Browns QBs

So there's a lot of talk about an Eaglse QB moving to the Browns. I will buy the argument that McNabb won't go there because of salary considerations - you don't sign a QB with a year to go on his deal, you just don't, and in an uncapped year I am not convinced that Cleveland has the money to get a new one done.

Kolb on the other hand... I could see that. I saw a comment on NFP that you'd need to give up a 1st round pick. But for someone who has maturity and some game time, if you value him, then sure, go for it. Don't tell me you can't get a 2nd round pick for Quinn, and a 3rd for Anderson - in fact, I bet you Anderson would be delighted to go back to the Ravens, assuming that Troy Smith goes, and Quinn has enuogh cold weather experience to go to the Bills, perhaps. At that point you can pick up a west coast back up - Garcia? - and suddenly the Browns have 2 2s, 2 3s, probably the shifty back up back in a new contract, grab yourself a Falcons cast off back (Norwood/Snelling), maybe Weaver (UFA?), rack up a couple more O Linemen, a handful of WRs in the dog ends of the 5th, a couple of DL with your other higher picks, and you're moving forward, no?

Tax and Electoral Reform

So

Apparently Labour have spotted that electoral reform might save them at the polls. [link]

What they're talking about is probably to a certain degree what they have in France, but geared down to the local parliamentary level. This would probably work pretty well for me, because I vote tactically against the party with whom I most disagree. I say most disagree. I mean loath the principles of. But there we are. However, I don't think this goes anywhere near far enough.

Here's an idea (it's my idea, but I'd like to call it an idea)

There's 646 seats in the commons. That's pretty big.

Probably about 15 are in Northern Ireland, which is a pretty unique political environment. To be honest, I think it would be good to have a lower house in England which dealt only with English issues and had only English representatives (ie elected by the English population) and an upper house who ratified bills as legal, and dealt with national issues (I'm going to say Security, Foreign Policy... that's it).

But that won't happen, because of the electoral math that Labour uses. So let's keep the Scots and Welsh in too, but recarve the political districts. The problem with PR is that you

A - lose the local value from MPs
B - have coalition issues

But the problem with first past the post is that you have

A - local MPs lobbying for programmes which won't help the nation as a whole
B - have absentee MPs who are the party fat cats

So let's mix

636 Constituency MPs.... No use to me. Let's have 346 constituency MPs, still plenty so that a city like Leicester would have 1 MP instead of the current 3, with some spill over into the counties. Probably Charnwood would get rolled into Loughborough, for instance.

Let's also have 300 PR elected MPs. What you'll get there is probably all the front bench MPs in the PR list. Because let's face it, if you can't get 100 of these people (1/3 of the total vote) you aren't winning the election.

The party leader would be #1, your deputy leader #2 etc. This would also get rid of the farce of Lords being appointed to sit in Cabinet, or parachuting MPs into safe seats (which is just insulting, really).


And tax

Let's talk tax

All the money we pay in tax goes into the consolidated fund (let's exclude NI for the time being). This big current account type money gets cut up into all sorts of bits and bobs. But who knows where.

I think a hypothecated tax system would be a bit clearer, don't you?

Oh.

I'll explain. Hypothecation would mean (this is just an example) that you'd pay tax like this:

You earn 22 grand. 6 grand of that is tax free. You'll pay

8% on the remaining 16 grand for the NHS
3% for national defense
1% for communities
2% for benefits/pensions deficits
1% for border control/immigration
1% for education

etc

Then all the tax you pay on petrol goes to transport infrastructure

Let's get rid of VAT, because it is evil. Because you pay it regardless of your means. And I think that's immoral.

This way, of course, when governments came in and said "we're going to cut tax by 1%" you'd say: "which bits, chap? Because, if anything, I'd like to see my NHS contribution go up a bit so we could have shinier new hospitals. And do we really need those nuclear submarines? Because if we didn't have them, you could slap that money into hospitals too. Or maybe some schools. You know, for the little kids, who will then pay tax and then I can retire before my hands fall off with the rheumatiz"

Just a thought that the current system allows the politicians to lie to us, and I think certain parties are more likely to lie to us, because I just don't trust them to be honest.

Also

Arch Enemy. Disturbing how hot she is.

Wales do not fear Argentina's scrum, claims Warren Gatland

In other news

"I do not understand the scrum", says Warren Gatland

Australia are stronger indeed - and this man coached the Lions forwards this year. It makes me weep, it truly does.

Susan Boyle

I'd be more impressed with her 100,000 sales if Guns hadn't sold 15m copies of Use Your Illusion.

And you know, if I weren't so bitter and cynical

Colts vs Pats

I haven't watched more than the first half of the first quarter, but there have already been two catches which caused my breath to just stop - the Garcon snatch in front of Bodden was just superb in terms of reaction time, and although I haven't seen it ruled in yet, the Reggie Wayne catch was something else

Brunch Break

Positives:

1 - All day breakfast contains pork products
2 - All day breakfast contains vegetable portions
3 - All day breakfast comes with tea and toast (two things that could undermine my "all boys need for happiness is things that start with the letter B" theory)
4 - Brunch means you had a lie in (even if it was only five minutes more)
5 - Two meals a day seems better for you than one meal
6 - The morning is broken up nicely

Negatives:

I've been back from lunch for over an hour now... How is it still only one o clock?

Quick, it's a controversy

Ok, so I can't bring myself to give a rat's ass about the Sun's latest lunacy. "The one eyed prime minister misspelt my dead son's name".

Go bollocks.

The prime minister takes time out of his schedule doing nothing important besides, you know, running a political party and a country, to write hand written letters. I'm not sure who started this hand writing letters thing, but I suspect it was someone with no massive recession and a casualty toll that wasn't mounting. Don't get me wrong, I respect the sacrifice the soldiers make, but they also know what they're getting themselves into. It's a volunteer army, not a drafted corps anymore. We should respect the courage, but we shouldn't be totally surprised when, in a war, some of those brave men and women die.

The worst thing about this is, if I were an incoming politician, I'd have serious qualms about continuing with the practice of privately recognising the sacrifice. Especially when it turns you into a political punchline and punchbag in short order.

So yeah, well done Mrs James, or Janes, or whatever. You've disrespected the highest office in the land, undermined parliamentary political process, potentially removed the possibility for politicians to sincerely and privately recognise the bravery of soldiers without any ludicrous flag waving or patriotic nonsense.