I read with growing despair the morons in the Labour Party who seek a change of leadership 16 weeks before a General Election. They have a death wish.
These ministers, backbenchers, onceweres, neverweres and neverwillbes ignore, forget or have never understood, we live in a parliamentary democracy.
They have watched too much TV and too much American TV. We-do-not-live-in-a-West-Wing-presidential-system. We do NOT vote for a PM.
We vote for a candidate to be our MP and, usually the party he or she represents.
Blair didn't win three elections, the Labour Party did. If Blair had continued with that moron, Alan Milburn, Labour would have lost the 2005 election.
It is the Labour Party - not Gordon Brown who will win or lose the 2010 election.
Those who want Labour to lose will spread rumours that we must get rid of Gordon. Poor benighted fools like Clarke, Milburn and et alia want Labour to lose.
The choice is simple Labour or Tory - who leads is irrelevant.
Tessa Jowell, who would have thrown herself in front of a bus - stupid woman - to save St Tony of Basra, should walk the plank.
The baby boomers from Charles Clarke to Tessa Jowell passing through the semi-detatched Frank Field have failed us all.
Our choice is Labour defender of the poor, the working class and aspirant middle class or Tory defender of the non-doms, the tax avoiders, the bankers and those with off shore accounts and the Trustafarians.
The choice is yours. I've made my choice - I vote Labour for fairer Britain.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Iceland and fair play
The English have made much about notions of fair play. It's just not cricket is an expression that could only have emerged on the playing fields of Eton.
The loadsamoney culture initiated by Thatcher and, after John Major's doomed attempt to return to gentler and fairer social values, anchored by Blair's venal love of excessive wealth forever destroyed notions of fairness in English society.
Nowhere is this clearer in the Holland and UK's treatment of Iceland over the Icesave debacle.
There are some 320,000 Icelanders, close to 67 million British and 17 million Dutch. Iceland's GDP some $16 billion, the UK GDP some $2.8 trillion, Holland approx $900 billion GDP.
The laid back, pot smoking, Dutch and the fairplay Cool Britannia - combined GDP $3.7 trillion and combined population 84 million are bullying, bankrupting and robbing some 320,000 with a GDP of $16 billion.
Laid back Dutch? Fairplay Cool Britannia?
Grasping, venal, cheapskates more like - Holland and the UK are demanding all Icelandic people pay one-third of their GDP for a civil banking debt run up by criminal fraudsters aided and abetted by lax regulatory authorities in Holland and the UK!
Mother Jones, the brilliant, independent, US magazine pointed out it is as if all American people owed Holland and the UK some $4.2 trillion. As if all Brits owed one country $900 billion and the Dutch $300 billion.
The role of the EU and IMF in enforcing a civil banking debt, created by criminal fraudsters and allowed by criminal neglect by lax regulatory authorities is an international disgrace.
The Dutch, the British, the EU and the IMF hang your heads in shame. Revisit this disgraceful treatment of 320,000 people and send the Icelandic bankers, most living in luxury as non-doms in the UK and other EU countries, to prison.
The loadsamoney culture initiated by Thatcher and, after John Major's doomed attempt to return to gentler and fairer social values, anchored by Blair's venal love of excessive wealth forever destroyed notions of fairness in English society.
Nowhere is this clearer in the Holland and UK's treatment of Iceland over the Icesave debacle.
There are some 320,000 Icelanders, close to 67 million British and 17 million Dutch. Iceland's GDP some $16 billion, the UK GDP some $2.8 trillion, Holland approx $900 billion GDP.
The laid back, pot smoking, Dutch and the fairplay Cool Britannia - combined GDP $3.7 trillion and combined population 84 million are bullying, bankrupting and robbing some 320,000 with a GDP of $16 billion.
Laid back Dutch? Fairplay Cool Britannia?
Grasping, venal, cheapskates more like - Holland and the UK are demanding all Icelandic people pay one-third of their GDP for a civil banking debt run up by criminal fraudsters aided and abetted by lax regulatory authorities in Holland and the UK!
Mother Jones, the brilliant, independent, US magazine pointed out it is as if all American people owed Holland and the UK some $4.2 trillion. As if all Brits owed one country $900 billion and the Dutch $300 billion.
The role of the EU and IMF in enforcing a civil banking debt, created by criminal fraudsters and allowed by criminal neglect by lax regulatory authorities is an international disgrace.
The Dutch, the British, the EU and the IMF hang your heads in shame. Revisit this disgraceful treatment of 320,000 people and send the Icelandic bankers, most living in luxury as non-doms in the UK and other EU countries, to prison.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Dementia and the General Election 2010 - Two
It is short term memory loss that is the bummer. Earlier, this morning, afternoon, evening, yesterday, the day before are concepts of time I struggle with. If someone tells me a list of facts, I lose facts one and two. A constant diary and a smart phone help enormously. I have a mind map of sites, mostly numbered and colour coded that acts as surrogate short and medium term memory aids. So far long term memory - last year plus is okay.
The strangest feature of it all is living in a perpetual present. A magical realm where the tradition of the new is constantly renewed. Yet still I can go half a dozen times into the kitchen before I remember to make that cup of tea or coffee.
There is no medication to help and I am not too far gone to merit diagnosis and treatment - what little there is available. The one thing that helps enormously is venesection, removal of a pint or litre of blood. That gives me a month of increased lucidity.
Yet I have that for another medical condition and it is not recognised for dementia treatment.
So I get it once or twice a year rather than the 6 or 8 times that would benefit me.
Research into dementia is a Cinderella service, the Ugly sisters of Cancer and Heart Disease get the vast bulk of research funding. Treatment is primarily for when the condition has deteriorated dramatically.
I get tea and sympathy and encouragement to do word games. Once I could do the Times or Telegraph cryptic crosswords in under an hour, today I struggle to get half a dozen clues a day.
The government needs for the NHS and University Research Institutes to develop medication and other treatments for those in the earliest stages of dementia.
It will come to late for me, the funding isn't there, but more monies are needed to help a rapidly aging society. That requires a political commitment.
The strangest feature of it all is living in a perpetual present. A magical realm where the tradition of the new is constantly renewed. Yet still I can go half a dozen times into the kitchen before I remember to make that cup of tea or coffee.
There is no medication to help and I am not too far gone to merit diagnosis and treatment - what little there is available. The one thing that helps enormously is venesection, removal of a pint or litre of blood. That gives me a month of increased lucidity.
Yet I have that for another medical condition and it is not recognised for dementia treatment.
So I get it once or twice a year rather than the 6 or 8 times that would benefit me.
Research into dementia is a Cinderella service, the Ugly sisters of Cancer and Heart Disease get the vast bulk of research funding. Treatment is primarily for when the condition has deteriorated dramatically.
I get tea and sympathy and encouragement to do word games. Once I could do the Times or Telegraph cryptic crosswords in under an hour, today I struggle to get half a dozen clues a day.
The government needs for the NHS and University Research Institutes to develop medication and other treatments for those in the earliest stages of dementia.
It will come to late for me, the funding isn't there, but more monies are needed to help a rapidly aging society. That requires a political commitment.
Dementia and General Election 2010 - Part One
The Alzheimers Society wants to put dementia research, treatment and care at the heart of this year's General Election Campaign. I support this initiative wholeheartedly.
I must declare an interest: I am suffering from the early effects of vascular dementia, a by product of polycythemia vera - a bone marrow disease. My prognosis is good 9-13 years and I am in touch with someone in Oxford, a Classics specialist, who has managed her condition for some 15 years.
A very fine person, the talented blogger and wit, Ron Broxted of Independent Minds, once messaged me "there's nothing wrong with your mind". It was kind of him and something I needed to hear at that time.
Dementia afflicts different people in different ways and at different depths of the mind. My friend in Oxford and I both have access to very large vocabularies and both of us read and speak several languages, blessed with impeccable grammar from an early age - we can both fake it in public, always find a synonym and get by.
Yet dementia bedevils our every waking moment. A wordsmith and language teacher all my life, I have been blessed with impeccable spelling. No more, I use a dictionary constantly and write by hand every blog, every tweet and every SMS. Even then I make many a slip between hand and eye and have problems seeing and copying tinyurls!
I have huge difficulties in concentration - which is why twitter is a god send - I think in bursts of 140 characters. This text is a huge effort and what once I could have written in a single draft in half an hour, now takes several re-writes and several hours.
I have difficulty in groups of 3 or more people, especially if two talk at the same time. I can no longer watch a 90 minute movie, my mind wanders and I literally 'lose the plot'. An hour ago, earlier today, short term memory is shot.
I must declare an interest: I am suffering from the early effects of vascular dementia, a by product of polycythemia vera - a bone marrow disease. My prognosis is good 9-13 years and I am in touch with someone in Oxford, a Classics specialist, who has managed her condition for some 15 years.
A very fine person, the talented blogger and wit, Ron Broxted of Independent Minds, once messaged me "there's nothing wrong with your mind". It was kind of him and something I needed to hear at that time.
Dementia afflicts different people in different ways and at different depths of the mind. My friend in Oxford and I both have access to very large vocabularies and both of us read and speak several languages, blessed with impeccable grammar from an early age - we can both fake it in public, always find a synonym and get by.
Yet dementia bedevils our every waking moment. A wordsmith and language teacher all my life, I have been blessed with impeccable spelling. No more, I use a dictionary constantly and write by hand every blog, every tweet and every SMS. Even then I make many a slip between hand and eye and have problems seeing and copying tinyurls!
I have huge difficulties in concentration - which is why twitter is a god send - I think in bursts of 140 characters. This text is a huge effort and what once I could have written in a single draft in half an hour, now takes several re-writes and several hours.
I have difficulty in groups of 3 or more people, especially if two talk at the same time. I can no longer watch a 90 minute movie, my mind wanders and I literally 'lose the plot'. An hour ago, earlier today, short term memory is shot.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Turning sixty
Okay, so my 60th birthday is next year, but as my pedantic oldest son, Ben, pointed out. This is my sixtieth year. Tant pis!
Actually, I missed being fifty. I was 51 for two years. Don't ask. I just kept telling people I was 51 - perhaps being born in '51 caused a year long lapsus - was pleased as punch to realise I wasn't 52 and enjoyed being 51 second time round.
Of course, like most of us I guess, chronological age is seperate from how old we feel or sense ourselves to be. In dreams and day to day living, I feel and think of myself as younger - late 40s say - even though my body tells me otherwise. Our internal perception of age is at variance with chronological time.
The Daily Galaxy recently intoned that the first person who will live a thousand years is already born.
In a very real sense, my generation is one of the last generations of homo sapiens. By 2200, if not before, homo sapiens plus will be replacing the older species. Sometimes I get the impression this shift is already taking place.
I'll be happy to make three score years and ten. It has served our species well enough for some ten millenia. I do wonder how our fractured societies will manage the transition to living 100, 150 and 200 years.
My wife Cathy comes from a long lived family, many living into their nineties. I am already the oldest male of my paternal line in four generations.
This reflection will be continued. Here's to two years of being sixty.
Actually, I missed being fifty. I was 51 for two years. Don't ask. I just kept telling people I was 51 - perhaps being born in '51 caused a year long lapsus - was pleased as punch to realise I wasn't 52 and enjoyed being 51 second time round.
Of course, like most of us I guess, chronological age is seperate from how old we feel or sense ourselves to be. In dreams and day to day living, I feel and think of myself as younger - late 40s say - even though my body tells me otherwise. Our internal perception of age is at variance with chronological time.
The Daily Galaxy recently intoned that the first person who will live a thousand years is already born.
In a very real sense, my generation is one of the last generations of homo sapiens. By 2200, if not before, homo sapiens plus will be replacing the older species. Sometimes I get the impression this shift is already taking place.
I'll be happy to make three score years and ten. It has served our species well enough for some ten millenia. I do wonder how our fractured societies will manage the transition to living 100, 150 and 200 years.
My wife Cathy comes from a long lived family, many living into their nineties. I am already the oldest male of my paternal line in four generations.
This reflection will be continued. Here's to two years of being sixty.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Garrison Keiler tale from Lake Woebegone
Two state workers cutting tops of trees at risk. Late afternoon sets in a snow blizzard, decide to go home. Cherry Picker truck develops problems, drive 20 miles in first gear as snow gets thicker. Stop to check engine. A tarpaulin flap had come loose, flipped lever and platform fully raised. Twenty miles of copper telephone wire dragged behind them. Cut wires, one says 'better call emergency' other replies 'lines are down!' Drive home, decide to keep schtum, jobs and all.
To this day folk in West Minnesota still remember snow blizzard when primeaval creature stalked the county fur, large footprints, chewed cable found. Used to warn children about snow blizzards.
To this day folk in West Minnesota still remember snow blizzard when primeaval creature stalked the county fur, large footprints, chewed cable found. Used to warn children about snow blizzards.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Hung Parliament and a second election in 2010
If the polls continue their current trends, a hung parliament and a second election in the autumn becomes very likely.
This could be the year of the duelling budgets.
Cameron is commited to a budget in 50 days, late June, and a summer parliament to pass the budget.
Should the Tories manage a minority government, the Tory budget risks defeat followed by an October election.
A close result would encourage Labour to stick with Brown to fight an autumn poll.
Both Labour and Tories should study the short lived Joe Clark Canadian government of 1979-80. Clarke lost his budget vote and lost the subsequent election. Despite 13 years in power the Liberals, under Trudeau, stormed back to power with a small majority.
Brown and Labour could do the same. Like Cameron, Joe Clarke failed "to seal the deal". People preferred a Trudeau budget over Clarke's.
Georgie 'boy' Osborne's GCSE June budget could well be a vote loser.
Personally, I expect a Labour government either with a small majority or a Labour minority.
Osborne's GCSE economics is Cameron's Achilles heel. A Tory summer budget would be an autumn vote loser. People in the media forget what a formidable opposition performer Gordon Brown is and would be.
There will be no summer hols for MPs this year, unless Brown wins.
This could be the year of the duelling budgets.
Cameron is commited to a budget in 50 days, late June, and a summer parliament to pass the budget.
Should the Tories manage a minority government, the Tory budget risks defeat followed by an October election.
A close result would encourage Labour to stick with Brown to fight an autumn poll.
Both Labour and Tories should study the short lived Joe Clark Canadian government of 1979-80. Clarke lost his budget vote and lost the subsequent election. Despite 13 years in power the Liberals, under Trudeau, stormed back to power with a small majority.
Brown and Labour could do the same. Like Cameron, Joe Clarke failed "to seal the deal". People preferred a Trudeau budget over Clarke's.
Georgie 'boy' Osborne's GCSE June budget could well be a vote loser.
Personally, I expect a Labour government either with a small majority or a Labour minority.
Osborne's GCSE economics is Cameron's Achilles heel. A Tory summer budget would be an autumn vote loser. People in the media forget what a formidable opposition performer Gordon Brown is and would be.
There will be no summer hols for MPs this year, unless Brown wins.
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