Judge Garzon in hot water over Franco investigation

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8606910.stm

I know this is slightly outside of my remit but I am truly appalled that this man is being targeted by the Spanish judiciary. He seems to be a man who cares deeply about the atrocities committed by Franco's forces and who seeks to expose them despite fervent attempts by right wing groups and the Spanish legal system to impede him. Read the story and hail his efforts, because he is almost sure to be censured and possibly lose his position. That seems to be inevitable for people who seek the truth and look to create a world without blinkers.

Aldi: German anti-trade unionists? Say it ain't so!

http://www.greenleft.org.au/2004/584/32414

This is an interesting article about Aldi and their now infamous anti trade union stance. The common argument you hear when you tell people about Aldi's basic lack of workers per store and absence of any significant trade union is that Aldi employees are paid loads and if you look at it from that standpoint, its true, they receive a greater financial reward than your average Tesco or Morrison's employee. In fact, they earn on average 20% more than workers in other supermarkets! Fantastic, you might say, well done Aldi for fostering a sense of employee loyalty through such a progressive pay scheme!

However, this ignores the fact that for every 600 metre square store, Aldi employs only 3 workers on a shift. That's three workers to man the checkouts, sort out the produce, stack the shelves, take in deliveries, clean up spillages, help with customers and all the other thousand and one myriad jobs that come up in a supermarket.

Anyway, the article outlines it in more detail. It's got quite a partisan tone but, hell, objectivity is for newspapers and the Beeb, not us on teh interwebz.

A stabber every 51 minutes? We've all seen the yellow boards....

http://knifecrime.blogspot.com/2009/05/knife-crime-statistics-for-london-may.html

Here's a link to a pretty cool blog that does the business, searching out various bits of generally un-discussed information regarding knife crime. The statistics are pretty scary but not surprising, which is the sad thing.

Also, I'm back after a two week hiatus due to a dead power supply in my computer! Working on my next post, so it should be a doozy, I hope!