Disheartening Debate and a Dastard

Did you watch the Politics Show yesterday lunchtime? Were you poised, like me, for some serious debate? 

If your answer is no then consider yourself fortunate.  It was dismal; so much so that I'm not even going to suggest you watch it on iPlayer. In fact I would go as far to say it was insulting to Scotland's electorate. It was more like an informal rehearsal than a live programme. Another pathetic effort by the BBC and with ITV not faring much better with their Leaders Debate production last week, Scotland is being deprived by our national broadcasters, of intelligent and serious discussion. 

But as it's Monday morning and I've no wish to start the week negatively, what about a citizen's award for the individual who took photographs, on his mobile phone, of Charlie Kennedy having a smoke outside Glasgow Central Station on Thursday and was fined £50 for littering.

According to the onlooker, who refused to be named:

“He'd been puffing at the entrance for about half-an-hour while chatting away on his mobile phone.

“He stood in the one spot and must have smoked four fags – each time letting the dog-end fall on to the pavement beside him.

“But the council litter patrol was keeping a good eye on him to see if he was going to leave them there.

“And once he started to walk away, they pounced.

“He wasn’t happy because I was standing there taking pictures, but I said to him, ‘it’s a public place Charles, I have got the right to take pictures.

“You have got to accept your punishment. You are not above the law’

I can think of an award for this self righteous dunderheid: a weekend, equipped with a bucket, shovel and brush, cleaning up the rivers of vomit which make Glasgow city's pavements like obstacle courses on Friday and Saturday nights.  If four doups on a pavement cause him/her so much delight, they'll be ecstatic making the footpaths safe for their fellow Glaswegians.  As a gesture of goodwill I'd be prepared to be their personal photographer.

When I was young we used to call such people snitches or clipes. Why they refuse to be named is a mystery.  After all, upstanding citizens usually have nothing to hide and are pleased to have their civic duties publicly acknowledged.

Whoever they are I doubt if they'll be bragging about their 'conquest' in any Glasgow pub. 

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What's Missing from This Article?

An article in today's Daily Mail states that 'Children with asthma are twice as likely to need hospital treatment during the month of September'.

It goes on to say hospital admissions for under-16s in England were 58% higher during that month last year and the previous September, according to data from the NHS Information Centre.

Yet why aren't smokers mentioned? We're repeatedly told that smokers cause asthmatic problems for children but there's no mention of them here.

Do smokers puff away more in September than any other month? I doubt it. Not with the cost of cigarettes.

Perhaps it's because smoking and passive smoking is nothing to do with asthma. Perhaps it's because smoking has been used as an excuse for billions of pounds to be directed to a section of society and yet, in the case of child asthma proper investigation hasn't been initiated.

Let me say here that smoking is a choice. Most smokers wouldn't smoke anywhere which caused problems for others. For my own experience they're a very accommodating section of society. Som people complain about the smell and it sticks to their clothes: it does and it's not pleasant even for smokers. Yet the other evening I attended a small meeting in a hotel where the smell of burned/stale fried food permeated the atmosphere far worse than cigarette, pipe or cigar smoke. Nobody complained and they meet there on a bi-monthly basis. When I asked at a tea break if anyone was aware of it I was told "yes of course, but it's a cheap venue".

Far too often smoking is deemed to be the 'habit of evil' yet, without the taxes from those who smoke, the NHS would probably grind to a halt. We'd still have the diseases which are presently related to smoking but we wouldn't have the finance to cope with them.

This fellow blogger and this one will be pleased to read a newspaper article which doesn't blame smokers - because they're not the problem. I'm pleased too. Time the anti-smoking lobbies encouraged researchers to look out of the box, but they won't of course; they're funded by government to protest against the smoking sector of society and therefore any in depth research into asthma is curtailed although these figures show it's desperately needed.

The quangos such as ASH would lose their jobs if more articles like this appeared in the MSM. More people would wonder if smokers were being punished for little or no reason. Bring it on!

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