Popular Posts Of Last Seven Days

Wednesday 3 October 2007

FINALLY GOOD FOR SOMETHING

The {arguably} most uninformed and most uninformative newspaper in the world, "The Belfast Telegraph" has proven to be useful for something at last. City center BT newspaper vendors are giving away beautiful loaves with a purchase of today`s BT. I left the BT and took the loaf, it is more nutritious and makes better reading.

http://www.genesisbreads.com/
Check out their wonderful website !!

2 comments:

Malcolm Merriweather II said...

WHAT DOES PAISLEY AND PUTIN HAVE IN COMMON ?????
DO THEY BELONG TO THE SAME HEALTH CLUB????
DO THEY READ THE SAME BOOKS????
DO THEY PLAN ON BEING IN "RIPLEY'S BELIEVE IT OR NOT ????
DO THEY EACH PLAN ON A "THIS IS YOUR LIFE" MOVIE ????
DO THEY EACH PLAN ON OUT RUNNING THE ENERGIZER BATTERY BUNNY ??


YOU DECIDE..

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Russia: Shrugs, Scorn Greet Putin's 'Prime Minister' Plans
October 3, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- Russian President Putin has announced his intention to head the Unified Russia party's list of candidates for December's elections to the State Duma. In surprise statements made at a congress of the pro-Kremlin ruling party, Putin also said he was not opposed to eventually becoming prime minister. Some policy watchers predict the move will hand Unified Russia more than 70 percent of the vote. Becoming prime minister would also enable Putin to remain in power after his second and last presidential term ends in March 2008. RFE/RL's Russian Service asked some of Russia's top opposition leaders to comment on Putin's latest move.



Garry Kasparov
Head of the United Civic Front since 2005; named the presidential candidate of the Other Russia bloc in September. United Civic Front is a fairly new organization that is united primarily by its opposition to the policies of President Vladimir Putin. It advocates an open political system and grassroots participation. The United Civic Front is not officially registered and is not eligible to participate in the December 2 Duma elections.
"What we are dealing with here is a kind of referendum to measure trust in Putin, in the tsar, rather than parliamentary elections. It's obvious that this de facto referendum that will take place on [December] 2 renders the election process pointless. For us, putting forward a list was a declaratory and fundamental gesture, because it's important to develop an alternative reality. If a political crisis breaks out in the country -- and I think that's inevitable -- there needs to be an alternative source of legitimacy.
"Several scenarios are possible, but one thing is clear: Putin has decided to stay and control the situation. He represents a certain camp in the political debate, and that's something [former President Boris] Yeltsin did not do. Yeltsin's system was based on the concept of a president as the father of all Russians; he didn't directly participate in the political process. Putin will give a shape to the content that is emerging in what we can call a soft one-party dictatorship in the style of the former GDR [East Germany]."
Nikita Belykh
Chairman of the National Political









THEN WE HAVE THE PAISLEY AND COMPANY...
THR FAMILY MOVIES ????


Paisley: The Movie is a tough sell
Roll up for The Last King of Ulster - but there are some serious hurdles to overcome before the Big Man is immortalised on screen.

Peter Bradshaw

Latest blog posts
Does Control's take on disability mark a new dawn?
Millais: the greatest cinematographer of the 19th century?
Northern Rock's crisis is like something out of the movies
Show all articles
Full profile

All Peter Bradshaw articles
About Webfeeds
March 22, 2007 12:50 PM | Printable version

Paging Brian Blessed: Ian Paisley in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, earlier this month. Photograph: Peter Muhly/AFP



The fashion for impersonating real-life characters onscreen and on stage continues: a kind of bio-docudrama-pic tendency, strip-mining the collective newsreel memory for heroes and villains too old, or too dead, or too constitutionally constrained to sue if the script isn't to their liking. We've had the Queen and Idi Amin on screen, with Brian Clough and Don Revie in the pipeline, a rumoured project about Margaret Thatcher and the Falklands on the way and David Frost and Richard Nixon are wowing audiences on Broadway.

Now it's time for the unlikeliest movie hero of all: the Reverend Ian Paisley, the legendary veteran of Unionist politics, who at 80 years old may well become the First Minister of Northern Ireland: a kind of Struldbrugg achievement in modern democratic politics. He is actually getting his own movie, reportedly commissioned and produced by the Paisley family itself, and almost certainly to be entitled The Big Man, Paisley's ruefully affectionate nickname.

Liam Neeson has apparently turned the role down, and Richard Griffiths might be in the frame. But there are other problems besides casting. What Hollywood producers always ask about with a new project is "rootability". Can you root for the hero? And would you, ahem, want to root the hero?

With Dr Paisley, I have to say that the answer is only "yes" if you have a great big Good King Billy Of The Boyne mural painted on the side of your house. The Paisley family may however be ready to tough out the vicissitudes of public affection. After all, they've been doing it politically for decades. And if they're seriously intending to bankroll a feature film, they must have some pretty deep pockets. I remember as a teenager visiting Belfast to stay with my grandmother, who lived near the Botanical Gardens in Rugby Road, and my father cheerfully taking me to gaze upon Dr Paisley's church: where the legendary "silent collection" was practised. The big man wanted only banknotes from each congregant. God help you if he heard the cheap clink of coins. Now, obviously no-one is suggesting that collection money is being used on the fripperies of cinema, but I think it shows the Paisley family's formidable sense of financial reality.

I think a very good and interesting film could be made about Ian Paisley. It would be fascinating to see a politician become islanded and fortified within his lifelong beliefs and prejudices, and finally to achieve an extraordinary pre-eminence, paradoxically, just when his brand of Unionism was utterly outdated, and achieve this by having to break bread and share power with the hated Republicans. What happens to a Unionist politician when he emerges from the Derry Siege of the mind? It's an intriguing challenge for an actor, and a writer.

But how the heck do you show a softer, more sympathetic side to Ian Paisley? Does such a side exist? Can he lower the decibel-level when he talks in private? And how are they going to dramatise the extraordinary moment in 1988 when Pope John Paul II addressed the European Parliament and Paisley, an MEP, stood up and bellowingly accused him of being the "Antichrist"? This isn't exactly Gandhi or Mandela we're talking about here. Dr Paisley is a tough sell.

Movieland's view of Northern Ireland is overwhelmingly antipathetic to Unionism, and Belfast itself is difficult to represent other than as a war zone. A Paisley movie might - just might - provide a corrective, though with the family's right of veto over the script, I have a heavy heart. Ian Paisley is so long lived that the movie might give cinemagoers a chance to realise that Belfast and Northern Ireland had and have an existence distinct from The Troubles. Perhaps it might be something with the sweep and flair of Carol Reed's Belfast-set drama Odd Man Out (1947) - although that, too, had a context of violence. I hope the Paisley film gets made, and that it isn't quite a hagiography. I worry that any comedy involved might be unintentional.




Digg this | Add it to Del.icio.us | Conversations about this post




This entry was tagged with the following keywords: ianpaisley thequeen lastkingofscotland frostnixon idiamin donrevie brianclough liamneeson richardgriffiths ulsterunionism derryseige carolreed oddmanout thetroubles belfast silentcollection

Comments
Comments have been closed on this entry

mickeydolenz

Comment No. 437288

March 22 13:39

GBR
commissioned & produced by the family itself? are you absolutely sure about that?

Malcolm Merriweather II said...

Thursday, October 4, 2007
LIARS LIARS ALL PANTS ON FIRE.........
DID HE KNOW ?DID SHE KNOW ? DID THEY KNOW ?DID WE KNOW ?.......

SOUNDS LIKE THE LYRIC'S TO THE NEW LINE DANCE SONG. "DOIN the UKNOW"...
THE DANCE THAT'S SWEEPING THE COUNTRY.............

Paisley embroiled in cronyism furore
[Published: Thursday 4, October 2007 - 10:40]
By David Gordon
DUP leader Ian Paisley made angry representations in support of a grant bid by would-be Giant Causeway visitor centre developer Seymour Sweeney, the Belfast Telegraph can reveal today.
In a dramatic new twist in the "Causeway cronyism" row, the Telegraph has discovered that a strongly-worded letter in 2003 by Mr Paisley to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) contained a highly questionable claim in support of the tycoon's funding application.The DUP leader stated in the letter that Mr Sweeney had the blessing of international world heritage body UNESCO for his Causeway centre scheme.A senior UNESCO official has disputed giving any backing to the businessman. Indeed, its own position in the visitor centre debate now runs directly contrary to Mr Sweeney's blueprint.The DUP has faced "cronyism" claims since its Ministers handed a major boost to the Causeway plans tabled by the developer, who is himself a DUP member.
DUP Environment Minister Arlene Foster last month said she was "of a mind" to grant planning approval to Mr Sweeney's centre scheme. She also stated that she had been unaware of his DUP affiliation when she announced her preliminary verdict. Environment chiefs within the Minister's department recommended a planning refusal.
Above: Ian Paisley's letter to the Heritage Lottery Fund
The controversy has centred on the fact that Mr Paisley's MLA son, Ian Paisley Jnr, has lobbied in support of the businessman on a range of issues over a number of years. It was fuelled by the fact that Mr Paisley Jnr answered: "I know of him" when asked by a radio interviewer if he supported the developer. Mr Sweeney sought a HLF grant for his proposed Causeway centre development in 2002.The application named the DUP leader as a prospective trustee of a charitable body which would help run the developer's centre.It has now been learned that Mr Paisley sent a furious letter to the HLF, a public body, in January 2003, after it had turned down Mr Sweeney's bid. That letter has been obtained by this newspaper following a freedom of information request. Written on headed Commons paper, it denounced the grounds for turning down the grant bid as "absolute rubbish". It also claimed, more than once, that Mr Sweeney's visitor centre plans had the support of UNESCO, the UN body which oversees world heritage sites like the Causeway. It said: " UNESCO saw and approved the plans, and were very impressed by the proposal." UNESCO has denied adopting such a stance. It actually issued its own mission team report on the visitor centre issue later in 2003, with recommendations that would rule out Mr Sweeney's blueprint.
This report said new Causeway premises should be built in the footprint of the Moyle Council visitor centre facility destroyed by fire in 2000.
UNESCO further stated that there should be "no extension in size and height" to the previous centre, and "no additional development" should be permitted in the vicinity.
Mr Sweeney's proposals involve a significantly larger-scale development on an alternative site in his ownership.
Mr Sweeney has spoken publicly about holding a highly-favourable meeting with senior UNESCO official Mechtild Rossler in 2001.
Ms Rossler has contested any suggestion of endorsement, and would not have had the authority to personally sign the organisation up to the project in any case.
She has made clear to the Belfast Telegraph that she would not support anything without going through the necessary UNESCO procedures.
She has also stated that UNESCO does not "decide on proposals" and that this would be a matter for Government bodies in the light of the UNESCO 2003 report.
Ms Rossler further said: "We were absolutely clear that any new visitor centre must be built in the footprint of the centre that was burnt down. That is my position and I am not moving one millimetre."
A DUP source told the Belfast Telegraph that Mr Paisley Snr had met with a UNESCO official to discuss the Causeway situation.
Mr Sweeney's proposals at the 2001 meeting differed in a key respect from those on the table by 2003. His 2001 blueprint was to have been located on Moyle Council's land above the Causeway.
By 2003 - the time of Mr Paisley's letter - his proposal was for an alternative location on his own land.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/article3027402.ece© Belfast Telegraph



SWING YOUR PARTNER BY THE SASH ON HIS RETURN HAND HIM SOME CASH..
DON'T BE LEFT OUT IN THE COLD DARE TO BE A LITTLE BOLD....
BE SURE TO ASK WHAT IS YOUR NAME IF YOU 'RE IN THE DUP IT'S ALL THE SAME...
IF YOU WANT SOME CASH JUST STAND IN LINE AND YOU CAN BE A FRIEND OF MINE..



Posted by Malcolm Merriweather II a