Waiting for Dog

Although rarely the focus of it, religion had always been part of my life.

Although I hardly remember him, my grandfather was a Church of England vicar - and a very good one from what I've heard. The sort of man who sacrificed a lot for the sake of his 'flock' and was an advisor, friend and mentor to his parishioners as much as their spirtual leader.

At school, I was one of the last generation of kids who said prayers and sang hymns at assembly. In Autumn, we'd go to Harvest Festival at the local church. We sang religious Christmas Carols to our parents at the end of the year.

I attended St David's University College, in Lampeter. It was originally founded by Cambridge as a theological university for aspiring priests. Many of my friends later went on to a career in the Church of England.

Although I'd never been a regular church goer, I fell heavily for an aspiring priest (priestess?) while I was there and used to obediantly follow her to chapel several times a week.

I left university and the years of indoctrination did their trick. Although I didn't regularly attend church, I still considered myself a Christian. As a history major, I tempered my consideration of the Bible with my knowledge of historical fact (something some Christians are unwilling to do) but I still believed in the big, general idea of Christianity.

I talked to God. A lot. And I never asked him for anything except the strength or motivation to achieve my goals or make it through troubling periods of my life.

When I finally met my wife, my religious convictions (however little conviction I had in them) were at least part of the reason why she considered me valid matrimonial material. She is a deeply spiritual Catholic. I don't believe she'd have married somebody who didn't at least believe in God. She often asked me if I prayed (I never liked the term 'pray.' I talked to God, like you would a friend, older brother, father or boss.)

As such, things continued more or less smoothly for the first four years of our marriage - until something that might seem to be utterly insignificant utterly shattered my beliefs.

Meaningless

On July 15th of last year, my wife's little cat Ava got hit by a car. She died in my wife's arms as we zoomed off to the local animal hospital. It was just once - and just for a second - but as Ava passed away my wife let out the most heart wrenching sob. It still brings tears to my eyes when I remember hearing it.

Some people may scoff, since Ava was 'just' a cat - but when Ava passed away I remember being filled to overflowing with hot, bubbling anger. I was utterly, hatefully furious with this 'God' who I had believed in and trusted.

Ava passing away didn't shake my wife's beliefs, but it completely destroyed mine. For a while, I still believed in God. I still believed in the 'facts' of Chrisianity. They just stopped making sense to me. Every single day, I observed more and more things about 'Christianity' that seemed disgustingly hypocritical or desperately absurd.

I listened to Christians try to explain to why a 'good' God (who grants rewards to his faithful subjects) would allow bad things to happen. And the more I heard the excuses, the justifications and the fantasies, the more they made my skin crawl. Try reading this disgusting piece of tripe.

It was only after a conversation with my father, during which we discussed history, the Bible and faith through the ages, that the penny dropped. I realised that the way the real world operated was quite simply incompatible with the fantasy of Christianity.

I didn't need to keep asking myself why, or waste anger on a deaf, dumb and blind God who only existed in the prayers I'd previously made to him. I looked up to the heavens and instead of seeing The Father, The Son and the Holy Ghost, I saw twinkling stars - flaming balls of gas burning millions of miles away.

I realised God didn't exist - and it was one of the most liberating spiritual experiences of my life.

I even stopped being angry about Ava. Her being hit by that car wasn't down to the negligence of some careless, patriarchial diety. It was just an accident. It meant I could finally just let it go and be sad for the little cat, instead of holding her inside me like a big ball of angry fire.

And remarkably, as soon as I slipped free from the shackles of faith, the world started to make more sense. The beliefs I'd had in this 'God' were soon replaced by an embrace of rationalism. Facts and science and history offered answers to things that Christianity never had.

I felt empowered. I'd previously thanked 'God' for the good fortune I'd had achieving my dreams, like moving to America. Once I'd stepped free from religion's shadow, I realised that the people I needed to thank were my parents, my mentors, my wife, my friends and even, to a larger extent than I'd ever thought before, myself.

And I had hope. Because if achieving dreams was down to hard work and luck, rather than the whim of the 'Holy Father,' I could play the odds and take my chances. If I won - fantastic! If I lost, I'd know it was down to bad luck or lack of skills or effort - instead of a cruel God punishing me for 'lustfully' checking out a girl on the subway or some other equally ridiculous 'sin.'

Morality was easy. Respect for my fellow man - and respect for the laws of the state of New Jersey - were all the moral guidance I needed. I no longer needed to feel guilty for a litany of meaningless 'sins' invented by a repressive religious regime.

I walked away from God and it was one of the best decisions of my life. Never before have I felt so alive. Never before has the world made so much sense to me. I have experienced 'enlightenment' and embraced my new destiny as a Born Again Athiest.

But the problem?

While I have undergone this spiritual awakening, my wife is still devoutly Catholic. She would be horrified to know that I have utterly lost my 'faith.' I feel bad about it - but it's not like I have any choice in the matter. It just 'clicked' and nothing's ever made so much sense to me before. I can't go back to believing in God any more, just as I'm sure no devout Christian could just 'decide' to become an athiest.

But I keep my beliefs to myself - and I am still entirely respectful of what she chooses to believe.

Jesus is Still my Homeboy

It's important to note that a lack of Christian belief doesn't mean I've stopped believing in the Bible. The Bible - at least parts of it - contain documented historical fact.

Werner Keller's amazing book The Bible as History is an excellent starting point. Although the archeological material is quite dated now (most of it pre-dates the 1930's) the facts are clear. Many of the 'stories' of the Bible are actually based on real events from that period of history.

Noah's Ark and the Great Flood, for example. In 1996, William Ryan and Walter Pitman, geologists from Columbia University, published evidence of an immense flood of the Black Sea in 5600BC (matching the dating in the Bible) which could well have served as the the basis for the myth of The Great Flood. For almost a full year, ten cubic MILES of seawater flooded farmland around the Black Sea nearly every single day.

Considering so much of the Bible contains nods to actual historical events, it's entirely logical to believe that some of the stories have some basis of truth to them. Which means the teachings of a humble carpenter from Nazereth are a philosophy that can't be disregarded as easily as the fantasy of an 'all powerful' cat-murdering God.

Angry.

I am no longer angry at God - because I might as well be angry at Winnie the Pooh or Captain Ahab. I might as well be angry at a cup of coffee for all the good it does.

But I am angry at a lot of Christians - especially since coming to America. I'm angry for all sorts of reasons. Some of these reasons are entirely selfish.

One of the things I detest most about 'hard core' Christians is them ramming their faith down my throat. Am I any better when I scoff and seeth at their wretched refusal to accept rationality and fact? Pride is a Christian sin, yet it took athiesm to make me humble in my beliefs.

I am still open to other beliefs because rationalism doesn't offer all the answers. For example, the concept of a 'higher power' delivering that inexplicable 'spark' which gave birth to all life on earth is entirely rational. Scientists can't quite explain how 'life' came from 'no life' and until they do, the idea of a mystical deity providing that spark is as difficult/easy to prove as any more 'rational' explanation.

What I can't stand - and what constitutes the 'faith' that I want to ram down the throat of pious Christians - is when they ignore irifutible, documented fact and instead chose to remain ignorant by sticking to dogma that's been proven time and time again to be utterly fantastical.

Like creation. For thousands of Christians, their 'God' can't be limited to rational scientific theory (the 'higher power' and the 'spark of life' theory.)

They declare that the world was created seven thousand years ago, when God made the heavens and the earth and made Adam from clay - creating Eve from his rib. It's exactly as it was laid out in the Bible.

WHICH IS RUBBISH! I mean, how can the world only be seven thousand years old when we have carbon dated human fossils dating back 130,000 years? Carbon dating is a pretty exact science. Christians who dispute carbon dating might as well dispute the existence of the light bulb, or Sweden.

Well, why not? They've never been there. They've only read about it in books. So there's no 'proof' that Sweden exists.

It's so utterly idiotic that it makes me swoon. The thought of a man like Mike Huckabee - who believes in the biblical story of creation - making it to the White House is utterly terryifying. What else does he not believe in?

Another perfect example is the story of Noah's Ark - I've mentioned it above.

You'd have thought the fundementalist Christians would be happy that history has given credibility to the overall story of the Bible. But NO.

They're not happy - because a flood in Europe isn't what the Bible says happened:

"Noah’s Flood was not a local flood in the Black Sea area," utterly retarded website Answers in Genesis declares, "but a world-wide flood that has left its mark on every continent on this planet."

Which it isn't - since you'd think we'd have noticed one of those.

I should try and restrain myself, because human beings have the right to believe whatever they want. No matter how stupid it is.

But whenever I hear a 'born again' Christian dismissively say: 'the world was created in seven days, just like it says in the Bible, and the theory of evolution is just a theory,' I still feel the urge to whack them around the chops and angrily expose them out as the blinkered idiot they clearly are.

But I can't do that. Because that's not very 'Christian' of me. It's ironic that popular use of the term 'Christian' signify acts of charity, generosity and respect - while 'real' Christians can often be incredibly disrespectful.

Take for example this letter, sent to the parents of Heath Ledger - the talented young actor who starred in Brokeback Mountain and passed away last week.

Stupidity and Hate

"I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle," says presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee. The Westboro Baptist Church is more concise. "God hates fags!"

Christianity is often used as a shield for people to say offensive things that would never be tolerated in secular society.

Lesbians and gays getting married hurts nobody. Homosexuality isn't a 'lifestyle choice' but a genetic trait that appears in animals as well as humans - yet fundementalist Christians try to change natural human behavior by manipulation, lies and emotional blackmail.

Why can't fundementalist Christians join polite society in embracing tolerance instead of hate? After all, if you read the Bible, that's what Jesus himself would do.

Jesus, whether he was a humble carpenter from Nazereth or the son of God made man, had a simple philosophy. Accept every man as your brother.

Until modern fundementalist Christians can actually follow the scripture of their prophet, it looks like we'll still be living in a country in which the most 'Christian' of people are liberal secularists.

Back on the Radio...

See that?

It's Tina and I on the corner of 46th and Broadway - otherwise known as Times Square.

Capital FM and Power FM presenter Ben Glover, who I used to work with back in England, cannily connected to EarthCam, which offers live webcams from all sorts of locations all over the world.

The other day, I was live on air - and on camera - during Ben's show back in Hampshire.

Funny to think that less than a decade ago, I didn't even have a mobile phone and Internet access was generally only achieved over a phone line. Now I can wave at my old neighbours all the way from across the Atlantic!

The wonders of modern technology, eh?

You can hear Ben Glover every afternoon from 4-7pm (GMT) on Power FM Drive.

Kosovo about to Declare Independence?

Foul-mouthed and opinionated blogger The Exile, who whines about the plight of the British working class while sipping Negra Modelo in the sunshine of Mexico City, posted a pretty terrifying quote from Yuri Baluyevsky, Chief of General Staff at the Kremlin.

"We do not intend to attack anyone, but we consider it necessary for all our partners in the world community to clearly understand that to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Russia and its allies, military forces will be used, including preventively, including with the use of nuclear weapons."

What is Yuri talking about?

Well, doubtless he's referring to Kosovo's imminent declaration of independence. With the Serbian presidential election set February 3rd, the province of Kosovo is poised to declare their independence should nationalist candidate Tomislav Nikolić win.

Tomislav Nikolić took over leadership of the nationalist Serbian Radical Party when former leader Vojislav Šešelj left for The Hague, to face charges of War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity.

If Tomislav Nikolić defeats moderate incumbent Boris Tadić, things will look bleak for the war torn province of Kosovo. It seems wise to strike out for independence while there's still a UN presence to protect them from Serbian retaliation.

But Yuri Baluyevsky's words are worrying. While most of the UN supports Kosovo's pleas for independence, Russia is highly skeptical of granting them freedom from Serbian oppression.

Not because of any concern or comradeship with the people of Serbia. Simply because Kosovo's UN-supported independence would throw an awkward spotlight on Russia's brutal treatment of breakaway provinces within their own nation.

If Baluyevsky is to be taken seriously, Russia might commit supplies, support, troops and even nuclear weapons to prevent Kosovo from achieving it's well-deserved independence.

It's a very thinly veiled threat of war - and the UN might well be left with no option but to call their bluff -or else back down and let vile vulture Vladimir Putin bully democracy into submission.

Thanks for playing, Rudy...

Last night's primary in Florida proved to be an enormous disappointment for former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani.

Largely ignoring the earlier primaries and caucuses in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, the Brooklyn-born Republican had placed all his eggs in one basket.

He had hoped the large number of former-New Yorkers sunning themselves in the Sunshine State would back his campaign for the White House and propel him into first place in one decisive victory.

Instead, he trailed in a disappointing third - barely getting half the percentage points of front-runners John McCain and Mitt Romney.

It's a huge disappointment for Rudy - who hoped his 'hero' status and the legacy of 9/11 would put him in a good position to run the country. Instead, his risky campaign strategy has pretty much blown up in his face and effectively ended his run before it really began.

In all honesty, Rudy has nobody to blame but himself.

At the start of the presidential nominations, Rudy was the clear front runner for the Republican nomination. He stood head and shoulders above the other candidates and promised to win over a lot of moderate Democrats and swing voters as well. So where did it all go wrong?

I believe it was the arrogance of his campaign. The current front-runners, like Romney and McCain, have thrown their all into the battle and are as willing to shake hands and kiss babies in seemingly unimportant states like Iowa and Wyoming as they are the 'crunch states' like Florida.

Romney and McCain have come across as earnest campaigners - putting in the 'hard graft' to get to the White House. More importantly, they've established themselves as statesmen who value the support and opinions of all Americans - not just the ones who'll vote them into office.

Rudy Giuliani made the same mistake as Fred Thompson. He looked at the campaign in a more tactical way and decided to direct his resources into several key states. If he won those, McCain and Romney's minor victories would pale into insignificance.

However, in doing so he immediately changed the public's opinion of him. No longer was he the straight talking, no-nonsense Brooklyn boy who'd fix the country's problems no matter what the cost. He'd suddenly become a cynical political animal who clearly displayed his lack of regard for middle America.

His campaign disregarded the humble people of Iowa and New Hampshire and that made normal, middle-class Americans nervous.

The idea of the American democracy is that every citizen has a voice. Rudy Giuliani illustrated that he wasn't interested in listening to that voice unless he was going to get something from it in return.

The leaders in this presidential race - Obama, McCain, Clinton and Romney - have proven that they're willing to accept and embrace the entire spectrum of American society. They're as willing to court tractor-drivers in Iowa as oil-barons in Texas. That appeals to a society based upon the mantra of 'all men are created equal.'

Roland's Second Attempt At Cartooning...

Oh my God! It's the same joke!

For the benefit of my European friends, the white bunny is the Trix cereal rabbit... Since his invention in 1969, he's been desperately trying to grab himself a bowl of delicious Trix cereal, only to be thwarted at each attempt by annoying kids who mock him with the catchphrase: "Silly rabbit! Trix are for kids!"

28 Weeks Later

Oh, the humanity!

Back in 2002, British director Danny Boyle delivered the most spectacular and terrifying horror film for decades. 28 Days Later.

A genuinely scary horror flick, it was the tale of a killer virus called 'Rage,' unleashed on London and rapidly infecting the entire country.

'Rage' was a virus that drove you instantly crazy - turning you into a spitting, scratching, blood-spewing creature only interested in attacking and infecting anybody around you. A single bite, scratch or splash of saliva was all it took to pass the infection on and when it did, the 'Rage' would take hold of you within a few seconds.

It was a zombie movie unlike any other. These 'infected' weren't shambling corpses. They were fast, vicious and totally without mercy. The film had you on the edge of your seat as you prayed desperately for our uninfected heroes to survive.

And survive they did - and so successful was the low-budget horror flick that a much more ambitious sequel was released last year.

Last night, I saw it - and was mortified.

28 Weeks Later was a travesty. A beautifully filmed, beautifully acted movie with a script so shoddily written you could drive a Double Decker bus through the multiple plot holes. It was just utterly, utterly terrible. An insult to the first movie and an astonishing display of incompetence by scriptwriter and director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.

Robert Carlyle, as the lead character, was entirely wasted. He got 'zombified' half way into the movie and the majority of his lines were snarls, grunts or spewed up mouthfuls of blood.

Much more promising was the utterly stunning 19 year old actress Imogen Poots, who played Carlyle's daughter. She spent most of the movie screaming and running from the infected, but she was utterly captivating and the only positive reason to see this dire film.

What annoyed me so much about 28 Weeks Later was the stupidity of the plot. In horror films, there's always some allowance for characters doing dumb things (Blonde: I'm going to investigate that strange noise in the cellar. On my own. In my bra and panties.) However, this was a privilege completely over exploited by Fresnadillo.

For example... Why don't the US troops post guards over an infectious, but cure-carrying patient they discover? Or at least lock the door - to prevent Robert Carlyle stumbling in and launching a whole new round of infections?

Or why are the US troops able to secure the Isle of Dogs from ravenous infected zombies, but can't prevent two kids sneaking out over a bridge?

What exactly is helicopter pilot Harold Perrineau's job? Why do his supervisors let him fly about the city doing whatever the hell he likes? Why is he willing to risk court martial and death to fly an infected teenager across the channel?

In fact, what miraculous fuel does his tiny helicopter run on? It apparently manages to fly from Wembley Stadium to the coast of France on a single tank!

And the US-led NATO task force itself? It's organisation of the recolonization of London brings two words to mind. 'Piss-up' and 'Brewery.'

It's a simply diabolical film - and somehow taints the memory of the original by merely watching it! It makes me think Juan Carlos Fresnadillo never even bothered watching the first one!

It's so utterly atrocious that it's surpassed the dreary and predictable Life of David Gale as my most-loathed movie of all time. By all means, buy or rent 28 Weeks Later on DVD - but only on condition that you burn the offending disc rather than let anybody sear their eyeballs watching it.

Piglet Immortalized!

A while back I posted about astounding artist and cartoonist Erica Henderson - who inspired me to pick up my pencils and try cartooning myself.

And just to prove that she's even more astounding than we all already thought she was, she drew this for me! It's Piglet!

I'm smiling so hard now, my jaw hurts!

Top of the Rock

Out of all of the 'must see' things to do in New York City, a trip to the top of the Empire State building is pretty high on the list.

The only drawback is that the queues to reach the top of the 102 story building are immense - often taking an hour or more.

Plus, just like the Eiffel Tower in Paris, once you've got to the top of it, the beautiful New York skyline is missing it's most recognizable feature (because you're standing on top of it!)

Just a block over from where I work is an alternative. The GE Building - also known at 'The Rock' or misnamed The Rockefeller Centre by tourists (the real 'Rockefeller centre' encompasses several buildings, including mine.)

The General Electrics building is one of Fifth Avenue's most recognizable skyscrapers. Standing a stately 70 stories high, the GE Building is the 8th tallest building in New York city and offers outstanding views from what they call 'The Top of the Rock.'

What's more, this lesser-known tourist attraction features much shorter lines that the Empire State. It's a quick and painless process to file into the glass-roofed elevators that shoot you all the way to the top of this 850 feet art-deco icon.

At $17.50 per person, it's one of the most expensive elevator trips you'll ever take - but it's worth doing at least once to enjoy an unmatched view of Manhattan.

What does Quantum of Solace mean?

"This title is meant to confuse a little. It debates relationships and how they hurt and how people can be hurt. If you are not respecting each other - it's over, and at the end of the last movie Bond doesn't have that because his girlfriend has been killed." Daniel Craig, on the title of the new James Bond movie.

I'm so excited about the new James Bond film.

2006's Casino Royale was pretty awesome - even for a Bond purist like me. Casino Royale was always my favorite James Bond book and director Martin Campbell made a good effort to keep the story as pure as possible, yet simultaneously bring it bang up to date and include enough explosions to keep the plebs happy. [Don't you mean the 'regular cinema-goers'? Editorial Bear]

This year, the next of the 'rebooted' Bonds will hit the cinema screen with the perfectly titled Quantum of Solace.

Quantum of Solace

But what the hell does that title mean, you might ask.

Quantum of Solace is actually the title of a short story included in the James Bond anthology For Your Eyes Only. It was one of Ian Fleming's more avant-garde writing experiments - opening with James Bond at a boring dinner party in Government House, Nassau (back in the days when the Bahamas was still run by Britain.)

Bond is incidental to this story - which is actually the tale of frustrated housewife Rhoda Masters, as told by the Governor himself.

Rhoda Masters was an air stewardess who married timid diplomat Philip Masters on a whim. But instead of finding the life of a colonial diplomat's wife luxurious, the flighty young woman soon became bored and began an open affair with a local playboy.

The affair was scandalous because Rhoda was so brazen about it. She and her rich, handsome lover made no effort to hide their passionate romance and Philip was turned into a bit of an island joke - the timid cuckold who 'put up' with his wife's flagrant infidelity.

But the affair tooks it's emotional toll on Philip and soon his work suffered and he faced a nervous breakdown. The Governor saw the devastating results his wife's affair was having on the young diplomat, so he sent Philip off to Washington DC for a lengthy trade negotiation with the Americans.

While he was gone, the philandering Rhoda was told in no uncertain terms to end her affair before her devastated husband returned.

Rhoda acquiesced to the Governor's demands - but the man who returned from Washington weeks later was very different to the timid, loving husband she'd been cheating on.

Something inside Philip Masters had died and when he returned to the Bahamas, he was a shell of his former self. Hard, cold and utterly indifferent to his wife.

Rhoda's affair and cruelty towards her husband crushed that last 'Quantum of Solace' he held within his fractured heart. Now free of any lingering affection, Philip Masters sold up everything and left Rhoda stranded in the Bahamas, divorcing her and returning to England with his former wife left utterly penniless and scorned by the rest of the diplomatic crowd.

Huh?

A quantum is the smallest possible measurable amount of something. The most utterly tiny amount that makes the difference between something 'being something' and not. In scientific terms, it's generally considered to be an atom.

The 'Quantum of Solace' was explained as being that small, practically immeasurable spark of compassion, love or feeling that kept Philip Masters alive inside while his wife was so horrifically callous towards him.

As long as there was that Quantum of Solace, there was something between them. When she finally crushed that tiny spark, Rhoda killed the connection between her and her husband. That's what empowered him to leave his wife utterly penniless in an unfriendly community - practically driving her to prostitution before a rich Canadian rescued her (and it is Rhoda and her second husband that Bond meets at the conclusion of this story.)

Ian Fleming's books are rich with clever catchphrases and concepts, but the Quantum of Solace is one of his finest. The immeasurable speck of affection that keeps a love affair smouldering.

It's often said that the opposite of love isn't hate. In fact, love and hate are separated by the thinnest of lines. Really, the opposite end of the spectrum from love is indifference. It's that Quantum of Solace that keeps somebody caring about another human being - instead of dismissing them as utterly emotionally insignificant.

The Real World

I've only seen the Quantum of Solace flicker a couple of times before - once when I broke up with a girlfriend I was still crazy about. I'd been a terrible boyfriend - and that behaviour had crushed her last Quantum of Solace. So when we broke up, I was still utterly crazy about her, but she couldn't care less. She didn't even have the interest to be angry at me. I'd just become an insignificance and she treated me accordingly.

Another time, I cared about a girl who still held some Quantum of Solace for an ex-boyfriend. He treated her terribly. Cheating, lying and being utterly heartless. But just as that Quantum of Solace threatened to burn to nothing, he'd make some utterly insignificant gesture - like giving her a 'mix tape' of his favourite songs, or inviting her to some family gathering in an act of supposed 'intimacy' and then the Quantum of Solace would flair up again and she'd be as hooked as she ever was.

Bond Is Back

Considering I'm so drawn to the concept, it should be no surprise that I'm excited the new Bond film is called Quantum of Solace. It opens up all sorts of possibilities to explore Daniel Craig's tough, but vulnerable Bond persona.

Part of me is worried it's just from expediency - there are still a few Bond titles that haven't been used yet and they all beat the generic 'Tomorrow Never Dies' and 'Die Another Day' and other meaningless phrases with 'die' in them.

But although the plot apparently stems around foiling a coup d'etat in some South American country - so it seems unlikely that aspects of the original story will be included - I still have hope,

Casino Royale was fresh and exciting and now they've got some momentum behind them, I'm sure the team at EON Productions won't disappoint us with James Bond's next installment.

No matter how bad it's ever got (like the decade gap between Timothy Dalton's last movie and the exciting Goldeneye) I've always held a Quantum of Solace for Monsier Bond.

Blissful Ignorance

A very disturbing trend I've noticed regarding the upcoming Presidential Election is the enthusiastic embrace of ignorance.

Some people don't like the horrible truth, so they resolutely refuse to accept it - despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

I'm afraid to say it's the conservatives who are the most enthusiastically ignorant. Many conservatives claim that their refusal of rationality is a 'political choice' whereas really, it's just bloody mindedness tinged with stupidity.

The most obvious example of this is Evolution.

Many conservatives - including presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee - reject the 'theory' of Evolution. Some prefer to consider 'intelligent design' - which is a not-mutually-exclusive theory in which the development of man was overseen by some 'higher power'

But others, like Huckabee himself, prefer 'Creationist' theory. This is the belief that the world was created exactly as described in the Bible - over the course of seven days, a little more that seven thousand years ago.

The problem with this 'theory' is that it's bunkum. Utter, preposterous rubbish.

Because 'Evolution' is not just a theory. It's also a fact.

Evolution is Here to Stay

The 'theory' of Evolution was not just invented by Charles Darwin while he was in a drunken stupor aboard The Beagle. It was a theory pieced together through objective examination of the evidence.

Further research - which yielded carbon-dating figures and the bones of dinosaurs and woolly mammoths - proved conclusively that animals have changed and developed over the course of the millenia and the world is considerably more than 7,000 years old.

Now whether you believe mankind developed from monkeys via random selection or the work of some 'higher power' is up to you - but it's a fact that humanity as we know it has walked the earth for 33,000 years before the Bible claimed it did.

Evolution is only a 'theory' in the same way that gravity is a 'theory.' We theorise why a ball thrown into the air will be drawn inextricably to the ground. The fact that it happens - each and every time - is a incontrovertible fact.

So people like Huckabee - who refuse to accept concrete, inarguable facts that blow their religious dogma out of the water - are just willfully, gleefully ignorant. And is that the sort of person we want running the country?

But leaving aside Evolution - which at least has the armour of religious dogma to protect it - let's examine some of the other incontrovertible facts conservatives blissfully ignore.

Global Warming

In the past century, the temperature of the world has gone up by a little more than a single degree centigrade. This is an astonishing rise in temperature and has been linked directly to the increase of so called 'greenhouse gases' accumulating in the atmosphere since the mid 20th century.

Given the industrialisation of the world, it is estimated that the planet's temperature could rise by as much as 6 degrees centigrade in the 21st century.

The world is getting hotter. That's a fact.

Unless, of course, you're a conservative.

Because a large number of conservatives refuse to believe the 'theory' of Global Warming and the mountain of scientific evidence linking man-made greenhouse gases to the rise in temperature.

One of the major reasons to be skeptical of the 'theory' of Global Warming is because it's convenient not to believe. If Global Warming is real, we're in trouble. It will take an expensive and inconvenient revolution to transform the world's industries to be environmentally friendly.

No more gas-guzzling cars. No more smoke-churning factories. It will take research and investment and - worst of all - we might have get up off the sofa to take part in it.

So plenty of people choose to be skeptical - and the conservative right (linked to oil industry investors desperate for us not to believe in Global Warming) are happy to swallow up the cynical propaganda pumped out to keep us skeptical.

I stole this cartoon from CK's Blog and I hope he doesn't mind!

I recommend reading Wikipedia's post on the subject of Climate Change denial. It's pretty scary reading.

Is there any credibility to the Global Warming skepticism? Well the most knowledgeable person I know is a friend of mine, energy conservationist Margo Bettencourt - who says: "Denying that global warming/climate change is real is akin to saying evolution is 'just a theory'. In both cases, those who don't know how to deal with the consequences of an issue deny it's truthiness. We'd all be better off if these naysayers could accept that we came from monkeys and are changing the climate."

Margo is the dictionary definition of a 'smart cookie' and if her opinions are good enough for Colombia University and the city of New York, they easily trump any of the cynical oil-industry funded 'strategic studies groups' [Or SUV owning laymen from the midwest - Editorial Bear.]

Why so dumb?

With things like Evolution, we just have to take the scientist's word for it (the thousands of scientist's words for it, backed up with mountains of incontrovertible evidence.)

For something like Global Warming, the evidence is right there in front of us.

I was born on a snowy day in February in 1978. In recent years, England can go for years without snow appearing. The bookies have even stopped running odds on a 'white Christmas' because what was once a reasonably common occurrence has now simply ceased to happen.

In 2002, I spent Christmas day in a New York snowstorm. This Christmas, I was walking around without a jacket on. Global warming is HERE. It's a FACT and we're all living it and witnessing it with our own eyes.

It just boggles the mind why people would make a conscious decision to ignore what they see right in front of them and instead live a fantasy of political expediency.

The problem the conservatives are creating for themselves with this 'embrace of ignorance' is clear. They're pouring their credibility down the plug hole.

If somebody chooses to ignore a fact, like the parallel between greenhouse gas emissions and rising temperatures, or carbon-dating proving that rocks are millions of years old, it makes you wonder what other incontrovertible truths they're willing to ignore.

I mean, the conservatives tell us that the 'War on Terror' is helping to make America safer. It's the cornerstone of the Republican presidential campaign (have you heard the presidential nominees talk about anything else?)

But are we any safer? And can we take the conservatives' word for it, even if we are?

The economy is another issue. Most conservatives would never vote Democrat because they're the 'party of big spending and tax increases.' Yet history has illustrated through the five recent terms of Republican presidency that Elephants can't balance a chequebook.

Right now, the Republican nominees are bleating about the wonders of Reaganomics. This 'golden age' of the American economy was a balloon that got popped on Black Monday.

Reaganomics is a myth.

In reality, Ronald Reagan plunged America into three trillion dollars worth of debt. While the President delivered tax cuts to the super-rich (slashing a 70% income tax to just 28%) payroll taxes for the average working man actually increased.

His Republican successor, H.W. Bush, similarly won the election on the promise of 'no new taxes' - but reneged on his promise as soon as he'd got his expensive loafers into the Oval Office.

Yet people keep buying into the dreary dogma!

In Conclusion

The embrace of ignorance has got me deeply worried about the upcoming election.

It's a well known fact that most of America votes on blinkered party lines - it's single percentage points of 'swing voters' who make the difference and tip the scales towards a Republican or Democratic president.

But Democracy is a system vulnerable to stupid voters - and there seem to be more of them than ever!

Maybe it's because I have liberal pretensions, or I'm a writer, or I occasionally watched Will & Grace and therefore contributed to the 'pro-gay biased liberal media' or some such rubbish - but I live with a dream of an election fought through open debate, rationality and logic.

Sure, some of our reasons for picking the president are going to be illogical. Some people aren't going to vote for Hillary because she's a woman. Some people are going to vote for Mitt Romney because they mistakenly believe he's really Evil Dead actor Bruce Campbell.

But the big issues? It would be nice if policy was dictated by an objective appreciation of the facts. Unfortunately, there's a powerful movement in conservative America that would happily ignore the inconvenient 'facts' in order to embrace a much more comforting fantasy they call the 'truth.'

As historian Indiana Jones said in The Last Crusade:

"FACT."

"History is the search for fact. Not truth."

"If it's truth you're interested in, Doctor Tyree's Philosophy class is right down the hall."

New York Nights

Last night, one of our clients took us out for dinner and VIP seats at Madison Square Garden, to watch the New York Rangers hammer it out on the ice against the Atlanta Thrashers.

It was great fun.

Having a fairly modest income and some big responsibilities on the horizon, Tina and I have pretty much remained housebound since we moved to America. We've been really lucky that Tina's brother and sister live so close and invite us to their exciting events, because otherwise, we'd probably have no social life at all!

But actually heading out into the bright lights of the big city reminds me just what an amazing place New York is and how amazing it is to actually live here.

When you're out in the Big Apple, you can't help but feel alive.

I can't claim to be much of an ice-hockey fan (I call it 'ice-hockey' rather than just 'hockey' because I want to differentiate between burly Caucasians slamming into each other at 90mph on the ice and British schoolgirls playing on grass with knee-high socks on.)

That being said, the game was great fun. There's an enormous amount of showmanship and watching the Rangers play in the heart of their home city warmed the cockles (even as the rest of you shivered.)

Ice Hockey is a fast and brutal game. Players whizz by at 40mph, perfectly balancing delicate ice-skating skills with raw power and strength. The game is violent, aggressive and unpredictable. The Rangers scored four goals against the Thrashers (which is four more goals than any recent game of British Premiership Football.)

I felt enormously energised by just being there - and it reminded me of everything I've got to be grateful for. A great life in a great city and a world of opportunities waiting for me to grab them.

It also filled me with excitement for our next journey to the city. Tina's sister and our brother-in-law bought us Broadway tickets and dinner at a restaurant, so on Friday we're coming into the Big Apple to take another big, juicy chomp.

I ♥ New York.

Ask Militant Ginger

It's that time again - to tackle some of the genuine questions entered into a search engine that randomly led to my blog.

I'm now allergic to almonds and never was till I went into anaphylactic shock...

Ah, nut allergies. One of the most mysterious and growing allergies across the civilised world.

There are plenty of theories behind what's causing the massive increase in the number of people effected by nut allergies. Perhaps in your case, you had a 'bad nut.' I know my reaction to mussels started off when I ate a bad one.

But my blog is really the wrong place to go to find credible information on the subject (as illustrated by this popular post.) Instead, I'd recommend popping over to visit my friend at NoPeanutsPlease - which is an excellent blog exploring the realities of having a child susceptible to food allergies.

At the end of Death Proof, what happened to the cheerleader?

Tarantino's return to the big screen didn't quite live up to the hype. In his attempt to create a perfect pastiche of the cheesy, crappy 70's horror flicks he grew up with, he created a cheesy, crappy horror flick. Death Proof wasn't so-bad-it-was-good. It was just so-bad.

But the film raised some interesting questions. At the climax of the movie, the evil Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell) had been driven off the road by stuntwomen Zoë Bell and Tracie Thoms. Rosario Dawson, playing leggy model Abernathy Ross, dispatches him with a stiletto-heel through the eye-socket.

But while the three of them were off smashing two perfectly good classic cars to pieces, their friend Mary Elizabeth Winstead (playing cheerleader Lee Montgomery) had been left behind to placate the unwashed yokel car-owner - who'd been lured into letting the girls take his car off by the promise of sexual favours from our unsuspecting cheerleader.

Her fate is a deliberate mystery. I think Quentin Tarantino wisely decided to let us draw our own conclusions regarding what happened to the cute little cheerleader. Doubtless, our imagination can provide a fate far more titillating than anything he'd be allowed to show on screen.

But imagining for a second that this isn't a Tarantino flick, I think it's fair to imagine that Lee explained her situation to the oversexed car-owner, who was a perfect gentleman and didn't press the issue. How he reacted to his Dodge Challenger being returned in several mangled, tattered pieces is another matter entirely.

Where is Pat Sissons going on Original 106?

My old colleague Pat Sissons has been driving Original 106's breakfast show since radio veterans Simon James & Hill swapped the early mornings for late nights. However Messieurs Hill & James have now left Original 106 - so a schedule shuffle has plonked Pat in their 6pm to 10pm slot. Tommy Boyd will be taking over the breakfast shift.

Pat's an enormously talented radio presenter and while Simon James & Hill will be tough act to follow - they've won three Sony awards for their ribald evening shows - I think Pat is more than up for the job. The best of luck to him!

I need to pee!

This isn't really a question - although it does make me wonder why so many people are being driven to my blog by this four-word phrase. I blame this post, which I wrote while frustrated at the speed at which my life was whizzing by.

Although it might equally refer to this post, which records my brief foray into the world of pharmaceutical sales, shifting a drug developed to treat 'overactive bladder.'

Whatever the reason, if you really, really need to pee, the solution to your problem is probably not to be found on the Internet. I'd recommend the nearest bathroom. Leave the tap trickling if you need motivation.

My Beer Machine beer is cloudy. Do you have any tips?

The Beer Machine! My most aspirational hobby - aside from novel writing - is attempting to brew foamy, delicious beer in this miraculous invention.

All in all, this process is beautiful in it's simplicity. The keg-shaped brewer is filled with water, 'beer mix' and yeast and then left to ferment for about five days. Following that, the fermented beer is chilled in the fridge to clarify it - theoretically producing a crisp, clear beer.

I have tried four brews in all - two in America and two back in England. While I have produced drinkable beer on all four occasions, there are several things an amateur brewer can do to dramatically improve the quality of his product.

• Use tap-water. It sounds abhorrent - the thought of using chlorinated tap water to brew your meisterbrau. However, the most important aspect of the brewing water is to keep it bacteria free. Bacteria can dramatically effect the taste of your brew - and never for the better. That's why spring water - even the stuff you buy in bottles - has to be boiled first. Chlorinated tap water is a quicker and easier option. I've tried brewing with tap water and Poland Spring and the tap water beer was astoundingly better.
• Keep it cold! All four of my brews have experienced cloudiness. This is caused by yeast swilling in the fermented beer. Only a long, cold period of chilling will help sink the yeast to the bottom of the barrel - producing clear beer. This is tough - I've yet to successfully manage it. However, there are two tips that might help.
• Firstly, after placing the Beer Machine in your fridge, keep it protected from taps or upsets. That will cause the yeast to swill (and the cloudiness will never fade.)
• Secondly, try to assemble the beer machine with the gravity spigot (the bit the beer feeds through to reach the tap) high up, out of the murky yeast sediment. It will mean your beer will 'run out' quicker, but should keep it clearer.

While The Beer Machine eliminates a lot of human errors, brewing beer successfully is still a science of trial and error. Keep brewing. Sooner or later, you'll crack it! And you have to agree - there's nothing quite as satisfying as enjoying a flagon of your own cold, foamy, home-brewed ale. The Beer Machine rules!

You can't turn left in New Jersey?

This is true! Sort of!

A commonly heard complaint from out-of-staters is the fact that you can't 'turn left' in New Jersey. No, this isn't quite literal. Cars do have turn signals on the left hand side (although few New Jersey drivers use them) and at junctions and traffic lights, you can turn left.

The 'no left turn' occurs on US Highways - two or more lanes of traffic in which the central partition is blocked by concrete blocks.

In New York and other states, if you want to cross the two lanes of incoming traffic, you can pull to a halt in the left hand (fast) lane and keep your turn-signal blinking until you have the opportunity to cross over the opposing traffic. On a busy day, however, this can block an entire lane of fast moving traffic.

In New Jersey, you can only turn 'left' on US Highways by using a 'jug handle.' This is an exit lane on the right (just like leaving a motorway) which curves ninety degrees to cross over all four lanes of traffic following a green traffic light.

This is how you're expected to make U-turns and left turns on the highway.

In theory, it speeds up the general progress of traffic by stopping selfish people from clogging up an entire lane of traffic. In practice, it's often frustrating because you have to double back on yourself (sometimes by as much as a mile or so) if the next 'left turn' jughandle isn't for a while.

Frustrating as it is, it's a pretty foolproof method. However, you'll still see plenty of idiots trying to make illegal left turns as long as traffic conditions allow it (i.e. there isn't a cop within sight.)

Ask Militant Ginger will be back in February...

Loose Girl by Kerry Cohen

In her first book, Easy, author Kerry Cohen painted a cautionary tale of a teenage girl desperately trying to find acceptance by exploiting her burgeoning teenage sexuality.

In her second book, the autobiographical 'Loose Girl,' Cohen reveals that much of her first novel was based on her own experiences growing up as an 'easy' girl.

Loose Girl is a beautifully written, uncomfortably candid memoir of adolescence in 80's and 90's New Jersey. Kerry Cohen explains how she first came to recognize the power her body had on men at a young age - and then goes on to describe how she first exploited this power and then untimately became consumed by it - all in an attempt to find the attention she so desperately craved.

Cohen is a master with the written word. Loose Girl is tautly paced, but still expressive and emotional. Given the right story - a fictional one - I think Kerry Cohen could quickly become one of the most dynamic authors of the decade.

But while her writing is pitch-perfect, the actual 'story' of Loose Girl is ultimately as unsatisfying as the one-night stands Kerry Cohen describes within it's pages.

The problem? Well, to be honest, it reads like a 224 page plea for attention. Throughout her teenage years, Kerry describes her attempts to win male attention by using her sexuality. This book, with it's rather cold and shameful litany of sexual misadventures, seems to be the literary equivalent of those adolescent fumblings.

"Read me!" The book screams. "I'm filled with illicit sexual promise!"

But turn the pages and instead of lurid language, you discover a dry list of unsatisfactory couplings stemming from Kerry Cohen's constant, burning need to be 'loved.'

She blames it on her mother, who left them to study medicine abroad. She blames it on her father, who'd rather smoke pot with her teenage friends than tell them off. The book seems to cry out for people to tell Cohen: 'There, there. It's not your fault you did these terrible things...'

Except the 'things' Cohen did aren't even considered all that terrible in today's day and age. With teenage sexuality rammed down our throat by One Tree Hill, the O.C. and even the latest Abercrombie and Fitch catalogues, what would have been a 'loose girl' in Cohen's day might just be a regular 'girl' in 2008.

From discussing it with female friends, I think many women would find a lot of interesting parallels between their experiences and those of Kerry Cohen. As a male reader, I might be missing the point somewhat.

Ultimately, I found Loose Girl to be just a little too introspective and self important to really hold my interest - but I could see the quality of Cohen's writing shine through and I will be interested to see what this promising author turns her talents to next.

Loose Girl is set for release in June 2008.

Friend of the Devil by Peter Robinson

After no less than 17 dramatic murder investigations, Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks might be forgiven for thinking that his sleepy little police department in the north east of England isn't all that sleepy at all!

But nevertheless, British/Canadian author Peter Robinson keeps churning out Inspector Banks mysteries and our aging detective dutifully plods through official police procedure to solve them. The most recent is recounted in Robinson's latest paperback, Friend of the Devil.

I was given an advance reading copy of this novel by Barnes and Noble, so I entered into the world of Detective Chief Inspector Banks without reference to any of his previous sixteen adventures. Fortunately, Robinson has a quick and engaging writing style and he hooks even the most unwitting reader (i.e. me) by presenting not just one, but two grisly murders within the first few pages.

There's a nineteen year old teenager who got herself raped and strangled in 'the Maze' of twisting passages in an old Yorkshire market town. Then there's a quadriplegic woman who was wheeled out of her care home onto a deserted cliff side and had her throat sliced open with a razor. Gory stuff - and Robinson doesn't skimp on the details.

Detective Banks tackles the murdered girl, while his old lover Annie Cabbot investigates the corpse in the wheelchair. Cue 372 pages of perfectly researched police procedure and angst-ridden, alcohol fueled character development.

I should lay my cards on the table. Police drama isn't really my thing. I'm no great fan of CSI and I only watch Law & Order for the courtroom bits. But Peter Robinson presents a clearly well-researched story which perfectly illustrates what a tedious, thankless task police investigation really is.

Equally tedious are the less successful attempts at characterization. Inspector Banks is a blank slate - the pages Robinson could have used to flesh out his character are instead wasted on a practically verbatim track-listing from his iPod and a menu of his preferred Tesco's and Sainsbury's supermarket meals. After finishing the book, I felt like I'd know what to cook for dinner and put on the stereo if Inspector Banks ever came round for supper - but I was still no closer to understanding what made the man tick.

The murder plot is handled better. The poor girl's case is wrapped up neatly, giving us a convincing red herring to lead us astray, but finally providing a murderer who's identity is satisfying, yet unexpected.

The second murder - the real crux of the book - isn't quite as convincing. The 'solution' to that murder is discovered less than half-way through the book's 372 page length. However, the vital 'who' is only discovered within the last two pages and the denouement is both unsatisfactory and trite. The key to a satisfying murder-mystery is to have had to opportunity to uncover the murderer yourself through consideration of the clues. Instead, Robinson hands us the 'solution' far too early and picks the identity of the final villain seemingly at random from a selection of barely-mentioned supporting characters.

Friend of the Devil is not a bad book by any means - Peter Robinson is a fluent and effective writer and his knowledge of police-procedure is top-notch. However, this is clearly a book for fans of the series and first-time readers would do best to start slightly earlier in the 'Inspector Banks' canon.'

Roly the Ninja

What's red and pink and white and goes: 'creeaaaaak' every time it moves?

The answer is me - after my first Mixed Martial Arts class...

At the start of 2008, I peered at the scales and realised I'd piled on quite a bit of weight over the last few years. My sedentary lifestyle in the states hadn't helped either. So I decided that 2008 was the year when I'd slim down to my 'fighting weight' from my early twenties.

The problem was - losing weight isn't as easy as it sounds. There's a simple mathematical equation involved:

Calories In (food/drink consumed during the day)
- Minus
Calories Out (food energy burnt during the body's daily activity)
= Equals
Calorie Surplus / Deficit

Eat more than you burn and you gain weight as the excess calories get stored as fat. Burn more than you eat and those fat stores get raided for the energy. You lose weight.

Pulling back on my appetite for steak and mashed potato was one route - but the major problem was the fact that I sat on my arse all day in the office, returned home (mentally exhausted) and sat on my arse on the sofa and then I went to bed (occasionally on my arse.)

Going to the gym seemed a waste of time - running on a treadmill is like a hamster running on a wheel. Both comic and tragic at the same time (do you think the hamster realises he's never going to get anywhere?)

Exercise at home was unlikely to succeed since that involves discipline and that's not a very powerful trait of mine.

So I needed to do something stimulating and motivating. So I decided to take up a martial art.

I picked Dynamic Duo Martial Arts Academy for various reasons. Firstly, they were close to my house - barely a mile or so away. Secondly, they had a coupon on the front of the Clipper magazine that offered 8 weeks training for $88 dollars.

And last night, in combats and an old Summer Study t-shirt, I turned up for my first lesson.

I will say this: I didn't learn to kick, punch, jump, stomp or do anything remotely Steven Seagal-ish. Instead our instructor told our small class (five veterans and myself) to stretch and do push ups and sit ups.

But it was a lot of fun.

Boy, did I struggle. Considering my exercise routine for the last six months has been limited to taking the stairs instead of the elevator, the instructor's order to do fifty sit ups and press ups was a bit of a stretch. I think I managed 30 or so, all thanks to my dojo partner literally hauling me up and down during those last, elbow-trembling push-ups by the scruff of my t-shirt.

I ducked out early and stood in the snow, taking deep breaths to avoid yacking my guts up.

But it was a great bunch of people, they didn't look down on me for my spectacular lack of fitness ("don't worry, the Master told me. You'll be doing classes back to back in no time") and once I'd recovered from the spotty vision and nausea, the aching muscles indicated that I'd exercised. I mean REALLY exercised.

I'm still feeling it this morning. I took my Lincoln to work rather than the Subaru because the thought of juggling a clutch and gearstick seemed too much for my frozen and creaking muscles to handle.

But actually leaving the house and interacting with other people seems like a much more promising route to a slimmer, sexier Roland in 2008. And maybe - once I can handle the high level of fitness demanded - they'll teach me the sexy kicks and punches I see in the action movies.

Watch this space.

Severe Weather Warning

We've been issued a Severe Weather Warning for tonight and tomorrow morning. Unfortunately (or fortunately, really) the Arctic snows forecast for Pennsylvania and the lower east coast are apparently turning to rain as soon as they hit New Jersey.

So no pictures like this are expected:

Economics even I can understand...

I've got vague memories of the Reagan (and in England, Thatcher) years.


I don't remember much - but I do remember England being swept up in the after effects of 87's Black Tuesday and millions of homeowners ending up in the dodgy financial situation of having negative equity.

They'd borrowed thousands to purchase their homes - and the sudden plummet of the housing market left them owing far more then they could ever recover even if they sold their house.

It was a pretty sticky situation and should have taught us all an important lesson.... But instead, America's teetering on the brink of a similar recession right now.

The culprit? The sub-prime mortgage industry.

In order to 'clean up' a potentially lucrative corner of the market, greedy banks like Merill Lynch and Citibank have been offering fantastic mortgage packages to slightly shaky customers. Huge loans that left the borrower struggling to make the monthly repayments.

The gamble could have paid off - but throw in plummeting house prices and sky-rocketing inflation and the 'on paper' profitability of the sub-prime market has suddenly turned into a slew of foreclosures and bankruptcies.

So instead of cleaning up on the sub-prime sector, the mortgage gambles have cleaned the banks out. Merill Lynch posted 14.1 billion dollar loses this quarter just a few days after Citibank wrote down almost $10 billion.

And the result?

Thousands of layoffs - some people speculate the after-effect of Citibank's disastrous losses could see as many as 29,000 people unemployed.

More foreign bail-outs - leaving more of America's industry in the hands of shadowy middle-eastern investors.

It's a very unhappy picture and the skyrocketing inflation and miserable financial outlook has left America on the brink of a recession - which will likely drag the entire world economy down with it.

What have we learnt?

Apparently, nothing.

I'm no economist, but I can't ignore the fact that Black Tuesday and this recent scenario came on the coattails of two terms of Republican presidency.

President Reagan was occasionally blamed (either rightly or wrongly) for contributing to 87's stock market crash through 'Reaganomics.' He turned America from the world's largest international creditor to the world's largest debtor nation, increasing the deficit to a whopping 3 trillion dollars.

President Bush turned a surplus of $86 million into a deficit of $434 million and increased America's national debt to just under $9 trillion dollars.

Wouldn't it nice to have a presidency that ran the US Government more like a responsible housewife than a sailor on shore leave? To spend only what they could afford to?

If somebody hold told the sub-prime borrowers to think seriously about their financial situation - or not been dumb enough to lend them the money in the first place - perhaps this inevitable disaster could have been avoided.

I saw it coming - and I'm not even an economist. You have to wonder what those well-paid pundits on Wall Street were thinking when they gave the thumbs up to a clearly ill-considered project like plundering the sub-prime sector.

The ripples made by the sub-prime splash are likely to effect every American - and for some time to come.

Every time a Republican candidate goes on TV and extols the wonders of 'Reaganomics,' I have to wince. The Republican party is meant to represent 'small government' and fiscal conservatism. Instead, every Republican presidency in the last 28 years has represented the complete opposite.

Skylark Diner - more than just a diner.

I've already said that one of the wonders of North American culture has to be the 'diner.' Affordable, freshly made food served with a lot more style than the fast-food farce that is MacDonalds.

Since moving to New Jersey, which has more diners than any other state in The Union, I've eaten at some great places - but one recently knocked my socks off and I think it's worth writing about here.

The Skylark Fine Diner & Lounge is everything great about American diners - except more so.

Random Discovery

We were driving up Route 1 to go shopping when Tina demanded we stop off and make up the lunch she'd skipped.

"Feed me!"

Skylark just happened to be the next restaurant we saw - a pretty art-deco style diner with a reassuring number of patrons parked outside. What was atypical was that rarest of rarities in New Jersey - a bar. That sealed-the-deal as far as I was concerned.

Most diners in Jersey can't be bothered to go through the strict regulations to get their liquor licence. Skylark was an exception and a welcome one at that.

Parking up, we discovered that the Skylark was fairly busy even at 4pm on a Saturday afternoon. That seemed to be a good sign - and despite the crowd, we didn't need to wait for a table. As we got led to our seats, two more things struck me:

First off, Skylark seemed just that bit cleaner and shinier than the average diner. Not spectacularly so - but enough to make you think: 'Hmmm. Nice place."

Secondly, everybody who worked there seemed to be universally young, slim and attractive. What with the small-town diner atmosphere and all the gleaming white teeth, I dizzily wondered for a second if we'd stepped out of New Jersey and straight into an episode of Smallville or One Tree Hill.

We sat down in a booth - normally I hate booths, but this one was a good balance of height and depth so I didn't need to squeeze in, but I also didn't feel too low down. (Why Tina, who is small enough to fit in a suitcase, loves sitting in a booth so much, I'll never understand.)

The menu seemed impressive. There was the typical diner-fare of burgers, sandwiches, breakfasts and wraps - but also a broad range of what the Americans call 'entrées' - restaurant style main courses like Chicken Française, grilled Lamb Chops and a wide range of seafood.

There were daily specials on the board and overall, the prices seemed to be only a couple of dollars above the average diner.

While we decided on what to eat, I was delivered a pint of ice-cold Bass - and I mean ice-cold. It had ice crystals slowly sliding down the outside of the glass. The beer was fresh and delicious - one of those perfectly-preserved pints that clings to the side of the glass as it goes down.

They certainly got a thumbs up in the beer stakes!

We also got complimentary fresh rolls delivered to our table - and our choice of three flavoured butters. Pesto, Jalapeno and Apricot. We tried them all and while the flavours clashed somewhat with the flavoured rolls, it was a pretty swanky touch and I was impressed by it.

Tina selected the Mediterranean Salad for $11.98, which was a mixed green salad with grilled chicken, topped with a mountain of mozzarella, olives, artichoke hearts, peppers, tomatoes, pine nuts and crumbled blue cheese.

I chose the less adventurous Kentucky Pulled Pork Sandwich at $8.95, which was pulled pork in a barbecue sauce, served on a kaiser roll with French fries.

The food arrived very quickly and was utterly delicious. The French fries (normally the acid test for a diner) were crisp and flavourful. Tina's salad was generously proportioned and while she thought the chicken was a bit bland, she enjoyed eating everything else.

She also enjoyed making a little pile of poultry in one corner of her plate.

My sandwich was immense. I had a tough time tackling it - ending up scooping the overflowing pork up with a knife and fork. It was lovely, though. The barbecue sauce was sweet and smoky.

Despite how nice it all tasted, in the end, we couldn't hope to finish it. We asked the waiter to have it 'bagged up' to take back home.

Our bill came to less than thirty five dollars (including two pints of Bass and a bottle of sparkling mineral water, but not including the tip) and in addition to our satisfied stomachs, we were both sorted for the next day's lunch thanks to our mountain of leftovers.

All in all, the Skylark Diner was a really great find. It delivered everything you'd expect from a typical American diner at competitive prices. Where it went above and beyond the norm was in the attention to detail.

The friendly staff. The flavoured butters. The home-baked rolls. All stuff that made you smile and think: 'Hey, that's a nice touch.'

For range of choice, quality of food and overall price, Skylark easily beats any typical TGI Friday or Applebees. And considering it's 'just a diner?' That's pretty impressive.

Skylark Fine Diner and Lounge is on the corner of Route 1 North and Wooding Avenue, in Edison, NJ. 1-732-777-7878. Visit www.skylarkdiner.com

Open 7am to 2am.

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

UPDATE - see below...

Last night, Fox let loose it's seasonal man eater - the much hyped Sarah Connor Chronicles.

A sci-fi series based on the wildly successful Terminator movies, it stars British actress Lena Headey as the titular paramilitary mom and Thomas Dekker as her fifteen year old son (and future savior of mankind,) John.

Summer Glau, the pretty young actress who played sexy sociopath River Tam in Joss Whedon's ill-fated Firefly series, joins the cast in pretty much exactly the same role. Okay, she's meant to be a robot in this one, but the ass-kicking, frequent nudity* and awkward social interaction are all lifted directly from her previous role.

On the surface of it, Sarah Connor Chronicles seems to be a deeply cynical retelling of the Terminator movie mythos - but it actually didn't turn out too badly.

Plot Implausibility

The first issue any fan of the Terminator movies will have to process is the absence of any sort of continuity between the movies and the series.

For people of my age, growing up in the years between the original Star Wars movies and the second lot of Star Wars movies, the seminal action/sci-fi film of our generation was Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

Sarah Conner Chronicles carries on directly from the plot of that movie - with commando mum Sarah Connors zooming off into the sunset with her teenage son. They'd been successful in eliminating a murderous Terminator and blowing up the lab that would later develop the lethal Skynet artificial intelligence system.

It's a great setup for the series, if it wasn't for the fact that the recent Terminator 3 movie contradicts everything about it. In that movie, John Connor explicitly states that his mother passed away from cancer in the period between the two movies. The last contact he'd had with a Terminator was when he lowered Arnold Schwartzenegger into molten steel at the end of Terminator 2.

The Sarah Connor Chronicles neatly splits the 'canon' into two separate time lines and Terminator 3 (soon to be joined by a Schwartzenegger-free Terminator 4) is completely removed from the continuity of the Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Action Packed

But swallowing that discrepancy down, the series itself seems to be promising.

It opens with an action-packed gun battle between Sarah Connors (dressed in an inexplicably short shirt - hardly 'mum' attire) battling a murderous Terminator. Just as you start to get invested in the battle, the Terminator guns down John Connor and it's all revealed to be a dream.

God, I hate series that start off with a 'dream sequence.' It's a total cop-out. The only thing that prevented me switching off the TV then and there was because all three Terminator movies feature similar dream-sequences.

Then the plot-proper begins. It's 1999 and we soon learn that Sarah Connors is quite clearly a bit crazy. Her long-suffering son is sick of being dragged from one hick town to another in an attempt to outrun both the feds and any possible Terminator robots.

Inevitably, they run into trouble as an FBI bulletin is intercepted by a murderous robot, who's been spending months trying to track them down. John gets cornered in his school by the Terminator and is only saved when ass-kicking Summer Glau arrives to rescue him.

Sarah, John and the friendly Terminator go on the run - and the plot continues...

Good points and bad...

The series is a lot of fun. If you're a fan of hot chicks with big guns, you'll be thrilled to see both Lena Headey and Summer Glau rattling off bullets like US marines. There's plenty of gory Terminator action as the evil robot gets bloody chunks blown off him and you get to see the shiny metal bits underneath. The script is quite tightly written and some of the one liners are cute.

What's not so great are the Terminator cliches - like a robot who can outrun a speeding car (as we saw in Terminator 2) inexplicably walking slowly and deliberately when chasing his target on foot (allowing John plenty of time to run and hide.)

Similarly, the Terminator shoots without mercy when it's faceless cops, soldiers or schoolkids getting in his way, but isn't above taking lead characters hostage or pausing for vital seconds before delivering that fatal shot - but only when the main characters are involved.

Overlooking those details, though, the series is a lot of fun and packed with enough action to keep most of the PlayStation generation entertained.

Will it last? I'm not convinced. It seems to me that Sarah Connor Chronicles is a bit of a one-trick pony and even Summer Glau repeatedly shedding her clothing* will not be enough to keep this leaky show afloat.

Given the impossible task of making a credible Terminator show, I think the producers have done very well. It could have been a lot, lot worse. However, the fact that something's not as bad as it could have been doesn't necessarily make it any good.

I'll watch the second episode tonight and see how things pan out.

* 'nudity' of course refers to sanitised, implied nudity - all that's allowed on network television. Gory school shootings and murderous robots are fine. Nipples? It would cause the downfall of civilised society, if you'll believe the hype!

UPDATE - Second Episode

Last night's second episode picked up the story from where we left off - with John, Sarah and their new Terminator friend being cast eight years into the future - arriving in 2007.

Some may have considered that a cynical ploy so that the makers of the Sarah Connor Chronicles don't need to use late-nineties cars, sets and details. But overlooking that nasty streak of realism, it sets the scene for an 'anything can happen' future.

The second episode was considerably better than the first. More action, more characterisation and even some nasty scenes that reveal our heroic team's less heroic side. John acts like a typical fifteen year old brat, running off to explore 'future' Los Angeles and jeopardising everything by meeting up with his stepfather (who didn't stop to ask why John was still 15 when he should have been 23 by then.)

Our sexy, sassy Terminator lives up to her name by executing one of Sarah's oldest allies - reminding us that the wise-cracking little robot is actually a lethal and unpredictable killing machine.

And the divergence between the plot of Terminator 3 and the Sarah Connor chronicles is explained when the friendly Terminator reveals to Sarah that she would have died in 2005 had they not leapt into the future - from cancer. Exactly as the movie version of John Connor remembered.

It's all still a bit hokey. The beheaded Terminator from 1999 managed to survive the nuclear blast that allowed the Connors to escape - and once it's head bounced through the time portal into the present day, there was a frankly absurd scene in which the headless body journeyed across the city to rejoin it's disembodied noggin...

But it's fun, it's unpredictable and it's exciting. After a shakey start, the crew of the Sarah Connor Chronicles have managed to make a believer out of me.