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We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.

Tabloid balls: brave England players laugh at ISIS as wimpy Germans cower

daily star england germansThe Daily Star’s scoop on “brave “England footballers at Euro 2016 and German “wimps” is total balls. First we hear from Manchester United and England’s Chris Smalling:

“We have a fantastic security team and we have been informed of all the French security as well. So from our point of view we have nothing to worry about. We are able to focus on what we are here for – and that’s the football.”

And the German “Wimps”?

But nervous German star Jerome Boateng has ordered his wife and children to stay at home during the championships because of terror fears. Bayern Munich defender Boateng, 27, was playing for Germany at the Stade de France the night three suicide bombers blew themselves up outside. He said: “My family and children will not be coming to the stadium. The risk is simply too big.”

What a wimp, eh.

Having shamed Germans for one man’s entirely sane decision not to invite his loved ones to watch the football in a country where last time he was in town Islamists murdered scores of people, the Star tells its readers one day later:

Ex-SAS gunners guard Roy’s Boys from ISIS

ENGLAND’S stars have been assured a crack squad of ex-SAS troops is standing by to whisk them to safety if terrorists strike at Euro 2016.

Brave. That’s the only word for it.

Posted: 10th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment


Normal teenagers will lose virginity to robots

Lock up your sons and daughters – the sex bots are coming. The Mail warns:

Teenagers may lose their virginity to sex robots in the future, a leading expert predicted yesterday. Professor Noel Sharkey, emeritus professor of robotics at Sheffield University, warned that android sex dolls may have damaging consequences for society.

Oh?

He said that just as the rise of internet porn took the Government by surprise, a similarly seismic robot revolution is on the way – with far-reaching consequences.

Seismic stuff. did the earth move for you?

Says Noel:

“It’s not a problem having sex with a machine. But what if it’s your first time, your first relationship? What do you think of the opposite sex then? What do you think a man or a woman is?… It will get in the way of real life, stopping people forming relationships with normal people.”

Normal people?

Posted: 10th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Technology | Comment


Out to lunch: fire at Dusseldorf refugee camp overcooks small portions

In Dusseldorf, Germany, a refugee camp has burned to the ground. Why?

Daily Star: “FASTING FURIOUS – A refugee camps was burned down by hungry migrants after they missed their Ramadan breakfast. They claimed nobody work them  in time to eat before  beginning their Islamic dawn-to-dusk fast.”

The camp is “home to 280 refugees”

BBC: “Ramadan meal row ‘prompted German fire’ at Duesseldorf shelter”

German investigators “say a group of men who were not fasting had complained that their lunch portions were too small.”

Such are the facts.

Posted: 10th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Tabloids | Comment


The dire England Support’s Band is finally banned

And the band played on and on and on and on and...

And the band played on and on and on and on and…

Good news! The Sun says the dire England Supporter’s Band, players of infernal rackets that puncture the life from England fans lungs, are “banned” from the Euros.

The paper says the band, “known for anthems like the Great Escape” has provided “the soundtrack at Three Lions matches” for 20 years. That’s not journalism – that’s a PR missive from Public Health England, who would soon have all fans, not just the weak-minded ones, dressed in jesters hats and as crusaders, harping on about The Lions and singing State-approved ditties on cue. Message to all: it’s not rugby. Stop it.

The elites, the witless and other no-marks enjoy having their chants provided by the England’ Supporters’ Band, football’s version of trad jazz, that theme music for lost causes. You might not have joined in with 10 German Bombers, No Surrender to the IRA or even In-ger-land, but if you don’t let the fans sing what they want to you end up with the hideously chirpy Great Escape and never will rejoice in the spontaneity of “Let’s all have a disco”.

Ban the band. And never ever let them back.

 

Posted: 9th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Sports | Comment


Prisoner sue over removal of marbles from his tattoed penis

marblesTo West Virginia where a prisoner is upset medics removed marbles he had implanted in his tattooed penis.

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals says Adrian King can pursue claims that officials at Huttonsville Correctional Center illegally threatened him into consenting to the June 2013 surgery, “or risk being segregated from other inmates and lose his eligibility for parole.”

“The interest in bodily integrity involves the most personal and deep-rooted expectations of privacy, and here, the nature of the surgery itself, surgery into King’s penis, counsels against reasonableness,” says the Virginia-based appeals court.

King now complains of “tingling and numbness” when his bellend is touched “or when it rains, snows or gets cold.” Or when he puts it in blender, uses it to mix drinks in a coffee shop, or fills it with ink and uses it as a biro. If King’s penis history is any guide, his knob could end up in all manner of unusual situations.

King adds that officials hurt his feelings whenever they called him “Marble Man”.

King, who is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, is (ball)baring up well.

Posted: 9th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment


Daily Mail v Mail Online: Vernon Kay’s vanishing smile

Married Vernon Kay and Tess Daly put on a “show of strength”. The telly twosome “put on a united front as they stepped out for the first time since his latest sexting scandal”. So says the Daily Star.

Kay, the world’s blandest TV presenter, is allegedly “back in contact”, although not literally, with Page 3 stunna Rhian Sugden. There are no allegations the pair have ever met, let alone shagged. Vernon and Rhian’s alleged relationship is all about texting. Whereas we used to get tales of five-time-a-night romps with love rats, tabloid readers now get to read text messages.

Anyhow, This is all news because Kay and Daly were on a night out at Jimmy Carr’s London home. The Sun also spotted Vernon and Tess. They were walking “hand in hand” as they left’s Carr’s house party. They were “all smiles”.

 

vernon kay sex

 

But over in the Mail, the same story is headlined, “The awkward party.” Victoria Ibitoye says, “Daly was not the only one who looked like she would rather be elsewhere”. Daly “looked far from pleased clutching the hand of Vernon Kay”.

 

Tess DAly Rhian

 

But over on the Mail Online, readers enjoy pictures of Daly and Kay over the caption “Going strong: Tess Daly and husband Vernon Kay looked very much a united couple as they held hands while leaving their friend Jimmy Carr’s house party in London on Monday night” and “Smiling: The pair looked extremely happy as they stayed close to one another.”

Was the Mail at two different parties?

Posted: 8th, June 2016 | In: Celebrities, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment


Chelsea: Dr Carneiro is ‘disgruntled’ but Mourinho is just ‘Jose’

Dr Eva Carneiro turned to the courts when Chelsea failed to take a stand against her co-worker Jose Mourinho, who publicly humiliated her. Having rejected the club’s offer of £1.2 million to shut up and go away, Dr Carneiro continued to sue for justice.

Yesterday she settled her dismissal claim against Chelsea on confidential terms. She had claimed constructive dismissal against Chelsea. In addition she reached a discrimination settlement against Jose Mourinho.

Chelsea said it apologised “unreservedly”for its treatment of its former first-team doctor.

“The club regrets the circumstances which led to Dr Carneiro leaving the club and apologises unreservedly to her and her family for the distress caused. We wish to place on record that in running onto the pitch Dr Carneiro was following both the rules of the game and fulfilling her responsibility to the players as a doctor, putting their safety first.”

Mourinho, who denied calling the medic “daughter of a whore” (she alleged that he did) never issued a public apology. The Chelsea statement merely noted:

“Jose Mourinho also thanked Dr Carneiro for the excellent and dedicated support she provided as first team doctor and he wishes her a successful career.”

But why should Jose says sorry? The Manchester United manager (£15m a year) remains good ol’ Jose in the Mail, whereas the victim is a moody woman who got lucky:

 

dr carneiro sexist

 

Revolting.

Posted: 8th, June 2016 | In: Back pages, Chelsea, Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment


Man finds ‘something from the Bible’ in his Costo salad

costco locust“We put the bag in the fridge straight away and had our first serving on Saturday night,” says Ian Lovejoy to the Henley Standard.

“It’s horrible to think about that now because it pooed everywhere and we were left wondering what we’d eaten. We decided to have the rest on Sunday but when I dropped the leaves on my plate I just saw this thing in my hand. I thought, ‘what on earth is this?’.

“It frightened me to death and my wife was extremely upset. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life.

“I could probably have coped if it was something small, like an ant, but this was more like something from the Bible. I can’t believe it was still alive after all that time in the bag, first on the shelf and then in our fridge.

“It’s worrying because the bag says the salad’s ready washed but they obviously haven’t cleaned it that well. When the shock had passed we just had some cheese sandwiches… I’d like to think the locust might go to an insect expert who can find a use for it.”

That salad sounds revolting – even a locust won’t eat the stuff.

 

Posted: 8th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Strange But True, The Consumer | Comment


Mourinho v Carneiro: Chelsea ‘whores’ and Chelsea ‘girls’

Former Chelsea team doctor Eva Carneiro is at an employment tribunal. Did former Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho call her “daughter of a whore” who was only suited to working with the juniors or the “ladys [sic]”? Mourinho, now at Manchester United, might not care about the ruling. After all, the case hasn’t prevented him from joining Manchester United.

The Times says Carneiro rejected an offer for £1.2m to settle out of court. She claims constructive dismissal against Chelsea. She also claims, in another case, that Mourinho targeted her for sexual discrimination.

You will recall, of course, how this nasty row started last August, when Mourinho, the then Chelsea boss, hurled abuse at Carneiro as she raced onto the pitch to treat Chelsea player Eden Hazard. Mourinho says he yelled “filho da puta” (son of a bitch). She says he yelled “filha da puta” (daughter of a bitch or daughter of a whore).

What Mourinho did say, after Carneiro was banished from the bench, was, “She works in academy team  or lady [sic] team not with me.”

Such are the facts.

And what of the reporting on alleged sexism in football? Well, the Star pretty much carries on regardless. An educated women in her early middle-age is a “girl doc”:

 

DR Eva Carneiro sexism

 

 

Posted: 7th, June 2016 | In: Chelsea, Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment


No, John Oliver did not give away nearly $15 million of medical debt

john oliver debt

 

John Oliver is the news king of talk telly. But unlike Oprah, he’s not giving  away free cars – he’s burning cash! The host of HBO’s Last Week Tonight is a hero:

“Any idiot can get into it, and I can prove that to you, because I’m an idiot and I started a debt buying company and it was disturbingly easy,” Oliver said. John Oliver forgave nearly $15 million of medical debt with a tap of a giant red button on Sunday night.

 

John Oliver debt

The Indy says it was #15m

 

No. Wrong. It was cracking TV. But he did not do as CNN said he did. He purchased his lot on the secondary market at a huge discount.

Last Week Tonight spent about $50 to create a debt-acquisition company in Mississippi. The corporation’s name is Central Asset Recovery Professionals Inc – also known as Carp. According to Oliver, soon after its creation, Carp was offered a portfolio of medical debt worth $14,922,261.76 at a cost of “less than half a cent on a dollar, which is less than $60,000”.

Not $15m, then. And at $60,000 it was a marketing and PR bargain.

Posted: 7th, June 2016 | In: Celebrities, Money, Reviews, TV & Radio | Comment


Euro 2016: England are well located for trips to dogging site

It’s Euro 2016 and the newspapers are full of fear. Today’s Fear Story is in the Sun, where we learn that the England’s team hotel is next to a dogging site. The Sun says people have had sex in the grounds near the five-star Auberge du Jeu de Paume in Chantilly.

The Sun has seen racy photos posted on a French dogging site. One shows a woman sat by a wall at the  Chateau de Chantilly. She is topless. “Art-loving England manager Roy Hodgson is expected to encourage his squad to visit the chateau which houses masterpieces by Raphael, Delacroix and Poussin.” Some are nudes, maybe.

Roy might care to rouse the troops on Wednesday and Fridays, when, as the Sun says, the doggers convene. The paper even produces a map of the area and adds a picture of former England player and now TalkSport commentator Stan Collymore asking, “What time is kick off?” In 2004, Collymore, reportedly, “confessed to having sex with strangers in car parks – an underground practice known as dogging.”

But dogging can occur in both underground and overground car parks. Dogs go free.

 

 

Posted: 6th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment


Welsh girl uses Unicorn toy passports to pass through Turkish customs

unicorn passport turkeyIn Wales there are dragons. There are also unicorns.Turks know this, which is why Turkey’s customs officers allowed Emily Harris, 98, to pass though customs with a passport identifying her as a unicorn.

The passport belongs to Emily’s toy unicorn, Lily Harris. Emily’s mum, Nicky, handed it to the boarder goons who stamped it and waved Nicky through.

Says Nicky, 43, from Cwmbran, South Wales: “I didn’t realise until I was putting the passports away. There was a moment of panic when I thought someone would come chasing after us, but nothing. The passport doesn’t even look real – it’s got gold teddy bears on the front and was a completely different size from mine and my husband, Allen’s. The man even asked Emily how old she was, and she told him nine, before he stamped it. The picture ID wasn’t even of Emily, it was of a pink unicorn. And to make it worse, the unicorn wasn’t even on holiday with us.

She adds: “It’s a worry to any parent, how easy it would be to smuggle a child through customs and into another country.”

Not to mention child unicorns.

Posted: 5th, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment


Saudi Arabia ban’s women drivers – invests big money in Uber taxis

On Vox, news of a problem with Uber:

Partnering with a country that won’t let women drive is a huge PR blunder for Uber

Eh? Women can’t drive in oil-rich Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia’s dictators invest $3.5 billion in a taxi company. Join the dots. Kerching!

Spotter: Vox

 

 

Posted: 5th, June 2016 | In: Reviews | Comment


University of London study shock: fat kids eat more than thin kids

fat newsAmazing facts in the Hindustan Times:

According to a new study in the UK, overweight infants consume larger meals but they do not eat more often than healthy toddlers. Hayley Syrad from University of London in the UK and colleagues used parent-reported intake for 2,564 children aged 4-18 months to study meal size and meal frequency in relation to weight.

The BBC has more news from the “experts”:

The report found overweight children were consuming larger meals than their counterparts (141 calories versus 130 calories). Report author Hayley Syrad, from University College, London, said: “The research suggests eating frequency is having no impact on weight and it’s not that parents of larger children are giving them an extra Mars bar or apple – it’s that their portions are bigger.”

Yes, it is true! Fat people eat more than skinny people. Who knew?

Posted: 5th, June 2016 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)


Six-year-old boy calls police on dad who raced a red light (audio)

Six-year-old boy reported his dad to the police after he drove through a red light

 

No-one likes a grass. But no-one told 6-year-old Robbie Richardson from Quincy, Massachusetts.

When young Robbie saw his dad drive through a red light on their journey home, he vowed to call the police. When they arrived home Robbie did as promised, dialling 911 and grassing up his father, Michael Richardson.

“My dad went past the red light and I told him that I was going to call the police,” Robbie told the police. “Red means stop, green means go, yellow means slow.”

 


YouTube link.

 

Posted: 3rd, June 2016 | In: Reviews | Comment


Married man hero Paula Broadwell wants the word ‘mistress’ banned

swearing mistress paula braodwell

 

Language changes. New words arrive and old words go out of fashion. Some people can’t wait. They want words banned. They want less words. In the Guardian Jessica Valenti writes on Paula Broadwell, a woman best known for her affair with married US military type David Petraeus:

In a New York Times profile, Broadwell talks about her behind-the-scenes campaign to get media outlets to stop using the word “mistress”, a term that has no similar male counterpart.

She wants the word banned.

“On the one hand, I don’t want to define myself by this” she told the Times. “But on the other hand, I’ve been defined by this. So if I can change things for the better because of it, then why not?”

We know what mistress means. It is well defined. Ban it and what will we use instead to describe a woman who dates and shags a married man? Valenti agrees with the ban:

Why stop at “mistress”, though? It’s hardly the only word reserved for women….  A man is a “bachelor” but a woman is a “spinster”. (Please spare me the argument that “bachelorette” is a word ever used outside of reality television and drunken parties.)

So mister is out, then?

We even use “female” words to insult men. On the first day of an English class I took in college, for example, the professor asked us what words were the worst things you could call a woman.

Dear. Call a woman “dear” as in “yes, dear” and watch.

In minutes, the board was filled with misogynist invectives – words like “slut” and “cunt”. When she asked us to do the same thing for men, the board filled up again: all the worst words you could use against a man – “bitch”, “pussy”, etc – were also distinctly female.

Balls. I’d go for knob, prick, dickhead, wanker – and feel free to use them toward women, in the spirit of equality. Or maybe we can ban all those words and just go for the unisex “arse”.

Posted: 3rd, June 2016 | In: Reviews | Comment


How to burn a carjacker to death and get away with it

How do you fend off carjackers? On YouTube, we find an answer:

When this foot switch is pressed, two things happen. One, a 14-thousand volt spark would appear here in this nozzle, and then you have these four jets here shooting out gas. Liquid gas from the gas bottle in the boot. Liquid gas, as soon as it exits over the spark here, will ignite and a ball of flame will shoot out of both side of the vehicle. Incapacitating the hijackers immediately.”

Amazingly perhaps, the system’s legal in South Africa – provided the driver is acting in self defence as depicted in this mock-up.

 

Peter Hicks would have enjoyed it.

Posted: 2nd, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Technology | Comment


Grandpa picks up wrong child from school who picked out wrong grandpa

Joseph Fuller, 65, picked up the wrong child went he meant to collect his grandson from Edisto Primary School in South Carolina on May 19.

 

edistro school

 

He was not alone in this case of mistaken identity:

The report said the grandfather approached the boy, gave him a hug, and said he was there to pick him up early. He asked the boy, who he thought was his grandson, if he was ready to go and the little boy said “yes.” A teacher’s assistant told deputies that she asked the student, “Was this your granddad?” and the student said “yes.” At that point, the report said, the student and the man went to the front office so the boy could be signed out. According to the school, the grandfather was on the approved list of people who can pick up students. The report goes on to say the grandfather put the child in his car and his wife, without turning around in the car, handed the boy a Happy Meal.

 

grandchild

 

When they got home, Fuller looked at the child again. “He had a tooth missing in the front, and I know my grandson did not have a tooth missing in the front,” he says.  “Immediately, I brought him back to school, and I am very sorry.”

 

Posted: 2nd, June 2016 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment


EU commissioner Vera Jourova censors free speech

jourova free speechOne more reason to vote to leave the European Union arrives. “The internet is a place for free speech, not hate speech,” says Vera Jourova, the EU commissioner responsible for justice, consumers and gender equality.

Jourova was born in 1964 Czechoslovakia. She grew up under Communist rule. You might suppose she’d know better than to meddle with hard-won freedoms. She says she understands what freedom means. Vera Jourova loves free speech. But Vera Jourova wants to censor free speech, to shackle it. The bits she does not like, she calls hate speech. These parts of free speech, says its champion, must be banned. And because the undemocratic EU works the way it does, what she says goes for every country in the bloc.

There’s a lot about European regulations, or regulatory intentions, that U.S. Internet giants don’t like. They hate being described and treated as monopolies, and a mention of paying taxes where they operate — as European countries have long wanted them to do — instantly puts them on the defensive. Yet ask Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube to censor their content, and they will happily oblige. Of all the U.S. rules that have allowed them to get as big as they have become, freedom of speech appears to be least important.

The four U.S. companies have accepted a European Union-dictatedcode of conduct, which obliges them to “review the majority of valid notifications for removal of illegal hate speech in less than 24 hours and remove or disable access to such content.” The reviewing is to be done by “civil society organizations” and “trusted reporters”: the EU and its member states are to “ensure access” to them…

Laws limiting free speech have a tendency to change in response to terrorist attacks, electoral upsets, changes in public attitudes. Russians and Turks can attest to how quickly anti-terrorist legislation can turn into a system of censorship and suppression. Europe is not immune to versions of these developments. The U.S. giants’ willingness to work with governments and advocacy groups to uphold speech limitations makes them unreliable as platforms.

On Twitter, a few see the dangers:

 

free speech twitter EU

 

You can vote to change this. You can vote ‘out’.

 

Posted: 2nd, June 2016 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment


Liam Fee murder: evil lesbian killer monsters are just like men

liam feeRachel Telfa, 31, and Nayomi Fee, 29, murdered their two-year-old son, Liam Fee, by beating him to death in March 2014. The couple were in a civil partnership. Telfa was the child’s birth mother. Both women denied killing Liam. There is every chance they still think they did nothing wrong. Indeed, as Trelfa was found guilty of murdering her son, she mouthed “I did not”. The tabloids report:

Daily Mirror (front page): “MOTHERS OF ALL EVIL”

That’s an odd headline given that the women were the mothers not of evil, rather an innocent child.

Page 4-5: “NOW CAGE THEM”

Well, that seems likely. The women – or one of them; the court could not decide which – hit Liam so hard in the abdomen his heart  ruptured. Fee and Telfa tried to pin the blame on a six-year-old boy, one of two boys other than Liam who seem to have been living with the couple in Fife, Scotland. The women were found guilty of abusing the two other boys, including keeping one in a cage, forcing them to eat dog poo and vomit, and mentally torturing them. Fee told one she had killed his father with a drill she kept to castrate young boys.

In order to implicate the innocent boy in Liam’s murder, Fee shoved his hands into the dead’s boy’s mouth to leave traces of his DNA on the corpse. When paramedics arrived she told them Liam had been strangled by the other child.

We then get to know more of the killers’ lives. The Mirror says the women got drunk “and watched Shameless on TV”. It wasn’t all bad telly because the paper says Telfa kept a horse at riding stables. We get the lowlights, but the normality escapes reporting. It is the ordinary that helped mask their crimes.

In Voice of The Mirror, the women are labelled “monsters”. They are not. They are human beings. That’s what makes them terrifying.

The paper than tries to make some point. It says the killers “demonstrated sadistic women can be as depraved as violent men”. Why not violent women and sadistic men? Why is this even worth saying? The story has nothing to do with men behaving badly. Indeed, the only men to feature in it are the judge who found the women guilty and Liam’s father, Joseph Johnson, 33, who “sobbed uncontrollably” in court.

 

Rachel Trelfa RAchel Fee

Rachel Trelfa

The Sun (Page 9): Tortured to death”

Liam was killed my his mum and “her lesbian partner”. He had more than 30 injuries, including “two broken legs and fractured arms”. As they were found guilty, the women “showed no emotion”. But the Times said Trelfa spoke out.

The Sun says the innocent 6-year-old framed for the killing “initially admitted he had strangled” Liam. It was only under questioning by police that the whole story came out. The child – not social services – cracked the case. He said Fee would make him lies on the floor. She’d place his foot on his next until he passed out. She beat him often.

Daily Express (Page 21): ” Lesbian loves face life for savage murder of Liam, 2″

The killers’ sexual orientation is to the fore. Sadly, the facts are less certain from there. The Express says the boy bullied into claiming he had killed Liam is age 7.  Fee told one boy she killed his father not with a drill, as the Sun claims, rather with a “saw”. Fee and Trelfa are not merely “lovers”, they are a married couple, tying the knot in 2012.

 

Nyomi Fee

Nyomi Fee

 

Daily Mail (Page 6-7): “Lesbian couple battered son, 2, so brutally his heart ruptured”.

The Mail places the State in the dock:

Horrific failings by social services were exposed yesterday as a mother and her civil partner were found guilty of murdering her two-year-old son.

Liam was failed.

Karen Pedder, a manager with Fife Council, told the court a caseworker had been assigned to investigate reports of abuse after the concerns were first raised in January 2013.
But a social worker and a police officer sent to visit the family had accepted the ‘plausible explanation’ given that he had simply bumped his head. The social worker who had been dealing with Liam’s case then went off sick in April and it was not looked at again until the nursery got in touch in June, she said.
During cross-examination, Rachel Fee’s defence counsel Brian McConnachie asked: ‘What seems to have happened here is basically, as far as Liam is concerned, this case just went off the radar?’

Mrs Pedder replied: ‘It did. Yes.’ She said a case would normally be reviewed after about four weeks, but this had not happened.

Hideous stuff. And what also hurts is that Liam Johnson was renamed Liam Fee, forced to carry the name of his abuser. Our thoughts must be with his father.

Posted: 1st, June 2016 | In: Key Posts, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment (1)


Liverpool: lying police charge man in Hillsborough T-shirt with public order offence

They hated and criminalised football fans when 96 innocent Liverpool fans died at Hillsborough in 1989. They hate and criminalise football fans now, idiots included.

A 50-year-old man has been charged with a public order offence after he was seen at a pub wearing a T-shirt mocking the Hillsborough disaster. Paul Grange, from Worcester, was charged by West Mercia police with displaying threatening and abusive writing likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress.

Any police officers been charged with, you know, treating innocent people like criminals, putting their loved ones through years of hell, branding the survivors as killers, sending for the dogs as the dying cried out for help, causing distress, harassment and alarm?

Maybe if one of these ultra-sensitive coppers pulls on a rude T-shirt, his comrades will lock him away for the good of society…

 

hillsborough

 

Posted: 31st, May 2016 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports | Comment


Harambe the gorilla named in child abuse allegations

harambe gorilla

 

More news on Harambe, the gorilla at Cincinnati zoo who died for our sins. The Mirror leads with a statement punctuated to look like a question: “Proof the gorilla was trying to protect the boy?” That question mark won’t show up on Google searches, so lots of people campaigning for Harmabe’s “murderers” to be tried in court and the boy’s mother, Michelle Gregg, to be punished, will see it as evidence they are right.

On the ridiculous and shrill Justice for Harambe petition, kind hearts want Michelle in prison and the child ripped from the family home:

It is believed that the situation was caused by parental negligence and the zoo is not responsible for the child’s injuries and possible trauma. We the undersigned want the parents to be held accountable for the lack of supervision and negligence that caused Harambe to lose his life. We the undersigned feel the child’s safety is paramount in this situation. We believe that this negligence may be reflective of the child’s home situation. We the undersigned actively encourage an investigation of the child’s home environment in the interests of protecting the child and his siblings from further incidents of parental negligence that may result in serious bodily harm or even death. Please sign this petition to encourage the Cincinnati Zoo, Hamilton County Child Protection Services, and Cincinnati Police Department hold the parents responsible.

The Mirror has no idea what Harambe was and was not thinking. Yesterday, the same paper told readers Harambe was “violently pulling the boy” who had fallen into his pen. If Harambe was a child minder, and we are to treat dumb animals as human beings, affording them the same legal rights as so many demand in online petitions and twitter, Harambe stands accused of child abuse. That gorilla’s a beast.

On Page 9, the Mirror says “Harambe was holding the boys’s hand… responding to Isaiah’s frightened cry”. Only when we reach paragraph 11 are we told that Isaiah was “dragged around the enclosure’s moat”.

 

harambe gorilla

 

The Mail also loads the dice against humanity, leading with another question: “Was this gentle giant trying to protect boy he took by the hand.” In other words, was Harmabe behaving like a caring human being? No. Harambe was a massive gorilla. He is kept in a cage surrounded by water, less to protect him from human being than to protect us from him.

Simon Barnes tells us: “Death seems a harsh punishment for a chance encounter with a naughty child.” Barnes says humans share 95% of our genes with gorillas, who “seem to have the capacity to experience emotions we think of as human.”

Facts:

It is very difficult to find reliable data comparing the human genome to animal genome. The principal reason is that few animals have had their full genome sequenced. Even those that have cannot be easily compared in terms of percentages because the genomic length and chromosomal division can vary greatly from one species to another.

– Cats have 90% of homologous genes with humans, 82% with dogs, 80% with cows, 79% with chimpanzees, 69% with rats and 67% with mice. (source)

– Cows (Bos taurus) are 80% genetically similar to humans (source)

– 75% of mouse genes have equivalents in humans (source), 90% of the mouse genome could be lined up with a region on the human genome (source) 99% of mouse genes turn out to have analogues in humans (source)

– The fruit fly (Drosophila) shares about 60% of its DNA with humans (source).

– About 60% of chicken genes correspond to a similar human gene. (source)

Barnes adds: ” The ungorilla-like noises of the terrified child  in Cincinnati might have confused Harambe and contributed to his ambiguous response to  this difficult situation.”

To recap: Harambe did not call 911, 111, nor 999. But had he had his phone and a pocket to keep it in, he might have called for help. Maybe.

 

Posted: 31st, May 2016 | In: Reviews, Tabloids | Comment


Johnny Depp silences bathtub rumours

depp norwich bathtub news

 

Johnny Depp says  – yes! – he did buy a £5,000 bathtub from Stiffkey Bathrooms, in Upper St Giles Street, Norwich, in 2014. Depp took the 1880 French Bateau bath on ornate feet to the USA.

Does he still have it? “We disposed of the thing and everything’s fine,” says Mr Depp. “The thing” and it being now “fine” arouse suspicion that the bath might well have been a problem.

Depp  denied rumours that he was spotted buying spatulas in Bath, Somerset.

The plot thickens…

Posted: 30th, May 2016 | In: Celebrities, Reviews | Comment


Jamie Vardy and ‘brassy’ Becky are no classy Charles and Camilla: a Daily Mail hatchet job

Compare and contrast the Daily Mail’s reporting on Becky Nicholson’s wedding to Leicester City and England footballer Jamie Vardy and Camilla Parker Bowles marriage to Prince Charles.

Alison Boschoff and Andy Dolan write on the Becky-Jamie alliance:

The most brazen WAG of all: Three children by three dads. A fling with Peter Andre. No wonder England football hero Jamie Vardy’s parents won’t be at his wedding…

For Vardy’s mother Lisa and stepfather Phil — who has raised him since he was a baby — will not be there because they do not approve of their son’s choice of wife, a glossy, risque brunette named Becky Nicholson…

So, what’s the problem? Well, perhaps it has something to do with the fact that Becky, who will be gliding down the aisle in a £5,000 traditional white dress, is anything but a blushing bride. For she has not only been married once before as a teenager, but has also gone on to have two children by two other men….

As is perhaps customary when a high-profile footballer makes it official with a WAG, Hello! magazine will be in attendance, with its sizeable chequebook and security retinue…

Since Jamie’s rise to fame she has kept her colourful mouth shut, except when there is a cheque in it for her.

 

jamie vardy hello

In this week’s tawdry Hello! mag – “Prince Harry is a great guy!”

 

Now enjoy “Charles and Camilla: Married at last“. Charles, who may recalls was cheating on his wife, Princess Diana, with married mum-of-two Camilla. Charles once expressed a desire to be Camilla’s tampon. Cheating Charles, heir apparent and with it a defender of the faith and good morals, had a civil ceremony with Cheating Camilla, and then scored a televised Anglican blessing by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle. Charles’s parents did not attend the marriage ceremony.

Charles and Camilla were in the ancient surroundings of St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, for the service, conducted by the Archbishop of Canterbury in front of more than 700 guests. Earlier they had married in more humble surroundings in the Windsor Register Office, with just 28 guests but without the Queen or the Duke of Edinburgh.

The Duchess of Cornwall changed into a porcelain blue silk dress with hand painted ikat design, hand embroidered with gold thread work, for the blessing of her marriage this afternoon.

The designers’ starting point was the Duchess’s comment that she liked the style of the velvet dress they had designed for her to wear for the gala night at the Royal Opera House…

At the reception, the Duchess wore a court shoe with a soft point toe and a 5.5cm heel in pale grey shot silk…

She carried a small, simple elegant floral bouquet bound with silk from her dress. Auricular flowers in dusty shades of greys and creams with touches of gold had been mixed with clusters of Lily of the Valley both for the scent and the sentiment…

The flowers were cut from English plants later to be grown in the gardens at Highgrove. A sprig of myrtle, representing happy marriage, was sent from a well wisher in Cornwall for the bouquet.

And what colour dress did chaste Camilla wear to that civil wedding to the down-at-heel Prince?

 

Camilla Charles wedding dress

 

Good job Camilla’s not like that Becky. But if she wants to get the “brassy” look, the Mail is here to help her. Below photos of  Becky in her undies – “Blushing bride: Rebekah appeared in a downmarket newspaper modelling ‘wedding lingerie’ (pictured)” – the Mail offers readers the chances to “GET THE LOOK” and “Say ‘I do’ like Becky in bridal lingerie”:

 

BEcky Nicholson wedding

 

It’s not about money, readers. No. It’s about class…

 

Posted: 29th, May 2016 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews, Royal Family, Sports, Tabloids | Comment


Now Watch: Daily Express recycles EU kettle news

kettles EU Express ban

 

Long ago, we kept up a feature called Now Watch, a look at instances of “NOIW” in front-page news headlines. Today we revisit the meme with a look at the Daily Express front-page laments: “NOW EU WANT TO BAN OUR KETTLES.”

Stopping just short of hailing the death of the Great British Kettle (made in Germany), the Express is at least prove that the boiler is reusable, having earlier thundered in 2014: “NOW KETTLES FACE EU BAN.”

Now, then, now, then…

Posted: 28th, May 2016 | In: Politicians, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment