'You woke up my neighborhood'

'Bad hipster art' (is there any other kind?) or sinister political vandalism? Whatever the case, there are strange goings on in our neighbourhood at the moment

Here's the background to the story, and Ditmas Park blog has heaps more on the incident.

Follow my conscience

Weekly Bulletin of The Socialist Party of Great Britain (102)

Dear Friends,

Welcome to the 102nd of our weekly bulletins to keep you informed of changes at Socialist Party of Great Britain @ MySpace.

We now have 1514 friends!

Recent blogs:

Coming up for Orwell

Problems and Solutions

Not So Honourable Members

Quote for the week:

"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all." Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Volume II. 1785.

Continuing luck with your MySpace adventures!

Robert and Piers

Socialist Party of Great Britain

The misfortune of Fortune

As sure as night follows day, breaking news from the BBC Football website that Celtic is about to sign someone can only result in one thing: said player's wiki page being hacked. This time around it's Nancy's Marc-Antoine Fortune, who Mowbray had on loan at West Brom.

Here's the link to his wiki page which may or may not have been repaired at the time of writing. Posted below for posterity's sake is a screen grab of the hacked page. (Click image to enlarge.)

Christ, I hope those career stats of his are part of the hack job. A scoring ratio of one goal every five and a half games doesn't really get the hairs on the back of the neck tingling, does it?

When the angels sing

Tin Can Pot, the Prefab Sprout dedicated music blog, brings us news of one of those "I can't breathe' moments:

Quote of the day

Eskimo: "If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?"

Priest: "Oh, no, not if you did not know."

Eskimo: "Then why did you tell me?"

Hat tip to John B:

Old Big 'Ead

Via Giulio Manieri over at Facebook.

Not my favourite scene from Mike Leigh's High Hopes. That would be this scene.

Face off

Clinging onto the back bumpers for dear life, the SPGB finally climbs aboard the Facebook bandwagon:

Socialist Party of Great Britain Facebook Group

Socialist Standard Facebook Group

Feel free to grab onto the toggles of our collective anorak.

Coming Soon:

The SPGB on Twitter . . . but only once it's truly passe.

Too surprised to blog

Michael Owen signs for Man Utd?

We're looking at the most inspired signing of the pre-season or 'Garry Birtles: The Remake'.

'Young Rosa'

A gentle nudge from my sitemeter and the latest post from Louis Proyect's blog reminded me of this old post from the blog.

That's not what's important. What's important is that you take time out to read the article/interview, “With the hard disk full of socialism”, linked to in the original post.

I'm truly humbled that there are such brave people in the world.

That Elvis Presley cover!

Ready Brek Trev

Weekly Bulletin of The Socialist Party of Great Britain (101)

Dear Friends,

Welcome to the 101st of our weekly bulletins to keep you informed of changes at Socialist Party of Great Britain @ MySpace.

We now have 1511 friends!

Recent blogs:

A simpler way of doing things

Positively socialism

Euroelections: the case for the SPGB

Quote for the week:

"It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle ... There was much in it that I did not understand, in some ways I did not even like it, but I recognized it immediately as a state of affairs worth fighting for . . . " George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (1938).

Continuing luck with your MySpace adventures!

Robert and Piers

Socialist Party of Great Britain

Don't forget to click to enlarge . . . as the blogger said to the reader of the blog.

Never let it be said that this blog misses out in the opportunity in signposting Noam Chomsky appearing in a cartoon strip.

No jokes about the real life Chomsky being a cartoon character, please. That gibe is for the self-satisfied over at Harry's Place.

I just like to spot *cough* public intellectuals in the most unlikeliest of places. It also takes me back to the good old days of avidly reading Roy and the Rovers every week, and the genuine thrill of that storyline where A J Ayer turned up in the pages of the comic face to face with Roy Race. Something about Ayer being the leader of a Spurs hooligan gang who decided to invade the pitch in a FA Cup sixth round replay to try and get the game abandoned after Melchester Rovers went 3-1 up with five minutes to go. I can't remember how it resolved itself - mind, it was a storyline from 30 years ago - but I suspect that 'Blackie' Gray despatched Ayer with a kick to the nether regions and the rest of the Spurs hooligan crew melted back into the terraces. That's how those cliffhangers usually got wrapped up if memory serves me right. If you see the particular issue on eBay, drop me a line. I'd like to read it again

The Chomsky cartoon? From the pen of Mitch Clem. His cartoon strips aren't really that political which it makes it all the funnier when Chomsky pops in from an alternate universe to make a guest appearance as this week's curmudgeon.

If you fast forward through about 217 songs, this too could be your random 25.'

The return of a long forgotten series on the blog.

Four of the songs are faves of Kara's but only three are strikingly obvious.

Owen stomped his feet to Level 42.

Kara asked, 'Who is this?' when The Delgados came on, which I interpret as a good sign. Maybe I won't have to play their albums in secret in the future.

I'd forgotten how spiky the Long Blondes were. They would play a terrific double bill with Sons & Daughters.

For the life of me I can't remember 'Shaking Through', even though I've played Murmur to death for a period of four months. I guess it suffered from B side syndrome. In the age of mp3s 9/10 songs that self-same fate.

I have to investigate that Steve Earle album further. It's time for me to get past his twenty year old statement that what the United States needed was someone like Neil Kinnock as their President.

For me, The Seeds will always just be another group on a Nuggets compilation but I noted that their lead singer, Sky Saxon, died this week. iTunes Genius obviously noted it as well.

What else makes the 25? Dionne Warwick murders the Cilla Black classic. Franz Ferdinand croon their Brooklyn song. Simple Minds remind us once again what a fucking brilliant band they once were. Wreckless Eric makes a strong case for being the bloke with a thirty five year old career based on one song (but it's a great song). Malcolm Middleton's sounds like he's covering Fatima Mansions but the song lyric doesn't contain half the wit of either Cathal Coughlan or the cover of the album that the song comes from. Tears For Fears get all vaguely political, as was obligatory for pop bands in the eighties after Live Aid. And Jellyfish. Whatever happened to Jellyfish? Did I miss anyone out?

Misplaced Pronouncements (Part 36)

A fool has one of those 'D'oh moments':

The setting is a Brooklyn apartment on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

Kara - [Reading BBC Sports News.] US have just scored. They're winning one to zero.

Me - I honestly can't be bothered going next door to watch it. It's a Mickey Mouse game. People are only interested in the tournament 'cos there's no other football on the tv at the moment.

World Socialist e-book now online

One for the kindle lovers amongst you:

"A World Torn Apart is a collection of forty articles on diverse topics written from a world-socialist perspective by Stephen Shenfield (Stefan). Organized in nine sections entitled: profits versus needs; working to survive; politics in various countries (U.S., South Africa, Israel/Palestine, China); popular culture; international relations; war and peace; non-military global threats; historical reflections; thinking about socialism. Includes analysis of wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Georgia, Congo, and Gaza and discussion of such issues as patent law, disaster management (Hurricane Katrina), paying for air, advertising, U.S. presidential elections, children's TV, national sovereignty and globalization, exploitation of Arctic and lunar resources, naval confrontation in the South China Sea, humanitarian intervention, nuclear disarmament, 9/11 and the "war against terror," Iran, global warming, pig/bird/human flu, the Neolithic Revolution, religion, literary utopias, technocracy, and free access."

You can already access some of the articles from the e-book over here. Get scribd.