It's how we all feel Tony...

...that you're basically a Tory. And now even David Cameron is saying it:

From the BBC:

Cameron praises Blair leadership

In an address to the left-wing think-tank, Demos, he will say Tony Blair had a "profound" understanding of what people wanted in the 1990s.

He will say the Tories must now focus on succeeding where Labour had failed to follow through on its promises.

He will also blame Chancellor Gordon Brown for increasing bureaucracy.

'Doesn't matter'

In his speech, Mr Cameron will praise Mr Blair, saying the prime minister saw his task as "preserving the fruits of the Thatcher revolution".

He will argue that Mr Blair's triumph was to focus on social justice and economic efficiency, but that Labour has failed because it has introduced "legislation, regulation and bureaucracy".

"Wherever they have seen a problem, they have seen action by the state as the solution," he said, adding that is the "natural instinct" of Mr Brown.

Mr Cameron believes the issues Mr Blair focused on are now the "common ground of British politics".

"The principal task for us is now clear," he will say.

"We have to find the means of succeeding where the government has failed."

'Morass'

Mr Cameron will add that Labour's move towards what was traditionally Tory ground devastated the Conservatives.

"We were left opposing a prime minister who claimed that his aims, even his means of achieving those aims, were far closer to our own."

Ahead of the speech former Conservative Party chairman Lord Tebbit warned against moving towards the "morass" of the political centre ground.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "If all the parties mill around in the centre ground and the elector feels that it doesn't matter which one he votes for, it will not make a lot of difference. He will probably stay at home."

But Conservative policy director Oliver Letwin said the "big difference" between the parties was that Labour's schemes were "all top-down, they're bureaucratic".

no Spa?

Bad news; it looks like the greatest F1 track will not be holding a race this year; what will I do without the thought of the thrill of seeing cars batting round eau rouge at stupid speeds?

From the BBC:

Belgian Grand Prix 'cancelled'

Ecclestone had seemed keen to preserve the race

The Belgian Grand Prix at Spa has been cancelled after Bernie Ecclestone pulled out of a bid to try to promote the race, say reports in Belgium.

Formula One chief Ecclestone had been in talks to take over promoting the race after its promoters went bankrupt.

A former local government minister told politicians that sources close to Ecclestone had confirmed the news.

The cancellation leaves little time for track improvements to take place before the proposed race date of 17 September.

Initially, Ecclestone had seemed enthusiastic to save the race, saying "we need to keep Spa alive, don't we?".

If the race is dropped, the 2006 season would be trimmed to 18 races.

Khaaaaan!

I will leave you as you left me, as you left her; marooned for all eternity at the centre of a dead planet...

Buried alive...

Buried alive...

papers being given at this year's Classics Association conference...

...include:

Amanda Potter (OU): The Greek Pantheon and Battlestar Galactica

See! It's not geekdom! It's academic!*

*Though I would like to ask a question about why, if it's all based on Greek mythology and the Lords of Kobol, why does Colonel Tigh say 'Jesus' in the first episode? I thought he didn't even believe in Jebus...

Oh Norman...

...Tebbitt... what would British politics be without your particular brand of pop-eyed, lunatic-right wing reactionary horseshit...

I mean, I think David Cameron is a wolf in sheeps clothing, getting ready to sell off what little of the state that Tony hasn't been able to get round to in order to fund tax-breaks for the rich... but really, Norm, he doesn't need you going round spoiling things for him and scaring the right wingers he needs to keep on board while he pretends to be nice enough for the rest of us to vote for... [from the BBC]

Tebbit warns of Cameron dangers

Ex-Conservative chairman Lord Tebbit told BBC Question Time it was "dangerous for the democratic system" if the parties looked too similar.

Mr Cameron has ditched policies such as subsidising private healthcare and says he wants no more grammar schools.

Lord Tebbit said it was not yet clear how his strategy would work out.

But he said: "The danger for him is that that if he moves the Tory party on to this mythical central ground that he will finish in a dogfight with the Liberals and New Labour, all of whom would be saying things which were very similar to each other.

"That would leave a lot of people on the Right of politics - voters - feeling disenfranchised in the same way that Tony Blair has left a lot of people on the Left of politics feeling disenfranchised."


(more rantage from Tebbitt, this time about damned foreigners)

In other news, Ming {the Merciless}, new chancellor of St Andrews University, has said he would push the LibDems to the left of Labour. I have to admit I was a bit worried he was a bit too close to the Orange Book lot... but hopefully that's not the case...

Lib Dems 'must be left of Labour'

Sir Menzies Campbell has promised to fight the next general election to the left of Labour if he wins the contest to become Liberal Democrat leader.

Tony Blair had "squeezed values out of politics", while Tory leader David Cameron was "certainly not a liberal", he told the Guardian.

Sir Menzies also said it was a "myth" that he had been against Lib Dem opposition to the Iraq war.

Asked whether he wanted the Lib Dems to be to the left of Labour and the Conservative Party, he said: "Yes. I am a creature of the centre left."

St Andrews, home of the rich...

I used to live in an awesome house. It had seven bedrooms, and seven of us lived happily in it, and the rent was about £55 a week. It was fun; we had an Aga and a gardener, a mouldy bathroom, and it was huge'n'ancient and impossible to heat. I loved Northcroft.

For those who used to live with me: Northcroft is now a wopping £95 a week. That's it nearly doubled in price in 4 years.


And they say rents here aren't ridiculous (and our union is nice and complicit in letting them get away with it...)

ds9log - stardate, season 1, first few episodes...

First of all - I will update properly soon. Honest. I will! Truly. You have my word on that. Last semester was pretty hectic, and I've been working madly on my thesis and on the Music Slut. But an (ir)regular service will resume soon...

It's dark out in space, where you're all alone... and beyond the Final Frontier...

yes! I'm going to demonstrate my outstanding geekery! I recently got my hands on all 7 seasons of (probably my personal favourite, at least as far as modern incarnations of the show go) Star Trek: Deep Space 9. This is really significant for me: while I can definitely say that I've owned all 79 episodes of the Original Series (+ the original pilot with Captain Christopher Pike, and his female first officer referred to only as 'Number One'), as well as most of the mid-seventies Animated Series, as well as a Goodly Proportion of TNG, I only ever had a handful of DS9s on VHS. And now I have them all! And I'm going to share with you! Yes You! Lucky reader, my experience of watching them all.

One of the things that has always made me such a fan was the understated performance of Avery Brookes as Commander (later Captain) Benjamin Sisko. And I don't mean the kind of understated performance that equates to 'phoned in'. I mean there's a quiet power to the man, a smouldering energy, and an anger, that will be impossible to rebottle once released. It permeates Brookes' performance in Emmissary, the season 1 opener, and Brookes is one of the few performers in the Star Trek franchise that ever manages to hold a candle to Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard (fact or fiction: Patrick Stewart provided the voice of the Cylon 'Cy' befriended by Starbuck in the final episode of the much derided second series/follow up to Battlestar Galactica, Galactica 1980? Answers in the comments, if you feel like it.)

When Sisko is confronting Picard over his new assignment, and over their previous meeting as enemies at the battle of Wolf 359, the tension is incredible; the emotionless Locutus/Picard initially set against the grief of Sisko as his wife is taken away from him is set up as a counterpoint to the restrained Picard (surely here foreshadowing the Picard who struggles against his Borg past in Star Trek: First Contact) who gives Sisko his orders as the Commander struggles to restrain his anger against the man who made him a widower, and now orders him to somewhere he does not want to be - the frontier world of Bajor.

The rest of the episode is a tour de force, culminating in a stand off against the Cardassians and the discovery of a wormhole to the Gamma quadrant, but with Sisko's emotional journey as the Emmissary to the Prophets taking precedence. But for me, it's the (all too brief) Sisko/Picard pairing that brings this first episode to life.

It's a pity that the rest of the first few episodes are less enthralling; but they have a job to do, and that job is to introduce the regular cast. And so we get a bollocks Chief O'Brien story, an okay Odo story, and so on. Best of the rest for the initial few shows is Past Prologue, which introduces the shady Cardassian tailor, Garak. Who isn't a spy. Oh no.