Thou Shalt Not Steal The Baby Jesus

.





Perhaps someone was in dire need of a personal saviour.

This story gives scope for a wicked cartoon but seeing how it's crimbo I shall go easy on the cultists, I've no doubt they will be visiting in their droves once the header is picked up by Google.

To my readers and all free thinkers out there I wish you a happy Christmas and I do hope Santa doesn't forget your bike.

A statue of the infant Jesus on display near Miami in Florida is being fitted with a Global Positioning System device after the original figurine was stolen.

The near-life-size figure forms part of a nativity scene in Bal Harbour city.

The original vanished three weeks ago, despite being bolted to the ground.

Dina Cellini, who oversees the display, says the statues of Mary and Joseph will also be fitted with a satellite tracking device to deter thieves.

She said: "I don't anticipate this will ever happen again, but we may need to rely on technology to save our saviour."

A Jewish lawyer, Jeffrey Harris, from Cincinnati, who read about the theft on the internet, has donated the new Jesus figurine in the Founders Circle area of the city.source

Gallery McCann Update

.
For latest gallery and update click here.

Tent City California USA

.
And worse to come I fear.

ONTARIO, California (Reuters) - Between railroad tracks and beneath the roar of departing planes sits "tent city," a terminus for homeless people. It is not, as might be expected, in a blighted city center, but in the once-booming suburbia of Southern California.

The noisy, dusty camp sprang up in July with 20 residents and now numbers 200 people, including several children, growing as this region east of Los Angeles has been hit by the U.S. housing crisis.

The unraveling of the region known as the Inland Empire reads like a 21st century version of "The Grapes of Wrath" John Steinbeck's novel about families driven from their lands by the Great Depression. more

On This Day December 24th

.
Cuba releases one thousand Bay of Pigs prisoners. John Stonehouse Parliament's own answer to "kyak man" found not drowned. First men orbit the moon and other.
I have forgotten anything?

Tanner To Change Story?

.






Again?




















Bad taste? complain here.

FBI Planned Mass Arrests

.
This was under J Edgar, how do you like my little black number? Hoover, but give it time, give it time.

Former FBI director J Edgar Hoover had a plan to arrest 12,000 Americans he deemed a possible threat to national security, declassified papers reveal.

The FBI chief sent his proposal to US President Harry Truman just after the start of the Korean War in 1950, The New York Times newspaper reports.

He asked the president to declare the mass arrest necessary to counter "treason, espionage and sabotage".

There is no evidence any part of the plan was ever approved.

Mr Hoover wanted the president to suspend the centuries-old legal right of habeas corpus, which protects individuals against unlawful arrest.

The FBI director planned to detain the suspects - whose list of names he had been compiling for years - in US military and federal prisons.more

"Unrelated" seven minute video "Fema detention camp?"

Travelling To The US? Think Twice

.
Little wonder tourism to the US is down, not content with treating entrants to the US like a piece of shit or a bloody terrorist, we now have the likes of this.

This being bad enough, but for us Brits the implications of this backdoor method of having your data collected by the establishment are more than a little disturbing.

FBI To Collect Biometric Information On Britons

British visitors to the US will have details of their physical characteristics added to a new billion dollar database under plans drawn up by the FBI.

Fingerprints, iris scans and even details of the way people walk, their scars and the size and shape of their ear lobes will be collected.

British intelligence agencies and police will also be able to access the information – giving them potentially more biometric data on British citizens than the Government collects at home.

Under the plans, revealed by the Washington Post, the FBI database will include details on everyone who applies for a visa to enter the US.more

Bible Bashing Is Dying Out In Kansas. You Think?

.



If you say so brother.

There is an American expression for something that is utterly obvious but not, for some reason, noticed.

"Hiding in plain sight", the Americans call it, and the expression came to my mind as I sat in Kansas City airport waiting for an ice storm to pass.

Hiding in plain sight in this state is a revolution in American Christendom, a change of heart that could see American Protestant churches looking increasingly like their European equivalents.

The state of Kansas gets a bad press. It is huge and empty and mostly flat.more

De Menezes Outcome: Brazil Pissed

Brazil's government has expressed its "unhappiness" that no senior police officers involved in Jean Charles de Menezes's shooting will be disciplined.

The Brazilian electrician was shot dead in 2005 by police who mistook him for a terrorist after the London bombings.

The independent police watchdog had cleared 11 of the 15 officers involved, and has now ruled the other four senior officers will face no further action.more

On This Day December 23rd

.





Massive earthquake in Nicaragua. Rostbifs and Frogs leave Suez. Axeman leaves British Rail and other.



These flamboyant little rascals have been sat in a folder for an age and have never seen the light of day, consider them Chrissy decorations for the blog, rebbit, humbug.

McCann Christmas Appeal : Please!

.


Shameless fuckers.

View this nauseating spectacle, if you have the stomach, after you have read an even more nauseating piece of "Journalism" in an equally nauseating sycophantic rag, the Daily Wail.


But despair not there are those that take a more realistic view of the situation.

The REAL Madeleine McCann Story by SPUDGUN

I came across these on my travels, very professional, put my efforts to shame.

Bliar Plays His Jesus Card

.
Blair joins boy buggery club, might as well he's buggered most everything else.

Former Prime Minister Tony Blair has left the Anglican Church to become a Roman Catholic.

His wife and children are already Catholic and there had been speculation he would convert after leaving office.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor, who led the service to welcome Mr Blair, said he was "very glad" to do so. more

OnThis Day December 22nd

.




Andes air crash, survivors rescued after two months, tasty. Ted Heath gets a bomb. Madonna gets wed and other

Romney You're Such A Whore

.
In all my years and of all the politicians that I have witnessed leaving a silvery trail behind them, I have to say Romney takes the biscuit.


In the few short months since he began his campaign I have never seen such a lying, flip flopping, fawning panderer as this son of a bitch.

There are no depths this bugger won't sink to for the sake of a few votes, what a slimey whore.

~ ~ ~

Earlier this month, in a speech defending the racist, uhm, quirks of his proud but secret religion, Mitt Romney declared:

"I saw my father march with Martin Luther King."

So, well, that's that. Except, according to a report in the Boston Phoenix, it turns out that depends on what your definition of "saw" is. And "march." And "with." And "Martin Luther King."

Because it never happened.

"A spokesperson for Mitt Romney now tells the Phoenix that George W. Romney and Martin Luther King Jr. marched together in June, 1963 -- although possibly not on the same day or in the same city."

... Romney spokesperson Eric Fehrnstrom suggests that these two were part of the same "series" of events, co-sponsored by King and the NAACP, and is thus consistent with Romney's claim that 'I saw my father march with Martin Luther King.'"

Mitt, Fehrnstrom explains, was speaking "figuratively." no kidding

Here's an update from the Concord Monitor.

Romney should not be the next president

If you were building a Republican presidential candidate from a kit, imagine what pieces you might use: an athletic build, ramrod posture, Reaganesque hair, a charismatic speaking style and a crisp dark suit. You'd add a beautiful wife and family, a wildly successful business career and just enough executive government experience. You'd pour in some old GOP bromides - spending cuts and lower taxes - plus some new positions for 2008: anti-immigrant rhetoric and a focus on faith.

Add it all up and you get Mitt Romney, a disquieting figure who sure looks like the next president and most surely must be stopped. more

Nasty Nips Won't Target Humbacks (For Now)

'



I'm far from being xenophobic but I could make an exception for these pricks.

A controversial Japanese mission to hunt humpback whales in the Antarctic has been temporarily abandoned, a top government official says.

Nobutaka Machimura said the humpback hunt would not go ahead - although the fleet will still hunt about 1,000 other whales in the area.

The BBC's Chris Hogg, in Tokyo, says Japan is now unlikely to chase the humpbacks for at least a year.

The move comes after pressure from the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

Japan is regularly condemned for its annual whaling missions.more

I will be posting this daily, or otherwise.

The BBC's Jonah Fisher is on a Greenpeace ship tracking the Japanese whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean. You can follow his travels for the next two months on the Ten O'clock News, and in this diary.

The McCann FSS Christmas Sale

'
Many thanks to internet poster "Swannie" for this clever and funny compilation.

HURRY, HURRY, HURRY! LAST FEW DAYS OF ‘THE ‘FSS CHRISTMAS SALE’.
New bargains added daily, so why not go along and make a gift selection from:

1 bag of clothing found at the airport (contents unspecified)
1 box of tissues (never used)
1 blanket (never used)
1 pair of Tanner’s spectacles (never used)
1 pair of luminous ‘Eyehore’ pyjamas (can be seen from 120m away)
1 camera (faulty timing device)
1 ‘Photoshop’ (perfect working order)
1 tape measure (automatically reduces all measurements by half)
1 phrase book (contains only 3 words – ‘ludicrous’, ‘hurtful’, ‘unhelpful’)
1 pad of ‘40 Quiz Night Questions’ (only two answers completed on 9 of the sheets)
1 Bible (just 2 pages marked)
1 Diary (only half the pages missing)
1 bottle of perfume (‘The Scent of Death’)
1 ‘Bedtime Star Chart’ (unfortunately starless)
1 child’s hair bead (all hair very, very, very carefully removed)
2 ‘Cuddle Cats’ (1 old called ‘CC’, 1 new called anything but ‘Mohammed’)
1 ton of Madeleine’s favourite cuddly toy (Auntie Phil)
1 butterfly (a ‘Red Amarel’)
1 barn owl (sorry, that’s a catalogue misprint and should read ‘barn towel’)
1 nanny (ideal for the kids)
1 scapegoat (ideal for the nanny)
500 red herrings (all overcooked)
1 bag of rotting meat (well, turkeys may be scarce this Christmas)
1 bag of dirty nappies (NOT leak proof ‘Pampers’)
50 drums of ‘Calpol’ (perfect for a quiet Christmas)
50 spare drums of cleaning fluid (works on everything but stains on character)
1 washing machine (worn out)
1 ‘Orange’ mobile phone (right out of juice)
1 window shutter (as new)
1 fridge (two cold frosty owners)
500 matching sets of his/her co-ordinated outfits (only sold as sets – no divorced items)
2 doctors’ white coats (hardly worn)
1 complete SAS outfit (could be exchanged for 1 ‘Action Man’ figure)
1 damaged Achilles tendon (perfect for the vulnerable)
1 well used tennis racket (no good for ‘serving time’)
100,000,000,000 wrist bands (could be exchanged for 2 pairs of handcuffs)
NB 1 forensic manual ‘Leaving No Stone Unturned’ (sorry, item no longer available - stolen by someone in the FSS)

SO WHY NOT HURRY ALONG NOW TO THE ‘FSS CAR BOOT SOIL’.
(All items going cheap – except for Cuddle Cat which goes ‘meow’)

Caption This

.


It has just struck me that there will be those among you that might not be aware that the major elements of the graphic are from Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Creationists Planning To Spread Their Nonsense To England?

.

And in my home county to boot! Build away, it will be bankrupt in twelve months.

I suppose only someone that believes in creation could believe his own words when he comes out with such drivel as this.

'It will be a halfway house for youngsters,' Jones said. 'Today all they do is binge drink. We will be able to offer them an alternative.'

Yep I can see it now, all the little tossers and toerags giving up the hooch, the dope, and the shagging, to go along to get a basin full of creationism, what a bleeding dreamer.

The latest salvo in creationism's increasingly ferocious battle with evolution is about to be fired in Lancashire. Not in a fiery sermon preached from the pulpit, but in the form of a giant Christian theme park that will champion the book of Genesis and make a multi-media case that God created the world in seven days.

The AH Trust, a charity set up last year by a group of businessmen alarmed by the direction in which they see society heading, has identified a number of potential sites in the north west of England to build the £3.5m Christian theme park.

The trust claims it already has a number of rich backers who are keen to invest in the project, which will boast two interactive cinemas, a cafeteria, six shops and a television recording studio, allowing it to produce its own Christian-themed films and documentaries. more

h/t Chris Americablog

On This Day December 21st

.





Bombed jumbo crashes on to Lockerbie. Brits to buy Polaris. DeGaulle elected. and other

Pre-Teen Brides and Child Labour: Unicef Photo's of The Year

,

The United Nation's Children's Fund recognized a handful of photographers with honors in their annual Photo of the Year contest. From Afghanistan to the Phillipines, their work exposes horrid conditions facing some of the world's children.

The image is startling -- a 40-year-old groom sitting beside his 11-year-old future bride. Photographer Stephanie Sinclair, who took the photo last year in Afghanistan, asked the pre-teenage bride what she felt on the day of her engagement.

"Nothing," said the girl, according to Sinclair. "I do not know this man. What am I supposed to feel?"more

h/t Anorak

Bomb After Bomb: Howard Zinn

.
I will say this without preamble. There is nothing noble or honourable about "our brave troops," they are nothing more than the killing machine of the government.

They would, if ordered, kill you and me, just as readily as in the past they have killed millions of other civilians and that does not make them brave troops, it makes them a very scary bunch of mercenaries dressed up in a uniform.

This then from the middle of the article by Howard Zinn, which goes someway to endorse my feelings.

Patriotism is defined as obedience to government, obscuring the difference between the government and the people. Thus, soldiers are led to believe that "we are fighting for our country" when in fact they are fighting for the government - an artificial entity different from the people of the country - and indeed are following policies dangerous to its own people.

And some of the rest.

I am stunned by the thought that we, the "civilized" nations, have bombed cities and countrysides and islands for a hundred years. Yet, here in the United States, which is responsible for most of that, the public, as was true of me, does not understand--I mean really understand--what bombs do to people. That failure of imagination, I believe, is critical to explaining why we still have wars, why we accept bombing as a common accompaniment to our foreign policies, without horror or disgust........


We might think that at least those individuals in the U.S. Air Force who dropped bombs on civilian populations were aware of what terror they were inflicting, but as one of those I can testify that this is not so. Bombing from five miles high, I and my fellow crew members could not see what was happening on the ground. We could not hear screams or see blood, could not see torn bodies, crushed limbs. Is it any wonder we see fliers going out on mission after mission, apparently unmoved by thoughts of what they have wrought.more

A Fruit Pickers Lot Is Not A Happy One

.
Three Florida fruit-pickers, held captive and brutalised by their employer for more than a year, finally broke free of their bonds by punching their way through the ventilator hatch of the van in which they were imprisoned. Once outside, they dashed for freedom.

When they found sanctuary one recent Sunday morning, all bore the marks of heavy beatings to the head and body. One of the pickers had a nasty, untreated knife wound on his arm. Police would learn later that another man had his hands chained behind his back every night to prevent him escaping, leaving his wrists swollen.

The migrants were not only forced to work in sub-human conditions but mistreated and forced into debt. They were locked up at night and had to pay for sub-standard food. If they took a shower with a garden hose or bucket, it cost them $5.

Their story of slavery and abuse in the fruit fields of sub-tropical Florida threatens to lift the lid on some appalling human rights abuses in America today.more

Max Blumenthal: The Conservative Persecution Hoax Exposed

.
This was an interesting enough little read even for me on this side of the pond, it should be more so then for my American readers.

I have to admit to being a fan of Max Blumenthal ever since I viewed his much watch video report on the batshit crazies of the Christians United For Israel in his short film "Rapture Ready"
Previous article with link here or direct link to video here. If you haven't previously watched please do and give yourself a "Cor Blimey" experience for a few minutes.

Or a somewhat less of an experience but still very watchable "Theocracy Now" article and link, or link only.

~ ~ ~

With President George W. Bush only a year away from departing the White House and the Republican succession in turmoil some of the most prominent conservative intellectuals and activists have gathered together for one last great crusade. Movement icons from Robby George of Princeton to Harvey Mansfield of Harvard, from David Horowitz to Brit Hume, raised howls of persecution when they learned that two masked men allegedly attacked a conservative Princeton University student. They insisted that the right-wing acolyte was beaten up "for his conservative views," as Horowitz put it. And they accused Princeton of failing to protect conservatives and upholding a hypocritical liberal double standard. Unfortunately, as I have reported for the Nation, the trumpeted cause collapsed when the victim turned out to be a hoaxer. more

On This Day December 20th

.



Penlee lifeboat disaster. (video) Spanish PM assassinated. US ousts Noriega. Betty tells Chuck and Di to call it a day. and other.