True

From Jack of Kent

"A culture of Fascism"

With it's dysfunctional legal system, the rampant corruption, the omnipresent criminality at all levels of society, it's disgraceful victimisation of minorities, and its police force with a 'culture of fascism', Italy would not be allowed to join the EU if it were to apply to join today.

It's time for Italy to be kicked out of the EU.

There's a Facebooky group thing you can join if you agree with this.

Bloggers changing politics?

The Liberal Conspiracy is asking how left-leaning bloggers can affect national politics.

It's a good question, and I suspect that I'd disagree with a lot of the positions put forward by bloggers on that site. Firstly, I don't think that building communities of like-minded bloggers will have the slightest impact. Mutual affirmation isn't that valuable, I wouldn't have thought, and I think that the concept of solidarity is entirely misplaced when it's applied to the blogosphere.

Me-too campaigns are, I think, hugely over-rated. I do think that left-wing bloggers can make a difference though. Right wing bloggers have succeeded in some ways because they are capable of choosing to believe a position that suits their ends, not one that makes them look good down at the health-food shop.

So, every time you meet a Tory these days, you hear that they are now 'libertarians'. Apparently, they've always been libertarians - didn't they mention it before? Oh yes! Always uncomfortable with Michael Howard's dog-whistle politics, dontcha know?

Of course, they were very unhappy at the time of the old Criminal Justice Bill - you know, the one that made it illegal for two hippies to go into the same field within ten days of each other? (OK, there were bad things in it as well..). For a Tory, pretending to be 'libertarian' is a way of never having to say 'fuck the poor' again. It's a way of never having to give anything back as your side of the social contract. All you have to say is how everything would be alright if the beastly state were just to get out of the way. You can even pretend that you give a shit!

The Tories have always managed to do this in a way that the left hasn't. On the left, I think, we are more concerned with up-our-own-arses consistency in all things. Being correct, and having an audit trail to show that we were on the side of the angels all along.

Ask these latterday libertarians about how inheritance and meritocracy are on a collision course, or ask if this new-found liberalism has any impact on their views on border control, and you just get a quick change of subject.

Here is a more detailed take on how the Tories are able to behave politically, while we are mired in our own elegance.

Right-wing bloggers understand that there are untapped anti-democratic forces that can be dog-whistled any time they like. Guido gets it. But there isn't a commensurate understanding on the left about how the way politics is discussed needs to be changed.

We need to value elected politicians ourselves. The right have worked out that 'direct democracy' is a very handy banner of convenience. Where is the left's defence of representative democracy? Democracy is unequivocally a project of the left, yet we can't even be bothered to pull up the drawbridge on our own castle.

Now, I recognise that no-one will listen to us singing the praises of politicians, of course. We can, however, get an audience that will listen to us attack the lobbying industry, that will slag of saintly pressure-group spokespeople - expose them for their inconsistency, name their donors, and so on. We can identify the senior civil servants that couldn't run a piss-up in a brewery, and we could highlight the demagogy of many journalists.

It is not enough to identify the BBC as a bulwark against the Thatcherite right, the BBC's rivals need to be attacked. BSkyB are the BBC's enemies. Where is the equivalent of 'Biased BBC' - demanding that the programme-making rules that apply to every other station should be applied to BSkyB? Nowhere. That's where.

When we can come up with an equivalent of the odious Tax Payers Alliance - something that can campaign in a concerted way against...

1. Supermarket chains - they strangle small businesses, drive out local craftsmanship, drive out small specialist shops that care about what they sell and know what they're talking about, increase local traffic, drive prices down artificially at the expense of people who work in the supply chain. Anti-supermarket campaigns have to be formed on local alliances, and not on greenie principles. It's not that the greenie principles are wrong - it's just you get tuned out as soon as you start spouting them. A concerted anti-supermarket focus from left-bloggers - one that reaches out to non-lefties and develops the arguments and the memes that will change things - would be a useful exercise for left-bloggers. A hatred of monopolies used to be a key feature the left. It's time this were true again.
   
2. The causes of centralisation - an acknowledgement of those causes and a willingness to attack them. Rather than forever focussing on the Westminster Village sideshow, that would be an example of left-bloggers behaving politically and doing something useful. We need to articulate a new understanding of a public-sector ethos and lead a call to break the link between the 'producer interest' and a legitimate shared understanding of what public-sector professionalism is. The Unions won't do it.
3. The City: What about the disgraceful pro-capitalist (as opposed to pro-market) arguments about how shareholders run companies, when .... they don't. Go and ask Tom what we should be saying.
4. The BBC's enemies - as I outlined earlier.

There are more, of course. But that's enough to be going on with?

All politics is local. But what does the left blogosphere major on? Pissing and moaning about politics and what so-and-so said to thingumyjig at some poxy wine bar in St James' Park. It's time to ignore the Kremlinologists and start being political again.

Like the Tories are.

Next Sunday

The TUC - among others - are campaigning for a new Bank Holiday - 'Community Day.'

I can't see any recommendations on the site for a specific date, but elsewhere, there are suggestions that it could fall on the birthdate of the NHS. If I recall correctly, others mooted a day in November as part of the remembrance timetable.

Next Sunday will be Robbo Day. The birthday of John Neilson Robertson - described lovingly here on the Bridport Red's website.

And this will be the third year of this blog's campaign to have it esablished as a national holiday (though being on a Sunday slightly undermines the case this year).

20th January. Robbo Day. Write to your MP. Because, when all of us lie on our deathbeds and look back on our lives, we will all do so in the certain knowledge that - compared to John - we have been found wanting.

On Sunday afternoon, in bars up and down the country (but particularly in the East Midlands), silent middle aged men will be observed standing alone, looking pensive - perhaps wistful.

If you see this, look closely. Has he bought a second pint that is standing beside the one he is drinking? The pint that will remain untouched?

That pint has been placed there in the hope that John will pass by and accept the offer. And talk about that night, 1st round, second leg, when everything changed forever.

20th January. Robbo Day. You know it makes sense.

Until the pips squeak

Led Zep - live!! Anyone who encourages this filth should be taxed into penury.

I was in the newsagent the other day, and the shopkeeper asked the bloke in front of me if he wanted to buy a lottery ticket.

"Nah" he replied. "It's a stupidity tax, innit?"

A fair point. But it occurred to me that there is a more lucrative stupidity tax than the extra few quid that they make during a rollover week. Led Zep tickets, for example. If anyone ever deserved to have £8,000 taken off them, it's Led Zep fans. And - apparently - £8,000* is what some people paid.

I hope the all the touts who made a killing were ex-Mod wideboys.

And the worthless soap-dodgers that weren't rich enough to afford an actual ticket still got stung for a reasonably hefty idiocy-levy - £125 - just to own a used stub.

Harvey Goldsmith wasn't impressed.

But here's a suggestion; Why don't a bunch of civil-minded pop stars - the ones whose tickets are rare enough to fetch a decent price - establish their own joint auction site, and insist that a sizeable percentage of the tickets for their British gigs are auctioned though it - as part of the contractual negotiations?

All profits above the face value could go to fill in for some of the money lost in the recent Arts Council cuts that will have a significant impact on small theatre. A willingness to do this sort of thing is the only redeeming feature that Radiohead have. Perhaps this could be their next stunt?

Now, if this is an orignal idea of mine (and I doubt it is), I'm slapping a patent on it here and now to prevent it ever being abused by shitheads like Pink Floyd, Led Zep, The Scissor Sisters, The Kaiser Chiefs or James Blunt. There is a poetic justice in those gigs funding fat blokes who spent their teens in Sta Prest.

And here's a second idea. As public service broadcasting becomes a less reliable underwriter for the performing arts, why doesn't the BBC offer free adverts to regional theatre to fill some of the gap? No money would change hands. More people buying tickets at regional theatres would improve grass-roots funding, and the BBC would see the benefits in the long term.

I've been meaning to write a post for some time entitled "Why the BBC should take advertising - as long as it isn't paid for." And one day, I will.

OK. Maybe someone else has had those ideas. Maybe they're just plain unworkable, or daft. I don't know. But whenever public funding disappears from any walk of life, there are people who suffer. And that isn't good. But, like cuts in adult education, cuts in arts funding - particularly smaller scale performing arts - have a highly corrosive long term impact upon the quality of all of our lives.

So, at times like these, even stupid ideas may be worth a second look?

*The £8k is a figure I saw in a newspaper article. It may not be correct. But whatever the real figure was, it was huge.

Agitate, educate, etc

Of all the social networking ideas, personally, I find Second Life to be the most gimmicky least convincing.

However, if you don't share this prejudice, then you can get involved in what is allegedly the first bit of industrial action in paradise. Or whatever.

Via John, who has more detail here.

Target 2008

The current situation in Burma / Myanmar provides an interesting angle on Moynihan’s Law.

"The amount of violations of human rights in a country is always an inverse function of the amount of complaints about human rights violations heard from there. The greater the number of complaints being aired, the better protected are human rights in that country."

Why should human-rights pressure groups expend a lot of energy criticising anti-democratic dictatorships when that are not vulnerable to criticism in the first place? It’s a reasonable question I suppose. It is difficult to make the case for self-censorship on the grounds that this uneven stream of criticism foregrounds the shortcomings of liberal democracies – the ‘bushblairhitler’ rhetoric -while effectively ignoring the real injustices and brutalities.

But what about when other factors make brutal dictatorships vulnerable to criticism? As Mick Hartley points out (in an excellent longer post)

“Since the threat of disruption to the 2008 Beijing Olympics seems to have paid some dividends in pushing China into modifying its policies on Darfur, maybe the same could apply here.”

Clearly, this is an example of where public opinion can be mobilised against a potential catastrophe. It would also provide those ready-to-go protest movements of all stripes with an opportunity to provide a counterbalance to the logic of Moynihan’s Law – without having to resort to self-censorship.

Will they take it? Will we see a massive pro-democracy mobilisation this weekend – marching to the Chinese embassy, calling for a boycott of the 2008 Olympics unless they withdraw support for the Generals?

I’ve not seen one planned, but I’m always told just how good the Internet is at this kind of thing.
I’ll go along if you will? Anyone?

Call to action

1. Support the Freemantle care workers. Read all about it. Via Neil at the trots.

2. More along the 'Belittle Britain' lines: It is the patriotic duty of everyone to write about the Tory grassroots like Pete is doing here. Their councillors will lose the next election for them - why doesn't Labour wake up to the fact that political centralisation serves to allow the massed ranks of the stupid party to hide behind the Bullingdon Boy's (admittedly, scuffed) veneer?

3. And - along the same lines again, I suppose that my 'I'm not voting for bloody Ken' rant is kind of put into perspective here. I'm still not happy with the general concepts of a powerful mayor though, and I reserve the right to vote for Ken with more reservations than I've ever had voting for a Labour candidate.

A worthy cause

John Smeaton has had more than a thousand pints bought for him already, but there's no need to stop there.

Watch the videos.

"They can try to come to Britain, and they can try to disrupt us any way they want, but the British people have been under a lot more things than this, and they will always stand proud. And you come to Glasgow, Glasgow doesn't accept this, do you know what I mean? This is Glasgow. We'll set about you."

Churchillian is the word that comes to mind. I wish that I could have bought Churchill a pint (apparently, it wouldn't have lasted very long....).

(Via Hak)

A sin that cries to heaven for vengence

More skinny on this here.

And while you're here....

• One game to go
• One point behind
• Two goal advantage on goal difference
• Game back on

Who'd have thought it?