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Continue reading →: Rupert Murdoch is a business genius?
When the News of the World (closure of) is the news | Samizdata.net. As Rob comments on the linked story over at Samizdata: Great opportunity to cut staffing costs and still have a Sunday paper, while keeping all the advertisers. How would Murdoch have sacked all those people without a…
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Continue reading →: Only 24 Types?
The 24 Types of Libertarian | Progressive Political Cartoon by Barry Deutsch. Quite amusing, I thought. How I wish I lived in a country where libertarians were influential enough for "progressive" cartoonists to need to mock us. Sadly our politics is not even about how much to extort any more…
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Continue reading →: Politically impartial television?
BBC News – Question Time – Join the Question Time audience. Follow the link to see what it takes to join the Question Time (#bbcqt) audience. Interesting questionnaire, eh? Maybe I should apply to be in the next London audience, suppress my principles and fill in the form dishonestly? What…
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Continue reading →: In a well-populated sewer
David Cameron is in the sewer because of his News International friends – Telegraph Blogs. If, as Peter Oborne asserts, David Cameron is "in the sewer" because of his relationship with Murdoch's minions, then he is not alone. That metaphorical sewer must be as capacious as the metaphorical closet from…
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Continue reading →: German politicians make war on truth
Europe declares war on rating agencies – Telegraph. Do Wolfgang Schauble and Heiner Flassbeck understand what they are saying? They want to "break", "dissolve" or "ban from rating countries" the independent agencies investors rely upon to rate investment risk. Is this what Chancellor Merkel meant when she asserted the primacy…
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Continue reading →: Cameron’s over-inquiring mind
Cameron backs phone hacking probe | Reuters. As m'learned friend Wiggy (aka @_millymoo) explains, there are numerous offences to be investigated in the context of unauthorised access to another's mobile phone account. Those should now be investigated by the police and prosecuted vigorously by the Crown Prosecution Service. A 'public…
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Continue reading →: Michael White says something sensible; Shock!
Phone-hacking scandal: Not even the News of the World is all bad | Michael White | Politics | guardian.co.uk. Michael White agrees with me on something, it seems. As his paper is, with the BBC, conducting the trial by media prosecution of News International, this is a particular surprise. He…
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Continue reading →: Join us in Stony Stratford
Stub Out The Stony Stratford Smoking Ban. I used to visit Stony Stratford for a drink from time to time when I worked in Milton Keynes (of which New Town it forms an ancient part). Its old coaching inns, on the route from London to Ireland, saw the exchange of…
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Continue reading →: Journalistic ethics
News of the World: bereaved relatives of 7/7 victims 'had phones hacked' – Telegraph. I was tempted to leave the space beneath my heading blank, save for the link, but that would hardly have been fair. It's wrong except in jest (and this is no laughing matter) to condemn a…
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Continue reading →: More than a little careless
Ministry of Defence loses £6.3bn assets | UK news | The Guardian. Ask yourself if, in any private sector job you can imagine, you could lose assets on this scale without your job being at risk. Now ask yourself if you expect any senior employee of the Ministry of Defence…
THE LAST DITCH
Your blogger
Tom is a retired international lawyer. He was a partner in a City of London law firm and spent almost twenty years abroad serving clients from all over the world.
Returning to London on retirement in 2011, he was dismayed to discover how much liberty had been lost in the UK while he was away.
He’s a classical liberal (libertarian, if you must) who, like his illustrious namesake, considers that
“…government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one.”
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Almost. I think Archbishop Sarah is a Christian. I just think she’s at a loss to know how to reach…
It’s almost as if they are not actually Christian but simply a person being advised by woke PR people in…
She may be gone but you have all those wonderful memories :-)
I miss the more traditional Anglican services that I remember from my younger years. I haven’t regularly attended church services…
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The Last Ditch by Tom Paine 
I’m sure there are a few fire and brimstone types they could have had instead of a woke woman. Putting…