A little light relief in a week of doom ‘n’ gloom – a couple of videos as a break between the news, albeit ones that address issues far from funny. The first is a new ‘un, whereas the
Continue reading →The Tap Room Video Show
The Long and Winding Road to Damascus
On Wednesday, the Commons will debate and vote on whether the fearsome might of the RAF – all half-dozen available planes – will join the US and the French in dropping bombs on Syria in the optimistic
Continue reading →The Thin Blue Line
Politics, it is true, attracts certain ‘types’, often in stereo. On the left, there is the social crusader whose guilt at his comfortable middle-class upbringing is manifested as doing the right thing by those who didn’t share
Continue reading →A New Broom
I was all for packing my bags and hitching out of town when the final missive from the previous premises was delivered. I anticipated a few fond farewells, but I always imagined my predecessor had a monopoly
Continue reading →Historic Allegations of a ‘Liverpool Kiss’.
Bring out your grievances! Bring out your grievances! Let the charges ring out!
It’s that time of year; the normally scattered family is gathered round the festive table, the Sherry bottle’s empty, Grandad’s fallen asleep, Mum has
Continue reading →Truth is the first casualty.
As the media gird their loins for days and weeks worth of satisfying bleeding, crying, heart-rending front pages, one question stands out ‘How could young men become so radicalised that they turn into suicide bombers’.
Continue reading →
Truth is the first casualty.
As the media gird their loins for days and weeks worth of satisfying bleeding, crying, heart-rending front pages, one question stands out ‘How could young men become so radicalised that they turn into
Continue reading →The Cambridge Companion to the Qur’an…
Ms Raccoon has had her nose in this book all week-end. As with the bible, one can play pick n’ mix’ to one’s heart content. I hadn’t quite appreciated why it was
Continue reading →Friday 13th – Lucky for some!
by Anna Raccoon on November 1, 2015 Wow! Just wow! Ms Raccoon has just returned from the hospital. Ten months ago they thought I had ‘two months at best’ – at that point you are formally designated ‘terminally ill’; that …Continue reading →
Camila Batmanghelidjh – More revelations.
In case you haven’t seen it – what follows is the written evidence of a Kid’s Company employee that was submitted to the House of Commons Public Administration Committee. It is quite devastating
Continue reading →Trigger Mortis.
One of the most chilling images in Orwell’s dystopian Oceania was the army of young ‘Spies’; the children who struck terror into adult hearts by threatening to expose any deviation from approved behaviour.
‘You’re a traitor!’
Continue reading →
Is that a Gun in your pocket?
Or are you still ‘transitioning’ Officer? – As Ms West might have been forced to inquire these days.
An armed MoD police officer making the delicate transition from male to female,
Continue reading →The Existentialist Mr ‘Blacker Does Not Exist’
However – he did grandly announce that he did not exist, from his position of principled non-existence. Jean-Paul Sartre would have been proud of him.
If nobody is around to hear
Continue reading →Polio Braggadocio.
Tell me, do you hesitate to pick up a beautiful feather, discarded by an escaping pheasant? Do you hear your Mother’s voice as you bend down to touch it? I can tell your age by your answer.
Continue reading →The Divine Ms Raccoon’s Annual Beanfeast….
I said we’d organise something, so here’s a very important date to put in your diaries – 19th November 2015. Previous get togethers have been in London, generally organised round Old Holborn’s annual Guy Fawkes
Continue reading →Polio Braggadocio.
Tell me, do you hesitate to pick up a beautiful feather, discarded by an escaping pheasant? Do you hear your Mother’s voice as you bend down to touch it? I can tell your
Continue reading →One of Life’s Characters.
There’s many a man of the Cameron clan That has followed his chief to the field
Continue reading →
He has sworn to support him or die by his side For a Cameron never can
Our Sweet Lords
Out-of-touch, privileged, cosseted from the real world, little or no interest in what goes on beyond their bubble, imbued with an arrogant born-to-rule sense of their own importance; sons, daughters, nephews and nieces of former occupants, inheriting
Continue reading →When is A Woman not A Woman?
…when she has a vagina, apparently. Germaine Greer is a woman, but not one at the top of Cardiff University’s Student Union Christmas card list. Why? Because she dares to mention the unmentionable, that transsexuals aren’t actually
Continue reading →‘This Septic Isle’ – full of elderly Paedophiles.
Just how do you rehabilitate a society where two thirds of the adult males have been jailed for sexual offences? Where more than half the population are dependant pensioners, and where, within the
Continue reading →Rutting Rutlands, Hapless Hipsters, and Follicle Oracles.
The last Duke of Rutland’s Mother in law fell down a lift shaft, suffering a head injury which left her ‘sexually voracious’. Her divorce featured a photograph of the naked Duchess, bar a
Continue reading →That’s Settled.
DCI Paul Settle’s evidence to the Home Affairs Committee yesterday has been fascinating. A solid, old fashioned Police Officer, standing his ground in the face of his senior officers and an array of
Continue reading →Oh! Revoir!
Paul Revoir is a journalist. At least, he’s portrayed as such on Journalisted. He grubbed around in the bowels of the Daily Mail for years, delivering earth shattering opera to his Editor:
Continue reading →Collateral Damage.
I woke last Sunday morning with a particular image in my mind, that could be aptly described as ‘collateral damage’ to the continuing #CSA saga. Within an hour, I had dismissed the thought
Continue reading →The Pied Pipers of Paedo Panic.
In times of yore, Kelvin MacKenzie, then at the helm of the great ship ‘Sun’, was of the opinion that the
Continue reading →For Rosa.
When Clive James wrote a few months ago of being ‘stuck with the embarrassment of still being alive’, it struck a particular chord with me – as a number of people thought it might, judging by the
Continue reading →Slack Narcissus
Cate Blanchett is an intriguing actress – interesting-looking, androgynous, a touch of Garbo about her. She climbed higher in my estimation last week when expressing her exasperation at her peers indulging in endless selfies when attending a
Continue reading →For Rosa.
When Clive James wrote a few months ago of being ‘stuck with the embarrassment of still being alive’, it struck a particular chord with me – as a number of people thought it
Continue reading →Jeremy the Gardener.
Fellow geriatrics will have sympathised. When a man reaches the age at which he remembers to wear a vest when he goes out, he also sends off to the Daily Express for one of those
Continue reading →Watson Tide
If we were to think of those who voted for the 2003 Allied invasion of Iraq and did their utmost to block any investigation into the affair, certain obvious names would leap forward; it’s significant that these
Continue reading →