KILLER FACT!

Arson attacks in France increased by 2,500% between 1993 and 2000. And cases of arson in Britain rose 200,000% during the 20th century.

The West is losing the War on Arson, along with the War on Drugs, the War on Terror, the War on Fare Dodgers, and some other wars I don’t remember right now. Is it time to consider decriminalisation? Making it illegal just drives it underground and gives it a false glamour, like filleting haddock on a wooden surface*. If burning stuff down were legal it could be taxed and controlled, as in Holland. There was a most interesting piece about it in The Economist.

*Banned by the 1990 Food Safety Act, since when cases of food poisoning have obviously rocketed.

THIS COUNTRY'S REALLY GONE TO HELL SINCE WE STOPPED BURNING PAPISTS

Four hundred years ago today a bunch of religious headbangers tried to blow up London. How times have changed.

Killer Fact! Five of the gunpowder plotters were blood relations of William Shakespeare. And Macbeth is full of refererences to the fifth of November. Shakespeare also wrote these lines, as a warning to children on Bonfire Night:

The boy stood on the burning deck,
His pocket full of crackers,
One fell down between his legs,
And blew off both his knackers.

DOM JOLY DIPLOMACY

On August 15th, in the Poliedro de Caracas, Chavez said he was going to sneak up behind Bush and shout "Boo!" in his ear hole, at the Summit of the Americas. He hasn't done yet, but he might, and if he does it will be the first time in history that someone has shouted boo into the ear hole of a sitting US President.

It's an unorthodox way of conducting diplomacy, but I'm sure Bush will see the joke.


High-spirited crowds turn out to greet Bush.

UPDATE! Seriously, he really did say that. Though it wasn't exactly "Boo!" It was more sort of "Wah!" But there's no point quibbling: it's extremely good in either version. I doubt if Bush has ever said anything that witty.

I've never really watched EastEnders. Which one's "Dirty Den"?

NEWS!

-Arlington’s clowan story has ended. "Barely even gibberish, obviously the work of a lunatic." (The Evening Standard.) But forward it to twenty of your friends and you will have luck in the New Year.

-Could Gonzales tell us more? Greg Sargent ponders a legal but pie-in-the-sky scenario for the Fitzgerald investigation.

What? Who? Every tiresome pipsqueak with a website is mouthing off about some boring scandal in America. As far as I can make out, all that happened was that some slippery fellows in suits committed perjury, obstructed justice, sold rifles to the Apaches, etc. There’s the usual ham-fisted thuggery and Clouseau-like bungling from the Bush administration, but no love triangles, no falafel, no bawdy amusement of any kind. I filed it under important, but not to me.

-And speaking of bawdy amusement, our fun-loving Minister of Pensions has resigned again. Mad Dog Blair made some speech.

-Rebekah Wade is a slapper.

KILLER FACT!

Jesuits were banned in Switzerland until 1973.

KILLER FACT!

Canada is the world's biggest exporter of zinc.