My own driving peeves
I’m sure most of you reading this has read Saraji’s driving peeves on her blog – and yesterday on my first driving trip up town for a while I was reminded of a few...
Monthly Archive: June 2004
The state of US intelligence …
Time Magazine has published a feature on the US Homeland Security department’s “Highway Watch” scheme, in which professional drivers are being trained to inform the department of “suspicious” things they see on the highway...
Why are computer books so expensive?
Today I took my usual weekend stroll through London, or rather, through the diminishing bookshop quarter of it around Charing Cross Road area since the local landlords (allegedly) priced the other companies out of...
Good News: Crimean Tartars’ rights restored
Following on from CAIR’s occasional “Good News” features in their mailings, I’ve decided to do one of my own whenever a good news feature (or apparent good news feature) appears in the media. Today...
So, we’re out at last
On past evidence I was pretty sure we were not going to make it to the finals of the current European championships (Euro 2004), and last night, if you hadn’t heard already, the English...
Media stars as politicians
There was an interesting piece in the most recent New Statesman, regarding the rise of the star journalist as politician – referring, of course, to the loathsome Robert Kilroy-Silk. (You may be able to...
UK motorway services “worst in Europe”
As a truck driver I regularly have to experience the joys of using Britain’s motorway service stations, particularly of course those around London. Now the AA has said ours are Europe’s worst, and they...
Today’s Wrox event
This evening Foyle’s Bookshop in London held a “networking event” featuring a number of people from the Wrox publishing company and its new owners, Wiley. I had meetings with some of the representatives as...
Alert on map thefts
s a graduate of the University of Wales in Aberystwyth, who made much use of the National Library of Wales, I’d like to help publicise the appeal for the capture of a serial map...
Crossing Continents – Training of Imams
Crossing Continents, a current affairs programme broadcast on Radio 4, is discussing (as I type!) the subject of training imams in Europe. The government of the Netherlands has recently passed laws demanding that foreign...
Free publicity for the “Teen Gulag”
I’m not sure why I’ve held up posting on this issue for so long, but a few months ago the BBC ran a series of features on a girl from England who was tricked...
Our rulers are scared of us
The Observer reports that the British authorities are seriously considering sealing off an area around the Houses of Parliament. Anyone who has been to the area knows that Parliament lies right next to a...
An Insight into the Jama’at of Slanderers
I did a Google search for Muhammad Shareef yesterday, for reasons I can’t quite remember. One of the first things it came up with was this discussion on SalafiTalk.net which really demonstrates what an...
Denis MacEoin’s at it again!
It seems that every time there is a debate about the right of Muslim girls to wear headscarves to school, a guy called Denis MacEoin from Newcastle on Tyne gets his two pennies or...
Wimbledon to use Linux
The BBC reports that the Wimbledon tennis championship is to use Linux for both its public website and its internal “intranet”. (I don’t watch the tennis, but it’s good to hear that such a...
UK sending refugees back to Somali war zone
The Guardian reports that the British government has been quietly sending refugees back to a known war zone – Mogadishu in Somalia, to an ex-Soviet air base controlled by clan militias. (This is after...
Dickinson murder and other stuff in the news
Much column inches were taken up today by the verdict on Francisco Arce Montes, concerning the dreadful murder of Caroline Dickinson, a 13-year-old schoolgirl who was on a school trip to Brittany. It turns...
Decent article on Wahhabi threat
William Dalrymple (of White Mughals fame) has contributed a piece to today’s Guardian, “Saudi Arabia created the monster now devouring it”. It gives the usual account of the fitna caused by Wahhabi missionaries, and...
Reflections on Respect and the recent elections
I wasn’t able to blog the last few days, because of long work hours and being too tired yesterday (after a run to Milton Keynes on Friday evening, not getting back until after 11pm,...
Come on England! (Oh, all right then …)
I was thoroughly glad to find a piece in the Guardian which told us it was OK to be indifferent as to whether “our boys” win the European championship this month or not. ‘It’s...