Kmflett's Blog

Beard Liberation Front

The Beard Liberation Front has said that the search for the Beard of the 2019 Cricket World Cup is underway.

The poll of well-known hirsute cricketers who are playing is on-line

In the beginning was WG Grace but in the twentieth century cricket went to the barbers. So much so that by the early 1960s a major shaving company was sponsoring one day cricket and players deemed insufficiently clean shaven were sometimes sent from the field to sort it out.

In the twenty first century beards in cricket are back from Moeen to Hashim. Its now understood that a beard can have a psychological impact on opponents after Mike Brearley pioneered the point. Beards can also have an aero-dynamic impact on play itself.

Beards will play an important, perhaps vital, role in the World Cup. But who will have the winning whiskers?

Contenders could include Moeen Ali, Hashim Amla and Virat Kohli. Competition is expected to bristle as the competition goes on

However the Beard Liberation Front has said that to be eligible the beard must at least pass the Clint Eastwood post-stubble test & will ideally be more in the WG Grace beard zone

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, at the moment Moeen Ali is the player to beat but every game brings hairy moments for the contenders

Jacob Rees Mogg on Opium

The current Tory leadership election has been enlivened by confessions of various candidates of the illegal drugs they have tried.

One Rory Stewart has smoked opium while in Iran.

Meanwhile Jacob Rees Mogg, who does not seem to be standing as leader on this occasion, has written not about how he took drugs (there is no evidence of such a thing I should underline) but how historically the British Empire, of which of course he is a huge fan, dealt with the matter of opium.

The nineteenth century opium trade originated in China and found its way through India both of which were of great interest to the imperial British.

In his widely criticised book The Victorians, Rees Mogg writes a good deal about the opium trade. In general he does not approve.

He notes that in the 1830s General Napier’s actions in India meant that the opium trade there came under British control but this was certainly not the aim of the General.

Two opium wars were fought in China, both backed by Lord Palmerston who was initially a Tory but became the first Liberal Prime Minister in 1859. Rees Mogg makes it clear that he does not think Palmerston acted decently in the matter of opium. Gladstone, when he became Prime Minister was resolutely against British involvement in anything to do with the opium trade. Gladstone being a Liberal, albeit a Victorian one, Rees Mogg is not a huge fan but on the opium issue he clearly supports him.

If we can take a moral lesson from Rees Mogg’s book, and it is a lot about morality, it is, don’t do drugs.

Its fair to say that in general this is and has been Tory policy which makes the recent leadership race revelations all the more interesting. Public virtues, and private vices

London Socialist Historians Group

9th June

contact Dr Keith Flett 07803 167266

Socialist Historians move 10^th June seminar in support of IWGB boycott of Senate House

The London Socialist Historians Group, which organises the socialist history seminar at the Institute of Historical Research, University of London*, has said that leading socialist historian Marika Sherwood will launch and speak on her new book (Pluto) on Nkrumah and the dawn of the Cold War on Monday 10th June.

The event is at Bookmarks Bookshop, 1 Bloomsbury St, WC1B 3QE at 6.30pm on Monday 10th June

The event which would normally have taken place at the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London’s Senate House has been moved in support of the continuing boycott by the IWGB of the University. The boycott is over the failure of the University to bring back in-house outsourced workers who are responsible for the day to day running of the building.

LSHG Convenor Keith Flett said, we are pleased to be able to launch this important new research into the origins of the Cold War at Bookmarks, one of the leading socialist bookshops in the UK, and delighted to be working again with Marika Sherwood

About the book

The West African National Secretariat (WANS) has almost been forgotten by history. A pan-Africanist movement founded in 1945 by Kwame Nkrumah and colleagues in London and France, WANS campaigned for independence and unity. Nkrumah returned to the Gold Coast in late 1947. The colonial government accused him of being a communist and fomenting the riots of early 1948. He was jailed. This led to the beginning of the Cold War in West Africa.

Drawing on archival research including the newly released MI5 files, Marika Sherwood reports on the work of WANS, on the plans for a unity conference in October 1948 in Lagos, and on Nkrumah’s return home. Sherwood demonstrates that colonial powers colluded with each other and the US in order to control the burgeoning struggles for independence. By labelling African nationalists as ‘communists’ in their efforts to contain decolonisation, the Western powers introduced the Cold War to the continent.

Providing a rich exploration of a neglected history, this book sheds light for the first time on a crucial historical moment in the history of West Africa and the developmental trajectory of West African independence.

*The London Socialist Historians are not organising seminars at the Institute of Historical Research at the moment in support of the IWGB boycott of Senate House and their campaign to bring outsourced workers back in house

Beard Liberation Front

9th June

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that a Financial Times report (8th June) that traditional pie and mash shops in London face a crisis due to ‘gentrification’ is overstated.

The FT focuses on the impending closure of F Cooke in Broadway Market in Hackney and suggests that customers, traditionally working class, are now hard to come by.

Yet at the same time the FT report has to concede that some pie and mash shops are thriving and some news ones are opening.

Pie and Mash consists of mashed potato, a meat pie (invariably with very little actual meat) and green liquor (parsley sauce).

The campaigners say that the liquor combines with the mash and pie to make a beard friendly mixture that rarely ends up in the beard rather than the mouth.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, pie and mash is an ideal meal for hirsute flexitarians, those people who mainly dont eat meat but occasionally do because it is 95% vegetarian with only very small amounts of meat. We do not however recommend the stewed eels also traditionally sold by pie and mash shops to beard wearers.

Beard Liberation Front

The Ambridge Socialist

June 9^th

The Professor: I Fought The Law

Professor Jim has turned up, perhaps reluctantly, at his ‘surprise’ birthday ‘party’. However before long he stormed out after PC Knacker Burns confronted him with being the bunting thief. Jim may have dashed off to listen to the Clash’s I Fought The Law (you never know with a Professor) but has Knacker Burns got the right person???

Lower Loxley: bankruptcy still threatens

The ever reliable and financially prudent Kenton has been discussing the continuing crisis at Lower Loxley again. Without an alcohol licence, the wedding and evening function trade has collapsed and losses are mounting. Is it time to turn the place into a Wetherspoons?

Open Farm Sunday

All is well. Natasha is doing the business (possibly on credit but that’s for later)

In Other News

Ed has had a crash transporting certain ‘items’ for Tim. Tim is not happy. Someone could get hurt here. Actually the Ambridge Socialist has a list of potential recipients of any ‘warning’.

Adam & ian have been skinny dipping in the Am. It cant be long before the pictures appear in the Borsetshire Echo

Teach Yourself Gove: Latest Update

June 9th

Apology : See Blue Moon

Guardian : A London based paper with a ‘style guide’ [content not approved as Gove Speak]

Murdoch : A man of great intellect. Usage ‘you, sir, are a true Murdochian’

The Times : paper of record. Does not need a style guide

Daily Mail: not appropriate reading

Justice : see Judge Dread

EU : career defining

Boris : yesterday’s man

David Cameron : used to be a friend of mine

Next Prime Minister: cometh the hour

Education: see Pink Floyd

May: month before June. June marks the end of May.

Plan: something to be worked out in the future

Theme song: One of these days (Pink Floyd)

Drugs: See memoirs

Donald Trump in London 3 & 4 June Pt 2, the Trump supporters

A common way of dealing with protests in much of the media is either to ignore them or downplay the numbers attending. However Trump is so unpopular that this wasn’t particularly the case when he visited London this week.

He, or his official tweeter, were left to organise their own counter narrative (although he did get a supportive Editorial in The Times- June 5^th).

Trump’s view is here:

Donald Trump tweeted yesterday: “I kept hearing that there would be “massive” rallies against me in the UK, but it was quite the opposite. “The big crowds, which the Corrupt Media hates to show, were those that gathered in support of the USA and me. They were big & enthusiastic as opposed to the organized flops!”

The reality as usual with the President was entirely different. When his motorcade (not State coach) swept up to Buckingham Palace on Monday there was no sign of anyone to welcome him behind the barricades that had been erected.

When he visited Downing St on Tuesday, demonstrators were restricted from protesting immediately outside the gates but the Trump baby blimp was up in Parliament Square and there was a large protest and stage in Whitehall.

Perhaps Trump did not see these but his supporters were few. As journalist Mike Stuchberry pointed out the Trump supporter who was milkshaked  was in fact one of the serial pests of the UK yellow vests, harassers of MPs and in this particular case, passing women. Others who were barricaded, appropriately in the Wetherspoons on Whitehall appeared to be mostly varieties of far rightists and fascists.

In short Trump’s tweet was fake news

Part 1

The size of the crowd: Trump in London 3 & 4 June 2019 Part 1

Beard Liberation Front

7^th June

Media Release: contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

Campaigners say Gove’s 2016 beard may have been related to cocaine use

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that Michael Gove’s confession that he has used cocaine may be related to the beard he grew in the summer of 2016.

Although evidence is far from complete it is thought that there may be a link between the use of cocaine and beard growth:

On October 12, 1860, Abraham Lincoln walked into the Corneau & Diller drug store in Springfield, Illinois, where he regularly purchased such items as bay rum, brandy, and cough candy laced with opium. On that day, Lincoln bought 50 cents worth of a product that a few historians claim contained coca or cocaine,1 thus becoming possibly the first American to buy this newly available substance (Pratt, 1943:153). Little else is known about Lincoln’s pattern of “cocaine” use or its consequences, but the following week he started growing his famous beard and shortly thereafter became president of the United States.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, frankly we think Gove was right to quit cocaine but he should have kept the beard.

https://kmflett.wordpress.com/2016/10/25/campaigners-regret-michael-goves-decision-to-brexit-his-beard/