What would happen if it was perfectly legal for Britain’s largest corporations to hire out the police force to investigate their own problems and grievances? It seems we might get an answer to that question sooner rather than we thought. Critics of the Met were dismayed yesterday, at the news that Virgin authorised a £5,060 overtime bill for the police to investigate claims that members of the public were using illegal means to watch free channels. No one is trivialising the importance of detecting fraud and eliminating clearly illegal practices, but quite frankly isn’t there something better the police could be doing?

Apparently it seems not. Fraud investigators rarely deal with the more headline-worthy crimes such as assault or murder, and it seems that Virgin’s payment actually came after the body of the investigation had been done. No harm, no foul, so why the outcry? Well, clearly one of the convicted men, Mr Munaf Zinga, felt aggrieved enough to  launch an appeal based on the claim that police only investigated the case on Virgin’s payout incentive, but the judge quickly threw it out citing the lack of evidence of any deal struck prior to the arrest. Since no deal was made before the police raid it puts the Met and Virgin in the clear, as Virgin were simply paying the police to continue to work on the investigation. According to the Police Act 1996 there is nothing illegal about this practice, although it has raised the issue of just how much influence can be bought at the Met.

Mr Zinga can rest assured, however, that in his case nothing underhand or illegal went on, it was just a case of Mr Branson wanting justice like the rest of us; except he wants it quicker and has the means to pay for it.

hippo86:

“IS TEST CRICKET DEAD?”

A close-up of a South African newspaper, neither commentator speaks. The shot switches to a panoramic view of the glorious Wanderers, Johannesburg. Scarcely a soul; a lurid vision. Eerie laughter and sepulchral echoes soundtrack a discussion on light meters that “the…

I’ll never know how my great-uncle died. I’ll never know what day he died, or what hell he was going through at the time. I’ll never know if he suffered or whether he was scared. I do hope I know why he died though, and I do hope I never forget.

My great-uncle David “Alfie” Bould was only 22 when he was killed while serving in the Kings Shropshire Light Infantry in Normandy during the most bloody phase of World War II. It was the summertime, and my great-grandmother was almost about to give birth to their daughter when she heard the news on August 11th 1944. The shock led to her going into labour soon after, and my great-auntie was born into a house still reeling from the news that her brother would never return.

It was Rememberance Day recently, the day we have designated to remember the fallen. Millions of soldiers died in the Second World War, and it is on this day every year we choose to remember their sacrifice, their ultimate sacrifice. We wear Poppies to remember them. The poppy image that we pin so proudly to our chest every November (or October if you work for the BBC or are in Parliament) comes from the battlefields of Flanders, where the blood, red poppy was the only thing that grew amongst the ravages of war.

But the poppy is more that just a tribute. More that just a silent, dignified nod of respect and approval of those who have fallen. It has become the closest thing Britain has to a national religion. I am convinced of this by the recent furore over  two issues. 1) The national team being “forbidden” by FIFA to wear them on their jersey’s in the recent friendly vs Spain and 2) The general outrage from the public over the rabble-rousing antics of attention seeking anti-government groups such as Islam4UK led by general publicity-hog Anjem Choudary. In a nutshell, FIFA disrespected the poppy and a muslim threatened to burn some.

Choudary is the type of muslim that moderate muslims despair at. Last year (2010) he whipped up a media storm (with the help of a frenzied Sky News team) when he announced he was going to led a protest march through Mecca*ahem sorry”, through Wotton Basset. Of course, he never did this, he was never going to, but merely suggesting it gained him the publicity he craved and the whole stunt worked to perfection.

Messages whizzed around facebook and twitter like a coked-up Hermes delivering warnings of 1) Muslim’s running riot, 2) “our country” being invaded, 3) Sharia law was all, but set to be imposed and 4) the United Arab Emirates of Basingstone was merely months away from being formed…

But of course, they are not, it is not, it isn’t and it probably isn’t….but the issue still enrages people like nothing else. I could walk into Boots, drop my trousers and start pissing on a Pudsey Bear and no one would bat an eyelid (might be an exaggeration..), but if I merely threatened to burn a poppy people would denounce me as a witch and almost definitely stop reading this blog.

One thing Mr Choudary would be wise to remember on Rememberance Day is that people like my Great-uncle died for many reasons. One of those reasons was to ensure the protection of our rights, our liberties, our freedoms. Freedoms against fascism, against totalitarism and against the horrifying threat of the Nazi’s. Freedom to be different, to be individual, to say what we want, to do what we want. If Mr Choudary wants to burn a poppy, then that is fine by me. Every time he does, he pays tribute to men like my Great-uncle, men far greater than many of us could ever hope to be.

_________________________________________________

http://radiohead.com/deadairspace/090805/Harry-Patch-In-Memory-Of

I am the only one that got through.
The others died where ever they fell.
It was an ambush.
They came up from all sides.
Give your leaders each a gun and then let them fight it out themselves.
I’ve seen devils coming up from the ground.
I’ve seen hell upon this earth.
The next will be chemical, but they will never learn.

Nels Cline may be the greatest active musician that you’ve never heard of. More on that later …

The point of this post is that I was at a show on Saturday night by Wilco, a band who I have been a fan of for many years. The gig was good, in fact very good.

For those of you not familiar with Wilco, they started life as the archetypal alt-country rockers. Made up of the remaining members of the genre defining Uncle Tupelo, their first albums were strong, but crossed little new ground. After this, they moved to a more experimental, progressive sound, and inadvertently became part of a story that reflects so much about the music industry.

Basically, Wilco made an album that would not necessarily appeal to their assumed fan base, as it was a departure from their old sound. The band had dared to be creative. The reaction of their label was to refuse to put the album out and to drop Wilco. As part of the deal Wilco gained the rights to their album. The album in question was Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, which is still generally seen as being their best album (amongst a very strong back catalogue) and is considered a classic by many good judges. Whilst this says a lot about the ruthlessly commercial attitude of the industry, the stupidity of it is also shown by the fact that the album became a success after it was bought from Wilco by an imprint of the label that the band had originally been signed with, and who had paid for its production. The label had therefore effectively paid for the album twice.

Wilco have continued to push at the boundaries since then producing a series of strong albums, the latest of which, The Whole Love, is possibly the best of all. The show on Saturday was a fine showcase of all they have achieved, featuring as it did tunes from throughout their 17 years together. Frontman Jeff Tweedy is a charismatic leader, and there is no doubt that he is the creative force behind the band. However, and this has been the case every time I’ve seen Wilco, it was lead guitarist Nels Cline that stole the show.

No-one plays the guitar like Cline. Undoubtedly the highlight of the show for me was the extended instrumental sections on tracks such as ‘At least that’s what you said’ and ‘Impossible Germany’. These 3/4 minute instrumentals that crop up somewhat unexpectedly on each Wilco album have become a trademark, and it is the guitar of Cline that makes it work. Wilco simply would not have the distinctive sound that they have managed to cultivate without Nels Cline, indeed it is hard to imagine the band without him. Its fair to say that without Tweedy there would be no band, but without Cline it just would not be the same.

Cline joined Wilco in 2004, and whilst it is difficult for an outsider to judge his influence accurately, the fact that this spell has seen the most varied and creative period in the band’s history feels as if it might be more than mere coincidence.

Cline’s playing has a raw yet almost mesmeric quality to it that I have never seen before. There are few instruments that I would rather stand and listen to someone playing than an electric guitar, and I can think of no guitarist around right now that I would rather watch perform than Cline.

So, whilst your friends might not be particularly impressed when you see them that you have just seen Nels Cline play live, you should go and do it. You will have seen a master at work, and man who in his own small way has made a lasting impact on musical history.

So … this is the first post (hopefully of many) in what is already being described as ‘(sigh) another blog’. The result of a night in the pub where two ‘lads’ decided that they had a lot to say that people should want to listen to, or, more practically given the nature of a blog, read.

Please be advised that despite the title of the blog, neither of the two of us (or any of the number of extra voices we are trying to recruit) are fervently anti smoking. Indeed, we are considering starting on the fags in order to give us a more reliable position on the whole ‘blogs v. smoking’ debate that seems to have captured the nation’s attention so surprisingly over the last few weeks’.

In fact the truth is that this blog will have nothing to do with cigarettes, its title merely being a weak and obscure literary pun that only the most talented Waterstones employee would ever conceive/appreciate (which we have now found out, much to our disgust, has been done before as far back as 2009). The aim is simply to give two young men the chance to air their views on a range of subjects which will have no common theme, and potentially very little value.

So, please check in on us from time to time as we share our experiences on life, the city, work, music, darts, Chris Tarrant and a myriad of other subjects either too dull or too extreme to be tackled by the mainstream media (obviously a lot of stuff in between those two positions will also be discussed).

Jon