Back to the election, I'm afraid...

Now hands up who would like David ('Dave') Cameron's head on a stick? Rabbit Public Services are glad to oblige. Here's the link that shows you how. Furthermore, after yesterdays's family friendly squirrelpic, some commenters have suggested that the pic was photoshopped. Tsk! Such cynicism! Here's the proof it was nothing of the sort.

Catch Her in the Wry (link to left) has posted a most unpleasant true story. I pass it on as a warning to others.

Have some Doors - Riders on the Storm to be exact...

Meet Mr Squirrel

The rabbit is a bit time poor today, having just returned from an early start in Manchester - a smallish town in Lancashire of no particular consequence - to a Lever arch file of papers to be read for tomorrow so just a quick pic nicked from Jailhouse Lawyer. After crasher squirrel we have handshaking squirrel.

Very endearing and not a word about the election...

Boobquake Day!

Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi seems like a sensible chap. He recently helpfully explained that earthquakes are caused by women dressing immodestly. Makes sense to me. 'Many women who do not dress modestly lead men astray, corrupt chastity and spread adultery in society which ... increases earthquakes. ' our man added thoughtfully. And indeed there is a lot of that sort of thing about. I mean adultery not earthquakes - or possible vice versa. Oh never mind...

Anyway...

Enter someone called Jen McCreight who appears to be auditioning for junior secularist of the year. She declares today Boobquake Day. Women are to show their cleavage en masse today and see if an earthquake results.

So guess what happens? Yup...

Only an earthquake, that's what.

1-0 to Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi methinks. The delightful blogger catch her in the wry has taken an interest in this matter.

I hold her personally responsible!

;)

Oh and the Disobey Murdoch on the 6th May thing has gone viral. It's all over the net like a rash. It is even being plagiarised (see below - names have been taken)! I'd be lying if I said I haven't got a buzz out of it.

Disobey Murdoch on the 6th May

After yesterday's posting I had a word with Beau Bo D'Or. As you see our man has come up trumps! Thanks, Neil - it's a cracker. There is also a button for your sidebar. I did suggest that the button should be in yellow as well as red but you can't have everything. Pass it on!

A parting shot - I was amused to say David Miliband in the paper today telling the unruly electorate that it was time to stop punishing Labour over Iraq.

Memo to Miliband: we haven't even started yet.

Make the 6th May Disobey Murdoch Day...

The behaviour of the right wing press is getting startling in its odiousness - even for them. Having concluded that the election was a shoo in for 'Dave' and Murdoch senior having thus committed the Sun and News of the World, things have gone badly awry - notably because of the Lib Dem surge and Cleggmania.

It's no more Mr Nice Guy for the Murdoch press, the Daily Mail and the Torygraph. The rabbit is no huge fan of Nick Clegg but some of the bile being avalanched on his head by a rattled Tory press is beyond the pale.

The above will give something of the flavour of the attack dogs - namely demented. The route to 'Nazi slur' is convoluted to say the least. In fact if it were not so odious the 'story' would be a joke. The Daily Mail is also at pains to point out that Clegg's father is half Russian, his mother Dutch and his wife Spanish.

SO

FUCKING

WHAT?

Not to be outdone, the Torygraph has a story, as someone pointed out in as big a banner headline as 9/11 merited, 'revealing' (this had already been declared and was a matter of public record) that some donors had paid money directly into his bank account to pay a researcher.

SO

FUCKING

WHAT?

(part 2)

Meanwhile all is not well in the Murdochbunker. James ('Baby Doch') Murdoch and the startlingly redheaded Rebekah Wade managed to slip their care in the community people and busted into the newsroom of the Independent 'see cartoon above), much to the surprise of the assembled hacks. The Independent had the temerity to have distributed free copies with a wraparound front page announcing 'Rupert Murdoch won't decide this election - you will'.

The cheek!!!

Baby Doch stormed up to the Independent's editor in chief.

'What are you fucking playing at?' he bellowed. Tsk! Such pottymouth is a bad example to His Rupertness's subjects. Baby Doch and Ms Wade were steered into the editor in chief's office where a heated debate took place.

Personally, I'd have called security to chuck them out.

One matter that has attracted comment is how the growth of the internet has created a much more open debate than that dictated by the usual suspects. This may explain in part their discomnfiture. The rabbit can only suggest that all people of goodwill cast their votes to indicate their disobedience of Murdoch, the Mail, the Torygraph. The whole motley crew...

The Ghost

MAYBE BIT OF A SPOILER HERE!

Observers of Earl's Bug Eyed Quiz will know of the rabbit's general ignorance of matters cinematic. This has not stopped him launching into film review mode on a few occasions in the recent past and heer is another. Last Friday he hopped off to see The Ghost, directed by Roman Polanski (for whose presernt difficulties the rabbit has no sympathy whatsoever) and adapted from the book by Robert Harris. Unlike my companion to this excursion to the Covent Garden Odeon, I hadn't read the book but I have read other novels by Robert Harris, notably Fatherland, which is unusual as a dystopia set in the past - as it were. Well technically, such fiction is known as alternative time line but I digress. Harris was formerly a big mate of one Tony Blair and of the New Labour project. Not any more.

Pierce Brosnan plays a former British Prime Minister holed up in his publisher's bunker on Martha's Vineyard working to finalise his memoirs. The Ghost - played by Ewan McGregor but in a clever device not given a name is recruited to work on the memoirs when the previous ghost becomes literally a ghost - apparently drowned when drunk. The Ghost is an apolitical ghostwriter of celebrity autiobiographies. Has he been chosen as a lightweight? If so, it is a bad move as he starts asking all the right sort of questions.

The former British Prime Minister is accused of war crimes, namely facilitating the rendition of UK citizens to be tortured by waterboarding (or enhanced interrogation techniques in Cheneyspeak). The International Criminal Court would like a word. Now who on earth could this be a not too subtle reference to?

Beats me too.

Olivia Williams as the ex-PM's wife is splendid as a cross between Cherie and Lady Macbeth. The rabbit was also rather taken with her so she gets lead pic. The Ghost discovers as he works to edit the memoirs that not all of the ex-PM's biography is as it would appear to be. He starts digging. Okay - here comes the spoiler bit - it emerges that the former British Prime Minister has been on the CIA payroll since the 1970s.

The difference with Blair is he did it for free.

It's okay as a film. Citizen Kane it ain't but it's worth a watch. There is a sort of nod, but not a good one, to Reg Keys - the father who lost his son in the iRaq war. Reg Keys did't do what the character in the film did. He stood against Blair in the 2005 election, got over 10% of the vote and made one of the great political speeches of all time. Here it is via the BBC - just watch it - and above all listen to it - the raw emotion is just devastating. In particular watch Blair and Cherie's faces as they have to stand there and take it - and even applaud at the end.

To lighten the mood and back to the current election, here is Beau Bo D'Or (link to left) making a tongue in cheek sequel to the 'I've never voted Conservative before' posters. To overseas readers and the inattentive, the Conservatives have pledged a £150 tax break for married couples - a really, really dumb idea in the rabbit's opinion.

Plus here is Charon QC - at it again and probably at the Rioja as well...

Soup, 'Dave' and the Clitheroe Green

This is a gastronomic variant on the usual grumpy old man type query. Why do soups seem to be overwhelmingly nothing more - or less - than pureed vegetables these days? Everything - and meat suffers as badly as vegetables in this respect - just seems to get pureed to mush. Why is this? Is it something to do with 'Elf and Safety - a fear that someone choking on a lumpy bit would sue for not being warned 'Caution: may contain lumpy bits'? Or is it some strange perception that a customer getting a lighter soup will somehow feel they aren't getting value for money?

Talking of mush, this splendid offshoot from Dave's performance in the all singing all dancing (okay it wasn't but I can dream) Election Debate and in particular his imaginary friend who popped up therein has hit the ether. Those naughty parodists have been at it again. Is there no repect these days? I think my personal favourite is 'last week, I met a young gentleman, who told me that Lady Gaga raped the next door's beagle'. There is of course a lot of that sort of thing about these days. Or possibly 'last week, I met an Afghan baker, who told me that the underclass took all of their money and spent it on a duck island'. Okay check it out yourselves. I do actually think something very - erm - mould breaking is stirring among the avalanches of dross in the run-up to the election but there are sure to be plenty of twists yet.

Another election-related comment, I fear. Caroline Lucas, the leader of the Green Party...

...for some bizarre reason reminds me of (younger readers will have to bear with me) the Clitheroe Kid.

Think I lie down now. Just 7 more hits and White Rabbit will go over the 50,000 mark! I resisted the temptation to cheat and click on refresh seven times, he typed virtuously. Oh and another gem from jailhouselawyer. A man pleaded guilty to a number of counts at Leicester Crown Court including buggery of a horse and of a donkey. He awaits sentence and when the topic of bail came up his counsel announced that he 'did not have a stable address'. Stable? Geddit? Oh never mind...

The Rabbit Whisperer and stuffed animals.

With Hat Tip to jailhouselawyer for drawing the rabbit's attention to this story. We have an - erm - rabbit whisperer as reported in the Torygraph. Cliff Penrose has a talent for hypnotising rabbits leaving them flat on their backs with their legs in the air. As one does. He regularly hypnotises rabbits before they go to the vet so they can be treated and examined more easily, reports the Torygraph. He also treats "problem" rabbits with behavioural issues and can make them less aggressive after putting them in a trance. The furry fellows evidently can live longer after a bit of the old de-stressing by Cliff.

All very odd...

Talking of odd, White Rabbit can exclusively reveal what 'Dave' Cameron looks like before airbrushing. Suspected as much....




Seriously, the Museum of Taxidermy closed in January due to lack of visitors but now you can buy these exhibits which were donated by a Victorian adventurer known as Prof Copperthwaite. Apparently, Victorian visitors were fooled by these somewhat strange exhibits, which also included the alarming flying cat...

And do unicorns exist? Of course they do. Here's the proof.

Oh dear, they're at it again......

With the election hotting up, those naughty Downfall captioneers are at it again. This time they are taking a pop at 'Dave' - whatever next? Okay, more mockery of our likely next Prime Minister, that's what...

Meanwhile three pigs have obligingly sorted out the election result thus saving the rest of us the bother. Hat Tip to Mahal, who will enjoy the image below, nicked from jailhouse lawyer

Dear meeeee........

Nicked from Earl to whom Hat Tip. What exactly is going on here? It's from some US TV show called Community. It's on NBC. Just to raise the tone, here are the Dead with Lovelight. I once saw them do this live. How cool is that? Okay, it's a rhetorical question.

Oh and Beau Bo D'Or (link to left) strikes again...

The last word...

...on the Guardian's spoof election posters. Idea by the rabbit, photoshopping stuff by someone who knows who he is but is far too modest to want to be named.

The x-ray hands on the last posting came from a website called wacky archives. Here are a few more x-ray goodies, such as man at work here...

And a busload of people on the move...

Oh dear, a nail in the tyre...

Time for a nice cup of tea (he wrote coming over all Thora Hird in an Alan Bennett monologue)...

Election 2010 - they're off....

The rabbit has nothing to declare but his lack of enthusiasm for the exercise. Labour don't deserve to win and the people they are supposed to represent don't deserve the Conservatives - an annoying collection of upper class twits and right wing gits of the worst stripe. The best solution would be a hung Parliament which then legislated some serious constitutional reform - proper proportional representation, fixed term parliaments, a wholly elected second chamber. This album cover summed up the 1970 election for many. Perhaps time to dust it down.

But just one thing with all the passion I can muster. The BNP will be looking for a breakthrough. They should be resisted. 'Do not rejoice in his defeat, you men. For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again. (Bertold Brecht - referring to Arturo Ui (representing Hitler), in The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (1941)

WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate killing of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff. Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked killing of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded, This is the full uncut version, please be warned THIS IS GRAPHIC. I don't post it out of prurience and quuite understand that many people will want to pass on it. But it should be available to be seen.

Posh...

With Hat Tip to Daniel Hoffman-Gill, here is a pic of 'Dave' with subliminal message to the right. Talking of posh, here is a clip called Gap Yah which has gone viral on YouTube.

Continuing on the posh theme, the Guardian's April Fool spoof (the proper one, not the one that was real but ought to have been a spoof as regards the Tower of Horrors was to the effect that Labourr strategists were planning to cash in on Brown's dour hard man image. Some mock up posters were shown. The tragedy is that they were hugely better than anything that Labour will come up with for real (see below). I'm offskies down to London now. Happy Easter to all as wants such wishes. I tried to find an orthodox choir online for a bit of Easter music (okay, it's not the orthodox Easter but let's not get technical) but a combination of sound failure and confusion over choices defeated that plan for now. Any ideas Android?

Oh and as a parting shot - as it were - if you feel the urge to slap a politician, get slapping on the slapometer . 'Dave' strikes me as a bit - okay a lot - underslapped so get redressing the balance.

The Wasteland, the tower and the Mail...

The fact that today is the first of April put me in mind of T.S.Eliot's The Wasteland (he's the bloke in the pic) and its endlessly quoted opening lines...

April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain.

I'll resist the temptation to copy, paste and post more. The bit about a 'handful of dust' gave the title to Evelyn Waugh's worst novel. Just read it (The Wasteland, I mean not A Handful of Dust). It's simply stunning. Perfection

The tangled mass of metal above is as far from perfection as can be imagined. The Guardian newspaper has a long tradition of running spoof stories on the 1st April by way of an April Fool joke. The most famous was a seven page report on a nonexistent island called San Seriffe (which is actually a typeface) When I saw this story this morning I assumed it must be an April Fool joke.

I copy and paste...

Designs for what will be Britain's biggest piece of public art, a 120 metres tall looping tower by the artist Anish Kapoor that people will be able to climb, giving spectacular views of London, were unveiled today by Boris Johnson, mayor of London.

Kapoor's Orbit, a vast, snaking steel structure, will dominate the 2012 Olympic park. It is being hailed as London's answer to the Eiffel tower and is part of an ambition to make the Olympics site a permanent visitor attraction.

The terrible truth has dawned on me. It is not a spoof. This is for real. I will speak slowly and loudly:

IT

IS

FUCKING

HIDEOUS!!!

Please! Let's get this stupid, stupid, horrible looking thing stopped dead in its tracks at the idea stage. I know the Eiffel Tower was unpopular initially and people were sceptical about the London Eye but just look at the thing!

MERCY!!!

AAAAAAAARGH!!!!!!!!

Finally, here are Dan and Dan with their take on thea British 'newspaper' that defies description in moderate language. You'll get the general idea from the clip.
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Gideon Osborne (his real name)

Here is the consistently great Beau Bo D'Or (link to left)'s take on Gideon Osborne's National Insurance gig. (Overseas readers - don't worry. you're not missing much. It's just that there is to be a general election here very soon indeed). Here are the leaders of the two main parties.

All very odd....

Apologies if you have seen this before, it's not an entirely fresh story but there have been strange goings on at Zurich zoo. The zebra above stuck its head into the hippo's mouth (this is not advisable - hippos can be notoriously grumpy and you really wouldn't want your head between the hippo's jaws) but the hippo just keopt its mouth open and let the zebra get on with it. Don't ask me why - I'm not an animal behaviourist - but the zebra was cleaning the hippo's teeth. Very thoughtful of it too. Hat Tip to the Dental Maven - who takes a professional interest in these matters.

Here is another song I have already posted but in a different version. I posted a live version of Drive All Night a while ago but here is the studio version complete with a rather fine clip of night driving. From the comments on Youtube the clip puzzled American viewers with the traffic being on the 'wrong' side of the road.
One concluded it was Australia because Britain surely couldn't have so many big rigs. Oh yes we can. It's the M1, Britain's first motorway. Oh and the song is just a great love song, complete with Clarence Clemons doing wonderful things to a saxophone - as is his habit - half way through or thereabouts.

Oh - and Easter is a time for giving flowers, so here is White Rabbit's gift to his readers via Banksy. Oh, and for some Easter reading here, from the Huffington Post via Mahal, is a list of the 11 most surprising banned books - I wonder what on earth it said in that dictionary!

Banksy and congratulations

I've been meaning to blog on Banksy for ages. Apologies to British readers - Banksy being well known here - if I start with a bit of basic stuff. Banksy started as a graffiti artist. He works in stencils. Reputedly he started to use stencils because he realised how much quicker he could work using them when hiding from the police under a train. The number was stencilled on the chassis. An inspirational moment followed. His identity has not been definitively established. It is known that he comes from the Bristol area. He was reputedly born in 1974. There seems to be a Mrs Banksy. A name has been attached to this shadowy identity. Let's not spoil the fun by digging too deep. This one is rather rude, isn't it?

Inevitably, he uses surrealist images such as this one of an ATM attacking a girl...


And one of his finest moments was working into the Louvre with his copy of the Mona Lisa, subverted by a smiley face. He hung it up. Unsurprisingly, it was rapidly removed. 'To actually ... go through the process of having a painting selected must be quite boring. It's a lot more fun to go and put your own one up'. I can relate to that.


In fact he seems very fond of Mona Lisa; she keeps recurring as a theme.


In another of his finest moments - well quite extend period of time - he went to the West Bank and set about subverting the apartheid wall (West Banksy the episode was called). He met with a distinctly mixed reaction. The Israeli Occupation Forces threatened him verbally and pointed their guns at him on a number of occasions and an old Palestinian told him after telling him that he had made the wall beautiful 'We don't want it (the wall) to be beautiful, we hate this wall. Go home.'

I do like this one from Bethlehem of the young girl frisking the soldier.


I think what I like about Banksy - well apart from his glorious subversion of all sorts of things is his English eccentricity plus his uncommercial approach to his work. It's not that he hasn't made any money out of his art. He has. However he could have made a vast amount more if he had taken a hard nosed commecial approach. He didn't and kudos to him. I will leave the last words to him.

Well maybe not quite the last words. Two good things happened today. Firstly, John Hirst aka jailhouselawyer has got engaged. Congratulations! Secondly,
Lawminx is back blogging after all sort of health problems. Welcome back your minxitude! You've been sorely missed!

For American (and British) readers...

A strange girl called Sarah gives you the chills. Hmmm ... Here is some more sensible stuff on American attitudes and beliefs relating to President Antichrist - sorry Obama. A further good news story from Texas shows why all is well on the healthcare front thus obviating the need for any intervention by President Antichrist and his pals. Double Hat Tip to Mahal. All is also well in Britain...

The fine looking fellow above is named Bob Bailey and is a Barking (sic) BNP Councillor and in a spot of poo. Our man attended a Barking council planning meeting where a Nigerian church was applying for plannning permission to convert an office building to a church. Councillor Bailey was off on one...

He said he had visited the premises and told the planning committee meeting 'these people eat off the ground'. He added 'we don't want the amount of black children'. Our hero may be suspended from the council. It turns out that he has a bit of form - literally as it happens. Mr Barking was stopped when driving without lights and refused a breathalyser procedure on the grounds that the police who bothered him thus were part of a politically inspired conspiracy acting upon 'a higher order...'. He elaborated 'it adds to my belief it is a conspiracy against me, my party and the indigenous people of this country'. Notwithstanding this helpful explanation, Bailey was convicted. A court appointed doctor said that Bailey suffered from a 'possible personality disorder'.

A BNP member with a personality disorder? Who would have thought such a thing?

For further sensible stuff - and with yet another hat Tip to Mahal - here is more news on the asbo (antisocial behaviopur order) front concerning a Mrs Cartwright who is in trouble for allegedly breaking her asbo prohibiting her from having noisy sex only two days after it was imposed. A fine looking woman she is, I'm sure you'll all agree.

Time for something heart warming...

Hat Tip to Cute Overload. But this is not nice...

Professional eater?

Anniversary...

Today is the first anniversary of me stopping smoking. The circumstances were odd, as was explained here. I haven't touched a cigarette since, or at the risk of tempting fate, wanted to. I've just put on two stones instead. I say that - I've being trying to lose some of the additional weight and a few of the extra pounds have been shedded - helped by lots of gym work. I can now be insured as a non-smoker too. Cartoon below nicked from Earl's quiz...