Ironically, England is having a hell of a time coming up with security personnel for the Olympics.
Newspaper accounts have told of recruits hired for essential security tasks at more than 100 sites — including the main Olympic stadium, which seats 80,000 — falling asleep during training sessions. Instructors for G4S, the private company that has a $440 million contract to provide 10,400 guards for the Games, have complained of facing rows of recruits who speak little or no English.Music, maybe by Paul McCartney or Bruce Springsteen.
One tabloid published a photograph, which it said had been taken at a training session, that showed a young woman slumped at her desk, apparently sleeping, with a youth alongside her apparently listening to music through earphones.
From the old Beatles catalog:
Mister City Policeman sitting, pretty little policemen in a rowADDED: Remember the old Beatles rooftop performance in "Let It Be." The police clownishly shut it down. There's a funny dramatic arc as the playing begins, people gradually notice and realize it's the Beatles, and eventually the cops arrive at the notion that it needs to end and do their their piddling duty.
See how they fly like Lucy in the sky, see how they run
I'm crying, I'm crying....
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18 comments:
Isn't the word the Mayor is grasping for "officious" and not efficacious?
Who has trouble speaking the English?
Much ado about nothing. This happens all the time at outdoor venues. Follow the rules are face fines or possibly being hauled into court. Frankly, anyone who sits through three hours of Springsteen has my deepest sympathies.
'When did England become a police state?'...
Around the same time you and your boss became oikaphobes - and started sharing a stage with the elderly mop top who dissed Bush at the Obama White House.
Pulling the plug?
Get used to it, asshole.
From the linked article:
According to Westminster Council, however, the decision to end the concert was made by its organisers and not local authorities.
"Concert organisers, not the council, ended last night's concert in Hyde Park to comply with their licence," said Leith Penny, Westminster Council's strategic director for city management.
Which makes Springsteen look a little silly.
Heck, sometimes I have a hard time understanding what it is all those Scotsmen who McCartney travels with are saying.
Interestingly, Mark Hamilton who has been McCartney personal guy for over 20 years sold his British company to G4S and is now managing the Olympic project.
Hamilton's a good guy, and I tend to believe his side of the story for the most part.
London 2012 Olympics: G4S blame £283 million security costs on Government and Locog
The private security provider to the London Olympics has defended its £284m contract and blamed the tripling of security costs on the Government and Games organisers.
Didn't prize fights in London go on for hours on end?
This is what happens when you extend knighthoods to people on the stage.
England has been becoming a police state for many years but I've only been tracking it since 2002. If artists start waking up -- a most unlikely event -- so much the better.
Bwahahahaha.
You could say Brucie & Paulie got "Tealdeered" ... suits them perfectly.
'When did England become a police state?'..."
LONG LONG time ago!!
You don't have ANY real rights in England. Bill of Rights? Nada.. they don't have that.
CCTV spying on you everywhere. Police can tap your phone anytime. No right to arms, no right to self-defense, no rights to privacy, no rights to counsel if questioned, no... NO RIGHTS AT ALL.
Hence, that is why they are called 'subjects'.
I thought they wanted to be equal?
The rules are the rules, they're not special.
Is there some law that Paul McCartney needs to be pulled up on stage at the end of every concert?
Munich II: The Next Generation. Coming soon to a British capital city near you!
Just trying to perserve the environment! Sometimes '80,000 people having some fun' must make sacrifices when it comes to protecting our planet.
Just trying to perserve the environment! Sometimes '80,000 people having some fun' must make sacrifices when it comes to protecting our planet.
Hear hear! Are they not familiar with Earth Hour? Every hour is earth hour! Why should they get to go long simply because they want to sing a bit longer. The polar bears are dying every minute they stay up on the stage.
Apparently it is a police state if this happens to Springsteen and McCartney. If things are waived for them, then everything's cool. What the little people have to deal with on a day to day basis is immaterial.
By the way, aren't Europeans proud of their multilingual Babel culture! Why should security officers need to speak English? Seems rather Anglocentric to me! Islamophobic? Hmmmmmm?
When did England become a police state? From the squawking and news articles, I'd guess sometime in the mid-Nineties, but I've never been there, maybe it was always this small-minded, just not with today's ubiquitous, panoptic surveillance cameras.
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