AIRSTRIP ONE

Hi, I'm Jim...

Know me as Gemineye Jim or Jim Gemineye. Anything, as long as it's not Jim Gemineye chéri! On the other hand, Eric is a nice name..

BLAIR'S MILLENNIUM

Eric Blair wrote the book 1984 using the pen name GEORGE ORWELL. Like all good science fiction 1984 dealt not so much with fanciful illusions about the future, but about his own perceptions of his time (1948). Writers sometimes have to use outlandish contexts in order to break the barriers of preconceptions that readers put up. However, in creating this new context, he explored several ideas that we could apply to other eras and also see come to fruition in this new millennium.

• Telescreen - we thought this was his view of the new medium of TV being used to brainwash the masses. That was before digital TV came along. Digital TV will evolve - it will be on all the time, it will be two way - the TV in the bedroom will have to go.
• Newspeak - Didn't quiet get this right. The idea was destroy the ability to express unorthodox ideas by destroying the language required to communicate them. This was done by simplification. Well, if anything, language has become even more complex. But some might argue that corruption of words like cool and wicked accomplish the same thing as Newspeak. On the other hand with the creation of a ‘drug culture' do you need Newspeak? If you're on the right drugs you can drivel on for hours without saying anything meaningful - let alone radical.
• Chocolate rations - Not quite sure why chocolate rations figured so much in Orwell's vision. It was used as a kind of reward or punishment. If news was bad, chocolate rations were reduced - if news was good, chocolate rations were increased. It was as if the people were held to blame for events in Airstrip One, We don't have chocolate rations now - but we do have interest rates.

Airstrip One was the new name for England or Britain under the regime of Big Brother.

Welcome to a different kind of spin... it's less gassy and leaves no bitter after-taste.

DEATH
STAR
SPOTTED
IN
BRUSSELS

European Parliament
in Brussels appears to have been modelled on Star Wars Death Star
as was the Millennium Dome in Greenwich.

IS IT A CONSPIRACY

or just spheroid envy?

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Gemineye asks important questions
like that every
month with no more than one vowel in it

Prescott can't wait
for 'grey belt' land?

A report in the Financial Times (October 1999) announces that a panel of inspectors appointed by John Prescott (Deputy Prime Minister) recommends over one million homes be built in the S.E. England by 2016. It would mean an end to green belt land.

Well, someone has gotta ask... Is any new development required at all, let alone on green belt land. When it comes to providing health care and pensions, we are constantly reminded that we have a large aging population. Well, to be blunt, they're not going to live forever are they - and all these old people, they're not all homeless or living with relatives are they?

So in a few years time there is going to be a lot housing stock released. We could even see a housing glut as our NHS seems to be unhappy with this demographic imbalance and is doing all it can to reduce the number of old people claiming pensions.
There are not enough young people to replace the aging population - we are told. So why do we need all this new development?

Its certainly not for the homeless - they can't afford the prices being asked for these new homes.
Perhaps the 'grey belt' housing is the wrong kind of housing. Smelling of cats and in need of fitted kitchens and stencilled walls. Or perhaps there's just more money to be made from building new houses?

All the same, it does beg the question - what happens to the 'grey belt' land?

INTEREST RATES UP 15%

Blair not to be
new Cardinal

In a shock statement from Rome, we learn that Tony Blair is not to succeed the late Cardinal Basil Hume. Rumours have it that the late Cardinal Hume has been late for so long that Tony Blair had thought that it was a requirement for the job and declined the offer.

The position is now likely to go to their second choice, Bishop Vincent 'Knocker' Nichols.

INTEREST RATES DOWN 15%