Punishing The Tax Avoiders

So far this year Google, Starbucks, Amazon and now Apple have been exposed as tax avoiders who have paid far less in tax then they should have but the surprise is that anyone is surprised, the purpose of a company is to deliver profits for its shareholders. That's it, they are in business to make a profit and if that means exploiting tax loopholes so they barely pay any tax then they will.
This leaves us with just two options, one for the politicians and one for the consumers.
Governments have to slam shut the loopholes which allow the likes of Apple and Google to shift their profits across national boundaries to avoid paying what they owe, that's down to the politicians but the second choice is something that we can all do, boycott the tax evaders.
The success of any attempt to change the moral compass of a profit driven company comes down to hitting the company in the wallet and if we don't do that we can't complain.
The tales of sweetheart deals between the UKs Revenue Collectors and the likes of Vodaphone and Goldman Sachs prove to us that there may not be the desire for our politicians to go after the big companies so it would be naive to expect the initiative to come from the Governments so it will have to come from us going without the Starbucks coffee or choosing another mobile and leaving the iphone to gather dust on the shop shelf.
A third option is that the companies will change themselves but as we are increasingly living in a world that is run by and for Capitalists, if you believe that then I know a Nigerian ministers wife that would like to meet you and your bank details.

Why Sell RBS?

It isn't very often we get to quote Vladimir Lenin but apart from advice on how to achieve elegant facial hair, he also said the following: 'What, then, is the significance of nationalisation of the banks?  It is that no effective control of any kind over the individual banks and their operations is possible because it is impossible to keep track of the extremely complex, involved and wily tricks that are used in drawing up balance sheets. Only by nationalising the banks can the state put itself in a position to know where and how, whence and when, millions and billions of rubles flow'.
In short, he trusted Banks about as far as he could throw a Romanov Princess and that was almost a hundred years ago so heaven knows what he would say about the banks today because his words still ring true today, banks are still operating a bundle of wily tricks to separate us from our money.
After the numerous scandals that have been exposed in the banking sector, it would seem that keeping such a shabby outfit in public ownership where it can be tightly regulated is in the public interest rather than the current course we are on of nationalising them before cleaned them up at taxpayer expense and then selling them back to the private sector to recoup the public money therefore handing them to a new set of people set to commit the same scandals as the previous owners.
The UK Government plan to sell off its stake in the bailed out RBS before the general election in May 2015, even though this would involve a loss of around £20bn less than the £45.5bn it cost to bail it out.
So why sell it at all and just run it as a nationalised bank? Why hand it over once we have paid to clean it up and set it straight again and take a hit of £20bn on it just as it begins turning a profit?
When the banking crisis first hit in 2008 there was talk of setting up a Government bank, we already have one, RBS, so why are we even thinking of selling it?
The trouble with Capitalism is that eventually you run out of other people's money, just ask the citizens of Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Iceland, Ireland...etc etc

MP's Find Extra For MP's Pay

It was only a few weeks ago that MP Ian Duncan Smith was telling us that he could live on £53 per week but went very quiet when he was asked to prove it so how about living on £1600 per week which is how much an MPs salary is due to go up to, could he do that?
The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) who took over responsibility for MPs salaries after it emerged MPs had been fiddling their expenses, have been looking at out Memebrs of Parliaments wages and have decided that the present MP salary of £66,000 per annum is not enough and they want to raise it by between £10,000 and £20,000.
While the average salary has risen by just 0.6% this year and many people are struggling to cope with the rising cost of living, a raise of over three times the £26,500 national average salary is sure to grate with the people these shysters are supposed to represent.
A survey released in January found politicians on average believed they should be paid £86,000 rather than £66,000, with some demanding more than £100,000 and rather obligingly, the Ipsa agreed.
I'd like to see David Cameron and other party leaders defend this one when they have frozen the pay and made redundant tens of thousands of civil and public servants as there is no money available but will be finding an extra £13.2 million from the same taxpayers pot to pay an extra £20,000 to the 660 MPs, many of who are already millionaires.
Over to you Dave, Ed, Nick because remember, we are all in this together.

Eurovision Result

Twenty six songs entered but only one of them could win and after the tears and tantrums and strange men in a perspex box, the dust settles to leave only Denmark standing and throned the country with the best song this year.
The Danes beat the Maltese song about an IT consultant and the Greek song about alcohol being free which is patently untrue but could explain why Greece are in economic crisis if they are not charging for alcohol.
It does annoy me when contestants only sing parts of their song in English. Either sing the whole thing in English so we know what it is about or sing it in your own language so we don't have a clue.
And what about the voting, Britain ended up in 19th place with only Sweden, Romania, Switzerland, Spain, Malta, Ireland and Slovenia giving us any points and the rest of the continent completely blanking us which we should remember the next time they come around with the tin cup because their banks have stolen all their savings.
So it's off to Copenhagen next year to do it all over again but considering the Euro countries are all skint, Denmark might be regretting it when they get the Eurovision bill for hosting it.
They should have just picked an 80's warbler and gave her a rubbish song like we did. We had the right idea, you Danish lunatics.

What Is Bitcoin?

Described as a crypto-currency implemented entirely with open source specifications and software which relies on a peer-to-peer network for both transaction processing and validation, i still have no idea what Bitcoin is but apparently the established financial institutions are becoming wary of it and that has to be a good thing.
One of the side-effects of the catastrophic failure of the banks is the interest in a virtual currency called Bitcoin but i have yet to find a clear explanation of exactly what it is and how it works, or rather an explanation that i can understand.
What i can glean is that Bitcoin is not a currency and that it is not run or administered or has any connection to a central bank such as the Bank of England so therefore free from government regulation and interference. There are also only a possible 21 million Bitcoins available at any time in the world and there are currently 11m Bitcoins currently in circulation.
The first step is to download a ‘wallet’ on your computer or mobile and then buy Bitcoins from places such as coinbase or Bitcoin Exchange. Other ways to get new coins is to either buy them off someone else, or 'mine' them by putting your computer to work at cracking a code that, once resolved, releases a preset number of Bitcoins into your virtual wallet.
When you have a wallet brimming with Bitcoins, you can then visit the places that accept Bitcoins although i couldn't find any of the mainstream retailers who currently accept them.
A few months ago a Bitcoin was worth nearly £250 but today its worth just over £80, according to Bitcoin exchange MtGox.
The Bitcoin Foundation, a body set up to maintain standards across the Bitcoin community, says the Bitcoin is still finding its equilibrium which is why there are such wild fluctuations in the worth of the Bitcoin.
While i am all for sticking to the banks who have caused so many of the problems, there is a downside. There have been several large thefts of Bitcoins, and unlike traditional currency they are not protected by insurance and the thefts are almost impossible to trace so there is almost no chance of you ever getting your money back if it is stolen.
Based on all the evidence, i don't think i will be exchanging my pounds for Bitcoins anytime soon because unless i am very much misreading the whole thing (which i admit is very likely), it just sounds far too complicated, there are only a limited amount of places you can spend it and it was created by a hacker and would be worried that as soon as a certain amount of Bitcoins have been 'mined', there will be a very rich hacker somewhere and i will be left with an empty wallet.

Sonic Screwdrivers Drawn At Convention

Sci-fi fans have not been this excited since they found themselves in the lingerie department of Marks & Spencers but it seems there is going to be a new Star Wars film. Great.
I have always been guilty of lumping all sci-fi fans into a genre labelled nerd, geeks and single but it seems that within their own clique, there is a simmering hatred between types of nerd.
Police were called to break up a fight at the fourth annual between Dr Who and Star Wars fans at the Sci-Fi and Film convention in Norwich.
According to reports, trouble erupted after a dispute over a Cyberman autograph. Seriously, a Cyberman autograph.
A fan who was dressed as the fifth Doctor, one as the 10th Doctor and one as Judge Dredd said: 'We were put in a police car and interviewed by the police and told to stay away from each other'.
"This wasn't a fight with lightsabers and sonic screwdrivers drawn' he explained further 'and we'd like to extend the hand of friendship'.
Head weiner, Dominic Warner, secretary of Norwich Star Wars Club acknowledged there had been disputes between the Dr Who and Star Wars fans members in the past and said: 'It does sound comical. People that dress up in costume are labelled geeks and some people laugh at us, and this just makes it even more so'.
I asked the computer bods at work just why there is so much animosity between the more nerdish of our society and it comes down to sci-fi fans being split into 3 competing camps, the Trekkies, the Whovians and the fans of Star Wars who are not cool enough to have a nickname but like to be known as...
Then i lost interest so made my excuses and left.

I Know You Got Soul

According to the British Religion in Numbers website, 41% of British people believe in angels, 53% in an afterlife, and 70% in a soul.
While i'm not really sure what the difference is between a ghost and an angel, i have no idea whatsoever what a soul is even though i have heard James Brown telling me i had it for the past two decades.
The local reverend described it as 'the imperishable part of every human being that was created by God and lasts eternally after the body experiences death' which sounds much like a ghost (or angel) to me and what about the human spirit, is that the same thing as a soul?
So if the body is just the vessel that carries the God made human soul and every human has one, why have we never detected it and where does it reside?
As i'm in a theological mood, how did God get to have a son and why didn't Eve run screaming like a banshee when a snake spoke to her, i get spooked by parrots speaking, if i heard a snake talking to me about apple trees i'd be out of that garden quicker than an Aussie in a dry bar.
There does seem to be a lot of songs, poems and stories about souls but man has been around for 6-7 million years and in that time a lot of people have come and gone but nobody seems to have seen, heard or witnessed a soul so where does the 70% or 43 million Brits who believe in a soul get the idea that we have one from and in that time a decent percentage must have been sent to hell to languish for all eternity so does God make new ones or are the same ones just tossed back down again?
It's all very confusing which is just as well i am in the 30% who ignore James Brown and the Religionists who tell me i have a soul and don't trouble themselves with the idea of a soul.
If i did i would be asking are souls assigned to bodies by any special criteria, are there billions of souls just waiting to be assigned a body and is it the soul that makes me me and if so, what about Karma?
Luckily i don't have to worry about it. 

Venezueleans Full Of It

Hugo Chavez is still warm and his country is up a certain creek, literally.
The country has ran out of toilet rolls and the Government are importing 50m rolls to boost supplies.
"This is the last straw," said Manuel Fagundes, possibly after using his last straw, "I'm 71 years old and this is the first time I've seen this."
President Nicolás Maduro, claims that anti-government forces are causing the shortages in an effort to destabilise the country and announced along with the 50m bog rolls, it also would import 760,000 tonnes of food which was probably not the best time to say it.
Commerce minister Alejandro Fleming blamed the shortage of toilet tissue on 'excessive demand' and explained that normal monthly consumption of toilet paper was 125m rolls, but that current demand 'leads us to think that 40m more are required'.
Disappointingly he didn't elaborate why demand had spiked but i'm sure that they will get to the bottom of it.
Might want to cut back on the prunes for a while though, at least until the next delivery.

Eurovision Song Contest 2013

As all the best songwriters and singers are to be found in Europe, we have an annual Eurovision Song Contest contest to see who is the best and this years competition begins tonight with the first semi-final in Malmo, Sweden.
The largest financers of the extravaganza get a bye to the final so France, UK, Germany, Spain, Italy and hosts Sweden are guaranteed to be in Saturday's final but the other 33 hopefuls have to battle it out to impress us 500 million Europeans who will be picking up our telephones to boot out 12 nations over the two semi-finals for falling short of the high European standards for musical merit.
The UK has Bonnie Tyler representing us with the better than standard fare that we serve up annually.
Last year we put forward Englebert Humperdink singing a song so slow it almost stopped the Earth turning, but listening to the competition, Bonnie may have picked a decent year to unleash that husky voice on the continent.
Somehow, Denmark are the pre-contest favourites with Ukraine and Norway joining them in the top 3 and the UK being pegged to finish the night somewhere around the 14th place mark but listening to the songs we are up against, it's not a vintage year for Euro music with many dire ballads on the list.
The Greek tune is a bit of a toe tapper and the Finnish entry is catchy but my favourite is the Norwegian song which is one of those that will either run away with it or sink without a trace. 
One thing that is for sure is that we won't win it because it's a massive conspiracy and it is all down to who has the largest number of friendly neighbours and everyone hates the UK we didn't want to win the stupid competition anyway.

How To Become A Saint

Not one to hang about, Pope Francis went on a Sainthood rampage this weekend, handing out halo's to 813 people but as i was not one of them, i wonder just what is the criteria to be in the number when the Saints go marching in.
As luck would have it, the Catholic Church provide a handy cut out and keep guide for anyone who want a street named after them.
Firstly, you must be dead as sainthood is only recognised after your death and once you are pushing up the daisies, the Vatican can start the Saintly ball rolling and first they look if during life you were a devoted Christian, ideally Catholic so if you're not Christened yet, get Christened as a Catholic. If you're a Jew, Muslim or part of another religion, join the Catholic Church and then die.
Now that you are Catholic and dead, there will be an investigation by a 'postulator' to check if you led a selfless, pure, benevolent, virtuous, kind and devout life and performed at least two, verifiable miracles. The healing of an incurable illness or walking on water, that sort of thing. 
If you pass muster on this front, a panel of theologians and the cardinals of the Congregation for Cause of Saints evaluate the candidate's life. If the panel approves, the Pope proclaims that the candidate is a suitable role model of Catholic virtues and a third, posthumous miracle is searched for and if found, bingo, your in the Saint's Club and parts of your body get carted around Churches for Catholics to gawk at and you may get a feast day in your honour.
Of course two miracles when you are alive and one after death may be a bit hard to achieve so the resourceful Catholics have designed a few shortcuts that miss one out the three miracles.
Martyrs who died for their religious cause can be beatified without evidence of a living miracle, they just need two posthumous miracles but the bar is set quite low for posthumous miracles, for example if someone has something nasty and they pray to you and it clears up, that's a miracle attributed to you. Congratulations.
Another shortcut is for your body to not undergo the usual unpleasant changes after you die which the Catholic Church take a sign that you were of the purest faith, or incorruptible, and you are just those two posthumous miracles away from being Sainted and being the Patron Saint of slugs or something because all the best things to be Patron Saint of have already gone.
It won't be venereal disease or hemorrhoids though, lucky St. Fiacre has already nabbed those. 
Good luck.