Time To Wind Down

Now I have a real job* that actually requires me to think and, you know, do *stuff* it has become very difficult to maintain this blog with to the usual poor standards expected by my five or so regular readers. Therefore I think it is probably time to wind it down a bit.

I'm not saying that I am going to stop blogging here and will (time permitting) continue to write elsewhere but (unless the Moai enters a prolific spurt on here) then posting on The Appalling Strangeness will be intermittent at best and non-existent at worse. I'll only be posting when I have something incredibly wise or profound to say, or (more likely) when something really pisses me off.

So, for now, au revoir!

*Ok, ok, I had a real job before but I found it so unengaging and frustrating that I wanted to do bugger all work when in the office. And since no-one seemed to care when I did bugger all I naturally jumped on the opportunity...

Diary of the week

Malcolm Tucker is one of the great comedy creations of recent times – a brutal, shouting, sweary thug of man, trying to manage the nation’s media through bullying, censorship and intimidation. Of course, the scary thing about Malcolm Tucker is that he is based on a man who was at the centre of the NU Labour Project – Alastair Campbell.

Now if I were Campbell, then I would want my memoirs to perhaps show me in a slightly different light. Perhaps a wiser, more erudite character than the arrogant, bullying public façade so often presented in the media. I mean, he has already confessed that he has edited the diaries so as to not embarrass certain people. You might have thought that he would try to avoid embarrassing himself as well…

This review in The Guardian nicely sums the way Campbell presents himself and the government he served in:

"It captures strikingly the laddish, hungry, boastful side of New Labour, a thuggish competition to acquire and use power. The details are realistic and for the most part depressing."

It also notes the vitriol he felt towards people who worked within the New Labour hierachy:

"Short - "God, she does turn my stomach""

I’m inclined to agree, but as a right of centre Libertarian you might expect that. But Campbell? Short was acclaimed in some circles for her work in International Development, and fundamentally Blair – Campbell’s boss – was the one who employed Short. A little support from Campbell would be no bad thing.

"Campbell is far crueller about those who cannot hit back than those who can. He loves power and the men who hold it."

Yes, the man who idolises Robert Maxwell and physically attacked someone for dissing that fat cock after he drowned. And of course Campbell is crueller to those who can’t hit back – he is the very definition of a bully.

"He tells Blair that the section of the diaries sent to the Hutton inquiry contains "a fair bit of bad language". "Fuck?" asks Blair. "Yes." "Cunt?" "Probably." "Bloody hell, Alastair.""

Proud to reveal to his boss – the Prime Minister – that he is foul mouthed. And now has to embarrass his boss – the Prime Minister – by confirming that he is foul mouthed.

"He revels in brutality: he wants to "kill Gilligan""

Very nice- makes Campbell come across as a vicious pig of a man. And I wonder what would have happened if Campbell wrote that he wanted to "kill Kelly"? Thinking about it, he may well have done for all we know – even he must have been sensible enough to realise that he would have to excise such a comment…

But perhaps the most depressing revelation from The Guardian comes in this sentence:

"Tellingly, Stephen Byers' adviser, Jo Moore, is criticised not for thinking that 9/11 was a moment to bury bad news, but for saying it."

To sum up, Campbell’s diary shows that there was a boorish, nasty, foulmouthed bully. And Blair’s government was spin obsessed to the point of distraction. Of course, we already knew that, but it is depressing to have this confirmed by Campbell. And it is even more depressing to realise that Campbell, for all of his spin skills, cannot spin his own diaries despite admitting to editing them.

Perhaps Rachel Slyvester in The Daily Telegraph best sums the impact of the Campbell diaries:

"Politically, the diaries are not particularly revealing. Emotionally, however, they are fascinating. Mr Campbell should be lying on the psychiatrist's couch rather than walking down the corridors of power."

Couldn’t agree more.

Health Secretary? No thanks!

It has got to be one of the bum jobs of the Cabinet. Just imagine going into meet with the new Prime Minister, fully expecting to get a post in the Cabinet that will push you further forward in your career, and being told that you are going to become the media's whipping boy (along with the Home Secretary) as Health Secretary. You may as well resign your seat in Parliament there and then, as your career certainly isn't going to go anywhere.

I mean, who would want a job like that? Perched like a demented Gordon Brittas* on top of a vast, dysfunctional (hell, even psychotic) bureaucracy desperately trying to fight fires and deflect body blows from the baying hordes of headline hungry journalists until your inevitable demotion/sacking/return to the backbenches. Who would want a job like that?

Well, I would for a start. It could be one of the great reforming briefs of the Cabinet. You could really make a difference - if you are willing to take a risk and challenge some of the fundamental assumptions about the health in the UK. I'd have a look at convincing the British people of four fundamental truths - and then, once the attitudes towards health have changed, we could have a look at real reform of Health in the UK.

1. The job of Health Secretary is Health, not the NHS

Every Health Secretary seems to focus solely on the NHS. But their brief is broader - they should be looking after, and finding ways to improve, the health of the nation as a whole. Not finding more money to throw into the NHS black hole, and not desperately trying to tinker with a system that is fundamentally screwed. Health Secretaries get a form of political myopia - they cannot see beyond the NHS, and therefore fail to look at radical policies that could make a real difference. Which needs me nicely onto my second point.

2. The NHS does not have to exist

Really, it doesn't. There was once a time when the NHS didn't exist, before Attlee et al created it. It is a human construct, and like anything created by humans, it can be demolished as well. We need to get beyond this limiting political assumption that insists that we must have the NHS. We need to go back to bases and challenge exactly why we have the NHS. Because, quite frankly, it isn't working. It is a leech on government funds, sucking billions of pounds without really offering anything in return. Furthermore...

3. The NHS just can't work

Really, it can't. It was conceived many moons ago, when medical technology was (by comparison to today) in the Stone Age. It was created to service a smaller population, and a population with a lower life expectancy. It is a completely different health service to the one that Attlee created, and with more people and more expensive treatments - it is no wonder that the government cannot afford to pay for it. The massive cost of the NHS was even acknowledged by the NHS creators - after all, it was Labour under Attlee who first started charging for prescriptions. Even the most preliminary examination of the NHS must show that it is, not to put too finer point on it, utterly fucked. And why on earth would we continue to fund something that doesn't work? Because it is a British institution, and it represents free healthcare for all. Except for the fact that...

4. The NHS is not free

Really, it isn't. Yes, it is free at the point of service, but we fund the NHS entirely. The billions thrown at it come from the nation's tax burden. Your income tax and your national insurance contributions fund this creaking, failing tax vampire. The only reason why people think it is free is beacuse when they arrive art A+E, they don't have to pay for it. Solely because they have already paid for it. Seriously. Nothing is free, the NHS just appears to be free when you arrive at hospital. And what is the point of having something that is free at the point of service if, fundamentally, the service is shit because the institution isn't working? This is not dissing those who work in the NHS, but rather acknowledging that they are restricted by the outdated, outmoded and failing bureaucracy they are working for.

I don't know what could replace the NHS, but I rather favour removing all funding for hospitals and instead using the money to fund vouchers for the population as a whole. Let people vote with their feet. The decent, working hospitals will still get government funding through people spending their vouchers in them. Those that are working will not get the funding, and may well end up closing. But, really, so what? If something isn't working, then why continue to fund it? If demand disappears for a supermarket brand, for example, then it goes out of business. Why not the same for a crap hospital? But as I say, I don't know whether this would work. But as Health Secretary I would be looking to change the way people perceive health in the UK - and would judge my success or failure based on whether people still feel the NHS has to exist or whether they are prepared to accept the NHS is past the sell by date and needs to be fundamentally reformed - if not replaced.

So, come on, then, let's not have the job of Health Secretary as career suicide for any incumbent. Let's have a great reforming Health Secretary. Someone prepared to change the perceptions towards the NHS in the UK, and therefore able to contemplate other ways of managing the health of the country.

*If they ever make a TV biography of Patsy, I really do think she should be played by Chris Barrie. Aside from a vague physical resemblance, only Barrie could convincingly portray that air of panicked incompetence that pervaded the senior eschelons of the Department of Health under Hewitt.

"I'm sorry, sir, this is a no smoking train."

Charlie K has been caught smoking on a train, less than 1 week since the smoking ban was introduced (and despite the fact that every train I've been on for the past five years has been no smoking anyway). With his rigorous grasp of the law - and a law he voted for - he thought it was OK if he smoked out of the window.

One rule for us, one rule for them, etc etc ad fucking nauseam.

A New Religion

Last night I watched An Inconvenient Truth*. Any regular readers will know I am a little cynical about global warming and the environmental movement, but I wanted to watch Gore's film to see if he could persuade me. After all, he was the Vice-President of the most prosperous and one of the most advanced countries in the world, so surely he would have access to a lot of research and a lot of information that I, working as an HR bod in Central London, just don't have.

Let's just say he didn't win me over. Sure, there were lots of graphs showing dramatic increases in, what I shall scientifically call, "stuff", but he failed to explain exactly what his graphs and pictures meant or exactly what his timescales were. And at the risk of being an intellectual snob, a truly good researcher does not cite his or her sources as "my friend". And the moments when Gore got really passionate were the moments when he was talking not about the environment, but rather himself. There may well be a case out there, somewhere, that will convince me about global warming, and the threat it poses to us all. But it most certainly wasn't An Inconvenient Truth.

But it did get me thinking. There was one moment** when Al Gore spoke about his son being involved in a car accident and ending up in a critical condition in hospital. He spoke about how it changed his life, and how it made him devote his energies to the environmental cause. How it made him realise that he would have to fight to save the planet, because what he took for granted may not be there tomorrow. Ho-hum. But perhaps that is the main motivating factor for many of those passionate about environmentalism. It is a chance to convince yourself that you have found the truth about the future, and found a way to save yourself and your fellow humans. You can spread the word, and save the world. You have the key to salvation!

Which, when you put it like that, sounds not unlike evangelical Christianity.

Now I'm not saying that everyone who is interested in environmentalism, or everyone who pays lip service to the environmental cause***, is like an evangelical Christian. Far from it. But those like Gore, those who refuse to enter into a debate**** about the absolute truth of global warming, and are passionate about spreading the word across the world and changing the way people live their lives in relations to that absolute truth, display the absolute conviction in their belief that I have only really seen before in evangelical Christians. And whilst there is probably more scientific fact in global warming than in the highly unlikely story of a carpenter's son who could turn water into wine and rose from the dead, I still don't see the concept of global warming and the supposed implications of that global warming as absolute fact. So you could argue that the evangelical environmentalists are acting on faith rather than fact.

Which actually helps me to understand the environmentalist mindset. It must be very comforting to have discovered an absolute truth, and then be able to think that they have a way to save the world, and the unbelievers. I almost wish I could have a belief like that. But unfortunately the cynic in me demands (the most probably unachievable) proof before I can have that faith.

And the case for global warming could be made much more convincing if the zealous evangelists in that movement managed to put their faith to one side at the moment, and took on the sceptics in an intelligent, reasoned and sensible debate. But the problem is that their absolute conviction in the scientific "facts" behind their movement resembles faith and therefore stifles debate. As soon as someone has "faith", it becomes very difficult for them to accept argument against those fundamental beliefs.

*I also watched Demons. Which was cheesy, poorly scripted and gleefully anti-intellectual. But since it had zombies vomiting green poster
paint, it was a lot more fun that An Inconvenient Truth.
**Actually, more than a moment. At least five minutes. Which in a 91 minute film is quite a substantial amount of time.
***Such as recycling rubbish.
****And there is no acknowledgement in An Inconvenient Truth that there is any real opposition to the global warming movement other than the occasional arch reference to the "so-called sceptics".

Touchy Feely Tories

David Cameron:

"The big idea is not for more state cash but to encourage more voluntary and community action - the welfare society. In order to deal with social breakdown, everybody, and I mean everybody, has got their part to play."

I'm not a big fan of Cameron banging on about poverty, as I've touched on in the past, but I won't go over that ground again. But I will point out that this is an interesting way to sell your party - the implication is almost "if we win the election, then you will have to give your time to voluntary organisations designed to reduce poverty." Also, it completely forgets the other issues that affect the country, like education, terrorism, the NHS. "Social breakdown" - that nebulous, almost meaningless, term is being pushed by the Tories as far more important than how our children are educated or the fact that people have tried to drive cars filled with explosives into airports.

Ignoring the party politics and ideological concerns (and, indeed, the passion that these concerns create) if this is Cameron's big plan for the next election then it is an audacious one to say the least. He is going after the Guardian reading, Liberal Democrat supporting voter. But in doing so he may well alienate the Telegraph reading traditional Tory. It will be fascinating to see how this one pans out - after the next election we could be praising Cameron's genius at electioneering. Or sneering at the elementary mistake he made in chasing the middle ground. However from a popularity point of view I can't help but think of Hague's blunder in 2001 of fighting the election based on saving the pound - people wanted to save the pound, but it didn't matter to them enough to change their vote. For Cameron the question is not whether people care about social breakdown or not, but rather how much it matters to them.

So much hot air

Brown is proving that he is a servant of the people and not a "centralising autocrat" by suggesting constitutional reform. Forgive me if I sound cynical, but haven't we heard all this before? Wasn't Major going to change the balance of power between citizens and leaders, and ended up implementing a traffic cone hotline? It is easy for an incoming PM to say they was to decentralise power and limit the reach of the executive. But once they have got used to that power they are a lot less likely to give it away.

Also, what precisely would a written Bill of Rights do? Would having the right to life on a bit of paper stop murder? No, it wouldn't. And does the lack of a Bill of Rights mean the government commits mass murder of the voters? No, it doesn't. A Bill of Rights/constitution is a meaningless piece of paper. Don't forget that under Uncle Joe Stalin the USSR had a constitution. Didn't stop prison camps and mass murder.

It is also telling that Brown's first announcement is about changing the constitution and shifting the powers/rights of the government. He is talking about doing cerebral things on a legal level. Nothing he says will really change life in Britian. It is also telling that the opposition parties have, conditionally, supported his non proposals. They would all rather discuss legalistic issues like the constitution than discuss real, practical policies.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the politicians of the Brown era (who are not unlike the politicians of the Blair era): Just so much hot air.

Go Boris!

Boris Johnson is being considered for London Mayor. Frankly I think he is an awesome choice. If people aren't going to follow my advice and make him party leader. Can you imagine anyone better to represent the varied metropolis of London than the larger than life, charismatic, erratic MP for Henley? He could become a London landmark - I mean, let's face it, he is already pretty much a British Institution!

Go go Boris! You'd get my vote.

Shit!

I knew things were bad in the NHS. But not this bad.

Time to change leaders?

Apparently Cameron's reshuffle does not reflect panic about Brown's slight upturn in the polls and the slanging match over grammar schools. Well, no shit, Sherlock. I don't like the guy and frequently disagree with him, but actually he's not doing too badly. Brown was always going to get a bounce in the polls when he got into Number 10, and there was always going to be a Shadow Cabinet reshuffle to reflect what happened in the real Cabinet. Like him or not, Cameron is safe where he is despite Brown becoming PM, despite grammar school debates and despite defections.

It is the Liberal Democrats who should be looking at their leader with a view to change.

I mean, seriously, where is the Minger? No-one has heard from him in ages. If IDS was the "quiet man" then Ming the Merciful is the "silent man." Brown ascends to PM, and the Tories lose one point in the polls. The Lib Dems lose three. He was supposed to be a safe pair of hands, but he is doing worse than the permanently pissed up Charlie boy.

Of course, Labour and the Tories aren't going to point out how bad Ming is. This is a dream come true for them - the Minger means that the Lib Dems are not so much going to fail to make progress at the next General Election as struggle to contest it at all. Ming has made them an irrelevance, and an irrelevant Liberal Democrat party means more seats for Labour and the Tories. Forget the Lib Dems trying to collect Tory scalps at the next General Election - they'll be too busy protecting their own.

The best thing the Lib Dems could do now is depose Ming. But they seem to be stuck in some sort of stupor - unable to do anything as their leader is unable to lead them. And without the jibes of the Tories and Labour, the Lib Dems are sleepwalking their way to catastrophe at the next election.

Pardon Me!

Right after the farce surrounding Paris Hilton going to, then not going to, then being freed from prison, US justice is once again shown to be the envy of the world as George W. Bush saves a mate from prison. The President says:

"I respect the jury's verdict, but I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr Libby is excessive."

Yep, you read that right: George W. Bush: compassionate conservative, war president and now legal expert.

Still, I'll bet there are some who wish the UK Prime Minister had similar powers...

The message is...

...in the face of terror to "Carry on as usual".

Fine, wilco. Mainly because I've never had any reason to go near Glasgow airport, and wouldn't go to Tiger Tiger if you paid me. By default, the terrorists aren't disrupting my life.

Dunkirk spirit and all that...