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Boom Boom Hotspots: Hamsterdam, Pepperhill ... Midsomer?
Interesting strategy choices from those looking to tackle me old schooly Chris Grayling for his witless, almost Libdemologist, Tory twaddle on broken Britain, boom boom Baltimore, and The Wire. Is the Tory front bench entirely peopled by liabilities, fools, dilettantes, heirs and graces?
Does the country - almost but almost recovered from the last great Conservative slash and burn culture - really need 150 more of these Tory muppets in our parliament?
Former hoopster, and current motivational speaker and social entrepreneur John Amaechi slam dunks the daft coot, suggesting that parts of Baltimore make Moss Side seem like Alderley Edge. Grayling had been stupid - S T U P I D - enough to respond to feedback by sending J.Am a "so what? fuck you!" copy of the driveling speech and to ask for a brisk fisk. He gets it.
Meanwhile Sheila Dixon, current Mayor of the real City of Baltimore takes a slightly different tack with a full court press release:Mayoral statement on crime
Fellow citizens
This week I was alerted to a speech made by a Member of the British Parliament, a Mr Chris Grayling, who suggested his country should fear becoming like our city of Baltimore as portrayed in the HBO series, The Wire. We all watched The Wire and while it was sometimes a heart-breaking reflection of reality, it was in the main, merely entertaining fiction.
The television show failed to reflect the best we have in this city, our sense of community, our hospitality and our proud history and culture. To present a television show as the real Baltimore is to perpetuate a fiction that dishonours our city. It is as pointless as boasting that Baltimore has a per capita homicide rate a fraction of that in the popular UK television show Midsomer Murders.
The Baltimore Police Department is working hard to protect the people of this city and it should be remembered that The Wire was just a television show. As this video shows, there is so much more to Baltimore than The Wire.
Mayor Sheila Dixon
City of Baltimore
STOP PRESS: Remake of Channel 4 hit Skins to be made in Baltimore with local teens forming cast. Hat tip: Baltimore Sun tweet.
FOR THE AVOIDANCE OF DOUBT: This was and is a ramp. Originator it now transpires Alex Hilton of Recess Monkey and Labour Home. Kudos. How the Balti Sun climbed down. Reading the very small print gives the game away ... but surely, but surely, even without that only a complete idiot ...?
9 comments:
I think the moral of the story maybe that all politicians are idiots; a mayor (presumably political not civic) is making speeches about Midsomer Murders! As the Aussies would perhaps say 'streuth!' Oh, and the slash & burn dig? Well, as your daughter and her chums would no doubt say - whatever!
Think Mayor Sheila's text - not a speech - shows a sense of humour and sense of purpose that is thoroughly absent among modern Conservatives! And check John Amaechi's personal site.
Slash and burn is how it was Dick. For 18 long years. That is where the continuing worklessness in this country has its roots ... in pit villages, mill towns, council estates, rural areas.
And it is also the era in which the disastrous MOD procurements Dr Fox is moaning about have their roots. Media report that the supply timeline from order to delivery is 15-20 years and Dr Fox - who appears to be no mathematician - tries to pin it on Bob Bollocks.
Go figure! As Myra might say ... if she were from Baltimore.
Okay - got as far as 'network of holistic community & sporting centres' before losing the will. Not that I get bored easily but on full council days I usually chart for my Labour oppo the number of times his members say 'community' and give him a little league table at the end - is it a code word for socialists or something?
Sure, I'm not defending all Tory policies at all - I personally think that mining villages should be re-established and that the Greenies (or watermelons - green on the outside - claret on the inside) should be told to sling their hook in our quest to construct loads more coal fired power stations - err.... don't think i've got any eggs, let alone an ability to count chickens with that one but....when people are having their power budgeted it may be a possibility. When nuclear stations start popping up at £10bn each then....
Update - apparently it's a wind up!
Er, yes Dick. Who'd have thunk?
In basketball full court press (release) is designed to breach the very best defences. Adding JAm stuff and the word "real" ahead of City of Baltimore ... hopefully add up to playing a blinder. Alex Hilton is a boy genius and needs to get recess monkey out more.
Not sure but I might be the conduit for the Balti Sun getting the story ... hurrah!
You can see my comment at LabourList HERE.
PS btw I agree that JAm's web statements are rather turgid and jargoned. I'm just down the road from the Amaechi Centre in Whalley Range and have a bit of slack in my work schedule if he wants a lift on that ...
We loved the photo - staring off into the distance, pensive yet alert, considered yet dynamic. It reminded me of an episode of Friends when Joey said just imagine someone's farted. Yup, think he could do with some help - at no point should this sentence ever be replicated 'holistic community and sporting centres for urban communities' - it's a contender for the Private Eye Pseuds Corner.
Have a good weekend Chris - bit of a celebratory feel to the Paul household I'm sure. Not one to ordinarily be an old curmudgeon but I can just about remember how stressful exams were - not the actual sitting but the anticipation of results. Plus, the mental thing that the exams you thought you'd utterly spooned sometimes gave the best results and the ones which were flown were rubbish (although, obviously not in your daughters case).
Cheers Dick. She did get an A* on one which she'd done in her spare time where the teacher told her she'd need almost 100% in the final exam to even get an A. Kind of bears out your scenario a bit. The Balti Sun actually ran their piece before my post, never mind my tweets roping them in this morning. So that spreading wasn't down to me after all.
Don't matter where they come from, just as long as it's in the bag. Now you gotta instill the notion that A levels aren't a piss take and that it's not a choice but that she should do somethig that she's good at!!! No prizes!
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