The Danger of Databases

As we know, Nanny and her acolytes have something of a fetish for gathering data on all of us and putting that data into databases.

Nanny's rationale being that the databases help her to "help" us live "better" more "secure" lives etc etc; eg the "super" NHS database (that has yet to work) and the proposed child "protection" database (that allows all manner of people access to personal details).

Nanny has assured us, on numerous occasions, that the data stored in these databases is secure.

Bollocks!

As we have seen in the UK (eg with the loss of HMRC data on 25 million people), databases are far from secure.

However, the ongoing Wikileaks fiasco wrt 250,000 "classified" US cables knocks the UK security failures into a cocked hat.

Whilst the content of the leaked cables is, to people with half a brain, hardly surprising and in many cases bordering on the trivial; the damage done to US diplomatic efforts is incalculable. People will now treat US diplomats in the same way as they treat journalists, and work on the assumption that whatever is said may well appear on the net one day.

How did this fiasco come to pass?

Post 9/11 the US became more scared and paranoid than it usually is. Now, under such conditions, one would assume that there would have been a "security lockdown" wrt handling diplomatic communications.

Perversely, no, the exact opposite happened.

Working from the premise that sharing data would increase US security, the government of the day undertook to build a central database of all diplomatic communications.

Maybe, in itself, this was a logical idea.

However, the US government then asked themselves the fundamental question wrt databases namely:

"Who do we grant access rights to?"

They chose, for reasons that are beyond any understanding, to grant unfettered access rights to over 3.5 million people.

Yes, you did read that correctly, over 3.5 million people were given access rights to this database!

An accident waiting to happen!

Quite why the US authorities are so "shocked" over this leak is beyond me. Frankly the fact that the leak didn't occur years ago is more surprising.

The lesson to our own Nanny is clear, databases can be abused. To leave the design and security of such databases to politicians (who have zero experience of the real world, work or IT) is asking for trouble.

BTW, one small question, what on earth does the US government want the biometric data of UN personnel for?

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Useless Gobshites!

Fresh on the heels of the recent announcement by the Tory led coalition to ban all branding of fags, our "beloved" government is now planning to up the minimum price of booze.

Nanny's Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, will publish a white paper this week that will outline plans to ban cheap alcohol sales.

Supermarkets will be banned from selling wine, beer and spirits below the cost of duty on the product plus VAT.

There are also plans to raise the duty paid on super-strength beer, as part of the Police and Social Responsibility Bill that is also due to be published.

Licences could be removed from sellers that breach the rules.

I had been labouring under the misunderstanding that we were now being governed by a Tory led government, with an agenda to lessen the burden of state control on the individual, not a socialist administration intent on encroaching ever further into our daily lives.

Clearly I was wrong.

I find it hypocritical, to say the least, that our "respected" MPs (hereafter referred to as useless gobshites) are striving to increase the price of booze; given that these useless gobshites have unfettered access to subsidised bars and restaurants (open until the wee small hours) courtesy of the long suffering taxpayer.

Why do they allow themselves the option of being able to drink cheap booze, but deny the voters that same option?

My thanks to the Irish Daily Star for coming up with a headline (albeit intended for the Irish cabinet) that so ably describes our government.

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Happiness

I am gemused to see that our coalition government has announced that it will spend around £2M a year measuring our "happiness".

A fascinating idea yet, somehow, I suspect deeply flawed.

Let us start with the basics, ie what exactly is "happiness"?

There are some basic theories that state that humans have several levels of "needs" that have to be satisfied before they achieve "nirvana".

The basic "needs" are:

- Food
- Shelter
- Safety/warmth
- Sex

Once these have been sated, the human "id" (or ego) takes over, and mankind (so the theory goes) looks for fulfillment (or his/her destiny) via intellectual pursuits and "leisure activities that boost the ego and give rise to feeling of self satisfaction/contentment.

Hmmmm, all well and good, yet measuring these key performance indicators (KPI's) is all but impossible.

1 As each new generation is born in the "First World", their aspirations are higher than the previous generation.

Economic, political, technological and social advancement means that each generation expects growth and improvement in their basic conditions. Our grandfathers would have been more than content with a roof over their heads and an indoor privy. The current generation expects nothing less than a 42 inch plasma TV with internet access etc.

2 One person's view of "enough" wrt eg food or sex, is not the same as another's. There are some who can make do with sex once a month whilst there are others, eg certain "celebrities", who cannot get a "boner" unless it's at least 3 in a bed twice a day with half a kilo of coke.

3 It is fair to say that many in the UK are more than sated wrt their food intake, one only has to watch people stuff their faces with all manner of shit from takeaways etc to see that.

Yet, take a close look at many of these face stuffers and ask yourselves are they really happy?

To my view they look terribly unhappy, and are in fact using food to take their minds off their own self perceived misery and self pity.

4 Despite all our social and economic advances, there are still people in this country who do not have a roof over their heads, who live in cold damp rooms and who do not have enough to eat.

Unless their basic needs are met there can be no effective measure of the country's happiness, because they have yet to get to the next level (where "happiness" is meant to kick in).

5 The Orifice of National Statistics will be the organ of the state assigned the task of measuring "happiness". As we know from its lamentable record wrt providing economic statistics whatever numbers it reports are unreliable, out of date and subject to revision.

Having proven that measuring "happiness" is all but impossible, the question that also needs to be asked is whether this really is any of the government's business?

Traditional political models work on the assumption that if the government stimulates the economy, and ensures that there is a reasonable level of "full" employment, then people will be happy. As demonstrated above, "happiness" is a little but more complicated than that.

For sure, money alone cannot buy you happiness. However, abject poverty in the face of conspicuous abundance is miserable.

The real key to "happiness" is a subjective mixture of:

- "wealth",
- "freedom", and
- the expectation/"hope" of self improvement.

These three "keys" to happiness can only come about when a government runs a "plug in and play" environment, whereby the individual can safely go about his/her business (without harming others) in the expectation that the government will not keep changing the rules of the game or stifle initiative and self growth via excessive rules, regulations and taxes.

This means that governments need to focus on downsizing their role in society, and individuals need to become (and be allowed to become) more responsible for their own lives.

Wasting money on measuring "happiness" will not achieve anything tangible, other than a "feelgood" buzz for Nanny.

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Happy Thanksgiving - Don't Touch My Junk

I would like to wish all my loyal American readers, wherever they are in the world, a happy and peaceful Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving in the USA is one of the busiest periods for travelling in the year. Therefore this story from the USA is rather appropriate.

In Europe, over the past few years, we have become accustomed to increased security checks at airports eg; shoes and belts have to be removed, passengers have to walk through metal detectors, pat downs are common place, body scanners are now being installed etc.

These security checks are as a result of the perceived increase in threat level from various terrorist groups, and the increased security requirements imposed on Europe by the US authorities.

I was therefore somewhat surprised to read that in the US, only recently have pat downs and body scanners been introduced and that a vocal minority of the travelling public there are rebelling against these on the grounds that they represent a threat to individual civil liberties.

John Tyner, a software engineer from California, has become something of an internet "hero" when he recorded his run-in with Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers at San Diego airport on his mobile phone.

The new security pat-down procedure, introduced on November 1, has caused an uproar; the alternative, walking through a body scanner, is not trusted by people in the USA on both health and modesty grounds.

Mr Tyner refused to submit to the body search, and told security officials in San Diego "If you touch my junk, I'll have you arrested".

Apparently there is now a range of T shirts with that motto emblazoned on them, and a movement has formed declaring 24 November to be "National Opt-Out Day" (urging passengers to refuse to be searched).

I can, to a degree, sympathise with the idea behind this; innocent until proven guilty ought to be the maxim, yet we are all seemingly treated as potential terrorists. The delays to travel brought about by the increased security checks is also a major hindrance to the "enjoyment" of flying.

However, I do wonder if these same people who are complaining would be quite so vocal if a bomber manages to get through and blow up a plane?

There needs to be a balance struck between sensible precautions (eg profiling etc), and excessively intrusive time wasting searches.

We, in Europe, have rolled over and meekly accepted all the security "upgrades" (eg body scanners, no liquids, show removal etc) without so much as a whimper. This passive obedience particularly sticks in the gullet, when one reads that the country that has insisted on Europe introducing these measures can't introduce them in its own borders without an almighty fuss from the travelling public there.

European and US travellers may well have some lessons that they could learn from each other, with a view to persuading the authorities to make the security checks more focused and less intrusive for the ordinary non terrorist passenger.

Do remember this, the terrorists win if they force us to live in a state of fear and siege.

On this rather "heavy" note I wish you all a peaceful, happy and rewarding Thanksgiving.

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Booze Matter - Drink Regularly

Yawn...another tedious "study" into the alleged effects of drinking has been published.

This study, conducted by Toulouse University (so it didn't cost British taxpayers anything I assume), compared drinkers in Belfast to drinkers in several regions of France. The rationale for the demographic split is that the French drink the same amount, but in a different pattern.

It seems that the good people of Belfast drink most of their booze over the weekend (Nanny calls this "binge" drinking), whilst the French spread it out over the week.

The study concluded that men who "binge" drink, had nearly twice the risk of heart attack or dying from heart disease compared to regular drinkers over the 10 years of follow up.

Binging, according to "experts", consists of drinking just over two pints of strong lager in one day!

Good grief, that's absolutely pathetic!

That is barely a gnat's piss in a swimming pool.

Clearly those who conduct research live on a different planet to me (and I guess a few of my loyal readers?).

As to what "twice the risk of heart attack" actually means in real life is not quantified. Given that a vast number of people in Britain consume more than two pints on a daily basis, I don't see bodies piling up in the street felled by a sudden cardiac arrest.

Needless to say, the media have latched on to this and of course our dog whistle politicians (who enjoy subsidised all day drinking courtesy of the taxpayers) will call for "action" to be taken.

It is of course utterly meaningless, the so called "unit" approach to "safe" drinking is nonsense. One person can drink gallons and not be affected, whilst another can have but half a glass of wine and fall flat on their face. It all depends on the individual, both physically and mentally.

One size does not fit all and Nanny, by reducing the "recommended unit intake" to the lowest possible level, makes a mockery of her health advice.

The only "lesson" one can possibly draw from this study is that drinking all week does you no harm.

Hoorah!

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Fag Matters - Packets

I see that Nanny's war against fags continues unabated.

Rather ironic, given that Nanny makes so much money out of fag taxes and that people's health is worse affected by pollution from cars and planes etc.

Anyhoo, dismissing those "annoying" little facts, Nanny has decided that the current design of fag packets is just too sexy. In her view they encourage people to smoke.

LOL!

Please, who is she trying to kid?

Who can seriously say that a fag packet looks sexy, or enticing?

Who on the planet has really been tempted to smoke, simply because of a fag packet?

Nanny's proposed solution is to have all fag packets made from brown paper, no logos or anything.

Here's why this idea is bollocks:

1 No one gives a fark about the design of fag packets, least of all the hardened smoker.

2 There will be a new market created in fag cases and fag packet covers (much like mobile phone covers).

3 Counterfeiters will rejoice, and Nanny's tax take will be reduced accordingly.

A totally daft idea!

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Celebrate the joy of living with booze. Click and drink!

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