Thursday 16 July 2009

Breakfast?? Wake up and smell the coffee..

Is there any sight more nauseating than the BBC's Breakfast team of presenters as they chew the fat with some invited talking head from sloppy research central on hot topics such as militant Islamic youth? Look at em, this cancerous array of bland Middle English accents, faces and attitudes; the Daily Heil hate sheet made human flesh and served up every morning to poke the eunuchs of Middle Earth into fits of prejudicial apoplexy. What do YOU think about striking catering workers bringing misery to thousands of innocent holidaymakers? Text in YOUR message or simply press the red button and register YOUR impotent rage. This cosy sofa Nuremburg whips up the massed ranks of white collar weasels to almost head exploding levels of anger. Like Michael Douglas in Falling Down, these people seem to be living on the very edge of gun- totin-good- people-pushed-too-far-homicidal rage. Just one more little push from the tabloids or Breakfast telly and they might just y'know...vote BNP!



Like most of the people who bother to write in to Points Of View (have you heard their voices?), these people live in a cultural void; the vapid, featureless, identity free sprawl of Nowheresville UK. They therefore cling desperately to anything that gives their mundane lives some sense of meaning. For many this manifests itself in an exaggerated, malignant patriotism and a romantic (and ultimately fictitious) notion of 'Britishness' and its supposed virtues - y'know the usual bullshit: tolerance, fair-play, a sense of humour and decency. That these people are almost always the least tolerant, fair-minded, humorous or decent people on God's green earth never seems to diminish their sense of self-delusion.



BBC Breakfast people infact. GMTV with its crass mix of dumb celebrity lead features and Chat magazine freak tales, gets a different audience altogether. These people don't vote, they don't spend, they are essentially non-people. The Breakfast brigade, however, these people MATTER. They are the so-called 'silent majority' who never fucking shut up. They are not the ageing array of blue-rinsed bigots that now form the rump of what's left of old school Conservatism, no these are 'consumers,' they are 'tax payers' and 'licence fee payers' and dammit, they've been taken for granted for far too long! They have rights and they have power. They're fed up of their tiny share of GDP being constantly under threat from the massed ranks of evil scroungers and miscreants intent on destroying the very fabric of their non-descript B&Q and Blockbuster lives. Gypsies and junkies, migrants and militants, single mothers and suicide bombers; they want what's mine, what's ours by birth, as Englishmen, as wealth creators, as voters in a 'liberal democracy (whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean). Their tolerance is defined as the ability to withstand the occupancy of this island with people of colour without resorting to burning them in their sleep or trucking them off to be gassed, as less civilised and fair-minded folk would do.



They are Bill Turnbull's maggot offspring still gorging on the rancid corpse of Empire, feeding their polluted guts on Churchill and Wellington and Nelson and Drake and Beckham and Branson and Blair and Bono and Johnny and Tim and plucky little Paula and (sssh black lesbian) Kelly. They sit in the M&S café and swap house prices, they listen to Coldplay CDs on the car stereo, they go to watch Robbie as a couple and dress at Gap and H&M. They are England Fans with England shirts and England flags and they whoop and shout "Coooooome on England!" because to be a patriot in one's own country is the easiest thing in the world. They believe in nothing because they have experienced nothing and so they can't understand anyone who possesses what used to be called 'idealism'.



Theirs is an abstract and sanitised patriotism and it's one that has been largely fostered by the BBC , who's propagandist function has always been (whatever the right wing press say) to uphold the interests of the establishment, because they are part of the system, funded by the system, controlled by and populated by the system. In BBCLand we're all just one big happy Tru-Brit family; Last Night Of The Proms, Trooping The Colour, The Boat Race, The Grand National, Royal Ascot, Wimbledon, the test match (highlights on the news or listen to 5Live)., the FA Cup final, Only Fools & Horses, Dad's Army, the Two Ronnies, Lenny Henry, Have I Got News For You, They Think It's All Over, Question Time, Dimbleby's Portrait Of Britain, Coast, Simon Schama, Jools Holland, Blue Peter, Horse Of The Year Show, Edinburgh Tattoo, State Opening Of Parliament, VE/VJ Day, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50 anniversaries, the Queen's Jubilee, the Queen's birthday, the Queen's minor illnesses, royal birthdays, royal funerals, royal marriages, royal funding (only 61 per day folks - cheaper than a loaf of bread!!).



It's enough to turn anyone into a suicide bomber. Get this suckers, England doesn't exist. It's a made up place, same as every other country. There is no English race just as there is no white race, or black race or any other race. Trace your ancestry back far enough and we're all just a monkey fuck in the jungle. Invent your own rituals if you like and your own religions and customs and laws and flags and live somewhere beyond the hills, over the plain, across the sea. Call it England or Israel or America or Japan or China or India or Iran. John Donne was wrong; every man is an island. Me, I know I probably share this crackpot view of the world with 0.1% of humanity but that suits me fine. You want to get wrapped up in phoney notions of culture and ethnicity? Go visit Auschwitz and see where that gets you.



The young suicide bombers who attacked London believed in another system, another way of life, another state-less state of being altogether. A hundred years a go they would have been called anarchists or communists. You might not agree with their aims or their methods, but you can't deny them their ideology. If the BBC reporters who covered the bombings couldn't grasp or even seek to understand this, then perhaps the problem is with them, more than anyone else. Just as the BBC apologised after 911 when 'uppity Asian/Arab' members of the audience on Question Time tried to put into context the reasons that may have lead the plane hijackers to perform their murderous deeds. It's Israel stooped! No, the state only wants debate on its own terms otherwise it's 'my country right or wrong' and 'treason trial' time.



60 years ago when idealistic young men from across the globe went off to Spain to fight fascist Franco in the International Brigades, they did so because they felt united by a common brotherhood, a shared political cause. They joined up to fight the oppressor, a cabal of tyrants intent of imposing their twisted idea of culture upon others. Young men always want causes to believe in and fight for, which is why suicide bombers, who should be over-60 years of age to qualify, are almost always below the age of 25. They see their martyrdom and the death of 'infidels' as a noble and honourable path to paradise. Whether or not they acted out of a twisted interpretation of the Koran or more non-spiritual political beliefs, they wanted to do their bit for the cause. Like it or not, no-one wakes up one morning and decides, 'think I'll go and blow myself up on the tube for a laugh.'



The likes of Bobby Sands and IRA hunger strikers of the 70s were also prepared to die for their beliefs and were also ridiculed and demonised at the time. Silly boys having their minds twisted by evil men who never risk their own lives for the cause. That was how it was seen and perhaps there's even an element of truth in it. Our school was one long Bobby Sands joke but, when alls said and done, this young man starved himself to death for a free Ireland. The ultimate irony is of course that martyrs never see their dreams realised and Bobby and co would no doubt be appalled to see their sacrifices wasted on some inter-government carve up between Dublin and London. As de Beauvoir put it; 'If you live long enough, you'll see that every victory turns into a defeat'. All causes end in either compromise or capitulation. Old men know this, which is why they don't sign up for Paradise backpacks. Idealism's a young man's game but what we need to recognise is the reasons why people think the way they do and how both government and the media must accept responsibility for shaping the dominant cultural forces that enable society to become polarised, divided and antagonistic.



I'm proud of being a northerner with all the abstract geographical, cultural and political baggage that word entails. It's not a conscious thing really, just a feeling of difference, of otherness to 'southerners.' Humans are tribal animals and if differences between us didn't exist, we'd have to invent them. You follow the reds, I'll follow the blues, you like that music, I'll like this music, you wear those clothes, I'll wear these clothes. Each to their own. Englishness and Britishness isn't something you sign up to. I wouldn't sign up to one of New Labour's preposterous 'Loyalty' oaths so why should anyone else?



My notion of who I am and where I fit into the world around me may be not be shared by anyone at the BBC but then the BBC is a self-perpetuating, closed shop of Oxbridge mediocrity, that engenders a distorted vision of Britain based upon its own bourgeois prejudices. Take their current 'the accent is on Voices' campaign for example. Even when the BBC tries to be inclusive and recognise that there are many and various aspects of Britishness, it still manages to fuck it up by getting getting a bunch of nobs from marketing to put on ridiculous 'regional' accents. It's almost as funny as those Fast Show 'We're Cockneys/Geordies/Yardies' sketches. The same patronising, paternalist attitude that condescendingly states 'and now the news and weather where YOU live.'



Greg Dyke said that the BBC was hideously white but he missed the whole point. It doesn't matter if the BBC becomes less white if its intake still comes from the same social and economic backgrounds. Just because Blue Peter has an Asian and a Geordie presenter doesn't make it any less hideously middle class. Were the BBC responsible for turning five young black and Asian young 'Brits' into suicide bombers? Of course not but lets not pretend that by swallowing the us and them line that all governments follow when they try to squirm out of problems of their own making, makes it any safer for the rest of us. You want context, you want analysis, you want intelligent debate, you want understanding, you want answers? Don't tune in to BBC Breakfast for fuck's sake.

Tuesday 14 July 2009

In the Noughties....

“In the city theres a thousand faces all shining bright, And each one of those faces is under 25! “




Or so Paul Weller said before he became some beaut running around the New forest in a loin cloth for a Style Council sleeve. But it did get me thinking about my own age. Now going on into my late twenties and I’ve got to look at the facts that im not exactly a youth anymore. Which kind of saddens me. Not because I’m terrified of the inevitable approach of the big 3-Oh as some whoppers are probably going to keep on telling me for the next few months but because I missed out on having my own youth culture of my own. Whilst some had mods, rockers, skinheads, punk, northern soul, warehouse parties etc etc What did I have? Coldplay and the fucking Kooks? Wise up.



But then looking back, I always did feel a bit out of sync with everyone else in my demographic. The noughties, the decade of believing anything FHM told you. Shocking state of affairs really. Even the name seems like some sort of focus group, committee decided marketing name. “Welcome to The Noughties. Its young, fresh, modern, urban, cool and best of all, sounds a bit like Naughty.” Sadly many took the bait. I seemed to be surrounding by clueless types who thought Robbie Williams was cool And I know other decades were full of whoppers as well but at least there seemed to be an alternative, an underground to seek refuge in. Yet I live in the age where Girls Aloud sang “Sound of the Underground” without a hint of Irony. They’re about as underground as your average 747.



However it did get me thinking about the things I never did and hopefully I didn’t make too much of a tit out myself. Then again there is still just under half a year left to make amends.

But, hey, I shouldn’t dwell on it too much. So I didn’t go fighting rockers along beach fronts on bank holidays, spend all night gurning at Shoom or become king of the terraces in my Hi-Tech Silver Shadows, at least I never had a spice boy haircut.





Things I've never done during the Noughties



Had a Toni & Guys special.


I must have missed a meeting but somehow becoming a hairdresser, not a barber but a hairdresser mind, has become a manly occupation. And having a haircut named after part of London is apparently the “In” thing to do. The Hoxton Finn, The Barnet barnet, The Camden Twat. Now I’m not trying to say that silly haircuts were the preserve of the Noughties, but there is a difference between gelling your hair into a slick back or a home bleaching and spending 50 quid to have a consulatation with Anton who suggested you should get a Shoreditch Mong which will cost you another 60 quid but don’t worry you’ll get a free head massage from the 17 year old trainee, you sexual deviant.









Voted on Big Brother


Or any other reality TV show for that matter, because frankly in the great scheme of things IT DOESN’T MATTER!!! The only time I would ever text in or press the red button is if it would lead to the release of a pack of rabid hounds, who had been starved half mad, into the house. If they survived that then they deserve their 70 grand cheque.



Bought into the whole Metrosexuality con


Ohh Fat Frankie Lampard waxes his armpits. Oooh men wearing eyeliner.

Ooooh men straightening their hair. Oooooooh, could you all go away and die please and we’ll use the money you vain tarts use to preen yourself on something more useful instead.



Been to a Starbucks.


Once had a conversation with one of those boring people who insist on telling you how sodding Green they are and how they are “sooooo against globalisation and have watched Supersize me like 30 times,” all the while he was drinking a Starbucks coffee. Its like the posh kid from Eton who got nicked at the May Day riots in London a few years back for smashin up a MacDonalds. Or the fact Banksy is a public schoolboy. What also bugs me is how they don’t stick to their own little Wi-Fied up caffeine speakeasies, tip tapping away on their laptops in an attempt to seem important. We now have to put up with coffee bores who insist on making queues at Greggs longer than necessary by ordering a double mocca, chocca, frig-a-chino with soya milk and hazlenuts at ten to eight in the morning. Behave yourself, I’m trying to buy a steak slice before I go to work.



Joined Bebo


Or as it should really be known, Bebophile. Social networking for sexual predators.

End of story.



Wore a trackie top with the name of a fictitious US Mid-West Univeristy on it


We’ve all seen them. People walking around with a zip up trackie top with some crap like Michigan State Cougars ’79 or Boston French Ticklers ‘77 blazoned across the chest. What the hell does that mean?? I know that it means. What it means is that you’re bird chooses you’re clothes for you, you GAP clad automaton. Here’s an idea, get your girlfriends handbag, have a rummaged around inside until you find your testicles and go and buy something a bit smarter, you’re almost 30 you scruff.



Enjoyed the music of Robbie Williams


The mere sight of this object gets me into a ranting rage. If I was to ever meet him I would set his face on fire and then put it out with a golf shoe, and then repeat the process ad nauseam. He’s not the entertainer, he’s a prick. Look at when Take That made a come back with their Morrisons-hawking anthem Shine and were getting the dubious honour of Brit awards etc. This no mark is so desperate for attention that he would elicit pity from people by booking himself into rehab for… Caffeine addiction. Oooh, I drink too much red bull and espressos, give me some sympathy please.



Robbie here is some advice for you. Dry your eyes, get your glad rags on, get yourself down the docks and get yourself a big strapping stoker from the coast of Kuala Lumpar and you’ll feel a whole lot better.



Worn a scarf indoors


My mate is in a couple of bands which means over the years I have been in and around the local music venues to lend my support. And I have seen what has to be one of the most arsey fashion styles in a while, wearing a scarf indoors. I’ve seen them with their Shoreditch mong haircuts, t-shirts that are a little too tight and bootcut jeans. And to top it all off they are wearing aviator shades and a scarf. If its cold enough to be wearing a scarf then may I suggest putting on a jumper, or possibly a jacket. The secret of staying warm is layers.



Sat and watched an episode of Sex and The City in order to get my Nat King Cole


Boyfriends, husband, lovers, backdoor men, and “friends” who live in the hope that one day the object of their affections will get drunk enough and/ or feel sorry enough for them to sleep with them. If any of you have thought that sitting through this will help you’re chances, you should hang your head in shame. This show has to be the zenith of “aspirational” programming which has clogged our airwaves in the noughties. Whilst crap like Footballers wives is easy to dismiss due to it being, well, crap, this comes with an amount of credence which is dangerous. But I’ll ask you this. Why would I want the women in my life to aspire to be anything like those Harpies on that show. Vapid, self obsessed, vain etc etc need I go on?

“But Paul, it completely revolutionised how many women are portrayed on TV. Women who were usually cast as sex object are now the ones talking about the sex, bladebladeblah…”

No it didn’t. All this nonsense was created by a rather skilled marketing executive who had the difficult brief of selling the exploits of over privileged, over sexed Manhattan socialites to the world. Let’s look at the facts. All the women in that show are obsessed with shoes and clothes and all the women in that show constantly talk about men. Oh yeah, I see how they’ve revolutionised TV by changing absolutely nothing. So now they put some low level soft porn smut in and I’m meant to be shocked. Come to some of the boozers round my gaff. The barmaids say things that would make Caligula blush never mind that bird out of Mannequin.













Read Harry Potter


Lets get this straight. That is a children’s book you are reading. And buying the adults copy without the cartoon pictures on the cover doesn’t make it any better. The thing that bugs me is that its just people buying what their told to buy. “Oh yes, I heard it on GMTV and This Morning that many grown ups read this gash so its perfectly okay”. And I particularly hate people who advertise the fact they read Harry Potter by reading it on the bus to work. I have not worked out how I am going to combat this yet but have thought of two plans. Plan A, the next time somebody pulls out a couple of Harry Potter and the Homoerotic subtext (think about it. He hits puberty, discovers he’s “different” from everyone else and doesn’t have to live in the “closet” under the stairs anymore) I will sit right next to them and pull out a copy of Spot the Dog. Or Plan B, I will pull out a couple of Razzle and calmly explain that since there are reading a children’s book, my reading material has to be of a highly adult nature to level things out.

Ant & Dec or out on the lash..

I have a theory that binge drinking in this country is not the result of an unhealthy attitude towards alcohol and intoxication which is exacerbated with draconian and patronising licensing laws, and amplified by the greed of developers and local authorities that have turned almost every city centre and market town into carbon copy plastic toy towns full of modern day gin palaces and tots in pink polo tops. No, its because Saturday night telly is rubbish. They talk about TV dumbing down but its been braindead on a Saturday for years. Talk about insulting your intelligence though, this continual stream of dross gives your intelligence a good kicking, nicks its wallet and throws its keys down a drain.



Hole in the wall? We actually think this is entertainment now, watching ex soap stars and z listers being pushed into water by a foam wall?? Run an electrical current throw the water and then it’d be entertaining, then I’d watch. Then you have the National lottery Quiz show, as if anyone tuning into the National lottery wants to see some nerk from Northampton win 50grand. In fact the last time I saw this program a woman answered this question “What B is the capital of Argentina?” She said “Brazil” I threw my trainer at the telly. And its not much better on the other side with family fortunes. But now its All Star family fortunes and its presented by professional northerner Vernon Kaye who takes his Brucey impersonation too far, but its okay because he knows he is and its all post modern, so don’t worry about it.



However its not all bad though. You do get the comic genius of Harry Hills TV Burp. Yes, I know its not Curb your enthusiasm but it makes me laugh, a lot. And then you have the One Shows Christine Bleakley in a revealing samba outfit on Strictly come dancing ( I would do shameful and terrible deeds for that woman).



It just mystifies me how cavalier the attitude of TV producers must be towards their audience to put this much brain rotting, soul destroying crap over the airwaves. Why they think people want to watch “stars” such as Gemma Atkinsons sister in law win a luxury spa day is beyond me, but then again people must be watching it and that’s why they are TV producers and I’m not. They must be sat down in their glass fronted office towers laughing at how the proles will watch anything they splash out at them. But the very worst one has to be the X-Factor, a show so ludicrous and tacky that the attempted piss take by Peter Kaye recently fell flat on its comedic harris because the fact of the matter is, you would have gotten more (albeit unintentional) laughs watching an episode of the X Factor.



Simon Cowell. He sits and listens, pulls a face, abruptly stops someone who is in obvious need of professional psychological assistance, gives them his pre written piercing jibe and another little bit of both him dies on the inside. The only reason I can see why he goes through his pantomime villain act every week is because he enjoys it, which speaks volumes about the man. But it’s the whole sham of it which offends me, and yes I do feel offended by their lies. He’s a salesmen who knows what he can sell, how he can sell it and who he can sell it to. Yet, he sits and judges them upon their singing ability. This coming from the man who gave us the musical detritus that is Boyzone. This coming from the man who gave us the musical equivalent of cod liver oil, Westlife. This coming from the man who gave us the WWF Superstars!!



Louis Walsh. Spends far too much time around publicity hungry teenage boys with silly haircuts for my liking. God knows what laws he’s broken in the confines of his record company office. And I don’t mean the criminal laws of the land, but the very laws of nature them self. He manages Westlife apparently and no group of people can be so squeaky clean without having some really dark secrets to hide. Now I want to make it clear I’m only speculating but I wouldn’t be shocked if there was ash trays made from human hands, a makeshift opium den and an altar for a black mass on the Westlife tour bus. I reckon Louis has been through that scene near the start of Godfather 2 more times than his immortal soul would bear to remember. Just take a moment and hear his soft Irish lilt saying the words “Its okay, this girl had no family, we’ll take of it, no one will even notice she’s gone missing…” Doesn’t seem so far fetched does it??



Dan… Danni… Danni Mino… Nope, just can’t say her name with a straight face. Just sit for a minute and ask yourself “What is Dannii Minogues most famous song?” I just did, writing this, and I’ve got to admit I don’t have a Scooby doo either. Primarily famous for being outshone by her sister for almost the last 20 years and she has the gall to sit in front of people and tell them they’re not good enough. Freud would have a field day with that one. She didn’t even have the bottle to chin Sharon Osbourne, Cheryl on the other hand would have knocked her spark out. The only thing she has done of any note in recent years is getting a lap dance, which leaves me with all I can say about her “Dip me in honey throw me to the Lesbians.”



Cheryl Cole. What a horrible, vacuous, incubus of a human being she is. I wish she would just disappear back from whatever BMWs back seat she rolled off of in the first place. From Pop Wannabe to WAG in five easy steps via some toilet based assault , but now her high heels are Jimmy Choos and they’re hanging out of a Lexus’ window instead of a 5th hand beamer. Her only plus point is she got rid of Sharon Osbounre, who somehow made a career out of being half pissed and patronising people, but thats her only plus point. She sits and performs every cliché she can think of from sassy attitude to crying at every sob story in a desperate attempt to win the hearts of the public. I don’t know why these celebrities always want to win the publics hearts, I’ve met the public and they’re pricks for the most part ( Sorry that’s a lie. I know why they want to win our hearts by ballroom dancing in the jungle, its so they can get that lucrative Iceland advertising contract, hawking frozen fish and chicken dippers and maybe a recurring spot on Loose Women) And if that’s not bad enough, its on twice on the same bloody night and repeated the next sodding day!! That’s its, I’m away out to get pissed.

Through The Wire..

The end of the football season is always a time of ambivalence. On the one hand, it’s a relief to be off the treadmill for a while - a break from organising our lives around the match and draining our finances accordingly. On the other, you soon long for the routine of the match and the publication of the fixture list is greeted with the same level of gratitude a junkie has for their fix. But when The Sopranos finished on E4, there were no such mixed emotions and wailing and gnashing of teeth was heard from Bootle to Kirkby. As the best television series in history is no more, many Shitbookers will be wondering what can fill the space in their lives left by the departure of T and the boys. Let’s face it, nothing out there even comes close to replacing the tales of New Jersey’s finest. Apart from one programme - The Wire on BBC 2. The Wire is ostensibly about ‘the game’ - drug dealing and hustling in Baltimore - and explores all the different groups that affect and are affected by it - police, drug dealers, trade unions, school kids and law-abiding citizens. But, as with all great television, it deals with far more complex and wide-reaching issues. Made by HBO, the cable network behind The Sopranos, The Wire is just as brutally realistic and multi-layered with some columnists believing it to be an even better programme. They argue The Sopranos experienced some dips in quality (especially in the Kevin Finerty episodes) whereas The Wire has maintained an almost impossibly high standard over four seasons. Much like in The Sopranos, no character in The Wire is straightforwardly good or bad. The police can be despicable both in their motives and actions and even the cold-blooded, predatory Omar occasionally reveals a softer side. Or as soft a side as somebody who robs drug dealers with a sawn-off shotgun for a living can have. Each collective is flawed, all of them embody the expression ‘money flows uphill, shit flows down.’ The police get fucked over by their superiors and justice falls by the wayside in the quest for better statistics to appease the Mayor; for the drug dealers, the runners and look-outs are expendable commodities and loyalty is conditional - conditional upon it not costing them money; and the trade unions lose sight of what’s important and become little more than glorified gangsters. Expediency and buck-passing are characteristics uniting all these groups but they somehow manage to stick together even when falling apart. The Wire and its cast have a list of collective and individual awards to rival United and Ferguson's. Time magazine, the American Film Institute and the New York Post have all honoured the programme and English broadsheets, particularly The Guardian, have been unremittingly effusive in their praise. Although it may seem unbelievable, the programme has come close to being cancelled. Like Arrested Development, disgracefully cancelled after three seasons, The Wire may be too complex and the seasons too long to keep the attention of the fair-weather viewers who want nothing more from television than a chance to switch their brains off for an hour or so. If that’s what they are looking for, they are definitely watching the wrong show. The Wire knows exactly where it is going and takes its time getting there. This allows the characters to develop fully, meaning you actually care about what happens to them. Chief writer David Simon often refers to it as a visual novel and its ability to genuinely engage and provoke visceral reactions at the plot’s twists and turns is more synonymous with literature than television. Much of this is down to the fact the characters are not cliches or stereotypes. Stringer Bell, for example, is definitely not a typical gangster. Eschewing the posturing and mindless violence of his contemporaries, Bell is a successful business student who reads Adam Smith, talks of market saturation and applies the same detached criteria to the drugs trade as he does to his college assignments. Bell’s nemesis Omar Little is the only homosexual character in The Wire but is far too terrifying for any of his enemies to perceive this is a weakness. He is scared of nobody, does not respect reputations and everything - murder, theft - is “all in the game.” His signature look is a trench-coat and a sawn off. Lead character Jimmy McNulty is part of the police force charged with bringing down Bell and his crew. American-Irish (“Can I have a Jameson’s please?” “We’ve only got Bushmills” “Isn’t that Protestant whisky?”), he regularly practices what George Best referred to as “the three Irish F’s - fucking, fighting and fucking drinking.” He is egotistical, selfish, incapable of monogamy, narcissistic and self-destructive. But never unlovable and certainly never less than compelling. In The Wire, The Sopranos and Curb Your Enthusiasm, HBO possess the Best, Law and Charlton of US TV, with the sublime Entourage taking the Paddy Crerand role of cult hero. Readers of Swine, take my advice. Get down to HMV and invest in the box sets immediately. You have nothing to lose but your social life.

FIVE ACE SCENES - McNulty and Bunk’s unique two-minute assessment of a crime scene - the dialogue? Purely the word ‘Fuck’ - used 35 times - Omar goes a huntin’ after Weebay - “Ayo, lesson here, Bay. You come at the King, you best not miss” - Landsman’s assessment of Bunk & Lester’s fashion sense - “pinstriped lawyerly affectations and brash tweedy impertinence” - Bubbs’ trip to Hamsterdam - so squalid you’ll want to take a shower immediately afterwards - The wake of a murder detective at a local bar with The Pogues’ The Body of an American playing in the background.

These are the times...

What’s Eating Pew Pew Barney McGrew Cuthbert Dibble & Grub?

By Paul Sharkey



Pew



The BNP’s success in the north west and Yorkshire got a lot of press with both the right wing press and the so-called ‘liberal’ media elite (the Guardian/Radio 4 etc) blaming this squarely on the shoulders of the ‘poor white underclass’ who’s silly little heads have been turned by vile fascists reaping the rewards of MPs expenses anger and ‘mass immigration.’ And whilst there’s obviously an element of truth in this, what really allowed the BNP in is New Labour’s entire strategy since coming to power in 97. Put simply New Labour needed to win over the mass of upwardly mobile floating voters who in the past have voted Tory out of self-interest and natural bigotry. The traditional old Labour vote in the industrialized heartland were, as usual treated with a mixture of contempt and outright hostility during the early years of the Blairite regime. These people, these voters were expendable in the brave new world of ‘third way’ politics. It wasn’t about ‘left’ and ‘right’ anymore it was ‘occupying the centre ground. Even the Tories knew that their old rump of party activists were expendable as they too shifted towards the centre with family friendly policies rather than xenophobic bile. New Labour under Blair and Brown were desperate to seem business friendly and desperate to keep in with the press barons who could make life difficult for them. They therefore cut their political cloth according to the pattern of maggots like Murdoch and the Mail’s Paul Dacre.



Into this idealistic void, the BNP exploited sometimes legitimate but more often than not distorted and exaggerated complaints about the treatment of poor ‘whites’ compared to immigrants and ethnic minorities. The usual stuff’ ‘they’ get priority treatment for housing, ‘they’re taking all the jobs, ‘they’ got free mobile phones. When you’re bottom of the pile there’s a natural desire to blame others for your predicament but its never the right people who are targeted; never the industrialists, city boys and the political parasites who feed of them. The cunts who impoverish whole communities whole countries, whole continents at the flick of a switch, the push of a button, the stroke of a pen.



Ofcourse it’s in the ‘establishments’ interests to shift the blame away from themselves by such diversion tactics which is why the right wing press stoke up all these immigrant scare stories, feeding resentment and hatred. Rather than tackling the big issues of a globalised economy, Labour simply plays to Dacre’s tune, pacifying the Daily Mail set and abandoning their core support to the ravages of this gloriously flexible ‘free’ market they’re so fucking proud of.



Signing ‘Not In My Name’ petitions and lashing eggs at Nick Griffin may well register a token protest but it’s all too easy for the middle class media to make sweeping generalizations about the BNP’s support or the apathy of Labour’s once solid support with glib clichés and misrepresentations. Most people aren’t arsed about politics in the first place and voting for Labour or Tory is now almost the same thing, infact when the LibDems become the left wing choice, you know the system is now arse about face.



New Labour have pissed 13 years of power up the wall. Even when the financial crisis hit and they could’ve got away with a truly socialist programme, they bottled it and handed over trillions to bail out the city. Let then never again say ‘the country can’t afford decent pensions, health care, housing, transport’ and if we get a Tory government for another generation, never let them lay the blame at their traditional supporters who were once again shat on by the very people supposedly looking after their interests.



Pew



Hastily re-shot anti-bacterial spray adverts that now mention Swine Flu. Kills all known germs (Geordie accent) ‘INCLUDING SWINE FLU’ – dead!! First it was HIV/Aids (it’s never just aids now is it?), mad cow disease and bird flu that was going to kill everyone, now swine flu is the latest plague penciled in the wipe us all out. Makes you almost nostalgic for the the good old nuclear holocaust days.



Barney Mcgrew



Speaking of which…..North Korea! Kim Il Mad has taken over from Robert Mugabe as my favourite pint sized tyrant. He’s boss and atleast unlike those half arsed Iranians he’s actually got the capability to wipe out half the planet, which is why the Yanks play it all cagey and don’t dare invade as they did in Iraq, Afghanistan and those other two camels and a pea shooter countries. In the cold war days it was easy, ‘you nuke us, we nuke you’ but when the technology is in the hands of I dunno, crazy Jewish, Hindu, Muslim and Stalinist nut jobs then hmmmm….maybe it’s time every fucker came to their senses. Non-proliferation treaties can’t and won’t alter the fact that human greed and idealism will use technology for evil purposes.



Cuthbert


Is shaving his hair and bleeching his teeth.



Dibble



Flip Flops eh? Soon as it goes over 60 degrees out they come, the meathead in flippies massive. Bald heads, ale guts, csrgo shorts, AX tee-shirts and designer flip flops sweatily sticking to their fat fucking kebs as they waddle down Bold St, mobile to ear loudly planning some bogus meet or transaction with some nugget sat somewhere in Concert Square with his top off and a pair of jarg Gucci shades glued to the top of his swede.



Grub



Spare us from aristocrats with a sense of social purpose. Prince Charles’s interventionist genes have been handed down to his alleged offspring with both Harry and Wills appearing in some ill conceived environmental charity advert dreamt up by their idle dumb daddy. ‘Saving the rainforest….for everyone!’ yah! Then Harry is whisked off to America to visit the site of 911 and is described on news bulletins as ‘a war veteran’ Ho Ho!! Next its Wills and Harry together posing in their pilots uniforms saying they want to fight on the frontline in time! IN TIME yah? Yah! In time for when the fucking war’s well and truly over. What an insult to those who died in Iraq and Afghanistan to describe Harry as a war veteran, what an insult to our intelligence to pretend they’g go anywhere near a real battle zone, what a disgrace that the BBC continue to plug these two vile morons and their idiotic aul fellar as upstanding champions of charity.

Thursday 9 July 2009

A list of things that make me smile...

My little princess Olivia x
Adidas Stockholm
The Wire
Gomorrah
Pink Floyd
Porridge with Ronny Barker
Lacoste Polo t shirts
The Sopranos
Kendall Ball & Harvey
Diadora Borg trabs
A Bacon barm with red sauce
CP Compnay Ice jackets
The Pink Panther
Miami Beach
The Park End
Bob Latchford
All dayer's on the ail & marching powder with your mates
Mikel Arteta
Larry David
Richard Prior
Sharp's goal at Anfield 84'
Adidas Mamba, Samba & Bamba
New York City
Sports Night
The Jam
The Golden Vision
Joy Division
The Grey Everton away top from the 83/84 season
Rigsby
Getting bladdered and re living tales of going to Town when you were 16.

This is a Modern World...

Walking down West Derby Road, I noticed a large unkempt scruffy woman walking towards me holding a a carrier bag from the local shithole fastfood eatery. As she got closer, it dawned on me that she was wearing an "Istanbul 2005 Champions League Final" t shirt. Now, being an avid Evertonian any cunt wearing one of those nasty cheap garments is enough to make me want to hurl, but this Grade A scruff was wearing it nearly 4 years after they lifted the fucking thing. As she walked past I didn't even make eye contact, she repulsed me that much. From the corner of my eye I noticed her hair looked like it hadn't been washed for days, and the pair of tracky bottoms she was sporting were those cheap nasty efforts, probably "Donnay" or some other shitty label they sell in those god awful sport shops. Once I was past the fucking heffa I thought to myself "Why can't I just be like her and not give a fuck". It would be a lot easier and far less stressful. I have pride and self worth, something this human being clearly never had. Just by looking at the pig you could tell she'd never held a job down in her whole life. The road before I got to my house some skinny scrawny middle-aged fella dressed in a black tracky was walking his Staffordshire bull terrier, whilst smoking a roly with his head down. He didn't even look up at me as I walked past. Another smackhead, crackhead or alky. What the fuck has this place turned into? It used to be such a nice area years ago. Am I different? Am I the strange one?
It was a warm summer evening, I was wearing my Lacoste polo top and combat shorts with my Timberland boat shoes. Not that these 2 fucking scruffs would even know or appreciate what I was wearing. I've always been into the clobber from a young age, as were all the kids that used to live round here. To see these scruffs bouncing round here these days makes me so angry. The people imitate the area - dirty, rundown and in the gutter. I feel like I don't belong in this modern world.