FARCE

The orange babyTrump calls Infantino and tells him to reinstate the USA’s star forward, and of course the FIFA president does as he is told. Not content with using the White House to gorge his pockets and those of his family, it is not enough! A giant ego needs the support of the people, he failed to get the Nobel Peace prize so he went on an orgy of destruction despite being awarded the FIFA Peace Prize (wtf!). The player himself Folarin Balogun, should refuse to play, claiming an injury or whatever; Belgium USA next opponents should be prepared to walk off if the referee appears to be biased. Politics should stay out of sport, especially when it is blatently unfair. No other sendings of have been rescinded, the sending off itself was not controversial or contested at the time, on the pitch (no VAR) or player protests. It just fucking stinks of corruption and mis-use of power. The world will be rooting for Belgium tonight. Our beautiful game has already been corrupted by so called hydration breaks, by America’s use of immigration laws to restrict attendance (even by teams -Iran), sky high prices for just about everything. Fuck off Trump and stick to cage fighting!. By te way England had a magnificent victory against Mexico with goals from our two players who ply their trade with foreign clubs – and Jude Bellingham was undoubtably the star of the show – xenophobes fuck off!

At home Farage – the slimy toad faced liar, is under new threat of investigation for accepting yet more money from dodgy sources (this time a convicted fraudster). The government is introducing new rules to prevent foreign donations that can affect elections and our democracy. Whether it will be enough, time will tell. He is already whinging at a “witch hunt” and refusing to be interviewed.

PEOPLES WORLD CUP

People get very nationalist about their countries participation in the FIFA World Cup – but a closer examination of the facts is revealing. 99 players in squads were born in France – only 23 are in the French squad. When Morocco played Brazil, none of their players at one time, had been born in Morocco. European born dominate (England 49,Netherlands 67, Germany 48, Belgium 36, Switzerland 34, Spain 36, Austria 31), 53 were were born in Paris! So it is not surprising when players do not sing their national anthems – except for te Spanish whose anthem has no words! Many players have had the option of chosing the country they play for due to birth, parentage and residency. As the famous song went “the world is just a great big melting pot” – and the flag shaggers can just fuck off with their racist comments. Yes have a flag for the tournament but do not go over the top! Englands two hero’s play in Germany and Spain. However do not mention this if you are in a pub at 5am tomorrow and England lose on penalties (again)! But seriously football is a global game and one that could bring about a better world without FIFA President with his head up Trumps arse.

Oh and was yesterday the 4th July- USA celebration of independance – hardly even acknowleged in the UK. Main news from the U.S. was about Trump using the precedency to enhance the wealth of him and his family! In the UK a bill is going through Parliament to restrict donations from abroad to £100000 – this seems weak, but better than nothing as muppet faced Farage squirms whenever asked why he did not reveal a £5mill “gift”. Which sent him running to the Treasury to promote crypto-currencies, no conflict of interests obviously.

Sunny here, and about to make strawberry jam, I might add some mint? Dry for the next month is the forecast – hopefully my water butts will be enough? Tomatoes are forming – hopefully next week?

BULLSHIT

The Education Minister has said it is important that kids attend school on Monday morning. I agree that for many it would be preferable to hanging around home, unsupervised, But am fed up with the ignorant comments about the devastation that a few hours of lost schooling would wreak! Every teacher knows that this time of year is not academically useful (it may still have social benefits), classrooms are hot, kids and teachers have no enthusiam, blinds are shut and videos reign supreme. That is if the kids are not visiting theme parks and watching films for “activities weeks”, or on pointless “work experience” for most. And to think parents are fined for letting theyr children have greater educational experiences other than that offered by impoverished budgets. Yes children who miss school regularly throughout the year should have their parents justify, but schools employ people to gather the evidence, whilst teachers put on a film of variable evidence. (and PS. never get to see the end of a film that is over 60 minutes long).

So my strategy would be for schools to jack in the traditional curriculum after the Whitsun break and concentrate on sports, environment and art – mostly outside!

MAGIC – and Taylor Swift!

The World Cup has produced some magic – Cabo Verde took world champions Argentina to extra time and then equalised again before losing out. So after 4 matches they were unbeaten at full time (including their opening match against European Champions Spain, and despite travel restrictions on their fans by the glorious Trump (twat!). So a country with a slightly higher populationcannot always switch their arrangements than Bristol has taken on the World Champions and the European Champions and gave them a fright – MAGIC!

FIFA meanwhile have shown their utter contempt for … basically everyone; players, supporters, our government, our employees and employers, by proposing an earlier kick off.. Firstly the players – at such a level of professionalism it must be wrong to switch KO from a pleasantly warm evening to the raging heat of the day; supporters to suit a new KO time; our government has changed alcohol licensing laws to accomodate a ‘1am kick off (UK time); employees and employers have made commitments to staff this event; And then they back track and say they are not changing it after all. The excuse was the weather predictions – but was more likely due to pressure from media companies in the UK and Europe – projected viewing figures were way down on expectations. So England players will have been asked to adapt to sweltering temperatures – and then told it was back to before. It is going to be difficult to adapt to the altitude, a very partisan crowd and the expectation of a nation anyway (well part of a nation?). On money – resale tickets for the match in Mexico City have been priced at £24000 – fucking ridiculous – too many people with too much money – a fucked up world! Still America is more interested in Taylor Swifts wedding in NY – who gave $26million to various charities , they are estimated to be worth at least a $billion – so by my very poor calculations it would be like a person with £1000 giving 0.2p to a charity! So next time Taylor make a bigger impact on poverty and the environment – do something meaningful that actually makes a difference.

Meanwhile Farage has flown to America again – to suck Trumps ……? He certainly will not be supporting the England team who are in Mexico! America like Britain has a shitty past, most countries cannot look back at their past with unbridled pride, but not many, if any, had genocide as a government policy.

4TH JULY

I guess this all has to be about the USA – I will not try to compete when Rebecca Solnit summed it up beautifully in an article headlined ‘The good, the bad and the ugly”. A country founded on genocide with more than a little corruption along the way has also been inventive and creative in a possitive way for humanity. They should get Danny Boyle design a celebration like London 2012 . I think in the past the USA had much to be proud of, and although late comers I would include WW1 &2, but very little at the present. Oh well I will this topic for now. South Africa is facing another spate of murders – not the genocide spouted by Musk and Trump, but black migrants from other African countries. It seems that a person does not have to be white to be a racist twat!

Can the press stop interviewing ‘formerhead of … ‘ It is becoming boring lstening to their whining and right wing comments which have little substance..

World Cup – England have against them 60000 + mexican supporters, altitude, history and expectation – what could go wrong?

SPOILT WHITE MEN

What do Boris Johnson, Donald Trup and Nigel Farage have in common – well the list is long and contains expletives that should not be used often! But I was thinking along the lines of privileged, rich, arrogant and going down in history as such. Trump has been condemned by the Supreme Court as a rapist, and the latest is a $billion crypto currency scandal, whilst Farage is struggling under a £5million ‘gift’ from a crypto billionaire – and Boris! All believe themselves to be above the law that determines a civil society. And there are many others who believe the same – but in general they are all white, priveged and rich. And all self grandising con merchants.

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

Isuppose it was/is inevitable that spending on Defence is going up but in general it seems to be going in the right places, although I am hesitant about nuclear submarines. What is much more sensible is a proposal to limit education trust executive to a max of £174000 – this is still high, but I doubt if any will be resigning or going on strike! Similar provisions could and should be made for all public servants especially Councils where executive salaries are way to high, universities and the NHS Trusts. If they are good enough they can take industrial jobs and boost the economy in that way. This educational initiative comes after a report stated that schools were failing white working class children, and that many children were spending too much time in isolation. Education was a kinder place when I started teaching in 1975. Local authorities provided essential services a head teacher was provided for each school rather than spending time between several? With academies I see no improvements, other than services being privatised – diners at Churchill Academy have certainly plummeted, kids cannot even sit to enjoy their food and friendships – no wonder so many are fucked up!

DOMESTICS

Just made pickled beetroot and am drying herbs. Maybe get strawberries tomorrow for jam, I would like to make raspberry jam but despite my raspberries spreading across the former lawn, I never have enough for jam (it might be my fault for snacking on the way to the greenhouse every morning! Tomatoes not ready quite yet, and chilli plant is thriving but no flowers yet. About to make a foolish for baguettes and maybe add basil and parmesan before baking tomorrow morning?

BASIC MISTAKE

I put the washing on and then looked at the weather forecast! I am a dumbass at times.

On an optimistic note Andy Burnham has published ideas for his future government – and there was not anything to dislike apart from those who hate paying tax and think the world is orientated around them! It was vague in parts but at least built up the hope that things will get better. He did it in Manchester – can he take on the vast vested interests of Westminster, Whitehall and the City of London.

SOFT POWER

Trump has gutted the USAID organisation which has resulted in a lack of contact with local NGO’s around the world; so what! It has saved $millions – but there is a catch. The earthquake disaster in Venezuela has left the US Government clueless a govt. spokesperson said aid was going to be big, fast and effective. Well the fast bit is already a lie, it will probably be big in terms of cost (Trump needs to keep his newest friends sweet), but effective needs good contacts with local NGO’s – so that is a no. Iran has revealed that Trumps belief that power is correlated with military might is totally false. Influence is a much more difficult factor to control, and Trump has destroyed much of the goodwill that tempered the brash behaviour of governments in the past. Copious funding may seem to be wasteful, but the alternative posited by Trump is “do as I say or I will bomb you back to the Stone Age”. He and his supporters are all thick as and talk shit!