The Dominic Cummings Affair And A Whole new Meaning to “A Barney Castle”!
A while back I wrote to our Carlisle MP, John Stevenson to make my displeasure clear about the continued employment of Dominic Cummings as Boris Johnson’s special adviser despite his lockdown breaking journey to Durham. This was followed by an unbelievable piece of bullshit driving to Barnard Castle as “an eye test”! Here’s John’s reply. Our ref, JO9392 Dear Ray Thank you for writing to me about Dominic Cummings The last couple of months have been trying for everyone – and we have all had to make sacrifices in regards to who we can see and what we can do. We have done this not just to protect ourselves, but to protect each other, including of course here in Carlisle. The Government has issued guidelines and rules to help us do...
Climate Disinformation in The Wake of the UN Climate Summit
Because the oil industry is on the back foot now, they are using their obscene wealth to double down on their disinformation PR campaigns globally, to con the gullible into ignoring the blatantly obvious warning signs that we are f*cking up our little spaceship Earth! A friend posted a video from the Youtube channel “Friends of Science” (sic). In it a very “lovely” grandmotherly figure (clearly a cold calculating, cynical, “take the money and run” lying bastard) talks in soothing tones about how Greta and the youngsters (whom she so respects “for standing up for something”) have been misled and how climate change is nothing to do with human activity, but do with natural processes and cycles. Her soothing tones cover...
The Case For A Climbing Wall In a Redeveloped Sands Centre
Recently it came to our attention that the new management of the Sands Centre here in Carlisle, were about to push through changes that would see the Sands’ current climbing wall demolished with no plans to replace it in the new facility. For the City’s growing climbing community it represents a real loss. Pete Gunn, has organised a petition through Change.Org to try and get a rethink on this short sighted decision (IMHO). It’s the only decent sized leading wall in North Cumbria and for those living in the Borders. Kendal’s massive wall is 50 miles away and it’s 60 miles to Newcastle the nearest alternative large lead wall. Under Pete and Davina’s stewardship, it’s open to the public 7 days a week and these two...
On Europe, Refugees and the Rise of Inhumanity!
I just read a post in Linked In by Ban Ki Moon – putting the case for a more humane way of viewing the current refugee crisis. It makes sad reading despite its upbeat tone. The only response so far was from some right wing sounding character who only picked up on the supposed increase in sex attacks in Belgium, completely ignoring the Belgian’s own nasty habit of isolating refugee communities within their country. (or is that just my misreading of the muddied reports that come out about refugee life?). It is however depressing to see the countries who most recently joined the EU for their perceived economic benefit are the ones building Trump’s Wall in Europe while our own astonishingly wealthy, but parasitised country virtually washes its hands...
Climate, Science and the Scourge of the Denialist
Who Do You Put Your Faith In For Climate Change Reality Checks? In the Climate Change and Global Warming debate, human beings are getting very tribal again. The debate is polarising into the Greens and the Denialists. I have to say right at the outset I am a Green (ish). My ire was triggered by the report from climate scientists, publicised on the Mashable blog, that the atmospheric CO2 level has already passed the 400 parts per million (0.004%) this year, weeks earlier than its first recorded 400ppm+ reading last year and its showing now sign of slowing down. (0.002% was more or less the textbook norm that we were taught as young Chemistry school students 40 odd years ago). In my Google Plus feed I noticed that Mashable had put the post out publicly and as...
4Networking: A Different Style of Business Networking for Cumbria
I recently joined in with a networking group that has been around for ages but is new to this region. 4 Networking was started up by a character by the name of Brad Burton, who seems to be out of the renegade entrepreneur mould. Over the past few years, Brad has built up a networking business for business owners that has grown rapidly and spread from its South West roots, to the North East and beyond, seemingly bypassing Cumbria along the way. We aim to put that right. What’s special about 4 Networking, when we already have such great groups operating in and around Carlisle and the rest of Cumbria already? What more could a business owner need when the Cumbria Chamber of Commerce is operating such a range of different networking formats. There are...
Trig: a Social Marketing Disrupter That’ll Save You Cash!
“Ray – you’ve got to come down to Wales and see the business we’ve got started in!” It seems a long way back in time: that trek down to South Wales! I had eventually agreed to go and see what my sister and brother in law had been on about. A social networking site that doesn’t make you change your habits and pays you back rather than paying Zuckerberg! At first my reaction had been sort of “… oh no: a social media version of Kleeneze… a Facebook clone!” Frankly I didn’t really listen. After a couple more conversations, and a lot of questions I realised that if this thing could be persuaded to fly, there was a real chance of the people doing the social, actually getting something back for their time: and if...