Even those who viewed with scepticism Sordel's previous adulation of the Formerly Red Baron cannot deny that Peter Mandleson has had a good couple of days.
Sunday was, of course, the day when he put in his application to work for the forthcoming Conservative government, by announcing during the course of a Sunday Times interview that he would certainly be willing to serve his country during a future Cameron administration. This is entirely consistent of Baron M., since if the thought of working for people who loathed him was uncomfortable to the Great Man, he certainly wouldn't be toiling for Gordon Brown. Indeed, the faces of his colleagues could scarcely be less friendly if they belonged to die-hard Tories.
Monday then saw Baron M.'s speech to conference.
Unlike another prominent Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, Peter Mandleson is not a well-known conference darling. Michael Heseltine - in many ways his closest antecedent as a maverick, egotistical power-broker - returned to the conference podium like a rock star coming to the stage in his home town. Mandleson, however, has merely been tolerated ... like a blob of toothpaste on an adolescent pustule.
The sound-bite that the news went with was "If I can come back, we can come back": a line delivered with a coprophagous grin and the air of one delivering a very simple joke to a very young nephew. He gave a sort of stage chuckle half way through, simulating good spirits in much the way that someone might simulate appetite by licking their lips and rubbing their stomach in a great big clumsy circle.
The line - however well-received in the hall - makes very little sense, though. It's like saying "if herpes can come back, swine flu can come back." The entire point about herpes is that it comes back: a guarantee that does not extend to the Labour Party.
In any case, Mandleson's best line was less widely reported. "I know that Tony said our project would only be complete when The Labour Party learned to love Peter Mandleson ... I think perhaps he set the bar too high." Here we see the essence of the splendid Baron: a man who at the summit of his power can still reproach those who declined to sign their name in blood on the dotted line.
It takes a particularly gloating form of villainy (one not seen since Cary Grant hung from Mount Rushmore providing Eva Marie Saint with a lifeline) to step on someone's knuckles when they are clinging on for dear life. Peter, Übermensch that he is, could do it with a smile.
Not, perhaps, a warm one.
It has widely been reported that the Baron has secured the prime minister's future and won over the hearts and minds of the Labour delegates with his performance.
Sordel suspects that in this case the media and the party faithful have both been misled. To misquote Richard Thompson: they thought he was saying good luck when he was saying goodbye.
Showing posts with label Labour. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Labour. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Friday, July 3, 2009
Just Like The Girl From Dr. No
Q: How many members of the government does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Two. Gordon Brown to change the light bulb and Peter Mandelson to explain that the bulb hasn't been changed.
Sordel is something of a fan of The (Formerly) Red Baron. In the past, government apologists have always adopted a fixed and ingratiating smile: the physical memory of something passing for charm. Kenneth Baker always had that smile. Ed Balls and his Stepford wife have that smile.
Baron M. does not have that smile.
He conveys to all watching that it is his painful duty to tolerate the stupid questions put to him and then (with an air of high moral seriousness somewhat inappropriate to a man hawking rotten fish) to set the interviewer right on a few points. Like a lidless headmaster exhausted by the folly of his charges his body language indicates that patience is at an end but rectitude in plentiful supply. The man is unflagging, indomitable: like the shapeshifting terminator and just as Protean.
We are only just getting started on his virtues, however, for Baron M. is also the consummate survivor of British politics. If there is a global nuclear war the only things left alive will be the cockroaches and him, but the cockroaches will lack the capacity to celebrate their victory. When Baron M. goes home at the end of the day there must be some fleeting moment (perhaps shortly before, perhaps shortly after turning off the light) when he indulges in a stiff but passionate dance of victory. One can imagine him silhouetted against a window frame, gyrating in unholy exaltation at the thought of his perennial return to power.
Surely every jilted lover has dreamt of the moment when his or her lover would come crawling back for that moment of jubilant closure. Is there a line in Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" that would disqualify it as Baron M. personal anthem? Yet when The (F.) R. B. walked in and found Gordon with that sad look upon his face, he neither crumbled nor lay down & died ... nor declared that he was saving all his lovin' for someone who's lovin' him. The love of Baron M. is boundless, and extends even to a stricken foe.
He walked on the water while the sharks were coming for Brown.
So how can one not admire Baron M.? Here is a man who - given a sow's ear - attempts to make a silk purse: a man who never encounters excrement without having a can of Mr. Sheen at the ready. His attitude is Can Do. His personal motto is The Difficult We Do Right Now, Winning The Election May Take A Little Time.
What's not to like?
A: Two. Gordon Brown to change the light bulb and Peter Mandelson to explain that the bulb hasn't been changed.
Sordel is something of a fan of The (Formerly) Red Baron. In the past, government apologists have always adopted a fixed and ingratiating smile: the physical memory of something passing for charm. Kenneth Baker always had that smile. Ed Balls and his Stepford wife have that smile.
Baron M. does not have that smile.
He conveys to all watching that it is his painful duty to tolerate the stupid questions put to him and then (with an air of high moral seriousness somewhat inappropriate to a man hawking rotten fish) to set the interviewer right on a few points. Like a lidless headmaster exhausted by the folly of his charges his body language indicates that patience is at an end but rectitude in plentiful supply. The man is unflagging, indomitable: like the shapeshifting terminator and just as Protean.
We are only just getting started on his virtues, however, for Baron M. is also the consummate survivor of British politics. If there is a global nuclear war the only things left alive will be the cockroaches and him, but the cockroaches will lack the capacity to celebrate their victory. When Baron M. goes home at the end of the day there must be some fleeting moment (perhaps shortly before, perhaps shortly after turning off the light) when he indulges in a stiff but passionate dance of victory. One can imagine him silhouetted against a window frame, gyrating in unholy exaltation at the thought of his perennial return to power.
Surely every jilted lover has dreamt of the moment when his or her lover would come crawling back for that moment of jubilant closure. Is there a line in Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" that would disqualify it as Baron M. personal anthem? Yet when The (F.) R. B. walked in and found Gordon with that sad look upon his face, he neither crumbled nor lay down & died ... nor declared that he was saving all his lovin' for someone who's lovin' him. The love of Baron M. is boundless, and extends even to a stricken foe.
He walked on the water while the sharks were coming for Brown.
So how can one not admire Baron M.? Here is a man who - given a sow's ear - attempts to make a silk purse: a man who never encounters excrement without having a can of Mr. Sheen at the ready. His attitude is Can Do. His personal motto is The Difficult We Do Right Now, Winning The Election May Take A Little Time.
What's not to like?
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Black Balls For White Supremacists?
Short of having a peerage, could Gordon Brown be less democratic? As an MP for a Scottish constituency he, like so many of his auld acquaintances, owes his place in the Commons to a West Lothian bye. He was never elected to his place as leader of the Labour Party, and never elected to be prime minister either. If he wants someone in the cabinet but can't get them elected (such as Peter Mandelson) he hands them a peerage. Moreover, at a time when it is painfully obvious to everyone that he can command the support neither of the country nor his own party (nor, quite possibly, his own cabinet), he clings on to power with the same Nanny-knows-best logic as his predecessor.
This is the man showing a new zeal for parliamentary reform.
It is interesting that he - and others - have been attacking the old abuses of the Commons with the emblem of a "gentleman's club". This comparison suits the class war mentality that he and Baron Mandelson seem to believe plays to a Great British Public resentful of privilege, yet it also seems a remarkably thin comparison. Gentlemen's clubs are, it is true, known for their leather armchairs, but extensive redecoration of the Commons is scarcely affordable, let alone necessary. Clubs are also known for their sleepy atmosphere, but - given the tireless energy that the members have been putting into their expenses - clearly there has been little time for napping between debates.
Moreover, it is worth bearing in mind that gentlemen's clubs supply a luxury that is paid for by its members, and not taxed out of the pockets of those milling outside its doors. People don't enter gentlemen's clubs to make money; they generally have it on the way in and somewhat less of it on the way out.
Presumably the basis of the comparison, then, is this: clubs are exclusive. They keep out the people who don't "fit".
It is interesting, then, that recent news has taught us a lot more about the ways of democracy with regard to the BNP. Evidently the other political parties have been colluding to run additional candidates in areas of local BNP strength in order to dilute their vote. There is, in short, a conspiracy against the BNP. When Nick Griffin said last night that the egg-throwers were only doing what the major political parties wanted them to, he was far-right on the money.
Now, I can't say that I like the BNP much, but amongst the reasons for Hitler's rise a prominent one was the defects of the Weimar Republic, and the roots causes of support for the BNP are not so distant. The Labour government spent years whipping up anti-Islamic sentiment in an effort to persuade us that fighting a war abroad was the only way to prevent domestic terrorism here. It was shameful fear-mongering, and has resulted in a country where dislike of foreigners now has an institutional root. Open the door to xenophobia (for contemptible political ends) and racist politicians will squeeze through.
Another factor to consider here is politicians tend to be made in the image of the tactics used against them, and the eggs are only the latest of the harassment used upon Nick Griffin, who has been unsuccessfully prosecuted for inciting racial hatred twice and was, of course, prevented from attending the vote count on Sunday at his first attempt by the mob demonstrating outside.
According to Wikipedia, Nick Griffin has a Boxing Blue from Cambridge. He apparently took up the sport after a "brawl with an anti-fascist". He will learn and employ tactics appropriate to those used upon him.
It goes without saying that there is no moral equivalency between racial hatred and spangly loo-seats but I do have a nagging fear that the true threat to the British political system is not the people clamouring to get into our parliament but the people fighting so ignobly to stay there.
This is the man showing a new zeal for parliamentary reform.
It is interesting that he - and others - have been attacking the old abuses of the Commons with the emblem of a "gentleman's club". This comparison suits the class war mentality that he and Baron Mandelson seem to believe plays to a Great British Public resentful of privilege, yet it also seems a remarkably thin comparison. Gentlemen's clubs are, it is true, known for their leather armchairs, but extensive redecoration of the Commons is scarcely affordable, let alone necessary. Clubs are also known for their sleepy atmosphere, but - given the tireless energy that the members have been putting into their expenses - clearly there has been little time for napping between debates.
Moreover, it is worth bearing in mind that gentlemen's clubs supply a luxury that is paid for by its members, and not taxed out of the pockets of those milling outside its doors. People don't enter gentlemen's clubs to make money; they generally have it on the way in and somewhat less of it on the way out.
Presumably the basis of the comparison, then, is this: clubs are exclusive. They keep out the people who don't "fit".
It is interesting, then, that recent news has taught us a lot more about the ways of democracy with regard to the BNP. Evidently the other political parties have been colluding to run additional candidates in areas of local BNP strength in order to dilute their vote. There is, in short, a conspiracy against the BNP. When Nick Griffin said last night that the egg-throwers were only doing what the major political parties wanted them to, he was far-right on the money.
Now, I can't say that I like the BNP much, but amongst the reasons for Hitler's rise a prominent one was the defects of the Weimar Republic, and the roots causes of support for the BNP are not so distant. The Labour government spent years whipping up anti-Islamic sentiment in an effort to persuade us that fighting a war abroad was the only way to prevent domestic terrorism here. It was shameful fear-mongering, and has resulted in a country where dislike of foreigners now has an institutional root. Open the door to xenophobia (for contemptible political ends) and racist politicians will squeeze through.
Another factor to consider here is politicians tend to be made in the image of the tactics used against them, and the eggs are only the latest of the harassment used upon Nick Griffin, who has been unsuccessfully prosecuted for inciting racial hatred twice and was, of course, prevented from attending the vote count on Sunday at his first attempt by the mob demonstrating outside.
According to Wikipedia, Nick Griffin has a Boxing Blue from Cambridge. He apparently took up the sport after a "brawl with an anti-fascist". He will learn and employ tactics appropriate to those used upon him.
It goes without saying that there is no moral equivalency between racial hatred and spangly loo-seats but I do have a nagging fear that the true threat to the British political system is not the people clamouring to get into our parliament but the people fighting so ignobly to stay there.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Brownian Motion
So: the big result is in.
The charming thing about The Apprentice is that it isn't decided by a public vote. Going back to my earlier comments on elitism, we should celebrate an area of televisual competition in which victory is allocated solely on the basis of the decision of a single judge who (rightly or wrongly) is acknowledged as the expert. Generally unerring though Simon Cowell may be, he is still forced to share power with the two lesser lights on his various panels, and is then forced to submit their collective decision for ratification to the collectively tin ear of Britain. The future Lord Sugar stands alone; it is indeed his way or the highway.
Had the European elections been settled on a similar system, the BNP would probably not have won its first two seats last night. Someone (quite possibly - on the basis of his extensive experience of European voting systems - Graham Norton) would decide for us all, and the inevitable confusion that follows from allowing the Great British Public to settle any question of moment would have been avoided.
The downside of all this, however, would have been that the losers would not have been able to call upon an enormous range of fanciful excuses to explain their failure.
If you listen to the Labour faithful (as we must now describe Lord Mandelson, who has engineered the biggest turnaround since Saul stopped persecuting Christians and changed his initial letter to P) then we all want him and Gordon to get back to the serious business of sorting out the economy. The anti-Labour vote was seemingly a slap on the wrist delivered to all politicians but focused upon the ruling party. The vote for the BNP was cast by people too stupid to be trusted with the vote in the first place, who evidently have no idea that the BNP is a racist party. So, at least, run interpretations repeated last night with such unanimity that any teacher worth his salt would have inferred collusion.
This post hoc gerrymandering, in which the vote is explicated one way or another to suit the standpoints of the politicians, is what happens when the usual excuse for ignoring the British public - "the only poll that counts is the one held this week/next week/sometime/never" - is rendered fatuous by an election actually having taken place.
What we really want is someone with the authority of the soon-no-longer-to-be Surallan to tell us all Why I Fired Them. In the absence of that certainly, the paths of our political masters are as inscrutable as the movement of pollen particles in water.
We can only congratulate ourselves that so many of them have sunk without trace.
The charming thing about The Apprentice is that it isn't decided by a public vote. Going back to my earlier comments on elitism, we should celebrate an area of televisual competition in which victory is allocated solely on the basis of the decision of a single judge who (rightly or wrongly) is acknowledged as the expert. Generally unerring though Simon Cowell may be, he is still forced to share power with the two lesser lights on his various panels, and is then forced to submit their collective decision for ratification to the collectively tin ear of Britain. The future Lord Sugar stands alone; it is indeed his way or the highway.
Had the European elections been settled on a similar system, the BNP would probably not have won its first two seats last night. Someone (quite possibly - on the basis of his extensive experience of European voting systems - Graham Norton) would decide for us all, and the inevitable confusion that follows from allowing the Great British Public to settle any question of moment would have been avoided.
The downside of all this, however, would have been that the losers would not have been able to call upon an enormous range of fanciful excuses to explain their failure.
If you listen to the Labour faithful (as we must now describe Lord Mandelson, who has engineered the biggest turnaround since Saul stopped persecuting Christians and changed his initial letter to P) then we all want him and Gordon to get back to the serious business of sorting out the economy. The anti-Labour vote was seemingly a slap on the wrist delivered to all politicians but focused upon the ruling party. The vote for the BNP was cast by people too stupid to be trusted with the vote in the first place, who evidently have no idea that the BNP is a racist party. So, at least, run interpretations repeated last night with such unanimity that any teacher worth his salt would have inferred collusion.
This post hoc gerrymandering, in which the vote is explicated one way or another to suit the standpoints of the politicians, is what happens when the usual excuse for ignoring the British public - "the only poll that counts is the one held this week/next week/sometime/never" - is rendered fatuous by an election actually having taken place.
What we really want is someone with the authority of the soon-no-longer-to-be Surallan to tell us all Why I Fired Them. In the absence of that certainly, the paths of our political masters are as inscrutable as the movement of pollen particles in water.
We can only congratulate ourselves that so many of them have sunk without trace.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Reality TV
So, Big Brother started again last night, which rather confuses things.
For example: "The House this year will be a place for wholly unsurprising twists." Is that the Big Brother House or the House of Commons? "The General Public will lose interest in activities within The House unless they see arguments and intrigue." BB or HoC? "Voters will be throwing people out of The House until mid-Summer, when there will only be a handful of fame-hungry eccentrics left." BB or HoC?
It's so difficult to tell.
This year, the only way to stay in The House is evidently to shave off one's eyebrows and draw spectacles and a funny moustache on your face in permanent black marker. (No, I've stopped playing that game now.) Those who have watched the series in previous years will shrug and yawn at the tedium of watching an assortment of page 3 girls and homosexuals go into a studio very quickly and come out again very, very slowly.
Meanwhile, in the other House, the entertainment value is noticably higher but impossible to keep up with even in so evanescent a medium as a blog. Last night, as the polls closed, we discovered that the Minister for Eating Biscuits had resigned, or so it appeared on Breakfast Time today where the only video the BBC had managed to scrape together of James Purnell was of his conspicuously filling his face while Gordon Brown held forth of a topic of national importance to his left.
It wasn't so much the biscuits that were important to the video, I suppose, but his positioning as Brown's literal "right-hand man". Nevertheless, it was the biscuits that formed the crucial semiotic element of the picture, and I only infer that it was biscuits on which the future rebel was feasting based on the unlikelihood that cabinet meetings are supplied with anything else. It may have been custard creams that he was hitting with the urgency of a man who missed breakfast and last night's supper, but he may have been tucking in to a full thali with complementary popadum for all I know. Whichever, the BBC was keen to show that in that moment of contemplative mastication the future savour of treachery was developing.
Either that, or they couldn't find a better clip of him.
Newsnight, which begins so precisely after the end of Big Brother that a segue is implicit, covered the Purnell story in an extended programme, which would be laudable had the programme been extended to cover the Purnell story. Instead, it was extended to give viewers a preview of Newsnight's forthcoming coverage of the General Election.
That's right: Newsnight is beginning a year-long schedule of activities including: commentary from an American pollster and - wait for it! - three people sitting around a table talking about politics.
Watching someone shave of their eyebrows and draw spectacles and a funny moustache on their face suddenly doesn't sound so bad, does it?
To be fair, Newsnight does have one actual new idea, which is a Dragon's Den style series in which members of the public pitch political ideas to a panel of so-called experts, but that does go merely another step further to adding to our confusion. All we need is Surralan to step into the picture and ... oh ... this just in ...
Perhaps if the editors of Newsnight want to increase their viewing figures by speculating about the future occupants of The House a year out, they picked the wrong House to cover.
For example: "The House this year will be a place for wholly unsurprising twists." Is that the Big Brother House or the House of Commons? "The General Public will lose interest in activities within The House unless they see arguments and intrigue." BB or HoC? "Voters will be throwing people out of The House until mid-Summer, when there will only be a handful of fame-hungry eccentrics left." BB or HoC?
It's so difficult to tell.
This year, the only way to stay in The House is evidently to shave off one's eyebrows and draw spectacles and a funny moustache on your face in permanent black marker. (No, I've stopped playing that game now.) Those who have watched the series in previous years will shrug and yawn at the tedium of watching an assortment of page 3 girls and homosexuals go into a studio very quickly and come out again very, very slowly.
Meanwhile, in the other House, the entertainment value is noticably higher but impossible to keep up with even in so evanescent a medium as a blog. Last night, as the polls closed, we discovered that the Minister for Eating Biscuits had resigned, or so it appeared on Breakfast Time today where the only video the BBC had managed to scrape together of James Purnell was of his conspicuously filling his face while Gordon Brown held forth of a topic of national importance to his left.
It wasn't so much the biscuits that were important to the video, I suppose, but his positioning as Brown's literal "right-hand man". Nevertheless, it was the biscuits that formed the crucial semiotic element of the picture, and I only infer that it was biscuits on which the future rebel was feasting based on the unlikelihood that cabinet meetings are supplied with anything else. It may have been custard creams that he was hitting with the urgency of a man who missed breakfast and last night's supper, but he may have been tucking in to a full thali with complementary popadum for all I know. Whichever, the BBC was keen to show that in that moment of contemplative mastication the future savour of treachery was developing.
Either that, or they couldn't find a better clip of him.
Newsnight, which begins so precisely after the end of Big Brother that a segue is implicit, covered the Purnell story in an extended programme, which would be laudable had the programme been extended to cover the Purnell story. Instead, it was extended to give viewers a preview of Newsnight's forthcoming coverage of the General Election.
That's right: Newsnight is beginning a year-long schedule of activities including: commentary from an American pollster and - wait for it! - three people sitting around a table talking about politics.
Watching someone shave of their eyebrows and draw spectacles and a funny moustache on their face suddenly doesn't sound so bad, does it?
To be fair, Newsnight does have one actual new idea, which is a Dragon's Den style series in which members of the public pitch political ideas to a panel of so-called experts, but that does go merely another step further to adding to our confusion. All we need is Surralan to step into the picture and ... oh ... this just in ...
Perhaps if the editors of Newsnight want to increase their viewing figures by speculating about the future occupants of The House a year out, they picked the wrong House to cover.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
The Rat That Missed The Piper
Last night (in true Les Mis fashion) Sordel dreamed a dream, and in this dream the Labour Party presented one of those surreal it'll-never-happen European Election Broadcasts in which the spokesman was inappropriate to a surreal degree. You know the sort of thing ... talking giraffe, Lord Lucan, badger in spectacles and a hat?
Except that in this case it was Eddie Izzard. And it wasn't a dream.
Back in the days of Cool Britannia it used to be the case that Labour liked to adorn itself with celebrity bling because it was so widely supported that even the likes of Oasis felt that it could take the Blair shilling without, um, shilling too conspicuously. The cash-for-bangers Popular Vote is a nice little runaround for most of the year, but to show off one's success one does like a rock star for the one dry Saturday in July.
Unfortunately, at a time when even the cabinet are high-tailing it out of Dodge like a bunch of banditos with the posse on their tail, watching a celebrity endorsement is rather like seeing a bag lady in a moth-eaten mink coat. There is a definite suspicion that Izzard was bumbling through the studio improvising a brilliant monologue full of hilarious non sequiturs when Jacqui Smith handed him a mic before casting a nervous glance over her shoulder and bolting for the nearest exit.
"Tell them why you're voting Labour, Eddie!" a director must have hissed, mopping sweat from his brow like the producer of the last radio station in government hands in the midst of a South American military coup.
And, like the trouper that he evidently is, Izzard ventured upon a heroic defence of The Labour Party (circa 1948) while, out the back, the editors spliced in some fanciful propaganda in which pensioners complained that David Cameron was intending to take away their bus passes. Short of suggesting that David Cameron was bayonetting babies, the broadcast could not have been more traditional in its selection of canards.
Of course, it remains open to Izzard to claim in future years that it was all a wry, ironic joke. Or, for that matter, he may don a woman's weeds and vanish in the crowd.
It will be a poignant moment, however, when darting a quick, mascara'd glance around him from under a Quaker bonnet he comes face to face with Gordon Brown, similarly arrayed and wearing the same shade of lipstick.
__________________________________
Errata and Corrigendum
In a blog of 6th May, 2009, Sordel inadvertantly implied that Jacqui Smith "never would be missed". I wish to apologise to Mrs. Smith for any distress that this error may have caused either her or her family. What I should have said is that she never will be missed.
Except that in this case it was Eddie Izzard. And it wasn't a dream.
Back in the days of Cool Britannia it used to be the case that Labour liked to adorn itself with celebrity bling because it was so widely supported that even the likes of Oasis felt that it could take the Blair shilling without, um, shilling too conspicuously. The cash-for-bangers Popular Vote is a nice little runaround for most of the year, but to show off one's success one does like a rock star for the one dry Saturday in July.
Unfortunately, at a time when even the cabinet are high-tailing it out of Dodge like a bunch of banditos with the posse on their tail, watching a celebrity endorsement is rather like seeing a bag lady in a moth-eaten mink coat. There is a definite suspicion that Izzard was bumbling through the studio improvising a brilliant monologue full of hilarious non sequiturs when Jacqui Smith handed him a mic before casting a nervous glance over her shoulder and bolting for the nearest exit.
"Tell them why you're voting Labour, Eddie!" a director must have hissed, mopping sweat from his brow like the producer of the last radio station in government hands in the midst of a South American military coup.
And, like the trouper that he evidently is, Izzard ventured upon a heroic defence of The Labour Party (circa 1948) while, out the back, the editors spliced in some fanciful propaganda in which pensioners complained that David Cameron was intending to take away their bus passes. Short of suggesting that David Cameron was bayonetting babies, the broadcast could not have been more traditional in its selection of canards.
Of course, it remains open to Izzard to claim in future years that it was all a wry, ironic joke. Or, for that matter, he may don a woman's weeds and vanish in the crowd.
It will be a poignant moment, however, when darting a quick, mascara'd glance around him from under a Quaker bonnet he comes face to face with Gordon Brown, similarly arrayed and wearing the same shade of lipstick.
__________________________________
Errata and Corrigendum
In a blog of 6th May, 2009, Sordel inadvertantly implied that Jacqui Smith "never would be missed". I wish to apologise to Mrs. Smith for any distress that this error may have caused either her or her family. What I should have said is that she never will be missed.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Spending-Our-Money-Like-Water-Gate, Day 2072
Like an over-loved teddy bear Harriet Harman has evidently been put out of the reach of small hands until Mummy can get to her with needle and thread. So much can be inferred from the fact that Margaret Beckett (a politician for whom the answer to the question "Is she still alive?" has for some years been No) was disinterred and sent creaking into the world last night for the purposes of occupying the Labour seat on Question Time. Since this seat is the only one likely to remain in Labour hands after the next election, leaving it vacant would clearly be at best unwise.
Now QT is - as we all know - a bear-pit on an average night, and like watching the Christians thrown to the lions on a good one. In this case, there were several lions on the panel and a great number in the audience, giving the clear impression of a three-day convention at which only one small plate of vol-au-vents has been served.
To clarify the metaphor, Mrs. Beckett was the principal canape on that plate, and one would have felt sorry for her but for the self-serving and casuistic arguments that she brought to bear in order to justify her various positions.
The first of these is that Grace and Favour apartments are not given to politicians free of charge. How the lions roared with pity for those politicians faced with onerous duty of living (as Mrs. Beckett has done) at Chevening and One Carlton Gardens! Their eyes grew quite wet with hunger.
The second argument that she ventured is that the issue of politicians' pay was really much too complicated for us to understand and we should stop worrying our little heads about it. The lions nodded appreciatively at this argument and shook out their napkins with a renewed appreciation of their meagre intellectual abilities.
Best of all, however, was Mrs. Beckett's answer to the question as to whether she approved of The Telegraph's decision to publish the details of MPs' pay in the first place. Puff pastry that she was, all plump with chicken and mushroom, she had the timerity to argue that she condemned The Telegraph for having taken delivery of the personal details of (and at this point I insert a conspicuously unnecessary parenthesis for the true significance of this to sink in) MPs' staff.
The lions blinked at one another, uncertain as to whether their manes had fallen in their ears again.
No, they had it right first time. Evidently the concern of MPs at their dirty washing having been laundered in the full light of day is not directed towards themselves but entirely towards poor Muggins-in-the-office, slaving away at the paper shredder unconscious of the fact that the security of her data was about to be jeopardised by The Telegraph. (Since Muggins-in-the-office is quite probably a member of their own family, perhaps MPs are right to be concerned.)
At this point the lions paused for a snack and were later seen to be giving Mrs. Beckett's arguments full consideration as they flossed her out of their fangs.
Now QT is - as we all know - a bear-pit on an average night, and like watching the Christians thrown to the lions on a good one. In this case, there were several lions on the panel and a great number in the audience, giving the clear impression of a three-day convention at which only one small plate of vol-au-vents has been served.
To clarify the metaphor, Mrs. Beckett was the principal canape on that plate, and one would have felt sorry for her but for the self-serving and casuistic arguments that she brought to bear in order to justify her various positions.
The first of these is that Grace and Favour apartments are not given to politicians free of charge. How the lions roared with pity for those politicians faced with onerous duty of living (as Mrs. Beckett has done) at Chevening and One Carlton Gardens! Their eyes grew quite wet with hunger.
The second argument that she ventured is that the issue of politicians' pay was really much too complicated for us to understand and we should stop worrying our little heads about it. The lions nodded appreciatively at this argument and shook out their napkins with a renewed appreciation of their meagre intellectual abilities.
Best of all, however, was Mrs. Beckett's answer to the question as to whether she approved of The Telegraph's decision to publish the details of MPs' pay in the first place. Puff pastry that she was, all plump with chicken and mushroom, she had the timerity to argue that she condemned The Telegraph for having taken delivery of the personal details of (and at this point I insert a conspicuously unnecessary parenthesis for the true significance of this to sink in) MPs' staff.
The lions blinked at one another, uncertain as to whether their manes had fallen in their ears again.
No, they had it right first time. Evidently the concern of MPs at their dirty washing having been laundered in the full light of day is not directed towards themselves but entirely towards poor Muggins-in-the-office, slaving away at the paper shredder unconscious of the fact that the security of her data was about to be jeopardised by The Telegraph. (Since Muggins-in-the-office is quite probably a member of their own family, perhaps MPs are right to be concerned.)
At this point the lions paused for a snack and were later seen to be giving Mrs. Beckett's arguments full consideration as they flossed her out of their fangs.
Friday, May 8, 2009
Oh, Oh, Oh What A Lumley War ...
Until last night, it had never been worth anyone's while to commit to memory the name of Phil Woolas, the United Kingdom's immigration minister. He may well have been calculating that, with a year to go of Labour Government, a prominent place on the Shadow Cabinet would be his for the asking after the bloodbath that will doubtless follow the next General Election. It was all going so well.
Searching for Phil Woolas on Youtube (that new instrument so beloved of Downing Street) it is possible to find a video of him on the receiving end of a custard pie. Those were the good old days, however, for now he finds himself unwittingly in the vanguard as Brown and company charge the Russian guns. "Someone had blunder'd" indeed.
The guns in question belonged, of course, to Joanna Lumley who - short of setting about them with a closed umbrella - could scarcely be doing a better job of treating our political masters as the pack of whelps and curs that they are. Our government is much happier to deal with the Great British Public in general, believing (quite against overwhelming evidence to the contrary) that you can fool all of the people some of the time. By saying that she trusts the prime minister, however, Ms. Lumley eloquently conveyed precisely the opposite, and Mr. Brown would do well to view the retribution visited upon his hitherto-anonymous lackey as merely a foretaste of what will come if he does not approach the issue of the Gurkhas with the same pre-emptive haste that he previously showed on the subject of MPs' pay.
Which reminds me.
Harriet Harman - who (let us recall) unsuccessfully introduced in January a Commons proposal to exempt MPs' personal expenses from the Freedom of Information Act - was on Newsnight last night defending her fellow cabinet members as a consequence of the Telegraph's revelation that some of them had been sucking over-enthusiastically on the national teat.
(Evidently the Prime Minister and his brother have been mucking out at the Augean stables, since they found it necessary to spend £240 a month of our money cleaning something. If Lady Macbeth had committed that scale of investment she might have been able to sleep better at night.)
Ms. Harman is, it seems, the government apologist of last resort, and this sets up a potential title bout that might cast the Rumble in the Jungle into the shade.
Harman vs. Lumley.
Let it be.
Searching for Phil Woolas on Youtube (that new instrument so beloved of Downing Street) it is possible to find a video of him on the receiving end of a custard pie. Those were the good old days, however, for now he finds himself unwittingly in the vanguard as Brown and company charge the Russian guns. "Someone had blunder'd" indeed.
The guns in question belonged, of course, to Joanna Lumley who - short of setting about them with a closed umbrella - could scarcely be doing a better job of treating our political masters as the pack of whelps and curs that they are. Our government is much happier to deal with the Great British Public in general, believing (quite against overwhelming evidence to the contrary) that you can fool all of the people some of the time. By saying that she trusts the prime minister, however, Ms. Lumley eloquently conveyed precisely the opposite, and Mr. Brown would do well to view the retribution visited upon his hitherto-anonymous lackey as merely a foretaste of what will come if he does not approach the issue of the Gurkhas with the same pre-emptive haste that he previously showed on the subject of MPs' pay.
Which reminds me.
Harriet Harman - who (let us recall) unsuccessfully introduced in January a Commons proposal to exempt MPs' personal expenses from the Freedom of Information Act - was on Newsnight last night defending her fellow cabinet members as a consequence of the Telegraph's revelation that some of them had been sucking over-enthusiastically on the national teat.
(Evidently the Prime Minister and his brother have been mucking out at the Augean stables, since they found it necessary to spend £240 a month of our money cleaning something. If Lady Macbeth had committed that scale of investment she might have been able to sleep better at night.)
Ms. Harman is, it seems, the government apologist of last resort, and this sets up a potential title bout that might cast the Rumble in the Jungle into the shade.
Harman vs. Lumley.
Let it be.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
She's "Got A Little List" (She Never Would Be Missed)
Until yesterday I am not sure that I had heard of Michael Alan Weiner. I had heard of Fred Phelps, because Louis Theroux made a television programme about him called The Most Hated Family in America. I imagine that we'll be hearing more of both of them, though, because the UK government has determined that there was some slender political advantage in naming them as people not welcome here.
Where is the Minister for Stop & Think when you need her?
It goes without saying that the policy of naming these undesirables has been placed in the safe keeping of Jacqui Smith, a politician of whom no news would be good news indeed. Instead of sitting in a corner crying (as any normal human being would with her recent record of catastrophe), the Home Secretary has popped her head above the parapets long enough to champion this list, and someone has even given it the name of "UK's Least Wanted." This suggests that someone in government thought that the idea was good enough to merit a snappy title.
So, of course, the news today is that Michael Alan Weiner is threatening to sue someone for defamation. Given that he has a hugely successful radio show and lives in a country with no shortage of lawyers, I favour his chances of dipping his hands into the pockets of British taxpayers at some point in the near future with a rapacious enthusiasm previously reserved for members of our own parliament.
Even should he fail (perhaps the case will never be brought, perhaps the lawyers for the Crown will be so greased by our money as to slip through his fingers) the net result of all this will be that Britain will extend its reputation as a country where the government is so terrified of dissenting views that it would rather ennoble them with an arbitrary and incompetent ban than expose them to the light of day. Personally, I never heard of a country that banned entrance to a campaigner of any sort without thinking that it was dictatorial and cowardly.
Louis Theroux made Fred Phelps look sinister and unbearable; Jacqui Smith has made him look like a martyr for freedom of speech.
The most worrying element in this, however, is the views for which Weiner has been banned. He is opposed to gay marriage but not apparently to homosexuality in general: a fairly bland view for an American right-winger. He has said some pretty ignorant things about autism, but hardly the sort of thing that posed a risk to public order more grave than a rowdy protest. He is opposed to immigration, which should surely put him and Jacqui on the same page.
He is reputedly anti-Arab and anti-Islamic.
Bingo.
The suspicion dawns that Weiner was not on the list for any especially grave or worrying views that he might hold, but in order to establish that the list of the UK's Least Wanted was not missing a final word: Muslims. Most of those on the list with viable militant credentials are indeed Muslims (not you, Mike Guzofsky) and there is a strong sense that the raison d'etre of the list is an attack on Islamic extremism to which some other names have been scraped up in the interests of apparent balance.
The only potential upside of this list, then, is the publication of a photograph of Jacqui Smith alongside the headline "UK's Least Wanted". With any luck it will be a photograph of the entire cabinet.
Where is the Minister for Stop & Think when you need her?
It goes without saying that the policy of naming these undesirables has been placed in the safe keeping of Jacqui Smith, a politician of whom no news would be good news indeed. Instead of sitting in a corner crying (as any normal human being would with her recent record of catastrophe), the Home Secretary has popped her head above the parapets long enough to champion this list, and someone has even given it the name of "UK's Least Wanted." This suggests that someone in government thought that the idea was good enough to merit a snappy title.
So, of course, the news today is that Michael Alan Weiner is threatening to sue someone for defamation. Given that he has a hugely successful radio show and lives in a country with no shortage of lawyers, I favour his chances of dipping his hands into the pockets of British taxpayers at some point in the near future with a rapacious enthusiasm previously reserved for members of our own parliament.
Even should he fail (perhaps the case will never be brought, perhaps the lawyers for the Crown will be so greased by our money as to slip through his fingers) the net result of all this will be that Britain will extend its reputation as a country where the government is so terrified of dissenting views that it would rather ennoble them with an arbitrary and incompetent ban than expose them to the light of day. Personally, I never heard of a country that banned entrance to a campaigner of any sort without thinking that it was dictatorial and cowardly.
Louis Theroux made Fred Phelps look sinister and unbearable; Jacqui Smith has made him look like a martyr for freedom of speech.
The most worrying element in this, however, is the views for which Weiner has been banned. He is opposed to gay marriage but not apparently to homosexuality in general: a fairly bland view for an American right-winger. He has said some pretty ignorant things about autism, but hardly the sort of thing that posed a risk to public order more grave than a rowdy protest. He is opposed to immigration, which should surely put him and Jacqui on the same page.
He is reputedly anti-Arab and anti-Islamic.
Bingo.
The suspicion dawns that Weiner was not on the list for any especially grave or worrying views that he might hold, but in order to establish that the list of the UK's Least Wanted was not missing a final word: Muslims. Most of those on the list with viable militant credentials are indeed Muslims (not you, Mike Guzofsky) and there is a strong sense that the raison d'etre of the list is an attack on Islamic extremism to which some other names have been scraped up in the interests of apparent balance.
The only potential upside of this list, then, is the publication of a photograph of Jacqui Smith alongside the headline "UK's Least Wanted". With any luck it will be a photograph of the entire cabinet.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
The Truth Shall Not Set You Free
One of the problems with the term blogosphere is that it suggests that this corner of the internet is pristine and impermeable, whereas permeability is its most conspicuous attribute. It is a "blogo-sponge" (this term, admittedly, does not have the same ring to it) and - as we now know - is one of those sponges that is regarded as a fertile breeding-ground for corruption of all sorts. There is a perception, in fact, that it is full of plain lies, which is why (a lowly member of) the government was so keen to get into the business.
Since there is a temptation for this to slide into another "all politicians are liars" rant, let us remember one who told the truth. On 17 March 2003 Robin Cook received the peculiar honour of becoming quite possibly the first politician in British history to receive a standing ovation in the Commons for a resignation speech in which he gave what all recognised to be a truthful and compelling account of his analysis of the argument for the Iraq War. It is one of a handful of political speeches in my lifetime that have had any real resonance or significance.
The bitter irony of this speech, however, is that it marked the effective end of Cook's political career, and as time goes by it is becoming largely forgotten. Many of the same MPs who stood for Cook went on to give the second standing ovation of the Commons to Tony Blair, whose policies were Cook's target and who had been shown by the point of his own resignation to be (at best) mistaken in the case he had made for war.
There is no need, therefore, to say that all politicians are liars. All one need say is that the ones who tell the truth will never gain an effective majority over those who prefer (even if they do not utter) the lie.
In recent years, the truth about the murder of Jean Charles de Menezes came to light despite the ardent attempts of all involved to suppress it. It seems likely that the truth about the death of Ian Tomlinson will also come to light. The truth about MPs expenses is so nearly in the light of day that they are furiously calculating a way to feather their nests that can be disguised as a reform.
Lies are beset on all sides by the truth, yet - like some mendacious reworking of the defence of Rorke's Drift - they maintain a valiant defence against seemingly insurmountable odds.
Since there is a temptation for this to slide into another "all politicians are liars" rant, let us remember one who told the truth. On 17 March 2003 Robin Cook received the peculiar honour of becoming quite possibly the first politician in British history to receive a standing ovation in the Commons for a resignation speech in which he gave what all recognised to be a truthful and compelling account of his analysis of the argument for the Iraq War. It is one of a handful of political speeches in my lifetime that have had any real resonance or significance.
The bitter irony of this speech, however, is that it marked the effective end of Cook's political career, and as time goes by it is becoming largely forgotten. Many of the same MPs who stood for Cook went on to give the second standing ovation of the Commons to Tony Blair, whose policies were Cook's target and who had been shown by the point of his own resignation to be (at best) mistaken in the case he had made for war.
There is no need, therefore, to say that all politicians are liars. All one need say is that the ones who tell the truth will never gain an effective majority over those who prefer (even if they do not utter) the lie.
In recent years, the truth about the murder of Jean Charles de Menezes came to light despite the ardent attempts of all involved to suppress it. It seems likely that the truth about the death of Ian Tomlinson will also come to light. The truth about MPs expenses is so nearly in the light of day that they are furiously calculating a way to feather their nests that can be disguised as a reform.
Lies are beset on all sides by the truth, yet - like some mendacious reworking of the defence of Rorke's Drift - they maintain a valiant defence against seemingly insurmountable odds.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Elitists Do It Without The Rest Of You
People tell me that the problem with independent schools is that they are elitist. Under Conservative policies of the past, that might have been true, but when it did away with the Assisted Places Scheme, the Labour government ensured that these schools would go from being elitist to being plutocratic. I know which one I would prefer.
Our current Labour masters have made an odd priority of education. Whereas the old policy was to make the best in education available to all, they have concentrated their attention on making it available only to the wealthy. If the old Socialist ideal was to provide a ladder and a net, Labour have increased the capacity of the net by lowering the attainment standard for good grades and done away with the ladder completely by ensuring that even a university education is now available only to those with significant private means. Why would you need a ladder when you have a greasy pole?
Conservatives are natural plutocrats, but they had the good grace to disguise this with fig-leaf policies that offered opportunity to all. Labour politicians are plutocrats by accident (they are happy for the rich to govern just as long as they pay generously for the privilege) and are determined to provide a level playing field for social benefits such as education and healthcare, however low the level of that field.
All of which makes it interesting to note that when Gordon Brown wanted a gun for hire, he chose Damian McBride, who is an alumnus of Peterhouse, Cambridge: that university's smallest college and one whose reputation is certainly not for egalitarianism or inclusivity. One may decry the use to which Mr. McBride turned that education, but it seems to have been no barrier to advancement under an administration that seems eager enough to deny elitist trappings to today's children.
It's nice when equal opportunity extends even to those with an Oxbridge education, isn't it?
Our current Labour masters have made an odd priority of education. Whereas the old policy was to make the best in education available to all, they have concentrated their attention on making it available only to the wealthy. If the old Socialist ideal was to provide a ladder and a net, Labour have increased the capacity of the net by lowering the attainment standard for good grades and done away with the ladder completely by ensuring that even a university education is now available only to those with significant private means. Why would you need a ladder when you have a greasy pole?
Conservatives are natural plutocrats, but they had the good grace to disguise this with fig-leaf policies that offered opportunity to all. Labour politicians are plutocrats by accident (they are happy for the rich to govern just as long as they pay generously for the privilege) and are determined to provide a level playing field for social benefits such as education and healthcare, however low the level of that field.
All of which makes it interesting to note that when Gordon Brown wanted a gun for hire, he chose Damian McBride, who is an alumnus of Peterhouse, Cambridge: that university's smallest college and one whose reputation is certainly not for egalitarianism or inclusivity. One may decry the use to which Mr. McBride turned that education, but it seems to have been no barrier to advancement under an administration that seems eager enough to deny elitist trappings to today's children.
It's nice when equal opportunity extends even to those with an Oxbridge education, isn't it?
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