The Role of a Lifetime: Prince Philip had a front row view of the entire world that nobody else had. In good times and bad, he exemplified the robust pride, courage, determination, stubbornness, and honesty of Great Britain and Britons

The Role of a Lifetime: Prince Philip had a front row view of the entire world that nobody else had. 

In good times and bad, he exemplified the robust pride, courage, determination, stubbornness, and honesty of Great Britain and Britons.

For 95% of the world, the closest thing to permanence -besides the Queen herself- we've had on the scene...

The last time #QueenElizabeth didn't know who #PrincePhilip was, she was 8 years old. 

1934. 

The @Cardinals' "Gashouse Gang" beat the @tigers in World Series. 

#FL's population was 1.585 million. 

Only 5% of #UK's population was alive before they married.

https://twitter.com/hbbtruth/status/1380555884573700096

https://twitter.com/RoyalFamily/status/1380475865323212800

It is with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen has announced the death of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. His Royal Highness passed away peacefully this morning at Windsor Castle.

The Royal Family join with people around the world in mourning his loss. Further announcements will be made in due course.
Visit http://royal.uk to read the announcement in full.

https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/prime-ministers-statement-on-the-death-of-his-royal-highness-the-prince-philip-duke-of-edinburgh

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's statement on the death of His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

From: Prime Minister's Office, 10 Downing Street and The Rt Hon Boris Johnson MP

Delivered on: 9 April 2021 (Transcript of the speech, exactly as it was delivered)

It was with great sadness that a short time ago I received word from Buckingham Palace that His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh has passed away at the age of 99.

Prince Philip earned the affection of generations here in the United Kingdom, across the Commonwealth and around the world.

He was the longest serving consort in history,

one of the last surviving people in this country to have served in the second world war at Cape Matapan, where he was mentioned in dispatches for bravery

and in the invasion of Sicily, where he saved his ship by his quick thinking and from that conflict he took an ethic of service that he applied throughout the unprecedented changes of the post war era.

Like the expert carriage driver that he was he helped to steer the royal family and the monarchy so that it remains an institution indisputably vital to the balance and happiness of our national life.

He was an environmentalist, and a champion of the natural world long before it was fashionable.

With his Duke of Edinburgh awards scheme he shaped and inspired the lives of countless young people

and at literally tens of thousands of events he fostered their hopes and encouraged their ambitions.

We remember the Duke for all of this and above all for his steadfast support for Her Majesty The Queen.

Not just as her consort, by her side every day of her reign, but as her husband, her “strength and stay”, of more than 70 years.

And it is to Her Majesty, and her family, that our nation’s thoughts must turn today.

Because they have lost not just a much-loved and highly respected public figure, but a devoted husband and a proud and loving father, grandfather and, in recent years, great-grandfather.

Speaking on their golden wedding anniversary, Her Majesty said that our country owed her husband “a greater debt than he would ever claim or we shall ever know” and I am sure that estimate is correct.

So we mourn today with Her Majesty The Queen

we offer our condolences to her and to all her family

and we give thanks, as a nation and a Kingdom, for the extraordinary life and work of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

#BorisBus - A public policy must-read over the holidays: "Boris's Bus (A Political Journey)" by The Guardian's London blogger Dave Hill, @DaveHill, who's been chronicling energetic London Mayor Boris Johnson's controversial effort to place his stamp on London's future transportation scene

@JessicaGKwong @transitmiami LOTS of insight into #transportation policy #London & #BorisBus via blog of @DaveHill http://t.co/sG9MI24lHi
— HallandaleBeachBlog (@hbbtruth) December 24, 2014

Here's the series in reverse-chron order:

Boris's Bus (A Political Journey) Boris Johnson's wish to create a modern successor 

to London's legendary Routemaster buses has been a signature policy of his mayoralty. 

The Guardian's London blogger Dave Hill has been following the unfolding saga of its creation

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/series/boris-bus-a-political-journey

Dave Hill's main blog on London is here:  

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/davehillblog

Rare sighting of white ad-free Boris bus (@ Old Kent Road Ilderton Road Bus Stop) https://t.co/AzP0g4SGqm pic.twitter.com/H4Ll4uKPDg
— Chris Nuttall (@ChrisNuttall) December 22, 2014

Transport for #London boss Peter Hendy on de-congesting the capital's high streets: http://t.co/Nt0v3pEhPm
— DaveHill (@DaveHill) December 23, 2014

So I walked into Liverpool Street station and who should turn up at the same time? pic.twitter.com/FwalhyuoF0
— DaveHill (@DaveHill) October 27, 2014

It goes without saying that we could really use this willingness to shake things up in government in Florida, especially South Florida, to say nothing of having double-decker buses along certain main streets.

Then again, ever since it started less than 10 years ago, the Broward County Transit express bus that runs on traffic-clogged US-1, back-and-forth from Aventura Mall to downtown Fort Lauderdale, the Buzz #1, after leaving the Aventura Mall, next to its food court near Macy's, does NOT stop at a single bus SHELTER in Aventura, Hallandale Beach or Hollywood. Really.

Waiting bus passengers get to wait and wait in the rain, sun, wind...

Just like bus passengers at Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport waiting for public transportation, whether visitors who have just landed and eager to get to their hotel, or airline, vendor or Homeland Security employees simply looking to get home, who also have to wait for it at a place with NO shelter, NO benches to sit on and with NO posted bus schedules present. 

It could hardly be less well thought-out and half-assed.

And the people manning the information desk inside the airport consistently CAN'T tell you where the one-and-only bus stop at the airport is, as I discovered first-hand there this summer when I did some investigating and snooping around.

The signs for it are seemingly an afterthought. 

The whole enterprise is a #RealityCheck for #BestPractices.

I've got a photo-filled blog post on that embarrassing transportation situation, esp. at the airport, coming sometime in January, and will publicly question how -yet again- Broward County citizens/taxpayers are clearly being mis-served by Broward's bureaucrats on something that is NOT that complicated, and yet is clearly being botched.

Yes, Broward, the same County that has an Advisory Board for every matter and problem under the sun, real and imagined, but which does NOT have an Advisory Board for the Airport, one of the principal economic engines we have here.

That is something that clearly needs to change in the near-future and with meaningful citizen representation, too. 

To make that change happen, in the new year I plan on speaking directly to the people and interest groups who make the decisions in this County. 

Then we'll see who wants to do what's best for the public and who wants to keep doing what clearly ISN'T working. 

#Resolutions

As the London 2012 Olympics reach two weeks and counting, the world's news media -and enthusiastic London Mayor Boris Johnson- visit Olympic Park, the Athletes Village, some venues and give us their appraisals; #London2012, @London2012

alejandromedinafilms video:  Time-lapse footage of construction of the London 2012 Athletes' Village. (HD). February 22, 2012. http://youtu.be/bB0W8xiqQ8Y





Al Jazeera video: Al Jazeera correspondent Lee Wellings checks out the Olympic Park two weeks before it's full of 16,000 athletes. July 13, 2012.
http://youtu.be/I1ZqZfVjMYU





Australia's 7News: Inside the Olympic village. July 13, 2012. 
http://youtu.be/p1os8q-8geo





London Mayor Boris Johnson inspected the beautiful Olympic Park on Friday, two weeks before the Opening Ceremonies and comes away both impressed and proud. 


MayorsOfficeLondon video: July 13, 2012. http://youtu.be/HIlZmMBYUy8
SNTVonline video: July 13, 2012.  http://youtu.be/p6Bg7uFUays





MayorsOfficeLondon video: A new £50m cable car system -aka Emirates Air Line- linking the Excel Centre at Royal Victoria Docks across the Thames to the O2 Arena in north Greenwich in five minutes, and with an amazing view. http://youtu.be/PLAz1lM0zgs


You don't have to be a genius to know in advance that whatever else happens the first week, this cable car ride with its great views is going to be one of the early breakout hits of the Olympics, with every TV cameraman from around the world in London taking at least two trips across with one of their correspondents showing the folks back home the view from mid-air, to say nothing of the visitors and athletes themselves who will cross with their own video-cams in tow, and why not? 
But the queues will be long!!!


I expect that within a month from today, there will easily be at least 500 videos of the entire Thames crossing on YouTube.


And lest you forget, that's Greenwich as in Greenwich Mean Time -GMT- though during the summer up 'til late October, London is actually on BST, British Summer Time, where the living is easy.
In any case, where time begins on this blue planet.




SNTVonline video: Inside Olympics venue - the Excel Centre. July 13, 2012.
http://youtu.be/3VN8R2mqxvU

Speaking of Depeche Mode... the music in the cable car video above you just heard is their's 



WarnerBrosRecords video: Depeche Mode - It's No Good (Remastered Video). October 26, 2009. http://youtu.be/aieEZ950d1I
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http://www.london2012.com/spectators/venues/

David Cameron & Nick Clegg stand firm on welfare reform (incapacity benefits), & caps on housing benefits -currently costing U.K. £20bn a year

"Do you really think it's wrong for people who can't afford to live privately in those areas that the state should subsidise people to the tune of more than £21,000? I don't think so."

-Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg in the Commons on Thursday

But first... let's go back a few days in time to see how we got to this point.


David Cameron is challenged by Labour leader Ed Miliband in the Commons over the government's plans to limit housing benefit

The Guardian
David Cameron refuses to back down over housing benefit cap
Prime minister tells Commons he is sticking by controversial policy as Labour steps up campaign against cuts and lobbies Lib Dems for support
Hélène Mulholland, political reporter
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 27 October 2010 17.00 BST

David Cameron today dismissed speculation that the government would climb down over its cap on housing benefit, despite claims that the policy could drive 200,000 poorer people out of major cities.

The prime minister made clear his determination to stand firm on the controversial proposals at prime minister's questions.

His comments came as Labour stepped up its campaign against the decision to cut housing benefit for people who have been out of work for 12 months and lobbied Liberal Democrat MPs concerned by the plans.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/27/government-committed-to-housing-benefit-cap

Video is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/video/2010/oct/27/pmqs-david-cameron-ed-miliband-video
-----

The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/oct/28/corrections-clarifications
Corrections and clarifications column editor
The Guardian, Thursday 28 October 2010

In a story yesterday headed Three-quarters of incapacity benefit claimants are fit to work, says DWP, the headline and opening paragraph over-compressed findings issued by the Department for Work and Pensions. And while a departmental statement made some mention of incapacity benefit, the figures at issue concerned the successor scheme – employment and support allowance (ESA), which has been in force for new claimants since October 2008. To clarify the figures: the 75% of ESA claimants characterised as fit to work actually included, as the second paragraph of our story said, people who closed their claim before medical assessments were complete. The full breakdown of how new claims were assessed between October 2008 and February 2010 was: claimants fit for work, 39%; claims closed before assessment complete, 36%; claimants unable to work now but with help could work in the foreseeable future, 15%; those unable to work now and needing long-term unconditional support, 6%; cases still being assessed, 3%. Parenthetically, a further outcome appears elsewhere in the official report from which the figures came, Employment and Support Allowance: Work Capability Assessment, October 2010. Its section on appeals notes that of people found fit for work after making a claim for ESA between October 2008 and August 2009, 33% have had an appeal heard to date; of these, the original fit-to-work decision was "confirmed for 60%"; by implication 40% of fitness rulings were not upheld (27 October, page 12).
-----

The above was a corrective to this otherwise excellent article which demonstrates that the Conservative and LibDem Coalition of David Cameron and Nick Clegg are not going to give-up on what they said they would do to put Great Britain on a sounder, fairer footing for the future, namely, increased public accountability, and for the Conservatives in particular, to fundamentally restructure the economy.

One of those goals was an end to the subsidization of certain social living arrangements in the country, wherein some people in London have gained at the expen$e of other Britons, leading to London mayor Boris Johnson's ridiculous remarks comparing this policy to the ethnic cleansing that took place in Kosovo, which he is now claiming was taken out of context.
To be exact, Johnson said "Kosovo-style social cleansing of London."

Oh, like a comparison of Serbia's policy of ethnic killing/rapes to anything in Britain is ever appropriate in some context?

See: http://www.channel4.com/news/catch-up/display/playlistref/281010/clipid/281010_HOUSING_28 and http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/28/boris-johnson-kosovo-style-cleansing-housing-benefit

British taxpayers pay around £20bn a year for housing benefits, which is why many of my British friends who live outside the metropolitan areas, are forever going-on about Local Housing Allowances and how many of their former Labour-turned-Conservative friends finally saw the light for forthright reform, regardless of the agitprop from the predictable quarters, once they had a family of their own.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/housing-benefit



Video of Housing Minister Grant Shapps on housing benefit row
http://www.channel4.com/news/boris-johnson-under-fire-for-housing-benefit-comments


The Guardian
Three-quarters of incapacity benefit claimants are fit to work, says DWP
Government seeks to demonstrate momentum as Clegg rejects accusation of social 'cleansing'
Allegra Stratton, political correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 26 October 2010 21.22 BST

Three-quarters of the incapacity benefit claimants reassessed recently are able to work, the government claimed today as it sought to demonstrate momentum in the drive to reform the welfare system.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures showed that 78% of the 842,100 people reassessed were either fit for work or had closed their claim before medical assessments were complete.

The government is pushing ahead with the programme of reassessing those on the old-style incapacity benefit. It plans to cut back the wider benefit bill by £18bn.

The issue of caps to housing benefit, meanwhile, flared up in the Commons today.

Read the rest of the post at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/26/incapacity-benefit-claimants-work-dwp
---

27 October 2010 Last updated at 10:54 ET
Housing benefit cuts: Who loses out?
By Ross Hawkins Political correspondent
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11637928

------

A different but well-argued point of view on the incapacity benefit was offered up by Guardian reader Melissa Viney back in July:

Draconian incapacity benefit tests are failing the sick
Inaccurate medical assessment and an inflexible benefit system are putting the most vulnerable at greatest risk
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 29 July 2010 13.30 BST

A disturbing sleight of hand within the revised benefits system has been performed on the electorate and particularly on the sick and disabled. It goes like this: Labour replaced the previous incapacity benefit (IB) with the new employment support allowance (ESA) in 2008 and introduced a fiendishly hard new medical test, followed by members of the government applauding their success in identifying record numbers of incapacity benefits claimants who are fit for work.

Read the rest of the post at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/29/incapacity-benefit-failing

The reader comments are spot-on, too, so be sure to read them. Here's a small taste, from the Viney essay: That's fine and well, but one of a number of reasons the benefit regulations are getting toughened is due to the culture of certain doctors simply signing off irritating benefit claimants. I've spoken to more than a few people who despite suffering from depression were perfectly happy to bite my head off and chat with me for a while and spend a great deal of their weekend enjoying their social lives. It was only when work was inevitably mentioned that their depression seemed to emerge.

Or as some of my friends would say, "Stop milking the bloody system!"

Or as one reader wrote, in part, at The Telegraph in response to story number one:
I welcome the housing benefits reform. Why should those of us livng and paying tax throughout the rest of the country be forced to pay for benefits scroungers and/or immigrants to live in Central London?

A similar comment by another reader was equally to the point:
If you want a house in a nice area then I’m afraid you’re going to have to work for it. And, I hate to break it to you, even then you might not be able to. Most people (myself included) working 40 hours per week can’t afford to live in a posh area so why should non-workers get to do it at taxpayers expense?

The Viney essay above is an example of exactly the sort of thing the Miami Herald and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel should've instituted years ago in order to remain relevant to public discourse in South Florida, where they are now afterthoughts -offering articulate readers the space to sound off on matters they know about, rather than the Usual Suspects.

Instead, despite new and original voices percolating out there and technology making it easier than ever to find them, the Herald and Sun-Sentinel have among the worst Op-Ed pages in the nation.
They're dreadful and often even painful!

The Herald consistently wastes space running dreadfully dull and predictable Mary Sanchez pieces from the K.C. Star, so often which are either myopic pro-amnesty or "victim" pieces.
If I see her name, I turn the page, since I've read it before -many times.
From her!


See also:

Guardian Politics Weekly podcast: Housing benefit and the 'Highland clearance' of London
Will the coalition adhere to its plans to cut housing benefit - potentially displacing hundreds of thousands of poorer people?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/audio/2010/oct/28/housing-benefit-nickclegg?intcmp=239

http://www.channel4.com/news
http://www.channel4.com/news/catch-up/

BBC's U.K. Politics homepage http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/politics/