Gambling

I had the pleasure of attending the Carling Cup final at Wembley Stadium last week. Not to watch the football, naturally, but to show my support for the corporate entertainment industry at this difficult time. I did notice that one of the teams, Tottenham Hotspur, is sponsored by Mansion, which is a gambling company. The other team, Manchester Untied is sponsored by AIG, another gambling company and one which is now proudly owned by the American Taxpayer.
Gordon Brown himself made a trip to America to visit his ‘good friend’ Barak Obama and congratulate him on his new acquisition. I thought that Gordon’s speech to Congress went well for him as he had received nineteen standing ovations, and I said so to my nephew Harry, who works for the Labour Party. Harry was less impressed and explained that they had only applauded when Gordon said something nice about America. He says the same thing happens when a rock and roll band plays a concert and says that “insert name here is the best venue we’ve ever played!” This ruse is apparently enough to guarantee a big cheer. So well done to Gordon for being in touch enough to steal a trick from the popular music business!
The meeting with the President didn’t go quite as well with the President finding it difficult to remember who the rime Minister was, or why he was there. Downing Street have denied the rumour that Obama mixed Gordon up with the leader of the Scout Troop who he met on the same day. I must say I am a bit disappointed in the President – I mean, deep down we always knew that he knew and cared about the rest of the world little more than poor old George W. Bush but we thought that at least he would be able to fake an interest. We like phoney sincerity in Britain – that’s why we kept electing Tony Blair.

I was pleased to hear Gordon use the phrase, “Let us build tomorrow, today!” To let you into a little secret , I suggested the phrase to one of my friends in the Labour Party when he approached me for some ideas. Actually, I stole it from an old exhibition I went to on a visit to America back in the fifties. Back then they thought that the world of tomorrow would involve moon bases and Jetson style flying cars rather than a new Depression but there you go.

It wasn’t a very interesting trip, although I do remember visiting a lake called Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg in New England. Apparently, Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, in the language of the Nipmuck People, means Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll-llantysiliogogogoch.

Business as Usual

It has been a reassuring week. I had been getting a bit worried about all that 'change' stuff in America, so I am relieved to see that when Barak Obama said 'troops out of Iraq in 16 months' he really meant 'troops not really out of Iraq in 19 months, just like John McCain would have done'. Politics is alive and well in the Land of the Free!

There was also good news from Ireland, where robbers managed to find a bank which still had some money which they proceeded to steal. The British government is rushing to organise a fact-finding mission to see what lessons can be learned on behalf of Britain's criminal fraternity who are on their knees after the drugs and prostitution market collapsed along with the banking industry. Not that the bankers are being paid any less, of course. It is just that the few who are still bankers are having to stay in to avoid the angry mobs and the many more who are now employed as government ministers have to worry about the tabloids finding out. Which makes all the fuss about Fred Goodwin's pension all the more unfair. I'd have thought that Gordon Brown would have thought £16 million was a small price to pay to get Fred out of RBS before he did any more damage to the economy – he was, by the estimation of a friend of mine who works for the treasury, costing the country around £3,000 per second, after all. Unfortunately for Fred he has committed the cardinal sin of the New Labour era – he has generated a bad headline for the government.

Amusingly, Tony Blair has set up a consultancy which will allow him to advise those governments who are willing to pay him lots of money as to how they should run their country. I am thinking of going into the market myself. For a mere £3000.00 per day, I will show you how to raise funds for your political party by selling government policy, honours, seats in the House of Lords and so on, how to use spurious evidence to drag your country into pointless wars and how to run your country's economy into the ground then get out before the shit hits the fan.

Looking into my Crystal Balls - Predictions for 2009

Many people have asked me to provide my predictions for the year ahead. This isn't something I would normally do, the prediction industry being, in my opinion, a load of hokum. This is especially true of astrology - I am very skeptical. Typical Capricorn. However, I have given in to the demands so here you go.

Barak Obama will publish his new book, “The Effrontery of Daydreams”. Hillary Clinton will release her own book, “Why the Secretary of State is more important than the President and other stories”. George Bush will publish his memoirs, “My Head Hurts – Global Leadership in the 21st Century”.

England will win the Ashes. South Africans everywhere will shrug and mutter about two bald men fighting over a comb.

John McCain will inaugurate the Failed Fighter Pilots of America Association and become its first President.

Madonna’s post mid-life crisis will be ended by her shattered pelvis.

Turkey will award Israel null points in the Eurovision Song Contest. Israel will retaliate by bombing the hell out of Ankara. The U.K. will come last in the Eurovision contest. Several people will be a bit upset.

All of the remaining unemployed bankers in Britain and America will be given jobs advising their government s on how to resolve the economic crisis. All of their advice will involve borrowing stacks of money that we can’t afford to pay back.

The Obama Presidency will be derailed by constant questions about whether Hillary Clinton’s effectiveness is being undermined by the revelations about Bill’s relationship with that intern at the State Department, the Washington correspondent of Al Jazeera and the Mexican girl who does the laundry. Hillary will blame a vast right-wing conspiracy even though there will be only 13 conservatives left in America.

The England football team will win a few more games. The press will declare it the greatest football team of all time.

Quotes of 2008

Here is a little collection of my favourite quotes from 2008. I am fairly sure that I have remembered them correctly and that none of them happened in dreams but I can't guarentee it so don't expect to find any of them on Wikipedia. Then again...

“Of course the UK economy will continue to grow this year. Those who say otherwise are guilty of talking us into a recession...oh, wait.” Gordon Brown.

"The fundamentals of America's economy are strong. Not like in my day – back then we had it tough. We used to have to get up out of the shoebox at twelve o'clock at night, and lick the road clean with our tongues. We had half a handful of freezing cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at the mill for fourpence every six years, and when we got home, our Dad would slice us in two with a bread knife." John McCain

"You have to understand that I was completely strapped for cash" - Max Moseley

“You can put lipstick on a pig but it’s tail will still not be uncurly” – John Major declaring his opposition to the first woman to stand for vice-chairperson of the Huntingdon Cricket Club

“Those who talk about the exchange rate are irresponsibly risking a run on the pound...oh wait.” Gordon Brown

“The country is groaning and moaning and screaming for change. Just like you would be after a night with me, baby” Bill Clinton telling the pretty girl in the front row why he endorses Barak Obama.

“You can’t let Sarah Palin be Vice President. A good VP needs to be a strong, experienced character, especially when the President has little executive experience himself. I mean, George W Bush didn’t have much experience when he became President so he appointed Dick Cheney as his VP and look how well that worked out.” Joe Biden.

"This is from the widows, the orphans, and those who were killed in Iraq. They had a whip-round and got you these for a surprisingly reasonable price" – Iraqi shoe-thrower Muntadhar al-Zeidi

"You can put lipstick on a pig, as many of you lonely farmers have discovered" - Barak Obama on the stump in Alabama.

“You know what they say about the difference between a hockey-mom and a pitbull – that’s right, a pitbull has more foreign policy experience” – Sarah Palin

“I am proud to have been the Chancellor who abolished Boom and Bust…oh wait.” Gordon Brown.

Feathering the Nest

There has been a welcome outbreak of entrepreneurship in the States A chap called Rod Blagojevich (pictured to the right) has shown commendable enterprise in these hard times by attempting to raise a bit of pocket money by selling off a seat in the Senate which used to belong to Barak Obama, who no longer needs it now that he is running the “Office of the President-Elect”. Incidentally, I understand that John McCain has got himself a new podium sign saying “Office of the President not-Elect” and Hillary Clinton has had one made up which says “Office of the President, Vice President, Secretary of State-Elect”. Some would say that Mr. Obama is being a bit presumptuous but President Bush seems to have lost interest in the whole running the country thing and has taken to playing dodge the shoe with his Iraqi friends.

Anyway, Governor Blagojevich's inventiveness has not been appreciated as the Feds seem to think that flogging seats in the Senate is a bit crooked. Of course we in Britain banned the practice back in 1832, when John McCain was still having his first mid-life crisis. But what about the cash-for-honours affair? I hear you ask. Well, the difference was that instead of being paid for seats in the Upper House of Parliament, the Labour Party merely accepted loans which they won't ever pay back, it being 21^st century Britain after all.

The whole Chicago episode might even cause problems for the President-Elect himself, as Blagojevich had been having conversations with Barak's chief of staff, a man called Rahm Edwards. And what a fine job Rahm's parents did in naming him. Impressive imagination.

Save the Cheerleader.....

Gordon was generally deemed to have made a bit of a fool of himself when he claimed in the House of Commons that he had 'saved the world' no less. The story was that this had been a slip of the tongue - he had meant to say that he had saved the banking system. However, my sources tell me that he actually meant it. Indeed, if you listen very carefully to the recording you can hear him say, 'we not only saved the world, we also saved the cheerleader!' Alert readers will remember George W Bush's college cheerleading days. A coincidence? I think not!

Gordon's global leadership has been accepted even in Germany, from where the last few pockets of resistance to the Era of Gordon have been pursuing their quixotic campaign to convince us that spending trillions of borrowed money that we don't have might not be the best idea. The Germans have agreed to sign up to Gordon's Single European Financial Stimulus Plan. I am not sure they have quite got the hang of saving the planet, though. They are insisting on spending money that they actually have rather than borrowing money that they can't afford to pay back. Oh well, they'll soon learn.

Luckily, George Bush seems to have got the right idea and is now preparing to start throwing money at the American automobile industry. This is in answer to prayers said in churches across that great nation for divine intervention to save the big car makers. A correspondent of mine wrote to me this week about a moving sermon he had heard in which the pastor reminded his flock of that Bible passage in which Our Lord cast the moneychangers from the Temple, after which they were given cushy jobs in Pilate's administration and had considerable success in reconstructing the Jerusalem camel trading industry upon which so many Judean jobs depended.

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!

It's a Rich Man's World

It's been a tough week in the city, and indeed on Wall Street and around the world, all summed up in the Financial Times' headline on Thursday, “We're all F*****d!!” However, I am happy to say that the worst is over.

I must say that it is very wise of the taxpayers on both sides of the Atlantic to bail out those poor chaps in the financial sector who have had such bad luck lately. After all, if it had not been for the generous lending practices of these great financial institutions many of those same taxpayers would never have had the experience of owning their own home, nor of having that home repossessed. Lending non-existent money to people who can't afford to pay you back may seem like criminal stupidity to the untrained eye but you must remember that bankers have their trophy wives to pay for and the bonuses one makes when one restricts oneself to sane practices just don't cut the mustard. One doesn't want to have to make do with a Filipino. Besides, if the banks go out of business then the government won't be able to borrow the money they need to prop up the banks! Then where would we be?

Some of the chaps have lost their jobs, though. We shouldn't feel too sorry for them, however. After all, they apparently were not very good at it and they will probably all be much happier following careers running whelk stalls, or in politics. The recruitment agencies have been busy – there was great excitement when a rumour went round that there may be one now former banker from Ireland who once successfully organized a piss up in the Guinness factory. Sadly, the story turned out to be apocryphal.

Proper Jobs

I was talking the other day to a friend of mine who owns a recruitment company. He was telling me that he had been contacted by a local council who wanted to recruit something called an Education Centre Nourishment Production Assistant. This turned out to mean a dinner lady at a local school. Really! In the old days people had proper jobs like Miner, Engineer and Lord Privy Seal! No wonder the country is such a mess!

Meanwhile, I see Gordon Brown has been doing his bit for the McCain campaign by giving Senator Obama the kiss of death by praising him in a magazine article. Obama immediately protested about Brown's intervention and insisted that Gordon issue a statement of support for John McCain. I telephoned an old friend of mine in New York to ask him what he made of this. He said, 'Gordon who?'

I also noticed an interesting story from Morocco where a chap has been jailed for writing in a blog criticizing the king. As if this were not bad enough, another Moroccan is languishing in prison having set up a facebook profile, whatever that is, in the name of one of the King's brothers. Imagine, someone being dishonest enough to impersonate a dignitary on the internet in this way! Appalling! It would never happen in this country!

One thing we have learned this week, though, is that you can put lipstick on a pig but it will still be a pig. Except that it will be considerably more attractive and capable of achieving high political office!

Hope from the Frontier!

Since American politics went all Monty Python last week, I hear that the Labour Party have been busily trying to copy John McCain's masterstroke in bringing in Sarah Palin to liven up his campaign. Harriet Harman has, apparently, booked snowmobile lessons, Hazel Blears has been seen toting a massive sub machine gun around the Department for Communities, whatever that is, and I hear that Dawn Primarolo has renamed her children Avenue, Handbag and Cat-flap, all in imitation of the Alaskan Wonder. They've also sent a delegation to the Shetland Islands after hearing about a fundamentalist gun-nut who came second in the Miss Lerwick contest in 1978 and who only wears clothes that she has trapped herself, hoping to offer her the Deputy Prime Minister's position. She turned out to be a Scottish Nationalist and told them to get stuffed.

I was reading today about the disgrace that has fallen upon my Alma Mater, Harrow school, who have had to expel their head boy for drug taking. This would certainly never have happened in my day. No! One might Tolley up before Trials, spend extra time in the Ducker trying to get into Torpids or wear one's Bluers, Greyers and Dossers but one would never want to make the school look foolish in this way! Besides, how would you know what the hell everyone was talking about if you were off your face?

I was discussing this the other day with an old school chum called Oliver who went into Advertising, although he is now celebrating the tenth anniversary of his lucrative early retirement. I asked him what he though of the state of his old industry; not much, as it turned out. As evidence of its decline, he offered the following example. Pizza express had a recent campaign which claimed that, “nothing says I love you like a pizza” - Oliver says he once meet a man who claimed that he had taught his dog to say “I love you” and frankly that had impressed him rather more. I disagreed with him. My PA Jemima says that she had a delightful evening last Valentines day when her boyfriend, having seen this advert, took her to Pizza Express and offered her a meat feast!

Python for President

Having dipped my toes in the festering waters of US politics, I feel duty bound to offer a Republican comment by way of balance. Luckily, John McCain has actually managed to do something surprising enough to get a bit of notice in the press. He has named his own Vice-Presidential candidate. Her name is Sarah Palin, the niece of the famous Monty Python satirist Eric Idle. With a firm grounding in the 1960s satire boom and a successful television and movie career before writing one of the most successful musicals to hit Broadway in decades, Sarah makes a welcome addition to the Republican ticket. She would surely be the best qualified Vice President since internet-inventor Al Gore. There is no truth in the rumour that celebrity non-Vice Presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton has exploded.

Meanwhile, back in Blighty, nothing much has changed. The Foreign Secretary David Milliband has been in the Ukraine, trying to find somebody who has heard of him. Gordon Brown, meanwhile, has wisely been keeping well clear of the Russian Business and has instead been enjoying the delights of China, hobnobbing with gold medal winning Olympians and hoping that some of the Boris Johnston magic will rub off on him.

My contacts tell me that he has a new plan for regaining the political initiative. He hopes to acquire one of those big booming microphones that make Barak Obama's emptiest platitudes sound deeply profound. This would allow Gordon to win the next election without going to the trouble of thinking up any policies. I fear, however, that this his plan is doomed to failure – Cameron has already got there before him! Ah well, as Sarah Palin would say - "Always look on the bright side of life!"

VP?

I normally refrain from commenting on American politics – not my area of expertise, you know – but I see that young Barak Obama has picked an old acquaintance of mine as his running mate for the Presidency. I remember meeting Joe Biden back in'87 when I was visiting America and he was running his own Presidential campaign. He asked me if I had any good ideas for a speech. I was a bit jetlagged, I must admit, and I fobbed him off with some piece of guff I'd heard from Neil Kinnock – well, I wasn't going to give him any of the good stuff, was I? I never heard how that speech went for Joe.

Kinnock, of course, went on to lose the unloseable election. I'm sure it won't be an omen, though. In adding Joe to the ticket, Barak has recruited a man who is so electorally popular that ,when the votes in the Iowa Caucuses were counted, he managed to poll almost a whole percent.

Meanwhile, the Olympic Games are bound for Great Britain! And what a fine display the British Olympic Association put on during the closing ceremony in Beijing! It was a stroke of genius – who better to sum up Britain's youthful energy and creativity than that young popular musician Jimmy Page? And who better to sum up British sporting prowess than the celebrity 'footballer' David Beckham whose performance in watching the European Championships from his home in LA was so impressive during the summer? And to think that some people are worried about London's ability to live up to Beijing!