The will of God?

THE Volkswagen crisis will probably go the same way as the BP oil-spill affair. The US legal system will spend years gleefully taking a foreign company to the cleaners and delivering billions of dollars in fees and compensation to US companies and citizens, some of whom, it will transpire, have lost not a single cent.

THE US authorities devised a stupid emissions test which bore no relation to real driving. The only valid test of a car is one involving real cars on real roads under real conditions. With Teutonic efficiency, VW produced software to detect and pass the stupid test. The Yanks then discovered that VW diesels were only clean during the stupid test, not on the open road. VW may be guilty but what about the people who devised and approved the stupid test?

INCIDENTALLY, if you drive a diesel Volkswagen, now is the time to start developing emissions-related symptoms to impress a judge. An irritating cough, memory loss, dizziness, memory loss, anger issues and headaches are useful. Plus memory loss.

IF the Saudi official had stepped in front of the world's cameras after the Hajj disaster and said: "Well, **** happens," there would have been outrage. Instead, he declared "It is the will of God," which means exactly the same as "**** happens" but with a divine sugar-coating. If last week's horror was the will of God then so, presumably were all the other Hajj catastrophes. The aerial footage shows a vast mass of humans being herded like animals with not a shred of concern for their dignity or safety. It is good to hear Western Muslims denouncing the "will of God" baloney and pinning the blame where it belongs, on the so-called organisers of the event. If Saudi Arabia had a decent legal system to bring its rulers to account, the Hajj would instantly become a lot safer. Sadly, God does not seem to be willing that just yet.

FOR some weeks, a new and slightly worrying mole had been growing on my forehead. I rang my GP, had a phone chat and saw her 48 hours later. She and a specialist declared the mole benign and zapped it off with a freezing blast of liquid nitrogen. I know the NHS is supposed to be in crisis but this is the second time this year my family has needed it and each time it has been quick, efficient and reassuring.

APPARENTLY my local surgery's efficiency is down to a new appointments system which has virtually eliminated what doctors call DNA (did not attend) and the rest of us call appointment-breakers. Sometimes the solution is money but sometimes it's better organisation.

THE more I use this little Chromebook, the more I love it (and, no, I'm not being paid for writing this). It's like a laptop but with no memory, no working parts, no viruses and enormous battery life. It reminds me of the much-loved little Tandy computers we hacks used back in the early 1980s. They were feeble compared to later laptops but for what journalists do, writing words and squirting them down a phone line, the Tandy was perfect. I once dropped one off the back of a Land Rover in Hong Kong and it didn't miss a beat. The Chromebook has the same simple, robust feel. It also takes me back 30 years, which is always welcome.

CONSPIRACY corner. This, from the Guardian website on the VW affair: "This was engineered by Merkel to divert attention from her ongoing efforts to destroy Europe ." Not the Freemasons, then?