More from Mr B
At daybreak on Saturday morning I sneak down the winding driveway of Beelzebub Mansions before Mrs Beelzebub's bedside Goblin Teasmade spurts into life. I'm off to show my support for the Beaufort Hunt on the day a whole swathe of previously law-abiding English society is to be criminalised.
The subterfuge is necessary as Mrs Beelzebub can fairly be described as an "anti", and if she knew that I was nipping out to mix with fox-murderers, she'd be down there with her aniseed balls and klaxon before you could say "Anne Robinson".
Yet I am not necessarily a "pro". Despite the veined nose, alcohol problem and arthritic knees, I have never hunted. I have more sense than to attempt to steer a ton of hairy stupidity across fields and fences with only two bits of string in my hands. Horses only engage my attention for one day a year, when I tweed up and hand a week's wages to the bookies at the Cheltenham Festival while alternating bottles of Champagne with pints of Guinness.
But I do support the right of those who wish to hunt to continue so to do. And that is because the law banning the pastime is nasty, stupid, vindictive and based more on class prejudice than common sense. Anyone who thought Mr Blah truly had the best interests of the fox at heart will have had their illusions shattered at the weekend, when 91 animals were killed by around 180 hunts – and probably all but a handful within the limitations of the Act.
Instead of being dispatched quickly and cleanly by a gene-driven, purpose-bred hunting hound, the vast majority of those ex-foxes will have been shot. Now I don't know if you've ever shot a fox (and it's unlikely if you're a NuLabour ciabatta-muncher with IKEA furniture and a subscription to The Guardian), but it isn't a pleasant experience - for either party. I know from reluctant experience that clean kills with a single barrel are rare. It can get very messy indeed.
And then there's the issue of eliminating the sick and weak. Foxes don't have the equivalent of the MRSA-infected National Health Service to see them off when they're getting on a bit. They have no natural predator. Up until last week, in usual circumstances, only the feeble and frail fell victim to the hounds. The youngest and fittest invariably got away. Now there's no natural selection involved. Fit animals will be shot alongside the diseased and decrepit. Well done, Tone.
Practicalities apart (and, to paraphrase Oscar Wilde, we are already seeing that stopping the Unspeakable in full pursuit of the Uneatable is completely Unenforceable), the central issue here is one of freedom of choice. I have always thought us to be a libertarian race. The laws we had were sensible laws, were relatively few, and were broadly obeyed.
But now we are in the grip of a political and ideological cabal of control freaks. These people aren't merely content with governing the country; they demand the right to tell us how to live every aspect of our lives. Now clearly shooting and fishing will be next on the forbidden agenda. Smoking is already there, with over-eating – or even eating the wrong things - not far behind.
But what's next? Chewing gum? Using a mobile phone on a train? Trying to sneak through the express till at Tesco with more than eight items? You may laugh, but you won't when the Government's Bacteria Inspectorate Wardens issue you with a fixed penalty fine for not washing your hands after using a public toilet.
Do you want proof? Since coming to power, NuLabour has managed to introduce 1,018 new crimes to the statute book. These vital measures to protect our society include the provision of a huge fine or six months in jail for anyone caught holding a Scout group performance of the Gang Show without a licence. (You get less time for getting caught holding a Scout, but that's another story.)
And what this escalation of State control generates is Bad Laws. And Bad Laws are always in danger of being disobeyed. In fact, they deserve to be disobeyed.
I can't think that there are many people out there who don't recognise that the whole campaign to ban hunting with dogs is a classic example of narrow-minded NuLabour bigotry; a Cabinet sop tossed to a rabid pack of urban backbenchers who still seem to think that anyone on a horse is a Hooray Henry. And, more sickeningly, in exchange for their acquiescence over the war in Iraq.
Now the deal is done. Tens of thousands of ordinary citizens are threatened with the courts for enjoying a brisk ride across rolling countryside, but Mr Blah gets free rein to drop bombs on women and children in Fallujah. You really could not make this up.
To the Brown Lubianka that is home to the Evening Post to collect my miserly expenses.
The sound of the Horst Wessel song rings across the newsroom from whence the Editor, wearing a leather greatcoat and with riding crop in hand, watches as ranks of trainee reporters goose-step past him at morning parade.
The smell of knackwurst and cabbage drifts up from the canteen. A burly security guard with an Alsatian dog is searching for the escape tunnel the features department is rumoured to be digging (which, seeing as they're based on the Fourth Floor, would be some feat) while the editorial artist quietly forges a passport identifying himself as Fritz Spiegel, a shoemaker from Frankfurt.
And meanwhile the Editor of the Western Daily Press has grown a Charlie Chaplin moustache, is wearing a coal-scuttle helmet and tank goggles, and is often to be found peering intently at maps of Poland. Or was it Devon?
Such is life in the Associated Newspapers Group … if you believe Ken Livingstone.
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There is much excitement as 30 kilograms of weapons grade plutonium (66 lb in old money) goes missing from the nuclear processing plant in Sellafield. Enough, apparently, to make seven atomic bombs.
Is it on its way to Iraq or Syria? Have the IRA snaffled it in a raid that Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness knew nothing about, oh no, not a thing sir? Is it already in the hands of militant foxhunters, intent on sending radioactive foxes onto the streets of Islington?
Get a grip, guys. We've all seen The Simpsons cartoon on TV. At the start of every episode, Homer is clearly seen walking out of work with a lump of plutonium lodged in his coat. Now that's got to add up, hasn't it? Mystery solved.
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I am ambivalent about London's bid for the 2012 Olympics. I fear the embarrassment of The Dome or the new Wembley. I fear it's going to cost us all an absolute fortune in years to come. And when it comes to the messianical Mr Blah, Berlin 1936 springs to mind. (Ooops. There goes that Daily Mail link again.)
However, the team behind the bid have clearly got their act together. Getting the IOC assessors over during half-term was a masterstroke, as was miraculously removing all roadworks from London's streets and doing a bit of fine-tuning of the traffic lights on the routes the visitors travelled.
And you have to admit that staging the Games in the capital will help our own medal ambitions. After all, we've all seen the London Marathon on the telly, haven't we? Let's see how fast those Kenyans can run when they're wearing Bernie Clifton's ostrich outfit. Or a deep sea diver's suit.
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I read with dismay that the manufacturers of Smarties are to do away with the traditional cardboard tube and replace it with a six-sided plastic "hexatube".
Why can't these bloody people leave well alone? The Smarties tube has been a mainstay of our lives for almost 70 years. Along with washing-up liquid bottles, egg cartons and toilet roll inserts, it has been a staple of Blue Peter modelling projects and has enlivened many a physics lesson when stamped upon, so propelling the plastic lid at the ginger kid who smelt funny. (The plastic lid is for the chop as well.)
Nestle's marketing wonks say: "We have taken a fresh and funky approach to the re-design." Leave it out, you red-socked twats. We tolerated the introduction of the blue Smartie (although the BNP is believed to have recruited significant numbers of seven-year-olds on the back of it), but this is just a step too far.
Kit Kat has done away with the traditional foil and paper wrapping, Opal Fruits are now called Starburst, and Wagon Wheels are shrinking in diameter by the day. Is nothing sacred?
Comments
Do you really need to ask?
Posted by: Mike | February 27, 2005 12:49 AM
How long 'til you can't 'Pick Up A Penguin', as after all, they don't actually contain penguins, do they?
Posted by: Spacemonkey | February 27, 2005 12:47 PM
Note that in the good ole' daze, Wagon Wheels used to have a picture of a cowboy using the real thing for cover as he fired his trusty Winchester rifle at Ind- er, sorry, Peace Loving Native American Tepee Dwellers..........I think the rot really started when the Milky Bar Kid had his firearms certificate revoked.
Posted by: Stuart | February 27, 2005 7:13 PM
You've gone all Jeff Cooper on us, though that's not a bad thing.
Posted by: JohnJo | February 28, 2005 10:34 AM