In Scotland, Hatred Never Dies

The best book about Ireland that I have ever read is VS Naipaul's 'Among The Believers'.

Some people might find that sentence surprising, perhaps not least Sir Vidia. However, his analysis of Pakistani nationalism's mindset circa 1980-81 almost directly matches my experience of the Irish nationalist mindset. In particular, his description of how Pakistani nationals of that era regarded emigration as wholly acceptable as they already had a country of their own to be eerily redolent of thinking that I have encountered in some Irish quarters.

This makes all the more questionable the claims of some Scottish civic nationalists - see Angus Calder's 'Scotlands Of The Mind', for example - that everyone who comes to Scotland should be considered to be a Scot, if only because it impertinently removes the freedom to choose which nation they consider themselves as belonging to from the objects of their affection. We can and should consider them to be neighbours; the obligation to show charity demands no less. However, whether they should be considered Scots is really their choice to make. The civic nationalists of the soi-disant, ersatz 'Scottish Government' might know fewer new Scots, and be more unfamiliar with how they think, than they are letting on.

And it goes without saying that any independent Scotland crafted by Scottish civic nationalists will also produce emigrants who feel the same way about Scotland as some Irish emigrants feel about Ireland and Sir Vidia Naipaul reported some Pakistani emigrants as feeling about Pakistan. But they'll be Scots, so it'll be all right.

However, those of us who really have no choice but to belong here must labour under the constraints imposed by the culture of the sometime Best Small Country In The World. Ruth Davidson, a kickboxing lesbian who is currently running for the leadership of the Scottish Conservatives, has parted company with one Ross McFarlane after he got a little carried away with the sectarianism.

If one were in an uncharitable frame of mind, one might be tempted to believe that the very unpleasant nature of his comments reveal Mr. McFarlane to be, in an untranslatable Glaswegian vernacular, a baw-faced balloon. As far as a political career in Scotland goes, he's toast. His name is now filed in too many memories to make any kind of comeback viable; not soon, not ever.

However, it's the disappointingly casual nature of his contempt for others' beliefs that gets to you. In Scotland, this sort of thing never stops getting to you. I've worked in places where being a Catholic, particularly one with some education, has given me the sort of status I imagine that an educated Greek slave might have had on a Roman latifundium; a useful guy to have around when brainwork needs doing but otherwise firmly out of the loop. In this respect, Scotland will never change. In this country, there will always be ignorant wallies out there who feel offended by you just because you're here.

Yes, we're a great wee country.

March Them To The Cashline

Listening to an alleged tax avoider claiming that the motorway speed limit should be raised from 70 mph to 80 mph in order to bring people inside the law almost had me kicking the TV in fury.

This proposal is absolutely Thatcherite, red meat for Del Boys and rich ferals who regard compliance with the law not as a civic duty but as a lifestyle choice. Lives will be lost so that 'business' can be done even more quickly in the country with the most worker-unfriendly employment laws and longest working hours in the European Union (and the visceral hatred of the Conservative Party for people who work for a living is proved by its stated intention to revisit one of the Blair government's very few progressive measures, the reduction in the qualifying period for bringing a claim of unfair dismissal from two years to one; for people who claim their ideology requires the removal of restrictions on business, they show not the slightest hesitation in regulating those who have only their labour to sell).

A suitable response to such specious claims about speed limits would be to demand stricter enforcement of existing laws and tougher penaties on speeders, such as the confiscation of vehicles driven in excess of the speed limit on the motorway network and mandatory life bans for those found guilty of a third offence. To bring people into the law when the law in unclear is one thing, but to bring people who won't obey the law into the law, even when the law is flashed in front of their eyes in orange lights as the speed limit is on British motorways, is quite another. At that point, such people have won whatever game they think they're playing, because the law will always be changed to suit them and the rule of law has ceased to have any meaning.

However, it was doubly sickening to hear another alleged tax avoider mouthfart today from the Conservative Party Conference about the financial mess the country's in. Their brain may have been addled by the small talk of cravatted manacle salesmen and wannabe sanctions-busters, but the irony that the country's finances may be as bad as they apparently are - a myth I do not buy into - on account of our authorities' ludicrously lax approach to the payment of personal tax by the wealthy might have been lost on them.

No person who's used as a tax avoidance vehicle, either personal or corporate, should be permitted to even become a Member of Parliament for a period of five years after their use of such vehicles has ceased. Any Member of Parliament found to have used such a vehicle should be barred from the House until they have paid all sums that would have been or may be owing at the correct rate of tax, in other words of personal income tax, on sums which they have either paid themself or been paid as rather smelly dividends. As they are both income, salary and dividends should be taxed at the same rate and under the same rules. If this means marching ministers to the cashline to pay up so that they can continue in government, so be it. Similarly, no minister found to have ever used a tax avoidance vehicle should be able to claim their full pension, instead being able to receive one calculated to reflect their calculated failure to contribute; and let's face it, they probably don't need the money anyway.

Fish rots from the head down, says that rotting old Russian proverb; and I for one am damn tired of knocking my pan in at the bottom of the heap while the guys who make the rules also seem to be able to slide around them with no or few questions asked.

The Predatory Pricing Of Nicotine Replacement Therapies

The braying donkeys of the British mainstream right, which is in fact a far right for all practical purposes, often bray at their opponents that if they are opposed to the business practices of supermarkets then they should not shop in them.

This begs the answer that the world the braying donkeys have helped create is one where there are few shops other than supermarkets, and that even their opponents have the right to eat.

Yesterday's storm in a whisky glass over a supermarket chain's apparent determination to flout the spirit of the law if not its letter, yet another example of a crappily drafted law having oozed out of the Queen's Scottish outhouse for no apparent purpose other than to cause confusion amongst those delegated with its enforcement and contempt amongst those upon whom it is supposed to be enforced, is not the worst example of antisocial business practice by supermarkets I have come across. The worst is one I have recently encountered myself.

I stopped smoking on 9th April this year but continue to use nicotine replacement therapy, specificially Nicorette 4 mg Freshmint gum, sold in packets of 105. These are not prescription medicines. I have purchased them at the branch of Boots on Crow Road, Glasgow at a price of £15.00 per box, if memory serves. I have also purchased them from my local supermarket, at an initial price of £10.00, again if memory serves.

However, the supermarket later cut the price for a packet of 105 Nicorette 4 mg Freshmint gums to £5.00. At the same time, it was retailing a packet of Nicorette 2 mg Freshmint gum, if I recall correctly also a packet of 105, for £8.00; more money for less nicotine, or, if you prefer, less money for more nicotine. At that point, I resolved not to buy anymore. However, my willpower has wavered. When I went to check this afternoon, it looked like the deals were off, and they certainly didn't have any packets of 105 Nicorette 4 mg Freshmint gums on display.

A medicine remains a medicine even when it does not require a prescription. I cannot see how that supermarket chain's decision to charge £5.00 for a medicine which sells for £15.00 in a pharmacy can be anything other than predatory pricing. The predatory pricing of goods that make you well is, to my mind, even more morally reprehensible than the predatory pricing of goods that make you ill. You stop taking the latter when you get ill, but need the former to restore yourself and will suffer more when the price goes up.

The only rational explanation I can think of for this apparently irrational pricing behaviour is that the supermarket might intend its customers to become accustomed to cheap nicotine, and when that's withdrawn they will have second thoughts about not visiting the cigarette stand. If that's the case, then the time has come for the operation of supermarkets to be licenced.

On Lemon-Flavoured Napkins, And Other Things

In one of his 'Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy' books, I cannot remember which, the late Douglas Adams placed his sublime antihero Zaphod Beeblebrox on a passenger spaceship which has crashed on to a wilderness planet.

Beeblebrox is startled to find the passengers sleeping, when they all instantly wake up screaming. A robotic steward later explains to him that the ship crashed while searching for lemon-flavoured napkins. With none available, the passengers have been placed in stasis until a civilisation capable of producing lemon-flavoured napkins can arise, at which point their journey will resume. They are revived once a year for coffee and biscuits, explaining their extreme reaction to a being with two heads.
The story, tall as it is, sprang to my mind after cancelling my Internet subscription a few days ago. For reasons of the type easy to imagine in our current economic climate, but which good taste dictates are still best kept to oneself, the decision has been made to disconnnect oneself from the online community until such time as its activation can be justified again.

Although this might seem hard to believe, it isn't really going to be much of a loss. This is the first time I've been online in days. I have not broken into cold sweats, nor been observed muttering to myself on the streets of Lanarkshire, or certainly no more than usual, at least as far as the muttering's concerned. Life goes on. There was life before the Internet, and there will be life after it. Blogging is a uniquely self-renewing medium. My best man The Big Lad has recently started his own blog, and a very good one it is as well. He has my best wishes for its success. Without wishing to engage in a maudlin 'Vitai Lampada', this kind of churn in creative personnel amongst bloggers is a good thing, a very good thing, for it keeps the medium fresh.

And having had more retirements from blogging than Frank Sinatra from Caesar's Palace, it's a fair bet I'll be back at some point, God willing.

With that in mind, I thought I'd give some last random thoughts before my blogging career goes to the Great Dashboard in the Sky, where everyone can read HTML and nothing is overcoded.

While Orlando Figes may at times have been mercurial and capricious in his personal dealings, his brilliance as a Russianist cannot be doubted. 'The Whisperers' makes the case that Stalin set out to destroy private life in Russia. There never was any real need for eight or nine families to be sharing apartments, but it suited the ideological agenda; fifty people sharing one toilet, and that indoors, can have few secrets from each other.

Having read that book, one can wonder whether neoliberalism has a similar agenda for the destruction of public life. The constant assaults on workers' rights to withdraw their labour - shamefully abetted by leaders of the Labour Party who have never seen a strike, no matter how just, which they haven't deplored and whose consistently spineless failure to defend working people's use of their bargaining chip of last resort will hopefully cause historians of the future to spit their names with venom - the petty indignities inflicted upon Scout troops unable to go to the park or the seaside because they don't have insurance and so on, all seem to indicate the workings of an ideology totally opposed to people having any kind of communal lives, either in the workplace or in pursuit of a shared interest. If it's true then it's rather sad, if only because it's so pathetic.

Murdo Fraser MSP wishes to become leader of the Scottish Conservatives and then reform the party into oblivion. The application of Occam's Razor makes me wonder why he just doesn't resign from the party he's in and start his own.

I am still getting to grips with the new English translation of the Mass. The overly pre-Free State Irish, at times overly-clericalised nature of much Catholic worship in Scotland may have been why the old lady behind me, 85 years old if she was a day, was bobbing up and down with slothlike nimbleness. It would be very sad to think she was putting herself through a set of physical jerks worthy of a Nazi summer camp in order to satisfy her conscience that she has tried to do everything a priest has told her to do. For the first few weeks, a little bit of the Mass's dignity was, to my mind, stripped away as worshippers seemed to be engaged in some sort of arthritic Pilates, a geriatric Zumba class for people who don't yet understand whether they should be standing up or kneeling down for the 'Agnus Dei'. Seeing the apparent discomfort of some of the old, and not so old, people around me at this point in the worship they have chosen to join, I have to confess that an uncharitable recollection concerning public comments made by the Scottish Catholic Church's spokesman regarding the Hokey Cokey has flashed through my head more than once. However, the element of unexpected physicality introduced by the new translation seems to be settling down now. Maybe the hip replacements are finally screaming for mercy. I'm also puzzled by some of the wording. In the Creed, the words 'of one being with the Father' have been replaced with 'consubstantial with the Father'. One would have thought that the words 'of one being' have precisely the same meaning as the word 'consubstantial', while also being very much easier to explain to young children. The more mean-spirited might think that 'consubstantial' is the sort of word best tossed out as refectory repartee, and while theologically exact doesn't really sit well with those, like me, who have no desire to be the most accomplished theologian in the graveyard, particularly when a very much clearer alternative is being pushed aside in its favour. These matters are not in my hands, thank Goodness, but for the first few weeks I was extremely disoriented, a sensation I never handle very well - quiet mutterings, quieter raspberries and all that - and came to understand and develop great sympathy for those souls who must have been disoriented by hearing the Mass in English for the first time. Given that the Mass is, or should be, an act of orientation towards the ultimate, I hope that the grace of the God who has guided the production of this new translation will descend upon His worshippers and lead them to appreciate its subtleties.

While I was not party to the negotiations, and have great sympathy for their loss as a family no matter whatever foibles some of them might possess or have possessed as individuals, the compensation reported as having been paid or which is becoming payable to the family of Milly Dowler by News International for the hacking of her mobile phone seems excessively high.

Earlier this evening, Channel 4 broadcast a documentary entitled 'The Wonderful World of Tony Blair'. This is a very good title for any item which is either written or broadcast about that gentleman, so good in fact that I used it as the title for an article I wrote for 'The Washington Dispatch' almost exactly nine years ago.

And that, for the time being, is that. Thank you all for your kindness in reading, and may God bless you and keep all of you in His tender care. I have made many generous friends through this blog, and wish all of you all the very best. Ave atque vale.

Does The Royal Family Use Tax Avoidance Vehicles?

This is probably a most unworthy thought for such a loyal subject as myself to have, but given that the Queen now actually pays tax one can't help but wonder whether she or any of her immediate family are the beneficiaries of any schemes the purpose of which is to legitimately minimise their tax liabilities.

I realise that in some circles that question might be regarded as being as tasteless as asking whether any of them have offshore bank accounts - Heaven forbid - but if their advisers have allowed such schemes to be set up on their behalf then that would send out a very poor message to the rest of us. Even if the person in whose name tax is collected isn't aware that they aren't paying as much as they could, what message about paying tax does that send to the rest of us?

'Downton Abbey'

The second series of Julian Fellowes's sublimely produced period toff porn is shaping up quite nicley.

The first episode, broadcast earlier this evening, was set in 1916. Some of the younger male servants are still not at the front - to the apparent chagrin of some of the more bloodthirsty female characters, it must be said - and at a concert in the Big House two young women start distributing white feathers. Enraged by this, the Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville) shouts at them 'You are the cowards here!'

Later on his gallant valet Bates (Brendan Coyle) leaves Downton at dead of night, apparently to prevent a sexual scandal from engulfing his empoyer's family.

It's edge of the seat stuff, I can tell you.

'The Rational Optimist'

In my last post, I described Matt Ridley's book 'The Rational Optimist' as being 'thoroughly squalid and meretricious'. Having now finished it, I fear I might have been pulling my punches.

With the justified garlands gained in his previous career as a scientist and populariser of science now tarnished by that irrational optimism which led him to believe that he could help run a bank, Ridley may have felt that he had something to prove to his public, with this book being the result. If that was the case then in my opinion he has failed, for to my eyes it merely reads like a frantic restatement of his really quite right-wing economic beliefs; the thoughts of a man desperately clinging on to the hope that the beliefs he holds and has held are true beliefs.

It is blighted by Ridley's belief, perhaps a predictable one given his background, that human beings evolved from apes, a proposition for which, to my knowledge, not a shred of evidence sits on the scientific record. Earlier this year, it was very interesting to see two different writers advance almost exactly the same argument for this faintly absurd suggestion; that it was so credible that it could only be true, and to think otherwise could be deemed unreasonable. One was H. G. Wells, in his 'Short History Of The World', published in 1928, while the other was Simon Schama, in his appositely titled anthology 'Scribble, Scribble, Scribble', published in 2010 (and a wonderful read it is as well, if only because the author, already much beloved on this blog, manages to skid from extremes of fanatical Obamaphilia to the most dessicated pointy-headedness when discussing art to his apparent default mode of Tiggerish harmlessness, all souffles and Charlotte Rampling, in the way other men change their socks).

Ridley might not have set out to be self-serving, but it is certainly my opinion that his perhaps legally accurate description of himself as having been 'non-executive chairman' of Northern Rock at the time it required to be rescued does seem self-serving. Were the words 'non-executive' included to try to put even a little distance between himself and what was going on inside the institution? If they were, it hasn't worked.

The thrust of the book is that human development has grown up through trade and, in Ridley's rather squalid phrase, 'ideas having sex'. Organised religions seem to be bad because, in Ridley's rather sweeping view, they need temporal empires in order to spread themselves - what Saints Paul, Thomas, Patrick, Columbkille and Francis Xavier might have thought of this view can only be speculated upon. But while organised religion may be a very bad thing - and organised religion is, incidentally, the only entity that lends legitimacy to the ranks held by the aristocracy of which Ridley is a member, on the basis that they are or have been granted by monarchs whose own very slender claims to legitimacy have depended upon their seizure of the title 'Fidei Defensor', that title which they claim to be theirs and which is so important that it's the only one on the coins - spontaneously ordered religion seems to be very good, and that old Mitteleuropan hack Hayek is its prophet. According to Ridley we should be actively seeking Catallaxy, not a good idea in my opinion for, as he should know very well, Catallaxy bites. We are not into science here, folks, but we are very heavily into eschatology of the most brutally materialistic sort.

This would all be a better class of agitprop if he hadn't made such sweeping judgements, nor tripped over himself so much, nor made such glaring mistakes. One mistake that really jumped off the page appears on Page 129, when he writes that,

"Other descendants of the Black Sea refugees took to the plains of what is now Ukraine where they domesticated the horse and developed a new language, Indo-European, that would come to dominate the western half of the Eurasian continent, and of which Sankrit and Gaelic are both descendants".

If you wish to read one book of universal history, read Felipe Fernandez-Armesto's 'Civilisations'. In that most wonderful of books, Professor Fernandez-Armesto writes that there is absolutely no evidence for the existence of, in his words, an 'ur-Sprach' from which the Indo-European family of languages sprang, nor of any particular place, no 'ur-Heimat', from which they sprang. If Ridley had studied this area of history more closely before sitting down at the PC, he might have learned, possibly even to his great delight, that modern scholarship in this area believes that the Indo-European languagess grew from, of all things, trading links. To my mind, this error reveals a glaring gap in Ridley's scholarship in matters outwith his own area of expertise, which in turn leads one to think that anything he writes upon anything not within his own area of expertise isn't really to be trusted.

And you really can tell something about a man by hearing what sort of people he admires. On Page 170, after listing all...zzz...of the achieve...zzz..ments...that they...zzz...made by, with almost tedious predictability, having little or no government and virtually absolute freedom to trade, he writes 'But in truth, was there ever a more admirable people than the Phoenicians'?

Well, yes, in fact just about anybody who doesn't or didn't practice child sacrifice is more admirable than the Phoenicians. I am perfectly willing to accept that Ridley's over-evolved enthusiasm for his economic beliefs got the better of him when he wrote that sentence, but to my mind it's a shocking, and squalid and meretricious, error of judgement. Then again, it might not be the first one he's ever made.

He trips over himself. On Page 291 he includes the name of Naomi Klein amongst those he seems to think are modern prophets of doom, yet on Page 318, in the context of how the aid system actively impedes development in Africa, he writes,

"...in recent years, much aid has been granted on condition of free-market economic reform, which far from kickstarting economic growth, frequently proves damaging to local traditions, undermining the very mechanisms that get enrichment started".

This sentence could have come straight out of 'The Shock Doctrine', by, er, Naomi Klein. Accordingly, I have to wonder whether Ridley read 'The Shock Doctrine' before denigrating its author.

This may indeed by cold comfort to Ridley, but in this matter he even seems to be to the left of John Pilger.

The last nail in this book's coffin is its list of acknowledgments: Richard Dawkins, Niall Ferguson, Johan Norberg, Nigel Lawson, Russell Roberts, David Willetts...the gang's all here. I merely report that having listed Nigel Lawson among the acknowledgments, the paperback version carries a very favourable quote from his son Dominic Lawson on the front cover, quite some way above the title.

This book was not worth reading. In my opinion it reads like a frantic iteration of belief from a man whose experiences may have shaken it. At times, Ridley's writings on economics seem like the outpourings of a fanatic, if only because he will analyse every aspect of the physical world around him but seems to accept the teachings of Hayek absolutely and without question. After reading it, I actually felt quite sorry for him - he puts everything under the microscope but himself.

Twenty Years After

My apologies for not posting recently - been catching up on my reading, although in the case of Matt Ridley's 'The Rational Optimist', in my opinion a thoroughly squalid and meretricious book, I might as well not have bothered - I couldn't let the occasion pass without comment.

I became physically symptomatic on Friday 13th September 1991 - a day that will live in infamy.

The very insecure old solicitor whose tedious Rumpeltskinian shenanigans got the ball rolling is now dead, so, if only to preserve a point of good manners he was never very keen on observing himself, 'de mortuis nil nisi bonum' and all that. At that time in his life, his early '60's, he looked like Stroessner on the slide - a pot belly on a five foot five inch frame somehow miraculously suspended above a grey Bobby Charlton combover and a pair of Reactolite Rapides. Every damn day he would lose confidence in himself and what he had directed should be done, and blow his top with someone as a result. It seemed like every damn day there would be an apologetic missal posted on the office notice board saying that each day was a new start, or some crap like that; the classic behaviour pattern of an abusive spouse.

However, as far as I was concerned any relationship with the man ended at about 14.30 on Friday 13th September 1991, two months into a two year traineeship on, if memory serves, a very sunny early autumn afternoon on Sauchiehall Street, when the ritualised bollocking, almost a hazing, of being forced to stand in front of his desk while he ripped up my work in front of me while screaming at the top of his voice, got too much for me and both my head and right arm suddenly snapped from the middle to the right and would not stop snapping no matter what I did ('duties of care', anyone?). I remember running through the office from his room on the ground floor to mine on the mezzanine level just to get away from him, and I don't remember anything else of that afternoon. A year long diagnostic process followed thereafter, I was diagnosed in November 1992 and by the grace of God I'm still bloody well here.

It's been an interesting twenty years - you can't have 22 jobs in 20 years and not have an interesting time - but the high points have, of course, been becoming a husband and then becoming a father. He's a lovely boy, you know. I suppose many fathers look at their children slightly wistfully, hoping that they will be able to do more with their talents than their fathers have. Maybe he'll be the one to crack writing for a living.

On the other hand, I'm not dead yet.

The Neil Lennon Verdict Explained (I Think)

While one side of my brain remains baffled by John Wilson's acquittal, the other thinks it might be able to explain why the jury reached its decision.

The critical element in the BBC report is this passage -

"The jury of seven women and eight men deleted the reference to making a sectarian remark from the charge relating to breach of the peace, and that the offence was aggravated by religious prejudice."

I may have this all wrong, and have not examined the relevant legislation - pulling out one's own fingernails with a pair of pliers would be an infinitely more enlightening and profitable pastime - but the wording of that report suggests to me that it has been framed in such a way that the alleged crime which is alleged to have been aggravated by sectarianism cannot be separated from the aggravation. In other words, in cases such as this, where a sectarian aggravation has been libelled, it is not enough merely for the crime to be proved for a conviction to be obtained; in order for the prosecution to be successful, the aggravation must also be proved.

If this is true then the law is not just an ass, it's ass backwards. For want of a better expression, an aggravation should always be the icing on the cake in such matters. A crime must always have been committed before it can be aggravated. What we might have here is an aggravation in search of a crime to attach itself to.

If this is the case, it suggests to me that the pitifully low standard of legislative draftsmanship displayed by the Scottish Parliament since devolution shows no signs of improving. Holyrood has a track record of producing badly written laws, and this one may be no exception.

It could also suggest that we might be on the way back to those days recalled by G. M. Trevelyan in his 'English Social History', when the phrase 'You might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb' had real meaning. Trevelyan records that in the 18th and 19th Centuries juries were often unwilling to convict in cases of minor crimes, often committed out of desperation, which carried grossly disproportionate penalties (ah yes, 'Merrie England', the birthplace of transportation and the man-trap). Given the political focus on stamping out sectarianism - a futile exercise to conduct in the west of Scotland, but I suppose God loves a trier - it may be the case that juries will not convict unless they are absolutely sure of guilt, applying a self-imposed standard of absolute and not merely reasonable doubt to their deliberations and allowing perfectly good cases which would have succeeded without the allegation of sectarian aggravation to fall.

And just as well, because as a self- proclaimed civil libertarian one can't really take any issue with 100 guilty men going free and so on and so forth and all that.

If any of the above is not the case, then I would be very interested to know whether the Crown Office was placed under any pressure by the soi-disant, ersatz 'Scottish Government' to prosecute this matter with a sectarian aggravation attached. The Tartanissimo has held forth at length on the need for anti-sectarian legislation, and what better way of driving home the need for such laws than a high-profile trial in which it will be alleged (with the word 'alleged' in this context meaning that the events were broadcast around the world) that a high-profile Catholic was subjected to a sectarian assault during the course of his employment as manager of Celtic Football Club, with the scene of the crime being pitchside during a league fixture. In Scotland, you don't get more high profile than that. If it is the case that the Crown Office was leaned on to make sure that the sectarian element stayed on the indictment to the bitter end, we're further down the road to Tartanitarianism than even I have feared.

The End Of Solicitor-Client Confidentiality In Scotland

It seems that my former professional brethren are all at risk of being co-opted as special constables in the war against the gangs.

I don't care what fine words are uttered by the President and Council of The Law Society of Scotland on this matter; although they might not intend to turn solicitors into snitches, that will be the consequence of their actions. The purpose of solicitor-client confidentiality is to ensure that clients are able to receive all relevant advice, and they can only receive all relevant advice when they are able to provide their solicitors with all relevant facts. If solicitors feel compelled to act like Eaglesham's or Eyemouth's answer to Eliot Ness, then clients will not discuss matters with their solicitors as fully as they should.

One possible, and very possibly unintended, consequence of this state of affairs coming about will be non-gang members being prosecuted for gang-related crimes. If a gang-member knows that he can't discuss gang activity with his solicitor then there is no reason for him to plead guilty to anything, if only because he can't obtain the appropriate professional advice. This would in turn result in increases not only in the number of unsuccessful prosecutions but also of less convincing prosecutions being brought before the courts; should the police ever feel under pressure to keep up their war on the gangs, the temptation to cast their net wider and throw a whale in order to catch a sprat might become very strong.

Another very possible, and most hopefully unintended, consequence would be jealous and avaricious solicitors maliciously 'shopping' their more successful peers in the hope of tarring them with the suspicion of being gang lawyers. One would hope that if such behaviours were ever detected, the beaks would have the culprits in their jaws in a flash.

This is just another example of how the civil liberties of Scots are being degraded during an administration which boasts of its wish to set Scotland free. Although freedom might be slavery and ignorance strength, The Tartanissimo and the agencies under his control also seem to believe that tyranny is liberty. As James Erskine of Grange remarked of pre-Union Scotland in 1732, 'Liberty was a stranger here'. It seems that in many ways she's still a stranger.

'That Bastard Verdict'

Although I will defend Scotland's unique 'Not Proven' verdict with the last breath in my body, there are times when one knows just what Walter Scott meant.

This is Scotland in the 21st Century, folks. Go figure.

Libyan Extradition Policy

The announcement that the now located Abdelbaset al-Megrahi would not be extradited by any new Libyan government, as neither would any other Libyan national, does make one wonder just why the BBC keeps referring to Gaddafi as being wanted by the International Criminal Court.

If he is ever caught, then it would seem to be the case that if his former subjects wish to try him themselves they will do so without any interference from abroad.

Similarly, it would be hard to see how any offer of amnesty or immunity made to him by any new Libyan government could ever be challenged by any other nation. The Libyans seem to be following the line taken by the Russians in their insistent refusal to extradite Andrei Lugovoy to the UK for questioning regarding the death of the late Alexander Litvinenko, that to do so would be contrary to their law (which it would be) and that they're not going to be dictated to in their own country by foreigners. We'll see how this one pans out; hopefully not into nationalism or pan-Arabist chauvinism, but a healthy regard for civil liberties, for law and for the rule of law instead.

To be forced to live in peace in a peaceful country in which he knows he is immune from prosecution but in which he can't oppress anyone anymore would be hell on Earth for Gaddafi, and at that point his transformation into a North African Pinochet would be complete.

A Short Guide To Reading 'The Guardian'

While the BBC, the 'Daily Telegraph', the 'Daily Mirror' and the 'Daily Mail' all saw fit to record the passing of the Scottish SAS veteran John McAleese, as at the time of writing this I have been unable to find any reference to his death in the online edition of 'The Guardian'.

I hope that they have made some mention of it in the paper edition. If they have not, its editors would be guilty either of shocking carelessness or unforgivable churlishness. While we might not like the uses to which our armed forces are sometimes put, we should always be on the side of the very brave men on the ground who do the fighting, the ordinary soldiers who didn't go to Eton or Harrow. They're the ones whose side 'The Guardian' is always supposed to be on.

'The Guardian' is often at its best when Britain is at its worst, such as during the phone-hacking scandal. Equally, it is when Britain is or has been at its best that 'The Guardian' is often at its worst, and this is a classic case in point. It takes physical courage greater than I can fathom to do what Mr. McAleese and his colleagues did in 1980, and to be disrespectful to those who preserve your liberty is to treat it with contempt.

My condolences to Mr. McAleese's family.

Legal Thoughts, Part I

It has been reported that a new suspect has been identified during the re-animated investigation into the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher. I am troubled by this.

The heartbreaking fact of the matter is that WPC Fletcher's murderer, whoever they might be or have been (given the current situation in Libya, this might perhaps be a more fluid, less definite condition than they might be wholly comfortable with), very probably walked out of the Libyan Embassy in London under the cover of diplomatic immunity. If they had immunity at the time, then I cannot see how they do not enjoy immunity now. I cannot possibly see how diplomats whose credentials have once been accepted can later be held to account for anything they did or might have done while their credentials were recognised.

For even after her murder, their credentials were recognised. That's why they walked out of their own accord, rather than being carried out in body bags after a brief encounter with some gentlemen from Hereford.

All we would achieve by pursuing a prosecution in this matter would be to make every British diplomat fair game for illegal prosecution, wherever in the world they might have served and without regard for whatever period of time might have elapsed after their posting had finished. I am beginning to wonder if those in charge of this country's government have finally lost all understanding of that the rule of law really is.

Legal Thoughts, Part II

The apparent thuggishness displayed by Frederick Goodwin, the most financially destructive incompetent in British corporate history, while flying the Royal Bank of Scotland nose first into the ground is being exposed in a soon to be published book entitled 'Masters Of Nothing: The Crash And How It Will Happen Again'.

Goodwin is reported as having thrown a Queeg-like wobbly when presented with the 'wrong' type of biscuit. If true, it seems like pathetically juvenile behaviour from the leader of a multi-billion pound organisation. More alarming, however, is the question of fire alarms.

As inimitably paraphrased by 'The Daily Record',

"At dinner functions, an engineer was kept on standby until the early hours to switch off fire alarms when fatcats wanted to smoke inside".

This raises two issues which might appear to merit closer investigation by the authorities.

The first is whether or not the Royal Bank of Scotland jeopardised the safety of its staff or contractors contrary to the Health and Safety at Work, etc Act 1974. There would be staff and contractors on site while these dinners were taking place, even if it was only the engineer who turned the fire alarms off having to wait around to turn them back on again. It would be interesting to know whether individuals who pursued what might perhaps be a course of criminal conduct, the alleged neutralisation of the fire alarm system, did so of their own volition or under duress, and if under duress what form that duress took.

The second is whether any of these reported puff-fests took place during the period between the banning of smoking in certain public places in Scotland and Goodwin's defenestration from the Royal Bank of Scotland. One would imagine that the Royal Bank of Scotland does not permit its staff to smoke within any of its places of business, although it might permit smoking in certain designated areas outside them. One would also imagine that the law of Scotland would deem all of the Royal Bank of Scotland's places of business to be public places of the type in which smoking has been banned. If the ban has been breached, then it would seem to be a simple matter for those who breached it and for those who allowed it to be breached to be held to account for their actions. We do not have one law for people at the top and another for people at the bottom.

That's the theory, anyway.

On Mozilla Firefox

This puppy's wonderful!

I've been paying for broadband for over six years, and at last I've got what I've been paying for!

As sad as it is to say, when even a literary-minded non-techie Internet Explorer loyalist like me decides to investigate whether there might be better browsers out there, the only conclusion one can draw is that Bill has blown it; and that is a state of affairs for which he has nobody to blame but himself.

The 'Publish Post' button actually works now! Look! Look!

On Gaddafi And Bounties

As someone whose repugnance at the rapprochement between the western nations and the Gaddafi regime has now been on record for the best part of a decade, I still have reservations about the approach being taken to effect his capture.

I can't stand the whole 'bounty' thing; it reeks of the desperation that accompanies lawlessness. It sends out the wrong message, that justice is a commodity that can be bought and sold like any other. The FCO, otherwise known as the FO with a great big C in the middle, should be discouraging it forcefully, if only because it gives the impression that either the world's most sophisticated intelligence services don't know where he is, or that it is thought that he might be much more difficult to catch than anyone anticipated.

If it is legitimate to pay a bounty for Gaddafi, it would presumably also be legitimate to pay bounties for the capture of other people associated with his regime, such as Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, and this is where the law and morality of it all becomes very muddy. There have been rumblings from Washington that Megrahi should be delivered to American justice. This would be a travesty, as he has already been convicted under the law of Scotland. For the rest of his days, he will be a prisoner of Her Majesty's sentenced to a period of imprisonment for life but who has been released on licence. That is his status; he has no other. It is unfortunate that many relatives of American victims, and some American politicians, were unhappy that he was released on compassionate grounds, but that's all it is; unfortunate. In fact and in law the USA has no jurisdiction over him, and any ex post facto claim of jurisdiction over him by the USA would be contrary to law and the rule of law; revolutionary justice of the worst sort.

They might see it as being unfortunate that he has survived for so long after his release, to which one can only say that if you were a non-UK national dying of cancer in Greenock prison who was released on compassionate grounds, then the combined effects of being transferred to your own country, of being around your own family again and of having access to drugs and medical care which might not be available on the NHS might prolong your survival for longer than anticipated as well. That he is still alive so long after having been released shouldn't really be a cause for irritation. It's only surprising that we should be surprised.

If the chaps from Fort Bragg do wish to take him for a ride, they can perfectly legitimately take him to see his social worker at East Renfrewshire Council, the only non-Libyan official in the world with legal authority over him; and the sight of Dwight and Clayton Lee doing a rope slide from a Black Hawk over Rouken Glen Park would probably be something they don't see in Giffnock every day.

(Update 26/08/11 - a matter of moments after this item was posted, the 'BBC Six O'Clock News' reported that Megrahi might appear to have broken the terms of his licence by no longer apparently being in residence at his villa in Tripoli. While this is obviously an undesirable state of affairs, I can't really recall any other situation where a Scottish prisoner on licence has breached its terms while living in a country which was undergoing a revolution and in which they were regarded as being close to the ancien regime, perhaps making them feel that they might be at risk if they continue to stay at the address they provided to the authorities. Megrahi's case has been exceptional from the outset, and I think even the Scottish Prison Service might understand if he's uncontactable for a few days under present circumstances. If he were really smart, he'd be looking to claim asylum in the one country in the world which possesses both a working government and a duty of care towards him, which is, er, the United Kingdom. Just imagine what fun the Daily Mail would have with that one, and by law there wouldn't be a damn thing anyone could do about it. The bugger will probably end up living in Buckingham Palace before he's done).

Back On The Blog

Regular readers will have noticed that the blog has been off-line for six days. I had deleted it.

This was on account of my desire to write a book, and the blog was proving to be so much of a distraction that I could not commence that task. However, having finally started writing it last night, I realised that it would be too big a job, and that I would be unable to complete it without causing lasting damage to my health.

So with my apologies to my loyal readers, I'm back here and will stay here, unremunerated and unedited but at least able to write something that someone, somewhere might read. Blogging might be one of the most ephemeral forms of literature, its merit lying somewhere between pamphleteering and graffiti, but I find it's one of the most enjoyable to produce. I never should have stopped.

Where was I?

(Update 27/08/2011 - Some reflection has led me to believe that readers deserve an explanation of the phrase 'I would be unable to complete it without causing lasting damage to my health'.

The realisation was achieved while banging my head off the wooden leg of a sofa in my workplace, during the course of one of those seizures to which I am fortunately only occasionally prone)

Raising Train Fares In The Wake Of The Riots

Last week, we saw riots in England, many of them in areas where there is high unemployment.

This week, we hear that there will soon be large increases in the cost of rail fares.

Constantly telling people of the importance of having a job and then making it very difficult for them to get to it seems to me to be an unsatisfactory way of trying to reduce unemployment, or of staving off the threat of violent dissent.

On David Cameron's Use Of The Word 'Sick' To Describe Some Parts Of Society

This was fascist language, used in the fascist sense. Individuals are sick. Cultures can become corrupt. Polities and peoples are never sick.

What's coming next, some great plan to restore national vigour? A little more therapeutic violence overseas? A new political liturgy? Shirt movements? What? Once you've complained about the cultural hygiene of parts of the society you govern, anything's on the cards.

On The Character Of Alex Salmond

It has been reported that the First Minister recently exchanged words with Thomas Docherty MP, and that during the exchange The Tartanissimo remarked to Mr. Docherty, 'How long have you been an MP, son?'

If true, this extremely patronising remark shows just how deeply arrogance and aggression run with The Tartanissmo's character. I have been trying to tell you, you know.

HRH The Prince Of Wales Favours 'National Community Service'

On a visit to Tottenham yesterday that was probably 11 days too late, HRH The Prince of Wales spoke of his desire to see a scheme for 'national community service'.

That HRH The Prince of Wales is in favour of something usually means that it should be opposed unflinchingly, and this is no exception. To my mind that was an unwarranted and perhaps even unconstitutional intrusion into politics. Under our system, what he does or does not want to see in our society is neither here nor there. His functions are to wave politely, to ask people whether they have come far and to sign bills passed by Parliament into law.

If he believes that he will reign as some kind of benevolent pater patriae, a philosopher king sharing his wisdom to his subjects when he feels it is required, then he is frankly delusional. I am the best arbiter of the type of education and training my son will require in order to become a rounded member of society, and I will suffer no more damn insolence from HRH The Prince of Wales on that subject.

On The Absence Of Comparative Justice In The Wake Of The Riots

Although Perry Sutcliffe-Keenan's attempts to start a riot in Latchford via Facebook were malevolent, and although he deserves to have his Facebook page thrown at him for the attempt, it is hard to square the sentence of four years' imprisonment he has received with the sentence of 16 months' imprisonment handed down to Elliot Morley for claiming more than £30,000 of parliamentary expenses to which he was not entitled.

On the face of it, it is hard to see whose offence was more grave. Sutcliffe-Keenan is an unpleasant, dough-headed yob; Morley was at one time a Minister of the Crown, not merely expected but presumed to possess the highest standards of integrity. No harm to life or property took place as a result of Sutcliffe-Keenan's actions, while Morley got away with a lot of money. Sutcliffe-Keenan's offence would not have been committed if like-minded unpleasant, dough-headed yobs not taken the initiative in Tottenham; Morley's was a premeditated, calculating and very cynical course of conduct pursued over the course of several years. Although Sutcliffe-Keenan was trying to incite violent disorder, Morley certainly wasn't the only one with a creative approach to accounting and an over-developed sense of entitlement.

It is hard to determine just why these offences have been treated so differently. If a savage and retributive sentence required to be imposed on Perry Sutcliffe-Keenan pour encourager les autres, it must surely have been passed in the knowledge that les autres were in no way encouraged by those actions of his which have placed him before the court. Trappist monks have ignited rioting more effectively than he did.

Where is Shami Chakrabarti when she is most needed? Come to think of it, who's Shami Chakrabarti?

On The Unpleasantness Of Libertarian Rhetoric

Given that they might have seen and possibly even lived through real looting, I hope that no libertarian ever describes the simple act of paying lawful tax as looting ever again.

Owen Hatherley

Good article from this chap, who seems to be an architecture writer, in 'The Guardian' about the proposals to evict rioters' families. He appears to reach broadly the same conclusions regarding the de facto enclosure of the social housing sector as I did in a post of June 28 2010, but coming at it from a different angle. If anything else, the 'Shock Doctrine' element of these proposals is very much more pronounced now than it was then, the riots having presented those determined to clear the estates with a perfect example of a crisis that should not be allowed to go to waste. It remains to be seen whether anyone will lose their home unjustly as a result of being maliciously 'shopped' on account of a neighbourhood vendetta, but given the interesting times we live in I wouldn't bet against someone trying to do it. I'm actually kicking myself a wee bit that I didn't think of the points he's made when the news of this stupid and unpleasant proposal broke, so kudos to Mr. Hatherley. He's a very capable and thoughtful writer.

As I wrote last week, our government seems intent on creating a vagabond class, permanently marginalised and thus stigmatised. They might just get it. If they do, that will be the point at which the problems will really start. As I wrote yesterday, we might just be going through one of those phases of societal transition that history is littered with. Let us all hope - and pray - that what comes next is in every way better than this.

FANS (Fathers Against National Service)

David Cameron has today re-launched his scheme for 'National Citizen Service'. As I wrote at the time he first mentioned it, if anyone wishes to put a gun in my boy's hand then someone will have to put one to my head first.

Now, one of the most important lessons one can draw from the study of British history is that the British state is not and has never been beyond arranging such an outcome. However, in my opinion it is of the utmost importance for every father of young sons in the land to oppose this policy. Even its title is misleading, given that British nationals are not citizens but subjects. If enacted, it would degenerate very quickly into national military service. That is the way of all these things. The British state will eventually require to deploy national military service, if only because my son is now a little over one year old and I can see no end to our involvement in Afghanistan; not soon, not ever. Athough the poor are still so poor that they keep volunteering, at some point in the future they just won't volunteer any more, and those in power will have to do something about it. With that in mind, I am no longer frightened of saying that my wife and I did not bring our boy into the world for him to become cannon fodder for the grand plans of some Washington think-tank loons, and those of their British acolytes too scared to think for themselves, to try to bring peace to an unpacifiable country. No. That is intolerable, and accordingly will not be tolerated. Here I stand. I can do no other.

If he wishes to fight for you, fine. He will at least have all the facts I can give him before making a final decision on that course of action. But if you think you can order him to fight for you, then you can go and take a three-cornered flying one to yourselves. I have not spent two decades chuntering away at the fag end of the Great British Globalised Economy, over-educated and under-rewarded, qualified for a profession I can't practice, blowing raspberries at VDUs while cheaptack, badly written programs requiring more RAM than the base unit can handle won't load on to them, for those who bear no small measure of responsibility for that state of affairs to demand my son as well.

There will be those people who read that and say I am being disrespectful to those who have lost their lives in Afghanistan and Iraq. Such people are obtuse, willingly blind advocates of DFO (Death For Others). My heart goes out to every parent who's lost a son in those places. I hope they understand when I write that I do not wish my son to share the fate of theirs. There will be those who will say, 'Kelly, this isn't about your son, it's about you'; and they'd be dead right. A very great deal has been said in the past few days about the importance of fathers staying with families, providing their children with good example. How this is possible for men confronted with a gynocentric family law system which those in charge of it seem to have no intention of reforming, even in light of recent events, or of altering the moral mindset which has come to regard human conception as a purely biological, morally neutral act of little consequence, like pollination, does not seem to register with David Cameron. It was quite sick of him to enunciate all the ways in which our society has become sick, when they have all been the consequence of the exercise of Parliament's will. That notwithstanding, opposition to any form of national service is, in my opinion, a cause against which every father should rally. If he wishes a display of fatherpower, then he should have it.

Accordingly, I raise the standard of FANS (Fathers Against National Service). Oh, don't worry, it's all very Big Society. Without regard for creed, colour or status, FANS is open to British fathers living with the mothers of their children in nuclear families, adoptive fathers in the same position, and to grandfathers acting as de facto fathers to children whose own have gone AWOL, the bastards. Freelance sperm donors, cranks, careerists, opportunists, axe-grinders and ideologues of whatever hue need not apply; my energy is limited, and that in turn plays havoc with my patience for time-wasting adults.

One striking conclusion we can draw from the past fortnight's events is that families are very similar to societies. They do not die of their own accord, but at the hand of outside agencies. Some of them even commit suicide. However, those of us British fathers whose interest in and love for their children is absolute need to step back and say as one that we will not be rolled over, that our sons and daughters are the best of subjects and that there is no need for them to be press-ganged iton sweeping streets they haven't littered, against both our wishes for them and our knowledge of their characters. Fatherhood is a privilege. It is not a political football.

If such a law as Cameron proposes comes to pass, I will have to seriously consider whether I wish my family to remain residents of the United Kingdom. Now, we have somewhere to go, as do Antonio, Alberto and Miguel Clegg (if National Citizen Service is good for some, it's good for all). But millions don't have that option. As I said, if a display of fatherpower is what is felt is required, then it should be given. Please email martinkellyllbdiplp@yahoo.co.uk to let me know if you want to join FANS. Let's get the ball rolling, and deal with the formalities later.

The Holy Island

One night in 793, some quiet Northumbrian monk on the island of Lindisfarne, his name lost to history, might have thought his eyes were playing tricks on him when, late at night, he spotted a light out to sea.

He would not have known that the fate he and his brothers were to endure would be repeated again and again and again as the Vikings ravaged England for centuries. Nobody really knows why they started coming at all. One suggestion I've read was that it was on account of an internal explosion in population of a type so sudden and extreme it made them realise that they had to move outwards or die. There just wasn't space for them all in Scandinavia, so conquest was their only hope of survival.

Yet for all their rage, pillage and unbelievable capacity for violence, for all of the chasm between their pagan beliefs and the Christianity of the English, many of them eventually integrated. Anyone with Norman heritage has a little bit of Forkbeard in them. They were not merely a criminal gang, they were one of the most frightening criminal gangs of all time. Yet although they made an enormous impact on the system, by themselves they never brought the system down.

Political England was never the same after their arrival as it was before, but Christian England never wavered an inch in its faith in their ultimate defeat, trusting in God, as it should have done, to protect them from the Norsemens' wrath.

Over the past few days, we have seen berserkers roaming the ways of England once again. The horned helmets have been replaced with hoodies, but the senseless rage and lust for pillage differ in no way from that suffered by the English over a thousand years ago. I leave it to professional social scientists to theorise about why what happened happened. No doubt they will produce any number of hypotheses, possibly tainted by their own convictions. Yet the pillagers did not win then, and the pillagers will not win now. The reason they will not win is that whatever else is broadcast about it or claimed to the contrary for it, this is a godly land, and if enough of His children pray for deliverance from this menace He will deliver us from it.

Lindisfarne, the place where the Vikings made landfall, is also known as 'The Holy Island'. If the British wish to recover anything from their experiences of past few days, the hope of holiness would be a good place to start.

The Wilding Of David Starkey

The old rood boy's got himself into a spot of hot water over some comments he made on 'Newsnight' about the role of race in the riots. Whatever Piers Morgan (aka Piers Stefan Pughe-Morgan, ne Piers Stefan O' Meara; he's got more bloody names than Prince Edward) and the Hon. Robert Peston might think about what he said, although he might have expressed himself badly he might also have had a point.

The point I think that he was trying to make is that race was irrelevant to the riots, and that because people of different races have lived together so closely in London for so long, that part of the world has to all intents and purposes developed its own culture. I don't think anyone would go so far as to call it a civilisation just yet, particularly after the events of the past few days, but that might still happen. It's been a field lesson in anthropology just as much as a crisis of political and police authority. What seems to be going on down there now is that we have what is to all intents and purposes the sort of colonial society of the type that develops wherever two cultures meet, the effects of which have been magnified by the mixing of very many more cultures than merely two. It has developed its own customs and language, its own mores and values. Given time, it might even develop its own religion and tabus.

Given the history of colonial societies as colonial societies per se, whether it ever develops into a vigourous civilisation is a bet I wouldn't put a fiver on in William Hill's. The barbarian war bands seem too numerous and too diverse to enable any single one of them to establish themselves as pacifiers and conquerors. The thoughts of Sir Vidia Naipaul on what has happened and what is going on might just be very illuminating. And may God in His divine mercy help us all.

The Strange Invisibility Of Her Majesty The Queen During Our Recent Crisis

I feel I owe an apology to HRH The Prince of Wales regarding what I had mistakenly perceived to be his absence from the public arena during the recent rioting crisis. On the evening of Sunday 14th August he appeared on BBC1's 'Britain's Hidden Heritage', enthusing over the quality of the plasterwork in the pink dining room at Dumfries House.

At times like this, you have to remember the important things in life. My apologies.

A random thought occurred to me while pondering the noticeable absence of HM The Queen in recent days. One would have thought that at times like this, and during events of the type we have seen, the head of state should be out front and centre, appealing for calm among her subjects, imploring them to stop stealing from one another and requesting that they co-operate with her agencies. Unless I am greatly mistaken, this did not happen. Why it did not puzzles me. What other purpose does a national figurehead serve other than to be a focal point in times of crisis?

The only conclusion I can draw is that the British oligarchy is extremely nervous of the Queen, or any indeed any monarch, not merely being disobeyed but being both seen and heard to be disobeyed. After all this time, they are still frightened of their position's fragility. Perhaps they know all too well that everything they hold depends upon the monarch being able to claim the title 'Fidei Defensor', an assumed royal title so important to everything that happens in British public life that it is the only one to appear on British coinage alongside the monarch's name and their rank, and the thinnest of threads by which to be connected to that to which you feel entitled. Being a national figurehead when the Germans are dropping bombs is one thing. Being a national figurehead when your subjects are engaging in riotous disorder is quite another.

If that's the case, it's a viewpoint which in its own way is a rather pathetic one to hold after you've been at the top for nearly a thousand years. I almost feel sorry for them.

You may have noticed an increase in what might be perceived to be anti-monarchical sentiment appearing on the blog in recent weeks. You might not be wrong. This is a direct consequence at the wave of disgust that swept over me when I saw HRH The Prince of Wales done up in full regalia, including those spotless spats, presiding over the Armed Forces Day celebrations held in Edinburgh on 25th June this year. It was the spats that did it; impractical, toytown footwear that would show the slightest stain being worn in front of men who've been there and done it where military matters are concerned. The volume of what one might perhaps not unreasonably feel to be largely unearned decorations being worn by members of the Royal Family at the wedding of The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge was laughably Ruritanian. I wouldn't have fancied being in a plane over London at the time, if only because of the impact all that metal might have had on the compass.

However, for what my perhaps incorrect, if not deranged, opinion's worth, all that posturing serves a deadly serious purpose. It tells anyone who might be minded to challenge our oligarchy that it has the army; and as any Roman usurper could tell you, if you can keep that, you're pretty secure.

Other Bits And Pieces From The Riots

It appears that even while the blood of innocents was flowing in the streets, The Tartanissimo, with his trademark toxic mixture of 'Come Ahead' chippiness and braggadocio, has insisted that the riots be referred to as 'English riots' and not 'UK riots'.

He never knows when to shut up, so here's something for him to think about the next time he decides to open his mouth on a matter which is none of his business and which common decency demands he should steer well clear of. In the last few days, Strathclyde Police have been held up as masters of the art of policing gangs. It sounds like the sort of thing that should be studied at Hogwarts. However for Glaswegians like me, who like to read books and think about the wider world without someone like The Tartanissmo telling me what to think about my own country, it has always been an embarrassment that our town has had such a bad reputation for gang violence. We've always wanted it to be like the rest of the UK. We needn't have worried. It seems that the rest of the UK is becoming like us. That's something for everyone to get worried about.

Of course, in The Tartanissmo's Scotland every problem will be solved, every tear wiped away, with a wee dram and a folk song, backed up as ever by the Scottish iron fist, developed from Calvinist authoritarianism and toned over half a millenium by constant and willing exercise. It'll be like 'Demolition Man', but with fewer good-looking women of the type who don't look as if they consider the cubic metre to be a measurement of underwear size, and with very much higher annual average rainfall.

Sorry, I'm having a wee Denis Leary moment. It'll pass. But not yet.

It's gratifying to see that the Tory psychos have been out in force. I keep saying on this blog, and have been saying for many years now, that there is a deeply sadistic strain in Conservative thought that likes punishing people, not because it's necessary but because they like doing it. That it should always be right-wingers who are the most prolific S & M spankers is not a coincidence. It is a perfectly natural of extension of their public views into the private sphere. Danny Kruger, a former Conservative candidate for Parliament who was sacked for calling for 'a period of creative destruction in the public services' has echoed the call of Tim Montgomerie, the Tory, er, blogger in chief that the police should (this is a classic!) 'baton charge the yobs'.

Let's go one better! Let's handcuff them to railings and birch their naked buttocks! Let's plant explosive devices in their skulls that we can set off when we catch them writing graffiti! Or even if we just suspect them of doing it! These are of course merely the soft options! What we should be doing is decapitating them on the spot, sticking their heads on railings and hanging signs around them saying 'This Is What Happens To Looters Round Here'!

The previous paragraph was, of course, intended to be satirical. Looting is theft, and deserves to be treated seriously, if only because it went unpunished everyone would be at it. Over the past few days, very many people were. The frothing bloviations of Montgomerie and Kruger, both of whom might run a mile from any looter to whom they might feel inclined to quote Schumpeter under normal circumstances and who is in the act of perpetrating their own kind of creative destruction, are a marked contrast to the dignity displayed by Tariq Jahan when discussing the murder of his son. If anything, the composure of Mr. Jahan in the face of such violence and its consequences is a standing rebuke to every figure of authority in the society in which he lives, from its invisible queen and her invisible heir downwards. Over the past week, Mr. Jahan has given them all what for him was I'm sure was a most unwanted lesson in the nature of authority. For right-wing ideologues, the answer is always for the police to baton charge the yobs, to stick the boot in. Mr. Jahan just told them to go home. They probably did. Last week, he did a better job than the Home Secretary.

But the nutter right still wants those relatively few public services enjoyed by many of the looters to be cut. It's the best case I've seen for closing SETI, because first contact has clearly already been made.

The expression 'gang violence' is a redundancy in the context of much of the criminal activity now taking place in the UK. As I mentioned on this blog in both June and December of 2008, these entities are instead barbarian war bands of the type described by Arnold J. Toynbee in his 'A Study of History', marauders who appear on the periphery of every civilisation on the slide.

For what my opinion's worth, David Cameron's hiring of Bill Bratton is a panic measure designed to give him good press. Not good press on the BBC or Sky News, but on Fox News, the majority of whose viewers will be very much more aware of Mr. Bratton's name than the majority of the BBC's. It is probably something he's wanted to do for a while, but didn't have a good reason for doing so before. He now thinks he has. Good luck to them both, and I hope they're very happy together.

One thing that Mr. Bratton might suggest was not such a good idea was to broadcast in advance that you're tripling police numbers in one area. One can only wonder just how much property was stolen across England for no other reason that the local cat was away, and the local mice thought they'd come out to play.

My Apologies For The Typos In The Post Below

I was doing fine, had performed the necessary katas and quadrilles to make sure that I could get the words down, then - Boom! - the 'Save Now' button froze when I went back in to edit the post. It jumped out at me from nowehere, like Burt Kwouk jumping out at Peter Sellers from the cupboard.

The boys in California should put down their skinny lattes, stop stroking their creative facial hair and start dealing with this. It is a pain. I try to write literate English, and the impact of one piece of technology upon another is making me sound like an embittered middle aged man with Tourette Syndrome. I can't do this alone. Perhaps because my own is so screwed up, I can't write software, I only expect to be able to use it. Right now I can't, and it's annoying.

On Benefits And Evictions

After finishing writing 'The Lord Of The Rings', Tolkien felt it necessary to rewrite it backwards, while Carlyle had to rewrite his history of the French Revolution from memory after Macaulay's maid had used the original manuscript to light the fire. That story put me off ever lending a book to anyone.

After the sheer hassle I've been having trying to get Blogger to work with IE9, I can understand the frustration both of them must have felt.

OK, let's boil down two hours's worth of prose into a few sentence.

The public enemas currently parading through the courts on charges relating to their involvement in rioting are undeserving of sympathy. The worst of the bunch are the middle-class ones living in good houses. They are not common or garden slum-dwellers, but the worse kind, slum-dwellers of the mind, people who will turn any area they live in into a slum.

The nutter right is currently having a jolly time lodging e-petitions demanding that any benefits being paid to persons convicted of riot-related charges be removed from them. To do this would be contrary to law and the rule of law. It would be the equivalent of a Bill of Attainder being passed to permit the confiscation of the pension being paid to Fred Goodwin, the most financially destructive incompetent in British corporate history, an issue over which the nutter right got its knickers in a twist two years ago. It would be correct to say that Goodwin has not been charged with any crime. However, those charged with riot-related offences have presumably not been charged with any offences alleging they have misrepresented their eligibility to claim benefits. If sanctity of contract and the rule of law hold good for financially destructive incompetents reponsible for enormous burdens on the public purse, they presumably also hold good for rioting benefit claimants who are also responsible for enormous burdens being placed on the public purse. In time, it will be interesting to review the numbers, if they are ever made available, and see whether the uninsured losses occasioned by these riots are equivalent to the sums which have been spent propping up the Royal Bank of Scotland. For all we know, The Shred might still be ahead on points.

If benefits were to be removed from convicts in this way, it would be a landslide occasioned by the ongoing erosion of British civic life. The nutter right hates paying tax. This is unfortunate, but also too bad. They must come to realise that they have obligations to the people around them. It would be interesting to see the numbers, if they are ever made available, to see whether uninsured losses occasioned by the recent riots are equivalent in value to, or greater in value than, the amount lost to the British economy every year through perfectly legitimate tax avoidance. It is hard to see how you can demand the right not to pay your share and then demand that others pay for your property to be protected. This is infantile logic, the screams of infants at the breast. If you want police, you have to pay them. In their minds, the blameless poor are equally as guilty as the shameless poor, their mutual crime being their common poverty. If this becomes law, people will stand to lose their benefits if convicted of failing to have a television licence, that most piddling and much-prosecuted of crimes which, to the best of my limited knowledge and earnest belief, is still the crime for which a single mother living on benefits in England and Wales is most likely to appear before the courts.

But they're poor, so they can get stuffed. Its only effect would be to increase property crime, as the poor would become desperate and turn to illegal money-lenders whose primary concerns do not conform to the goals of the Big Society. But they're poor, so they can get stuffed.

The proposed eviction of social housing tenants who have family members residing with them who have been convicted of riot-related offences goes one step further. The permanent exclusion of these people from social housing would not merely create, or enlarge, an underclass of desperate people. It would create a permanent vagabond class, permanent outsiders. Where are these people going to live? We tried this once. Some of them ended up living in Sherwood Forest, and engaged in a notorious course of ideologically-motivated property crime borne of desperation. It didn't work then, and it's not going to work now. As for the local authorities, they would do well to remember that their tenants are their tenants and not their serfs. If tenants are compelled to keep their families under lock and key to ensure their good behaviour, they are also entitled to have tenancies that are warm and dry in areas which are properly maintained and policed and where the bins are collected regularly. The sword that is the law of landlord and tenant is one that cuts both ways.

You would think that these proposals would have Shami Chakrabarti, the Director of Liberty, shouting in rage from the rooftops. Sadly, and once again when she should be out front and centre - you know, when the going's getting tough for civil liberties of the poor, the sick and the weak - Her Shaminess once again seems to have ridden off into the sunset, possibly on Shergar while accompanied by Lord Lucan, and is nowhere to be seen, a recurring and disappointing theme of her career. She may be exercising some influence over policy at the moment; possibly even a gnostic one.

Their abuse of the phrase 'on their watch' has shown that our political class seems to have no regard for the unsuitable deployment of inappropriate and out-of-conext maritime metaphors. With the very honourable exception of Lord Prescott, I would doubt whether any of them have ever served on a ship bigger than a rowing boat. However, I'm afraid I have to use an inappropriate metaphor of my own, one derived from American football, that slowest and most incomprehensible of games.

David Cameron's Monday morning quarterbacking of police performance during the riots will have made him no friends among senior police ranks. I hope that one of them remembers that the Prime Minister has been remarkably coy about his own history of drug use. He could be doing with making friends in those circles, not alienating them. The sound of a multi-millionaire saying that social housing tenants are receiving a service at a massive discount was revolting, particularly when his party gave much of the stock away at massive discounts and at enormous cost to the public purse. It would be interesting to see the numbers, if they are ever made available, to see whether uninsured losses occasioned by the recent riots are equivalent to, or greater in value than, the cost to the public purse in capital lossesand interest charges occasioned by the 'Right To Buy' policy. As if they'd ever let us know.

And That was about it, I think.

Terrible Problems Cutting And Pasting Into Blogger On IE8 And IE9

This is very frustrating, as it significantly diminishes both the utility of the package and the pleasure one derives from using it.

I also find that I now can't paste a post's URL on to the 'Link' bar, and that to publish a post I have to save it, go into 'Edit Posts', select the item and post from there. The 'Publish Post' button is about as useful as a padlock in Clapham Junction.

Sory to seem a bit pissed off about this, but I've just come within a hair's breadth of losing a 1,600 word post it's taken me two hours to write.

Any suggestions?

Scarman, Interrupted

Thirty years on, it now seems clear that Lord Scarman was in many ways a prophet. The people who engaged in the rioting he reported on seemed to have very many of the same problems as some of those who have been making their presences felt over the past few days; indeed, they might even be related. It is the fate of some prophets to spend their days shouting to themselves in the wilderness. Scarman may have been one of them.

When in doubt, you can always trust the Tories to play to that psychopathic element in their own ranks who live for the idea of doing violence to those weaker than themselves, but most of all to their neighbours' children. The Prime Minister has uttered the words 'water cannon', something of a spastic reversion to type to get the bastards back into line. I don't think even Baroness Thatcher ever went that far. But then again, she wasn't a Bullingdonian. Probably a bit too soft for her own good.

The absence of any kind of introspection from David Cameron as to why this situation should have come about probably means that references to the Big Society will become few and far between. This would be a pity, if only because the riots have been a wonderful example of a Big Society type of project. People have got off their backsides, taken the initiative, done things in their communities and made an enormous impact.

We have a coalition government consisting of two parties. I don't think I've seen or heard any comment from Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats and Deputy Prime Minister. He must be having a hell of a hard time. It must be embarrassing to be the first Liberal leader in 80 years to have a place in government and then having the poor on whose behalf you're supposed to be liberal going and messing the place up, and that's even without images of the police taking the truncheons to them. How Clegg reacts to this will dictate whether he faces a leadership challenge later this year, one that could seal the fate of the coalition. The fact that Cameron has gone in mob-handed, so to speak, and authorised the iron fist in the iron glove suggests to me that he did not consult Clegg prior to his displays of bravura from behind his bodyguards. This in turn suggests that the working relationship between the Prime Minister and his deputy is poor, or that Cameron has no regard for the niceties of coalition government (which probably wouldn't surprise me), or that Clegg doesn't want to be contacted. These are all very disturbing possibilities, and none of them reflect well on Clegg. Though Scripture tells us that the lion shall lie down with the lamb and the leopard with the kid, when it comes to making bedfellows most bootboys don't usually appreciate the sight of sandals in the hallway. Having gone right on cuts, it will be very hard for him to go even further right on law and order. If he did that, he'd be accused of imitating Tony Blair. Ouch!

One wonders how many of those on the streets were raised in homes that didn't have stable father figures who were in constant employment. My guess would be most. But we are told that no fault divorce is a good thing. Having practiced family law for some years I never saw much evidence of that myself - indeed it mostly seemed to be about finding fault - but what would I know?

It would be disappointing if the advances made in consequence of the Scarman Report were to be undone as a result of these events. I wouldn't put anything past these guys.

Mr. Tariq Jahan is one of the most dignified and composed people I've ever seen. My condolences.

On The Images Of Our Rioting Class Currently Being Beamed Around The World

I wonder how this is playing on Libyan state TV - if it's still on air, of course. Don't forget, we're involved in that nation's affairs in order to bring about peace and prosperity. Or was it prosperity and peace? I can't remember.

The rioters whose images I've seen on TV all look as if they hail from that demographic which suffers altitude sickness if required to rise from bed before lunchtime. One can almost hear their doxies, every one a poissonarde de nos jours, all built like onions with tattooed cocktail sticks shoved into the base, their fleshy, pendulous breasts hanging in the air, horribly, like the 'Hindenburg' in flames, screaming encouragement from the sidelines. If the cops play their cards right, their examination of CCTV footage might just lead to the slashing of Disability Living Allowance claims in the worst hit areas. Who knows, that might even cover the cost of reconstruction. Not that that will do a damn thing for the price of insurance, which will soar once this is over, and that isn't even taking into account businesses that might have been torched by the owners. After all, who needs cashflow problems when you've got a riot taking place on your doorstep?

Sarajevo had an Olympics as well, and they didn't even have riots beforehand.

It would be deeply depressing if the coalition government were to use these events to crack down on us further. Police services that constantly feel the need for more powers should be given the civic equivalent of a random drugs test.

The alleged use of Twitter and other social media to fuel these events show that they have the potential to be antisocial in equal measure to their potential to be social.

Conservative government elected in 1970, industrial unrest in 1972 and 1974. Conservative government elected in 1979, riots in 1981. Conservative Prime Minister elected (sort of) in 2010, riots in 2011. The lead time seems to be going down. Without wishing to seem partisan, there seems to be something about Conservative governments that make people want to go out and smash things. Could this possibly be because they have all been insanely right-wing and have governed without regard for the sensibilities and needs of the majority of the population? Perish the thought.

Where are HM The Queen and HRH The Prince of Wales when you need them? Why isn't the heir to the throne out on the streets appealing to his future subjects for order and calm? They are national figureheads, or so we're told, so surely at times like this they should be helping to bring the nation together. If they're not national figureheads to be seen and flocked round at times like this, why do we pay for them?

This is our Katrina, folks, Expect the right-wing backlash to be long and deep. After the phone-hacking scandal and the de facto burying of Rupert Murdoch's political influence, those of our ultras at the top table will have been gagging for the chance to stick the boot in and restore what they consider to be 'discipline'. This is what the right does, everywhere, every time. After the defeat of Napoleon, the crackdown on civil liberties that occurred in the UK then took decades to unravel. It was only after that event, when the ideological competition had been crushed, that breaking your loom was made a capital crime. In Russia in 1905, the throne and altar brigade did not fail to immediately organise itself after the proclamation of the first Duma, creating the civic equivalent of a coronary blockage. After the collapse of Soviet Communism in 1989, our own right exposed what their own motivations had been all along. They were only interested in us for as long as there were Communists to oppose - once they were gone the lipservice to social democracy went out straight after them, a state of affairs which has led to our current and, as the scenes in London and elsewhere have shown, apparently insupportable gap between rich and poor. In that regard, the rioters have shown themselves to be true Thatcherites; they are not rioting for the right to vote, nor the right to wear their socks on their foreheads, but for stuff. They are doing it for the plasma TV and the smartphone. They have taken consumerism all the way round the clock and have reverted to pillage, the form of capitalism with the least expensive lawyers.

We British are so bloody hung up on property and owning stuff, concepts which did not exist at all in the early Church. Why can't we be like those saints, and live together in peace and harmony? When all is said and done, why can't we all get along?