A Conservative Party spokesman has suggested to the BBC that a Tory Government might look at privatizing the UK Met. Office (United Kingdom Meteorological Office).  Liam Fox, shadow defence (it’s spelled with a “c”) secretary for the Conservatives said, “There’s a very strong case to look at the assets of the Ministry of Defence and say do these deliver anything for the front line?”.  The UK Met. Office is a part of the Ministry of Defence, and he said that the Tories are committed to reducing Defence costs by 25% and that might entail selling the UK Met. Office to private parties.  The Office was founded in 1854 to provide forecasts to mariners.  The Office now has an annual turnover of more than £170 million a year (one British pound = $1.63 American dollars, so 277.1 million American dollars).  The United Kingdom (England, Wales, Scotland and No. Ireland) is about same size as Michigan and Indiana put together.  While America turned sharply left in the last election, much of Europe is moving in the opposite direction (Merkel in Germany, Sarkozy in France, Berlesconi in Italy, Boris Johnson – mayor of London, Gianni Alemanno – mayor of Rome, and the million people that turned out to protest a drive for abortion on demand in Spain (it’s interesting to note that on this story, the BBC got a crowd estimate of 250,000 from the local police, one million from the regional government and two million from the organizers and reported all three totals.  France 24 reported “more than a million”, expatica.com (English version) had specific estimates of 1.5 million from organizers and 1.2 million from the Madrid regional government, as reported on TeleMadrid television.  However, CNN reported only “thousands” and showed a picture of one sign, but no pictures or video of the crowd.  – BTW, Spain’s unemployment rate is now 19% and the youth unemployment is at 39%, the general unemployment is up from 7.95% when the Socialist Party won the Spanish election of April 2007.  Polls show the Conservative Party in the U.K. with a substantial lead heading toward the next election, which must occur on or before June 3, 2010.