AN OPEN LETTER TO THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION

Fuckhead Revisited:

The future Prime Minister, the future London Mayor and the rest of the Bullingdon Boys photographed shortly before going off to get smashed and destroy some poor sod's restaurant. Hoorah!

(Boris Johnson: bottom right, David Cameron: top row, second from left)

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION

Dear Electoral Commission,

How are you? I’m fine. My name is Matthew Thomas and I’d like to suggest some changes to the voting system ahead of the London mayoral elections tomorrow. I know it’s late notice but if you hear me out I think you’ll see the logic.

They say your politics become more moderate as you get older. It’s true, when I was 16 I believed socialism was the only ethical way to run a society and that everybody on the right of the political spectrum was a selfish, myopic twat. Now that I have had time to mature and learn about the world, I believe socialism is the only ethical way to run a society and that everybody on the right of the political spectrum is a selfish, myopic twat, with excellent taste in wine, some interesting things to say about cricket and the ability to get Wimbledon tickets without queuing.

You could say that maturity has given me a more rounded opinion of conservatives as people and softened my, admittedly extreme, views about what to do with them in the event of a revolution*. In fact, I’d go so far as to say I like many of them – and not just because they’re my bosses. Whilst I still find them cold-hearted and illogical, I’ve even come to understand their views a little better, particularly in the run-up to Thursday’s mayoral election.

Let me explain. It’s fair to assume that this is now a two horse race between Ken Livingstone and a real-life P.G Wodehouse character called Boris Johnson. They enjoy pretty much equal support with Boris ahead in the richer suburbs and Ken Livingstone ahead amongst the working classes in the inner-cities.

For a while I was completely baffled by how Boris, a man who has made a career out of being an incompetent boob; who edited a magazine that nobody reads and still managed to cause a national scandal; who once described black people as ‘flag-waving piccaninnies’ with ‘watermelon smiles’; whose whole persona is based on being, y’know NOT VERY GOOD AT THINGS, could actually be in with a shout of running Europe’s biggest city. Then it hit me, I realised why. The wealthy people voting for Boris simply aren’t qualified to make a decision of this magnitude.

I know, I know, that’s pretty insulting but hear me out. The residents of Richmond, Belgravia, Putney are very confused. It’s our fault really, when you’re struggling to pay £500+ per week in rent on a pitifully low salary and spending half your life wedged against Perspex panel 100 metres below ground it’s easy to forget that when you mention job-seekers allowance to these people they think of gardening leave and a 6-figure golden handshake.

We really should have explained better, after all they have little or no experience of the NHS, state education, unemployment, council housing or benefits. They’re not in debt, they haven’t paid rent in a long time, the air quality where they live is fine, they won’t need a state pension, crime for them is someone taking their seat in All Bar One and if they use the tube it tends to be beautifully run lines like the jubilee and they certainly don’t take the bus.**

So you see, they’re not qualified to speak on pretty much all of the issues.

Oh, sorry I forgot there is tax and nonsense like the congestion and emissions charges. These they’re intimately acquainted with, seeing as they’re the ones with the money*** and the ones who can afford to drive in London. This obviously isn’t enough to chat about for an entire dinner party so new and exciting issues have to be invented also – cue immigration panic, family values panic, gay marriage panic etc****.

Conservatives rail against the notion that they’re self interested and out of touch, but when your entire rationale for making a decision is based what’s best financially for you and your already privileged family, your right to drive a ridiculous car + some invented fluff, I really don’t see what else to call it.

That’s why I’m proposing that we reclassify Chelsea, Richmond, Kingston, Wimbledon, Belgravia, Balham and Clapham as rotten boroughs. Maybe then we’ll get to have a proper debate.

Thoughts?

Your’s Faithfully,

Matt.

*Let’s just say it involved a game reserve on the Isle of Wight and genetically modified giant Foxes riding wolves – you can guess the rest.

**Admittedly not all of these issues fall within the remit of the London Mayor but national issues have always been factors in people’s choices in local elections. In other news, cats dislike dogs and there’s no such thing as the Loch Ness Monster.

***Which of course they hauled themselves up by their bootstraps to get with absolutely no help from their, upbringing, accidents of birth or the rest of society.

****Strangely global warming panic hasn’t quite taken hold yet.

Schadenfreude: German Word, British Institution

Have you ever noticed how when a couple starts having an argument in public everyone else gets much quieter? It’s as if there’s only so much noise in the world and these two are hogging it. What it really is of course is people keeping their own conversations to a minimal volume so that they can hear the particulars of the argument, without appearing overly interested. If society allowed us to get away with it we’d pull up a chair and gawp like our lives depended on it - unpalatable as it may be to admit, there’s nothing British people like more than someone else’s domestic.*

Most people generally try to keep public fallings out to a minimum, preferring to wait until they’re in the privacy of their own home where they know which doors make the most satisfying slam and they won’t be called upon to make the shrugged shoulders “I dunno mate” gesture to a complete stranger when their girl/boyfriend flounces off on some trumped up pretext. However, every now and then somebody looks at somebody they shouldn’t, or leaves somebody somewhere to go and talk bollocks with their idiot friends, or doesn’t take someone’s side even though their clearly wrong and it all kicks off. That’s the cue for the rest of us to subtly turn off our MP3 players and switch from reading magazines to pretending to read magazines.

If you can overhear the conversation but can’t be heard yourself that’s perfect – it gives you occasion to trot out all kinds of hackneyed bon mots. In fact, it’s actually the law in England that if a group of more than three people witness one of these arguments, at least one person has to say “trouble in paradise” whilst looking smug. If a woman’s present she - under penalty of prosecution - is required to say “He won’t be getting any tonight**,” whilst nodding suggestively.

It’s marginally less fun if you know the people - the argument’s still entertaining but you’re expected to participate in the clean-up operation. If you’re a woman this involves listening to your friend cry and blather on about how in love they are and how much of a ‘passionate relationship’ it is whilst you fight the urge to inform her that she’s dating a nutter and is behaving like one herself. If you’re a man it involves going for a beer and talking about sports to ‘cool off’ – being a man is so great!

Well that’s about all I have to say about the entertainment factor of other people’s emotional turmoil. If this has put you in the mood for witnessing a live barney then may I recommend the bus stops at Trafalgar square around 3 in the morning – there’s something about the thought of a 90 minute bus ride to Croydon or Kingston that just brings it out of people.

* Unless we’re asked to weigh in and give our opinion, then it’s all “I don’t want to get involved mate. None of my business.”

**Women as a gender have failed to realise that the average man spent the better part of his teens trying and failing to get women to have sex with him. Therefore many of them somehow think that withholding sex is a viable way to punish us. This is like giving an Abu Ghraib survivor a Chinese burn – ladies, unless you’re really willing to keep it up for 16 years, we can take it.

Return of the Time Thief

Fact of a Week: No matter how secure you feel in your relationship, buying an 18-pack of condoms is tempting fate. He/she will break up with you the next day and those things will stare at you from the sock drawer for the next six months.

Go See This: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXyK0ean-D4&NR=1 I love James Corden.

MAIN EVENT

When you die I reckon God/Allah/Buddha/L. Ron Hubbard takes you aside and presents you with a long list of stats about your life. These stats would include things like number of days bunked off work, number of miles cycled along the pavement and the all important wank/shag ratio. He/she/they will then analyse these stats, much like Alan Hansen on Match of the Day (hmm, maybe he’s God)*, and decide how worthwhile a life you’ve led. This will then translate into how nice a flat you get in heaven – whether you get to live in a cool converted factory or above a chicken take-away 2 miles from a tube.

If this is indeed how it works then my most shameful stat is most likely to be number of hours spent watching Channel 4’s ‘Shipwrecked’. I don’t like it. In fact, I hate it. I have however still managed to spend an estimated three days of my life staring at the bloody thing like a confused marmot. There are two reasons for this: firstly, on Sunday mornings I tend to be in a vulnerable state where complex thought is impossible and an hour and a half of pretty people in a pretty environment seems appealing; Secondly, at least once an episode, Shipwrecked can be relied upon to make me so angry that I throw something at the TV – I find this perversely enjoyable.

For those unfamiliar with the format, Shipwrecked is a programme where two groups of people with ‘sexy-messy’ hair, from Godalming and the surrounding areas are marooned on two separate islands. They then proceed to wander around talking about how spiritual they feel and what a great experience they’re having, despite the fact that they’re doing literally nothing. There’s kind of a competition element tacked on but no one really pays attention.

The islanders are there for three months which, as the voice-over keeps telling you, places a huge emotional strain on them as they have only each other for company. Well actually, each other, a sound recordist, a producer, a production secretary, a couple of runners, a stylist and at least 3 cameramen all working in shifts with other production teams of equal size.

Despite this Satre’esque isolation the islands’ inhabitants rarely even argue and if they ever have sex with each other (which they surely must sometimes) the viewer never gets to hear about it. In fact, it’s bloody difficult to distinguish one episode, or even one series, from another. I’ve been watching the thing fairly regularly for its entire six series run and I can’t remember a single memorable moment or one cast member’s name - that is how unremarkable the show is. It’s basically exactly what you’d see if you put a camera in the common room of a posh sixth form college.

This year promises more of the same, though the producers have at least tried to keep a 50:50 toffs /proles split. All are ridiculously good looking except for one overweight girl. however, to her credit, after 2 days on the island she says ‘fuck this’ and speedboats out of there, pausing momentarily to pick a live fish from the water and swallow it whole**. There’s also a model who was tragically born with a speech impediment that forces him to shoehorn the words ‘sweet’ and ‘Yeah?’ into every sentence and a mouthy brunette who I’m hoping will get buried neck deep in sand with honey spread on her face (to attract ants) by episode three.

The first episode’s bile inducing money-shot comes courtesy of mouthy brunette who, upon learning that they have to nominate two people to leave the island, goes into a ‘Sophie’s Choice’ style fit of hysterics, successfully making the moment all about her – I think she’s a drama student. When they finally choose the smiley blonde from Cheshire as one of the ones who has to go, mouthy brunette goes into overdrive, hugging smiley blonde and screaming ‘I can’t do this without you’ through her sobs. Pretty impressive emotion for someone you’ve known for five days lady. She’s clearly one of those people who describe themselves as ‘big-hearted’ on application forms because they can’t spell clinically insane.

* Over the course of writing this I’ve decided that Alan Hanson is in fact God. Join me in worshipping him, the first sermon will be about the lack of clarity in the offside rule. Meet me in the car park of the Woking Morrison’s 10 am this Sunday.

** This last bit may have only happened in my mind.

Boris Johnson on the US Presidential Election

-Bet she wasn't that luv-ver-ly you spade faced twat!

Now, I think there are many good things about the US: Hollywood, cheeseburgers, guns, executions of the mentally incompetent, this is all good stuff. However, there are some things they get badly wrong. There is, for example, no American born person capable of uttering the following sentence in conversation “I’m sorry I don’t know enough about that, I wouldn’t like to comment.” They also don’t understand irony, real ale or the proper way to pronounce the letter A.

I wasn’t aware of this until recently but another one of those areas of incompetence is apparently politics. That’s why I’m glad that London Mayoral candidate, editor of The Spectator (if you haven’t heard of it you’re probably poor!) and world class political mind, Boris Johnson has agreed to offer us a brief master-class on exactly why.

Take it away Boris....

Boris Johnson on the US Presidential Election

Hello all. Let me first say how honoured I am to be writing on ‘Everyone Likes Jazz.’ I wasn’t sure at first, but then Matthew told me that his father used to play rugby with me at Eton, so naturally I was onboard in a flash. He also told me that this is going to be broadcast over some fancy computer thingy, wasn’t really listening to be honest, can’t abide boffin-talk, but it all sounds jolly clever nonetheless.

Anyway, enough chat. To the point we must go.

When we colonised North America in 19-whatever we brought with us a fully functioning, hierarchical society based on the solid foundations of guilt, shame and resignation to your lot that had worked perfectly well for hundreds of years. This august way of doing things was of course known as the class system. However, regrettably over the years since we left, the Yanks have rather eroded these noble values until all that’s left is a hollow imitation.

As we all know the basic foundation of the class system is that you will die in the class that you’re born. Ergo, no matter how much wealth the working classes somehow acquire, they will never be afforded the status necessary to affect any real change in the status quo. Quite sensible, I think you’ll agree. Can you imagine the alternative – Alan Sugar, Jordan and Ray Winstone would probably have turned Westminster Abbey into a snooker hall by now.

No, it’s far better that the serious decisions, be it in business or politics, are made by the ruling classes. After all, how are you supposed to vote for a chap or invest in his company if you’ve never even heard of his school?

The Americans however, have seriously misunderstood. They seem to be determined to choose their leaders based on so called achievements! The upshot being that now any old Tom, Dick or Harry who’s led a life of public service and happens to have made enough sound investments to acquire a rather vulgar fortune of new money is capable of being elected bloody president!

This year the Republicans have actually nominated a man who not only didn’t go to an Ivy League university – that’s the equivalent of not going to Oxford! Or even Cambridge! – but was actually in the Navy! How uncouth!

Don’t even get me started on the pair of toerags the Democrats are thinking about nominating. Thank goodness the British are capable of seeing past the issues. They know an all round good egg when they see one don’t they.

Vote Boris for Mayor!

Unofficial Cross-Weight Boxing Match: NORLJ EXCLUSIVE!!

As great as No One Really likes jazz is, the money it generates is not quite enough to maintain my playboy lifestyle and pay child-support for my army of illegitimate children. Therefore I have to supplement my income with actual writing work. The bulk of this ‘work’ is sports related. This is great because it gives me a cast-iron excuse to waste my life in front of, say Ipswich vs Wolves, and no one can say a thing because ‘I’m working actually!’

If I wrote sports content for a national newspaper I’d get millions of perks like match tickets and proper interviews however, because I write for websites and teeny-tiny magazines I do all my writing based on TV coverage and barely ever get to go to live sporting events. So imagine my delight when on my way home from the pub last Monday I was treated to a live boxing match between two amateur fighters.

I was so impressed by this impromptu sporting display that I’ve decided to write it up, just like I would for sport.co.uk or gambling.com.

Here goes...

Bouncer vs Skinny Hacket-Top Guy: Unofficial Cross-Weight Unification Match

Result: Bouncer by a (probable) knockout

History’s great fights: Foreman vs Ali, Eubank vs Ben, McGuigan vs Pedroza have all been battles between fighters of conflicting styles. This is what made the bout between Hacket-Top Guy: with the clear height and reach advantage and Bouncer: at least five weight classes above his opponent, such a mouth-watering prospect. The build up to this fight was brief, though there was clearly no love lost between the pair, especially after the bouncer hauled Hacket-Top’s trainer and promoter, Pinstriped Shirt Guy, out of a nightclub and onto the pavement moments before the fight commenced.

Round One: Hacket-Top’s unconventional style comes into play early on as he takes the unusual step of approaching the bouncer shouting obscenities with his arms outstretched. This cavalier rejection of standard form reminds you of the early days of Prince Naseem - perhaps that thought had occurred to the bouncer who cautiously didn’t take the bait, merely crossing his arms and nodding. He saw an opportunity towards the end of the round and got a shove in but other than that, nothing. A tactical chess-match of a bout appeared to be shaping up.

Round Two: During Hacket-Top’s stern pre-round talking to from Pinstriped Shirt Guy I was close enough to hear the training code ‘leave it’. Of course only they know what that phrase means exactly but it must have had something to do with insulting the bouncer because Hacket-Top launched into the second round with a Mohammed Ali style tirade, though rather than ‘You Ugly, Foreman!’ it was more ‘Come on then, you fat c**t!’ The tactic really worked, the bouncer got so worked up that he grabbed Hacket-Top by the neck prompting the round to be abandoned as support staff and trainers poured in to separate the pair. As he was being dragged away Hacket-Top shouted ‘You’re lucky!’ sense of humour being another similarity with Ali.

Round Three: Hacket-Top senses blood in the water. As the other bouncers crowd around their guy Hacket-Top stalks his corner like a caged tiger. Pinstriped Shirt Guy is clearly confident too, so much so that he’s fucked off home. With a final yell Hacket Top swings wildly at the doorman, missing completely. In the next instant he’s buried by about 60 stone of door staff. Fight over I think.