Smoking Ban Has Been Huge Success.

Over 80% of people now support the smoking ban, 76% want to ban cigarette vending machines and 70% want fag packets out of sight in shops. 800,000 smokers have given up as a result, heart disease and strokes have dropped significantly and now even smokers chokezone Greece is set to introduce a ban on July 1st.

So what will a Tory government do when it gets in? You guessed it, relax the smoking ban. Top Tories have been in talks with their tobacco paymasters for years on how best to tackle public opposition. FOREST (the cigarette manufacturer's PR machine) fund several 'astro turf' groups to garner support for their aims.

The Tories favourite is to 'allow' local authorities to introduce 'a smoking room' within pubs. This legislation will be quietly included in a bill within two years of the Tories coming to power. We all know that this will mean the whole pub will stink of smoke, punters will end up stinking of smoke and workers once again will have to work in smoky atmospheres damaging their health. There is no practical way smokers and non-smokers can mix indoors without harming non-smokers as well. If there was, believe you me, the new Labour fudgers would have found it.

No One Is Innocent!

If you buy the Sun newspaper you are spitting on the graves of those who died at Hillsborough. If you subscribe to Sky or buy the Times, you paid for Bush's re-election and the pro-Iraq war propaganda. If you buy the Daily Mail or Express or Telegraph, read the Metro or buy the Evening Standard, you contributed to the rising measles death toll over MMR ignorance or the deaths of children and the most vulnerable as cars squeeze the lifeblood out of our cities with their pollution, noise and excess speed encouraged by the 'speeding culture' and 'anti-camera' brigade.

The Daily Mail/Evening Standard in particular has eroded the morality of the most fortunate whose greed has gloated over rising inequality, poverty and crime as they dodge their tax responsibilities. Reading a tabloid press that is rabidly right-wing and ignoring their obvious intrusions into people's private lives while hypocritically claiming the moral high ground over what...the smoking ban or CCTV - give me strength!!!

It is YOU who have made the Labour party rightwing, it is YOU who cannot claim innocence over Iraq, or the Thatcherite greed of the few that has run us into recession and eroded our public services and made the poor pay more tax than the rich. And ultimately it will be YOU that inflicts on the liberal majority yet another Tory government that is morally bankrupt (aided and abetted by a undemocratic electoral system).

The estates will erupt, and crime, poverty and sheer misery will explode because of the cowardly short term, money grabbing indecency of the few who believe the right-wing nonsense in the papers. It is time to take a look at how much you should be allowed to whinge on these issues when you clearly are not innocent of any of the crimes you accuse politicians of. If you really do believe in responsibility, then ask yourself how much you really can blame the politicians for all of your ills and how much is down to your own bloody minded, ignorant greed.

Excellent - Lets Blast Those Libertarian Loons!

Excellent video game! Devils Kitchen and Longrider better beware.

Hat-tip - Never Trust A Hippy.

The Arrest Of Damien Green Is A Triumph For Democracy.

***UPDATE 3***- Unity over at Liberal Conspiracy makes same point as me -

"the arrest of Damian Green could, and should, turn out to be a good thing for Britain’s democracy"

**UPDATE 2** - Tory Crocodile Tears *UPDATE* Unity over at LIberal Conspiracy delves deeper - in particular why Cameron and Boris were informed of the arrest but not the PM and why Official Secrets Act offences are dealt with by terror police.

Nobody should be above the law, least of all politicians. The Tory howls of 'stalinism' over shadow immigration minister Damien Green's arrest would have more force if...

they had done the same over the 1am storming of cash for honours Lord Levy's home (and others).

I doubt anything will come of this arrest or the search of 'several' of this shadow minister's homes and offices (the fact a shadow minister can afford several homes tells us something more interesting).

The 'moles' in the Treasury and Home Office and other departments have been feeding the Tory press and front bench advance information on government behind the scenes discussions on policy now for many months - the government has finally got tired of tolerating what is an offence under the Official Secrets Act, and who could blame them - no government could carry on with such distractions and destabilising an influence.

The Tories led by George Osbourne's immature disregard for conducting themselves honourably have shown utter disrespect for etiquette and even the law. It is time one of them (at least) goes to jail for their crimes!

Not Joining The Euro Has Cost Us Billions.

Centre-right Euro-sceptics love to go on about how......

Gordon Brown sold our Gold at a low price (he actually swapped it for Euro currency that has vastly appreciated and as Gold is priced in the plummeting dollar we have lost very little).

What they won't mention is that if the UK had joined the Euro currency zone from the start we could have had 1.5-2% lower interest rates and joined at an exchange rate of around 1.50EUR to the POUND instead of the current 1.25EUR.

That is a DEVALUATION in our currency of nearly 20%!!! - something that has brought down previous administrations - this is worth much more than the piffling losses from any gold sale.

While the strength of the Euro would have damaged exports that go to non-EU countries (which is less than half of our total exports), the lower interest rates would have more than compensated for this (as demonstrated by the extraordinary growth in Ireland) and long-term inflation would have been much easier to control with lower interest rates and a strengthening Euro currency to back it up.

As well as the Tories and their right-wing media friends being responsible for increasing the number of people on welfare, increasing our national debt, being responsible for the credit crunch (by irresponsible credit deregulation in the 1980s), socially oppressing our people (with inaccurate and depressing stories of 'broken Britain' thereby hardening people's attitudes to rehabilitation, abortion, sexuality etc and making it impossible for politicians to be brave), tripling inequality and doubling crime, they are also clearly totally completely inept about our future economic security.

And we want these Tories back in power? We must be mad if we throw away the progress that Labour has made because of the disenchantment with its speed of delivery - every Labour government from Attlee to Wilson has disappointed the Left but without these governments there would be less liberal attitudes to minorities, no NHS and more inequality and crime.

New Labour has actually delivered more - record improvements in education, health, transport and overall quality of life.

Despite appearences to the contrary this Labour government have delivered the biggest redistribution of wealth by the tax system to the poorest of ANY government.

Not enough in a world where incomes at the top have gone out of control - but don't let the Tories fool you into thinking that doing nothing is a better option.

Jill Saward Asks Some Important Questions

Jill Saward is standing in the Haltemprice & Howden By-election. While I do not agree with...

everything Jill Saward proposes (especially on increasing the prison population), by supporting an expansion of the DNA database to everyone (far fairer) and improving CCTV quality - that together have already prevented thousands of crimes including many murders and rapes (despite current limitations holding their usefulness back), she does give people a real choice in this election.

If you oppose equal gay rights, support capital punishment, SUPPORT 28 days detention without charge and support some minor reduction in CCTV cameras and the DNA database that will make them less effective tools for catching criminals, then VOTE FOR TORY DAVID DAVIS - Davis has to be the shittest exponent of liberty in recent history to try to stand on a libertarian platform - only a Tory could have the barefaced cheek to misrepresent their real views so spectacularly and seemingly get away with it! (Davis has even been ambivalent about ID cards - voting for them in 2004).

If you support equal gay rights, oppose capital punishment, OPPOSE ANY days detention without trial and dislike CCTV and the DNA database (but seem to have no specific policy on this) then VOTE FOR THE GREEN'S SHAN OAKES.

If you support ID cards, an expansion of the DNA database, better and more widespread use of CCTV, and better support for victims of crime generally, then VOTE FOR JILL SAWARD. Jill asks questions the 'libertarians' can never give a reasonable answer to - like; give real examples of what significant harm CCTV and the DNA database itself (rather than their potential misuse) actually do to people? And why is a theoretical principle worth letting hundreds of murderers and rapists (who do real harm) roam free?

Hopefully these three candidates will not be crowded out by the sheer ridiculous size of the ballot paper crammed as it is with 26 candidates.

It will be hard for the Greens and Jill to make any headway in a safe Tory seat and when the national media and Liberty have given such explicit backing to Davis's supposed 'principled' stand - criminally failing to mention his very illiberal voting record on this issue. As usual the Tories get more than an easy ride from the media.

Posh Suburbs Swing It For Boris.

A few weeks ago, I would have thought a million votes would have been enough for Livingstone to win. I was wrong, it wasn't. But I think it says a lot about...

the man, that he loses having increased his number of votes from just 750,000 in 2000 when he was first elected to over a million today - how Labour wishes it could gain votes like this after so long in power. When you consider the state of Labour nationally and the Evening Standard campaign against him, it was remarkable that Livingstone could still come so close. This, of course is little consolation. We have lost a great man to politics.

I am amazed that 1.1 million people in Greater London could vote for Boris. Of course Livingstone won the majority of votes in inner London - but it wasn't enough.

The life of these Londoners is about to get a lot more difficult. If you live in the suburbs and drive into London, you may soon save a few pounds in congestion charge fees, but congestion is destined to get worse. Those who live in London will find the roads will get more dangerous, more congested and their lungs more polluted as Boris favours motorists over pedestrians.

Of course, the damage that Boris will do will take time to show through and will be fairly unnoticed at the beginning - but sure enough cutbacks in police, transport, cultural and environmental budgets will be felt. Boris's waffle on crime will be exposed - or will it? I doubt the London Evening Standard will hold Boris to account in any way. At least with Livingstone - if he as much as sneezed in the wrong direction - we could be guaranteed to know about it.

Well, all this is sour grapes I know, Boris has won the 20% of Londoners votes he needed to win and Ken didn't. Ken was magnanimous, I find it difficult to be so.

Those over 60 who wanted 24 hour freedom passes will be dissappointed. I imagine a lot of them didn't realise a vote for Boris has denied them this benefit but it has. And over the years expect all those who currently have free travel to find it eroded by eager Tories keen to cut this 'stealth tax'.

I was particularly disappointed in Brian Paddick and the Lib Dems - what a poor candidate and their 9% share was more than they deserved. A better Lib Dem would have highlighted the distance between Tory policy and their own rather than pretending both Livingstone and Boris were equidistant in a vain hope to maintain Lib Dem seats in the rural south of England.

This election is lost and along with it goes my hope of things improving in this country. Livingstone was my political hero and demonstration that Left politics can be good, efficient and electorally successful. That has now gone and along with it my interest in politics. I know I shouldn't be so downbeat - but it is how I feel at the moment. Livingstone was the best politician of his generation but in the end it wasn't enough to beat the Tory press lies. This is a sad day for democracy, how this country yearns for a free press and a press that tells the truth as a rule rather than as an exception.

Boris To Scrap Smoking Ban.

Boris Johnson has been paid a lot of money by Tobacco lobbyists and has promised to repay them by scrapping the smoking ban. He floated some vague idea of a internet referendum on the issue in the Sun. For someone who calls postal voting corrupt, it takes the biscuit to destroy people's health in such a dismissive (and easily fiddled) way.

The smoking ban was voted against by most Tory MPs, so it is no surprise that right-wingers like Johnson want it repealed. Boris gives us an insight to what a future Tory government will be like.

The smoking ban is probably the single most effective legislation that will improve people's health over generations since Labour set up the NHS.

If you like the ban and want to save your lungs then vote for Ken. Boris must be stopped.

If you think this is a civil liberties issue (it isn't) and if you think Boris is some sort of libertarian, remember that he also wants to ban drinking alcohol on the tube.

*update* It seems Boris's minders are now typically trying to deny the whole thing - Boris just cannot control his tongue - imagine this guy trying to promote London - what a mess!

Is It Time For Labour To Ditch first-past-the-post?-

There is a Progress event at the House Of Commons tomorrow at 6pm debating this, involving Michael Wills, Polly Toynbee, Stephen Twigg and others.

The difficulty for...

Labour in this, is that any change in the electoral system at the present time is going to be open to the justifiable claim that it is only being done to 'save Labour's skin' because Labour fear they are going to lose the next general election. This is why it was so disappointing that the Labour tribalist old guard won out over the principled Labour ministers, in denying the promised referendum in the first term - when any accusation like this would have been farcical.

There are two answers to this conundrum, firstly the present system is still heavily biased in Labour's favour - so any change can be shown not to be beneficial to Labour in terms of seats - it would worsen the result for Labour in the short term and secondly, Labour should propose to hold the referendum on PR at the same time as the next general election.

The advantages for holding a binding referendum at the next general election would be fourfold; this would ensure a better turnout, neutralise the 'saving Labour's skin' attack, ensure the support of Lib Dems and other parties - thus boosting Labour popularity and finally place the Tories in an awkward situation during an election campaign - when the general public are finally confronted with the facts about the travesty of democracy that is first-past-the-post and the myths of PR are busted, the cynical Tory defence of this archaic system would be finally exposed. Also of course, more important than any of these things - having a referendum on PR is the right thing to do for democracy.

Even if the Tories did go on to win the general election, which would probably be made less likely by having this referendum - as it would be clear they supported such an obvious, unpopular, anti-democracy position on this - then the Tories would then be faced with either honouring the referendum or seen to be the anti-democratic party they are.

The main Tory argument will be that first-past-the-post is not completely broke, just needs adjusting by fiddling the boundaries back in their favour. They will mention the Isle of Wight a lot and the fact that Tory constituencies look like they have more voters. As Paul Davies (at makevotescount) explains here, this is in fact a red herring - the real bias is in 'differential turnout' and 'inefficient vote distribution' (which favours Labour) and un-registered voters (which favours the Tories). None of which can be fixed by moving the boundaries (see the gerrymander wheel). It is the system itself that is broke - we cannot keep tolerating minority elected government and plummeting turnout. Most people are getting to realise their vote is useless.

I know any campaign on 'boring' constitutional issues is never going to get a million people to march for it (even a unified national press banging on every day has failed to build much enthusiasm for the Euro Constitution referendum), but really PR should get more interest than the Iraq War.

This issue is the Iraq War, Inheritance tax, Devolution, Euro referendum, English Parliament, ID Cards and Road Pricing (and every other issue) rolled into one. This is about how we allocate power - it is time to make this issue interesting and get people interested. The march against the Iraq war failed to stop that war, but electoral reform wouldn't need that many people to turn heads, maybe a hundred thousand people could make the difference on this - we have more time - but the longer this referendum is delayed the less chance we have of ever getting it. Now is the time to act because one thing is sure, the Tories are currently dead set against.

English Nationalists Need Lessons in English History.

From 1066 to 1216, England was effectively a colony of Northern France (even the Magna Carta was written by French speaking Barons). No 'English' King in this period considered themselves English - this includes English nationalist heroes like Richard the Lionheart (a Frenchman who only ever visited England twice, and whose Crusades and ransom payouts on his capture, actually bankrupted England).

The polite 'English' society of...

the ruling class, a supposed English 'trademark' and to which many nationalists aspire to, involved a reverence to their ruling class descendent's language, i.e French. Polite 'English' is generally derived from French and coarser 'English' from Anglo-Saxon. The ruling classes generally spoke French - a remnant of this is that the Queen still gives her Royal Assent to bills in Norman French. Even the word parliament comes from the French word 'parler'. There is a certain irony to nationalist calls for an English 'parliament' and their calls to leave the EU - to be ruled by the 'English', when in fact the public school dominated ruling classes in London are probably more French than those in Brussels in terms of their ancestry. The English 'Euro' regions are actually roughly based on ancient Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, the counties came later in the 12th Century under Norman rule. So when the English nationalists claim the 'euro' regions as 'artificial' to England, it is clear they know less about English history than EU officials.

In fact, most of what we now consider the best English laws and attributes have their origins abroad and were brought here by immigrants. England over the last few thousand years has been one of the most invaded and 'mongrelised' of nations - indeed this tolerance, adaptation and incorporation of new cultures and ideas has usually been one of England's greatest strengths (the Mini, fish & chips, the cup of tea, even the royal family - they all have arrived here from abroad).

I have always found the most 'English' people I have met either come from abroad or that their parents did. Who (in terms of their contribution to our culture) is more English - Salmon Rushdie or Gary Bushell? This intolerance of foreigners that English nationalists show, is not an attribute of Englishness - if anything, it is its antithesis.

Cameron Shows True Colours On Tax, Boris Shows True Colours On The Environment.

Rightwingers everywhere have been pressing the Tory leadership to abandon completely their somewhat modest and vague commitment to 'share the proceeds of growth' between tax cuts and public spending.

Already this commitment could...

mean public spending cuts when they would hurt the most - during a recession. But even this modest spending commitment is too much for the Tory right.

David Cameron, George Osbourne and Boris Johnson all come from privileged backgrounds and know nothing about really earning a living and what it is like to have no money. Despite what they currently claim, they have always been hostile to public spending, the environment, gay rights and redistribution. Hence their talk of how 'charity can provide for the poorest', that 'only losers take the bus', 'gay people should be denied adoption rights', and 'money will naturally trickle down to the poorest'.

All these theories have been disproved - mainly before the 20th century. Charity will only ever raise a fraction of what is needed for public services - the poor law idea of the undeserving poor and workhouses were counterproductive, the Tory decimation of the provincial bus services - three buses in a minute then none for an hour, the police state of Thatcherism clamping down on minorities with section 28, abolishing of local government tax raising powers etc, and finally the explosion of inequality still felt today by Thatcher and Reagan 'credit boom' economics.

Which side are you on? The descendents of your ancesters rulers who have opposed every advance for minorities and the poor and used the press to bamboozle you about their priorities, or the party that brought you the weekend, the NHS and the minimum wage. It's your choice.

In London in May, the choice has never been clearer. Despite all the rumourmongering and scandalised innuendo thrown at Ken - he has always been squeaky clean. The best they can do is accuse some of his employees. Ken's LDA, funds small organisations and businesses - less than 1% have failed, that is actually a very low rate of failure when it comes to small organisations. All of these allegations of corruption & covert funding (Trevor Phillips article etc) have been thoroughly investigated by the London Assembly and found to be without foundation.

With Boris Johnson - his corruption and dishonesty is clear - he has been sacked many times, including by the Tories (for lying). His opposition to the congestion charge, the 4x4 levy and opposition to funding for race relations, buses and cyclists are disgraceful. Londoners will not be fooled by Andrew Gilligan and the Evening Standard or by Boris now pretending he likes the free PT travel and congestion charge.

Jeremy Clarkson's Bank Account

Jeremy Clarkson recently printed his bank details in the Sun newspaper. His account number, sort code, branch and how to get his address from the electoral register were all published.

Essentially, the point he was trying to...

make is correct - that we give these details to all and sundry whenever we write a cheque and that the fuss about the data loss by inland revenue is a fuss about nothing.

Of course by advertising these details in the UK's most widely read newspaper and by effectively inviting people to 'have a go', he was going that one step further and opening himself up to a much higher level of risk.

It is most likely that the child benefit details have got lost in a pile of bureaucratic paperwork or are lying somewhere equally innocuous, out of the hands of anyone who might want to make criminal use of them. The discs have in fact probably already been destroyed if truth be known. The main point is that these details should not be of use to anyone even if they have fallen into criminal hands, otherwise anybody who has ever written a cheque should watch out as well.

The outcome of Clarkson's bravado however is that someone has set up a £500 direct debit from his account to Diabetics UK (one of many organisations that no longer require a signature). Clarkson was convinced that the level of security offered by his bank would prevent any loss to himself of allowing widespread knowledge of his basic bank data.

Some opponents of government databases and ID cards have all had a good laugh about this, shouting 'see, look how dangerous this all is'. However Clarkson's basic point stands. As far as I know, the direct debit guarantee would allow him to be fully reimbursed (if he so chooses), so his basic premise is correct that he would not be out of pocket.

Obviously whomever set up the direct debit was making a point, rather than trying to personally profit (in fact it was so convenient that one has to suspect if Clarkson wasn't in on the whole thing from the start). What I do find most interesting is the following comment;

"The bank cannot find out who did this because of the Data Protection Act and they cannot stop it from happening again"

It beggars belief that the data protection act would protect criminal activities in this way. Surely the data protection act should allow this data to be shared when a fraud has been committed. If anything it seems those who laughed at this case and who argue against data being shared are helping the criminals rather than protecting people as they claim.

Liberty And The State.

I couldn't have put my views on the danger of the bloggertarians any better myself. Read Polly Toynbee here.

By the way, for all those who accuse me of hypocrisy (an overused word that doesn't take severity into account) for being an ideological supporter of ID cards while condemning those who oppose them on ideological grounds. The difference between me and them that I was trying to illustrate was that I will go along with the evidence and accept that (at present) the government proposals look flawed therefore plans for ID cards should go on ice. Whereas whatever the evidence, opponents will oppose any future ID scheme, no matter what the benefits may be. Now that is pathetic and luddite. That is not abuse, just accurate.

Greens Hold Regency In Landslide: Full Results Here.

Well thankfully the Tories didn't win, but Labour were squeezed into third place with Labour supporters voting Green to keep the Tories out - Labour finished 21 votes behind the Tories and the Lib Dems absolutely collapsed (they actually held this seat six months ago!) nearly falling behind the hopeless Independent candidate - this is obviously very disappointing for Labour and Delia Forester especially but the national situation hardly helped us. One has to say congratulations to the Greens and Jason Kitcat on such a massive vote on a low turnout. The full results are as follows (May result in brackets);

Jason Kitcat (GREEN) 749 - 42% (34%)
Robert Nemeth (TORY) 397 - 22% (22%)
Delia Forester (LABOUR) 376 - 21% (21%)
Simon Doyle (LIB DEMS) 148 - 8% (18%)
Tony Davenport (B+H IND) 130 - 7% (5%)

Turnout - 24% (34%)

Thatcher Is To Blame For Everything.

Yes, she really is.

Northern Rock - Out of control lending and spiralling debt and the inevitable boom and bust in the housing market are a result of Thatcher's financial deregulation in the 80s.

Dodgy Party Funding and DataGate - Thatcher's autocratic style and disregard for democracy 'won' elections and forced Labour to follow suit. Thatcher abolished local government and she put undemocratic Quangos in its place. We still haven't recovered from this top-down unaccountable managerial inefficiency.

England being crap at sport and our children fat and unhappy - Burgers and chips on school menus, legalitus forcing after school activities to cease and building for the car - this all reduced children's opportunity to play and all stem from the Thatcher era. Not to mention the tripling of child poverty as inequality spiralled (VAT doubled & Council Tax was introduced to hit poor, top rate income tax cut for the rich, public services trashed).

Crap Public Transport - Outside London, deregulated buses all turn up within 5 minutes of each other and there are none for an hour afterwards - Thatcher is to blame.

Muslim terrorism - Thatcher's dodgy deals with Saudi Wahabis helped prop up their dictatorship and madrassas both there and Pakistan - the spectre of Thatcher hangs over the 7/7 bombings.

Few top level English footballers - see 'crap at sport' above, but also Thatcher sucked Murdoch's cock and overode competition legislation to let him do what he wanted. The inequality in English footy is the result.

Lack of renewables - Despite the best R&D and biggest wind resources in Europe, Thatcher starved our fledgling wind power industry of funds. Denmark didn't starve theirs, now they lead the world.

Finally - insert any current problem - Thatcher is undoubtedly at the root of it. See also this post.

Bad Times for Labour & English Football.

Both Gordon Brown and Steve McClaren are suffering from the same syndrome...

- unsurprising cowardice in the face of enormous unreasonable pressure. The civil servant responsible for 'discgate' and Scott Carson's nervy performance (rabbit in headlights) both signify an underlying problem with our country.

When Joe Cole refused to defend McClaren on Tuesday when asked if he would like McClaren to continue in the job, I sensed the game was up. It was clear that McClaren had not got the confidence of his players.

I don't think sacking McClaren is going to address the underlying problem with English football and I don't think sacking one person will change a culture of negligence at work. That is not to say that both shouldn't be sacked, just that it won't make any difference.

I have heard that England, don't have the quality players, that money has reduced players' incentives and passion, that Croatia are too good. There are three simple answers to these - (i) England have more top league players than Croatia (ii) Croatian players earn similar vast sums (iii) Croatia lost to Macedonia on Saturday. So I don't think we can say the poor quality of our players or high wages were the problem.

Before the game, I thought McClaren was right to start with Scott Carson in place of Robinson and also start Wright-Phillips. Although I wouldn't have played Lampard, it did sort of make sense to play him alongside Gerrard with Barry playing the holding role. In hindsight Carson looks a mistake, but who knows what mistakes Robinson (who must be so thankful he was dropped) or James would have made in the conditions. So all in all, although McClaren could have made the changes earlier, when DeFoe and Beckham came on it did get us back to 2-2, so it is hard to say what McClaren could have done differently. More indicative of the poor state of English football was the terrible condition of the pitch - which was totally inexcusable. It was not a good advert for our World Cup bid. The underlying problem is, the fear that the English players displayed in the knowledge of an idiotically impatient populace fed by an idiotic media. The best teams need time and stability - something our national side is never going to get.

The government losing 25m people's data is ironically likely to boost the case for ID cards (as it happens I doubt a single person will be defrauded because of this loss). Millions of call centre workers and employees have access to these details and people lose this sort of data every day - that should not be the problem. The problem is that this sort of data is useful. We have to make it more difficult for people to commit fraud. Although I reject the government's current scheme, some sort of ID scheme using biometrics has got to be the answer in the future.

Gordon Brown (and Steve McClaren) have got to start showing some courage and allowing people to take risks. This means that mistakes will happen and although we have to minimalise these - we shouldn't react hysterically to every mistake. Making mistakes is sometimes how we make the quickest progress. Apparently Gordon Brown was persuaded not to go the England game today because the Sun said he has been 'bad luck'. This is a perfect example - Brown should have turned around and made a big point about how this superstitious nonsense will make no difference to how the England team will perform. Instead he took the safe option in fear of being ridiculously blamed for the result. Absolutely pathetic. This is his (and our) problem. We need to be stood up to. Ultimately we will respect leaders that do that.

Bloggertarians Are Just So Negative.

Following on from the setting up of the so far excellent leftish LiberalConspiracy and posts at Stumbling&Mumbling, Paulie at NeverTrustAHippy and also at DrinkSoakedTrotsForWar has decided to once again stir up the bloggertarian (negative reactionary bloggers who label themselves as libertarians) hornets nest.

He singles out DevilsKitchen and Longrider as examples of...

a typical blogger who hails libertarianism but only in the negative sense. Paulie is, of course absolutely correct in this analysis and I have been trying to make the same point for years. Paulie likens it to trying to reason with creationists and that is a good comparison because it can be so very frustrating.

I didn't need Isaiah Berlin to come up with a name for (negative and positive liberty) to realise that liberty in a negative sense is not enough.

Bloggertarians mostly seem to think that liberty is just about 'not banning something'. They fail to see how unfair wealth distribution (for example) can restrict liberty or how the state can play a positive role in enabling liberty (by regulating dysfunctional markets to maintain competition and reign in big business). As the freed slaves used to say 'they took chains off me ankles and put them on my pockets'.

The fact that the concept of 'positive liberty' only appeared in the libertarian vernacular in 1958, demonstrates how the wealthy chattering classes have dominated this debate. The internet is the new plaything dominated by wealthy Tory-boy bloggers and they are continuing the long tradition of conservative reaction to anything new.

Traditional conservatives from Edmund Burke onwards have thrived on negative opposition, reacting hysterically to all radical change. Bloggertarians are just the new dismal line in this continuance of reactionary Tories.

Welcome, Paulie and other sensible lefties to this brave old reactionary right-wing world of the bloggertarians and good luck in your fight, you will need a lot of patience, but if we all shout as loud as them, at least we can stop some people both left and right from being fooled by their stupid non-arguments.

Clarkson and Monbiot On Speed.

Jeremy Clarkson in Saturday's SUN has responded to George Monbiot's Guardian article from last week, which noted how...

Top Gear and Jeremy Clarkson especially, incite criminal damage against speed cameras, give legal tips on avoiding payment of fines, claim speeding is safe and that cameras are vindictive, that cameras are counterproductive and stealth taxing and demonstrated that speeding at 170mph is too fast for the cameras to catch. Monbiot also goes on to point out the hypocrisy of a press that calls for stiffer penalties for every other crime, but thinks a crime that kills and injures many thousands every year is somehow, well ok.

After Clarkson used expensive lawyers and cost the taxpayer a fortune to avoid his own speeding fine earlier this year, maybe we should not be too surprised at his reckless attitude towards people and property.

Getting back to his Sun article, while graciously admitting that 30mph is 'too fast for some roads', Clarkson goes on to argue that technological advances in the making of cars, especially with tyres and brakes, have made our '73 year old' speed limits arbitrary and outdated. Clarkson also has a pop at Monbiot for using mere 'statistics' to show that speed cameras save lives.

For pointing out the dangers of someone like Clarkson popularly encouraging people to break the speed limit, people have accused me and Monbiot of being 'boring loser lefty whingers who want to inflict their misery on the rest of us' while Clarkson is 'highly humourous, entertaining and effectively harmless'. I, not surprisingly disagree with at least some of this analysis. Even if it were true that me and Monbiot were 'loser lefty misery guts', it would not alter the fact that we speak the truth, whereas Clarkson speaks a pack of lies (admittedly humourous lies that people want to hear). So at best, maybe me and Monbiot should enrol on a comedy class, but that does not say anything about speeding and cameras.

Lets see if, for once, me and the 'speedhead libertarians' out there can agree on some basic facts;

(i) All other conditions being equal, the faster you go, the more likely you are to have an accident, as you have less time to react to a hazard.

(ii) Reaction times are the biggest factor in accidents, and they have not changed. In fact it is arguable that the quiet cars of today have dulled our reaction times or lulled us into driving faster and braking later.

(iii) Speed Limits are supposed to be MAXIMUM LIMITS. Most drivers drive too fast (even within the speed limit) for the conditions they face, which is why we have so many deaths and injuries on the road.

(iv) 3,000 deaths and 100,000 injuries per annum is no joke (no matter how Clarkson phrases it) and we should do something to reduce this total.

(v) Speed Cameras reduce speeding AND even if you want to call the fines a 'stealth tax' - it is a cost on those who are caught fair and square driving over the speed limit - i.e breaking the law - so those who complain are just whingers - take your £60 fine with grace please (and before we go about those losing their livelihood - my friend who relies on his car for work, has 14 points and avoided a ban - everyone is now allowed to get caught FOUR times in 3 years - surely they only have themselves to blame if they get banned?

(vi) We can have arguments and debates over the siting of cameras, but surely we have to agree that it is right that they are currently mainly sited in spots where there has been several recent accidents.

(vii) There are plenty of warnings to the whereabouts of cameras, they are even painted yellow! Personally I think all cameras SHOULD be hidden - it sends out a wrong message to highlight them - i.e. only observe speed limits when you see a camera - rather than at all times (which is the law).

I hope that, if we can agree on most of these basic points, we can agree that trivialising breaking the speed limit is just no laughing matter - no matter how entertainingly it might be conveyed.

Gun Laws and School Massacres.

The Tories want to legalise the .22 type of handguns used by Pekka Eric Auvinen in the Finnish School massacre (contrary to news reports this is the second school gun shooting to have occurred in Finland in the last few decades).

I can see a pattern emerging in...

who the perpetrators are of these crimes - middle class, white, rural, alienated social misfits who join legal gun clubs and amass legally owned weapons.

Your inner city lout may be using illegal weapons to help protect their drug business but they are not completely whacko. That takes rural gun nuts amassing easily available legal weapons.

There should be one question to test the suitability of someone who wants to own a gun - 'do you want a gun' - if you do, then you are not suitable to own one - simple as that.

The UK has one of the lowest gun death rates in the world, it also has some of the toughest gun ownership laws. Coincidence? I think not.

Regency By-Election - December 13th.

Green Regency Councillor Hermione Roy has resigned less than 6 months into her tenure. The official reason given for her resignation was ill health, however there had been rumours circulating...

from day one that she was flabbergasted at being elected and didn't know whether she could juggle her work and the demands of being a councillor. The fact the Greens had a candidate in place immediately after her resignation suggests they have known about this possibility for a while.

I spoke to Hermione a few days before she was elected, and she was far from enthusiastic about the possibility of winning. She seemed to suggest her chances were remote (wishing thinking perhaps?).

The Greens were always in with a fantastic chance of taking both seats in Regency and to pick a candidate that doesn't last 6 months calls into question their judgement, especially after the calamity they had choosing candidates in Preston Park - a calamity that nearly lost them their one seat there as well. After the Lib Dims infamous absentee Regency councillor Dawn Davidson, Regency deserves a councillor committed to the area. Labour are the main challengers to the Greens here, the Lib Dims ended up finishing 6th and 8th - probably as a punishment for inflicting Dawn Davidson on us. The voters of Regency have to ask themselves, do they dare risk being messed about again by electing a Green?