UK Current Affairs

How Not To Sing The National Anthem

Samuel Hooper3 Comments

It finally happened. For the first time in over three thousand years, a British man actually won the Tour de France. This is exciting stuff, a sure sign of a British road cycling resurgence, perfectly timed in the run-up to the Olympic Games.

So who would be best to represent Britain by singing our National Anthem at the prize-giving ceremony? Go on, have a guess.

Whoever you just thought of, the answer is “no”. The correct answer (apparently) was Lesley Garrett. That’s L-e-s-l-e-y G-a-r-r-e-t-t.

I can’t seem to embed Telegraph videos in this blog (thanks, WordPress), but you can watch the performance for yourself here.

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When Garrett abruptley switches key mid-warble, poor Bradley Wiggins looks like he wants to leap to his death from the winners podium, if only it were a little higher off the ground.

This was another opportunity to showcase the best of Britain. If (and I’ll never understand why you would do this, given the material the performer has to work with) you decide to go with an a capella, soprano rendering of “God Save The Queen”, at least pick from one of the many talented British sopranos that are out there. Instead, I find myself listening to someone who looks and sounds like an aging drag queen on a budget Mediterranean cruise ship. And then, a la Katherine Jenkins, they incorrectly labelled her an “opera singer”. Who made this casting decision, and how was it allowed to proceed unchallenged?

Rupert Christiansen, writing in The Telegraph, agrees with me:

What I would really like to know is who was responsible for selecting Miss Garrett for this delicate task. She is emphatically NOT an opera singer – apart from one operetta, she hasn’t sung a single role in an opera house since the turn of the millennium – but to the powers-that-be she depressingly appears to remain the publicly recognised face of British classical music (there’s Katherine Jenkins too now, of course, but in every artistic respect she’s even worse).

It enrages me that there are so many fabulously good and attractive young British sopranos out there – Elizabeth Llewellyn, Sophie Bevan and Lucy Crowe to name but three – who could have turned this cringe-making moment into a tear-jerking one.

Precisely.

And does this make me a classical music snob? No, I would have had to have been listening to a classical musician to be considered for that charge.

But at least she remembered the words, unlike a certain Christina Aguilera:

 

I hope she gave back her fee. Actually, I hope both of them refunded their artists fees. Double Fail.

Cracking Down On The Black Economy

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The Minister of the Bleeding Obvious states the bleeding obvious in this story from The Telegraph.

Treasury minister David Gauke informs us that it is “morally wrong” to pay tradesmen (plumbers, builders, electricians etc.) with cash in hand, as this makes it easier for them to evade VAT or income tax. Aside from the fact that every cabinet member from Cameron on downwards needs to quit the moral preaching (why can’t you just say “illegal” or “wrong”?), his basic point is right. Until he goes on to say: “Getting a discount with your plumber by paying cash in hand is something that is a big cost to the Revenue and means others have to pay more in tax”.

Seriously, Mr. Gauke? You expect us to believe that the black economy makes our taxes higher? You would tax us just as much as you already do even if you could get your hands on this missing slice of revenue – you would just find new ways to fritter it away on pointless, undeserving goals and beneficiaries. So let’s not pretend that the cash-in-hand job that your local plumber does on the sly is the one thing standing between us and an actual competitive tax code.

You must think we’re all really dumb.

The Real Austerity Games

Samuel Hooper4 Comments

 

To the leadership of the Public and Commercial Services Union, and their leader, Mark Serwotka:

They called the 1948 Olympics the “Austerity Games”.

Britain in 1948 and during the preceding war was the closest that this country has come to real austerity in living memory. Milk, meat, butter, sugar, tea, and sweets were still rationed – as, I believe, were bread and clothing. Many British cities still bore very visible scars from bombing during the Second World War. Thirty years later, some of those scars would still be there.

We couldn’t afford to build a single new sporting venue, or an Olympic Village to house the visiting athletes – they had to avail themselves of pre-existing accommodation.

We were such a weary and depleted nation at the time, that we seriously considered giving the Games to our friends and allies, the United States, to host.

THAT was austerity.

And yet we pulled together as a nation, and opened our doors to the world for the 1948 games of the XIVth Olympiad.

Based on a membership turnout of 20%, you decided to threaten and then lead a strike of UK Border Force customs and immigration officials in an attempt to blackmail better pay and conditions out of the British government, and to further your anti-privatisation, ideological agenda. Creating havoc at UK airports and other points of entry in the immediate run-up to our country playing host to the Olympic Games for the third time.

Go to hell.

In Defence Of Olympic Free Speech

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Marbury finds a wonderful example of people not being cowed or bullied by the over-reaching, un-democratic London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Act 2006:

Image from marbury.typepad.com

 

2012, London, Olympics, Two Thousand and Twelve, Olympix, Summer Games, Twenty Twelve, Spirit In Motion, 2012 Gold, Olympiad, Silver Games, Paralympian, Faster Higher Stronger, Citius Altius Fortius, London Medals, Olympian Sponsors.

Our government, in their infinite wisdom, have decided that any business using two or more of the words or phrases from this list in their advertising, products or promotional materials without having signed a sponsorship agreement with the London Olympics authorities, is committing a criminal offence. Long live free speech…

They can bite me. Seriously.

Sweet Justice

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The BBC reports that Apple has failed in its attempt to block sales of Samsung Galaxy Tab tablet computers on the spurious grounds of copyright infringement:

A UK judge has ordered Apple to publish announcements that Samsung did not copy the design of its iPad, according to the Bloomberg news agency.

It said the judge said one notice should remain on Apple’s website for at least six months, while other adverts should be placed in various newspapers and magazines.

It follows the US company’s failed attempt to block sales of the South Korean firm’s Galaxy Tab tablets.

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It said the notices must make reference to the court case and should be designed to “correct the damaging impression” that Samsung’s tablets had aped the look of Apple’s products.

Let me literally count the ways that this is funny:

1. Apple got smacked down for doing engaging in the typical, bullying behaviour that causes many people to hate large corporations, and was told that it could not, in actual fact, copyright or trademark vague and ethereal concepts such as “simple design” or “coolness” for their exclusive use.

2. Apple has to pay to place advertisements in the national media, admitting that it was wrong about something. I can’t wait to read the tortured wording.

3. 1 & 2 are funny because I own a rubbish, aging, malfunctioning BlackBerry, and my iPhone-toting friends make fun of me for it.

4. Though Samsung won the case, the judge said of their Galaxy Tablet device: “They are not as cool. The overall impression produced is different” when explaining his decision. So even in victory comes a rather devastating critique of their own efforts to build an iPad rival, now officially noted in the public record.

5. Free thought remains just about permissible in Britain today, as the article states that presiding judge “Judge Birss said that the US firm was ‘entitled’ to hold the opinion that his judgement was wrong”. It is good to know that the day has not yet arrived when failure to agree with authority represents a thought crime, despite the best efforts of Gordon Brown and the incompetence/weakness of the Cameron administration.

6. Hopefully other companies can breathe a little easier now, and continue to innovate and bring new products to the market with less fear that they will be persecuted by a big bully with a shiny logo.

There. Without knowing any of the specifics of the case, I have already extracted six reasons to be cheerful. That is all.