Welcome To Zelo Street!

This is a blog of liberal stance and independent mind

Monday, 3 June 2019

Brendan O’Neill Recycles Enoch Powell

Head Spiked honcho Brendan O’Neill has been getting ever closer to flat-out racism for so long that the moment of tipping over was inevitable. Also inevitable was that he would pen another of his sneering I-know-more-about-this-than-all-the-Libs-who-get-triggered-by-my-oh-so-clever-writings posts on the kerfuffle surrounding John Cleese’s unfortunate comments about London recently. The result is perhaps O’Neill’s biggest turkey yet.
The problem for Bren is that he has introduced his rant about London being some kind of foreign city with a premise straight out of Enoch Powell’s infamous “Rivers of Blood” speech, after the headline, “A city without citizens. John Cleese has a point about London”.

Here it comes: “I know someone, now in the twilight of her life, who has lived on the same London street for the past 45 years. Many of her local friends have died or moved away. Where the street once buzzed with English, spoken in a variety of accents, now you can go through an entire day without hearing English. From her small terraced house, she hears Pashto over one garden fence, Romanian over the other.” There is more.

In the nearby row of shops, the English-speaking Indian-owned mini-supermarkets have given way to Polish shops outside which young men gather every evening, speaking Polish … the most common shops now are African barbers and Eastern European markets with grand names like ‘International Food Emporium’. The people inside rarely speak English”. And then comes the pièce de résistance.

This person says she often feels lonely and isolated, like a foreigner on her own street. Does that make her racist? In the eyes of the chattering-class defenders of the cult of diversity who raged against John Cleese last week, it probably does”. Ring any bells yet? Here is the part of Powell’s speech that O’Neill has recycled.
Eight years ago in a respectable street in Wolverhampton a house was sold to a Negro. Now only one white (a woman old-age pensioner) lives there. This is her story. She lost her husband and both her sons in the war. So she turned her seven-roomed house, her only asset, into a boarding house. She worked hard and did well, paid off her mortgage and began to put something by for her old age. Then the immigrants moved in. With growing fear, she saw one house after another taken over. The quiet street became a place of noise and confusion. Regretfully, her white tenants moved out”.

The day after the last one left, she was awakened at 7am by two Negroes who wanted to use her 'phone to contact their employer. When she refused, as she would have refused any stranger at such an hour, she was abused and feared she would have been attacked but for the chain on her door. Immigrant families have tried to rent rooms in her house, but she always refused”. Then Powell went totally OTT.

She is becoming afraid to go out. Windows are broken. She finds excreta pushed through her letter box. When she goes to the shops, she is followed by children, charming, wide-grinning piccaninnies. They cannot speak English, but one word they know. ‘Racialist,’ they chant. When the new Race Relations Bill is passed, this woman is convinced she will go to prison. And is she so wrong? I begin to wonder”.

Sure, the flat-out 1960s racism has been laundered out of O’Neill’s post, but the use of the alleged long-term resident who sees herself as “a foreigner on her own street” is the same in both his work and that of Powell. It’s blatant recycling. I suspect O’Neill knows that, but didn’t think anyone would remember the passage from Powell’s infamous speech.

Well, I did remember it. And one more thing I remember about that pensioner in Wolverhampton: she didn’t exist. Several journalists from local and national titles tried to track her down. All drew a blank. Their conclusion was that Powell had made it all up.

So I hope Brendan O’Neill has a real-life source for his Rivers of Blood recycling. Because if he hasn’t, he’s in even more trouble. It’s called Spiked, because it should have been.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Widders Gay Hatred No Shock Horror

Another of those who stood for election under the banner of the Brexit Party  at the recent European Parliament elections, and another subjected to no scrutiny whatsoever by our free and fearless press, was former Tory MP Ann Widdecombe. So when she appeared before the inquisition of Niall Paterson, standing in for Sophy Ridge on the Sky News politics show yesterday morning, some were taken aback by her comments.
Local politicians for local people

As the BBC has reported, “Ann Widdecombe has come under fire after she suggested science could ‘produce an answer’ to being gay … During the interview on the Ridge on Sunday programme, Ms Widdecombe, 71, was asked whether people would want to share a platform with her due to her views on homosexuality”. There was more.

“The MEP said she had ‘never claimed that such science already exists’ to change someone's sexuality … But she added: ‘If you simply rule out the possibility of it, you are denying people who are confused about their sexuality or discontented with it, the chances that you do give to people who want to change gender.’”

But no-one should have been surprised. She has previously opposed LGBT rights moves, and on the question of equalising the age of consent at 16, attacked the then Labour Government, sniping “one of the sundry horrors for which this Government is likely to be remembered will be that it gave its imprimatur to sodomy at 16 … there will be no protection for the vulnerable and confused against the predatory attentions of older men”.

She opposed the repeal of Section 28. She was firmly opposed to same-sex marriage, declaring “the state must have a preferred model" and "a union that is generally open to procreation”. And, the spark for yesterday’s questions from Paterson, “In 2012, Widdecombe voiced support in the Daily Express for the practise of conversion therapy, which claims to change the orientation of gay men and women”.

Never mind that so-called “Gay Conversion” therapy has been widely condemned. Yet so many pundits have either failed to put Ms Widdecombe on the spot, or have fallen back on the idea of her as some kind of loveable eccentric, which she most certainly is not.

She has repeatedly advocated for the return of the death penalty. She is opposed to abortion. She split with the Church of England over the ordination of women as priests. On climate change, her views have been summed up by comments such as “There is no climate change, hasn’t anybody looked out of their window recently?” and that “climate change money should go to [the] armed services”. She has supported homeopathy.

And, of course, when she was prisons minister, she “defended the Government's policy to shackle pregnant prisoners with handcuffs and chains when in hospital receiving ante-natal care”. She also once said of Michael Howard that “there was something of the night about him”, a remark which some considered to be anti-Semitic.

Yet until yesterday’s outburst, our free and fearless press either kept schtum, or laughed off her viciousness as “Widders” being a little eccentric. It’s not mere eccentricity. It’s ultra-conservative intolerance, it’s bigotry, and the favouring of ignorance over knowledge.

How many more horrors does the Brexit Party have to reveal? More on this subject later.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Sunday, 2 June 2019

US Trade Deal Means No NHS - OFFICIAL

Next week sees a state visit to the UK by the clown pretending to be a proper US President, Combover Crybaby Donald Trump. And as befits the flagrant double standards of our free and fearless press, there have been none of the snipes and sneers seen when Barack Obama told them that the UK would be “back of the queue” for a trade deal. That was interference in our democracy. But it isn’t when The Donald does it.
Donald, where's yer hairspray?

Trump, who may be unaware that his surname is, in parts of the UK, slang for “fart”, has been doing plenty of interfering, asserting, just before a Parliamentary by-election, that Nigel “Thirsty” Farage, now Oberscheissenführer of the Brexit Party, and London’s formerly very occasional Mayor Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, vying to become Tory leader and Prime Minister, are Very Wonderful People.

What he is also promising is that all-important trade deal, somehow missing the inconvenient fact that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said it won’t pass Congress unless it respects the Good Friday accords. That trade deal has been talked up by both Farage and Bozza. So it was bound to be discussed when US Ambassador Woody Johnson appeared before the inquisition of the host on The Andy Marr Show™ today.
After a little doublespeak on food standards - suggesting the UK allow in US products because that gave us a “choice” - very Milton Friedman of him - Johnson was asked about healthcare. Marr put it to him that “lots of people are worried that a big free trade deal with America means American pharmaceutical and medical corporations getting a slice of the NHS”. Initially, though, Johnson dismissed the idea.

Oh I don’t think they’d be put in any particular position regarding that. Your national healthcare service is the pride of the country. It’s a highly emotionally charged issue”. So Marr came at it from a different angle. “Do you feel that healthcare has to be part of the [trade] deal?” Then the answer was a little different. “I think probably the entire economy, in a trade deal all things that are traded will be on the table”. Got that?
Squeaky you've been rumbled finger up the bum time

Andrew Marr had got it. “Which includes healthcare” he put to Johnson, who this time admitted “I would think so”. Have a think about that. “Healthcare” in a UK context means the NHS. It would be up for grabs as part of a post-Brexit UK-US trade deal.

Which means what, exactly? It means the likelihood of our free-at-the-point-of-delivery NHS being effectively abolished in favour of an insurance-based system, as in the USA. That is what Nigel Farage has repeatedly advocated. Yes, Brexit Party voters, I’m looking at you. Prime Minister Bozza might deny any such inclination, but he’s as big a fraud and liar as Mr Thirsty. He’s also rich enough not to care.
Oo-er chaps, Beano Bozza popularity down the chute again. Cripes!

But if we pay less in taxes and keep up the premium payments, it’ll all be all right, won’t it? Well, no it won’t. As Adrian Barker has observed, in the USA “A study done at Harvard University indicates that MEDICAL COSTS is the biggest cause of bankruptcy, representing 62% of all personal bankruptcies. One of the interesting caveats of this study shows that 78% of filers had some form of health insurance”.

How can someone with health insurance be driven to bankruptcy? Simples. Ever heard of “Co-payments”? The insurance doesn’t cover all costs. You’d have to cover part of it - maybe an excess, maybe a proportion of the whole bill for some treatments - yourself. You may have to find part or all of your prescription medication cost yourself, and be charged at that euphemistically-titled market rate. That means it would be a lot more expensive.
Then there is the ultimate get-out clause - “Policy doesn’t cover it”. Not that all those slagging off the NHS and saying it should be binned, because it won’t cover the costs of the latest and most expensive drugs if there is already an established and cheaper product available, will tell you this. It happens. And it would happen here, too.

Still, as Barker also notes, many in the USA have found a way out of that. “DEAD BROKE Takes on a whole new meaning … Bankruptcy is the biggest cause of suicide in the US. THIS the system they are shaping us up for … No NHS? Then it's the American way pay, still die, just bankrupt. 62% due to medical bills”. That is the reality of the US system.
And it’s a system that has a multi-million Dollar lobbying effort behind it. It’s a system endorsed by Astroturfers like the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance. Nigel Farage has endorsed it. And if he becomes Tory leader and takes the UK out of the EU, Bozza will, with the certainty of night following day, be endorsing it too.

That’s the problem, you see - people in power who have so much money they become detached from the everyday reality facing tens of millions of Brits. That’s what makes the Brexit Party an ultimate false prospectus, with the Tories not far behind.

It’s also what makes Brexit a grave threat to the British way of life. Not that Nige and Bozza will admit that, of course. That would involve honesty, and that would never do.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Tommy Robinson Fans A Danger To Everyone

He may have gone quiet since being unsuccessful in his efforts to be elected as an MEP, but Stephen Yaxley Lennon, who styles himself Tommy Robinson, always has his loyal fan base to speak out. And speak out they are doing - in a way which the Police and security services hopefully will be monitoring, perhaps even taking action.
If that sounds serious, it is because what is being discussed - openly - by those who call themselves Lennon’s fans is not merely bigoted and unequivocally racist, it is encouraging violence and indeed killing. Not only that, but some of the individuals in those conversations are readily identifiable. Here’s some of what they have been discussing.
While one contributor muses “It’s gonna happen soon the BRITISH will attack the Police soon big time, the scum cops won’t know what hit them”, another admits “I wouldn’t mind shooting a few Antifa and Muslim terrorists … We need firearms by then … Lots of fire power … And we need to gain support from the British Army”.
That was particularly nasty, but arguably worse was the echo of 1930s Nazism in the comment “We had many Anzac ceremonies stopped here in Australia for fear of violence, the one day of Veterans live for taken because of sub human filth”. The author of those sentiments has already been identified. And there was more. Rather a lot more.
The same commenter asserted “Just give every patriot a gun. If the cops are siding with the terrorists, that means they are seen as terrorists as well. We fuck up whoever wants to fuck us up, fair enough”, while another who is in the process of being identified added “Also wear your Christian cross let it be seen”.
Homophobia is also on the menu where Lennon’s fans are concerned, typical of the genre being “LGBT (Lettuce, Guacamole, Bacon and Tomato) [is] the sandwich of choice for these freaks (and there are millions of them) … UK and morality really have collapsed, gone to the dogs, it’s abysmal and evident for all to see … use your eyes, we are no longer world leaders, we are now officially third world”. And it gets worse.
Another contributor ventured “Shoot these rapists, paedophiles and terrorists on sight. They only come to the west for destruction, they ain’t compatible with human beings at all. If you don’t kill them, they will come after you and your children and women”, along with a rant about Saudi Arabia, and the old chestnut “Send them all back home”.
One prize specimen, responding to the idea that there should be “a purge on them”, asserted “I’d not have any compunction for doing that. It’s pointless to let our moral high grounds hinder us from protecting our country. They want to kill us all anyway. If we don’t wipe them out before they can do further harm to our people, your country will not be yours in a matter of time”. Then another participant fantasises about putting his “pork products” up against a Muslim woman’s shopping at a supermarket checkout.
Quite apart from the scale of ignorance on view, the casual consideration of violence and desire to get hold of lethal weaponry, the contempt for authority is worrying

So it’s good to know that the authorities are being kept informed. More on this later.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Top Six - June 2

So what’s hot, and what’s not, in the past week’s blogging? Here are the six most popular posts on Zelo Street for the past seven days, counting down in reverse order, because, well, I have to be out and about later. So there.
6 Tory Leadership - Now The Uber Candidate Kit Malthouse tried to cover up phone hacking and has screwed over the Taxi trade. No - just no.

5 Tommy Robinson HUMILIATED He not only failed to be elected as an MEP - he lost his £5,000 deposit, too. Bye bye Tommy.

4 Labour Expulsion - Corbyn v Campbell Should Jezza have also been expelled from the party? Sadly, no he shouldn’t. Sorry Al.

3 Is YouGov Push Polling? Check out the definition of this practice - then an extract from one of their recent questionnaires.

2 Question Time - Another Dodgy Panellist Alexandra Phillips may have been elected as a Brexit Party MEP - but she has been involved in seriously dodgy stuff too.

1 Tracy Ann Oberman - Shame On You One nasty swipe at Jeremy Corbyn too many - whatever will her lawyers think?

And that’s the end of another blogtastic week, blog pickers. Not ‘arf!

Saturday, 1 June 2019

Creepy Old Bigot Threatens Autistic Teenager

Godfrey Bloom is a bigot. He is also a climate change denier who seeks solace in endorsing the wacko denialist fringe. He is a former MEP who was too off the wall even for the dwindling band of saloon bar propper-uppers that was UKIP. He lost his post as the honorary President and chief economist of the Ludwig von Mises Centre after a series of unforced anti-Semitic rants. He reached rock bottom and just kept on digging.
Still Godders opens trappers and inserts footers, and now he has a new target for his ire, one who he has gone after in no style at all, showing that unappealing and creepy side of his non-character to worst effect. Because of his obsession with junk climate change denial, Bloom has taken a deep dislike to Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, who is rather more popular, and indeed rather more influential, that he is.
Hence his seeing the headline “'We will not let you get away with it', Greta Thunberg slams politicians for ignoring climate crisis”, and going into Gammon Overdrive, frothing at the mouth and spluttering “Why do I always feel an overwhelming desire to give this ghastly child a good shaking”. Why? Because you’re a creepy old bigot, Godders.
He also gives a Retweet to Paul Popper, another climate change denier who claims he is “now probably close to where Roger Scruton is” (Scruton is a nailed-on racist, so that’s probably not a good look).  Popper has scaled the lofty intellectual heights to tell the world “I want a Prime Minister who tells her to fuck off”. What a thrilling start.
But instead of winding his neck in and showing some kind of regret for being a creepy old bigot, Godders just keeps on emitting the crappers. So when it was put to him that he was jealous of Ms Thunberg’s intelligence, compassion, eloquence and respect, he scoffed “Gosh, that dreadful child & her awful parents are more intelligent than me! There's a thing”. He really should desist. But not Godders. He just doubles down.
For this, he takes the outpourings of Steven Goddard, another climate change denier who is not as clever as he thinks (see Zelo Street exposing his ignorance HERE). Goddard is claiming that fewer people die from drought and flood, and so it isn’t happening. Godders suggests “Somebody tell the dreaded Swedish pixie & her dreadful mother”.
More creepy abuse, but he also applies the term to politicians in the UK, especially if they are called Amber Rudd. She might back “Oiky” Gove for Tory leader, and not Bozza? Godders doesn’t like that one bit. “So we return to the original withdrawal agreement. Led by a totally back stabbing charisma free pixie. Do the Tories have a death wish?
You get the picture, and, indeed, why even UKIP found him too poisonous. Still he ranted as Ms Thunberg, taking as his text the assertion by another climate denialist that she was part of “The Green Environmental Climate Doomsday Cult”. What say Godders? “Blasted Swedish pixie, would you retain a sixteen year old doctor, dentist, lawyer, accountant, chauffeur, builder, radiographer, physiotherapist or any other sixteen year old save for a bit of housework. SHE'S A BLOODY KID!!!” He’ll spontaneously combust next.

But, if he doesn’t, someone really needs to sit Godders down and explain to him that being a creepy old bigot is not even slightly clever. It is, in fact, totally out of order.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Is YouGov Push Polling?

Push polling. The live rail accusation for pollsters. A discredited technique that verges on misusing polling, turning it into propagandising, manipulating, another form of dirty tricks. No reputable polling organisation should go anywhere near the technique. But one pollster in the UK is being quizzed right now on whether it has gone there.
The Wikipedia definition is a useful place to start. “A push poll is an interactive marketing technique … in which an individual or organization attempts to manipulate or alter prospective voters' views under the guise of conducting an opinion poll … in all such polls, the pollster asks leading questions or suggestive questions that ‘push’ the interviewee towards adopting an unfavourable response towards the … candidate in question”.
Bear that in mind as we consider an extract from a recent YouGov questionnaire, which discusses Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. It begins with the preamble “People have made different criticisms of Jeremy Corbyn which we list below. Please choose the ONE which you personally think is most worrying”. So even before the respondent gets to the criticisms, they know that it’s going to be “worrying”. Ri-i-i-ight.
Anyhow, bring on the first criticism. “Corbyn supported the IRA, he said the death of bin Laden was a ‘tragedy’, he can’t be trusted to take tough action on security, crime and defence”. It was advertised as “worrying”, then backed up with one flat-out lie and a blatant taking of a statement out of context. Can we see the next one, please?
Here it comes. “Corbyn is an old fashioned socialist who supported the Soviet Union and will take Britain back to the 1970s”. They do like the flat-out lies, don’t they? Don’t tell me, one of the remaining two options is about immigration, isn’t it?

Well, yes it is, and here it comes. “Corbyn has said repeatedly he doesn’t believe in ANY limits on immigration, it’s not too high, so if he’s PM it will be out of control”. He did? I must have blinked and missed it. But the message of this exercise is clear.
By that stage, anyone thus questioned will have been softened up by being told that Corbyn means “worrying”, and then most certainly moved in the general direction of, er, “adopting an unfavourable response towards the candidate in question”.

This looks like push polling. It appears to walk like push polling. And that sound it makes suggests it quacks like push polling.  So what has YouGov to say for itself?
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

Julia Hartley Dooda STRUCK OFF

The right-wing snowflake brigade is in full cry, after the latest campaign by self-promoting TalkRADIO host Julia Hartley Brewer progressed not necessarily to her advantage. She had been invited to address the annual conference of the Royal College of GPs, but after the Docs diagnosed a severe case of incurable bigotry, her appointment was cancelled, to the relief of those who thought she shouldn’t have been invited in the first place.
We know who you are, thanks

The RCGP spokesman spelled it out. “It has become clear that some of the views she has expressed are too much at odds with the core values of Royal College of GPs and our members, and our work to promote inclusivity within the profession and among patients … This person [Julia Hartley-Brewer] has expressed views that are highly controversial regarding immigration and expressed that she could not see anything in the ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech that he [Enoch Powell] had got wrong”.
No comment

And it wasn’t an isolated incident: Ms Hartley Dooda had recently had a racially tinged swipe at Channel 4 News host Krishnan Guru-Murthy, and she infamously mocked those with autism, resulting in her being banned from this year’s Labour Party Conference.
She isn’t known as the Waitrose Katie Hopkins for nothing. But that didn’t stop the outpouring of right-wing indignation, which made for excellent entertainment, kicked off by Ms Hartley Dooda herself: “The RCGPs has pathetically decided to no-platform me following a nasty online campaign against me speaking at their conference because of an old tweet which they wrongly claim is racist. My response via @spectator will be online in a few minutes”. How dare they do that to me? I shall write to the Times about this!
Cue supportive whining from some of those supporting her, not least that from failed former MEP Patrick “Lunchtime” O’Flynn. “No platforming the excellent @JuliaHB1 who has totally mainstream and common sense views just shows how the ‘woke’ Left is determined to forbid dissent. Of course anyone who posts many tweets will make the odd duff observation. This absolutely doesn't justify silencing them”. Yeah, right.
She’s got her own radio show. So she ain’t being silenced. Still, Mark Littlewood of the IEA was in her corner: “Julia can be pretty feisty woman. Sometimes even a tad scary. But I’m surprised that British GPs are such a meek & feeble bunch of people that they can’t even contemplate the concept of listening to her. Utterly, utterly pathetic”. Wow! Zap! Dull!
So was abuse merchant James “Saviour of Western civilisation” Delingpole. “This is insane. The Royal College of General Practitioners: yet another once respectable institution hijacked by woke fascists. Where will it end?” Gay marriage. Global warming.
Iain Dale wanted to make sure he chipped in, just so folks remember he’s still around. “I stand by my friend and colleague 100% in this. The only 'fascists' here are those who seek to deny freedom of speech on utterly spurious grounds. @HelenRCGP should perhaps decide whether she is a leader or a follower. She's given into a politically motivated mob”.
Who said “fascist”? Still, there was always the kiss of death from Whinging Dan Hodges: “This is getting beyond a joke now. Doctors are too sensitive to withstand a talk from @JuliaHB1. And they're meant to take decisions on life and death”. Non sequitur, much?
The parade of stupid went on, ably helped on its way by Dan, Dan The Oratory Man: “Always the same pattern. Left-wing activists dig up some old Tweet, fall about in feigned offence, and succeed in no-platforming someone. Disappointed to see doctors playing these silly games”. She’s got a platform. It’s called the TalkRADIO breakfast show.
No matter, the line to take had been established, and there is no more establishment voice than that of the serially dishonest Fraser Nelson, editor of the Spectator: “Julia Hartley-Brewer is one of the best-informed journalists around - and always superb on Question Time. It made sense for the Royal College of GPs to ask her on its own panel”. If she was so well-informed, she wouldn’t be so crashingly ignorant.
And of course Darren Crimes, sorry, Grimes, had to get a look-in. “It’s refreshing to see @JuliaHB1 admit that a tweet she made in 2016 was poorly researched, but it’s a sad reality that in 2019 folk are so desperate to extinguish voices that they obsessively tap into Twitter search to see if we have ever tripped up to shut us up. It’s pathetic”. Er, shouldn’t you be helping the Metropolitan Police with their enquiries, Daz?
But no festival of right-wing whinging would be complete without the loathsome Toby Young, and so it came to pass. “Extending an invitation to a speaker and then rescinding it after an outrage mob protests is explicitly contrary to the @EHRC’s guidance on free speech. @rcgp should be ashamed of themselves”. It’s got stuff all to do with free speech.
Julia Hartley Dooda already has freedom of speech, and a platform on which to dispense it. She is also given a platform all too regularly by broadcasters. The RCGP has done no more than exercise its freedom of decision making. For this, they have been subjected to a tsunami of mardy strop throwing by those willing to defend forthright bigotry.

And that tells you all you need to know about her defenders. I’ll just leave that one there.
Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at