well, it's a start

look at the facebook fan page for Nasty Naz here and notice that you are not finding members of Reading Labour Party on there, come on boys (and indeed some girls from time to time) get involved, go on with you. Have a look at the site, you will see that he uses Denefield School as a backdrop, with an unnamed female person in the shot, who may even be a pupil there, who knows.

Amnesty International

I used to belong to that organisation years ago. but now, oh dear. White far right Jew-haters as well as the brown-skin Muslim kind. Oh dear.

still dunvotin

on Home Affairs business yesterday. You'd think Mr Salter would want to make the most of the opportunity, with just a few short weeks left to serve, but no.

still happy, Guardian readers?

(AFP) – 2 days ago

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Taliban militants blew up a girls' school on Saturday in northwest Pakistan, the latest in a wave of attacks by Islamist extremists targeting educational institutions, a minister said.

No one was hurt in the attack, which took place in the village of Huwaid, eight kilometres (five miles) north of the town of Bannu.

"The explosive material was planted at three different places in the girls' primary school, which completely destroyed five out of seven rooms of the building," provincial education minister Sardar Hussain Babak said.

He blamed the attack on Taliban, saying they were "opposed to girls' education".

Senior police official Iqbal Marwat confirmed the incident. He added: "No one was hurt in the explosion as it occurred at 6:00 am (0100 GMT)."

Pakistan's military is engaged in offensives against Islamist fighters across much of the northwest including tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, a region branded by Washington the most dangerous place on Earth.

About 30,000 Pakistani troops poured into South Waziristan in mid-October to try and dismantle strongholds of the Taliban leadership, enraging militants who have responded with a surge of bomb blasts and attacks

or would you have preferred it if Lots Of Girls Had Been Killed? because Let's Not Follow the Bush and Blair Agenda. Oh No.

Hein?

a million million typos

here it is - so let's all dash out and buy, hey boys?

did you spot it?

in this clip from the BBC the other day, the posh-slip in Salter's accent? back to middle class from faux barrow boy, without passing by Jewish west London at all!

give me an answer, do

I have a colleague here in Strasbourg who is still on the electoral register in the UK (as am I and entitled to be for the next 12 years, so there) and was last resident in Reading West. He asked me who he should vote for, having already decided that if Salter stood again it would not be for him. I didn't have to think about it for long. I said that if I were voting in Reading West it would be for Adrian Windisch, the Green candidate. Of course there is still time for other candidates to register. I also told him that I believe the seat will be Conservative after the election.

The LibDem candidate for Reading West, Daisy Benson (hence the title of this post) has moved out of Redlands, which is the ward she represents on the council, and to a location west of the centre of Reading. It is however in the Reading East constituency. Sadly Ms Benson does not appear to have been aware of this, and thought she was moving into the constituency she hoped to represent. My correspondent tells me she has been using the Salter map of Reading. Daisy, Daisy, if you make a mistake like that keep quiet about it, don't tell every council officer in a three-mile radius.

We UK citizens who live elsewhere in the EU can register as overseas voters in the last constituency we lived in, which I have done, and can vote there in general elections. But not in Scottish or Welsh or London assembly or local elections. We French residents can vote in France in municipal elections and in either country in European elections. We cannot vote in France's regional elections, which take place next month, for reasons which escape me. Twenty of France's 22 regions are under Parti Socialiste administration. The one I live in in eastern France is one of the other two. Seems to me that if I cannot vote in the regionals here in France I should be able to vote in London. Grrr.