Masochistic Mr. Clegg

The Deputy Prime Minister, despite describing early deep cuts as "economic masochism" during the general election campaign, has revealed that he had changed his mind on the issue as early as mid-March. First, he tells us that his opinion was changed abruptly by a phone call from Mervyn King (who denied he had given Clegg any new information on Britain's economic fortunes), now he states that it was Europe's "financial earthquake" that brought him round to the Conservatives' point of view. This is an admittance of a huge lie told to Liberal Democrat voters in the run-up to the election - many would not have voted for his party if he had told them of his conversion. In effect, Clegg stood on a platform that he secretly opposed. Baffling.

The duplicitous nature of Nick Clegg

What better way to start commenting on political matters, than to comment on the fact that Nick Clegg is a lying git. Not only has he abandoned whatever principles he may have had prior to the general election in order to gain a seat at the Cabinet table, he has also lied through his teeth about why he has done so. Today, yet another lie of his has surfaced. That of why he supported the quite frankly disastrous deficit-cutting measures outlined in Gideon Osborne's emergency budget. An article published in the Guardian claims that Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, did not tell Clegg over the telephone that the Tory plans to cut public spending at an increased rate (far quicker than considered safe by either Labour or the Lib-Dems), as Clegg has oft claimed since the budget. This just goes to show that Clegg will attempt to absolve himself of blame by any means necessary, even if it means completely fabricating the reasons for his u-turn.

Belgians still don't make the news.

That's right - the shady organisation sometimes known as the 'European Union' has plans to pour your loved ones' remains down the drain! Or so UKIP and sections of the press would have you believe. A stark example was an article in my local newspaper (owned by the Daily Mail's parent company) that was headed ‘Horror at EU Corpse Plan’. This scaremongering is typical whenever the EU is involved - however little - in a story. For one thing, there is no “EU corpse plan”, with the proposals not originating from the EU at all but from the Flemish Association of Undertakers as a greener alternative to cremation. As much as Mr. Godfrey Bloom (the area’s UKIP MEP who crops up to describe the process as “macabre" in the article) dislikes the proposals they did not originate with a European bureaucrat but a business association in Belgium, an individual EU member state. The European Commission’s only role is to judge whether the proposal is safe or not - it is not about to be forced upon any EU country. I am growing increasingly exasperated at the media's scaremongering - a simple Google search reveals this blatant UKIP propaganda to be pure Eurosceptic codswallop. Whether you agree with the proposals or not, it would actually be sensible as a nation and as a planet to discuss how we deal with the dead in an increasingly populated world. What we could do without is such lazy journalism stoking the reactionary fires.