14/06/2008 by AJ.

Bless the Irish!

Yes, they’ve put a huge spanner in the works of the rolling juggernaut of injustice that is called the EUROPEAN UNION.

We have trodden a long way down a very steep hill since the early-1970s, when Ted Heath used all the power he could muster to get us to join something we were told was a “Common Market”. Make no mistake, that terminology describes EXACTLY what the British people signed up to at that time. A trading arena where all countries would find selling to others within the market a lot easier than it had been. Theoretically good for business - provided yours was one of the countries that could deliver better products cheaper and faster than any of the other member states.

With the benefit of hindsight, knowing the sort of industrial unrest that was coming our way later in the 1970s, and the problems that this would create for fulfilling orders and keeping customers, well, those in the UK who voted YES must have been mad to think that all this was a “pretty neat idea”.

Step ahead 35 years, and somewhere along the line, we’ve been hijacked. I say “we” meaning the British electorate, because as sure as hell all three major political parties WANT us to stay in Europe, although none of them can outline WHY it is that they go against the obvious will of the majority, in that we don’t like the way things are going.

Growing up on the fantasy worlds of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, in many ways I’d been programmed to the idea of a WORLD GOVERNMENT. This was implicit in the likes of Fireball XL5, Stingray and Thunderbirds, and more explicit in CAPTAIN SCARLET. In the 1960s, this seemed like a way that we could avoid all future wars - if we’re all on the same side, who’s left to fight? Well, alien invaders was the answer, as well as Nation States obviously not aligned with this New World Order. However, the answer to who the armies would have left to fight, in reality, is actually more ominous that any number of Mysteron hordes.

A world army will fight those who oppose the one-world government. Within the ranks of its own people. Think that’s crazy? Well, consider a recent change in terminology: why have TRAFFIC WARDENS been renamed CIVIL ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS?

Don’t believe it? Then I suggest you check out this article: http://www.westminster.gov.uk/transportandstreets/parking/ceos.cfm

And if you think that’s all the powers they are going to have - as listed on that link - why is it that they have been issued with the ‘wording cards’ that the Police carry to read from when they make arrests? That’s a large expense if they are never going to get used!

The European Union is planned to be one state, run by one Parliament from Brussels. Similar things are happening with the AFRICAN UNION, and then we have the move to join Canada, Mexico and the USA together into the NORTH AMERICAN UNION. Once all these various unions are set up, it’s literally a small hop to a WORLD UNION. In the UK we are already in the position that any laws our Parliaments make can be over-turned in Brussels.

Organisations like the United Nations and the World Health Organisation are playing their part in “harmonising” (i.e., making the same) all laws, rules and regulations at a global level, too. For instance, we’re currently paying an annual fine for not allowing meat that’s laced with growth hormone from being imported from the USA. Sure, you can do your own thing, but it will cost you. And keep costing you until you give in and do as you’re told.

And don’t get me started on a little puzzle called CODEX ALIMENTARIUS that will effectively make all nutrients (which, being natural, can never be patented) illegal from the beginning of 2010 onwards - except in the most ineffective of dosages. You can find out more at http://www.alliance-natural-health.org/

All this feeds in to where I came in - Ireland voting NO to the Lisbon “Treaty” (or, as it really is, the aborted European Constitution with a few changes - and guess what, as it’s NOT called the Constitution any more, Labour don’t have to keep their election promise of having a referendum on it as, well, it’s not the same thing … ah-hem!).

Luckily for the UK, and the rest of Europe that has been refused the right to a referendum to agree to all this, there’s a clause in Ireland’s own laws which INSIST that they have to vote on whether to accept this “Treaty” or not.

Over in Ireland, there are various attempts to explain away the fact that the Irish people have had the good sense to vote “No”. They are being seen as UNGRATEFUL for not thanking Europe for the massive aid it has received over recent years - aid which has turned its economy around, allowing the people to thrive. The Irish people have been told, effectively, that they don’t know what they are doing!

Well, let’s put things in order, for those who don’t know what this thing is. The Lisbon Treaty allows Brussels to make law, instead of just having a framework for law-making. It provides no effective checks and balances to control future law-makers.

The treaty gives the EU the permanent right to seize more powers without any future agreement or consultation. And, get this, the EU refuses to publish the full text of the Lisbon Treaty until after it has been ratified!

Angela Merkel, German Chancellor, admitted the Lisbon Treaty is 98 percent the same as the Constitution. Commissioner Margot Wallstrom told the Constitutional Affairs Committee that the word ‘constitution’ had been dropped to avoid trouble with the British!

There is a saving grace, though. Our own British constitution forbids any government from giving away the sovereignty of the people, according to the Bill of Rights 1689, which is still on the statute book. That Act of Parliament is, in turn, based on the Declaration of Rights 1688, which is a legally binding contract between the sovereign and the people. It is therefore beyond the reach of any elected British parliament to repeal or amend. Indeed any elected British parliament must respect its contents since all British parliamentarians are also subjects of the Monarch.

In any case, any future British government has the right to repeal the European Communities Act 1972. This would have the immediate effect of taking the UK out of the EU. Which means UK law is supreme.

This begs the following question: what change of circumstance allowed the UK’s current Minister for Europe, Jim Murphy, to tell the UK Parliament’s European Scrutiny Committee in January 2008 that the UK does not have an opt-out from the EU’s proposed Charter of Fundamental Rights in the Lisbon Treaty?

Before he left office, Tony Blair had told Parliament that the UK did have an opt-out and that the charter would not apply in the UK as a result of a protocol to the Treaty. Who is, or was, right, and why?

Our British government will sign the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty without any further consultation with us, against a tide of widespread opposition. Which could mean we have interesting times ahead. How would the EU deal with a retrospective referendum here in the UK, once a government with the mind to stage one comes into office, later on down the road?

As it is, there are several well-funded legal challenges already under way in the UK to stop ratification of the Lisbon Treaty, or have ratification overturned.

And for those of us who want to keep our currency as the British Pound, since the Lisbon Treaty apparently includes much the same wording as the EU constitution, that document noted: “the currency of the EU shall be the Euro”. If that’s still there, what powers will a future British government have to reject membership of the Euro if the Lisbon Treaty is finally ratified by all 27 nation states?

So, no wonder the Irish people RIGHTLY said they didn’t know what they would be voting YES to! Only a very small select number of people actually DO!

All of which means it’s time to find a political party that will not only give us a referendum, but also uphold our own Bill of Rights 1689.

Unfortunately, you can immediately strike off that list Labour, Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. UKIP is seen as a one-issue party and has already been scuppered by the mainstream media.

The answer has to come from somewhere new … something new … now, take a look at this …

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11/06/2008 by AJ.

Sometimes you come across a piece on YouTube which simply stands out for its ability to entertain while informing.

It’s a balance between questions of taste and getting a message across.

For those of you who believe everything you see in the Mainstream Media, this might strike you as shocking. If that’s the case, get Googling and do your own research. For something wicked may well have this way come …

Now, THAT is a track I’d love to see top the singles charts. Somehow, though, I don’t think it’s going to get any airplay on Radio 1!

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08/06/2008 by AJ.

2008 seems to be fast becoming one of those years where I get to revisit previous parts of my life with a new 21st Century perspective. And the lovely thing about it is that in almost all cases it wasn’t a case that the stuff that meant something to me all those years ago was a victim of rose-tinted spectacles. The return gigs have reminded me exactly WHY I was fired up about them all those years ago, and that I was right to hold them in such esteem to do this day.

A first-ever visit to Los Angeles in April/May this year served as a reminder of why television as a medium is still an important part of my life. Fact is, though, the honesty comes in appreciating that what I really want to do is be making it, taking part in some way, not just celebrating its “Greatest Hits”. That’s a personal thing, it’s not really adding to what has gone before, which should be everyone’s goal.

The other couple of incidents were music related. The first was seeing THE HUMAN LEAGUE in concert again, for the first time in nearly a decade. The first time I saw them was back in 1981, at Bingley Hall, Stafford, with the stage set featuring a backdrop of a huge number of 35mm slide projectors, spewing out images that supported the messages of the songs. Yes, HUMAN LEAGUE songs DO have a point to them. It’s not all funny haircuts and plinky plonk synths!

Seeing them in the 1990s was NOT the same experience - gone were the cultural-reference backdrop of images, and it felt very much like a shadow of what had gone before. HOWEVER. When THE LEAGUE toured to celebrate their album DARE earlier this year, back came the backdrop of images. Except no longer were we talking projectors and screens - now we had a bank of huge Plasma screens, elevating and descending, all helping tell the stories of the songs once more. Hairs on the back of my neck stood on end - the LEAGUE I knew were back.

One band I never saw live until this year was SPARKS. As if it were yesterday I remember in 1979 going into GOULD’S in Wolverhampton Mander Centre and purchasing the LP of NUMBER ONE IN HEAVEN. A splendid luminous see-through yellowy-green vinyl slab of glorious electronic disco pomp. Probably the album I have played more than any in my collection over the years.

I’d first seen Sparks many years earlier on TOP OF THE POPS, performing THIS TOWN AIN’T BIG ENOUGH FOR THE BOTH OF US. Ron Mael’s Hitler-esque social disconnection at the keyboards, brother Russell’s inability to keep still on-stage - it was just something that burned like a laser into my memory.

So, when the announcement came that Sparks were taking up a residency at the Carling Academy Islington to play 20 concerts featuring their first 20 albums, rounding off with the debut of their 21st at Shepherd’s Bush on 13th June, I simply had to turn up to the pivotal albums from their output - as far as I was concerned, that is.

So, on 25 May, Sarah and I went to see the performance of NUMBER ONE IN HEAVEN in its entirety. On the following Tuesday, we went to see TERMINAL JIVE get its airing. At both, and showing how small the world is (and how common our collective interests are) there were even regular CULT TV FESTIVAL attendees also present to savour the experience!

However, yesterday, 7 June, was the performance of PLAGIARISM. A unique album, in that it has a huge number of tracks, and is basically Sparks doing their own ‘tribute album’ - revisiting some of their greatest hits, giving them a dust-off and applying to them a different style to what we had previously experienced.

As it was such a long album, there was no support act (Thank God, as the two previous ones, well, I simply cannot think of anything kind to say about them!). But we’d had an email to tip us off that Sparks were likely to be onstage for 8.30pm. Well, okay, technical difficulties meant that this actually ended up as 8.45pm, but then again given what we had in store for us, that is entirely forgiven.

The first clue that this was to be no ordinary evening was the arrival onstage of a string quintet from Trinity College. Three violins, a cello and a double bass. All played by some of the most gorgeous ladies I’ve seen onstage for some considerable time (for some reason I keep thinking of Bill and Ted’s ‘Medieval Babes’, even though they were all demurely dressed in black T-shirts sporting the cover of PLAGIARISM, in a square on the front). Couldn’t make up my mind whether the double bass lady or the first violinist were the most attractive. Or was it the violinist right in the middle who seem to spend her entire ‘downtime’ onstage staring lovingly at Russell???

Anyhow, as there is a lot of orchestral arrangement on this album, they were certainly kept busy throughout the evening. And for the track “Change” an entire brass section, again from Trinity, crowded the stage to add even more impact to the evening. Fantastic!

But the crowning moment came with the “reprise” of “Number One Song in Heaven” - this is a reworking of the first half of the extended version of the song, which is all dreamy and otherworldly - before we get into the second half which is some of the most upfront rock disco ever created. Now, there’s a problem doing this live, mainly as the version on PLAGIARISM has guest vocals from JIMMY SOMERVILLE, formerly of Bronksi Beat, and known for his high vocal range.

So, Russell begins singing the one part of the song … and then out of nowhere appears none other than JIMMY SOMERVILLE!

It’s one of those moments you remember for the rest of your life. The song becomes a duet, and the duelling vocalists give it their all. A tear in my eye as I realised that these are the sort of set pieces which can make an evening iconic.

An encore of the rare track “Looks Aren’t Everything” sped by afterwards, as did the long train journey home. The night had fired up my creativity, and puzzles on various projects got solved as if the answers had been obvious all along. Two hours travel passed in the blink of any eye.

Anyhow, check out more about the band at www.allsparks.com and, if you’re lucky, do anything you can to get a ticket for the premiere of “Exotic Creatures of the Deep” at Shepherd’s Bush on Friday 13th ….!

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