'OUTCASTS' IN A WORLD OF ITS OWN.

After writing-off the BBC's new drama series 'Outcasts', I thought I should give it a second chance, just to see if there was any possibility that my initial reaction had been wrong.

What a mistake. Episodes 3 and 4 were every bit as rubbishy as the first 2. Dramatic music galore, glowering looks everywhere and a script so lacking in anything meaningful as to be pointless. What the storyline is, is anyone's guess, the horribly miscast characters could just as well be played by the 'Woodentops' (remember them ? Their show made sense) and, all in all, this programme is utter drivel.

Last year, the 'Beeb' wasted heaven knows how much on another over-hyped drama, 'The Deep', which sank without trace; not long before that, we were subjected to 'Survivors', another disastrous load of ridiculous nonsense. One would have thought they'd have learned their lesson from these miserable failures but it seems not. Suffice it to say that I won't be watching any more of this tripe.

AWARDS FOR MEDIOCRITY.

The season of blubbering film makers and 'stars' is upon us again, whether we like it or not.

There was a time when awards went to films of great merit and to stars of great ability, but today's nonsense is of an altogether different type. Today's films are dominated by gloss and dramatic effects, often computer generated; the stars rarely speak more than a handful of words at any one time and don't even have to go on a proper set. The films and performances are rarely of any lasting quality but are simply designed to appeal to the moment. Very few of the films will last the test of time, and yet these seem to be the films that, more often than not, win the major awards.

The more glitzy the awards' ceremonies become and the less meritorious the films and performances, the more effusive become the acceptance speeches; minutes of blubbering and tearful thanks to all and sundry. What a load of tosh.

'OUTCASTS' A WRITE-OFF.

With the current dearth of anything of merit on television, I've watched the first couple of episodes of the BBC's new drama series 'Outcasts'. What a mistake.

This drivel is simply 'Survivors' in space, and 'Survivors' was a ridiculous load of nonsense, apparently dropped due to lack of interest from the viewing public; there's no reason for the story to be set on another planet, it could equally well be in the Australian outback or Gobi desert. It has nothing of any originality, the sets look to be cast-offs from 'Mad Max', the acting is wooden and the script rubbish. Loads of portentous musical backing can't make up for the total lack of a decent storyline.

What has happened at the Beeb ? Where is the genius that produced 'Life on Mars', 'Spooks' and 'Hustle', as well as dozens of other great programmes ? The sooner 'Outcasts' is cast out, the better.

LARKRISE A WINNER.

Having had a few drinks with Sunday dinner, I may be accused of being over-sentimental or some such. However, watching 'Larkrise to Candleford', I'm utterly entranced.

This is a series of true nonsense and yet it has elements of veracity in it. It is obviously set in an imagined world with such well groomed peasants and beautiful surroundings that it is a tale of pure romance; and yet it is also so wonderfully set that it's impossible not to like it.

The series has a cast that does enormous credit to its makers. Being too old to be in love with the character of Laura, I am besotted with her boss, Dorcas Lane, though I suspect it's really Julia Sawalha that I truly adore; I've held a secret passion for her for at least 20 years ! That aside, the series is a jewel in an otherwise barren desert of television on a Sunday night. What wonderful performances there are from the supporting cast, especially from the girl who plays silly Minnie, Ruby Bentall; to my mind she is sensational and really should be in line for an award, BAFTA or whatever.

Call me old-fashioned, but this is my kind of entertainment.

THE MYTH OF THE USA.

Am I the only person to be wholly fed up with, and frightened by, the jingoistic crap that comes out of the USA ? While professing every virtue under the sun, this 'Country of the Free' still tolerates appalling treatment of its ethnic minorities and denies even basic human rights to a large part of its population.

The USA is founded on violence and exploitation. Immigrants from Europe wiped out most of the indigenous population and Hollywood subsequently invented the calumny that it was the 'Red Indians' who terrified the newcomers with their barbarity; in truth, actions such as scalping were at least as common from the white men as from the Indians and it was the indigenous population that was almost exterminated. If this wasn't genocide one has to wonder what it was.

The USA is a young country with very little history of its own. It is desperate to prove that it is more than a modern invention and will go to any lengths to prove it. It happily buries the less acceptable elements of its past and is more than happy to distort history, and even steal the history of others, in its attempts to bolster its own ego. It rewrites history daily and, through the universal media of films, television and the internet, plus the miserable compliance of Governments such as our own which give the teaching of history no priority in our schools, it spreads a message that everything of value came from them and that they have been the perennial providers of freedom and justice. The USA has continued to use Hollywood as a means of spreading false historical messages around the world with examples such as their hijacking of the invention of the 'Enigma' machine not very long ago. 

The US is dominated by money and powerful 'interest groups'. It's government is wholly subservient to its Jewish lobby and daren't criticise the government of Israel, regardless of what they do. However, the USA supported the Shah of Iran until he became unsupportable and has supported Hosny Mubarak for many years in similar fashion. It supports any dictator, however repulsive, if that dictator serves the political interests of the USA and it withdraws its support as soon as that situation changes.

Essentially, the USA is an amoral state totally dominated by its own political self-interest. The most worrying part of this analysis is that the USA is soon to be seriously challenged by China in its position as the world's number 1 economy. The Chinese already own a huge part of the US economy through their purchase of vast amounts of US government debt and this is simply a first salvo in the inevitable economic war that is to come. The real problem is that the US may well see this as an attack on their national pride and will turn an economic war into a real one; it wouldn't be the first time in history that trade has led to outright military conflict. The problem today is that both the US and China have nuclear weapons by the score and, while the Chinese have more long-term sense, the US government just might hit the button at some time in the not to distant future.

I don't claim that this is an authoritative analysis but it is one I will stand by; only time will tell what, if any, of it turns out to be true. I trust I will be long gone by the then.

LET'S END POLITICAL POSHNESS.

Andrew Neil's thoughtful programme, 'Posh and Posher', about the way in which our political masters are being groomed from an ever narrower background of 'posh' public school and Oxbridge education, concluded that the solution to the problem was to improve the state's education system. He even went so far as to suggest a return to a form of selection and the re-introduction of Grammar Schools.

Oh, music to my ears ! The abomination of Comprehensive schools, which have dumbed down education to a point at which most children now leave school with barely any ability to read or write, little understanding of simple arithmetic and absolutely no knowledge of history or geography, was an invention of the left, designed to achieve exactly what it has - an ignorant populace that will provide no challenge to its rulers.

Why the conservatives went along with this disastrous policy is anyone's guess, but they did and must bear their share of the blame. What they must now do, at the earliest opportunity, is to reverse the policy and re-establish a system that gives all children the opportunity to blossom in whatever field they are best suited to. Whether their talents are academic, vocational or technical, they should be guided by the education system to achieve their own level of excellence. The lunacy of 'one size fits all' education, and 'mixed-ability schools and classes' must end. Comprehensive education has all but destroyed the ability of the vast majority of people to climb the ladder of social mobility and has taken us to a land in which our rulers are increasingly drawn from the ranks of those with public school educations. Let's hope that Mr Neil's programme is merely the first shot in a war that we must win, a war for our futures.

HOLOCAUST NONSENSE

Apparently, today is 'Holocaust Memorial Day', something of which I was happily oblivious only a few short years ago.

This day is an entirely modern invention, mainly intended to make sure the world doesn't forget how horribly the Jews were treated in the past, with specific reference to the German concentration camps of World War 2. Inevitably, the scope has had to be extended in order to prove that views such as mine are wrong, however, the emphasis is still largely on the Jews.

Of course, the Jews suffered shockingly under the Nazi regime, but so did other minorities - gipsies, the disabled, homosexuals etc - though these are rarely mentioned in the headlines. While we are now sometimes reminded of the atrocities committed by Pol Pot in Cambodia, and the more recent events in Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, what do we ever hear of the treatment of the Armenians by the Turks, or of the millions murdered by the regimes of Stalin and Mao Tse-tung ? What are we told of the virtual extermination of the native North American population or of the disgusting treatment of the Irish during the years of the potato famine ? While it may not be a genocide, what about the treatment of the native Palestinians by the immigrant Israelis ?

It would be much easier to accept this nonsense of a 'Holocaust Memorial Day' if its coverage properly recognised not just the atrocities of the Nazis and a handful of other modern events that have gained media topicality, but also the atrocities committed by today's power-brokers, the USA, Russia, China and the UK. It is also time that Israel stopped using the past as an effective excuse for its behaviour towards the indigenous population of the land that it expropriated in 1948 and later.

Until such time as these countries admit their own parts in the barbarisms of their recent histories, 'Holocaust Memorial Day' will remain nothing more than a bit of Jewish propaganda in my eyes.