17-May-08
We quite frequently drive along the mountain road between Fivemiletown and Roslea. Last time we were along that road a car was stopped beside the memorial at Moane’s Cross to two IRA men: Feargal O'Hanlon and Sean South, who died after an attack on Brookeborough RUC station on the 1st January 1957. An elderly couple seemed to be laying flowers at the place. I wondered if they were friends or relatives of those who had died there all those years ago in the IRA border campaign.
Mary McAleese has suggested that the end of Ireland’s centuries long political conflict is at hand. This in many ways echoes comments by Bertie Ahern whilst he was in Washington. Of course these sentiments are not confined to RoI politicians or to nationalists and also seem to have some echoes in Dr. Paisley’s latest remarks. I do feel, however, that this is a very difficult conclusion to draw when one considers the history of this island and indeed the history of other conflicts in the world.
The conflicts here have been “solved” with tedious frequency. Ireland has been “pacified” whether by force or by politics on many occasions. By turns Elizabeth I, James I/VI, Cromwell and Gladstone used “pacification” of various forms and the list of rebellions includes so many dates: 1641, 1798, 1916 etc. I would suggest that the nature of our conflict here is somewhat similar to ethnic conflicts, although as with many so called ethnic conflicts, there are no actual ethnic differences, merely cultural ones. The problem is with totally differing political aspirations and that is unlikely to change any time soon.
Looking to other places in the world there are frequent examples of conflicts supposedly solved years ago, which recurred. How many expected the orgy of violence visited on the Balkans? Remember also that the Balkan conflict was “solved” by the creation of Yugoslavia after it had helped precipitate the First World War (of course the above is utterly simplified but there is some truth therein). The horrors of Rwanda were unexpected but had causes and (much milder) precedents in the history of that region.
So maybe we have some form of permanent peace and all subsequent quarrels about Northern Ireland will be solved peacefully. However, this sounds a little like the pronouncement of “The End of History” after the end of the Cold War.
Whilst I agree with Mick that at the moment there (thankfully) seems little likelihood that the dissident terrorists will manage to return us to major violence; I am brought back to that elderly couple at Moane’s Cross with whom I started. I sometimes wonder if the terrorist attacks we are seeing now are a little like the IRA border campaign. At the time I am sure the RUC and the government in Stormont were delighted with how relatively easily they defeated that campaign. Little did they know that massively more violence (initiated let us remember by loyalists) was then less than a decade away.
16-May-08
A Limavady grammar school has found itself at the centre of a sporting/ political controversy after allegedly reneging on an invitation to the GAA to provide a training session for school pupils in an extra-curricular capacity following apparent ‘complaints' by parents and teachers. Limavady Grammar Headmaster, Sam McGuinness, has said he would like to see gaelic games being played at the school. Meanwhile, Ian Paisley has been paying a visit to St. Patrick's College, Bearnageeha, where he was presented with a hurley stick and invited to attend a GAA game at Croke Park by the passionate advocate of comprehensive education and School Headmaster, PJ O'Grady. Belfast's Unionist Lord Mayor, Jim Rodgers, was also in north Belfast this week, visiting a catholic primary school in Ardoyne, where he handed out prizes for the school's award-winning Gaels, this time of the handball court. At least that's two steps forward for the one in reverse...
At the Cedar Lounge, WorldbyStorm picks up on a quote from an Irish Times interview today, by Deaglán de Bréadún, with out-going Northern Ireland First Minister Ian Paisley Snr. [subs req]
Of the future, he says: "I believe that we can live together. We’re not going to have a united Ireland within 50 years or maybe 100 years but then I’ll not be here anyway, so it doesn’t matter."
And, regardless of what some might say, unless former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's advice is followed, he's probably not wrong.
Previously the de facto leader of the UDA, Jackie McDonald, told Channel 4 News why the UDA had held onto "the peoples' guns" and how they would "do their best to maintain a sense of law and order in their own communities.” In a lengthy interview in today's Irish News [subs for now] he revisited the topic [do you think he liked the photo? - Ed] and pointed to the recent attack on a policeman near Strabane.
"This week we have a policeman blown up with an under-car bomb," [McDonald] said. "Now the dissidents may not have the same capacity the IRA had but the fact is this has happened and we don't know when it will happen again or who will be the next target. How can you ask loyalists to decommission when we are sitting here not knowing when the next attack will be? There are criminal gangs now with more money and weapons at their disposal than paramilitaries on either side ever had. The police aren't willing or able to deal with them and so we continue to be led by opinion within our own community."
Of course, concern for the police hasn't always been a priority for the UDA. But Jackie might be forgiven for thinking ‘where have all the good times gone..' And there may also be some carotene-withdrawal symptoms involved..
I strongly recommend it for the insight it provides into the workings of the Prime Ministerial mind and the succinct and incisive quality that he brings to our national life.
The following gives a flavour of the PM's uniquely spare and economical use of the English language:
Question:
Were you really as persistently disobedient and impertinent to your predecessor on public sector reform as is suggested by John Prescott and Cherie Blair? And what do you really make of that woman - Mrs Blair?
Prime Minister:
The public sector reforms, many of them were proposed by the Treasury, many of them were pushed forward by the Treasury and many of them are there as a result of the initiatives such as all the Gershon changes that have reduced the number of civil servants by I think nearly 70,000 to make way for other uses for resources. I think that the issue that has been raised in the book is foundation hospitals, the only issue on foundation hospitals - so that none of you start re-writing history - was whether hospitals could run up huge borrowings at a local level. The Treasury obviously was worried about the implications for debt if individual institutions were able to borrow substantial sums of money and someone - because a hospital could not easily close if it had an accident and emergency facility or something like that - had to pick up the bill. And that was the only issue in relation to foundation hospitals. It was a perfectly sensible issue; how do you deal with a situation where an institution that is not actually the Government itself can run up huge borrowings. And of course we reached an understanding on that and I think the result is that we do not have these huge borrowings, that was the only issue.
Well, that clears that up.
OK, its Friday night, Janet's out with her mum, my younger son's been round, but now I'm reduced to the Smashhits! channel on Sky as I create a marketing brochure (day job) ... and then this comes on. So 90s, but brilliant!
Gabriele Paolini, the man known as the "prophylactic prophet" and the "television polluter" has been sentenced to five months in jail for calling the late Pope John Paul ll gay.
Paolini, also known as the "condom prophet," began his career as a subverter of television after a close friend died of Aids. His one-man protest, set out to up-stage television shows in order to promote safe sex and the use of condoms.
He followed the reporters and would show up on TV screens around the nation wearing a chain of condoms around his neck - often making faces and gesticulating behind some journalist in the middle of a news report. His campaign was so successful that he made it into into the Guinness Book of Records for appearing on television 20,000 times over a six year period.
In 2005, he positioned himself behind a TV broadcast in Rome and called the late Pope John Paul ll gay. It is against the law in Italy to interrupt a public service. Dissing the Pope also brought the charge of insulting state religion.
Paolini isn't a quitter. Despite being roughed up and threatened on numerous occasions he persisted with his campaign. Given his track record, he should be able to survive the five month stint on the inside.
His website is at gabrielepaolini.com
With thanks to the City Council's Economic Development Department, who gave me the CD, here's a glimpse of Dundee's Waterfront of the future. As Planning & Transport Convener of the City Council, I am a member of the Waterfront Board, and am taking a very close interest in developments. You can access the Waterfront website by clicking on the headline above.
A BBC series that will go to air later this month, includes mention of a meeting Bush had with Palestinian leaders in 2003. It was during this meeting that Bush divulged his "special" relationship with the man upstairs.
In the BBC program - Elusive Peace: Israel and the Arabs - due to be aired this month, Palestinian foreign minister, Nabil Shaath, says he and Mahmoud Abbas were treated by Bush to the following revelation:
"I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.' And I did, and then God would tell me, 'George go and end the tyranny in Iraq,' and I did."
The hymn "In the Garden" that includes the lyrics "he walks with me and he talks with me" has nothing on the President's relationship with the great hypothetical. To hear Bush tell it you would think he had God on speed-dial.
Bush's ill-conceived "War on Terror," launched on the back of 9/11 and a pack of lies, features an enemy that has been largely concocted in order to justify Bush's madcap adventures. R.T Naylor's book - "Satanic Purses: Money, Myth and Misinformation in the War on Terror" - exposes the inner-workings of a "war" that is more myth than reality.
The tall tale the Bush administration has been peddling about a global Islamic terror network stretching from the Middle East, to Chechnya and the jungles of the Philippines - is a fiction. Worse Bush has conned the American people into buying this fable - but who are they to argue, God himself is giving Bush inside tips.
The tragic part is that a good time Charlie with limited skills and childlike notions about "God" was ever let anywhere near the Presidency of the United States. The American people and the global community have paid a terrible price for this man's follies, including a massive civilian toll in Iraq and 1,950 dead American service men and women.
Recently Bush said that he honored the military dead by giving up golf - an unintentionally insulting statement that turned out to be a lie, since there is evidence that he went ahead and played golf anyway.
The idea that Iraq has now been "liberated" and "victory is at hand" is Bush administration propaganda. Buying-off Sunni insurgents and maintaining a tenuous grip on the security situation is a guarantee of nothing, especially given the changing dynamics in the Middle East.
The global tensions fired up by Bush, with quasi-religious warnings of "evil doers", "an axis of evil" and a mythical global terror organization with the backing of a sophisticated financial network, was the scenario he needed to justify his military adventures. God apparently was in on it all, urging Bush along a path of lunacy - pushing the world ever closer to the abyss - an abyss that yawns wider with Iran now in the cross hairs.
God of course is a great alibi. If your schemes backfire or when you are faced with the horrific consequences of your actions, you can say "God told me to do it" and absolve yourself of guilt and responsibility.
God is a hypothetical, but unfortunately George W. Bush isn't. Even with his popularity at an all-time low, he continues to embrace his delusional world view and mocks American Democrats as "appeasers" from a platform in the Knesset. His comparison of the situation in the Middle East with Nazi tanks rolling into Poland and the machinations of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich is inflammatory and wrong headed. At that stage in WW2 the prospect of military actions unleashing a nuclear disaster wasn't part of the equation, as it is now.
Bush's term as president is drawing to a close, but the consequences of his actions will continue to reap a bitter harvest for many years to come.
Do these very different-looking busts, both dated to around 45BC, show the same person? If recent international press reports are to be trusted, they both depict Julius Caesar towards the end of his extraordinary career; and the one on the right, found last autumn after lying at the bottom of the Rhône for more than two thousand years, has the greater claim to show what Caesar really looked like.
The new discovery, dubbed the "Arles bust", is part of a huge and very exciting haul of around a hundred objects, which also includes a statue of Neptune dating from around the 3rd Century AD. But not surprisingly, the new "Caesar" attracted most of the attention. Its striking realism, and remarkable state of preservation (especially considering where it was found), gives an eerie impression of being brought into contact with one of the most significant figures in history. As Charles Bremner put it in the Times, "the world has been introduced to the true face of Julius Caesar." And it's a new Caesar, too: less bald, rounder-faced, and somewhat less haughty-looking than more familiar depictions. Though some have noted a slight resemblance to George W. Bush.
But is it really Caesar? How was this image authenticated, and with what degree of certainty? According to the expedition leader, Luc Long, he at least was never in any doubt:
These really are his features. I recognised them immediately. It is a new image, with the realism of the period, before the conventional representations of a divine Caesar. He has a long neck, wrinkles showing his age, the prominent Adam's apple, the high and wide forehead and marked baldness.
So on the one hand, it looked sufficiently like Caesar for Long to immediately recognise him. On the other, the fact that it doesn't look particularly like other images of the dictator is ironically proof of its authenticity. Other, better-attested images of Caesar (such as the one on the left, known as the Tusculum portrait, and also believed to date from his lifetime) are thus suddenly downgraded. We thought we knew what Caesar looked like, but it seems we were wrong. And he has a theory as to why the bust was dumped in the river. It was after Julius was assassinated in 44BC, he thinks, when owning an image of the dead man might have been dangerous.
Not everyone is convinced, however. Mary Beard, for example,
There is, I suppose, a remote possibility that it does represent Julius Caesar, but no particular reason at all to think that it does - still less to think that it was done from life.
The game of art-historical snap is a risky business, and honestly you could find hundreds of Romans who, with the eye of faith, look pretty much like this. Besides - despite all you get told about the style of the portrait pinning it down to a few years - this style of portraiture lasted for centuries at Rome. There is nothing at all to suggest that it came from 49-46 BC.
Prof. Beard reminds us of Heinrich Schliemann, the most romantic of archaeologists, who found a beaten-gold death mask in a tomb at Mycenae and excitedly told the world's press that he had "gazed upon the face of Agamemnon". "Almost every local archaeological society in England was certain that the tiny little Roman villa they were digging up was actually the governor's residence," she adds. It's the same wishful thinking, I suppose, that wants to make every post-Roman British fort the site of Camelot, every mummy dug up in Egypt a possible Nefertiti, or every bad anonymous late-Elizabethan poem a lost work of Shakespeare.
On the comments section of the Coin Archaeology blog, "Mary Jane" has an exhaustive list of 14 points of difference between the two busts. On the assumption that the Tusculum bust is an accurate representation of Caesar, she concludes that the new bust cannot possibly be him. So what is the evidence that the Tusculum portrait is genuine? Actually, little more than its similarity to Caesar's image on coins. The coins are the only contemporary depictions of the man inscribed with his name. And who knows how accurate even they actually are?
Surely there must be more to it than this? The identification, apart from anything else, carries with it the official imprimatur of the French state. A press release from the Ministry of Culture describes the Arles bust as "the oldest known representation of Julius Caesar". And according to the expedition's supervisor, Michel L'hour, part of the reason that the discovery has only now been announced was due to the need to establish the truth beyond question:
We have consulted the most eminent specialists in ancient statuary so as to make sure that this really is a portrait of Julius Caesar. The researchers unanimously confirmed the authenticity of the image. It is typical of realist portraits of the Republican era... Everything points to its being a portrait of the emperor executed during his lifetime.
Given such definitive statements (and Luc Long also claimed to have consulted "specialists in art history and forensic morphology") it's not surprising that the press have accepted the attribution without too much in the way of scepticism. It's an exciting news story, after all. The trouble is, the claim that this bust represents Caesar, let alone that it was "drawn from life" is suppositious at best. And the more you think about it, the more far-fetched it appears. For one thing, unlike his successor Augustus, Julius wasn't in the habit of setting up images of himself all over the empire, so how did this end up in Arles? For another, it was common practice for wealthy Romans to have busts of themselves and their ancestors sculpted.
In the absence of an inscription, it really could be anyone. The truth is that we will never know precisely what Caesar looked like. With ancient Egyptian notables, facial reconstruction artists can often get to work on the mummy and produce an almost exact likeness. Julius Caesar, of course, was cremated. But people, even "eminent specialists", can be very suggestible, especially when faced with a romantic and perhaps career-defining possibility.
More data, this time about the provision from primary care trusts in England (Hansard 15 May 2008, columns 1673W-1677W). The data is (or "are" if you prefer) based on social aspects like life expectancy and deprivation and on administrative aspects like the proportion of patients seen within forty eight hours and the proportion able to see a specific GP.
Each trust is ranked against the average for all trusts in England. Average is undefined but presumably is the mean average.
Here comes the teaser. There are 152 trusts in the published Hansard table in rank order. If 1 is best and 152 is worst, whereabouts is Cornwall and Isles of Scilly primary care trust (CIOSPCT)? Near the best or the worst? 32nd, 99th, 151st?
I'm sure you've guessed right, having read my previous posts.
Yes, it's 32nd.
Of course I repeat my comment on all Cornwall data: to look at aggregated data for the whole county, or an entire trust, is not particularly helpful. What counts is the position on the ground for individuals and parcels within those areas. For people who live here Cornwall is not one place but many places and the circumstances of life vary vastly.
Let me end with another teaser. Do you think this favourable trust data will figure on any nationalist or Libdem Cornwall website?
This week on Sunday Live, Adam will be speaking to Gordon Brown's key lieutenant, Cabinet Minister Ed Miliband.
Last year he was charged with drawing up the party's manifesto for a snap election - given the current state of the polls, should Gordon have gone for it?
The papers will be reviewed by Conservative MP Bernard Jenkin and former Number 10 adviser to Tony Blair, David Hill.
You can also see an exclusive interview with the President of the Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko. And the former Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf speaks about the state of the criminal justice system and ethics at BAE.
One of the original 'Angry Young Men' - Alan Sillitoe - discusses turning 80 and the enduring popularity of works like 'Saturday Night and Sunday Morning' and 'The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner'.
Plenty to talk about with the FA Cup and Champions' League Final in the pipeline, and showbiz is provided by Graham Goulden of 10cc, and the singer who broke out of the internet and into the mainstream Sandi Thom:
That's Sunday Live at 1000 this Sunday.
My administration will hit the ground running...
Day 1: If you vote for a political party because a dead soap opera character told you to, you will lose your vote. And your prefrontal cortex.
Blogger Guido Fawkes was sentenced to a three month curfew order this afternoon after being convicted of driving while over the legal alcohol limit and without insurance.
Appearing at Tower Bridge Magistrates Court the blogger, real name Paul Staines, was told the curfew would operate between the hours of 9pm and 6am. Staines, 41, will also have to wear an electronic tag.
The judge also handed down an 18-month supervision order and a three year driving ban. Staines will be required to retake his driving test when the driving ban has elapsed. He was also ordered to pay the prosecution's £60 costs.
(Additional reporting by Tim Ireland)
Tags: disintermediation
Update 16/5: Our court reporter Tim Ireland adds further details.
The NHS website now allows you to compare hospital facilities like transport and parking. Visitors to the website can also rate and post comments about their patient experience.
I think this is a really valuable tool to assist patients in allowing them to make an informed decision about where best to get treatment.
We can all promise the world, the skill is in delivering it, as Tory London mayoral hopeful Boris Johnson has just found out.
Johnson admitted during a recent campaign trip that his plans to replace bendy buses with 500 new Routemaster buses would cost more than 100 million pounds. Johnson had originally estimated the cost (of conductors only) at 8 million.
This is just another example of an unfunded, poorly planned and ill considered Tory pledge that demonstrates financial irresponsibility, and puts at risk our mortgages, jobs and investment in public services.
[N]othing terrifies a repressive regime quite like a natural disaster. Authoritarian states rule by fear and by projecting an aura of total control. When they suddenly seem short-staffed, absent or disorganized, their subjects can become dangerously emboldened. It's something to keep in mind as two of the most repressive regimes on the planet -- China and Burma -- struggle to respond to devastating disasters: the Sichuan earthquake and Cyclone Nargis. In both cases, the disasters have exposed grave political weaknesses within the regimes -- and both crises have the potential to ignite levels of public rage that would be difficult to control.2
A regime's failure to respond promptly and effectively to suffering caused by a natural disaster, the failure that the opposition can exploit, can indeed become a factor in its downfall. Such was the case with the Shah's regime and the earthquake of 1978 that wiped out Tabas and damaged forty other villages in Iran.
Michel Foucault reported in Corriere della sera on 28 September 1978:
Who will rebuild Tabas today? Who will rebuild Iran after the earthquake of Friday, September 8 [Black Friday, when the army massacred hundreds of protesters in Djaleh Square of Tehran], right under the treads of the tanks? The fragile political edifice has not yet fallen to the ground, but it is irreparably cracked from top to bottom.
In the torrid heat, under the only palm trees still standing, the last survivors of Tabas work away at the rubble. The dead are still stretching their arms to hold up walls that no longer exist. Men, their faces turned toward the ground, curse the Shah. The bulldozers have arrived, accompanied by the empress; she was ill received. However, mullahs rush in from the entire region; and young people in Tehran go discreetly from one friendly house to another, collecting funds before leaving for Tabas. "Help your brothers, but nothing through the government, nothing for it," is the call that Ayatollah Khomeini has just issued from exile in Iraq.3
Neither Islamic nor Marxist nor liberal revolutionaries of Iran, however, called upon the West to claim its "right to protect" and send its armies to save them from the Shah. They overthrew the Shah's regime on their own, and Iran's Islamic Revolution has grown into a republic that can survive natural disasters, such as the earthquake of 2003 that destroyed Bam, killing more than 20,000 and injuring many more.
One of the casualties of the Bam earthquake was an American man, Tobb Dell'Oro, who was vacationing with his fiancée Adele Freedman in the city. Freedman, who credits the "kindness of Iranian people" for her survival,4 became the subject of an important documentary film, Bam 6.6: Humanity Has No Borders (Dir. Jahangir Golestan-Parast, 2007), which shows Iranians' solicitude for her wellbeing and gracious hospitality to her parents who initially thought Iran would be a terrible place for Jewish Americans like them to visit but have changed their minds about the Iranian people.
The Bam earthquake also moved many of the normally fractious Iranian diaspora, as well as the populace of Iran, to solidarity, holding benefits and raising funds for their countrymen and women in need back home.
Artists did their part, too. Mohammed Reza Shajarian, the finest musician in Iran, held a concert "همنوا با بم" [In Harmony with Bam] with Hossein Alizadeh, Kayhan Kalhor, and Homayoun Shajarian in remembrance of the victims of the earthquake.
Iran's Islamic government, by the way, did not reject international, including American, offers of assistance, unlike the Bush White House who didn't let Cuba or Iran help Americans after Hurricane Katrina, and welcomed international NGOs as well, even though well-intentioned outsiders can create as many hindrances as aids they bring:
In a recent lessons-learned meeting on the Bam earthquake in Iran, a polite and respectful colleague from the Iranian Ministry of Health related his frustration at international NGO coordination in the early days of the emergency. He said that, at the same time as he was desperately trying to set up field hospitals and bury the dead, representatives from over 100 international NGOs had individually requested meetings with him. He appreciated their help, he said, but some organisations wanted to ask him about the siting of rural clinics when he was still trying to arrange emergency medical evacuations. Was there no way, he asked, that these agencies could organise themselves better in the early days of a disaster?5
But Iran's government, even under President Khatami, would not have accepted international relief if it had been imposed upon it by a show of force.
1 Robert D. Kaplan, "Aid at the Point of a Gun," New York Times, 14 May 2008.
2 Naomi Klein, "Regime-Quakes in Burma and China," The Nation, 15 May 2008.
3 Michel Foucault, "The Army -- When the Earth Quakes," in Janet Afary and Kevin B. Anderson, Foucault and the Iranian Revolution: Gender and the Seductions of Islamism, U of Chicago P, 2005, p. 190. An endnote omitted from the quotation and replaced by a parenthetical editorial clarification.
4 Corey Kilgannon, " For One Earthquake Survivor, Joy Is Tempered by Sorrow," New York Times, 10 January 2004.
5 Jenty Wood, "Improving NGO Coordination: Lessons from the Bam Earthquake," Humanitarian Practice Network, 2003.
This is going to be trouble. ( See The First Post's Mole here ).
Firstly, the "brand" is hardly tainted. with much more buoyant poll ratings lately, so it does seem a little odd for us to look like we are scared to have the party name or logo on a letter.
Sadly, some MPs and senior HoC officials chose to try and block voters from finding out what MPs actually spend their money on. One argument used to try and prevent this information being published was that it would put MPs at risk and make them less secure. Obviously some MPs forgot that their address is actually published on the ballot paper every time they stand for election.
What will be interesting will be to see who has made the most ludicrous expenses claims. Press reports some months ago suggested that in some cases MP's claims could be very embarrassing and might mean some would be forced to consider their position.
Either way, those who have abused the system will be caught out and hopefully people will see that some MPs are not all crooks as they have all in recent weeks been tarred with the same brush of sleaze because of a few individuals like Derek Conway.
Presidential campaign logos 2008-1966.
And thank you for your kind comments about the new baby. I think she may have my appetite 
Whilst we know that lists and so forth are traditionally Iain Dale's territory, it appears that all the cool kids are starting to get excited about them of recent so we might as well join in the party. The trend developed earlier in the week when the Telegraph published a list of the 50 most influential figures on the new Right, inspiring Political Wire to produce a similar version for the Left.
Though the two people holding prime position on the two lists is hardly a surprise - Gordon Brown on the Left and David Cameron on the Right - some of the other political players that have managed to get their names scribed down - and the positions in which they are in - will most likely be the subject of contention...
Read more...This video seems to say it is police brutality. Look at 2:08.
Police Brutality at Glasgow Rangers vs Russia UEFA Cup Riot
The Rangers in Manchester - Riots
Mind you in this video some of the rangers fans seem to walk up to rhe riot police maybe to goad them, and claim they are tough. Thye fans seem to be goading them. If this fired up the riot police they should take responsibility too, for the brutality the police may have done to innocent Rangers fans.
Plus one police man has his arm broken. So I understand the police had a tough job to do. But I do not like the attitude from some that this is an excuse for racial abuse against all Scottish people.
It seems according to the extremist media all Rangers fans and Scottish people are racist scum who all rioted and all deserve to be beaten up and gassed by riot police, and banned from Manchester.
I am sure there were rioters in the Rangers fans, but it is a fact some innocent people were beaten by the police.
How will the English media react when the Russian police beat up any random English football fan.
This Manchester Rangers riot is being used to stoke up racism between the two nations. I have read people on the internet who have claimed the fans should be gassed and never allowed back to Manchester.
I am sure there were some bigoted thugs in the crowd and much of Rangers support does suffer from bigotry and bullying attitudes but do not use this riot to spread racism.
Janet Daley's stunning insights into the character of Gordon Brown in her Daily Telegraph column last year caused disquiet with many on the right because she is seen to be of the right. She firmly bought into Gordon's project, thinking that he would be intellectually firm in the face of the shallow flim-flammery of Cameron.She wrote immediately after the 7/7 bombing:
Mr Brown made a terse and perfectly judged statement. For all its brevity, it conveyed the essential message of calm resolution and national unity: "I know that the British people will stand together, united, resolute and strong.'' This was High Seriousness delivered in the old-fashioned way, with spare wartime urgency and without sentimentality.He even became for her a great, non-neurotic TV performer:
Again, yesterday, in his interview with Andrew Marr, Mr Brown did not put a foot wrong ... Interestingly, these were the first television appearances I have seen in which there was no sign of his peculiar nervous mannerism of rolling his tongue inside his mouth that is so beloved by satirists. Has he been trained out of it, or has he been transformed by his role and the state of national emergency? Either way, its absence helps to remove the impression of neuroticism that would not have inspired public confidence.So no more laughing at Gordon the Great. The next month in August 2007 she contrasted Brown's biblical strength to the effete Dave. Gordon had, in Janet's view, the strength to withstand the trials of power:
First the terror attacks, then the floods, now the pestilence. Gordon Brown seems to be undergoing the trials of Job. But in this case, it is not so much his faith that is being tested as the country's in him. And, my goodness, isn't he rising to the challenge?
Once again he has appeared on our television screens within hours of terrible news, not just to assure us that he personally is taking charge of the foot and mouth crisis but to thank the authorities in affected communities for their cooperation and competence - to make it clear, in other words, that he is in command but also deeply respectful of people on the ground who must deal with the problems over which they have singular expertise.
Wow! Will this guy ever put a foot wrong?
Reality struck Janet hard in September :
Was Gordon the Great just an illusion?
Can Gordon pull it back? This week is the true beginning of the Brown era, as opposed to the fag end of the previous one. With the Queen's Speech and the first Brownite legislative programme we should get the answer to the political question of the moment: was the New Brown a figment of our imagination, the most transitory illusion ever to capture the imagination of the Commentariat, or was there really something there worth grasping?
The Commentariat collectively, Janet in particular, wrote in the summer of 2007 with all the considered judgement of a herd of sheep. They however would have you believe that they possess valuable insights and good judgement based on their intellect and access to the key players. They have opinions just like everyone, no better, no worse. They merely express them better than most. More often than not their access and close proximity to the subjects they write about clouds their judgement. Mostly their opinions are not worth the chip-wrapping they are written on...
"...the Secretary of State for Wales, Paul Murphy, went on television to state that the election results showed that further devolution was no longer the political priority of Welsh voters. People, he said, were far more interested in the delivery of public services.
"In making this statement he was speaking diametrically against the policy of the Welsh Labour Party. This underlined the growing tension between the Labour Party in Wales and their Labour colleagues in the UK Parliament. Undoubtedly Welsh Labour leaders in the National Assembly saw their disastrous local election performance as a result of the incompetence of Labour's ruling regime in London."
In the past fortnight we have seen mounting tension between Cardiff Bay and Welsh MPs in Westminster, who seem to be abusing the LCO process for their own ends, namely to curb devolution and the threat lawmaking powers will ultimately pose them, leading as it inevitably will to a cut in their numbers.
Betsan Powys noted on Wednesday:
There's concern that while the Assembly LCO Committee wanted to work jointly with the Welsh Affairs Select Committee to scrutinise the Order, "this has subsequently proved not to be possible".
And there's yet more disappointment that despite cross party support in the Assembly for the conferral of powers in relation to the physical punishment of children - it isn't, of course, happening. You must remember the 'Slap in the face of the Assembly' headlines.
And then there was that half-hearted invitation from the MPs to AMs to 'observe' their scrutiny ... but not join in.
The conferral of powers in relation to the physical punishment of children is an example of our democratically elected Welsh Government and Opposition coming to an agreement and yet being denied legislative power by the Welsh Affairs Select Committee, of whom Dafydd Elis-Thomas was critical last week on Dragon's Eye:
"They tend to want to double scrutinise and look at policy and look at measures because they have a policy interest as Members of Parliament...it's not for them to make legislation. What we are seeking are the powers, that is what the issue is about. That's a constitutional matter and therefore I think that's more appropriately addressed by the Justice Committee, the constitutional committee of the House of Commons."
Such a situation is politically unsustainable. The eleven members of the Welsh Affairs Select Committee may represent Welsh constituencies, but they neither represent Wales as a whole, nor have they any mandate to make or break Welsh legislation.
It is time, as the Llywydd suggested, for the Welsh Affairs Select Committee to be relieved of its role in the LCO process, and the job handed to others more capable of objectivity and less interested in undermining the evolution of devolution. Equally it is time for the Secretary of State for Wales to serve and not to govern.
In his new book, Reappraisals, Tony Judt claims we live in an "age of forgetting". We regard history, he says, not as something that has shaped us, but rather a litany of error and delusion from which we have escaped into sanity. And because our economy is undergoing the most rapid and extensive transformation the world has ever seen, we believe history has nothing to teach us: we think "that was then; this is now."
Which raises the questions: is this true? If so, why?
It certainly hard to square with what seems an active market for history. The BBC's History magazine sells as well as the New Statesman and Jewish Chronicle combined; two TV channels are devoted to history, albeit sustained by Nazi-porn; and popular books on history sell well.
And yet, I suspect many might be guilty of Judt's charge. Here are three possible causes of the problem:
1. An undervaluing of academia generally. Knowledge for its own sake - be it history, Latin, pure science - has a low priority. The function of education is thought to be preparing people for work.
2. Managerialism. The most famous saying of the quintessential managerialist Henry Ford is: "history is bunk." And it is for managerialists, who are always "moving forward", "progressing" away from an irrelevant past: Tony's Blair's ignorance of history was limitless. The managerialist faith that all problems are soluble requires a blindness to history, which tells us this is not so. No boss values the employee who tells him: "we tried that a few years ago, and it didn't work."
3. Narcissism. In an era when we all think ourselves unique and special, we flatter ourselves that we are self-made men rather than bearers of historical and social relations. We don't therefore need history to tell us who we are.
As Oasis put it in one of their most popular songs:
I'm free to be whatever I
Whatever I choose
But the point is that the Gallaghers were not free, but were instead products of