When Dr John Reid held high office, he implemented some major ventures.
On 10 May 2007, when John Reid was Home Secretary, he wrote: “Out of 27 EU member states 24 already have identity cards. If we do not take this step we risk exploitation, fraud and terrorism. As home secretary (sic) it is my duty to protect the public and secure our future.
A large part of this responsibility depends on an effective scheme to safeguard identities. Only the state can provide such a universal system, define the standards and be accountable for it.
There will be people who say we shouldn't do it. But I believe the benefits are indisputable”.
As Defence Secretary, John Reid ordered British troops into Helmand in 2006. He said: "We are in the south to help and protect the Afghan people construct their own democracy. We would be perfectly happy to leave in three years and without firing one shot because our job is to protect the reconstruction".
Quite a track record.
Prescience? Foresight? Eligibility for High Office? I think not.
So, on behalf of all those serving in our Armed Forces, here’s a number* for you, Dr John.
* After the death of Steve Marriott, the lead singer of Humble Pie, the band asked Peter Frampton (who had been in the band in its early days) to rejoin for a memorial concert. This is the 2nd part of this stonking track - if you like it, the first part is on You Tube, but sadly cannot be embedded in the blog.
Saturday 11 July 2009
In Memoriam
When you go home,
Remember us, and say,
For your tomorrow,
We gave our yesterday.
For the 360 who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan
Remember us, and say,
For your tomorrow,
We gave our yesterday.
For the 360 who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan
Thursday 9 July 2009
An Honourable Man
Peter Hitchens may not be everyone’s cup of tea.
He tends to generate strong feelings among those who read or hear him. He is either loathed or loved.
I do not loathe him.
While I may not agree with every one of his views, I admire him for the consistency and courage with which he expresses them, because they are based on a personal philosophy that is tested by experience and thoroughly thought through.
A socialist in his youth, he has, over his years, applied a considerable intellect to the worth of his values and tempered them on the fire of life and experience. He has settled on traditional, conservative and Christian principles, with which I broadly agree.
He has a gift for dry, witty demolition of cant. In his post today, he conducts a delightfully forensic demolition of one of his opponents’ arguments, which I reproduce for the enjoyment of those who have not seen it:
He tends to generate strong feelings among those who read or hear him. He is either loathed or loved.
I do not loathe him.
While I may not agree with every one of his views, I admire him for the consistency and courage with which he expresses them, because they are based on a personal philosophy that is tested by experience and thoroughly thought through.
A socialist in his youth, he has, over his years, applied a considerable intellect to the worth of his values and tempered them on the fire of life and experience. He has settled on traditional, conservative and Christian principles, with which I broadly agree.
He is an honourable man.
He is also a most courteous man. In his blog he takes time to respond to his correspondents politely and in detail, correcting inaccuracies and restating his point when it has been missed.He has a gift for dry, witty demolition of cant. In his post today, he conducts a delightfully forensic demolition of one of his opponents’ arguments, which I reproduce for the enjoyment of those who have not seen it:
Delicious.‘Dave’ disagrees with me that the word 'homophobia' is a propaganda invention. Well, it would be interesting to trace its history and usage. It isn't in my beat-up and disintegrating Shorter Oxford Dictionary at all, but since that's half a century old, I'm not especially surprised. I'd guess it first found its way into dictionaries in the last five to ten years, and that it owes its origin to an American college campus, perhaps the University of Madison in Wisconsin, which I think is the birthplace of PC speech codes.
This weblog's full-time etymologist, Wilfrid, summoned complaining from his dusty, cobwebbed cubicle, writes: ’As a word “homophobia” is a triple nonsense, and the compilers of the Oxford Dictionary wouldn't have given it house room in the days when they stood up for serious knowledge. Those who use it almost invariably give away their ignorance as soon as they pronounce it, with the first syllable rhyming with "dome". In fact the first syllable of the word “homosexual” ought to rhyme with “Somme”. Why?Because the “homo” concerned is a Greek word, meaning “the same” as in “homogeneous” or “homogenized” or “homophone”. And that is how it is pronounced. First syllable rhyming with “Somme” or “Bomb”. This helps to distinguish it from the Latin word “homo”, which means “man”. Ill-informed people have long thought that the word “homosexual” meant “person attracted sexually to men”, which is why you get the ridiculous coupling of “homosexual and Lesbian”. Lesbians are homosexuals. But they're female homosexuals.
‘Then there's “phobia”. This is also from a Greek root, meaning fear or dislike of. So, the two Greek words put together would mean “fear of the same”, which is meaningless drivel. Whereas if it's a hybrid, pseudo-classical word (like “Television”) it would mean 'fear of man', which it plainly doesn't. The only way in which “homophobia” makes sense at all is if it's a semi-literate coupling of a Greek word with an old English abusive slang word for a homosexual, not in use now and not heard in use by me these 40 years, ie “homo” (pronounced to rhyme with “Omo”, a washing powder popular in the 1960s).’
Wilfrid's a bit pompous for modern tastes - but he knows his stuff. He adds, perhaps more in hope than in certainty: ‘The compilers of the Oxford dictionary seem to have had a bit of a dispute about this, because there are two completely separate entries for “homophobia”. The first (described as “rare” which is a bit of an understatement) is "Fear or hatred of the male sex or humankind". The second gives "fear or hatred of homosexuals and homosexuality". Then we get "homophobe- a person who is afraid of or hostile to homosexuals and homosexuality”.
Thank you, Wilfrid.
Scientific Objectivity
In a recent article in the Daily Telegraph, Christopher Booker reported that:
Over the coming days a curiously revealing event will be taking place in Copenhagen. Top of the agenda at a meeting of the Polar Bear Specialist Group, set up under the International Union for the Conservation of Nature/Species Survival Commission, will be the need to produce a suitably scary report on how polar bears are being threatened with extinction by man-made global warming.
This is one of a steady drizzle of events planned to stoke up alarm in the run-up to the UN’s major conference on climate change in Copenhagen next December. But one of the world’s leading experts on polar bears has been told to stay away from this week’s meeting, specifically because his views on global warming do not accord with the views of the rest of the group.
Dr Mitchell Taylor has been researching into the status and management of polar bears in Canada and around the Arctic Circle for 30 years, as both an academic and a government employee. More than once since 2006 he has made headlines by insisting that polar bear numbers, far from decreasing, are much higher than they were 30 years ago. Of the 19 different bear populations, almost all are increasing or at optimum levels, only two have for local reasons modestly declined.
Dr Taylor had obtained funding to attend the week’s meeting of the PBSG, but his presence was voted down by its members because of his views on global warming.
The chairman, Dr Andy Derocher, a former university pupil of Dr Taylor’s, frankly explained in an email (which I was not sent by Dr Taylor) that his rejection had nothing to do with his undoubted expertise on polar bears: ‘it was the position you’ve taken on global warming that brought opposition’. Dr Taylor was told that his views running ‘counter to human-induced climate change are extremely unhelpful’.
So much or the objectivity of “consensus” AGW scientists. You would have thought that they would welcome news that the cuddly white killer teddies are not all heading for oblivion.
But no; it appears that they relish the prospect of the bears’ extinction since it is a means to their end of perpetuating the gospel of disaster. More and more, they dismiss and ignore any evidence contrary to their theories of devastation through man-made CO2. And the constituency of contrary evidence is vast, growing and increasingly from natural phenomena rather than human opinion.
By way of one small example, just today, (8 July) CBC reported that:
Temperatures dropped to a record low in Prince Edward Island (Canada) overnight Tuesday, with reports of frost throughout the province. An official record low of 3.8 C was set early Wednesday morning at Charlottetown airport. The previous record for that date was 5.1 C, set in 2005.
Bob Robichaud, a meteorologist with Environment Canada, said that to his knowledge, frost has never been reported before in July in P.E.I. "That 3.8 we got last night kind of sticks out as being lower than some of the other records for anytime in early July," Robichaud told CBC News on Wednesday. "So we're looking at a significant event," he said.
Environment Canada has issued a frost risk warning in low-lying areas of the province for Wednesday night. The temperature is expected to dip to 4 C.
But even "significant" events such as these will be ignored by Pro-AGW theorists, who are dangerous in the myopic narrow-mindedness of their "consensus". However, such a shared vision is an illusion held in common that works only for those willing to be directed (or deceived) by it.
Any reputable scientist would seek to test a theory objectively, but these people do not brook any counter-argument. Their peer reviews are invariably conducted by those who share both their views and the financial incentives to “prove” man-made, CO2-based global warming.
Dr Taylor and thousands like him are being sidelined and stifled by one of the biggest and most dangerous collective grand narratives since communism. And, as under communism, the time is near when objectors will not be allowed to have their say.
AGW proponents are evangelical in their zeal for their “new religion” to manipulate political direction. Throughout history, until recent decades, the mechanism that allowed religion to maintained social control and the dominance of its collective grand narrative was the restriction of information.
The same thing is happening now.
Over the coming days a curiously revealing event will be taking place in Copenhagen. Top of the agenda at a meeting of the Polar Bear Specialist Group, set up under the International Union for the Conservation of Nature/Species Survival Commission, will be the need to produce a suitably scary report on how polar bears are being threatened with extinction by man-made global warming.
This is one of a steady drizzle of events planned to stoke up alarm in the run-up to the UN’s major conference on climate change in Copenhagen next December. But one of the world’s leading experts on polar bears has been told to stay away from this week’s meeting, specifically because his views on global warming do not accord with the views of the rest of the group.
Dr Mitchell Taylor has been researching into the status and management of polar bears in Canada and around the Arctic Circle for 30 years, as both an academic and a government employee. More than once since 2006 he has made headlines by insisting that polar bear numbers, far from decreasing, are much higher than they were 30 years ago. Of the 19 different bear populations, almost all are increasing or at optimum levels, only two have for local reasons modestly declined.
Dr Taylor had obtained funding to attend the week’s meeting of the PBSG, but his presence was voted down by its members because of his views on global warming.
The chairman, Dr Andy Derocher, a former university pupil of Dr Taylor’s, frankly explained in an email (which I was not sent by Dr Taylor) that his rejection had nothing to do with his undoubted expertise on polar bears: ‘it was the position you’ve taken on global warming that brought opposition’. Dr Taylor was told that his views running ‘counter to human-induced climate change are extremely unhelpful’.
So much or the objectivity of “consensus” AGW scientists. You would have thought that they would welcome news that the cuddly white killer teddies are not all heading for oblivion.
But no; it appears that they relish the prospect of the bears’ extinction since it is a means to their end of perpetuating the gospel of disaster. More and more, they dismiss and ignore any evidence contrary to their theories of devastation through man-made CO2. And the constituency of contrary evidence is vast, growing and increasingly from natural phenomena rather than human opinion.
By way of one small example, just today, (8 July) CBC reported that:
Temperatures dropped to a record low in Prince Edward Island (Canada) overnight Tuesday, with reports of frost throughout the province. An official record low of 3.8 C was set early Wednesday morning at Charlottetown airport. The previous record for that date was 5.1 C, set in 2005.
Bob Robichaud, a meteorologist with Environment Canada, said that to his knowledge, frost has never been reported before in July in P.E.I. "That 3.8 we got last night kind of sticks out as being lower than some of the other records for anytime in early July," Robichaud told CBC News on Wednesday. "So we're looking at a significant event," he said.
Environment Canada has issued a frost risk warning in low-lying areas of the province for Wednesday night. The temperature is expected to dip to 4 C.
But even "significant" events such as these will be ignored by Pro-AGW theorists, who are dangerous in the myopic narrow-mindedness of their "consensus". However, such a shared vision is an illusion held in common that works only for those willing to be directed (or deceived) by it.
Any reputable scientist would seek to test a theory objectively, but these people do not brook any counter-argument. Their peer reviews are invariably conducted by those who share both their views and the financial incentives to “prove” man-made, CO2-based global warming.
Dr Taylor and thousands like him are being sidelined and stifled by one of the biggest and most dangerous collective grand narratives since communism. And, as under communism, the time is near when objectors will not be allowed to have their say.
AGW proponents are evangelical in their zeal for their “new religion” to manipulate political direction. Throughout history, until recent decades, the mechanism that allowed religion to maintained social control and the dominance of its collective grand narrative was the restriction of information.
The same thing is happening now.
Gandhi once said: "A lie does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become a lie because nobody sees it."
We need an open, objective debate before the costs of following AGW’s prophets drive prosperous, free societies into a new Dark Age.Wednesday 1 July 2009
Remembrance
Following recommendations from the Armed Forces Chiefs of Staff, The Queen has agreed that an award will be made to the next of kin of servicemen and women who have been killed while serving their country in conflicts since 1948.The award will be called the Elizabeth Cross.
In a broadcast to Her Armed Forces today, Her Majesty said:
“In these present times, no less than in previous years, the men and women of our Armed Forces undertake their duties in the knowledge that danger often lies ahead. They know that many have died in the service of our country and that difficulties are ever present.
With this in mind, the Armed Forces have recommended that for those servicemen and women who have given their lives during operations, a special emblem and scroll will be granted to their next of kin. I am pleased to be associated with such an initiative, which is in keeping with a tradition established during the First World War. And so I have asked that this emblem should be known as the Elizabeth Cross.
This seems to me a right and proper way of showing our enduring debt to those who are killed while actively protecting what is most dear to us all. The solemn dignity which we attach to the names of those who have fallen is deeply engrained in our national character. As a people, we accord this ultimate sacrifice the highest honour and respect.
I greatly hope that the Elizabeth Cross will give further meaning to the nation's debt of gratitude to the families and loved ones of those who have died in the service of our country. We will remember them all."
The Elizabeth Cross takes the form of a badge, or brooch, which next of kin may wear if they choose. Some may do so with pride and others may choose not to. Whatever choice they make should be respected.
But they will all take something from knowing that the Sovereign and the nation have marked their loss and sacrifice in a formal and public manner.
But I wonder how many days will pass before some multiculturalist, equalities-obsessed knuckle-dragger will object that the award takes the form of a Christian symbol, since some of those who have died were of other faiths. This issue has already been raised regarding British Honours and Awards.
But in this case, they would be wrong.
Because, on enlistment, every serviceman or woman takes a solemn oath of allegiance to the Sovereign, who is Defender of the Faith. Her Majesty has granted her own name, uniquely, to this mark of recognition to the fallen, and no serviceman or woman, dead, living, or soon to die, would be any doubt of Her sincerity, of would quibble over its form.
It is the views of serving personnel that count in this case, not those of people who criticize our Armed Forces and its traditions, or those who would never consider placing themselves in harm’s way on behalf of our Nation.
This is a good thing that has been done and I pray that very few Elizabeth Crosses need to be awarded in the future.
But until the Armed Forces are properly resourced, I fear they will.
But they will all take something from knowing that the Sovereign and the nation have marked their loss and sacrifice in a formal and public manner.
But I wonder how many days will pass before some multiculturalist, equalities-obsessed knuckle-dragger will object that the award takes the form of a Christian symbol, since some of those who have died were of other faiths. This issue has already been raised regarding British Honours and Awards.
But in this case, they would be wrong.
Because, on enlistment, every serviceman or woman takes a solemn oath of allegiance to the Sovereign, who is Defender of the Faith. Her Majesty has granted her own name, uniquely, to this mark of recognition to the fallen, and no serviceman or woman, dead, living, or soon to die, would be any doubt of Her sincerity, of would quibble over its form.
It is the views of serving personnel that count in this case, not those of people who criticize our Armed Forces and its traditions, or those who would never consider placing themselves in harm’s way on behalf of our Nation.
This is a good thing that has been done and I pray that very few Elizabeth Crosses need to be awarded in the future.
But until the Armed Forces are properly resourced, I fear they will.
Tuesday 30 June 2009
MOD Torpedoes Climate Research
Nature News reports that the MOD has pulled funding of £4.3 million from the Met Office’s Hadley Centre for Climate Change, amounting to 25% of its budget.
The news came as a bit of a surprise, not that it upsets me.
Far from it.
But it made me wonder why the MOD was supporting the organisation in the first place. I know that the MOD funds much of the Met Office. After all, it was part of the MOD until fairly recently for the very sound reason that weather forecasting is important for military operations. Like D-Day.
But Climate Change research?
(As an aside, let’s get one thing clear. I believe in maintaining the earth’s environmental balance, particularly its rainforests. I believe in climate change. Its been happening for tens of thousands of years without any help from humans. I also believe that the jury is far from decided on man-made climate change or the alleged catastrophic effects of man-made CO2.
But I believe that the hysteria gripping society is based on a hugely subjective viewpoint propounded by a relatively small band of arrogant, dogmatic zealots who are so obsessed by their own opinions they refuse to countenance any other and have closed their minds to debate.
And there are many thousands of eminent scientists who take a contrary view to the “consensus” and whose opinions are ignored by the climate change elite and the media. Until their views are allowed to be aired openly, the climate change issue will be dominated by a narrow-minded cabal who appear afraid to have their theories exposed to objective test, as any honest scientist should.
Unlike the credulous politicians, media, and folk in the street who have naively accepted the doctrine of disaster, I have spent many hours looking at both sides of the argument. Unlike the apostles of apocalypse, I believe the debate is far from over. Why is for another post
But I am in no doubt that until an open debate is forthcoming and some balance established, the West will be drawn into levels of climate spending, for which the need is speculative, that will reduce it to an uncompetitive industrial and economic backwater).
But back to the Hadley Centre’s funding. Reaction from the prophets of doom was predictable.
A climate science professor called Martin Parry, formerly of the Met Office, now at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London said:
Get a life.
So MOD money was being spent on generating hypotheses, which are then hyped to the public as facts. (The Hadley Centre is good at this*).
Funding guesswork or equipping soldiers properly? Tricky one.
Parry added:
The Met Office is now in negotiations with DEFRA, DECC and DfID to try to recoup some of the lost funding.
But a reasonable, sane citizen might wonder why DECC (Dept of Energy and Climate Change) hasn’t been underwriting the Hadley Centre for Climate Change completely. There’s a bit of a clue in their titles, after all.
Gavin Schmidt, another climate “modeller” at NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York said:
These whinging puveyors of the Apocalytic Doom Theory should be invited to don a flak jacket and spend a few months on some climate research in Helmand Province. They deserve to experience the personal climate effects of the MOD’s core activity since they have been using its money so freely.
Naturally, George Monbiot, the Archdeacon of Apocolypse had to have his say and appears to contradict Professor Parry.
* The Hadley Centre was behind the scare story last week that Barnsley would soon be as hot as Buenos Aires. But how far should they be trusted?
Hadley are not just presenting a general impression of what might happen globally during this century, or even how climate change could affect the UK as a whole. They are claiming that they can predict what will happen in individual regions of the country - down to a 25km square.
Thanks to The Register for this:
And the Met Office owns Hadley. So a quick flit into a £80K plus job and Julia appears to have flipped her opinion in just 12 months and Hadley’s “inability to predict” has become a “certainty”.
Wonder why.
It makes you wonder about the integrity of climate science.
The news came as a bit of a surprise, not that it upsets me.
Far from it.
But it made me wonder why the MOD was supporting the organisation in the first place. I know that the MOD funds much of the Met Office. After all, it was part of the MOD until fairly recently for the very sound reason that weather forecasting is important for military operations. Like D-Day.
But Climate Change research?
(As an aside, let’s get one thing clear. I believe in maintaining the earth’s environmental balance, particularly its rainforests. I believe in climate change. Its been happening for tens of thousands of years without any help from humans. I also believe that the jury is far from decided on man-made climate change or the alleged catastrophic effects of man-made CO2.
But I believe that the hysteria gripping society is based on a hugely subjective viewpoint propounded by a relatively small band of arrogant, dogmatic zealots who are so obsessed by their own opinions they refuse to countenance any other and have closed their minds to debate.
And there are many thousands of eminent scientists who take a contrary view to the “consensus” and whose opinions are ignored by the climate change elite and the media. Until their views are allowed to be aired openly, the climate change issue will be dominated by a narrow-minded cabal who appear afraid to have their theories exposed to objective test, as any honest scientist should.
Unlike the credulous politicians, media, and folk in the street who have naively accepted the doctrine of disaster, I have spent many hours looking at both sides of the argument. Unlike the apostles of apocalypse, I believe the debate is far from over. Why is for another post
But I am in no doubt that until an open debate is forthcoming and some balance established, the West will be drawn into levels of climate spending, for which the need is speculative, that will reduce it to an uncompetitive industrial and economic backwater).
But back to the Hadley Centre’s funding. Reaction from the prophets of doom was predictable.
A climate science professor called Martin Parry, formerly of the Met Office, now at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London said:
"This news comes as a shock”.I’ll bet it bloody well does, sunshine. Welcome to the reality of recession. The UK economy has just experienced its biggest quarterly decline in 51 years and you are surprised when some money dries up.
Get a life.
“ The UK's core modelling work on climate change has been funded from this source, up to now."And you were quite happy to take it for your intellectually onanistic, close-minded, quasi-religion at the expense of soldiers on operations. Your use of the word “modelling” gives you away. Scientific modelling is a process for creating abstract models, which, in turn, are conceptual objects used in the creation of predictive formulae. All of which are hypothetical and none of which are facts.
So MOD money was being spent on generating hypotheses, which are then hyped to the public as facts. (The Hadley Centre is good at this*).
Funding guesswork or equipping soldiers properly? Tricky one.
Parry added:
“Global and regional security will be threatened by climate change, and the MoD is hopelessly wrong to think it is outside its responsibility".No it won’t, you odious immoral man. You can’t say “will” unless you deal in fact, and you don’t; you hypothesise. So why not say “there is a possiblity that global and regional security………….”? Because you are a zealot, with no more moral authority or grounding than a Jesuit during the Inquisition.
In a statement, an MoD spokesperson said that the cuts, which will come into effect immediately, were made with a view to "prioritizing success in current operations, such as Afghanistan".And about time. But why hasn’t “prioritizing success” been on the agenda before now? No doubt many families of soldiers who have died through lack of resources will be saying: “Well that’s fine; it doesn’t matter that Johnny didn’t come back as long as Climate Science is funded”.
The Met Office is now in negotiations with DEFRA, DECC and DfID to try to recoup some of the lost funding.
But a reasonable, sane citizen might wonder why DECC (Dept of Energy and Climate Change) hasn’t been underwriting the Hadley Centre for Climate Change completely. There’s a bit of a clue in their titles, after all.
Gavin Schmidt, another climate “modeller” at NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York said:
" If they don't recoup it, they are going to be in serious trouble. Losing 25% of your funding is a huge deal. Five percent is generally containable, but 25% is not an amount you can hope to absorb easily."No Shit. Make efficiencies. The unemployed are having to and so will government, whatever Brownies the Great Leader and his acolytes spout.
These whinging puveyors of the Apocalytic Doom Theory should be invited to don a flak jacket and spend a few months on some climate research in Helmand Province. They deserve to experience the personal climate effects of the MOD’s core activity since they have been using its money so freely.
Naturally, George Monbiot, the Archdeacon of Apocolypse had to have his say and appears to contradict Professor Parry.
"Our wars make us less safe. We would be better protected from terrorism and global instability if the UK’s armed forces stopped going abroad to make trouble.Have a lie down, George. You’ll get better soon. Or perhaps not.
Now the rational, least painful solution is to stop building tanks, and use the money to address a real threat”.
* The Hadley Centre was behind the scare story last week that Barnsley would soon be as hot as Buenos Aires. But how far should they be trusted?
Hadley are not just presenting a general impression of what might happen globally during this century, or even how climate change could affect the UK as a whole. They are claiming that they can predict what will happen in individual regions of the country - down to a 25km square.
Thanks to The Register for this:
All this is rather unexpected. In May last year, a world summit of climate modellers took place at Reading University. On the agenda was one very important problem for them; even the most powerful super-computers that have been developed so far are not capable of running the kind of high resolution models that they claim would allow them to reduce the degree of uncertainty in their predictions, and also make detailed regional predictions that policy makers would like to have so that they can build climate change into infrastructure planning.
Here are excerpts from the conference website:
The climate modelling community is therefore faced with a major new challenge: Is the current generation of climate models adequate to provide societies with accurate and reliable predictions of regional climate change? A major conclusion of the group was that regional projections from the current generation of climate models were sufficiently uncertain to compromise this goal of providing society with reliable predictions of regional climate change.
This was summed up by Julia Slingo (at that time Professor of Meteorology at Reading University, who also chaired part of the conference) in a report by Roger Harrabin on the BBC News website:
Julia Slingo from Reading University admitted it would not get much better until they had supercomputers 1,000 times more powerful than at present.
“We’ve reached the end of the road of being able to improve models significantly so we can provide the sort of information that policymakers and business require,” she told BBC News. “In terms of computing power, it’s proving totally inadequate. With climate models we know how to make them much better to provide much more information at the local level… we know how to do that, but we don’t have the computing power to deliver it.”
Slingo said several hundred million pounds of investment were needed.You bet she did.
If, since the conference, several hundred million pounds had been invested in producing a new generation of supercomputers, a thousand times more powerful than the present generation, and the Met Office had already developed and run the kind of high resolution models which were so far beyond the scientist’s grasp just a year ago, then I suspect that this might have seeped into the media and we would have head about it. So far as I am aware, the fastest supercomputers are still a thousand times slower than the modellers consider necessary for credible regional scale modelling of the climate.
So I wondered whether Professor Slingo had anything to say about the Met Office’s new report.
“Through UK Climate Predictions 2009 the Met Office has provided the world’s most comprehensive regional climate projections with a unique assessment of the possible changes to our climate through the rest of this century. For the first time businesses and other organisations have the tools to help them make risk-based decisions to adapt to the challenges of our changing climate.”
Slingo confidently explained the 'breakthrough' to Bloomberg. “We can attach levels of certainty,” she said.
So what’s changed since last year? Well one thing is that Julia Slingo has a new job. She has been appointed as Chief Scientist at the Met Office. So far as I know, the limitations that lack of computing power place on the accuracy and resolution of models are just the same.
And the Met Office owns Hadley. So a quick flit into a £80K plus job and Julia appears to have flipped her opinion in just 12 months and Hadley’s “inability to predict” has become a “certainty”.
Wonder why.
It makes you wonder about the integrity of climate science.
Saturday 27 June 2009
One for the Weekend
Having watched highlights of the master poet's recent concert at O2 on BBC iPlayer, I just can't get this song out of my head. His use of language and his enduring ability to deliver emotion on stage really get under my skin.
But having read this from the Washington Post, picked up from The Devil's Kitchen, I wonder if Leonard is still living in hope.
But having read this from the Washington Post, picked up from The Devil's Kitchen, I wonder if Leonard is still living in hope.
Friday 26 June 2009
Accountability linked to Responsibility – Not under Labour
One of the most significant stories of the week, in my opinion, has passed with barely a murmur; eclipsed by other news, including BBC and MPs’ expenses, a new Speaker, the Iraq Coverup Inquiry, and the passing of St Michael of Neverland. It relates to a £1 million pilot project, run by the Border Agency in Kent, to help failed asylum seekers return home.
It repatriated one family. Just one.
The unmitigated failure of this £1 million project is highly significant because it illustrates, in one small, untidy package, many of the reasons why Labour is utterly unfit for government.
OK, I know that £1 million is probably trivial in the context of overall government spending, but it matters to me because it is still a shedload of taxpayers’ money and because it represents the annual tax burden for almost 200 people on the average salary. My guess is that they would be pretty incensed if they knew.
So how does this largely overlooked little story encapsulate Labour’s failings?
First, like so much else in its liberal-socialist nirvana, New Labour tried to tackle the effect of a problem, rather than address its cause. Labour’s immigration and asylum policies are in tatters and our borders leak like a sieve. The Border Agency, which has a £2.28 billion budget, spent £7.8 million on its own publicity in 2008/09, so a million here or there is doubtless lost in its own noise.
Elsewhere, health, social work, defence and education suffer from the same heavy-handed band-aid approach.
Got a government problem? Talk with heavy gravitas, set up an Agency/ Commision/ anybloodyquango and sit back in righteous satisfaction at a job well done.
But addressing effect rather than cause doesn’t work. You may have heard a huge sigh of relief echoing around the country today. It was when teachers heard that Labour has abandoned its primary school literacy and numeracy policy – after only 12 years of inhibiting the education of a generation.
Labour certainly learns lessons quickly. Which is more than it has allowed children to do.
Next, the Kent pilot project was incoherent. The Children’s Society, which reviewed it, said: “It wasn’t clear what the UK Border Agency was trying to achieve with the project, which caused considerable confusion from the outset.”
Hmmmm. Sound familiar?
Acolastus spent 30 years in an arm of public service that is world-renowned for doing what it does with excellence. From day one, we were taught that every activity has an Aim. And determining the Aim required a logical process of analysis, which we were also taught.
But Labour doesn’t work like that. Oh No. Rather than use handsomely rewarded Servile Servants to do this work, it will farm out the analysis, and often the whole problem, to consultants. Or create another quango.
But consultants and quangos rarely have deep familiarity of the detail and scope of a problem. Yet those who employ them do, and in engaging them, admit to either incompetence or idleness.
In 2005, Labour spent £1 billion of taxpayers’ money on consultancy and £180 billion on quangos; organisations that are utterly unaccountable to the public. What do our Servile Servants do, for heaven’s sake.
This is semi-detached public administration by a semi-detached government.
Next, Labour has abandoned those fundamental and inextricably linked principles of public service governance; accountability and responsibility. For those too young to remember what these meant, if you are responsible for something you are accountable for it.
In short, screw up and expect to get your arse kicked.
So who, I wonder, got fired from the Borders Agency for the Kent debacle? Surely, wasting £1 million of taxpayers’ money is a firing offence?
I’m not holding my breath. Because these days, public servants are likely to sue for dismissal. Even if their incompetence has cost lives. And Labour doesn’t like being sued.
So, finally, they will spin their way out of trouble.
Fresh from his illuminating encounter with Joanna Lumley and the Ghurkas, that nice Immigration Minister, Mr Woollas, said of the Kent fiasco: “The lessons we learnt have been used to design a new pilot currently running in Glasgow. This demonstrates our commitment to keep exploring alternatives to detention which increase voluntary returns and provide value for money to the taxpayer. This is a complex issue with no one-size-fits-all remedy, which is why these pilots are so crucial.”
Unbelievable, utter cant. And not one syllable of regret or apology for the waste of those 200 taxpayers’ money. Shame on him.
The really worrying aspect of all this is that the shabby, spendthrift, unaccountable culture championed by Labour over the last 12 years may have become so engrained in our public services that it has become the default position.
This is something David Cameron must address comprehensively as soon as he enters Number 10. Root and branch reform is required if citizens are to regain value from their taxes.
As is a General Election.
It repatriated one family. Just one.
The unmitigated failure of this £1 million project is highly significant because it illustrates, in one small, untidy package, many of the reasons why Labour is utterly unfit for government.
OK, I know that £1 million is probably trivial in the context of overall government spending, but it matters to me because it is still a shedload of taxpayers’ money and because it represents the annual tax burden for almost 200 people on the average salary. My guess is that they would be pretty incensed if they knew.
So how does this largely overlooked little story encapsulate Labour’s failings?
First, like so much else in its liberal-socialist nirvana, New Labour tried to tackle the effect of a problem, rather than address its cause. Labour’s immigration and asylum policies are in tatters and our borders leak like a sieve. The Border Agency, which has a £2.28 billion budget, spent £7.8 million on its own publicity in 2008/09, so a million here or there is doubtless lost in its own noise.
Elsewhere, health, social work, defence and education suffer from the same heavy-handed band-aid approach.
Got a government problem? Talk with heavy gravitas, set up an Agency/ Commision/ anybloodyquango and sit back in righteous satisfaction at a job well done.
But addressing effect rather than cause doesn’t work. You may have heard a huge sigh of relief echoing around the country today. It was when teachers heard that Labour has abandoned its primary school literacy and numeracy policy – after only 12 years of inhibiting the education of a generation.
Labour certainly learns lessons quickly. Which is more than it has allowed children to do.
Next, the Kent pilot project was incoherent. The Children’s Society, which reviewed it, said: “It wasn’t clear what the UK Border Agency was trying to achieve with the project, which caused considerable confusion from the outset.”
Hmmmm. Sound familiar?
Acolastus spent 30 years in an arm of public service that is world-renowned for doing what it does with excellence. From day one, we were taught that every activity has an Aim. And determining the Aim required a logical process of analysis, which we were also taught.
But Labour doesn’t work like that. Oh No. Rather than use handsomely rewarded Servile Servants to do this work, it will farm out the analysis, and often the whole problem, to consultants. Or create another quango.
But consultants and quangos rarely have deep familiarity of the detail and scope of a problem. Yet those who employ them do, and in engaging them, admit to either incompetence or idleness.
In 2005, Labour spent £1 billion of taxpayers’ money on consultancy and £180 billion on quangos; organisations that are utterly unaccountable to the public. What do our Servile Servants do, for heaven’s sake.
This is semi-detached public administration by a semi-detached government.
Next, Labour has abandoned those fundamental and inextricably linked principles of public service governance; accountability and responsibility. For those too young to remember what these meant, if you are responsible for something you are accountable for it.
In short, screw up and expect to get your arse kicked.
So who, I wonder, got fired from the Borders Agency for the Kent debacle? Surely, wasting £1 million of taxpayers’ money is a firing offence?
I’m not holding my breath. Because these days, public servants are likely to sue for dismissal. Even if their incompetence has cost lives. And Labour doesn’t like being sued.
So, finally, they will spin their way out of trouble.
Fresh from his illuminating encounter with Joanna Lumley and the Ghurkas, that nice Immigration Minister, Mr Woollas, said of the Kent fiasco: “The lessons we learnt have been used to design a new pilot currently running in Glasgow. This demonstrates our commitment to keep exploring alternatives to detention which increase voluntary returns and provide value for money to the taxpayer. This is a complex issue with no one-size-fits-all remedy, which is why these pilots are so crucial.”
Unbelievable, utter cant. And not one syllable of regret or apology for the waste of those 200 taxpayers’ money. Shame on him.
The really worrying aspect of all this is that the shabby, spendthrift, unaccountable culture championed by Labour over the last 12 years may have become so engrained in our public services that it has become the default position.
This is something David Cameron must address comprehensively as soon as he enters Number 10. Root and branch reform is required if citizens are to regain value from their taxes.
As is a General Election.
Thursday 25 June 2009
A Warning from History for the Concensus on Global Warming
The essay below, from Watts Up With That?, carries a tragic story and a stark warning for those who would mortgage our country's future on the basis the hypothesis-based "consensus" on Global Warning.But concensus based on hypothesis is neither fact or proof. There is still room, and real need for debate.
Credit to the author, Professor David Deming, and to the copyright holder Lew Rockwell for generously allowing reproduction.
Death of a Civilization
by David Deming
This memorial is situated near Bisho in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. It commemorates the mass killing of cattle in the Eastern Cape that took place in the 1850s . A Xhosa prophetess had delivered a message from the ancestors saying that the Xhosa must slaughter their cattle (wealth) so that they could rise again anew after defeats by the British colonialsts and mass deaths of their cattle from a lung disease. Following the massacre, some 40000 Xhosa died of starvation. The inscription reads "HERE REST MEN, WOMEN AND CHILDREN - INNOCENT VICTIMS OF THE 1856/7 CATASTROPHIC CATTLE KILLING".
Over the past several years we have learned that small groups of people can engage in mass suicide. In 1978, 918 members of the Peoples’ Temple led by Jim Jones perished after drinking poisoned koolaid. In 1997, 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate cult died after drugging themselves and tieing plastic bags around their heads. Unfortunately, history also demonstrates that it is possible for an entire civilization to commit suicide by intentionally destroying the means of its subsistence.
In the early nineteenth century, the British colonized Southeast Africa. The native Xhosa resisted, but suffered repeated and humiliating defeats at the hands of British military forces. The Xhosa lost their independence and their native land became an English colony. The British adopted a policy of westernizing the Xhosa. They were to be converted to Christianity, and their native culture and religion was to be wiped out. Under the stress of being confronted by a superior and irresistible technology, the Xhosa developed feelings of inadequacy and inferiority. In this climate, a prophet appeared.
In April of 1856, a fifteen-year-old girl named Nongqawuse heard a voice telling her that the Xhosa must kill all their cattle, stop cultivating their fields, and destroy their stores of grain and food. The voice insisted that the Xhosa must also get rid of their hoes, cooking pots, and every utensil necessary for the maintenance of life. Once these things were accomplished, a new day would magically dawn. Everything necessary for life would spring spontaneously from the earth. The dead would be resurrected. The blind would see and the old would have their youth restored. New food and livestock would appear in abundance, spontaneously sprouting from the earth. The British would be swept into the sea, and the Xhosa would be restored to their former glory. What was promised was nothing less than the establishment of paradise on earth.
Nongqawuse told this story to her guardian and uncle, Mhlakaza. At first, the uncle was skeptical. But he became a believer after accompanying his niece to the spot where she heard the voices. Although Mhlakaza heard nothing, he became convinced that Nongqawuse was hearing the voice of her dead father, and that the instructions must be obeyed. Mhlakaza became the chief prophet and leader of the cattle-killing movement.
News of the prophecy spread rapidly, and within a few weeks the Xhosa king, Sarhili, became a convert. He ordered the Xhosa to slaughter their cattle and, in a symbolic act, killed his favorite ox. As the hysteria widened, other Xhosa began to have visions. Some saw shadows of the resurrected dead arising from the sea, standing in rushes on the river bank, or even floating in the air. Everywhere that people looked, they found evidence to support what they desperately wanted to be true.
The believers began their work in earnest. Vast amounts of grain were taken out of storage and scattered on the ground to rot. Cattle were killed so quickly and on such an immense scale that vultures could not entirely devour the rotting flesh. The ultimate number of cattle that the Xhosa slaughtered was 400,000. After killing their livestock, the Xhosa built new, larger kraals to hold the marvelous new beasts that they anticipated would rise out of the earth. The impetus of the movement became irresistible.
The resurrection of the dead was predicted to occur on the full moon of June, 1856. Nothing happened. The chief prophet of the cattle-killing movement, Mhlakaza, moved the date to the full moon of August. But again the prophecy was not fulfilled.
The cattle-killing movement now began to enter a final, deadly phase, which its own internal logic dictated as inevitable. The failure of the prophecies was blamed on the fact that the cattle-killing had not been completed. Most believers had retained a few cattle, chiefly consisting of milk cows that provided an immediate and continuous food supply. Worse yet, there was a minority community of skeptical non-believers who refused to kill their livestock.
The fall planting season came and went. Believers threw their spades into the rivers and did not sow a single seed in the ground. By December of 1856, the Xhosa began to feel the pangs of hunger. They scoured the fields and woods for berries and roots, and attempted to eat bark stripped from trees. Mhlakaza set a new date of December 11 for the fulfillment of the prophecy. When the anticipated event did not occur, unbelievers were blamed.
The resurrection was rescheduled yet again for February 16, 1857, but the believers were again disappointed. Even this late, the average believer still had three or four head of livestock alive. The repeated failure of the prophecies could only mean that the Xhosa had failed to fulfill the necessary requirement of killing every last head of cattle. Now, they finally began to complete the killing process. Not only cattle were slaughtered, but also chickens and goats. Any viable means of sustenance had to be destroyed. Any cattle that might have escaped earlier killing were now slaughtered for food.
Serious famine began in late spring of 1857. All the food was gone. The starving population broke into stables and ate horse food. They gathered bones that had lay bleaching in the sun for years and tried to make soup. They ate grass. Maddened by hunger, some resorted to cannibalism. Weakened by starvation, family members often had to lay and watch dogs devour the corpses of their spouses and children. Those who did not die directly from hunger fell prey to disease. To the end, true believers never renounced their faith. They simply starved to death, blaming the failure of the prophecy on the doubts of non-believers.
By the end of 1858, the Xhosa population had dropped from 105,000 to 26,000. Forty to fifty-thousand people starved to death, and the rest migrated. With Xhosa civilization destroyed, the land was cleared for white settlement. The British found that those Xhosa who survived proved to be docile and useful servants. What the British Empire had been unable to accomplish in more than fifty years of aggressive colonialism, the Xhosa did to themselves in less than two years.
Western civilization now stands on the brink of repeating the experience of the Xhosa. Since the advent of the Industrial Revolution in the late eighteenth century, Europe and North America have enjoyed the greatest prosperity ever known on earth. Life expectancy has doubled. In a little more than two hundred years, every objective measure of human welfare has increased more than in all of previous human history.
But Western Civilization is coasting on an impetus provided by our ancestors. There is scarcely anyone alive in Europe or America today who believes in the superiority of Western society. Guilt and shame hang around our necks like millstones, dragging our emasculated culture to the verge of self-immolation. Whatever faults the British Empire-builders may have had, they were certain of themselves.
Our forefathers built a technological civilization based on energy provided by carbon-based fossil fuels. Without the inexpensive and reliable energy provided by coal, oil, and gas, our civilization would quickly collapse. The prophets of global warming now want us to do precisely that.
Like the prophet Mhlakaza, Al Gore promises that if we stop using carbon-based energy, new energy technologies will magically appear. The laws of physics and chemistry will be repealed by political will power. We will achieve prosperity by destroying the very means by which prosperity is created.
While Western Civilization sits confused, crippled with self-doubt and guilt, the Chinese are rapidly building an energy-intensive technological civilization. They have 2,000 coal-fired power plants, and are currently constructing new ones at the rate of one a week. In China, more people believe in free-market economics than in the US. Our Asian friends are about to be nominated by history as the new torchbearers of human progress.
May 13, 2009
David Deming is associate professor of Arts and Sciences at the University of Oklahoma.
Copyright © 2009 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.
Global Warming - Who is Right?
A worrying story from The Daily Mash suggests that "GLOBAL warming has caused an acceleration in evolution that should see the world overrun by 20ft mice within 10 years". See the whole terrifying account here.
On the other hand, over at Watts Up With That? it appears from this post that :
"The average arctic temperature is still not above (take your pick) 32°F 0°C 273.15°K–this the latest date in fifty years of record keeping that this has happened. Usually it is beginning to level off now and if it does so, it will stay near freezing on average in the arctic leading to still less melting than last summer which saw a 9% increase in arctic ice than in 2007".
So what about all the melting icebergs and stranded polar bears?
I'm Confused.
Who is right?
Well, I'll tell you one conclusion I've reached.
I'll bet a Pound to a pinch of pigshit it ain't Hilary Benn.
But he and his worthless kind in Westminster and Brussels are happy to bankrupt this country further on the basis of unproven "consensual" science.
Oh, but "consensus" isn't proof; it's newspeak for "la la la la - I can't hear you because I have organic carrots in my ears".
It's time for an open, even and honest debate before billions of taxpayers pounds are wasted.
Pigs will fly.
On the other hand, over at Watts Up With That? it appears from this post that :
"The average arctic temperature is still not above (take your pick) 32°F 0°C 273.15°K–this the latest date in fifty years of record keeping that this has happened. Usually it is beginning to level off now and if it does so, it will stay near freezing on average in the arctic leading to still less melting than last summer which saw a 9% increase in arctic ice than in 2007".
So what about all the melting icebergs and stranded polar bears?
I'm Confused.
Who is right?
Well, I'll tell you one conclusion I've reached.
I'll bet a Pound to a pinch of pigshit it ain't Hilary Benn.
But he and his worthless kind in Westminster and Brussels are happy to bankrupt this country further on the basis of unproven "consensual" science.
Oh, but "consensus" isn't proof; it's newspeak for "la la la la - I can't hear you because I have organic carrots in my ears".
It's time for an open, even and honest debate before billions of taxpayers pounds are wasted.
Pigs will fly.
Joke of the Day
H/T to Brookie for this.
A father walks into a Starbucks with his young son. He gives the young boy three coins to play with to keep him occupied.Suddenly, the boy starts choking, going blue in the face.
The father realizes the boy has swallowed the coins and starts slapping him on the back.The boy coughs up two of the coins, but keeps choking. Looking at his son, the father is panicking, shouting for help.
A well dressed, attractive, and serious looking woman, in a blue business suit is sitting at a coffee bar reading a newspaper and sipping a cup of coffee.
At the sound of the commotion, she looks up, puts her coffee cup down, neatly folds the newspaper and places it on the counter, gets up from her seat and makes her way, unhurriedly, across the restaurant.
Reaching the boy, the woman carefully drops his pants; takes hold of the boy's' testicles and starts to squeeze and twist, gently at first and then ever so firmly.. After a few seconds the boy convulses violently and coughs up the last coin, which the woman deftly catches in her free hand.
Releasing the boy's testicles, the woman hands the last coin to the father and walks back to her seat at the coffee bar without saying a word.
As soon as he is sure that his son has suffered no ill effects, the father rushes over to the woman and starts thanking her saying, "I've never seen anybody do anything like that before, it was fantastic. Are you a doctor? "
'No,' the woman replied. 'I'm with The Inland Revenue.'
A father walks into a Starbucks with his young son. He gives the young boy three coins to play with to keep him occupied.Suddenly, the boy starts choking, going blue in the face.
The father realizes the boy has swallowed the coins and starts slapping him on the back.The boy coughs up two of the coins, but keeps choking. Looking at his son, the father is panicking, shouting for help.
A well dressed, attractive, and serious looking woman, in a blue business suit is sitting at a coffee bar reading a newspaper and sipping a cup of coffee.
At the sound of the commotion, she looks up, puts her coffee cup down, neatly folds the newspaper and places it on the counter, gets up from her seat and makes her way, unhurriedly, across the restaurant.
Reaching the boy, the woman carefully drops his pants; takes hold of the boy's' testicles and starts to squeeze and twist, gently at first and then ever so firmly.. After a few seconds the boy convulses violently and coughs up the last coin, which the woman deftly catches in her free hand.
Releasing the boy's testicles, the woman hands the last coin to the father and walks back to her seat at the coffee bar without saying a word.
As soon as he is sure that his son has suffered no ill effects, the father rushes over to the woman and starts thanking her saying, "I've never seen anybody do anything like that before, it was fantastic. Are you a doctor? "
'No,' the woman replied. 'I'm with The Inland Revenue.'
An objective view of Labour
Morale was raised by the post below, which is reproduced with the generous permission of The New Adventures of Juliette , a blog always guaranteed to raise spirits.
Labour Pains
I'm about to make a fairly radical comment here
I can't stand Labour.
Whether it's Old Labour, New Labour or sort of Middle Aged But Young At Heart Labour, it gets on my bloody nerves. And it always has done
Normally, anyone who fancies themself as a bit on the intellectual or satirical side is duty-bound to say the exact opposite. Labour is my bestest friend. And Convervatives are stupid/boring/ ugly/unsexy/smell of poo-poo/have nits/can't play with us.
Well, sorry. But - while I'm no great pom-pom carrying cheerleader for the Right (and I still think George Osbourne is Central Casting's ideal choice for a Home Counties Patrick Bateman) - the fact is, I hate the Left a whole lot more.
There are many vices in this world I can happily tolerate.
However, hypocrisy is not one of them.
And the Left is absolutely crawling with the stuff. Exuding it from every sanctimonious pore.
Read the Guardian comment section, and its columnists are constantly warning of the hell that will await us under the Tories. Within months of Cameron acending to power, England will become a nightmarish dystopia of cruelty and evil. Peasants being whipped to death in the street for the crime of pulling a rickshaw too slowly. Babies starving in gutters as top-hatted capitalists whisk past lighting their foot-long cigars with hundred-pound notes. Serfs, vassals and droit de seigneur. People of England, you have been warned.
Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but - unlike the proles in 1984 - I do have a fairly reliable memory. And it tells me that day-to-day life under the Tories was pretty much same as it is now.
Maybe a bit lighter on Diversity Co-ordinators, Traveller Liaison Support Workers and Equality Support Strategic Development Co-ordination Czars.
But what the hell, we survived.
And yes, I know there are statistics showing that there's less crime, safer streets, happier pensioners, better healthcare etc etc etc under Labour. Thing is, you can prove anything with statistics. Literally anything. Especially if you threaten the people producing them with demotion or dismissal if they can't make the numbers go the right way. You can prove that Iraq is a safer place to live than Tunbridge Wells. Or that you're in more danger from a feather duster than a terrorist bomb. Don't believe me, watch The Wire some time.
IMHO, all politicians without exception are dodgy, thieving, lying wankers who care about exactly two things - getting elected, and getting rich(er).
The only difference is that the right are (very slightly) less hypocritical and annoying about it.
And while they're ripping you off, screwing the public for every last penny, not giving a tinker's toss about the poor and needy, crawling up the arses of any dodgy Russian billionaires that happen to bung them a few (milion) quid and scrounging freebies right, left and centre, they don't simultaneously expect you to bow down and worship them as the public-spirited holiest of public-spirited holies.
Here are my top reasons why the right-on left wing sucks...
1
Polly Toynbee
God, how I loathe this woman. How can I even begin to convey the depth of my hatred and contempt for her, and everything she stands for?
Here is my case for the prosecution.
Exhibit A - her smug, annoying, sanctimoniously smirking face - which acts much like a government health warning on a packet of fags, immediately warning you of what horrors lurk within. She has the most instantly dislikeable visage this side of Mark Thatcher.
Exhibit B - her relentless patronising air of holier-than-thou superiority, which she takes to a level that would make Lady Bountiful physically sick. Underscored by the certain knowledge that, for all her pontificating on the tragedy of inner city estates and what must be done to help their unfortunate underprivileged inhabitants, she lives about as far away from an inner city estate as it's humanly possible to get without the aid of space travel.
She is the sort of person who will earnestly use the phrase 'people less fortunate than ourselves'
The sort of person who will say 'it is tremendously important to understand the social context that compels under-privileged young people to demonstrate challenging behaviour and become involved in the justice system.'
But you can bet your left tit she's got a bloody good burglar alarm.
The only good thing about Polly Toynbee is that - if you read her column right before Body Combat - you'll go into that class like a young Mike Tyson on crack.
So from the narrow perspective of my health and fitness, I guess she's not a complete waste of space...
2
John Prescott
Yes, I know he's yesterday's man. But for me, his entire being summarises an entire breed - he's the sanctimonious Old Left incarnate. And highlights a rather awkward truth which the likes of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists somehow endeavoured to ignore.
People in power immediately become greedy bastards. Fact.
This applies whether they were born in a forty-bedroomed stately home with wall-to-wall housemaids and hot and cold running butlers, or in a cardboard box in t'middle of t'motorway a la the Monty Python sketch.
Far as I can tell, the only difference between old-left John Prescott and old-right Nicholas Soames is that Nicholas Soames a - knows how to hold his cutlery, b - isn't carrying something on his shoulder that's less a chip, more a fair-sized branch of McDonalds, and c - isn't a hypocritical cock jockey who thinks he's a man of the people despite owning five dozen polo ponies, eight mansions and a private army.
Apart from that, they're two smug greedy fat peas in a particularly ugly pod (think the horrible great slimy things in Gremlins...)
3
Virginia/Harriet/Jacqui/Margaret/Hazel/Thing
Aaargh! It's a multi headed political monster in horrible flat brown lace-up shoes, and it's trying to bore us to death! It's bombarding us with heavy-duty jargon at machine-gun pace! Multi-agency-working! Robust strategic partnerships! Outcome-focused patient-centric services! Use the Farce, Luke. Use the Farce!
4
The Observer On Sunday Magazine Section
Lost. Will to live. Answers to the name of Fluffy.
5
Polly Toynbee
Yes, I know I mentioned her before. But I hate the pious old bag so much, I just had to give her a second reference.
So it's another mention for the intrepid people's champion, with a real intuitive grasp of how ordinary British citizens live, think, work and feel. Daughter of rich literati. Great-niece of billionaire philathropist. Alumnus of Badminton School and St Anne's College, Oxford.
Anyone know where I can buy a decent voodoo doll round the Liverpool Street area?
6
The Right-On Teachers Of My Youth
If a teacher attempted to brainwash kids by reading them right-wing propaganda, there would be an uproar - and rightly so.
So how come, in my youth as now, it's perfectly okay to do the opposite?
Today, the offending books would almost certainly have been the staggeringly over-rated works of Philip Pullman - whose entire philosophy could be summarised as follows. Brainwashing kids to be conservative or religious is vile and unforgivable, and CS Lewis was a wanker. It's quite okay to brainwash them to be liberal atheists, though. Hey kids, God is dead, gay is good and anyone who says any different is evil and deserves to die.
Back in the day, however, it was a book series named The Borribles by a man named Michel de Larrabeiti. Which was read out to our primary school class, in not-particularly-eagerly-awaited instalments, by some Thatch-hatin' commie twat of a teacher called Mr Wilson. He had a guitar, too. And wore jeans. If he'd been any more of a cliche, he'd have been removed from the first draft of his own life by an eagle-eyed editor.
For some inexplicable reason, the Borribles series has fallen into obscurity. But here's the story in brief, if memory serves. Kids (who are good) run away from home and from grown-ups (which are bad), and form an anarchic tribe of their own called the Borribles (which is good). They survive by stealing (which is good) from adult businesses (which are bad). But they only steal food, and not money (which is bad). Their enemies are the police (who are bad), who try to catch them and make them become respectable law-abiding citizens (which is bad).
The police are led by an evil man named Inspector Sussworth, who is short and dark-haired with a toothbrush moustanche and a passion for order. The author doesn't actually give him one bollock or a German accent, but you get the impression it was a close-run thing.
It was the most most glaring attempt at childhood brainwashing since Swastika Press released their children's classic Jenny Lives With Adolf and Eva.
Although actually, it didn't work. Because even at the tender age of nine, I privately considered Mr Wilson to be an annoying cock monkey - and hence believed the exact opposite of anything he told us.
To this very day, I still think the police are better than shoplifters.
Sorry, Mr Wilson.
I'm voting Conservative next election, anyway. And at this point, I'm going to come right out and tell you the shocking truth.
I voted Conservative last general election, too.
Hey, sue me...
J x
A couple more points discovered here about Blessed Saint Polly. Failed her 11-Plus, so couldn't stay at Badminton. Went to that exemplar of egalitarian comprehensive education, Holland Park, emerging with one A Level. Got a scholarship to Oxford, but left after 18 months and didn't complete her degree.
A great role model.
Labour Pains
I'm about to make a fairly radical comment here
I can't stand Labour.
Whether it's Old Labour, New Labour or sort of Middle Aged But Young At Heart Labour, it gets on my bloody nerves. And it always has done
Normally, anyone who fancies themself as a bit on the intellectual or satirical side is duty-bound to say the exact opposite. Labour is my bestest friend. And Convervatives are stupid/boring/ ugly/unsexy/smell of poo-poo/have nits/can't play with us.
Well, sorry. But - while I'm no great pom-pom carrying cheerleader for the Right (and I still think George Osbourne is Central Casting's ideal choice for a Home Counties Patrick Bateman) - the fact is, I hate the Left a whole lot more.
There are many vices in this world I can happily tolerate.
However, hypocrisy is not one of them.
And the Left is absolutely crawling with the stuff. Exuding it from every sanctimonious pore.
Read the Guardian comment section, and its columnists are constantly warning of the hell that will await us under the Tories. Within months of Cameron acending to power, England will become a nightmarish dystopia of cruelty and evil. Peasants being whipped to death in the street for the crime of pulling a rickshaw too slowly. Babies starving in gutters as top-hatted capitalists whisk past lighting their foot-long cigars with hundred-pound notes. Serfs, vassals and droit de seigneur. People of England, you have been warned.
Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but - unlike the proles in 1984 - I do have a fairly reliable memory. And it tells me that day-to-day life under the Tories was pretty much same as it is now.
Maybe a bit lighter on Diversity Co-ordinators, Traveller Liaison Support Workers and Equality Support Strategic Development Co-ordination Czars.
But what the hell, we survived.
And yes, I know there are statistics showing that there's less crime, safer streets, happier pensioners, better healthcare etc etc etc under Labour. Thing is, you can prove anything with statistics. Literally anything. Especially if you threaten the people producing them with demotion or dismissal if they can't make the numbers go the right way. You can prove that Iraq is a safer place to live than Tunbridge Wells. Or that you're in more danger from a feather duster than a terrorist bomb. Don't believe me, watch The Wire some time.
IMHO, all politicians without exception are dodgy, thieving, lying wankers who care about exactly two things - getting elected, and getting rich(er).
The only difference is that the right are (very slightly) less hypocritical and annoying about it.
And while they're ripping you off, screwing the public for every last penny, not giving a tinker's toss about the poor and needy, crawling up the arses of any dodgy Russian billionaires that happen to bung them a few (milion) quid and scrounging freebies right, left and centre, they don't simultaneously expect you to bow down and worship them as the public-spirited holiest of public-spirited holies.
Here are my top reasons why the right-on left wing sucks...
1
Polly Toynbee
God, how I loathe this woman. How can I even begin to convey the depth of my hatred and contempt for her, and everything she stands for?
Here is my case for the prosecution.
Exhibit A - her smug, annoying, sanctimoniously smirking face - which acts much like a government health warning on a packet of fags, immediately warning you of what horrors lurk within. She has the most instantly dislikeable visage this side of Mark Thatcher.
Exhibit B - her relentless patronising air of holier-than-thou superiority, which she takes to a level that would make Lady Bountiful physically sick. Underscored by the certain knowledge that, for all her pontificating on the tragedy of inner city estates and what must be done to help their unfortunate underprivileged inhabitants, she lives about as far away from an inner city estate as it's humanly possible to get without the aid of space travel.
She is the sort of person who will earnestly use the phrase 'people less fortunate than ourselves'
The sort of person who will say 'it is tremendously important to understand the social context that compels under-privileged young people to demonstrate challenging behaviour and become involved in the justice system.'
But you can bet your left tit she's got a bloody good burglar alarm.
The only good thing about Polly Toynbee is that - if you read her column right before Body Combat - you'll go into that class like a young Mike Tyson on crack.
So from the narrow perspective of my health and fitness, I guess she's not a complete waste of space...
2
John Prescott
Yes, I know he's yesterday's man. But for me, his entire being summarises an entire breed - he's the sanctimonious Old Left incarnate. And highlights a rather awkward truth which the likes of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists somehow endeavoured to ignore.
People in power immediately become greedy bastards. Fact.
This applies whether they were born in a forty-bedroomed stately home with wall-to-wall housemaids and hot and cold running butlers, or in a cardboard box in t'middle of t'motorway a la the Monty Python sketch.
Far as I can tell, the only difference between old-left John Prescott and old-right Nicholas Soames is that Nicholas Soames a - knows how to hold his cutlery, b - isn't carrying something on his shoulder that's less a chip, more a fair-sized branch of McDonalds, and c - isn't a hypocritical cock jockey who thinks he's a man of the people despite owning five dozen polo ponies, eight mansions and a private army.
Apart from that, they're two smug greedy fat peas in a particularly ugly pod (think the horrible great slimy things in Gremlins...)
3
Virginia/Harriet/Jacqui/Margaret/Hazel/Thing
Aaargh! It's a multi headed political monster in horrible flat brown lace-up shoes, and it's trying to bore us to death! It's bombarding us with heavy-duty jargon at machine-gun pace! Multi-agency-working! Robust strategic partnerships! Outcome-focused patient-centric services! Use the Farce, Luke. Use the Farce!
4
The Observer On Sunday Magazine Section
Lost. Will to live. Answers to the name of Fluffy.
5
Polly Toynbee
Yes, I know I mentioned her before. But I hate the pious old bag so much, I just had to give her a second reference.
So it's another mention for the intrepid people's champion, with a real intuitive grasp of how ordinary British citizens live, think, work and feel. Daughter of rich literati. Great-niece of billionaire philathropist. Alumnus of Badminton School and St Anne's College, Oxford.
Anyone know where I can buy a decent voodoo doll round the Liverpool Street area?
6
The Right-On Teachers Of My Youth
If a teacher attempted to brainwash kids by reading them right-wing propaganda, there would be an uproar - and rightly so.
So how come, in my youth as now, it's perfectly okay to do the opposite?
Today, the offending books would almost certainly have been the staggeringly over-rated works of Philip Pullman - whose entire philosophy could be summarised as follows. Brainwashing kids to be conservative or religious is vile and unforgivable, and CS Lewis was a wanker. It's quite okay to brainwash them to be liberal atheists, though. Hey kids, God is dead, gay is good and anyone who says any different is evil and deserves to die.
Back in the day, however, it was a book series named The Borribles by a man named Michel de Larrabeiti. Which was read out to our primary school class, in not-particularly-eagerly-awaited instalments, by some Thatch-hatin' commie twat of a teacher called Mr Wilson. He had a guitar, too. And wore jeans. If he'd been any more of a cliche, he'd have been removed from the first draft of his own life by an eagle-eyed editor.
For some inexplicable reason, the Borribles series has fallen into obscurity. But here's the story in brief, if memory serves. Kids (who are good) run away from home and from grown-ups (which are bad), and form an anarchic tribe of their own called the Borribles (which is good). They survive by stealing (which is good) from adult businesses (which are bad). But they only steal food, and not money (which is bad). Their enemies are the police (who are bad), who try to catch them and make them become respectable law-abiding citizens (which is bad).
The police are led by an evil man named Inspector Sussworth, who is short and dark-haired with a toothbrush moustanche and a passion for order. The author doesn't actually give him one bollock or a German accent, but you get the impression it was a close-run thing.
It was the most most glaring attempt at childhood brainwashing since Swastika Press released their children's classic Jenny Lives With Adolf and Eva.
Although actually, it didn't work. Because even at the tender age of nine, I privately considered Mr Wilson to be an annoying cock monkey - and hence believed the exact opposite of anything he told us.
To this very day, I still think the police are better than shoplifters.
Sorry, Mr Wilson.
I'm voting Conservative next election, anyway. And at this point, I'm going to come right out and tell you the shocking truth.
I voted Conservative last general election, too.
Hey, sue me...
J x
A couple more points discovered here about Blessed Saint Polly. Failed her 11-Plus, so couldn't stay at Badminton. Went to that exemplar of egalitarian comprehensive education, Holland Park, emerging with one A Level. Got a scholarship to Oxford, but left after 18 months and didn't complete her degree.
A great role model.
Wednesday 24 June 2009
Poems I Learned at My Father's Knee
It's just a bit of doggerel, really, but as my late Father used to say:
It happened 695 years ago today.
Robert Bruce (1274 - 1329), King of Scots from 1306, breaks the handle of his battleaxe as he kills the English knight Sir Henry de Bohun with a blow to the head before the Battle of Bannockburn, June 1314. Photo: Hulton Archive/Getty Images.
Bruce and De Bohun
Fought for the Croon,
Bruce drew his battleaxe
and knocked De Bohun Doon.
It happened 695 years ago today.
Robert Bruce (1274 - 1329), King of Scots from 1306, breaks the handle of his battleaxe as he kills the English knight Sir Henry de Bohun with a blow to the head before the Battle of Bannockburn, June 1314. Photo: Hulton Archive/Getty Images. Thus is history learned. The independance of a small nation was protected against aggression until a mutual Union created something greater. Will the same vigour ever be shown in preserving the sovereignty of this United Kingdom? Not under this government.
An Odious Little Speck
Much erudite comment has been written over the last couple of days regarding the elevation of J S Bercow Esquire to the dignity of First Commoner in the land. I shall resist the obvious cheap shot.
Not that I am a fan of Mr Bercow. While I have never met him, nothing I have learned of him is endearing, although I am sure he loves his wife and small fluffy animals.
But every time I see or hear him, he reminds me of the odious speck at school who would frequently be seen emerging from the Head’s study, face a picture of smug self-satisfaction, having sneaked on one of his fellows. Perhaps his favourite small fluffy animal is a weasel.
Some might describe him as self-satisfied; an unattractive trait. His performance on Monday, during his speech and subsequently, did nothing to allay this perception. Conceit appeared to ooze from his pores. But perhaps that is just his manner and such judgement harsh.
There is no doubt that Mr Bercow is a trimmer. His weaving political voyage puts one in mind of a drunken sailor returning to his ship. But I do not believe his to be a random journey, since Mr Bercow is shrewd and calculating.
Like many small men his lack of stature is counterbalanced by the size of his ego. Knowing that his trimming would be unlikely to earn him advancement in his own party, and that crossing the floor would, at best, gain a shadow brief, perhaps he saw the Speaker’s chair as the only route to the advancement he believed he deserved.
Mr Bercow is of modest origins. He has that in common with some of the finest Speakers of recent years. But unlike them, he clearly has little regard for the dignity and history of his new position. He appears to typify the “me, now” generation and fails to understand that he is now the incumbent of a post that is steeped in tradition which he has a responsibility to uphold.
It is not his place to tear asunder that tradition on a personal whim. If he had a whiff of modesty or judgement about him he would at least have taken counsel from his Sovereign. But his performance on ITV last night showed not one whit of modesty, but an arrogant, abrupt school bully.
However, PMQs today brought some little cause for optimism. If he has the courage to translate into discipline his warning about trailing legislation in the media, entertaining times await. Mr Hain seems to think otherwise, and since flaunting the primacy of Parliament is so engrained in Labour’s psyche, it is likely we will enjoy the delight of a Minister before the Bar.
Labour’s contempt of Parliament in backing Bercow brought the politics of the schoolyard to our legislature. Infantile and puerile, their only aim was to score a cheap point. It is illuminating that only one of his 15 proposers came from his own party.
Mr Bercow is on probation. He has 11 months to prove that Parliament’s interests, not his own, dominate his agenda. He may confound his doubters, but I suspect that this leopard will remain very spotty.
The Conservative party should be very careful if they wish to remove Bercow once they gain power. They have lost much of their reputation as the nasty party, and talk of removing another Speaker might lose them ground.
They should play a long game; Mr Bercow will make it easy for them.
Not that I am a fan of Mr Bercow. While I have never met him, nothing I have learned of him is endearing, although I am sure he loves his wife and small fluffy animals.
But every time I see or hear him, he reminds me of the odious speck at school who would frequently be seen emerging from the Head’s study, face a picture of smug self-satisfaction, having sneaked on one of his fellows. Perhaps his favourite small fluffy animal is a weasel.
Some might describe him as self-satisfied; an unattractive trait. His performance on Monday, during his speech and subsequently, did nothing to allay this perception. Conceit appeared to ooze from his pores. But perhaps that is just his manner and such judgement harsh.
There is no doubt that Mr Bercow is a trimmer. His weaving political voyage puts one in mind of a drunken sailor returning to his ship. But I do not believe his to be a random journey, since Mr Bercow is shrewd and calculating.
Like many small men his lack of stature is counterbalanced by the size of his ego. Knowing that his trimming would be unlikely to earn him advancement in his own party, and that crossing the floor would, at best, gain a shadow brief, perhaps he saw the Speaker’s chair as the only route to the advancement he believed he deserved.
Mr Bercow is of modest origins. He has that in common with some of the finest Speakers of recent years. But unlike them, he clearly has little regard for the dignity and history of his new position. He appears to typify the “me, now” generation and fails to understand that he is now the incumbent of a post that is steeped in tradition which he has a responsibility to uphold.
It is not his place to tear asunder that tradition on a personal whim. If he had a whiff of modesty or judgement about him he would at least have taken counsel from his Sovereign. But his performance on ITV last night showed not one whit of modesty, but an arrogant, abrupt school bully.
However, PMQs today brought some little cause for optimism. If he has the courage to translate into discipline his warning about trailing legislation in the media, entertaining times await. Mr Hain seems to think otherwise, and since flaunting the primacy of Parliament is so engrained in Labour’s psyche, it is likely we will enjoy the delight of a Minister before the Bar.
Labour’s contempt of Parliament in backing Bercow brought the politics of the schoolyard to our legislature. Infantile and puerile, their only aim was to score a cheap point. It is illuminating that only one of his 15 proposers came from his own party.
Mr Bercow is on probation. He has 11 months to prove that Parliament’s interests, not his own, dominate his agenda. He may confound his doubters, but I suspect that this leopard will remain very spotty.
The Conservative party should be very careful if they wish to remove Bercow once they gain power. They have lost much of their reputation as the nasty party, and talk of removing another Speaker might lose them ground.
They should play a long game; Mr Bercow will make it easy for them.
Saturday 20 June 2009
Cameron's Commitment to Aid - A Pitfall?
David Cameron has made overseas development one of his two untouchable areas for spending growth. I share his view that rich countries should assist less fortunate nations towards self-sufficiency.
But laudable and altruistic while his policy may be, will the public support it while unemployment is high, the economy is in turmoil and they perceive growing poverty in Britain? Will voters endorse his philanthropic use of their money overseas when they may consider it better spent at home?
I believe that unless he qualifies very clearly how he will make every penny count, this policy could come back and bite him.
Hard.
The British public has a splendid reputation for individual generosity towards the world’s disadvantaged. Since its inception, Comic Relief has generated over £600 million. In 2005 alone, UK donors gave an estimated £8.9 billion to charity, averaging almost £150 per person. Even accounting for corporate giving, and those who cannot or will not give, this is impressive.
Much individual giving is based on emotion. Most people see themselves as saving the donkey, or sending the cow. They relate to causes that interest or move them, and once committed, will continue to support them for years.
Or, at least, while they can afford to.
While major events like Comic Relief continue to attract increased donations during the recession, the same is not true for individual charities. It has become cruelly clear that the first economy many people make in harder times is in their charitable giving.
So how will they feel about more of their taxes going in that direction? When DFID’s current annual budget is £9.1 billion, will voters accept further growth? Sure, DFID aims to find 1.7% in efficiency savings this year, but will that mollify anyone on jobseekers’ allowance?
Acolantus has a modest track record in overseas development and he can assure you that its bureaucracy and inefficiency is staggering.
DFID, Comic Relief and most other funding agencies do not spend money directly on development. They rely instead on those charities we support to do it for them, since in most cases, they are professionals in their fields. But it could be argued that the development sector is overcrowded.
It may come as a surprise, but there are over 400 overseas development charities in UK alone, many working in the same sectors. Their infrastructure costs mean that very few of them could operate on individual giving alone. They therefore compete for much of their project funds to the funding agencies; DFID, Comic Relief et al. And their proposals are usually based on their own agendas, rather than complying with a strategic, synchronised oversight of priorities.
Inevitably, their proposals are frequently unsuccessful. Consequently, some charities have closed and others have cut staff.
This perpetual competition for project funds involves costly, often unproductive duplication of effort and consumes a considerable proportion of individual donors’ money. I wonder how many of them know that. And I wonder how many realise that it is not their money that is funding much of the delivery of the projects they hold dear, but money from funding agencies, which in most cases comes from taxes.
Equally, funding agencies such as DFID employ expensive staff to evaluate applications and award project contracts. They also evaluate performance, although it could be argued that greater rigour could be applied. DFID has offices in 72 overseas countries that also initiate project competition, award contracts and conduct evaluations.
So we have a risible position where:
- Much of donors’ money funds infrastructure, not projects.
- Charities need projects to deliver what their donors expect.
- DFID et al need charities to deliver development.
- Charities have to compete for projects and often fail.
- Charities can develop and carry out projects to their own agendas and priorities.
- Duplication of project type, and therefore staff costs, is frequent.
- Charities are allowed to submit their own interim and final evaluations.
- External evaluation and quality audit is insufficiently rigorous.
- Incoherence and lack of coordination reign.
If David Cameron wants to sell growth in international development to a cash strapped electorate, he might consider:
- Insisting that charities operating in the same sectors amalgamate, or become consortia, to provide greater efficiency, economy of scale and value to the taxpayer.
- Informing those charities that will not work together that they will not be awarded taxpayer-funded projects.
- Committing DFID to ensuring that only projects that deliver large-scale coherent and progressive development growth are funded.
- Ensuring that DFID works much more closely alongside charities in the field to ensure that taxpayers’ money is used efficiently and to maximum effect.
Then, just maybe, he will be able to persuade the electorate that his policy is acceptable to a country with 1.5 million unemployed.
I hope he can. The alternative, for both Britain and the developing world, would be tragic
Friday 19 June 2009
Master of Shameful Duplicity
For years, Gordon Brown has managed to obfuscate the extent of his deviousness. He shrouded his attempts to manage the economy with righteous labels such as prudence, the Golden Rule and sustainable investment. Concurrently, and largely through stealth, he raised our taxes in ways sufficiently subtle to evade widespread public criticism.
Really?
Perhaps, true to form, he is simmering with delight that the redaction furore has diverted attention from news of a recommendation that MPs' salaries should be increased by up to £10,000.
Mac's cartoon in today's Daily Mail hits the bull's eye.
Little did they realise that those who had initiated those orders and sent them to this optional war would fail them grievously. A questionable basis for the war; appalling procurement delays, inadequate equipment and resources; no post-operational plan for nation rebuilding; drawing down forces as operations intensified; all these failings cost lives.
The relatives of those who died and the public deserve to know why, why, why. Nothing less will do.
But with Brown's ignominious track record for candour and transparency, I suspect we should keep our expectations low. Little wonder that the enquiry will not report until after the election; Brown needs its findings like he needs YouTube.
Strange, I just can't keep the image of Brown's dead hand on Sir John Chilcot's shoulder out of my head.
He seems to have relished secrecy and ambiguity for so long that it appears they have become his default setting. He gives the impression of believing what most people see as palpably false, and of being psychologically unable to provide a clear and revealing answer to any direct question.
But the fluttering of chickens coming home to roost is increasingly audible.
Only a few weeks ago, Brown condemned the Telegraph's revelations and trumpeted that MPs' expenses would be published by Parliament, inferring that the Telegraph's actions were pernicious and pointless. Perhaps he should have checked before sounding like a fool, since yesterday he claimed not to know why some of his claims had been blacked out, adding "my principle in this is for the maximum transparency".
Really?
Perhaps, true to form, he is simmering with delight that the redaction furore has diverted attention from news of a recommendation that MPs' salaries should be increased by up to £10,000.
Brown's obsession with secrecy dominated his original intent that the Iraq inquiry should be held in private; a different and more odious form of redaction, from which he has made an inelegant, if only partial, retreat in the face of a storm of criticism.
Mac's cartoon in today's Daily Mail hits the bull's eye.
Only a full public enquiry, with concessions for essential national security issues, will begin to expose the level of betrayal of British service personnel who, despite reservations in some quarters, were true to their oath to the Sovereign and obeyed orders.
Little did they realise that those who had initiated those orders and sent them to this optional war would fail them grievously. A questionable basis for the war; appalling procurement delays, inadequate equipment and resources; no post-operational plan for nation rebuilding; drawing down forces as operations intensified; all these failings cost lives.
The relatives of those who died and the public deserve to know why, why, why. Nothing less will do.
But with Brown's ignominious track record for candour and transparency, I suspect we should keep our expectations low. Little wonder that the enquiry will not report until after the election; Brown needs its findings like he needs YouTube.
Strange, I just can't keep the image of Brown's dead hand on Sir John Chilcot's shoulder out of my head.
Thursday 18 June 2009
Brown's Brave Boys (and Girls)
In his excellent diary, Ian Dale reports that he has heard that over 20 Cabinet Ministers were invited to appear on Question Time this evening (not all at once, I hope) and they declined.
I wonder if the Prince of Darkness has decreed that they are only to speak in the benign environments of Westminster and the media, away from the rough and licentious peasantry.
Or could it be that the Rt Hon Members actually realise that the line they are being instructed to take is so transparently false that when they espouse it before the public, they are likely to be ripped to shreds. On the evidence of the last three editions of Question Time, I suspect this to be the case.
Due perhaps to her stunning lack of any contrition over her expenses, Margaret Beckett was reduced by the audience to a caricature of a rabbit in a lamp's beam just before the trigger is pulled - and this is an individual hotly tipped to become Speaker. Lord help us if she was to face a turbulent day in the Commons.
Ms Flint, in an unedifying swansong as Europe Minister, resorted to bullying interuptions of other panelists in an attempt to dominate the programme. Eventually, the penny began to drop as the audience refused to accept her gospel, and her face became a pleasing vision of sulky, incomprehending anger.
Last week, Peter Hain was reduced to a gibbering poltroon, his face radiating confusion. His gem moment came when Tsar Alan's possible conflict of interest was being debated. Suggesting that other politicians' TV work created a precedent for the Tsar, he cited Michael Portillo who, of course, left Parliament in 2005. Peter needs a long lie down.
So we will have the charming and suave Lord Falconer on the programme tonight as it is little wonder that the Cabinet prefer hiding in Brown's Mitty-world bunker. The reality of public opinion would be too much for what little remains of their sanity to bear.
Still, things can only get better.
I wonder if the Prince of Darkness has decreed that they are only to speak in the benign environments of Westminster and the media, away from the rough and licentious peasantry.
Or could it be that the Rt Hon Members actually realise that the line they are being instructed to take is so transparently false that when they espouse it before the public, they are likely to be ripped to shreds. On the evidence of the last three editions of Question Time, I suspect this to be the case.
Due perhaps to her stunning lack of any contrition over her expenses, Margaret Beckett was reduced by the audience to a caricature of a rabbit in a lamp's beam just before the trigger is pulled - and this is an individual hotly tipped to become Speaker. Lord help us if she was to face a turbulent day in the Commons.
Ms Flint, in an unedifying swansong as Europe Minister, resorted to bullying interuptions of other panelists in an attempt to dominate the programme. Eventually, the penny began to drop as the audience refused to accept her gospel, and her face became a pleasing vision of sulky, incomprehending anger.
Last week, Peter Hain was reduced to a gibbering poltroon, his face radiating confusion. His gem moment came when Tsar Alan's possible conflict of interest was being debated. Suggesting that other politicians' TV work created a precedent for the Tsar, he cited Michael Portillo who, of course, left Parliament in 2005. Peter needs a long lie down.
So we will have the charming and suave Lord Falconer on the programme tonight as it is little wonder that the Cabinet prefer hiding in Brown's Mitty-world bunker. The reality of public opinion would be too much for what little remains of their sanity to bear.
Still, things can only get better.
Wednesday 17 June 2009
Goodbye Mr (you've had your) Chips
There are not many who will be sorry to see Michael Martin leave the Speaker's chair. But in their hearts, will some MPs see beyond his hapless tenure as Speaker to the man himself, and what shaped him, and feel a pang of conscience? I doubt it. He, and a few like him on the Government benches, are dinosaurs; relics of a monocular socialism that saw little beyond the class struggle, unable to adapt to the expectations of a changing society, and often representing and reflecting constituencies where political opinion is shaped by bitterness, tradition and intransigence.
Martin's departure brings to mind three issues:
The British trait of hypocritical sanctimony has, once again, been hard at play in recent weeks. Yes, many MPs have behaved disgracefully, have betrayed the taxpayers who fund them, and were the catalysts for Martin's fall. But perhaps in a nation with a staggering record of "sick" days, benefit fraud and workplace minor theft, there are some who should consider pots and kettles before becoming too hysterically self-righteous.
I am no supporter of Speaker Martin, but I wish him health and peace of mind.
His greatest tragedy is that the Labour Party could not look beyond party prejudice to the requirements of the appointment when they elected him. His undoing is their shame.
Martin's departure brings to mind three issues:
The British trait of hypocritical sanctimony has, once again, been hard at play in recent weeks. Yes, many MPs have behaved disgracefully, have betrayed the taxpayers who fund them, and were the catalysts for Martin's fall. But perhaps in a nation with a staggering record of "sick" days, benefit fraud and workplace minor theft, there are some who should consider pots and kettles before becoming too hysterically self-righteous.
Be careful what you wish for. Martin may have been seen as inept, but the indicators are that he will be followed by an even less attractive incumbent, installed again by Labour, not in the interests of the dignity of Parliament and the need for reform, but in the spirit of petty spite that typifies that party. Is it any wonder that the qualities that once exemplified Britain have vapourised with their faux leadership?
Martin was not entirely disingenous today when he reminded Brown that he and his party had rejected parliamentary reform over a year ago. Indeed, Brown did not even feel moved to vote on the matter. Where were Labour MPs when they could have supported Martin, rather than their own interests, and how shamefully two-faced was their outrage when he was forced to stand down? I am reminded of an old joke about Harold Wilson. "I can't stand two things about Wilson". "Really - what?" "His face". Labour doesn't change.
I am no supporter of Speaker Martin, but I wish him health and peace of mind.
His greatest tragedy is that the Labour Party could not look beyond party prejudice to the requirements of the appointment when they elected him. His undoing is their shame.
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