Gary Monro’s blog

At most, only one of these two BBC stories can actually be true:

Blair says rebate ‘will remain’ (8 June, 2005)

Blair says EU rebate ‘has to go’ (21 June, 2005)

Which one could it be? They’re both so flatly contradictory that it leaves the casual reader baffled. Let’s read the text within the story and see if that sheds any light.

Blair says rebate ‘will remain’

The UK’s EU budget rebate remains justified and “will not be negotiated away”, Tony Blair has told MPs
He spoke amid claims other members want to freeze or axe the rebate, won by Margaret Thatcher in 1984, when leaders meet at a summit next week.

Speaking at Prime Minister’s Questions, he said: “The UK rebate will remain and we will not negotiate it away. Period.”

Shadow chancellor George Osborne said it was not good enough for Mr Blair to say he would not negotiate away the rebate.

“What he needs to say is that he will not diminish its value in any way and that there will be no concessions and no fudging,” he added.

“Trying to extract the truth from this prime minister is like trying to nail jelly to a wall. He must be completely clear about what he means.”

Well, that’s pretty clear. In fact, I think that George Osborne is just causing trouble, trying to make a name for himself. I see little doubt about Blair’s intentions here. He’s pretty emphatic, I feel.

Let’s take a look at the other story then:

Blair says EU rebate ‘has to go’

Tony Blair has said Britain’s £3bn EU rebate is an “anomaly that has to go” - but he made clear that its removal had to be linked to farm subsidy reform.

Mr Blair said: “We have made it clear all the way through that we are prepared not just to discuss and negotiate upon, but to recognise that the rebate is an anomaly that has to go, but it has to go in the context of the other anomaly being changed away.”

(Emphasis mine).

Oops - sorry George. Looks like you were right to try to pin Blair down. Now we’re really confused. Which do we believe?

After the lies and deceits over Iraq - and, don’t forget, Blair was fully backed by his cabinet over these things - anything is believable but the problem here is not that Blair is covering up his lies it’s that he’s actually being forthright - blatant, even - with regards to two absolutely contradictory stances. And it’s not like there was enough time between speeches for his opinion to evolve into something else. He was a unilateral disarmer, a nationaliser and an anti-European before becoming a multi-lateralist, Thatcherite free-marketeer and Euro-fanatic - but the transformation did at least take a few years. This dramatic change of stance occurred in just two weeks.

What strikes me more though is that he must realise he’s taken a complete about turn over the rebate and yet has absolutely no qualms about it. Who does he think he is? Who does he think we are? His holding of two totally contradictory points of view suggests either staggering disregard for his reputation as an honest man (my, how I smile as I write that) or a split personality.

Either way, he shouldn’t be leading our country.

Okay, okay, I’m lying. Just thought I’d grab your attention with a statement that is obviously absurd…

Just stumbled on Ashley Mote’s site - he’s a British member of the European Union - and a Euro-realist (ie he doesn’t agree with their being a European union in the first place).

While our own politicians tell us that we aren’t handing over powers to the EU, that we’re still a sovereign and independent nation state, that we won’t be swallowed by that organisation and made into just another region of the Euro Super State other MEPs are more candid about their intentions:

“National sovereignty is a luxury of the past”
– Graham Watson MEP, leader of the liberal group in the European parliament, speaking after Tony Blair’s speech, 23 June 2005

“Presidencies may come and go but the European Commission is eternal”
President Barroso to Tony Blair, after Blair’s speech to the parliament, 23 June 2005

And then there’s this little snippet. Recall, if you will, that the EU is democratic. The MEPs in the European Parliament are elected by you and I and they create the laws that you and I then have to obey.

Okay, now if you know a little bit about how the EU runs you’ll know that that last statement is nonsense. Actually, the European Council - unelected, meets in secret, accountable to nobody - suggests new legislation, draws it up, debates it and then hands it to the EU for rubber-stamping. I know from a number of MEPs’ first-hand accounts that this rubber-stamping process is a farce, that the MEPs stand no chance of getting through the reams of paper presented to them and that, often, they just accept the legislation that the European Council produced and that’s that.

So I am not surprised to read this:

“The Council’s staff decide - and that’s it. The game’s over. If MEP’s want to influence decisions they have to find out what’s going on before it’s too late.” These are the words of a former civil servant who worked for many years with the EU’s Council of Ministers at the very heart of the European project. Alexander Stubb is now a Finnish MEP and - in his own words - an unreconstructed federalist.

Mr Stubb made these comments during a meeting of the Constitutional Affairs Committee on 21 April 2005, during a debate on proposals to create an EU External Action Service. Such a service is dependant on the new constitution being ratified by the member states, but the Commission has no intention of waiting for the democratic process to be completed.

His comments crystallised and confirmed the power of the Council of Ministers which always meets in secret. Each committee of the Council is composed of ministers or officials from the government departments of member states dealing with each topic under review.

On one famous occasion, some years ago, a British minister confessed afterwards to being astonished when he was asked to sign a communiqué on arrival. When he questioned the request he was quickly informed that the decisions had already been taken and he was there only to give his approval.

Mr Stubb has just confirmed that nothing has changed over the years. MEPs are still treated like mushrooms - kept in the dark and fed on rich manure.

When you read into this EU business very little surprises you. Most European politicians are quite open about their desire to see a united states of Europe, a single political unit that does away with the whole idea of national sovereignty and which answers only to an unelected European Council.

In itself though, this doesn’t disturb me. It’s completely potty of course but there’s no law against being a little mad.

What really disturbs me is the fact that politicians like Tony Blair, Jack Straw and Gordon Brown are only too aware of this and yet they still won’t simply admit that the EU’s final destination is a single state with the United Kingdom being no more than a couple of regions within that state.

I wonder why…

Samizdata is a pretty excellent blog and contains much quality writing. In fact, the comments section in Samizdata is sometimes better than some blogs!

A point which is borne out by the following post that actually originates from a comment somebody made on some other post on Samizdata. It basically calls for the anonymous suits behind this attempt to make us known in all our details to the authorities via the ID Card to themselves be exposed.

Here’s the text of the post, in full. I recommend you go there and take a look at the comments that accompany this post. It will be interesting to see where this all leads.

It never occured to me that you could study humour but, it seems, you can. And, because you can, someone did. The British Association for the Advancement Of Science to be precise.

Seems they carried out a survey a couple of years ago to find the world’s funniest joke. Here it is:

Famed fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his gruff assistant Doctor Watson pitch their tent while on a camping expedition, but in the middle of the night Holmes nudges Watson awake and questions him.

HOLMES: Watson, look up at the stars and tell me what you deduce.

WATSON: I see millions of stars, and if there are millions of stars, and if even a few of those have planets, it is quite likely there are some planets like earth, and if there are a few planets like earth out there there might also be life.

HOLMES: Watson, you idiot! Somebody stole our tent.

The BAAS said the joke was the most popular among 10,000 submitted, being chosen as the best by 47% of the 100,000 people from more than 70 countries who took part.

Personally, I think it’s a bit of a children’s joke and not especially amusing. A year later The LaughLab experiment - conducted by psychologist Dr Richard Wiseman, from the University of Hertfordshire - attracted more than 40,000 jokes and almost two million ratings. Now these jokes are much better:

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services.

He gasps: “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator says: “Calm down, I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.”

There is a silence, then a shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says: “OK, now what?”

Jokes were also split by their popularity in certain countries:

Top joke in Scotland: I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my grandfather. Not screaming in terror like his passengers.

Top joke in England: Two weasels are sitting on a bar stool. One starts to insult the other one. He screams, “I slept with your mother!” The bar gets quiet as everyone listens to see what the other weasel will do. The first again yells, “I SLEPT WITH YOUR MOTHER!” The other says, “Go home dad you’re drunk.”

Top joke in USA: A man and a friend are playing golf one day at their local golf course. One of the guys is about to chip onto the green when he sees a long funeral procession on the road next to the course. He stops in mid-swing, takes off his golf cap, closes his eyes, and bows down in prayer. His friend says: “Wow, that is the most thoughtful and touching thing I have ever seen. You truly are a kind man.” The man then replies: “Yeah, well we were married 35 years.”

Top joke in Belgium: Why do ducks have webbed feet? To stamp out fires. Why do elephants have flat feet? To stamp out burning ducks.

Not sure about that Belgian one….

Seems like someone actually bought it!

With thanks to The Liberty Cadre.

You can easily judge the character of others by how they treat those who can do nothing for them or to them.

— Malcolm Forbes (1919-1990) American Publisher

The Daily Telegraph reports that politics students at Bristol are being ‘over-taught’ so their workload needs drastically reducing. So the number of lectures the students must attend is being slashed by a whopping 66%.

From three lectures per week to one.

The poor lovies should be able to cope with that. But if they’re still trembling with fear then there’s more good news on the way: first year exams are going to be phased out too.

And - if that were not enough - Bristol University has promised that a higher proportion of students will be awarded a first class degree. Now, correct me if I’m wrong but the only way you can promise more first class degrees is by messing with the exam marks or the pass mark. Either way, the idea stinks.

When you consider that the entry requirements to this degree will be relaxed if a person has “suffered from educational disadvantages” it seems to be that obtaining a politics degree at Bristol Uni is a cinch. Could I study for one during my lunchtimes perhaps?

Question: what do you get when you teach an ignorant, foul-mouthed, belching trollop how to dress in a corset and walk properly?

Answer: An ignorant, foul-mouthed, belching trollop who, when required, can dress in a corset and walk properly.

I’m not sure how these fly-on-the-wall documentaries normally work but the format for this one - the only one I’ve ever watched - is this: scrape up about 10 crude, low-rent trollops from some gutter somewhere and take then to a finishing school with the hair-brained intention of, in a few weeks, reversing years and years of degradation and creating the polar opposite of what you started with. Put them through a few hoops - speech lessons, cookery classes, flower arranging - and, to add a bit of spice, eliminate one a week until you’re left with the least awful one. Crown that one a ‘lady’. Job done.

It’s not that these girls are common. There’s nothing wrong with being common - I sound like the Londoner I am, have no idea how to use a fish-knife, am totally unfamiliar with formal etiquette in polite company and as for dress-sense, well, just ask my wife. I am also totally uneducated. But there’s being common and there’s being horrible and these girls are just plain horrible.

In tonight’s episode one of them got drunk in a pub and snogged some bloke she’d just met there. This is in full view of her friends - who cheered her on - and the other customers there. Oh, and a television crew. For the same audience she lifted up the front of her skirt for all the world to see.

Next day they taught her flower arranging. Well, that should cure her, shouldn’t it? What she needs is a lobotomy.

One of the central weaknesses of the whole exercise is that the teachers are trying to alter the girls’ characters simply by altering their behaviours. This won’t work. Behaviours - making a souffle, learning to walk up stairs with grace, elocution lessons and so on - follow character. When you’re of the right state of mind then you pick up the behaviours.

And what is needed really is an engagement with their minds first of all. Someone needs to tell them that being a lady is first of all a state of mind, an attitude, a temperament. First and foremost whatever you are is a result of how you think, your beliefs and the attitudes these give rise to. So drinking, swearing, snogging and so on when out of sight of the instructors means that your ladylike behaviours are just a sham. Inside, you’re no different. You just went on a course, that’s all. And knowing which knife to butter your bread with is something you could teach a monkey. But it wouldn’t make the money a lady (or a gentleman).

The truth is, turning any of these girls into ladies requires the skills of an alchemist. The finishing school’s teachers are trying to turn lead into gold. Whichever one ‘wins’ this contest won’t be a lady. She’ll be the one most skilled at suppressing her worst habits and excesses - helped, of course, by the relative inability of her fellow contestants to suppress theirs.

One of the contestants was expelled yesterday. Her attitude all along was poor and she really couldn’t care less. One of her comments as she left was, There’s more to life than this. And I thought to myself, No, not for you there isn’t. The different things you were exposed to - which you could have made use of to expand your horizons a bit - are probably the last chances you’ll ever have of filling your life with something worthwhile. Now you go back to boozing, belching and ‘having a good time’ with your lousy attitude and low behaviour totally unaffected by the experience.

It’s strangely compelling, watching these women - not bad women but simply light-years away form being the ladies they are trying to be - mess it up every week. I find myself pleading, silently, that they behave themselves, that they see the light and really set themselves a standard that they’ll live with even when there’s nobody around to check up on them. But it looks like a hopeless cause. They try - at times - to meet their teachers’ expectations but, in truth, they really need to be meeting their own expectations. But they have few, if any, expectations of themselves. So whatever they do learn in this charade will be quickly forgotten on the next Friday night binge session.

As the saying goes: you can take a horse to water but you can’t make him drink.

Crikey. Even the title scares the life out of me.

It gets worse once the programme actually starts. One of the strengths of good science programmes - like Horizon - is that they manage to turn science into stories. Sometimes it’s a detective story, sometimes a scary story but always a story. And a story that keeps you glued to the very end. Forget tripe like EastEnders - give me something like this:

So these super-massive black holes (SMBHs from now on or my fingers will drop off) - not super, not massive but super and massive - are really very, very big indeed. In fact, they are between 1 million and 1 billion times bigger than the standard black hole.

And the standard black hole is a frightening enough thing. Caused by the ongoing contraction of its own matter the black hole - previously a star, now dead - becomes smaller and smaller and increasingly dense. Its gravitational pull becomes super-strong, pulling in gas from nearby stars, literally stripping them of all substance. Such is the intense pull of a black hole’s gravity that light itself cannot escape - hence its blackness. The more the black hole consumes the more massive - and therefore the more strong - it becomes. For me, black holes are the ultimate nightmare scenario. In my fevered imagination, one could drift by earth and simply relieve it of its atmosphere. That would be the end of us all.

You can’t see a black hole because it’s black. And it’s a hole. But you know they’re where they are by the effects they have on surrounding matter - other stars particularly. What scientists first discovered was a really big one - a SMBH - in the middle of a galaxy and it was quite a find in the world of cosmology. So they decided to look for some more.

(more…)

Just heard on the BBC this morning that police are set to patrol Hampstead Royal Free Hospital because of the criminal behaviour there. This is saddening but it’s becoming all the more common now that, in a society that is soft on crime and soft on the causes of crime, our health staff not only have to suffer the stresses of long hours, hard physical work and mental strain but also aggressive language and violent behaviour.

But what really amazed me was the BBC’s assertion that crime in the Royal Free Hospital accounts for one quarter of all Hampstead’s crime.

Even if that’s more a testament to the relative good behaviour of Hampstead’s residents it is quite shocking that so much of the borough’s criminality is concentrated in one hospital. I still fall into the trap of thinking of hospitals as havens, as places of care and safety. I bet there are plenty of health professionals who can put me straight about that….

Peace is not a relationship of nations. It is a condition of mind brought about by a serenity of soul. Peace is not merely the absence of war. It is also a state of mind. Lasting peace can come only to peaceful people.

Jawaharlal Nehru

In The Telegraph today:

The imprisonment rate in England and Wales is the highest of any major country in western Europe, according to figures published today.

It seems we jail 142 people per 100,000 of population while countries like France and Germany jail considerably fewer - 91 and 96 per 100,00 of population respectively.

On the face of it seems that the UK is pretty harsh on its population. It seems even that Mr Blair’s ‘tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime’ statement has been met with positive action. Well, I find that hard to believe so let’s look a little deeper…

First, the statistic itself is not particularly revealing. To know if 142 people jailed per 100,000 of population is high or low you need to know how much crime’s being committed amongst that population. 142 people per 100, 000 of population in jail is high if there are only 142 crimes per 100, 000 people because it means everybody goes to prison. But if all 100,000 have got their fingers in the till then 142 imprisonments looks pretty paltry.

The more meaningful statistic is the rate of imprisonment per X number of crimes, not per X number of people. It seems we usually measure imprisonment against per 1,000 crimes. That gives us a measure of actual criminality in the society and a corresponding rate of imprisonment in comparison with that.

Which paints a different picture.

Using a graph found on the excellent Civitas blog (with thanks to Blimpish) we can look at some slightly older figures to illustrate the general point.

In 2000, for example, England and Wales together imprisoned 124 people per 100,00o of population. Germany imprisoned just 97 per 100,000.

But if you look at the number of prisoners per 1,000 recorded crimes then both countries imprisoned at the same rate - 12.7 people per 1,000 crimes.

In fact, the UK’s imprisonment rate is quite low compared to the EU average of 17.7 people imprisoned for every 1,000 crimes.

Some countries are prison-crazy. Greece locks ‘em up at the rate of 21.8 people per 1,000 crimes. In Italy it’s 24 people per 1,000 and in Spain - the most severe country in the EU at that time - they must be putting you away for wearing a loud shirt in a built-up area because their imprisonment rate is a whopping 49.1 people per 1,000 crimes.

You know what’s interesting in Spain’s case? A very high rate of imprisonment but a very low rate of crime. At 2,339 crimes per 100,000 people its crime rate is barely one-third of the EU average and is less than a quarter of the UK’s extremely high (50% more than the EU average) crime rate.

Want another? Ireland imprisons like it’s going out of fashion too. At 39.4 jailings per 1,000 crimes they’re the second most severe jailers in the EU (as at the year 2000). Yet at 1,933 crimes per 100,000 people they have the EU’s lowest crime figures.

And so it goes. The general consequences of low imprisonment - as per the UK - is high crime - as per the UK.

Prison isn’t perfect. We don’t do nearly enough to prevent reoffending, we seem not to pay the greatest of attention to educational needs and we possibly aren’t taking seriously enough the appalling backgrounds of some of our prisoners when formulating rehabilitation schemes. So we suffer a very high (approximately 80%) reoffending rate. But criminals in prison can’t commit crime. And those just setting out on a life of crime may well rethink their ambitions after an early and meaningful spell at Her Majesty’s pleasure. The crime and imprisonment figures of the EU seem to suggest that prison does indeed work.

Meera Syal - comedienne, novelist, writer and all round well-known person - expounds the delights of Leytonestone in ‘The Sunday Times’.

“Welcome to Leytonstone, lovely Leytonstone,” she intones in the Indian vowels of her alter ego, Granny Kumar. “Where else could you get a six-bedroom house for only £470,000?”

She’s actually selling up and taking herself to horizons new. Well, ‘horizon’ might be over-stating it a bit: South Woodford. But she retains an affection for her old stomping ground.

“This area of London is brilliant — it has the best of both worlds. It’s easy to get into town, being closer to the centre than Ealing, but it’s incredibly green and and has a wonderful community feel. I’ve grown to love the East End, its history, its people. It’s also a really multicultural area — I have to have access to Asian culture, and I’m very near Brick Lane and Green Street with all their restaurants and fashions and where some of my writing is set.”

Her Leytonstone house was derilict when she’d bought it. One of the first renovations was to the sash windows. Good move. The first thing I did with my sash windows was replace them with PVC double glazing. Warm - but charmless.

Syal wrote many of the pieces that made her famous in this house, including the recently televised ‘Life Isn’t All Ha Ha Hee Hee’ and parts of the comedy ‘Goodness Gracious Me’. All of which, I’m sure, added a few quid to its asking price when she sold…

It is better to err in forgiving than to err in punishment.

The Prophet Muhammad

I’m fairly politically-minded and am active in my local Conservative Party. I’m hoping to stand as councillor for my local council in May 2006.

This category will be mostly devoted to expounding conservative ideology; it is my attempt to clarify (in my mind as well as in anybody else’s) the underlying philosophy of conservatism. Most people’s only memorable brush with conservatism came courtesy of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Mrs T’s conservative credentials were largley economic however - and in that area she was actually as much a libertarian as anything else.

I find myself on the more ‘purist’ wing of the philosophy. I’m all for adaptation to current circumstances but that should mean simply altering our emphases at a particular time or changing our approach to better fit with prevailing circumstances or being more imaginative in our approach to tough challenges.

That should not mean jettisoning the conservative idea, the fundamental view of life that recognises the superiority of individuals, family and community over bureaucrats, officials and government. It should not mean abandoning the principles of responsibility and accountability and right and wrong.

The conservative outlook is an optimistic one, one that believes fully in the ability of people to create for themselves, their families and their communities lives wholly appropriate for their time, their circumstances, their beliefs, their aspirations and their dreams.

It is this message that I will try to develop over time. I’m sure it will be an interesting endeavour…

You’re too polite to ask so I’m volunteering some of this stuff. Better I tell you now than let the News of the World uncover it later…

Actually, I’m a study in boring but here goes:

38 years old (at the moment - I expect that’ll change though).

Married to a lovely brown-eyed lady. We married in Blackpool in November, 2003. I liked it so much I married her again in Bombay in January 2004. Marriage is something I definitely recommend. But not to my wife of course because I already beat you to it…

12 year old daughter from a previous relationship (politically correct way of saying I was an irresponsible bum and didn’t think twice - or, even, once - about what I was doing). She’s also a lovely person, very intelligent and is currently hassling me to get off the pc so she can do her homework (aka messaging her friends).

Employed as a software engineer at a scandalously low rate of pay.

I live in a galaxy far far away but reside in a two-up two-down in Ilford when visiting earth.

Hobbies include gym, yoga, blogging, erm… and blogging. Am currently searching for a life - let me know if you have a spare one.

Latest news: sat a selection interview with Ilford Conservatives Friday. I’m hoping to get on the approved list for local government councillor candidates. The interview went mildly well; I was very tired (a week of hot weather had killed my sleep) and really I have no idea what they asked me or what I told them. I hope most of it was true. If it wasn’t true I hope it was extraordinarily impressive. Iwill find out the results next week. If I pass I then have to find a ward that desperately needs a candidate (to replace one that has retired or perhaps run away to Brazil) and then be interviewed by the ward’s chairperson. I want to succeed here so my fingers are very, very crossed.

I’ve had a short and not exactly illustrious blogging career. In March this year I created my first ever blog -called ‘A Very British Insurgency’ - whose basic idea was to let rip at the various evils of Blairite rule and expose the man for the charlatan and criminal I believe he is. The blog amounted to one long, intense rant which attracted, at its height, about 80 readers a day and some kind commentary from people whose own blogging efforts were vastly superior to mine.

I was invited to contribute posts to another blog called ‘Once More’ - a rather more sophisticated ponder on the state of conservitism - the political ideology - and the Conservative Party itself. If you’re politically minded then I recommend it.

Now I have this one and have decided to lay A Very British Insurgency to rest. It was a single issue blog which was both its strength and its weakness. It was a strength because it was highly focussed and, in that its aim was to expose the inadequacies of this government, there was no shortage of material.

But it was a weakness also because posts to the blog required some research (yes, I do have a passing acquaintance with accuracy!) and because it meant that I couldn’t blog on some of the many other areas that tickle my fancy from time to time. Sometimes, it’s nice to write something lightweight, humorous or just a little unusual.

This new blog has a different remit. It’s not a single-issue site and can cover a wider variety of areas. And this means therefore that I have a variety of ways now in which to bore the life out of the unfortunates that stumble onto it…

If you’ve never seen a blog before they’re actually a very simple idea.

I - the blogger - write things and you - the blogee (I think I just invented a new word there) - read them.

Each article a blogger writes - usually called a ‘post’ - is listed above the previous one so the newest posts are at the top of the screen.

Actually, it’s counter-intuitive that new writings are at the top because when you write a document or a story or a poem or a diary the newest stuff goes to the bottom but there is sense to doing it the other way round if you consider this: a person who logs into a blog every day will see the latest offerings immediately at the top of his or her screen rather than having to scroll down to find them.

So a blog looks a bit like a diary but with the latest postings at the top, the older ones stacked underneath.

Everything I post goes onto the main front page in the order I write them but note that each post also has a category title. If you like particular types of post - say, ‘politics’ or articles about blogging or something a little lighter like my television reviews - then you can click on the appropriate ‘category’ on the right-hand side and see all previous posts for that category.

You can also add your own comments to what I’ve written. Just click on the ‘comments’ link at the bottom of each post, fill in your name or nick-name, an email address and, if you have one, the url to your own site (optional) and off you go. A warning: Comments that contain expletives, gratuitous insults or are just plain hateful (as opposed to critical - that’s allowed) will be removed. Let’s disagree by all means but let’s remain civilised with it.

But don’t get all hung up about the detail. Just dive in and read. What’s the worst that can happen?

Only terminal boredom….