Golf Tango Foxtrot

Ajax Amsterdam is a football team with a proud heritage. A team that was popularly identified with the Jewish community. When I lived in Amsterdam (in the 1980's) the "Golan Shawarma" was my local fast food joint in Staatsliedenbuurt, the neighbourhood I lived in. The flag of Israel was proudly displayed behind the counter, not as I first assumed as support for the Zionist state but for Ajax the football team. The guy who owned the place was Turkish and held no truck for the Zionist state. He loved his football though.  As one walked round the city in these times, many bars and houses would display an Israeli flag to indicate their partially to Ajax. In my last  few brief visits to the city, things are different. It's rare now to see an Israeli flag. Even the Ajax Ultras the self-styled "Super-Jews" (most of whom are not Jewish) seldom fly the flag any more. In November 2024 Ajax hosted Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Europe League. In the ensuing riots...

Donald Trump is an arsehole and a piece of shit. A convicted rapist, thief and someone who cheats at Golf. Trump has put his puppet Zelensky in his place.  Whether this is due to his new found desire for peace ( but only in Ukraine), desire to cash in the US investment in arms supply for rare minerals, or the threatened disclosure of pictures of Russian sex workers pissing in his mouth I cannot tell.  Keir Starmer doesn't know where to look. He is the dowplicker's dowplicker. Ah, when thieves fall out.... 

We are told that the Russian government has ordered a "partial" mobilisation in response to apparent reverses in the war in Ukraine.  Global tension rises and the threat of nuclear war grows.  NATO alliance members in their war on Russia are arming their "ally" Ukraine in order to bleed their Russian rivals white.  It seems that their reinforcement of the Ukrainian Armed Forces is paying off.   Am I the only one to be thinking we are back in 1914?  For "gallant little Belgium" read "gallant little Ukraine".  We were told then that the German huns were raping and butchering their way through Belgium.  Nowadays it's the Russian bears are doing the same in Ukraine.   In the 1990s the west, (principally British and US Imperialism) created a monster in Russia. The counter-revolution to restore capitalism in Russia resulted in the creation of a kleptocracy fit to challenge its creators.  Frankenstein created the monster which grew to riva...

Ruth Davidson has gone as Tory leader in Scotland.  The shower of has-beens, never was-es and non-entities (Fraser, Tomkins and Carlaw respectively) who seek to replace her are casting about to see where the land lies.  The Westminster shit-storm over a Brexit that Scotland rejected and the fear of an early General Election which will wipe out the Tory party in Scotland (again ) has been vexing them sorely.  We can expect the idea of a "separate" Tory Party for Scotland which is not just a branch office will rise again from the grave where someone forgot to drive a stake through its heart.  A bit like Gordon Brown's "vow" this one gets trotted out as a "new" idea whenever it looks like the Jocks are getting restless. What form might such a party take? A clue comes from the shameless pandering of Fraser and Tomkins to the Orange vote.   Before the Labour Party won the working class Orange vote in Scotland in the 1950s Scottish municipal politics...

Karl Marx famously observed that history repeats itself. The first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. The coronation of Boris Johnson as the Westminster Prime Minister, brings Karl's quip to mind.  Listening to this corrupt, practised liar, bought and sold by whichever plutocrat has his ear this week makes one want to throw up. Simply to hear Johnson self-consciously ape the speech patterns of his idol Winston Churchill brings the realisation that this is the farce.  The dog returning to his vomit. The recycling of the bombast that characterised Winston Churchill and his brandy-soaked cigar-chomping reactionary politics. Policy that promised the world to his listeners and ultimately (by the most delicious of ironies) delivered the demise of his beloved empire. The members of a party which hasn't had a majority in Scottish seats at Westminster for more than 60 years have inflicted on us the most right-wing cabinet that has been seen in living memory. The smirk...

Here ah sit, masell alane, washed up an failin wi fadit memories ae a life thit his bin full ae hope. "If we dinna live in hope wull dee in despair". Its warm oot though.  The air is fullae blossom and scents ae thi flooers i the gairdens.  Thi first time ah passed by this foontain years ago ah met a refugee fella wha wis livin rough here in the Larribal Gairdins.   He was haein a morning wash. Wi passed the time ae day in a sortae English, sortae French sortae Catalan wye is thi nearest spik wi hid thi githir.  Ah gied im a couplae Euros.  He looked like he cid yais thim. Back up thi hull ahint is is the Miro Foundation.  It still his Alexander Calder's Mercury Fountain.  A wee bit ae Scottish art in this finest ae cities. Ah widna tak a wash in it though.. The toon itsell lies alow mi. Ahm nae quite king ae aw I survey.  Truly ah dinna own a handful ae this hale earth. Its stull thi foreneen. Ah cin see Tibidabo awa ower on thi ...