Ian O'Doherty and intolerant 'liberals'...

It's been a while since I posted a link to an opinion piece from the Irish Independent, so allow me to rectify that omission forthwith.

But unlike my more regular links to the writings of Kevin Myers, this piece, in which he exposes the illiberal bankruptcy of the self-important pedlars of 'the orthodoxy' - ring any bells - comes from one of his colleagues, the frequently amusing and always readable Ian O'Doherty.

You won't be surprised to read that I think he's got it absolutely spot on; but what do you think?

Lord Taylor convicted: the third domino falls...

Given the nature of the evidence which emerged during the trial of Lord Taylor of Warwick, I am not at all surprised to see him convicted of six counts of false accounting in relation to what are now unarguably bogus expenses claims.

Indeed, given his extraordinary admissions (remember, Lord Taylor is a fully qualified barrister who specialised in the criminal law) that he claimed a total of £11,000 in lieu of a salary which members of the upper house are not entitled to, because 'that's what everyone was doing, so I thought it was all right', the only aspect of his conviction which raises my eyebrows is that he was only convicted on a majority of eleven to one.

I fear the noble lord would now be well advised to buy himself a new toothbrush before he returns to court to be sentenced, as a custodial sentence may now be all but inevitable. At this rate, Kenneth Clarke may have to consider building a new prison simply to hold convicted parliamentarians.

He could call it H(MPs) Graft.

And still the pulses run quicker in the Morley, Devine and Haddingfield homesteads...

A wintry wonderland...

I took this photograph earlier today, whilst out for a walk in the Lancashire countryside with Mrs RToK and our canine companion.

Whether the shot actually conveys the true beauty of the scene, I'll leave up to you; but the dusting of hoar frost on the branches of the trees and bushes at either side of the path was truly a sight to behold.

And for those of you wondering exactly where I came across this scene, it was on the footpath leading down into Marles Wood at Dinckley in the Ribble Valley. For regular or semi-regular visitors, this location is about half a mile away from the one I refer to in this post from April 2010.

Ex-PC Mark Kennedy courts the press...

Whatever your views about the rights and wrongs of using 'undercover' police officers to infiltrate environmentalist groups bent on 'direct action' (and for what it's worth I would be very disappointed in them if they weren't), you may agree with me when I observe that for a man supposedly living 'in fear of his life' after he was exposed as such an officer, Mark Kennedy has hardly acted as he might have been expected to if his fear was genuine.

On what do I base that assertion?

Well call me old-fashioned, but agreeing to have your photograph taken (after transforming your appearance back to what most people would refer to as 'normal') and printed in a national Sunday newspaper is hardly the action of a man fearful of an imminent lethal attack, is it?

Either that, or he's an imbecile.

And by the way; has anyone else noticed his rather startling resemblance to the late Marty Feldman?

Humour...

Just to lighten the tone, here is a post I shamelessly nicked from a site called 'Area Trace, No Search':

.uıɐƃɐ ʎɐqǝ ɯoɹɟ pɹɐoqʎǝʞ ɐ ƃuıʎnq ɹǝʌǝu ɯɐ ı

Well it amused me!

Eric Illsley MP: The second domino falls...

So, the second of those former and in this case present, parliamentarians to be charged with fraudulently obtaining thousands of pounds in so-called 'expenses' from the taxpayer has acknowledged his serial dishonesty by pleading guilty to obtaining a total of £14,500 he was simply not entitled to.

I was going to say that he had admitted stealing it; but it's actually worse than that. Theft can be - and frequently is - an opportunist crime, committed by those presented with a spur-of-the moment chance to take something which doesn't belong to them.

But Eric Illsley like David Chaytor before him engaged in a sophisticated and protracted campaign of dishonesty and deceit in order to 'steal' that money; and in that sense, his offences are far more serious than simple opportunistic theft, particularly as he is still a serving Member of Parliament and therefore in a position of huge trust and responsibility.

I will not speculate here as to the potential sentence he faces on returning to court in a month's time, but if I was him, I wouldn't be making any holiday plans this year.

And as a corollary, I suspect that with this news, pulses in the Morley, Devine and Haddingfield houses continue to quicken whilst their rabbits' noses simultaneously twitch all the more urgently...

The first domino falls...

As former MP David Chaytor begins his richly deserved, but all too brief, prison sentence for stealing in the order £20,000 from the rest of us, I wonder if pulses are running just a little quicker in the Hanningfield, Morley and Devine households this evening...

Given that Chaytor has been jailed, despite his guilty plea, I suspect that the other three might just roll the dice and put their trust in twelve good men and true, don't you?

But to lapse into the vernacular for a moment, I'll bet their rear ends are twiching like rabbits' noses tonight...

Well done, England...

Little more to add to the tidal wave of publicity which has accompanied England's retention of The Ashes on Australian soil.

Not only did we retain the trophy however - merely drawing the series would have been sufficient to achieve that target - we won the series 3 - 1, winning three test matches by an innings, which for the uninitiated, is a thrashing.

We have effectively mauled the Australians on their own soil. They hate it; they really, really hate it.

Which makes our victory all the sweeter, because as any sports fan will attest, there is nothing as awful as an Australian bragging about his country's latest sporting success; magnanimity in victory is a concept utterly lost on them.

So well done England and roll on 2013...