Doodle-Sketch

Clarke on the Rampage

2006-09-10T01:54:00.000Z

The political thriller known as the Labour Party goes on. This time it is Charles Clarke's turn to go on the attack. His target Gordon Brown. His motives are unlclear, does he want to get into someone's good books, get the leadership for himself or just get Gordon?

Gordy's Macbeth moment

2006-09-07T13:13:00.000Z

As pressure mounts on Blair and the minnows have traded their jobs for 5 minutes of fame it is time for Gordon Brown to make his decision. Should he strike now or wait it out?

Of all the political commentators who have tried to guess what Brown is thinking, I feel Bill Shakespeare has it best:

Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.

Murdoch strikes again

2006-09-05T22:15:00.000Z

Murdoch has been close to Blair since Blair's 1997 election victory. It seems fitting and almost inevitable that Murdoch and therfore The Sun would be the first paper to tell of the end of Blair, or at least the scheduled end of Blair. May 31st 2007 we are told.

The 'leaking' of this date to The Sun, if orchestrated by No. 10 shows how Murdoch and Blair's relationship is used to their mutual advantage. Murdoch get's a solid date to quote on the front page of his newspaper, ensuring they'll be a best seller. Blair on the other hand gets a reprieve, or at least that is what he and his advisors hope. He has fed the ravenous party wolves a scrap to keep them at bay, yet has done so without himself committing himself to a specific date. In short, Blair has his cake and eaten it.

No wonder he was smiling at his speech today.

Blair has learned from Thatcher's mistakes. Thatcher never said when she would step down, she seemed permanent and unmovable, so her party got rid of her. Blair saw he was in a similar situation so said very publically he would not serve another term. I thought it was clever then and I still think it was clever now. Those in the Labour party who wish to see Blair gone remember Thatcher's toppling too, they remember the damage it did to the Tories. The end is in sight, Blair will be gone, it is only a matter of time. And the Labour rebels won't further jepordize their marginal seats to oust him a few months sooner.

Nothing really has changed, Blair still hasn't told the public when he will be stepping down. It is the press, Murdoch specifically who has decided when Blair is to step down. Murdoch's end date, right or wrong, I feel it is enough to appease those Labour MPs who this morning were contemplating revolution; for another few months at least.

The Case Against Israel

2006-08-02T19:54:00.000Z

With the Qana bombings described as war crimes by Human Rights Watch and some activists already trying to get Israel referred to the International Court, I thought I'd use the Rome Statute to see how much of Israel's actions could be referred to the International Court as war crimes.

1)"Intentionally directing attacks against civilian objects, that is, objects which are
not military objectives".

Israel's initial air strikes which destroyed bridges, roads (including the main road to Damascus) and airports could fall under this as there seemed to be no military reason for their destruction, this supported by Israel's chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, who uttered the famous soundbite "we will turn Lebanon's clock back 20 years."

2)"Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause
incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or
widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which
would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military
advantage anticipated."

While Israel claims it has tried to minimise civilian 'collatoral damage', the Guardian yesterday quoted the number of Lebanese civilian deaths at 515, Lebanese military deaths at 21 and Hizbullah deaths at 38. If Israel are targetting Hizbullah they don't seem to be very accurate.

Even if Israel's air strikes in general do not fall foul, there is growing consensus that yesterday's attack on the village of Qana does. As the BBC reported "The Israeli air strike on the southern Lebanese village of Qana in the early hours of Sunday killed at least 54 Lebanese civilians, mostly children." and "The UN's emergency relief co-ordinator was highly critical of Israel's strike in Qana, calling it "indiscriminate and excessive"."

3)"Employing weapons, projectiles and material and methods of warfare which
are of a nature to cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering or which
are inherently indiscriminate in violation of the international law of armed
conflict"

There have been reports of Israel using white phosphorous bombs in Lebanon, violating international law.

4)"Intentionally directing attacks against personnel, installations, material, units or
vehicles involved in a humanitarian assistance or peacekeeping mission in
accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, as long as they are entitled
to the protection given to civilians or civilian objects under the international
law of armed conflict"

The bombing of a UN outpost caused much outcry, Kofi Annan innitially calling the attack seemingly deliberate.

Why I agree with Ken Clarke (a bit)

2006-07-05T17:15:00.000Z

The Tories, being the warm fuzzy liberals they are, have been calling for a Bill of Rights, a written constitution for the UK. Wonderful you may think, a libertarian policy coming from the Conservative party, who would have thought. However, the Tory policy essentially gives with one hand and takes with the other; while enshrining many rights in this 'constitution' the Tories have also stated they would repeal the human rights act, at least in parts. While the Conservatives claim otherwise, the way Cameron is treating the European parliament, ordering his MEPs to break from their moderate coalition in search of more Euro-sceptic partners, also hints Cameron may see a UK Bill of Rights as a way of going over the head of the current EU Convention on Human Rights. So apart from being a possible smokescreen behind which the Tories could attempt to repeal human rights legislation without appearing authoritarian and uncaring, why else would we need a Bill of Rights?

The main argument in favour of a Bill of Rights is that Britain has no written constitution, thus there is no limit to a government's power and also we the citizens of

Britain

do not have our rights enshrined in a written constitution. Tackling the latter part first, there is no need in my view for a written constitution to protect our human rights. We have our human rights clearly stated and protected by both the human rights act and the EU convention of Human Rights. Indeed article 3 of the first protocol of the EU convention does protect

Britain

's democracy; something that many claim is as yet not guaranteed: "The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature"

The other main line of argument is that the powers of government have to be controlled and that a bill of rights that Cameron suggests should need about 70% of the House of Commons to vote in favour of change would achieve this. It is perhaps true that recent anti-terror legislation has been too authoritarian yet is a bill of rights needed to change this? Already the EU Convention has given judges the ability to challenge government over its breeches in civil liberties. However, what is perhaps more worrying is the government’s attempt to bypass parliament, notably through the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill, the dangers of which are best summed up here. I would argue that a Bill of Rights would not stop bills like this from being passed and indeed it may make such bills easier to stomach, after all the Bill of Rights would protects us right?

It is instances such as these that convinces me that we don't need a Bill of Rights, what we need is a stronger parliament. At the moment, parliament is nothing more than a rubber stamp to the government’s legislation. A stronger parliament, more independent of government would protect the civil liberties of this country far more than a Bill of Rights would, especially if the Bill of Rights replaced the current Human Right’s act. This would not be especially difficult to achieve either; electoral reform and proportional representation (STV+ if I had my way) would whittle away any majority, if any, a government had and so making it harder to pass controversial legislation. Increasing the powers of select committees would be another way of curtailing government power.

I doubt either Labour or the Conservatives would have the courage to propose something that would damage their political dominance, yet I do not see the Bill of Rights as an acceptable compromise. In this country, we have both an independent judiciary and an independent monarch to safeguard our civil liberties. Until we have an independent parliament these will have to do.

Friday Night with David Cameron

2006-06-24T00:04:00.000Z

Famous comedian come chat show host David Cameron interviewed rising politician Jonathan Ross this evening, or was it the other way around?

It was an interesting interview to say the least. Jonathan Ross certainly tried to raise his game, inspiring some question time style rounds of applause for his comments on legalising drugs and the Iraq war, yet he was no Jeremy Paxman. This was probably one of the reasons Cameron and his team decided to appear on the show.

While an obvious popularity stunt, Cameron and his team have to be admired for trying to reach out to the large proportion of the electorate who does not follow politics in depth. Anything that brings politics out of the houses of parliament or even the rather niche question time and newsnight slots and into mainstream viewing has to be commended.

While Ross tried to raise his game, Cameron had to try and strike a careful balance between laughing at Ross’ jokes and being a ‘normal person’ while also appearing as a statesman-like prime minister in waiting. I think Cameron did quite well, he came across as a likeable person who was willing to play along with Ross’ jokes. At times Cameron did try and force his political points through Ross’ barrage of jokes, almost making it seem he believed in something himself.

The main reason for watching however was to see the Tory leader squirm when asked whether he had a pin-up of Margret Thatcher as a teenager. The answer was a disappointing no, as was the answer to Ross’ follow-up question “so you didn’t imagine her in stockings then?”

Balance of Power

2006-06-13T17:40:00.000Z

Iranian Fans celebrating
The world cup must be one of the only international events that America doesn’t dominate one way or another. The thing about football is it isn’t about wealth, how much a country can spend on developing the sport. Brazil is not the richest country and yet their football team is arguably the best in the world. Football unites people in a way not many other things can. At club level, fans often cheer foreign talent for example. Football could even be seen as educational, how many Briton’s knew what a metatarsal was before Beckham or Rooney
broke one? It is not an English sport as arguably
cricket is, it is truly international. Only Zimbabwe and North Korea don’t try for qualification.

Despite its almost universal appeal, most Americans don’t know the world cup is happening. Remembering the Kyoto treaty, perhaps America naturally shys away from international events that either in the case of Kyoto mean a sacrifice, or in the case of the World Cup, they do not dominate. The UN is another example, US domination is hardly complete and what degree of control they do have over the UN is probably the only incentive they have to stay in.

What if the UN was more like the world cup? No, I don’t mean dominated by Brazil but what if the UN was more international and less dominated by America? What if America wasn’t allowed to veto almost every resolution that put pressure on Israel? What if America couldn’t pressurise the UN by threatening to withhold funding to the UN because it recognises the democratically elected Palestine government? What if America could be shown a red card when she plays dirty?

As it stands African nations are better represented in the World Cup than in the UN and the Iranian football team is more likely to meet the USA in the knockout stages of the world cup than Iranian leaders are to sit down to face to face negotiations with Bush & co.

Sure all this happening is as likely as England winning the world cup, but we can dream can’t we?

'free lunches should be banned'

2006-06-05T11:59:00.000Z

"People do not value free goods or services" is a phrase that is almost a tautology, it is after all hard to value somehting that is free. This by the way, was a phrase used to describe university education by the Committe for European Reform (CER) and it offers a new argument in favour of top-up fees. Perhaps the commision is right and perhaps it is a sad reflection of modern society that there needs to be a charge for something, people need to pay just to ensure they value something. I however, believe that people do value free services, or at least they do when they are taken away from them, or if they are too poor to afford them.

The CER also states that "It will be less easy for young people to think about higher education as a convenient way of filling time". Do all students think this? I certainly don't. Are students to think in the cynical terms of financial viability when deciding if they are to go to university? i.e. will I earn enough extra money after graduating to make up for three years earning debt rather than earning money? Whatever happened to learning for the sake of an education, education being the goal, not the means to an end? So if not all students see university as a 'way of filling time' is it right that all students are penalised because of a few, as is so often the case anyway?

It is interesting timing, that the CER's report coincides with strike action of many of Britain's lecturers but why is it the students that end up burdened because the government won't fund Universities themselves? Okay fine, there might not be such a thing as a free lunch, but then students are giving up three years that could be spent earning money for their degrees as well as paying top-up fees. Now Brown is making not so subtle hints that he may raise the £3000 cap?

If the government really cared about drop-outs and people seeing university as 'filling time' then perhaps this is as much a result of the government's aims to get 50% of school leavers to university, remember that pledge? I certainly do. There must be better, more effective, less capital-orientated ways of getting students to appreciate their courses. It is not fair however, to put an extra financial burden on all students. A drop out fee I wouldn't be against, yet incresing fees is just as likely to dissuade hard-working low income students from applying than the first year drop-outs.

Croquet sales up

2006-06-02T18:48:00.000Z

Following the revelation that John Prescott spent a day playing croquet in his grace and favour house of Dorneywood, two things have happened. The first, Prescott in an attempt to salvage what is left of his reputation and career has voluntarily given up Dorneywood. Perhaps he needn't have bothered as the second point is that the sale of croquet sales are on the up. Asda reports sales of its croquet sets have tripled over this time last year and this is almost certainly due to charismatic John, the man with more lives than a cat, or even David Blunkett. There are even rumours that a television company plan to make a celebrity croquet tournament and plan to invite Mr Prescott to take part in it. Look John, you've started a trend!

A Victory or just Vindictive?

2006-06-02T00:17:00.000Z

Yesterday the remains of Gladys Hammond were finally reburied, over nine years from when she was first buried. The remains, which went missing around 18 months ago, had been dug up by animal rights protestors who protested her son-in-law's guinea pig farm. The farm bred guinea pigs for animal testing. The remains were found by the police after one of the protesters (all of whom are now serving jail time) tipped them off.

DISCLAIMER: I do not want to get into the ins and outs of animal testing just yet. I am not skirting the issue; rather I would not want to contribute to a heated and divisive debate with my rather poor knowledge of medical science.

What interests me more is the more aggressive tactics used in particular by animal rights campaigners; although it has to be noted this is not their exclusive territory. Similar tactics are employed by both pro-life and anti-cloning movements. Perhaps then, where the life and existence of another sentient being is involved, protesters feel the need to get more extreme. Two important questions need to be asked, the first being ‘is this form of protest justified?’ and the second being ‘is it effective?’.

The first question poses some very difficult moral dilemmas. Which I will, just mention briefly (wouldn’t want to get bogged down in actual thinking now would I?); ‘is an animal’s life worth the same as a humans’ ‘is a grave sacred?’ and I could go on.

The second question depends more on the goals of the protestors. Had their goal merely been the goal of shutting down the Hammond family guinea pig farm they were indeed successful, the family stopped farming guinea pigs in January. If their aim was the much larger and less achievable goal of stopping animal testing then they most certainly failed. In fact I believe they not only failed to make an impact, they significantly harmed their cause. The public after all are now less susceptible to their message and more likely to view all animal activists as ‘extremists’. It is the more extreme elements of any group that invariably give the whole movement a bad name. This is counter-productive not only because the public are less willing to support said movement, but the government will use this extremism as an excuse to curtail people’s rights to protest. Take the Oxford University protests for example, the University would have had a much harder time applying for an exclusion zone had the animal liberation front not declared war against all students, staff and anyone slightly related to the university. Ironically, many students at Oxford University even supported the protestors.

I don’t think I have much of a point; this is much more a rant than anything else. But if protest is to succeed I believe it must be non-violent. The protestors cannot stoop to the moral level of the people they are protesting against or they will not be fighting an injustice but a guerrilla war. However romantic or noble a guerrilla war may sound they normally involve casualties, many of whom are just innocents caught in the crossfire.

Political Compass

2006-05-31T20:20:00.000Z

Inspired by Sam Langfield I decided I'd take the political compass test.
Here are my results:
Economic Left/Right: -5.63
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.54
And the graph:

According to their website this puts me somewhat to the left and more libertarian than Ghandi, or as the Americans would say, part of the 'loony left'. That suits me just fine.

Parody is homage gone sour...

2006-05-30T10:52:00.000Z

Or at least according to Brendan Gill it is. Yet I think parody should be taken as a compliment, after all it indicates how famous someone is, the more parodied someone is the more that person has managed to seep into popular culture. In the current media driven society this counts for alot.

My point is, I haven't seen many parodies of Menzies Campbell. The last one I remember vividly was this one:

Yet even this was made before Ming was made leader of the Lib Dems and leys face it, it doesn't look much like him. It is more a play on the name than the man. Here I believe isMings problem, people haven't taken to him as much as they have to Cameron, even Labour thought it was fit to parody 'Dave'. Even Charles Kennedy, who was ridiculed by the press towards the end of his tenure, was done so in a lighthearted and rather warm way.

Ming has recently appointed a proffesional spin doctor, yet I think there is only so much she will be able to do for him. Ming has, in the eyes of the media, a personality defficiency. I think this is rather unfair but the timidness in question time is rather reminicent of a certan IDS (who the press turned into an acronym just to make him slightly interesting). Hopefully Ming will show a more interesting side to him soon. Ming is currently portraying himself as more mature than the fighting 'schoolchildren' played by Dave and Tony. Yet mature is just a polite term for mouldy and Ming would do well to remember this.

New Labour. New Prescott.

2006-05-28T14:24:00.000Z

John Prescott has mirrored Labour's transformation from 'Old' to 'New' more accurately than anyone else. Born into a working class family, he became a steward in the merchant navy, working and was a popular left-wing union activist. Fast forward to today and there are renewed calls for his departure after one tabloid revealed while Tony Blair flew to America, the Deputy Leader was enjoying a game of croquet. Perhaps Prescott was merely governing the country in the same way Bush did in the first few months of his presidency (the infamous "now watch this drive" golfing interview). Prescott's work ethic aside, the change appears undeniably startling. Like New Labour, New Prescott severed his links with the trade unions long ago (except if they were offering him a house) and New Prescott's revolutionary fire, which apparently did burn long ago, has been drowned in a lifestyle of champagne and fast cars.

New Prescott seems to be the living embodiment of the idiom that absolute power corrupts absolute. But I am not really lamenting the loss of John Prescott or even the Labour movement, rather I am lamenting the loss of idealism in party politics which I feel is not representative of the grassroots politics we have in Britain.

'Old Labour' is seen as a dirty word, an insult. To be called 'Old Labour' within the Labour party is to be labeled a 'wrecker' someone who wants to go back to old-style Labour beliefs, (yes the Labour party did have beliefs once) beliefs that apparently won't win elections. If believing in ideals and guiding principles is seen as politically damaging then maybe this is why the public don't bother voting, or maybe I am being to idealistic myself. Maybe there is no room in government for idealism, maybe there is only room for realism and games of croquet.

Nothing to say

2006-05-26T19:19:00.000Z

I have nothing to say today.

Well maybe I do have a little to say. With free speech come responsibility and people, especially those in the public eye should think before they say things. A little self-restraint and self control isn't too much to ask is it? If you have nothing useful to say, say nothing. And yes Mr Galloway this DOES mean you.

The Importance of Appearing Earnest

2006-05-25T17:07:00.000Z

Charles Clarke could have learned a lesson or two from his sucessor John Reid and perhaps he is taking notes, preparing his return to frontline politics. The Home Office is something of a
poisoned chalice at the moment, which is why Blair has given the job to John "Oh fuck, not health" Reid. Where Clarke wouldn't or couldn't shake up the Home Office, Reid will and is starting to do so with almost reckless abandon.

With Home Office scandals surfacing on almost a daily basis, John Reid's crusade-like reorganisation of the Home Office seems to be going down well with at least some of the press, one newspaper refering to Dr Reid as being "Like Rambo with a red box". Dr Reid understands that he cannot sit idly by and must be seen by the public to be doing something, even if this means doing reorganisation that will probably make little difference, such as the recent reshuffle of his ministerial team. Today there were reports that Reid sacked a senior civil servant and that "plans to change significantly the duties of another" have been speeded up. The civil service are being used as a scapegoat, but perhaps this is some justification for this. John Deham, the chairman of the select committee Reid recently addressed said: "it would appear some civil servants knew 10 days ago that the courts had started releasing serious offenders on bail but didn't tell the home secretary." And here lies the main problem Dr Reid faces, the Home Office is essentially a big bureaucratic mess and this even Labour's Dr Fix-it will not be able to change singlehandedly.

John Reid (on hearing of his new post?)

According to Micheal Howard, when he first became Home Secretary the civil service showed him some charts of increasing crime statistics and showed a worrying trend of increasing crime then they told him "the first ting you must do Home Secretary is realise there is nothing you can do to change it". This is much the same for John Reid, the Home Office is so large he cannot possibly know everything that is happening in it and for some things he will not want to know unless something goes wrong. Yet Dr Reid is adept at looking like he is making progress even if he isn't and looking like he is making changes when he is really just rearranging the furniture yet perhaps this is all the public want. Having tasted blood when Charles Clarke was sacked, it is looking like John Reid is appeasing the public's blood lust in sacrificing civil servants and ministers, anyone but himself. I have a feeling John Reid will come out of his term in the Home Office smelling like roses, or at least a lot sweeter than the two previous Home Secretaries and he will owe this mostly due to his hard and rather adversarial stance towards his own department and to his handling of hte media, which despite some bad headlines I think could have been much much worse.

While appearing earnest may save Dr Reid, it does not bode so well for the rest of us. The Home Office is already obsessed with meeting targets and filling quotas and in an attempt to appease the public this may increase yet more. It is not right that because the Home Office is incompetent and so large it is unweildy, that aslym seekers, many of whom have genuine reasons to be here are turned away or deported. Already the Home Office has stated in no uncertain terms that all future bail applications should be contested as strongly as possible and where bail is granted, the mos stingent of conditions should be imposed. I am not one who wants killers walking on the street but I fear the Home Office is not only closing the stable door once the horse has bolted, they're also setting fire to it as a show of strength.

Free Speech? Not in my back yard...

2006-05-24T17:42:00.000Z

The government seems to have caught a bout of the same hypocrisy shown by Secretary for Local Government Ruth Kelly a week or so ago. Kelly famously spoke out against 'Nimbys' who protest about new housing developments being built near them despite Mrs Kelly's history as an MP who consistently sided with her Bolton constituents against new housing developments. The government has taken the same attitude with free speech.

Despite praising the country's free speech at any available opportunity, the government seems less than happy protesters continually flout this freedom in front of them. Taking a stance similar to that of the 'nimbys' the government enforced a 1km exclusion zone around parliament; protests only being allowed if they have written permission. Brian Haw, the man who has kept a 5 year vigil on parliament square and who the government probably had in mind when they wrote section 132 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 (SOCPA) has finally felt the full force of this law. The police, decided to move in around 2am yesterday morning, perhaps in the hope their rather heavy-handed approach would go unnoticed. They confiscated large portions of Haw's protest display, including works donated by that famous 'guerrilla artist' Bansky. Perhaps the Home Office wouldn't be in such a big mess if they didn't spend their time 'cracking down' on harmless protests.

Before...

And After...

In other news, a signed copy of the Hutton report, that famous government whitewash was auctioned off for £400. The report was signed by Cherie Blair.