I had fond memories of HSBC: But not any more! The reason is that because as a young and married soldier living in Singapore I needed to open my first Bank a/c - yes, yes, I know but up to then I was just another feckless 'Tom' living week by week, cash in hand from my army wages. However, my newly acquired 'Memsahib' who had worked in a Bank most of her life soon put me straight! Anyway, I am sorry that HSBC has now been swallowed whole by those political gangsters who have seized control in China. My advice - don't go anywhere near any of their branches!
Ms. Patricia McCarthy is spot on! No, I don't know who she is but this is an extract from piece at The American Spectator:
What is so disappointing is their cowardice in the face of outright thuggery. What nonsense. Black Lives Matter, as Tucker Carlson so aptly pointed out, is a cult, a new religion for those who virtue-signal because they crave to be seen as woke. It’s all pathetic, a sad commentary on the lack of moral and intellectual stamina of far too many Americans.
Couldn't have put it better myself!
Charles Dickens - bit of a rat, apparently: There was a fairly hefty piece in The Telegraph the other day following publication of a new biography of the, er, great man of letters! I didn't read it all, any more than I ever read any of his great novels which were rammed down our throats at school. Alas, I cannot offer a thoughtful critique of his work simply because I know so little of it. Totally tedious!
I've suspected it but Patrick O'Flynn says it! And, needless to say, he says it at The Spectator site. Quite baldly he tells Boris to get a grip! I must admit, albeit somewhat reluctantly, that I, too, have sensed a certain waywardness from this government. Yes, it appears that Boris has decided to take a strong line against China even, allegedly, hinting that he will cut Huawei out of our 5G communications system. I have yet to see any blood! Also, there have been what I can only describe as 'Trumpian' promises to flood the country with 'zillions' of quid to fire things up after this damned pandemic. Where it will come from and how it will be repaid remains a mystery. Yes, I do realise that these are incredible times but that is when 'Great Leaders' come to the fore and, er, well, LEAD! Ask old 'Winnie'! OK, so he can't reply but just read some of his biographies!
"Downton Abbey" - simply the best! Happily they are repeating the series on TV these days, every evening Monday to Friday. Julian Fellowes, the creator and writer of it, is a genius! His storylines cover a host of interesting characters and situation both above and below stairs. Impeccably acted and directed. In the unlikely event that you have not seen it - treat yourself to a box-set! You can take my word for it because I was once an actor, you know - and I heard that!
Is "Black Lives Matter" a racist slogan? I ask because I fear that were I daft enough to attempt to publicise the slogan "White Lives Matter" I would have the 'woke' mob on my back instantly!
If you read nothing else today, read this: By Kevin D. Williamson at The National Review:
https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/06/george-floyd-protests-comforting-abstractions/
No more Rumbles
I make a point of muting ads when I watch TV but one I noticed the other night was about the current flu shambles - promoting HSBC! They don't get irony, then?
Posted by: The Jannie | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 16:23
Those who seek to be seen as "woke" will find themselves insufficiently "woke" in short order by the Keepers of Wokeness. All that guilt ridden kneeling and flagellation will count for nothing. Decades of public school miseducation topped off by even worse "education" and even indoctrination at universities have given us the "social justice" woke generation. Under educated but oh so sensitive and deeply in debt. These twenty something and thirty something adult children have spent their education years having never been challenged by few if any contradicting ideas. This is academia after the left took over. The right should be chastised for abandoning the university to them.
Posted by: Whitewall | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 16:28
If Black Lives Matter is a cult and religion so are watching only one news channel and Trumpism.
Posted by: Bob | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 17:35
We bought the DA box set a while back and David you are right on all counts. We may never see a production that well done again.
Posted by: Whitewall | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 18:23
As the big city "shooting season" draws near, we will find out just how much black lives matter.
Posted by: Whitewall | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 18:26
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/7856787/Violent-inner-city-crime-the-figures-and-a-question-of-race.html
The official figures, which examine the ethnicity of those accused of violent offences in London, suggest the majority of men held responsible by police for gun crimes, robberies and street crimes are black.
Black men are also disproportionately the victims of violent crime in the capital.
The statistics, released by the Metropolitan Police, permit an informed debate on a sensitive subject for the first time.
One prominent black politician said that the black community needed to face up to major challenges.
Shaun Bailey, a Tory election candidate in London and a charity worker, said: “The black community has to look at itself and say that, at the end of the day, these figures suggest we are heavily – not casually – involved in violent crime. We are also involved in crime against ourselves – and we regularly attack each other.”
The data provide a breakdown of the ethnicity of the 18,091 men and boys who police took action against for a range of violent and sexual offences in London in 2009-10.
They show that among those proceeded against for street crimes, 54 per cent were black; for robbery, 59 per cent; and for gun crimes, 67 per cent. Street crimes include muggings, assault with intent to rob and snatching property.
Just over 12 per cent of London’s 7.5 million population is black, including those of mixed black and white parentage, while 69 per cent is white, according to the Office for National Statistics.
The police figures also show that black men are twice as likely to be victims. They made up 29 per cent of the male victims of gun crime and 24 per cent of the male victims of knife crime.
The Met declined to comment on the statistics. However, some officers will see them as a justification for Operation Trident, a unit targeting black-on-black murder and violent crime.
Others will see it as justification for targeting a disproportionate number of black men under stop and search powers. Figures released annually have shown black people are at least six times more likely to be stopped and searched than their white counterparts.
On sex offences, black men made up 32 per cent of male suspects proceeded against, and white men 49 per cent. The statistics also suggest that black women are responsible for a disproportionate amount of violent crime committed by females.
As with the statistics in the US, black crime rates are higher than white and other ethnicities, and the victims of black crime are in greater proportion black.
The is a sort of black self-genocide.
If black lives matter, blacks need to be policed more thoroughly in Blighty, not less.
SoD
Posted by: Loz | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 19:00
Racist Bristol BLM rioters pull down the philanthropist Edward Colston's statue because amongst supporting and endowing schools, almshouses, hospitals and churches in Bristol, London and elsewhere, he was also in the slave trade ...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52954305
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Colston
This is at the same time as they portray George Floyd in graphiti murals and placards as an angel and hero, in spite of his being a multiply convicted violent criminal, including aiming a loaded pistol at a woman's vagina while he robbed her, and with zero redeeming characteristics.
The stinking hypocrisy of these people knows no bounds.
SoD
Posted by: Loz | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 19:52
You're right about the blm bollox. The "only whites are racist" dogma clashes with my experience: the most racist person I ever came across was a black Tanzanian. When we honkies discussed him out of his hearing we concluded that he had been brainwashed in his education into thinking that black people could at least match white, if not beat them. When he came to college in the UK he couldn't and I don't think the poor bugger ever got over it.
Posted by: The Jannie | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 20:33
HSBC have been immoral, unethical, bandits for a long time. When posted to Hong Kong in the early 80's, I had a choice of opening a bank account with HSBC or Standard Chartered. I chose the latter. The problem, which soon became apparent, was that HSBC was the military bank, into which all the salaries were paid, so that the military would receive their pay on the last bank working day of the month. However, instead of immediately transferring the required amounts into the Standard Chartered so that those with accounts in that bank, were also paid on the same day as HSBC customers, they hung on to the money for a day or two, gaining interest, before transferring the money. At times, when a bank holiday appeared at the end of the month, the delays in getting paid were longer. Complaints were ignored by both Army and RN senior staff, though lectures on "managing your money" were offered instead.
A colleague, a much decorated SNCO, applied for a short term loan and was humiliated by a 20 odd year old bank underling who asked a number of extremely personal questions before demanding a letter from the soldier's CO that he could repay the loan and the interest. The underling was told to get stuffed. It was at hat point that we realised what 'FILTH' meant - 'Failed In London. Try Hong Kong'.
I certainly wouldn't shed any tears if the London office of HSBC came to the notice of the BLM morons.
Posted by: Penseivat | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 21:21
BLM seem rather selective over which black lives matter. If a felon with more "Form" than Red Rum dies with the Police being involved, it's "Loot and Scoot" time. Any innocent Black Person (for example, a 6 year old girl shot in a drive by shooting whilst doing her homework in her bedroom in Ferguson, Missouri while BLM rioted and looted over the death of a Black Thief) will be totally ignored. Clearly, quite a few Black Lives do not matter at all to BLM...
Posted by: Michael | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 21:29
There were sad looking pale white student types and some old redundant former socialists gathering in Glasgow today to support the BLM. They were let out from lockdown by the Scottish Government who condemn large gatherings. My own Mrs reluctantly admitted this was more about Trump than black lives. She does not like Trump and she is honest.
Posted by: Glesga | Sunday, 07 June 2020 at 22:58
https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/asking-the-correct-questions-about-poverty-and-slavery/
From a black intellectual.
Posted by: Whitewall | Monday, 08 June 2020 at 03:26