DAILY STAR: “’THE TAPAS SEVEN‘” – AN APOLOGY

The Sangria Seven, surely. Or the Tapas 9 (what happened to them?). But what of this latest apology? Ahem..:

In articles published in September and November last year we suggested that the holiday companions of Kate and Gerry McCann might have covered up the true facts concerning Madeleine McCann’s disappearance and/or misled the authorities investigating her disappearance.

Yes…

We also suggested that the McCanns’ friends had been identified as potential suspects.

And…

We now accept that these suggestions should never have been made and were completely untrue.

The Star is printed in Portuguese…

We apologise to Jane Tanner, Russell O’Brien, Fiona Payne, David Payne, Matthew Oldfield, Rachael Oldfield and Diane Webster to whom we have agreed to pay substantial damages which they will be donating to the Find Madeleine Fund.

Ah, yes, another donation. Well, at least the cash will keep the story going;, and the Express in news, and robots…

TIMES: “Express group to pay McCann friends damages”

How much?

Friends of Madeleine McCann’s parents are expected to accept libel damages of £375,000 today.

Express Newspapers has previously paid damages of £550,000 to Mr and Mrs McCann, from Rothley, Leicestershire. The group and other newspapers also paid more than £600,000 to Robert Murat, a former official suspect, and two other people.

Anorak broke that story. And what of the “other newspapers”, like the Times’ sister organs, the Sun and the News of the World. Why not mention them by name?

THE GUARDIAN: “Desmond’s papers back in court to apologise for more shoddy journalism”

It’s Roy Greenslade, fearless repeorting on bad jouslism. No, not the Maddy keywords. No, not the BNP adverts. The Express:

It is a further nail in the coffin of the reputation of the Daily Express and its pornographer owner, Richard Desmond.

Reputation? Does he care? And what fot Desmond’s newspapers? They might be full of bollocks, but people still read them, or at least they look at the pictures:

Guardian circulation: 348,878

Daily Express circualtion: 739,025

Daily Star circulation:  731,433

And you thought no-one read the Express…

Madeleine McCann: A child is missing, still missing. After a year and half of reporting, there are no suspects. The press has uncovered not a single lead. And the parents continue to search for their daughter…

What else of 2030? “It’s…

“…A chilling world where licences are required for having children and questioning global warming is a crime could be ushered in by climate change”.

Why wait. Bring it on.

The scenario is one of five potential responses to climate change described by a panel of 60 experts in the study by Forum for the Future, a sustainable development group.

Not sure if we get a vote on which world we want, but know that the “five possible futures for mankind are”:

• ‘GOLDEN AGE’: Rapid innovation in energy efficiency and new technology has enabled a low-carbon economy with almost no need for changes in lifestyle. The result is an increasingly individualistic and consumer-focused world, with a growing divide between rich and poor. Some call this a golden age of technology and freedom, but others call it a very shaky house of cards.

We turn the card and it says “a golden age of technology and freedom”. Sounds like now…

• CARBON WORLD: Carbon has become one of the most important and expensive commodities in the world, unleashing unprecedented levels of creativity across the global economy. It has also created a new type of consumerist world, with a “share with your neighbour” ethos. Many companies also now meet underlying needs by selling services, not products.

Carbon. Diamonds. Expensive. Sounds like now. Services not products. Sounds like the UK now. The experts are not being creative enough. Perhaps they need an injection of raw carbon?

• GREEN EUTOPIA: A “well-being” economy has come to the fore across the world, whose key values include low-impact lifestyles more quality time with family and friends, better health and an increased sense of community. However, “free-riders” plunder resources and exploit the vulnerable. Several large cities set themselves up as “havens of real capitalism”.

South Africa becomes the model. To South Africans it sounds like now…

• DRACONIAN STEPS: Tough measures have been adopted to combat climate change in a world which woke up late to the threat, pushing economies to the limit of what they can deliver. Governments took a stronger and stronger role, rationalising industries to reduce their climate change impact, even putting “carbon monitors” in people’s homes to watch their energy use.

Gordon Brown is till in power. Sounds like now…

• OPEN WAR: Globalisation has gone into retreat and countries focus on security and access to resources at any cost. Accusations of cheating over emissions agreements, such as through undeclared power stations, cause international co-operation to collapse. Terrorists capitalise on the chaos to further their nationalist causes by launching devastating bio-chemical attacks.

That’s more like it. Here’s one vision of tomorrow land we can make a film about that can pack ‘em into the megaplex.

Unless the theatre has been overrun by Islamic terrorists and we’re all trapped inside? In which case, watch out for the Russians. Sounds a lot like now…

Flood: Coming To A Cinema, Street, Garage, Shop Near You

Yes, some people are poor and some are out of work, but not everyone; not even a majority. Keynes was right. The most important thing in a recession is for those with money to keep spending it. Those without can cite Aquinas and remember that the best things in life are free.

Talk is cheap. The Times costs 80p. Anorak is free…

The Guardian would like to garner your thoughts on the BNP.

“Does the BNP speak for you?”

You put down your white (guilt) coffee and look at the canvasser’s laptop. You click through to politic-poll.com. and see a picture of BNP leader Nick Griffin.

Cast your vote and a free gift as a reward. You can browse the BNP propaganda while you think on the ishoos.

A spokeswoman for The Guardian said the links to the poll were supplied by Google and got through its list of banned keywords. The newspaper will now block all poll advertising.

It’s not like the Guardian knows how keywords work, and their value. Not long ago the paper bought the keywords “Madeleine McCann” from Google. Type in a search for Our Maddie and by the result you’d get an advert for the caring Guardian.

So vote made. And back to the coffee. And while you drink, enjoy one of the 2m Guardian newspapers being given out to Starbucks customers each week. Inside, they can read about the environment while listening to the tropical sounds of the store’s in-house waterfall…

British coffee for British drinkers!

Madeleine McCann: Greedy Newspapers Banking On Maddy In Brussels, And Naming Rights

The BNP’s Hitler Youth, CCF, Nashi And Other NUT Jobs

Starbucks Creates Skinny Rain And Foamy Seas

Oxford Union: Luke Tryl Invites BNP Leader And Holocaust Denier To Speak

SWP Remembers The Jew Free Holocaust At BNP Rally

Let’s Hear It From The BNP And Holocaust Deniers

BNP-ed Off

Ken Livingstone, former London mayor and still former London mayor, turns to Sky New’s political editor Adam Boulton and asks:

“Have you ever had sex with an animal?”

Boulton declined to comment, forgoing the obvious answers:

Is that an offer?
Can you have sex with a newt?
You’re like a concentration camp guard
To keep warm?
Only when nobody wants me

Source: Independent

Animal Sex On Lily Allen’s Chatshow: Call The Archbishop Of Canterbury

Ken Livingstone Is The BBC’s Voice Of the Apocalypse

Man Caught Having Sex With A Dead Deer

Remembering Ken Livingstone On CBeebies

Ken Livingstone’s Ally Yusuf al-Qaradawi Denied Visa

Ken Livingstone For Sale

Ken Livingstone’s Non-Carbon-Neutral Kids

MADDIE WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann, Kate McCann and Gerry McCann

INTERNATIONAL HERLAD TRIUBIUNE (France): “Billionaire retailer Green shops for a bargain”

Mark Pootter says Philip Green is on the hunt for a knock-down-once-in-a-lifetime- I’m-cuttin’-me-own-throat-guv’nor-honest-to-goodness bargain.

And who is Philip Green? Why…:

In May 2007, after the disappearance of British girl Madeleine McCann in Portugal, Green also donated 250,000 pounds as a reward for any useful public information.

Madeleine McCann: giving people’s life meaning and worth…

Madeleine McCann: The Star ‘Donates’ To The McCanns, The Express Apologises And Sue Carroll Explains

Madeleine McCann: The News Of The World’s Sorry Apology For Tabloid Reporting

Going Dutch On Madeleine McCann Reward

THE wife of a convener of the Australian Conservation Foundation is being charged with the alleged removal of 150 trees on the couple’s Blue Mountains property.

She did it to show how removing trees is so very wrong, right?

Suzanne Tzannes, owns the weekender with her husband, Ross Tzannes, who is also a governor of WWF, at Mount Irvine, next to the World Heritage-listed Blue Mountains National Park.

In the bizarre land-clearing case, she is being charged in the Land and Environment Court by Blue Mountains City Council.

She proved her point. We can all learn from her brave stand…

Ms Tzannes will plead not guilty to the charge, which her husband described as “absurd and embarrassing”.

The shame is our for forcing them into such drastic action…

And here’s your chance to see tree chopping in action. The WWF jet-set holiday:

April 6 – 30, 2009
From $64,950

Trip Overview

Join us on a remarkable 25-day journey by private jet. Touch down in some of the most astonishing places on the planet to see the top wildlife, including gorillas, orangutans, rhinos, lemurs and toucans. Explore natural and cultural treasures in remote areas of South America, the South Pacific, Southeast Asia and Africa.

To reach these remote corners, travel on a specially outfitted private jet that carries 88 passengers. World-class experts – including WWF’s director of species conservation – will provide a series of lectures en route, and a professional staff will be devoted to making your global adventure seamless and memorable.

Save the plant and see how bad humans are the world over…

Earth Hour Campaigners Win Flights To Cannes

We’re back to those default swaps again, and the reason why they have nothing to do with insurance and everything to do with speculating on other people’s property; Simon Evans in the Independent reports today, the 12th October:

‘It is like Joe Public buying an insurance policy on someone else’s house and pocketing the full value if it burns down.’

Ring any bells?

On the 25th September I wrote:

‘Anorak could take out a vast insurance policy on Anorak Towers, and if it burned down Anorak would get lots of dosh but no Anorak Towers.

Insurers won’t let me take out a vast insurance policy on Anorak Towers, because I would have a clear interest in setting fire to Anorak Towers and collecting lots of dosh.

Of course, I wouldn’t have Anorak Towers, but then I didn’t have Anorak Towers in the first place.’

My highly reputable lawyers, Messrs Sue, Sue and Suesomemore, will no doubt be in touch with the Indie’s briefs…

- Chenier

GUARDIAN – Hugh Muir:

“If you are lucky enough to have some spare money, now could be the time to cash in,” said the ever-informative Daily Express, addressing the credit crunch yesterday. “Icelandic bank Icesave pays 7.06% on £1,000 or more on its one-year bond.” Yeah, right – October 8, 2008

GUARDIAN:

Ten of the best … savings accounts
An unexpected bonus from the financial crisis is banks raising their savings rates to attract customer cash. Harvey Jones picks a selection of the best buys on offer

Hear ye, hear ye… Any idea what’s No.1?

1. Icesave’s easy access cash Isa

Really…

…Icelandic-owned bank Icesave’s Easy Access Isa currently pays a variable 6.1% on £1,000 or above. If you don’t have that much to invest you can earn 6.08% on balances of £1 or more paid into Barclays’ Tax Haven Isa. Bear in mind that this figure is inflated by a 1% introductory bonus which disappears after one year - September 24, 2008

When the broadsheets mock the tabloids they ape…

Spotter

Iceland Is For Sale

British Town Halls Lose Millions In Iceland Bank collapse

Terrorism Saves British From Iceland Banks

Mum Kerry Katona’s goen To Iceland, But Where’s Dad?

In the beginning was the word. And the word was “Maddie”…

THE INDEPENDENT: “Religion vs science: can the divide between God and rationality be reconciled?”

And on the eighth day the media was created and Our Maddie did come to the fore…

‘A clergyman in charge of education for the country’s leading scientific organisation – it’s a Monty Python sketch,” pronounced Britain’s top atheist, Richard Dawkins, recently. The problem was that Reiss, as well as being an evolutionary biologist and population geneticist, is a non-stipendiary priest in the Church of England.

Still dunno.

The danger is that between the strident secularists and the fanatical fundamentalists some important middle ground is being squeezed out. “Dawkins sees religion as credulous, superstitious and prejudiced but mature religious traditions teach people to challenge all that,” says Tina Beattie.

Dawkinzzzz…

“Science will never offer an answer to the parents of Madeleine McCann. Nor will it ever be irrational to go to a Mozart concert, though science can never explain the genius of his music.”

Mozart. McCann. Maddie. DNA. Science. Creationism. Maddie. Do you understand now..?

The Madeleine McCann Christian Prayer Circle Says God Took Her

Bishop Carl Cooper And The Church of England’s Good Sex Guide

The Funeral Of Richard Dawkins

Richard Dawkins On Jews And Power

“But I believe that the credit squeeze is going to be good for grassroots sport and therefore good for all of us in the long run – as long as we do not end up homeless” – Gabby Logan, The Times

So Gabby…:

Aside from a property, what’s the most expensive thing you’ve ever bought?

Paintings – the most I’ve spent on one was £7,000.

More credit crunch insight as it comes in…

“In the old days I used to get the knickers and the bras. It was good. Filth whispered in me ears.

“He’s a w***er” (Times.

They’re just bored of me now. I’m just that geezer who keeps, you know, doing these worthy things around the country.”

Like shoving it down people’s throats…

The four horsemen of the apocalypse (Short Sellers; Bradford, Bingley, Daryl Lehman) are staved off with the promise of cash. It’s a bribe, and – who knew? – but the forces of man’s destruction are open to cash offers.

Still, the Times asks its readers: “Is this the safest place to put your money?” There picture is of a man pushing a large box cardboard out of book shop. The box is on trolley. The man is in shirt and Comfi-Slax.

Times readers may well says “yes” and rush out to invest in trolleys, cardboard or trace the man in the picture and attempt to stuff cash in his pockets and openings.

Over in the Telegraph, we are “Back from the brink”, having teetered ion the edge of the Guardian’s “Abyss”.

The bailout of the banking system “Could mean £20,000 bill for every UK taxpayer,” says the Scotsman. Or as the Mail puts it:

£16,000 each – Never mind the damage to your pension, that’s what every one of us could have to pay for the Great Bank Nationalisation.

Such are the facts.

Of course, now that we are bankers all, we should dress to look the part.

The Telegraph features two bankers – just yesterday Jim was working the dipping well in Starbucks and Steve was unemployed – but now they are money men.

The lads are sporting this year’s range of light blue shirts. It seems the Times was right, if unspecific, and that putting your money in light blue cotton is a sound investment…

Well, not all of them are chanting, just the Islamist students who are unveiling a new book.

The book “Holocaust,” published by members of Iran’s Islamist Basij militia, features dozens of cartoons and sarcastic commentary. Education Minister Alireza Ali-Ahmadi attended the official launch of the book in Tehran’s Palestine Square.

The Telegraph , which reports on the action, doesn’t say how much the book sells for, nor if it can be ordered online.

The big deal seems to be that Iran can do humour. It might not be what you find funny – unless you are laughing at the creator or believe his work to be a parody - but it’s a good stab at satire in a land so often associated with insecure militant nutters.

The cartoons are about as funny, as, well, those Danish cartoons.

Denmark and Iran – kings of comedy? They try. But can you name a Iranain comedian? What about a funny Dane? They try. And good luck with it, boys.

At least the Jews are funny…

Sarah Silverman Is F*cking Matt Damon

Pen & Ink

Danish Lawmakers Cancel Iran Trip Over Cartoons

Islamstadam: Gregorius Nekschot Declares Jihad On Danish Cartoonists

Why We Need To Publish The Mohammed Cartoons

Behead Those Who Insult Britain: Islamists Lose Again

Those living on the Japanese island of Okinawa, the small Sardinian mountain town of Ovodda and Loma Linda in the US are the world’s longest living. So any of them would be top of most people’s lists.

So listen up as David Mayer, chairman of UK Transplant’s Liver Advisory Group, says:

“If we were to provide livers for the world from the UK, then UK patients would be enormously disadvantaged.”

Well, yes. We would have no livers, ours being a nation of some 60million, and the rest of the world having far more bodies to fill with offal. And what with our binge drinking, you’d think the demand just wouldn’t be there. The UK as the world’s liver farming would be like the Germans farming funny bones.

But here’s Professor Nigel Heaton, head of the transplant unit at King’s College Hospital, London, transplanting part of an adult British liver into a boy from one of the Gulf states.

The liver was harvested from an NHS donor; the boy was a private patient. The Telegraph says that “according to national guidelines, livers must be offered to all other NHS centres before they can be given to a patient outside the EU”.

King’s has given livers from UK donors to 22 private patients from Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates in the past five years, earning the hospital more than £4 million from carrying out transplants on overseas patients.

There’s money in liver. But is there not small fear that the liver will contain memories of the donor and his culture? Will the recipient find himself falling foul of his region’s police as he sips a morning livener on the beach then does the dance of the flamin’ arseholes with lovely Armani from Essex?

Buyer beware…

Source

Juice Drinker Canned In Dubai

By and large our intellectuals live their lives entirely free of even the briefest consideration in the national press, which is far too busy with nonintellectuals such as Amy Winehouse, Jade Goody and Giles Coren.

And here they are illuminating a story about intellectuals. File under: celebrity journalism…

Giles Coren In The Times’ Sub Editors’ Inbox

Giles Coren Is Journalism’s Christ-Like Figure

How To Get Ahead In Journalism, By Rachel Royce

Australia’s second city, Melbourne, is caught up with the tale of it own missing 21-year-old backpacker. A Croatian police statement that they are “looking for a girl and not a body” headlines in all of today’s Oz newspapers.

Britt Lapthorne, above, went missing in Dubrovnik, Croatia on September 18. In the reverse of so many tales of Europeans missing/lost/murdered tales in Oz, her brother, Darren, and father, Dale, are now in the country desperately seeking clues to what has happened to their loved one, last seen in the city’s Fuego nightclub.

Croatian police say the son of the owner of the Dubrovnik hostel where Britt was staying was released after 36 hours of questioning but was not a formal suspect.

- AGW

QUEENSFERRY GAZETTE (Scotland): “We’ve been ad”

A CONCERNED mum has spoken out about the potential hazards posed by new outdoor advertising boards. Janette Sheppard is also worried that other parents may think the boards are simply lamp-posts.

Lamp-posts, for paedos to hide behind… Like those (G)litter bins…

She said: “These have just sprung up – one is outside my son’s primary school. At first glance it would be easy to mistake them for lamp-posts, but they are actually advertising boards.”

The wonders of modern technology. Who would have thunk it. Go on…

“There is a small electronic strip at the top which could be used by the council to post information if a child goes missing. I believe the council also gets some revenue from the boards.”

Making money from missing kiddies. For shame!

“My concern, as a parent, is if the council thinks it’s appro-priate to put one of these boards outside a primary school. Our kids are already inundated with advertising – do they really need more? And what kind of advertising is it going to be?”

Sweets. Peados. Guns. Snuff movies. You know, the usual kids’ stuff…

A West Lothian Council spokesperson said: “The new signs are part of the Amberwatch system, which is designed to allow urgent safety messages to be relayed instantly to the local community. The similar Amber Alerts system in America has been credited with helping locate over 100 missing children, and the parents of Madeline McCann have campaigned to have such a system installed across Europe.”

So there it is. It’s there to advertise when a child goes missing; and when a child doesn’t go missing…

DAILY TELEGRAPH: “Review: My Sister, My Love by Joyce Carol Oates”

Review: My Sister, My Love by Joyce Carol Oates – The unsolved murder of a child star is too close to real events for David Robson

A child star… Get ready to be entertained…

Novels based on real-life crime stories always leave a slightly queasy taste. Novels based on unsolved real-life crime stories leave an even queasier one.

Hands over mouths; heres it comes…

There are probably writers already working on fictionalisations of the abduction of Madeleine McCann, but it is hard to feel much respect for them.

They don’t do it for the respect. They do it for the money; like the newspapers…

The same applies, mutatis mutandis, to this ethically questionable piece by Joyce Carol Oates, inspired by a crime that was the talk of America in 1996, when a six-year-old child beauty pageant contestant called JonBenet Ramsey was found brutally murdered in the basement of her parents’ house in Colorado.

DAILY STAR: “THAT’S VERY IRRITATING – FIONA IS BRITS’ MOST HATED CELEB”

IT’S Fiona Philips, GMTV’s soon-to-be ex-self-righteous-Labour-cheering-ultra-violet-toothed-baby-boasting-braying-nodding-head.

FIONA Phillips is more annoying than the washout summer, chavs and Heather Mills.

Mills isn’t annoying; Mills is entertaining.

Her on-screen gaffes include telling the parents of missing Madeleine McCann: “There are light moments. You’ve acquired this odd celebrity status.”

A gaffe? No way. This is the highest praise possible in the GMTV lexicon. GMTV renders everything it touches a celebrity: car crash victim, prime minister, doctor etc. are all touched by the GMTV celebrity wand. A celebrity… nothing bigger, nor better…

100 MOST ANNOYING THINGS FOR 2008

1. Benefit scroungers

2. The credit crunch

3. Tailgaters

4. Cold callers

5. People reading over your shoulder

6. Gordon Brown

7. Fiona Phillips

8. Being bloated

9. Rising fuel prices

10. Falling house prices

11. The wet summer

12. Middle lane drivers

13. Constipation

14. Bossiness

15. Slow internet connections

16. Being put on hold

17. Pregnant women smoking

18. Someone nicking your parking spot

19. Stepping in dog poo

20. Jehovah’s Witnesses

21. Debt companies advertising on TV

22. Skinny people who complain they are fat

23. Queue jumpers

24. Bullying

25. Noisy neighbours

26. Nosey neighbours

27. People parking in disabled bays when they aren’t disabled

28. Junk mail

29. Snobs

30. Noisy eaters

31. Dog owners who don’t clean up after their pets

32. People putting our Olympic achievements down

33. Novelty ringtones

34. Automated phone systems

35. Chavs

36. People who walk slowly

37. People who take their kids to shops and let them run riot

38. Amy Winehouse

39. Sienna Miller’s love life

40. Rude shop staff

41. Wasps

42. Diarrhoea

43. Cristiano Ronaldo

44. People who have their mobile turned off when you really need to get hold of them

45. Dannii Minogue

46. Mosquitoes

47. Kids kicking the back of your chair on a plane

48. Hangovers

49. The hot water running out when you want to take a bath

50. Buses not arriving on time

51. Heather Mills

52. James Blunt

53. Reformed smokers

54. People talking on their mobile on public transport

55. Headaches

56. The smoking ban

57. Toothache

58. Litter bugs

59. Spots

60. People who write “text back” in texts

61. Scientology

62. Russell Brand

63. Screaming kids

64. Alistair Darling

65. Traffic wardens

66. Americans

67. Roadworks

68. Big Brother

69. Pete Doherty

70. Runny nose

71. PDAs (public displays of affection)

72. Flat tyres

73. Ashley Cole

74. Tax returns

75. Finding out that you’ve run out of toilet paper when you really need

the loo

76. Boasters

77. Not having change when you really need it

78. Carol Vorderman

79. Paper cuts

80. Stepping in chewing gum

81. Bad hair days

82. Charley Uchea off Big Brother

83. Mothers-in-law

84. Cashiers giving you your change on top of a receipt

85. Posh Spice

86. CDs that jump

87. Stubbing your toe

88. Getting something in your eye

89. Losing your glasses

90. Cat hair that sticks to your clothes

91. Children who cough in your face

92. Losing your passport

93. People ramming the back of your heels with trolleys

94. Rubbish opening times at doctors and dentists

95. Kate Garraway

96. email spam

97. People using mobiles in the quiet carriage on the train

98. People who don’t remove their shoes in the house

99. Naomi Campbell

100. Troublesome computer printers

And so on…

THE TELEGRAPH: “Esther Rantzen: Fear of paedophiles is harming children”

Esther Rantzen has admitted she blames herself for raising fears of paedophiles to such a degree that adults are now scared to help crying children.

Rantzen! Last week the Telegraph brought us: “Baroness Neuberger: Children will grow up not trusting anyone in Britain’s risk-averse society”

Very soon everyone will be agreeing with this new premise, it being the way opinion is formed: one celebrity says something; another agrees; the media reports it as fact; all hacks agree; a woman in the Daily Mail says she disagrees; a reader says it’s “common sense gone mad”; a celebrity agrees; and so on and on…

The veteran broadcaster, who founded the counselling service ChildLine, warned that young people are now being harmed by the widespread suspicion that anyone who has contact with children could be a child abuser.

Well, they could be…

Her fears were confirmed by an experiment she helped conduct in a busy shopping centre, which found that 99 per cent of adults chose to walk on by rather than going to the assistance of two children who looked lost and distressed. Even the handful who did stop admitted they were worried that people would assume they were trying to abduct the children.

You stop and help a child who turns out to be pretending to be lost and alone, a honey trap that allows for Esther Rantzen to spring out on your with a TV camera. Will anyone stop ever again? Rantzen! Can she be cured?

Unattended Children Will Be Sold As Slaves

This comes amid growing concern that in the wake of high-profile cases such as the disappearance of Madeleine McCann and the Soham murders, all adults are now viewed as paedophiles unless they can prove themselves innocent.

McCann… Paedos? How so? What does the Telegraph know?

DROWNED IN SOUND: an interview with popular beat combos Crystal Castles, The Teenagers (pictured) and These New Puritans

Who is your favourite daytime TV presenter?
Michael Teenagers: I don’t watch daytime TV.
Dorian Teenagers: Alexa Chung.
Thomas These New Puritans: Damilola Taylor and Madeline McCann.

HIGHLAND NEWS: Gordon’s got news for you

WHAT do Madeleine McCann, Gordon Brown, George Best, Jimmy White and killers Rosemary and Fred West, and the Yorkshire Ripper, have in common?

More jokes. Well, not one of them ever won the World Snooker Championship – for shame! C’mon Jimmy!

It’s writer Gordon Burn.

Entertaining the masses and selling books…

- Chenier

Sir Ian Blair Teaches Amy Winehouse To Dry Out

Ladies And Gentlemen, The Death Of Jean Charles De Menezes

A report on cannabis prepared for next year’s UN drug policy review will suggest that a “regulated market” would cause less harm than the current international prohibition. The report, which is likely to reopen the debate about cannabis laws, suggests that controls such as taxation, minimum age requirements and labelling could be explored.

(Image: Beau Bo D’Or Website)

Says the Guardian:

The conclusions are unlikely to be embraced by the government or the Conservative party, both of which are opposed to relaxing restrictions on cannabis use.

Because politicans don’t puff it, do they..?

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith Smoked Cannabis

Cannabis Use In The House Of Commons

Dutch Ban Smoking In Amsterdam Cannabis Cafes

An Interview With Home Secretary Jacqui Smith

Bombed Away: Taliban Turn Cannabis Into Heroin

The Economics Of Trafficking In French Cannabis

“JOHN le Carré: I nearly left the West” – how the writer wanted to “defect to the Soviet Union during the Cold War” – Sunday Times headline.

“I had from time to time placed myself intellectually in the shoes of those on one side of the Curtain who took the short walk to the other… Only when traduced by your editors does it acquire such disproportionate and damaging significance” – John le Carré letters to the Sunday Times

How newspapers work…

And it’s a good job that the Bank of Cameron is open, but not all that good, maybe, if Lady Louise Patten, wife of Tory education minister John, is running things.

Until recently she was a non-executive director of Bradford & Bingley, aka Bring & Buy, aka Boom & Bust etc.

And there is Christopher Gent, director of Lehman Brothers, who has given tens of thousands of pounds to the Tories.

As Cameron said at the conference:

“What you won’t hear from me this week is the sort of easy cheap lines beating up on the market system, bashing financiers.”

Indeed not…

It’s Grim Up North: We Own Bradford And Bingley

Lehman Bank Employees Block Entrance To Bank’s Headquarters

As AGW puts it:

Probably, John, in the same way a grizzly bear makes a good companion for salmon fishing on the River Spey…and just as relevant.

Spot the barrel chest…

Not literally, although sending shards of the fabric to all corners of the world would surely be a gesture of great spiritual meaning. For such reasons, a miniature of the Diana wedding dress made from the greater wedding dress material is to also up for sale. More miniatures may be in the offing.

The Telegraph says the engagement blouse is being put up for sale by Elizabeth Emanuel, who tells us:

“It is sad, especially for me, but I don’t know what to do with them … There comes a point where it is so expensive to store.”

Yes, what with property prices so high in London, the space occupied by a blouse can go for as much £3million to £4million.

Diana fans may care to note that other items coming up for sale include:

Diana’s engagement knickers
Diana’s wedding vest
Diana’s divorce support stockings
Diana’s car socks

Anoraks learns that  woman on the fabled Sixth Floor of Harvey Nichols has made an early bid for all items…