Another from the British press.This time it is a local council gone mad over an "organ grinder's" mechanical monkey. The council will not let the performer perform until a health and safety "risk assessment" is completed.
Paddy Cooke, 64, has been told by the local council that his act with Simon the stuffed ape must be suspended until a risk assessment is carried out.
Ripley Town Council in Derbyshire has also cancelled a Punch and Judy show and a dance act in recent weeks for fear of the potential hazard to the public.
Mr Cooke, from Crich, near Matlock in Derbyshire wears Victorian costume as he walks around playing his organ, a replica of an instrument used more than 150 years ago.
The former fireman, who been grinding organs for 15 years said: "It's not as if I have a live monkey which might jump at people. Mine is a battery-operated interactive toy and the best I have ever had. He says things like 'I want a banana' and even once offered to tell me the sum of pi squared."
Mr Cooke was hired as part of the summer entertainment provided by the town council and has £10m public liability insurance cover.
Well, thank eavens there were no mince pies involved. Still keen on a nanny state? Really?
Barack Obama, at the behest of his left-wing supporters, wants "Universal Health Care" aka socialized medicine. Britain has had free health care for years now. And it comes with many benefits.
Like free maggots in your slippers.
Official figures obtained by the Tories show that 80 per cent of NHS trusts reported problems with ants, 66 per cent with rats and 77 per cent with mice.
Cockroaches were reported at 59 per cent of trusts, biting insects or fleas at 65 per cent, and bed bugs at 24 per cent.
There were infestations of maggots at a further 6 per cent of trusts. And many of the pests were in clinical areas.
The data, revealed under the Freedom of Information Act, shows that, on average, every trust in the country calls out pest controllers once a fortnight.
At one hospital, a horrified patient awoke to find maggots in her slippers. At another, expectant mothers were dismayed to find the ward overrun with rats, while at a third hospital, a store for sterile materials was infested with mice.
Still think socialized medicine is a good idea? Enjoy your slippers.
Michael Grunwald at Time is trying his level best to carry water for Obama by "debunking" the Republican slaps at Obama's tire pressure advice.
But who's really out of touch? The Bush Administration estimates that expanded offshore drilling could increase oil production by 200,000 bbl. per day by 2030. We use about 20 million bbl. per day, so that would meet about 1% of our demand two decades from now. Meanwhile, efficiency experts say that keeping tires inflated can improve gas mileage 3%, and regular maintenance can add another 4%. Many drivers already follow their advice, but if everyone did, we could immediately reduce demand several percentage points. In other words: Obama is right.
Here's something I doubt you'll see in the major, water-carrying media. Want to improve your gas mileage by about 4.5 percent?
Use regular gas without ethanol.
My car is driven 100 miles each day. The car has an instrument package that calculates mileage (which I have checked with manual calculations. It is accurate.). When I was burning "cheaper" ethanol blended gas I got 26.5 mpg (10% ethanol blend is cheaper by about 10 cents per gallon where I live - that is not always the case). A while back, I switched to running straight regular gas. The results?
27.7 mpg. A bit better than a 4.5% improvement. I do keep my engine tuned up and the tires inflated properly. Is this a huge improvement? No, but it adds up. And I rather doubt you will ever read that from the water - or ethanol - carriers in the MSM.
World news | Gaius Tuesday, 5 August , 2008 | 
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