There's No Cure For England, Otherwise Known as Stupidity

LONDON, July 7 (UPI) -- Toddlers who say "yuck" when given flavorful foreign food may be exhibiting racist behavior, a British government-sponsored organization says.

The London-based National Children's Bureau released a 366-page guide counseling adults on recognizing racist behavior in young children.

The guide, titled 'Young Children and Racial Justice,' warns adults that babies must also be included in the effort to eliminate racism because they have the ability to "recognize different people in their lives."

The bureau says to be aware of children who "react negatively to a culinary tradition other than their own by saying 'yuck.'

"Racist incidents among children in early years settings tend to be around name-calling, casual thoughtless comments and peer group relationships," the guide says.

Staff members are advised not to ignore racist actions and to condemn them when they occur.

Posted by Lord Lunch, with regrets.
Hamsammich Castle, Worcestershiresauce, England

Holy Moo Cow!

Look at the time. Worse, look at the date! The date of the last post and the date of this, the most recent. From December 18 in the year of '07 'til today, March 7, 2008, has nothing happened to stir me from my slumbers? That's a rhetorical question of sorts, for I am out of sorts, having apparently slept through Christmas and the Super Bowl.

So, why now, I ask (I being the only one tuned in to this blog, the other person having long ago departed to a site more current, so it would not be proper to say 'Why now, you ask,') do I rub sand from mine my eyes and take quill in hand?

Good question, m' Lord, thanks for asking it.

Yew are most welcome.

(Get on with it! - ed.)

The answer is, er, for one thing, my man Bix has made me perhaps the most refreshing toddy ever have I had. And half way through the second serving of same, I am feeling verbal, mellowy verbal, not spit-bubble-blowing drunk verbal.

Not so verbal as to take up much more of your time, you being of course, the royal you, meaning me, since my reader abandoned moi whilst unsuspectingly I slept.

(DO get ON with whatever it is you're going on about! - ed.)

Right-ho. Sipping my toddy sans parasol capped swizzle stick, which kept poking me in the left eye before I had the sense to snap it in two and toss it towards the fireplace, where Bix shall have to put it after he picks it up off the stuffed Rhino-foot hassock where it landed, my aim being not what once it was...

(I give up --- And I'm Outta Here! - ed.)

Sipping my toddy, as I was saying, I revisted this page for the first time since December, saw the yawning gap betwix that date and this, and resolved to prevent said yawn from becoming wider.

Further, I was moved to memorialize my thoughts on Google ads. It was my impression that dear old Google possessed some mysterious machine, powered by moonbeams and pixie dust, that detected the nature of content on a web page and then sprinkled little ads on the page relevant to said content. But nowhere on the pages of this "Daily" Aspect are there any Google ads relevant to any content herein. At least there is no relevancy that I can devine. Perhaps a few more premium toddys from Bix will lubricate, er, illuminate my ability to find linkage.

Go I now into the night, praying I shall, from now on, more frequently return to these pages with inkpot and toddy glass brimming, and with quill poised and brain primed, to entertain, educate, and amaze all who venture here with incisive insights into the inner workings of this world of folly and fable.

Yours, etc., etc., etc.

Lord Lunch, Hamsammich Castle, Worcestershiresauce, England.

Oh, and P.S., please. Swizzle sticks. Parasol-topped swizzle sticks at that! They are for ditsy dainty ladies who sip thick, sticky, sweet, rainbow colored drinks on cruises, or under thatch-roofed poolside bars in exotic resorts. Certainly, toddy drinkers do not, and will not, be seen operating such sissy apparati. I have told Bix this, but it is, he insists, a rule of the Gentlemen's Gentlemen Union that drinks be served thus.

(Toddy drinkers, if you are unfortunate enough not to know, use the butt-end of their cigars to gently swizzle the ice around, if it is needed to be done. Or, absent a cigar, the right index finger serves just as well.)

Toodles pip!

Little Hope Left for Scotland's Survival

There is an hypothesis, which gains currency with every passing day, that the best, brightest, and boldest of those born in the United Kingdom left long ago for pastures greener in North America, Australia, New Zealand, and anywhere elsewhere.

And, of course, very many of Great Britain's best, brightest, and boldest sacrificed their lives in World Wars I and II, thereby draining the British genetic pool of its creamy top.

Upshot: with a few notable exceptions, Britain is today peopled by submissive, palms-out morons governed by an alliance of poltroons and buffoons.

Scotland seems determined to surpass what passes for progressive thought and governance in its southern neighbors, England and Wales. Ample examples exist to illustrate this fact, and each new day brings to light additional examples, many vying to be more extreme than the others.

Fox News reports (and I decided to post this post as a result) the following:

Domestic Violence

Vince Hogg of Wormit, Scotland was arrested after tearing out the hair of his live-in girlfriend and slamming her against a wall.

The two apparently have had a stormy relationship and he became incensed because a leaky shower was causing the carpet to get wet.

All of this has caused Hogg problems with his job, as an anger management counselor.

But Hogg is still on the payroll of the National Health Service, which runs the "zero tolerance campaign" against domestic violence, where he worked.

Hogg was, however, demoted and reassigned.

Well, fellow travelers, there's not much to add, except a tear and a sigh from those of us sad to see the sinking of a once so great society.

Yours 'til next I wake,

Lord Lunch, Hamsammich Castle, Worcestershiresauce, England

Scientists Find Oldest Living Animal — Then Kill It

This is really a "no commenter" blog-wise. But I just had to post it, because of the headline:

British marine biologists have found what may be the oldest living animal — that is, until they killed it.

The team from Bangor University in Wales was dredging the waters north of Iceland as part of routine research when the unfortunate specimen, belonging to the clam species Arctica islandica, commonly known as the ocean quahog, was hauled up from waters 250 feet deep.

Only after researchers cut through its shell, which made it more of an ex-clam, and counted its growth rings did they realize how old it had been — between 405 and 410 years old.

Another clam of the same species had been verified at 220 years old, and a third may have lived 374 years. But this most recent clam was the oldest yet.

"Its death is an unfortunate aspect of this work, but we hope to derive lots of information from it," postdoctoral scientist Al Wanamaker told London's Guardian newspaper. "For our work, it's a bonus, but it wasn't good for this particular animal."

This article was lifted from FoxNews.com by Lord Lunch.

The Height of Ludicricity

There is a gem of a quote in Jack Shafer's Slate column October 18th. It's one of those quotes you (meaning me) wish you had had the wit to utter.

The column, entitled The Churchillian Side of Chris Matthews (in which Shafer blisters the thick skin off Matthews's hind-end), cites Vanity Fair's James Wolcott, a man "who appreciates the talents [of Chris Matthews]." In his 2004 book, Attack Poodles and Other Media Mutants, Wolcott writes:

Matthews manages to outrace his contradictory statements by blustering so many excitable things so fast and so often that pinning down the discrepancies is like trying to grab a gust of wind by the tail. He isn't a cynical dissembler. He seems to suffer from some pundit variant of short-term memory loss. Each day on earth erases the days before. He says what he believes and believes what he says, and has the liberating advantage of always working from a blank sheet.

Come to think of it, Matthews is a gust of wind.

- Lord Lunch

Hamsammich Castle, Worcestershiresauce, England

Why Al Really Won the 'Peace Prize'

Your Lordship (moi) takes great pleasure in providing (below) an illuminating excerpt from Adamant wherein the always delightfully perceptive Russell Seitz peels away the p.r. puffery and reveals the hokum that is the Nobel Peace Prize.

- Lord Lunch, Hamsammich Castle, Worcestershiresauce, England

The method of electing the [Nobel Peace Prize] winner ensures a political outcome. Other Nobel prizes are assigned by committees of experts in the orbit of the Swedish Academy of Science, but the Peace Prize winner is determined by a committee reflecting the current strength of Norwegian political parties. Were Norway's anti-immigrant Progress Party to gain a majority, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize might well be Pat Buchanan.

Will The 2008 Nobel Peace Prize Go To Pat Buchanan ?

The five members of the parliamentary committee to whom Democrat Gore owes his prize include three drawn from the Socialist Left, Labour, and Progressive parties forming Norway's ruling coalition, and one Conservative - a former Minister of Trade. Little wonder Francis Sejersted, past chairman of the committee, admits:

“Awarding a peace prize is, to put it bluntly, a political act.”

And all politics is local. None of the other worthy Peace Prize nominees one might list, from Burmese monks to the embattled opponents of tyranny in Uzbekistan and Zimbabwe, can increase the value of Norway's oil and gas reserves. Giving a prize that amplifies the credibility of the world's foremost advocate of carbon taxes most assuredly can.

Investing $750,000 in Al's power to pontificate on behalf of his carbon trading business could pay Norway and OPEC handsomely. The return could exceed a million to one, since Al's crusade to double coal's cost by taxation should translate into far higher prices for the lower carbon North Sea oil and gas that are the mainstay of the Norwegian economy. Oslo stands to gain hundreds of billions of Euros on its multi-billion barrel reserves, a truly extraordinary return on a one kilogram disc of gold.

So my congratulations to Mr. Gore, and kudos to the Oslo committee, whom I hereby place in nomination for the Nobel Prize in Economics for awarding the Peace Prize to Al.

Their decision is in the best Viking fiscal tradition, but avoids the recrimination that so often attends rapine, pillage, looting and burning. Especially the last -- nowadays, a Viking's loot might not cover his carbon offsets.

Search for Kidnapped US Soldier in Iraq Delayed 10 Hours by FISA Law

And Democrats in Congress are determined to extend that law in a vote later this week.

Excerpt from the New York Post, Oct. 15, 2007:

Sometime before dawn, heavily armed al Qaeda gunmen quietly cut through the tangles of concertina wire surrounding the outpost of two Humvees and made a massive and coordinated surprise attack.

Four of the soldiers were killed on the spot and three others were taken hostage.

A search to rescue the men was quickly launched. But it soon ground to a halt as lawyers - obeying strict U.S. laws about surveillance - cobbled together the legal grounds for wiretapping the suspected kidnappers.

Starting at 10 a.m. on May 15, according to a timeline provided to Congress by the director of national intelligence, lawyers for the National Security Agency met and determined that special approval from the attorney general would be required first.

For an excruciating nine hours and 38 minutes, searchers in Iraq waited as U.S. lawyers discussed legal issues and hammered out the "probable cause" necessary for the attorney general to grant such "emergency" permission.

Finally, approval was granted and, at 7:38 that night, surveillance began.

"The intelligence community was forced to abandon our soldiers because of the law," a senior congressional staffer with access to the classified case told The Post.

"How many lawyers does it take to rescue our soldiers?" he asked. "It should be zero."

The FISA law applies even to a cellphone conversation between two people in Iraq, because those communications zip along wires through U.S. hubs, which is where the taps are typically applied.

U.S. officials had no way of knowing if Jimenez and his fellow soldiers were still alive during the nearly 10-hour delay.

The body of one was found a few weeks later in the Euphrates River and the terror group Islamic State of Iraq - an al Qaeda offshoot - later claimed in a video that Jimenez and the third soldier had been executed and buried.

I say there ought to be a law! Oh, wait . . . .