IPCC & Police complaints

Geeklawyer is in despair over the reports (via the hugely useful Inner Temple news blog) of the criminal ineptness of the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Charges allege that, almost universally, poorly trained inexperience junior staff who are rude slow and police biased are supervised by unqualified inexperienced barely trained managerial staff.

Fucking jesus!

Justice?

However much Geeklawyer may whinge we do at least have some semblence of a system of fair trials. For those in Afghanistan the story is different: a 4 minute trial with no right to defend oneself or appeal followed by a death sentence.

Even sicko Blair wouldn’t have turned our justice system into this: but only because he’d never have succeeded; not that he didn’t want to.

And what are those cunts on about at the Sun with their campaign for the death sentence to be reinstated? Oh yea Geeklawyer remembers, cheap publicity gimmicks. Geeklawyer is all in favour of the death penalty for Sun journos but no-one else (ooh, is that calling for their death too?

Freedom of Assembly

If you are a little sick of the state of the right to protest in this country – given that you can be forbidden to protest near Parliament unless the police are, effectively, happy and give you permission to do so on terms they can set, then do something about it on March first: attend this rally (link via Melonfarmers).

Yea, protests are old fashioned but there’s nothing on telly anyway so WTF.

Podcast with Charon

Geeklawyer just did a podcast with Charon on filesharing – among other topics. The sound is awful at Geeklawyer’s end and that is his fault not CharonQC’s, but it is still a good listen.

Hear it here.

Terrorist not really a terrorist says loony psycho, terrorist friendly, terrorist judge

Geeklawyer, along with his mates at the keepblairforpm website, have long decried the ‘enemy within’: the lawyers liberal meeja, and judiciary who have a secret agenda to undermine our beloved land of St George.

These scum would compel us to wake at 6.30 every morning and turn to face Mecca and worship Satan, or ‘the Prophet Mohammed’ as muslims prefer to call him.

Now, this heavenly mission is being frustrated by a traitor in their midst. A judge, so low than one can barely refer to him as “Justice” Collins, has deliberately released an undoubtedly guilty man knowing full well that he intends, following one lawyer’s site’s advice, to assassinate Tony Blair, the Queen, all of Parliament and the every child at the School for Handicapped Children at Hailsham East Sussex.

It is political correctness gone mad Geeklawyer says.

Stupid government websites

Geeklawyer recently attended the illuminating Web2.0 Transformational government conference at Parliament. It was attended by a small number of very switched on Government types who ‘got’ the Web and the possibilities of collaboration and open standards.

Great, but regrettably it was chaired by the total cock Alun Micheal who displayed the modesty and self-deprecation, in the face of criticism, that one would normally associate with Geeklawyer – except that he meant it!
So all government web facing IT is good? Erm no.

William Heath at the very readable IdealGovernment blog alerted Geeklawyer to an astonishing set of T&Cs at the site of the DirectGov website that purports to govern the conditions under which any website may link to them.

Apparently:

a) you must ask their permission to link,

b) you must describe DirectGov as they wish (i.e. you may not say anything uncomplimentary about them),

c) and you must remove the link if they want you to, immediately. Presumably if you don’t the same cops that executed Charles de Menezes will turn up at your door.

Geeklawyer is willing to provide free legal consultancy services to DirectGov on this issue. In the form of an executive summary, and free of charge here, it is:

1. No. No-one can be forced to accept T&Cs just by linking. Cretinous.
Where’s the explicit agreement? Hard, it is, even to see how one could
reasonably construe it in the circumstances. Tosh of the first order.
One isn’t bound by them.

2. The issue here is one of defamation and it can get a bit complex.
But broadly if the Government department is crap then a voter is perfectly entitled in law to say so. It is a partly matter of free speech and democracy and in addition
there is good law to say that governments can’t sue for defamation.

3. Removal of links: again, no. As a government agency they would be in all sorts of trouble if they tried to do so. Secondly if someone, e.g. Google or any random blogger, chooses to tell someone where to find some Government site that is publicly and lawfully available but the Government don’t like it then tough fucking titties, they can take their own site down. Suck my sweaty melons mr Brown.

Ubiquitous?

Lawcareers.net has described Geeklawyer as ubiquitous. Geeklawyer had always thought omnipotent was better. It ponders that he must not get much work done. Had he not known better he’d would have sworn that that line was written by my failed co-blogger. In fact nothing could be further from the truth. Geeklawyer works massively fast – tho’ work is a little light at the moment it’s true. Apart from that he is disappointed that his mention on the column doesn’t really amount to much more than this comment. Ho hum.

Simon Myerson does a good review of the site.

Geeklawyer film reviews

Yes, what the flying fuck does this have to do with law? Nothing. Report me to the Bar Council.

Sweeney Todd.

One of Geeklawyer’s punters (one of only two who knows he writes this blog) described him as “a bit brutal“; there was the question about whether a note he had drafted to be handed up to the High Court judge was going to upset him a bit by it’s aggressive tone. Genuinely perplexed Geeklawyer thought it a masterpiece of subtle understatement doing no more than hinting that his Lordship may ultimately incur the displeasure of the Court of Appeal. Such an assessment has been made before of Geeklawyer and equally unfairly.

So, you may not be entirely surprised that Geeklawyer thought Sweeney Todd was blindingly terrific. Exquisitely acted, beautifully filmed and composed and musically great: Depp does a magnificent duet with Judge Turpin in the Barber’s chair. Johnny Depp apparently say’s that he can’t sing. Bollocks.

Based, it seems, on a Sondheim musical it takes a different tack from other versions of the play. Johnny Depp is a barber who is whisked away to Australia for a crime he didn’t commit so that the evil Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman) may have his wicked way with the pretty wife. Todd makes his way back after 15 years in the hell that is Australia and the fun begins.

Geeklawyer recalls seeing other versions of this play. The BBC did an astonishingly good version early last year with Ray Winston equally good and deeply but differently textured.

The theme of the play is irony and the cancerous malevolence of revenge. Nonsense of course. Revenge is the emotion that distinguishes us from the apes – not the ability to use a fucking knife and fork. But revenge should not, contrary to the old saying, be cold, but rather as hot fresh and salty as gushing arterial blood.

The film is all about profound tragic love and the ultimate doom of fate crossed lovers. So, somewhat like Romeo and Juliet, it’s a chick flick.

But a chick flick with throat slitting. How cool is that? This is one film you can take some totty to see at the cinema and pretend to cry at the sad ending, while secretly reveling in the sanguinary tide of crimson love juice.

Oh yes, there will be razors.

Nanny state at it again

Gordon Brown is not, so far, the disaster that Tony Bliar was but it is surely just a matter of time. He is at least genuinely of the left and more focussed on policy than media headlines. Of course that isn’t always a good thing. The left are inclined to paternalism and to lack any sense of global economics (Geeklawyer is not prepared to accept globalisation and it’s consequences without hesitation – but that’s another post). One, then, fears that he may be prey to all sort of crackpot thinktanks.

One such is the ministerial advisory board ‘Health England‘ who hope to force people to have a ‘difficult to get’ permit to smoke in the asinine hope that this will drive people away from destroying their lungs.

Professor Julian Le Grand seems to have left his brain sitting in a jar on the window sill while writing this report. Geeklawyer is not a smoker, apart from the very very occasional joint, and one assumes that the Professor isn’t either since only a man not lashed to the wheel of nicotine could possibly think that making someone fill in a form supply a photo and pay £10 will act as any sort of deterrence lasting more than, oooh, 10 nanoseconds.

All this will do is grow the black market & frustrate smokers, leading to unofficial buying co-operatives. Oh, and raise taxes license funds of course. Happy coincidence that.

More sensibly they suggest incentives for large companies to provide exercise hours. It says something for modern government that when one talks of the populace there is coercion compulsion and threats. But when it comes to large companies, with political clout and party contributions, one talks only of ‘incentives‘. Where is the liberal paternalism here? Where are the laws saying “Anyone who wants to exercise for an hour at work is entitled to so so without suffering any prejudice or penalty” “all companies of more than 50 employees must provide a gym“?

And what the flying fuck is “libertarian Paternalism“? This has nothing to to do with any brand of left or right libertarianism. Its proper name is statism, rebranded because socialism is no longer an acceptable political theory in Western government.

Update: More nanny statery – fireworks to be effectively banned.

Geek love – it’s bad but it’s good

February the 14th, Valentine’s day. It is the season of love: the time when Venus is drawn in a silk chariot to Chez Geeklawyer. To his astonishment Geeklawyer received only 3 valentines, and one valentine email, which doesn’t really count. Sadly not all were so fortunate.

MsRobinson, that finest and most fragrant flower of antipodean womanhood (that is, one who doesn’t get into bar fights or fart in bed), is bearing continuing fruit. She points Geeklawyer to the stories in The Times where poor old women (i.e. those over 29) complain about the declining availability and maturity of British manhood. “Why?” it is asked are British men so unwilling to commit? So unwilling to behave as adults rather than spoilt teen boys? All these men pretend to commitment and pursue concomitant obligation with the ardour that Geeklawyer would reserve for a Russian billionaire Oligarch who has acquired an interest in Intellectual Property: only to shy off when it is responded to. Why are they interested only in their mates, football and XBOX 360’s?

Women, it seems, think men are selfish because they can pass 30 without panicking that they will never be able to breed; that they can pull 20-something totty for casual no commitment great sex. They are thereby steeped in sin.

The thesis of William Leith is that changes in society mean that those who were once no longer desirable are now able to choose those women who have run out of choices. Woman need to be picky because they carry a foetus that picks up weight quicker than Ruthie if given a free “All You Can Eat for 6 months” ticket at the local Indian, whereas a man can splash sperm around like the Pope delivering the sacrament and remain free of consequence.

It seems the boot is now on the other foot: women now choose their careers; choose to have it all and find themselves in possession of a career but an empty bed, and a womb with a sign saying “space to let – no unreasonable offer refused“. And of course the geeks are now seen to be less than a laughable option: good solid well paid jobs – reliability and an inexperience with women that makes them easy to manipulate dominate and nag into servility.

Geeklawyer is at the top of the desirability pile, as far as women are concerned: young, slim, good looking, rich, ultra-bright, witty and with the sort of sexual prowess and stamina that would make Warren Beatty lose his erection. But take heart dear totty. Even Geeklawyer can be taken with an irrational attraction to elderly women of 34 who are tubby, highly strung, mercurial and at the bottom of the professional pile.

Of course it helps if you totty out there are perverted in bed, but that is a tale for another video.

The moral? You want a moral? Life has no moral: it’s about doing stuff until you die.