An Irishman, a Frenchman and a Japanese Physicist walk in to an (English) bar

Yesterday, the leader of the British Nationalist Party (BNP), Nick Griffin, outlined his party's immigration policy. When asked to expand on their manifesto pledge that Britain should be a "non-immigration country," he elaborated, "the doors are going to be shut because Britain is full, we're the most overcrowded country in Europe."


Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme he lamented, "while we'd actually rather today be talking about the economy as the other leaders are going to be, we're very pleased to talk about immigration because what we're saying is what the British people think." All of them? Why bother collecting polling data when you can mind read?


When asked who the doors would be shut to, Griffin responded "to everybody...unless" and then went on to outline some circumstances where immigration would be welcomed:


"We've got a policy to create a whole new generation of British built nuclear power plants... if for that we've got to import a Japanese physicist and let him come here with his family then we'll let them come."


I wonder will people queue all night outside HMV to get their hands on the first shipment of Japanese physicists?


But when asked, what if other countries reciprocate by closing their doors to Britons, Griffin replied, "the last thing I saw, there wasn't a queue of Brits wanting to go to Albania or Somalia." Huh? The former a country whose GDP is 25% of the European average and the latter a country ravaged by civil war.


So to clarify Griffin's position, "Japanese physicists."  Good. "Polish plumbers" and "Afghan refugees." Bad.


Today presenter Sarah Montague countered, "but [British] people might want to go live in France, they might want to go live in Ireland."


"We are certainly not going to shut the doors to the Irish because as far as we are concerned the Irish are part of Britain and are fully entitled to come here. And France doesn't have that many people coming to Britain. The people that come to Britain from France are usually people like the Japanese physicist I mentioned earlier who are actually contributing to our society."


In case you're wondering the phrase to note is "as far as we are concerned."


All this reminds me of a joke I heard once, an Irishman, a Frenchman and a Japanese Physicist walk in to a bar....

UKIP to repeal decimalisation! Well not quite...

After reading Spy Wednesday's latest post, I decided to peruse UKIP's (UK Independence Party) election manifesto. Yesterday evening LCB had brought to my attention their proposal to introduce 'English-only days' in Parliament, whereby those of tartan wearing, leek-eating or nay-saying orange origin can piss off. On these days English MPs, would therefore, comprise an 'English Parliament.' It is unclear whether this the first tentative step to outright independence from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and casts doubt as to the motives of the Anglo-centric Parliament in granting devolution. So not only does UKIP seek independence from the European Union but also those barbaric Celts.


Under the heading Culture & Restoring Britishness (presumably read Englishness) is the pledge to '[r]ecognise the numerous threats to British identity and culture,' watch out Lost, The Wire and 24. There's also the plan to scrap 'political correctness.' In practice I take this to mean that under a UKIP government, when describing those who formulate their policy, one may revert to the term, retarded. There may be positives to draw from such a regressive measure, when one considers how cumbersome the following statement is in politically correct language; UKIP are visually impaired when it comes to the needs of the average British household.


One of my favourites is the call for the safeguarding of 'British weights and measures (the pint, the mile, etc) which have been undermined by the EU.' And while we're at it why not repeal decimalisation.


Finally UKIP proposes a requirement on 'UK schools to teach Britain’s contribution to the world, including British inventions and Britain’s role in fighting slavery and Nazism.' Maybe they slept through history class and should instead propose mandatory espresso shots for students.


Click the post title to navigate to UKIP's online manifesto or here for the mini version.

April Fools

It's April Fools and and as such Internet users at home and in offices around the globe are no doubt chuckling to themselves, as that rarest of phenomena, the corporate sense of humour, rears its ugly head.

As in previous years, Google leads the way, with its new 'Translate for Animals' application.

If you search Google today, I'm sure you will note that search time is not measured in seconds, but anything from 'microfortnights' to 'femtogalactic years' to 'times the velocity of an unladen swallow.' 

More silliness from Google. Also try the new You Tube feature and convert video to text by clicking to change the resolution (to the right of volume control).

There are several more side-splitting offerings from Google to be found here.

The Guardian, often credited with reigniting the British media's enthusiasm for all things foolish on April 1st after its San Seriffe Islands hoax of 1977, are at it again with an exclusive look at Labour's new election campaign.

Check out the full poster campaign here. My favourite is number four.

Also read about the consolidation of two newspaper industry giants as Guardian and Mail to merge.

Fancy a trip to Camp David? Just visit whitehouse.gov to find out how you can book your place.

Sticking with the tourist theme the Guide 2 Nottingham have made a startling Robin Hood related discovery.