Dear Royal Bank of Scotland, UK Government, World

I notice that RBS has reported an annual loss of £2 BILLION today, up £0.9 BILLION from last year's total of £1.1 BILLION. Top-notch work in turning that shit around, bang-up job, backslaps all round, well fucking done.

"Yeah, alright, I admit, I probably don't deserve that new Ferrari."

And yet, despite this, those HEROIC INVESTMENT BANKERS from RBS will still be sharing a bonus pool of £390 MILLION (of our £45 BILLION, which we still haven't got back and apparently won't be doing for the forseeable future) between them.

An investment banker, saving the world.
Thank GOD for them!

Now, granted, I only have a borderline B-grade in GCSE Maths (certificate provided on request as proof), and am admittedly a bit hazy on the complex ins-and-outs of this global Economics malarkey, so I was wondering if you could just answer me this simple question:

WHAT'S

WRONG

WITH

THIS

PICTURE?

Give it fucking back. It's not yours, it's ours. GIVE IT FUCKING BACK.

In short:


Up yours, and I'm dead fucking serious, go fuck yourselves and die somewhere miserably, horribly, wretchedly, every last scum-sucking fucking one of you,

Davis.

PS - I can feel my mask of sanity slipping. At the rate we're going, it's going to have to be suicide, but rest assured: you're all coming with me.

Dear BBC News website (II)

Just copped a goz at your latest Entertainments and Arts page.


Beezer stuff. I can't help but think, though, that what your pages really need is MORE STORIES, FEATURES, ANALYSIS PIECES AND ARTICLES ABOUT ADELE. Why, this week alone she must have taken at least five shits, inhaled and exhaled thousands of times a day, said something, done something and maybe sang something, somewhere, at some point.

If you're stuck for inspiration, try looking back at your coverage over the last couple of weeks, when you reported on that time when Adele "triumphed at the Brits", was then "cut short at the Brits", followed by James Corden saying "something about cutting her short at the Brits", then some utterly fucking random bloke expressing displeasure at her "being cut short at the Brits".

We could also then do with a special report from the Arts editor on how Adele "triumphed at the Brits", followed by reaction from some other people on Adele's "triumph at the Brits", plus some additional footage of Adele "triumphing at the Brits". This, of course, after some build-up to Adele's inevitable "triumph at the Brits" and innumerable special features on Adele prior to "triumphing at the Brits" - possibly incorporating something about her throat here. And here. And here. And here.

All of these were, astonishingly, SEPARATE FUCKING ARTICLES - a bit like that time you reported on how she wouldn't be playing gigs that weren't even slated, then might have been quitting for a while, but wasn't actually quitting at all (where I come from, they're what might be classed as non-stories). Why, if I actually paid my license fee, I would have legitimate cause to get jolly well cross about this sort of flagrant, superfluous, wanton overkill!

In short, change the fucking record, yeah? That goes for every single one of you bastard radio programmers, too. Enough already. Enough. PLEASE. If nothing else, do it for my own sanity, and so that I can free myself from the bizarre Adele irony trap I appear to have become ensnared in, whereby the only place where you can read and hear more about Adele being in the news is from me bitching about Adele being in the news. Adele Adele Adele.

Adele.

Adeley regards,
Davis.

Dear Michael Cocking Gove (II)

I noted with great interest your invitation for the public to Tweet you questions using the hashtag #AskGove.

A preliminary scan of Twitter yields a vertiable smorgasbord of tantalising teasers (most of them, admittedly, honing in your spurious lack of qualifications for the post of Education Secretary), including such hot-to-trot dillemas as:

"Why are you saying your changes will take ten years to have an impact,
yet you want to sack teachers in a term?"

"Why do you insist on discrediting every educational achievement I get?
It's not actually easy to get 9 A*s as GCSE and 6 A's at AS"

"Would you accept the new average teacher pension to survive on?
Would you work until 68?"

"Who will replace the teachers who are sacked for being inadequate,
considering the inadequate teachers beat others to the job?"

- Tough cookies, all. However, I don't suppose it'll come as any great surprise to you that I've decided to cut through all this idle conjecture and get right to the nub of the issue. Are you ready? Here's my question:

Childish, unhelpful, unconstructive... but enough about your education policy.

All the best,
D
x

PS - @davismclelland if you'd like to reply, though I suspect 140 characters probably isn't enough to cover even the most basic overview.

PPS - Oh, pipe down, you humourless prick.

Dear BBC News website; Reporters & Journalists nationwide

Oi oi! Just clicked on a very interesting-looking article on your homepage which I felt warranted further investigation. To wit:

Blimey, this one looks like it's going to get interesting! One of our most beloved filmmaking houses embroiled in a row over insensitive material in their latest family film? Do go on...

Crikey! Aardman have really got it wrong here, haven't they? Perhaps you could fill in the blanks with a bit more exposition though, just so we really know what we're talking about here.

Good work! A terse and factually accurate description of the moment in question - I think all the article needs now is the opposing faction's perspective, in order to provide a more rounded view of the conflict:

Bravo! Excellent reporting! Well-sourced, objective, brilliantly reasoned, mercifully free of flab, and it -

Oh, for FUCK'S sake.

Despairing regards,
Davis.

Dear Michael Cocking Gove

Not a great day to be you really, is it, Boat Boy?

[Smack here]

Funnily enough, in a quite mind-boggling display of affrontery, you'd somehow managed to make my morning shitlist even before I'd got wind of you suggesting we generously spooge £60 million on a gift boat for Her Majo (and oh, 'twas a pungent guff indeed).

No, Govearino, you can only imagine my look of blank-faced stupefaction when I read this morning that you'd like to see fewer GCSE and A-Level passes next year in a bid to tackle "exam inflation" - this just three days after you advocated that "underperforming" teachers be given the heave-ho within as little as one month for failing to get their kiddlings to achieve... [drumroll]... GOOD GRADES.

I'm confused, Mikey Mike. Which is it to be? Are these "real achievements of children on the ground" you're so valiantly seeking in the interesting subjects like English and the Arts, or just the 'important' ones? Have you ever been in a class of 15-year-olds, taught a cunting lesson or attempted to hold the attention of a bunch of dead-eyed, soulless brand-slaves-in-waiting whose only concern is getting out of the classroom to bazz messages back and forth on their smartphones while listening to Rihanna bleat on about fucking all evening? No? Right, then.

Way to fundamentally misunderstand your own remit, Goveanator. Perhaps try quoffing back some some Imodium next time before opening your trap and blithely spewing shit all over public policy?

In short, your Department of Education:

Regards,
Davis.

Dear Gods of the Comedy World (II)

I was so pleased with myself when I thought of this joke earlier today that I assumed someone must have done it already. They don't appear to have done, so I've gone ahead and made the video myself.

I hope you will agree that that was 13 seconds of your life well-spent.

Regards,
Davis.

Dear David Cameron

I read with great interest your comments on the British film industry this morning, particularly your contention that it be encouraged to make "commercially successful pictures". It comforts me that you have such a steady, sure-footed grasp on the mechanics of production/reception, and makes me wonder why, with your expert knowledge on what makes a film good – sorry, "commercially successful" – we didn’t appoint you Movie Tsar years ago. In fact, I’m sure that Hollywood would be grateful to hear from you, what with this miraculous, all-encompassing magic formula of yours.

Thanks for acknowledging that British films made "a £4bn contribution to the UK economy and an incalculable contribution to our culture" last year (interesting choice of precedence there, though I appreciate these are cash-strapped times), although I would perhaps question the wisdom of then advocating that resources now be ploughed solely into a select few projects, thus negating the potential livelihoods of those seeking to nurture their own creative aspirations. But never mind that, Dave – you know best.

It’s comforting that we can now forget those “niche” people – you know, those pesky minorities whose circumstances don’t feed into the “mainstream” (read: your) experience. Forget the millions of multiplex-averse viewers, the ones who - God forbid - might like to be bothered ever-so-slightly by the intellectual or emotional challenge of watching a film. Forget Fish Tank, Tyrannosaur, Regeneration, Kes, A Room for Romeo Brass. Forget those with a bothersome pretension towards actual artistry. Buh-bye, Ken Loach, Mike Leigh, Shane Meadows – come back again when you’ve put some more guns and that in there (probably just as well that you’re all established directors now, since there wouldn’t be a hope in hell of your first features ever securing funding so that you could actually get to this stage).

In the meantime, YAY for James Bond. YAY for The Inbetweeners. YAY for quaint, Hollywood-friendly misrepresentations of British middle-class life, Heritage films and costume dramas populated by American actors for a bit of “star power”. YAY for limp, lowest-common-denominator comedies starring Mackenzie Crook or Rowan Atkinson, Billy Elliott and Calendar Girls. YAY for Richard fucking Curtis.

Cheers, Dave. Cheers for your contribution, especially after you helped to axe the Film Council and have been steadily withdrawing funding from the BFI ever since. Cheers.

Now FUCK OFF, you IDIOT.


All the fucking best,
Davis.