Off Topic

Wallace1492

OK, a bit off topic, but a few things are on here.
I think the critcism of Gordon Brown by The Scum is totally out of order.

I am not a huge fan of Brown, but he has taken the time to write personally to a grieving mother, and gets it in the neck as his writing may not be the best in the world.

Sorry if this is a bit off topic, but thought i would post anyway.

Matt the Tester

completely agree! GBis a bit of a pillock but considering the situation he came into #10 downing street. he's doing incredibly well.

symo

Let's see:

1-Told the city he would not intervene if a Labour government came to Power (and the Credit Crisis started in the city)
2-Kills people everyday in a war no-one can win
3-Is presiding over the handover of power to the EU.
4-Failed to reign in public sector spending.
5-Keeps final salary pensions schemes in the public sector (because we can afford such high calibre people).
6-Not elected PM

Him and Blair should be strung up for treason. Cool britania my ass. This labour government has done what labour governments always do. Blame the tories for everything then ramp up public debt so high that generations have to pay it off.

shouldbeinbed

Don't read any papers - all scumbag populist whores ignoring the truth for a good story, but spotted it on news 24.

I'm not sure he's up to the job but nevertheless he's one of the busiest and most under pressure people in the world let alone this country, he takes the time to try and show a small act of human decency (and I'd not heard him crowing about it before this non event story blew up) to show right from the top how much the sacrifices are felt and he makes a spelling mistake. OK not great in context of what he was writing for, but human and it shows that ths isn't a stock letter from the dead soldier folder on the computer or an instruction to someone else to 'type something nice and I'll sign it' but is time taken to do it personally.

I can sympathise with the handwriting, mine is abysmal, block capitals all the way or even I've no chance of reading it let alone anybody else.

suzyb

nvm

CiB

Wallace1492 wrote:

OK, a bit off topic, but a few things are on here.
I think the critcism of Gordon Brown by The Scum is totally out of order.

I am not a huge fan of Brown, but he has taken the time to write personally to a grieving mother, and gets it in the neck as his writing may not be the best in the world.

Sorry if this is a bit off topic, but thought i would post anyway.

He clearly didn't take the time, either to make an effort, or even to check the spelling of their surname. He gets no sympathy from me when his little PR exercise blows up in his face*.

The man is a buffoon. His track record is appalling both as Chancellor and now as PM. He has absolutely zero mandate to be at the helm and the sooner he goes the better. If The Scum can speed up that process by highlighting one more of his many failings I'll raise a glass to that, even if I'd rather walk to work than buy that dreadful newspaper. GB may have many qualities, but none of them fit with his current role. Go. Now.



*Yes I did.

don_don

It seems to me irrelevant who wrote the letter, or how busy they might be.

If you are going to write an official letter to a greiving mother, consoling them for the death of their son, you can at least get someone to check that the names have been got right.

Maybe it doesn't warrant trial by media, but it was pretty avoidable and unnecessary.

TheStone

Letter thing is a bit over the top, but the man was the worst chancellor ever.
He's been even worse as a PM. They think nothing through, just chuck some new
stuff out to keep the masses happy.

The debt bubble he encouraged as chancellor is truly shocking. The fact that he's
printing money and getting the UK into even more debt to try to avoid taking any
responsibility and keep the bubble floating will probably destroy this country.

The man knows nothing about finance.

unscarred

New Labour's positive contributions to Britain:

1. Making the Bank of England responsible for setting interest rates.
2. er....

Labour Governments raise taxes and spend money, always have. This one has come up with the interesting variation of borrowing money as well! The official national debt on the books is staggering, but it doesn't even include the unfunded public sector pensions or the mass of PFI schemes that they're still rolling out. The country is bankrupt, and the only thing keeping us above water is that the rest of the world is pretending they haven't noticed and hoping it magically goes away.

Pa Broon has been an unmitigated disaster. However, this last story with the letter is starting to feel like bullying. We know he's got dodgy eyesight, and apparently he's got very bad handwriting. Any normal person with such bad handwriting (e.g. me) would type the letter, print it off and sign it. Of course, if he had done that the Sun would be accusing him of not writing it himself!

TheStone

This Labour govt is much worse than the previous.

In the 70's we went cap in hand to the IMF for less than 3bn. This year we've 'borrowed'
175bn (over 5x as much in real terms).

Except they weren't sure if anyone would lend it to them, so they printed it. (Mugabe style).

But it's ok, 'cos it means we can still employ twice as many people in the public sector than
we can afford and give people on over 50k/year tax credits and it helps further increase
the ridiculous housing bubble.

The fact that the children will have to pay the cost to keep housing further from their
reach seems to go unnoticed.

Is this socialism?

DonDaddyD

To stimulate economic growth you need to increase spending.... so my economics lesson taught me.

That's Brown's logic to get us out of the recession. Spend, create work, create more jobs, get money circulating, increase demand, increases the value of the resources being used.

Not sure about the other stuff. I'm voting Lib Dems or Greens (though i need to read up more on them).

I will never vote Conservative.

Wallace1492

I was really trying to keep the politics out of this.
My point was that Brown has been hung up for writing a letter of condolence to a soldiers mother.

It might not have been the best of writing, may have had spelling mistakes, but it was heartfelt and genuine (IMHO) He did not need to do this.

DonDaddyD

TheStone wrote:

But it's ok, 'cos it means we can still employ twice as many people in the public sector than.

On the NHS. With an ageing population it isn't sustainable. People live longer meaning as they get older beyond the age of retirement will require more from NHS and other public services. This being paid for by taxes isn't fair as these people who own their house are being supported by those that do work and are struggling to buy their first house (to draw perspective and comparison)

This is arguably one of the biggest drain on public services and the current system (though worked well to get to this point where we have too many healthy retired people to sustain) cannot support it much longer.

There are drives to improve this but it means an upheaval of the public services and all politicians are afraid to tackle it.

always_tyred

Aren't you all missing the point?

the story here is the reprehensible behaviour of the gutter press again.

She is clearly angry about the equipment situation and clearly very emotional and, frankly, not that bright. The Sun has seized upon this opportunity to sell papers and is not acting in the family's best interests. It makes be ashamed to be British.

DonDaddyD

Wallace1492 wrote:

I was really trying to keep the politics out of this.
My point was that Brown has been hung up for writing a letter of condolence to a soldiers mother.

It might not have been the best of writing, may have had spelling mistakes, but it was heartfelt and genuine (IMHO) He did not need to do this.

The sincerity of the letter is cheapened by the fact that he couldn't take the time to proof read it for accuracy. Getting a name wrong in this nature can be insulting in and of itself.

Though Brown could be dyslexic... and the fact that he wrote a letter (personal) at all should be merit enough

bails87

unscarred wrote:

New Labour's positive contributions to Britain:

1. Making the Bank of England responsible for setting interest rates.
2. er....

Cycle2Work?

EDIT: And these 'evil' final salary pensions go some way to compensate public sector workers for the lower pay they earn, in general, compared to private sector counterparts. It's not just "fatcats" and "bigwigs", but nurses and firefighters getting them too.

symo

Always Tyred wrote:

Aren't you all missing the point?

the story here is the reprehensible behaviour of the gutter press again.

She is clearly angry about the equipment situation and clearly very emotional and, frankly, not that bright. The Sun has seized upon this opportunity to sell papers and is not acting in the family's best interests. It makes be ashamed to be British.

No the issue is a Nu-labor PR stunt gone wrong and blowing up in their face. I find it funny that they thought they could profit from one womans tragedy and then it go so badly for them. A party based on focus groups and not thinking about consequences.

Oh and PFI was created by the Tories but it had profit caps on it. Guess what Nu Labour took out for private companies?

He deserves everything and more, in my opinion he, blair and bush should be at the hague on war crimes charges.

bails87

Erm, how was it a PR stunt? Most people were unaware he even wrote these letters! If it was a PR stunt wouldn't he turn up at their house with a big brass band, and get photographed doing it? Also, if it was for publicity, it would have been written by a professional caligripher(is that a word?), and spelt/presented perfectly!

vorsprung

I'm off topic too

Those hazelnuts always taste a bit stale IMHO

Wallace1492

symo wrote:

Always Tyred wrote:

Aren't you all missing the point?

the story here is the reprehensible behaviour of the gutter press again.

She is clearly angry about the equipment situation and clearly very emotional and, frankly, not that bright. The Sun has seized upon this opportunity to sell papers and is not acting in the family's best interests. It makes be ashamed to be British.

No the issue is a Nu-labor PR stunt gone wrong and blowing up in their face. I find it funny that they thought they could profit from one womans tragedy and then it go so badly for them. A party based on focus groups and not thinking about consequences.

Oh and PFI was created by the Tories but it had profit caps on it. Guess what Nu Labour took out for private companies?

He deserves everything and more, in my opinion he, blair and bush should be at the hague on war crimes charges.

I do not think it is a stunt in any way, shape or form. The only people profiting from it are The Scum, I genuinely believe that Brown was heartfelt in his letter(s) he writes. After all it was The Scum that brought it up, not Labour saying how great we are, we write to mothers.

The gutter press have a lot to answer for.

always_tyred

symo wrote:

Always Tyred wrote:

Aren't you all missing the point?

the story here is the reprehensible behaviour of the gutter press again.

She is clearly angry about the equipment situation and clearly very emotional and, frankly, not that bright. The Sun has seized upon this opportunity to sell papers and is not acting in the family's best interests. It makes be ashamed to be British.

No the issue is a Nu-labor PR stunt gone wrong and blowing up in their face. I find it funny that they thought they could profit from one womans tragedy and then it go so badly for them. A party based on focus groups and not thinking about consequences.

Oh and PFI was created by the Tories but it had profit caps on it. Guess what Nu Labour took out for private companies?

He deserves everything and more, in my opinion he, blair and bush should be at the hague on war crimes charges.

I think you have prefectly encapsulated the Sun's motivations for running the story so long. Do you know what the term "hoodwinked" means?

symo

Always Tyred wrote:

I think you have prefectly encapsulated the Sun's motivations for running the story so long. Do you know what the term "hoodwinked" means?

Is it where a person wears a hood, and then winks at you. As in; he hoodwinked you.

biondino

Wallace1492 wrote:

I do not think it is a stunt in any way, shape or form. The only people profiting from it are The Scum, I genuinely believe that Brown was heartfelt in his letter(s) he writes. After all it was The Scum that brought it up, not Labour saying how great we are, we write to mothers.

The gutter press have a lot to answer for.

The woman may have lost her son but her reaction is shocking. The PM calling her up, trying to apologise and explain, and her recording his stammering attempts to do a decent thing by recording the conversation and selling the tapes to the Sun. What a conniving cow.

d21dga

biondino wrote:

Wallace1492 wrote:

I do not think it is a stunt in any way, shape or form. The only people profiting from it are The Scum, I genuinely believe that Brown was heartfelt in his letter(s) he writes. After all it was The Scum that brought it up, not Labour saying how great we are, we write to mothers.

The gutter press have a lot to answer for.

The woman may have lost her son but her reaction is shocking. The PM calling her up, trying to apologise and explain, and her recording his stammering attempts to do a decent thing by recording the conversation and selling the tapes to the Sun. What a conniving cow.

+1

sharm1969ca

Wallace, did you originally post this for a dare! c'mon mate you cant seriously be backing this bloody idiot Gordon Brown! Now i usually like reading your whitty posts especially about dodging fireworks (made me laugh for ages by the way) I agree with everything symo says about the bloody bafoon.

Stevo_666

Sounds to me like the woman is stooping low to make something out her own son's death.

Still doesn't change the fact that the the sooner we get shot of Comrade Brown and his appalling bunch of incompetent, interfering, overtaxing nannies, the better. Where's Maggie Thatcher when you need her? :twisted:

Wallace1492

sharm1969ca wrote:

Wallace, did you originally post this for a dare! c'mon mate you cant seriously be backing this bloody idiot Gordon Brown! Now i usually like reading your whitty posts especially about dodging fireworks (made me laugh for ages by the way) I agree with everything symo says about the bloody bafoon.

Not for a dare, I am no fan of Brown, but I think the way he has been treated in this case is very low. I am even les of a fan of the Sun though, having had a mate being killed in a tragic train accident a number of years ago, the Scum ran a story on the day of his funeral that he had committed suicide with absolutely no truth in it. Just trying to be fair.

the_hundredth_idiot

Nu Labour and Brown are all a bunch of self-serving gits, IMHO.

So it was something of a surprise to me to find myself siding with Brown on this. The man's partially sighted, FFS - blind in one eye and losing sight in the other. He (apparently) has to use a big felt-tip pen to write so he can see what he's written. My understanding is that it is arguable that he actually spelt the name incorrectly - more that his handwriting is so bad that it's hard to tell what he wrote.

The Scum - written by scum, read by half-wits. I'd love to see The Sun pilloried over this and eventually forced into a big apology.

tailwindhome

symo wrote:

Always Tyred wrote:

I think you have prefectly encapsulated the Sun's motivations for running the story so long. Do you know what the term "hoodwinked" means?

Is it where a person wears a hood, and then winks at you. As in; he hoodwinked you.

You leave Kieran Burns out of this :P

tailwindhome

symo wrote:

6-Not elected PM

You seem, like many others, to misunderstand the British electoral system

tailwindhome

biondino wrote:

Wallace1492 wrote:

I do not think it is a stunt in any way, shape or form. The only people profiting from it are The Scum, I genuinely believe that Brown was heartfelt in his letter(s) he writes. After all it was The Scum that brought it up, not Labour saying how great we are, we write to mothers.

The gutter press have a lot to answer for.

The woman may have lost her son but her reaction is shocking. The PM calling her up, trying to apologise and explain, and her recording his stammering attempts to do a decent thing by recording the conversation and selling the tapes to the Sun. What a conniving cow.

Not sure I would go so far as to call her a 'conniving cow' but I certainly agree the overall point.

I would have thought that wether or not you like Gordon Brown, the position of Prime Minister deserves a lot more respect.