The Curmudgeon

YOU'LL COME FOR THE CURSES. YOU'LL STAY FOR THE MUDGEONRY.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Helping Hands, Sticky Fingers

Local government in the Turks and Caicos islands, a British overseas territory in the Atlantic, has been suspended for two years so that the government of Gordon Brown and Lord Mandelbrot the Infinitely Recurring can put things "back in good order". The governor of the islands claimed that the idea was "to make a clean break from the mistakes of the past by establishing a durable path towards good governance" of the kind which the Glorious Successor has instituted at home and which the Foreign and Commonwealth Office supports in Uzbekistan; "sound financial management" with appropriate bonuses, legitimate expenses and reasonable pensions for those who can afford them; and "sustainable development", doubtless consisting of a few more airports and a nuclear power station or two. There have even been allegations that certain developments on the islands are "the product of corrupt deals between local politicians and foreign businessmen". No wonder the intimate friends of Rupert Murdoch and Oleg Deripaska have had to step in with a strong, purgative dose of Saudi-British values. Nevertheless, the islands' media have "accused the British government of having double standards on the issue of corruption", and their Sun newspaper (no relation to ours, presumably) has "contrasted the UK's tough stance on the islands with the MPs' expenses scandal at Westminster". Imagine that.

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