Longrider

Via JuliaM, this little gem.

Packs of red meat should carry warning labels advising shoppers to ration themselves to three portions a week, amid controversial claims that livestock production is killing the planet.

The proposals come from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), which also wants Britons to switch to milk substitutes as part of a radical move away from dairy farming.

As if we don’t have enough self-appointed busybodies wagging their fingers and telling us what to do. And anyone who has tasted those milk substitutes will realise that they are foul, disgusting concoctions from the Devil’s own Kitchen (sorry). I like my dairy products, I like my full cream milk, full cream butter on my bread and when I do have a coffee, I have a nice dollop of cream in it – and have every intention of continuing to do so.

WWF insists that the recent campaign from Sir Paul McCartney to encourage people to go ‘Meat Free on Mondays’ does not go far enough.

As I mentioned at the time, it goes too far. It is none of McCartney’s damned business what other people eat.

The organisation suggests people could switch to eating more chicken and other poultry and drinking milk alternatives made from soya or rice.

It also argues people should switch to consuming much more fruit and vegetables.

The WWF is about to issue an 84 page report outlining strategies for reducing red meat and dairy consumption in order to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Remind me not to give any money to this fake charity.

WWF insists that it is not telling people to stop eating red meat and dairy, rather to reduce the portions eaten per week.

Makes no difference, it is not their place to tell us to do anything, because it is none of their damned business.

Incidentally, I notice from the comments on the piece that people just don’t get it. This, for example:

But the hysterical reaction to any suggestion that we produce and consume too much meat and dairy is bonkers. Farming can still thrive in this country even if we produce less, health can improve if we eat a bit less, and it’ll help the environment. This isn’t a ‘bizarre’ suggestion; it’s actually a fairly minor lifestyle change. Eating meat with every meal is a recent phenomenon, not our ‘traditional eating habits’. Calm down people, this really isn’t that bad.

It is not about farming surviving or what we eat that is the issue – it is that a fake charity has set itself up to tell us what to do. It has no mandate to do this and the poison it whispers in the government’s ears will, sooner or later, come out as policy driven by “concerns raised”. That is why this is an issue.

Today, I’m sitting in a hotel room. In a little while, I’ll be wandering down to the restaurant. You can be absolutely sure that I will not be ordering the vegetarian option. Contrariness is the appropriate response to control freakery.

Alan Johnson is widely reported today making a climbdown on ID cards.

He said the cards will now only be issued to Britons on a voluntary basis meaning no one will ever be forced to have one, effectively paving the way for the scheme to be scrapped altogether.

A pilot scheme for airside workers, which marked the first attempt at making the £4.9 billion programme compulsory for British nationals has been abandoned.

Well, well, well. After all they hype, after the bluster and the lies, finally they hit reality head on. Over priced, unworkable and unnecessary.

Mr Johnson even admitted the suggestion the cards would help combat terrorism was exaggerated as he accepted the Government should never have allowed “the perception to go around that they were a panacea for terrorism”.

Good lord! Should they have not indeed? Well, I never. Has he okayed this with David Blunkett?

Instead, the Home Office is now concentrating on the cards being useful for youngsters to prove their age when going in to pubs.

There are already perfectly good products available for this without giving the government your personal details. And somewhat cheaper, too. As I don’t have this problem, It’s not an issue for me and I have no need to “prove who I am” all the time and on the odd occasion that I might need to produce a utility bill or two, I can live with it.

Of course, they are still making noises about rolling it out – well, they would, wouldn’t they? And, we have to be aware that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Despite Cameron’s promise to stop the project, none of us can be sure that a future government won’t be enticed to sneak in some aspect of this discredited scheme by stealth. It was, after all, the database not the cards themselves that posed the real danger. Let us not forget that. We do at our peril.

Still, it’s nice to see a climbdown. One little victory along the way.