[Richard]

Maybe I should watch this space a little longer. I will just keep using my old bought and paid for retail versions for the moment.

[Richard]

Ed P wrote:

Richard my comment was factual not bigoted rubbish. Many officers no longer really know their beats and the people involved. While I agree no-one has stated that the tasering was due to inexperience, the officer concerned may have taken a totally different approach if he/she had known the full background of the individual in question, it may also have resulted in sending a team that included a mental health specialist (this is now standard practice in my area when the situation is known to include such an individual). I used to know most of the local Police force by name, I now can only place names on two or three – the older ones took the package while the experienced middle aged officers have been assigned elsewhere to bigger, higher crime regions. Please check the facts in your area before stating that my post was ‘rubbish’, and it certainly was not bigoted unless you ascribe a religious element to Conservative party membership! I’m certainly not intolerant of Conservatives in general and some such as Ken Clarke generally speak sensibly and with great experience. Others however need to be held fully accountable for their past actions or support.

According to the available reports the van in question was pinged up as uninsured. Up to that point the thug, fool, criminal (name it as you see fit) would have been unknown to anybody on or off its ‘parish’.

News flash, vehicles do move about and do not always stay on their home patch, they move about.

The rest is more or less public history.

Your copious use of the word may makes it sound like another ‘phantasy trip’.

This smells very much like your previous fishing trip against the ‘establishment’ based on the word of the disgraced paedophile and extortioner ‘Nick’. You know the one who was championed by Watson and several police officers. Those senior officers apparently did not know cases should proceed on the basis of evidence and plausibility.

Of course, it may, (that word again) be possible that no one knows insurance is needed for a vehicle and that without evidence of such insurance a vehicle is liable to be stopped by the police to verify its legality. It may also be that everyone drives round, (or should drive round) with a large knife in their vehicle ready to attack anyone they do not like. If that is the case I did not get the memo.

It may equally well be that the whole thing played out by the police training book. I seriously hope so given that it is said to have been recorded on the body cameras of the police.

[Richard]

I have seen it be slow to load, but never a double load operation.

[Richard]

I believe I answered your points in my note, I am not advocating a return to those days, e.g. It is one sound bite wonder to compare past efforts to use the fear of possible incarceration for stealing food against the certainty of going hungry. I advocate something more structured, if you can find the top 1000 miscreants by all means track them down and take suitable actions. You are bringing in hell-hole prisons I am not. See this quote; For the sake of accuracy I am not advocating some backwoods USA style failed crack down. I note you did not respond to my point about the now dead 89 year old and brought in your own off at a tangent red herring, that is OK, I cannot stand fish I will leave you to munch on that. The certainty of arrest does have value of a deterrent, what follows can make all the difference. Though if the police have the right sub species for the widow’s murder removing its right to roam for a very long time, would be a sound idea, if only to protect others.

I guess you missed this closing comment, so have other approaches such dealing with problems as health issues though not at the expense of allowing criminal acts to go unpunished. It was a reference to your comment about the Scottish idea of treating knife crime as a medical issue as much as a criminal one. Though, a mindless application of the approach in a rubber stamp style would likely fail unless it was applied to identical issues, are they really identical? Some comments have suggested they may diverge from each other and from location to location.

However, I see little prospect of finding any common ground, a usual situation when people are driven by preconceived political ideas such as your suggestion of hell-hole prisons. I might add that transportation did resolve the problems of one long distant family member who went on to really prosper. I should stress that is emphatically not an answer I am promoting, what are you proposing?

[Richard]

BL’s deal idea is a better option than many, but for me I am not really convinced. Basically, though I have 4 PCs my wife does not really use Office and an old version of Outlook does all she ever wants. It is pretty much the same for me, though I do use Office a very tiny amount more than her, these days it is a tiny amount of use, some medical histories plus Outlook with its diary function and that is about the sum total. The two portables are kept up to date, but not really used at all so a subscription would be wasted on them. Our daughter uses even less and is in a world of her own much of the time anyway, the odd text, a tiny bit of Google and a very few emails. As long as her PC keeps working, I want to keep well away from messing with its ways.

Adobe want to sell me a subscription down grade from my present version of Lightroom, but I use it so rarely at the moment that I am unlikely to learn about any new functions, let alone use them.

[Richard]

I am sure that the 89-year-old woman who was raped and murdered in her own home and beaten to death, was very reassured to know that she was feeling terror rather than the thug who was killing her without a concern for her.

A little honesty suggests that what Priti Patel wants criminals to feel is the concern, ideally terror that they will be caught, processed and treated, perhaps as the scum who murdered the old lady should be. Not be the nine out of ten who get off scot-free with the tenth getting tea and sympathy and being sent on their way. Only to rinse and repeat ever more.

It is one sound bite wonder to compare past efforts to use the fear of possible incarceration for stealing food against the certainty of going hungry, it is another to suggest that the present way of so called justice is working well. Frankly if fools want to die after synthetic drug use let them do so wherever they fall, without wasting money on treatment. However, if they want to rob and assault you Dave for their next fix because of their self-inflicted folly, where will you then stand, or more likely fall down injured or dying?

For the sake of accuracy I am not advocating some backwoods USA style failed crack down, though the famous broken window approach did appear to have merit, so have other approaches such dealing with problems as health issues though not at the expense of allowing criminal acts to go unpunished.

[Richard]

I still use the original versions of things I wanted and paid for, ignoring the so called appeal of subscription model down-grades for the reasons you put forward. Do the things you want disable any older versions? Can you not continue to use the previous versions and ignore the down grade to a subscription. Recently a mail advised that an item was due for an annual refresh. It had been bought as a one off to do a ‘then’ task a year ago; as it has now expired so it is history.

Perhaps it is easy to see why lazy sellers like the repeating revenue stream, but I am not on the receiving end of the money stream, so it is not for me. I apply the same logic to the likes (or in my case non-likes) of Sky’s subscription model – not for me!

[Richard]

dwynnehugh wrote:

Dave – I agree but there is an old adage that ‘when you are up to your neck in alligators, it’s easy to forget that the goal was to drain the swamp’. What is the alternative – do the American police forces have it right???? Whilst anything can go wrong at any time – we have to accept that as a fact of life – we have car accidents – should we close all roads, we have nurses to kill – do we close all hospitals, we have air crashes – should we ban all aeroplanes?? The list is endless. There are no ideal senarios for every day situations. As much as anyone can do, we do have to accept that, as long as there is human interaction – things can and will go wrong – occasionally with tragic consequences for both sides. Please have a look how many police officers have been killed in the course of their duty in the last 10 years as compared to the death rate from tasers. Those officers did not go to work on that day intending to kill someone or to be killed – fact of life. Our emergency services are expected to do more and more with less and less staffing, large decreases in budgets, certainly these days the police have HAD to take on new rolls for which they were, in my time never trained for, just because other agencies are in the same dire straits as the police BUT the police are there 24/7/365 and they HAVE to cope and that is how HMG gets away with it!! The ‘stress level sickness’ of police is now higher than it ever has been. I wonder why?

I do not and will not argue with what you have said, I said much the same above, I will add a few comments and touch on a few personal aspects. Closing the old mental hospitals without making any realistic provision for the care and treatment of those who need care and treatment was a major failure. However, it is also true to say that closing the old style mental hospitals, (the ‘lunatic asylums’) was probably correct on at least two grounds. They were not fit for purpose and many were time expired buildings. The huge error was in dumping those who needed help into communities that could not cope and then expecting the police to pick up the resulting pieces. That would have been bad enough, but the growing drug problems has multiplied and considerably complicated the issues. Medical issues, stupidity issues and criminality issues became woven together with no one able to disentangle the threads, so it became a ‘police problem’ as a last resort.

Our eldest had medical complications in the past, quite distinct from her younger sibling’s issues. She adopted a fairly alternative style of dress when young. One day she collapsed with a seizure some years ago, so the ‘highly trained medical staff’ who turned up took one look, assumed she was suffering from drugs or alcohol and left her in the bus stop. Eventually friends helped her to get home where she was cleaned up and recovered. Subsequently, she obtained treatment for her underlying conditions, but no thanks to those who should have known, but did not know better. At least that one did not become a police statistic – to everyone’s benefit.

[Richard]

I do accept that the law of unintended consequences all too often applies. A certain Mr Blair found that out when he was throwing his failures round. I noted that the police now wear body cameras, some other professions have copied this style, as much for their protection as for other reasons. I suspect that the body cameras not only cut down the likely complaints from those who are in the wrong, but I know that if I was wearing one, I would be aware of being recorded. In fact, I am aware that wherever I go I expect and perhaps hope to be recorded and I try to act accordingly, though I have little hope that the criminal protection service, (the CPS) would ever accept the recording as valid evidence of any wrong done against me.

Returning to the matter of the taser specifically in this case, rather than confusing the issue with historic matters, I have no objection at all to its use. Society has become a sicker, worse, riskier pile of poo as shown by the driver in question, but at the same time past events have provided rich evidence to guide developments and lessons are being learned. Police body cameras are one manifestation of the needed developments. I have mixed feelings about whether the police recordings should be made public. Some increasingly prevalent low life would possible seek to find ways to circumvent their use if techniques become too widely understood.

Dave, I very well understand the issues surrounding autistic behaviour, our daughter is in assisted living. Suffice it to say that we are less than ecstatic whenever she mentions any idea of changing her treatments, after a long period of stability.

I also referred to collateral damage, to expand that a bit, the 8-year-old long dead school friend of our other, elder daughter was collateral damage from the drug habit of her highly paid father. He left her surviving sister a very large trust fund. Drug fuelled stupidity is not just for the ‘underprivileged’.

[Richard]

Ed P wrote:

We are now in a Catch 22 situation, our idiot Conservative Government so reduces our Police Force that there are too few Police Officers on the street to nip any situation in the bud. This is compounded by very inexperienced officers, many of whom do not even know the area having just been bussed-in from some outlying district to cover shortages etc. Despite statements from the Clown PM this situation will not improve for many years. The Police were forced to close and sell off many Police Stations so in many cases new Police Officers will have to work from home. They will not be able to use a Police car to get in as the Government forced a sell-off of these as well! I’ll just touch on the fact that training will be a huge resource consumer a that it will take years to increase numbers. (Unfortunately I cannot link to official data as there has been a Government clamp-down on releasing negative information, but any Neighbourhood Watch rep should have the contacts to verify these statements) The nett effect is as said a Catch 22 situation, we are pretty much forced to be in a situation where the Police have to make up for insufficient resources with fire-power. (not REAL fire-power as training fire-arms officers takes even more resources!). BTW I totally agree with JCD, and my perception is that a greater proportion of the population now need to be placed in controlled Institutions than was the case in the 1970s.

Does this bigoted rubbish have any relevance to the report in question? I can answer that one for you, No it does not. Police numbers were not an issue in this case, not having insurance for his lethal weapon was. Did police training play a part in the wild idiot’s attempted use of lethal force, no it did not. Did police training help the office who was being attacked, yes he disabled the loon, sadly not permanently.

As for the points from others. The police have been equipped with body cameras to try to rebalance the issues. No doubt dubious odd sods will of course claim that the police video has been edited to show the police in the right against, their special interest bod or some other characterless thug.

The age of Dixon of Dock Green never was that was fiction. The reality is that too many streets and districts are now affected by a range of  serious issues many down to the likes of the misnamed ‘legal highs’, or more accurately ‘life-losers’. If they don’t kill you there is a high risk they will have serious life affecting results on both the taker and those who become collateral damage.

I take dwynnehugh’s point, ever job has those who are just unsuitable, those who are poor performers, those who are unsuited to a particular job, those who are having an off-day those who are off the pace and so on. Most do not set out to do a bad job, SPAD train drivers are probably not setting out to kill themselves or others, lorry drivers who misjudge a corner or hill in all likelihood did not set out to kill, though they have established a regular records of deaths on the M11 through careless driving. Van drivers who set out with no insurance to carry a large knife do not do so through accident, they set out that way. They did not try two ways to escape before trying to kill their way out of trouble.

[Richard]

The white wash trail cuts both ways I see the ‘person-thing’that tried to kill a small child at the Tate is now being reported as: ‘The 17-year-old charged with throwing a young boy off a viewing platform at London’s Tate Modern gallery will be assessed by mental health experts, a court heard’.

Do I hear the sound of another can of white-wash being prepared? Ready for him to be released in a few months time perhaps?

[Richard]

On the other hand why was the scum responsible not in need of hospital attention? Though, it would have been a waste of resources, so I am glad the need did not arise. It went back to its van, tried to drive off and then attacked with a large knife, so three strikes in one go. I understand all of its performance was caught on camera. I am sorry I do not buy the bleeding heart rhetoric of those who seek to defend the wrongs of low-life-trash like that. At least NHS resources did not have to be wasted on it, that is the only ‘good’ news.

The case Dave quoted there was this statement “was in a manic state, out of his mind and ranting”. Why was he even on the street and not in some more secure location where he could have had the care he very clearly needed?

I read about the case of the race relations person, but since I have no information other than brief conflicting comments, I can give no valid comment.

I avoid going out at night and avoid many areas, even in day light given the problems of wild criminals there are about the place. There are drug dealers actively trading within a  couple of miles, perhaps less of where I live.

Why should I have to restrict my life because of them and their crazy minders? Frankly I have already lost my freedom, so why should those who caused my loss not suffer? If it hurts them, good.

[Richard]

That does sound familiar from a while past. I think that the army ran into problems with something like that, perhaps 3 or 4 might be more years back. Even the name sounds ‘sort of’ familiar, but being the case and sounding possible are two different things.

I agree, research, research and research again before treading into dangerous waters.

It is a tragedy for her, her family and those affected by the death.

[Richard]

You will have set off by now, but if you get this before you return have a good one and enjoy every minute.

If you do not get this before you return I trust it all went well and you enjoyed it all you could.

Either way I trust you return refreshed and ready for what is to come. Hopefully that will all be good.

[Richard]

Bob, I wondered about that point; it does sound like a really poor bit of software if it forces some sort of reset every 60 minutes unless the faulty module or modules are not used. It appears only to be reliable when it is used in a stripped down form. I know we should all take regular breaks when driving, but a satellite navigation system that gives up and forces a break to re-build itself every 60 minutes does sound like something that needs a permanent bathroom break and no remission.

It sounds like some sort of fault or error condition arising in one of the modules that misbehaves when the device is run in full fat mode, (even with an external power source).

Is it even a reasonable item to market in its flawed state?

It is far more like an item unfit for sale because it is not of merchantable quality.

[Richard]

Look into the likes of Freecycle for various bits and pieces to avoid spending money before you have earned any, office desks and miscellaneous kit are sometimes given away for free, I know I have disposed of stuff that way. You might well get some left over construction materials from DIY projects that can help.

You might/can get tax breaks for ‘investments’, this could include space and heating in your home, but be very wary, you might then attract business rates and should you come to sell your home it can get very complicated. JCD offers some very sage advice, in general I suspect he puts forward the notion of ‘rush slowly’ into every step.

Do heed Les’s advice and make sure your tax affairs are squeaky clean right from the off; ensure you keep first-rate records in at least two places, ideally one ‘off site’.

[Richard]

Steve, I cannot fault your logic. There are too many ways to know that something is about to befall you. If a final one is on its way better ignorance than a long slow slide though dementia.

[Richard]

Les, that was an interesting view. A while back I bought a replacement battery for a mobile. It was tagged as Duracel, but to be honest it did not have anything like the life I was expecting. So my view of their products became equally jaundiced. Something about their agents made me suspect that they are now just a badge stamper getting stuff from wherever they can and that quality is not longer a key feature, at least with some of the Duracel badged ‘other devices’ such as mobile power packs and the like.

Have you ever seen any of Big Clive’s YouTube videos? He dissects failed devices and jumper packs, battery packs come to explosive end of life in some of his sessions. Build quality is not always what you would hope to see.

[Richard]

Or was it, (or would it have been), someone’s devil extracting revenge?

There is always a way to shovel blame about the world. The worrying aspect is that there are always those who fall for the tall stories every time.

[Richard]

No doubt had it happened in the way that you worried about,  the left wing establishment would have blamed Israel!

[Author]

Posts