The government have released a map describing the effects of a four centigrade degree rise in average temperature across the world. It's quite a horrific possibility when you grasp the details - but that's exactly why it was released. Carrying straight on where our previous government left off, the climate change propaganda machine marches on.

I've said this before and I'll say it again. We're not necessarily to blame. The Ice Ages officially ended something more than ten thousand years ago but what isn't generally realised is those ice expansions and plummetting temperatures were not constant. There were a number of such expansions, and in between , it got warm again.

Those periods are called interglatials. Strictly speaking, we're in one now, and experts believe that the next ice expansion will occur in fifty thousand years time. In the meantime, yes, it will get warmer. It's happened before. We know that the British Isles had a climate similar to modern Africa at least once during the Ice Ages. There were no cars, no industries, no high carbon economies. It simply got hot naturally. And the process is currently repeating itself.

I wish governments weren't so irresponsible in these scare tactics. It's purely designed to get us to accept costly policies we don't need. Because at the end of the day, it makes no difference whatsoever whether we adopt low carbon economies, pay more for production goods, or simply walk everywhere. At the end of the day, the strength of sunlight is variable, and the Earths orbit is not precisely the same every rotation. That's what drives the major changes. There are no economic policies that will stop those changes. At least King Canute knew it was pointless to order back the tide, and if I remember right, he didn't use it as an excuse to extort money from his subjects.

Stirring Stuff

I was watching a documentary last night about the Battle of Britain. How could I resist? No blue-blooded englishman can resist a retelling of that epic saga. This one focused on the discovery of reconnaisance photographs made by the Luftwaffe that provided some interesting insights into what was actually going on.

In mid September 1940, one Lufwaffe intelligence report believed the RAF were down to their last fifty fighters. It is true Churchill was told at that time that there were no more reserves, but instead of four squadrons, we were actually fielding fifteen.

Was it any good? Not bad. Most of these documentaries use more veteran talking heads with their personal anecdotes and in fact I found that their relative absence detracted from the program, for no other reason than it meant listening to the script for an hour.

For me, the worst mistake this program made was in its use of period footage. Battle of Britain? I spotted the Western Desert, the Eastern Front of 1942/43, and either Sicily or Italy. Whoops.

Stirring Syrup

The Job Centre have passed me on to a job placement team. It isn't that I mind, but my claims advisor is seriously starting to annoy me. He keeps on hinting that he doesn't believe I'm as concientious about my job search as I claim. Anyway, the people at the placement team office are pleasant enough and gave me a website to follow up on possible job vacancies. Okay, lets log on... Seach... Hey, there are jobs going in Swindon. I 'll try this one. All I need to do is fill in an online application form. How hard can that be?

As it turns out, the form was exactly what I was afraid it might be. It is a horrendous web document that expands to fill all avaliable space. I lost interest when they demanded the name of my cat and asked how long I'd been a feline owner, and could I explain in less than 500 words why cat ownership is good for Britain. Mandatory information too.

I only get two hours a day for internet use. There just isn't enough time to wade through all this petty bureaucracy, and I seriously don't believe the company involved has any real use for the informatiion they ask for. No, I give up. I'm looking for a job somewhere else. I'll bet you can figure out why.