Power to the people

Cicero is feeling guilty. And fears he may be giving his devoted and loyal readers the wrong impression. And he would like to make amends.

You may from recent posts be left with the impression that Cicero has something against this country’s Apparatchik class and that in his eyes these people can do no right. But in this post Cicero would like to suggest that those working to create wealth can at times be prone to much silliness too.

A few weeks back Little Ed, to much gnashing of teeth and beating of breasts from the Two Caesars and their acolytes, promised when speaking to the Last Lot, that should the Last Lot become the Next Lot after the Two Caesars have sought the judgement of the Vulgar Mob, that they would pass a law to cap energy price rises. A very relevant topic given the inflation busting price increases that our energy companies have just announced.

Now clearly such a law is more beneficial than debating and legislating to tax carrier bags to save the odd polar bear. Even if it will have the same effect as Canute as trying to stop the waves. You can’t buck the market. You can’t nationalise capitalism by getting them to pay for it. You really must stop listening to and reading the works of Pater, Little Ed.

Now such nonsense is bad enough. But it was trumped by the nonsense of one of those affected. A classic case of shooting yourself in the foot. 

Little Ed’s Marxist cant, while loved by the Vulgar Mob not unnaturally, was received with distinct unenthusiasm by those whose job it is to risk their capital to extract the oil and gas from the ground and to transport this vast distances so that we might keep our lights on, homes warm, and our offices and factories working at full stretch. Freezing prices artificially for 2 years will destroy investment, destroy jobs, destroy the economy. You might win some cheap votes, they warned, but such a policy will lead to blackouts, food riots and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

And while Cicero might agree with the sentiments, such dire warnings might have been a wee bit over the top.

And no sooner had their apocalyptic warnings started when, in a brazen piece of marketing cheek, and it was not a bad piece of marketing, one of their number announced that it was not possible to fix your energy prices not for two years, which would clearly result in the end of civilisation, but for 4 years.

The Marketing Head Honcho who signed off this campaign clearly was not cc-ed into the Armageddon memo.

So silliness is not just an Apparatchik monopoly.

So re-arrange these words into meaningful sentences. Pot black calling kettle. Left right hand doing not what hand knowing. Billy a who’s silly.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper. 

The yoof of today

As you know Cicero is well ancient.

He has seen generations come and go, the ebb and flow of fashion, and changing cultural, moral and philosophical mores. And if he was to rely solely on our august and venerable Fourth Estate for his news and information he would be holding his head in despair and concern. Fortunately Cicero is more pragmatic and realistic and refuses to let the supposed decline in our moral welfare as illustrated through the news headlines get to him.  And nor should they you.

Pick up any quality newspaper, so obviously that excludes the paper they call ‘The Grauniad’, any day of the week and you would quickly gain the impression that in this country our young people, and by that we mean kids less than 16, are doing nothing but getting pregnant, injecting drugs or turning up at school drunk. Some of them no doubt doing all three at the same time. And no doubt much more depravity besides.

Nero, Caligula and other depraved Roman Caesars of Cicero’s acquaintance would be proud of the yoof of this Green and Pleasant Land.

In denouncing our yoof the baying hounds of the Fourth Estate are led by the Daily Mail, whenever they are not having a go at Li’le Ed’s Pater.

So when you read on a daily basis that 5000 kids are turning up at school drunk; that every girl sits their GCSEs pregnant or when breast feeding; and that hundreds of thousands of 14 year olds have tasted coke, and we don’t mean the diet kind here, at least once a week, you do start to believe that the yoof of today are running amok and that our moral fibre is on the point of collapse.

And if you don’t believe Cicero on this, have a look at the Daily Mail today…or tomorrow…or the day after.

Now in Cicero’s humble opinion such statistics have a serious flaw that makes the data spurious-the numbers are generated by asking the yoof the last time they had sex, got drunk or intravenously injected.

In other words some researcher approached some acne ridden yoof and asked them these questions.

Now Cicero doesn’t know what you were like when you were a spotty adolescent, and Cicero can barely remember what he did and thought last week never mind when he was a pimply yoof, but does it not occur to anyone, and especially to those who ply their trade in the Fourth Estate, that the yoof might make especially unreliable witnesses? Has it not struck the finest of our investigative journalists, even those in the Daily Mail, that the respondents to these surveys might be exaggerating to impress?

Imagine the kudos a 15 year old would get among his peers by admitting that he is regularly drunk and that he can drink anyone under the table.

Naturally a 14 year old will acquire additional swagger by publicising that he or she is a 3 times a night kind of person.

And of course a 13 year old would look and appear older in front of his mates by letting any Tom, Dick or Harriet researcher that he was a total coke head.

And it is on the back of such dubiousity that tomorrow’s fish wrappers generate their lurid headlines. That our Apparatchiks and their policy makers develop their policies. That Mr Tonbridge Wells declares that he deplores the yoof of today.

And that is why Cicero can be more optimistic when he sees these headlines. Quite simply they are wrong.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper.

Sandpit bullies

Did you read the news over the past few days that Uncle Sam’s finest Special Forces Action Men had stormed their way ashore in Libya and Somalia and taking prisoner a so-called leading Al Qaeda operative? 

What did you think?

Did you cheer that another alleged terrorist had been taken out?

Or shrug with indifference? After all it happened in a land so far away and did not seem to involve anyone from This Green and Pleasant Land.

Cicero is quite frankly appalled at such brutish and bullying behaviour and wonders if this sets a good example.

Now let Cicero be clear at the outset.

He is not soft on terrorists. He could never be described as a Bleeding Heart Liberal. And he has only ever read ‘The Grauniad’ once and that was by mistake. So he does not take the line that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.

However he does believe that no one and no country is above the law. And he does not think it right that Uncle Sam, or anyone else for that matter who purports to be a stickler for the maintenance of the law and due process, has or should have the right to wade ashore like modern day Milk Tray Men and just kidnap a stranger and whisk him out the country to be water-boarded or whatever.

This just isn’t right.

Surely there is a process for this sort of thing.

And if there is Uncle Sam must learn to use it and not just think it can do whatever it likes, wherever and whenever it likes, excepting of course with Russia, China, North Korea and Syria, where different rules seem to apply.

 Indeed Cicero is reminded that a few generations back the Brits were very good at taking on with their gunboats and Maxims people whose armaments amounted to no more than spears, pebbles and raw fruit. 

Uncle Sam seems to have learnt this doctrine of warfare. Libya and Somalia, yes. China and Syria, no.

Cicero has a vague recollection that Uncle Boris has a running dispute with Uncle Sam’s diplomats over their refusal to pay the Big Smoke’s Congestion Charge. Seemingly they think they are still back in the 1770s and are alleging ‘no taxation without representation’.  It will be tea in the Thames next.

But maybe Uncle Boris should take a leaf out of Uncle Sam’s play book.  

And send across our own Milk Tray Men to storm ashore in Washington and seize the Congestion Charge recidivists and whisk them out of the country before they can say ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.’

Would that work?

To right it wouldn’t.

Firstly we in this Green and Pleasant Land play by the rules, at least most of the time and we don’t bully.

Secondly it is doubtful if in these economically straitened times if we could muster enough Milk Tray Men to do the job.

And thirdly Uncle Sam wouldn’t like it. Bullies so hate it when people stand up to them. And should we dare to stand up to Uncle Sam, even if we could, we would never hear those words, ‘The Special Relationship’, again. Although on reflection Hugh Grant did seem to get away with it so it might be worth a try.

But in Cicero’s book those who aspire to export freedom, democracy and the rule of law, must live up to those same standards or perish by them.

Thoughts?

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper. 

On the right track?

Last week Cicero spoke, and spoke so eloquently, about motorways. This week we are going to speak about trains and about one train in particular, HS2. This will be the last time for a while we will be communing about transport issues. Promise.

As we mentioned in my previous post Cicero is currently plying his trade and sharing his wit and wisdom with the lucky folks in the heart of this Green and Pleasant Land, pretty close to its supposed heart, in fact.

In this corner of the world the Angles and other tribes who have pitched their tents here are much vexed with the Two Caesar’s plans to build a high speed rail track through their gardens and fields. This plan has produced a highly contagious outbreak of Nimbyism for which there is at present no known cure though the finest scientific minds are currently looking into this. And naturally they are mightily displeased with the Two Caesars and their plans even though the plans were originally initiated by the Last Lot.

Now Cicero has many talents and skills and a wide spread of knowledge on very many topics but he would be the first to admit he is no transport expert. But this does not stop him from pronouncing and sharing his thoughts on this topic or any other with which he has scant knowledge.

Given this it is worth stating at the outset that to date Cicero has avoided succumbing to the outbreak of Nimbi’s and can this take a more detached view of the of the rights and wrongs of this issue for I have no skin in the game, other than as a taxpayer who will no doubt be funding this construction extravaganza. And possibly as a potential traveller who might choose to use the service to sojourn to the Big Smoke from time to time.  

My starting point in this debate is to admit that I know nothing about the topic, whether it economically stacks up though when did that last stop us doing things our Caesars wanted to do; whether or not we need the capacity that it is claimed we need; or whether there are better things we might do with the apparently obscene amounts of money it will take to build this Hornby Train Set.

But, and this is not something few realise, other than HS1 which links the Big Smoke with the land where Johnny Foreigner lives, we have not built any new train track in this country since the 19^th century which is even before Downton Abbey. So surely if we are going to build a new train line it is only right that we build the best, most up to date and most modern we can afford? After all if we were setting out to buy a new car we wouldn’t be looking to purchase a Model T Ford, would we?

It surely is not possible to run a modern 21^st century economy able to compete with modern and fast growing economies like Brazil, India and China (and possibly even Scotland once it discards it colonial shackles next year)  on a 19^th century infrastructure. Maybe those with Nimbyism think we can.

Finally we elect our leaders to lead, for good or ill, that is the strength and weakness of democracy, but we pay the Two Caesars to lead. So get on with it. You have looked into this and decided that this is the best thing for us to do. You have had experts with brains the size of planets to examine the issues and you still think we should do this. So in the words of my old friend, Aristotle, albeit in Greek, ‘lead on and just frigging do it’.

Those of you with higher active listening skills may have discerned Cicero’s previous subtle pronouncements that he is not usually favour of the Caesars spending his bawbees on State business but indubitably the Two Caesars will be relieved to know that this plan has Cicero’s blessing.

But what do you think? Have you a bad case of Nimbyism? Or even worse Ludditism?

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper.

The road to hell

This will surprise you but this week Cicero is going to be helpful and constructive though

hopefully still radical and thought provoking.

I happen to work close to one of this country’s very few toll roads, the M6 Toll. Now as someone who hails from the far north of this green and pleasant land, well beyond the Wall of Hadrian, from a tribe with an ill-deserved reputation for being careful with their bawbees, it is unlikely that I am going to pay to drive on a road when there is a perfectly good alternative which is free.

And it seems that many other people think in a like-minded way.

I have, I must admit, paid once to travel around Birmingham, albeit by accident, I missed the turn off to stay on the free road. And the road was empty and deserted. And when travelling on the free road very very few drivers seem to come onto the free road from the pay road, or leave the free road to go onto the pay road. In short methinks that this is the whitest of elephants, indeed you might describe the M6 Toll as an Albino Elephant.

And in the meantime the traffic grinds to a halt as it travels through the West Midlands on the M6, the road that is free, causing drivers to be late for their meetings; delivery deadlines being missed by the truckers; and giving the eco-and enviro-mentalists the heebie-jeebies when they stop to consider the damage being caused to the polar bears in the Arctic by the traffic gridlock through Walsall, Smethwick and Wolverhampton.

On really bad days the inside lane is wall to wall with Yorkie Man and their big trucks.

Now I have an idea to save us all from this road to hell. And it’s a good one. And more to the point it is constructive and helpful. Well at least Cicero thinks so.

If the aim of a road is to get those using it from A to B in the swiftest and most frictionless way possible then clearly the M6 is failing. And even though there is an even better alternative available, albeit at a price. So why not incentivise Yorkie Man to use the Albino Elephant especially at peak times.

{WILD APPLAUSE}

Thank you. You are too kind.

The logic is quite simple. At peak times especially Yorkie Man is parked up on the free road, clogging it up for everyone else. So why not allow Yorkie Man to take his truck on the Albino Elephant as peak times when everyone else is trying to get to their offices for free or even for a significantly reduced toll? That way Yorkie Man gets his truck and his deliveries through the Birmingham and West Midlands funnel quickly and efficiently. Those trying to get to their offices on time will do so. And even the polar bears will benefit to the relief and no doubt unbridled joy of the eco-mentalists.

Everyone a winner.

Now some of Cicero’s readers might carp and cavil that there will be a significant impact on the revenues of the Albino Elephant. Will there? No one is using it in the first place. And it might be well that by breaking the default of Yorkie Man to use the free road that he might even see the benefits of using it outwith the promotion periods.

And some might moan that if we can do this for Yorkie Man why can’t they do it for those driving cars? Because it is my guess that most cars on the road at that time want to go into and out of Birmingham not through it, even if most probably would like to by-pass the city entirely.

And by removing a large chunk of the road population in one fell swoop all the traffic will benefit. 

Considerably.

Anyone object to such a great idea?

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper.

Have yourself a very merry Christmas...

What month is it?

At this point you might be thinking that Cicero has finally lost his marbles and gone gaga. I am sure I can hear someone say ‘Poor man, he had such a brilliant mind once upon a time’.

Please, there is no need for faux sympathy and tears.

Obviously I know what month it is-October but only just. The sun still has some warmth in it and the trees remain wreathed in leaves, albeit starting to convert from soft green to crisp rusty brown. Some of the old grey cells are still working, mes amis, as M Poirot might say.

However a recent shopping experience did put doubt into my mind.

For while wandering around a local shopping mega-emporium in the dog days of September, Cicero was mightily disconcerted to see the shelves and other merchandising space replete with goods for Christmas. There were Christmas cards, decorations, trees and all kinds of other tat which we associate with the Bacchalian revels of December.

It’s September for God’s sake! There’s still 3 months to go! The kids have just gone back to school! ‘Strictly’ has only just begun! What’s going on?

And if you look around you bit by bit Christmas messages are beginning to seep into the marketing messages that daily bombard us-‘Book now for Christmas’; ‘sign up for your Christmas party’; ‘Christmas tat on sale here’.

At the place where Cicero earns his bawbees, Cicero is currently being chased on a daily basis for his Christmas card list. Even though the ‘X-Factor’ wannabees are still at Boot Camp.

It is not that I am agin Christmas and all the shenanigans that go with it. But I just like Time’s winged chariot to be lower in the sky before I start to dedicate brain cells to this festival.

Cicero would like to propose a law that there can be no mention, talk or discussion of the C-Word until after Bonfire Night.

It seems sensible that we don’t give a thought to the C-Festival until we have left Halloween and Bonfire Night behind us. Let’s take our festivities one at a time and not rush them. Let’s enjoy them, savour them, imbibe them even, before we move on to the next one. And let’s not confuse the human brain by disturbing nature’s logical and rational and ordered chronological sequence of events.

It’s time for the Two Caesars to do something useful with their days and introduce the necessary legislation forthwith. Instead of messing around with taxes on plastic bags and anything else the eco- and enviro-mentalists might be asking you to do; helping people buy houses with my money; or squabbling over who and who is not allowed to be married, please do this. For me. This might be the most transformative piece of legislation of the millennium so far.

And until Betty Windsor has signed off this legislation as good to go, Cicero will continue to ignore the C-Fest until Guy Fawkes has been reduced to cinders and ash, yet again. And if you are waiting for me to compile my C-Card list, you have another month or so before I will even begin to think about it.

What is the earliest sign you have seen of the C-Fest this year?