Falling On A Bruise

Everyone Loves China Now

2026-07-17T15:15:00.000+01:00

Pew Research surveyed more than 42,000 people across 36 countries and asked them 'Who do you find less alarming, the Communists or Donald Trump' and the result was that the world now views China more favourably than the United States and have more confidence in President Xi to do the right thing than President Ding-a-Ling in the White House.
Americans’ nearest neighbors Canada and Mexico, the poor sods actually bordering the Trump led insanity, viewed China more positively than the U.S. as did almost every European nation asked such as France, Greece, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the UK.
Of the 36 only 6 (Poland, Philippines, South Korea, India, Japan and Israel) preferred the child-like Tangerine Tyrant.
The Mango Moron has single handedly done more for the global image of the Chinese Communist Party than 75 years of Beijing propaganda, a million little red books or every panda they ever loaned out and all Xi Jinping had to do was stand there quietly while the orange wrecking ball did his thing.
The reasons cited by those interviewed was that America interferes in the affairs of others (75%), it is an unreliable partner (52%) and doesn't contribute to the peace and stability (52%) and specifically America's reputation went spinning down the toilet due to the Iran war, the demands to take Greenland, kidnapping Maduro, the backing of Israel and the handling of Gaza and tariffs
Asked about the poll, the White House trotted out a flunky to declare that Trump has done more for global stability than anyone else, citing among his triumphs having obliterated Iran’s nuclear facilities which means that in the Trumps Governments eyes, responding to a poll that says the world thinks you’re destabilising the planet by bragging about the bombing campaign the pollsters literally identified as a reason the world thinks you’re destabilising the planet is a winner.
China didn't have to win hearts and minds, it just had to stay quiet and not be the loudest lunatic in the room and allow the dysfunctional Americans to do their work for them.
Maybe Xi should send them a bottle of something fizzy and a thank you card for making their Authoritarian regime seem more cuddly than the current one in Washington.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek God Ares

2026-07-17T00:30:00.015+01:00

I know what you’re thinking. Ares, why are you here? Shouldn't you be out there inciting a riot or sharpening a spear with your teeth?
First of all, mind your own business. Second of all, being the God of War in a family of intellectuals is a nightmare. My father, Zeus, who, let’s be honest, spends 90% of his time turning into various farm animals to ruin someone’s marriage, once told me to my face that I was the most hateful of all the gods on Olympus.
The most hateful? Really, Dad? Have you met your wife? But no, I’m the problem because I like a little hullabaloo.
Growing up was tough. While Apollo was learning the lyre and Artemis was practicing her archery (from a safe distance, like a coward), I was out there getting my hands dirty. I don’t do strategy or long-term planning. I do war. The messy kind. The kind where you wake up in the morning, scream at the sun, and run toward the nearest Sharp Thing.
Two giants, Otus and Ephialtes, stuffed me into a bronze jar for thirteen months. It was a long time ago. It was cramped, it was dark, and I didn’t have a snack. If you think you could handle thirteen months in a jar without losing your edge, you try it. Artemis had to bail me out, which honestly, was more painful than the jar itself.
We have to talk about my sister, Athena.
If war had a Teacher’s Pet, it would be her. She’s the Goddess of Strategic War. Do you know what that means? It means she sits in a tent with a map and a juice box while I’m out there doing the actual work.
She’s beaten me a few times. Big deal. She uses wisdom and tactics which is just a fancy way of saying she cheats. In the Trojan War, she literally hid behind a cloud and helped Diomedes stab me in the stomach. A mortal! Stabbing a god! Do you know how much that hurts? Not the wound, the embarrassment.
I’m the god of the bloodlust, the roar, the adrenaline. She’s the goddess of did we bring enough supplies? Boring. If I wanted to think about logistics, I’d be the God of Middle Management. War isn't supposed to be a chess game, it's supposed to be a mosh pit with consequences.
Look around you. Everything you love is because of me. Civilizations? Built on the ruins of people I helped kick over. Technology? You wouldn't have the internet if you hadn’t first invented better ways to throw rocks at each other.
And yet, where is my statue? Where is the Ares Day parade? You’ve got Valentine’s Day for my girlfriend, Aphrodite (which, by the way, is a total commercial sham)but nothing for the guy who keeps the world spinning through pure, unadulterated conflict.
Now, let’s talk about the state of humanity today. Humans, what are you doing?
You guys are fighting wars with buttons. A guy in an air-conditioned room in Nevada presses a key, and a drone three thousand miles away drops a missile. Where’s the sport? Where’s the eye contact? Where’s the part where you get covered in the other guy’s sweat and gory bits? You’ve turned war into a spreadsheet. It’s pathetic. If you’re waging war while sitting in an ergonomic chair drinking a smoothie, you aren't a warrior. You’re a librarian with a grudge.
Back in my day, if you wanted to destroy a city, you had to roll up your sleeves and do it brick by brick. You really got to know the architecture. Now? You just drop a bomb and the whole thing is gone in a mushroom cloud. It’s lazy.
I’m not saying we need to go back to the Bronze Age but we need to put the passion back into conflict. Stop trying to justify everything, just admit you’re angry and admit you want to hit something! It’s much more honest.

Special Guest Blogger: John Prescott

2026-07-15T00:30:00.011+01:00

I led my life believing that a proper breakfast involves a full English and a strong cup of tea but that was the kind of man I was, born in a modest council house in Grantham, the kind of place where the smell of boiled potatoes was a constant and I entered the world with a yowl and a plan.
My dad was a miner, my mum a cleaner, and I grew up in a house with parents who thought moderation was a type of sandwich.
Fast forward to the early ’80s. I’d already been elected as a Labour Councillor and I’d decided it was time to actually do something with my knack for shouting at people.
I was elected MP for Kingston upon Hull East in 1970, a constituency whose residents taught me the value of hard work, humour and the unbridled joy of a properly cooked fish and chips.
I quickly learned that Parliament was a bit like a giant, stuffy pub where underneath the silk ties and polished shoes was a collective yearning for a decent pint and a decent argument.
My first real highlight came in 1997, when Labour won a landslide victory, and I was appointed Deputy Prime Minister (and Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions). Suddenly I was the guy who was no more being the guy who yelled at the bus driver for taking the wrong route, now I could make the routes.
I introduced the Cycle-to-Work scheme, which, helped thousands of people cycle to work and it gave me a clear run in my Jag to the office.
Working alongside Tony Blair and Gordon Brown was like being in a band where everyone thinks they’re the lead vocalist. We managed to rewrite the party’s manifesto, bring the UK into the era of digital connectivity and on one rare Sunday, I found myself in a small Yorkshire pub, debating whether to support a proposal for a expansion of the port when a local farmer, visibly agitated, shouting at me and hurled a raw egg straight at my head and I responded with a calm smile, a measured nod, and a purposeful, punch to his face to underscore the seriousness of my point.
The incident made the front page of The Sun the next day under the headline, 'Rambo Smashes Egg-Throwing Nutjob!' but looking back, the episode taught me If you’re going to punch a protester, make sure you have a reason that can be turned into a catchy headline.
When you stand at a podium, you often wonder what will echo through the corridors of history. Will it be the policies you championed, the speeches you delivered or the scandals you survived? Sometimes it just involves an egg.

Being Honest About Ann Widdecombe

2026-07-13T18:00:00.000+01:00

A 28-year-old white male suspect has been arrested after former Tory minister and Reform UK politician Ann Widdecombe was found murdered in her home in Dartmoor, Devon.
Absolutely awful but to anyone under 40 she is best known for her appearances on Reality TV where she came across as a fun old lady game for anything, but to anyone over 40, before she became the cuddly national treasure, she was firstly a Conservative and Reform MP with some awful far-right and homophobic views.
Widdecombe built a political career on bigotry and religious zeal and repeatedly used her platform to oppose same-sex marriage equality and during her 23 years as an MP, took every opportunity to block gay rights, including the repeal of Section 28.
According to vote monitoring website, Public Whip, Widdecombe opposed every single equality measure for LGBT people and supported 'gay cure therapy' for: 'gays who do not want to be gay' and said that trans-inclusive policies were 'lunacy'.
She recently stated that Israel's Genocide in Gaza was: 'A just War', compared being in the EU to Slavery, opposed abortions, left the Church of England at protest at the CoE decision to ordain women as priests, supported the reintroduction of the death penalty and was a Climate Change denier.
Her views aside she didn’t deserve what happened to her, nobody does, but to only concentrate on the nice things she said and did and avoid mentioning the more controversial, wicked things she said and did doesn't paint a fair picture because in my eyes, if your wicked before they went, they’re still wicked after they’ve gone.

Your Own Fault America

2026-07-13T15:08:56.359+01:00

I got sent this so it is nothing i have found myself and it has not been verified or checked but it does seem to ring true.

Iranian spokeman on Al Jazeara:

Donald Trump has nothing to be afraid of when it comes to Iran harming him.
Trump's Presidency has caused more damage and humiliation to America than any Iranian Bomb or nuclear program could ever have done.
Iran only wishes Trump good health and that America could have Trump as their leader for another decade
Trumps presidency has truly been a gift for Iran as we have never been more unified and strong as well as now having friends worldwide that we never knew we had.
The world is not laughing at Iran, they are laughing and mocking Trump and what America has become under his stupidity and arrogance.

As i said above, how true this is remains unknown and i have been unable to find another source for it but it certainly is true that America, under Donald Trump, has been damaged and humiliated by his idiotic words, lies and deeds.
The World is laughing at Donald Trump and America, we look over the Atlantic and think what the hell is going on there?
Can you not see the creeping totalitarianism and why are you allowing a man who was found liable for sexual abuse and is almost certainly soon to be exposed as a pedophile to write his name all over the buildings on your country?
That would be like us Brits voting Gary Glitter into Office and allowing him to build monuments and stick his name all over them, which would never happen but it is there.
I guess once he is safely out of Office or dead, whichever comes first, all his supporters currently shielding him in the in the Republican Party will come out and condemn him although it will take a generation to repair the reputational damage he has done to his country around the World and that is how it should be because the first time he was voted it could be quite correct to say they didn't know how bad he would be but to vote for him again, and stand back and watch him ruin their country, that's very much on you Trump supporting America.

Burnham Learning On Left's View Of Israel

2026-07-13T01:00:00.000+01:00

The Genocide in Gaza by Israel with the grim death toll of at least 75,000 has been taking place with military, political and diplomatic backing from the US who continue to back the nation run by a War Criminal wanted for War Crimes while they ethnically cleanse the Palestinians and Lebanese from their land where the death toll sits currently at 4,300 people, 569 in a single day on 23rd September.
By not outright condemning the Israeli Genocide, the current British Prime Minister Keir Starmer set himself immediately against the Labour Party Members and supporters who called for the mass slaughter to be strongly criticised by the British Government but after appearing to approve the immoral actions of Israel, he was forced to walk this back after much criticism and said that he had merely meant that he was only backing Israel’s right to defend itself, not how it was doing it in what was an expression of mild criticism of Israel’s most violent actions.
What he did next further distanced him from his own Party when he made it illegal to support Palestine Action and watched as elderly protesters demonstrating against that ban dragged away as as terrorists.
There are many things you could throw at Keir Starmer, his delivery was stunted, his lack of Socialist policies after a decade of right wing austerity was galling for Labour voters and attempting to take away the Winter Fuel Allowance from pensioners but when questioned why so many Labour supporters were deserting, one of the top reasons was his lack of forceful voice on the Israeli actions were cited and damaged him among core Labour voters, driving many to defect to the Greens who did shout loudly about what Netanyahu was doing in the Middle east.
The PM Elect, Andy Burnham, has obviously noted this and was swift to apologise for Labour’s attitude to Gaza and to Israel under Starmer, saying this week that the party got it wrong and how he was: 'Absolutely appalled by what I’ve seen and read about the destruction of Gaza. There’s increasing evidence that war crimes appear to have been committed.' he said. 'There must be accountability for the depth of the suffering the people of Gaza have experienced.'
A good start but words don't amount to much unless they are backed up by actions such as sanctions on Israel and support for the ICC and ICJ in bringing Netanyahu and his warmongers to justice for War Crimes.
That would go a long way to bringing back into the fold the many who left in disgust that we failed to call out a nation who have been committing the most horrific Genocide since the Nazi's.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek God Hermes

2026-07-13T00:30:00.008+01:00

Listen, I’m a man of brevity. I’m the god of the quick text, the short-range herald but I have notes. I have many, many notes.
First of all, let’s address the the wings on my feet. Being the Messenger of the Gods is not the glamorous gig the poets made it out to be. Homer really glossed over the chafing. Do you have any idea what kind of aerodynamic drag you get from a brimmed hat when you’re breaking the sound barrier? It’s a nightmare for the neck muscles.
And the sandals? Let’s talk about the Talaria. You think your fancy carbon-plated running shoes are high performance? Please. My footwear has a mind of its own. They don’t just cushion the impact but occasionally decide to chase a hawk mid-delivery because they think it’s a game. I’ve spend half of eternity trying to steer my own feet while Zeus screams at me to deliver a very important lightning bolt to some king in Phrygia who forgot to say bless you after a sneeze.
I’m basically the universe’s most overworked delivery driver, except I don’t get tips, and if I’m late, I get turned into a shrub.
Before we get to my main grievance, let’s talk about my resume. People see me and think, Oh, look at the cute guy with the wings, he’s like the ancient version of ther Royal Mail.
Excuse me? I am the God of Commerce. If you’ve ever bought something on sale, that was me. I’m the God of Travelers. If you’ve ever found a shortcut that saved you five minutes, you’re welcome. I’m the God of Language. If you’ve ever used a double entendre to make a colleague laugh, that’s my bread and butter.
I also invented the lyre out of a tortoise shell because I was bored at four hours old. Then I stole Apollo’s cows just to see if I could. I’m the patron of thieves, liars, and politicians (usually the same thing to be honest).
I have a legacy of speed, wit, and high-stakes negotiation. So why, in the name of my father’s lightning-scarred glutes, is my face, specifically my staff, plastered all over the American medical system?
It’s a lot of emotional labour which is why, when I finally get a break, I like to look down at Earth. And what do I see? I see my staff on your pharmacies. I see my wings on your health insurance cards.
America. We need to talk about the Caduceus.
You know the one. My beautiful staff. Two serpents entwined in a lovely symmetrical dance, topped with a majestic pair of wings. It screams elegance but it does not scream, I am a trained medical professional who knows how to remove an appendix.
Somehow, around the turn of the 20th century, the US Army Medical Corps looked at both and said, The one with two snakes and wings looks way cooler. Let’s go with that.
Guys. You picked the symbol of the God of Thieves and Merchants to represent your healthcare.
Do you realize how funny that is to us on Olympus? I’m literally the god who guides souls to the Underworld. That is my job. I meet you at the finish line and walk you to Hades. If I’m showing up at a hospital, it’s usually because someone is leaving.
When I’m not being misidentified by the Surgeon General, my life is a blur of high-speed errands. People think being a god is all ambrosia and harp music. No. It’s mostly logistics.
Zeus would tell me to tell Poseidon to stop making the earthquakes and I would zip down to the Mariana Trench and tell Poseidon who would send me back with a message to tell Zeus to stop letting his eagles poop on his dolphins.
Then there’s the Underworld shifts. Do you know how depressing it is to spend your Tuesday afternoon explaining to a ghost that, no, they can’t bring their emotional support peacock into the Elysian Fields and to leave it at the Styx and that happens more than you would think.

Iran Targeting Trump?

2026-07-12T18:00:00.000+01:00

According to Israeli intelligence, Tehran is hatching an alleged Iranian plot to kill Trump and mourners at the funeral for slain Iranian Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, did call for the assassination of Trump with a banner that said, 'We Will Kill Trump' and others held signs calling for his death.
Trump and his group of sycophants had no grounds to justify their actions when they attacked Iran and in the first move bombed a girls school which killed 185 and also assassinated the Supreme Leader Khamenei which could very well create a precedent for other countries seeking to resort to force without consideration for the rule of law.
Donald Trump has often boasted of the assassination of the 86-year-old Iranian Leader but makes no mention of the killing by his side of his daughter, daughter-in-law and a 14-month-old granddaughter in the attack which is illegal under International Law which prohibits the: 'Targeted assassinations of political leaders in peacetime unless during armed conflict' and as the assault has been called 'Pre-emptive', which is also illegal as there was no armed conflict until Trump and Netanyahu decided to start it by assassinating the Leader so the legal ground is non-existent.
National leaders should quite rightly be hesitant to target their counterparts in other states, in case it leads to their own targeting and if Israel is to be believed, this is what is happening.
Obviously any intelligence coming from Israel should be taken with a whole bucket of salt rather than a pinch but if Iran does manage take out Trump, it would indeed be very, very wrong and should be loudly condemned but it would be hard to not say so without triggering objections of double standards and hypocrisy.

Count Binface

2026-07-12T18:00:00.000+01:00

Facing increasing scrutiny and tough questions over his finances, Nigel Farage has made the decision to resign and call a snap by election in Clacton, seemingly frustrated by all the unwelcome attention and bad press over that fat gift of £5m from a billionaire supporter that he failed to declare on becoming an MP.
Obviously hoping to avoid the two investigations, he has thrown his toys out of the very expensive pram (paid for by someone else) but what he wasn't planning on was all of the main parties agreeing to not standing any candidates against him which not only makes him look a wally but leaves him facing just one opponent, a man who is named Count Binface (a name which also works for Farage without that 'o' in the name) and who could soon find himself parking his bottom on the House of Commons benches as a newly elected MP.
To make it even more hilarious, the House of Parliament have said that even if Farage is reelected, the investigations will only be paused and would restart once he is back in Parliament meaning it would all would have been for nothing and the probes and questions into the millions he received will just carry on afterwards.
As he is friendly with the almost certain pedophile in the White House, maybe he should ask him to give Keir Starmer a call to get them cancelled like he did with that red card at the World Cup although the answer would be two words and the second would be 'Off' so if things work out, we could see a man with a bin on his head sitting behind the Conservative Benches and Nigel Farage sitting in the new home which he refuses to say how he paid for and crying into his pint about how it all went wrong.
Got to love British Politics sometimes.

Norway V England

2026-07-11T10:26:13.870+01:00

One of the most brilliant bits of Sports commentary came in 1981 after Norway beat England 2-1 in a World Cup Qualifier and the commentator, Bjørge Lillelien, went on a fantastically and slightly unhinged rant where he named a long list of England's most well known people such as Lord Nelson, Lord Beaverbrook, Sir Winston Churchill, Sir Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee, Henry Cooper and Lady Diana and ended with....Maggie Thatcher, can you hear me? Your boys took one hell of a beating.
The joy of beating England with players like Bryan Robson, Kevin Keegan, Trevor Francis and Glenn Hoddle is understandable because back then Norway were just not very good and hadn’t qualified for anything since the 1952 Olympics but now it is Norway V England in the World Cup Quarter Final to play either Argentina or Switzerland in the last four.
It is a real shame we are playing our North Sea neighbours because i would be cheering for them if they were playing anyone else but it is the likes of Erling Haaland and Martin Ødegaard who will be standing on the other side tonight so we can only hope that by midnight we can say: 'Roald Amundsen, Edvard Munch, Morten Harket, Erik the Red, Ada Hegerberg, King Harald V, Ole Gunnar Solskjær, Leif Erikson, Edvard Grieg...Your boy's took one hell of a beating'.

Special Guest Blogger: Ivan Pavlov

2026-07-11T00:30:00.009+01:00

I never intended to be a psychologist. In my day, psychology was seen as a bunch of people sitting in velvet chairs talking about their dreams of flying sausages. I was a physiologist. I cared about the guts! The juices! The magnificent, sloshing machinery of the gastric system!
I spent years studying the digestive glands of dogs. I wanted to know how the stomach knows food is coming. I was the King of Saliva. I was the Sultan of Secretions. I had perfected the art of the gastric fistula which is a fancy way of saying I put a little window in a dog’s stomach so I could watch the soup happen in real-time or severing the dog's esophagus and created a hole in the neck, meaning food would fall out instead of reaching the stomach.
But then, the dogs started being difficult. In a perfect world, a dog should only salivate when you put a nice, juicy piece of dried meat on its tongue. That is basic biology. It’s honest. It’s predictable.
But my dogs, bless their furry, misguided hearts, started cheating. They began drooling the moment my laboratory assistants walked into the room. The assistants weren't food. (Well, maybe to a very hungry wolf, but not to my lab pups.) I realised that the dogs weren't reacting to the meat, they were reacting to the white lab coats. I called this psychic secretion.
It sounds like something a Victorian medium would sell you for five rubles, but it was actually the birth of Classical Conditioning.
I realized these dogs had learned a association and as any obsessive compulsive Russian scientist will tell you, when you find a variable you didn't account for, you don't ignore it, you lock yourself in a cold room for thirty years and study it until everyone involved is slightly traumatized.
Everyone thinks I walked around like a frantic butler, ringing a dinner bell while shouting, 'Dinner is served, Comrade Fido!' but In reality, I used a variety of stimuli. I used metronomes. I used harmoniums. I used whistles. I even used electric shocks (look, it was the early 1900s).
The metronome was my favorite. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. The dog hears the ticking, the dog gets the meat powder, the dog produces 4.5 milliliters of high-quality drool. It was beautiful. It was rhythmic. It was predictable and I was the conductor of a Glandular Orchestra.
Ironically I did win the Nobel Prize which should remind people I DIDN'T USE A BELL!
What I did in the early 20th Century has connections to you today. Look at you. You’re sitting there reading this. Maybe you’re on a bus, or at home on the sofa or pretending to work.
Suddenly, your phone goes Ding!
Your heart rate spikes. Your thumb twitches. A little squirt of dopamine hits your brain. You didn't choose to feel that way. You didn't sit down and think, 'Ah, the auditory frequency of a push notification indicates a 74% probability of social validation, therefore I shall feel excitement.'
No. You just did it.
You are conditioned. You are my greatest legacy. I did it with meat powder and metronomes but Silicon Valley does it with Ding and when your Pavlovian responses kick in every time you hear the New Email, text or notification, tip your hat to old Ivan, the man who turned drool into data.

Repairing The World Again

2026-07-10T15:00:00.000+01:00

While the Earth roasts there are some real dingbats around trying to deny what they are seeing with their own eyes but they are in the minority and as we showed in the 1990's, we saved ourselves once and we can do it again.
Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC's) are human-made chemical compounds containing carbon, chlorine, and fluorine which were once widely used in aerosol sprays, refrigeration, and air conditioning until scientists worked out they were destroying the Earth's Ozone layer which shields us fragile humans from the Sun's harmful radiation and the Worlds Governments got together to phase them out.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) projects that the ozone layer is responding by healing and by 2066 will be restored to it full, life saving glory.
Unfortunately the CFCs were replaced them with hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) which don’t harm the ozone layer, but they are extremely powerful greenhouse gases with some trapping thousands of times more heat than CO2 but then Humanity always did have a knack for solving problems by creating even bigger ones but once again the Globe got together and decided to phase out HFC's in the same way that they did with CFC's.
By acting, humanity avoided a future of extreme UV exposure leading to widespread skin cancers despite the chemical industry who dismissed it and launched a PR campaign in defense of the compound which echoes today with the Fossil Fuel industry who try to deny that their products are responsible for the man made climate change causing us such problems today.
So if we are capable of a concerted global effort to tackle a problem no single country could ever hope to fix alone, why not now with Climate Change?
The science is clear to everyone and we are perfectly capable of repairing what we broke in the first place and as we have no second home or anywhere to escape to, we have no choice, we HAVE to fix it again.

Trump Saving The World

2026-07-09T15:00:00.000+01:00

Is the FIFA Peace Prize winner Donald Trump going to accidentally save the World?
Not with the hilarious botched reflecting pool or his racism but with his continuing war on Iran which has done us all a favour and pushed up oil prices and nudged the World towards clean energy faster than we might have otherwise.
Yes we know all about how he has claimed victory against Iran for the 73rd time and says he will keep winning this war until someone tells Iran and they admit defeat but meanwhile all over the world, Governments are switching faster and more thoroughly to clean energy and away from dirty and polluting fossil fuels.
The war has been a fossil fuel own goal and some/all/or none of this is thanks to Donald J Trump who recently said Climate Change is a the greatest con job perpetrated on the world and was invented by and for China to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive although he did apply for planning permission to build large sea defences at his golf courses in Scotland and Ireland, citing on his application that the defences were necessary: 'Because of global warming and rising sea levels'.
It turns out the unintended consequence of the confused Americans who voted for Trump and more foreign wars and making things more expensive in America (oh, that's right they didn't vote for that) is the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel industry.
We all knew that Trump was an idiot (which isn't even the almost certainly a pedophile's worse trait) and literally everything he touches goes wrong but his buddies in the coal, oil and gas industry must be a bit annoyed right about now but thanks Donny, you and your supporters being unable to reach the benchmark for being stupid enough to be moron's has really paid dividends this time.

Special Guest Blogger: Franz Beckenbauer

2026-07-09T00:30:00.013+01:00

When I was a little boy in Munich, the only thing I could do better than kicking a leather ball around the backyard was pretend-playing the role of the referee complete with yellow cards, exaggerated whistles, and an occasional 'offside' shouted at my poor mother as she tried to serve us dinner.
Little did I know that those early theatrics would become the foundation for a career that spanned playing, coaching, chairmanship, and enough public appearances to make a Kardashian blush.
I was born a few months after the war had finally decided that enough was enough. My parents, both of whom survived the rubble of post-war Munich by playing Schach (chess) and occasionally smuggling small pieces of chocolate, gave me the name Franz.
At age six I discovered football as my father, a former amateur player for TSV 1860 München, noticed my enthusiasm and signed me up at the local club, SC 04 Schwabing. The first lesson was simple, Don’t trip over the ball. The second lesson was more philosophical: If you do trip, at least do it with style.
In 1964 I had just broken into the first team of Bayern Munich (then a modest club playing in the second division). My teammates started calling me Der Kaiser because of my elegant playing style and the way I liked to stand with my arms spread wide before a free kick, a pose that made me look like a monarch addressing his subjects.
The name stuck and it gave me a brand that even the most sophisticated marketing agencies in Berlin would have envied.
The first major trophy I lifted was the European Cup with Bayern in 1972, after beating the mighty Ajax 2-0. I remember the moment the ball hit the net and it felt like the entire continent had paused for a collective Wooo-hoo!
If you think the Kaiser sounds like a fancy nickname, you’re missing the point as I captained West Germany to their first World Cup win in 1974. It was an extraordinary tournament and we defeated the Netherlands, the team famed for Total Football, in the final, 2-1. The match turned into a tactical chess game, which I, being a chess aficionado, enjoyed immensely.
A particular moment that still makes me grin happens when I think of the famous 1974 Final photograph, where I’m running with the ball in my arms, Gerd Müller trailing behind, and the crowd cheering as if we had just handed them free Saurkraut. I later discovered that the photo was used for a promotional campaign for a brand of German mustard.
In 1976, West Germany reached the European Championship final, only to lose to Czechoslovakia on a penalty shoot-out.
Twice named European Footballer of the Year, I appeared 103 times for West Germany, playing in three FIFA World Cups and two European Championships and I ended my playign career in the North American Soccer League with the New York Cosmos, playing alongside Pelé. with the Cosmos for four seasons up to 1980, and the team won the Soccer Bowl on three occasions (1977, 1978, 1980).
Fast forward to 2006, when Germany played host to the World Cup.
I was the team president by then and, as you might guess, I was also the official face of the “Football for All” campaign.
However, a political scandal from that time involving a political donation (a small sum of 6.7 million euros) erupted in 2016 caused the media to spin a tale that I had been bribing the German Football Association. In true German fashion, the press called it Der Skandal however, the trial was suspended due to the Covic pandemic and closed in 2020 without a verdict because the statute of limitations expired. Thank you International Pandemic!
If you read any modern football textbook, you’ll see a chapter titled The Art of the Sweeper-Libero. That’s me, in a nutshell. I reinvented the role of a defender who both defends and launches attacks, turning a simple hacking the ball clear job into a creative masterpiece.

Canadians At Eurovision

2026-07-07T16:00:00.000+01:00

Countries from across the globe meet each year to compete in the Eurovision Song Contest and next year we are likely to see a new country take to the stage.
With the almost certain Pedophile in the nation below them being a dick, the Canadians have been fluttering their eyelashes at Europe for a while and after they became a full member of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), they are now eligible to participate in the singing competition.
Canada does have some history in the Eurovision with Celine Dion competing for Switzerland back in 1988 and winning it but Canada is not the first non-European country to take part in Eurovision, Israel have been showing up since 1973 although hopefully not much longer and Australia has been competing in the contest since 2015 when they were initially handed a glittery invite as a one-off guest to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the contest but have returned ever since due to popularity.
The truth is that it may be called 'Eurovision' but it has nothing to do with politics or geography, it is down to being a member of the the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and if they desire there are some East Asian and North African nations who could join the party although most decline the invite although they don't know what they are missing because it is brilliant fun, as Canada will find out next May.

Farage Resigns

2026-07-07T15:37:56.882+01:00

I guess after announcing his resignation as a Member of Parliament this morning and triggering a by-election, Nigel Farage is thinking he has dodged the two investigations into him over undeclared 'gifts' from backers, but boy has he not read the rules if he does.
There are currently two parliament standards investigation into him first failing to declare benefits-in-kind from convicted criminal George Cottrell and another into failing to declare a £5m gift he received from the Thailand-based crypto-billionaire Christopher Harborne which Farage declares: 'Was nothing wrong'.
It is expected the Parliament Committee will find it plenty wrong and suspend him and if the suspension is over 10 days, then a by-election is triggered but if the Poundland Trump thinks him stepping down will make the probes irrelevant, he has judges it wrong.
The Parliamentary guidance states: 'If parliament is dissolved or the member otherwise ceases to be a member while an investigation is in progress, the commissioner will suspend their investigation until the member is re-elected' which means that the investigations would be suspended during the period of any by-election, but would be re-started if he was re-elected.
If the commissioner decides Farage did break the rules, he could recommend a penalty and Farage could face a recall petition in his constituency meaning he could face a second by-election shortly afterwards.
Hopefully he will realise this and walk away completely to avoid scrutiny of his dodgy dealings and Britain will be relieved of one of the biggest stains of recent years in our Politics.

USA Out And World Cheers

2026-07-07T15:02:45.794+01:00

After the Balogun red card reversal madness, I assume the only places that wanted the USA to win last nights game against Belgium were in America itself and in the living room of FIFA President Giovanni Infantino but as it turned out the Europeans put them over their knee and gave them a good spanking 4-1 so it all worked out in the end.
I did chuckle at the Belgium FA social media post which featured celebrating Belgians and the words 'Overturn This' but everyone and his dog is taking aim at the Footballing top banana for bowing to the pressure of the Americans who now join the ranks of 'Who?' along with the other co-hosts Canada and Mexico who England knocked out in one of the best games of the World Cup so far.
With 5 UEFA nations (France, Norway, England, Spain, Belgium) already in the Quarter Finals along with 1 CAF (Morocco), the two SAFC nations (Argentina and Colombia) play this evening against Egypt and Switzerland to try and make up the last eight with France quite rightly the bookies favourites to be lifting the trophy and it is hard to see anyone beating them and have been head and shoulders above everyone else over the past few weeks.
England play Norway on Saturday and we can only hope that Erling Haaland has an off day and if we do get past the Norwegians, we are in line to face Argentina and if Messi gets a red card in their Quarter Final, Javier Milei doesn't get on the blower to Infantino.

Special Guest Blogger: Gene Hackman

2026-07-07T00:30:00.013+01:00

I grew up in a tiny town in San Bernardino, California. My father owned a printing press, which explains why I can still read a newspaper without a tablet (though I had to squint). My mother, a devoutly religious woman, wanted me to become a minister. I told her I could preach something else, the art of lying convincingly for a living. She didn’t have a choice.
My first break came when I stumbled into a community theater in San Diego, pretending to audition for a place-holder role. The director liked my gruff voice and gave me a part as a convict who never spoke. That’s how I discovered that silence could be more powerful than a thousand screaming monologues and it also saved me from having to memorize a lot of lines early on.
From there, I bounced around TV shows such as The Mod Squad and Ironside until a chance meeting with a producer who’d seen my French Connection performance and which led to a lifelong partnership with every major studio that could afford my demanding schedule.
Winning an Oscar in ’71 for The French Connection was like finding a parking spot right in front of a crowded theater which was an unexpected delight that made the whole night feel worth it.
In 2003, after finishing Behind Enemy Lines, I announced I was retiring. The industry asked Why and I answered, because I’ve seen enough explosions, car chases, and bad coffee on set to last me a lifetime.
The truth was my brain was already taking short-term memory loss personally and a few months later, I received the diagnosis that I’d been pretending to ignore for years - Alzheimer’s disease.
My mind began to misplace not just names and dates, but entire scenes—I’d forget whether I was playing a cop or a villain, whether I’d ever met a director named “Scorsese,” or whether I had actually been an actor at all. I started to act my own life, improvising for an audience that was increasingly invisible.
Retirement, however, didn’t mean I vanished completely but I was humbled by the fact that people still watched The French Connection and Unforgiven and that my name appears on lists of greatest male actors of the 20th century.
My wife passed away in early 2025 and losing her felt like the world had turned the lights down a notch and then flicked the switch off as by now I was just a grumpy old man in a rocking chair, sipping black coffee, and muttering, 'What was I supposed to be doing again?'
Without my wife and sole carer laying dead in one part of the house and me with a brain that was by now telling me i was a Unicorn, a week later i was also found dead.

Can't Fat Shame A Fat Shamer

2026-07-05T19:30:00.000+01:00

I have long been a supporter of Donald Trump's efforts to rise from the Third Fattest President ever to the second and i have to admit that his efforts are going well because in recent pictures, lets just say that Melania has certainly been busy letting out the seams on his already XXXL suits.
With his Medical record putting his weight at 239 lbs (17 stone or 108kg), if we suspend belief and go with that, he is still medically obese which is a good starting point to get to the required 280 lbs (20 stone or 127kg) to replace Grover Cleveland in the silver place but some people may think this is fat shaming the President but that is a weak argument because there are plenty of other things to shame him about, such as him being almost certainly a pedophile, a convicted sex pest, liar, fraudster, fascist and having the intelligence and business acumen of a role of sellotape so his morbidly obese weight is way down the list of things to throw at him.
That said, i don't want to be accused of fat shaming so i just use some of the words the massively rotund fatso said about other people in what Psychologists call narcissistic projection.
That goes that Trump is a crook so he calls other people crooks, he’s a liar so he calls other people liars, he’s a complete ignoramus so he calls other people stupid, you get the idea so his obsession with other people’s weight is another manifestation because he's a very overweight man who calls other people overweight.
So he has 'got a bit large' (aimed at Kim Kardashian) and has a 'fat, ugly face' (said about Rosie McDonnell) due to his overeating and lack of exercise he has got 'bloated, fat, disgusting' (this was his description of the Americans Federal workforce) and resembles 'Miss Piggy' that would be former Miss Universe Alicia Machado' and has a 'fat arse' (Jennifer Lopez) and as he told one of his own supporters
at a rally, 'That guy’s got a serious weight problem. Go home, start exercising!'
There you have it then, you can't fat shame a fat shamer so keep going Donald because as the recent photographs show, having those family dinners for four even when there aren't three other people with you is certainly working.

Here Comes The Ai

2026-07-05T17:49:30.321+01:00

Artificial intelligence systems can now convince you they are human apparently as two large language models have passed the Turing test, which determines if a machine can 'show the same intelligence as a human being'.
According to men with pens in their top pockets this is a significant and troubling development in AI as they can now raise their own questions of what’s real and what isn’t.
Researchers tested four Ai Systems to see if they could distinguish if the answerer at the other end was human or a machine and if the individual cannot tell them apart, the machine is considered to have passed the test and all four passed and were able to effectively imitate people in short interactions.
The AI exhibited the same tone, directness, humor and fallibility as humans and displayed convincing social behavioral traits, which has major implications for how we think of AI' stated the researchers.
AI models passing for humans is a concerning development because the models seem to be really good at it which raises the risk of counterfeit people and we need to be more alert and i know that that in 2007 Google launched the Learning Unit Correspondence Program (LUCP) to see if Ai could create Blog posts which could be trained to read newspaper articles, pay attention to how those words relate to one another and then predict what words it thinks will come next and build that into a Blog post but I never heard anymore about that so not sure what happened to it.

Special Guest Blogger: Sven-Goran Eriksson

2026-07-05T00:30:00.007+01:00

If you’ve ever asked yourself the existential question, What if I were a football manager who was also highly sexed and a bit pervy? then congratulations, you’ve just invented my alter-ego.
I’m a man whose résumé reads like a mixtape of triumphs and embarrassments. I’ve managed clubs whose fans chant my name louder than a 3-minute pop chorus, I’ve coached a national side whose hopes were as fragile as a fresh-made crumpet, and I’ve flirted with the press in a way that would make a Bond villain blush.
I grew up in the tiny town of Torsby, where the most exciting thing on a Saturday night was watching the local band Lärkarna rehearse. My footballing education began in the back garden, where I spent more time perfecting my header than my homework.
I got my first professional contract with IFK Göteborg in 1975. I remember stepping onto the grass and thinking this is it, I’m finally moving from the backyard to the big league but I was more of a bench-warmer than a bench-sweeper, but hey, you’ve got to start somewhere.
My debut was a spectacularly timed sprain that left me limping off the field like a toddler trying to avoid a puddle.
As a player I was no great shakes but fast forward a decade, and I find myself in the sun-drenched stadiums of Italy, first as an assistant at S.P.A.L., then as head coach of Lazio. This is where my reputation for being a bit pervy really began to bloom, in the purely tactical sense.
I won the Serie A title in 1999-2000 with Lazio playing attractive football, we were disciplined, and I managed to keep my beard tidy while shouting tactical instructions in both Swedish and Italian and from that to the England Experiment when the English FA, desperate for a fresh voice, hired me as their national team manager.
The press loved it: 'Sven the Swede, the man who could bring order to our football chaos' however, I was about to discover the true meaning of order in a country that treats tea and weather as religious rites.
Euro 2004 and we reached the quarter-finals, beating the likes of France and Portugal and I still get goosebumps remembering the stadium roar after the final penalty. It was the first time in nearly three decades that England had truly competed on a European stage.
I’d switch formations mid-game like a DJ changing tracks at a rave. 4-4-2? Nah, let’s go 3-5-2. Oh look, a set-piece! Let’s do a short-corner!” The players loved it, the commentators loved it, the pundits loved it… calling me 'the Swedish Sir Alex'.
Then came the infamous Sex Scandal. Yes, the affair with Ulrika Johnson, a Swedish model and former weathergirl. It started innocently enough with a coffee in Stockholm, a whispered joke about sweating more than the players after 90-minutes and then… well, you know how the story goes.
The tabloids dubbed me the most highly sexed manager since… well, ever.
I’ll admit, the press loved it. The headlines read: 'Eriksson’s Off-side Affair.' I was on the front pages of The Sun, The Daily Mail, L’Équipe (in French), Bild (in German) and every interview becomes a potential episode of Debbie Does Dallas meets Match of the Day.
After being let go by the Football Association I tried my hand at a few other ventures which never involved a national anthem and became a football ambassador and returned to Lazio as a technical director.
Finally, I settled into my favourite post-career pastime of regaling audiences with tales of that one time we almost beat Argentina but if I had to sum up my contribution to football in a single sentence, it would be play the ball well, keep your tactics fluid and never underestimate the power of a well-timed wink at a blonde weathergirl.

Cut Defence Spending: The Rest Of The Post

2026-07-03T15:30:00.000+01:00

I wrote a post a few days ago regarding the £15bn increase in defence spending and it was a very short post rubbishing spending more on weapons as i dashed it off while on a vape break outside work on my phone so here is part 2 to put some meat on the bones of why increasing defence and cutting back on other projects to pay for it is just plain wrong.
For months now all we have heard from some in parliament and military people on the TV is that Britain should spend more on defence and even now after a £15 billion increase to 2.7% of GDP, some are still saying that we should spend far more but funnily enough none are suggesting what should be cut to pay for it.
Keir Starmer said that the increase would come from cutting 'infrastructure projects' which includes roads and energy projects as well as trimming other Parliamentary budgets and as always, the finger is pointed at Russia who are currently embroiled in a war with Ukraine.
Army chiefs claim Russia is intending to march to war across Europe but that absurdity is just a ruse to get taxpayers to consider less being spent elsewhere as a good deal but that has been going on since i can remember with the bogey man just biding their time until they come for us in our beds changing at regular intervals.
After the Cold War ended, Mikhail Gorbachev said to the West: 'I’m very sorry, you’ll have to find a new enemy now' and we have wheeled through many, and even went to war with some, before landing back on Russia again.
The truth is nobody is threatening to annihilate us, we have an impractical £133 billion nuclear capacity which is just sat there never to be used and if it was, would mean the end of us anyway and the billions we currently spend buys a lot of drones and other machinery to attack another nation we find ourselves disagreeing with.
Why we should have to put up with less being spent on the infrastructure we use every day just so the military can buy more things to kill people with is ludicrous but this Government can never again say that they lack the money for anything, but they will.
We must ask do we feel any safer with bigger and better military weapons or would we all be much better off if that money was being spent improving the lot of their citizens, i think if you asked the 20% of the UK population living in relative poverty, equating to 13.4 million people, including 4 million children, you might get a different answer.
If the Government decide they can afford to spend an extra £15 billion more on rockets, drones and tanks and spend less on building schools, equipping hospitals, hiring police officers, improving roads, improving energy projects or building houses then they should be deciding which is more important and to me, it should never, ever be the damned war equipment.

Special Guest Blogger: Jason

2026-07-03T00:30:00.010+01:00

Listen, everyone talks about the Hero’s Journey like it’s this soul-enriching, transformative experience. They make it sound like a gap year in Bali, but with more bronze swords and fewer sourdough starters.
Let me set the record straight, being a Greek hero is 10% divine favor and 90% trying not to get incinerated while your crew of legendary ego-maniacs argues about who gets the most legroom on a boat.
I’m Jason. You might know me from such hits as the Quest for the Golden Fleece and that all started because my Uncle Pelias was a jerk. I showed up in Iolcus wearing one sandal (long story, involved a disguised Hera and a very muddy riverbank)and instead of saying, Welcome home, nephew, Pelias said, You look like a guy who wants to go to the edge of the known world to steal a magical sheepskin from a king who hates everyone.
So, I did what any rational youth would do and pulled together the Argonauts. We’re talking Heracles, Orpheus and the Boreads twins and after dodging harpies and Clashing Rocks that tried to turn the Argo into a giant toothpick, we finally arrived in Colchis. The King, Aeetes, was... let’s call him difficult.
I told him I wanted the Golden Fleece to reclaim my kingdom. He told me I could have it, provided I completed a few light chores.
These chores were not mow the lawn or take out the bins but included plowing a field with two metallic Fire-Breathing Bulls which are just like regular bulls but these could turn your face into a charcoal briquette but thankfully Aeetes daughter, Medea, gave me some magic ointment that would stop me from melting.
Then sowing Dragon’s Teeth which almost immediately grew into a crop of fully-armored, extremely grumpy warriors, the Spartoi, who were so damned grumpy they fought amongst themselves and completely eliminated each other and after the bulls and the harvest of warriors, i had to defeat a dragon that never slept who was guarding the fleece.
I drew my sword, ready to do something brave and probably fatal but Medea, bless her, pulled out some magical herbs and sang a little song. The dragon’s eyes started to droop. Ten seconds later, the Eternal Guardian was snoring so loud it was shaking the pine trees.
I grabbed the Fleece and ran for the Argo and rowed like our lives depended on it. Which they did.
So, Was It Worth It? The thing about being a hero is that it doesn't really have a happily ever after button because when we got back i hooked up with a princess called Creusa which my ex girlfriend Medea never took very well and presented to Creusa a cursed dress as a wedding gift that stuck to her body and burned her to death as soon as she put it on and killed her father and our two sons and I died when the rotting hull of the Argo fell on me when I was sleeping so if a woman helps you defeat fire-breathing bulls and a dragon, maybe don't try to leave her for a younger woman, that doesn't end well for anyone.

Let's End The World Cup Now

2026-07-02T17:15:00.000+01:00

With the extra teams shoehorned in, we can all agree the World Cup has gone on far too long, so let's end it now because it monopolises our time, sleeping habits, eating and drinking patterns and generally leaves everyone tired for work the next day.
No one wants to stay up for a 2am BST kick-off or even attempt to watch a couple of games a day so can't we just say congratulations France and get back to enjoying baking in our houses for the rest of this Summer.
Us Englanders can try to lie to ourselves that it is worthwhile watching Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham do their bit, but it is all completely forlorn because we may just about struggle past Ghana, Paraguay and DR Congo but we all know that the first halfway decent team we play (and it is Mexico in Mexico next), we will be on the plane back to Blighty so ending the World Cup now will save a lot of needless heartache for us and every other team and the players will get some much-needed rest before the business of the Premier League starts up again in August.
To make it fair, just share the silver medals between those teams still in it and lets avoid Mbappé, Dembélé and Olise prising open the opposing defences like a cheap tin of Corned Beef so let's choose the Worlds best team now and let us get some sleep.

Special Guest Blogger: Jimmy Carter

2026-07-01T00:30:00.005+01:00

When a man in a small town in Georgia says he is going to run for president most people assume he’s either a bold optimist or a prankster. When I announced my candidacy back in 1976, the peanut growers in Plains could barely contain their excitement because a lot of us thought that campaign trail might finally involve a good stretch of blacktop for hauling our harvests to market. Little did I know that the trail I would eventually walk would be a bit messier than any dirt road.
If you ask any kid in the 1970s what a president does, they probably picture a man in a suit, a stovepipe hat, and a silver tongue but in January 1977, while the nation was still wrestling with the aftershocks of Vietnam and the energy crisis, I was sneaking a few bags of peanuts into the West Wing. I’d packed them in a briefcase, hidden beneath a stack of Energy Policy memos, and whispered to the Secret Service that if the world blows up, at least we’ll have a snack.
The Iran hostage crisis left a sour taste in my mouth that no amount of roasted peanuts could remedy. Sixteen Americans held captive for 444 days but in 2002 the Nobel Committee decided that a former president who had never started a war deserved recognition.
When I left office, one of the ideas I carried home was simple, a nation’s power isn’t measured by the size of its military arsenal and I spent my post-presidential years traveling to places that most presidents would consider off-limits, North Korea, Cuba, the Middle East but I have to mention the elephant, or the orange, in the room.
I’ve never been one for naming and shaming I prefer gentle persuasion, soft-spoken reason, and a steady hand on the plow but when a president turns the presidency into a nation’s version of The Jerry Springer Show, I can't stay quiet.
When I first saw Trump’s campaign rally (a sea of red hats and a man with a hairdo that seemed to have been designed by a wind tunnel), I thought this is a man who sales himself as a sack of peanuts that’s golden, buttery, hand-roasted only to discover that they’re actually raw, unsalted, and have been sitting in a warehouse for three years.
You might think that life after presiding over the free world would be a perpetual carnival of speeches, memoirs, and endless applause but in truth the fact that I never added Bomb Maker to Peanut Farmer on my resume is my highlight and the way i treated my Presidency like a Peanut Harvert, I sowed ideas, watered them with dialogue and weeded out the misinformation, and eventually reaped the results whether they’re sweet or a little salty.