Let the Good Times Roll!

Up in space, NASA have made yet another invaluable contribution to the future of humanity by inventing a system for recycling urine into drinking water. And what a fine use of public money, even at this time of great austerity. Previously if I wanted to drink my own piss they'd have called for the men in white coats. It is certainly an improvement on blowing it out the airlock.

I understand that the fight against obesity may be close to a breakthrough. My young niece tells me that scientists are working on a supplement which will trick the body into creating a hormone that will suppress appetite. This is certainly an improvement on the Gordon Brown / George Bush approach to the obesity epidemic which is to destroy the economy to the point where we have to reintroduce rationing and round the clock soup kitchens.

On that theme, many of us have been reassured by young Barak Obama's appointments to his new cabinet. We had feared that he might fall into the trap of bringing in new faces with original thinking just because they might know what they are doing. We shouldn't have worried – he is instead following Gordon Brown's lead by packing government with as many of the people responsible for the economic crisis as possible. Quite right too. They can't be trusted to run loose. Who knows what damage they might do?

The Chinese, meanwhile, are getting worried. I had the great pleasure to share lunch with an old business acquaintance yesterday and he explained how the Chinese economy works. It seems that they've been telling their people to invest the pittance they earn for working fifteen hours a day in a sweatshop in bonds which are issued by American banks which was then used to lend money to Americans and Europeans who can't pay it back so that they can use it to buy cheep stuff that they don't need and which is made by those same Chinese sweat-shop employees. I know, it is impossible to see the flaw in this plan but apparently it is not going so well now that no one in the West can afford to pay back their loans. So you can see that it is even more important than you thought that you go out and spend as much money as you can like the government wants you too. So spend, spend ,spend! The future of the world depends on it!

Darling to the Rescue

I had lunch today with Toby, an old friend who works for one of the investment banks in the City and who is well connected with the Treasury. I wanted to pick his brain about Alistair Darling's newly announced prescription for the ailing British economy ie. Borrow a fortune and hope that everything will be all right.

'The main thing,' he told me, 'is to protect the irresponsible lending industry which has made Great Britain what it is today. The Government must take the lead before it is too late! I mean, how will anyone afford a new BMW if they can't borrow the money against the value of their home? They can't all have an accident at work and sue their employer!'

I asked him just how much he thought the Government would end up borrowing. He wasn't sure but he thought it was roughly equal to around three quarters of the entire economic output of the planet. I suggested that this sounded like rather a lot. 'That's nothing', he said, 'the American will soon owe about four times the entire economic output of the solar system. Apparently they are having to invent a new number to express it.'

There was just one thing I didn't understand, however. Who are we actually borrowing all this money from? Toby wasn't certain. 'The Chinese, I think. Probably.' But doesn't this put the Chinese in rather a powerful position? 'Only if we pay it back' he said with a smile.

Come Dancing

Britain was rocked this week by the scandal involving the continued participation of John Sargeant in the celebrity ballroom show Strictly Come Dancing. John is a hopeless dancer but the viewing public, who are now chronically and in my view very healthily unable to take telephone votes seriously, kept voting for him to continue in the show. His competitors complained, suggesting that the show was all about the dancing (which is why they hired a bunch of b-list celebs instead of actual dancers) and John was forced to fall on his sword. The whole episode brought back bad memories for yours truly. Yes, a similar thing happened to me back in the 50s when I was disqualified from the National Hokey-Cokey championship for putting it in when I should have been shaking it all about.

Further down the news schedules, naturally, I have noticed numerous government ministers, Labour Party backbenchers and various apologists have been working hard to rechristen the dog's breakfast that used to be the British economy 'the global financial crisis which started in America.' This is known in the trade as the 'I never done nuffink, honest' defence (it is similar to the 'A bigger boy made me do it' defence which they used after the Iraq war went pear shaped), and it is popular amongst governments of all stripes because it lets you blame the Americans for everything. For the millionth time I find myself thankful that the government no longer employs spin since Honest Gordon took over.

Gordon has been accusing the Tories of 'lacking compassion' for pointing out that it might not be wise to respond to a crisis caused by irresponsible borrowing with a massive splurge paid for with irresponsible borrowing, as someone might ask for it to be paid back. I have a great deal of sympathy for Gordon's view. My own family has suffered quite severely recently thanks to some dubious investments and I shall be attempting to cheer them up by buying them fabulously extravagant Christmas presents. I can't afford this, obviously, but I have solved this problem - I have already stolen their credit card details and that will easily cover the cost!

Polling

The financial crisis is causing problems for the organizers of the London 2012 Olympics who fear that they may have to scale back on their plans. I was speaking yesterday with one of Boris Johnson's advisers about some of the cost-cutting schemes that are being considered. Shockingly, they are even contemplating changes to the events themselves. The Boxing will now include all other forms of packaging. On the same theme we will be stockpiling decommissioned barbed wire from Guantanamo Bay once it has been closed to be used in the Fencing. And the athletics will now climax with Underarm Javelin. He also passed on a bit of gossip about the British women's Badminton champion. He says that she has had a difficult year – it has been all shuttle and no fun at all.

Meanwhile, I visited one of our local Territorial Army bases earlier in the week to mark Armistice Day. While I was there, I met a young female soldier. Now you may think that this would be a problem for an old traditionalist like me, but you would be wrong. Back in the last war, I served with several admirable women officers when I was being trained to handle bazookas. So are meeting went very well, despite one small misunderstanding when she misheard something I said while I was reminiscing about my wartime experiences. All was well, however, when I explained that I had said V.E!

I had a little shock this week when I discovered that my Personal Assistant Jemima has joined the Liberal Democrats and has been helping out with in local constituency ahead of an upcoming by-election. It is a strong Tory area, of course, so there is little hope of making an impact; indeed she says that she and the elderly prospective candidate have been doing a lot of polling together and that he expects to lose his deposit!

Onwards to the Future!!

 Well, with Barak Obama’s Presidency of the United States in sight, I’m pleased to see that he is getting down to business. He is already putting into practice his first scheme to raise funds with which to fill the hole in the public finances. He has gone into business as a flag salesman albeit with a fairly limited range – you can see some of them in the picture to the right.

The race is already on for a share of the spoils. I shared a train carriage yesterday with a Democratic Party official with whom I am acquainted and I took the opportunity to ask which names I should be looking out for. It seems that another old acquaintance of mine, Laurence Summers, is in line for the job of Treasury Secretary. I remember sharing several enjoyable evenings with Laurence, and Lady Collar of course, back when I was advising the government of the day on waste disposal policy, engaging in some blue skies thinking over dinner as to how to deal with the growing rubbish mountain. On one occasion I’m afraid I had rather too much Port and opined that we should send all our garbage to the Third World! It’s funny the things you say, isn’t it. A little later, when Lady Collar had gone to bed, I shared with him my grandfather’s theory, from the days when he lead the brave fight against those dangerous extremists in the Suffragettes, that the real reason why woman did not appear in positions of power and influence was because they didn’t work as hard as men and because they weren’t very good at arithmetic and so forth. How we laughed! I often wonder why he lost his position as President of Harvard but it seems that the University’s loss will be America’s gain!

Laurence has served his country before, of course, as one of Clinton’s Treasury Secretaries. I’m pleased to see that, like Her Majesty’s government, Barak Obama can see that the way to get out of the financial crisis is to employ as many as possible of the people who got us into it. In this spirit, he is also considering employing Timothy Geithner, who is the current head of the New York Federal Reserve bank and who helped to dream up the idea of giving the banks $700 billion to pay to themselves as bonuses. Some have argued that appointing Geithner would be failing to deliver change. This is nonsense. Geithner will have changed from a very rich banker into a very rich government minister. What more can you ask?

The Labour View - The Most Meaningful Moment in History

I had the great fortune to be able to speak today about the week's momentous events with an old Civil Rights Activist from the Southern State of Mississippi who happened to be in Britain this week. 'I never thought,' she told me with a tear in her eye, 'that I would live to see the day when Gordon Brown would win a by-election!' She went on to tell me that she thought Labour's win in Glenrothes was probably the most meaningful event ever.

The voters of Fife voted for Change, wisely recognizing that having Gordon as Prime Minister is totally different from having Gordon as Chancellor of the Exchequer – just as the Russians bravely voted to change President Vladimir Putin for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin earlier in the year. The rest of the world has responded to this brave lead – the people of New Zealand have elected a new government and apparently the Americans have done too. The new President is Barak Obama, and he is the first man ever to win an election by not being George W. Bush. Of course his opponent, John McCain, isn't George W. Bush either but the People could see clearly that he was less not George W. Bush than Obama is. Now all we have to do is hope that all of the problems of the world actually were Dubya's fault so, fingers crossed everyone!

I don't think I'm breaking any confidences if I tell you that one of Barak's first acts as President Elect was to receive a call from Gordon Brown himself, who gave valuable advice on how to solve the credit crisis. This involves cutting interest rates so that the banks can borrow money cheaply from other banks and lend it to people who can't afford to pay it back so that they can buy houses which they can't afford and start pushing house prices back up to levels that can't be sustained because that will make everything all right again. The only problem is that none of the banks have any money to lend to the other banks. Gordon has shown the world that this is easy to solve; simply give them lots of taxpayers money. Gordon is confident that Barak will see the wisdom of this little work of genius. As I always say, fight fire with fire, and fight irresponsible lending with irresponsible lending!

Incidentally, I hear that Bernie Ecclestone, the Formula 1 supremo, and dedicated tobacco promoter has been offering Gordon Brown some presentational advice. He suggested that Gordon should capitalize on the success of Barak Obama and Lewis Hamilton by blacking up and wearing a curly wig. 'Everyone would understand that it was just a little joke,' explained Bernie, 'and it is not like he'll be getting whipped by five prostitutes or anything like that.'

Election Campaigns are Great

An election, you say? In America? Well, they kept that quiet! Yes, it is true. In just two more days, campaigning begins for the 2012 election for President of the United States. And we already know what the key question of that election will be;

Canvasser : Will you be voting for Sarah Palin?
Voter : Sarah who?

I was actually approached during the week to offer some advice for the Palin for President 2012 campaign. I suggested a couple of possible slogans. “Palin – she puts the Ass in Alaska!” and “Vote Palin, or she'll shoot!”

Meanwhile, I have been chatting to one of my City chums about the government's ongoing attempts to rescue the banking industry. He is most appreciative of Gordon Brown's efforts. He says that the few jobless bankers who have not been given jobs in the government will soon be gainfully employed by the new beefed-up regulators. I asked him if he agreed that a lack of regulators had helped to cause the credit crunch. He was surprised at the question. “Of course not,” he said, shaking his head at my ignorance, “the regulators didn't intervene because they all thought the bankers were right. How were they supposed to know that letting the banks lend money they didn't have to people who couldn't pay it back might not be the most prudent idea?” No, it seems that the push to put lots of new regulation in place is in fact a clever taxpayer-funded job creation scheme for. This is a very clever idea, I must concede. After all, lets face it, they are unqualified to work in any real industry and it would cost substantially more to retrain them to work flipping burgers or stacking shelves.

I also heard this week that scientists have been working as hard as ever and have discovered that love and hate is caused by the same chemical in the brain. I already knew this. The chemical is called alcohol and it is one of nature's greatest miracles!