It is good to be back in the US after three weeks in the South and West of England. There is no place like home, its comforts and its familiarity. It is some three years since I last visited the country of my birth and this time the central reason for visiting was to spend time with a close relative suffering a terminal illness. This took us to just north of London but we also spent some real vacation time in Devon and Dorset where we were blessed with unusually good weather.
My previous two visits to the UK over a period of ten years were to North London and the East Midlands so this time I am not able to exactly compare like with like. Still, it is possible to see differences that have taken place and I am sure that anyone who has been away for long periods can see changes that for the permanent residents are too incremental to be noticed. First, the positives! Parts of England in fine weather continue to look uniquely beautiful. This is especially true of rural and coastal Somerset, Devon, Cornwall and Dorset.
Wherever the countryside, villages and seaside towns have been spared ‘development’ and ‘cultural enrichment’, the old England remains worthy of the work of the world’s greatest artists. I recommend those places to any website visitor considering a vacation in the UK. I am sure the same could be said for much of Wales, East Anglia, the North East and the Scottish Highlands. The South West is still – outside of its biggest cities – “hideously White” and none the worse for that! The English Channel, the Channel coast line of Cornwall, Devon and Dorset and the small coastal towns that fringe it have preserved most of their heritage despite the attentions of developers and the dictates of Government to build for more population. In some places the changes have been a mixed bag. Exeter, which these days, thanks to the presence of its University and the growth of local Government, is now a Leftist bastion, is busy destroying the countryside to its East. Ugly business parks, a spider’s web of roads, roundabouts and bypasses have already gobbled up much good countryside, and the plans for a huge new housing development will soon swallow several once-beautiful villages. The local residents who overwhelmingly oppose this new town are, as usual in such things, being ignored. When it comes to building on green spaces, nothing gets in the way of the Government’s immigration targets and the Leftist Environmentalists always collude. In fairness, however, I must commend Exeter’s development of its river waterfront, an area that was once a rundown reminder of the industrial age.
Regarding the negatives I will start with the area of Hertfordshire around Stevenage. The countryside here has never been amongst England’s best but nevertheless it has had its own charms. Its villages, with many buildings dating back to the Eighteenth Century and earlier, were once amongst the prettiest that England had to offer. Stevenage will serve as my example for many of the small towns such as Hatfield and Hitchen that are now being vandalized by progress because they lie in the path of big cities ‘benefitting’ from mass Third World immigration. Let me make it clear that I am not blaming the immigrants for they are not responsible for the growing destruction of Old England. The blame lies wholly with the dominant Media Class, Leftists, political do-gooding self-haters and their Globalist Big Business allies, for these are the people who have in combination lulled, misinformed and betrayed the native British working people in order to swamp out of existence an independent Nation State and its people’s identity.
Not so long ago, Stevenage was an average small country town where change was gradual, the population had longstanding roots and the town center was characterized by old buildings that owed their existence to being on the ancient coaching road to London. It was surrounded by pretty old villages with village greens, country lanes that could be walked and cycled with safety and great old pubs. Then in the 1950’s a do-gooder had the idea of adding a new town to it in order to ‘rescue’ the people of East London and particularly, its slums. Unlike today’s Government efforts at social engineering, this was not one with a hidden and wicked agenda. As always, however, the road to ‘worse’ was paved with good intentions and as always the local residents wishes were ignored. The new town, which was architect-designed and applauded by progressives everywhere as a glorious symbol of the future is, quite frankly, obscenely ugly. I challenge anyone to visit the New Town shopping area or the industrial park or even the housing areas and deny the ugliness. The new town shopping area is depressingly awful, with its concrete walkways, its uninviting shops and fast food outlets and its predominant air of decline. The people who are most visible match their surroundings. Disaffected ‘yoof’, tattooed, purple-haired girls pushing strollers with one hand and a fag in the other, and adults who look both extremely poor (but able to afford the fags) and ignorant. It is hard to imagine that the local State benefits office is not doing excellent business. The people one sees are mostly ‘hideously White’ and indeed the few people who look and dress as though they have some pride are Asian. The shopping area looks ready for demolition and ‘redevelopment’ and I would not be surprised if it is soon gone, for 1950’s and 1960’s buildings generally have a short life, despite the fact that they were built in concrete and architect-designed by progressives building for a glorious future.
The surviving old town, not far away, is generally still a civilized place, despite some ugly modern intrusions and despite having become an island due to being encircled with busy roads and the ugly concrete pedestrian walkways and footbridges so beloved by modern planners. Sadly many of the beautiful old pubs and buildings now host ethnic food take-aways but old Stevenage’s main street is a standing reproof to modern architecture, local Leftist government and do-gooders. I have to ask these questions. Why is it that buildings that were erected willy-nilly (no Council planning departments in those days) in the 1700 and 1800’s are still standing and functional, shame modern buildings with their visual appeal and symbolize the spirit of the people of England’s past. These buildings were often built in times of economic hardship and by builders who had never been educated beyond the age of ten. Building materials were found locally and lacked all of the benefits of modern science. It is often argued by apologists for today’s Leftist, progressive architecture, that modern building is constrained by cost and the greed for profit but was this not always true? I am not here contrasting old buildings erected by great wool merchants and railway tycoons with Stevenage new town but comparing humble dwellings and pubs of the past, built by humble people, and comparing it to stuff designed by specially educated (arrogant) people (professionals), who have access to superior materials and whose work is overseen by armies of well-paid local and central government planners armed with great powers.
Did Stevenage New Town benefit those transported from East London? Might it not have been better to let East Londoners restore their own areas, assuming that they wanted better? Did they take with them to Stevenage standards and attitudes that have overwhelmed the local people and simply spoiled a bit of old England. I don’t profess to know the answers and the political correctness that now rules will not allow such questions to be asked. For the record, I grew up in a small version of East London’s grimy terraced-housing streets and I benefitted from a move to better surroundings, but was that experience typical? Two things are certain. One is that the transported East Londoners made room in London for mass immigration from the Third World. The second is that the breach in London’s Whiteness led to swifter and more mass immigration and fuelled White flight from London. More of that later!
I must mention the smallness of things in the England that I visited. The roads, both urban and beyond, have all become little rat-runs. Tiny cars, fit only for midgets, buzz everywhere like angry wasps, searching for short cuts and elusive parking spaces. The drivers of these boxes on wheels are aggressive, impatient and grossly competitive. It is rare to drive a quarter of a mile without being confronted by another roundabout. Mostly the roundabouts are every few hundred yards and each requires a life or death dash for entry. The out-of-town supermarkets are small, over crowded and their parking lots are wholly inadequate so that a parking space is at a premium. The parking spaces themselves are designed only for midget (now euphemistically called ‘smart cars’) vehicles. Gas stations have all but disappeared, for everyone fills up his midget at a super market pump and is prepared to wait in a long line in order to save a few pence on a litre of fuel. This is not irrational given that the price of highly-taxed fuel is astronomical when compared to costly, over-taxed California. The English people I talked to about the size of their cars, the over-crowded roads, the cost of gasoline, the tiny parking spaces, the overwhelming presence of race-track roundabouts, the once-pretty country lanes that have become perpetual rat-runs, and the stressfulness of competing for a space, seemed oblivious to the changes that have taken place and the decline in the quality of their lives. This is the terrible lesson for conservatives in America. Incremental changes from bad to worse are largely unnoticed by most people. Is it that they are too busy coping, simply too passive or is it that if, at the end of the journey they can enjoy the vicarious pleasures of TV, they are satisfied and convinced that life is good? What has happened in England is that it has become grossly overcrowded at the expense of most of its native people and of its towns and villages. For the new privileged classes such as Pop Stars, TV people, Film Stars, Establishment politicians, Celebrities, Union Leaders, top Government employees and Academics, secluded country estates beckon along with flights to superior foreign places. For some powerful sections of the new Ruling Class the over crowded cities offer unlimited supplies of the things they crave for – sex, perverted sex and drugs. Some people, in remoter parts of England, appear to be blissfully unaware that the over crowding problems will eventually reach them or their children or grandchildren – at least that is surely the only explanation for the latest election results. Others have been enabled by rising house prices in big cities (caused mostly by mass immigration) to join in the White flight to the West Country and other places and are therefore happy and unconcerned about the long term future.
Americans should be aware that Obama, his Leftist comrades and the Ruling Media Class that has put him in power, are working hard to inflict the contemporary British way of life on them. A country overcrowded with Third World masses, midget cars battling for scarce parking spaces, expensive gasoline, and a native people brainwashed and intimidated into subservience – this is where they want to take us. The British generally continue to get fatter, though not as fat as many Americans. This is not because they eat more healthily than Americans but because by necessity they have to walk more. From what I saw, the Brits are not getting better looking or better dressed either. The women, as in the US, are pre-occupied with the lives of celebrities and Media people and, during my visit, the Royal Wedding. I am struck by a curious fact. As the ordinary women get fatter and less appealing, the women of the Media World such as actresses and models become ever thinner and more glamorous. The gulf between the masses and the Ruling Class those masses are pre-occupied with, grows ever wider. I am sure that this is true of the American people too. There are exceptions, of course. No-one would call Media personalities Rachel Madow, Rosie O’Donnell and Oprah glamorous! Many more Brits smoke than the people here in California. This is especially true of the young in general and young mothers in particular. I spent time in pretty Dawlish in South Devon. Like many small seaside towns on the English Channel, it was grossly overcrowded and driving a car anywhere was a challenge only exceeded by the problems of finding a parking space. This was also true of coastal places I visited in East Devon, Cornwall and Dorset, though as the weather was exceptionally warm and there were Bank (Public) Holidays in this period, there were many visitors. Again, the population was hideously White (I am here quoting the words of BBC people). I almost never heard a West Country accent either amongst the holiday-makers or workers in shops, railway stations or pubs. The overwhelming accent is a quasi Cockney that Americans now assume is, alongside the Royalty voice, typically English. There are two possible explanations, and I think they are both relevant. One is that White Flight from London is continuing apace and the other is that the Average Englishman has adopted the speech and ignorant mannerisms of TV Soaps like East Enders and certain soccer stars. These are the role models of today’s people who live their non-working lives in front of a TV set. I am sure that TV and its propaganda powers, assisted by the Print Media and cinema, are increasingly and deliberately molding and dumbing-down the people. This is surely the main explanation for the failure of the British Nationalist Party to make progress at election times, though I think the Party’s lack of progress is made worse by the leadership style of Nick Griffin and his suffocating control over it. It seems that the Party’s main organ of communication – its website – can never issue any news items without a long delay for Griffin to approve them.
Here in the USA, I have concluded after a week of Media obsession with the Bin Laden assassination, that Obama actually led the raid in person. His heroism, his planning, his decision taking and his Statesmanship are now beyond dispute and his 2012 election victory certain. The Media has been in overdrive celebrating his warrior skills. I suspect that he had two reasons for agreeing to this assassination. One was that the Intelligence information and the military advice left him little room but to offend his Muslim friends and the other was his opportunist instinct that detected an opportunity to boost his sagging poll numbers in the midst of the frantic election campaign in which he is now engaged. The man is a shameless liar with a shallow intellect, a racial chip on his shoulders, a background of Leftist influences that he has only partially absorbed and an overwhelming ego. The official information released since the assassination is so conflicting as to be the stuff of farce. It surely reflects the incompetence and the cavalier attitude to facts of him and the Government he leads. Still, Obama has no need to worry since his Media Masters will continue to cover over his mistakes and amplify his lies. As long as he and his Administration expand Government, push the homosexual agenda and blatantly ignore the Constitution by directing resources to Leftist organizations, they will enjoy Media promotion and protection.
As I am a believer in revenge, I rejoice in the killing of Bin Laden. Whether it will have any long term effect on Muslim terrorism remains to be seen. There is no precedent for this for the world-wide movement of Islamic Imperialism is a new phenomenon. As we can see, the willingness of Muslims to commit suicide attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan continues. In Egypt, now under the rule of protestors that the MSM drooled over, Christians are now daily being murdered by the score. This will not bother the Christian-hating Media people and their Leftist allies and it will not cause Obama to lose a moments sleep. Indeed in Media circles, away from the public eye, I have no doubt that there is a consensus of satisfaction.
In both the UK and the USA inflation continues to gallop along. Do not be deceived by Government statements to the contrary. This inflation is not caused by a shortage of raw materials or food but by Governments wiping out Government debt by using the presses to print pounds and dollars.
While I was in Dawlish I was able to visit my relative in Starcross on the Exe Estuary. I can report that sea levels have not risen one centimeter from what they were 60 years ago. I see a reputable scientific journal is now claiming that Global Warming has somehow by-passed the whole of North America but is continuing apace in the rest of the world. Presumably, dangerous rising sea levels are also by-passing Starcross and Dawlish Warren. Can someone please email this website and explain?
Recommended Music Slot – My eldest son has brought to my attention a Peggy Lee recording from 1977. The album is called ‘Fever’ and the orchestra is led by Pete Moore who I had never heard of and may be English. Anyway, the arrangement is superb, as is the band. The tune Miss Lee sang on this recording that so impressed him is “Lover”. She had recorded this many years before with the excellent American Gordon Jenkins Orchestra and this too was a great recording. It is not often that a singer manages to repeat a hit many years later and equal the first, but for once, this is the case.