I see Mr Irresponsible has been at it once more.

He has been telling motorists to top up their cars in case the tanker drivers dispute remains unresolved.

In his position should he not having been advising them to behave normally? Not to instantly rush to the pumps?

Has he never heard of panic buying?

I saw the result for myself this afternoon when I went in to a forecourt to check the air in my tyres. Well, I say went in. But I had to queue: due to the volume of cars waiting for petrol.

And to what level should motorists let their tanks drop before “topping up”? A quarter empty? A third? A half? Or maybe after just one litre has been used? Should they drop in to every petrol station they happen upon on the off-chance?

The man is either a numpty (see definition 3) or he was deliberately encouraging anti-social behaviour. (Which in these circumstances is what rushing to top up your car unnecessarily certainly is.)

The lead story on the lunchtime BBC news today (18/2/12) concerned Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons. There followed some guy (from the Armed Services Institute?) talking about the ramifications of that on the likes of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, etc as regards proliferation.

The second story on the guardian‘s front page was headlined US believes strike on Iran is inevitable later this year.

Looks like Cowdenbeath are a banker for the Division 2 title this year, then. (With a side order of Armageddon.)

Seriously, though. What are these guys on? Remember Mr Irresponsible during the 2010 General Election campaign? It seems now like that was a prediction rather than an idle slip of the tongue.

How can I put this?

Iran poses no threat whatsoever to the UK. Still less does it pose a threat to the US. I’ll give you it may be a (possible) threat to Israel but its posture there may be rhetorical rather than real. However, there is no way it could invade either the UK or US; nor could it overthrow their governments.

And if it is in the process of acquiring nuclear weapons why might that be?

It has seen its neighbour, Iraq, attacked, on the flimsiest of pretexts, mainly by the US and the UK – and thereafter thoroughly destabilised. It does not want the same happening to it. It knows Israel has nuclear weapons almost certainly targeted on it; it also knows North Korea has such a “deterrent” and is treated more carefully as a result. In its mind developing nuclear weapons might be a rational response to its current circumstances. We (the UK, along with the US) have a history of interfering with the region that goes back a long way. If I were them I wouldn’t trust us either.

The ratcheting up of the Iranian situation reminds me of the run-up to the (second) Iraq war. Drip by drip of increasingly ludicrous assertions. (A much heightened version of this sort of thing was evident in the German press in the summer of 1939.)

I don’t much go for the idea that we could be the bad guys but, in the absence of any attack by Iran on us (or, at a push, Israel) that would be the case here; as it was in Iraq.

Moreover, and again as with Iraq, it would be thoroughly counterproductive.

The ramifications of an attack on Iran would only confirm the idea that the “West” sees Muslims as a whole as targets and though it would take time might make recent terrorist attacks seem like a garden party. Any occupation of Iran would make our involvement in Iraq seem like a picnic and Vietnam a cakewalk.

Do we really want that?

The above is a Scottish phrase – well West of Scotland really – much used in childhood, which means more or less that things have not turned out to my liking and I’m in a huff, the rest of you can do what you like but you can’t play any more because it was my ball you were playing with and I’m taking it home with me now.

This seems to me to paraphrase what the UK Prime Minister, Mr Irresponsible, aka David Cameron, has done vis-a-vis the rest of the EU. The only differences are it wasn’t his ball and he might have gone home, but the rest haven’t.

Whatever “protections” he sought for British financial institutions* he quite plainly has not got. Moreover he will now have little influence – as he will not be involved in the discussions – over any steps taken in the future in these matters, thereby making it more likely that the situation he professes to avoid will actually come about. Brilliant!

And why does the BBC news keep referring to his veto? It wasn’t a veto. He has not stopped the other 26 members of the EU from creating a new treaty. Indeed by the BBC’s own accounts they seem keen to go on without him (and us.)

He has also thrown a very large bone to the anti-EU elements within his party, who, far from being satisfied, have now tasted blood, and will go for the jugular. UK politics will, as in the John Major era, be mired in endless argument over the EU.

(The people’s response in any subsequent referendum they secure may not quite go the way they want either. Given that the Tories have been banging on for so long about how bad the economic prospects are right now – a self-fulfilling prophesy by-the-by – what possible sense would it make to sever our connections to our biggest export market?)

[*The very organisations to a large extent responsible for the mess several European economies are in.

Who lent money to those countries who are now so heavily in debt?
Aren’t those debt holders in part culpable for the ensuing difficulties?
Is it not the responsibility of a prudent lender to make sure there is a good prospect of the debtor paying the money back?

They seem to think they are on a one-way trip to profit and they should receive all their money in full.
Well, they should take a good part of the hit. They helped to create the hole the world economy is in.]

I saw on the BBC News today David Cameron (otherwise known as Mr Irresponsible) denying that he would have made a good KGB agent. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev later apparently joked that he would have.

Is this a spectacular case of double bluff?

Failure to take on the bankers in any serious way at all, no curbs on bonuses, proposals to remove the 50% income tax band – all could have been designed to foment revolution.

Given the actions of our esteemed leader since he got hold of the reigns of power in Downing Street we could have been forgiven for believing that a KGB agent is exactly what he is.

Now that the steaming cess-pit that was the News of the World has been exposed – at least in part – the ramifications are widening, not least for our non-elected Prime Minister.

I listened to Mr Irresponsible’s speech today and his answers to the subsequent questions. This may or may not turn out to be David Cameron’s Iraq or Black Wednesday but it was certainly his Ed Miliband moment.

I lost count of the number of times he repeated the phrases “€œsecond chance” (must have been around twenty repetitions) and “€œresigned all over again” (ten? fifteen?) Was it he who came up with these formulations or one of his scriptwriters? Whatever, he stuck to them like a limpet. Or a comfort blanket.

Before that, though, he said we the public look to the police to protect us, to politicians to represent us and to the press to inform us and that all of them have been let down. I’€™ll repeat that. All of them have been let down. The police, politicians and the press have been let down?

In such a carefully crafted speech can this have been a slip? (Freudian or otherwise?)

Or does it betray Mr Cameron’s true attitudes? I think the latter part of his performance argues for him still not seeing where he has erred.

Second chance…. second chance…. second chance.

Resigned all over again…. resigned all over again.

These phrases were clearly designed to put Mr Cameron in a positive light. Yes it is entirely worthy to give someone a second chance. I wonder, though, how far David Cameron’s enthusiasm to rehabilitate others would go. Will he now be employing any ex-€“burglars do you think? Former fraudsters? Rapists? Murderers? Licence-fee dodgers? Others who have had to resign from their jobs for underhand, dodgy or illegal activities? Tax evaders? Oh wait a minute! He’€™s probably done that last one.

However, “€œresigned all over again”€ can have had no other meaning than that Andy Coulson had already been punished for his misdemeanours, indeed had been overpunished. That phrase (despicably, to my mind) tries to cast Mr Coulson as the victim, something which he is very far from. It is there purely to attempt to exculpate: whether Mr Coulson or Mr Cameron I’€™m not sure. And let’s not forget there was no punishment. Mr Coulson walked into a – presumably well paid – job with Mr Cameron. And, moreover, precisely because of his former job and its connections.

There is also the more pressing question of police entanglement with News International’€™s operatives (including the apparent payment of money to serving police officers for information.) Is it any surprise that initial investigations into News of the World’s reporters’€™ activities were tardy and incomplete? The police are there to uphold the law, not to provide juicy tit-bits to journalists; certainly not to benefit from such provision (beyond any help it may have in securing further information from the public.) Press releases and press conferences are fine; underhand undercounter payments for exclusive access are not.

I am reminded of the old Latin tag, “€œQuis custodiet ipsos custodes?”€ (“€œWho guards the guardians?”€) Are the Metropolitan Police in any position, now, to investigate these matters? Are they not, like the Prime Minister, utterly compromised?

Then there is the implicit protection being part of Mr Irresponsible’s team as Leader of the Opposition and then in Downing Street itself must have given to Andy Coulson. Is it any wonder the police did not pursue him too closely to begin with? When he got the job with David Cameron he must have thought he was fire-proof. No wonder he gave “assurances.”€ Assurances that were not worth the breath they were uttered with.

Please let David Cameron not get away with this catastrophic misjudgement by pretending to lance the boil the way he pretended to over the MPs expenses scandal. (The main scandal there being actually that those who could pay back their spurious or fraudulent claims have got away with it. Many members of the present UK cabinet included.)

The cosy relationship between politicians and the representatives of News International, the currying of the favour of that organisation politicians (all politicians) undertook – perhaps in the mistaken belief that an interest other than the corporation’€™s own might then be followed – the hands off treatment of that organisation’s tentacular growth, have all been large contributors to public apathy with the political process. Vote X get Murdoch. Vote Y get Murdoch. Let’€™s not vote; we’€™ll get Murdoch anyway.

A free press is indispensible to a functioning democracy. A cohort of politicians in thrall to one section of that press is not.

Today David Cameron promised Public Inquiries. Let their remits be as wide as possible and let them start as soon as possible so that they can take advantage of any information the police investigations turn up. Only under those two conditions will his credibility as PM be restored.

One steaming cess-pit down. How about The Sun next?

(Oh and are the Murdochs fit persons to be in charge of any news organisation?)

I really don’t know what our esteemed Prime Minister, Mr Irresponsible, thought he was doing (beyond echoing Angela Merkel) when he said multiculturalism had failed in the UK.

To me he seemed to be saying that all minorities ought to become the same as the rest of us.

This demands the question, what rest of us?

For there is no single British culture. For a start there are four distinct national areas in the UK and the “culture” of each differs from the others. Even within each of the four areas culture differs from place to place. It differs within any city. Even within a town. Or village.

Now, I would agree that people who fail to learn English are going to struggle to come to terms with life in the UK and they should be encouraged to do so, by all means. (If I went to live abroad I would make every effort to learn the language.)

I would also agree that anyone who seeks to commit, or carries out, acts of indiscriminate murder (or murder of any stamp come to that) ought to be prosecuted – but that applies to anyone, not just to “minorities.”

In any case, the problem – if it is a problem – is not existential. A few disaffected, and misguided, youths are not a threat to the fabric of the UK nor to the British way of life; whereas laws implemented in over-reaction most certainly are. Neither have the 7/7 attacks on London Transport nor any subsequent actions been as extensive as those of the IRA were.

[By the way, we are all immigrants. There were no humans in Britain till our ancestors migrated via Europe from Africa. As a consequence, none of us has the right to say that others should not come to make their homes here. What we do have is the right to expect and insist that they obey our laws.]

As for the rest of it, the Prime Minister seemed to me to be suggesting that perhaps everyone should be (let’s take an example) members of the Church of England. This is a strange way to try to win over people who may be disaffected as a result of their perceptions of the prevailing attitudes of most Britons towards them and their religious affiliation. To tell them that to be accepted they must abandon what they think defines them is not going to persuade them that they are wrong. Quite the opposite.

This is a Tory playing to the Tory right – and giving succour to the more extreme right wing. I am strongly reminded of the remarks of Margaret Thatcher (of unblessed memory) about “swamping.”

I have two words here for David Cameron.

Guy Fawkes.

Four hundred years ago it was Roman Catholics who were disaffected and the terrorists of their day (albeit the then government knew every detail of the Gunpowder Plot.) Excepting Northern Ireland (and there any dissidents’ wishes are particular not general – and not in any case dedicated to the overthrow of the British state) most British RCs no longer have a grievance against the government – no more so than any other Britons anyway – and would not resort to violence to relieve themselves of it.

Just give it a few hundred years; problem solved.

I’€™m not sure I want to wake up on Friday morning. I have this terrible feeling that Mr Irresponsible will win an outright majority.

It’€™s not that I’€™m in favour of Labour, though. Because of the nature of Labour in Scotland, I couldn’€™t bring myself to vote for them. But for all their drawbacks in the UK sense (Iraq, ID cards, other infringements of personal liberties, failure to bring the bankers to heel, not scrapping public private partnerships, intense relaxation about people being filthy rich) they are still better than the Tories. To take one example of their success, the NHS is immeasurably better than it was 13 years ago.

The reason that I dread a Mr Irresponsible premiership – more accurately I fear a George Osborne chancellorship -€“ is experience. The Tories have a track record. They seem to take a visceral delight in the cutting of public expenditure. But it’€™s all right for Cameron and Osborne; they’€™re well off and won’€™t be affected. (In fact, due to their inheritance tax plans, they’€™ll be even more quids in if their parents snuff it.)

It’€™s other people who will suffer, people who can least afford cuts, either in their benefits, their pensions or their jobs.

I know the other main parties are also saying they would make cuts but they are more likely to make efforts to mitigate the worst effects.

And don’€™t tell me the Tories are the party of low taxation. I well remember them during the 1979 election campaign denying claims that their plans would require the rate of VAT to be doubled. In their first budget after the election they raised VAT from 8 to 15%! (In subsequent Parliaments they raised it further to 17.5%.) VAT is a tax which hits most those who can least afford it.

I also fear for the BBC. It’€™s a great British institution which happens to be tremendously good at what it does. I would go so far as to say at everything it does. We would all miss it when it’€™s gone. I know we all have to pay for it almost willy-nilly but it is amazingly cheap at the price. The Tories are in Rupert Murdoch’€™s back pocket (as well as Lord Ashcroft’€™s) and he would like nothing better than to see the BBC dismantled or at least curtailed. Sky would not be able to give us such sterling service. It never could, because Murdoch is only seeking to turn a profit. I would rather never watch TV again than contribute to his coffers.

I know my vote is not going to make a difference. My sitting MP (Gordon Brown) has a huge majority and I can’€™t see it being overthrown. Besides when was the last time you heard that the incumbent PM actually lost his (or her) seat?

I genuinely don’t know for whom I’€™m going to vote; only that I will. Too many people fought too long and too hard for my right to do so for me not to honour them. But it will not be Tory or Labour.

If Mr Irresponsible should win on Thursday then, in the words of a prominent 1980s politician, I warn you not to be old, I warn you not to be ill, I warn you not to be poor.

The trouble is that, down the line, you (and I) are likely to be at least two of those things, if not all three.