In my Inbox today... A 'Home Depot' scam warning

I received a 'heads up' warning today in my inbox... for those men who may be regular Home Depot customers.

It recounts how a friend of mine has, over the last month, become a victim of a clever scam while out shopping.

He tells me how simply going out to get supplies has turned out to be quite traumatic and warns... "Don't be naive enough to think it couldn't happen to you or your friends"!!

Here's how the scam works

Two seriously good-looking 20-21 year-old girls come over to your car as you are packing your shopping into the trunk. They both start wiping your windshield with a rag and Windex, with their breasts almost falling out of their skimpy T-shirts.

It is impossible not to look!!

When you thank them and offer them a tip, they say "No" and instead ask you for a ride to another Home Depot. You agree and they get in the backseat. On the way, they start undressing. Then one of them climbs over into the front seat and starts crawling all over you, while the other one steals your wallet!

My friend tells me he had his wallet stolen on November 4th, 9th,10th, twice on the 15th, 17th, 20th and the 24th 29th. Also December 1st, 4th, twice on the 8th, 16th, 23rd, 26th, 30th, three times last Saturday and very likely again this upcoming weekend!!

So tell your friends to be careful!!

P.S. Walmart has wallets on sale 2.99 each

What is Home Depot?

According to Wikipedia, The Home Depot is an American retailer of home improvement and construction products and services.

The Home Depot is the largest home-improvement retailer in the United States, ahead of rival Lowe's, and the second-largest general retailer in the United States, behind only Wal-Mart.

Headquartered in Atlanta, The Home Depot employs more than 331,000 people and operates 2,193 big-box format stores across the United States (including the 50 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Guam), Canada (ten provinces), Mexico and China!

I've already written to Atlanta... pointing out my blog post today... and asking for a suitable commission!

Gibraltar Appeal court ruling on homosexual couples is shameful

I am totally bemused by a Gibraltar Court of Appeal ruling yesterday, that the Gibraltar Government was legally entitled to protect the ‘traditional family’ by favouring heterosexual married couples in the allocation of state-owned housing!

Two local lesbians failed in a legal bid to convince Gibraltar’s highest court that Government housing policy discriminates against homosexual couples.

The case dates back over three years and stems from a decision by the Housing Allocation Committee to refuse the couple joint tenancy of a Government flat, even though the women were in long-term, monogamous and loving relationship.

Under Gibraltar law, only parents, spouses and children can be included in a Government tenancy agreement.

Lawyers said that left the two women at a disadvantage because, unlike heterosexuals, they could not marry and had no way of meeting the criteria for joint tenancy of a Government-owned flat.

Last December the Supreme Court rejected claims that the Government's refusal to offer the couple joint tenancy housing amounted to a breach of the couple’s fundamental Constitutional and human rights.

Acting Chief Justice Anthony Dudley also dismissed a separate argument that a same-sex couple should be afforded equality under common law to a married couple of the opposite sex.

The couple appealed the decision but yesterday the Court of Appeal agreed, by a majority of two to one, with Mr Justice Dudley's earlier ruling in December last year.

However, the Gibraltar Chronicle report said "the judgment yesterday fell short of an unequivocal victory for the Gibraltar Government" with "one clear voice of dissent".

The Appeal was heard by three senior UK judges, Sir William Aldous, Sir Paul Kennedy and Sir Murray Stuart-Smith, the President of the Court of Appeal.

The 'clear voice of dissent' was that of Sir William Aldous, who was clearly far more 'learned' than his colleagues. Sir William agreed with the couple and even went as far as describing the Government policy as "illegal"!

In a 33-page Judgment, Sir Paul Kennedy said that "... the preference which (the Government policy) gave to married couples was a positive preference of a kind which the law regards as acceptable in circumstances such as these, and which did not require further justification."

He was backed in that view by Sir Murray Stuart-Smith, the President of the Court of Appeal, who said that marriage was widely accepted in legal precedent as an institution that conferred particular status.

"There is no analogy between married couples and couples who remain unmarried, whether by choice in the case of heterosexual couples or because they are unable to marry in the case of homosexual partners.

The protection of the ‘traditional family’ is in principle a legitimate aim of domestic legislation."

Well, maybe so... and I would not disagree with these basic principles. I think protecting the 'traditional family' is a good basic principle for any country's domestic legislation... but so is protecting against homophobia and Governments (or anyone) discriminating against people on the grounds of sexual orientation! Which is why both the UK and the European Union laws disallow discrimination of this kind on those grounds!

I'm no lawyer... but it seems to me that this ruling flies in the face of both!

Article 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) protects against discrimination based on a number of criteria including sex. The ECHR has also been incorporated into the laws of the United Kingdom by the Human Rights Act 1998

So how can two UK judges sitting on a Court of Appeal in Gibraltar rule in favour of the Government in this instance??

Frankly, I find this judgment very disappointing and I simply cannot understand it!

The Gibraltar Chronicle report concludes that "for now at least, the decision brings to a close a case that could have set a landmark precedent for gay rights in Gibraltar"... but I for one very much hope that this issue is not allowed to rest here.

Following the Gibraltar Appeal Court ruling, Gibraltar's Equality Rights Group GGR criticised the Gibraltar Government for "wasteful use of taxpayers' money in pursuing court actions which, in the end, it will have to go back on".

Equality Rights Group Chairman, Felix Alvarez said "the vast majority of Europeans today consider the kind of treatment being meted out by the Housing Allocations Committee to same-sex couples as unfair and unacceptable".... and I am one of those Europeans!

In his statement, the Equality Rights Group Chairman said:

"While government spends many thousands of pounds in preventing a gay couple from being able to occupy one flat jointly instead of being allocated two separate housing units as a couple of long-standing, they know as well as we do, that the EU will be introducing binding law which will make discrimination in housing illegal on the grounds of sexual orientation.

In other words, government will have no choice in the matter in a few years’ time.

The Caruana government continues to pour big money into the defence of a position it is doomed to lose.

What kind of reasoning is this when not so long ago we were being told by the Minister for Justice that the access of ordinary citizens to Legal Aid had to be re-defined and curtailed in order to save money?

Something somewhere just does not fit in what appears, more and more, to be a government policy led by prejudice and homophobia.

The rulings of the Courts must be respected at all times. However, judgments are subject to further appeal. GGR will continue to support this and any other same-sex individual or couple with a just cause in discrimination to take their complaint as far as the law permits.

In this case, we look forward to the Court of Appeal’s recent ruling being overturned either by the Privy Council in the UK, or by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. We are confident this will turn out to be so. And even if it isn’t, in a few years’ time we will still live to see government obliged to change its policy by law, whether the present administration likes it or not. The only shame is that government should still insist on wasting citizens’ money.”

Protecting 'traditional family values'?

Whilst I might share Felix's concern over the Government's wasting of tax payers' money to a degree, I am far more concerned with the more shameful aspect of all this, which is a Government relentless in its obstructive policy, discriminating against two human beings on the grounds of their sexual orientation! Shameful!

If the Gibraltar Government is genuinely interested in protecting 'traditional family values' (whatever those may be), they might do better by looking into protecting against and restraining the amount of domestic violence, physical, sexual, psychological and / or financial violence that prevails in Gibraltar... a society that continually turn a blind eye and brushes under the carpet, far more concerning issues within the Sanctity of Marriage... which brings 'traditonal family values' far more into question, than a same sex couple wanting to share their lives under a joint roof ever will!

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Les Barker's Guide Cats for the Blind

Some of you may know I have a slightly serious problem with my eyesight. I have a severe bout of glaucoma, which I am told will make me blind within my lifetime. A prospect that, whilst there are probably worse things, one nevertheless has to come to terms with... and prepare for.

So, I was doing a little bit of research and came across Guide Cats for the Blind. This was originally a poem written by a fella called Les Barker.

If you haven't come across Les before you can probably be forgiven as he seems to have kept a relatively low profile. I only recently discovered him myself... and I can tell you, he's a bit of a gem... a bit from the old school as it were... very funny and well worth listening to if you have a good sense of humour and enjoy hearing words put together well, as I do!

Here's an excerpt from one of Les' live performances of Guide Cats for the Blind, set to some amusing pics... of Maine Coon kittens:



Les Barker (born 30 January 1947) is an English poet. He is most well known for his comedic poetry and parodies of popular songs, however he has also produced some very serious thought-provoking written work.

The poem Guide Cats for the Blind led Les in an an unexpected direction. The poem was heard by Clive Lever, a keyboard player and comedy songwriter from Maidstone, who also happens to be involved with an organisation called the The British Computer Association of the Blind. The association runs a program called 'EyeT4all' which aims to make computers accessible to people who are blind or visually impaired.

Clive got in touch with Les, who agreed to the poem being used as the title track of a double fund raising CD. Les also agreed to the recording of a series of albums, in which his poems and songs would be recorded by artists from the folk world but also by well known celebrities from the entertainment and theatrical world. Presenters from all five BBC Radio stations featured on the albums and so far between £40,000 and £50,000 has been raised for the British Computer Association of the Blind's 'EyeT4all'.

So far three 'Guide Cats' albums have been produced, 'Guide Cats for the Blind', 'Missing Persians File' and 'Top Cat, White Tie and Tails'. A fourth album 'Catnav' is being prepared at the moment.

The CDs contain performances of Les's poems by members of the folk world like June Tabor, Martin Carthy, Steve Tilston, Mike Harding and Tom Paxton but also well known figures like Jimmy Young, Nicholas Parsons, Terry Wogan, Nicky Campbell, Robert Lindsay, Prunella Scales and Andrew Sachs.

Les' involvement with the British Computer Association of the Blind has been a new development for him and it has brought Les's work to a wider audience outside the folk club and festival circuit which has taken him very much to their hearts over the years.

Originally from Manchester he trained in accountancy before his talent for the written word was discovered. At first he toured around folk music venues as a solo performer then later with the Mrs Ackroyd Band (named after his pet mongrel dog Mrs Ackroyd).

Les is not a singer and the Mrs Ackroyd Band, with classically trained vocalists Hilary Spencer and Alison Younger and keyboard player Chris Harvey, have enabled Les' parodies to be performed live to enthusiastic response.

As well as touring Britain he has also performed in Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, the United States of America and Canada.

Les Barker recently had a heart problem which involved undergoing surgery, and he has had to disband The Mrs Ackroyd Band for the forseeable future but he has started solo gigging again and is happily well on the way to full recovery.

There is a growing campaign, by his folk fanbase, to get him chosen as the Poet Laureate for 2009. Even if this is not successful, it may bring his work to the attention of a wider public.... and I thought I would give this a helping hand tonight!

You can read more about Les Barker @ Wikipedia.

Don Quixote is alive and well and 'tilting at Gibraltar windmills'

That most famous of literary 'Hidalgos' Don Quixote is alive and well... and these days has replaced his trusty steed Rocinante... for a jet ski!

Those of you who may be unfamiliar with the term 'Hidalgo' may like to know this is a synonym term used in the ancient Spanish colonies and territories that would become known as the Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon.

The term described a Spanish 'noble' or 'hombre rico' ('rich man'), although with time it came to colloquially mean the lower-ranking gentry, the untitled, or the non-wealthy nobility (who usually may not have owned real property).

It should be noted that Hidalgos were exempt from paying taxes. Over the years the title lost its significance, especially in Spain. Kings routinely awarded the title in exchange for personal favors. By the time of the reign of the House of Bourbon, over half a million people enjoyed tax exemptions, putting tremendous strain on the state. Attempts were made to reform the title and by the early 19th century it had entirely disappeared, along with the social class it had originally signified.

The prototypical and most famous 'hidalgo' was of course the literary fictional character Don Quijote de La Mancha (Don Quixote in English). He is often referred to as 'The Hidalgo'. His possessions allowed him a meager life devoted to his reading obsession, and his concept of honour led him to emulate knights-errant.

A perfect example of a Hidalgo... or in today's parlance, a jumped up 'upstart', might be the aristocrat, politician and 'sailor' Alvaro de Marichalar... or to give him his full title, Álvaro de Marichalar y Sáenz de Tejada!

Did I hear you say rhubarb... rhubarb or was that a huge raspberry?? Oh OK then we'll call him Don Quixote de Marichalar. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, etc!)

Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry), our modern day Hidalgo, has decided to turn his attention to tilting at a few windmills in Gibraltar!

In a letter to the Gibraltar Chronicle, published today,
Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) makes a scathing attack on Gibraltar, describing the Rock as "a refuge for thousands of tax free companies known as ‘brass plate’"!

Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry), apparently, is no stranger to Gibraltar, as he was here some years ago during one of his highly publicised jet-ski expeditions across Mediterranean ports.

In a vain and inaccurate thrust at Gibraltar's Financial centre, our modern day Don Quixote declares:

"It is a pity that the rest of Europe condones through inaction the last colony in Europe!"

Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) has made a bit of a name for himself as an 'adventurer' though it's probably more accurate to describe him, in today's society, as a 'bit of a celebrity'. Apparently he is the first person to jet ski across the Atlantic (a pointless and idiotic feat to my mind... but each to his own).

Personally, I think the likes of Sir Ranulph Fiennes or Robin Knox Johnston, might have something to say about our Hidalgo being described as an 'adventurer'!

Perhaps more pointedly, our Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) was forced to retire from the Spanish Air Force following an accident, having served for only two years. That's more in keeping with my impression of inept Hidalgos tilting at windmills and coming off the worst for it!

Don Quixote de Marichalar's (rrrrraspberry) credentials as an 'aristocrat' (usually known as wasters to you and me) are a little more credible though, as his grandfather was Viscount of Eza, a Minister for War with King Alfonso XIII and Mayor of Madrid. Grandad is also known for having helped establish Spain's social security system (something that our Hidalgo may be especially grateful to his Grandad for). His brother, who either has awful taste or awful eyesight, married the Infanta Eleanor of Spain, the daughter of King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia. Maybe, in the best traditions of 'old aristrocracy' he may instead, perhaps like his brother, also have an eye for a 'good sponge'!

So, now that we have established our Hidalgo's dubious 'authoritative' credentials for commenting on Gibraltar's finance centre, we can move on to tell you what
Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) had to say.

His diatribe against Gibraltar includes describing the Eastside project as "an illegal reclamation of land from Spanish waters, using platforms erected on the Spanish seabed". This, while claiming that the Rock’s main economic activity is "money laundering as stated by the GAFI-OCDE".

At best, our Hidalgo is being 'economical with the truth'. At worse, and to my mind in point of fact, he is being mendacious and mischievous, to say the least!

This mention of 'GAFI-OCDE' refers to the (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development or OECD in English). It relates to a report in June 2000, when Gibraltar was among 35 jurisdictions identified by the OECD as a tax havens. This report is often mentioned by Spanish politicians (and Hidalgos), when wanting to 'put the boot' into Gibraltar. What they always fail to mention is the further reports since, from both the OECD and the IMF in particular.

These Spanish politicians, (and our Hidalgo today), fail to mention that the OECD, long after the 2000 report was published, has since accepted the commitment by Gibraltar "to implement transparency and effective exchange of information for tax purposes" and has endorsed and implemented the standards required by the OECD. This is confirmed in a number of reports since and most recently in the OECD Progress Report in April 2009.

Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) also said that "Gibraltar has tailored its own fiscal regulations repeatedly declared illegal by the European Commission"!

This statement is also inaccurate... or put quite simply another way... untrue!

As a result of having made a commitment in accordance with the OECD's 2001 Progress Report on the OECD's Project on Harmful Tax Practices, Gibraltar is not included in the OECD's list of uncooperative tax havens. What's more, it has also never been listed on the FATF Blacklist of uncooperative countries in the fight against money laundering. This can simply be proved by visiting the Financial Action Task Force (FATF - GAFI) website, where a search for 'Gibraltar' will reveal... NOTHING... no document related to Gibraltar. So, our Hidalgo's statement is simply a very mendacious tilt at this windmill... in other words... in simple language... a lie!

Furthermore, in 2007, the International Monetary Fund Report on the Detailed Assessment Report on Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism once again endorsed Gibraltar’s robust regulatory environment.

According to the report:

"Gibraltar has a well-regulated financial sector.

The Gibraltar authorities are concerned with protecting the reputation and integrity of Gibraltar as a financial center, and are cognizant of the importance of adopting and applying international regulatory standards and best supervisory practices.

Gibraltar has a good reputation internationally for cooperation and information sharing."

Emphasising Gibraltar's willingness for transparency and co-operation in respect to its Finance Centre, only last week during the G20 London Summit, probably at around the same time as our Don Quixote was sharpening his mendacious quill, US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Gibraltar's Chief Minister Peter Caruana signed an agreement that will allow the two countries to exchange tax information.

Failed in flight and failed in politics

I am reliably informed that our Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry) has also been tilting at a few windmills in his own country. He has been having a go at Spanish national politics and not been particularly successful here either. In 2007 he joined Rosa Diez’s UP y D party (Union Progreso y Democracia). He stood for election to parliament for the province of Soria in 2008 and 'went down a storm', failed to obtain a seat, obtaining only 1,106 votes, representing a measly 1.97% of the votes cast! At least the voters of Soria know a prize bullshitter when they see one!

Our Hidalgo seems to me to be a bit of a failed fighter pilot and failed politician... but good at jet skiing, tilting at windmills and mendaciously mouthing off about matters that really don't or shouldn't concern him. He also sounds to me a bit desperate for cheap publicity!

Don Quixote de Marichalar (rrrrraspberry), in his letter to the Chronicle, makes a number of other ridiculous claims... (including one or two other lies) that I, quite frankly, cannot be bothered to answer or refute and would sooner treat them with the contempt they deserve... ignoring them... but I will answer them if pressed (please note)!!

Anyway... as a fitting final typically nonchalant and brave act, inherent in all good windmill tilters, with a flourish of his quill, our Hidalgo has also shown great insight (if not brains), in publishing his address, presumably encouraging us (or potential sponsors) to write to him. I am happy to oblige him and reproduce his address here for those of you who might want to let him know what you think:

Calle Azalea, 82 La Moraleja, 28109 Madrid Kingdom of Spain

That 'Kingdom of Spain' bit is his idea not mine! He has also made public his email address: atlantik2002@hotmail.com.

Which all rather makes life easier for those of you who may want to extend your cordial good wishes to him, in the same way as it makes it easy for those beloved SPAM harvesters, who I hope will also take full advantage (let's hope he has a good anti virus proggie but I would doubt it).

A footnote on Hidalgos

In terms of knights-errant... our particular 'Hidalgo', the subject of our piece here today... is certainly no knight... but I do believe he is 'errant'... and definitely another candidate for a truly great sailor and Knight... our very own Sir Francis Drake!

"So please your Majesty, to singe the King of Spain's beard; it has grown somewhat too long."

Tilting at Windmills - A disclaimer

In closing, I would like to point out that this 'Gibo's Tale' today, has no connection and does not refer in any way to my esteemed colleague Sancho, who excellently blogs over at Tilting at Windmills, and who may well have something to say on the subject of our Hidalgo, if and when the urge takes him!