A Fairytale of New York (and elsewhere)

I thought I’d closed the Tavern doors for good but sometimes the Muse strikes and resistance is futile.

(With apologies to fans of the original…)

“It’s New Year’s Eve, babe, 

In a Manhattan flat

Lord Alli’s lent me, so why not come along?

He says it isn’t wrong;

‘Just put the figures through

Two-fifty a night we’ll say, Ange, just ‘cos it’s you.’

Aren’t we the lucky ones?

We’ll never lack for funds

As long as Lord Alli is here for me and you,

So here’s to freebies

New York holidays,

The best designers; he’ll make our dreams come true.

“We’ve fine jackets and scarves

When the weather gets cold;

Who cares about WFA for the old?

We can sit in the front row 

Among VIPs,

And then claim it’s self-sacrifice rather than sleaze.

It’s our cultural duty!

Go see Taylor’s booty,

Take the kids to the footie - the donors will pay.

Give Downing Street passes

In exchange for free glasses

Then cover our arses and go on our way.”

But suddenly the voters know

And say it’s not fair play;

Will they rat each other out to get away?

“You're a leech!” “You're a skunk!”

“Were you clueless or drunk

That you never once said ‘All this might be misread’?”

“You scumbag! “You maggot!

If you want it you’ll blag it,

Kiss a millionaire’s arse to come up with the brass.”

Or, though people hate hypocrisy 

And wish they’d go away,

Will they keep on selling out day after day?

Balls gets the snip

We would never normally stoop so low as to celebrate someone's defeat but, in one case, we are prepared to make an exception. As they say, 'Don't let the door hit you on the way out!'

There is one thing I shall miss about him: the fact that, according to in the conventions of headline-speak, his utterances are all reported thus...

Labour not anti-business - Balls

or

Balls - Labour Government will 'balance the books'

...and somehow I find myself mentally adding an invisible exclamation mark of disbelief each time. I admit it may be somewhat below the belt to poke fun at a chap's name but you have to agree that there has been a rich vein of satire to be mined here.

Given his previous appearances in this blog, there is, of course, only one possible victory song today...

As Labour takes a drubbing in every counting hall,
Let's raise a toast to seeing Brown's old enforcer fall
And cheer as Morley suffers the unkindest cut of all;
Who'd have believed it? Labour have lost their Balls!

Do you think anyone was pleased to see them?

A little more recycling today (with apologies to Thin Lizzy...)

Guess who just got back today?
Them wild-eyed Blairs that have been away;
Haven't changed, have much to say,
But man, I still think them cats are crazy!

They’ve been asking what’s going down
Asking where all the cameras could be found
Now the election's come around
Driving all the voters crazy.

The Blairs are back in town

You know Cherie that used to smile a lot?
Any sniff of a freebie and she’d be there takin' all you got
And then off for a break on some millionaire's yacht,
I mean she was schemin'.

And all that time Tony was about the place,
‘Cool Britannia’ and that smug grin on Tony’s face;
Man, he made politics a disgrace,
As they said - “Things can only get better”.

Spread the word around
Guess who’s back in town

Every night they'll be dressed to kill
Down at the Ivy or the Ritz grill,
The drink will flow and money will spill
And if the people want to bitch, just let them.

And the satirists in the corner blasting out the same old song;
The Blairs’ll ignore it, so hope it won't be long,
Won't be long till summer comes
And then the Blairs are gone again.

The Sunday Songbook - Election special

A spot of recycling; the apathy of five years ago has returned with a vengeance, compounded by the occasional burst of suppressed rage, so I've plundered the archives for a bit of music to soothe the savage breast...

It’s not a mystery, we ought to want it;
So much depending and relying on it,
So why on earth should I be feeling nothing,
Wishing it were through?
And I can’t bear this Press pandemonium;
On May the seventh it’ll all be over.
People will vote as they intended to anyway;
Nothing, nothing anyone can do.

We’re in the run-up to a general election,
Each side points out the other’s imperfections,
But all they do to get their message through sounds like so much guff to me.
Recall election night anticipation?
This is more like waiting for an operation;
Will the offending growths be removed
To leave us trouble free?
I’ve just had enough, enough, enough,
I’ve just had enough.
I’ve just had enough, enough, enough,
I’ve just had enough.

Excitement levels couldn’t get much lower;
The whole damn business makes your heart beat slower.
It’s a long time since there’s been any pleasure
Reading Britain’s news.
They’ve all got plans, your future is safe with them,
It’s the same story over and over;
It’s enough to make you want to hide away
Which one’s lying? Could we really care less?

So in the run-up to a general election
I groan and throw away the Politics section;
I’ve heard it all already; there’s no innovation, instead just constant irritation.
And as the juggernaut is set in motion
I start to entertain the dismal notion
It’s too much bother, you won’t win me over
There’s no more left to say;
I’ve just had enough, enough, enough,
I’ve just had enough
Of mock sincerity and fake emotion
Yellow, red or blue.

So here we are, stuck in the run-up to a general election,
Hoping everything will take a new direction,
Or is it all lies...
(ad lib)

Follow the money

Remember Baroness Uddin? Chucked out of the House of Lords until she paid back the £125,000 she fiddled on expenses and claiming to be penniless, she had the gall to ask to be reinstated in order to pay the money back out of the taxpayer-funded daily allowance.

When that failed, at the end of her 18-month suspension, she had a rummage down the back of the sofa and miraculously came up with the cash in a handy lump sum.

Only it turns out that the sofa in question wasn't her own. According to the Register of Members' Interests, she received an interest free loan for £124,000 from three sources, all Muslims.

Given all the other investment opportunities out there, one wonders whether these benefactors would really sacrifice the use of that amount out of the goodness of their hearts or the desire to see Baroness Uddin's little face light up in gratitude.

Islamic finance does not, of course, permit the direct charging of interest on loans. Instead, the lender may effectively acquire a whole or part share of any assets and a share of any income or benefit generated. When the asset in question is a member of the House of Lords, this surely raises some disquieting questions.

In the light of this generous financial backing for the Baroness, the inspiration for our past musical efforts seems even more appropriate...

She kept a home down in Wapping,
Where subsidies helped pay the rent,
A mansion in Bangladesh,
And don’t forget the flat in Kent,
Pressed for a remedy, she says she’s in penury,
But once she’s back in Westminster then all will be fine;
Three hundred quid a day she’d get,
She’d use your cash to pay her debt
Extraordinarily nice!
She's Manzila Uddin,
Baroness of Bethnal Green,
House of Lords expenses queen;
Her arrant greed will blow your mind. 

The Sunday Songbook - The ballad of Charlie Hebdo

Where have all the grown-ups gone? On one hand, you have a satirical magazine rejoicing in its role as enfant terrible of French journalism and producing cartoons of occasionally spectacular vulgarity and, on the other, a group of fanatics claiming that their Prophet's status is so fragile it can somehow be damaged by a mere drawing.

Although the perpetrators of last week's atrocity and similar crimes are nominally adult and have access to firearms and explosives, we are essentially seeing 'Lord of the Flies' enacted on a global scale; there is something inescapably childish about their arrogant posturing on video and their spurious justification for murder and unilateral violence.

Like all bullies, they need to be met with a united front and a refusal to succumb to their attempts at mass intimidation. I've never been keen on the 'Charlie Hebdo' house style - I prefer my satire rather more aesthetically pleasing - but I heartily applaud the defiance that brought ordinary French people onto the streets in their millions (even if the 'world leaders' did somewhat spoil the effect).

One thing the journalists and cartoonists of 'Charlie Hebdo' had right; it is important that terrorists should never be allowed to assume the status of bogeymen in our collective consciousness or to command the awe and dread they wish to inspire in us.

In that spirit - and with all due respect to the victims of an appalling crime - I offer the following:

To make fun of the Prophet takes men who are bold
And quite unaccustomed to fear;
Just take the example of 'Charlie Hebdo'
And the cartoonists' freedom to jeer.

Of ribald depictions and scurrilous news
The magazine's made a career
But cartoons of Mohammed and critical views
Of Islamists have now cost it dear.

On Twitter and Facebook the faithful complained
Saying editor Charb went too far;
How lucky free speech guaranteed them a way
To explain just why 'Je ne veux pas'!

But no legal means would suffice for the ones
Who tried petrol alight in a jar
Or those whose response consists solely of guns
And a cry of  'Allahu akbar'.

You may well give offence if you want to make fun
Of religions that people hold dear,
But who's to decide if a cartoon or pun
Is high satire or blasphemous sneer?

Whoever it is who is taking a stand
There is one thing that has to be clear;
The unwritten sign of a civilized land
Should be freedom to speak without fear.

One (more) night in Clacton

Dedicated to JuliaM, for inspiring me to resume work on this - an earworm shared is, it turns out, an earworm doubled.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9cNtrrCP0E

Clacton, Northern Essex setting,
And I think we all know what Westminster's getting;
The delectable sight of Carswell in the
Role of spectre at the Tory dinner.

Time flies, doesn't seem a minute
Since Nigel Farage said he’d help him win it;
All change, don't you know that when you
Piss off the electorate they turn against you?

In Eastleigh, Heywood and Middleton
Or Rochester or, or this place...

One night in Clacton and the world's his oyster;
Carswell got a mandate for the world to see.
He left your ship, now you can watch him hoist a
Purple skull and crossbones there beside the sea;
Cameron, here’s a taste of how it just could be.

One town may yet lead to another;
Are you really sure of those places, Brother?
It's a drag, it's a bore, it's really such a pity
You Tories ignored the world outside the city.
What do you mean
'It's just one unimportant provincial town'?
Get out, walk in any street;
Ask some questions of the people that you meet.
You’ll find they’ll say it’s too late to restore the myth your motives are the purest;
No chance - expenses scuppered that line, Sunshine!

One night in Clacton and the Tories humbled;
Media portray despair and ecstasy.
One night in Clacton, now which seat will tumble
To Nigel Farage and his company?
I can feel that Devil walking next to me!

One night in Clacton

A busy week continues to keep me away from the blog but this seems a good time for an updated version of of this post from May 2013...

*****

This song was somehow inevitable, given the quasi-mythical status that the media seem to be attributing to this larger-than-life character.

With apologies to Stan Ridgway...

I was sitting in my local, feeling rather down;
I’d been drinking on my own since half past five.
It was visiting the polling station left me without hope
When I'd seen the parties hanging around outside.
I was looking for the courage to go back and see who'd won
And I sighed as I contemplated Britain’s fate;
Just then a chap in a fedora with a shocking purple tie
Appeared there at my shoulder and said "Wait."

 He offered me a pint and said "Don't worry, son, I'm here;
If Cameron wants to tangle now, he'll have me to dodge."
I said, "Well, thanks a lot!" I told him my name and asked him his
And he said to me "The name’s Nigel Farage".

'Oh, no, no, no!' said Farage;
'The English aren’t as docile as they seem;
Oh, no, no, no!' said Farage;
'Things are going to change now UKIP’s on the scene.'

Well, we talked all night, side by side, while the votes were counted in
And I wondered how the drastic shift began
'Cause now support for UKIP seemed to spring up everywhere
And I wondered if this was all Farage’s plan.
"They called us clowns and fruitcakes, but UKIP have the last laugh," he said,
"Perhaps the government now understand
That Britons may be tolerant but we’ll only take so much
Of the EU wanting to keep the upper hand -
Just let them try..."

And I knew this was somethin' we'd seen in Brussels,  'cause I remember how he was pullin' a metaphor right outta thin air and swattin' von Rompuy with it from here to kingdom come...

When the count was nearly over we shook hands and said goodbye;

He just winked at me from the door and then was gone.
When I got back to my family I told 'em about my night
And about the time I'd spent with Nigel Farage.
When I said his name, the others gulped and then they took my arm

And said to me, “That really can’t be right”,
And they pointed to the television; “There’s Nigel Farage
And he's been right there on News 24 all night!

(Feels like he's been there all week long...)"

 Well I know I must have imagined it – I’d been drinking like a fish –

Though as hallucinations go, it’s pretty large,

But it’s certain UKIP’s won a seat and it looks like they're here to stay,
And we’re all going to see much more of Nigel Farage.

(It's been drawn to my attention that iPads and phones don't always display the embedded videos; if you spent the mid-80s doing more worthwhile things than listening to the top 40 on a Sunday night - "No, honestly, I am doing my homework!" -  you can follow the 'Stan Ridgway' link to Youtube to hear the tune.)

'The Harem Shuffle'

I can't lay claim to the title (though I wish I'd though of it first); it was an inspired comment at 'Underdogs Bite Upwards' which irresistibly led to the following...

(Image from Daily Mail)

(With apologies to Bob & Earl)

You move to the left,
Put Gove on the shelf.
You move to the right, 
Ken Clark’s out of sight.
Get those women; you know
They do well in the polls
Elections looming fast;
You can’t be last.

You'd sign up a monkey,
If it made you look cool;
With the old guard in limbo,
Your squad's good to go
So call all the papers
Tell them ‘look at me now!”
As you groove it right here
To the harem shuffle.

Update: (with thanks to Mark Wadsworth in comments) Or, if you prefer:

'How do you solve a problem like Maria?'

Just when I though 'Expenses: the Musical' was distant history, along comes more inspiration in the form of the menacing Mrs Miller. Don't be fooled by the winning smile; she clearly knows where the bodies are buried.

Parliamentary commissioner Kathryn Hudson had found Mrs Miller over-claimed by £45,000 [half of the total amount she claimed] for expenses towards mortgage interest payments and council tax on a house which she shared with her parents. 

But the House of Commons Committee on Standards [in some cases, judgement by her peers indeed] decided she only needed to pay back £5,800 to cover over-claiming of mortgage expenses, resulting from her failure to cut her claims when interest rates fell.

As it happens, the media silence on the subject of MPs forgetting to alter their claims when mortgage interest rates went down was raised here in the Tavern back in May 2009, when Elliot Morley and David Chaytor - remember them? - admitted that they submitted their claims in annual bundles and had both overlooked the small matter of their mortgages having been paid off already.

Ms Miller's 'second home', on which she claimed almost right up to the maximum allowance of interest subsidy for several years, was mortgaged for £525,000, despite having been originally purchased for a mere £237,500. There is something very disturbing about a system that has allowed those whose decisions may profoundly influence the housing market to profit from price increases through effectively interest-free property loans.

The commissioner believed she should only have been able to claim expenses for interest payments on the original 1996 mortgage of £215,000. The committee, made up of MPs and lay members and which has the final say, disagreed. 

I feel this calls for a song...

How do you solve a problem like Maria?
Shouldn't this bring a cabinet minister down?
How should the voters view the way Maria
Borrowed against her residence in town?

Many a thing you know you'd like to tell her;
You have to admit it looks quite underhand,
To make the public pay
When you've mortgaged all the way
Then added on at least 300 grand.

Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria?
And MPs expenses getting out of hand?

Her answers were confused,
The committee was bemused
By her efforts to procrastinate and jam
The enquiries asking whether
She had fleeced us; altogether,
Its quite obvious she didn't give a damn.

She managed to invest
In a comfy London nest
And she moved her aged parents in as well,
While claiming all the while
Basingstoke was more her style;
The whole thing has a very nasty smell.

How do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you stop her throwing her weight around?
How do you find a word that means Maria?
I can think of a few, but they all have an ugly sound!

Many a thing the voters want to tell her
Many a thing she ought to understand
But Cameron says she can stay
And the MPs have got their way
A swift apology and all's in hand.

Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you make her pay back forty grand?

Promises, promises!

Of all the points for discussion raised by Ed Balls' Magic Porridge Pot pledge to 'balance the books' by 2020 while reducing the national debt, my favourite is the fact that, according to in the conventions of headline-speak, his utterances are reported thus...

Labour not anti-business - Balls

or

Balls - Labour Government will 'balance the books'

...and somehow I find myself mentally adding an invisible exclamation mark of disbelief each time.

I admit it may be somewhat below the belt to poke fun at a chap's name - though in this case I'm prepared to make an exception - but you have to admit there is a rich vein of satire to be mined here.

We have, of course, already celebrated him in song back in the days when he was Education Secretary - sorry, 'Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families'; it's not New Labour without a touchy-feely title - and doing such a good job that many of those who entered secondary school during his tenure now 'cannot write properly, add up or even wear appropriate clothes for work'.

Apparently this is damaging Britain's hopes of economic recovery, which gives an interesting irony to the grand schemes he unveiled this week.

I think it's time for a reprise (with apologies to The Who):

He walks onto the platform and gazes round the hall
"I promise you," he tells them, "That we can have it all;
A healthy budget surplus while Britain's borrowing falls."
And this man's behind it; it's got to be pure Balls!

A Festive Selection Box

Well, it looks like normal service may soon be restored at the Tavern at last, following absence, midwinter festivities and downed telephone lines.

The seclusion enforced by the latter has meant that several news stories have passed by without comment here. The treat-sized asteroid 2013 YB, for example, flew by just a whisker under 15,000 km away on the 23rd, though at somewhere between 1.5 and 3 metres in diameter, the most it could have done would probably have been an impromptu firework display in the upper atmosphere.

Meanwhile, a tale of not-so-goodwill from Canvey Island gave us a quote positively dripping with Zeitgeist:

"All we know is somebody in a yellow tabard went and asked them to stop because it was apparently traumatising children."

What dreadful deed could possibly have justified such a dramatic intervention? The culprit was a volunteer dressed as Santa Claus on behalf of a local charity; he turned up at the town's Christmas Event and fell foul of some hi-vis jobsworths, who told him to sling his festive hook because the officially approved version was on his way.

"A town council officer told us we had to take our Santa away as the Rotary Club Santa had arrived at the other end of the Christmas market round the corner."

Apparently, the prospect of seeing two Santas in the same place was considered too much for Canvey Island's impressionable youngsters, though, oddly enough, the spectacle of an 'aggressive' man in a fluorescent jacket shouting at a beloved childhood icon appears to have been deemed quite acceptable.

Personally, I'd have thought that today's children are familiar enough with celebrity lookalikes and fictional distortions of the space-time continuum to take it in their stride and, in any case, the local infants do seem to be made of sterner stuff than most.

Finally, since we are in Canvey Island, it seems fitting that another recent news story has awakened the long-silent muse and provided a merry tune to whistle while next out shopping in a popular high street store.

This is not just a song parody...

Saturday, in town,
Food shop, look around:
Basket, I put in
Pork pie, bottle of gin.
The headscarfed woman in the cashier's seat
Takes one look and gets to her feet;
"I can't handle pork and alcohol."

Says that she's gotta go;
Why work where you know
There’ll be liquor and pork?
You knew it right from the start.
How bad can scanning the barcodes be?
I ain’t asking you to taste it for me;
I just want some pork and alcohol.

"Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching."

Some news stories are just crying out for the treatment...

(photo: Sky News)

One man on his own

Opposed to radiation,

One man and his dog

Made a demonstration.

Angry Iain Dale

Flushed with indignation

Fought the one man and his dog

Who made a demonstration.

Then the mainstream press

Depicted for the nation

Iain Dale fighting one man and his dog

Who made a demonstration

Photographers all round

Filmed the confrontation

For reports of Iain Dale fighting one man and his dog

Who made a demonstration.

The comments flooded in;

Political exploitation

Of the photos and reports of Iain Dale fighting one man and his dog

Who made a demonstration

Blogs were swift to add

Trenchant observation

On the comments on the photos and reports of Iain Dale fighting one man and his dog

Who made a demonstration.

When you're in the public eye,
Whatever your frustration,

Take a lesson from the posts on the comments on the photos and reports of Iain Dale fighting one man and his dog 

And the media sensation*.


*Unless, of course, that was the whole aim of the exercise - how far will a publisher go to create interest these days?

The Sunday Songbook - Littoral Littering

Britons now drop litter as cows defecate in fields, or snails leave a trail of slime. That is to say, they do it naturally, without conscious reflection.
(Theodore Dalrymple: 'Litter: The Remains of Our Culture')

Recent news coverage has treated us to abundant images of litter strewn across parks and fields in the aftermath of festivals and Bank Holidays. Doubtless this weekend's V festival will be no exception, as thousands of people exercise what they seem to regard as an inalienable right to drop their rubbish wherever they choose.

Perhaps it's because they know that, sooner or later, someone else will clear it up - the more callous might even suggest it creates work for the unemployed - or maybe they want to demonstrate that they are free spirits who can't be bothered with such mundane details, but I suspect it has at least as much to do with simply following the herd.

There's a blackly amusing irony that, if you approached these festival-goers and asked their opinion on, say, Green issues, they would probably sigh over the latest global warming predictions and deplore the plight of the polar bear and Man's impact on the environment while surrounded on all sides by their own carelessly discarded leavings.

It's not just the festivals that generate unnecessary carpets of rubbish; it's a depressing thought that, thanks to this summer's fine weather, Britain's coastline is likely to be strewn with even more litter than usual, and 'usual' is pretty bad.

Even after the poor summer last year, the Marine Conservation Society's annual clean-up produced 924kg of rubbish from just six beaches in Northumberland alone.

The number of cigarette stubs found on beaches between 2011 and 2012 doubled, with general smoking litter, including lighters and packets increasing by 90%. There was also a rise in the number of sweet and lolly wrappers.

Along with the ubiquitous drinks cans and bottles, this suggests a constant stream of secondary indulgence by those for whom a trip to the beach is not sufficiently enjoyable on its own - not to mention a considerable financial outlay.

It's hard to imagine what goes through the minds of the people who are happy to spend a few hours sitting amid the spectacular scenery of England's North-east coastline, then walk away and leave their rubbish behind.

Perhaps it's something like this...

Come here me little Jackie
Now av smoked me baccy
Let wer drop the packet
Dinna mind a bin.

Dance ti' thy daddy, sing ti' thy mammy,
Let fa' the wrapper that yer lolly's in;
Haud thy chip buttie till it’s gan a’ squishy,
Chuck it doon an’ leave it by yon baccy tin.

Here's thy mother sittin'
Lager cans a’ roond her,
Sup thy drink and kick the
Bottle doon the sand.

Dance ti' thy daddy, sing ti' thy mammy,
Dance roond their tab-ends lyin' in a ring;
See in the watter a’ the little fishies
Swimmin’ in wor roobish when the tide cooms in.

The Sunday song book - εξάπόδι

Following the fate of the needle-tailed swift a few weeks ago comes news of another rare creature's early demise:

'A holidaymaker who caught and ate an octopus was "horrified" to learn it was only the second rare six-legged specimen ever found.'

(With apologies to Rodgers & Hammerstein)

Where the skies are all bright, a lucky fellow
Splashing in the waters of his native Greece
Might just find him a tasty octopus
Brought ashore for a family feast.

And it’s too late to rant and rave and bellow,
Now it’s done and the creature is quite dead,
That it sure was a cockeyed octopus;
Only six legs attached to its head.

The creature in the case
Was just the second of its race
Discovered in the waters below,
But our hero had the will
A cephalopod to kill
And serve up with a nice merlot.

You could say that this hungry tourist fellow
Should have known it was rare right from the start,
But there's now no hope;
That American dope
Flash fried it and tore it apart
A la carte.

(As an extra trivial treat, the singer is Reba McEntire, who plays sharp-shooting, vowel-torturing survivalist Heather in the cult film 'Tremors'. Also, if you missed it, here's a link to Mark Wadsworth's inspired plot conflation 'South Pacific Rim - the Musical'.)

Fish gotta swim and birds gotta fly...

...turbines just give them a new way to die.

(with apologies to Noel Harrison)

Round. ..
Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel,
So the turbines of the Islands
Dance their ever-spinning reel.
Then one lone and ardent twitcher
On a sunny afternoon
Gets a glimpse of something special,
Calls his friends and pretty soon
Eager crowds of them are rushing
To that bare and lonely place;
"Hirundapus caudacutus!" 
Eager smiles on every face
Until they reach the spot and find
What the windmills left behind....

(Picture from Fox News)

Meanwhile, you might like to investigate the Guardian Environment blog's unique approach to the story and savour the use of their magic word:

Predictably, some people, who have shown little interest in bird conservation before, have sought to martyr this poor bird for their anti-windfarm cause. This is as offensive as it is irrational.

The Sunday Songbook - UKIPpy-ki-yay

This song was somehow inevitable, given the quasi-mythical status that the media seem to be attributing to this larger-than-life character.

With apologies to Stan Ridgway...

I was sitting in my local, feeling rather down;
I’d been drinking on my own since half past five
It was visiting the polling station left me without hope
With the big three parties hanging around outside.
I was looking for the courage to go back and see who'd won
And I sighed as I contemplated Britain’s fate;
Just then a chap in a fedora, with a shocking purple tie
Appeared there at my shoulder and said "Wait."

He offered me a pint and said "Don't worry, son, I'm here;
If Cameron wants to tangle now, he'll have me to dodge"
I said, "Well, thanks a lot!" I told him my name and asked him his
And he said to me "The name’s Nigel Farage".

Oh, no, no, no! says Farage;
The English aren’t as docile as they seem;
Oh, no, no, no! says Farage;
Things are going to change now UKIP’s on the scene.


Well, we talked all night, side by side, while results came rolling in
And I wondered how the drastic shift began
'Cause the council seats for UKIP seemed to spring up everywhere
And I wondered if this was all Farage’s plan.
"They called us clowns and fruitcakes, but UKIP have the last laugh," he said,
"Perhaps the government now understand
That the British may be tolerant but we’ll only take so much
Of the EU wanting to keep the upper hand -
Just let them try..."


{spoken}
And I knew this was somethin' we'd seen in Brussels,
 'Cause I remember how,
He was pullin' a metaphor right outta thin air
And swattin' von Rompuy with it from here to kingdom come.

When the count finally ended, we shook hands and said goodbye
He just winked at me from the door and then was gone,
When I got back to my family I told 'em about my night
And I told them how I’d met Nigel Farage.
When I said his name, the others gulped and then they took my arm

And said to me, “That really can’t be right”,
And they pointed to the television; “There’s Nigel Farage
And he's been right there on News 24 all night

(Feels like he's been there all week long...)"

Well I know I must have imagined it – I’d been drinking like a fish –

Though as hallucinations go, it’s pretty large,

But it’s certain UKIP’s vote share came to 22%

And we’re all going to see much more of Nigel Farage.


(It's been drawn to my attention that iPads and phones don't always display the embedded videos; if you want to hear the tune, follow the 'Stan Ridgway' link to Youtube.)

Quote of the day - Sleazy O'Leary strikes again

You can say this for Michael O'Leary, he's consistent.

Almost a year to the day since his last outrageous proposal to reform air travel (a distinctly dubious approach to in-flight entertainment), he's back with another headline-grabbing idea.

Michael O’Leary claims legislation forcing passengers to wear seatbelts is useless, unnecessary and insisted upon only by authorities he deems “plonkers”.

Unlike his previous schemes - scrapping the co-pilot and coin-operated toilets, for example - getting rid of seat-belts appears to have no immediate financial benefit.

O'Leary, however, is nothing if not a canny operator; this attention-seeking device is merely a Trojan horse to advance an idea we've seen before - standing passengers on aircraft.

Since his initial ideal of vertical backrests seems to have met with engineering difficulties, his plan this time appears to be removing ten rows of rear seats completely to sell £1 standing-only tickets to European flight destinations:

“We don't have heavy landings anymore. "If you say to someone, 'Look, hang onto the handle there, you're coming in to land', they'll be fine."

It is, of course, about as likely as removing the windows and asking passengers to stick their arms out and flap, but O'Leary's got exactly what he wanted: I wonder whether he has a regular entry in his desk diary: "November 7th; wind up the media again."

Must save a fortune on advertising.

Somehow O'Leary and the Stranglers seem to fit uncannily well together; perhaps it's their blend of blatant misogyny and cynicism ...




O'Leary's seeking business,
He goes on reducing prices
And he's got a great idea:
Fly to Brussels* for a pound
By just hanging around.
By just hanging around.

 At the airport early
 And the staff are grim and surly
 And the milling hordes are swelling
 So a seat cannot be found
 They're just hanging around.
 They're just hanging around.

 So tired, by halfway through the
 Flight you wonder why you bothered -
 If you change your mind about it
 Tough, you're high above the ground
 You're just hanging around.
 You're just hanging around.

 *South Charleroi Airport, 29 miles from the centre of Brussels

Denis MacShane - the musical

Well, it's been a while since we had one of these...

I think I did it again.
Asked you to believe
My tale of expense,
Oh baby;
The BBC's in a rush,
To make it seem that it's serious,
But to fall through my expenses,
Can you really do this to me?

Oops! ... I did it again.
I filed the receipts
And put in two claims
For the same laptop, baby.
Oops!... You think I'm a fraud
But it’s all above board...
I'm mostly innocent.

You see my problem is this:
I've claimed, in a way,
Things I suppose technically didn’t exist
But was it too much to pay?
Can't you see I oppose fascism every day?
And this trawl through my expenses;
That was done for the BNP!

Oops! ... I did it again.
And right from the start
Got lost in the game.
Oh, baby, baby.
Oops!... I'm not really a fraud,
Ed, please keep me on board!
I'm mostly innocent.


(In case anyone thinks I was amazingly quick off the mark with this mirth-inducing story, I should admit that it's an updating of a previous piece which just happened to suit rather well...)

The dog returneth to his vomit

Talk about recidivism! No sooner do we drag Westminster's finest away from one trough than they have their noses buried in another.

This time it's the rent scandal; they're all renting from each other while we foot the bill.

Something about it seemed uncannily familiar, until I realised that it's similar scam to one that was rife, albeit in rather different social circles, when I briefly worked in a housing benefit department many years ago (it involved home-owners swapping unemployed offspring rather than expense-funded flats but the aim was broadly the same).

This ought to call for a new installment of 'Expenses: the Musical', but the muse is elusive and, in any case, the quick-witted Oxfordshire Geek has a sharply-written song parody posted already, while Caedmon's Cat presents the story in his own inimitable style (and provides the title of this post).

So I shall turn my attention instead to George Osborne, who had the bad luck to be spotted in a first class railway carriage with a standard class ticket. Rather than travel with the plebs - oops, sorry; voters - he had his aide pay £189.50 for an upgrade.

Such an occurrence might have escaped public notice but for the wonders of modern technology; a television journalist in the train, who presumably couldn't believe her luck, tweeted the ensuing conversation to a waiting world:

“Very interesting train journey to Euston Chancellor George Osborne just got on at Wilmslow with a STANDARD ticket and he has sat in FIRST CLASS.”

  “His aide tells ticket collector he cannot possibly move and sit with the likes of us in standard class and requests he is allowed to remain in First Class.

“Ticket collector refuses.”

“George Osborne pays £160 to stay in first class!”

Cue an enigmatic silence on the part of Osborne's spokesman while, one assumes, frantic behind-the-scenes damage-limitation talks are being held. For the news to break on the same day as Mitchell's resignation leaves the Conservatives uncomfortably vulnerable to criticism.

Here in the Tavern, however, it has prompted a nostalgic singalong from the days when Sir Nicholas Winterton, too, found second class travel a democratic gesture too far.

Oh the posh, posh travelling life, the travelling life for me,
Comfy seats and lots of tables, complimentary tea;
If you can’t enjoy the benefits then why be an MP?
Proles Out, Stewards at Hand, posh with a capital P-O-S-H, posh

The people there in second class will always make me frown,
Their noisy children anger me, they never settle down
But I am on expenses so ta-ta and toodle-oo
As I board first class and never have to sit with any of you.

Oh the posh, posh travelling life, the travelling life for me,
Comfy seats and lots of tables, complimentary tea;
And all the other passengers are people just like me,
Proles Out, Stewards at Hand, posh with a capital P-O-S-H, posh

In first class I am sure to find an atmosphere to suit me
If there was any justice then the public would salute me;
They’d understand why I avoid all peasants great and small;
When crowded in with hoi polloi one just can’t think at all!

Oh the posh, posh travelling life, the travelling life for me, 
Comfy seats and lots of tables, complimentary tea; 
When I'm travelling at your expense I do it stylishly 
Proles Out, Stewards at Hand, posh with a capital P-O-S-H, P-O-S-H, P-O-S-H, P-O-S-H...