We have recently learned that the multimillionaire Andrew Lloyd Webber, the lifelong Peer who has graced our ears and eyes with countless schmaltzy musicals (wretched genre, if you ask me), has dutifully rushed back in business class from New York just in time to vote for George Osborne’s repellent tax credit cuts.
What an upper class hero!
I herewith launch a petition on Change.org to have his worldwide hit, Cats, rechristened “Fat Cats.”
A few shots from yesterday’s national anti-austerity demo against the next tranche of savage cuts this 2nd Tory administration is going to inflict upon the weaker strata of the Uk population.
Yours faithfully went, marched alongside a Brixtonian contingent and carefully avoided the VIP speeches in Parliament sq. Russell Brand’s in particular.
The Legacy of Thatcherism. Assessing and Exploring Thatcherite Social and Economic Policies, edited by Stephen Farrall and Colin Hay. Oxford University Press for the British Academy. 352 pp. £25.00.
The legacy of Thatcherism: how not to assess it? Even beyond the ‘Anglo-liberal’ shores, Margaret Thatcher is such a totemic figure that it could be argued—without fear of opprobrium—that the present British political settlement is still cast in a Thatcherite mould.
We’re only making plans for Nigel
We only want what’s best for him
We’re only making plans for Nigel
Nigel just needs that helping hand
And if young Nigel says he’s happy
He must be happy
He must be happy
He must be happy in his work
We’re only making plans for Nigel
He has his future in a British steel
We’re only making plans for Nigel
Nigel’s whole future is as good as sealed
And if young Nigel says he’s happy
He must be happy
He must be happy
He must be happy in his work
Nigel is not outspoken
But he likes to speak
And loves to be spoken to
Nigel is happy in his work
Nigel is happy in his work
We’re only making plans for Nigel
We only want what’s best for him
We’re only making plans for Nigel
Nigel just needs this helping hand
And if young Nigel says he’s happy
He must be happy
He must be happy
He must be happy in his work
We’re only making plans for Nigel
We only want what’s best for him
We’re only making plans for Nigel
Nigel just needs this helping hand
We’re only making plans for Nigel
He has his future in a British steel
We’re only making plans for Nigel
(XTC, 1979)
PS. Già vecchia. Nigel ha dovuto accettare a forza il suo vecchio lavoro.
Rosette and campaign trails
False gestures. too much make-up
Elected to serve the public
How did you make your fortune?
I love your cheesey smile
Please will you kiss my baby
More cars and endless car parks
Planning permission granted
Another bloody election
Another bloody election
Cover-ups. official statements
Digest my gospel headlines
Marilyn committed suicide
Some nut blew jfk away
Mr. Murdoch cares for orphans
McDonalds goes eco-friendly
I’m cynical of you
There’s millions like me too
Another bloody election
Another bloody election
Another bloody election
Another bloody election
(1996)
only that this one should be permanent.
All I really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really want to see
is a total
eclipse
of the
sun.
Margaret Thatcher said that New Labour was her greatest achievement. Silvio Berlusconi could say the same of his ally/rival, the Italian prime minister, Matteo Renzi.
Vivieen Sanchbraj asks:
“Is happiness important these days? How can we be happy? What steps do you suggest?”
Slavoj Zizek
08 October 2014 2:25pm
Happiness was never important. The problem is that we don’t know what we really want. What makes us happy is not to get what we want. But to dream about it. Happiness is for opportunists. So I think that the only life of deep satisfaction is a life of eternal struggle, especially struggle with oneself. We all remember Gordon Gekko, the role played by Michael Douglas in Wall Street. What he says, breakfast is for wimps, or if you need a friend buy yourself a dog, I think we should say something similar about happiness. If you want to remain happy, just remain stupid. Authentic masters are never happy; happiness is a category of slaves.
(Online Guardian Q&A with the Slovenian philosopher. Il resto del pirotecnico scambio è qui.)
Il suo ultimo libro, Absolute Recoil: Towards a New Foundation of Dialectical Materialism, è appena uscito per i tipi di Verso.
It is a fact. We live in a world straight out of an absurdist – and nightmarish – play, a play in which language and meaning are regularly distorted. Continue reading “The philantropy of air strikes”
INNERCITYLIVING 