Pink Sauce

A vote against this effete and frivolous Tory is a no-brainer by Polly Toynbee, The Guardian , Tuesday April 29 2008 Ken Livingstone has relentlessly worked to improve London’s lot. Boris Johnson is running only for fun and fame. Vote for Ken

With the current debate raging in the media and in Parliament around Alistair Darling's budget and his decision to remove the 10p rate on income tax, I thought I would resuscitate this post I originally published on 27 march 2007 as an interesting angle on the controversy. Last week, with the approval by both Houses of Parliament of the Sexual Orientation Regulations was of course a very important and much publicised time for the LGB community. That same week might however have other less obvious and less auspicious consequences for at least some members of our community. The big news for the Country, last week also came from Parliament. Gordon Brown, Prime Minister in waiting and current Chancellor of the Exchequer was delivering his budget for 2008 and to some extend two to three years beyond that. The big headline, widely reported in the media, for what everybody assumes to be Brown's last budget, was the announcement by Brown at the end of his speech of a cut of 2p in the...

Comments on the Evening Standard website regarding Boris last week: We should stand up for Boris. So what if he has no grasp of detail and his management experience is limited to editing the Spectator magazine. He is a jolly funny chap and will be an inspiring ambassador for London. - Martin Clerkenwell, London I’d rather he spent £100M on new Routemasters than another penny on minority ethnic interests. - Squiz, Islington Doesn’t matter, I would much rather Boris spend the money on Routemasters unlike Ken who squanders our taxes on ‘focus groups’ for immigrants or visits to third world dictators. - Kyle, London So what if Boris got his sums wrong, I’d take someone who admits his error over someone who gets his team to lie for him so he doesn’t have to come clean… - St, London Boris all the way. He is funny and not politically correct which is great. - David, Lincoln Johnson - or to give him his full name, Boris LOL!!!! what a legernd!! Johnson!!! - is a TV character loved by millions ...

The BBC's (very quick) response to my complaint about that comedy programme the other day : Dear [Zefrog] Thank you for your e-mail regarding [sic] I am sorry if you were offended by the content of 'Happy Mondays: The Don't Watch with Mother Sketchbook'. I can assure you it's never our intention to deliberately upset its audience. As you're no doubt aware and the programme title itself suggests the content often 'sails close to the wind'. However we can assure you the programme isn't intended to gratuitously shock and the humour contains no malice. As a public service financed by the licence fee we must provide programmes which cater for the whole range of tastes in humour. We believe that there's no single set of standards in this area on which the whole of society can agree, and it is inevitable that programmes which are acceptable to some will occasionally strike others as distasteful. The only realistic and fair approach for us is to ensure ...

"If we go back to the beginning we shall find that ignorance and fear created the gods; that fancy, enthusiasm, or deceit adorned or disfigured them; that weakness worships them; that credulity preserves them, and that custom, respect and tyranny support them." Baron D’Holbach , Système de la nature , 1770

Last week, BBC Radio four premiered a new late night comedy programme entitled Happy Mondays , meant to be "showcasing new ideas in comedy". The first episode was reasonably good featuring a diverse array of comedian including the black gay comedian Stephen K Amos . This week's episode, The Don't Watch with Mother Sketchbook , "a celebration of the 30th anniversary of an imaginary sketch show", was sadly not at all as funny as last week's. If I am honest I even found it rather offensive. There was a sketch meant to be the only surviving copy of an old sketch from this imaginary show dubbed in Zulu, featuring a man and woman hopefully really talking Zulu must as likely as night just making things up on a background of canned laughter. Nothing very funny there at all. The most offensive part, in my view, however, was found right at the beginning of the show during the introductory speech where a former member of the imaginary team, Peter Wellet, was said ...

The local elections are only a few couple of weeks away now and the debate is slowly heating up. It's time for people to finally make there choice as to who they vote for. Londoners have to choose between no less than 10 candidates, although it is widely predicted that the election will be played out between the candidates of the three main political parties; all three of whom are rather strong personalities. Although I already pretty much knew already who I was going to vote for, I took a short online quiz a few days ago. The results (as reproduced below) given to me by Vote Match didn't yield many surprises (if any): Ken Livingstone (Labour) Siân Berry (Green Party) Lindsey German (Left List) Brian Paddick (Liberal Democrats) Boris Johnson (Conservatives) Alan Craig (Christian Peoples Alliance / Christian Party) Matt O’Connor (English Democrats) Winston Mckenzie Gerrard Batten (UKIP) Richard Barnbrook (BNP) In order to help voters make up their minds, many interest groups ha...

"We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another." Jonathan Swift