Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Knowing that every vote makes a difference, makes a difference

I've previously noted the unfairness of the UK electoral voting system in Scotland, which gives Labour an unearned majority there:

(Data: BBC)

But the system in the Scottish Parliament works far better. Each person gets two votes, one local and one party-list-based regional. In aggregate, here is what happened in 2011:

Data: Wikipedia

... bang on for Labour, slightly generous for the SNP. Not a bad hybrid, either: voting first for a local candidate, and then for a party, rather than combining the two and effectively voting for a Prime Minister (with all the personality-cult garbage that brings in its wake).

Even more interesting is the difference between how the two votes were cast:
 
Data: Wikipedia

In the regional contest, when it was no longer simply First Past The Post, and the vote was more likely to be taken into account even if one chose a minority candidate, the voting share for small parties leapt from 1% to 12%. Knowing that every vote makes a difference, makes a difference.

Electoral Calculus predicts that in next year's UK General Election, even under FPTP, UKIP may get over 14% of votes cast - and NO seats - so goodness knows what the voter behaviour would be under some form of proportional representation. Perhaps this month's European Parliament elections will give us a clue, and the differences between those results and GE 2015 could be worked up into some yardstick of democratic deficit.

Not, of course, that the EU Parliament decides anything, as Pat Condell points out in this splendid rant (htp: James Higham):



- which leads me to wonder why on Earth Alex Salmond would wish Scotland, if and when divorced from the rest of the UK, to remain in the European Union (or rather, join, legally speaking, not that the EU has much respect for law if it gets in the way of power).

I've already suggested that Scotland might do better to join forces with Norway and Iceland, maybe even Denmark (which, you'll recall, was expected to vote against the Lisbon Treaty and so the government cancelled the referendum and went ahead anyway). With North Sea fishing and oil, and firm Icelandic-style treatment of banksters, plus the energy and technical creativity of its people, a Kalmar-Union-plus might just work. Rather that than tie your jollyboat to a sinking megavessel like the EU.

One more question: should Scotland get independence, will the Scot Nats have outlived their usefulness? And has the shrewd Salmond already planned for that? Salmond the EU Commissioner? Salmond for EU President?


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Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Eudora Welty

Eudora Welty at home in Jackson, Mississippi (pic source)

From "Why I Live At The P.O.":

It wasn't five minutes before Uncle Rondo suddenly appeared in the hall in one of Stella-Rondo's flesh-colored kimonos, all cut on the bias, like something Mr. Whitaker probably thought was gorgeous.

"Uncle Rondo!" I says. "I didn't know who that was! Where are you going?"

"Sister," he says, "get out of my way, I'm poisoned."

"If you're poisoned stay away from Papa-Daddy," I says. "Keep out of the hammock. Papa-Daddy will certainly beat you on the head if you come within forty miles of him. He thinks I deliberately said he ought to cut off his beard after he got me the P.O., and I've told him and told him and told him, and he acts like he just don't hear me. Papa-Daddy must of gone stone deaf.'

"He picked a fine day to do it then," says Uncle Rondo, and before you could say "Jack Robinson" flew out in the yard.

What he'd really done, he'd drunk another bottle of that prescription. He does it every single Fourth of July as sure as shooting, and it's horribly expensive.

_________________________

- Part of Eudora Welty's collection "A Curtain Of Green" (1941)
 
What brings this to mind is Brain Pickings' republication of her unsolicited (and unsuccessful) letter of application to New Yorker magazine at the age of 23:


March 15, 1933

Gentlemen,

I suppose you’d be more interested in even a sleight-o’-hand trick than you’d be in an application for a position with your magazine, but as usual you can’t have the thing you want most.

I am 23 years old, six weeks on the loose in N.Y. However, I was a New Yorker for a whole year in 1930–31 while attending advertising classes in Columbia’s School of Business. Actually I am a southerner, from Mississippi, the nation’s most backward state. Ramifications include Walter H. Page, who, unluckily for me, is no longer connected with Doubleday-Page, which is no longer Doubleday-Page, even. I have a B.A.(’29) from the University of Wisconsin, where I majored in English without a care in the world. For the last eighteen months I was languishing in my own office in a radio station in Jackson, Miss., writing continuities, dramas, mule feed advertisements, santa claus talks, and life insurance playlets; now I have given that up.

As to what I might do for you — I have seen an untoward amount of picture galleries and 15¢ movies lately, and could review them with my old prosperous detachment, I think; in fact, I recently coined a general word for Matisse’s pictures after seeing his latest at the Marie Harriman: concubineapple. That shows you how my mind works — quick, and away from the point. I read simply voraciously, and can drum up an opinion afterwards.

Since I have bought an India print, and a large number of phonograph records from a Mr. Nussbaum who picks them up, and a Cezanne Bathers one inch long (that shows you I read e. e. cummings I hope), I am anxious to have an apartment, not to mention a small portable phonograph. How I would like to work for you! A little paragraph each morning — a little paragraph each night, if you can’t hire me from daylight to dark, although I would work like a slave. I can also draw like Mr. Thurber, in case he goes off the deep end. I have studied flower painting.

There is no telling where I may apply, if you turn me down; I realize this will not phase you, but consider my other alternative: the U of N.C. offers for $12.00 to let me dance in Vachel Lindsay’s Congo. I congo on. I rest my case, repeating that I am a hard worker.

Truly yours,

Eudora Welty
_______________________

Truly she was "a good gift".


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Monday, May 12, 2014

Who owns your money?

From The Guardian

"No man in the country is under the smallest obligation, moral or other, so to arrange his legal relations to his business or property as to enable the Inland Revenue to put the largest possible shovel in his stores. The Inland Revenue is not slow, and quite rightly, to take every advantage which is open to it under the Taxing Statutes for the purposes of depleting the taxpayer's pocket. And the taxpayer is in like manner entitled to be astute to prevent, so far as he honestly can, the depletion of his means by the Inland Revenue."

- Lord Clyde (Ayrshire Pullman Motor Services v Inland Revenue, 1929)

This is not tax evasion, but tax avoidance, and Barlow has earned his corn honestly and, as far as I know, without cheating or hurting anyone. It's not his fault that, like Henry VIII, our governments in recent years have been completely useless at managing their finances.

What Lord Clyde would have thought of the Inland Revenue getting clearance to shovel money directly out of your bank account on the merest (even pretended) suspicion that you might owe them something, I can't say.

But as Martin Armstrong observes, that fires the starting-pistol for the race to get your money away from any jurisdiction that thinks it can make free with your property. Governments should not give themselves carefully-fuzzy powers to do what they will: "carte blanche" was the instrument of Dumas' wicked Cardinal Richelieu.

Nor is this the revolutionary French National Assembly, where the mob brings down whomever it wants on a whim. Whipping up public indignation is a very dangerous and two-edged sword.

And remember that the American Revolution was about "no taxation without representation" - the tea dumped into Boston Harbour was a Trojan horse attempt to get the colonists to concede the principle by purchasing a product that had been taxed at source.

You could argue - and I do - that our current electoral system is so dysfunctional as to be just such a form of non-representation.*

These appear to be desperate times.
____________________

*No, that doesn't mean don't pay your taxes. But the sense of disenfranchisement feeds potentially dangerous resentment. Power carelessly exercised creates its own opposition.

The system's increasingly urgent search for extra money to keep going, the increasing difficulty ordinary people find in making a living and saving money, plus the erosion of civil liberties and general over-bossiness, are making some people stressed and reactionary. The EU debate (for example) involves such issues. Norman Cohn's "The Pursuit of the Millennium" shows that when societies are under great stress, they are vulnerable to manias. I think we see some of this on the Net.


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Safe seats, inequity, democratic crisis

http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

Data from the 2010 General Election - not a good one for Labour - shows that the 50 safest Parliamentary seats in the UK (% of winner over second highest candidate) are all Labour.

Of these 50, the runner-up in 27 constituencies was not Conservative or Liberal, but UKIP.

UKIP are predicted to get 14.44% of votes cast in 2015, compared with 9.1% for the Liberals; and 0 seats, compared with the Liberals' predicted 19.

Tony Benn warned that when turnout dropped below 50%, we would be in trouble. In 2010, four constituencies did this, and a fifth just managed to reach 50%.

We are overdue another Reform Act.

Data from Electoral Calculus: http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html


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Sunday, May 11, 2014

Wheat Belly

A few years ago, we walked the Cumbria Way with a group of friends. We covered eighty five miles over six days and on returning home I found I'd gained six pounds in weight. How do you walk eighty five miles and gain six pounds? Well maybe one way is to begin each day with a breakfast like this. This was Keswick as I recall.




The extra pounds soon disappeared once we'd returned home because although I like my food, I dislike overeating, the bloated feeling that comes afterwards.

I was reminded of this by a No Tricks Zone post The Greatest Nutritional And Pharmaceutical Swindle Of All Time…High Grain, Low Fat Diets Are Killing Us By The Millions.

There are two videos in the post, the first being an interview with Dr William Davis, author of the book Wheat Belly. From the Amazon book description:-

Every day, over 200 million Americans consume food products made of wheat. As a result, over 100 million of them experience some form of adverse health effect, ranging from minor rashes and high blood sugar to the unattractive stomach bulges that preventive cardiologist William Davis calls "wheat bellies." According to Davis, that excess fat has nothing to do with gluttony, sloth, or too much butter: It's due to the whole grain wraps we eat for lunch. After witnessing over 2,000 patients regain their health after giving up wheat, Davis reached the disturbing conclusion that wheat is the single largest contributor to the nationwide obesity epidemic - and its elimination is key to dramatic weight loss and optimal health. 


There isn't a huge amount of wheat in that Keswick breakfast, but I followed it by toast and marmalade, so lots of wheat and sugar. Is wheat so damaging, or is it all those cheap calories it delivers?

After all, if we move to any reasonably balanced diet which calorie for calorie is more expensive, wouldn't we tend to reduce our calorie intake? Would that generate similar health benefits?

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Will Straw's Saga (2)

Source: Huffington Post

Making friends with the elves

"The people of Heathdaele[1] are fickle[2]," said Jóhann. “Their speaker Jakob[3] is of the Íhaldsflokknum[4], but those who study such things think he will be ousted at next year’s Althing[5]. Our Party, Verkamannaflokksins[6], is expected to lead by 40 farms[7] and become the new government at Kirkjan Vestur[8]. If you succeed in seizing Heathdaele, you will be seen as helping in the victory and your ship will be launched on a favourable tide.”
“How can I achieve this?” asked Vilhelm, whose father’s analysis had made him more eager than ever.

“The people of this country have no understanding,” replied the other. “If they had, they would have hanged most of the inhabitants of Kirkjan Vestur long ago. But they have no brains. Appeal to their hearts; in other words, befriend them. Say you like the things they like, especially their elves."
"I know nothing of elves," replied Vilhelm, "but I am willing to learn. Should I go to Elf School?[9] "

“I am saddened that your memory is so poor!” retorted his father. “I have just told you that you do not govern by knowing things, but by knowing your fellows. There are thirteen kinds of Huldufólk[10] and only a fool would waste his time studying them. “
“Is that because they do not exist?” asked Vilhelm, chastened by his father’s reproof.

“They certainly do exist[11],” said Jóhann, “but they do not vote.”
 “Then why are they important?” asked his son.

“The Spring is a season of celebration,” came the reply. “Your neighbours dress like dark elves, dance and drink ale. You will gain their affection if you share their company, however briefly. But you must do this in a careful way. Some will try to pretend that the dancers’ appearance is a mockery and shows that your neighbours have bad feelings about elves. You will prevent criticism by saying immediately that it is a tradition and those who do not like the dancers do not like the common people.”
Vilhelm followed this suggestion, and all went well. But that was not the end of the matter. The local speaker Jakob tried to take the wind from his rival’s sail by naming a Heathdaele ale as his choice for the tavern in Kirkjan Vestur. The ale came with a picture of the dancers as dark elves.

“You watch,” said Jóhann to his son, “this will not turn out as he hopes. In the first place, he is making his gesture away from the people he wishes to impress. Secondly, there are many more malicious tongues in that town than here, and they are far sharper. He has forgotten to dull their edges as you did.”
So it turned out. The gossips made it seem as though the dancers were elf-haters, and so the picture had to be changed[12]. When the farmers at Heathdaele heard, they were doubly offended, both for the implied slander and for their speaker’s failure to defend their good nature, on which they prided themselves. Their response was to drink so much of the ale at the festival that it won the prize.[13]

"From the Burnley and Pendle Citizen)

“By this time next year, all the details will have been forgotten,” said Jóhann to Vilhelm. “The people have even worse memory than you. But the heart remembers what is essential.”
“All this, over elves and ale?” asked Vilhelm.

“This is chess played with feelings,” replied his father. “Every move counts.”
(Wikipedia)


[1] Rossendale (and Darwen)
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rossendale_and_Darwen_(UK_Parliament_constituency)
[3] http://www.debretts.com/people-of-today/profile/26895/James-Jacob-Gilchrist-(Jake)-BERRY
[4] Conservative Party
[5] See swing prediction here: http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/gainloss.html
[6] Labour Party
[7] http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html
[8] West Minster
[9] Álfaskólinn - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_Elf_School
[10] “Secret People” - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hulduf%C3%B3lk
[11] http://www.elfmuseum.com/?q=contemporarytales
[12] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2619267/Race-fear-Commons-Parliamentary-PC-brigade-refuses-let-bar-sell-ale-featuring-black-faced-Morris-dancers-cause-offence.html
[13] http://www.burnleycitizen.co.uk/news/11199803.Britannia_Coconutters_have_last_laugh_as_controversial_ale_a_hit_at_beer_festival/


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Saturday, May 10, 2014

Respect for learning, and Druids

(pic source)

I have long felt that Celts have greater respect for learning than Anglo-Saxons. It seems to me that the descendants of the latter would far rather have their children become worldly successes (such as professional sportsmen) than university professors.

Whereas according to Peter Berresford Ellis, the Druids, whose knowledge was never written down in pre-Christian times and who took twenty years of study to qualify, had enormously high status. For example, in the ancient Irish text Leabhar na hUidre the king of Ulster stands up to speak to his assembly, but is forced to stand in needle-drop silence, unable to utter a word, until his druid Cathbad asks him, "What is the matter, O King?"

It is said that the druid Merlin caused Stonehenge to be built; he also starts the great Arthurian cycle by casting a spell on Uther Pendragon to make him resemble the just-slain Duke of Cornwall, so gaining entrance to the bedroom of his enemy's wife Igraine and begetting the future King Arthur.

Is learning worthwhile, even though it may not make us rich or rulers?


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Electric aircraft: you couldn't make it up

The spoof (from last month's BOM)
 
The reality: EADS E-Fan (source)
Turns out it wasn't a joke, after all. There really is a potentially commercial electric plane being developed - and it's not the first to fly. Though short-flight, it recharges quickly (about an hour) and fuel costs are allegedly one-third that of conventional flying.

I'm not sure how that cost claim stands up in the accounting - the electricity is generated elsewhere and ultimately implies a vast web of economic activity, so it would be an interesting challenge to compare the work achieved/costs of conventional and electric air transport in purely energy terms, say along EREOI lines.

But there could also be an exercise on relative disbenefits - noise and air pollution (including the high-altitude water vapour that I think has some effect on weather and climate) - and the economic costs of same. (Electric might spike the guns of the chemtrail conspiracy people.)

Here's the video of this new creation:



Cheaper than windmill-powered?


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Friday, May 09, 2014

The bleak delights of Blogworld

It would seem that human beings are not able to describe, nor perhaps to imagine, happiness except in terms of contrast.
George Orwell - Why Socialists Don't Believe In Fun

There are numerous reasons to blog, but I’m sure one of them is the pleasure to be found in contrast. We all know all about it, but allow me to set the basic scene via a familiar experience.

One of the pleasures of walking through a peaceful snowy landscape, quite apart from the exhilarating beauty, is returning home to put the boots away, hang up the coats to dry and light the fire. The kettle comes into it too.

It’s partly the contrast between snowy cold and snug warmth. Both pleasurable in themselves, but back home the pleasure is enhanced no end simply by coming in out of the snow. Especially as night closes in. 

Both experiences need not be pleasurable of course. Walking home from the dentist for example. Rarely is there so much quiet enjoyment from walking home.

Yet maybe we with our soft lives are not able to savour sweet contrasts as in earlier times. As Orwell says in the essay quoted above, Dickens knew how even poor people could glean a great deal of enjoyment from the warmth of fleeting pleasures. Not merely the appeal of a crust of bread to someone who is starving, but further up the scale of destitution too.

The inability of mankind to imagine happiness except in the form of relief, either from effort or pain, presents Socialists with a serious problem. Dickens can describe a poverty-stricken family tucking into a roast goose, and can make them appear happy; on the other hand, the inhabitants of perfect universes seem to have no spontaneous gaiety and are usually somewhat repulsive into the bargain.
George Orwell - Why Socialists Don't Believe In Fun

I suspect most of us live comfortable lives with no personal experience of Dickensian contrasts, but maybe blogging sometimes provides us with an alternative. 

We roam an angst-ridden landscape as a counterpoint to those comfortable lives. A mental cold shower where the comforts of real life are all the more pleasing when we leave the delightfully bleak scenery of Blogworld.

So I think I’ll finish off with coffee and dark chocolate.

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Thursday, May 08, 2014

Negative leader

(pic source)

Leaders are not necessarily good for the group, or even clever.

I once taught a class where I felt a boy had followers, but his negative attitude to learning was dragging them down with him. A colleague told me about sociograms:

"Hand out a slip of paper to each child, marked so that you can identify them. They have to write the answer to two questions: if you could sit next to anyone in the class you wanted to, who would it be? And if you could vote for a form captain (boys for a boy, girls for a girl) who would it be? Then draw the diagram."

Sure enough, there was a cluster of boys who had given both their votes to the same lad.

I then wrote in the academic grades for each child. The ones closest to this individual had the lowest grades.

On this basis, we moved the negative leader, not down to a lower set, where he could have the same effect or worse, but up to a higher set, where the other children were success-oriented and he had the choice of shaping up or curdling in unsplendid isolation.

Somehow this experience resonates.

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Wednesday, May 07, 2014

Down the road a peacock struts

From Wikipedia

This is not easy to get across if you haven’t experienced something similar, but the other day I stumbled across Andrew Marr interviewing a politician on TV. I think it was one of the Eds or possibly George, Nick or even Dave.

So what?

Well here’s the difficult descriptive bit. For a brief moment it felt really weird to see a professional liar being interviewed on TV.

Weird? Yes I know - how could it possibly feel weird?

Yet it did – momentarily. For about a second or two – no more. One of those things you have to catch and store away because the clamour of daily life soon dilutes them to nothing.

So the weirdness was a brief strangeness - like seeing a peacock majestically strutting down the middle of the road. We once saw exactly that outside our house and for a second or two we had to make that basic adjustment we all make to the unexpected - is that thing really a peacock? It was.

The Andrew Marr thing was much like our double-take on first seeing that peacock. An appropriate image too - peacock strutting.

A startling flicker of evil on the very edge of perception. An insight yet not an insight, because we know these evils but don’t really feel them as evil. Too familiar. Perception has its wicked way with us, drops the veil too soon. Moulds reality, kneads it back into shape, back into what we expect.

We adapt so well and with such phenomenal speed don’t we? No surprises. So we even tolerate professional liars – see them as part of the furniture. Unremarkable. Normal. Not evil - not at all.

Nothing to see here – move along now.

But usually we don’t even get that far – we don’t so much tolerate professional liars as accept them into the backdrop of our lives. Folk still watch TV in their millions, so they must listen to what is said, to the lies, without feeling the weirdness. Without switching off in disgust.

We are too good at this, adjusting to what ought not to be. Missing what could be. Instead we grind out the social and political analysis, treat professional lies as some kind of argument requiring rebuttal. Even though we know what the liars are, what their lies are, why they lie.

It’s weird. But only rarely.

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Monday, May 05, 2014

Will Straw's Saga (1)

(pic source)
The Farm at Heathdale

There was a man called Vilhelm Johannsson who worked near Kirkjan Vestur[1].  He was skilled in rune-writing, but he had tired of this employment and wanted a farm of his own.  So in the Spring he went to his father, who had a homestead at Svartáin[2].
On his way, he rode across a heath and a valley[3], past a river where oak trees grow[4]. “This would be a good place to settle,” he said to himself.

When he came to Svartáin he greeted his father, and after dinner and the usual formalities he explained his plan. “It is not such an easy thing as you think,” said his father. “I can use my influence to get you the land, but you must learn how to work it.”

“Work is for slaves,” said the other. “I can write and speak well. When my neighbours need a man to go to the Althing, I can represent them.”

“You are young,” replied Jóhann, “though your ambition does you credit.”


“I am thirty-three,” replied Vilhelm. “You were thirty-two when you first spoke at Kirkjan Vestur. “

“That is true,” said his father. “But even before then I had represented many young men, and helped several important people with their counsels.”

“I should be glad of your counsel,” said the son. “That is why I have come, and if I am at Heathdaele it will be easy for me to consult you frequently.”

Pleased with his son’s sagacity, Jóhann agreed warmly and so they began to make their plans.





[1] West Church/Minster
[2] Black River, or Black Burn
[3] heiðina og dalinn: Heathdaele (Celtic “Ros”: “moor, heath”, hence "Rossendale")
[4] ánni þar eik tré vaxa: Oak River (Celtic: “Darwen”)

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Healthy diets are bad for you?

WRONG! (apparently...)
(pic source)

Computer expert and financial maven Karl Denninger lost a lot of weight a couple of years ago. He's keen to spread the news that carbohydrates are the enemy.

Repeating his message today, Denninger references a WSJ article by investigative journalist Nina Teicholz, trailing her dietary-fat book that is due out next week. The article reveals that the research recommending the so-called "Mediterranean diet" was deeply flawed:

"Dr. Keys visited Crete during an unrepresentative period of extreme hardship after World War II. Furthermore, he made the mistake of measuring the islanders' diet partly during Lent, when they were forgoing meat and cheese. Dr. Keys therefore undercounted their consumption of saturated fat. Also, due to problems with the surveys, he ended up relying on data from just a few dozen men—far from the representative sample of 655 that he had initially selected."

It now seems that official dietary advice has been not only wrong, but lethally so:

"Excessive carbohydrates lead not only to obesity but also, over time, to Type 2 diabetes and, very likely, heart disease. The real surprise is that, according to the best science to date, people put themselves at higher risk for these conditions no matter what kind of carbohydrates they eat. Yes, even unrefined carbs. Too much whole-grain oatmeal for breakfast and whole-grain pasta for dinner, with fruit snacks in between, add up to a less healthy diet than one of eggs and bacon, followed by fish. The reality is that fat doesn't make you fat or diabetic. Scientific investigations going back to the 1950s suggest that actually, carbs do."

One dramatic claim is that in the light of this new knowledge, Type 2 diabetes can be reversed. Newcastle University Professor Roy Taylor recommends weight loss through a calorie-reduced diet. However, diabetes blogger Janet Ruhl's take on this is that cutting calories implies cutting carbohydrates; it's not the weight that's the problem, but the insulin-level-jangling carbs.


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Sunday, May 04, 2014

Making sense of Russell Brand's revolution

Last year, Russell Brand wrote an article for the New Statesman calling for his kind of revolution. As he told the Parliamentary Select Committee on drugs and addiction, he is verbose, so I have attempted to précis, paraphrase (and  re-order logically) his 4,759 words down to 372. I think I have been fair; I have certainly tried to be.

My summary is below; please click this link for the full essay:

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/10/russell-brand-on-revolution
___________________________________________________

I am bored by politics, disillusioned with politicians, and have never voted. Most Members of Parliament are contemptible. They are all the same, irrespective of party affiliation. It is better to reject the political system altogether than to validate it by voting.
Most people do not care about representative politics. Their apathy is a consequence of the system’s irrelevance to their needs, yet it suits our rulers.

Big business has corrupted our political agencies. Businesses and banks exploit and overcharge us. Meanwhile, the benefits previously won for ordinary people by socialism are being removed. Young people cannot amass wealth. The rich exploit them as consumers and punish them for protesting, but escape justice for their own economically harmful greed.
A modicum of material comfort is essential. However, more does not greatly increase happiness and threatens to destroy the world. Our overconsumption and waste cause want and squalor elsewhere.

Old religions, nationalism and other social constructs are not equipped to deal with the current ecological crisis, which threatens our survival. Nor are politicians, with their outdated thinking abetted by professional media advisers.
Conservatism is born of the natural instincts of desire (fostered by materialistic culture) and fear (spread by the media), both cultivated and managed by government, which seeks to set us against each other. We should not, as they wish, resent immigration (which is implied by the free movement of international capital), nor condemn rioters. However, atheistic Marxism is also a form of social atomisation, and divides us into opposing groups.

We need a complete revolution of consciousness and of the social, political and economic system. The solution is primarily spiritual, that is, we should care for each other and the environment. The new spirituality is ecological and inclusive.
Peaceful demonstrations are ineffective. Riots are a direct form of political action - and fun (socialists are too serious). We should revolt against the cause of our problems, which is those who now hold power.

We should revolt in any way we wish, whether as rioters, religious fundamentalists or simply mischief-makers, provided we include all and neither judge nor harm anyone.
History is accelerating; the brief opportunity for the Spiritual Revolution must be seized now. This will engage the young and refresh socialism.


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Saturday, May 03, 2014

Black cloth on the towbar

We're told today that round Wolverhampton, you may occasionally see a little piece of black cloth tied to the towbar of a car.

This means, "You rear-end me, I claim whiplash, we split the compensation."

A 2010 BBC news item says that this kind of fraud adds some £44 to the annual cost of a motor insurance policy.

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Friday, May 02, 2014

A child's chair



This is a Victorian child's chair in our guest bedroom. It's for clothes and suchlike, not for sitting. 

Antiques usually have something to say about their times and in the case of this chair I think it's particularly obvious. I'm not thinking of the Aesthetic Movement style here, but rather the basic design.

Firstly there are no stretchers for little George or Georgina to climb on and off the chair themselves. The chair does not encourage that degree of independence.

Secondly there are neither arm rests nor footrest. George or Georgina have to sit up straight with their legs dangling into space or they will fall off. No wriggling around, no stretching across the table for an extra slice of cake.

Ah - those soft-hearted Victorians.

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Thursday, May 01, 2014

The camshaft bribe

From Wikipedia
Computer animation of a camshaft operating valves

A well-worn issue this, but still worth asking in the interests of clarity.

Decades ago, someone I knew had a camshaft problem on his car a few days before he was due to get married. Specialist work was required and there was a backlog, but the car was essential for the honeymoon. What to do?

Well he simply went round to the workshop and offered twenty pounds to the guy in charge, which was a reasonable bribe in those days.

“You’re next,” was the response and all went well.

So if an NHS patient sees an NHS consultant and opts for private treatment by that same consultant, is that pretty much the same type of queue-jumping bribe? Legally it isn’t bribery and probably the camshaft issue wasn't either, but should we see both examples as bribery to the extent of calling them bribery?

Or are they merely examples of markets doing their stuff and paying for a better service is perfectly okay? 

To my mind, many forms of legal bribery are endemic in the UK, but so is evasive language. The NHS illustration is entirely legal of course, but in effect NHS consultants accept queue-jumping bribes. Why not say so?

It's good to be explicit isn't it? 

But would I use money to jump the queue if a loved happened to be faced with a long wait for an essential operation to resolve a painful or debilitating condition?

Yes. 

Does that make me corrupt? Maybe, or maybe it is only a rational response to an imperfect world. Yet I would not shy away from the word bribe if it came up. 

So does explicit language leave us with a better situation or a worse? 

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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.