only going to be passed on by the females in the family. Therefore there is only one immediate family member who has it and that is Eaodine (hope I’ve spelled your name right my dear, my spell-check wants to spell it iodine).
We do have a near relation who also has the Ursula mDNA and that is our first cousin Maureen O’Brien. She will have passed it on to her daughter Anne Marie who will in turn have passed it on to her daughter.
These two young ladies now bear a huge responsibility in that they are the only ones who will be able to pass it on to their female descendents and continue our mDNA line of descent. Amazing considering that by my latest reckoning there are 43 surviving descendents of Eileen and Michael Kelly. Three are deceased and there are six adopted children in the family
It is of course possible, that the sisters and maternal aunts of our maternal grandmother Julia Foley, nee Supple, also had daughters and that they in turn had daughters. Sadly that part of our family history is unknown to me.
Should you wish to know more about Ursula and her descendents and how they found their way into north-western Europe and Ireland you can read Professor Syke's book The Seven Daughters Of Eve or click on;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryan_Sykes
Gwen wants to know why I have left out the other female members of the family. Well, I think it highly unlikely that my two sisters Theresa and Sheila will have any more babies. But who knows what modern science can do. I excluded Kerry, Gail and Tina as I'm reluctant to ask them what their future family plans are. None of the other females in the family carry the Foley/Supple mDNA.
Ursula would have grown up in a society where the men hunted wild animals for protein and fat and where the women scratched around in the vegetation for edible roots, nuts and fruit. These people would become known to historians as hunter gatherers.
She would have lived 35,000 years before the invention of agriculture and the domestication of animals. She also lived in a time before man discovered and used metals. Her people would have used stone tools and would therefore be classified by historians as Stone Age people.
As the climate warmed up and the ice began to retreat, Ursula’s descendents began to migrate. It is believed that the route of migration was along the southern coast of Europe bordering the Mediterranean, eventually arriving in Iberia (modern Spain).
From there they turned north along the western coast of Europe bordering the Atlantic. They eventually arrived about 14,000 years ago in an area of north-west Europe, which as the glaciers and ice covering Europe melted and the sea level rose was to become an archipelago of islands in the north west Atlantic. This archipelago, known geographically as the British Isles from the original Celtic inhabitants, is today politically unacceptable. Political Correctness reigns supreme.
The skeleton remains of one of Ursula’s earliest descendents in the British Isles and now known as Cheddar Man, was found in a cave in Somerset in 1998. It has been carbon dated to be 9,000 years old.
I have searched the data bases for the same mDNA sequences as ours and found only two with an exact match so far. One is in Texas and she is from German descent and the other lives in Belgium. Interestingly Belgium got its name from the Celtic tribe called the Belgae, who occupied parts of Europe that later became known as England and France.
Ursula would have lived at a time when Neanderthals, a member of the genus Homo but not a modern human, would also have roamed in the same areas as Ursula’s bands. Although Neanderthal people eventually fade from history, scientists are not yet ready to declare if they interbred with Ursula’s people or were wiped out by them or otherwise. Political correctness would have us believe that it was our ancestors who wiped them out and by our connection to them our conscience would dictate that we must therefore be guilty of genocide.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
View Of Haiti From An Irishman
From the Irish Independent
Kevin Myers: I can say Americans are lazy and boorish morons. That's fine. If I say the same about Nigerians, I'm jailed
By Kevin Myers
The most fascinating aspect of the debate about the future of Haiti is its absence. All "discussion" consists of assertions that "the west" must rebuild the country. "The west" is a useful term. If things go very well, the Haitians will get the credit. If they go moderately well, the EU -- but probably the French -- will claim the kudos. If they go badly, the US will be universally blamed (because that's what Yanks are there for) and everyone will be happy.
To suggest that the best thing that outsiders can do once the immediate rescue work is finished, and the water is flowing, is to leave the Haitians to rebuild their own country is merely to invite shrill accusations of racism. However, you might have forgotten that the Chinese were hit by an earthquake two years ago. It killed 68,712 people, left 17,921 missing, with more than 374,000 injured and at least 15 million homeless.
Even if those figures are invented -- and I suspect they're not -- they bespeak the existence of a government that can count, which is more than Haiti has ever had. (Cue hisses of "racist!" at this irrefutable truth). Yet the two earthquakes rather conveniently bring together the two extremes of foreignness. The Chinese -- who probably had the worst 20th century of anyone save the Jews -- do not naturally attract pity, yet without it, have largely rebuilt Sichuan. The Haitians have been cursed by pity throughout their existence, and now are probably about to be suffocated by it. In 10 years' time, I bet, outsiders will still be rebuilding Haiti, while the Haitians will continue to do whatever it was they were doing before the earthquake struck, back when George Hook went to build houses for them. It must be Stephen Hawking's turn soon.
Pity is the most human of emotions. It is also one of the most ruinous. It robs its subjects of responsibility, initiative, independence, courage, self-respect and will: hence the fate of so many African countries. Yet no pity rescued Poland or Italy or the Ukraine or Germany or Japan after the Second World War. Their peoples alone did.
Moreover, uncontrolled pity can damage those who feel it, sentimentalising judgment and elevating emotions. It makes an intellectual assessment of any problem almost impossible, for to use your brain equates with "heartlessness".
Yet pity is also a strangely useful tool, for it reveals a strange global hierarchy. At the bottom are black people, whom everyone pities. At the top are the Chinese, whom no one pities. Alongside them are the English, the one foreign group that Hollywood may officially reduce to unpleasant racist stereotypes. And the cultural censor that allows this actually has a strange Oedipal streak. For the only US ethnic identity which can be perpetually reduced to a stereotype of grasping, greedy, shallow bigots are WASPs. Not far behind them are the hillbillies of the Appalachians, namely, the Ulster-Scots.
Yet these are the very peoples who made the US (and who are both symbolically represented in that convenient pastiche, the Hatfields and McCoys). Between them, they founded and refined and fought for American freedoms, and then opened the doors of their country to the peoples of the world. The outsiders poured in, and ever since have shown their gratitude to the founding peoples of the USA by lampooning WASPs called Dexter and trailer-trash called Bub, in ways which would be unacceptable if the subjects were African-Americans or Jews or Irish Catholics.
The taboos of this cultural hierarchy cause even simple truths to remain unspoken. Jews have been disproportionately responsible for financial crime in the US, yet even to utter this simple truth is to court shrieks of anti-Semitism. In Europe, on the other hand, the only public criticisms of Jews that are not merely allowed, but are actually encouraged, are of Israel, about which "liberals" may utter the most ludicrously untrue and racist libels, and be applauded.
This strange cultural censor reluctantly allows us to acknowledge the role of blacks in street crime in Britain and the US, but preferably as a measure of their "victimhood". That blacks are grossly over-represented in sex offenders' wings in jails, however, or are responsible for the vast majority of trans-racial sex-crime, may not be publicly discussed at all.
Moreover, the total absence of Jews from sex offenders' wings is similarly unacknowledged, for it could lead to uncomfortable questions. If Jews don't rape, and they don't, then is it possible that our secular Christian culture -- never mind Afro-culture -- actually creates rapists? And if we can talk about Jews NEVER being sex offenders, can we then discuss Jews' disproportionate role as swindlers? Of course not: so we discuss neither.
You can say we have free speech -- but we haven't. Example: I can say Americans are loud, boorish, lazy and insensitive morons, and that's fine. If I say the same about Nigerians, I am in jail.
Look, you cry, he's at it again! He starts off quite innocently on Haiti, and look where's finished up!
Quite. I agree. You are looking nervously at the door. I am making you uncomfortable. You wish to leave. I quite understand.
Kevin Myers: I can say Americans are lazy and boorish morons. That's fine. If I say the same about Nigerians, I'm jailed
By Kevin Myers
The most fascinating aspect of the debate about the future of Haiti is its absence. All "discussion" consists of assertions that "the west" must rebuild the country. "The west" is a useful term. If things go very well, the Haitians will get the credit. If they go moderately well, the EU -- but probably the French -- will claim the kudos. If they go badly, the US will be universally blamed (because that's what Yanks are there for) and everyone will be happy.
To suggest that the best thing that outsiders can do once the immediate rescue work is finished, and the water is flowing, is to leave the Haitians to rebuild their own country is merely to invite shrill accusations of racism. However, you might have forgotten that the Chinese were hit by an earthquake two years ago. It killed 68,712 people, left 17,921 missing, with more than 374,000 injured and at least 15 million homeless.
Even if those figures are invented -- and I suspect they're not -- they bespeak the existence of a government that can count, which is more than Haiti has ever had. (Cue hisses of "racist!" at this irrefutable truth). Yet the two earthquakes rather conveniently bring together the two extremes of foreignness. The Chinese -- who probably had the worst 20th century of anyone save the Jews -- do not naturally attract pity, yet without it, have largely rebuilt Sichuan. The Haitians have been cursed by pity throughout their existence, and now are probably about to be suffocated by it. In 10 years' time, I bet, outsiders will still be rebuilding Haiti, while the Haitians will continue to do whatever it was they were doing before the earthquake struck, back when George Hook went to build houses for them. It must be Stephen Hawking's turn soon.
Pity is the most human of emotions. It is also one of the most ruinous. It robs its subjects of responsibility, initiative, independence, courage, self-respect and will: hence the fate of so many African countries. Yet no pity rescued Poland or Italy or the Ukraine or Germany or Japan after the Second World War. Their peoples alone did.
Moreover, uncontrolled pity can damage those who feel it, sentimentalising judgment and elevating emotions. It makes an intellectual assessment of any problem almost impossible, for to use your brain equates with "heartlessness".
Yet pity is also a strangely useful tool, for it reveals a strange global hierarchy. At the bottom are black people, whom everyone pities. At the top are the Chinese, whom no one pities. Alongside them are the English, the one foreign group that Hollywood may officially reduce to unpleasant racist stereotypes. And the cultural censor that allows this actually has a strange Oedipal streak. For the only US ethnic identity which can be perpetually reduced to a stereotype of grasping, greedy, shallow bigots are WASPs. Not far behind them are the hillbillies of the Appalachians, namely, the Ulster-Scots.
Yet these are the very peoples who made the US (and who are both symbolically represented in that convenient pastiche, the Hatfields and McCoys). Between them, they founded and refined and fought for American freedoms, and then opened the doors of their country to the peoples of the world. The outsiders poured in, and ever since have shown their gratitude to the founding peoples of the USA by lampooning WASPs called Dexter and trailer-trash called Bub, in ways which would be unacceptable if the subjects were African-Americans or Jews or Irish Catholics.
The taboos of this cultural hierarchy cause even simple truths to remain unspoken. Jews have been disproportionately responsible for financial crime in the US, yet even to utter this simple truth is to court shrieks of anti-Semitism. In Europe, on the other hand, the only public criticisms of Jews that are not merely allowed, but are actually encouraged, are of Israel, about which "liberals" may utter the most ludicrously untrue and racist libels, and be applauded.
This strange cultural censor reluctantly allows us to acknowledge the role of blacks in street crime in Britain and the US, but preferably as a measure of their "victimhood". That blacks are grossly over-represented in sex offenders' wings in jails, however, or are responsible for the vast majority of trans-racial sex-crime, may not be publicly discussed at all.
Moreover, the total absence of Jews from sex offenders' wings is similarly unacknowledged, for it could lead to uncomfortable questions. If Jews don't rape, and they don't, then is it possible that our secular Christian culture -- never mind Afro-culture -- actually creates rapists? And if we can talk about Jews NEVER being sex offenders, can we then discuss Jews' disproportionate role as swindlers? Of course not: so we discuss neither.
You can say we have free speech -- but we haven't. Example: I can say Americans are loud, boorish, lazy and insensitive morons, and that's fine. If I say the same about Nigerians, I am in jail.
Look, you cry, he's at it again! He starts off quite innocently on Haiti, and look where's finished up!
Quite. I agree. You are looking nervously at the door. I am making you uncomfortable. You wish to leave. I quite understand.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Haiti and Black Africa
FROM THE BOTSWANA SUNDAY STANDARD
Haiti and the blacks! by Loose Canon
I hope black people will learn a lesson from the earthquake that hit Haiti. If they don’t learn anything from it, then I throw up my hands in despair and give up. Let’s start with a few basic facts.
Until the earthquake, I never knew there was a place called Haiti. I was taught geography at school but I cannot remember a time when the mistress told us about Haiti. It must have been one of those insignificant countries that we had no reason to know about. I was fairly good at geography because I knew which country was on which continent. I also knew many capital cities. But as for Haiti I was clueless. Now the whole world, including myself, knows about Haiti.
I heard news of the earthquake on the radio. I wondered where Haiti was and what sort of people lived there. Finally, when I switched on the television, I was informed that Haiti is an island out in the Caribbean. Television pictures revealed a place populated by black people. From the non-stop television coverage of the earthquake, I got to learn about the history of Haiti. It was not a good history lesson. It would seem throughout its existence Haiti has suffered a series of natural calamities. In the process it has sunk even deeper into poverty and deprivation. Like all places populated by black people, Haiti is poor.
As I watched the television images, I felt very sorry for that forsaken place. Then I was hit by a thunderbolt. I wondered what if there were no white people. You see, when the earthquake hit Haiti somebody had to come to its assistance. There had to be a rescue effort. The Haitians who survived of course did their fair bit by digging out their families from the collapsed ramshackle buildings. But such was the scale of the devastation and the loss of human life that a bigger effort was needed. For that sort of work, you need heavy lifting gear and other sophisticated rescue equipment.
I have been following the story of the earthquake keenly. I can attest to the fact that the first people to arrive with sniffer dogs were white crews from all over the world. The aero planes that set off carrying water and food were from white countries. Not only that, the teams of volunteer doctors that I saw on television comprised white people from across the world. As the sniffer dogs went into action, the organized rescue teams that carried the stretchers were made up of white people. It was announced that a mobile hospital was on the way. It was coming from a white country.
For all intents and purposes in the aftermath of the earthquake, Haiti was literally swarming with white people. They had all arrived to save the poor blacks. And the locals were so happy to see them. Granted there were teams from the Orient such as the Chinese and Japanese. They too had quickly left their homes and families to go and assist the stricken people of Haiti.It is obvious to everyone that this was a devastating earthquake and the work to repair Haiti and return it to a modicum of normalcy will take many years. Somebody had to commit funds to this effort.
Most of the countries that have committed funds to aid the recovery are white. In fact, it would seem the whites are running the show in Haiti. What is my point? My point is that ever since Haiti was hit by the earthquake I have not seen any of my folks from Africa. Unless the television cameras deliberately ignored them, I never saw a rescue team from my motherland. Nor did I see any sniffer dogs from down here. Heck, I never saw a single traditional doctor busy divining where to find people buried under the rubble.
Haiti is a land of black people. I would have expected the place to be swarming with black people helping their own. They were nowhere to be seen. I never saw any ships from black countries pulling into the harbour. As the air traffic circled above the small airport, none of the planes was reported as coming from Africa. The blacks were nowhere to be found. They issued tepid statements of condolence to the people of Haiti and a few of the African countries donated small amounts of cash. Granted that was better than nothing. But I must say I was disappointed. I was sad because the blacks did not behave as I had expected.
You see, for far too long black countries have been insolent to the point of being abusive. They have a tendency of insulting the white man and telling him to keep out of their countries. In Fact, black people have the temerity to tell white people they can perfectly survive on their own. So I had expected the black countries to be consistent and behave true to form.
Why didn’t black countries tell white countries to stay away from Haiti because we were quite capable of leading the rescue effort? We should have insulted them as we often do at international forums.There, our countries insult white countries and accuse them of imperialism and neo colonialism. I was extremely disappointed when our countries failed to accuse white people of practicing imperialism and neo colonialism by coming to rescue the blacks of Haiti.
We should have told them we have better sniffer dogs that have been taught only to rescue black people. We should have told their ships to stay away and their planes not to overfly Haiti because we were up to the job with our own ships and aeroplanes. We should have brought in our traditional food instead of the strange rations the Haitians are not accustomed to.
I am so disappointed by the black leaders that I hope never to hear them again bleating about how bad white people are. The earthquake in Haiti was the most opportune time to show the whites, once and for all, that we don’t need them. From now onwards, I want black leaders to shut up and never accuse ever white people of being bad. I am sick and tired of big words such as imperialism and neo colonialism which are unable to rescue victims of the earthquake.
I hope this is not the last earthquake that hits a black country. I want the next one to specifically hit the residence of Old Man in Harare. Then we will see if he will abuse the white crew coming to rescue him and Pretty Face!
Haiti and the blacks! by Loose Canon
I hope black people will learn a lesson from the earthquake that hit Haiti. If they don’t learn anything from it, then I throw up my hands in despair and give up. Let’s start with a few basic facts.
Until the earthquake, I never knew there was a place called Haiti. I was taught geography at school but I cannot remember a time when the mistress told us about Haiti. It must have been one of those insignificant countries that we had no reason to know about. I was fairly good at geography because I knew which country was on which continent. I also knew many capital cities. But as for Haiti I was clueless. Now the whole world, including myself, knows about Haiti.
I heard news of the earthquake on the radio. I wondered where Haiti was and what sort of people lived there. Finally, when I switched on the television, I was informed that Haiti is an island out in the Caribbean. Television pictures revealed a place populated by black people. From the non-stop television coverage of the earthquake, I got to learn about the history of Haiti. It was not a good history lesson. It would seem throughout its existence Haiti has suffered a series of natural calamities. In the process it has sunk even deeper into poverty and deprivation. Like all places populated by black people, Haiti is poor.
As I watched the television images, I felt very sorry for that forsaken place. Then I was hit by a thunderbolt. I wondered what if there were no white people. You see, when the earthquake hit Haiti somebody had to come to its assistance. There had to be a rescue effort. The Haitians who survived of course did their fair bit by digging out their families from the collapsed ramshackle buildings. But such was the scale of the devastation and the loss of human life that a bigger effort was needed. For that sort of work, you need heavy lifting gear and other sophisticated rescue equipment.
I have been following the story of the earthquake keenly. I can attest to the fact that the first people to arrive with sniffer dogs were white crews from all over the world. The aero planes that set off carrying water and food were from white countries. Not only that, the teams of volunteer doctors that I saw on television comprised white people from across the world. As the sniffer dogs went into action, the organized rescue teams that carried the stretchers were made up of white people. It was announced that a mobile hospital was on the way. It was coming from a white country.
For all intents and purposes in the aftermath of the earthquake, Haiti was literally swarming with white people. They had all arrived to save the poor blacks. And the locals were so happy to see them. Granted there were teams from the Orient such as the Chinese and Japanese. They too had quickly left their homes and families to go and assist the stricken people of Haiti.It is obvious to everyone that this was a devastating earthquake and the work to repair Haiti and return it to a modicum of normalcy will take many years. Somebody had to commit funds to this effort.
Most of the countries that have committed funds to aid the recovery are white. In fact, it would seem the whites are running the show in Haiti. What is my point? My point is that ever since Haiti was hit by the earthquake I have not seen any of my folks from Africa. Unless the television cameras deliberately ignored them, I never saw a rescue team from my motherland. Nor did I see any sniffer dogs from down here. Heck, I never saw a single traditional doctor busy divining where to find people buried under the rubble.
Haiti is a land of black people. I would have expected the place to be swarming with black people helping their own. They were nowhere to be seen. I never saw any ships from black countries pulling into the harbour. As the air traffic circled above the small airport, none of the planes was reported as coming from Africa. The blacks were nowhere to be found. They issued tepid statements of condolence to the people of Haiti and a few of the African countries donated small amounts of cash. Granted that was better than nothing. But I must say I was disappointed. I was sad because the blacks did not behave as I had expected.
You see, for far too long black countries have been insolent to the point of being abusive. They have a tendency of insulting the white man and telling him to keep out of their countries. In Fact, black people have the temerity to tell white people they can perfectly survive on their own. So I had expected the black countries to be consistent and behave true to form.
Why didn’t black countries tell white countries to stay away from Haiti because we were quite capable of leading the rescue effort? We should have insulted them as we often do at international forums.There, our countries insult white countries and accuse them of imperialism and neo colonialism. I was extremely disappointed when our countries failed to accuse white people of practicing imperialism and neo colonialism by coming to rescue the blacks of Haiti.
We should have told them we have better sniffer dogs that have been taught only to rescue black people. We should have told their ships to stay away and their planes not to overfly Haiti because we were up to the job with our own ships and aeroplanes. We should have brought in our traditional food instead of the strange rations the Haitians are not accustomed to.
I am so disappointed by the black leaders that I hope never to hear them again bleating about how bad white people are. The earthquake in Haiti was the most opportune time to show the whites, once and for all, that we don’t need them. From now onwards, I want black leaders to shut up and never accuse ever white people of being bad. I am sick and tired of big words such as imperialism and neo colonialism which are unable to rescue victims of the earthquake.
I hope this is not the last earthquake that hits a black country. I want the next one to specifically hit the residence of Old Man in Harare. Then we will see if he will abuse the white crew coming to rescue him and Pretty Face!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
A CONTINENT OF INCOMPETENCE
By Robin Hind
Surely it is not possible, you will be entitled to say, to make assumptions and generalisations about anything as large as a continent, let alone a nation, or even a group of people?
Well, it is possible to generalise in some ways, and it can be said that most who live in France speak French. The arguments against generalisations will always be that there is a wide spectrum of capabilities and behaviour in any group, and that it is improper to try to match the best against the worst.
However, there may be sets of circumstances by which, using a limited number of parameters which are carefully defined and reproducible, to shown that one group can have entirely different capabilities from others.
An example is the airline safety. The aim of the endeavour, safety, is an absolute, and will not be debated. The training and maintenance protocols used in operating aircraft are close to universal, and are therefore applicable across large domains, even domains as large as a continent. The number of flights is large and highly statistically significant.
Therefore, given the limited number of variables permitted, aircraft safety should be equivalent throughout the world. Is this the case?
In fact it is far from the case as is demonstrated by the accident statistics for 2009, recently released by The Flight Safety Foundation, which listed 757 airline fatalities. The overall number of fatalities was below average, although the number of accidents was on average. Five out of 30 airliners involved in fatalities were on the European Union “Black List”.
However, what is of concern is that the accidents in Africa reflected a condemnable and ongoing adverse trend. About three percent of all world aircraft departures occur in Africa, but thirty percent of all (worldwide!) airline fatalities occurred in Africa.
Naturally, there are airlines flying in Africa with excellent service and safety records, such as Ethiopian and South African. However what is of concern is that airlines are not independent of the countries over which and into which they fly. Some, such as Nigeria, have demonstrated appalling air traffic control and other lapses of safety on the ground.
One can therefore say, with statistical assurance, that one's chances of being killed whilst flying by airline in Africa are 10 times those of the other parts of the world. Light aircraft, unscheduled flights, and "occasional airlines" have demonstrated deficient safety far worse, even, that the statistics recorded above.
Surely it is not possible, you will be entitled to say, to make assumptions and generalisations about anything as large as a continent, let alone a nation, or even a group of people?
Well, it is possible to generalise in some ways, and it can be said that most who live in France speak French. The arguments against generalisations will always be that there is a wide spectrum of capabilities and behaviour in any group, and that it is improper to try to match the best against the worst.
However, there may be sets of circumstances by which, using a limited number of parameters which are carefully defined and reproducible, to shown that one group can have entirely different capabilities from others.
An example is the airline safety. The aim of the endeavour, safety, is an absolute, and will not be debated. The training and maintenance protocols used in operating aircraft are close to universal, and are therefore applicable across large domains, even domains as large as a continent. The number of flights is large and highly statistically significant.
Therefore, given the limited number of variables permitted, aircraft safety should be equivalent throughout the world. Is this the case?
In fact it is far from the case as is demonstrated by the accident statistics for 2009, recently released by The Flight Safety Foundation, which listed 757 airline fatalities. The overall number of fatalities was below average, although the number of accidents was on average. Five out of 30 airliners involved in fatalities were on the European Union “Black List”.
However, what is of concern is that the accidents in Africa reflected a condemnable and ongoing adverse trend. About three percent of all world aircraft departures occur in Africa, but thirty percent of all (worldwide!) airline fatalities occurred in Africa.
Naturally, there are airlines flying in Africa with excellent service and safety records, such as Ethiopian and South African. However what is of concern is that airlines are not independent of the countries over which and into which they fly. Some, such as Nigeria, have demonstrated appalling air traffic control and other lapses of safety on the ground.
One can therefore say, with statistical assurance, that one's chances of being killed whilst flying by airline in Africa are 10 times those of the other parts of the world. Light aircraft, unscheduled flights, and "occasional airlines" have demonstrated deficient safety far worse, even, that the statistics recorded above.
Monday, January 25, 2010
DNA Database. Do we need it?
I see that another murderer has been identified and convicted on DNA evidence after 27 years. It has often been suggested many times on here, that a DNA data base should not be allowed as it conflicts with people's civil liberties. And of course there is always the possibility of abuse by conniving governments, politicians or civil servants, including the not so civil police.
Our progress on the road from small hunter/gatherer society to modern civilised society, over the past 10 000 years, has always had to contend with inhibiting the criminal conduct of some of societies more deviant members. The bigger the nation state became, the greater was the need to introduce more methods and rules to control the criminal element. This has always led to concerns about the limiting of individual freedoms that a free society should have.
Technology has always provided deviant individuals with the additional means to carry out their various crimes, but at the same time, it has also provided those we appoint to protect us from the waywardness of criminal individuals, with better means of protection and apprehension such as, fingerprints, blood tests and DNA.
Technology has of course introduced other fears into society, such as the prohibitions by the Christian churches on scientists, such as Galileo. And then there were the famous red flag legislations to control first the speed of steam locomotives and then the speed of motor cars. Eventually common sense prevailed and these prohibitions were dispensed with.
Now of course society tends to split on how to manage many of these newer technologies e.g. nuclear energy, IVF and cloning being just a few. If however, one looks back in history, one will note that many of the technologies which were feared by our ancestors, don't even warrant a thought by the younger and more modern generations.
Here are a few of the more recent DNA criminal cases.
Father of three convicted of first Crimewatch murder 26 years on... thanks to his son's DNA.
A father of four yesterday admitted the abduction and murder of a teenager 26 years ago. The case of Colette Aram, whose naked body was dumped in a field in October 1983, was the first killing to feature on BBC's Crimewatch. But it was not until this April that Paul Hutchinson was arrested after being trapped by DNA taken from his son.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1237493/Father-admits-1983-sex-killing-16-year-old-hairdresser-Colette-Aram.html#ixzz0dhJIsJiC
A man who served two-and-a-half years in prison after being convicted of raping a 15-year-old girl has walked free from court in Edinburgh.
A previous trial heard that Desmond Uttley, 35, had found the girl collapsed in the street after sharing a bottle of cider with a 14-year-old boy. The girl claimed she had later woken up to find Uttley having sex with her. But appeal judges quashed the conviction after new DNA tests showed he had not had sex with the girl.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8418369.stm
Prisoner has murder conviction quashed after 27 years
Appeal court corrects miscarriage of justice as new DNA evidence quashes Sean Hodgson's conviction for rape and strangling of barmaid Teresa de Simone in 1979.A man who spent almost three decades in prison for crimes he did not commit had his conviction for rape and murder quashed by the court of appeal today thanks to a DNA analysis that could have established his innocence a decade ago.http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/18/prisoner-hodgson-murder-quashed-miscarriage
Rape conviction 'backs DNA case'
A rapist jailed 19 years after his crime might never have been caught if time limits on DNA retention had been in place, it is claimed. Under the latest proposal the DNA of people arrested but not convicted should only be held for six years. Last year, William Bates was convicted of raping a woman in a Sunderland park in 1990, after he was traced using DNA taken in an arrest for assault in 2001. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/8354817.stm
Post-Conviction DNA Analysis
For some individuals, however, the post-conviction release has been a bittersweet one given that decades have already been spent behind bars. Still, these cases highlight the value and importance of DNA analysis that occurs after a person has already been convicted of a crime. Most of the post-conviction DNA analysis has occurred in the United States. Since the late 1980s, there have been more than two hundred people exonerated as a result of DNA evidence.
http://www.exploredna.co.uk/post-conviction-dna-analysis.html
DNA – conviction and freedom
Happily, DNA evidence in England now seems to be fairing much better after the suspension of Low Copy Number DNA evidence in 2008 following the spectacular collapse of a major trial against a man charged with one of Northern Ireland’s worse bombings – the Omagh bomb in 1998 (DNA test halted after Omagh case).
A man was recently cleared of rape (after he’d been sentenced in 2002 to six years’ imprisonment) as the result of DNA evidence that showed he had not penetrated the victim but that there was evidence of the DNA of three other males on the swabs from the complainant and another man was convicted after a random “hit” on the DNA database. http://forensicscientist.wordpress.com/2009/12/12/dna-conviction-and-freedom/
Our progress on the road from small hunter/gatherer society to modern civilised society, over the past 10 000 years, has always had to contend with inhibiting the criminal conduct of some of societies more deviant members. The bigger the nation state became, the greater was the need to introduce more methods and rules to control the criminal element. This has always led to concerns about the limiting of individual freedoms that a free society should have.
Technology has always provided deviant individuals with the additional means to carry out their various crimes, but at the same time, it has also provided those we appoint to protect us from the waywardness of criminal individuals, with better means of protection and apprehension such as, fingerprints, blood tests and DNA.
Technology has of course introduced other fears into society, such as the prohibitions by the Christian churches on scientists, such as Galileo. And then there were the famous red flag legislations to control first the speed of steam locomotives and then the speed of motor cars. Eventually common sense prevailed and these prohibitions were dispensed with.
Now of course society tends to split on how to manage many of these newer technologies e.g. nuclear energy, IVF and cloning being just a few. If however, one looks back in history, one will note that many of the technologies which were feared by our ancestors, don't even warrant a thought by the younger and more modern generations.
Here are a few of the more recent DNA criminal cases.
Father of three convicted of first Crimewatch murder 26 years on... thanks to his son's DNA.
A father of four yesterday admitted the abduction and murder of a teenager 26 years ago. The case of Colette Aram, whose naked body was dumped in a field in October 1983, was the first killing to feature on BBC's Crimewatch. But it was not until this April that Paul Hutchinson was arrested after being trapped by DNA taken from his son.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1237493/Father-admits-1983-sex-killing-16-year-old-hairdresser-Colette-Aram.html#ixzz0dhJIsJiC
A man who served two-and-a-half years in prison after being convicted of raping a 15-year-old girl has walked free from court in Edinburgh.
A previous trial heard that Desmond Uttley, 35, had found the girl collapsed in the street after sharing a bottle of cider with a 14-year-old boy. The girl claimed she had later woken up to find Uttley having sex with her. But appeal judges quashed the conviction after new DNA tests showed he had not had sex with the girl.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8418369.stm
Prisoner has murder conviction quashed after 27 years
Appeal court corrects miscarriage of justice as new DNA evidence quashes Sean Hodgson's conviction for rape and strangling of barmaid Teresa de Simone in 1979.A man who spent almost three decades in prison for crimes he did not commit had his conviction for rape and murder quashed by the court of appeal today thanks to a DNA analysis that could have established his innocence a decade ago.http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/18/prisoner-hodgson-murder-quashed-miscarriage
Rape conviction 'backs DNA case'
A rapist jailed 19 years after his crime might never have been caught if time limits on DNA retention had been in place, it is claimed. Under the latest proposal the DNA of people arrested but not convicted should only be held for six years. Last year, William Bates was convicted of raping a woman in a Sunderland park in 1990, after he was traced using DNA taken in an arrest for assault in 2001. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/8354817.stm
Post-Conviction DNA Analysis
For some individuals, however, the post-conviction release has been a bittersweet one given that decades have already been spent behind bars. Still, these cases highlight the value and importance of DNA analysis that occurs after a person has already been convicted of a crime. Most of the post-conviction DNA analysis has occurred in the United States. Since the late 1980s, there have been more than two hundred people exonerated as a result of DNA evidence.
http://www.exploredna.co.uk/post-conviction-dna-analysis.html
DNA – conviction and freedom
Happily, DNA evidence in England now seems to be fairing much better after the suspension of Low Copy Number DNA evidence in 2008 following the spectacular collapse of a major trial against a man charged with one of Northern Ireland’s worse bombings – the Omagh bomb in 1998 (DNA test halted after Omagh case).
A man was recently cleared of rape (after he’d been sentenced in 2002 to six years’ imprisonment) as the result of DNA evidence that showed he had not penetrated the victim but that there was evidence of the DNA of three other males on the swabs from the complainant and another man was convicted after a random “hit” on the DNA database. http://forensicscientist.wordpress.com/2009/12/12/dna-conviction-and-freedom/
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
World Cup 2010 Transport
For those wishing to visit us in South Africa for the 2010 World Cup and were worried about insufficient transport need only look at the attached picture to see how inventive we are.
World Cup 2010 News
South African Police have vowed to track down and arrest two criminals who threatened to murder and rob foreigners during this year's World Cup in interviews broadcast on local television channel e.tv.
Lashing out at e.tv. which broadcast the interviews on Friday evening, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa accused the station of "reckless harbouring of criminals". But group news editor Ben Said claimed it was e.News' duty to inform the public, and Mthethwa was shooting the messenger.
The footage had both self-confessed criminals' identities hidden - one with a stocking pulled over his head, the other filmed loading a firearm - and contained comments that they intended to commit armed robberies and murder during the football showpiece in June and July.
They justified their intentions by saying it was repayment for colonial wrongs.
South African Police have vowed to track down and arrest two criminals who threatened to murder and rob foreigners during this year's World Cup in interviews broadcast on local television channel e.tv.
Lashing out at e.tv. which broadcast the interviews on Friday evening, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa accused the station of "reckless harbouring of criminals". But group news editor Ben Said claimed it was e.News' duty to inform the public, and Mthethwa was shooting the messenger.
The footage had both self-confessed criminals' identities hidden - one with a stocking pulled over his head, the other filmed loading a firearm - and contained comments that they intended to commit armed robberies and murder during the football showpiece in June and July.
They justified their intentions by saying it was repayment for colonial wrongs.
THE NEW SOUTH AFRICA OR THE EMERGING ZIMBABWE
The Durban public bus service was run and operated efficiently by the Durban City Council from 1912 until 2007. The bus service has now gone insolvent and has had to close down, leaving thousands of daily commuters with no way to get to work and back.
How on earth did that happen?
How on earth did that happen?
In 2007 the City Council (now ANC controlled) decided the bus service had to be run and operated privately by someone from the previously disadvantaged community. The City then sold the public bus service to a BEE (Black Economic Empowerment, also known as affirmative action) company, Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd for R70 million. This sum included the route operating licenses, all the vehicles, equipment and buildings in Alice Street where the buses were garaged, serviced and repaired.
Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd immediately sold off the buses, (mostly new vehicles), one by one, to independent BEE "owner-operators" contracted to Remnant Alton. An owner-operator would drive their bus over their allocated routes, collect the fares and use the bus garage in Alice Street as a facility for maintaining the bus.
Less than two years later at the end of 2008, most of the buses were in such a poor condition they were unsafe to drive. This degraded the service to commuters to a shambles. To overcome this problem, Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd approached the City Council for help in March 2009, and the City Council lent them R40 million at a very low interest rate to restore the bus service.
Less than a month later at the beginning of April 2009, Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd went into liquidation and ceased all operations. The R40 million was "gone", so the City Council seized the company.
The 1,500 "owner-operators" who had failed to maintain their buses and therefore the bus service to the public, then took the Council - as the new owners of the business - to the labour court for loss of income at R8,000 per month each for the four months left on their contracts, and won their case. The total, R48 million, comes from Council revenue, paid by the ratepayers of Durban.
The 1,500 "owner-operators" who had failed to maintain their buses and therefore the bus service to the public, then took the Council - as the new owners of the business - to the labour court for loss of income at R8,000 per month each for the four months left on their contracts, and won their case. The total, R48 million, comes from Council revenue, paid by the ratepayers of Durban.
Now the Council, spends a fortune on buying new buses and restoring the bus service to its former state. Nobody yet knows what this has cost - the bills are still coming in. It is estimated to be in excess of R100 million.
But suddenly there is a "whoops".
The Council can't run the buses, because it sold the licenses to operate the routes to Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd. No problem. Just buy them back. There is however a teensy weeny problem, Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd had sold the licenses to its Managing Director, Mr J Singh. After negotiations the council beat Mr J Singh down to R45 million. Yes, that's right. R45 million.
But suddenly there is a "whoops".
The Council can't run the buses, because it sold the licenses to operate the routes to Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd. No problem. Just buy them back. There is however a teensy weeny problem, Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd had sold the licenses to its Managing Director, Mr J Singh. After negotiations the council beat Mr J Singh down to R45 million. Yes, that's right. R45 million.
Final Reckoning.
OK. On the income side, the ratepayers scored R70 million when the bus company was originally sold.
OK. On the income side, the ratepayers scored R70 million when the bus company was originally sold.
Now, on the debit side;
they have an unrecoverable loan of R40 million.
the cost of restoring the company to a good operating standard - say another R100 million.
the cost of buying the route licenses back - R45 million.
the cost of recompensing the owner-operators R48 million.
So the total cost to ratepayers is R233 million less R70 million = R163 million.
Now here is the real kicker.
The Council says it doesn't have the capacity to operate the bus company, so it will be looking for a privatecompany to operate it in the future - and they have found the perfect candidate.Yep. You guessed it. They are GIVING it away, lock, stock and barrel, completely FREE, to.....
The Council says it doesn't have the capacity to operate the bus company, so it will be looking for a privatecompany to operate it in the future - and they have found the perfect candidate.Yep. You guessed it. They are GIVING it away, lock, stock and barrel, completely FREE, to.....
Wait for it......
Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd.
I kid you not.
Now, the Durban Council is overwhelmingly ANC, and they got VERY upset when an opposition Democratic Alliance Councillor asked if they knew that the Managing Director of Remnant Alton (Pty) Ltd had in the past been found guilty of fraud and served jail time.The response? No, we didn't know that.
After more questions - Well, actually, the City Manager did know, but itwas some time ago, and the "gentleman" concerned had served his time and paid his debt to society, so we didn't think it was important....
Meanwhile, the buses haven't begun running yet. Nobody has a clue when they will operate again.
But the citizens of Durban can take solace in learning the new and unpronounceable street names as they walk to and from work, hoping they won't step in the turds and filth, or get mugged. They may even see their City Manager sweep by in his fancy luxury car, with a cavalcade of body guards, as he makes his way to his new luxury penthouse, valued at several million, at the Point Waterfront - smiling as he goes because the area has been declared, BY HIM, as a rates-free zone until 2014.
Effectively he is totally unaffected by this huge cock-up. He doesn't even have to pay his share in his rates bill.
Isn't Africa wonderful? Why don't you rush back here.....
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