The perils of Space Travel

There is trouble in outer space of all places. The toilet on the International Space Station is broken. Now call me old fashioned but I thought that space travel was supposed to involve shiny rockets shooting rays at each other not hanging about in a metal tube crapping in a plastic bag and blowing it out the airlock. I think I would, if you will excuse the indelicacy, hold it in until I got home.

Which takes me back to the days when the main problem we had with toilets was finding some paper – when rationing finally ended after the war I was so desperate I nearly shot myself! (it was around the same time that I discovered that I wasn't a very good speller.) Soon the country was flooded with handily packaged rolls of paper towels imported into the country, as it happens, by my father's company. What a relief! No more popping next door to ask the neighbours if they had two fives for a ten!

Trophy Wives

It seems that my old friends in the City have been raking in another years worth of enormous bonuses – and very welcome it is too. The poor chaps need cheering up, what with them wrecking the British economy and all that. And if that wasn't bad enough I read that the county's divorce lawyers has been inundated with trophy wives hoping to get a good divorce settlement before the economy goes completely belly up and all the poor chaps in the City get the sack. The good news is that the weak pound will make it cheaper to import a new wife from the far east. Or if you don't fancy that, I understand that you can get a good one from Russia for a song – and the song only needs to be good enough to win Eurovision.

If only Tony Blair had obtained a wife who would quietly spend his money instead of writing books. I have been reading Cherie Blair's memoirs in which she reveals that she and Tony conceived their youngest son at Balmoral whilst visiting the Queen. She says she was too embarrassed to take her 'contraceptive equipment' under the same roof as Her Majesty. One wonders quite what she means by 'contraceptive equipment.' The mind boggles. You'd have thought that the thought of some grubby journalist finding out about it and printing all of the sordid details in whichever rag of a newspaper was prepared to commit such a callous invasion of privacy upon the Prime Minister's wife and child would have put a dampener on the mood. Hang on a minute while I read that last sentence back.....irony is a wonderful thing, isn't it.

Gordon Again

The people who pass for Senior members of the Government these days have been out in force trying to make Gordon Brown look like less of a loser.

I heard one of those identikit Labour party politicians that they have these days; he is a chap called Alan Johnson and he is the Secretary of State for Health. You may remember that he was one of those ones who tried to get elected as deputy leader last year and then got into lots of trouble spending donated money that hadn't been properly registered and which they had to give back because they'd passed a dopey law to make unregistered donations illegal. Of course they didn't realise they were all breaking the law even though it was them who campaigned for it, drafted it, steered it through parliament and lectured everybody else about how great they were for passing it. Frankly what surprised me was that so many people wanted to move into Prescott's office – especially knowing what he got up to in there. Anyway, Mr. Johnson said that the job of Prime Minister is now more difficult than it has ever been, which was why he was making such a dog's breakfast of it. I'm not sure if he has heard of, say, the second world war.

He did, however, demonstrate why Gordon is safe. With people like Johnson as potential successors there is no chance of a challenge.

Big Brother

Over a rather fine lunch at the club, I spoke today to an interesting chap whose company provides IT services to the government. George is no boffin, of course; his expertise is in convincing Civil Servants and Ministers to sign on the dotted line. Luckily for him knowing what he is talking about is unnecessary for the simple reason that none of them know what they are talking about either. And they have a touching naiveté when it comes to the power of technology to solve their problems – just say the word Database and they are all over you like flies offered a particularly succulent turd. Quite right too. Next time you meet someone from IT ask yourself if you would want him running the country!

I asked George about the rumour that appeared in the papers this week that the government is planning to keep a record of every e-mail and text message sent in the UK. This would be an outrageous assault on civil liberties. I don't fancy my messages to that nice young lady Max Moseley introduced me to the other month being pored over by some official snoop. Not that those messages aren't perfectly innocent, of course. It is just that some things can be misconstrued – especially e-mails sent to bigbetty@aol.dl.net George wasn't worried. He says that it might be possible to build such a contraption but as the whole process would be overseen by people like him it would take so long to make it work that by then e-mails and text would long since have become obsolete. I asked him what he thought would have replaced them. He didn't have a clue, naturally!

As evidence for his confidence in how long it would take to make this proposed database work, George cited the Identity Card scheme, which is supposed to have something called biometrics to make them unforgeable. George thinks that this will prove so difficult to administer that the government will inevitably have to choose between the fancy technology and actually getting the cards issued before we all die of old age and they will end up having to issue something made of cardboard with your name written on it. Just like during the War.

There is not, however, any truth in the rumour that following an incident when an Undersecretary at the Home Office misheard a conference call, they spent eighteen months and 14 million pounds trying to develop a rectal scanner to confirm the identities of their employees. The story I heard was that they had engaged the services of Julian Clary as a consultant.

Russian Policing

I read an interesting letter to the telegraph today in which the correspondent mused about the fact that Manchester United and Chelsea were able to play the European Cup Final in Moscow without a single supporter being arrested – the assumption being that this was because they were frightened of the Russian police and that more robust policing should be adopted here. It is an interesting argument, is it not? What this country really needs is more riot police with licence to thump anyone who looks at them cock-eyed.

It seems unlikely to happen, however. In fact the police have been criticised for their new tough approach to knife crime. It seems that this risks “alienating” the country's youth. Nothing upsets a child more than taking their knives off them.

On the political front Gordon Brown, having failed to take my generously offered advice, has stumbled from crisis to calamity. It seems that the Labour party's MPs are in a panic, believing that Gordon is the problem. The trouble is that this time last year the same MPs were certain the Tony was the problem. However, they seem pretty convinced and there are even suggestions of staging an “illness” as a pretext for Gordon getting the chop. Then they could impose another unelected Prime Minister on us all. How long do you think it will be until they are the problem? I think I shall open a book.

That reminds me. My PA Jemima has been helping out the Chairman of the local Conservative Party – an old friend of mine. She's had a taste of some of the stresses of political life – there was a late vote in the House during the week. She says that she and the Chairman were kept busy and that his Member was up all night!

Good Luck Gordon!

Gordon Brown's has been responding bravely to his recent problems, I see. He has realised that increasing taxes on the poor to pay for a tax cut for the rich might be sending out the wrong signals to his working class voters who might actually vote for someone else instead of whoever Gordon chooses to be their representative – i read that there is a by-election this week somewhere called Crewe where the former incumbent's daughter is hoping to inherit the seat in a welcome return for the much maligned hereditary principle. Gordon has attempted to kiss and make up with the electorate by giving everyone a tax cut to give them back what he had just taken off them. Wisely, he is offering this to the rich, who will now pay even less tax, as well as to the poor who will now pay the same as they were before. Except for the really poor who will still be paying more. The best bit about it is that it is all paid for by reckless borrowing, thereby giving a much needed boost to the irresponsible lending business at a time when the industry most needs it. Gordon, you are a genius.

His flunkies have, meanwhile, been missing the point by telling him that it is all about image and that what he really needs to do is smile more. Take it from me, Gordo, this is not good advice. People liked you when you were a mean-faced bastard. It was only when you cracked the dirt on the back of your neck by smiling creepily that everyone went off you. People want their leaders to be bastards – people look up to those. Like they did to Thatcher. And Stalin.

They will tell you, of course, that Tony grinned like an idiot for a decade and that it never did him any harm. What you must understand is that the people can sense a phoney. Tony could get away with acting like a cross between an insincere snake oil salesman and an embarrassing trendy vicar because that was what he was! Everyone understood it! You are not.

It seems that academics have added to the sum of human knowledge by discovering that young people get drunk because they hope to have more sex. It is good to see that the academic world is as sharp as ever. And that whoever it is who is in charge of research grants (their identity is one of the great mysteries of the modern world) is maintaining the standards for which they have established such a well earned reputation!

It wasn't like that in my day, of course. We didn't need booze as we had the war to provide us with unlimited opportunities for casual sex. Yes, throughout the war love was in the air! Except in single seater fighters, obviously. I remember on many occasion sidling up to some pretty little thing and whisper something like “Would you like to see my dishonourable discharge?” or, "Is this a V2 missile in my pocket or am I just pleased to see you?" and Bob's your uncle!

Weight

Scientists have, apparently, discovered a gene which causes fatness and they believe that an obesity cure could be available in a mere decade. Too late for poor old John Prescott, of course, but never mind. At least we now know that it wasn't the pies and Chinese meals but rather his genetic inheritance. This will no doubt come as a great comfort in his later years.

The real answer is, of course, exercise. We didn't get fat in the old days because we spent plenty of time doing healthy exercise, like hunting and shooting grouse. I suppose the poor didn't have that option but then they didn't have any food, so they didn't have to worry about it. Giving the poor access to cheap food was where it all went wrong, as there wasn't enough room on the country's estates for all those people to exercise on. There are other options, of course. I was a swimming champion when I was younger – i was a breaststroker - a hobby i have followed keenly ever since. And as I always said, once a breaststroker always a breaststroker.

Boris for President!

I read a story in the press about a man called Troy Buswell who, unsurprisingly, is an Australian politician has got into trouble for sniffing a seat that a female employee had been sitting on. What a fool. As my old friend Max Moseley could have told him. There are women who will do that sort of thing for you for a reasonable price and only some of them will sell their stories to the papers.

I am glad to say, however, that he is sticking to his guns and refusing to stand down. Just right. He can learn from our own newly elected Mayor of London, the upstanding Boris Johnson. Proof if it were needed that being the victim of press intrusion into ones marital indiscretions should not spell the end of ones career. Of course BoJo (we can't use his initials as a nickname, obviously!) wasn't up to anything weird like Max or the Australian, although those of you who have seen a photograph of his mistress Petronella Wyatt may disagree! But it has restored my faith in Britain. Only in this great country could an oaf with no discernible talent and burdened by a private education rise to such high office. If only somebody would give the young chap a bloody good haircut, although a bloody awful one would be an improvement.