Filed under Yanks

The what-th Amendment now?

As any fule kno, publishing controversial material in England, especially if it concerns evil litigious rich bastards, is unwise.

Many bloggers, me included, host their sites [*] in the US, on the grounds that Yank courts are generally a little bit saner about That Sort Of Thing (yes, I know it doesn’t legally protect me from a libel action in England, but any sue-er would need to demonstrate to an English court that the person they’d dragged into the dock was Mr PDF, which would be difficult without records from my US hosting company).

However, the experience of WikiLeaks suggests that American courts are almost as fucking rubbish as ours. It’s a (truly excellent – as with all freedom-of-information stuff, anyone who opposes it should be crucified and resurrected on an infinite torture cycle forever) site that allows whistleblowers to post for the perusal of the unwashed masses.

Some such documents concerned Nazi-gold-laundering Swiss cunts [**] Julius Baer. The crooks’ bank first issued a writ to WikiLeaks directly for ‘violation of trade secrets’ (oh noes! our sekrits is violateds!). But worse, while that case awaits trial, Julius Baer have served a writ on the doman registrar that manages the wikileaks.org domain banning them from, err, doing their job: instead, the domain points to nowhere.

…which is a bit depressing. On the plus side, there are an awful lot of mirrors where Wikileaks can be activated (also, awesomely, BBC News has a story that links directly to one of the mirrored sites – hooray for misplaced legal actions that massively increase the bad publicity for the fuckwits who bring them). Still, it’s just a shame that the one country that claims to be totally free-speeched up has let the world down on this one.

Relatedly, if you’ve not seen the Northern Rock information memorandum from last autumn, then Wikileaks still has a copy. In some ways, it was daft of NR and the government to try and restrict this one, given that it confirms the fact that the bank really does have a high-quality loans book that’s putting the taxpayer at more or less naff-all risk…

[*] or “site their hosts”, if you prefer

[**] ‘Nazi-gold-laundering Swiss cunts’ is used here as a general synonym for ‘Swiss’ – I have no knowledge of or interest in the question of whether Julius Baer itself laundered Nazi gold, but since Switzerland’s prosperity is based on taking a cut from every thief, fraudster and genocidaire going, it’s certainly profited indirectly from horrible suffering.

Amen, brother

Those who the gods love die young. Jerry Falwell was 73.

No offence, la

I’m not convinced that slavery reparations are generally a good thing. The fact that the average black American, despite having a lifespan despicably lower than the average white American, has a lifespan despicably higher than the average black African, is an example of how financial costing can’t really make any sense of the whole issue.

However, there is one factor on the basis of which I would massively support the payment of enormous reparations from the UK to pretty much anywhere on the basis of our involvement in the slave trade. Its name is Liverpool.

Slavery was an immaterial criterion in London and Edinburgh’s route to being the financial wealth generation centres of the UK; it was immaterial in Birmingham and Glasgow’s route to being the heavy manufacturing weath generation centre of the UK; and it was immaterial in Manchester’s route to being the cotton processing wealth generation centre of the UK.

Rather, slavery enriched the ‘we’ve got boats and we do fuck all else’ centre of Liverpool.

Since Scousers, despite being in a theoretically better position than most people in the North [*] whine a lot about everything [**], it would be delightful to see them being held personally responsible for the real, rather than made-up-and-whined-about-in-an-irritating-accent suffering of the victims of the slave trade. Maybe we could even enslave, whip and torture the fuckers.

[*] in the UK we don’t make much anymore, but we import a fuck of a lot. Because Scouse dockers are lazy incompetent fucktards, even importing goods to the North of England is now done by making detours to Southampton, Harwich or Rotterdam Europort.

[**] see: footballing death event where Scousers are documented to have urinated and robbed the dead bodies of other Scousers. This is an absolutely true fact. Anyone who mentions it – like (the idiot) Boris Johnson and (the surprisingly praiseworthy, if only for standing up to the Whiny Scouse Cunt lobby) Kelvin McKenzie – gets pilloried, but it is true. If you deny that the bodies of Liverpool supporters were urinated on and robbed by other Liverpool supporters at the Hillsborough disaster, you are a liar and in denial. Most Scousers are liars and in denial.

A brief note on anti-Americanism

Hating individual people from the US for their nationality is wrong.

Hating the US itself, its actions overseas over the last 200 years [*], the evil bastards who run it, its belief that it’s a force for good, and its belief that it can do anything it likes anywhere it likes to pursue these ‘good’ aims, is entirely right, proper and sensible.

If I met someone who was anti-American in the first sense, I’d think they were a cunt. The same would be true for anyone who wasn’t anti-American in the second sense.

[*] partial exception granted for its reluctant and delayed intervention in Europe 1941-45.

Perhaps the most apt thing he’s ever said

Stephen at Unspeak makes a valiant attempt at translating George Bush’s recent speech into English. The highlight:

“We go forward with trust that the Author of Liberty will guide us through these trying hours.”

Translation: God help us.

It’s funny, and/or terrifying, because it’s true.

Odds malkins!

From A Word A Day:

malkin (MO-kin, MAL-kin) noun

1. An untidy woman; a slattern.

2. A scarecrow or a grotesque effigy.

3. A mop made of a bundle or rags fastened to a stick.

Which definition do you think is most accurate?

I don’t feel good…

and I knew that I wouldn’t, now.

It’s a terrible shame. I suggest we all light up a crackpipe and down a bottle of Scotch in Mr Brown’s memory.

Also, happy Christmas.

Interesting new crazy meme

Insane right-wing Americans, who’ve almost certainly never been to France and hate the French for their cheese consumption and lack of redneck stupidity (side note: they should meet my friend’s girlfriend’s rural French family, who are apparently an easy match for any Appalachian in Hickness Quotient), believe France is subject to an intifada (link broadly representative of wingnut opinion).

No, a few thuggish low-income low-prospects French people are rioting a bit. It happens. Get a fucking grip, you Arab-hating buffoons…