Big Sticks and Small Carrots

Insommnia strikes
Last night I couldn’t sleep. I tried a long slow walk at around 1am, and again at around 2.30am. Then I tried a hot bath. Then I took off my NRT patch. It is day 16 without cancer sticks. Can I say week 3? I think I can. By 4am I decided to give up. I switched on the TV and flicked channels. I ended up watching Fox News on Sky. I’m not sure how I thought this would help me sleep, I was tired and not thinking clearly. (I don’t have Sky at my flat but this house does. It is a bone of contention as my attempts to convert the owner to Freeview have, so far, failed. I’ve got an old On Digital box at my flat which gets me BBC News 24 and a random selection of other Freeview channels.) Eventually, at around 7am, I fell asleep on the sofa. I’d have to say that I’m not feeling fully up to speed today.

On a more positive note, I have seen some very funny stuff since I switched on the PC this afternoon. Some links coming once I’ve had something to eat. (Not that the sites in question need any links from me. More an acknowledgement of stuff which made me lol.) I may well spend much of the evening trying to design a poster for the first time. It could go horribly wrong but I’ll never know if I don’t give it a go.

Once in a while, someone says something so stupid that I can’t resist a cheap shot at it. Today is such a day.
It follows on from Tory Idiots which I wrote last week. It is amusing enough that Howard Flight seems determined to keep this story in the news by refusing to go quietly, but it is Michael Howard’s statement today which I can’t let pass without comment.

Explaining the reason for the sacking of Mr Flight:
“It is about the suggestion that the Conservative Party is saying one thing before an election and intends to do something else afterwards. That is not the case.“
Michael Howard, BBC report.

Oh dear. I like to try to keep an eye on the news and I’ve never heard the Conservative’s say anything like this:
“After the election, and facing another 5 years in opposition, the Conservative party will contend yet another round of messy infighting. This will be followed by a bitter leadership contest.”
Does this mean that every member of the party will be stepping down?

I told you it was a cheap shot. Still, I don’t think many people will take issue with this post on May 6th. I won’t delete it so feel free to come back and gloat if I’m wrong.

I Like America
Part 3 of an as yet undetermined number of posts in which I attempt to counter the notion that being against Mr Bush means that you must also be against America and instead promote the notion that being against Mr Bush means being against Mr Bush, against money equals power, against the “War on Terror”, and against the “War in Iraq”.

I like:
Baseball

That surprised you. I do. We get live games on Ch 5 (I think it’s called “five” now but that just looks stupid). It is an interesting game. I couldn’t tell you how to pitch a curve ball but I could probably explain a sacrifice fly if I had to. At a push I could even tell you the difference between RBI and slugging statistics.

This is a short version of longer post which I am struggling to write. It’s unlikely to be clever and it certainly won’t be pretty. It is really just a statement of where I’m coming from. Unless you really, really want to know, I wouldn’t bother with this. Read another post instead. This one will probably be deleted if I ever finish the longer version. It’s not easy to explain what you believe in a logical, consistent, and structured post. I know what I think, but that’s not much use to anyone but me. This is going to be dull. Anyway, here goes.

Voting
The first thing is that I think the First Past the Post (FPTP) voting system isn’t good.
The 2001 UK election results show one reason why I don’t like it.
Out of 659 seats:
Labour: 413 seats, 62.6% of the seats with 40.7% of votes cast.
Conservatives: 166 seats, 25.2% of seats with 31.7% of votes cast
Lib Dems: 52 seats, 7.9% of seats with 18.3% of votes cast.
Others: work it out. This is a short version so I’m not going to.

It doesn’t look very democratic. It gives a disproportionate number of seats to the most popular party. It leads to situations like “President Blair” having absolute power with only 40% of voters electing him. It means that if you live in a safe seat and you want to vote for another candidate, well, you’d be better off going down the pub. Your vote is unlikely to make any difference. I still think you should vote because it’s never going to change if you don’t.

I’d rather we had a Proportional Representation (PR) system. All votes would count. There would be no “President Blair”. Parties would have to cooperate because there wouldn’t be an overall majority in parliament (unless something really odd happened). It would take some of the “yah boo” out of politics. I know PR has its problems. I don’t even want to start discussing the various forms because:
a) I’d have to look it all up.
b) It is very dull political theory.
The general principle is more democratic than FPTP though. There are other problems; coalition governments tend to be more unstable and small unpleasant parties (I’m thinking BNP) might get a few seats. Overall, I think the benefits outweigh the problems.

Economy
It has become accepted that the free market system leads to better economic growth than other systems. Fair enough, but does money actually make anyone happy? Ask a rich person. There are more than enough resources to provide a comfortable standard of living for everyone on the planet. Instead, the current system has a few very wealthy people and millions living in poverty. I don’t find this acceptable. I don’t have the answer but I know that the current system is unfair, and that our prosperity in the West is based on the exploitation of people in developing countries. It isn’t up for discussion. I know enough economics to know this is a fact. I’d read “Globalization and its Discontents” by Joseph Stiglitz (one time economic advisor to President Clinton) before you even try to disagree.

Another major problem with the current system is the formation of Oligopolies. This is a growing phenomenon. Some markets: fuel, washing powder (they’re all made by the same companies, look at the labels), supermarkets, banks, and lots of others I can’t think of right now. An oligopolist market often distorts the competition principles which are supposed to keep prices low. Power becomes increasingly concentrated in the hands of just a few companies. Collusion is illegal in many countries but large oligopolistic companies will always have a large incentive to cheat the system and set prices together with their “competitors”. A general point also needs to be made. The perfect market conditions, which proponents of the free market treat as a theoretical holy grail, rarely exist in the real world.

To summarise this, I would prefer to sacrifice economic growth in order to bring about a fairer society. I’d pay more tax if that’s what it takes. The current system is, I believe, unstable. At the moment, life expectancy varies hugely between the rich and the poor. In the richest countries people can expect to live for twice as long as those in the poorest countries. Faced with those circumstances, wouldn’t you want to immigrate to a richer country, preferably with your family?
As I said before, I don’t claim to have all the answers but I do know that this imbalance cannot be allowed to continue.

Only governments can do this. Large multinational corporations only have a responsibility towards their shareholders. They want to make money, it’s what they do. This is why it is so important that the free market is not allowed to run rampant. Regulations and taxes must be enforced and used to balance out the huge inequalities in the system. If that leads to slow economic growth, I’ll happily sleep in my bed knowing that everyone else in the world also has a bed to sleep in.

This is an ugly summary of things I feel strongly about. It is not complete by any means. There are a lot of other points which I’ll try to add to the post I’m struggling to write. I hope that this gives anyone who has read it a basic understanding of where I’m coming from. If you want to know more, the best thing is probably to read some of my posts. If you still want to know more, what are you, some kind of stalker? I’m joking, I guess I don’t expect anyone to read all this. Email me if you have done and you want to ask me something. I’ll be so surprised that I’ll probably send you a really polite reply.

I was recently speaking to a former senior civil servant about the prime minister’s relationship with the truth. “Has he got one?” he asked. He was deadly serious.
John Ware in the Guardian.

Since the leaking of the government censored section of the resignation letter of Elizabeth Wilmshurst, I have been trying to find a statement from Tony Blair on the issue. I predicted a response here, and had to admit that I was wrong here.

The story broke on Wednesday. This is the only reference I have found so far:
“I have long since realised there are groups of people who, however many times we debate this or answer questions, will find new ways to reformulate it with so-called shock-horror revelations - and to have a rerun of the arguments. The only argument that is important is: was the decision right or wrong?“
Tony Blair in the Guardian.

In my opinion it doesn’t really address the accusation that Mr Blair is a liar. I have to admit that I haven’t searched every news source so I might have missed a more considered response. I would ask my imaginary reader to email me if they have seen or read any responses from Mr Blair concerning this issue.

Blair said that the “only argument that is important is: was the decision right or wrong?” This would be a very good defence if Mr Blair had used the same argument for the invasion before and after it happened. He didn’t. The problem is not whether the world is better off without Saddam. The problem is that Mr Blair lied about the reasons for the invasion. Whether he lied in good faith is a matter of opinion but the fact that he lied is not.

“I made up my mind that Saddam needs to go.”
G.W. Bush, April 2002, interview with Trevor McDonald.

“I’m with you.“
Tony Blair in conversation with G.W. Bush on the subject of Iraq, 7th September, 2002.
Both cited by Bob Woodward, Plan of Attack, p119 & p178.

“No one wants military conflict. The whole purpose of putting this before the UN is to demonstrate the united determination of the international community to resolve this in the way it should have been resolved years ago: through a proper process of disarmament under the UN.“
Tony Blair, 24th September 2002, Hansard.

The new series of Doctor Who started on BBC 1 last night. My childhood memories of watching Doctor Who are partly clouded by the sofa I used to hide behind. I still watched it every Saturday and looked forward to the next episode in the way that only a fanatic schoolboy can. It is, I believe, an experience shared by many people my age. I don’t watch much TV these days, my attention span is variable at best, but I made the effort to be sitting in front of the box at 7pm with a cup of tea. Was I disappointed?

The surprisingly straightforward answer is no. It was the business. I was going to try to explain why it is so good but I don’t need to. I read Who’s back on What You Can Get Away With. What point is there in me trying to write what I thought when it’s already been written. Read it. It’s a lot better than what I would have come up with. If you didn’t see Doctor Who yesterday, well why not? I’ll be watching every Saturday for the rest of the series. If you know me, don’t phone me when it’s on, I won’t be pleased.

On a marginally related issue, so far I’ve only ever linked to posts which I like (with one early, and rather bizarre exception, which I’ve since deleted). If I read a blog I don’t agree with or don’t like, well, I don’t feel any need to point it out. That’s not to say I’ll never do it, but in general I don’t see what use it would be. I have a question about this and I can’t decide on an answer. The question is, does this approach mean I’m a sycophantic creep, or does it mean I’m a nice friendly guy? I guess I’m not in the best position to make the call.

The US government has decided to sell F-16 fighters to Pakistan. Details are available from the Times, the Guardian, the Independent, the BBC, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Aljazeera.

All of these stories make it clear that the government of India, the most populous democratic nation in the world, is not pleased with this decision. Tensions between India and Pakistan have been well documented. These include 3 wars since WW2, and the aquisition of nuclear weapons by both countries. In 2002, tensions were particularly high but another war was narrowly avoided. It could be argued that providing military equipment to either side is unlikely to be helpful in defusing the tension between the neighbouring nations, although this is open to debate.

What is not open to debate are the democratic credentials of the President of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf. Wikipedia has a useful article on the subject. Here are some salient, and undisputed, facts about the President of Pakistan. General Musharraf became President in 1999 after the army had removed the democratically elected government in a bloodless coup. The BBC has full coverage of this story. In late 2003, he promised opposition parties that he would resign his position as head of the army at the end of 2004. In September 2004, he stated that he would not fulfil this commitment, citing reasons of national security. He has committed to full democratic elections in 2007, some 8 years after the coup which brought him to power.

Although Musharraf’s democratic credentials are flimsy at best, he is an ally of the United States in the “war on terror”. The government of the US has been accused of double standards in it’s foreign policy. It has been said that the Bush regime is more concerned with other nations conforming to the wishes of the US government, and less concerned with issues of democracy and basic human rights. Mr Bush would deny this catagorically. In this case, I believe, the facts provide their own conclusions.

I spend a lot of time blogging about the Labour Party, and Mr Blair in particular. This is because I don’t think the Tories have any realistic chance of winning the next election. I’d rather everyone voted for the Liberal Democrats. I don’t have any connection to the party but I’ve always voted for them, mostly because I think the FPTP system is not very clever. The Liberal Democrats support Proportional Representation and so do I. I know PR comes with it’s own problems but can anyone honestly say that they are happy with the curent system? I’m not. So, I think that the only way to genuinely change the way UK politics operates is to vote LD. They aren’t perfect; the Telegraph has a summary of the voting rights for prisoners issue, which Mr Kennedy botched badly. At least he’s more consistent on the issue of Iraq, unlike the Tories rather bizarre position.

Labour’s main pre-election tactic, so far, is to tell us that it would be a lot worse if the Conservatives won. I can’t disagree with that. Just in case anyone was starting to doubt this, the Tories helpfully reminded us just how hopeless they are. I call the first witness, Mr Howard Flight. All I can do is laugh. Idiots.

I’ve been thinking about this today and I’ve thought of another explanation. Perhaps this is actually a very clever strategy. Blair keeps banging on about how bad the Tories are, and the Tories take the wind out of his sails by doing exactly the same thing. Blair can’t say “Vote for me, you wouldn’t want the Tories to be elected, would you?” because it’s a ridiculous notion. “The Tories winning? Don’t be stupid”, people will say. The thought amused me, but in the end I don’t think it’s true. I actually do think they are idiots.

If you disagree, consider this:
Day 1. Tories unexpectedly win the 2005 election.
Day 2. Nothing gets done. Everyone is hungover after celebrating their surprise victory.
Day 3. The Conservative Party disintegrates because they still can’t agree what to do about Europe.
Day 4. The end.
Renegotiate the terms of the UK’s membership of the EU? Right, that’ll be easy.
Idiots.

The Washington Post has an article today about a new office which is being set up by the State Department. It is called the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization.
An extract:
“When President Bush sent Congress an $82 billion supplemental request last month for emergency funding for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, it included $17 million in start-up funds for a State Department office that would help manage the aftermath of war and stabilize countries torn by civil conflict.”

$82 billion? Supplemental? I’m sure I read somewhere that the Republicans were opposed to big government. I must have misread it.
Anyway, of that $82 billion, $17 million is to go to the new department. If my understanding of the US definition of billion is correct, that makes it around 2% for the new department . I’m going to speculate that most of the remaining 98% is earmarked for the US armed forces. I’m going to speculate further that this demonstrates the degree to which Mr Bush is committed to the welfare of Iraqi and Afghan civilians.

In a post on Wednesday, I predicted how Mr Blair might respond to the release of the memo which the government didn’t want us to read. I’m going to have to admit that I was wrong. Mr Blair doesn’t seem to have responded at all. In a convenient coincidence, Prime Minister’s questions did not take place yesterday. It was a Thursday and Mr Blair was in the House of Commons, (I’m sure, I saw him on BBC Parliament) but apparently, he was too busy. It would probably have been the last PMQ’s before the general election but it was not to be. Shame, I’m sure he wanted to set the record straight.

You’d think journalists would be bound to ask him for a statement on the issue. If you saw Newsnight yesterday, you’ll know what happened to Michael Crick when he tried it. Don’t worry if you missed it. If it is still today, Friday, you can watch it online via the link. If it isn’t still today, here is a handy summary. Blair was doing a PR visit. Mr Crick asked him if he would make a statement. Mr Blair ignored him. Crick tried to follow Mr Blair. The PM’s officials ejected Crick from the building. A truly edifying sight, I’m sure you’ll agree. Open government at it’s very best.

At the end of his report, Michael Crick suggested a solution. Perhaps, the full legal advice of the Attorney General will be leaked out. Given his record, I’m hoping he already has an inkling that this will happen. We shall see. Another possible solution, reported by the BBC, is that the Information Commissioner will conclude that it is in the public interest for the document to be released. Fingers crossed.

Robin Cook has written an article in the Guardian today on the same issue. Don’t let the fact that people have suggested that he looks like a crazed ginger dwarf deter you. On the invasion in Iraq, his warnings have been borne out by the facts rather better than the PM’s. In fact, I’d say that he is probably the most Honorable Member to sit on the government side of the House. Despite the convention, I’d suggest that there are no longer any Honourable Members sitting down at the front.