5 more years

For Fergie according to Giggs who reckons he will still be in charge when Giggs has to hang up his boots.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/manutd/6815071/Ryan-Giggs-Sir-Alex-Ferguson-will-outlast-me-at-Manchester-United.html

Henry Winter and Oliver Kay salute the sports personality of the year Ryan Giggs
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/manchester_united/article6956737.ece

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/manutd/6811811/BBC-Sports-Personality-of-the-Year-ceremony-highlight-our-obsession-with-football.html

Hargreaves struggling to overcome his injury nightmare. I don't think we will see him a United shirt again. And if he does make an appearance i just can't see him being the same player.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football/2771891/Hargo-agony-over-Utd-return.html

Richard Williams must have been reading United fanzines as he writes an column suggesting Laurent Blanc may be the ideal man to fill Fergie shoes when it's time to quit. He would definitely be on my shortlist.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2009/dec/15/alex-ferguson-laurent-blanc-manchester-unit

Joseph Stiglitz argues it's time to cut banks down to size and get rid of banks that are too big to fail.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/13/mervyn-king-banks-curbed

The new economics foundation calls for a fundamental rethink of work
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/call-for-fundamental-rethink-of-value-of-work-1840507.html
Even if you don't buy the argument that hospital cleaners and waste recycle workers ( binmen to me and you ) should earn the same as bankers and footballers, ie you are not a marxist, should they earn x times whatever more. Not for me.

A sad week as the thick of it finished on Saturday night and the latest Curb your enthusiasm finishes on Thursday. The latter has been superb and after a slow start so has the thick of it. The first couple of episodes introduced us to Rebecca Front as the new hapless labour minister but by the end of the series she was an integral part of the show. The last two episodes with the sacking and reinstallment of Malcolm Tucker were absolutely stupendous. I suppose one extra reason for not wanting the tories to get an overall majority is we will get to see more Malcolm Tucker in the next series. Although the introduction of the tories Coulson ? figure looked to have plenty of comedic scope if we do end up with the old Etonians back in charge.

Music

Amadou & Mariam - Soul ni tile: The blind musical husband and wife team from Mali bring a more western orientated sound from the African duo than from some of their compatrioys. But with songs as good as these it doesn't matter. Sung in French and African it's a class album.

At the drive in - In relationship of command: A classic indie hard rock album from from the Texas goup that was to spawn The mars volta. Right from the brilliant first track arcasenal it has you nodding your head and wanting to jump up and down. They performed a brilliant version of one armed scissor on the Jools Holland show earlier in the decade but this is from the Letterman show

John Coltrane - Interstellar space - :This if really out there, if you don't like free jazz you will hate this. Duets between Coltrane and drummer Rashied Ali it's about the musicians as much as the music. So during the same tune there are scorching passages as well as some that don't sound that great on the ear. What a saxophonist though.

The long blondes - Couples : The second album from the Sheffield indie pop outfit and what a pity it saw them break up after it because they were two pretty good albums. This one surpassed the first for me. In a different decade they would haved graced the singles charts regularly i am sure.

The new pornographers - Twin Cinema : An excellent album from the Canadian indie super group with guest vocalist Neko Case that was released in 2005. There are some great jagged catchy indie pop tracks on it starting with opener title track twin cinema through to Jackie dressed in cobras to teach me Spanish techno

The Peth - The golden mile : Another Super Furry Animals offshoot and another cracker of an album. The furries drummer Daffyd Ieuan is joined by actor Rhys Ilfans to create suprisingly good record. It's hard to pick stand out tracks as they are consistently good but let's go fucking mental is a blinder but i can't find a decent enough version of it, so here is stonefinger which could have come straight from a Super furries album.