Clicking in the name of!

So it’s happened. Rage Against The Machine, ironically enough, have proven the power of social networking to the remaining anti-techs out there, and it has real power. Last year we saw Barack Obama successfully highlight that the internet generally, and social networking specifically can be used to enhance a political campaign, he used it to: build a support network, raise money and target where his volunteers should canvass. This momentous achievement of new technology, helping in such a fundamental way to put the first black president in the White House was largely missed by most of the mainstream media; however Simon Cowell’s X-Factor act missing out on the Christmas number one - this is an achievement that cannot be ignored by our celebrity obsessed ‘news’ outlets.


It is a truly surprising outcome and a parable for our brave new world that husband and wife, Jon and Tracy Morter, could from the comfort of their own home, using the social networking site Facebook, topple the four year monopoly that the X-Factor has enjoyed over the Christmas number one slot. The LA rockers', Killing in the name of, has set two records: the most downloads registered in a single week, and the first song to peak the charts solely on download sales alone.

There has been a lot of nonsense talked about the demise of the Christmas number one over recent years, let’s be realistic, I can count the number of festive hits that had any artistic merit during my lifetime on one hand.


As a Rage Against The Machine fan, I’m ecstatic about their signature tune being so prominent once more, however the number of people who have commented that it is just a foul tirade of expletives have annoyed me. I would like to highlight the songs meaning for those who have dismissed it as profanity and empty angst.


The song is about powerful leaders and police officers being institutionally racist, many of them being members of the insidious Klu Klux Klan, it goes on to tell us that those in power manipulate and control what we think about them, i.e. ‘all police officers are heroes’, that in our society it seems justifiable for the police to kill, or to brutalise people from minorities in the name of the law, and that we moronically honour slain racist police officers. The line “Killing in the name of” therefore has two meanings: it is the murder of a black person by a racist cop, and that cop getting his just desserts in retaliation. “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me” is a rallying call to black minorities to stand up to racist police and to fight back, rebel against and to defy corrupt oppressive authority.


Killing in the name of may not be a jolly festive tune, but for the first time in a great many years a song has topped the chart which has a powerful message, great guitar riffs, and soul. We have caught a glimpse of the future power of social networking and happily we have learnt that Simon Cowell can’t always polish a turd, giving us a superbly surprising end to the otherwise dull and culturally vacuous year that was 2009. Happy Christmas!

Copenhagen, another Kyoto cop out?

It appears that as I write some sort of face saving fudge has been reached at the Copenhagen Climate Conference. A US spokesman is reported by the BBC to claim “a historic step forward” after an agreement between the US, China, India and South Africa has been reached, adding “the deal was not enough to prevent dangerous climate change in the future - but was an important first move.” Barack Obama describes it as a foundation for action, before adding there was “much further to go”. There is no mention in this statement of the EU, the world’s largest economic trading block, which seems a little surprising. I can only assume it’s an oversight, seeing as how Europe has led the charge on climate change for well over a decade now.



So will this “historic step” amount to anything? My suspicion is no, not really; it is another voluntary agreement, just the same as Rio and Kyoto. People will hail the fact that the US have taken part at Copenhagen, and are prepared to sign up this time. So what, would be my response; if we look at how many of the signatories to the two previous ‘agreements’ came even close to meeting their voluntary targets then we see that these conferences are utterly meaningless. They do however give our politicians the opportunity to strut on the global stage, spouting rhetoric to sure up their ‘green credentials’, whilst many will on previous evidence have no intention, whatsoever, of even attempting to implement a single commitment.


The conference build up was overshadowed by the accusations of “climategate”, where scientists from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit were reputed to have suppressed evidence that there was a levelling out in the rising temperature trends over the last decade. This was followed by the Russians accusing the Met Office of “cherry picking” the weather station data from across their country in order to enhance the case for warming. The Met Office strenuously denies this charge and they say they choose a set of stations evenly distributed across the globe.


Who knows what the truth is; the mysterious thing to me over the last decade has been the idea that most people are quite happy to accept those scientists who are sceptical to be naturally corrupt and in the pay of the fossil fuel lobby, like modern day Dr Mengeles. At the same time there is a bizarre assumption that those meteorologists who agree with a warming hypothesis are beyond reproach, neutral and impartial; like some sort of noble Victorian gentleman scientist. Modern science is an expensive business, and regardless of what side of an argument a scientist finds himself on, he is funded by someone or other. In the vast majority of cases, because they have a vested interest in that research supporting their view, this will sometimes deliberately and often subconsciously impact the findings of that research.


On this basis; I like everyone else, assume the sceptics look to ‘find’ evidence which highlights their hypothesis, but I also assume the non sceptics (for want of a better term) are equally as biased as their counterparts. This is true in many other fields of science, so why people think it should be different in the field of climatic research a mystery; as such I wasn’t remotely surprised to hear of alleged ‘selection’ by the Climate Research Unit.


Incidentally I have become increasingly uncomfortable with the growing use of ‘totalistic’ language employed by green activists over the last few years; sceptics are painted as ‘climate change deniers’ which is quite frankly offensive, and mere climate change is no longer serious enough, it has to be ‘disastrous’ or ‘catastrophic’. This seems to be the language of a cult to me, where any dissent is no longer tolerated; there can be no other view or challenge to ‘consensuses’. These characteristics are counterproductive to the argument and will turn people off from the problem; hence 46% of people in the UK are supposedly sceptical of manmade climate change, according to a recent ICM survey.


I think that the case for Global Warming is now highly established and that pumping billions of tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere is clearly effecting that process, however I also realise that those with the most to lose, should we try to reduce emissions are some of the richest and most powerful people in the world. The latter are the voices that global politicians hear, not ours; it doesn’t matter how hysterical the green movement becomes, they will stop using fossil fuels when they run out and not a second sooner. Sad, but unfortunately true, you may charge me with being too cynical, but I would suggest it is a realistic assumption based on history and human nature.

Straw Dogs

I once used to know a guy who would smoke pot and philosophise on the meaning of life, ponder the depths of the universe and question the very fabric of reality; he would then conclude that life is just a dream, we are merely creations of our own imaginations and that everything is just a shadow of an otherwise empty reality. To this we would politely listen, gravely nod and turn up Pink Floyd or Dire Straits and bring the conversation back to shallower subjects; such as football and pretty girls.


After reading John Gray’s ‘Straw Dogs: Thoughts on humans and other animals’ I am beginning to think he may have been on to something all those years ago. I had always dismissed this school of thought as a product of age. Too old to blithely live an existence in blind ignorance, though not yet old enough to have any real control or means of affecting that life, thus creating a nihilistic view of a cruel and ultimately empty world. John Gray poses a similar outlook, however coming from the Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics, he is a little more difficult to dismiss than my pot smoking friend from yesteryear.


As an atheist my hopes were firmly based in a vaguely humanist/secularist philosophy; man would through progress and science, eventually arrive in a place of peace and prosperity. All would be equal, hunger vanquished, superstitions quelled by knowledge. Or at least things would inevitably get a little bit better over time at any rate. According to Gray, this is just as starry eyed as belief in a deity, and is in fact a relic of Christian logic, as are many tenets of Enlightenment thought.


This book will be somewhat of an anathema to those who were laboring in the belief that humankind is somehow special, different or set aside from the rest of nature; we are neither the masters of our destiny nor the controllers of our fate. We are simply animals like any other, locked into our automatic waking dreams. It would seem, if we accept Gray’s extremely skeptical philosophy, then we must accept that our lives are just a by-product of genetics, most of what we perceive are illusions created by our brains and the ultimate end is that there is no purpose or point to our lives; there are no happy endings in this book!


I thoroughly enjoyed reading ‘Straw Dogs’ and found its assertion that humanism is no more based on reality than any of our more mystical beliefs insightful. Some of Gray’s arguments are weaker than others and he is generally lacking in any attempt at substantiation, though the logic is at times convincing.


On the whole it’s a good read if not an uplifting experience.

Flavor of Love

My current regime of weekend nightshifts at the garage and days during the week at uni has left me with a somewhat erratic body clock; it’s like being perpetually jet lagged without all the bother of actually travelling anywhere. I can sometimes lurch into wakefulness in the wee hours and I have found a more modern version of counting sheep.



All I have to do is flick on MTV and there is the perfect mind numbing antidote, TV programmes that don’t require any of my brains higher functions, just the brain stem, that relic of our reptile ancestry is stimulated, keeping me breathing whilst I’m dimly aware of colours passing before my eyes and garbled nonsensical sounds wash over me; before I know it I’m back into a much more convincing version of reality.


A couple of nights ago however, I was startled back into alertness by a show that makes the rest of MTV’s American celeb-reality formats look sane by comparison – I had stumbled upon the arrestingly bizarre ‘Flavor of Love’. This is the happy tale of Flavor Flav, the front man of Public Enemy, who is on a quest to find ‘true’ love. Mr Flav was apparently badly burnt in his last relationship with Brigitte Nielsen, so is wary of dabbling with another famous woman. Naturally a reality show is a safer environment for Flavor to find the woman of his dreams.


Those born circa 1990 are probably wondering; who the hell are Flavor Flav and Brigitte Nielsen? Well Public Enemy were a hip hop group who allegedly made ‘politically charged’ music and the track ‘Fight the Power’ was their most famous offering. Flav also wore clocks around his neck, to which people used to say: “WOW! How like totally COOL”, for we lived in simpler and more forgiving times. Brigitte Nielsen was quite tall.


The best thing about this show are the contestants, who are the most stupid individuals on the planet; if you were to measure their collective IQs it would tally to that of an average poodle. They go on ‘dates’ with Flav and give the impression that they would do ANYTHING to win this show to capitalise on their 15 seconds of fame, including listening to Flavor’s nonsensical ramblings. I do not know if it’s because he’s meddled with too many drugs over the years or received a savage blow to the head, but with his 1000 yard stare and tourette's like mumbling, Flav does not give an impression of balance and composure.


If you get a chance to, you should watch one episode of this show for some jaw dropping comedy value; in much the same way as everyone should watch one episode of ‘Pimp My Ride UK’ to have a good laugh at the madness of Tim Westwood’s persona. Unfortunately my new accommodation doesn’t avail me with Sky in my room, so I will need to find some new sleep remedy; however I doubt I’ll see anything as monumentally insane as ‘Flavor of Love’ for quite some time.

Has the Independent had its day?

It would appear that the Independent’s future may be more perilous than was previously thought. It has been widely acknowledged for some time that the paper has had financial problems, with losses reputed to be in the region of £10 million a year, leading to workforce reductions and the Independent’s remaining staff being forced to rent office space in the Daily Mail’s headquarters of all places.

A source who prefers not to be named has told me that the paper is now being invoiced on a daily basis for its distribution, after its circulation has continued to drop, now below 200,000 copies per day, posing ever deeper questions about its financial viability. The paper’s ownership deserve much credit for keeping the Independent running for as long as they have, in the face of the losses they have incurred over recent years; the renascence it enjoyed after becoming the first ‘compact’ broadsheet seems so long ago now.

Should the Independent go, the political balance of the British press will become even weaker than it already is. Of the major titles the Mirror is alone in representing the left, and with the Guardian, the Independent representing a centrist viewpoint. All of the rest firmly support a right-wing view of the world, spreading pessimism and pandering to irrational fear. Clearly the circulation figures suggest the British public prefer their news to represent this view and the dominance of the tabloid format hints at unwillingness to read a story expanded beyond the bare facts.

I hope the Independent can survive, it seems sad to me that virtually all newspaper sales are focused on such a narrow point of view. We need papers that challenge the prevailing opinion; opposing the Iraq war, promoting environmental issues, supporting civil liberties and campaigning for electoral reform to fix Britain’s crooked politics.  What other paper would run a blank front page with simply "WHITEWASH?" printed to display their contempt at an establishment cover up?

Leave the Tent and Bunker: bring politics back into the open.

This week has been an interesting one for those of a political bent. It started with an Ipsos MORI poll showing that the Tories' lead has been reduced to 6 points, producing Conservative fear, Labour hope and a combination of both for those of us in the Lib-Dems. In the event of a hung parliament we have a difficult choice; to prop up an unpopular Labour Government, to form a coalition with the Tories who would refuse to offer constitutional reform - a fundamental Lib-Dem condition, or to do neither and allow a minority government. The latter would be my preference, which would mean the Lib-Dems wouldn’t be sullied by Red/Blue policies and leave us as power brokers in parliament; whoever was in government would have to tailor legislation to get liberal support.



We could have moved from Blair’s ‘Big Tent’, via Brown’s ‘Bunker’ into a brief period of compromise and government by consent.


Then we had an unusually exciting Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, with David Cameron attacking Labour over giving public money to an alleged extremist organisation, namely Hizb ut-Tahrir, via a ‘front’ organisation running two schools in the South-East. If true then this is an extraordinary revelation; £113,000 pounds of tax payers money, possibly from the Pathfinder fund set up to combat extremism, being given over to an organisation who are reported to have stated that: “Jews should be killed wherever you find them” and their constitution states of non-Muslims that: “their blood is lawful, as is their property.” The Government have denied that the money came from its Pathfinder scheme; however this misses the point, why an organisation like this is running schools in the first place? Most would accept that any public money handed over to them is outrageous, though until the full details emerge we should perhaps reserve judgement.

After this we had Nick Clegg strike a direct hit on Gordon Brown over the Chilcot Enquiry into the contentious Iraq War. Clegg first asked the PM to confirm the enquiry was to be open and transparent, save on matters of national security. The PM stated: “I have set out a remit and brought it to the House of Commons. Sir John Chilcot has been given the freedom to conduct his inquiry as he wants. He has chosen to invite people to give evidence, and he will choose how to bring his final report to the public. That is a matter for the inquiry.” Clegg responded: “As I think the Prime Minister must know, the matter is not just for the inquiry, because his Government have just issued a protocol - I have it here - to members of the inquiry, governing the publication of material in the final report. If he reads it, he will see that it includes nine separate reasons why information can be suppressed, most of which have nothing to do with national security. Outrageously, it gives Whitehall Departments individual rights of veto over the information in the final report. Why did the Prime Minister not tell us about that before? How on earth will we, and the whole country, hear the full truth of the decisions leading up to the invasion of Iraq if the inquiry is suffocated on day one by his Government’s shameful culture of secrecy?”

Not quite as open as we had been led to believe then – we shouldn’t forget the PM wanted this enquiry to be held behind closed doors, I can only assume because it severely embarrasses many of those still in government, himself included, which exposes how they knowingly and willingly led this country into war on the basis of lies and spin.


For those who want to know the full truth of this sorry episode of British foreign policy, I fear we shall have to wait for the 30 year rule to be implemented.

Horizon – Money for old rope?

When I read the synopsis for this week’s offering of Horizon (BBC2) I let out an audible sigh, and set my expectations to disappointment. Alan Davies, sometime comedian, panellist and mediocre actor was ‘on a quest’ to find the length of a piece of string, leading him 'on a journey’ into the field of quantum mechanics. Hilarity all round then, we start off with a cliché, Alan can look comically befuddled and add some bons-mots on the not so funny world that is the incredibly small.

It is only fair to set my stall out early; I am a huge fan of the Horizon format. Over the years they have made some brilliant, ground breaking and informative documentaries; a task that fulfilled the BBC’s role as a public service broadcaster.

It was not however a huge ratings winner, and in the modern world of the Beeb this can mean only one thing – fuck about with the format. The popular tool to ‘fix’ the documentary format these days is either the docudrama, usually reserved for historical subject matter and when done well can be good; however when done badly resembles a metaphorical car crash between a Jane Austin novel and a 1972 Open University broadcast.

The other tool in tele-land is the modern favourite that if in doubt; slap a celebrity on it, the great panacea of our age. This is especially galling when done to the documentary format, even more so when it’s done badly and inexcusable when done to Horizon.

This week’s subject matter of Quantum Mechanics is an incredibly complex branch of physics. Richard Feynman, winner of the Nobel Prize for physics said: “if you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics”, so I was eager to see what light Alan Davies would shine on a science which Einstein himself was troubled by and unsurprisingly the answer was very little.

It gave the impression that after Alan had got his piece of string, measured it and chatted to a couple of kooky scientists that the producers had managed to fill 30 minutes of the hour long show. Rather than expanding on the science they chose to fill the remaining time with some baffling sequences of Alan mumbling with slow motion shots of him wandering down the road; brow furrowed, clutching his piece of string. There were also lots of echoed replays of segments of Alan’s discourse, maybe too strong a term, with the physicists; brow furrowed, clutching his piece of string.

Horizon used to be the only vehicle on TV where those of us interested in science, expanding our minds and maybe challenging our understanding could go. The public service aspect of the Beeb has been gnawed away by executives who believe the only validation of a program is large ratings. It seems that the idea TV can be good; with a loyal if not huge audience is an antediluvian concept these days. I would like to grab those who have diluted Horizon to this travesty of a show by the ears and suggest if they want to make vacuous, celeb obsessed nonsense then they should piss off and work on Strictly Come Dancing, or some other cranially challenging format.

Next week’s Horizon: Flogging a Dead Horse – Les Dennis examines Keynesian Economics using a dead horse to illustrate the free market, followed by this week’s guest Question Time host – Jordan aka Katie Price. God help us all!

Power sharing: Is Britain equitable?

I've just handed a politics essay in, part of which was to analyse how democratic Britain is, and to select two criteria which I felt a good democracy should possess. 

The first criterion was a little technocratic; that the legislature should have sufficient power to scrutinise and be able to hold the executive to account.  This is important stuff, though I freely admit a bit boring unless you happen to be a political geek like myself.

The second criterion that I chose was more topical; that minority ethnic groups should not be excluded from the decision making process and therefore should be fully represented in all institutions of power.  To quote George Orwell's "All animals are equal ..." is a lazy cliche, but there we go; is our democratic system equitable, or is latent inequality the status quo?


When examining minority ethnic participation within positions of power and responsibility, we first need to define the proportion of the British population defined as being from minority ethnic groups. If we take the 2001 census as the most recent accurate source, then minority ethnic groups form 9.1% of the English, 2.1% of Welsh and 2% of the Scottish populations; and 7.9% of the United Kingdom as a whole. We should expect there to be a correlation between these figures when we examine minority ethnic participation within government and public life, if the second of my criteria is to be met.

I looked at a Parliamentary report from 2008 by Ben Smith titled Ethnic Minorities in Politics, Government and Public Life which examined this question, from which I have highlighted some examples.

The Executive:

Within the executive there are currently no cabinet ministers from a minority ethnic group, however there have been in the past; former Labour MP Paul Boateng (right) being the first in 2002.  At the time the report was published there were 122 ministerial positions; of which 7 were held by members of minority ethnic backgrounds, which represents 5.7% of the total.

The Civil Service:

The civil service as a whole employed 7.6% of its staff from minority ethnic groups in 2002, rising to 8.3% in 2008, higher than the 2001 census figures; however when we examine senior positions it is 2.9% rising to 4% respectively, and is therefore under represented by minority ethnic groups.

Quangos (Quasi autonomous non-governmental organisations):

Quangos are undemocratic institutions relying on patronage; however they do hold real power within the British system. In 1992 only 2% of participants were selected from minority ethnic groups, this had risen by 2007 to 9.2% in England, 4% in Wales and 3% in Scotland. This means that Quangos are now well represented when referenced to the 2001 census figures; however there is no mention to what proportion of senior roles come from minority ethnic groups.

The Legislature:

In The House of Commons there have periodically been MPs from minority ethnic groups, the first being David Sombre in 1841. The first woman from a minority ethnic group was Diane Abbott (left), who with Paul Boateng, Bernie Grant and Keith Vaz became the first MPs since the Second World War to come from these groups. There are currently fifteen MPs from minority ethnic groups; this represents a distinct lack of representation, there should be fifty-one to equate to the 2001 census proportion. The House of Lords currently does not provide figures on the ethnic identity of its membership; however it is fair to assume that it is under represented as most Lords are drawn from The House of Commons.


Local Government:

When examining local councillors elected in 2006 he found 4.1% were from minority ethnic groups, therefore well below the census figures and Smith tells us that minority ethnic women are “severely under represented” at this level of government.

The Judiciary:

According to statistics on The Judiciary of England and Wales website; there are no minority ethnic judges above the level of High Court Judge, and at this level 3.5% are represented. When looking at the judiciary as a whole, 4.5% are represented by minority ethnic groups, with women being well represented as reported by The Judiciary of England and Wales (2009). This is the only example of minority ethnic women being well represented in a position of power; why the lower levels of the judiciary is the platform that this occurs is not explained.

So then what are we to make of all these statistics? It is clear that minority ethnic groups are under represented in government, and we could expand this criticism to include women in general, the disabled, gay groups as well as people from working class backgrounds.  It isn't all bad news though, the statistics do show that the lower echelons of government are becoming more representative, however this has yet to translate to senior roles.  I will return to this subject in the New Year; I have yet to write part two of my essay and I wouldn't want to be accused of plagiarising myself!

I will say however that we should be concerned that British democracy isn't representative of society, it raises the anecdotal question of how deeply entrenched; latent racism, xenophobia, sexism, homophobia and disabled discrimination are within large segments of British society.  It is also concerning that the vast majority of those in power come from an extremely narrow background, namely; upper-middle class, white, Ox-bridge educated men.  It seems improbable to me that they will represent all of society, when they have similar vested interests to protect.

I think the more Diane Abbotts, Paul Boatengs, Simon Hugheses (below) and David Blunketts there are in British politics then the better we will be as a society, and the less disenfranchised we will be as a whole.

Means testing is mean:

I went to see the dentist for his six monthly poke about in my mouth last week.
It was unsettling this time for a couple of reasons, primarily because of the untimely death of my dentist of eight years earlier this summer. John Bue was a lovely man, who always seemed pleased to see me and despite his incredibly busy schedule always found time for a chat; he was a Liverpool and I a Newcastle fan, as such we would bemoan the failings of our respective teams at length. For someone I barely knew, his passing away deeply saddened me and he shall be greatly missed.

The other unsettling thing was a little more unexpected, for you see I am now a full time student, so I was looking forward to receiving my dental care for free! It isn't a case of free loading; I have a very tight budget, and £20 is a lot of money to me now. I booked my next appointment and when the receptionist asked for payment, I meekly informed her that I was a student and didn't have to pay. Somewhat to my surprise, she told me I had to fill out an application form, and if successful, I would be able to get a refund; no problem I thought!

When I got home and pulled the strangely weighty tome from its brown envelope. I thought I had picked the wrong form up, but no, you have to fill out a twenty page booklet asking a stream of hugely irrelevant and intrusive questions about every aspect of your financial income and personal details. One question was about how many breakfasts you receive as part of any rent! If you have a partner you must also inform the NHS police of their details too.

Fair enough, I hear you say. It probably stops benefit fraud, you've nothing to hide. Whats the problem?

Well, apart from being a irksome waste of my time, students have to provide term dates, even though it acknowledges on the form universities operate on a semester basis, requiring a pointless trip to admin to generate some official meaningless dates. Apart from free dental care being my right when Labour created the NHS. Apart from the inevitable tower of waste and bureaucracy that administering this over the top new system must cost, will surely out weigh any counter fraud savings.

It sums the current government up, a minority of people were wrongly claiming for free dental care and prescriptions. So what do you do to solve this problem? Most people would suggest maybe punishment of those who steal health care, not New Labour. Their solution is the creation of an expensive bureaucracy, an intrusive waste of time for those who have an entitlement to free care, and yet another means test. It seems that Labour have forgotten the principles of the NHS which it founded sixty-five years ago, and it could be argued they have done very little of merit since.