Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Nadine Dorries and Self Pity

Witness Nadine Dorries blathering on in The Daily Hate about how hard life is as an anti-abortion pro-life campaigner:
Pro-abortion activists deluge me with hate mail, or call on the police and public authorities to investigate me over some time-wasting, invented grievances — like whether I have a permit to hold a press conference on the green outside Parliament, or whether a certain salary payment to my staff is justified.
We only have Dorries' word (for what it is worth) that she is deluged with hate mail by pro-choice (not pro-abortion) activists. As for the grievances - Dorries is an elected politician proposing policies that will have a national impact. Therefore, she is and should be subject to rigourous scrutiny. Especially in the aftermath of the Expenses Scandal - a scandal in which Dorries herself was involved at the very least in a peripheral way.
Indeed, one member of my office recently left my employment because she was so fed up with this endless oppression from campaigners.
Oppression? Please, get a grip. Pressure is the very best you can argue your people are under - and they work for an elected representative, so they should expect to have to deal with public pressure.
Because I am an MP, the police and other bodies have no choice but to investigate, no matter how frivolous the complaint: then the campaigners run off to their supportive friends in the Left-wing press to say that ‘Nadine Dorries is under investigation’, always declining to report a few days later that I have been cleared.
The police and other bodies should investigate all complaints regardless of whether Dorries (hardly the most impartial of sources) finds them to be frivolous. And there is something rather amusing in someone criticising others for using the left-wing press using the medium of the right-wing press. Pot and kettle, Nadine. And I doubt whether you or The Daily Hate will be retracting the unsubtle and inaccurate dig at one of your most eloquent and persistent critics when it is pointed out to you and the terrible rag voicing your self-pitying and unconvincing opinions.
Even my own family is in the firing line. One of my daughters works in my Parliamentary office, so she sees all the cruel messages, while my other daughter, during her last year at school, had to put up with snide comments from teachers whose dogmatic feminism had been offended by my stand.
Well, I don't doubt that you can complain about those snide teachers if you so wish, Nadine. Assuming, of course, there is something meaningful for you to complain about other than your seemingly self-perpetuating persecution complex operating in overdrive. As for the daughter who works in your parliamentary office - it is her choice to take a nepotistic job with her mother, and if she doesn't want to be exposed to the "cruel" messages (which could just be those messages that do not agree with Dorries' positions) she should get a real job in the real world.
Yet what are all these campaigners so scared of? Why should they be anxious about women being offered independent advice?
I think people who are pro-choice would favour independent, neutral advice. Dorries wants to reduce the number of abortions; I think there is nothing wrong with those of us who are genuinely pro-choice questioning the extent to which Dorries' independent advisors would be neutral.
If they are really as pro-choice as they pretend, they would support my proposal. That is what women in this country deserve.
Except the reason why people who are pro-choice do not support Dorries is because, by attempting to reduce the periods in which women can have abortions, Dorries is reducing choice. She is attempting to reduce the control women have over their own bodies. And I can only speak for myself, but I really doubt that is what the women in this country deserve.

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A Palin Candidacy?

I’m pretty sure that I haven’t missed an announcement, so I guess that Sarah Palin has yet to declare her candidacy for the Republican nomination for President. This makes me wonder whether she is actually going to do so.

In a sense, it might be wiser for her not to declare and sit this one out. The field for the nomination is crowded, and there are already two slightly loopy candidates in that field – one of who looks and sounds a lot like Palin but with the added advantage that she didn’t fuck off half way through a term as an elected representative. To some extent Palin has been out-manoeuvred by Bachmann. Furthermore, if Palin runs and fails to even get the nomination, then her brand of simplistic redneck nonsense will be damaged. She won’t such a hot ticket if her record reads “National Elections Fought: 2. Won: 0”.

Then there’s the fact that Obama, while weakened, still looks like the most likely victor from next year’s general election. He has the massive advantage of incumbency and the fact that, while he’s been a disappointment to many, he hasn’t been an absolute catastrophe and his policies are only truly execrable to those who wouldn’t vote for him under any circumstances anyway. Palin is unlikely to win the nomination; she’s also unlikely to win the White House even if nominated.

There’s a sense in which it would be better for Palin to wait for 2016, when there’ll be much more of a level playing field. But then she risks the fate of Hillary Clinton in 2008 – of being a presumptive nominee for so long that the idea of her candidacy becomes boring, and the space is therefore created for a more charismatic stalking horse to come along and steal the nomination and, maybe, even the White House.

So in a sense Palin is damned if she does and damned if she doesn’t. So I reckon she should go with the latter option. Continue the Sarah Palin show across America. Then again, I’m biased as I think that the idea of President Palin is utterly terrifying and should be avoided at all costs…

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Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Riots, Individuals, Communities and Bullshit

Over at The New Statesman, we have some robust analysis dismissing the claims of the right that the recent riots were anything to do with family. Oh, actually, we don't. Instead we have lacklustre and predictable analysis just as tedious and meaningless as those people who drone on endlessly and without mercy about "broken Britain". Let's take a look and some choice cuts of prime grade bullshit from the article introducing the leading left thinkers (who, laughably, include Diane Abbott):
In his great book After Virtue, published in 1981, Alasdair MacIntyre wrote that the most striking feature of "contemporary moral utterance is that so much of it is used to express disagreements . . . There seems to be no rational way of securing moral agreement in our culture." Moral statements amounted to little more than statements of personal preference.
Now MacIntyre - a Catholic Thomist - strikes me as an odd choice for a left-wing magazine to be citing. After all, it is difficult to imagine the modern MacIntyre being classed as left-wing. Of course, the author of the article could argue that the Thomist turn in MacIntyre's work came after the book quoted above - and they'd be accurate. But let me pluck a copy of After Virtue from the bookshelf and turn to the pessimistic conclusion. MacIntyre writes "This time the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers: they have already been governing us for quite some time". So MacIntyre believes the barbarians have been in charge for quite some time and MacIntyre was writing in 1981... meaning that, in this country, the Tory administration was circa two years old (and you don't write a book like After Virtue in a hurry) whereas the Labour party - as well as a post-war consensus worshipping Labour-lite Tory party - had been in power for, well, quite some time. It would appear that MacIntyre was attacking the very sort of politicians that The New Statesman loves to praise.
Thirty years later, little has changed, as the aftermath of the English riots and responses to them show. Appalled and embarrassed by the marauding gangs and looters, David Cameron speaks of the "sickness" in our society, showing himself to be a classical conservative pessimist, a believer in original sin and in the futility of all utopian schemes to remake society.
I have to say that it is a bit of a stretch to call Cameron a believer in "original sin" (although, as a Catholic, the approvingly quoted Alasdair MacIntyre actually is) but there is nothing wrong with being a political pessimist and there is nothing wrong with believing the futility of "utopian schemes to remake society". You only have to look at France in the reign of terror or Stalinist Russia or the nightmare of the Cambodian Year Zero to see just how badly wrong such utopias and go - and how devastating they can be when they do go wrong. Whatever crass schemes Cameron embarks on and whatever damage he does to this country, it is pretty hard to imagine him doing anything as devastating as those utopians who have managed to gain control of certain societies in history.
He says nothing about the socio-economic forces that shape behaviour, or the corrosive effects of entrenched inequality (for the true conservative, there are always natural inequalities). Nothing about how three decades of neoliberalism have coarsened our society, debased our discourse and corrupted our public morality.
Y'know, I'm sick of left-wing people using the term "neoliberalism" in such a way. It is a bit like those tedious right-wingers who rail against political correctness or multiculturalism without ever really engaging with what those terms mean. Yeah, there's a critique of neoliberalism to be made, but it requires consistent, intelligent engagement with neoliberal thinkers in order to make it credible. And part of that will be acknowledging that we have never seen the free market in action - at least not in the period since 1981. What we have seen is varying degrees of the Mixed Economy.
Nothing about how the venality of those at the top of society affects those at the bottom.
Ah, venality. Let's ask those venal bastards like Tony Blair about the impact they have had on our society. We should probably acknowledge at some point that they are Labour politicians, though. Or is that a bit too inconvenient? Yeah, yeah, you might well argue that bankers are also examples of the venal. And they tend to be Tories... except for their willing less to enter into pacts with the Labour party during the latter's thirteen years in power.
As for the left in general, there has long been a reluctance to address what it means to live a good and fulfilled life in an age when religion, for most of us in the secular west, can no longer offer guidance and when family life has become dysfunctional for many. The solution to all problems, it is said, is more state intervention and greater redistributive taxation.
And that is precisely the solution we have heard trotted out time and time again in the aftermath of the riots. The biggest problem is that pretty much any situation, according to the left, requires more state intervention. If you comprehensively made the case that state intervention was the problem then I don't doubt that some people would respond - completely in earnest - with the idea that more state intervention is the solution. The fucking morons.
Long before the rise of Red Tories and Blue Labourites, Houellebecq articulated how globalisation had disenfranchised the urban poor and how lifestyle libertarianism had broken society. It is an insight understood by Phillip Blond, who, in 2009, in his essay "Rise of the Red Tories", wrote: "The current political consensus is left-liberal in culture and right-liberal in economics. And this is precisely the wrong place to be." One need not endorse Blond's religiously inspired social conservatism to acknowledge that many of the ties that used to bind us together - ties of familial, communal and civic obligation - have frayed.
MacIntyre probably would embrace Blond's conclusions, at least to some extent. But to say that the ties that bind us together have been "frayed" is to make a massive assumption across a broad, diverse and pluralistic society. But even if we accept that, then what is the alternative to the reality we now face? Forced state intervention to rebuild those ties? 'Cos that seems to be completely counter-productive and utterly naive.
Pleasure without happiness, freedom without responsibility: we are living through a profound cultural crisis. Does the left in Britain have anything original to say about family breakdown and our moral confusion? Can agreement be reached about what has gone wrong and what should be done about it?
Agreement seems unlikely - a tenuous consensus is probably the best we can hope for. But that would involve interested parties not adopting the casual and thoughtless positions that left and right demand. Just a cursory glance at the very titles of the articles in The New Statesman suggest that there is precious little original thinking going on there.
Overleaf, leading thinkers attempt to answer these questions and others as they, like the rest of us, move uncertainly through the burnt-out and blackened landscape of our cities, looking for a way forward.
Oh, please. I live in Leeds, and nothing happened. Across this country, millions of people live in cities and parts of cities where nothing happened. And that is just the people who live in cities; people who live in unaffected towns or the countryside are also probably rolling their eyes at the needless hyperbole that rounds off this article. An article that adds little to the debate on the riots.

But given my criticisms of the views of both left and right in the aftermath of these riots, it would probably be remiss of me not to offer my own opinions on those riots. I think some peope rioted because of poverty. And I think some people rioted because of the lack a father figure in their lives. And I think that some people rioted because (once again) the police gunned down someone. And I think people rioted because of peer pressure, because of uncontrolled rage, because of a desire to have new trainers for literally no cost whatsoever. The point is that disparate people with all kinds of different motives took part in those riots - when we attempt to ascribe a common cause, we are bound to get into trouble.

Which is part of the problem facing both those who claim that the riots were down to poverty etc and those who claim that it was down to a breakdown in some families. It seems to assume identikit people inhabit this country - people with the same motivations, across the board. Now I'm not trying to deny the existence of community - or, on a more micro-level family or on a more macro level society - but I am pointing out that we are a collection of communities of individuals. We respond to different things in different ways - hell, we even respond to the same things in different ways. To deny this is to deny our true nature as individuals, and to suppose that we can truly build a better future through such a denial is to embrace the sort of utopian politics that should be rejected based of, if nothing else, than the lessons of history.

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Monday, August 29, 2011

Nearly missed this one from Guido Fawkes on the early release of one of Baby P's killers:
Two years after being convicted Jason Owen is back on the streets free. You can sign the e-petition to restore the death penalty here.
By all means sign the petition, but bear in mind it wouldn't have made a blind bit of fucking difference here as Owen was not convicted of murder and therefore wouldn't have been eligible for the noose. But let's not get too hung up on the facts - especially if they get in the way of a bit of rabble rousing...

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Sunday, August 28, 2011

Torchwood - Miracle Day - Immortal Sins

Ok, so this was very typical Torchwood: Miracle Day in a number of ways. It progressed the overall story arc in a slight way (Jack's ex is behind the miracle, apparently, or at the very least knows how it started) but at the same time felt like an exercise in padding. But in other respects this was atypical for Miracle Day. Set largely in the past (other than the present day row between Gwen and Jack), this felt a lot like old school, pre-Children of Earth Torchwood.

Let's look at the evidence. The story involves a minor alien* conspiracy - minor, at least, in the sense that it is very easily dealt with by Jack. The rest of the story focuses on Jack's immortality and Jack's insatiable appetite when it comes to humping. So far, so much normal, old-school Torchwood.

And this is very much old Torchwood, but in fairness, it is old Torchwood done well. The relationship between Jack and Angelo is not simply casual titillation; the exploration of Catholic guilt and how people might actually respond to an immortal man is surprisingly intelligent. Indeed, the scenes where the mob turns on Jack are horrific and genuinely compelling. And I do wonder whether the trio of men who bargain over Jack and the vial of his blood taken in those scenes will figure later. That could be truly intelligent story telling (and therefore something this series needs a lot more of).

Plus it is nice to have the universe in which this series resides acknowledged. It was good to hear a mention of the Doctor (although any such mention does serve to highlight the extent to which Jack is a lacklustre substitute for the last of the Time Lords). The nod to the Trickster was also brought a smile to my face. This sort of references are nice for the fans but not too much for the casual viewer.

But, again, I'm left with the feeling that we lose something when we try to deal with the Torchwood team interacting with the Miracle. The scenes between Gwen and Jack, although played with gusto by the regulars, just feel a bit tedious and strangely out of character. Gwen has been built up to be almost a superhero so far in this series, but at the first hint of a threat (backed up with remarkably little proof) Gwen's attacking Jack and handing him over to his death. Furthermore, both Rex and Esther somehow managed to be irritating in this episode - no mean feat given just how little screen time they actually had. And the whole thing - the whole sodding episode - pretty much ignored the Miracle. It would be great, it would be fan-fucking-tastic, if we could focus a bit more on the world-changing event than Gwen tearfully emoting in the front seat of a car.

So a welcome distraction of an episode, but nothing more. Any chance we can start getting some sort of progress in the overall story arc sometime soon? Preferably before the final episode?

*Is this the first alien we've seen in this series so far? I think it might be.

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Saturday, August 27, 2011

Doctor Who: Let's Kill Hitler

So, the Good Man returns to our screens after a summer break. And he's back with a bang. And with a break-neck story that never really pauses for breath. But also a story that, when you look back on it, is a delightful piece of story telling; a deceptively simple plot that manages to advance the overall story arc at the same time as offering some genuine surprises that, on closer analysis, appear to be logical developments given what we have seen thus far and what we can guess is to come. And it is also a very funny script; one very clearly written by the author of Coupling. It is a great way for the show to return after its summer holidays. Let's take a look at why in a bit more detail.

Oh, and perhaps appropriately, there are spoilers ahead.

First up, it has a pre-title sequence that is clever and exciting. It has a novel way of contacting the Doctor and, just as you think you've figured it all out, it throws in a twist and an apparently throwaway character in Amy's best friend, Mels.

Ah, Mels. You have a gun, an attitude, and have been brought up (unintentionally) by Amelia Pond (and other, less friendly forces as it turns out) to have an obsession with the Doctor. But it all is for nothing, because Hitler shoots her in a blind panic. Amy's best friend is going to die. Except... except... Well, we never did stop to ask what 'Mels' is short for. Turns out it is Melody. Melody Pond. So one regeneration later, we have the Doctor dying and a couple of parents searching for their ever so wayward superhuman daughter while Hitler remains locked in a cupboard. And that's before we even come to the Terminator style robot spaceship with the minaturised people inside it.

In this episode, we get the Eleventh Doctor, Amy and Melody Pond all firing on all cylinders. But it is also worth pausing for a moment and remarking on how Rory has grown as a character. Here, he gets many of the best moments. Witness his treatment of Hitler and his lines after he and Amy have been miniaturised. Furthermore, Arthur Darvil's performance as he watches his future wife realise that he has loved her for years is sublime.

And those scenes with Amelia Pond, young Rory and young Mels - that at first appeared to be nothing more than a bit of padding - actually turn out to be crucial to the ongoing story. Here we see that Amy and Rory did raise their daughter, even though they were children too at the time. It is a neat way of getting around the narrative problem of how the Ponds as parents would get to see their daughter growing up.

Furthermore, the later appearance of Amelia Pond - this time as projection in the TARDIS - is wonderful. Not least because it is preceded by a lighthearted reveal of something really rather dark - that the Doctor doesn't like himself, and feels guilt (understandably) over the impact he had on the lives of Rose Tyler, Martha Jones and Donna Noble. This is basically an aside in a very busy story, but it hints at an emotional complexity that you might not expect from such a bold, brassy (half) season opener.

It is also worth commenting briefly on the direction here. There were so many nice little moments that indicated a talented director at work - such as the seamless merge between the model TARDIS and the real thing flying out of control through the sky. Combined with a great script and fine performances (especially from the regulars) this is bold, confident Doctor Who - the show at its best.

And it really does hint at what might be to come. We learn a little more about the Silence, as well as learning that silence will fall when a very old question is asked. What could that question be? Well, I have a proven track record of being really rather crap when it comes to Doctor Who related predictions, but I'll make a guess anyway - could that question possibly be one posed to the Doctor that simply says "who are you?"

Any problems? Well, the Hitler element to the story is a little bit of a red herring, but the full nightmare that was Hitler's life isn't the sort of thing that can be done in a family show broadcast at 7:10pm on a Saturday evening. And the incinerating things in the Teselcta ship looked a little... well... cheap, but to bemoan cheap special effects in Doctor Who is to open up a can of worms that would take months to fully discuss. But I can't help but feel that to criticise this episode too much is almost to be a bit too pedantic and churlish. This was fun, clever and vastly enjoyable.

And it is the sort of episode that shows why Doctor Who should be celebrated as a largely unique television experience. It is damn near half a century old, but still has the ability to be hugely exciting and surprising. And it still has the ability to leave you desperately wanting to know what will happen next week.

Welcome back, Doctor. You were only away for a few weeks, but even that was far too long.

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Doctor Who: The Clunkers

Ok, ok, I'm running a little bit behind with this week's clunker. The explanation of why I find The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood to be the weakest of the Eleventh Doctor's adventures will be explained... later. Most probably next week. Because, for the moment, my focus is on what will be broadcast at 7:10pm this evening: Let's Kill Hitler...

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Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Libya and the Reality of Foreign Policy

So there’s change ahoy in Libya (added, without doubt, by a hefty payload of bombs from certain Western powers). No doubt for some we are seeing the dawn of a brave new era for Libya as a murderous dictator slowly falls from power. Now, for all those celebrating this turn of events, I’m probably going to sound cynical, but I’m going to wait to see what happens next before I get too excited by Libya’s Brave New Dawn.

After all, we’ve seen similar events play out before. For example, there was a Middle Eastern country where an unpopular dictator who had enjoyed considerable support from foreign sources was usurped by a populist movement in his own country. But post revolution Iran is hardly renowned the world over as a beacon of freedom now, is it? Of course, there are no guarantees that Libya will go the same way, but you’ll have to excuse me if I wait to see whether it does or not before I start popping the metaphorical champagne corks.

And it is worth pausing for a moment to consider the chequered relationship this country has had with the Gaddafi regime. Sure, we’ve hated him when he’s been involved in the murder of a police officer or the bombing of innocents on an aircraft. But when it looked like he could be an ally in the spurious War on Terror, we were happy to jump into bed with him. We’re helping to depose him now in an apparently noble crusade of freedom for the people, but dig into our relationship with Libya even just below the surface of the current headlines and you’ll get a much less edifying picture.

Which is the reality of foreign policy. It involves ugly compromises with temporary partners who, under normal circumstances, we probably wouldn’t deal with. Witness, for example, America funding bin Laden in the Cold War against the Soviet Union before he went to war with them. Or the allies joining the totalitarian regime that was the Soviet Union in World War Two in order to defeat the mutual enemy of Nazi Germany. Foreign policy is messy and involves difficult choices. Which is why anyone telling you about an ethical foreign policy is either terminally naïve or lying to your face. The grim reality of foreign policy is the realisation that Morton’s Fork and that the law of unintended consequences are your constant companion. And there are no guarantees that both concepts won't be rearing their ugly heads as Gaddafi apparently falls from power in Libya.

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Why The Tories Will Almost Certainly Win A Second Term

Guido has recently had a post up questioning whether we are witnessing a one-term Tory government. While the points raised are relevant, I can’t help but feel that Guido is hedging his bets to some extent. If the Tories win outright, he has a whole host of posts highlighting the failure of Labour to get anywhere. If the Tories lose, he can point to this post and again be “proved” right. But that could just be my natural cynicism (which is generally rewarded where Mr Fawkes is concerned, though). The point of my post is that, as things stand, I think the Tories will go on to win a second term.

There are three reasons for this. Firstly, while things may get worse in terms of the economy, there is also the possibility that things will get distinctly better – especially if George Osborne clocks that economic recovery is aided by tax cuts as well as spending cuts. A recovering economy tends to reward the incumbent government; if Cameron & Co can pull it off, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t reap the rewards in the ballot box. And, after a year and a bit in office, there is still a lot of time to do it before the country has to go back to the polls in 2015.

The second reason is that the Tories aren’t really campaigning at the moment. They’ve got other stuff to do. Like govern. And, of course, muzzle their coalition partners as much as possible. However, come the next election (and they will effectively decide when that is – don’t rule out the possibility of a snap poll if a Tory victory looks likely in one), they will be coming out all guns blazing, using the healthy war chest to try to dominate the core messages of that campaign. And I think they will be emphasising the compromises they have made for the supposed good of the nation (for example, going into the coalition), the difficult choices they believe they have made (cuts etc) at the same time as hammering Labour for leaving them such a fucking mess to deal with in the first place. In the meantime, Labour have little else to do but campaign. And how well are they doing at that? Well, they are attracting back some of the supporters they lost during the long, messy years they spent in power, but those people are coming back for no real reason other than they don’t like the Tories and the reality of that party being ineffective control of the country narks them a bit. Labour, despite having all the time that no longer governing affords a party, are struggling to effectively vocalise any sort of popular message or image.

Which leads me to the third reason why a Tory victory still looks likely – Ed Miliband is just plain shit at the job of being Leader of the Opposition. And if you are shit at that job you have precisely no credibility when it comes to pitching for the promotion to the top job. Especially when the guy you are fighting for that job is already in it. Cameron may be compromised by, say, his association with Rebekah Brooks, but he still looks a lot more credible and Prime Ministerial than his Labour counterpart. Of course, Miliband Minor might be binned before the next election. But who would they replace him with? The reason he won the last Labour leadership election was because he appeared to be the least shit of those running in it. That situation hasn’t changed; there appears to be no-one in the upper echelons of the Labour party who could look credible against even that lightweight David Cameron.

Of course, lots could change, politics is constantly changing blah blah fucking blah. And yeah, something could happen that radically changes the political landscape. But as things stand, I think that enough of the British people will decide, in balance and when faced with the reality of voting in the ballot box on Election Day, that they prefer the devil they know rather to the one they don’t. The Tories will, most likely, benefit from a grudging refusal on the part of the British people to embrace change unless they absolutely have to or have grown utterly repelled by the incumbent government.

After all, that’s what allowed the odious Tony Blair to be re-elected. Twice.

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My Preference for the 2012 US election

Over the past couple of weeks, both in the comments section here and in my inbox, I've had people either expressing incredulity that I am not supporting one candidate or the other in the upcoming presidential election or asking me who I do actually support. So let me go on record and say this: I support no-one.

Two reasons - firstly, the choice before America is particularly unedifying this time around. Obama will almost certainly represent the Democrats despite being an increasingly compromised and uninspiring president. On the Republican side it is either charisma bypasses like Mitt Romney or total loons like Bachmann and Perry. The best they've got is Ron Paul, but he just seems to be a desperate choice that some libertarian's latch on to and as far as I am concerned, he offers little in the way of charisma or ability to actually win the nomination or the presidency. As far as I am concerned he's the least worst of a bad bunch; therefore, if he gets anywhere, he will therefore represent the least worst option - but I'd be very surprised if that actually happened.

The second reason is implicit in what I've written above - this is the choice before America. I'm not American; I'm not eligible to vote either in the primaries or in the general election. Therefore, unlike when this country goes to the polls, I don't feel duty bound to compromise myself and go with a candidate I'm not entirely convinced by. I'm happy to offer commentary on what will be a looonnng campaign for the control of the White House, but that's about it. Those looking for support from someone with precious little influence and no vote in the upcoming elections would do best to look elsewhere.

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Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Lots to say, precious little time to say it in. Will try to rectify that before too long...

Monday, August 22, 2011

Rest assured, it isn't just Rick Perry with illiberal ideas vying for the Republican nomination, as this video shows:



Try to ignore the irritating presenter and marvel at yet another contender utterly unsuited to the office they are trying to attain.

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Sunday, August 21, 2011

Torchwood: Miracle Day: The Middle Men

Woo-hoo! Winston Zeddemore is in it! I don't quite know why that makes me so happy. I guess it is because it is a distraction from this slow-moving, lumbering beast of a story.

But let's look at the content of the episode rather than just the casting. Colin Maloney is a wonderfully ghastly creation - a unpleasant man in complete meltdown who has ceased to be fully in control of his own actions. There is the implication that, deep down, he knows that what he signed up to do is wrong, and when that combines with a sudden collapse in his life and things start to fall apart, he becomes terrifying and lethal. A maniac, out of control, in a vanity golf cart. The only downside to his character is that we never really saw it properly develop. We never saw him move from a minor public official into murderous, monstrous concentration camp director. Had he been introduced into the story earlier (and, as we know, those early episodes could have done with a lot more story and a lot less padding) we might have seen a compelling story arc and how humans can fall into evil. Instead, we end up simply with a rather transparent weak yet evil man. Which is good, but could have been so much better.

There is also the surprisingly intelligent conversation between Gwen and Dr Patel about moral choice in a concentration camp. It is even more striking given this has hardly been the most intellectually challenging of stories so far. It is a bit like coming across a discussion of the categorical imperative in a Colin Baker Doctor Who story. Of course, and rather sadly, it doesn't last for long, and with in minutes Jack is slapping the bum of a waiter. Back to business as usual, then.

The 45 club is another unsettling, but completely logical, extension of the Miracle. What a shame it wasn't introduced earlier, since the way it is treated here is just as a means to kill off a minor character in a world without suicide. Why can't we spend less time with the Torchwood team and more exploring this strange, new world? Are we going to hear about the 45 club again or have they just disappeared from the series, rather like the Soulless? There seems to be an assumption that we should find the antics of the Torchwood team so exciting that we only need brief hints of the world around that team. Unfortunately, the exact opposite is true.

And that's all I've got to say about this episode, really. Once again, I'm left with the frustration that this still isn't really going anywhere. This week, we learned that the camps are really bad. Which we also already knew. We learned that there is a conspiracy behind the Miracle and behind PhiCorp, which we also already knew. We didn't get to see Oswald Danes, or understand the implications of his speech. Oh, but we have found out that there is something called the blessing. But we know fuck all about it really. In short, we still know bugger all about what is going on here. Still. When you strip it down to basics, this episode was yet another exercise in padding.

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Saturday, August 20, 2011

Doctor Who: Partners In Crime

Prior to Steven Moffat opening the most recent (half) season of Doctor Who with the Doctor being gunned down and then Amy Pond shooting her own daughter, season openers for the new look Who tended to be quite lightweight. Fun frolics designed to ease the casual viewer into the new season. I can see why RTD felt this was necessary, although I always felt that the season openers were disappointing and lacklustre compared to the episodes that followed. And Partners in Crime is the worst of a bad bunch. It is, quite simply, dreadfully bland and utterly disappointing.

It has Tennant doing his Doctor-by-numbers routine, and Donna is still the shouty chav she was in The Runaway Bride (although this would change as the season went along, demonstrating in the process what a good actress Tate actually is). The direction is flat, and manages to even turn the supposed set pieces (the Doctor and Donna seeing each other across Foster's office, the larking around in the window cleaner's life) into something really flat - and it is further undermined by the jaunty incidental music that plays over many of the (supposedly) more dramatic moments. But it is the script that really lets this down. It is, quite simply, the worst thing RTD has ever written (from what I've seen of his work).

I once read that RTD thought that Partners in Crime should be used to teach script-writing. I can't help but think that this should only be the case if the lesson is how not to write an episode of Doctor Who. The first segment of the story is frightfully unfunny "comedy" as the Doctor and Donna fail to meet, pretty much doing exactly the same thing as each other (so we get to see everything happening twice, effectively) but just missing each other at the same time. It is the sort of thing that you would expect from an earthbound, unimaginative sitcom - not from the opening instalment of a series that has the whole of time and space at its disposal. It's crap, really - a trick I've seen countless times before being done in a lacklustre way.

Then we have the villains - Foster, who is played with some relish but never really amounts to anything more than generic female baddie with two meatheads at her side with very big guns. But nothing than compare us for the Adipose - lumps of fat designed to look cute. They're babies, basically, making their communicative ability even less than your standard Who monster. And they don't do anything other than toddle around, burble for a bit and then disappear. The Doctor even points out that their lethal potential - which we hardly see - is not their fault. The upshot? This is a Doctor Who story with no real sense of threat, either to the planet or to the protagonists. It is only later, in Turn Left, that we get a feel for the awful implications of Foster's scheme. Here, it is all a bit of a nothingness. Of course, not every Doctor Who story can, or even should, have a sense of constant threat and menace. But a complete lack of those things makes this into an edition of 2point4 children without the (albeit very limited) laughs.

There are a couple of nice moments - such as the conversation between Wilf and Donna on the hill closely followed by the Doctor talking to an empty TARDIS. And the return of Rose at the end of the episode was, at the time, a brilliant little twist that raised my dampened spirits. Yet, it wasn't enough then, and it isn't enough now. This isn't even a slight episode, it is downright disappointing. In fact, it is the worst episode since the show came back, and definitely in the top 10 of the show's worst stories.

NB: next week's Clunker review will be materialising on Friday because, at around about this time next week, they'll be something else to review...

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Friday, August 19, 2011

(Failing to) Defend the Death Penalty

Over at Anna Raccoon's place, a chap called James Garry has come up with a well-written piece defending the death penalty. However, I don't find it convincing and in order to show why, it is probably most effective to look at the final four paragraphs:
The converse is also true: If you do not use the death penalty to deter crime, then you run the very real risk that innocent people will die in the future because their murderer has no real fear of the consequences of his crime. It cuts both ways.
There are a couple of problems with this. Firstly, it is possible for a potential murderer to fear the consequences of his (or her - women kill too, you know) action without the threat of the noose. I know there is this myth that prison is some sort of holiday camp and while some prisoners have privileges that might seem undeserved, prison is still that - prison. It is being denied your freedom and being incarcerated in close proximity to other prisoners, the vast majority of who will be unpleasant individuals at the very least. Death is not the only deterrent - a lengthy prison sentence would probably deter many.

But then again (and this is the second problem) there is the very real question of whether those who commit crimes are truly thinking of the consequences - in part because those consequences only become applicable if that person is caught. This then leads to the question of just how many criminals - murderers or otherwise - actually believe they will be caught before they commit their crimes. And it is no good pointing to those criminals who have been caught who now talk about consequences - those consequences will, no doubt, have become very real to them since their capture. No doubt the response to this is the idea that if just one murderer is deterred by the threat of the death penalty that it is worth it. More on this later.
As much as the anti-capital punishment brigade might not like it, supporters of the death penalty are wholly capable of dispassionate, rational thinking about the death penalty. I expect most supporters of the death penalty, similarly to me, want the death penalty reinstituted because of its success as a deterrent. We do not salivate at the prospect of the noose. Instead, I think we look a little further into the future than our opponents do.
I don't doubt that there are some supporters of the death penalty who are simply interested in its capacities as a deterrent - although whether they constitute "most" of them is disputable. But there are definitely some who salivate at "the prospect of the noose". Still, all this is conjecture; I don't know about the psychological make-up and reasoning of all those who support the death penalty, and nor does Garry. I would suggest, though, that "dispassionate, rational thinking" is of essential yet limited use when it comes to considering the death penalty. The use of empathy is also important when it comes to understanding what it would be like to feel the ultimate sanction of the state for a crime you are wholly innocent of. Far too often I see the case for the death penalty presented presented in utlitarian terms - that it is ok to execute a few innocent people if a greater number of people are saved. I find such ideas - which effectively amount to the sacrifice by the state of some citizens for the greater good - deeply troubling at best, and morally repugnant at worst.
Looking into the future we see the face of an innocent girl who has not yet been murdered. We conclude that if the threat of the death penalty could prevent her killer from killing her, then it is essential that we have a death penalty.
We could also look into the future and see the innocent misfit in the condemned cell, facing their last night on this planet before the heavy hand of the state snaps their neck for a crime they didn't commit. But let's not get too emotional here; let's actually look at an example of a child killer and ask whether the death penalty would have deterred them.

Ian Brady is often mentioned when people advocate the death penalty, and rightly so. Brady is a repellent human being - an immoral, sadistic child killer. If you want to make the case for hanging child killers, then Brady is a good place to start. And if the death penalty would have deterred Brady from killing, then it would be worth it, surely? If the threat of execution was enough to stop Brady from killing five young people, it has to be worth it, right?

Except that Brady was arrested on 7th October, 1965 - just over a month before the death penalty was abolished. In other words, all of Brady's crimes were committed when the death penalty was in place. Indeed, his most notorious crime (the horrific murder of five year old Lesley Ann Downey) was committed on 26th December, 1964 - nearly a year before the death penalty was abolished and also nearly a year before the last death sentence was handed down. I know the 1957 Homicide Act reduced the applications of the death penalty, but Brady would still have been eligible for the rope from the moment he killed his second victim. Did the death penalty deter Brady? Doesn't look like it. So if we look to the past, and that poor little girl walking into the clutches of the Moors Murderers on Boxing Day 1964 we see an example of the death penalty being, well, not really a deterrent. And that's before you consider the fact that Brady wants to die.
If you are concerned with protecting the innocent and the gentle and the law-abiding, you ought to support the death penalty.
Oh, please. To support the innocent, gentle and lawabiding we need to back the state murdering its own citizens? Self-defeating nonsense.

And I want to repeat myself - there is something deeply wrong with the idea that we should empower the state to take the lives of its citizens. The fact that the state already has this power (through such things as denying cancer sufferers the drugs that could save them, for example) doesn't then make it ok - in fact it simply further makes the case that we should be restricting the power of the state rather than increasing it. And owing to the general incompetence of the state and the fallibility of the humans who constitute it, we need to be very careful before we return to that state the power to take the lives of its citizens in a ritualistic manner for the greater good.

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Thursday, August 18, 2011

"Big Brother" and Big Brother

A new series of Big Brother starts today. I don’t think many of my regular readers will be surprised to hear that I won’t be tuning in. Frankly, when it (apparently) ended I saw that as a cause for celebration. The fact that it is back after such a short space of time is thoroughly depressing.

But the more I think about it, the more depressing I find the whole Big Brother experience. Like its dreadful counterparts (The X Factor and so on), Big Brother brings an ersatz political experience to its many viewers. You get to do, with Big Brother, much of what constitutes politics. You get to observe how people are performing, make decisions about them and their behaviour, and then vote on who should (and who shouldn’t be successful). Of course, it is more than possible to simultaneously be politically engaged and watch trite reality TV, but I can’t help but feel that as politicians become blander than bland and reality TV becomes more and more a freakshow - ghastly yet compelling (for many) to watch - people will opt for the latter even though the former is so much more important.

And this, for those of us with an open enough mind to consider such philosophers, is the sort of thing that the likes of Theodor Adorno warned us about decades ago. People become content to accept the status quo and to cease questioning it because they get their daily fix of televisual nonsense. Why worry about what the government is up to when it’s a bit boring and there are dickheads to laugh at on the TV? Why bother to walk all the way to the polling station when you can vote on which social misfit should be denied the limelight on the idiot box in your living room?

As people watch Big Brother, Big Brother is increasingly watching them without them realising it. A fact that is simultaneously striking and utterly depressing.

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Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Why Is Rick Perry So Terrifying?

The news that Rick Perry has joined the race for the Republican nomination for President sends a shiver down my spine. He is exactly the sort of politician that the US does not need – a bellicose God-botherer who is perfectly happy to send the mentally retarded to the execution chamber despite commandments in his religion like “thou shalt not kill”. He’s for freedom, just so long as it is economic – if you’re gay and you want to marry someone of the same gender, your freedom should be curtailed in the strange worldview of this Christian fundamentalist. And while I’m pretty liberal when it comes to gun laws, I can’t help but feel doing something like this makes you look like a total dickhead:



But Perry is not alone in many of these opinions; increasingly, these represent the sort of stances that a Republican candidate must take if they want to have any chance of being successful. So why is Perry particularly terrifying?

I think it is the fact that he is George W. Bush but Bush Junior turned up to 11. From what I’ve seen and heard of Perry, he makes Bush Junior – the worst President of the United States in living memory – look like a subtle and nuanced thinker in whom you could have complete confidence. And that is what makes Perry such a dangerous option for the Republicans and, if nominated, the US as a whole. After all, we know how it ended for George W. Bush. Why on earth would anyone want to replicate the sorry farrago that was Bush Junior’s presidency? Or, even worse, risk an even more extreme version of it?

And it is this sort of candidate who makes Obama look like the best option. Obama is a weak, compromised president but he does at least come across as far saner than many of his Republican rivals. And this may well be the factor that gets him a second term – not that he’s any good, but just that he’s less mental than those he fights elections against.

So to any Republicans reading this and preparing to vote in next year’s primaries – Rick Perry: just say no.

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Rioting and Austerity

Over at The Guardian, we learn that austerity causes riots. Actually, we don’t – despite what the headline says, this is not a “fact”. The “fact” is that there is a correlation between the implementation of some austerity measures and some social unrest. But let’s not dwell on that – we know that this nation’s media are not big on facts. Let’s instead pretend that it is fact and therefore ask the question “so what?”

Seriously, so what if austerity measures cause riots? Does that mean we should never ever cut spending, just in case? Even if spending is at a horrific, unsustainable level? No, of course not. That would be a bit like saying we shouldn’t allow immigration because it causes rioting from EDL louts. A far more sensible policy (if this was “fact”) would be to make sure that, when austerity measures are introduced, thought should be given to the potential impact they might have on social stability. Or to put it another way, the police should expect some rioting, and prepare accordingly (i.e. by doing a bit more than standing by looking blankly when it all kicks off). Furthermore, if the government changed its economic policies owing to these riots, it would be implicitly condoning rioting or, at the very least, saying “rioting works - if you don’t like our policies, burn down a Gregg’s and raid a Foot Locker, and we’ll change them”.

There have been numerous attempts to explain these riots and, to some extent, to excuse those rioting. Such attempts are, as far as I can see, simultaneously unsuccessful and utter bullshit. The riots were caused by (a) the fact that some people like fighting and (b) the fact that some people like free stuff – something that can be facilitated by stealing stuff. Any analysis more complicated than that is frankly adding a gravitas that the situation simply does not call for.

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Tuesday, August 16, 2011

A Request...

...to Ron Paul supporters - please, please, please stop sending me shit about Ron Paul's money bombs. I don't have the cash to spare and even if I did I would spend it on candidates based in this country, not the US. And even if I did have the cash to spare and you'd got the right nation, I'd still be unlikely to give money to a candidate with practically no chance of winning.

Thanks.

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Sunday, August 14, 2011

Torchwood: Miracle Day: The Categories of Life

My last three reviews of Torchwood have been necessarily harsh, but harsh nonetheless. So let's redress the balance a bit. This episode was not bad; in fact, not bad at all. In fact, it was probably the best one since RTD kicked off the show five weeks ago. The main reason for this is that the Torchwood team now seem to be actively participating in their own adventure. Rather than just larking around on the sides of the Miracle, now they are fully exploring its implications. They are going into the camps and finding out what is going on - even if, in the case of Rex, it takes a demonstration for him to work out what the modules are for.

But it isn't just the active participation that works here. For the first time, we get a real sense of menace created through the fact that the Torchwood team are now genuinely in danger. Of course, it takes an extreme event - the gunning down and then incineration of Vera by a desperate man who has lost all control of himself - to really hammer this point home, but at long last we get a feeling (added to by the preview for next week's episode) that the team aren't playing around anymore - and nor are their enemies.

Elsewhere, the positively reptilian Oswald Danes (seriously, they should get Bill Pullman to play a Silurian in Doctor Who - he wouldn't need any make-up) appears to be hedging his bets; advocating PhiCorp in his speech, but also hinting (as Jack suggested) that they knew about the Miracle before it happened. And... that's about it, really, in terms of developing the overall story arc. Because while the Torchwood team have been finding out about stuff at San Pedro and Cowbridge, the rest of the story hasn't really gone anywhere. At the end of the last episode we knew there were camps and at the end of this episode we know there are camps where bad things are happening. It is hardly a dramatic leap forward in the underlying story, and other than the whispers about morphic fields we know next to nothing about the causes of the Miracle. Yeah, yeah there are still five episodes to go, I know. But it is telling that the pace of this story is so slow that the Torchwood team were able to have an evening to themselves and chow down on some Chinese takeaway at the beginning of the episode.

And while elements of the plotting of the episode - for example, that Danes was able to win over the crowd with his mix of contrition, flattery and hope - other elements of the story have me shaking my head in disbelief. If you're a government building large areas designed effectively to burn people alive, what is the one word you would want to avoid? "Camp". Brings up all sorts of association with, I don't know, mass slaughter. But what are the death centres referred to as here? "Overflow Camps". Fucking hell, you may as well call them "charnel houses" or "killing fields". And had they been named something else, then the Torchwood team would literally be none the wiser. They'd have continued larking around at the edges of the story. And frankly, it stretches a credibility that is already at breaking point to suppose that governments all over the world were able to build these camps without anyone anywhere ever saying "err, shouldn't we have a slightly less loaded word to describe them?"

But there are always going to be problems with a show as lazily scripted as Miracle Day. Let's leave that to one side, and instead keep our fingers crossed that the upturn in quality here is replicated and built upon in later instalments. The Categories of Life remains far from perfect, but does at least give me a certain level of hope that was sadly lacking after watching Escape to L.A.

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Saturday, August 13, 2011

Doctor Who: Aliens of London/World War Three

As Clunkers go, this is a slightly odd one. It is here because, as far as I'm concerned, it is the worst of the Eccleston era. But it is far from terrible. Elements of it are very strong. Other elements are not great. And as this was the longest Doctor Who story since 1989, it is worth pausing to consider why.

The plot: the Doctor returns Rose to earth, apparently 12 hours after she left. However, it is actually 12 months. This causes some ructions in the Tyler household and earns the Doctor a slap from Jackie Tyler. In the meantime, an alien spaceship crashes and aliens launch a coup in Downing Street. The aliens are the Slitheen, a criminal family determined to reduce the Earth to radioactive sludge that can then be sold. The Doctor, using his connections and his newfound extended family in the form of the Tylers, defeats them. Hardly the most original of plots, but entertaining nonetheless.

So what works well? Eccleston is superb. Witness him chasitising the soldier for gunning down the space pig or threatening the Slitheen. This is an outstanding actor bringing real gravitas to the role of the Doctor. And he is ably backed up by Billie Piper as Rose - and pretty much anyone involved in the Tyler side to the story is really strong here. As is Penelope Wilton as Harriet Jones - a character who could have been deeply irritating (the repetition of her name and constituency, for example) is made compellingly human through Wilton's performance. By the end of the show, you want her to become Prime Minister. So we have a number of strong performances here, and we are introduced to someone who would become an important part of Torchwood - Toshiko Sato. Sadly, we also get some pretty OTT and consequently uncovincing performances - see almost anyone playing a Slitheen in these episodes.

The Tyler side to the story is also entertaining and, in its own quiet way, ground-breaking for Doctor Who. "Don't you dare make this place domestic" warns Rose after Jackie and Mickey enter the TARDIS. Well, here the show is made more domestic, and amazingly it enhances the experience. Looking at how life with the Doctor affects not just his companions but also those around the companion is a fascinating idea, and leads to these episodes best moments - the Doctor getting slapped and "maybe because everyone thinks I murdered you" being two examples. This is the first time we really see one of RTD's strengths - bringing the domestic and realistic emotions to the show.

Unfortunately, we also see the biggest weakness of RTD - sci-fi plotting. There is precious little that is original here, and the sci-fi elements of the story add next to nothing to it. Blowing the aliens up with a redirected missile is hardly a satisfying resolution after circa ninety minutes of drama. Nor is the cliffhanger any good - it is padded out for ages, and resolved in seconds with the plotting equivalent of a get out jail free card. I'd waited from 1989 to 2005 to see another Doctor Who cliffhanger - and it was not worth the wait. And much of World War Three involves the Doctor, Rose and Harriet talking about stuff in a room. Likewise, the Slitheen are undermined to a large extent by being vulnerable to vinegar - it is a childish plot device that makes them somehow unconvincing and very silly. Not as silly as their constant farting makes them, mind.

Indeed, the Slitheen were never going to become one of the iconic Doctor Who monsters - they are just a bit too silly for that. But I really don't think they are done any favours by the director here. They could be made menacing, even with all the farting. But the times when they are meant to appear menacing (i.e. before they kill) the direction is really rather flat, and they come across (again) as childish rather than a genuine threat. Which is a shame because, done just slightly differently, they could have been very sinister with their baby alien faces and their plump yet lethal hunter bodies. But the way they are presented meant they were always going to be consigned to The Sarah Jane Adventures and children's TV.

Essentially (and much like the current run of Torchwood) we have two stories here - one very domestic and really rather convincing and one outlandish and just plain silly. And this would be the curse of RTD - he was always great at doing the emotional or domestic, but when it came to plot twists or decent sci-fi, the quality went out the window. It is also why his best story - Midnight - relies on ordinary people facing an undefined and unexplained monster with only the most basic of sci-fi trappings.

So Aliens of London and World War Three are disappointing in some ways, but they are by no means a disaster. In fact, a strong case could be made that these two episodes are the best of what I'm calling the Clunkers. But in many ways they define the highs and the lows of an era - an undoubtedly successful age of the show where the lead writer was exceptional in some regards and sadly very lacklustre in others.

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Friday, August 12, 2011

Guido is once again spouting self-serving bullshit and revealing his socially conservative side in the process:
What happened to the Ed Miliband who got hitched to Justine after pressure from those of us who pointed out that it was unusual and a little bit weird for a party leader not to be married to the mother of his children?
Now, I have no idea why Ed Miliband chose to get married this year; it could be because of Guido’s pressure (although I rather think Guido is once again over-estimating his own influence); it could be because Miliband Minor wanted to silence the snidey bullshit emerging about his private relationship with the mother of his children and life partner coming from prurient muck-rakers like Gudio. It could also be because he loves Justine and wanted to make that relationship formal. I don’t know why he chose to do what he did; nor does Guido, I rather suspect.

And while it true that party leaders are traditionally married to the mother (or father, in the case of Thatcher) of their children, it is not a “little bit weird” if they are not. There are countless couples across the country who are not married despite having children. I know two couples myself who are about to have children but who are not married. We live in a time when marriage is no longer considered an essential stepping stone before a couple can have children. Thankfully, we live in a more modern age. People might not get married before having kids because they just don’t get round to it (and trust me, organising a wedding takes a lot of time), it might be because they don’t see any value in marriage or believe that their love for each other needs to be rubber stamped by the church or the state. Such views are not “weird”; they are perfectly valid alternative views for those who are not obsessed by the social norms of the past and are happy to live in a way that is slightly different from the socially conservative expectations of the likes of Guido Fawkes.

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Be a Politician? No Thanks.

A question (well questions really) posed by Simon Gibbs over at the Libertarian Home website:
My question to Pavel, which I will repeat, is what other challenges prevent you, dear reader, from standing on your own behalf to fight a campaign? Is it the absence of a positive Party brand? The official paperwork? Publicity? Is it solely a lack of resources such as time and money?
Obviously I can only speak for myself, but the problem isn’t so much the lack of an effective party structure or the lack of relevant resources. It is that I have no inclination to run any sort of campaign, let alone a campaign for office. It isn’t so much that I wouldn’t win – but obviously embarking on a thankless quest almost certainly destined to end in failure won’t appeal to most. Rather, I’d be afraid of winning. Put simply, I have no interest in holding office within the political structure of Great Britain. I do not want to immerse myself within the massive bureaucratic nightmare that is the British state, and I do not want to expose myself or my loved ones to the public spotlight and our intrusive media that has no respect whatsoever for the privacy of any public figure. Above all, I don’t want to be a politician. I lack the arrogance to believe that I know best and that my opinions should be forced onto others.

Furthermore, I think we have adopted a very narrow sense of what constitutes politics in this country. We see politics as increasingly synonymous with government; local, regional or (mainly) central. We see those who stand for Parliament as the real politicians, backed up by lesser politicians in those who make up the party structures. However, I would argue that there is very little that is genuinely political about MPs who become lobby fodder in the House of Commons or those party functionaries and unthinking supporters who spout a party line about issues rather than engaging with those issues and reaching their own conclusions about them. There is more politics happening in a debate between open-minded, politically aware people in the pub than there is in a “debate” in the Commons. The tragedy is that the debate in the pub evaporates into the ether just as soon as the final beers are supped whereas the drones making laws in the legislature can affect each and every one of use.

Of course, this leaves us in a perfect Catch 22 situation; the only way we can change the system is by engaging with it – but, by engaging with the system, we run the risk of becoming apolitical as we conform to the restrictions of that system. I don’t know the way out of that conundrum, but I do know where I stand in relation to the political system in this country; resolutely and happily on the outside.

So why don’t I run a campaign on my own? Because I don’t want to be a politician. And I suspect I am not alone in that.

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Friday Fun




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Thursday, August 11, 2011

An Epic Summer Recess

I always wonder why it is presented as something that is in some way comforting when the House of Commons returns from a recess to debate a key issue of the day. Why would a bunch of self-important, indolent and self-serving gobshites pontificating on riots or on phone hacking make a blind bit of fucking difference out there in the real world? No doubt the rioters are now shitting themselves and would never dare to rob a Foot Locker again, and all because Cameron and Miliband returned (no doubt briefly) to the Commons to engage in an extended bout of meaningless posturing.

But what is really striking is that this is the second time that the Commons has been recalled from its recess since it began about halfway through July. I don’t care that there have been two crises in that short space of time; rather, I’m staggered by just how many recesses the Commons has awarded itself and how long the summer recess is. MPs don’t have to attend the Commons from 19th July to 5th September this year, and then they’re back for a whopping 10 days before getting a Conference recess from 15th September to 10th October. Yeah, I know that they have constituency duties, but effectively from late June until mid-October MPs are doing at best half their jobs, and they aren’t doing one of the crucial things they are elected to do; they aren’t debating legislation, they aren’t legislating, and they are not governing despite being, y'know, the government. I feel some relief that they aren’t adding to the legislative burden of this country for much of what we laughably call the summer**, but I’m staggered given the amount they are paid and the role they do (governing, for fuck’s sake) which apparently still allows them to take a large swathe of the summer off. Because, as the hacking scandal and the riots show, politics does not stop just because we are in the summer months.

It would be too much to state that the feckless indolence of much of the population is the result of the feckless indolence of the parliamentarians who apparently see nothing wrong with taking the majority of the summer off*** - I suspect that most people don’t know about the recess and probably don’t care. But there is a concept called “leading by example”; our MPs expect us to follow them but time and time again they show a steadfast refusal to demonstrate why we should follow them or actually consider them to be leaders. At a time when the economy is struggling and disaffection with politicians is running at an all-time high, a starting point to turn this situation around could be our MPs starting to work at full pelt not just in parts of the year, but across the whole year. Which is not too much to ask, surely?

*Or in the case of Gordon Brown, pretty much at all.
**Given this positively autumnal August.
***There are some who have argued that the summer recess would be reduced – such as former MP Chris Mullin. The fact that their aruments have made sod all difference is probably a good indicator of the mindset of those who sit in the Commons.

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Blog Awards

The Total Politics blogging awards are up and running again - follow the link for details. As always, I can't be bothered to actively campaign or indeed reveal who I'll be voting for (assuming I vote at all), but everyone should feel more than free to vote for this blog if they so wish. Or not as the case may be.

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Wednesday, August 10, 2011

On Being a Member of a Political Party

LPUK is dead. Long live LPUK*.

Since leaving (well, not renewing my membership after they failed to let me know my membership had expired) LPUK, I’ve been faintly surprised that I’ve not really missed being part of a political party. And as a result I’ve actually reached the conclusion that not being a member of a party is actually the way forward, for me at least.

It isn’t the cost factor (although the fact that LPUK apparently managed to piss away so much money makes me reluctant to spend my hard earned cash on a membership fee for that particular party) or the fact that no party truly represents my views. Rather, it is that being a member of a political party requires a certain amount of compromise. You have to accept not only that the party won’t perfectly match your ideological views, but also accept the leadership of potentially unpleasant people (seriously, how did anyone remain a member of the Labour party when the ghoulish and utterly odious Brown was leader?) and accept the tactical and strategic mistakes of that leadership. Yeah, I know that some will argue that part of being a party member is assisting that party in trying not to make mistakes in the future at the same time as attempting to adapt it to your own views. However, I reckon that people who believe that can actually happen are both more optimistic and have far more time on their hands than me.

Besides, I’m rather taken with the idea of a political gadfly; someone who zips from issue to issue, explaining their views as they go without having to take and/or defend a party line. Indeed, I’d argue that the pace and diversity of modern politics and that issues that arise from it defy hierarchical and bureaucratic party structures.

Of course, some will answer this by questioning just how I – or anyone else who adopts a similar position – hopes to have any political influence outside of a political party. Put simply, political parties represent the main way politics is done in this country – how can I expect to have any impact without being a member of one? Well, I’ve been the member of a major and a minor political party, and still had no real impact on politics in this country. I’m basically in the same position regardless of whether I’m a member of a party or not; the main difference is not having to shell out my hard earned cash to get a card saying I’m a member. So I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you.

So party membership; thanks but no thanks. I’ve better things to do with my time and money.

*I’ll warn anyone who still believes LPUK has anything to offer one piece of advice – if it resurfaces with the same team that led it to the brink of destruction you want to avoid it like a particularly virulent and unpleasant plague.

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Tuesday, August 09, 2011

I don't have a great deal to say about the London Riots, and next to nothing that hasn't been said already. But I'll throw my thoughts into the maelstrom of thoughts on these riots that is swirling incessantly out there anyway. There's a bandwagon, so feel free to witness my attempt to jump on it.

One of the reasons why I have so little to say about the riots is because this is a political blog but, as far as I can see, there is precious little that is political behind the violence that has broken out in London and, to a lesser degree, elsewhere. I hear about social deprivation and inequality, and about how the police gunned down a man who may or may not have been a gangster of some sort and who may or may not have shot one of them in a chest. Then I see images of a Greggs burning, I hear about a CarpetRight that has been torched, and I hear about trainers being stolen from a JD Sports that was looted during one of these riots. And I see that these events have precious little to do with politics and everything to do with an infectious, uncontrollable rage and a real lust for taking goods that haven't been paid for. Indeed, one of only two of the political dimensions I see to all this is that failure of the police, and the British state, to respond to those who have turned the poorer areas of the capital city into what is effectively a war zone. It is one thing to protest against the state, another to take to the streets and indulge in a self-perpetuating orgy of looting and mindless violence.

Furthermore, even when some of the rioters and looters are put on trial for their actions, what do we think will be the result? Does anyone seriously think that their claims that these were legitimate acts of protest will be taken seriously? And what do we think the long-term political reaction to these crimes will be? Do we honestly think that the state will use this as an opportunity to anything other than flex its muscles and expand its power and control over us? And as we hear that Facebook and BlackBerries have been useful tools in the co-ordination of these riots. So what do we think the government will do - leave us to use our BlackBerries and Facebook in peace? Or demand the right to intrude further with regard to both things? I know what I would put my money on, and this is the second political dimension to these events - there will be another encroachment on our freedom and our civil liberties.

And when will it stop? I don't know. I suspect that there is more violence to come. But I also suspect that these events have become embarrassing for the police and will become more so the more often they happen. So I suspect that the next time the riots start, the police are going to be more and more likely to seriously start cracking skulls. Then, at the next legitimate protest, the police will go in heavy handed, determined to take no chances and therefore to take no prisoners. They won't be able to take the risk of the repetition of that mindless violence, so they had to club that person to the ground and, while they are sorry that it ended in this way, that's why he had to die... and so on.

So all we have here is a largely self-indulgent outbreak of violence that will get Middle England tutting at the perpetrators and in doing so this violence will strengthen the state. And if the motivations of the rioters were genuinely political, then they would see that what has happened is, to a massive extent, a disaster for their cause. But they don't have a case, and, furthermore, I suspect that a substantial number of them will just be happy to have got themselves new acquisitions without having to go through the trouble of buying them.

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Monday, August 08, 2011

Never Let Me Go

In many respects, Never Let Me Go is a very simple film. It is a movie about a tragic love triangle between three doomed individuals. But that simplicity is deceptive. In fact, it is a far more complex film that it might first appear. Because the background scenario - the dystopian society that provides the backdrop and the reason as to why the leading trio are doomed - is simultaneously fascinating and frightening. And yes, there are spoilers ahead.

The trio at the heart of the story are donors - not those who volunteer to donate organs after their demise, but rather human clones who are bred to provide replacement organs for real humans. And those organs are removed while the donors still live -organ by organ until the donor can no longer survive and they die. Their whole lives are laid out for them, and the donors know that they will die on an operating table giving their vital organs to those deemed to be more important than them.

In part, the film is about what it means to be human. The donors - bred to be internally cannibalised - are effectively human. They feel; they love, they argue, they hope and they fear. They create. In what way are they different from other humans? Is it simply they were bred to be spare parts and then conditioned to accept that fate? But it is about more than just the question of whether the donors are human, since the film also posits the implicit question of "how human is a society that breeds fellow humans to slowly kill them in a cold, clinical and bureaucratic way?"

As such, this film is in part a tragic romance, in part a dystopian fantasy. But it is also an very unlikely but also compelling horror movie, rather like In The Loop (albeit for different reasons). The horror isn't blatant or in-your-face; rather, it hangs in the atmosphere but is everywhere. The film features people born to die and while one of the characters muses that everyone completes (the film's term for dying), these people aren't just born to die, they are born to be killed and their organs systematically harvested. Furthermore, there are constant hints at just how inhumane this society has become. Hailsham - one of the schools that educate the donors - is perceived by one of its leading staff members as a last bastion of ethical behaviour towards the donors. It cares about whether they are human or not. But even as it asks that question it still grooms these children not to question; to be compliant little donors. It is complicit in the systematic slaughter of numerous people in society. Furthermore, it is suggested that Hailsham has closed towards the end of the film, and that the newer schools for clones are really just battery farms. Humans clones as battery hens, bred by a society that would rather ignore them until it needs their organs. And clones so indoctrinated and convinced of their own fate that they do not run and do not flee; the closest they come to such an aspiration is wanting to defer their first donation because they have found love. Hell, even the bland wording for the process are haunting; "donations" for the harvesting of organs, "completion" for what is effectively murder at the hands of the National Donor Programme. This is a dystopian future, and we see it through the dystopia's victims.

Never Let Me Go is touching, sinister and thought-provoking in equal measure and, as such, is well worth watching.

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Sunday, August 07, 2011

A Moral Case Against The Death Penalty

Over at the Telegraph, we learn that the death penalty "works". We also get a wonderful attempt to demolish the arguments of opponents of the death penalty through a striking example of hysterical (and largely empty) rhetoric:
We can expect anti-death penalty campaigners to point to America as an example of why it should stay banned. The usual images will be invoked of pot-bellied, racist, white judges sentencing innocent saints to death by chainsaw in some Alabama charnel house. Accepting the many obvious injustices in the US legal system, there is an instinctive British snobbery towards Americans that renders any comparison between our two countries unflattering. Amnesty International, Liberty and the New Statesman will probably ask, “Why would we endorse a system of retribution practiced by those knuckle-dragging, Bible bashing, toothless crazies over in Texas?”
Well, while some may use such imagery in their arguments against the death penalty, you won't find it coming from a death penalty opponent such as my good self. I don't care what the examples of the US - and of other more authoritarian (Iran, China) and totalitarian (North Korea)regimes - show us. Because my opposition to the death penalty is far simpler, and doesn't rely on statistics showing how ineffective it is. My position is this: the death penalty is morally wrong.

I don't believe the state should be able to take the lives of its citizens. I don't believe it makes sense. To claim that a crime - such as murder - is so wrong that the only way to combat it is to take a life doesn't fit together for me. Such arguments justify state murder using murder. But if murder is wrong, then why should the state be empowered to commit such a crime?

Of course, what the current campaign is actually advocating is the death penalty in certain cases - when the victim is a child or a police officer killed in the line of duty. Surely I'm not defending a person as vile as a child or cop killer? Well, no, of course I'm not - I believe that those people should be locked up for life. But to say those crimes are so heinous that the perpetrators deserve to lose their lives - or have their lives taken by the state - actually tells us something quite interesting about how we view individual worth. Put simply, the life of a serving police officer or a child is worth more than mine in the case of murder. And I struggle with that. It alludes to a mindset where we do not exist as individuals, but rather as amorphous blobs; of collective categories rather than individual humans. And I also worry about what the death penalty says about our relationship with the state; there can be few better ways of showing that the state is more important than the individual than through empowering it to end the existence of individuals in certain circumstances.

Then there's the problem of the fallibility of humanity. Humans fail; through incompetence and malice. That's why we have murderers in the first place. But the state - any state - is the construction of humans. Therefore, it too will be fallible. Yeah, I'm about to trot out the line about innocent people being sent to the gallows. But it is so often used in these debates because it is absolutely crucial to the nature of the death penalty. Any proponent of the death penalty needs to use their powers of empathy to put themselves in the shoes of a person wrongly accused of child or cop killing in the condemned cells facing the last night of their life before the state takes their very existence from them. There are no certainties in this life; we could all end up the victim of a miscarriage of justice. But I know for many of those arguing for the death penalty it seems highly unlikely that they would end up facing the ultimate sanction. As the examples of Derek Bentley and Timothy Evans shows, it is often the mentally slower people who end up as innocents on death row. Or, to use two examples of those who have more recently suffered miscarriages of justice and would have ended up facing death under Guido's proposed law, those who have stood out as in some way strange - Sally Clark with her post-natal depression or Stefan Kiszko, whose main crime seems to actually have been being an awkward mummy's boy. So those who are prepared to take a risk and allow for state murder are falling into the same trap as those who argue some victims are more important than others - they are stating that the lives of some are more important than others. They are effectively saying that the lives of the non-conformist, of the mentally ill or of the mentally subnormal are worth risking if we can string up a genuinely guilty child or cop killer. And I find such valuations of individual lives as morally questionable at best, and morally repugnant at worst.

So those who oppose the death penalty don't use to use anti-American cliches to make their case. Even if there was conclusive evidence using a simple utlitarian calculation that the death penalty works there would still be a moral argument to be made and one that needs to be effectively answered before we revert to the noose or embrace the needle.

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Saturday, August 06, 2011

Doctor Who: The TV Movie

I know it has its fans just as I know that Paul McGann has his fans. But to me, this movie is an utter failure. McGann is a failure as the Doctor. And this whole misfire nearly consigned the series to oblivion when it should have been a glorious rebirth of the series.

Yeah, yeah, I know that McGann has got far better as the Doctor in the Big Finish audio plays. And I know that it is slightly unfair to choose a clunker from the McGann era when there is only one TV story to choose from. But it still stands, and as far as I am concerned this movie was and is a massive disappointment.

To truly understand why I have so little time for McGann's one TV outing it is worth comparing this failed attempt to relaunch the show with a later - far more successful attempt; 2005's Rose. Because while Rose is far from perfect, it does help to highlight all that went wrong with this TV movie. Rose begins with, well, Rose as she goes about her daily business - getting up, going to work, flirting with her boyfriend, before finally going into the basement of the store where she works to find that the shop dummies have started to move. Then she meets the man who will change her life and he says just one word - "run". It is a brilliant opening, launching straight into an adventure without bringing the complex baggage of 26 years worth of Doctor Who. However, the TV Movie does precisely the opposite. In a pre-title sequence that consists of bad CGI and Dalek voices that sound like chipmunks playing as Daleks, the Doctor in a voice over says:
"It was on the planet Skaro that my old enemy, the Master, was finally put on trial. They say he listened calmly as his list of evil crimes was read and sentence passed. Then he made his last, and I thought somewhat curious, request. He demanded that I, the Doctor, a rival Time Lord, should take his remains back to our home planet - Gallifrey. It was a request they should never have granted."
So, this sequence assumes prior knowledge of (1) Skaro, the home planet of the Daleks (2) who the Master is and (3) people identify the Daleks from their voices - they will know what they sound like even though they don't sound like, well, the Daleks here. So it is an intro for geeks like me, really. Except that it is really unsatisfying even for geeks. It isn't just the Dalek voices, it is the complete lack of knowledge of the Daleks. Yeah, they might execute the Master - that's believable. But they don't do last requests. And they certainly don't invite their mortal enemy - the Oncoming Storm - to pick up the last remains of one of his other mortal enemies from their home world without exterminating him. And why the frig would the Doctor agree to this? To place himself in moral danger in order to get the final remains of his nemesis (particularly given the Master was actually using a stolen body)? Sorry, this beginning is bollocks, and it makes no-one happy; neither the casual viewer or the devoted fan.

Then we have the presentation of the Doctor. In Rose, he is instantly charismatic; a mix of a gurning joker and angry, bereaved loner. He is also alien through and through. The Eighth Doctor, however, comes across like a hyperactive child, rushing around, talking crap and acting like a slightly quirky action hero. As I say, McGann matures in the Big Finish audio plays, but here he is the least Doctorish Doctor there has ever been. And as for that horseshit about him being half-human... please. Why do we need this? What does it add to the story? And for such a continuity filled installment of the show, to piss on 26 years worth of mythology by making the Doctor half-human is both crass and pointless.

Of course, McGann isn't helped by the fact that, for a sizable minority of the story, he isn't the Doctor. Instead, we see the demise of the Seventh Doctor. Now, as noted last week, I'm a big fan of McCoy's incarnation, so it was nice to see him again in this. Nice, but not essential. Not least because the most Machiavellian of Doctors is not felled through his own machinations but rather through being caught in the crossfire in a gang war before finally being offed by his new companion operating on him. Besides, it is a dumb way to begin a new era of the show and to relaunch it to an international audience - McCoy was watched by between 3 and 5 million people in the UK, making him probably the least successful Doctor in terms of viewing figures ever. And it is difficult to imagine many people in America knowing much about the Seventh Doctor. So why open your brand new version of the show with a little known actor who is about to be replaced anyway? Why not just start the new version of Doctor Who with the new Doctor? Like, well, they did with Rose? I mean, just imagine how surreal would have been with Paul McGann in the role of the Doctor for the first ten minutes before he regenerated... into the new (and therefore real) star of the show.

Then we have the adversaries and the companion(s). The Master is the main enemy here and, by God, he's fucking mental in this one. And quite nasty as well. He doesn't mind snapping people's necks or destroying his own stolen body. I guess you could argue that he is pretty desperate here, but it doesn't stop him from camping it up. It isn't that the Master is bad here, more that he just isn't that memorable. In his first adventures, he was always backed up by some other monsters... like, Autons in his first story. And Autons are a simple idea, but very effective. Plastic mannequins that come to life. Much more memorable that a glorified body snatcher.

Of course, companions don't need to be visually iconic or that memorable on paper. The two companions in the TV movie - surgeon and gang member - are far more memorable on paper than Rose Tyler. Yet it is Rose Tyler, with her inquisitive nature and her ability to save the day, that makes her an iconic companion and those in TV Movie also-rans. Rose Tyler is extraordinary despite being ordinary; the two companions in the TV Movie are really very ordinary despite living extraordinary day to day lives. Neither shows any real curiousity about traveling in the TARDIS. Rose? She sprints into the TARDIS at the end of her first story. And quite right too. If the human we are witnessing the story through isn't at least a bit interested in life in the TARDIS, why should we be interested?

Which is why the ending to Rose - with its excitement and promise of future adventure - is actually inspiring, whereas the ending to the TV Movie - with its promise of repetition and its use of a comedy sound effect - just makes the viewer think that no-one is taking this story seriously.

Of course, bad luck could play a part here for McGann. In a sense, comparing his debut story to the relaunch of the show by a lifelong fan and talented writer in his own right taking a hell of a lot of creative control, is unfair. I mean, other Doctors - both of the Bakers and McCoy for example - had disappointing debut stories. The difference is, of course, that for the other three those stories were part of a (highly) popular, long-lasting TV series. In the case of the McGann story, this was meant to be the (re)launch of a very British brand internationally. Put simply, it couldn't afford to be anything other than fast-moving, light-weight yet compelling entertainment. It certainly shouldn't have been an often nonsensical piece that pleases neither the casual viewer or the fan. This TV movie was beaten by a season finale of Roseanne. And, as much as it pains me to say it, this TV movie deserved to be beaten by an episode in a series about a fat woman and her working class family. Indeed, given the success of Rose, it is interesting to conjecture what might had happened if the Eighth Doctor hadn't met Grace but instead a girl from a working class family with a mother like Roseanne...

Now, the reality is that, one day, Doctor Who will disappear from our screens again. But it is also true that, a few years after that disappearance, someone will decide that it is the right time to resurrect it. And let's just hope that they use, for all its flaws (like the bin that burps), they use Rose rather than going for this terribly disappointing and completely mishandled attempt to relaunch Doctor Who.

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