Military wards in NHS hospitals

Once again, British politicians are racing to see who can make the most stupid remarks.
Tony Blair, apparently writing in the News of the World, says that troops will be treated in a "military managed" ward at Birmingham's Selly Oak hospital.
OK so far, with some reservations.
He then goes on to say that he is ruling out reopening military hospitals because they cannot "match NHS specialised care and treatment".
Bingo!
The stupid factor rises to umpteen immediately.
Hello, Mr Blair; since when did NHS hospitals specialise in the treatment of the kind of injuries troops are likely to suffer on the battlefield?
Still, dear old Tony shouldn't feel too embarrassed, the Tory shadow defence secretary, Liam Fox, chipped in with a comment about it being a "disgrace" that wounded soldiers were being treated alongside civilian patients.
So, the stupid factor applies equally across party lines then.
I know they are both talking out of their respective rectums because I was once a patient in a military hospital (Catterick Garrison) and have had first hand experience of how military hospitals operated,
The first thing I have to say about them is that they were excellent in their treatment of both military and non-military patients.
Of course, the military doctors and staff had the requisite grounding etc in the treatment of wounds etc.
They were also bloody good at dealing with other common or garden ailments too.
Just ask the locals from the area around Catterick who were also treated at that hospital.
My stay in Catterick Military Hospital was thankfully for nothing more than a tonsillectomy but, due to my age, I was obliged to spend 3 days in the intensive care ward. Although this was almost 40 years ago, I still remember that the patient in the next bed to me was a young civilian girl, next to her was a young civilian school boy of about 10 years of age. In the beds opposite were people who were in more a serious condition than we three, mostly suffering serious coronary problems and virtually being kept alive by machines.
None of these patients were military.
When I was moved to a general ward, the mix there was probably about 60% military and 40% civilian patients. (This was probably due to the high incidence of heamorrhoids in the Army!)
I visited Catterick again last year for the first time since leaving the Army.
At the site of the miltary hospital, what did I find?
Come on, have a guess....
Yep! A housing estate!
Wasn't it Harold McMillan who once said something about selling off the family silver?

Keeping military (and when I say "military" I mean the likes of the Navy & RAF hospitals as well as Army) hospitals open and operating the way they did was perhaps too much of a sensible option for some of our attention seeking politicians.
Under the old Tory regimes, it was seen to be a good idea to cut expenditure wherever possible, regardless of how service were affected. After all, this meant more money could be slashed off the tax bill which would in turn lead to more votes which would perpetuate the well paid reign of the incumbents in Westminster.
When New Tory came to power in 1997, the Tony B. Liar saw no reason to change this policy and he bullied his acolytes into understanding that, if they wanted to pursue old fashioned Labour Party policies, they were not going to get any of the juicy cash rich jobs that may be on offer. New Tory (I agree, they have been operating under the Nom de Guerre of "New Labour" but don't let that fool anyone!) policies would follow roughly along the same lines as Old Tory but with a bit more vigour.
Old Tory or New Tory, it made no difference.
Think about their logic for a moment; if they cut military hospitals out of the equation, they not only save a few quid to put toward their "We Cut Taxes" fund but they also get an opportunity to grease their mates' palms with the new wonder drug, PFI (or PPI if you like, it's the same thing).
Brilliant idea chaps! Instead of giving the military the money to take care of themselves, let's give it to our mates in their comfy, mahogany lined boardrooms. Then, explain to the gullibles (public to me and thee) how this is really saving billions of pounds and the military ought to shut up whining.
How stupid do they think we are?
When the military ran their own medical services, they had to operate within fixed budgets. They had to get the maximum value out of the assets they had in hand. At least they didn't have to worry about greedy shareholders crying "More, more!".
Under PFI, NHS hospitals will be built with only the operating company's profits in mind. When the greedy shareholders cry "More, more!", they can be staisfied by the company going to the government and demanding more money and "Oh, by the way, we will have to shrink the capacity, facilities, operating budgets or whatever to ensure a good return to our investors".
Now, having read what I have just written, I understand now; it isn't B. Liar and his mate Fox who are stupid, it is me.
They can see that to do what I thought would be the sensible thing with military hospitals, they would risk alienating their well heeled C.E.O. mates.
When the choice is between threatening the continuation of a multi-million pound salary and the health and welfare of a £150 week squaddy, who may have been severely injured or crippled while defending the comfortable existence of these chief executives, well, the answer is obvious isn't it?
"Bugger the squaddy! More champagne anybody?"

Why "What Really Annoys Me"?

A good question, I suppose. The short answer would be "most things".

Take your pick; politics, modern society, the so-called Middle East, television etc and each of those has their own sub-categories.

Let's start with something from the previous line; "the so-called Middle East".
Why the "so-called" label? Well, that is easy. When I was a young man, serving in the British Army, the world to the East of London was conveniently divided into the Near, Middle and Far East.
Broadly speaking, the Near East covered the Mediterranean coastal states such as Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Cyprus, Jordan and Israel.
The Middle East was those areas south of this and eastward across the Arabian Gulf (which was the Persian Gulf in those days) and on as far as India.
The Far East began at or around Burma and ranged as far eastwards as China & Japan.
Now the whole lot seems to be the Middle East, so what changed?
I suspect the answer has more to do with the involvement of the U.S. in politics beyond their own shores. Everything was neatly in its box until the U.S. came along and started using terms such as "South West Asia" or "South Central Asia". I suppose they must have then figured out there has to be a Middle East as people wouldn't have a clue what they were talking about so they resurrected that term..in the wrong place!
Even the good old United Nations referred to the area as the Near East (have a look for resolution 234 of 1967).
Anyway, there is just one example of how things can exasperate a grumpy old man.
I shall start dipping into all manner of moans and whinges in the coming weeks. If nothing else, I expect the net outcome for me will be almost therapeutic having had the chance to have a good old shout.