Sod This For A Game Of Toy Soldiers

Well, I was about to write a long post about how traditional political alignments are meaningless and how it would almost make sense for some traditional Tories to vote for Nu Labour (not me, I might add). But you know what, it is sunny outside, I am on holiday, and the pubs have been open for literally hours. So, as the title of this post might suggest, that's all from me for the moment, folks.

And given the next few days are going to be a mix of dinners, drinks, parties and a wedding (no, not my own) the chances of anything appearing from me on this blog are not high - not least owing to the fact that I will have no access to the internet!

Quote of the Day

"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejuidices."

William James, 1842-1910

Slavery and Africa

My post on Prescott's proposals for an annual (for want of a better phrase) slavery day struck a nerve with a friend of mine and I thought I would stick (edited) highlights of our e-mail exchange here, because it goes much further than the narrow, Prescott bashing of my original ramblings. Her text are italicised, mine are in normal font.

I had a conversation with a Nigerian about how fucked up Africa is today and how the West must take responsibility for that, which I recalled when reading your blog entry, entitled People, Move On...

Prescott has a point, although he made an error linking a commemoration of the slave trade to modern-day human trafficking. Far more important is for British (and other European) schoolchildren to understand what the colonies did to Africa and their lasting legacy on African countries' politics and economies, which is just as damaging as memories of slavery and far more relevant today.

It's dangerous to talk of moving on, when African nations still suffer and the West was and in some fundamental respects, still is the cause. To generalise, Africa, although it has valuable natural resources, is a continent undermined by disorganised leadership, which has come about a direct reaction to the legacy of colonial rule and its badly planned withdrawal/handover. At the same time, one could say that the Western oil majors and mining companies have taken advantage of this and still do.

Certainly, it is not until recently that African countries' national oil and gas companies got a look in on lucrative production projects; before this, any cash generated either left the country or disappeared to corrupt governments. And their inclusion now is more a measure of control than any exercise in social responsibility.

The West fucked Africa over. South Africa, which is trying to get over what Europe did to it with legislation forcing black empowerment after the toll of deliberately under-educating black children under Apartheid, will take a few generations to get back on track. Goodness only knows what will happen in places like Zimbabwe, where Mugabe's backlash against colonial rule has sent the country into chaos.

This isn't something that is taught in UK schools. There may be initiatives, such as Black History Week, but these tend to focus on celebrating the achievements of a minority of successful individuals who have stood up to or who have overcome this. Little attention is paid to how things remain and what the lasting impact of the West's activities in this area is and how that feeds into the consciousness of any cosmopolitan city or town.

My fundamental problem with what Prezza said (aside from the fact that he said it, and I do have a real problem with supposed intellectual pronouncements from a barely coherent thug who probably only discovered there was an African subcontinent when someone offered him a freebie trip there) is the current focus on slavery. Slavery was a terrible part of our history, but as former imperialists and would be players on the international stage, there is no shortage of terrible parts to our history. Concentration camps in the Boer War, the fire bombing of Dresden, various atrocities in Ireland etc. It could also be very effectively argued that Prescott himself is part of a government that has further darkened British history by tearing the Iraqi state apart in an ill-thought out US led foreign adventure.

But slavery in the UK is over - human trafficking continues, and this is a major problem, but it is a very different problem to slavery 200 years ago and requires very different solutions. And this narrow minded focus on commemorating it - and of us having an annual sackcloth and ashes day where we all feel sorry for what our ancestors may or may not have done over 200 years ago (I am not denying that slavery existed, just pointing out that our ancestors may or may not have been involved in the slave trade) is just so much navel gazing. It is the ruthless pragmatist in me, I know, but I would rather we did something proactive for the future rather than worrying about the past and apologising for stuff we did not do.

Africa does not need an apology or the Western World feeling sorry for slavery, it needs practical, tangible help. I've just finished reading a book about economics and, whilst being a little bit left wing and banging on about environmental economics a little bit too much, did make an interesting point about Africa. Africa needs the political institutions to enable it to develop, to encourage people to develop economically and away from a subsistence existence. We cannot graft our institutions on them - as you point out, the post colonial governments have often created major problems for their countries (Mugabe, Amin etc). We also risk being accused of cultural imperialism, and we cannot assume that every other nation responds well to Western Liberal Democracy (Russia's attempts at democracy, and the fact that it has ended with an ex-KGB man who looks, too all intents and purposes, like an [albeit more capable] Soviet leader, shows this) but we do need to find practical ways in which we can assist.

Part of that might be restricting the more mercenary and brutal instincts of Western natural resources companies in Africa. We see Shell, for example, as an excellent example of capitalist success. But their record in Africa, and other less developed parts of the world, is reprehensible and shocking. Whether this is done through encouragement or through direct legislation is a whole new can of worms that I don't want to open here, but trying to get them to have some sort of ethical connection or social responsibility to the countries they operate it could be a tangible way to help Africa.

And then there is the question of aid. Aid can obviously help, but then again we need to consider whether the aid we give actually does help. There are a lot of nepotistic and downright corrupt governments in Africa and a lot of aid meant for the people does end up going to the government. Then there is the question of what restrictions we place on the aid - if there is something the West should apologise for, it is for things like the US giving money to the African nations but saying the money cannot be used on contraception or abortion programmes. Brilliant work there, Dubya, you total cretin! Let's give money to Africa, but not allow them to spend it in areas where it could be a massive help.

Anyway, my point (as incoherent as the above may be) is that we need to take tangible, pragmatic action to help Africa. The focus on slavery, and the proposition that we should have an annual day, runs the real risk of simply sooothing the guilt of the Western World about Africa. "Oh, Africa may be a mess, but at least we have acknowledged the part we played in making it a mess." Also the example of Ireland, and, to some extent, the Middle East, shows that progress is made when people move on from the past and do not focus on past wrongs, but rather what can be done to make the future right.

The point in the article about education is more interesting. I maintain that Prescott is not best placed to talk about reforming the national curriculum, but there should be some debate about how history is taught in this country. I think that there is no real focus on the history of Africa, but the problem with UK schools teaching history is broader than just that. The focus is on the UK and, to some extent, the West. I can remember, whilst doing my history A-level, that the focus of our course was on World War One and World War Two. The focus on those two wars shapes the way we view war as a whole. If people studied the Vietnam War, then they might have had different perceptions of how the Iraq War would go. So let's have a debate on how to teach history in our schools, but let's not just shoe-horn slavery into the curriculum because Prescott is feeling a little bit of white, liberal guilt about Africa.

"I agree that a commemoration day is a naff idea - it is an inadequate, obvious and rather patronising knee-jerk response to an issue that deserves more thought. And the focus on slavery seems superficial - at the risk of sounding far too flippant, slavery is the trendy tip ofthe iceberg. I will iterate, though, that I think it is dangerous to talk of moving on (and will add) while the nation is largely ignorant of the root causes of many of the imbalances and injustices we see today on both a global and local level. Of course practical help is desirable and necessary too, but as long as people don't understand the context in which it is given, there is the risk that it will not be administered in an effective way."

I would pretty much agree with all that. I think that the likes of Live Aid and Live 8, as hounourable as the intentions of the organisers might have been, were counterproductive and failed to take into account the simple fact that you do not help Africa by chucking money at it. The problems are more deep-rooted and complex than that simplistic response would suggest. The nation is ignorant of far too much, partly owing to the soundbite, 60 second news mindset of the Main Stream Media. My only concern is that we lose ourselves in the soul-searching and the attempts to understand the causes of the problems in Africa, when we also need to be finding effective solutions. The Blair years - and, indeed, the current performance of David Cameron - shows that as a nation we are very good about talking about problems, and wringing our hands about past problems. But when we are required to find tangible, useful solutions to those problems, we are, more often than not, found wanting.

Heroes

No, not a post about the TV series which I have still not seen, despite a lot of positive comments from a lot of different sources. And it is not about the David Bowie song, although he is referenced later on. It is about heroes in the technical sense of the word – what I would define as people you would want to be.

Inevitably it was a conversation in the pub that got me thinking. A mate mentioned that his heroes were slightly, shall we say, idiosyncratic. If memory serves, they were Lance Armstrong and Spike Milligan. And he said that he would bet that my heroes are idiosyncratic choices as well. Which is where the problem arises.

I couldn’t think of anyone. I could not think of one person who I would class as a hero. Not one person. And, one week on, I still can’t.

There are people who have played a role in politics who I admire. Thatcher would be an obvious choice for the erstwhile ex-Tory in me, and I do admire her single minded determination and her refusal to be brow beaten by an often virulent and vile opposition. That said, she did make mistakes, and ultimately disappeared into her own her own legend and lost power as a result. She can’t be a hero, she is too flawed.

Likewise, I admire Lyndon Johnson. He was a ruthless political pragmatist, someone who clawed his way up to being US President and managed to win one of the most spectacular victories in US history despite the many problems he had in presenting himself to the media. Above all, he was responsible for taking the practical steps that ended segregation and advanced civil rights so much in the US. Martin Luther King and John Kennedy may have talked about it, but it was actually Johnson who did it. But again, there is a flipside to Johnson. He was the president who sleep walked his way through foreign policy and as a result escalated the Vietnam War to the point where America could not win. And the stories of his womanising and of his boorish behaviour, such as conducting meetings with aides whilst he was on the toilet and flashing his genitalia to other men to prove how well endowed he was, do little to endear him to me. Lyndon Johnson – hero in some areas, irrevocably flawed in others.

Whilst I primarily bang on about politics on this blog, music is also an important part of my life. And there are musicians I admire. Morrissey, for example, displays a wit and an eloquence that has seldom been matched in modern music. But I really struggle with the undertones of racism and child abuse that pervade some of his music. And I do feel that anyone who, from the deepest reaches of middle age, has as the refrain to the lead single of their last album, “As I live and breathe, you have killed me, you have killed me/Yes I walk around, somehow, but you have killed me, you have killed me” probably needs to realise that they are no longer a teenager. I also like some of the music of David Bowie, but his eclecticism is sometimes too much for me. “Let’s Dance”? No thanks, Dave. “Rock And Roll Suicide”? Now you’re talking. Even the likes of Manic Street Preachers are flawed – their politics is heartfelt and eloquently expressed, but is overwhelming negative and naively left wing.

As a would be/wannabe writer, there are writers and scriptwriters that I admire. Russell T. Davies, Stephen Volk, Nigel Kneale, Dennis Potter, J G Ballard, Iain Banks and Tony Marchant are the names that spring to mind. But all of those authors have created work that I am less than fond of, and I would maintain that it is more healthy for a writer to try and carve out there own identity rather than slavishly follow a literary hero.

And there are people in my personal life who I admire and have personality traits that I would aspire to. But that doesn’t mean I want to be like them, and doesn’t mean they are heroes to me.

Which I suppose indicates where I am coming from with this post. For me – rightly or wrongly – I feel that the word hero is pretty much synonymous with worship. I don’t have a hero because there is no-one that I know of that I feel I could worship. At the end of the day – as my summing up of Johnson and Thatcher shows – we are all human beings, so whilst we may have a lot of good features, we also have flaws. There is a lot I can learn and a lot I can take from both people and I know and people I know of. But that does not make them heroes, because no-one is perfect. It may sound arrogant, and I don’t mean it to, since if the question had been “who do you admire”, then I could spieled off a list that lasts for hours.

But, as I always say at the end of this type of post, that is enough navel gazing. Normal service (ie calling our leaders an ancient slang word for a particular part of the female anatomy) will be resumed as soon as possible.

Cameron on Education

The Times announces that Call Me Dave Cameron has decided to announce education policies for his party. Actually, no, scratch that, he has decided to pontificate and procrastinate to avoid having to announce any policies on education. Nothing revelatory in that I know, but let’s take a look at what Cameron says. Because it neatly sums up the fundamental problem I have with him.

Cameron has attacked parents who don’t look after their children. He says:

“If a child is eating too much, it’s the duty of a parent to stop it happening. Allowing harmful behaviour as the price of a quiet life is grossly selfish and irresponsible. Being a good parent isn’t just a gift to your child but to the whole of society.”

Semantically, I would argue that being a good parent is a duty rather than a gift, but I pretty much agree with with what Cameron says. And with this:

“Communities have an important role in bringing up children. Collective disapproval is a powerful tool in regulating behaviour and establishing social norms. If children are misbehaving, we should say something.”

Sure, communities are important. I would say that I would not be willing to chastise a misbehaving child for fear of violent retribution from the kid or from the parent, but I do believe the community, along with the parents and the education system, have a role to play. I can even support this statement conditionally:

“The great challenge for the 1970s and 1980s was economic revival. The great challenge in this decade and the next is social revival.”

I think the Iraq War, social inclusion and the EU will also be great challenges moving forward, but I agree that social revival is something that should be addressed and has utterly failed to be addressed by Nu Labour.

But where Cameron completely fails is to suggest exactly how we are going to bring about social revival, about how we are going to improve parenting and how we are going to involve communities in ensuring the better upbringing of children. What are the policies going to be, Dave? How are you going to bring about the change? Because this is all so much making the right noises to avoid making the right policies.

This latest pronouncement simply shows that all of his critics are right about Cameron – he is all spin and no substance. Because he was not announcing policy, but rather a childhood inquiry – in other words, an inquiry that may come up with some policies. Possibly. At some point in the future. It is just not good enough for any party leader, let alone the leader of the Conservative Party, to have no policies. The fact that Blair has been doing it for over a decade does not matter. It is just not good enough - and the state of Britiain today proves that.

And I don’t think this sort of thing will help Cameron at all in the future. Because if I was in the Labour party HQ right now, I would spinning to the press that Cameron – the Tory toff leader – has just discovered, from his ivory tower upbringing and sainted life to date, that there is a problem with parts of our society. But because he has no real understanding of the problems because he has only just discover them, he cannot do anything other than talk about them rather than offer any sort of solution whatsoever.

Bond v. Borat

I managed to miss both Casino Royale and the Borat film at the cinema on their release last year but have recently seen them both on DVD. And whilst I was pleasantly surprised by the former, the latter was puerile, unimaginative and utterly pointless crap.

There are spoilers ahead, by the way.

I never had a problem with Daniel Craig as James Bond - his selection comes from what I would call the Christopher Eccleston school of casting*. But he was more impressive than even I thought he would be in lead role. The character of Bond is also very different to the way he has been placed by Craig's predecessors - even Dalton's more hard-edged incarnation. Craig's Bond was arrogant, petulant and almost a bit spoilt - Lynd got it right when she described this Bond as having a chip on his shoulder. You believe that Craig's Bond is a trained, ruthless killer. But Craig also convinces that he is naive, and just starting as a Double O agent. There is an edge of youthful arrogance to any secret agenct who would invade a foreign embassy on foreign soil by himself, and then kill a man before blowing the embassy up. But not take into account that the entire moment might be recorded on CCTV.

However it was more than just Craig's performance that made the film good - the action sequences were more believable than in the previous instalments. Above all else, they seemed to hurt and whilst seeing Bond battered and bruised got tiresome after a while, the casual brutality of the film is very much in keeping with the voyeuristic sadism of the original Bond novels. And it was nice to see not only Bond not kill the Bond villian but also not end the film with the Bond girl - whilst the suicide of Lynd was straight out of the novel, the line from Craig ("The job's done and the bitch is dead") was far more convincing and interesting than the normal innuendo that has ended almost every other film before (such as "who says Christmas only comes once a year").

The Borat film, however, was a massive disappointment. In fact, I would go to say it was a bag of shite. The original Borat segments in Da Ali G Show were very entertaining, not just because Cohen managed to get people to say outrageous things using the Borat persona, but also because of the patronising attitudes displayed by almost everyone he interviewed. The first major problem with the film was the decision of the film makers to also patronise the Borat character. Talk of the village rapist and how his sister was the fourth best prosititute in the country may be mildly shocking, but it is nothing more than a cheap shot. The borderline racism on display in the film is so outrageous that if cannot be taken seriously, but I was left wishing that they had tried to come up with something a little more subtle than the joke about a cow living in the bedroom.

The interviews with Americans in the film were also disappointing. For a start, they made up much less of the film's already short running time than I thought they would. And also they failed to convince me that the Americans were the ignorant racists that they are so often painted to be by the European media. It was not for a lack of stupid or moronic comments from the Americans - there were quite a few of them on display. It was more the fact that the they were clearly staged - especially the interview with the students. The original sketches worked well because they got people's real thoughts and real personalities - it all becomes a bit pointless if you have to get people to act.

And finally, as mentioned above, the humour on display in the film left a lot to be desired. It was not just the casual racism - the jokes in the film were about as subtle and understated as full blown nuclear warfare. Maybe I am being snobby, but I need something more than two men (one of whom is so fat that he has clear man-boobs) wrestling naked and then chasing each other through a hotel to make me laugh. Watching the film made me wonder what their target demographic was, and made me conclude that it was teenage boys aged between fourteen and a half and fifteen who still find fart jokes to be the very pinnacle of humour.

I'm glad I missed Borat at the cinema - to shell out £10 on a ticket to see that pile of wank would have really, really irritated me...

*In tribute to the casting of Eccleston - with close cropped hair and in a leather jacket - as the Doctor. A controversial decision at the time but vindicated when the end results were seen and proving that casting an actor to play a lead role gets a better performance than casting someone the public feels should be playing the lead role.

People, Move On

John Prescott, Deputy Prime Minister Without Portfolio, has actually managed to do something. Shocking, I know, but don’t worry – what he says is total bollocks.

“An annual commemoration day is to be held to recall Britain's role in the slave trade, and the fight against it, John Prescott, the deputy prime minister, has told the Guardian.”

How can John Prescott – a man stripped of all political responsibility because of his inability to keep his wedding tackle in his no doubt voluminous pants – announce anything, even a commemoration day? Or is his new job spokesman for the Labour Party? Is he now the man who announces policy when the spokesperson for the Labour Party is off sick?

“He expected the day to be held in common with the rest of Europe in June so that modern day slavery - human trafficking - could also be recalled and combated.”

Right, and how would remembering something that happened 200 years ago help us to combat the different issue of modern day human trafficking? Wouldn’t it be better to spend the money that would be spent on a day of commemoration for the distant past on enabling the police force to better track down and stop those involved in human trafficking? Or is that too practical and close to common sense for Nu Labour?

“He likened slavery to the Holocaust and expressed his deep personal regret.”

Why oh why oh why does Prescott feel the need to express his personal regret? Really, why? I mean, unless he is 200 years old and was involved in the slave trade, his “deep personal regret” is utterly meaningless. Prezza has far more pressing things that he should be expressing his deep, personal regret for. Such as being John fucking Prescott.

He says:

“"Like the Holocaust, we are learning to talk about the slave trade openly and more honestly. Tragic and terrible as it was, the slave trade defied anyone to discuss it because it was so horrendous."”

People probably talk more about the Holocaust because it is within living memory. There are still people living who have first hand experience of the death camps, and there are still people living who helped to liberate those camps. The slave trade is not in living memory – what, with it having ended 200 years ago (I know I keep on mentioning the 200 years bit, but it is quite fundamental). I think that – more than anything else – is what stifles discussion.

“"We need to get the proper history told, including the good, the bad and dreadful.””

Proper history is being told – in schools, in books, in pubs, just about everywhere – it is just this is the first time that Prezza has taken notice that there is a thing called history.

“The Ghanaians said 'We don't want apologies. We want people to think what we can do to help us. What our ancestors did was horrific, but everyone feels we need to learn and move on from that experience'."”

I’ve highlighted the key phrase. You know what? I think we have learnt the fundamental lesson from slavery – namely that it was abhorrent. So let’s move on from the events of two centuries ago!

“Mr Prescott said the climate of awareness in Britain was changing, pointing out that black youngsters in St Pauls, Bristol, had demanded that the name of the new shopping centre should not be called Traders or Merchants.”

For fuck’s sake, unless the shopping centre is actually going to be involved in the slave trade, I cannot see a problem with them using the words “Traders” or “Merchants” since I am guessing they are using the words in their modern sense.

“He said it was vital that the government went ahead with changing the national education curriculum so that there was a proper presentation of slavery in its true abhorrent sense.”

The last person who needs to be pissing about with national education curriculum is John Prescott - a man who cannot be trusted with anything – even a grace-and-favours home. And a man who cannot string a sentence together, preferring instead to speak with his fists.

John Prescott is simply trying to show he is still relevant by banging on about something that the left-wing in this country would normally care about. But instead Prezza is achieving something else, albeit unintentionally.

He is showing how much of a tit he is.

Dissing The Dead

I have been meaning to do this for a while, but the original (and subsequent) post disappeared. But thanks to the sterling work of CoralPoetry, I have a copy of Terry Hamblin’s reprehensible and sickening attack on Sally Clark on the occasion of her premature death. So here we go, a fisk of the latest person to earn The Appalling Strangeness’s Worthless Cunt tag.

He begins:

“Sally Clark, the mother who was imprisoned for 3 years for killing her two infant sons, but later released following a campaign to discredit the medical witness against her”

Nope, following a campaign to prove her innocence. The discrediting of the medical witness was a pleasant and just side effect.

“has died under suspicious circumstances.”

Well, no, she died before her time. May not be usual. But is hardly unprecedented. Or that suspicious.

“News outlets are hinting at suicide”

Actually, the news outlets I saw quoted a family source who said Sally had been in poor health for some time, but don’t let details stand in your way, there, Terry.

“and that she was known to have had an alcohol problem and to have been a depressive.”

What, so everyone who is a depressive and/or an alcoholic commits suicide, then? Is that what you are trying to hint at? Because alcoholism and depression are very (and perhaps increasingly) common and to my knowledge, there has not been a sudden or proportionate rise in the number of suicides. Perhaps it is just easy for the likes of Terry to judge those who suffer from those problems. Rather than try to understand or empathise with them.

“So far response in the correspondence columns of the major newspapers has been that the ordeal of unjust imprisonment had driven her to it.”

Again, no proof of suicide. The general implication of the coverage and commentary on Sally’s premature death was that three years in prison, so soon after the deaths of her babies and with the stress and trauma of being classed as a child killer in one of our penal institutions, may have broken Sally. But fuck me, Terry, that would break all but the stoutest of hearts. How would you feel after the death of your children, being imprisoned for their murders, and then having to ensure the taunts of your fellow inmates and the constant threat of violence? I am guessing: not great.

“I wonder. Perhaps she was possessed by guilt that she really had killed her kids and remorse that she had brought down two eminent professors of paediatrics in getting the decision reversed.”

Already dealt with this. But I would reiterate - I hope Sally did not give a flying fuck about the ignorant medical charlatans who condemned falsely to two life sentences.

“I have not followed the case closely”

So why, *precisely*, do you feel you can comment on it so negatively just after Sally Clark died?

“but it seems to me that anyone who attacks motherhood is on a hiding to nothing, even if the mother is a lawyer.”

What?

What the fuck?

The false conviction of Sally Clark was not an attack on motherhood. It was an attack on Sally Clark. And as the woeful expert witness career of Roy Meadow shows, people are more than willing to convict mothers. Also, Sally was a solicitor, not a lawyer. Small point, I know, but still important, I would argue.

“There has been a prolonged and vituperative attack on the concept of Munchausen-by-proxy”

Which, by my understanding, is a symptom (albeit a highly destructive and awful symptom) of a wider mental disorder rather than a disease in itself. Making Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy the motive for double murder is a flawed diagnosis.

“and the doctor who videoed a mother harming her child in hospital was attacked for an intrusion into privacy.”

Yep, quick question, but what *precisely* does the above have to do with Sally Clark? It is an entirely separate incident, and entirely separate case. It has nothing to with the argument, and is irrelevant to the erroneous and flawed conviction of Sally Clark and her subsequent tragic death. The doctor in the case mentioned above was attacked for getting it right. The doctor(s) in the Sally Clark case got it wrong.

“It may be that Sally Clark was entirely innocent.”

Uh-huh, that was the conclusion of the court when the full facts of the case came to light.

“I suspect we will never know the truth.”

Perhaps not. So maybe we should go with the judgment of the court after, at the risk of repeating myself, the full facts of the case came to light.

“However, being declared innocent by a court doesn't make you innocent any more than being declared guilty by a court makes you guilty.”

Absolutely right. But what is your alternative, Terry? Because in this country, being declared innocent means you are innocent. For libel purposes, anyway.

“I rather suspect that more people are falsely declared innocent than are falsely declared guilty.”

Yep, the concept of “beyond reasonable doubt”, designed to save the innocent from circumstantial evidence. And if the full evidence had been known when Sally was first on trial I believe she would never have been convicted.

To publish this sort of hurtful, ignorant bullshit so soon after the death of someone is offensive in the extreme. I have no issue with calling people, such as our Dear Leader, total cunts. But – if they didn’t have far better things to do that construct retorts to a right-wing ranter – those people have the right of reply. I would never, ever, publish a mix of insults and total lies on the occasion of the death of the likes of Blair or Miliband.

And you know the reason why? I still see those people as human beings – stupid, flawed, fuckwitted twats, to be sure – but still human beings. So when they die, I will show them some respect, because they were humans at the end of the day, and will have loved ones who will mourn their passing. I can empathise with that. Because I still have some sort of emotional connection with the human race.

However, judging by these crass comments, Hamblin has no emotional connection to humanity. And it is the same as the cold, brutal emotional detachment from fellow humans that allowed Meadow to spout the statistical bollocks that allowed Sally Clark to be convicted in the first place.

Job Vacancy

See here for details.

The vacancy will need to be filled by, oh, say, mid-summer and competence and experience are apparently not pre-requisites for this job.

A warning from across the Atlantic

A highly successful Chancellor who oversaw a stable economy in a prosperous Western democracy, who clashed with the head of government, and who then become Prime Minister, only to struggle in the role, lose an election and leave office in acrimony.

It's been done before, Mr Brown.

The Tax Cut That Costs Me More

Apparently Gordon Brown has reduced income tax. The concept of our Dour Drip of a Chancellor actually doing something that will save me money left me frankly incredulous, so I was grateful to the BBC for setting up this calculator to show what benefit - or lack thereof - I will actually get from Brown's latest attempt to hide his staggering fiscal incompetence. And - oh, what a fucking surprise - I will actually end up, through indirect taxes, paying more.

Sheesh. Those Nu Labour stealth taxes are now so fucking obvious that even the toothless, terrified BBC has caught on to them.

The worst thing is I should be postively affected by this budget. If this is Brown's big pitch to be as green as Hug A Husky Cameron, then I should be up on the deal. I don't have a car, let alone a "gas guzzling car", and my morbid fear of flying means I am not overly fond of getting on a plane. Whilst I am not an environmentalist by any stretch of the imagination and actually think a lot of the climate change talk is a load of half baked bollocks, my carbon foot print is actually minimal. Brown should be encouraging people to be like me, since my only real taxable vice is the occasional over-indulgence in cheap lager. But no, I - like almost every one else in this country, I am guessing - have been shafted by the shifty, misanthropic, power hungry cretin who lives at Number 11 Downing Street.

All this budget reveals is the fact that Brown's entire career - from the moment he got his grubby digits on a Parliamentary seat through to this budget - has been about Gordo becoming Prime Minister. He is not willing to do anything that will upset his chances to get into Number 10. So he will not take any of the difficult decisions involved in cutting government expenditure - such as cutting back in pointless government schemes or employees - for fear of upsetting his ministerial colleagues or raising the unemployment figures. But equally he has no issue with telling people that he has cut taxes, even when this is an out and out lie. Look at this budget. He has dropped income tax for a lot of people. But he has not missed a single opportunity to fleece even more cash from the people in any other possible way. The man is a two-faced, arrogant, deceitful cunt - he is no different from the used car salesman who tries to con you into buying into him with a mix of false promises, mis-informed statistics, and downright lies. Except the used car salesman will have more charisma.

Brown's final budget should be a good thing - the last time we have to endure his evasions, spin and downright lies and pay for them afterwards. But the alarming thing is that the next budget will almost certainly see Brown not just in charge of the Treasury, but the country as a whole.

Now that sends a shiver down my spine.

Veils

Because it is one of the stories of the day, the Moai and I have been having a bit of a debate about the decision to let schools ban veils. And in spite of agreeing with a lot of the arguments for banning veils in schools I cannot agree with the decision.

I completely agree that veils can represent a more fundamentalist side to Islam. I agree that they make security and identification very difficult (see here for a topical example). I agree that they also make communication and integration very difficult. And I know that some of our leading educational organisations have already taken action to ban the niqab and the burka. But I still do not think they should be banned.

It is different to asking a motorcyclist to remove his helmet when they come into a building for identification purposes. And it is different to asking someone not to a cross. Because Muslim women wear the niqab and the burka for religious reasons. Because of their faith, they do not feel they have a choice.

And this is fundamentally about freedom of expression rather than more pragmatic and practical considerations. I think those who wear the niqab or the burka should know that it does make communication and integration more difficult. They should also be aware that in our traditionally Anglo-Saxon, Christian culture there will be prejudice and stigma attached to wearing a veil. But you know what? If you make them aware of the above and the strength of their religious convictions is still strong enough to make them want to wear a veil then they should be allowed to do so.

The simple fact is that we do live in a multi-cultural society where there are disparate religions and other beliefs that may appear alien to the traditional British values (whatever they maybe) but unless you are willing to embrace the barmy far right, neo-Nazi politics of the BNP then multi-culturalism is here to stay. So rather than banning people for adhering to the rules of their religions, let’s try to find ways around the problems and issues that may arise.

Sally Clark and Sir Roy Meadow Part II

Well, I was going to do a determined fisk of Terry Hamblin's attack on Sally Clark just after her death, but there is a problem. Namely that the post has vanished. The url is inactive, and there is nothing on Hamblin's blog anymore. May be the negative reaction to his appallingly insenstive and crass comments was too much for Hamblin, and he has decided to go back to wittering on about technical medical issues. Which I suppose is a shame - I am not a fan of censorship in any form, even self-censorship.

However DK has quoted the most insulting of Hamblin's comments on Sally Clark, namely:

"Perhaps [Clark] was possessed by guilt that she really had killed her kids and remorse that she had brought down two eminent professors of paediatrics in getting the decision reversed."

Um, yeah, well, it would be worth pointing out that when the full results of the autopsy into the death of her second son were revealed and when Roy Meadow's statistics were dismissed Sally Clark's conviction was quashed. In other words, she was innocent. She didn't kill her kids. I accept the court may have got it wrong in setting her free as courts are fallible, but from my limited layman's knowledge it appears that Sally was innocent and her imprisonment was a gross miscarriage of justice. The decision was reversed based on evidence.

And I very much doubt that Sally was worried about bringing down two eminent professors not least because they actually brought themselves down. In Roy Meadow's case by getting it wrong time and time and time again.

But the simple truth is I don't care whether Hamblin thinks Clark murdered her children. Hell, he is entitled to his own viewpoint, so as far as I am concerned he can believe that evil pixies came from Outer Mongolia to kill those two boys. What I do object to is the timing - there is no way that Hamblin should have voiced his ill-informed and obnoxious opinions so soon after Sally Clark's death was announced. To do so simply heaps further insult and unhappiness on a family that has been torn apart by the death of children, then the unjust imprisonment of the mother, and then the premature death of the mother. I wonder how Hamblin would feel if he lost a loved one, only to find a blog somewhere that accuses that loved one of terrible crimes.

There were other parts of Hamblin's post that riled me, such as the veiled accusation that Clark may have killed herself (before any autopsy or inquest) and also the tenuous link between depression, alcoholism and child killing. But as the post doesn't exist anymore and I can't quote directly from it, I will leave it.

However I would note that Hamblin's writings displayed all the cold and clinical disassociation from reality and from human feelings and suffering that Sir Roy Meadow also showed when he helped innocent women be sent to prison with ill thought out and poorly researched statistics.

Joining the Labour Party!

No, not really. I am not joining NuLabour.

But after a really rather good weekend I was feeling fairly pacified, and felt that perhaps this blog could turn more towards the reflective, reasoned posting of say Disillusioned and Bored or Dizzy Thinks fpr a while. But, alas, no, unfortunately reality has intervened, and I’ll be turning my attention to profane ranting at least the next couple of posts. One target on the list is the compellingly odious Terry Hamblin, who, via CoralPoetry (an interesting blog in itself and well worth checking out), I note took the occasion of Sally Clark’s death to speculate on whether guilt over actually having murdered her children forced her to commit suicide. But first I wanted have a look at my old friend, The Labour Party.

In particular, Mr Rob Henderson, who sent me a letter today asking me to rejoin the Labour Party.

Christ knows how he got my address, but I am guessing it came through some sort of breach of the Data Protection Act. After all, as we know, the laws of the land do not affect the Labour party. But I find begging letters from the Labour party staggering – I can understand why the Tories would do it, as I was once an activist. But why oh why oh why would Blair et al bother?

Henderson writes:

“I’m going to get straight to the point – I want you to rejoin the Labour Party.”

I’m sorry, but who are you? I have scoured my brains and realise I neither know – nor have ever known – a Rob Henderson. So why the fuck would I listen to your advice Rob? I often ignore the advice of my parents, and I have known them for 28 years! Why the frig fuck would I listen to the ramblings of some tit-wit who has just mastered the art of the mass mailer and the auto-signature? Your opening sentence is half-baked marketing bullshit, designed to get my attention. Instead it got nothing but my utter, lasting, contempt.

And I am sorry, rejoin? I have a relatively good memory, and never been a member of the Labour party. Sure, I had a flirtation with the student Labour party when I first went to uni, but soon ran away when I realised that the existing members were utter cockmonkeys with their naïve heads up their naïve arseholes. I never bothered to join, because that would have wasted valuable beer money. So quite where, as someone who recently left the Tory party because the Tories are too left wing, you get the idea that I would want to rejoin a party I have never ever been a member of is completely and totally beyond me.

But rest assured, Rob, you have *really* raised your credibility with an inaccurate and patronising first sentence.

Henderson goes on with his campaign to get me to fork out my hard earned cash on a party that I wouldn’t piss on if it was on fire by mentioning the Tories. Yep, 10 years on, and Nu Labour are still carping on about the Tory governments. Henderson writes:

“(Let me) remind you of how things were under the Tories – 3 million out of work, the miner’s strike, interest rates of over 15%...”

Let me remind you, Bob, of the fact that I am 27. I don’t remember the miner’s strike. I don’t remember 3 million out of work. I only have a faint recollection of interest rates of over 15%. You shouldn't remind me of stuff I don’t remember, because it makes you look like a total dick. Sure, I have read a lot about politics, not least because of my degree, so I will acknowledge the Thatcher and Major administrations were not flawless. But I will also point out that there were a lot of successes, such as the sale of council houses, the sale of some grossly inefficient government owned industries, (conditionally) the Falklands War and also the strong economy handed over by Ken Clarke to Gordon Brown – which, despite the sterling attempts of the latter to fuck it up, is still doing OK today. Maybe the fact that I don’t remember it all gives me a level of understanding you lack, Robbie, because I can put the Tory years from 1979 to 1997 into perspective and say, on balance, that they were a success.

But in fairness our *new friend* Rob realises that banging on about the Tories is not enough to win me over.

“Perhaps I could tell you about all the new hospitals? How we’ve built or started to build over 100 hospitals in the last 10 years…”

You could. I would point to Hazel Blears (Chairperson of the Labour Party and potentially Deputy Labour Leader and Deputy Prime Minister) protesting against hospital closures.

“Have you got children? Then I could tell you all about family credits, SureStart, paternity leave and trust funds.”

No, I haven’t got children. But damned good assumptions again there, Rob.

“But maybe that doesn’t fit in with you and your life.”

No, really?

“Not every issue or story resonates with every person, and just listing things that we’ve done is a bit of an insult to your intelligence.”

Not one of your issues resonates with me. In fact, I am not sure that any one of your issues has a basis in reality. But I would argue that sending me this frigging letter in the first place is far more insulting to my intelligence than the shite contained within.

But Rob is one step ahead of me again, and realises that statistics might not work. So instead he starts carping on about the cynicism of the modern age.
“These days it is so easy to be cynical about things- politics in particular. It’s easy to demonise people for one mistake, or to reel off powerful-sounding headlines about one new ‘crisis’ or another, without thinking about the bigger picture. It’s easy to isolate the negative…”

Hell, with the ten years of Tony Blair, you cannot help but trip over the fucking negative. It is everywhere. You want a detailed list? Not got the time. But some edited highlights:

The Petrol crisis, Ron Davies, Foot and Mouth, Peter Mandelson, David Blunkett, the Iraq War, David Kelly, Charles Clarke, John Reid, the Good Friday Agreement and Cash For Peerages.

Jesus, Major wasn’t great. But he is streets ahead of the fucktard Blair.

“What I’m trying to say, is that it can be easy to forget.”

Unless it comes to controversial Tory policies, Rob, in which case you have no problem in remembering.

But he goes on to say that people feel parties are not in touch with them, and only talk to them when there is an election in the offing. Well, yes, on some levels I understand and accept that parties will only talk to me when there is an election – after all, Sainsbury’s will only aspire to talk to me when I have some shopping to do. I have no issue with parties not listening to what I say – what I do care about it parties never listening to what I say but still going out and doing the wrong thing on my behalf.

Henderson does on to say that they are trying to take an interest, and that

“…those who criticise have to take some responsibility towards finding a solution.”

Uh-huh, and what does that have to do with joining the Labour party? The party who have utterly failed to find solutions for the past 10 years?

“For us to be effective, insightful grounded and ‘real’, we need your help. You need to tell us how to better, critically and constructively.”

Can do “critically”. Not sure about “constructively”. But here would be my three point plan for a better Labour party:

1. Blair resigns. Now.
2. Gordo takes over and calls a General Election.
3. Someone else wins that election.

“Change can sometimes be difficult, and it is easier to say I don’t care.”

Change is often difficult but, Rob, or which ever Labour party whore wrote this letter, what makes you think I don’t care? The fact I am not a member of the Labour party should be a massive indicator that I do care.

“Apathy doesn’t stand for election.”

Yes it does. It calls itself The Liberal Democrats.

“You can help to make change happen. You can chose our next leaders. You can set the agenda for the country, to make the policies and decisions that you want to see make our lives better. You can. If you want to.”

Yep. I can not join the Labour party, and I can vote for just about anyone else other than Labour at the next election.

Sally Clark and Sir Roy Meadow

I woke up on Saturday with the usual hangover and an odd, nagging feeling at the back of my mind. I was thinking about Sally Clark, and how terrible it must have been for her to go to prison for murdering her sons, even though she was innocent. As nightmare scenarios go, I could think of little worse than losing your children, then your freedom, and then your career. To be a convicted child killer is one of the worst possible things to be in a prison.

Then I wandered into the newsagent’s and saw the newspaper headlines saying Sally Clark had died.

The cause of death will be determined by the coroner and by a post mortem, but whatever it reveals, I am inclined to believe the family when they say she "never fully recovered" from the effects of the "appalling miscarriage of justice". Prison almost certainly broke Sally Clark, and the tragedy is even her exoneration and freedom could not lessen the impact of the years spent inside for murdering her children.

Her death is tragic, and leaves a terrible taste in the mouth of any right thinking person. It is tempting to look for scapegoats – something I would normally try to avoid. But this time there is someone who is definitely to blame. The arrogant, ignorant Sir Roy Meadow. This man was supposed to be an expert witness – someone who offers the jury the truth about what happened to Sally’s Clark’s boys. But, as An Englishman’s Castle so eloquently puts it, Meadow seems to have lacked even a basic understanding of statistics. Parents have been imprisoned because of Meadow’s evidence and supposed expert testimony. You could argue that to err is human, and that Meadow is living proof. But we have to accept that we are responsible for mistakes in this life, and Meadow’s punishment (being struck off) was utterly lacking – not least because it has now been over-turned!

The people who have had to bear the responsibility and punishments for Meadow’s mistakes are those who were convicted and imprisoned because of his evidence. Meadow himself has not had to face up to the devastating impact his intellectual crassness has had. It is one of the great injustices of our time that Sally Clark should have to pay such a hefty price – ultimately perhaps even with her life – for Meadow’s blunder. Whist the person who made the mistake(s) escapes effectively without punishment.

A+ for behaviour, B- for attitude

Just when you thought that is was only Hug A Husky Cameron who was being dissed by kids, the Moai found this rather good picture on the BBC:

Bottom left for anyone with poor eyesight...

Personally I think this kid, even though he is most probably an odious little shit, should be knighted for expressing the public disapproval of Blair in a far more succint and credible way than anyone in the Opposition parties. But this being the fucked up world of modern Britain he is probably now proudly sporting his own ASBO...

Red Nose Day

Oh Christ help us.

This is going to make me sound curmudgeonly, like an old man in the pub who rants away about how modern life is basically shite but I cannot fucking stand Red Nose Day. I cannot stand the dreadful, cheap piss that is foisted on the television and I cannot stand the shower of shits who are allegedly celebrities in this country trying to make utter dicks of themselves in the name of charity. You know what? Russell Brand doesn’t need Red Nose Day to make himself look like a total and absolute cock. He can do that just by being Russell Brand. And if someone really wants to give to charity they should just fucking go and do it quietly, and with a certain dignity. Not by buying a piece of crap red nose that even the most cash-strapped clown would reject as cheap tat. Today is Red Nose Day – I will spend it, as I always do, hoping that some fucktarded pseudo-celebrity drowns in a tub of beans.

In Red Nose Day – fuck the fuck off.

If you want it put a little more eloquently then I will refer you to this awesome quote from Tim in The Office:

“Don't get me wrong, I've got nothing against this sort of thing. It's a good cause, but I just don't want to have to join in with someone else's idea of wackiness, okay? It's the wackiness I can't stand. It's like, you see someone outside Asda collecting for cancer research because they've been personally affected by it, or whatever, I dunno, an old bloke selling poppies, there's a dignity about that. A real quiet dignity.”

Precisely.

Prime Minister Straw?

The Moai flagged this to me and asked the questions "What do you think? And, what about Jack vs Call-me-Dave?"

Well...

Jack Straw is not really a credible contender for leader. He was crippled and embarrassed by his demotion after the 2006 local elections. Sure, he has tried to push through Lords reform and sparked the whole debate on Muslim veils, but this is more him trying to hog the limelight rather than setting out a platform for being Prime Minister. And he has not aligned himself enough with Blair to be the Blairite candidate – we know Miliband, Milburn and Reid are all Blairite. We do not know who Straw supports – and if anyone is going to beat Brown it will be someone who can galvanise (rather than get grudging support from) the Blairites. It is not anyone bar Gordon for the Blairites – they know that person is David Cameron. It is someone who is more Blairite than Brown.

Straw v. Hug A Husky Cameron is more interesting. Straw is a more electable politician that the Dour Drip Brown, and could out perform Cameron in the Commons. However, whilst cartoonists have failed to be able to lampoon Cameron effectively, Straw will always be the Demon Headmaster to people. And he is very closely associated with Blair and the Iraq War – Brown has kept his distance from both, whereas Straw has not really turned against Blair even after his humiliating demotion from Foreign Secretary.

I still fear it will be Prime Minister Brown...

*Pretty* Polly

As advertised on the Kitchen, last night saw the frankly farcical sight of Polly Toynbee addressing the Conservative Bow Group. Yep, that’s right – the arch Social Democrat (or socialist, if you will), the Brown lover, the pie in the sky leftie that is Polly Toynbee addressed a Conservative meeting last night. It would be surreal, if it wasn’t so tragic.

I was there, along with DK, Trixy and Jackart. Sat in the corner of Committee Room Six in the Commons. To say there was more than a little hostility from our corner towards the *esteemed* speaker would be an understatement. But that’s not to say that it was simply anger we were directing at her. There was also quite a bit of pointing and laughing.

I was going to do a detailed analysis and critique of what Toynbee had to say, and her answers to the questions put to her, but I won’t. Simply because that would take too long, because, frankly, everything she said was wrong. Instead, I’ll just make a couple of points about some of the more egregiously crappy things that she said.

Firstly, Polly talked about redistribution of wealth and evening out the differences in society. She cited the Scandinavian example(s), where the consultant in a hospital earns a similar amount to the person cleaning the floors. Hmmmm…. Well, I don’t support redistribution of wealth, I think it is wrong to punish people for being successful and prosperous. But actually it is more fundamental than that. The consultant in the hospital who is going to operate on someone’s brain frankly should earn a hell of a lot more than the person wiping up shit in the corridor. He has more specialist skills and he has a far higher pressure job than the cleaner mopping up outside the operating theatre. What is wrong with rewarding people for doing a technical, specialist jobs? Can you really, really claim that the work done by the cleaner is as challenging and difficult as the work done by the consultant? And worth as much? Because if you can, you are a total twat.

Also, Polly claimed that people’s fear of tax rises was based around a fear of losing CEOs, as has occurred in her beloved Scandinavia. Erm, no, Polly. I couldn’t give a flying fuck where CEOs live. They can reside on the arsing moon for all I care. My dislike of tax rises is more based on my fear of the government wasting even more of my hard earned money on crap policies and crap schemes. And I don’t think I am alone in this – witness the Tory victory in 1992 General Election after the Labour party revealed their tax and spend plans. If the government cannot efficiently use the tax revenue they currently raise, then why on earth would anyone want to give them more money to waste?

And there is something very interesting about the way in which Polly views society and the success of individuals within that society. It seems to be purely based on earnings. The problem seems to be that the highest earners net so much more than the lowest earners. Success is based on how much money you earn. Well, personally, I rate success in life on more than just salary. Sure, I earn more than the median salary quoted by Pol last night. But not massive amounts more – and I certainly don’t earn anywhere near as much as those CEOs who seem to cause Polly such consternation. And you know what? I don’t care. Frankly those who act as CEOs deserve the money they earn. They pretty much give their lives to their jobs, and work exceptionally hard in high pressure roles that I know I could not cope with and have no interest in. They earn their money, Pol, and good luck to them.

Polly’s argument is not even based on class envy anymore – it is greed, it is based on jealously of salaries. Personally I am not greedy and vacuous enough to see money as the route of all happiness and success in their life. And I pity those who, as Polly seems to do, worship money above all else.

The end result of Toynbee’s ideas and policies is equality – everyone is equally miserable. Because as far as I can see she is not a Social Democrat, but rather a good ol’ table thumping, Red Flag waving, socialist. She proposes the great levelling – the government intervenes until everyone is earning the same. End any aspirations for individuals – no matter how hard you try, you will end up the same as the waster sat next to you on the train because, no matter what happens, no-one can be left behind.

Ultimately, as Jackart controversially noted last night, the socialist/social democratic countries may outstrip the UK in many of the parameters that Polly finds important, but they also beat us in another, unarguably bad, category.

They are better at suicide.

Soap Operas make me drink!

Mr Eugenides highlights the latest, evil, terrible scourge on the nation's youth - yes, it is true -soap operas are making our children drink by showing people drinking as part of every day life!

Bastards!

Of course I might point out that the actions of the shitheads and slags in Eastenders and dour northern cockmonkeys in Coronation Street are likely to be far more influential on the nation's youth than the shameless crack antics and coke antics of fashionable rock star Pete Doherty and fashionable model Kate Moss being constantly highlighted by the media. I might also point out that soap operas (at least nominally) claim to reflect reality - and unless the dead tree press is lying to me, heavy drinking is part of everyday life. So of course they show people drinking. And I could also point out, as a former retailer and liqour licence holder, that it is illegal for those under the age of 18 (the *youth*, if you will) to buy booze. So those who illegally sell drink to the youth may be more to blame than the soap operas.

But you know what? I think soap operas do make people drink - namely, me. That's right - Eastenders, Emmerdale et al make me drink. Not because they show boozing on screen, but because they are on screen. The fact that the only thing on TV before nine pm is aimless soap opera dross means I have to go out for beers every evening after work...

Rain falls, Like Elvis tears

You've gotta love the lyrics of Saint Etienne.

"Our Best Year Yet!"

Owing to the sort of comedy injury that only comes to the terminally clumsy like me, I had the joys of visiting an Accident and Emergency unit today. And what an experience. It made me very happy that so much of my tax goes to the NHS.

I knew it was going to take a while - I mean, no one going to Casualty can honestly think that they are going to be seen within an hour unless their heart has stopped. And even then it is probably still touch and go (no pun intended) that you will be seen with any degree of urgency. So I stopped off on the way to the hospital and bought a book to help kill the waiting time.

On arrival (and having passed through the labryinth of concrete walkways that makes up the route to A&E and also saps the soul of anyone doing the walk) I had to sit on a red chair waiting for the triage nurse. There were five red chairs, which was a small problem as there were at least seven people waiting to see the nurse. Fortunately there was more than one nurse on duty in triage, so I quickly got to see the the nurse. Well, I say quickly, it was actually about twenty minutes to half an hour. Which sounds like a lot, but given the three and a half hours that made up my hospital visit it was next to no time.

The nurse's detailed examination - that consisted of barking questions at me about how ill I felt and how to spell my name - was certainly worth waiting for. I felt particularly special when the triage nurse took me out back, shined a torch in my eye, and then thrust a form at me and told me to go to reception to get it typed up. Yep, that's right - the nurse's examination happens before you go to reception. Maybe the reason why the triage nurse displayed all the interpersonal skills of Pol Pot with depression was because the hospital ranked meeting her as the warm up to meeting the receptionist.

And the receptionist was far more charming than the triage nurse. But considerably less capable. Which was no mean feat, given all she had to do was type up my details. She needed every word spelling. I was genuinely suprised that she didn't ask me to spell the numeral "3". But we managed to get all the details, through the sort of sterling team work that had made Britain great. And then she said to me that a doctor would see me "soon".

Never before had I realised what a relative term "soon " is. Because not only did I get a hell of a lot of reading done, but I also managed to have the arbitrary, random thoughts that only the deeply, deeply bored can have. I thought about how it was great to live in a country where you can walk into a hospital and receive deeply poor service for free, and also how great it is to live in a country where you have the political freedom to come out and belly ache about that poor service on your blog. I thought about how poor most of the footwear worn by the doctors and nurses was - with one nurse wearing a pair of black shoes so worn down that her big toe was sticking through. I wondered why every tramp in the known world has that pungent reek of urine (do they actually pee in their trousers?). And I wondered why, in spite of everything TV sitcoms and kids comics have taught me, there is never, ever a boy with a saucepan stuck on his head in Casualty.

Then the seemingly impossible happened, and I got to see a doctor. Well, I am assuming she was a doctor. She took me deeper into the hospital and asked me some medical sounding questions, but she was also wearing this terrible pseudo leopard print trouser suit and seemed to speak less English that the Spanish cleaner at work who refuses to learn our language. However, through a rigorous examination consisting of asking the same arsing questions I had already answered for both the triage nurse and the fucking receptionist and then shining another bastard pencil torch in my pissing eyes, she decided I was ok. But probably needed an X-ray to be on the safe side.

Of course, having an X-ray meant waiting once again for another doctor. And said doctor - who X-rayed my now irritable and aching head - was so quiet that I did ponder whether he was actually mute. Another wait, and then it was the turn of Doctor Leopard Print Suit to confirm that the X-ray proved I was "probably OK", but might have a headache for a while longer (presumably she meant because of the wound on the side of my head rather than the pissing stress). Then the doctor wondered off, leaving me with no real knowledge of how to get out of the hospital and into the polluted London air I was now so desperately craving. I had to find a nurse to point me in the direction of the main exit.

That said, I guess I must be fine since I must have met with the whole staff at St Thomas's and no-one seem that worried. And having read the first 150 pages whilst waiting for medical attention, I can say that The Last King of Scotland is a damn good book.

School's Out

Via DK, I see our beloved government is making private schools “earn” their charitable status.

Hmmmm. It is difficult to see this government policy as anything other than an attack on private schools, which is kind of ironic as our Dear Leader attended a private school and also sends his sprogs to private schools. It does sound like an old Labour policy, and it is difficult to see what Bliar and the rest of the gaggle of wankers who make up his government hope to achieve with this latest policy.

I went to a private school (and quite a famous one at that) and can’t say I particularly enjoyed the experience. However that is not to say the experience was not beneficial to me – I learnt a great deal, and now find myself in a position where I can deal pretty much with anyone in any situation (which I attribute to the *joys* of growing up in a private school environment). And my parents did not send me to a private school because they like spending thousands of pounds a year, but rather because they thought that the educational standards of a private school far outstrip the standards in the state schools*.

And here lies the key point – people spend thousands of pounds educating their kids because they want the best for their kids**. The value private schools can add to society is best shown by the fact that people will part with thousands of their hard-earned pounds to get that sort of education. No-one makes them do it – it is all down to personal choice.

If the government wants to end private schools, then it should try and make the state schools as good as those in the private sector. If people had faith in their kids getting educated properly in the local comp, then they would spend their money on something else. Sure, it may be next to impossible to get the average state school to match the facilities and educational experiences of the most impressive private school, but for fuck’s sake, the government could at least have an aspiration to try.

Which is my biggest problem with the government’s proposal. It does seem to be anti-private school, and the upshot may be that the proposal causes private schools to close. Instead of trying to even things out in a positive way by making state schools better, they try to even things out in a negative way by restricting choice.

Why the fucking hell can’t Nu Labour do something positive, rather than butting even further into the lives of its citizens and further restricting choice in Britain?

*Something which, from the stories my friends who teach in state schools have told me, is 100% correct.

**There may be a small number of people who send their kids to private school for class/snobbish reasons but in my experience the majority of parents just wanted the best for their off-spring, and spent money accordingly.

The Tooth Hurts

Gordon Brown proves himself to be a double hard bastard by having root canal work done without an anaesthetic. What a hero.

Except… no. Because according to the BBC it may not have hurt if the nerve tissue is dead, and the fact that the Chancellor was “perfectly relaxed” and “did not flinch or grimace at any stage” really does indicate that it did not hurt. And even if it did, you know what? Tough. Because if Gordo cannot organise had his dental surgery done on a different day to making a speech about “citizenship training for migrants” then how the frig fuck is he going to organise this country effectively on the dark day when he becomes PM?

UPDATE

This says pretty much the same thing, only a bit better.

Nuts About Hazel!

I would rather claw out my own eye balls and stomp on them whilst singing The Red Flag than see that chipmunked face anus as the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party and therefore our Deputy Prime Minister. But evidently others disagree with me, for you can buy Hazel Blears merchandise. If you want to, you can walk about wearing this T-shirt:




Of course, if you do want to wear this T-shirt, I fear you must have suffered some sort of tragic accident and some resulting major brain damage. It must only be the truly slack-jawed, inbred cock monkeys within the Labour party who would support the talentless Blears for leader, and it must only be the the supreme fucktards amongst those slack-jawed, inbred cock monkeys who would spend their hard earned cash on such a pointless, twee and deplorable item of clothing.


The Moai found this link. But hopefully he hasn't bought anything from there - otherwise I may have to set fire to him. But I take the Hazel Blears tat on sale at that website as proof that not only does God not exist, but if he did exist it would be solely to hate the human race that he has created.


This has made me irrationally angry. I need to go and lie down in a darkened room.

The Blunkett Effect

It happened to Straw and Blunkett and now it's happened to Reid; the transmutation, in the Home Office, of an MP from a vaguely sensible career politician to swivel-eyed nutter frothing at the mouth. I dub it, the Blunkett Effect.

Via Surreptitious Evil, I learn that The Appalling Strangeness is not blocked in China.

I can't think of anything to say other than "oh."

Ourobouros

The Nameless One started out posting to my old, now defunct blog, and now he's invited me to contribute to his. I humbly accept.

I'm still going to be a cantankerous lefty, though.

Hot Fuzz

Finally got around to seeing Hot Fuzz last night and after careful consideration I would judge it as "Ok".

It is too long, a little uneven and some of the jokes are very obvious (but in fairness you are always going to be disappointed if you go into a film like Hot Fuzz expecting high brow humour). But it is worthwhile, and it is nice to see a British comedy flick that isn't written by Richard Curtis - and also nice to see Timothy Dalton working again.

The problem is that it will inevitably be compared to Shaun of the Dead - and Shaun of the Dead is a much better film. Funnier, more original and more punchy (also with zombies - a big benefit in my book), Shaun of the Dead also has a much more likable lead character. In Hot Fuzz Nicholas Angel is a super cop - a little up tight, sure, but generally brilliant at everything he tries to do. In Shaun of the Dead Shaun is a lazy, drunken ordinary bloke who is drifting through life without realising it. I think most people will find it far easier to relate to Shaun than to Nicholas, and that makes Shaun of the Dead a far easier film to buy into (in spite of the zombie invasion...)

So if you haven't seen Hot Fuzz at the cinema, I would wait until it comes out on DVD.

Neon Bible

Today is quite an exciting day, at least in my world - although I did not realise it until I wandered into HMV on my lunch break. For today The Arcade Fire release their new album.

I've not heard any of the tracks as yet, and for all I know it could be utter rubbish. My enthusiasm is based mainly on their previous effort - Funeral.


Whilst it was released in 2005 I only got around to buying a copy of it in summer last year, and pretty much fell in love with it straight away. Don't worry, I am not going to bang on about the whys and the hows but if you like eclectic indie rock (stuff like Eels, for example) then the chances are that you will love Funeral.

Political Miis

Disillusioned and Bored has had a go at representing the party leaders in a new way, and is running a contest to see whether anyone can come up with any better ones.

Now, I wonder whether anyone will have a go at capturing the handsome good looks of Nick Griffin?

“Isn’t that right, Donkey?”

The Moai found this really rather startling link (Lord alone knows what he was looking for...) It is difficult to highlight one particular phrase as it is all really eye opening but particular bits that stand out to me are "dressed in latex and handcuffs", "this charge was later dropped when the defendant said that it was the donkey who caused that damage" and "he was fined €2,000 for bringing the donkey to the room under the Unlawful Accommodation of Donkeys Act 1837."

Go read it now. It is going to be a damned sight more interesting than anything else that appears on this blog today.

Insult of the day

"I just can’t bring myself to do anything for that fat, lazy, boring, twitching, unfunny, uncharismatic, cunty cunty cunt of a prize cunting twatting cock fucking cunt."

Brilliant stuff!

The Follies of Youth

Via Mr Eugenides and the BBC, proof that Tony Blair (back row, third from right) is a wanker:

Wrecking the Party Part II: The Tories Strike Back

My post on damaging the chances of a Conservative win by not voting for them has created some debate. Matt’s Musings on the subject have caught my eye, and, indeed, the Devil’s ire.

Matt starts:

“Jackart, DK and the Nameless One are in a fight over the UKIP again.”

Really wouldn’t classify it as a fight, Matt. More of a debate – a semantic difference I know, but important nonetheless. Broadly speaking I would say that the Dude, DK and I agree on a great deal, and it is more the details that we debate and disagree on. I would say that we save the fighting for the likes of Terry Kelly…

Matt comments on how the Tory Party develops their policies:

“This assumes that the Conservative party's policy comes down from on high and that members should passively take or leave the opinions of the parliamentary party.”

Yes, that is pretty much how it happens in my experience. The Built To Last document (or Pile of Arse as I would rather call it) was put to a vote within the party, but there was zero consultation with me as a (then) party member prior to sending out the document and was presented very much as a fait accompli. At a local level I was able to express opinions but I never laboured under the delusion that, under the sheer weight of Tory membership and party bureaucracy, my voice would be heard.

“The actual challenge for someone with a view outside the political mainstream (the position we share on climate change is another example) is, in the end, to find the party whose approach to politics is most compatible with their own and then try to convince them of the merits of their position.”

Two things – firstly, I would say that I am not outside of the political mainstream. Sure, I have some fairly rightwing views on the EU, but I am not alone in those views in this country. I don’t have any polling data to hand, but I reckon membership of the EU is not massively popular in this country – and likely to get less and less popular as time goes by (and would get far worse if the media actually managed to get round to reporting the impact of EU influence on day to day life in the UK). Nu Labour and the Nu Tories are representing the middle ground – a small part of the spectrum of British Politics. The fact that I am not in that narrow centre ground does not mean that I am not in the political mainstream.

Secondly, I found the party that was most (but not entirely) compatible with my own views and thinking. I was in broad agreement with Michael Howard’s Conservative Party. However, I feel that the Tories have changed so much under Cameron that they are not longer compatible with my views and I cannot, on points of principle (I realise principles in politics are unfashionable in this post Blair era), remain a member. And in terms of finding another party that fits my views – well, UKIP is the closest.

“If you do not like the leadership's position on the European Union then convince the membership and, at the next leadership election, you can get the kind of leaders you want.”

Yeah, um, think you are over-estimating the impact one Tory party member can have. I spent a lot of my time trying to persuade other members of the validity of my positions but it did not stop the party from electing the ideological vacuum that is David Cameron as party leader. Sure, you could argue that, as a Davis supporter at the last leadership election there is an element of sour grapes seeping into my thinking. But I find the assertion that a member can influence the vast array of people in the party enough to influence the outcome of a leadership election staggeringly naïve.

“As such, the only reason to leave the Conservative party is if you think its members aren't those who will be easiest to convince of your position (they're easily the most Eurosceptic portion of the population so that seems unlikely) or if you think your cause is hopeless but would rather be screaming at the wind than be dirtied by the compromise of contact with the Conservatives.”

It is not just the EU, but as it stands I do feel like being in the Conservative party is like “screaming at the wind”. It has nothing to with the membership, but rather the leadership. From my conversations with people in the party, there is a widening gulf between what the members want and what the leadership does. At the moment, a lot of people are prepared to grin and bear it because of the positive poll results. But woe betide Cameron if the numbers change.

“Look at it this way: There are opportunity costs to the UKIP. Imagine if all the money, effort and people committed to the UKIP were, instead, within the Conservative party arguing and voting for change in its European policy. You wouldn't piss off loyal Tories by associating Euroscepticism with undermining right-wing electoral chances. What talent and funding UKIP possesses might be spent convincing people rather than on the paraphenalia of running a party.”

What does that tell you about the depth of feeling amongst those who have left the Tories and set themselves up to do the largely thankless, and certainly desperately difficult, job of setting up a new political party? And what makes you think that by setting up a party they are not trying to convince/influence people? I would say exactly the opposite is true. The reason why UKIP was set up was too convince people of the validity of their Euro-nihilistic ideas. Because the Tory party no longer supported such ideas. UKIP exists because people no longer have faith in the Tory party giving voice to their thinking on Europe.

And there is an undertone to this, and other pro-Tory arguments, of mindless veneration of the Tory party as an organisation. Almost as if UKIP are being rude and dis-respectful by not playing in the Tory camp. Well, bollocks. The Tory party exists to represent the views of their members. If cease to do so, as they are starting to for members on the right, then they should expect to lose members and for challenges to rise from new political parties. They – and no other political party – can or should assume support from voters or members. It is this arrogance that arguably led the Tories to their massive defeat in 1997.

“They replace their voice and vote with a threat, to hurt Conservative election prospects, but there is no evidence that this is a threat which the party responds to in the way UKIP would like.”

I can only speak for myself, but I am not threatening the Tory party at all. My vote is not a threat, it is and will be indicative of which party I feel best represents my views at the next election. Again, there is this arrogance seeping into the Conservative viewpoint. My vote is not directly tied in to supporting the Tory party or threatening the Tory party. It is based on who I think is best for the UK.

Put simply, if I were to vote for UKIP next time out, it would be because I think they best represent my views. It would not be to threaten the Tories or to get them to do anything in particular. It is a very Tory-centred view of politics that sees every vote as for or against the Tories, rather than supporting the party the vote is cast for.

I am not supporting the Tory party at the moment because they have ceased to speak for me. Pure and simple. It is not just the EU – there are a host of other issues I feel passionately about that the Tory party no longer either comments on or supports the same standpoint as me. And I do not venerate the Tory party, and will not support them regardlessly because I was once an active member. I have political principles that are far more important to me than being a member of a political party. This may mean I am not being pragmatic enough and I understand the “politics is the art of the possible” argument very well, but my principles out-strip the *pragmatic* at best (and downright wrong at worst) compromises that I would have to make to remain a Tory supporter under Hug A Husky Cameron.