"Mr Blair, who was leading House of Commons tributes to Sir Edward, said: 'He was magnificent... a prime minister our country can be proud of.'" [BBC]

I noticed the House of Commons took some time off to pass around the valedictory hot air. If a retired ex-member of staff dies in my office we just pass around a memo and have a collection for a wreath.

5:12:29 PM    

In the otherwise entertaining Rixstep newsletter there is a small piece on the London bombings of 7 July and the two minutes silence observed on 14 July.

Both Radsoft and Rixstep suspended web operations for these two minutes and had for this purpose - and as an explanation - specially inserted home pages. Ed.

I'm sure the world feels better for that.

11:11:50 AM    

Avoid London - Area Closed was the message displayed on motorway signs today as I headed south from Stoke On Trent, over 100 miles from London.

And the helpful Mr Bush tells us:

[CNN] U.S. President George W. Bush was among the somber leaders who stood behind Blair as he spoke.'We will not yield to these people, will not yield to the terrorists,' he said in a short statement after Blair departed. 'We will find them, we will bring them to justice, and at the same time we will spread an ideology of hope and compassion that will overwhelm their ideology of hate.'

8:37:10 PM    

"Sometimes when you rely too much on stats, it can lead to some pretty ridiculous unintended consequences, as people focus on 'fixing' the stats, rather than actually dealing with the issue. That appears to be the case with a police emergency call center in Scotland. After a 'busy night' in which the center's 'call response targets' were not met, one of the dispatchers was sent outside to dial 999 repeatedly (999 being the equivalent of 911 in the US) on his mobile phone. Those calls were, of course, answered immediately, until the center's stats were at an acceptable rate. [From Techdirt]

11:04:45 PM    

Assuming there's no irony intended, this is an incredible site. Praise the mass murderer. We have a friend who agrees with our killing.

"A site to thank Prime Minister Tony Blair for his support of the American actions in Iraq." [ThankYouTony]

11:19:45 PM    

Did the right (or left) thing today by exercising my right to vote in the UK general election. For the first time in 3 elections I had to queue to get in to the polling station. I was the youngest punter there (I'm 21) and felt unnerved by all the grey Tory hairs around me. Perhaps I shouldn't have worn my 'F*** Thatcher!' t-shirt. When I got to the booth I suddenly felt a little light-headed. How wonderful that nice Mr Blair had deigned to allow me to draw two lines with a pencil to demonstrate either my total support for him or my total support for someone else. And if I vote for the eventual loser in my constituency he can ignore me anyway - my vote won't matter! I'll be unrepresented until next time, at least. If I recall, we were supposed to have been given some kind of proportional representation by now, but Mr Blair was too busy fighting wars to get round to it. Maybe next time! Oh, hang on. Is Mr Blair staying the full term or going early. Damn. I wish they'd let us know important things like that.

1:03:04 AM    

There's a lot of lying going on. Today a client lied about a telephone call I had made to them, quoting things I hadn't said. The notes I made of the call and the subsequent action I took prove that the client lied. But it's a client so they get away with it and I just have to chew my lip and try not to let it get me down.

Meanwhile Billy Liar is lying, and so is Gordon Brown-nose. I heard him say today that the UK went to war with Iraq to remove Saddam Hussian, because he was a cruel dictator. That's a plain lie. We were told at the time that we went to war because of Weapons of Mass Destruction. Liar, liar, liar.

10:35:30 PM