Dangerous Dancing

Whose tune is danced to?

There are still those, even beyond the confines of the BBC who fail to understand that their attachment of the term 'right wing' to the likes of the BNP is dishonest in the extreme.

Hopefully articles such as this should disavow all but the most mentally corroded of this lazy assumption. As a précis for those without the time to read any Guardian bilge, the 'BNP Ballerina' Simone Clarke has joined the executive of a union called 'Solidarity' who seem to spout the real voice of trade unionism, including a distrust of 'foreigners taking our jobs'. Their real crime, at least as far as the TUC are concerned, is that they are not an officially approved union which sometimes criticises certain (and on this alone I will agree with them) backwards looking unions who are 'official' but also called 'Equity'.

<lie>I don't like poking fun at the internal travails of the left</lie>, but it does feel good to sit on the diametrically opposite side of the political circle from the likes of Bob Crowe and Ms Clarke, and despise the authoritarian left wing instincts of both the TUC and their proxy government as well as the BNP.

For those who think that this is a cheap dig at the left and have some experience of life outside the south east, simply ask yourself one question. If some TV company paid you to go under cover to infiltrate and recruit on behalf of the BNP vermin, would you choose: the local Con/Liberal Club, or the local Labour/Working Men's club?

If there was to be prize money at stake, I know where I'd be staking my pitch.

The BNP is a creature of the authoritarian left, and it's time the moderate left started to take some responsibility for it rather than simple colluding in the lazy media characterisation of it as a right wing organisation and hoping some guilt will attach by distant association to the Conservatives.

Whichever path the Lib Dems take under either Huhne or Clegg I think many both within and without the party will hope they will abandon to some of the statism that has crept around their message in recent years and become the voice of left of centre liberalism to mirror what Cameron has already achieved to the right of centre. The statist right wing exists only in dimmest of memories of thirty-somethings like me, leaving the David and Goliath of the BNP and Labour to fight for the big state left vote divided on either side of the racist/non-racist axis.

This has been one and only time that I've ever tried to persuade someone to vote Labour; they couldn't stomach the Lib Dems, and their alternative choice was much worse, and for that the person the selection of the only two viable candidates was as natural as breathing.

As an aside, to have had a couple of pleasant beers with good company, then to come home for a couple of glasses of wine (cheapish but nice burgundy) with good music (Zero 7, Something for Kate...ok...it's in the ear of the beholder) and a bit of a internecine squabble in the trade union movement has seemed like a good way to end a bad week - gawd, what am I turning into!

Another Cuckoo in the Nest

Nobel Prize Medal

When I reacted to the ludicrous news that Al Gore had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, I made the mistake on commenting somewhat favourably on the Literature Prize award to Doris Lessing.

I admitted that I knew nothing about her, but from the Radio 4 precis she seemed not to quite fit the bill of the typical leftism victim who normally come out on top in such awards and she made a point a eschewing the various politically correct labels that some tried to attach to her. Perhaps I was also just enjoyed her reaction at hearing about her award as she got out of a cab, taking the whole thing very much in her stride.

Of course, I should have known better. The Nobel Prize Committees are, I am sure, very professional, and such a lapse could never have been tolerated.

The International Herald Tribune reports:

MADRID: The recipient of this year's Nobel Prize in Literature, Doris Lessing, said in an interview published over the weekend that the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States were not "that terrible" when compared with attacks by the Irish Republican Army in Britain.

"September 11 was terrible, but if one goes back over the history of the IRA, what happened to the Americans wasn't that terrible," Lessing told the Spanish newspaper El País.

"Some Americans will think I'm crazy," she said in the interview published Sunday. "Many people died, two prominent buildings fell, but it was neither as terrible nor as extraordinary as they think. They're a very naïve people, or they pretend to be."

...

Lessing added: "As for Bush, he's a world calamity. Everyone is tired of this man. Either he is stupid or he is very clever, although you have to remember he is a member of a social class which has profited from wars."

Source: International Herald Tribune

OK, she did go on to have a pop at the Iranians too, but overall it was just pretty standard anti-American, anti-Bush bile.

To consider a whole nation "naïve" simply because they find a single incident in which just under 3,000 people perished as bad as 3,700 dying over a 30 year period in Ulster's sectarian strife, sounds like a case of trying to find a justification for an extant prejudice.

As for the Bush diatribe, frankly it's just boring. Blah blah "stupid", blah blah "evil", blah blah "class". To be honest, I'll be glad to see the back of Bush myself, but when I look at him I don't just don't see the creature that the left are so desperate to see.

Perhaps he isn't the sharpest intellect ever to grace the White House, but he is clearly far from the moron that the true idiots wish to believe he is on the basis of occasionally poor public presentation. When I look at him I see a man of simple faith and of convictions that may be not that politically correct but are clearly heartfelt; I'm also never convinced I'm seeing someone who is doing a job that at heart they really want to do, more someone following an unavoidable destiny of going into the family business.

Most of the same crap was thrown at Regan through much of his presidency, but he had the charisma that ensured it never really held water. Sadly the left's simplistic tarring and feathering of Bush will probably stick.

It looks as though whatever may lie within Lessing's worthy tomes, I wouldn't expect much in the way of insight, more likely an artistic dressing up of threadbare themes, if her views on current affairs are anything to go by.

Welcome Home

It's finally all over. The England team returned from Paris today to a chorus of approval from all quarters, without anyone going over the top.

My England shirt is sitting in a kitchen sink full of dilute bleach, in the vain hope of getting some of the Guinness and red wine stains to fade. I normally never wear it on match days, preferring for reasons of practically and tradition to stick to one of the shirts I actually played in, but this was a World Cup final so it had to be the white on Saturday. I can give good news to anyone in the same position in that it appears that the intentionally red bits seem sufficiently resistant to bleach to resort to these measures.

The only thing that spoilt Sunday was a lack of Internet, hence this post coming today, and the revolting Roy Hattersley, who always strikes me as some kind of Brown Mark I, on Andrew Marr's show on Sunday morning, with his ridiculous comment on the supposedly excessive media coverage of a 'minority' sport. He didn't actually say anything about class, but you knew what he meant. I would suggest that Spluttersley takes a tour to the rugby clubs of South Wales, the South West or some of the Rugby Union pockets in the north. He might receive a painful lesson about just how ridiculous his views are, and after all, even if you accept the very dubious premise of that the type of hard class distinctions that aging socialists cling on to try to divide the country whenever it might come together, does it really matter?

As for 'minority' sports - frankly Roy, that doesn't matter either. I've seen people crowd round the pub TV for finals of rowing, hockey, even curling and a dozen other 'minority' sports of much smaller reach than the Rugby Union, and its World Cup which draws TV audiences behind only the soccer equivalent and the summer Olympics. These events draw people of every background together and break down barriers, and I suspect that's why, unless it is soccer, they are so distrusted by these relics of socialism. Old style socialism is driven by creating artificial barriers between us all and the engendering an envy and hatred between those they place in different camps that they claim to be the only ones capable of putting right.

But enough of that. For the last time this time around, once again, well done to the Bokke on a well earned victory and great respect to the England boys for a job done better than many of us dared to hope.

Oh, and for the record...I must dissent from the views of Jackart and Donal Blaney on the try that might have been, though I have a lot of doubts about the final penalty that the Springboks scored from. Even Planet Rugby in their 'stats from the final' story refused to classify it as the 'crossing' offense that Rolland awarded it for, and merely put it down as 'unknown'. I'm also in agreement with Jackart's other rugby themed post.

The Good Old Days

A blast from the past

It's highly unusual for me to quote that renowned journal, Socialist Worker, however now I shall do it for the second time in less that a week.

Anyone who wonders whether or not the less thinking type of unionism that blighted this country for decades has been wholly eliminated by the actions of the Thatcher administration, and the merciful inaction of Blair and Brown thus far, should take a look at this gem.

Fortunately strikes such as the current postal workers' dispute and the recent shenanigans by Bob Crowe and his merry men are now sufficiently rare that for all the inconvenience and disruption they cause it is possible see such neanderthal rubbish as amusing from time to time.

I don't know why I found this particular effort so amusing, just something about the breathless style of the coverage of the posties' misguided actions, as they wreck their own job security. It finally struck me that it came over like a report in the local rag about the local soccer team's latest outing in the lower reaches of the football leagues, with a bit of Sid James 'Carry on at your convenience' style unionism as a bit of an afterthought.

Just to show you how some parts of the union movement have moved with the times:

The last day of the national postal strikes saw a fantastic spontaneous march by 100 postal workers through the centre of Ipswich chanting "What do we want? Fair pay! When do we want it? Now!".

...

Monday's strike saw four deliveries turned away including the weekly delivery of the canteen's food.

Source: Socialist Worker

"What do we want? X! When do we want it? Now!"...for God's sake this is the twenty-first century. Hmm, and I wonder who they will blame their empty bellies on when they finally do get back to work?

It even has the equivalent of the Opta statistics for the game, with 'shots on target' replaced with 'scab numbers'.

On a serious point, I've always despised the language of hate that fuels so much of left-wing rhetoric. As little time as I may have for the Human Rights Act, I do hope one day that a 'scab' takes legal action under it against one of the old-school unions - there seems to be ample cause.

For now, the CWU's campaign to destroy their member's job security Scargill-style continues unabated. Postal services across the continent face a very uncertain future, thanks to the CWU the Royal Mail faces probably the future with even less confidence than their European counterparts.

My Enemy's Enemy is...

Socialist Worker -
Moron shall speak unto moron

...still a complete and utter waste of oxygen, and a source of much CO₂ that we could well dispense with.

If there was ever to be an award for the most ironically named newspaper or periodical, the only significant challenger to the Independent would be Socialist Worker. I guess 'Socialist Striker' or 'Socialist Layabout' would have been a little too frank - has anyone ever seen a 'horny handed son of toil' selling this pathetic rag? Assuming that is that the 'horny handed' bit refers to hard graft rather than what they do once they have picked up cash for the fortnight courtesy of those who actually, erm...work.

I would never claim this band of losers as unlikely bedfellows, but for all of that it was amusing to see their headline over the postal strike:

Strikers tell Brown: ‘We won’t bottle it’

Alan Walsh, branch secretary, Watford CWU

Source: Socialist Worker

It's good to see them taking the Conservative whip on attitudes to our loathsome Prime Minister.

It's good to see unity in the country, to have united left, right, and centre, including now the extreme left, and I suspect (though I have no intention of going to look) the extreme right, in universal derision is a pretty special achievement for Broon.

Big Brother...of the NUT?

In Need of Education?

Some of the activities of the NATFHE, representing staff in higher education, last year did make me wonder if that is exactly what its post merger successor, the University and College Union, would become. An organisation legitimately representing the voice their membership at large, or a debating society devoted to preserving the corpse of long dead arguments?

Today was a day of mixed messages on the subject. I was alerted to the fact that UCU were holding their conference this week by an article on the BBC website centring on whether or not they would back government requests for them to report on activities amongst their students that may be suggestive of extremist activity. I wasn’t especially interested in this as I was sure they would reject the opportunity to be Reid’s spies on the campus, which they duly did and I applaud them for doing so. However the term used was that they were set to ‘boycott’ this bit of NuLab’s Big Brotherism, so I started to wonder if the old chestnut of boycotting Israeli institutions and academics was about to rear its dog-ugly head again. I started wading through the fraternal greetings and composites of their meeting’s agenda, which was predictably light on the interests of their members and the good of higher education in general, heavy in political posturing. I was beaten to it by Archbishop Cranmer took a shortcut via the Socialist Worker to find the typical moronic bilge.

Congress believes that in these circumstances passivity or neutrality is unacceptable and criticism of Israel cannot be construed as anti-semitic.

Congress instructs the NEC to

• circulate the full text of the Palestinian boycott call to all branches/LAs for information and discussion;


• encourage members to consider the moral implications of existing and proposed links with Israeli academic institutions;


• organise a UK-wide campus tour for Palestinian academic/educational trade unionists;


• issue guidance to members on appropriate forms of action.

I was ready to vent my own spleen on the mind numbing stupidity of such measures, however three things quelled my indignation :

• The motion (which passed) only invited institutions to consider the request by allied Palestinian unions to have an anti-Israeli boycott, and made only vague reference to future kindergarten behaviour


• It became clear that the union leadership were opposed to bigoted actions like this


• In a separate vote the existing boycott of two Israeli higher education bodies, inherited from the NATFHE days was lifted

So I’ll have to be fair minded and say credit where credit is due. I doubt the passing of the motion for institutions to consider a boycott will have much effect; once they are back at their day jobs I suspect the activists will find their influence diluted by enough colleagues with enough common sense not to indulge in such counterproductive posturing. Even if the somewhat more moderate line of the leadership did not prevail on the motion which did pass, the lifting of the existing boycott is a blow for common sense.

The extremists of course were not happy with the latter outcome. One particular LSE victim quoted by the BBC typified the self-deluding bullshit that we come to expect:

"The struggle goes on. This is the end of the beginning.

"We are not surprised. We saw people who did not come to earlier meetings there and we knew what the outcome would be.

"We won the moral argument. They just won the vote."

Sue Blackwell, Birmingham University

Well as we say in Yorkshire ‘You can have t’ moral cup then luv’, common sense won the real one.

Why do I even care? I’m in the ‘plague on both your houses’ camp when it comes to Middle Eastern affairs. I do find much anti-Israeli sentiment from the left to be based not on moral judgement but a tenuous link between ‘Israel’ and ‘right wing’ or on dated prejudices, but that’s not what worries me most.

I’ve got no answers that I can put forward with confidence about the future for secondary education in this country. I do know though that despite some known problems, from worthless degree subjects to the seemingly ever more limited abilities of the domestic intake, much of the upper end of our higher education system is still world-class. The number of overseas students who vote with their feet, and their money is testament to this. This success has in no small part been built on resisting political interference; the last thing that is needed is political corrosion from within starting the rot.

Boycotts like this also strike at the heart of what, beyond the study advanced subject matter of whatever nature, is probably the most important opportunity afforded by the few years many of us spend in the world of academia. I mean of course beer and sex the fact the in the course of your study you are made not only to learn, but to debate, to justify and where necessary to defend and rebut. You learn to do this without the use of props such as mindless slogans, shouting and certainly without violence; perhaps a little irritation, but no hatred.

In my second year at University I ended up in a lab group with half a dozen others for a term. One was an Israeli, a proud one, who had come to Cambridge only once he had done what he saw to be his duty in national service; he’d not actually been involved in any controversial actions but was quite open that he would have done, within reason, whatever he was told to do by his commanding officer. Another was a Moslem woman, clearly very observant to the tenets of her faith. I never asked her about exactly where she came from but minor details of dress (and according to more linguistically talented people than I, language) suggested Palestinian roots.

The two had not the slightest problem working together. They would also have tea together while the rest of us swilled lager after the lab session. They would talk, even argue, often heatedly, but they would also laugh together. While some of these arguments were about faraway political problems, more of them were about the same sort of rubbish that got the rest of us hot under the collar. I saw many other positive examples at University, more later on in business, and still more when I worked in America for a while. In each case a loyalty to a different ideal took precedence over tribal identities and constructive, even friendly, dialogue took place.

It still doesn’t happen enough, and to try and close down one type of forum where it does take place for reasons of petty ideological posturing is beneath contempt. My suggestion to any student of today who finds that a given lecturer supports this type of action is to consider whether, without prejudice to your education, it is possible to boycott their particular courses.

As a rule I found, with only one exception that dates back to primary school, that the ones that are good at this type of outmoded politics won’t be very good at their day job anyway. ‘Those who can do, those who can’t teach’ is a load of crap (thunderbolt from ex-parent teachers averted); it always seemed to me though that within the profession that ‘Those who can teach, those that can’t become the union rep’ seems a fair enough adage.