The
answer to the question of whether the Spanish media would report
equally on both EU decisions on Gibraltar would appear to be No.
They're ignoring the clean bill of financial health given to The
Rock. What we do have is another incident n Gibraltar waters
apparently deliberately provoked by Spain. I'm guessing this will be
widely reported in today's media. Meanwhile, the Great Rocky Words
War has been escalated by the irritated (and rather lippy) Gibraltar
chief minister, who's warned that Spanish ships may be mistaken for
terrorists and sunk. Now, that surely would be a news item.
You do wonder whether the Spanish government isn't trying to provoke a
serious incident. Though possibly one short of several drownings.
The
Spanish Judicial System: Chapter 3: Spain's National Court has
authorised the arrest of an ex Chinese President and 4 of his
officials, over genocide in Tibet 20 years ago. If anyone understands
why Spanish courts are taking this responsibility to themselves, I'd
be grateful for an insight.
Talking
of offences committable in Spain . . . An imminent new Citizen
Security statute sets out potentially heavy penalties for
unauthorised protests and for insulting or threatening the police,
inter alia. One wonders whose word will be taken in the case of the
latter. And whether the police will be issued with helmet
cameras(sic), as they now are in the UK, where police are no longer
believed the way they were aeons ago. More details on this here, care
of David Jackson.
And
still on offences - I learned yesterday that blasphemy only ceased to
be a crime in England in 2008. And that, when it was on the statute
book, only the Anglican God could be blasphemed, not the Quaker nor
the Catholic God, for example. The last time the state initiated a
case was in 1922, when the accused had compared God to a clown. He
was sentenced to hard labour. Thank God, as it were, that times
change. Especially as I've
just realised that I compared God to a comedian above. I wonder what
the Spanish take on blasphemy is.
Another
sad sign of the times: Spain's reputation for taking the learning of
English seriously is said to be improving rapidly. But no wonder -
many (if not most) young people see their job prospects as being far
better outside the country than within it. Forcing some to think about leaving home before they're 35. Even if it means cleaning hotel rooms in
London. Or waiting on table in a tapas bar in Leicester. Is there a
tapas bar in Leicester, Britain's curry capital?
Finally
. . . Some extracts from the strange autobiography of Bertrand
Russell. Tomorrow -1894.
1893:
Trinity College, Cambridge
I
began to find there were serious forces of evil. When the Junior
Dean, a clergyman, who raped his little daughter and became paralysed
with syphilis, had to be got rid of in consequence, the Master went
out his way to state at College Meetings that those of us who did not
attend chapel regularly had no idea how excellent this worthy's
servant had been.By this time, I had quite ceased to be the shy prig
that I was when I first went to Cambridge.
It
was May Week, and I was shocked to read in the paper that during this
week people's thoughts were not devoted to work. But by my fourth
year I had become gay and flippant.
When
I argued with Keynes, I felt I took my life in his hands and I seldom
emerged without feeling something of a fool. I was sometimes inclined
to feel that so much cleverness must be incompatible with depth, but
I do not think this feeling was justified.
The
profound conviction that the Treaty of Versailles spelt disaster so
roused the earnest moralist in him that he forgot to be clever -
without, however, ceasing to be.
The
number of sons and daughters [of the Strachey family] was almost
beyond computation, and all the children were to to my unpractised
eyes exactly alike except in the somewhat superficial point that some
were male and some were female.
Finally,
finally . . . More fotos:-
Elegant arches.
Elegant metalwork.
The
metal struts artwork outside the new museum.
The slabbed side of the new museum. The strips are lit at night, destroying my
cityscape. The local prison looks better.
An
elegant building, which just happens to be the main building of the
old museum.
Woman and chickens, outside the market. Lovely. But is it art?
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