The best from the blogosphere and beyond

1. Harry Grunwald says casting faith schools as divisive does a huge disservice to them.

2. Brownites can't play the expectations game, says James Forsyth.

3. Edmund Conway barks at Gordon Brown's housing package.

4. What's most dangerous for Brown? Charles Clarke or Compass?

5. Uber-Blairism, says Sunder Katwala, is a useful term, despite criticism.

6. John Rentoul says Brown is right to ditch cash payments to help with fuel bills.

7. UK Polling Report asks if Labour would do worse with Milliband.

8. Iain Hollingshead welcomes the rise in state school admissions at Cambridge.

9. Donal Blaney calls for action against BBC bias.

10. Cherie Blair attacks herself, says Dizzy Thinks.

Full coverage of UK politics
Three Line Whip home

earlier today, I blogged on the way that the EU is trying to resurrect the legally defunct Lisbon Treaty.http://my.telegraph.co.uk/hammer/blog/2008/09/05/lisbon_treaty_rearing_up_again

Doubting Thomas mentioned their latest chicanery on 'in absentia' sentencing. May I give you a possible scenario.

A is someone who stirs loudly and effectively against the EU, its budget spending and general non-representation. He goes away on an innocent holiday.

B, carrying a forged passport, purporting to be A, enters, say, Roumania and carries out an atrocity and leaves before he is caught.

Roumania investigates, finds the identity of the villain, sentences him in absentia. A is then extradited, and there would be no political efforts to stop this miscarriage and A can be effectively re-educated whilst in prison.

The Brussels battalion of bureaucrats can then get on with their nepotism, fiddling and empire building with one less effective voice digging them out.

Not possible? How many British passports went adrift recently? How many whistle blowers have been framed and muffled in the corridors of power?

If the EU is so good, why should not every country have a referendum to tell them so? A refusal can only mean that they know that they would lose, because it is not in the people's interest, just the politicians.

If enough people get up and instruct their representative MPs and MEPs to force a vote, then we can see. If it goes as a YES, all I can do is shut up for a year or so, before you start to hear a muttered, "I told you so," by which time we will have German or Russian tanks in Piccadilly.

Remember, Putin is Teacozy's friend.

Hey everyone.. Finally a new season.   Well tonite I got my feet wet again.  I really didn't want to start off big, but it look that way in the first game.   Here are my games

Game 1:  224

Game 2:  170

Game 3:  188

Total Series:   582   Avg. 194

My goal this year again is to have a 200+ average for a full season.  My other is to get a 800 series.  My teammate already got a 805 to start the season.  He was just on.   Never missed the pocket.  Had a 289 first game.  Left a stone 8 pin on the 11th ball.  TTyNW(talktoyounextweek).

2. Paper Planes by M.I.A.

If you could abolish just one quango, which would it be? Heaven knows there are enough to choose from. According to a recent study by the Taxpayers’ Alliance, there are now 1162 executive agencies in Britain, costing £64 billion a year.

It’s a toughie, but, on grounds that you should start with those that have the greatest capacity to do harm, here are my top five:

1. The National Institute for Clinical Excellence
2. The Health and Safety Executive
3. The Equaltity and Human Rights Commission
4. The Standards Board
5. The European Commission

Alright, we don’t often think of this last as a quango, but what the devil else is it? Twenty-seven unelected Commissioners with a monopoly on the right to propose new legislation: if that's not a super-quango, what is?

I’m sure you have candidates of your own. The excellent Donal Blaney, for example, makes a strong case for scrapping the Advertising Standards Authority. Douglas Carswell is obsessed with getting rid of the Better Regulations Commission which, he argues, typifies what is wrong with our whole approach: instead of tackling the problem of too many laws and too many quangoes through repeal and abolition, Labour chose to do so by passing another law and creating a new quango. And as for the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority…

I’d welcome any ideas you have. The comment thread is open.

 

 

This is very exciting, even if its not us being the next finalist and its a friend we made on KIIS it's all worth going on this journey.

English Heritage has thrown a spanner in the works of the Catholic Diocese of Leeds and its beanie-wearing bishop, Arthur Roche.

Bishop Roche's plans have been hampered by English Heritage

The figure-skating prelate has been too busy to reply to formal protests from parishioners distraught at the closure of six churches (some of them thriving) in the Pontefract deanery. But I bet he finds time to respond to English Heritage's decision to slap a Grade II listing on Holy Family, Chequerfield, a 1960s building that Roche closed last month.

The heritage watchdog cannot force Big-hearted Arthur (as he isn't known) to re-open the church – but the listing means that it cannot be demolished without going through an expensive planning procedure.

As a result, the diocese's plans to sell the land for housing are severely hampered in the short term. Imagine the dismay at Hinsley Hall, headquarters of the Bishop, his delightful Vicar General Mgr Michael McQuinn and the unfailingly polite and helpful diocesan press officer John Grady.

Here is a report of the English Heritage ruling in the Yorkshire Evening Post. Note this quote:

Diocese of Leeds property administrator David Damant said the sale of the church was proceeding but admitted it was likely to attract a much lower price because of the new restrictions.

A much lower price, eh? But, hey, let's shut the church anyway, because that's what "Bishop Arthur" wants. He wants a red hat, too, I should imagine – but, thanks to the valiant fight put up by the faithful of the six parishes, that's looking less likely by the day. 

Join me, Mikey, and Bob on Fridayt at Questions in the Strip from 5-9PM.

Then join me, Tall Cathy, Bonics, and Scottro on Sunday night from 10PM-1AM.

Click the link below to see ALL of my crazy pictures from all of our parties at Questions!

http://kissnation.961kiss.com/jorge/gallery/view_gallery.one?gal_id=393891

With bunnycombs, and sparrowmints
And Lickatoads all in a row.


Viva Pinata is the impossibly cute gardening sim

Yes, Viva Pinata is back. As I was saying the other day, I've been playing this a fair bit and thought I'd share my green-fingered adventures.

For the uninitiated, Viva Pinata is the impossibly cute gardening sim in which you can entice the titular Pinatas to your plot by planting seeds and digging ponds. These pinatas are gloriously colourful animals with sweetie-sounding names such as the White Flutterscotch, Profitarmole (one of my favourites) and the seed-stealing Sour Shellybean.

The game is utterly delightful, yet has an impressive amount of depth and can be helplessly addictive. It's perhaps more of an expansion on the excellent original than a full-blown sequel, but is immediately more accessible at the same time as having a host of new features and species of Pinata to attract. You can now travel afield to the Dessert Desert and capture sand-dwelling Pinata, or visit an Artic plain to snaffle the Pinatas that are keener in the cold. It's all great fun and is helped no end by the co-op mode, where a second pair of gardening gloves can drop in and out of your garden at any time. It's perfect for parents looking for an excuse to 'help' children in their garden. Don't think they don't know why you're really playing though,  Dad.

For me, it's been a great way to spend a lazy evening in with my partner. We'll potter around in the garden attempting to make it beautiful and keep all our resident Pinatas happy. You can even breed them, though the mating ritual is the super-saccharine 'Romance Dance' where your two pinatas head back to their house to disco dance before a stork drops off the newborn. Make of that what you will.

I'm under strict orders from my better half to scare away any Pretztails (foxes) that enter our garden, however, as she doesn't want any of our bunnycombs being hunted for food. It may sound a silly thing, but it's actually a good indication of how attached to your garden's fauna you can become. Sometimes you have to let nature take it's course, but certainly under my partner's watchful eye I'll be chasing those foxes away with my trusty spade.

So our garden is growing nicely, as you can see in the picture above. That's two of our Lickatoads, Lippy and Lucy (yes, you can name them), taking a swim in our freshly built pond. You can take photos about your plot and upload them to Viva Pinata's official site.

Because of that, I'm opening a Viva Pinata photography competition. E-mail me at tom.hoggins@telegraph.co.uk with your best photos in Viva Pinata and hopefully we'll get enough great shots to put together a gallery. It's just for fun and a chance to get your garden seen by the world.

I know this all sounds excruciatingly cute, and at times Viva Pinata does come crashing heavily into the vegetable patch marked 'twee' but it can be difficult to resist its candy-coated charms, even for a manly man like myself*.

*may not be accurate

HAY LUGARES QUE RECORDARÉ TODA MI VIDA

AUNQUE  ALGUNOS HAN CAMBIADO,

ALGUNOS PARA SIEMPRE, NO PARA MEJORAR,

ALGUNOS SE HAN IDO Y OTROS AÚN EXISTEN

TODOS ESTOS LUGARES TIENEN SUS MOMENTOS

CON AMORES Y AMIGOS QUE AÚN PUEDO RECORDAR

ALGUNOS HAN MUERTO Y OTROS AÚN VIVEN

EN MI VIDA LOS HE AMADO A TODOS ELLOS

PERO DE TODOS ESTOS AMORES Y AMIGOS

NO HAY NADIE QUE PUEDA COMPARARSE CONTIGO

Y ESTAS MEMORIAS PIERDEN SU SENTIDO

CUANDO PIENSO EN EL AMOR COMO ALGO NUEVO

AUNQUE SE QUE NUNCA PERDERÉ EL AFECTO

POR LAS PERSONAS O  COSAS QUE SE FUERON ANTES

SE QUE A MENUDO PARARÉ Y PENSARÉ EN ELLAS

EN MI VIDA TE QUERRÉ MAS A TI

EN MI VIDA TE QUERRÉ MAS A TI.... 

 

Imagenes para hi5

html_removed html_removed html_removed html_removed

Every sip of old bushmills

Takes me back to 03-05

Where I fell into her sorrow

And barely came out alive

In Kentucky, in Ohio

I fell in love with the land

But my heart had no place to go

Thoughts of suicide to end the pain

Of a soul so lost

Driven insane

 

Jack and Jim, my only friends

One from Kentucky

One from Tennessee

But in the end

I knew they were never gonna help me

Another year rolled away

And the angels came to help me out

Saying I’ve got to fight to live

That I wasn’t over yet

I had more to give

 

I breathed in the Stockholm air

With my brothers in 07

A chance to prove something to myself

My doomsday clock stuck at eleven

 

I missed someone through the streets of Copenhagen

Knew it was just a waste of time

But the night was full of sin and hate

To be honest, I could never tell

If a knife wound would be my fate

 

Through Amsterdam to Berlin

I knew I was blessed to see it all

The sorrow fading within

Still, I missed someone

 

Stumbled through Prague alone

Hungry, I had lost my way

And to be honest, it felt good to be alone anyway

Vienna was beautiful, so was Budapest

Living like this put me to the test

Sleepless train journeys and parties

Until the dawn came around

Good times with the brothers

Who I can only appreciate now

 

My heart was almost broken

By things I’ll never talk about

And no one can party much

With a heart ripped out

 

I felt the earth alive below my feet

In the dusty Athens soil

And I never spoke a word

I felt love for something or someone

I was higher than a bird

 

It’s hard to forgive yourself

For all the things you’ve done

Even though you know there’s good reasons

And circumstances change

Sometimes quicker than the seasons

I wrote a lot of stuff in Berlin

About all this hiding within

I was up all night with a coffee or two at hand

Waiting for a plane home

Back to sleepy Ireland

Home was in the arms of a girl

That would never belong to me

But Ireland you’re still a babe

And I love you still

You’ve just lost a lot

The things that kept you tranquil

 

There’s a guilt that lingers

When you see places

That no one else can

It’s hard to explain

But they’ve never see how close to the edge I was

So maybe they can’t complain

 

I was trying to find my way

Just like anyone

Florida to Carolina

Under the summer sun

I was getting stronger

With trying testing times

Until the Nashville city nights

Let me rest, some time to unwind

Tennessee a more a more beautiful place

Would be hard to find

 

God I hate nights now

I think about the girl I never have

When I should sleep to find the rest

To own the day

To do my best

I need someone to think about

To ease the hours of the nothingness of the night

By James Battersby

July 08

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHqUipinDyw

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPmlw4Wm058

This is posted on my page here, but I finally finished up this Mega Man tribute video last night in honor of the upcoming Mega Man 9 and all of Mega Man's 8-bit past. It includes gameplay of the past games with original music, and some original animation by myself. I'm hoping to promote this to all fans of the franchise, so I hope you share it with friends and most of all, enjoy!

-Niko