Two Wongs Still Make A Wong

My favourite story for a long time has just come along .....

 

Beijing Police With Advice For The Ladies

.... I say 'favourite' for a number of reasons, but principally because it allowed me to pun horrendously in the post title. Still the story has some merits, as it concerns a part of the world where political correctness has yet to get even a fingernail, and as its a very ancient culture, it may never do so.

A Forgotten Man

Had you ever heard of Sean Lester? No, well neither had I.

In fact like most people, I have hardly heard of the ‘League of Nations’, the precursor to the modern 'United Nations'. It was set up after World War I in 1919 and was largely the dream of the US President Woodrow Wilson, but was probably doomed from the start (it had no armed forces, or commitment from ‘the great powers’ to back its resolutions with armed force) – its maximum membership was just 58 member nations.

By the 1930’s, the Axis powers; Germany, Japan, Italy, Spain and others, started leaving and the organization collapsed as the world geared up for WWII.

So who was Sean Lester? Well amongst other things, he was the last Secretary General of the League of Nations, and probably the last person to tell Adolf Hitler ‘No’  in Germany, while he was 'High Commissioner' in the Baltic port of Danzig (which the Germans wanted back under German control) … he opposed Nazi attempts to limit freedom of speech, and he criticised moves by Hitler to silence his political opponents. He was eventually removed from his post as 'High Commissioner' by a combination of events and the Nazis, and spent the war years in Geneva, where he was installed as the last Secretary-General of the League of Nations, before the United Nations was created in 1945.

Sean Lester Last Secretary General League of Nations

Western history never completely forgets these figures, and there are moves afoot to commemorate this Ulsterman’s life with a street name or plaque, here and there ….

Lost Generation

The political cowardice of earlier UK governments, particularly that of Tony Blair, who had to make the decision in the mid 1990's, but kicked the can down the road, in not committing the UK to a generation of Nuclear power station renewal, has not only cost us our national pride - we have had to ask the French with Chinese backing, to build the next one, after all our world expertise was lost, with a generation of non building .....

UKs Fuel and Power Sources

 
but its also lead to the almost certain fact that the UK could be facing power blackouts in any bad winter in the next decade or so.

News Blasts From The Year Of Our Redemption 1753

I am introducing a new occasional feature on the blog – ‘News Blasts From The Past’ … this will be scans of the news, illustrations and articles from the Periodicals/Magazines and Newspapers of the past two hundred years or so.

Now before copyright legal weasels start rubbing their hands in anticipation of emptying the 'PC Towers widows and orphans Christmas fund', I should point out that I have a small collection of genuine antique newspapers from when I was interested in collecting “Ephemera”, or the objects of everyday life in bygone eras. I stopped collecting this stuff (or rubbish as my then girlfriend would insist on describing it), when it became obvious that an unfocused collection of 'ephemera' (from ration cards, to police whistles, and of course Newspapers), was the surest path to becoming a ‘hoarder’ (always an easy line to cross in even the best of ‘collectors’).

But while the other items largely disappeared over the years in house moves etc - some with much regret when I realised their loss – I always retained the old newspapers. I guess I thought it was a kind of ‘sacred trust’ through the ages. They had survived the centuries, and I wasn’t going to be the one who dropped that baton. However I am at the point where I have to start considering passing on that baton to another (via eBay), to someone else who might look after them for a few decades more, but before they go, I decided to scan a few of the articles and headlines into my PC and republish them for the ages, partly as insurance against their eventual destruction, and partly as nice post subjects (I was going to say ‘easy’ posts, but in fact the scanning, cleaning them as they are quite dirty from handling over the centuries, and recombining the split scan parts for the very large images, is time consuming – so not ‘easy’ posts).

The first of these posts is from a publication entitled as a 'Vox Stellarum' or 'a Loyal ALMANACK' of 1753, by Francis Moore physician – which the more observant amongst you will know later became the well known  'Old Moores Almanac', and is still on sale today.

A Loyal Almanac

So amongst the 'predictions' of the future, and of course the predictions of tides, sun rises, moon phases and seasonal events, that were of great use to a society still based on the land and farming, there were also historical tables and discussion pieces for the farmers and landed gentry who it was aimed at::   

Lists of the Monarchs and a paean of praise for Britannia

But the big piece was a religious tract about the Revelation to come .... in particular the importance of the number '1260' in the events that will mark the end of times ....

The Revelations of St John and the Number of 1260

More of these reports from the NoPC vaults will follow over the next few months .... assuming that its not in the cycle of 1260 that seems to indicate that the end cometh.

Addendum:

As promised, I have revisited and scanned the additional two pages from the 'Almanack'

Astrology and Remarkable Events 1665

 Here are the other two pages of interest ........

Remarkable Events 1665

Made In Britain

There are times when what we produce in our society is just excruciatingly embarrassing .... as anyone who has been abroad, and seen British teens despoiling the seaside resorts of European countries with their drunken behaviour can testify.

However the 'Chav Culture' that has been breeding for the last 50 years on the council estates of the UK, may have reached a new low, when returning from a 'holiday' in Malta (it makes you cringe what he and his fat girlfriend may have got up to on the trip), a 52-year-old man - got drunk on the plane, and started abusing fellow travellers - tried to start a fight, and needed the Captain to warn him before he 'calmed down'.

Made In Britain - A Working Class Hero

However not content with this ruination of everyone's flight, this fat, bald headed, pot bellied, charmer, decided to restart his antics when the plane started to disembark, and started removing his clothes on the runway, before his female companion slapped him across the face. Undaunted, this working class hero stumbled around the airport tarmac in only a pair of black underpants, before he took these off, and urinated against a wall.

He then dressed, and casually entered Manchester Airport, where the police (eventually, if he had been a terrorist he would have had a field day), challenged him, then 'Dry Tasered' (aka "Drive Stun") him, where the Taser is held against the target, but without firing the projectiles, the jolt is intended to cause pain, without fully incapacitating the target, and then arrested him on 'suspicion of being drunk and disorderly in a public place'..... only suspicion of being drunk, or disorderly .... what do they need, a written confession?

And what was the penalty for this little bit of holiday 'fun'? He was issued with a 'Fixed Penalty Notice'. ..... which is a small fine. I'll bet his neighbours were pleased to see him back ...... and they wonder why so many are fleeing this demi-paradise.