Here's something quite sinister for armchair conspiracy theorists: it appears that US prez George Bush has final approval on the the UK version of Google Maps and has decided to redesign the world in a way that more adequately reflects his own particular vision.

As reader Mike Clark explains:

If you visit http://maps.google.co.uk you'll start off with a map showing the southern part of the UK. Zoom out to maximum distance using the slider on the left, and then pan around to see a unique world view that would warm Dubya's cockles...

That's right. In Google's Brave New World, potential threats to US national security have been neutralised by airbrushing them from the surface of the globe. Naturally, the UK survives the apocalypse by virtue of its "special relationship" with the US:

We were initially baffled as to why Central America and several Caribbean islands - including Cuba - have been spared. Then it dawned on us: the former is vital to the US economy as the supplier of orange-picking, dish-washing immigrants; the latter an essential justification for the continued existence of the US weapons development programme. After all, if you haven't got at least one cigar-puffing Commie building an enormous underground chemical weapons plant, then what's the point of spending $8m on research into ground-penetrating nukes?

Bootnote

Canada has also escaped the cull. Why? What are they not telling us?

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