Fox off Liam
22 Feb 2012 1 Comment
in Individuals worthy of contempt, Opinions, Politics
Welcome back Liam. We've all missed you so much. Really.
You just can’t keep a good man down can you.
Liam Fox has raised his head again. His piece in the FT is supposed to signal the beginning of the political comeback for a man who resigned last year over issues of naked corruption his rather curious relationship with his bezzie mate Adam Werrity. Various scandalous rumours circulated over what exactly he was getting up to with his professional partner he was probably shagging him but we won’t go into that now.
It matters not a jot what Fox gets up to in his personal life. The issue with Fox has always been snouts in troughs. And there was a lot of that with former defence secretary and Werrity, which is ultimately why he had to stand down.
But presumably Fox thinks he has served the time for his crime and now, several months later, he can get back in the saddle. He is a hero of the Tory right and they want one of their chief spokesmen back.
Of course I was rally excited to hear what Fox had to say about where British politics should be going. It promised to be a radical, unique series of insights from a political titan. I’m sure the man has spent the intervening period reassessing the debates and objectively analysing the Coalition’s abysmal record in office. Hell, he might even have something to say about addressing endemic corruption in public life.
Or perhaps not.
The good doctor has come up with some fairly unsurprising ideas. Namely:
1) Cut taxes
2) Make it easier to sack people.
3) Cut public spending even more.
Fan-fucking tastic. I tip my hat off to you sir.
I suppose the first thing to say is that we hear this shit every single day in the media. Why is he presenting it as some sort of brilliant insight? How long did he spend thinking about the article? Was it a cut and paste job of everything he has ever said about the economy, ever?
I suppose I better deal with each in turn (sigh…….)
1) Everyone is saying that one way to stimulate the economy is to cut taxes on the worst off. So nothing new there. I also presume he means cutting taxes on the wealthy, even though time and again this has been shown to have no positive effect aside from…..letting the rich pay less tax. The higher rates of tax have brought in significant extra revenues to the government. But of course this is a political question. Fox wants his mates looked after.
2) Oh dear god not this old one. When the economy is tanking then the right want to make it easier to sack people and pay them less because that will stimulate the economy supposedly. Not true. Insecure workers will naturally spend less of their money and save more if they are fearful of losing their jobs. And when the economy is doing well the right still say they want less regulation as it is holding back growth and prosperity. Fox just wants weaker employee protection per se. He is forgetting that firstly employees are actual people with lives and families and needs and secondly that countries with stronger employment regulation and unions, i.e. Germany and some of the Scandinavian economies, have weathered the economic storm rather better than Britain has (and I’m not suggesting that Germany is a paradise by any stretch……) This isn’t about economic competitiveness. Once again this is Fox defending the interests of his mates and trying to increase their profit margins.
3) The Americans rejected austerity, implemented a small but significant stimulus package and their economy is slowly climbing out of recession. Britain has been attempting an almost unprecedented scaling back of public expenditure (on some things, not all) and the economy could be about to re-enter recession. The consenus now is that the Tories plans aren’t working and are probably motivated purely by ideology. And yet Fox wants more austerity. You do the math.
Fox is just repeating the same old dystopian shit he has spent his entire political career trotting out. Why is it suddenly front page news in the Financial Times?
Praying at council meetings
22 Feb 2012 2 Comments
Who's a big boy then? Eric Pickles
I hadn’t said anything about the recent controversy regarding prayers being banned from council meetings but I think I’ll add my two penneth.
I wasn’t even aware that many councillors get down on their knees and beg for the Lord’s mercy before council meetings and I’ve been quite shocked to find out how widespread the practice is. It makes me very uncomfortable that councillors are being openly divided not on a party basis but on a religious one. And make no mistake, that is what is happening.
I think as a story it is a classic example of the media with an agenda deliberately misrepresenting what has been decided by the judges.
The ruling banned prayers from council meetings. That is to say, council meetings are now a protected secular space where secular or atheist councillors do not have the religious beliefs of other thrust down their throat. No one has been prevented from organising a praying session before or after the meeting at another venue. What has been stopped is the prayers being a part of meetings.
We are not a Christian country. Most people do not pray every day. Most people do not go to church. Religion is tolerated and accepted but no longer made a central part of the British way of life. That, my friends, is called secularism in action. A healthy, respectful secularism that the non-religious and religious alike should welcome. Making religion a part of council meetings is divisive when the real divides should be over issues of policy.
The religious rights of councillors are not really being infringed (and in any case the rights of non-religious candidates not to have it rammed down their throats should take precedence). They can do as they please before or after the meeting. But they no longer have the right (if the ruling is upheld that is) to make their religion a part of a council meeting. How could anyone possibly object to that…….?
A good example of the dishonesty of the pro-prayers brigade is this piece in the Telegraph. The headline in particular:
Prayers before council meetings ruled unlawful
The prayers weren’t before the meetings. They were a part of the meeting.
Eric Pickles argument is telling:
“While welcoming and respecting fellow British citizens who belong to other faiths, we are a Christian country, with an established Church in England, governed by the Queen. Christianity plays an important part in the culture, heritage and fabric of our nation. Public authorities – be it Parliament or a parish council – should have the right to say prayers before meetings if they wish. The right to worship is a fundamental and hard-fought British liberty.”
I think it needs repeating; I really don’t think we are a Christian country anymore. But even if we were, prayers forming part of meetings of elected representatives would still be inappropriate. And it also needs repeating that the prayers weren’t before the meeting. They were a part of it and the non-religious and atheists were being by definition excluded and marginalised. How is that democratic, or tolerant? And no one is denying people’s right to worship-another Tory straw man.
Someone might like to get their cock out when they are in the privacy of their own home. If they were a councillor I would hope they would refrain from it at council meetings, however important they thought it was to their lives. There is a time and a place for these things………
And if we have an established Church of England, maybe it’s time to disestablish it. It would make things so much easier.
I’m loath to attack those of faith too hard. They are absolutely right that they are entitled to their religious beliefs. But when it impinges on the political process and religious political representatives wish to inflict their ideas on everyone else then those of a secular disposition need to take a firm stand. Judge Ouseley’s ruling is a welcome one and I sincerely hope it isn’t reversed.
Iain Duncan Smith’s ludicrous Daily Mail article
21 Feb 2012 1 Comment
in Individuals worthy of contempt, Politics
John Harris in the Guardian has beaten me to it regarding a response to Iain Duncan Smith’s simply outrageous piece in the Daily Mail about ‘job snobs’ but I thought I would say a few words about it anyway.
Of course the article is motivated by the growing outcry regarding the government’s various workfare schemes (and that, Iain, is what they are in all but name, you sanctimonious, pedantic dickhead) where JSA claimants are forced into doing jobs for no pay in order to keep their benefits. There is a whiff of feudal Britain about the policy, as Harris correctly points out.
Duncan Smith’s thinks the critics of the various schemes are ‘job snobs’ who look down on the people who do the kind of work that people on the schemes are being forced into.
I don’t know whether Duncan Smith is an idiot or is deliberately misrepresenting the views of his opponents here. I would imagine the latter
No one is objecting to the work itself. The issue is that the people doing it aren’t being paid a fair wage to do it. They aren’t being paid at all most of the time, for fuck’s sake! And in the majority of cases there isn’t a job at the end of it for them. It is a government-subsidised pool of desperate benefits claimants for big companies to dip into and get free or very low cost labour.
If Tesco et al have all these posts they need to fill then employ extra staff with proper pay and conditions (and that of course would mean better salaries and conditions than the pitiful ones on offer at the moment. But retaining the status quo would be a start…..) Considering their huge profits, they can clearly afford it.
No one is objecting to shop work. We are objecting to people being compelled to do it and not being paid the correct wage for doing so.
Duncan Smith says the various schemes are ‘purely voluntary’. In a sense of course they are. If you are ok with the other choice on offer. Starvation. MWA is a scheme where claimants are forced to work on pain of losing their benefits for months at a time.
The best bit is this:
“Anyone who is gulled by those who believe in the first path is in danger of creating a society with a twisted culture that thinks being a celebrity or appearing on The X Factor is the only route worth pursuing in life.
The belief that you can just sit at home or wait to become a TV star and that work simply lands in your lap, in turn, feeds the pernicious idea that success is not related to effort and work.”
Quality. Because of course that is what the people opposed to this think we should all be doing instead. It’s one of the most appalling straw man arguments imaginable on a par with Gove’s arrogant dismissal of his critics in the education system as ‘enemies of promise’ and ‘trots’. The sheer intellectual dishonesty and deliberate misrepresentation of his opponent’s arguments is quite disgraceful. Of course that is what the Tories resort to when they are rattled and the self-evident stupidity of their plans is exposed
The problem is of course that Duncan Smith can’t say what he really thinks. That he is happy with a pool of unpaid labour being there at the beck and call of Britain’s corporations. That high unemployment and pitifully low wages at the bottom end of the jobs market are actually a desirable, if politically awkward, outcome for people of his mindset.
The simple litmus test for all the Tory MPs lecturing us on what we should be putting up with: would they do that kind of work for that kind of money?
And if Duncan Smith thinks that shop work is so noble, then why doesn’t he advocate an increase in the minimum wage so those noble workers are remunerated appropriately for their noble efforts? In fact, why not ensure they are paid the same as an MP?
Excellent piece on Iran……by a Tory MP?
21 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
in Politics
An extremely good piece onIran, by a Tory MP, unbelievably. It certainly doesn’t read as a contribution from someone who is representative of the normally gung-ho Conservative Party.
It’s thoughtful, well-argued, thoroughly sensible and reiterates many of the points I made here the other day. Military action is the height of folly. In particular I like the way he rejects Hague’s patronising suggestion that Arab states effectively can’t be trusted with nuclear weapons.
It’s interesting to note that Baron is a former soldier. Those who understand the realities of war are often at the forefront of questioning the wisdom of further conflicts. Politicians such as Cameron and Blair see foreign wars as a way of avoiding those tiresome domestic questions and looking like great international statesmen.
I suppose John Baron is in the strictest sense a paleo-conservative but it seems a slightly unfair label for this piece. I’m certainly not implying I agree with the man on many other issues, indeed he seems like a bit of a reactionary, but on this issue he is spot on.
Why the west should rule out military action against Iran
Posted by John Baron MP -20 February 201217:58
The threat of military force heightens tensions and makes a peaceful outcome less likely.
With tough new sanctions in place, further measures threatened by Iran, naval forces mustering in the Persian Gulf, and state-sponsored terrorism ongoing, we are on the brink of a military conflict.Israel, at this very moment, is contemplating whether to undertake a strike. This would be calamitous, and could lead to regional war. What is desperately needed is a fresh assessment of the situation. The west’s approach of sanctions and sabre-rattling are yesterday’s failed policies. The fact we are once again on the cusp of conflict is testament to that failure.
My motion today therefore calls for the government – and, by implication, the west – to rule out the use of force in order to reduce tensions and bring us back from the brink of war, and to redouble diplomatic efforts. By ruling out the use of force – except, of course, in self-defence – we can reflect on some of the inconvenient truths which the west chooses to ignore, and the need for a fresh approach.
The catalyst for the most recent round of condemnation of Iran has been the IAEA’s latest report. However, close reading of the report reveals no ‘smoking gun’. There is no evidence of attempts to produce nuclear weapons, or of a decision to do so. Much is made of western intelligence reports. But Iraq should have taught us to be careful of basing major foreign policy decisions on secret intelligence.
A second inconvenient truth relates to the usual depiction of Iran as intransigent and chauvinistic in her foreign policy. Western governments too easily forget that Iran is not totally at fault here. There have been opportunities to better relations between Iran and the west which the west has spurned. We forget Iran expressed solidarity with the US following 9/11, and that attempts were made to develop contacts during the early stages of the Afghan war. Her reward was to be declared part of the “Axis of Evil” by President Bush. This led directly to the removal of the reformist President Khatami. Despite this, further attempts at cooperation followed in the run-up to the Iraq war, and these were similarly rebuffed.
I am not an apologist forIran. No-one can agree with her human rights record, or her sponsoring of terrorism beyond her borders. But these are not arguments for military intervention. Rather, I suggest no-one’s hands are clean in the region, including our own particularly after the invasion ofIraq.
The argument is advanced that, should Iran develop nuclear weapons, this will lead to a nuclear arms race in the region, but without the safety mechanisms that existed during the Cold War – and this could lead to nuclear escalation. I do not accept this argument.
There is no reason why the west’s adherence to the theory of nuclear deterrence should not be equally valid in other regions of the world. Despite the rhetoric, there is no evidence of irrational behaviour byIran. This view was re-enforced by the Israeli defence minister last year. Meanwhile, other countries in the region, such as India and Pakistan, have fought wars and yet shown nuclear restraint. Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons in anger.
We are then told it is naïve to rule out the use of force, that all options must ‘be left on the table’. But I suggest pursuing a policy which has clearly failed is naïve. It has brought us to the brink of military conflict.
What compounds the error of this approach is that most agree a military strike would be counter-productive. It would unite Iran in fury and perhaps trigger a regional war. It would not work – a fact the US defence secretary has recently highlighted. Furthermore, knowledge cannot be eradicated by military intervention. There are even influential voices from inside Israel against a strike.
Yet, despite this, the present policy is to refuse to rule out the use of force. Such a policy is not only naïve, but illogical: we are keeping an option alive which all know would be a disaster; against a country which chooses to ignore it; yet this option heightens tensions and makes a peaceful outcome less likely. It is a nonsense.
A fresh approach is required. Israel will not attack Iran if Washington objects. Now is the time for the US to make clear to her ally that force should not be used. Ruling out the use of force would have the immediate effect of reducing tensions and making conflict less likely. This would lessen the chance of another accident, such as Iran Air 655, which could in itself trigger a conflict. Such a policy longer-term would give diplomacy a greater chance of success.
We need to better understand and engage with Iran, and offer the prospect of implicit recognition ofIran’s status as a major power in the region – a status we created ourselves by our misguided invasion of Iraq which fundamentally altered the regional balance of power. There is a precedent for recognising this new status. In the 1960s, when the US presence in Asia was waning and China was beginning to flex her muscles, Nixon did not respond by denying the reality of Chinese power. His visit to China in 1972 took everyone by surprise, but it was the right decision – it was a defining moment.
I suggest the US needs to realise that this is one of those defining moments.Israel and Iranare two proud nations, both perhaps uncertain as to the best course of action. The US is the elephant in the room. It needs to put behind it the underlying antagonism of the last 30 years which defines this crisis. It needs to make clear an Israeli attack would be unacceptable, and then better engage withIran. It is in Israel’s long-term interest that this happens.
We need to go the extra mile for peace. War should always be the measure of last resort: to be used only when all other avenues have been exhausted. We have not reached this point here.
John Baron is the Member of Parliament for Basildon and Billericay. A former soldier and member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, he resigned from the shadow frontbench to vote against the Iraq war, opposed our intervention in Afghanistan, and was the only Conservative MP to vote against the Libyan intervention.
The astonishing hyprocrisy of Tony Pulis
20 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
in Football, Individuals worthy of contempt, Opinions
Tony Pulis: Dressed to impress.
Premier League managers would be advised to tread with the gentlest of care when preaching the imagined moral superiority of the British game, with it highly doubtful that any could justifiably declare their charges immune from bouts of exaggeration and gamesmanship. Still, there remains a backward core of regressive, parochial philistines dismissive of diving and on-field dramatics as a disease devised by deceitful foreign cowards, albeit one whose insidious influence is threatening the noble honesty inherent on these shores. Such sentiment is, of course, bollocks but the truth has rarely infringed upon the nonsensical drivel discharged from contemptible Stoke City boss Tony Pulis. For the Welshman, Spain’s La Liga is little more than a villainous haven for cheats and conmen, where unscrupulous chicanery is nonchalently accepted “as the norm” and it’s two leading lights, Barcelona and Real Madrid, serve up only a gutless spectacle “littered with people rolling around at every challenge” in games where both sides have ”forgot (sic) about football.”
Inevitably, such a scathing and misguided attack on a footballing culture that has produced the reigning world and European champions, whilst lending itself to accusations of insularity, even xenophobia, is also pretty hollow coming from a native of a nation with only a solitary appearance, 54 years ago, at a major finals. From Pulis inparticular, those words highlight a quite astonishing hypocrisy and an extraordinary poverty of self-awareness. Perhaps the temerity of a man whose team habitually practice a crude appropriation of the game at it’s lowest, most base form decrying sides of infinitely greater aesthetic grace and ability for negating football would be admirable if it wasn’t quite so graphically and so sickeningly abhorrent. But then Pulis isn’t really a man known for his understanding of aesthetics. Just look at him. Tracksuit-clad whilst his trademark bargain-bin baseball cap veils a sharply receding hairline and as with so many men in their 50s, such headwear serves only to suggest the look of someone struggling against terminal illness or a learning difficulty. Either way, his aggressively arched eyebrows imply that whatever the malady, it leaves him scarred by grudge.
Obviously, to suggest that Pulis’ sartorial shoddiness and unfamiliarity with Saville Row undermines his managerial authority would be frivolous yet presenting for work in attire more suited for walking the dog than leading a professional football team is indicative of his place very much in the game’s ‘old-school.’ And Pulis’ Stoke are very, very ‘old-school.’ That is euphemistically to say, dirty, unrefined, uncouth, unimaginative, physical and elephant-man ugly. Essentially, every unflattering but largely substantiated stereotype about British football manifested in one apolyptic nadir of a club. Under Pulis, Stoke have consistently enjoyed less possession than any other Premiership side, which inevitably leads to the team occupying an unflattering position in the fair play rankings. Less possession necessitates more tackling and seemingly above all else, Pulis loves a tackle. Good old British self-proclaimed ‘football men’ are often found rhapsodising upon the noble art of tackling, tellingly a concept that Real Madrid’s cultured Xabi Alonso openly found perplexing during his time at Liverpool, as far from being a last resort, a wild, studs-showing, injury-inducing lunge exhibiting a laissez-faire attitude to actually cleanly winning the ball is the game’s raison d’être for Pulis and his neanderthal ilk. Not that any of his lads are that sort of player, of course.
This all-pervading lust for the primitive stretches to see Rory Delap’s presence on the team-sheet owing more to his ability with the ball in his hands than at his feet. Delap is a central midfielder by trade and as such occupies a territory officially unrecognised by Pulis, as the crass, direct style afflicted upon his team sees the area bypassed by a bludgeoning barrage of aimless, hopeful punts upfield. Incomprehensibly, this coarse philosophy is often praised for the ‘variety’ it engenders, even provoking the infamous rhetoric of cheerfully departed Sky Sports ‘analyst’ Andy Gray, who felt bizarrely moved to question the hypothetical influence of Barcelona’s Argentine genius Lionel Messi on a wet, windy Tuesday night in Stoke. Quite how the prospect of giving cumbersome donkeys of Robert Huth and Andy Wilkinson’s calibre the runaround is meant to intimidate the world’s finest footballer is anyone’s guess and such nonsense serves mostly to strengthen the joy that the boorish boys’ club of the Gray and his hairy-handed, massive-faced misogynistic side-kick Richard Keys no longer stains the nation’s screens.
Nevertheless, for all his obnoxious knuckle-dragging and bombastic alpha-male bravado, Gray’s choice of Stoke for the location of his mistaken musings is telling. Shamelessly physical and boastfully pragmatic in their ‘play to your strengths’ dogma, Stoke’s reliance upon set-pieces and long balls is such that last weekend saw the team surrender 63% of possession to Crawley Town, a side 3 divisions beneath them. That the tie ended with Stoke 2-0 victors is immaterial. Instead, Pulis’ disinterest in actually playing football was exposed even when confronted by a team with a fraction of the budget of supposedly, pedigree of his own. Stoke’s perplexingly plentiful apologists will point to Matthew Etherington and illiterate hoodlum Jermaine Pennant as evidence of Pulis’ partial indulgence of flair but instructing busy wingers to toss the ball into the area at every opportunity is merely an extension of his Reepian preference for playing the percentages rather than a reputation-jarring allowance for expression. The redundancy of more progressive signings such as Eidur Gudjohnsen and Tuncay Sanli speak further of the club’s failure to engage a more nuanced approach whilst the huge fees that secured the combative Wilson Palacios, erratic sometime-target-man Kenwyne Jones and England international striker Peter Crouch, surely signed more for his beanpole 6 ft 7 in frame than the unusually sure touch it accompanies, make clear where the manager’s asinine affections lie.
Still, although Pulis may have a point about El Clasico featuring less football following the toxic tenure of José Mourinho in Madrid, such comments are nevertheless an excruciating embarrassment coming as they do from the least appropriate agent in top level European football. The crux of his criticism however, is far more predictable. In Britain, senseless sensationalism often abounds around the game’s illusory descent into the realms of becoming a ‘non-contact sport.’ That is to say, that crude, ill-timed attempts at maiming an opponent are no longer allowed to pass unpunished, unlike in those glorious halcyon days of yore where hooliganism both on and off the pitch proved an omnipotent footballing supplement. Pulis, discernibly laments the loss of these dark days and is in no doubt as to what has curtailed the blood-lust: diving, or more specifically, diving foreigners. Inevitably, aside from the rather more worrying inferences such a slant suggests, Pulis’ thoughts can clearly be viewed as motivated by rampant self-interest with the aim of creating doubt in the minds of those set to officiate Stoke’s forthcoming fixtures. With his team naturally spending longer stretches chasing possession than those of his competitors, his want for publicly highlighting the perceived evils of exaggeration is explained by the subsequent need for his players to make more tackles and a desire for referees to therefore adopt a more tolerant stance.
Nonetheless, Pulis may be correct in his denunciation of diving as “cheating” but is it really a stronger iniquity than say, the career-threatening challenges of Stoke defender Ryan Shawcross that damaged Francis Jeffers’ ligaments in 2007 or more infamously, inflicted a double leg fracture on Arsenal’s Aaron Ramsey? Clearly not. Clumsy, reckless challenges should, undoubtedly, be punished and whilst emphasising contact or feigning injury may be unpaltable, they are only the secondary offence here and besides, victims of mis-timed tackles are under no obligation to stay on their feet for fear of falling foul of what Pulis piously preaches “goes against the grain for British football.” The puritanism is particularly surprising, given Pulis’ position in football’s broad spectrum resides at the polar opposite of romantic, though the blinkered refusal to countenance that natives of these isles are equally inclined to gain a dishonest advantage is ridiculous. Of course, quite whether affronting a culture that produces hypocritical wankers like Tony Pulis should be deemed negative is open to debate.
DC
Another day, another collection of government NHS balls-ups…….
20 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
in Current Affairs, Individuals worthy of contempt, Politics
Bill and Ben, the flowerpot wankers.
After a day like today one does have to wonder how the Tories managed to get elected. They do seem an incredibly incompetent, cack-handed bunch.
Polling has shown that the Tories are losing support in a big way over their NHS reforms, changes designed purely to offer a money-making opportunity to their friends in the for-profit health sector.
As usual follow the Mambo’s golden rule (we’d love to claim copyright but we aren’t that original); follow the money. This list of MPs and Lords financial interests in healthcare gives a demonstration of why these policies are being pursued. The Tories are looking after their mates and returning the favour to those who fund them.
It is as simple as that. The aim of the bill which is becoming an Act in all but name is to introduce market forces even further into healthcare. It will most emphatically not be in the interests of patients. Only the companies making the profits will benefit.
Hence the groundswell of professional and public opposition to the government’s plans.
Cameron, like a dog with a meaty bone, just won’t let go of them however. He seems to be determined to press on and today’s ‘summit’ with the NHS professional bodies that support (or at least do not publicly oppose) the plans was evidently not a forum for debating the proposals. Apparently we are passed that now. The issue is implementing the changes successfully. They are presented as a fait accompli. The open contempt for the democratic process, as I have remarked before, is simply disgraceful.
Apparently the failure to win universal support amongst the professionals and public is one of communication. If people knew what the government was doing then they couldn’t possibly oppose it. The reforms haven’t been explained ‘clearly’ enough, according to a statement from Downing Street which implicitly blames Lansley for all the trouble. He is being made the scapegoat for something that Cameron is fully signed up to.
Of course the problem for the government is quite the opposite. People know exactly what they are doing.
The condescending arrogance and worship of market dogma on show is breathtaking, and strangely redolent of the government’s position on selling off forests just before they backed down. I’m not so sure they will back down over this though, sady.
Cameron seems determined to brazen it out, whatever the consequences and public embarrassments, and right now the embarrassments seem to be coming thick and fast.
Most notably we have Lansley being heckled and abused by an old lady today. It was great, and his response, smirking like a twat when confronted with real anger, was that of a man who had no answer and in all honesty doesn’t care about the consequences of what he is doing. ‘Winning’ is all that matters to the little prick.
Then we have the reports of what may have happened when Cameron was at the Newcastle Royal Infirmary last week. I need to stress that the version of events I have linked to is hotly disputed by many officials, but if we assume it did happen then Cameron was accosted by a nurse and his response was to flatly ignore her and walk on by. Journalists were not allowed to accompany the PM and patients were not allowed to leave their beds for the duration of the visit. It all sounds like Tony Blair at his worst.
We are often told that George Osborne is a master political strategist. If he has an ounce of political nous then he needs to take the PM to one side and say that he is behaving like a complete dickhead and could be doing his party huge long-term damage with his mule-like stubbornness. Its damage that I of course would naturally love to see inflicted on them but I’d far rather he just dropped this crazy bill and left the NHS well alone. People’s wellbeing, and lives, are literally at stake and right now the government are treating this as some sort of virility test.
A ludicrous attack on Richard Dawkins
20 Feb 2012 1 Comment
As I’ve previously stated on these pages I’m not quite as enthusiastic about Richard Dawkins as I used to be. He is right on most issues but I find some aspects of his politics and methods a little distasteful.
The latest Dawkins-related story however demands complete sympathy for Britain’s leading atheist.
Dawkins has been attacked by the Sunday Telegraph for having ancestors that were slaveowners. According to them it is an “awkward revelation” for the biologist to deal with that nearly three hundred years ago the Dawkins’ were involved in the slave trade.
Why is it awkward? What has it got to with him? Is it his fault that his ancestors were involved in that way? If so, why?
As a piece of journalism it really is the lowest of the low. Dawkins has upset a lot of people recently and they seem determined to throw anything at him, however ridiculous. Trying to imply Dawkins’ moral responsibility for something that happened several hundred years ago is scraping the bottom of the barrel.
It is amazing to hear this from the Telegraph of all places too, surely the house journal of those who have lived comfortably on the proceeds of historically ill-gotten wealth.
According to the Guardian report a Telegraph journalist contacted Dawkins and
“After the reporter quoted the biblical verse about the Lord “visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation” Dawkins said he ended the conversation.
However, he said the reporter rang back and suggested Dawkins may have inherited a “slave supporting” gene from his distant relative.”
One can only hope the reporter was taking the piss.
Gutter journalism. And proof that the most ardent defenders of religion tend to be dunces.
William Hague and Iran
19 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
Iran and the Iranian regime’s desire for nuclear weapons is a thorny issue for those of us of a vaguely left-wing disposition.
On the one hand we can’t help but be suspicious of any American, Israeli and British government sabre-rattling in the region. They only wish to get rid of a regime that has perversely been the chief beneficiary of the disastrous war in Iraq.
But on the other hand the Iranian regime is simply foul and butchered the left in its thousands in the years after they took power. Supporting Khamenei and Ahmedinejad in the name of “anti-imperialism” is brainless in the extreme.
On the one hand a world free of nuclear weapons would be lovely and it would be very nice if Iran wasn’t seeking to build one.
But on the other you can hardly blame them for doing so, and surely they wouldn’t ever be mad enough to use them first.
Israel, American and Britain have them too, so on what consistent grounds would they deny them to anyone else? The constant rumours of an impending Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear sites seem motivated more by domestic political opportunism rather than any genuine fear of an Iranian nuclear strike if they developed the weapons and a delivery system.
If all the media reports are to be believed then Israeli is planning a pre-emptive strike in the autumn. There is a feeling in the air that we are now moving in the direction. The Western rhetoric is being ratcheted up and the economic and diplomatic screws gradually tightened on Tehran.
While I am not inclined to think that a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities would lead to global chaos, as some doom-mongers are predicting, it would surely have pretty grave regional consequences and would surely be counterproductive if the real long-term aim is a nuclear-free Iran and further democracy in the region. An Israeli/US bombing would probably only set Tehran’s nuclear programme back a couple of years and the Iranian regime’s determination to get a nuclear weapon would surely redouble following an attack. Having the ability to strike back with devastating effect would surely deter Israel from anything similar in future……
One gets the feeling that much of the posturing from the Israeli government is domestic political politicking rather than genuine fear of a nuclear-armed Iran. Netanyahu’s apocalyptic language is more a product of his fanatical neoconservatism than any facts on the ground. I simply don’t accept that a nuclear-armed Iran poses more of a threat to Israeli security than a non-nuclear Iran. If Tehran launched a nuclear attack on Israel they would be signing their own death warrant.
The basic irrationality and likely consequences of military action are leading many in the Israeli defence and security establishment to oppose an attack. Some quite heavyweight former Israeli military figures have said that they think the exercise would be foolish.
Netanyahu and much of the Israeli political class on the other hand seem determined to launch an attack at some point, and the final decision lies with them.
Here in the West, governments are keen to avoid taking a clear stand for or against bombing. William Hague’s intervention the other day was belligerent in its language about the Iranian government, whilst warning against a rush into conflict, but lacked anything concrete. He is keeping his options open.
That said the language Hague used was extremely emotive. He talks about a ‘new Cold War’ and arms race in the Middle East if Iran develops nuclear weapons. I’m not sure if the facts actually bear this out, as countries that have nuclear weapons have been notoriously reluctant to use them, thankfully, and I don’t think the Iranian regime would be different. They are extremely obnoxious but they aren’t suicidal.
There is also a slight hint of the colonial mentality running through Hague’s comments too. Surely these mad Arabs can’t be trusted with nuclear weapons…… He is worried about nuclear proliferation in the region. Of course it is worrying. But surely then he should be also directing his criticism at Israel and their large nuclear arsenal? Is that really helping to keep the peace and deter their neighbours from seeking similar weaponry?
And is the belligerent language, sanctions, and likely military action really going to dissuade Iran from seeking to develop the technology that would probably guarantee their immunity from future attack?
In the US there is considerable public and administration support for any possible Israeli strike, and many sections of the Obama administration, whilst preferring the use of sanctions in the short term, seem to have accepted that they aren’t ‘working’ and that the Israelis will launch an attack at some point anyway. Naturally Obama is reluctant, especially in an election year, to unambiguously demand that the Israelis refrain from such a course even though he could easily stop them if he was so inclined.
Even so, senior American officials are warning against precipitate action without ruling it out in the future. Whether that will deter Netanyahu and the Israeli hawks is an open question. On past evidence probably not. The Likud government may act independently and present the action to the Americans as a fait accompli.
Clearly sanctions, as per usual, aren’t having any positive impact on the process. As this excellent article demonstrates (along with a very well-informed general analysis of the situation) the attempt at an economic blockade is effectively shoring up support for a regime that would otherwise probably be in serious trouble right now.
The American/British/Israeli long-term strategy is about regime change, and the replacement regime they have in mind isn’t going to be one that acts in the interests or ordinary Iranians. That’s why it is key, in my humble opinion, to oppose military action, sanctions and the barbaric rule of the Ayatollahs. The Iranians can and will settle matters with their own government in due course as the position of the Iranian government is extremely shaky at best (the Iranian economy would probably be struggling even without sanctions) and only benefits from a belligerent external enemy that they can rally the Iranian people against. The Ayatollahs and Likud, for all the abuse they direct at each other, actually need their ‘enemies’ as without them much of their raison d’être would disappear.
Excellent article on Liberal Conspiracy about My Big Fat Gipsy Wedding
19 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
in Current Affairs, Opinions, Politics
I thought I would re-post this excellent article from Liberal Conspiracy.
Initially MBFGW completely passed me by as a cultural phenomenon but as time gone I’ve noticed it more and grown more and more uncomfortable with it. Rather than being an affectionate celebration of a social group with an alternative lifestyle it appears more and more to be cruel, intentional mockery that reinforces popular prejudices about travellers. Right now we seem more keen than ever to find scapegoats to pick on, and this, allied with much of the British public’s crass voyeurism and TV executives desire to get good ratings figures at any cost, produces TV like MBFGW.
It’s the sort of thing that makes me very uneasy indeed. Of course they have let themselves be filmed. But that doesn’t mean that the people doing the filming have the right to exploit them for advertisng revenue. And that is what this about, in the final analysis.
It’s worth going to the original article to read some of the comments underneath. Unfortunately it is part and parcel of the left wing blogosphere that it draws the attentions of weirdos and right-wing cranks with their pet theories on how the world works based on their ‘experience’, and their desperate desire to shout down anyone who questions their narrow-minded ‘wisdom’. The ignorance on show is breathtaking. If I was as stupid and uninformed as those people are I would at least have the good grace to keep my mouth shut.
Bigger. Fatter. Gypsier. More Racist.
by Guest February 19, 2012 at 12:03 pm contribution by Joseph Cottrell-Boyce
I have a confession to make; when ‘My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding’ first aired as a one-off documentary two years ago, I didn’t think it was that bad.
Having been acclimatised to Daily Mail Gypsies-camped-in-my-living-room-and-ate-my-babies type hate mongering, the show was in contrast, fairly gentle.
Voyeuristic and misleading no-doubt, but I was pleased to see issues affecting the community, such as evictions and discrimination, being aired to a mainstream audience. At the very least, I thought, ‘it can’t do any harm’.
How wrong I was.
Fast forward two years and MBFGW has become a cultural phenomenon; Channel Four’s highest rated programme since Big Brother, syndicated internationally and a favourite talking point of the tabloid press. The programme makers claim that the show throws ‘an overdue light on a secretive, marginalised and little-understood segment of our society’.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Far from increasing understanding, the incredible reach of the show has succeeding in propagated a warped depiction of Travellers in the UK, objectifying an entire ethnic group for the sake of light entertainment.
The programme focuses almost exclusively on a handful of wealthy Traveller families with a penchant for extravagant celebrations. Self-sufficiency and entrepreneurship are central to Traveller culture and some families have done very well; but the vast majority of Travellers in the UK who live below the poverty line are conspicuous by their absence from the programme.
MBFGW’s characterisation of Travellers as a wealthy care-free bunch masks the fact that 20% of Britain’s caravan-dwelling Travellers are statutorily homeless; trapped in traumatic cycles of eviction. That Gypsies and Travellers have a life expectancy 10 – 12 years below the national average.
That 18% of Gypsy and Traveller mothers have experienced the death of a child, compared with less than 1% of mothers in the settled community. That 62% of adult Gypsies and Travellers are illiterate and 25% of Gypsy and Traveller children in Britain are not enrolled in education.
That a staggering 4% of the adult male prison estate is comprised of Gypsy, Traveller and Roma prisoners, many of whom have graduated from the care system. These statistics paint a grim picture of the Traveller experience in Britain; one that is a million miles from the high jinks of MBFGW.
The programmes producers claim that they merely ‘film what they see’ but this is clearly disingenuous, neglecting the power which they wield in deciding what makes the final cut. Of course commercial television is going to focus on the bizarre and titillating to secure an audience, and Travellers are not the first group to be exploited via the medium of reality TV.
But there is something particularly distasteful about adding to the already bulging cannon of stereotypes and slurs which the Travelling community has to endure. While it may ‘cast a light’ on some frilly dresses and mammoth cakes, the programme does very little to illuminate the myriad disadvantages and injustices which the community endures.
Joe Cottrell-Boyce is a Policy Officer at the ICB’s Traveller’s Project
Another pointless dig at cyclists
18 Feb 2012 2 Comments
in Current Affairs, Individuals worthy of contempt
One can only assume, reading Christina Patterson’s most recent column in The Independent, that she was desperately searching for something to write about and could only come up with something designed to be gratuitously offensive for its own sake.
I won’t dwell on the later comments about her thinking that James Corden is funny. That isn’t even worth engaging with. I’m rather more concerned with yet another mean-spirited and petty attack on cyclists and those who defend cyclists.
The targets of Patterson’s smug middle class ire this week are Ghost Bikes. For those not familiar with the concept the bikes are painted white and put up at locations where cyclists are killed or injured. Of course they get vandalised and bits get pilfered off them but they are there to serve as a reminder of the dangers that cyclists face and a memorial to those who died on the roads.
It’s a concept that seems lost on Patterson:
“You might want to explain that people who took big risks did sometimes get killed, and when they did, it was very, very sad for their families. But what was sad for a family didn’t always have all that much to do with anyone else……..accidents did happen, and when they did, it wasn’t always somebody’s fault.”
No of course not Christina. When a cyclist gets killed or injured it’s just a random event. Just like the lottery numbers on a Saturday night. Or you managing to get a career in journalism.
Because cyclists never get hurt because people are driving too fast, aren’t looking where they are going, are on their mobile phones, drunk or just plain irresponsible. Those things never happen so what need is there for people to campaign? I mean, this story here is just a figment of my frenzied imagination isn’t it Christina………
Why is it by cycling one is necessarily taking a “big risk”? Why should it be? Can we not have a situation where people can bikes safely co-exist with motorists? Or would that would be too much of an infringement of “motorists rights”?
Sometimes it is “somebody’s fault” and people need to be reminded of the consequences of their stupidity and selfishness, and Ghost Bikes are about raising awareness of the issue and asking people to think about what they are doing. The number of cyclists killed and injured by cars every year is colossal but for some unknown reason it doesn’t get mentioned that much.
I am dreadfully sorry if such ideas and visible reminders of the consequences of irresponsible driving offend your delicate aesthetic sensibilities Christina, and that you think that these little memorials they are an
“eyesore”
That is a dashed nuisance isn’t it. My heart bleeds for you.
A nasty, spiteful, myopic little article by a nasty, spiteful, myopic little journalist.
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