The State of the Railway

Many a reader of The Idle Spectator has contacted this magazine with correspondence that, were it relayed in person, would be accompanied by gesticulations of the wildest variety. The subject of these missives, while usually varied and diverse, a carpet-bombing of reactionary prose reminiscent of Any Answers on the BBC’s home service, has been, above all else in recent weeks, the railway system of this fine kingdom and the indignation many readers feel at paying vast amounts of beer tokens for a service that is frequently late, uncomfortable and above all else, not even adequately divided on class terms.

TIS shares in this indignation, but we also detect the stench of corruption that makes the decidedly Freudian image of a train going into a tunnel seem all too appropriate. The source of this stench, National Express. Most rail companies have the decency to absorb a little lost here and there, it provides a decent excuse to hike up fares, but that provider saw fit to, when the bloated pigs of its board realised their trough was empty, saw fit to run away from their contractual obligation and jam their fat asses back onto their coaches. Pigs and Asses, national express is a veritable farm yard of ill management.

Of course, this does highlight a deep rooted problem with the public/private system, in which losses are passed on to the taxpayer and profits to shareholders, but this is a capitalist system in which we live and thus, if someone’s pockets are being lined, then all is probably fine.

At this point, it would be usual for The Idle Spectator to offer an outlandish solution to such a problem, as we did with our answer to the economic crisis some months ago. However, as that would be far too much like hard work, we instead posit a simple question; while do public services need to make a profit?

While this may indeed sound like leftism of the lowest order, and would seem to have a simple answer in that they need to run, it does trouble the minds here at TIS. After all, the railway service is just that, a service, it exists to transport large numbers of people from one point to another, though admittedly born out of a desire to make money, but have we not moved on from the Victorian era, or are we still doing things in exactly the same way?

Perhaps the answer is not a (urgh) root-and-branch review of the franchise system, but instead to use an entirely different tree. Perhaps making the entire system free, with an appropriate rise in taxes. This may be an unpopular move in the short term, but the long term benefits would be vast. There, Mr. Brown, is your legacy. That and the death of democracy.

Of course, all this does sound strangely French. If that be the case, what can we say but vive la France.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

The Truth About Vegetarian Meat Suppliments, Exposed.

The Idle Spectator would like to issue yet another apology for a prolonged absence from electronic print, it appears that while time does not actually fly, it can get away from one when other concerns take precedent over that which is is business here at this esteemed journal. The reasoning this time was not due to an ongoing legal process, but simply because all of our key members of staff were involved in  a exercise of investigative journalism that will now, if you will permit us, be revealed below.

Over the last twenty or so years there has been a slow but distinct rise in the number of those among the populace that choose not to eat the flesh of beasts, some call these people vegetarians. While TIS has nothing against these people per se we do hope that this article will give them pause for thought next time they are poised above a plate of Quorn or Soya, slavering with anticipation, for we can now reveal that those products are not as friendly to either the environment or the animals of the world as they might have us believe.

Let us take first Soya. The common conception is that this product originates from some kind of bean of the Orient, a similar etymology to the Soy sauce that is popular in the cuisine of that part of the world. Our interest piqued, TIS dispatched an investigative team to that part of the world to track down a supplier of such beans. After an extensive period of investigation, centred largely around the opium dens of Shanghai, our man found someone willing to talk, at great risk to his own neck, about the true origins of Soya.

Firstly, our correspondent, who asked to remain anonymous, asked if the product did come from the beans, to which our informant replied, ‘the sauce, that comes from the beans, sure… but the other stuff, the stuff people eat… you don’t want to know where that comes from.’ Our intrepid correspondent pressed that source from more information, but all he gained was the cryptic message, ‘look west’, and the address of a warehouse.

A few days later, having tracked an incoming Soya shipment back to its source, our man found himself in the back of a truck, heading along the ancient silk roads to eventually, the Ukraine, specifically, Chernobyl.

Our man was in a pig farm far inside the zone of exclusion and in this dark, desolate corner of the world the truth was learnt, Soya comes not from beans, but is, in fact, irradiated pork. Here at TIS we had long suspected something was up with such a product, but to have the sickening truth exposed in such a way was beyond our wildest nightmares. The Food Miles that product undergoes our, frankly, outrageous and as such, boycotting is the only viable course.

Running parallel to this investigation was another into the true origins of Quorn, However, the truth behind this product is so sickening, so vile, that it can hardly be discussed in good conscience. But it is our duty to do so, and we can now reveal that Quorn is not, in fact, people, as was the common belief in our offices, but made from protein rich Fungi. There is only one word to describe this, and that word is EW. I mean, really, what’s wrong with a good steak?

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

Proliferation Problems, or a rant on a number of subjects, some related.

As promised, normal service is resumed, thanks to the mercifully slow legal system of this fine Kingdom of ours. As such, The Idle Spectator seeks to return to what might be called its grass roots, after months of conjectural articles on a variety of subjects which an impending legal process may or may not prove to have been slanderous, an editorial decision has been made in the highest of offices that this august journal return to its former raison d’etre, that of conjectural articles about politics.

It falls to TIS then to write upon that most light and fluffy of subjects, nuclear arms proliferation. The reason such a ephemeral and transient of subjects was chosen was because of the recent news that the comedy Bond villain state of North Korea recently claimed to have conducted its second successful test of such weapons to much finger wagging from the international community. Whether or not Mr. Jong Il in fact intends to hold the world to ransom remains to be seen.

With recent moves by the similarly cartoonishly evil Mr. Ahmadinejad of the Persian territories towards a similar end as well as the barbarians at the gate of the nuclear armed state of Pakistan, the threat of swift and merciful obliteration in the form of a fiery apocalypse (or a slow death from radiation poisoning for those less fortunate) is as close now as it was at any point in the cold war.

To top all this off, as if emergent nuclear powers were not enough, the great old enemy of the last sixty years has once more begun to rattle its sabre, the big red bear has awoken from hibernation in the time of an economic crisis so severe it might just lead to that third world war we’ve all been looking forward too. This might seem like something of a leaping assumption, the very weapons that have been becoming dangerously profligate of late are what prevents such a version of world politics, Putin will not pull a Mussolini and invade Abyssinia because of the threat of the bomb. Also it would be a logistical nightmare.

Or would he, perhaps nuclear proliferation, everyone possessing the power to destroy everyone else allows a man like Putin, who like the aforementioned, could come straight from the pages of Flemming, the leeway to do whatsoever he pleases, as his excursion to Georgia last year can be seen to demonstrate.

Had the on-line edition of this magazine been published at that time, then the astute reader would no doubt have picked up on a certain anti-Russian sentiment at that time, with articles published such as the classic Cossack Dogs Push on Georgia, Stupid Americans pack up trailer and head for Mexico, before reaching border and being told its a different Georgia that is being invaded. The headline writer was fired shortly thereafter. Nonetheless, that sentiment still exists here, and those in the corridors of power would do well to note our sage advice to never trust that dirty Cossack for a second, to never turn the cheek as we did last year and to answer action with action, rather than words.

This magazine does not advocate war as a positive choice, but it is occasionally a necessary one, as a tool of foreign policy the strategic deployment of troops is an underrated tool, certainly such a situation could easily spiral out of control and lead to a conflict the like of which the world has never known, a conflict that, had American troops engaged the Russians in Georgia, we could easily be in the midst of right now. However, the threat of action partnered with a demonstration of a willingness to engage in that action when necessary, would be a more effective tool of foreign policy than any economic sanction ever could be.

Come to think of it, that does sound like an avocation of war. So be it. War is hell, we recognise this, but suffering is the natural state of things, all forms of life are in conflict and this is a Nihilistic philosophical debate that will likely be picked up at a later date if I get that kind of depressed drunk that allows me to lucidly discuss such matters. If you would allow The Idle Spectator, we will put it this way, we do not think war is a good thing, just sometimes, more often than perhaps we may want to think, a necessary one.

Back to the matter at hand, the impending apocalypse. The threat of such obliteration comes not just from nuclear armed states, as if that weren’t threat enough, but also from groups of people that might actually be stupid enough to use such a weapon on a city like London. The kind of slavering maniac that we have been trying to figure out how to fight since Viet Nam.

Strength of arms failed, diplomacy never stood a chance, assassinations just replace one slavering maniac with another, letting them fight it out didn’t quite pan out, nor did letting them have a bit of land, letting them be crushed under an iron fist works for a while but people seem to object to that for some reason. TIS has no answers, other than to point out that blind passivity is no more efficacious than terrorism, objecting to further military action because of the failure of past operations jeopardised the security of our own nations as well as the lives very people who need our help the most.

If Iraq had not been such a monumental clusterfuck, which it would not have been if it had been fought rather than managed, then the American war machine could have been put to good use in Rwanda, or against the Lord’s Resistance Army, saving lives, albeit by killing those who would threaten the innocent, a step that is in the eyes of this diatribe, acceptable.

If you are really lucky the opinions of this journal on the situation in Africa, as well as Cossack imperialism, will be revisited along with nihilism at a later date.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

A Date Most Notable

On this most midweek of days The Idle Spectator has (almost) reached a milestone. In the four months that the electronic edition has been published we have covered many subjects, from the trivial to the sincere, the political to the meteorological, the big to the small, the.. well, that is all. But it is upon this day the this most august of journals received its one-hundredth ‘hit’. If this is not progress, the The Idle Spectator does not care to know what is.

While this is clearly a good thing, it does bring to mind mixed feelings for the staff here, as it can be seen to be something of the end of an era, the era of double figures, as it shall be called in the annals of this magazine’s history. While the period was marred by corruption, greed, fraud, thievery, large scale post-it note theft and criminal miss management of the firm’s assets, it shall always be remembered as a more innocent time, when investigative journalists plied their trade it these halls under the delusion that they were making a difference and when editors did not feel their hands were tied by advertising revenues.

Mayhap this is also a moment of hope, when you, dear reader can look at this magazine and know that we are not bound by advertising revenue to print asinine crap, nor, by a curios legal loophole, are our hands tied by draconian slander legislation. As such TIS strides forward into this new era with a renewed sense of hope and purpose, at least until the next set of bills arrive.

Speaking of bills arriving, it appears that, like the hangman’s noose, the aforementioned legal loophole seems to be tightening around the neck of The Idle Spectator and the figurative wolves of the oppression of the press are here! The barbarians that would seek to choke the voice of humanity are at the gate! The boot is stomping on the human face for eternity! The coppers are in the building!

Barry! Barry! I told you not to open the bloody door Barry! Well its too bloody late now, Barry! Look, just start chucking computers out the window… Then shred these files. And burn the shredder when you’re done.

Ahem. Normal service will be resumed in due course.

You’ll never take me alive coppa!

What do you mean ‘why am I still typing?’…

Humph and the Ingratitude of Man

The Idle Spectator has been remiss. During the period of our recent absence and even during the retrospective upon that period The Idle Spectator missed one of the most important dates of the year. Indeed, this date went unmarked by the vast majority of people, however at his magazine we attest that it should not have been so ignored.

The date of which we speak is the first anniversary of the death of one Mr. Humphrey Lyttleton. This may seem unremarkable, the man was old, and old people do die, but for the first anniversary of such a great man’s death to be ignored is in the eyes of this magazine an utter abhorrence in which our ignorant complicity brings shame of the highest order to our both persons and our reputation as a journal for which the words ‘honour’ and ‘respect’ are supposed to mean something.

It could be argued, of course, that the late lamented Mr. Lyttleton was not famous enough for the first anniversary of the event of his demise to to be marked by the kind of media coverage that will inevitably go to both Ms Goody’s posthumous book sales in twelve months, but such a view is typical of the sickening ingratitude to be seen how the modern media works, how contemporary culture is influenced and controlled by the sort of latte drinking scum that refuse to recognise the death of such a great man to be an event that warrants more coverage than is afforded to talentless nobodies that pervade our screens. Humph did something. This is a man who as a 2nd Lieutenant in his early twenties came ashore at Salerno with a pistol in one hand and a trumpet in the other.

Here we come to the crux of the issue. Mr. Lyttleton was apart of the generation who fought and died in the second world war, the ‘greatest generation’, those to whom we owe no less than the very freedom that is presently crashing down around our oblivious ears, those who fought in and lived through the most destructive conflict ever fought and may very well have never spoken about what they saw in those years ever again. Those who are presently dying steadily and unremembered in anything but a few lines of obituary.

To this journal the unmarked first anniversary of the death of Mr. Lyttleton represents the failure of this present generation to recognise and show gratitude for the actions of the greatest generation on a daily basis, certainly yearly remembrance ceremonies are apt and tasteful, but the focus of such events is upon those who fell in conflict, less so upon those who survived and achieved a great many other things with their lives. Thus The Idle Spectator would like to give thanks, even if doing so is all too inadequate, it is at least a start, to men like Humphrey Lyttleton, Spike Milligan, and thousands of others like them who lived the unsung lives of normal men who once defended our freedom. Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, thank you. And to those who still live, such as the venerable Mr. Alan Whicker, thank you too, and keep up the good work.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

May 4th be with you.

It is upon this most Star Wars of days that The Idle Spectator has seen fit to return to the field of online publishing after an absence of the better part of two months. Those whose enjoyment of this journal is limited to the electronic edition should not feel left out however, as the paper version has not been published for most of that period either, due to a minor mishap in which the entire staff has been locked out of the office for most of that period. As such, for only the thirteenth time since its inception has publication of this magazine been suspended. As is clear now, however, the presses do run once more and the loins of many a litigious attorney have been duly girded.

It is a tradition here at TIS to examine how what has been reported has been reported. During the period covered by our recent hiatus there has been more than a little fodder for that particular cannon. Mayhap it would please the reader for a retrospective of the last couple of months, in order to make up for our unfortunate absence. Please bear in mind however, that this is not ’silly season’, the period covered by the summer break our hard working members of the house come to deserve every year, during which the media grab at any straw of a story in the hope of filling those long dark hours of rolling coverage.

Firstly, the canine American known as Bo Obama. ITS A DOG. Admittedly, the ‘first dog’ of the United States of Whatever, but a dog nonetheless. Perspective is needed here, this is not just any dog, but rather the dog of the first black president of the US of A, history’s eyes are upon this dog, its behaviour will be a model for the dogs of America today and the dogs of America’s future.Why should the media concern itself with such trivialities like the second great depression when Mr. Obama’s choice of pet is clearly such a pressing issue.

This brings us neatly on to another issue, since last TIS was published the economic crisis has deepened and as such, we would like to refer you readers to an earlier article, encouraging a hole digging based economic recovery plan, the validity of which we still stand by. Indeed it is gratifying to see that the highest echelons of government have taken this advice to heart, promising that any job seeker that fails to gain employment after a year will simply be given a job in the.. erm.. jobcentre.

Thirdly, Swine Flu, influenza H1N1, a strain of viril infection that is capable of spreading from human to human, which the world health organisation is almost (at the time of publishing) preparing to designate as at the highest level of pandemic. In light of these events we encourage our readers to begin panic buying as soon as possible, buy up bread, and the ingredients needed to make bread, as well as canned food, bottled water, C-rations, sandbags, fill your bathtub with water as you don’t know how long an uncontaminated supply will last, fill up your tank and several jerry cans with petrol, but do all this quitely, or your neighbours will become aware and covet your supplies when the end comes. For you cannot trust them and the end is coming.

With global panic thus encouraged this edition of The Idle Spectator’s editorial missive must come to a close, with the promise of a return to more regular publication, unless SOMEONE loses the keys again.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

For your consideration,

Here at the Idle Spectator we are not solely concerned with matters related to the fields of politics and the media, we also have a long and varied record of patronising the arts. As such, here follows the first it what may very well become a series of vaguely New Formalist sort-of sonnets by a young writer who concerns himself with matters far above his station.

If only the young could write Poetry,

But they know nothing of Philosophy.

To write, to write, write right into a fall,

To yearn, to love to know that is all.

Ghost of the known unknown lighting the day

Why live living just gets in the way.

Even art from art sake must speak the truth

Truth is subjective but aye so is youth.

To live a little than draw pen from air

Experiment begets sentiment

In a way introspection could never.

Better to leap shake off the firmament

For to leap shows more than looking could ever.

Can innocence experience be,

When the truth is lost, even to me?

The lack of punctuation in this verse betrays a certain pretention on the part of the author, but TIS is not here to critique, that is the purview of our readers.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

The Quail Revolution

The Idle Spectator can see a storm brewing. Monday the 23rd of February saw the Manchester Guardian publish a front page headline expressing concern over the potential for a summer of unrest given the possibility for the mobilisation of the jobless middle classes, in light of the recent economic unrest, in a manner which, had they jobs, would previously have been anathema.

In light of this TIS was driven to dispatch a less valued member of our staff to the streets, in this case a work experience peon known only as Tea-boy. His task was simple, to find a member of this so called middle class and find out their views in regard to potentially violent civil unrest in the near future of this country. He did so, finding one who would only identify himself as Sainsbury McWaitrose, the self appointed ‘voice of the middle class’. When questioned as to the prospects of civil unrest, Mr. Waitrose replied on no uncertain terms, promising, “there will be fighting on the streets, brother! We shall mobilise, we shall be heard, we shall not be ignored any longer! We may have lost our jobs but we have not lost our middle class outrage!”

Since turning in this transcript Tea-boy has not been heard from, and we have assumed he has been subsumed into the growing underground of footsoldiers of the coming revolution. Or he locked himself in the supply cupboard again. Last time he was in there for a week, surviving off of post-it notes.

Regardless, there is a distinct possibility of violent protest this summer, the promise of a G20 meeting in London assured that anyway, but the Idle Spectator must wonder what this means for the present government. Even the possibility of such protest surely suggests one thing and one thing alone, that the climate of fear created by the omnipresent threat of terrorism, that which has given cause for our glorious leaders to put a CCTV camera outside your (yes your) window, and call for every inhabitant of this state to carry seven forms of identification at all times and have a bar code tattooed on their forehead, has passed.

The threat of civil unrest on the streets of England goes to show that we are no longer afraid of what our government tells us to be afraid of. Perhaps it is indeed time they were afraid of us once again. Perhaps not. In all honesty, when the cry goes up, ‘There is no quail in Waitrose!’ and the middle classes take to the streets, we are not at all sure where we will stand.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.

The Snowman Cometh

It may very well have come to the attention of the readers of this publication that there has recently be a certain level of snowfall upon these fair isles. This can be seen to be a fairly newsworthy occurrence, it has, after all, been some eighteen years since last snowfall of this magnitude was recorded. As such the powers that be at the Idle Spectator felt that a comment upon these affairs by one of our lead writers was not just warranted, but necessary. Unfortunately they were all unavailable, adverse weather conditions foiling their attempts to reach our Pall Mall headquarters or the emergency outpost set up in the early hours of Monday morning in Fitzrovia.

This is understandable, there is a lot of snow. The trains have ground to a half, not because of any problems with the tracks (the Victorian engineers had half a braincell between them), but rather because the useless tin boxes those who man the locomotives travel to work in largely cease to function at three Celsius. The entire road network of the United Kingdom has vanished completely. Workmen interviewed by TIS swore that they ‘left it right here Friday, guv, some blighter must’ve ‘ad it away’. When our intrepid man in the field scraped away the inch of snow to reveal tarmac the workman eluded further questioning by claiming to be on a tea break. Finally those most Ariel of gateways to the kingdom have been shut down completely, which might have placed additional pressure on the seaports, but fortunately no one from South East rail showed up to work, preventing any air passengers from rushing the port of Dover.

Of course, should one choose to look past the dozen or so pages of coverage granted to a comparatively low level of snowfall in every major broadsheet, mayhap one could stumble across a passing byline regarding the wildcat strikes in the country’s oil refineries. Perhaps this is because this is a much more contentious issue to cover than tales of London bobbies throwing snowballs at each other. Pulling together, blitz spirit in the face of adverse weather, this is the England that sells papers. An England of striking oilmen does not. We do not strike. We are not French.

Perhaps we here at the Idle Spectator are wrong, perhaps the snow is more important that the strikes. After all, if the striking workers cannot make it to the picket line, what importance does the strike have? Perhaps, this is a matter that has been entirely blown out of proportion. It has after all, been snowing and that is what matters above all else. The price of petrol may once again rise leading to the rest of the working classes getting bolshie and joining their brother oil refiners or the price of fuel may rise to the point that the aged may be unable to open the threatening letters from their energy providers, but what really matters is that it has been snowing.

Yours, The Idle Spectator

A Modest Proposal

Sirs,

Herein the Idle Spectator seeks to suggest a most modest of proposals for the consideration of our glorious leaders that will, we believe, alleviate if not completely nullify the present pressures upon the British Economy.

Simply put the chief problem of the matter is that there a great number of unemployed members of various strata of society that place a drug upon the economy. People are unemployed, less money is made, less money is spent and more people become unemployed. Such is the way of economies and such will continue to be the way until someone actually stands up and does something.

What we here and TIS suggest is that the unemployed (and probably unwashed) masses are divided into two separate and distinct groups. These divisions should be entirely random to ensure a good spread of individuals of every level of skill in each.

Members of the first group should be told to gather in one place on one day, possibly not on a national level, perhaps subdivided by councils or constituencies. Once gathered, members of group the first shall be given spades, thoroughly briefed in the use of such spades to prevent any form of litigation, and taken to a field. Once in said field the members of this diverse group should be instructed to dig a whole. And dig they shall, for 12 hours, with an hour for the taking of vittels. For this work they shall be paid a fair wage, of £5 sterling per hour. Once the twelve hours are complete the spades will be regathered by the administrators of the project and members of the group will be informed they have the following day off.

On the following day, while the first group is sleeping off the first hard day’s work of their lives, the second group should be gathered in the same location as the first was on the previous day. Once their they too shall be thoroughly briefed in the use of spades, again to prevent any litigious members of the congregation from getting any ideas, and taken to the same location that group the first was on the previous day. Once there they shall set about filling in the hole dug by that first group, they shall be paid the same amount and work the same hours. In the unlikely event they fill in the hole, they should begin digging again and the positions of the groups reversed, in fact this would be favourable, leading to a large number of “multi-skilled” individuals on the job market.

Once the hole-digging project is in full swing and a large number of low income household are frittering away money again, more jobs will be created by the financial stimulus this puts into the economy.

TIS thanks you for your unending gratitude, for we have just solved the ‘credit crunch’ for considerably less than the cost of propping up a bank with financial balsa wood.

Yours, The Idle Spectator.