FUTURUS

It was nice to meet up with some old friends as well as some current colleagues at a recent meeting in London to discuss the relaunch of FUTURUS, the think tank.

One of the many criticisms that has come out of the recent civil war in UKIP is the lack of academic integrity and a reliance on outdated arguments. FUTURUS will not be a UKIP project as such, that would not help our case at all, it will be non-party political, but with strong eurosceptic leanings.

There are certain policy areas in which eurosceptics are provided with rows of open goals. Sadly these are all too often missed, amongst the shadow chasing and in-fighting that dominates our slice of political space. FUTURUS is not the only such project emerging at present, and I think we can look forward to a long-awaited refreshment and rejuvination of our platform.

I was delighted to receive a copy of the new book ”Too ‘nice’ to be Tories?: How the modernisers have damaged the Conservative party” by Anthony Scholefield and Gerald Frost. The author's analysis of the flawed reasoning behind the modernisation of the Conservative party is extremely interesting and their arguments convincing. I strongly recommend it.

Enjoying my second childhood!

My son and I spend a lot of time at the military museum in Brussels http://www.klm-mra.be/klm-new/engels/main01.php?id=menu_links/startpagina

For those who are interested in such things, a few new exhibits have arrived. An 88mm flak gun and a Hawk SAM system to name but two. It is also possible to actually watch restoration work going on, and a DH Dragon Rapide is starting to look pretty impressive now.

Well worth a visit, and there is a reasonable cafe in the aircraft hangar where on Saturdays it is quite normal to sit down and join groups of Belgian veterans  for a spot of lunch. Youngsters can also sit in the cockpit of a Hawker Hunter, and wander around an old Flying Boxcar, but for some of us the superb collection of WW1 biplanes is the star attraction.

No Virgins for Osama!

By now I guess Osama Bin Laden will have realised that all that stuff about 72 virgins awaiting him in paradise was all total nonsense.

I think he is somebody who will not be terribly missed, but I wonder how the conspiracy theorists are taking the news. Many of them believed that Bin Laden did not actually exist.

I am aquainted with a true master of plots and conspiracies - in fact I breifly shared an office with him - who once explained to me that Bin Laden was an invention of a world government, and the George Bush ordered the destruction of the World Trade Centre. This was so that this shady secret world government could introduce 'anti-terror' laws that would enable them to enslave us. He was truly convinced of this. Mind you, he also believed that the Russian invasion of Chechnya was a CIA plot, and that wind-turbines are throwing the Earth off of its axis.

How does he feel now that Bin Laden is dead? How is he taking the news that his sad theory was complete nonsense?

Another favourite topic of the conspiracy theorists is the Bilderberg group. In fact, I remember about 10 years ago there was speculation about whether that group really existed, or whether it was part of an elaborate smokescreen put in place to hide the existence of something even more shadowy - there are even conspiracy theories about conspiracy theories, it seems. I decided to find out a bit more about the Bilderberg group, so I called up their secretariat in the Hague. A charming lady answered all my questions. Another barmy theory bites the dust - a bit like Osama Bin Laden!