It's where you can dance the night away:
"In Britain, members of Parliament told to clean up their act" by Isaac Stanley-Becker Washington Post October 11, 2018
In 1943, during a debate over whether to rebuild the House of Commons chamber, the cradle of British democracy, after it had been destroyed during the Blitz, Winston Churchill observed, ‘‘We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us.’’
Seventy-five years later, if the state of Westminster is any indication, there is a rot at the core of British politics. The Houses of Parliament are again in a desperate state of disrepair, but that’s not all. Members of Parliament are being warned about rules of decorum after vomit and used condoms were found by cleaners tasked with tidying up Westminster offices, according to a report in the Sunday Times.
The national newspaper revealed that cleaners have grown so exasperated with raucous parliamentarians and their staffs that they have complained to the Commons clerk.
Oh, so this is ongoing behavior and I would say the scum shape the building.
‘‘The House of Commons provides offices to MPs and their staff to enable them to carry out their parliamentary duties,’’ a spokesperson for the chamber said in a statement. ‘‘Any use of such facilities must be in support of those duties, as specified in the Members’ Handbook and Code of Conduct. Any reported misuse of facilities will be taken seriously and investigated.’’
Commons authorities are weighing a new ‘‘service agreement’’ enforcing standards for the use of professional space, and applying penalties for the ‘‘worst culprits,’’ the Times reported.
‘‘It’s the type of behavior you would expect from students enjoying freshers’ week, not MPs and their staff,’’ a senior source told the newspaper, referring to the weeklong, alcohol-fueled rite of passage for new students at British universities. ‘‘But cleaners are being confronted with vomit and used condoms in offices used by MPs and their staff. The cleaners are not there to clear up after their debauchery and this is not an appropriate use of office space.’’
Paging Brett Kavanaugh!
As the #MeToo movement shines a light on the dark corners where sex and power mingle, the UK Parliament has been one among many case studies in how highbrow politics has been conducted alongside disreputable misbehavior.
The mess that lawmakers have made of their workspaces has additional significance because of the sex scandal that gripped Westminster last year. Perhaps the most notable case was that of Michael Fallon, the defense secretary and member of the Conservative Party who resigned in November following allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior, including placing his hand on a female journalist’s knee at a 2002 dinner.
As accusations cascaded, Theresa May, the Conservative prime minister, called for new grievance procedures last fall, saying the existing system lacked ‘‘teeth.’’ Reforms also included a crackdown on free-flowing, subsidized alcohol in the Houses of Parliament — the cost of which has been a subject of petitions and freedom of information requests.
According to the Times, a total of 11 bars, restaurants, and cafeterias in the Commons sell alcohol.
You know, that seems to be at the root of a lot of these problems.
It's time to ban booze and reinstitute prohibition!
Scrutiny of the drinking culture escalated when the former manager of the infamous Sports and Social bar said last November that she had been repeatedly propositioned for sex by members of Parliament. One had allegedly groped her and tried to follow her home, according to British media.
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Notice there is no mention of Saville or the other sex scandals that have also erupted in British society? This latest scandal is safely confined within the necessary age and class limits, i.e. over legal consent and political, respectively.
Patty cake, patty cake, baker's man, bake me a cake as fast as you can:
"Britain’s Supreme Court on Wednesday reversed a lower court ruling and ruled that a bakery owned by a Christian family didn’t discriminate against a gay customer when it refused to make a cake bearing a slogan supporting same-sex marriage. Ashers Baking Co. in Northern Ireland refused in 2014 to make a cake iced with the ‘‘Sesame Street’’ characters Bert and Ernie and the phrase ‘‘Support Gay Marriage.’’ The owners argued they shouldn’t be forced to put messages on their products at odds with their Christian beliefs. The high court agreed....."
That Kavanaugh guy keeps showing up on the dance floor!
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
Trump’s UK visit used 10,000 officers, cost $24m
That's one heck of a price tag for an overnighter.
I'm told he slept like the dead:
"Libyans find 75 bodies of suspected IS fighters" Associated Press October 12, 2018
BENGHAZI, Libya — Libyan authorities have found a mass grave believed to contain the bodies of 75 members of the group that calls itself the Islamic State near the coastal city of Sirte, formerly the main North African stronghold of the extremist group, an official said Thursday.
Sirte is/was also, if I remember correctly, the seat of Khadafy's support.
Salem el-Ameel, a spokesman for a local force, said a resident reported the grave about a month ago on his farm in al-Daheir district.
‘‘At the time we did not have the capabilities to go and dig it up, but now we have dug up more than 75 bodies,’’ he said. He said that those buried at the site appear to have been wearing clothes worn by members of the terrorist group, but that forensics testing is needed to determine their identities and nationalities.
The Islamic State group and other extremist groups exploited the chaos in Libya following the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed Moammar Khadafy. Islamic State militants carved out a fiefdom centered on Sirte before Libyan militias drove them out 2016. The country is currently governed by rival authorities in the east and west, each backed by various militias.
Thanks, Obama.
In a separate development, the self-styled Libyan National Army said it seized two Italian fishing vessels off Libya’s coast. LNA spokesman Ahmed al-Mosmari told a news conference in Benghazi that the vessels were seized in Libyan territorial waters and brought to the port of Ras al-Hilal.
Italy’s ANSA news agency reported that Libyan forces fired on the boats, causing damage to the cabin of the 140-ton Afrodite Pesca. The other boat, Mcv Pesca, sustained no damage, and no injuries were reported.
Nicola Cristaldi, the mayor of the town where the boats are based, said that the seizure happened in waters that the Libyans illegitimately consider their own.
Italy to soon be at war with Libya?
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Also see: A royal wedding with a bit less je ne sais quoi
