John Echohawk

John Echohawk is a Native American lawyer who is the Executive Director of The Native American Rights Fund.

Until recently I had never heard of this organisation.

What John does is campaign for restitution for the Indian Tribes who over a hundred years plus have been abused by the Federal Government.

When the tribes were ousted from their lands in the mid-nineteen hundreds, a trust was set up for them, to ensure they received income from any exploitation that took place on their new reservations.

This did not take into consideration their forced removal from their traditional homelands, nevertheless on paper it looked quite good.

So when miners, loggers, oil men, started to find exploitable resources on the reservations, it was not surprising to think that the tribes would benefit.

It seems that in most cases the companies honoured their legal requirements and made payments to the funds set up by the Federal Government.

Where it all goes pear shaped is when the funds arrive in accounts controlled by the Government.

A mixture of corruption and incompetence over at least 100 years has meant that the tribes have been abused by the system.

The sums concerned are literally staggering!

We are talking Billions of Dollars.

Successive attempts have been made to ensure justice for these people and they have got nowhere.

John has even attempted a class action and because of the power of central government he is getting delay after delay.

Senators and Congressmen say that this is going to cost the American tax payer a fortune, well so be it!

One must ask the question as to where all the money has gone in the first place.

What is left to the Native American people if they can't achieve restitution?

The simple answer to that, is the Nationalisation of Government assets on their land.

Most of these assets are highly sensitive military installations.

Please visit the North American Rights Fund and make a donation.

If freedom is to survive in the Western World we must start with those who have suffered under our two hundred years of exploitation.

Facebook

Well the old fart has joined Facebook!

I know what you are thinking, Simon we thought you had a brain!

Well obviously not, but to be honest it is grand to communicate with my kids and their friends, even if I don't understand what they are talking about most of the time.

It will be amusing for me when they visit this blog, where we discuss issues of a Global nature!

I can see it now! Dad why are you so boring!

No matter, the little tinkers will understand when they are a bit older.

I guess the truth is that young people need to express happy feelings with their friends and should not be concerned with the worries of life, that will come soon enough.

One of the reasons I write this blog is to leave a legacy to my kids about my personal thoughts as a man of advancing years, who has made many mistakes in his life, but believes he can still offer a modicum of wisdom to his offspring.

The greatest achievement a person can aspire to, is to love their children.

All else in this World is incidental.

Happy Christmas people!

Christmas in Alnwick

Well it's finally starting to feel like Christmas in our little town and whilst the lights have been up for nearly a month now, the spirit has been a bit lacking.

I suppose that's because of the on-going recession affecting Britain.

But today for the first time, the local shops are busy and children are starting to get excited.

In England, the shops are only shut on Christmas Day, but that never seems to prevent people from buying enough food to withstand a siege.

This always, for some reason means you cannot get a loaf of bread before Christmas Day and will mean that the landfill sites will be full of the stuff come January.

Christmas Day is always a quiet time for me, Manuela is back in Brasil, with her family, Justine will be in Scotland with Michael, and Barry, my son, is going to his mothers, although we are planning a couple of lunchtime pints at The George, before he goes.

The landlady at my local pub opens for two hours at Christmas lunchtime, just for her regulars, so it would be churlish of me not to attend!

Besides it's tradition to go and laugh at the new jumpers, the dads will have got for Christmas!

Why is it families buy chaps jumpers that you can only look at whilst wearing welding goggles?

I'll then go home to cook lunch for Dad and I.

Dad will be wanting to watch the Queens Speech on the television, which he always enjoys, being a Royalist of the old school.

Then I shall join him to spend the afternoon watching mindless drivel suitably anaesthetized, with vintage port!

Child of the Sixties

This is a subject that my kids find totally tedious.

The nostalgia that surrounds the 1960's.

OK it was a great time, music, fashion, opinion, design, cars were all revolutionary.

Some months back I joined a hippy forum, just to see how it would develop and I was deeply disappointed.

The members turned out to be folks who were living in the past when it came to all of the above, with the exception of radical thinking, where they seemed to me to be as conservative as the generation they rebelled against.

I still pick up the posts and they sound like a bunch of old duffers who can't move on.

They go on about the anti-social aspects of smoking and drinking but will tell you how many joints they smoked at the weekend.

I think my kids are right, whilst I love the music from that time, it is foolish to live your life in the past, you just end up narrow minded and age that much faster.

My generation now rules the World and have been systematically removing the freedoms they campaigned for!

I think I'll go and live in Tristan da Cunha!

History

I think it was Henry Ford who said that history was 'bunk', I'm not certain, please correct me if I'm wrong.

Wherever you live history has been, until relatively recently, that which is presented by your own media and the prevailing education system.

Traditionally history was always written by the victors.

Today however we have access to resources around the World, which are helping to give us a more balanced view of specific events.

Two examples are the British Empire and also the history of Native Americans, there are many more, but for this post two will suffice.

When Dad was at school a quarter of the globe was pink, you could travel over land from Alexandria to Cape Town and not step outside the Empire.

School children were taught about the wonderful benefits of being part of the British Empire with it's paternal approach to civilising the natives!

Everybody new their place and all was right in the World.

For my father's generation this teaching has left them not knowing who they are and they are unable to comprehend the massive changes they have witnessed in the World.

This is not their fault, they were fed an institutional form of history which was about population management.

The Second World War changed everything, former colonies realised that their masters were not infallible and so self determination became the new mantra, supported by a now dominant America.

For my generation, we were fed a variation of the above in the creation of what was termed the British Commonwealth of Nations, which still today comprises some 26 countries and has a certain amount of political clout in the World.

The nineteen-sixties saw the first serious attempts to look at history from a different perspective and this was done through the media with film and books.

Film allows you to look at an issue from a human level and thus permits people to reassess particular events.

Books also played a part in this process.

In the U.S. a film came out called Soldier Blue, that publicly admitted atrocities against Native Americans followed by a seminal book called Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.

These incredible works opened the eyes of a generation to their origins and their culture and encouraged other writers and film makers from around the World to look at history anew.

An Englishman, Sir Richard Attenborough directed the film Gandhi, which exposed some of the less savoury aspects of Empire.

With the advent of the internet, we have got to a situation where we can see other peoples perspectives.

Today many writers of history record events, not at a national level, but rather at the human level and for me this is more powerful.

My friend Meam Wye records Islamic history in just this way.

When you write about individuals and their achievements, it does not matter where they come from.

Their achievements are for the benefit of humankind, wherever they live.

The result one hopes is that we can learn to live together in a way that permits varied opinion and dialogue.

We must teach our leaders to understand that we do not want conflict and that they must find another way to resolve issues.

History shows us that it is mothers who suffer, when their sons are sent to war.

May be it is time for women to run the World.

The Vagueries of English

Just for the benefit of readers around the World, I will try to clarify some of the expressions that not only I use, but which you might come across when viewing British websites.

My regulars will be aware that I live in the Northeast of England, so to make it easy I will say we are called Geordies. Some useful words and sayings follow:

Whyay pet!:yes

Canny Dia:nice day

The Toon:Newcastle upon Tyne or Newcastle United Football Club

Wor Lass:My wife,my daughter or my sister.

Bairn:my kid

Ha Wey!:Fuck off!

Ar Divnt Na!:I don't know!

Ar man ye feckin blaked:I say old chap you are drunk!

Yea suthern bastad!I take it you are from down south!

In other parts of the country you will experience a different set of expressions.

In London you have cockney rhyming slang, which some of you might have come across watching Guy Ritchie films like Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels or Snatch.

Simple examples follow:

Sky=sky rocket=pocket

Apples=apples and pears=stairs

Bristols=Bristol Cities=titties

Bottle and Glass=Arse

Mother's Ruin=Gin

In other parts of the country accents are different:

In Yorkshire the lads will say' Aye I sup some stuff!' Meaning I had a few beers!

The West Country Lads will say arr ass roit good beer that is, arr! Meaning the beer is ok!

Oi reckon the sheep round ere are ok. This could mean Welshmen or Norfolk lads who obviously are attracted to sheep, so be careful!

Building an Herbaceous Border

Shortly after taking up a position to run the garden at Wadhurst Castle in Sussex, I was tasked with the renovation of the south facing herbaceous borders, backed by the old kitchen garden wall.

The border was about 50 metres long by 4 deep and hadn't seen any care since the 1950's.

All that was worth salvaging was an old Magnolia and some ancient climbing roses.

Since the land was pure clay,I wasn't concerned with the roses in the least, perfect ground for them. Just a severe prune and they could be brought back to life.

Magnolias are a little different, they are very slow growing so pruning had to be judicious.

The Lady of the House had an idea of what colour schemes she required and then pretty much left it to me.

Fortunately I was given a reasonable budget to bring the site back to life.

When dealing with clay, it is pointless to dig it, you are simply doing work that you can get nature to do for you.

Having cleared the ground in the Autumn I laid down a bed of spent mushroom compost, to a depth of about four inches and then in the early Winter a six inch layer of well rotted horse manure. 22 ton which I barrowed to the site by hand, I was a fit bugger then!

Simple after that, I just let the weather get at it and was ready for planting in the Spring.

Come that time, I used a mix of perennials and annuals to ensure a strong first year showing, with the intention that year by year perennials would replace annuals, but still achieve the colour combinations that the Lady wanted.

So if you love gardening, but are terrified of the potential work or the poor soil conditions, just think about nature.

Plant for the conditions that exist in your area.

Think about a colour scheme that you want and then find plants that will work in your local conditions, rather than seeing something at the local garden centre, which looks great, but may not work where you live.

I know this is easy for me to say, since I'm a plantsman, but there are any amount of quality gardening books that will tell you where plants come from and what conditions they need to grow in.

I would recommend publications by The Royal Horticultural Society as probably being the best.

Just one final comment, don't be worried about shovelling horse shit! If it's well rotted it has virtually no smell!

Happy Christmas.

I've Been Thinking

Yes I know, Oh God here he goes again.

Well we now live in this Global community which allows us to express ourselves in a way not possible in the past.

Opinion was traditionally driven by our respective Governments and Cultures.

We now find ourselves in a situation where the Tower of Babel has been rebuilt and we do not always swallow what we are told.

This must be a nightmare for our leaders.

How can they convince us that what they say is true?

The answer to that one is they can't.

Those who wish to influence human opinion are also under threat, simply because we find friends around the World who tell us how it is in their own environment without the need for emotionally charged agendas.

In my travels it seems to me that most people are kind, considerate and open to different opinions, irrespective of their religious or cultural backgrounds.

I'm a Christian with Muslim friends, neither of us are trying to convert the other, and why should we? We both believe in the Great Architect of the Universe.

So to try and maintain some sort of control, the governments of the World focus on issues which they believe they have full control over, namely weapons and global warming.

I will deal with the issues seperately.

Weapons: It's alright if we have them, but if you do,sorry that isn't allowed!

Global Warming:It is probably happening, but I am yet to be convinced that man can do anything about it.

I read an awful lot about this subject and our planet.

We may be heading for what I term as a readjustment which has nothing to do with humanity, just something the planet does from time to time.

In the last 70 million years the poles have shifted 170 times.

If you believe Charles Hapgood, we have never experienced an Ice Age, simply a shift in the crust, which has meant that the poles have moved, thus resulting in a change in polar regions.

This would certainly explain the discovery of a mammoth in Siberia found to have food in it's frozen mouth and stomach which said it lived in sub-tropical areas.

It was instantly frozen, which means the poles shifted instantly, think about that for a minute!

We have this belief that we are infallible but in reality we are just another species.

Our advantage however is this, we are intelligent.

If another cataclysm is to descend upon us, some humans will survive, and who will they be?

Well for sure they will not be accountants and lawyers!

Think of who you are and who your friends are.

To survive we will need people who are experts in the following fields:

Fishing

Hunting

Butchery

Gardening

Herbal Medicine

Leather Workers

Metallurgy

Geology

Stonemasons

Carpenters

Woodsmen

Spirituality

All of what I have mentioned are trades that will help us survive, the final one is about how we rebuild civilisation.

I know it is Christmas and the greenies tell me to be politically correct, but I want a Range Rover Sport, purely and simply because it does 120mph, which I will need to get to the hills when the tidal wave comes!

Heyho have a lovely time!

Why do we call it piles?

Because we can't spell haemorrhoids!

At one time or another in your life, you will probably experience this ailment.

I don't know if it is the same in your country, but here it often generates a certain amount of hilarity from those around you.

Then again the British have a thing about bottom humour and if it involves you walking in a way that clearly means you are suffering, so much the better!

Even worse your friends will start taking the p*ss which sets you off laughing and thus amplifies the discomfort.

Even the name is ridiculous! It sounds like the name for a Science Fiction movie!

The Invasion of the Haemorrhoids, don't miss the latest James Cameron blockbuster!

After a while it becomes necessary to visit the quack!

Oh dear, on goes the rubber glove and he says,' let me know if you feel any pain!'

Is this man an idiot?

Now don't get me wrong, my body has not been invaded by these aliens since my twenties, at the time I was a young bachelor who lived on beer and curries!

So after the man with the rubber glove had completed his examination he proudly announced that I had piles, well whoopee, clever these Doctors.

Tell me Mr Holmes about your diet,'Well doctor, 14 pints a day, a chicken vindaloo and twenty tabs(cigarettes).

Says he,' It's hardly surprising you have piles Simon,( getting familiar now he has visited my bottom!) with a regime like that!

So being a sensible person I immediately reduced my beer consumption to 7 pints, changed to chicken madras and cured the problem at no cost to the NHS.

Still on the twenty tabs mind!

Happy Days

Some of you may have noticed, that of late my tone has been a little angry, my friend Al at Publish or Perish pointed this out to me yesterday, and he is right, time to lighten the mood I think.

Well folks this chap is going to be a Grandfather in the New Year,for the second time, my lass Justine has announced that she is expecting!

Wow! I hear you say,' but Simon you are far too young to be a Grandfather!'

Shocking as it may seem but this English hunk is 56 years old!

Yes I know, quite unbelievable isn't it!

The bairn will be born in the month of August and both Justine and her lad Michael are over the moon.

Isn't life wonderful.

Time I think for a pint!

The Black Bird

Monday is often a pretty dull day, but this week I have enjoyed a visit to the Bank by a lady whose site is called, The Black Bird.

This is one of the best sites I have run across in my travels.

Hilarious is an understatement!

We are dealing with a woman who is highly intelligent, humorous and earthy.

Her picture on her site says it all!

You know immediately who is in charge when you look at that face!

I strongly recommend you all visit The Black Bird, she is going to be a Blogging star!

I am a Christian

Well there you have it, I've admitted that I follow the teachings of Jesus.

Today in modern Britain I am considered a stupid person who believes in some kind of fantasy.

Well sorry chaps but I view the teacher as a great man.

Being a Gnostic Christian I follow the Nazarenes where the path to God is found within one's self.

This is a life times endeavour to become one with the mind of God.

It is a personal journey that does not involve priests.

Fortunately other Gospels and writings have survived to support our beliefs and analysis of the New Testament has shown that Jesus was married and had children.

To Gnostic Christians we do not have a problem with the humanity of Jesus.

He was for us a teacher and we accept that he was human and not a God.

The Catholic Church has been a lie since it's existence and it knows the fact.

Since Constantine created the official Church as a political tool to control the Empire, the faith has been abused.

However Christians today are waking up to the origins of their faith and realising that the teachings of Jesus are not what have been presented for the last 1500 years.

At last his thoughts are being expressed in their original form.

The Destruction of Freedom

This is not simply a trait of Britain, it is happening all over the so called advanced world.

The pernicious nature of it is driven by both politicians and unelected government officials.

It covers every facet of your life, from your religious beliefs, who you vote for, whether you drink alcohol or not, smoke, drive a car, own your own home, want to wave a flag outside your house, how you bring up your children, go hunting, believe in aliens, eat meat, support your local fishing community, express a view that uncontrolled immigration is a bad thing, global warming is created by humans, health and safety!

On a personal level I have experienced the change in policing, when making a complaint about anti-social behaviour, the coppers don't accept what you say, noise is acceptable because the law now says people have to smoke outside a pub because of health and safety.

The time has come to name the individuals who create these laws and those who gain from implementing them.

They must suffer the consequences of a reduction in freedom. They must also lose their jobs!

Gordon Brown

This post may not mean much to you if you are fortunate enough not to be a Briton.

Currently we have an unelected Prime Minister who thinks the way to solve economic problems is to spend borrowed money.

We are now in a position where 65% of GDP is created by the public sector, which basically means we are in the fertiliser.

Our beloved leader who seems to me to have had a personality by-pass, has put Britons in a position where it could take twenty years to pay off the national debt.

When he and his chum the Holy Tony came to power, we did not have a national debt!

What may you ask have they spent the money on?

The simplest way of answering this question is to start at where they haven't spent it.

The transport system could best be described as Pre-Christian.

The military are fighting with bows and arrows.

Christianity is virtually criminalised.

Law and Order has become politically correct and thus requires little Government expenditure because to prosecute criminals is to oppress the poor.

Our beloved Prime Minister has created the biggest national debt in the history of Britain.

Most of this money has gone to pay for quangos, political schemes , local politicians and institutions that will happily continue to promote the Labour Movement.

We now have a system where senior civil servants are paid massive salaries and given incredible bonuses for performance.

Excuse me but why should tax payers money be used to make these idiots wealthy?

Our nation is in trauma and I could see a civil war, unheard of since Cromwell.

If this should happen, it is a major threat to the rest of the World.

To prevent it happening the major powers should force Britain to revert to it's historical roots of freedom.

Not even America can afford for this country to fall apart.

Our current PM is an enemy of liberty and must be removed.

Sir Alan Beith

This is an open letter to my local MP.

Dear Sir Alan

As the propaganda sheet issued by your local constituency office polluted my doormat this morning, I thought it might be prudent to respond to you.

In this ill considered pamphlet you were foolish enough to mention that you had served this constituency for the better part of thirty years.

In this time you have achieved exactly what?

To date we still do not have a dualled A1, our local hospital is little more than a part time clinic.

We no longer have a full time police station and village schools continue to be closed.

Yes you have been successful in meeting with moaning minnies in your Berwick and Alnwick offices, which has clearly helped you get re-elected.

Your greatest success no doubt has been achieving a knighthood for yourself and getting your former secretary into the House of Lords.

Nice and cosey for the pair of you but it does little for North Northumberland.

Are you seriously considering standing for re-election, because sir you are a complete tit and represent a party that couldn't manage a whelk stall!

I bid you good day!

Our Origins

Every kid born in the British Isles has been brought up with an incorrect view of both our history and our origins.

We were and are taught that our islands were populated by a series of tribes that, with each phase of invasion effectively ethnically cleansed the country.

With the advent of genetic mapping, we now know that what we have been fed over the years, is complete tosh!

Ethnically there is little difference between the English,Scots,Welsh and Irish.

The first inhabitants of our islands were Basques and to this day we are still predominantly ethnic Basques.

Only a small percentage of our population was ever Celt, Anglo-Saxon, Viking or Norman.

This tends to suggest that those arriving on our shores were in each case an elite, probably escaping some kind of persecution in their homelands.

This of course is intriguing, it means that we are an incredibly ancient race who have lost their heritage.

Our ancestors built Stonehenge and the other megalithic monuments in Britain, for why we don't really know.

The Druids originated in our islands and far from the Roman propaganda which said they practised human sacrifice, we know that their learning was revered throughout the ancient

World, which in itself suggests that Britain was not an island of savages.

The Romans true interest in Britain was it's mineral wealth.

The most important metal of the time was bronze which is an alloy of tin and copper, both of which were in abundance in Britain.

There are legends in the West Country that Jesus came here with his uncle, Joseph of Arimathea and that Jesus studied under the druids at Glastonbury.

Obviously there is no material evidence for this but folk tales have often proved to have an element of truth.

We know for sure that Joseph was a wealthy tin merchant and since Cornwall was the biggest producer of this metal in the ancient World, it would not be surprising if he travelled there.

To support this argument, the early church stated that the first Christian church was created in Britain at Glastonbury.

Why would Jesus come here? Our islands have an ancient spirituality involving megaliths, ley lines and of course the druids.

It was well known in ancient times as a mysterious place and a centre of spiritual learning

Many Christians may be horrified by my suggestions, but they should remember that Jesus was not a Christian.

The cult that developed out of his teachings became known as Christianity.

So we Britons live in a mystical place and more and more of us are going back to our roots, this land has a special hold on us that we cannot truly explain.

I believe that we will over the coming years start to re-evaluate our place in the World.

Throughout history these small islands have had an influence out of all proportion to their size and this will continue but in a way based on the knowledge of the ancients.

If your ancestors came from these isles you are probably of Basque origin, either way this is your spiritual home, visit it if you can.

Ludwig van Beethoven

After the last post I wanted to express something truly personal and truly emotional.

On 16th December 1770 was born for me the greatest composer who ever lived, and even he knew that God had placed him here for a purpose.

I am sitting here listening to Egmont.

As with every note he ever composed, it means something, it has spiritual resonance and you know that God put this man on the planet to express the beauty of life, nature and humanity.

Ludwig's music is the culmination of expression before the devastation of industrialisation.

You feel every note, it is organic and part of you.

Go out and buy the Emperor Concerto and listen to it late at night in the dark and then you will feel the genius of this man.

Every phrase makes sense, nothing is out of place, it just comes together in a way that will make you understand why you are on this planet.

If I have convinced you, which I hope I have, then move on to the Ninth Symphony, the greatest piece of music known to man.

Ludwig attended the premier in Vienna and received a standing ovation at the finish of the Symphony.

He witnessed people clapping their hands and knew that he had created a wonderful piece of music.

It was composed when he was completely deaf, he cut the legs off his piano so he could feel the note vibrations whilst he was lying on the floor.

God created a master who knew his duty to the Lord and he created what was required.

Can you think of an artist today that makes you think of nature, true love, humanity or spirituality?

Nudity and Civilisation

This post may upset some of my readers, but nevertheless I feel the need to state my views.

There are certain things going on in our World that are pernicious and need to be addressed.

Two types of violence are polluting our children. One is obvious and that is the glorification of weaponry and the other is on-line porn.

Both these demean us as humans.

It should be noted that the biggest purveyors of both these corruptions are The United States of America.

Under the US Constitution these systems are protected, firstly the right to bare arms and secondly the right of free speech.

Why do Senators and Congressmen continue to permit this filth to be exported around the World?

The answer is quite simple, money.

America makes billions of dollars every year from the propagation of the sale of weapons and porn.

Both products degrade humanity and lose America, respect in the World.

Huge corporations such as Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and others, choose to avoid their moral responsibility to society.

The Bill Gates Foundation may spend millions helping poorer countries, but do nothing to prevent the moral collapse in the West.

This is sinister in the extreme.

Secular society says that we should never have censorship, but there are certain subjects where it is in the public interest.

I think most people would prefer that their children were not exposed to either violence or porn in a way that suggests it's normal behaviour.

I titled the post Nudity and Civilisation, for me to pick up a paper and find a half naked girl in it, has got to the point of being tiresome.

She will be admired for nothing more than her body.

This obsession with the body beautiful has become idiotic and the effect on our society means that we think of nothing less than how pretty we are!

The time has come when we say no!

If we do not our civilisation will collapse.

William Adams

William Adams was born in the Kentish town of Gillingham, England, in the year of our Lord 1564.

At the age of twelve he was apprenticed as a shipwright working in Limehouse, an area of the old London docks.

His apprenticeship lasted twelve years before he gained a position as Master and Pilot with the Worshipful Company of Barbary Merchants, where he spent a further twelve years, including joining a Government funded expedition to the Arctic to try to find the fabled Northwest Passage.

In the year 1598 an opportunity arose to join a small Dutch Merchant fleet as Pilot Major, with the objective of opening trade between Holland and Japan.

The fleet consisting of five merchantmen, sailed that year and headed off for the tip of South America.

Only three vessels made it through the Straits of Magellan, one of which was captured by the Spanish and another was lost in a storm.

The last remaining vessel crossed the Pacific and arrived off Japan in April 1600, with only 20 of the original crew of 100 surviving. The most senior of which was William Adams.

Initially they met with a hostile reception from locals accompanied by Jesuit priests, who wanted them crucified as pirates.

However, word was sent to Tokugawa the Daimyo of Mikawa, the future Shogun of Japan.

He insisted on interrogating Adams over a considerable period of time, on such subjects as his profession, country, religion and England's relationship with Spain and Portugal.

Much to the annoyance of the Jesuits, Tokugawa refused to countenance the execution of people he did not have a quarrel with.

Adams was commissioned by the now Shogun to build Western style sailing vessels, the first of which was used to chart the coast of Japan.

Within a two year time frame Adams became fluent in Japanese and gradually replaced the Jesuits as the advisor to the Shogun on matters covering shipbuilding, trade and diplomacy.

About this time the Shogun presented him with two swords and changed his name to Miura-Anjin, thus he became the first European to be made a Samurai.

Known by most as Anjin-sama, meaning Lord Pilot, he received an estate which included 100 servants and was located at a place called Uraga, near modern day Tokyo.

Adams married a local Japanese girl, by whom he had two children.

Given privileged trading and diplomatic rights, he served Japan until his death in 1620.

His grave can be seen today in Hirado, Nagasaki Prefecture, where it is maintained by local monks.

William Adam's memory is preserved to this day in two places, Anjin-cho, in Nihonbashi and at a village in his former fiefdom called Anjinzuka.

Every year on the 10th August, the city of Ito holds the Miura Anjin Festival.

His story was the inspiration for a novel by James Clavell and also turned into a mini-series called Shogun.

Christmas

The Christmas season is rapidly approaching when we all should be thinking of family, friends and the happy times ahead.

However for many parents this time of the year can be very stressful as they consider the potential financial cost of the Season of Goodwill.

Retailers the World over manage to encourage children to want want want.

Parents do what they can to make Christmas a special time for their young ones, but sadly the focus is mainly on the fleeting happiness experienced through materialism.

Less and less do people in the developed World pay homage to the true meaning of this festival and as a result it has been usurped by commercialism.

Gone are the days when carollers would knock on your door and sing just for you, expecting a little charity to be distributed to the poor.

Even Christmas decorations are rarely symbolic of this most important Christian festival, they are more often than not ' thematic '.

The season of goodwill has turned into a feast of over indulgence where little time is given over to reflecting on those who will not be experiencing the joys of a family coming together.

Many Christians live in oppressive regimes, have little money to survive let alone celebrate Christmas in a material way.

However they will more likely express their spiritual feelings at this time.

So if you can, take a little time to think of those less fortunate than yourself and give a little charity when someone in need crosses your path.

The Strange Death of Dr Kelly

You will all remember the aftermath of the Second Gulf War, where politicians in both Britain and the US began to question the reasons for going to war.

The UN was told by Bush and Blair that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and despite concerted efforts, postwar, nothing was ever found to suggest that Iraq possessed WMD's.

In Britain a Parliamentary Inquiry was undertaken to investigate the original claim.

One of the principal witnesses was a chap called Dr David Kelly, a government scientist who was considered to be one of the World's leading experts in this field.

A quiet and unassuming man who was clearly uncomfortable in the media spotlight.

The evidence he gave at the inquiry was to say the least damning for Mr Blair's government.

Shortly afterwards he was found dead, in a local beauty spot, close to where he lived.

His family to this day, say that he was not the suicidal type, but the subsequent inquest stated that he took his own life.

In today's paper a group of six physicians have stated that he was murdered by persons unknown.

Consider this: The Inquest was set up by Lord Falconer, an ex-flat mate of Tony Blair, who appointed Lord Hutton to oversee the inquiry.

The six doctors in question have asked for a judicial review on the basis that certain questions have not been satisfactorily answered by the original inquiry.

I will quote verbatim the six points they wish to have answered:

1.Why was the cause of death found to be a haemorrhage, when hardly any blood was found around the body?

2.Who were the mystery men seen around the time of Dr Kelly's death, near where his body was found?

3.Why were there no fingerprints on the knife that Dr Kelly supposedly used to slit his wrists?

4.Why did the police investigation into Dr Kelly's death apparently begin before he even set off for his final walk, let alone before his body was found?

5.Why were there claims that Dr Kelly took 29 painkillers, when only a fifth of one tablet was found in his stomach?

6.Was Dr Kelly's body moved after death?

Dr David Kelly's family have never believed that he committed suicide and for six eminent physicians to consider that the original enquiry was flawed makes you wonder why the government is reticent to investigate this issue in detail.

Let us look at Tony Blair for a moment.

A public schoolboy whose father was a life long member of the Conservative Party, Blair meets Cherie Booth a rabid socialist.

Blair joins the Labour Party at a time when it is in terminal decline and meets a traditional Labour supporter called Gordon Brown.

Over time a deal is struck, they create a new concept called 'New Labour', which is little more than a Conservative variant.

Blair says to Brown, you get me traditional Labour support and I will win the election, after one term I will hand over to you, OK says Brown and the rest is history.

Not only does Blair betray his original roots, he betrays his relationship with the Labour Party, Gordon Brown and his so called Christian beliefs by converting to the Catholic Church.

What we have here is a man that the World cannot trust and who is ruthless enough to arrange the death of a government scientist who could potentially expose him.

A previous Chief of the General Staff has gone so far as to suggest this man should stand trial for War Crimes.

I leave it to you to make up your own mind.

Copenhagen

And I don't mean the name of the Duke of Wellington's horse!

You will have read in the news about the latest climate change conference that is taking place in Copenhagen.

Scientists have been telling us for some time that we are experiencing Global Warming, and I think that is self evident from the odd weather that we all know is affecting our World.

However I am not one of those who blindly follows the mantra of science.

A little reading and a little education will show you that the planet has experienced dramatic climate change in the past, long before industrialisation, motor cars and vast herds of farting cattle.

The 'green' industry will tell you that sea levels are going to rise and sink many cities and communities around the World.

What they fail to mention is that an increase in temperature will also result in an increase in evaporation, creating a higher humidity and rainfall.

So vast amounts of this extra moisture will be held in the atmosphere and end up being deposited in places that are currently starved of water.

On the one hand we have the developed World promoting this CO2 emissions mantra, primarily to put pressure on developing countries, by suggesting we monitor the production of all products, based on their carbon footprint,( a spurious form of measurement derived from biased and ill considered calculation.).

Then under developed countries sign up to this principal as a means to extract funds for so called sustainable development.

What we really have here is a post industrial methodology designed to maintain a status quo with regard to advanced economies, ensuring that the new technologies needed to combat the uncombatable are developed by sophisticated countries.

Green scientists are the new priesthood and to question what they say amounts to nothing less than heresy, after all they know, don't they, they went to University and who are we to criticise their findings?

So their mantras are promoted around the World by politicians and pop stars whizzing around in executive jets, travelling in limos and living in huge houses.

Perhaps the public will start to believe what we are being told, when those who promote it start living in a more environmentally friendly way.

For me, as a man who has worked with nature as a plantsman, certainly I see changes, but you would be amazed at how rapidly nature adapts to conditions.

Humanity is beginning to realise that the age of enlightenment is coming to an end and we will revert back to living in tune with nature.

The dinosaurs of our age are scientists who still believe they can change the World by manipulation.

Stop worrying and adapt, the Great Architect of the Universe created our home, which has seen many changes and it will see many more before our Sun becomes a Red Dwarf!