Osborne and Cameron really are a bland, boring duo. 1p off a pint of Beer? Hardly going to create a rush of jobs is it?

Over in America they are so much more inventive, original – and colourful. I suppose that should be colorful.

They know how to get essential workers into jobs that people are just clamouring to pay good money for.

Take the grant that has just been awarded to three Doctors at Yale University. Under the circumstances I think I can refer to them as Quacks.

They’ve been given $384,949.00 under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that was set up to invest money in the sort of job creation scheme that Ed Balls would like to see the UK undertake. $384,949.00 is a lot of money to feather your academic nest with, and I’m sure the good Doctors won’t get their feathers ruffled if I take a closer look at what precisely they are doing with this money.

So far they appear to have paid $14,931 to nine different ‘vendors’. What are they buying? Apart from tape measures, it is difficult to imagine what other equipment they might need.

For working under the august figure of Professor Richard Prum (please note: that is Prum, not Plum. You will be grateful for me mentioning that…) and enlisting the politically correct assistance of ‘high school students from under-represented minorities’ they have embarked on a four year long ‘exciting opportunity’ to, er, write a lengthy and earnest manuscript describing their progress, er, measuring the erect penis of hundreds, if not thousands, of Ruddy Ducks.

No, it is not April Fool’s Day yet. A quarter of a million pounds in ‘stimulus money’ stimulating Donald Duck and then running after him with a tape measure…

The project constitutes an exciting opportunity to investigate the role of sexual conflict on the evolution of reproductive structures…

The mind boggles. If anybody can come up with a British job creation scheme using government money that can outdo that one, I shall be delighted to award them a bottle of my favourite Monbazillac to go with their Duck in Plum sauce.

* Fascinating web site though – I wish we had the equivalent in the UK, hours of fun to be had.

Kingbingo March 22, 2013 at 10:28

Today our problems are largely too much government spending and too much
debt on one hand combined with too many misallocated resources in the private
sector. Zombie firms like the 8th nail bar on Lewisham high street or the 21st
coffee shop in Clapham. These businesses are often tying up resources but only
manage to continue to exist thanks to fantasy interest rates.

In an effort to avoid dealing with all the above problems the government is
avoiding them all with funny money, QE and low interest rate, massive bond
selling, all to keep government spending at a level that is obviously
unsustainable. All the while wedded to the notion of ‘growth’ or more
accurately, avoiding negative growth (recession).

What we need is a healthy recession. The idea of a recession being health
is utterly alien to most people. I’ve even had senior people in politics and
finance laugh in my face for suggesting such a thing. They implicitly assume
that every pound of capital in the economy, every worker, and every bit of
land is currently deployed in the most economically efficient manner possible.
That we must maintain every constituent part of our existing economy, and grow
from here.

They fail to realise that a huge amount of the factors of production (Land,
Labour & Capital) are tied up in pointless projects, especially large
parts of the public sector. So inefficiently is our current economy, with so
many factors misallocated that as we can see growth is impossible with the
current levels of oppressive taxation. Senior business politicians should not
be worried about a lack of growth since 2008, they should realise that by
moving heaven and earth to avoid a recession they are just maintain the status
quo, and we are facing a long depression. I am convinced that without a
dramatic change of course we face DECADES of depression ahead.

What is needed is three-fold. Firstly a massive reduction in the size of
the state. You heard of that ‘communist’ country China? The one that’s doing
OK for itself. You know that proportionally our government is TWICE the size
of the ‘communist’ Chinese one?
The size of government must fall back
dramatically, self-evidently. On Tuesday George Osbrown brought forward his
413th tax rise in his short career and STILL he going to double the debt
during just one parliament. Now if you slash government spending overnight,
and government spending is the major component of the GDP calculation, then
obviously we will have a recession in the short term. Good! Leads me to my
second point:

We must stop obsessing with GDP. It’s like running a business by looking
only at its revenue figure, while ignoring the rest of the Profit&loss
account, let alone the balance sheet! It’s very easy to have massive sales if
you’re prepared to destroy your balance sheet in the process. I could be the
greatest salesman in the world if my business was to sell £10 notes for £9
each. Of course without an excellent supply of credit I would not remain in
business long. No private business could operate like that, because private
businesses don’t have their own central bank!

Thirdly and finally, Interest rates should be set by the market, not a
central bank. It is essential that price mechanisms work in all markets. That
could be the price of bananas, washing machines or money. For a healthy market
supply must match demand, and all an interest rate is, is the price of money.
It matches up the supply of savings with the demand for loans, it brings both
into equilibrium. Of course what we do in the UK is to keep rates at fantasy
low levels then just print the difference for government and leave private
firms credit starved. The printing help lowers the value of all money
(inflation) and hence lowers the value of all wages and savings while the
government which has a negative net worth, gets richer.

Higher interest rates would give us a healthy recession that clears out all
those misallocated resources, all those businesses that are not making good
use of the factors of production that they hog. Those factors of production
would then be recycled into the right business that can actually use them. It
would be like knocking down a wonky bridge and using the materials to rebuild
a newer strong better one.

Until we are prepared to cut government, release interest rates, and
tolerate a short sharp recession, then we will never escape this recession. A
short brutal recession would likely all be over in 6-8 months, but would set
the foundations for a long period of REAL growth. Instead we are all cowards
electing greater cowards. And these efforts to avoid cutting government, to
avoid interest rate increases and avoid a recession are instead going to give
us a generation long depression, missed opportunities and lower living
standards and increased anguish for years.

binao March 22, 2013 at 12:05

I seem to recall around the start of the nineties, with debt being
expensive, life in manufacturing was very tough, from which came the
survival of the fit and adaptable, and the demise of the weak and
complacent.
Similarly early 70′s & on.
Every time I hear the loopy
class warriors (many not even conceived at the time) banging on about how MT
destroyed industry in the 70′s I think of the overmanning, resistance to
change and innovation, poor products and poor quality that were so common
then; certainly in manufacturing businesses I worked in. A spell in the US
was invigorating.
But back to govt. I cannot see how a state where govt
consumes half can compete internationally. Fine if our manufactures,
materials or services are in scarce supply, have an edge or monopoly, but
they don’t. And isn’t it time local authorities abandoned the social work
and started repairing roads and pavements? Why are they obliged to organise
Health Walks, food events, street markets, Wellbeing initiatives and Gypsy
counts and all the other timewasting tosh, but never public toilets?
I
think the beer’s worn off.

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 22:17

Of course, there are inherent dangers in volunteering to join in the,
albeit personally upstanding, insertion of one’s own person into the warm,
cosy, depths of scientific research. This pair of volunteers misread the
brief, failing to properly note that the topic being researched was coitus
UNinterruptus

http://ww1.prweb.com/prfiles/2011/09/21/8817349/Lotus%20Position.jpg

(I originally saw this on display on 5th Avenue, in what I then thought was
some fancy art gallery street window
)

Mjolinir March 21, 2013 at 21:46

“Just a thought” – male sharks are doubly endowed. Researching their
capabilities (including absolute AND relative dimensions & usage) would
warrant a MUCH bigger grant –

Mjolinir March 21, 2013 at 21:33

Although not strictly about ‘an old Canard’ – surely one these grants
should have been given to Kees Moeliker – curator of the Natural History
Museum in Rotterdam (Winner of the 2003 IgNobel for Biology) – so he can
reproduce his seminal work of 1995 “Homosexual Necrophilia in the Mallard Duck
”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NfWiqdlmsm4

Engineer March 21, 2013 at 21:33

One wonders if there’s a sliding scale of grants for researching different
species, and if the size of grant is related to size of specimen, or to number
of specimens. In other words, would I be better off researching elephants or
ants?

Perhaps I’d better stick to ants. Being an engineer, I’m familiar with
micrometers. Mind you, you can get ‘stick mikes’ up to ten feet long or more,
so maybe elephants might not be such a bad earner.

Dioclese March 21,
2013 at 20:14

Every time I buy a pint I shall put the penny aside and then, when I have
enough, I shall buy a bottle of wine.

Oh, bugger! He’s put the duty up on wine…

Wendi March 21, 2013 at 16:48

Bloody hilarious! If ducks were an endangered species maybe…

Anyway, had to look up ‘duck penis’ and the never-failing youtube came up
with a full “Explosive eversion of a duck penis” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwjEeI2SmiU which leaves me
wondering HOW exactly Dr. Prum & co. get to measure this rather
odd-looking appendage correctly without embarrassing or over-stimulating poor
Donald…

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at 17:14

You have just achieved the impossible – put Mr G off his grub….should
have changed the menu, Duck was an unfortunate choice….

Friend of Dog
March 21, 2013 at 17:42

I have just cancelled tonights booking at our local restaurant. Thanks
Wendi.

Wendi March 21, 2013 at 18:52

Sorry guys – guess you shouldn’t have looked! New flush of
vegetarians on the Raccoon horizon?

Peter Melia
March 21, 2013 at 20:08

The youtube video is said to be of a duck.
Very impressive rate of
growth for what is, after all, quite a little fellow.

Here is Professor Prum’s abstract of his work, obtained by following
your link, (so far?, or is it ongoing?).
NB. In the Abstract given
below, they cheerfully discuss working with ostriches, emus and
rheas.
Could be dangerous.
Perhaps the 380 thou dollars includes
danger money.

Abstract: The erection mechanism of the penis in most vertebrates is
blood vascular. A major evolutionary transition occurred in birds, where
the erection mechanism changed from blood vascular to lymphatic. Within
birds, however, the erection mechanism of the ratite penis has remained
unknown. Early work suggested that the erection mechanism in ostrich
Struthio camelus was blood vascular while no description existed for the
emu Dromaius novaehollandiae or the rhea Rhea americana. Because the penis
in all other described birds has a lymphatic erection mechanism,
clarifying that the erection mechanism of ratites is of great importance
to understanding one of the major evolutionary transitions of penis
morphology within amniotes. Here, we show that the erection mechanism of
ratites is lymphatic, confirming that the evolutionary transition to
lymphatic erection occurred in the last common ancestor of Aves.

Wendi March 21, 2013 at 20:41

Had to Google the Rhea to find they are ‘ratites’, flightless birds,
omnivores and can be quite nasty if their feathers are ruffled, so I
reckon that these researchers must be paying a high insurance
premium!

JuliaM March 22, 2013 at 05:29

If you think they’re nasty, check out the cassowary!

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 16:22

The UK version would entail the mass construction of moats and the erection
of duck houses…a sort of subsidised social housing scheme allowing ruddy MPs
to feather their nests further, while we get billed. The houses would be
prefabricated in China, Pekin Duck brand, and we would import Pomeranians to
do the building and Indian Runners to do the onsite catering. The problem
would probably be that by the time construction was finished, all the
Gressinghams would have been rustled for grub and there would be duck all left
to inhabit it

Joe Public March 21, 2013 at 16:22

OK – here’s some for starters:-

1. “Shape of a Ponytail and the Statistical Physics of Hair Fiber Bundles”,
by Raymond E. Goldstein, Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical
Physics, Cambridge, and Robin C. Ball Department of Physics, University of
Warwick. [Assisted by Patrick B. Warren of Unilever]

2. Paid-for research that may not altogether come as a surprise to many
Bloggers & Blog readers, but it’s been officially confirmed that swearing
relieves pain. “Swearing as a Response to Pain” by Richard Stephens, John
Atkins, and Andrew Kingston of Keele University.

3. Who would have thought that research by Catherine Douglas and Peter
Rowlinson of Newcastle University would show that cows who have names, give
more milk than cows that are nameless. “Exploring Stock Managers’ Perceptions
of the Human-Animal Relationship on Dairy Farms and an Association with Milk
Production,”

4. Charles Spence of Oxford University, helped determine that
electronically modifying the sound of a potato crisp to make the person
chewing the crisp believe it to be crisper and fresher than it really is –
“The Role of Auditory Cues in Modulating the Perceived Crispness and Staleness
of Potato Chips,”

5. I’m unsure whether the Zoological Society of London depends upon
government grants, but if it does, then this surely has to be a
contender:
Research by Agnes Rocha-Gosselin of ZSL and Diane Gendron of
Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Mexico, into perfecting a method to collect
whale snot, using a remote-control helicopter – “A Novel Non-Invasive Tool for
Disease Surveillance of Free-Ranging Whales and Its Relevance to Conservation
Programs,”

6. Sir Michael Berry of Bristol University researched using magnets to
levitate a frog. The outcome being a famous paper “Of Flying Frogs and
Levitrons”.

REFERENCE:

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at 16:25

“Research by Agnes Rocha-Gosselin of ZSL and Diane Gendron of Instituto
Politecnico Nacional, Mexico, into perfecting a method to collect whale
snot, using a remote-control helicopter – “A Novel Non-Invasive Tool for
Disease Surveillance of Free-Ranging Whales and Its Relevance to
Conservation Programs,”

I reckon you could start polishing that corkscrew – I don’t believe
anyone will outdo that one!

Joe Public
March 21, 2013 at 16:33

Reference: Those IgNobel Awards http://www.improbable.com/

However – I fear my suggestions may be disadvantaged by the fact that
they were all winners.

For losers, the mind truly boggles.

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 16:39

Many years ago, must be about 40 or so I guess, Bernard Levin wrote a
wonderful piece lampooning an article in ‘Nature’, about research carried
out by the Psychology Department at Aberdeen University into the role of the
nose in visual perception. As part of this, using the autokinetic phenomenon
– broadly, in pitch darkness, a fixed point of light will eventually seem to
the viewer to move of its own accord – they tried to see if, by making the
nose visible, this prevented the light from moving. The methodologies for
introducing a visible nose varied from luminous false noses, luminous paint,
both of which had their obvious limitations, up to, and most inspired, the
insertion of little electric lightbulbs, as shoved up the nostrils…..I
remember laughing till I cried. Alas, my copy is long gone, and try as I
might, I have never yet found it on the web, so that such inspiration could
be appreciated by more

Mudplugger
March 21, 2013 at 21:03

I’m thinking of updating my previous magnum opus, “The Differential
Coefficient of Friction Encountered with Pubic Hair of Differing Shades,
Using the Standard Metric Scale from Blonde Minimum to Ginger
Maximum”.
The update is necessitated by the increasing popularity of
complete depilation (so I’m told), causing a necessary review of the
national and global average levels of friction encountered within a given
population of the target gender-type.
All I need now is a large group of
volunteers for the sampling exercise………. please form an orderly queue.

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 21:17

You could possibly scratch in a bit more funding too, if maybe not more
volunteers, by adding to that the ecologically friendly sub study entitled
“Allied to the Investigation of the Maximisation of the Utilitarian
Benefits to be Realised whilst engaged in the Ecologically Friendly
Enhancement of the Environment Required to Ensure the Survival of the
Endangered Species, Pediculosis pubis”

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at
21:24

Will that comply with the government’s carbon neutral policy?

Ho Hum
March 21, 2013 at 22:05

Probably Not. Too much hot air generated

GildasTheMonk
March 21, 2013 at 16:04

I have launched my single handed campaign to jump start the economy by
buying no less than two packets of luxury Choco Leubnitz dark chocolate
biscuits this afternoon, with the intention of eating them all! Sadly I fear
the only thing that will be boosted is my waist.
It seems my plan is just a
cock up. I don’t have the tools for the job. I do think it is a bit hard on me
though when I am not the only member in the failure club! I have to go and
recuperate. Maybe a scotch is in order – preferably a large and stiff one

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 22:22

Very clever! I even laughed prematurely

Chris
Barratt March 21, 2013 at 15:54

As a Classic Car collector, I am intrigued and a tad bemused by one of
Gideon’s lesser publicised decisions.
Once upon a time (1995) Kenneth
Clarke introduced an historic road tax exemption for ‘classic cars’ – they
would still need a current tax disc but it would be free of charge. It was a
‘rolling 25 year’ exemption, as cars became 25 years old they would qualify
for free road tax.
Except one of the first things Cyclops did when he
became Chancellor was to ‘freeze’ it. Without consultation. So, for the past
15 years a 1972 car has been free to tax, a 1973 car full pops. Of course this
has resulted in lots of 73-on Mini’s, Escorts etc becoming ‘ringed’ to 72 or
earlier identities and so on, others like myself have just had to stand it (or
be canny).
Gideon has, very kindly, brought the historic exemption forward.
But by just one year (1973). And not taking force until April 2014.

Mainland Europe have a similar classic exemption scheme, but fixed to a
‘rolling’ 30 years.

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at 16:03

The extraordinary situation in France is that classic cars are not
subject to the French equivalent of an MOT – ever! (Says the owner of a 1972
Morris traveller that she thoughtfully brought to France with her!!!)

The older the car – the less interested they are in even discovering
whether the brakes function or not!!!

Chris
Barratt March 21, 2013 at 16:13

They’ve recently exempted pre-1960 cars from MOT here – I think it’s
cos they can’t expect the component fitters we call mechanics now we know
to understand anything about how they work.
A local firm have a fleet
of 1940s/50s Humbers as wedding cars, they took one to a Kwik Fit for a
simple repair to the exhaust, it ended up needing a new front end! The lad
who put it on the ramp couldn’t work the brakes….

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at
16:20

When I ran a garage, young lad who worked for us was told to put a
car on the ramp, jack it up and rev the engine with it in gear – he’d
done it several times before with other cars – unfortunately this time
it was a mini….it shot over the six foot high wall behind the ramp and
ended up in Harry Dudley’s vast tank that he boiled his beetroot in for
his market stall.
Front wheel drive – it’s a complicated theory for
some people….

Mudplugger March
21, 2013 at 20:48

When I worked at a garage, I once asked a customer to reverse his
(un-seen) car onto the pit so we could check his reported
exhaust-blow. He didn’t tell us it was a Reliant three-wheeler – you
can guess the rest.

Anna Raccoon March 21, 2013 at 20:57

Just in case you ever come across one – the Moscovitch is the
only car in existence that you can fit the diff upside down – sent
him out with four reverse gears and one forward….takes them an awful
long time to come back and complain like that mind you….

MTG
March 22, 2013 at 07:40

They had a diff? During its brief run here, Moscovitch were
inundated with claims after imprudently extending the body
warranty to a full three weeks.

Wendi March 21, 2013 at 16:58

Wish I’d known as I could have offered you my ’78 MB 500SLC (the
aluminium hood & boot & engine) which I literally just sold (very
cheap) to, fortunately, another classic car lover who’s having it trucked
over to the UK as I write to register and renovate it.

Few local authorities in Spain give 100% tax exemption on classic cars,
25-30 yrs. depending on greed of the town hall in question, 50% is the norm
but insurance is dirt cheap on them…

Mudplugger
March 21, 2013 at 20:42

Glad I hung on to my pristine ’73 Roller – might be able to afford to use
it again in 2014. Bugger – I’ve just worked out how much it costs to fill
these days, maybe it will stay indoors a little longer.

Ho Hum March 21, 2013 at 15:54

Qwackers

Joe Public March 21, 2013 at 15:49

I rise to your challenge, Mlle Raccoon.

I’ll hopefully get this pun (yes, it is a pun) in before anyone else; and
shortly respond with my research.

Anna
Raccoon March 21, 2013 at 16:05

Get your ducks in a row Joe, and do your worst.