I had to laugh and simultaneously applaud Conservative Iain Gibson for branding Celtic fans ‘gypsies’.  An outraged Celtic fan from the William Orr (himself hanged for treachery) Supporters Club in Antrim demanded a written apology from Gibson.  It’s a pity Gibson didn’t tell him where to go, and instead offered a gibbering apology to the emotionally walking wounded.  As far as I’m concerned, there are more appropriate names for Celtic fans.  How about:

• Traitors.
• Hypocrites.
• Those who should clear off to the country whose flag they are so keen to display on British soil.
• Plastic Provies.

I intensely dislike Celtic FC and I especially dislike the flag of a foreign country waved as a badge of honour in the United Kingdom.  I say pull down Parkhead, re-locate to Croke Park and take the ‘gypsies’ with you.

A few days back, Alison posted a really interesting blog here on the topic of a report which she believed conflated rape with excess alcohol intake. (I agree with her analysis, by the way.) It is precisely this kind of thoughtful and challenging writing that I want to see here on ATW and I salute Alison for tackling this issue.

Now then, Alison’s blog generated a fire storm of comment – I see it is now almost 150 comments. Because ATW is unmoderated – as it says at the bottom of every page – this means that I do not hold comments to approve them, as I do not have the time nor inclination to do so. This means that inevitably some comments are made that I never see or else I may scan them without fully taking on board all  the content. On this occasion, as I pointed out at the time, I had a family funeral on my mind and was not taking in very much in the way of comment content. I hope you will all accept this.

But I have become aware of comments that were made by Rottypup on this thread – and I am also aware that some female readers took exception to these. (As did some male readers, in fairness!)

I have now read all comments and would make the following points.

1. I sincerely value the contribution from ALL of ATW’s female visitors. It goes without saying how much I value Alison – as her presence as a co-writer demonstrates. I want this site to be a place where you all feel comfortable and happy to make your points of view without suffering hysterical abuse. Things that impact negatively on this disturb me.

2. Rottypup is a writer who makes some great points over on his site, and I frequently agree with his scathing tone on a range of topics. Apart from his choice in Music, he gets the War on Terror, the lies of the Left, etc.  However, I think he gets Alison and her argument on this topic completely wrong. Not only that, but he takes issue with it using some vicious ad hominem comments – which have no place on this site. Ever. Clearly neither Alison nor Aileen are "feminazis" and I think that the attribution of such moonbattery values to serious commentators is out of order and only undermines Rotty’s point of view.

3.  It distresses me when I see those of us broadly on the right diverting our considerable energies against each other. Unlike leftists (Well, unlike most Leftists! Hello Frank!) we like to dissect argument and identify if the prevailing logic holds up. But name calling does not achieve this – and I really hope that this is minimised without me having to get involved all the time. I am sure that all writers realise that one cannot edit out every unwarranted attack that comes their way. Just for your information, over the years, I have received two death threats, been called every imaginable name (!) – including some I couldn’t imagine – and I know Andrew has endured some very nasty comments too. It comes with the territory alas.  As this site has grown, in some regards this has grown with it since we attract a large number of visitors not all of whom agree with the broad editorial line taken by the writers! But I don’t like it when we are attacked "by our own", if you follow me.

So, I want to re-affirm just how much I, as the proprietor, value all female contributors and hope you will feel comfortable here. Any issues at all – drop me an email. The site would NOT be the same without your points of view. We may not agree all the time but we can try to be agreeable when we disagree – seems a good rule. Let’s all operate to that!

In my new job my title is ‘Peripatetic Senior Care Officer’.  Essentially I have to work in various care homes run by my employers in the Bradford area.  En route to my shift in the suburb of Queensbury earlier this week, I decided to have what is for me a rare treat: fish and chips.  My shift was due to start at 12.45 so I pulled over at the main fish and chip shop in the village.  There is nothing quite like warming your hands on a grease-stained paper whilst sleet and biting winds fall and blow about you.

How long did I have to queue for my food?  20 minutes!! And why?  Because the adolescent hell-spawn of Queensbury School on nearby Deanstone Lane were packed into the shop in such numbers, I thought the walls were going to bulge out.  There must have been 20 kids in that establishment, with another 30 lining up outside to get their hands on a portion of freshly-fried haddock.  Two thoughts entered my mind:

1. When I was at school it was forbidden to leave the school premises during school hours (that privilege was reserved for sixth-formers).  If you did and were caught, you faced a week’s detention. 
2. What possible effect will the ban on junk food advertising have on a generation so used to filling their guts with fat-laden products, they know virtually nothing else?  None!

The ruling from the regulator Ofcom is typical of contemporary thinking in a Britiain itself schooled and conditioned by ten years of ‘nanny state’ socialism.  When pubs extended their opening hours 1 year ago it was to ‘promote a more continental approach to drinking.’  Has there been such a cultural revolution?  Not a bit of it!  All you see now is more drunken behaviour and decorative little packages of vomit on the pavements the following day. 

Cultural changes require patience and education, not proscription or prohibition.  You are no more going to affect the waistlines of obese teenagers with junk food ad bans than you are going to change the habits of the ‘let’s go out and get wasted on a Friday night’ brigade with extended opening hours.  When will the authorities learn that fact?

So Tony Blair has gone jet-setting around the world once again.  This time his travels take him to Pakistan (though with the way this country is going, I’ll be surprised if Blair can find much difference between the ethnic composition here and on the streets of Islamabad) where brave Tone pledged £480 million in UK development aid for the country. In other words, Blair gave away nearly half a billion pounds of taxpayers money to a foreign country without even asking our permission.  Speaking personally, I am wholly supportive of giving money raised in this country to projects in this country; I am bitterly against my money being squandered on foreign endeavours – be they European agricultural incompetence or Third World basket cases.

We all know why Blair is throwing our money at Pakistan as ‘aid’.  It is because he wants the country (the same territory where Bin Laden, if he is still alive, will almost certainly be hiding out) to continue to be a willing partner in the war on terrorism.  He mustn’t realise that the best way to cooperate in the way on Islamism is to share techniques and expertise between our respective intelligence services, not to offer some sort of bribe in the way of taxes from the British people, quite a few of whom experience the day-to-day negativity of having to live in communities swamped by mass migration from Pakistan.

It seems to be the classic panacea for all socialists.  If you need to solve a problem, be it the inefficiencies of the NHS at home or the threat of Islamic terror abroad, you pay what amounts to a fiscal bribe.  It would be nice if money could be spent on more worthwhile causes.

1620 – Pilgrim Fathers’ ship, The Mayflower, arrives off Cape Cod , Massachusetts.

1863 – US President Abraham Lincoln delivers his famous Gettysburg address, declaring Government of the people, by the people, for the people.

1947 – Prince Phillip is created Duke of Edinburgh.

1969 – Brazilian footballing genius Pele scores his 1000th goal in his 909th professional football match.

1984 – More than 500 people are killed, and 10,000 homes are destroyed, in an explosion at a chemicals factory in Mexico City.

1997 – Police confiscate indecent videos and pictures of children in a series of raids on the homes and offices of British pop star Gary Glitter.

As we rarely are offered the chance to speak directly to the organ-grinder, as it were, I thought I’d highlight this website, as it touches on something dear to at least my thinking, as well as hopefully the thoughts of many others in this Euro-dominated country of ours!

After you visit, and do the necessary, send the URL off to all your friends, let’s get a really good head of steam behind this, the first sensible suggestion to appear within a hundred miles of Number 10, Downing Street in a very long time (well, since 1997, anyway!)

What sort of person blasts a fire-engine with a laser-sighted air rifle?

It’s reported that a gunman blasted the fire engine in Londonderry but no-one was injured in the attack on the team from the city’s Northland Road station just before 11pm last night.

It seems very fashionable amongst the thugs out there to attack Fire fighters. I regularly hear horror tales from those directly involved in the Fire Brigade about the atrocious behaviour they are frequently confronted with – and it seems to happen right across Northern Ireland. They express concern at the inability of the PSNI to do anything about it. This thuggery directed at the Emergency Services seems to be a further instance of what happens when a society chooses to exercise no moral values.

Noticed the coy, cloying, Sport Section comments upon the withdrawal from the cricket series ‘Down Under’ of Marcus Trescothick, and his return to England? You will also have noticed the discovery of a new illness, or rather the intimation that it’s not really an illness, it’s just ‘Stress-related’! The poor man is suffering from one of the many Real Illnesses categorized under the sub-heading ‘Mental Illness’, but from both t.v. commentators, and the allied massed morons of the newspapers of our so-involved country, there is nothing but an embarrassed glance, and a fervent hope he’ll just fade into the furniture, so we can all pretend he’s not there any more! Because he’s not there any more, we can ignore the very real truth, that there’s a lot of it out there, but no-one near us, fortunately!

Well, I’ve got news for you, it IS inconveniently near to you, and, what’s more, there’s more just around the corner! I have personal knowledge in my own family, and pretty heart-breaking it is! We, the survivors, the carers, the supporting cast know all about the problems of a catastrophic mental illness on a loved one, and it’s attendant chaos in our wider lives! But what does one see when the ‘news’ breaks that a son, or a cousin, or a brother has been ‘sectioned’; or a voluntary in-patient in one of the new ‘Leper Centres’ now re-named as Mental Facilities? We then know who your true friends are! We then see who sidles past on the pavement, intent on a distant horizon rather that speak to an inconvenient and ‘contaminated’ acquaintance!

We definitely do not want your sympathy, or even your ‘understanding’, all we wish is for you to look us in the eyes and say "Howsit’ going Mate?" The Trescothick family has my utmost sympathy, and future hopes that this fine sportsman is allowed a full recovery, along with a forlorn hope that the ‘New Leprosy’ is allowed out of the cellar where we have kept it for too long!

During my (too short) appearance on BBC World Service a few evenings ago, I did point that Al Jazeera English was merely the extension of the Jihad by electronic means. I was clear in telling them that Al Jazeera is a sophisticated propaganda tool for the Islamofascists. I see that Tony Blair has gotten himself into trouble after foolishly taking part in a David Frost interview on AJ TV.

The media reports that Tony Blair has "admitted" that Iraq was "a disaster". 

No he didn’t – but the media WANT him to admit that, and Al Jazeera are delighted to broadcast the words of the British PM and twist them as they see fit. I fully agree with Blair’s analysis of what is happening in Iraq – but the media don’t want to  hear. They have their own dhimmi narrative and Al Jazeera is VERY happy to provide them with copy towards it.

I see that the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer,  has warned doctors they risk going on trial for assault if they refuse to allow patients who have made ‘living wills’ to die. Lord Falconer’s message to the medical profession told doctors and nurses that new laws will require them to end lives rather than save them. Those who decline to do so will face jail or, alternatively, big compensation claims in the courts.

Lord Falconer set out the determination of the Government to use draconian penalties to enforce living wills in a guide to Labour’s Mental Capacity Act for doctors, nurses and social workers.

So, I guess the Hippocratic Oath is out of date?

NuLabour knows best. Kill the patient is so much more modern, so much more in keeping with the spirit of these times, don’t you think? We have immoral monsters in power.