Outspoken

Madeleine

The events surrounding Madeleine McCann this week have been truly horrifying and it is something no parent should ever have to face. We become so hardened to bad news that few stories affect us any more yet there is something about the innocence of children that cannot fail to touch any normal person.

I look at the pictures of Madeleine and cannot help but think of my daughter, Alice, who is also 3 years old. There have been many comments made about her parents being negligent for leaving Madeleine and her 2 year old twin siblings alone in a hotel room but these comments offer no help or support to anyone. I personally would not leave my children alone in a room abroad but if this is negligence it is on the very far end of minor and there is no one else to blame for this except the person who abducted her.

Since the day my children were born my wife and I have never let them out of our site unless they are with family, at school or at nursery. I won't even leave them in the car when I am paying for petrol. It's such a shame that giving birth to children these days comes with a constant feeling of paranoia over your head for the rest of your life.

My wife and I discussed pedophelia the other night and I attempted to explain that it is in fact an illness, a fault in the genetic make-up of that individual and that there had long been arguments that it could not technically be a criminal act if it was a medical problem. Needless to say my wife did not even want to hear it. We then discussed what should happen to pedophiles and she immediately said that they should be hanged if found guilty. I am not in favour of capital punishment and believe it shows a failure of any reabilitation system when we need to kill people to get justice.

My hatred of capital punishment has one exception and that is the people described above. Call it an ilness all you like but bringing utter misery to children, their families and every parent on this planet deserves an exceptional kind of justice. Saying that "hanging is not good enough for some people" is a cliche but it fits in this situation- no matter what phsycological issues these people have when they do something like this they need to be removed from our society. It will of course never happen but there surely can be no worse crime a person can commit.

We do not know what has happened to Madeleine yet and may never know. You may know my thoughts on religion but even I said a little prayer to 'whoever' last night asking for a positive outcome.

When the Constitution kills

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

The right to bear arms in the USA is one held dear by millions of people and it is such a precious right that politicians dare not speak out against such a ridiculous theory. It has been proven that legalising guns will cause more gun deaths and in the US in particular it is a staggering amount.

American children are more at risk from firearms than the children of any other industrialized nation. In one year, firearms killed no children in Japan, 19 in Great Britain, 57 in Germany, 109 in France, 153 in Canada, and 5,285 in the United States. (Centers for Disease Control)

The statistic above is frightening to say the least and is clear proof that the idea of protecting oneself with a firearm can only lead to more violence. In the UK carrying a gun is illegal except under very exceptional circumstances and it shows in the amount of gun related crime which is so low as to barely register a blip on the crime statistics. The idea of owning a gun or having one in the house is absurd to most British people and I genuinely cannot see a day in which it will every become law.

There is an oddity in the statistic above in that Canadian gun crime is relatively low in comparison to the number of guns owned and in stark contrast to the statistics that come out of the US every year. Some of you reading this will have very strong views that are pro gun ownership and I for one would love to hear them. Without doubt many gun deaths are caused by firearms that are owned illegally but this is a cultural problem, not a legal one. Because gun ownership is so widespread it becomes part of life and thus more access equals more deaths whether they be by violence, suicide or accident.

In a civilised society there is absolutely no need for legal gun ownership and in my mind it is an indicator of an overly violent society. America is in fact not overly violent but the guns remain and the politicians are still too scared to tackle the issue. I’m not saying that guns would disappear overnight if made illegal but someone needs to take a stand on this issue and shout down the people who feel they have a ‘right to bear arms’- it may have been relevant when the Constitution was written but it most certainly is not today.

The tragic consequences of this policy were made all too obvious in Virginia yesterday and it is far from the first time something like this has happened. These people were just starting their lives and there is no excuse for what happened…

“There are approximately 192 million privately owned firearms in the U.S. --65 million of which are handguns. Police Foundations, 1996”

“In 1997, 32,436 Americans were killed with firearms-in homicides, suicides and accidents. In comparison, 33,651 Americans were killed in the Korean War and 58,148 Americans were killed in the Vietnam War. National Center for Health Statistics, 1997”

“More than 1.2 million elementary-aged, latch-key children have access to guns in their homes. Lee, Journal of the American Medical Association, 1990”

A Brit abroad

It's been a while since I wrote an Outspoken article and even longer since I last went to America. Previous excursions have been to Los Angeles, Boston and New York and I was not impressed with any of those places. Orlando was different to the above for so many reasons and that was mainly because of its infrastructure which is amazing compared to what we see here in the UK.

On a Disney bus trip to one of their parks automatic sprinklers are spraying the grass by the roads for most of the journey, over in the UK we are facing a drought order because out water companies have never bothered to give us the infrastructure needed to cope with our population and the government continues to allow the building of houses in areas where the current energy and water supplies are already not adequate for their needs. Our water companies lose 30% of water by leakage alone.

No new water is ever created on earth and we wash in and drink the exact same water we did thousands of years ago (learnt that at Epcot:)).

The entire Disney set up is phenomenal- buses flow between each park and Disney hotel every 20 minutes and you never have to worry about getting from A to B. The staff are very polite (almost annoyingly so) and they do everything they can to help if you have a problem. Every person we met was polite and great to talk to apart from the occasional example such as the lady in one of the designated smoking areas who upon realising I was British asked me "If every one in the UK hates their President." My affirmative response caused her to throw her cigarette down and stomp off (well, waddle actually) cursing and swearing...

The designated smoking areas are very annoying indeed. It's quite hypocritical for the largest polluting nation in the world to make such a big deal about protecting people's health when 4 and 5 litre cars are trundling down the roads, at about 10 miles an hour from what I could see, and causing many more times the damage that someone happening to walk past some cigarette smoke could ever do. I understand that people do not like other people's smoke but it seems to be going too far now with regards to the anit-smoking brigade. Of course it kills but it is not illegal- make it illegal and every one would be happy, even us smokers.

America (well, Orlando at least) seems to be heading down a slippery slope with regards to health. I found it offensive when a HUGE person demands to get on a bus first because they are so fat they cannot walk and then claims to have a handicap. We saw a girl of about 13 years old who was extremely overweight with her parents who were both confined to those motorised vehicles Disney hires out by the dozen. What chance does she have? Children of 5 and 6 years old are put in hired strollers and walked around the parks- make them walk for Gods sake! They are children and it is teaching the exact wrong lesson at a very early age. I would guess that 1 in 5 people we saw was pretty overweight with about 1 in 10 deserved their own border patrol...

I know this sounds like I am mocking these people but they have to take some responsibility for this and so do the authorities- a BIG meal of burger and fries in Disney cost $5.00, a healthy small sandwich cost $8.99, a small tub of grapes and water melon was $4.49- not exactly encouraging healthy eating is it? We struggled to find healthy food in the hotel or the parks and carbonated drinks seemed to be the order of the day for everyone- buy a cup for $11 and you can kill yourself with Coke all week long for no extra money.

I can only see this problem growing unless something is done about it very quickly. On another note the TV channels are great- lots of superb entertainment from the likes of Fox and hilarious news coverage. The religious channels out numbered all of the other genres on offer. One phone in made me laugh-

Caller: "My husband has left and I don't know what to do?" Followed by a few sobs over the phone line.

Presenter: "Just think what Jesus went through for you and you will realise it's all OK. Take Jesus to your heart and everything will be OK for you." Followed by false concerned look.

I was in tears... through laughter.

A friend (American) emailed me the following comment- "Never liked the place--too fake and way too sugary. Probably an influence from my mom, she's not a Disney fan.  It just reeks of commercialism, as Disney does in general. You have to wonder how the influence of media and entertainment affects the whole of our culture"

I loved the falseness of it- I'm not comfortable in the real world and prefer a place like Orlando.

Everything else about Orlando was wonderful- beautiful weather, beautiful design (if a little man-made) and very friendly people who made the holiday worth every penny. As a general standard of living somewhere like Orlando provides a  LOT to a young family and whilst my thoughts will be clouded by the fact I have just returned, the past week made me fall in love with America all over again... If I could get a Green Card I would seriousy consider living there, let's just hope no one in Immigration reads this site:)

The war on terror?

The past few weeks have been terrifying for most Londoners and anyone travelling to our capital city. I have to go there on Wednesday and really do not want to- I feel like most Brits in that we should just carry on as normal but it's easier said than done with so many incidents occuring at this time.

The shooting of an innocent man last week has kept the news going for the terrorists and they must be loving every minute. It's impossible to know at this time how justified the police were but these two comments on BBCi are both valid-

"The police had no option, the man could have been a suicide bomber. They could not afford to take chances with the lives of innocent people at stake. He should have obeyed the police when challenged."

"What if this man did not understand English, and all he saw was 3 normally dressed large built men screaming, looking aggressive and running after him in a tube station? Put yourself in his position."

It's quite awful that the Police in the UK are having to use guns but understandable at the same time- to me there appears to be no way to stop these attacks happening. Relatively easy to plan, easy to execute and more and more people appear to be joining up to carry them out...

At the same time I feel that we are playing into the hands of the terrorists who find it all too easy to recruit young people and brainwash them into believing that the West is evil. Many of us think the West is evil at times so what chance do we have in the Middle East and Africa? It has been argued that they will find any excuse for the attacks and whilst that is true when you consider how many countries have been attacked we have done a lot of things to help breed this recruitment process.

Obviously Iraq is the big one and will continue to be. No matter how we justify it over 25,000 dead civilians will always be a good persuasive argument to use against young people. You know my views on the Iraq war but whatever side of the argument you are on you have to recognise that for extremists it is the oxygen they need.

Where we go from here is anyone's guess- basically we are f*cked whatever we do. Too many people hate us even if the majority of our populations are not responsible for any wrong doing and they will continue to recruit and will continue to kill innocents.

In the UK we have been used to terrorism for many years and that side has died down somewhat- just imagine this telephone conversation-

"Hi Tony, it's George. You have a domestic problem with the IRA- how about I speak to some people and sort that for you if you join us in Iraq?"

A colleague at work mentioned that to me the other day and it made me think- probably total rubbish but conspriacy theories are always good fun...

It's all very depressing and will not be solved for many years to come. Any one have any better ideas of how to solve this mess?

Too young to murder?

A disturbing crime happened in the UK this week when a 5 year old boy was seriously injured in a woods whilst walking home. I have to point out that no proof exists yet but the police are concentrating their enquiries on a group of children around the age of 12. The 5 year old boy ended up with injuries to his neck which suggested that something very tight had been tied around it and bruises all over his body- fortunately he has been discharged from hospital but how long will the event stay with him?

Personally I can't imagine letting my 5 year old son walk home on his own but that's a separate issue. The question is just how responsible are these children for the crime if it is proven to have been committed by them? For many of us the incident described above brings back memories of one of the most horrid crimes ever to take place on British Soil- the murder of Jamie Bulger. I can't remember the facts exactly but he was around two and a half years old and was escorted out of a shopping centre by 2 ten year old boys who had a plan of what they wanted to do to him.

He ended up dead on a railway track after they had, amongst other things, twisted his testicles until they bled and it appears that they had coaxed (or bullied) him into running onto the track. I did not write the previous sentence for effect but to highlight what these '10' year old boys did to him... I repeat- 10 years old.

Because they were only 10 they are now free from jail (due to the fact they were tried in an adult court- error!) and can live a comfortable life free from their previous troubles. They have new identities, probably paying jobs and a much better life than they could have expected had they remained in the environment that they were brought up in which was basically a very poor area with huge amounts of crime and little chance of a future the rest of us are blessed with and work hard for. Compare this to the life Jamie's parents have had to live following the death of their son- the one thing parent's wish for above all else if that their children outlive them but tragedy strikes when you least expect it and they have had to deal with what happened to their son every day since.

Are the killers less guilty because they were only 10 years old? Is it all the fault of their parents? Do they understand the difference between pulling the legs off a spider and killing a child?

Answers; No, yes to a point and of course they do.

I have spoken to a few people about this subject and opinions seem to be very much divided, ranging in extremes from "they have no idea to what they are doing" to "they should be hung!" The case of Jamie Bulger was unique and thankfully incredibly rare but I personally do not feel that they should have been let out so early- obviously there is a point where innocence ends and putting an age on that is impossible to do. Having said that the crime itself must be a good indicator of the person's state of mind.

What do you think? Where do we draw the line at punishing children for terrible crimes? Is 10 years old too early to be prosecuted for murder?

Tell me there's a heaven by Chris Rea

The little girl she said to me
What are these things that I can see
Each night when I come home from school
And mama calls me in for tea
Oh every night a baby dies
And every night a mama cries
What makes those men do what they do
To make that person black and blue

Grandpa says their happy now
They sit with God in paradise
With angels wings and still somehow
It makes me feel like ice

Tell me theres a heaven
Tell me that its true
Tell me theres a reason
Why Im seeing what I do

Tell me theres a heaven
Where all those people go
Tell me theyre all happy now
Papa tell me that its so

So do I tell her that its true
That theres a place for me and you
Where hungry children smile and say
We wouldnt have no other way
That every painful crack of bones
Is a step along the way
Every wrong done is a game plan
To that great and joyful day


And Im looking at the father and the son
And Im looking at the mother and the daughter
And Im watching them in tears of pain
And Im watching them suffer
Dont tell that little girl
Tell me

Tell me theres a heaven
Tell me that its true
Tell me theres a reason
Why Im seeing what I do


Tell me theres a heaven
Where all those people go
Tell me theyre all happy now
Papa tell me that its so

Tiny Tears

The children stared at him from the photo frame on the shelf, from a time when he was a hero who knew everything, from a time when he was the funniest man in the world who loved more than he thought possible.

The half smoked cigarette burned the astray having just added a few more cancerous cells to his lungs but he didn't care- the future was the least of his worries. It was a future filled with the same day over and over again and all he could see was conference calls, emails, meetings and TV. No time spent drinking with friends down the pub talking about football and music and very rare outings with work colleagues which bored him to oblivion and only served to make him feel more lonely. Having a couple of drinks in between games of ten pin bowling was really not his cup of tea especially as he was crap at the game.

After an hour the LCD screen started to blur and his head lightly smacked the desk as sleep overcame him and took him to a place where he could not hurt anymore.

"Marc, please be careful. This weather's awful." The rain splashed against the windscreen and fragmented into small magnifying splodges of water which made the task of seeing the road ahead and other vehicles even more difficult. Marc still felt safe at his customary eighty miles per hour in the outside lane.

"I'm fine Ruth, stop worrying. I have done this trip a hundred times before and never had a problem." The 'tut' at the end of his sentence highlighting his annoyance. Billy and Meg were asleep in the back of the car and had no idea weather like this was dangerous and that their father felt invincible at the wheel of a car.

"I'm just saying that's all. How would you feel if something bad happened?"

"Nothing's going to happen- you want to get home before midnight don't you?" Ruth rolled her eyes.

"I just want to get home in one piece thanks." Silence took over for a few miles.

Marc was awoken by the sound of his PDA beeping. It was 7am and he was still at the desk but could feel a hard object pressing against his right ear- it was the mouse. The thirty seconds following sleep were his favourite part of the day- as his mind started to put together memories for a brief moment he was not the person with so much anger and bitterness inside. He was just an ordinary guy with ordinary worries.

He decided to take a look at his emails but lost interest fairly quickly and headed up to the bathroom. The November chill was especially apparent as he stepped into the shower and waited for the warm steamy water to bring his aching body back to life. He felt as though he had slept on a rock and could not dislodge the ache at the bottom of his spine. Despite the number of times he had decided never to fall asleep sitting at the desk again it still happened far too often.

The first four chapters are available at http://www.clieuk.co.uk/TinyTears1.html

The child catcher, the fibber or the gingerbread man?

If you live outside of the UK you may be unaware that we have a General Election next week and have to decide who will govern our land for at least the next 4 years.

It's been a campaign of bitching, mud slinging and general avoidance of real issues from some parties, complete incompetance from others and odd behaviour from others.

Before we look at the parties let's take a quick look at their leaders-

Tony Blair- actually has a very good record in charge of the country. He has done many positive things and slipped up on only a few. He has a natural style which I suspect a lot of people can identify with and is easily the best communicator of the three. Has a tendancy to get angry when questioned bluntly but at times that comes across as passionate and works in his favour.

His major error was Iraq and this is currently dominating the campaign. The release of the Attorney General's legal advice today has added more credance to the case that he lied when taking us to war. Personally I believe he misled us rather than lied and that outside pressures had a big part to play in this (that pressure lives to the left of us and has been discussed many times in this blog:))

Without Iraq he would be laughing now but the way the population feels about the war still hurt him politically to this day. I don't believe it is enough to do him real damage but you never know.

Michael Howard- a man who is about as endeering as the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang bang. He has one policy and that is immigration, immigration, immigration. Surprisingly this is working for him- everywhere I go I hear comments like "We are letting too many in", "No more" etc. etc. The launguage Michael Howard uses is carefully constructed as you would expect from a good barrister but panders to our most basict instincts and if this trend continues we will have a real race issue in this country.

He has a new policy every day which are often ill thought out and you have to ask where the money will come from for lower stamp duty, no tax rises, lower council tax for pensioners, better schools, hospitals etc. His economic policies are bodering on post-it note politics and do not convince me for one minute.

Add this to his manner and you have a man you would never invite for dinner. He is slimy in the extreme, takes too long to get his sentences out and is unconvincing at every turn.

Charles Kennedy- if he worked in my company I would presume he did the filing. A nice man who has some good convictions but he is not the kind of person you could ever see running the country.

He was the only leader to oppose the war in Iraq and this is helping him in the polls but it's simply not enough. Local income tax kills off his hopes in one go as many people will be paying an extra £1,000 per household per year.

He wears his ties far too long, has a drink problem (so rumor has it) and is just not quite there as an effective leader. Not sure why but he reminds me of the gingerbread man.

OK, lets take a quick look at the parties-

Labour- have been in power since 1997. Schools are better, hospitals are better, the economy is stable, fox hunting is gone and I for one have only seen imporvement under them.

Obviously we can only rely on stats for schools and hospitals but we have had no real issues with either apart from Christmas but that's another story. I cannot see them losing this election because they have done little wrong, questionable human rights laws and Iraq aside.

They are also pro Europe which I for one love to hear. Those that cry "keep the pound" and "let's stay British" are hoping for a time gone by and need to move onwards and upwards.

Conservative- clueless. When you look at the shadow cabinet the lack of talent in it is quite astounding. Michael Howard is a very clever man but does not have the communication skills required to get the general public on his side.

One example is Oliver Letwin (Shadow Secretary of State for Economic Affairs & Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer) who has the most slappable face in the world. Born with a silver spoon up his backside he is even more hateable than Michael Howard (so I guess we should at least give him credit for that:))

The Conservative campaign has been one of 'attacking Blair' with little focus on their own policies or ideas for the countries future. I pray that they do not get in- a party who pander to the right wing do not deserve such a place. Everyone I know who is going to vote for them is over 40 years old and has swallowed the xenophobic vitriol that has fallen out of Howard's mouth.

Liberal- um... Nice bunch of people. um... quite old party members. um... that's all I can think to sayabout them.

I musn't forget the other main parties-

BNP- terrible bunch of people, really terrible.

UKIP- not much different to the above lot.

Veritas- ditto.

Green- some excellent policies and quite clever thinking but never a chance of power.

Well, you can probably guess who I am voting for. I have weighed this decision up over many hours and can see no other choice but Labour. I do not like Blair one bit but like many others am expecting (and hoping) he will make way for Gordon Brown soon- that's the kind of man we need leading this country.

The hunt is over...

So, the ban on hunting foxes with dogs has now come into force in England and Wales. There has been many demonstrations by the 'hunting set' over the past few months and many of these have been violent affairs.

These people are supposed to be the elite, or at least they think they are. They have shown themselves to be little more than a bunch of thugs in recent months who deserve little sympathy from people who have a genuine interest in stopping animal cruelty.

Personally I think fox hunting is a disgusting pastime and I have not heard one good argument for it since the debate began. The arguments will continue and the legal challenges will get more expensive but at least a few foxes will not die a horrible death in the meantime and hopefully a few of these people will lose the home comforts they don't appreciate anyway.

Any views on fox hunting, or hunting in general?

Why is the party always somewhere else?

I am a natural pessimist and always have been. I wake up worrying about money, my children, what I have achieved in life and anything else that will stop me from thinking about nothing. I go to bed worrying about the same things and in times alone they all come back into my head.

If I am at home at the weekend I presume that the people next door are having more fun than me. I presume that others are having more fun and that what I am doing is nothing special. I guess I have been like this since I was a child- the fat kid at school with few friends who never left the house. I am now the not so fat adult with friends but I cannot shake the feeling that I have not made enough of myself.

This is not an article asking for sympathy but one that I find easier to write on a web site than to discuss with those closest to me- that is really stupid but it's the way it is. I guess I am writing it to help me come to terms with what I am feeling and have always found it easier to get my feelings into type rather than out of my mouth.

At Christmas my daughter, Alice, was quite ill and something changed inside me without me even noticing. I sat with her, held her, tried to make her laugh as the tubes in her arm kept her hydrated. Families came in and out of the hospital with worried parents doing the same for their children. Everything was a blur and Christmas ended as if it had not happened. Life carried on as normal- 8 hours a day at work, playing with the children at night and the endless posting of news on the 247 sites. Over the past couple of weeks I have become over emotional by my standards with much more time spent on my own (I have always hated my own company). Talking to people does my head in at the moment- on the surface I am Mr. Jolly who is always cracking rubbish jokes and never showing any sign of a problem and I will walk into the office tomorrow as happy as ever, hiding how I really feel.

Everything feels so endless. Endless days at work, endless crying and stamping of feet from the kids and the endless pretending to be someone else. I love my family dearly and have more than many others- who would not want 2 beautiful children, a lovely understanding wife and a good job? I know I have it all but can't really bring myself to discuss how I really feel with anyone.

I never cry but I am as I write this and I don't know why.

This is not exactly an interesting article to read but I wanted to get it off my chest. I am not depressed, I am not having a breakdown- I am just really, really fucked off and don't know where the hell I am going. I want to believe in something that makes me feel alive again. I want to do something new. I want to feel love like a teenager does on their first date. Most of all I want to be happy and be able to rejoice in all of the goods things that I have. But I can't...

Being

My reason for being I will never understand

No point thinking about it

Better off with your head in the sand

------

You judge me by the size of my house, the looks of my spouse

My bank account, clothes and voice

Like I ever had a choice

------

The relentless and pointless accumulation of wealth

Get stressed, selfish and hurtful

Forget about your health

------

Take a walk and see the have nots and the haves

The classy and the chavs

Material purchases everywhere

Is there anyone left who truly cares?