Sunday Paper Review: 9th January 2011

So, 2011 is now truly underway. Here are the stories making their mark in the first proper set of Sundays of the new year.

The Mail on Sunday claims that David Cameron's enforcers are using "scare tactics" in a bid to stop Conservative MPs from making their views - and those of their constituents - known and represented in Parliament when the European Union Bill containing the famously laughable 'referendum lock' is voted on this week.

The report details how: "Government whips have reportedly told newly elected Conservative MPs that they risk toppling the Prime Minister if they rebel in a vote on protecting parliamentary sovereignty from the European Union."

The newspaper also contains an article by Bernard Jenkin MP - a thoroughly brilliant piece of writing which we would urge all British patriots and defenders of the national constitution to read.

The Bernard Jenkin article also single-handedly destroys the last shred of credibility that William Hague might have had, too.

To find out what UKIP's Nigel Farage thinks of the 'referendum lock', head to the Sunday Express. It quotes Nigel as saying: "The Referendum Lock could be picked by a child. Designed the way it is, this law makes things less democratic rather than more by handing even more power to the courts. It is marketing without product."

Here's something you thought you'd never see... a pro-British, EU-truth article in The Observer.

The newspaper reports on the incoming 'Welfare of Laying Hens Directive' (gosh, have the EU dictators really got nothing better to do?) and the effects that it will have on egg producing farmers.

The worry for British farmers is that we'll be the only people in the European Empire who actually comply with the damned directive, putting British business at a competitive disadvantage.

Sounds like business as usual to us. EU Directives enforced in Britain against the people's wishes, ignored in the rest of the European Empire and Britain and her businesses go to the wall as a result.

The only thing new here is that The Observer is the messenger of what normally gets branded a 'eurosceptic' story.

Things really will change when even the left start reporting uncomfortable European Empire truths.

The shooting of a Congresswoman in the United States is preoccupying the minds of the writing staff at the Sunday Telegraph. It's very strange reporting. On the one hand, they seem to quite deliberately create a false impression by running with a quote from Gabrielle Giffords' father who says: "The whole Tea Party were her enemies."

The result of that headline is that those who assimilate world events through soundbite will think the shooting is linked to the Tea Party movement.

Yet in a separate report on the incident, a former friend of the man said to be responsible is quoted as saying that he "seemed to be liberal or Left-wing" when she knew him and amongst his listed favourite books was The Communist Manifesto. He was also said to be "oddly obsessed with the 2012 prophecy".

All of which, to my mind, makes the headline soundbite linking of the incident to the Tea Party movement all the more troublesome and it looks suspiciously like a case of using an horrendous incident to promote disinformation.

The Independent on Sunday seems to have no such struggles in it's political even-handedness - it simply chooses to ignore any political party other than Labour.

In an article intended to weigh up the pros and cons of the Alternative Vote, the individual making the case for the 'yes' campaign is a "former adviser to Gordon Brown" while the case for the 'no' camp is made by a "Former Labour MP and minister".

Do talk amongst yourselves, chaps.

As far as this blog is concerned, we'll soon be launching our own campaign... for everyone to deliberately spoil the ballot paper for the referendum nobody asked for, using the opportunity instead to make it clear what we want to happen in the referendum that we do want and were promised but have never been given...

Back to the Sunday Telegraph, briefly, for it tells us how: "New flu jabs will not protect the elderly." The Mail on Sunday, meanwhile, tells us of: "Fears over mutating swine flu virus that could render vaccine useless".

And, returning to the Sunday Express, it reveals that: "UP to a million under-fives have been inoculated against the flu virus with a controversial vaccine containing poisonous mercury." The report adds that: "Pandemrix also contains a substance called squalene used to boost the immune response to the jab. It has been linked with adverse reactions including nerve problems and Gulf War syndrome."

And finally... the Sunday Mirror reveals how we're all going to be able to use Prince William's wedding to Kate Middleton as an excuse to go on the piss for fourteen hours.

God shave the... hic!