Supreme Court Justice

I don't like commenting on other countries, but what happens in America affects the world and we are friends. Obama is right, a judge should be a judge, not a Republican Judge, not a Democrat judge, just a judge. What is happening to the Republican Party? Who thought we'd see extremism there? Such a shame the American people didn't vote Obama more power. President Trump is just too scary to contemplate.

Broken Promises

In the first couple of years of a parliament promises get broken all the time. They're banking on people not remembering by the time of the next election. I don't understand why people abandoned the Liberals at the last election, the coalition worked much better than giving the Tories a free rein, it stemmed their worst excesses whilst still improving the economy, what was so bad? Now we get this kind of thing (not to mention throwing the toys out of the pram in Europe!) Hit 'em when they're down, by Mr Morality-Smith!

Ticketless Trains

Train companies have announced they want to get rid of ticket machines at stations, and of course staff selling tickets. The idea is that you use your smart phone with a barcode or similar to swipe in. So, if your phone gets lost, stolen or simply breaks down you'll be going nowhere. You could say that about a lost ticket, but it's easier to replace a ticket at a moment's notice than a phone.
Then there's the plight of older people who don't have smart phones; I know older people who not only don't want the complexity of a smartphone, but who also have simple phones with large buttons they can actually see instead of a big screen, which of course leads us on to blind people and others who need assistance at stations with no staff. Not to mention the job losses, safety and security for all travellers and on and on.
Anyone who eschews tech and the internet gets to pay loads more for things as it is, especially utilities, and already buying train tickets is a minefield, they tell you you've saved x and then you see the same ticket cheaper elsewhere. Actually I think it's a national disgrace and although I don't like governments telling businesses how to operate as a general principle, fairness needs to be legislated for. Still you can't knock progress eh!

Government Advertising

Driving home the other day I saw a poster that said 'Don't Join The Army - Don't Make Friends For Life!' The temptation to add something like 'it may be a short life for you or for them' is great, unfortunately I'm too well behaved. I'm told there is another which says something like 'Don't Join The Army - Don't Learn New Skills' as if you can't learn skills at college, at university, at work, as an apprentice. Unless you want to learn how to kill, everything else is available elsewhere. Same applies to the Navy, currently advertising for recruits on TV. You can't trust politicians and your life is not your own once you sign, so don't do it. Peace is better.

More Government Advertising

The government is running a TV campaign to recruit teachers - all very necessary, but why? I know a lady locally who is a brilliant teacher, but she's changed to being a supply teacher because the conditions she worked under as an employed teacher were intolerable. My father was a teacher and I know things have changed in that profession, and not always for the better. Instead of just advertising for more, perhaps the government should look at why teachers are quitting!

BT The Communications Company That Doesn't Communicate

Two doors up lives an elderly lady, she has lung cancer and her husband is now in a nursing home. She has an emergency system to call for help called 'On Call' which utilises her BT landline. Her BT landline is suddenly out of order. Her nephew called BT but their help line, whatever it is, is all automated, can't talk to a human being to tell them that a sick, elderly woman on her own is cut off. He tried 'On Call' too, but BT won't speak to them either. The automated response seems to suggest it could be four days to get an engineer on the case. BT stands for British Telecom, you can't talk to them, they're the communication company that doesn't communicate and leaves vulnerable people cut off and at risk. That's Britain today, that's British.

Update
Later that evening the lady's nephew found a BT engineer working on a box in a street nearby, he talked to her and explained the problem, she checked the line and found the fault was at the exchange, since she was going back to the exchange she looked into it, found some wires had become dislodged and fixed it. So BT that's what can be achieved when people talk to each other, human being to human being and not to a machine!

Advertising that gets your goat.

That nice Rob Brydon is advertising P&O Cruises. I've nothing against cruising, I've been on one and enjoyed it. I recognise the strengths and weaknesses of cruising though. Stops are generally short and you get to do a nice little recce of a place you might want to come back and see more fully another time. Life on board is generally luxurious and fun.

I also spent a lot of my life travelling on a small yacht and stopped at many harbors where cruise ships also dock. I've seen them disgorge up to two thousand passengers who then swamp places like Ephesus and Pompei before returning to eat and set sail again asap.

So it came as some surprise, when watching the telly, to see dear Mr Brydon and his other half sitting virtually alone in a Romanesque theatre with  him humorously uttering a line like 'lucky to get a seat'. If you think that's how it is, think again. Misleading.