The posts make up for the passion for Java

Just wanted to take the opportunity to plug a new blog on the block called Stop the Bureaucrats. He's only done a few post thus far but each of them has been excellent. His only negative is that he says he's "passionate about Java" and he's not talking about coffee. I have but one response to such passion:

ps aux | grep java | grep -v grep | awk {'print $2'} | xargs kill -9

Alan Johnson performs another U-turn?

I've just been told a totally unsubstantiated rumour that the Secretary of State for Education, Alan Johnson, arrived in the Midlands today, received a call from the Whips office and promptly turned around without doing any of the planned hand shaking etc.

I tried to ring the Department of Education press office to see if he really did go to the Midlands, and whether he returned early, but sadly they close at 5pm and you just get an answer phone. To be honest I think they might really have left the office at 3.30pm when the bell rang.

Police mergers that never were cost taxpayer £3.9m

In an answer to Parliament yesterday, Tony McNulty, Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety, admitted that a total of £3,997,200 had been wasted on the police force mergers that never happened.

The table presented to Parliament shows that the police forces to be merged had spent around £6.5m on preparatory work but the Government placed a cap of 100,000 on there claims when the policy was scrapped.

Labour whips office recalls ministers?

In an earlier post by Guido he mentioned that the Labour whips were looking a little stressed today given the vote this evening about an Iraq inquiry. Apparently, the Labour whips office has been on the phone recalling ministers to Westminster. Anyone fancy a flutter?

Leeds to get Balls?

Last week Paul Linford speculated that Ed "I look like a school boy" Balls would be moving into the soon to be vacated seat of Leeds West now that John Battle has announced his plans to step down (or go to the House of Lords).

A usually reliable source has told me that this is not mere speculation and is effectively a done deal (bang goes the idea of Hull East). It also ties in with rumours that during the Labour Party conference Yvette Cooper was said to be hoping for the family to stay in West Yorkshire.

Personally speaking I'd rather he didn't find a seat at all, but I doubt that will happen. His appearance on Channel 4 News the other week when the tax proposal document was leaked was awful. he was like an excited little school boy who didn't seem to get the distinction between proposals and policy.

Want a new career? Become a profesional gold digger

According to an article in Guardian the Government is planning legislation that will allow couples who live together to have "divorce" rights. Harriet Harman told the Guardian that the law needs to be changed so people who live together are able to make the same claims as married couples after a relationship breakdown.

Besides the obvious question of "what's the point of marriage?", surely such proposals are going to be exposed to massive fraud? At least with marriage a gold-digger needs to make a significant legal commitment.

Council Tax collection outsourced in Oxfordshire?

Are Cherwell District Council providing outsourced tax collection services to other Councils? According to their website they "also collect Council Tax for other councils."

Given so many Council's have massive Council Tax arrears perhaps this isn't actually a bad thing if it is as it seems. Why not outsoruce the job to another more effective Council? Sure it might cost you a little but if it's costing less than recovered arrears then maybe it;s a price worth paying?

We need to start playing Aussie Rules

Why is it that the EU can stir up such massive emotion and hatred? More importantly, why is it that we apparently acquiesce at every whimsical idea that gets pumped out of the EU Commission? As someone who is a sceptic, and by that I mean I'm equally sceptical of europhilia as I am of euroscepticism, I find myself thinking that neither side are right when it comes to the answer.

On the one hand the europhiles will say that we don't acquiesce, we have simple agreed, as with all other member states, to confer areas of competence at the supranational level. That means that in some areas of policy we accept that qualified majority voting is the weight required to carry it.

On the other hand, the eurosceptic frame the debate within the issue of sovereignty. For them we have given away our right to decide to do x, y or z and we only have ourselves to blame. Their solution tends to manifest itself through groups such as Better off Out, or they call for renegotiation of our membership back to the terms they believe we agreed to in 1975.

Personally I take another view that is less political and more cultural. I think all our problems and annoyances with the EU stem from our obsessively British sense of fair play and following the rules. We, in joining the club, agree to accept the rules. We're not like those French, Germans, Spaniards or whoever else that might occasionally ignore the rules when it suits them. That just wouldn't be British!

Therein, for me at least, lies the problem. Take for example the recent changes to the law regarding booster seats in cars. The law, as many will know, stipulate if your child is under a certain height, or under 12, they must have a booster seat. Besides the problem of enforcement on our own part, ask yourself this, if we had ignored the law what would've actually happened?

Nothing. A few words would've been said in the Council of Ministers no doubt, strong words from the Commission, perhaps talk of a fine. It's not like they have the capacity to invade. In recent years the French and Germans have comprehensively broken the economic rules governing the Euro. Their argument? National interest, sod off. Would we ever do that? Probably not. Perhaps we should.

The European Union, works for those on the continent precisely because they know it doesn't really have the capacity to enforce it's will. This is especially true where those member states have their own written constitution. We on the other don't, so we get lost in the minutiae of statute and convention trying to figure out where sovereignty lies. Throw into the mix our cultural tendency toward following the rules and fair play and you have a recipe for disaster.

Put simply, our relationship with the EU is defined by our insistence on playing cricket with it. Everyone else meanwhile is playing Aussie Rules.

Update on British security student

For those interested (i.e not the British press it seems) in the ongoing tale of British citizen Chris Soghoian, the security postgrad who highlighted significant flaws in airport security where electronic check-in is present. The Congressman that originally called on the Bush Administration to apprehend him has now had a change of heart and suggest the Government employ him (presumably due to the number of emails he received). He said that it was clear that

"[Chris] intended no harm but, rather, intended to provide a public service by warning that this long-standing loophole could be easily exploited.... Under the circumstances, any legal consequences for this student must take into account his intent to perform a public service, to publicize a problem as a way of getting it fixed. He picked a lousy way of doing it, but he should not go to jail for his bad judgment. Better yet, the Department of Homeland Security should put him to work showing public officials how easily our security can be compromised."

More here

Belusconi and Mills to stand trial for corruption

It's been reported on Reuters that Silvio Belusconi and David Mills are to stand trail for corruption. At least the mortgage was paid off.

Not down to me guv'

The Lib Dem MP, John Hemming, has failed in his High Court challenge regarding the standard of the replies Tony Blair provides to Parliament under questioning. Apparently the MP has raised this in the past in the House and the Speaker has told him that it's not the Speaker's place to rule on the matter. Now the High Court says it's not their job either. The hapless MP has been ordered to pay just over £2000 in costs.

MPs fail Highway Code test

Just spotted this Early Day motion submitted by Lib Dem MP, Richard Younger-Ross. Basically he's calling on the Government to "educate drivers in how to respond to emergency vehicles, in particular by including such advice in the Highway Code, and to make it part of the driving test."

Perhaps it's Mr Younger-Ross that need educating given the HighWay Code states the following:

29: Emergency vehicles. If an ambulance, fire engine, police or other emergency vehicle approaches using flashing blue lights, headlights and/or sirens, keep off the road.

194: Emergency vehicles. You should look and listen for ambulances, fire engines, police or other emergency vehicles using flashing blue, red or green lights, headlights or sirens. When one approaches do not panic. Consider the route of the emergency vehicle and take appropriate action to let it pass. If necessary, pull to the side of the road and stop, but do not endanger other road users.

I think we should make him, and the 17 others who signed the EDM, take their test again.

The USB duck hoover

Only in Japan.


Hat Tip: The delightful Tokyomango

Police Press Officers monitoring and commenting on blogs

Last week there was a report on the BBC and other news outlets that the Greater Manchester Police had put out an order to limit arresting Muslims during Ramadan. A few blogs out there commented on this at the time - see here, here, and here. The interesting thing to note is in their comments appears a statement purporting to be from the Greater Manchester Police Press Office. The statement says that the whole issue was been misrepresented by the media.

After someone contacted me last night to ask if I thought it was genuine, I decided to give the press office at Greater Manchester Police a call and find out if they really were monitoring the blogs and putting out official statements on them. The answer was yes, the GMP press office was responsible for the messages.

This left me wondering, is this now an official policy for UK police authorities? Will we soon see press officers from other areas of the state apparatus posting press statements in the comment section of blogs? I imagine they'd get slated if they did it at Guidos

Incidentally, I notice the GMP still have the "Cones Hotline" (disbanded in 1995) listed on their useful numbers page. I got all nostalgic when I saw it.

Dizzy's Environmental Proposals

The Environmental policy debate appears to be moving a pace with ernest today. Below are some alternatives to Miliband's insanity.

• The state can have a role in environmental policy. However it should concentrate on areas already within in it's remits, such as environmental policies within the public services.
• Around 60% of all energy is lost from power station to consumer. There should be a national strategy to encourage Council's to go down the route of self-sufficiency.
• Councils should be encouraged to take themselves off the grid through energy decentralisation.
• Investment should be made into implementing locally based energy generation with a combination of solar, cogeneration, trigeneration, wind, fuel cells and tidal power (where appropriate).
• All local authority property, including social housing should have its energy supplied by these decentralised power sources.
• This will create localised grid that will rely on the national grid only for power resiliency.
• Woking Borough Council provides the case study for how such a strategy is possible.
• All new social housing building projects should have local decentralised power generation within in their design plans.
• The benefits of the above are not just environmental. They will tackle the scandalous waste of energy that currently takes place.
• If we stop wasting 60% of energy in the delivery, then we can consume the same amount but actually produce less. Such an approach would have order of magnitude impact on our CO2 emission output far greater than blunt tax increases.
• As has been found in Woking, such strategies provide the means to sell excess energy back to the grid, and also means that local energy prices in council property can be kept stable and relatively low.
• A range of tax breaks should be introduced to encourage, rather than coerce, changes in individual behaviour, thus acknowledging that not everyone will change their ways and that is there choice as individuals at liberty in civil society.
• For example, increases in vehicle excise duty will hit the poorest and push them off the road entirely as they will not be able to afford to buy a brand new low emission car. Instead, rebates should be offered on vehicle excise duty on the basis of how much mileage a car does in a given year. This genuinely provides an incentive to changes in behaviour.
• Local offsetting initiatives in conjunction with organisations like Climate Care.

Brown and Miliband's plan to punish the poor

Gordon Brown and David Miliband are preparing to tax the poor off the road with plans for "a substantial increase in vehicle excise duty for higher-emissions vehicles" according to a leaked document in this morning's Mail on Sunday. The document, from Miliband to Brown, outlines a number of areas where the intention is to heavily tax everyone in an attempt to make them more environmentally friendly. It's not so much a stick as a baseball bat, and there is no carrot. Key proposals are:

• Substantial increase in road tax - bizarrely arguing that this will be an incentive to buy low emission cars. Which may be true for someone able to afford a new car, but won't be for low-income family of four driving a 10 year old Mondeo. I guess they're expected to catch a bus in our "integrated transport system".
• Remove the freeze on the fuel escalator by arguing it will create price stability of oil. I'm not quite sure how the tax on fuel in the UK impacts the global oil price, but that is the argument in the document.
• Total "road-user pricing". Basically a per journey charge to use roads which has massive technological and surveillance implications.
• Using Council Tax to target owner-occupiers who have have high emission homes. That basically means punishing those who live in period property.
• Putting VAT on air fares.
• Introducing an air passenger tax. That on top of the tax already, and presumably VAT.
  
• No stamp duty on purchases of "zero carbon" homes. Not quite sure how any home can be "zero carbon". This sounds like a headline grabbing policy that will never actually be applied because of it's virtual impossibility to achieve. A bit like zero road tax on a car that is no longer in production.

Perversely, Miliband's final bullet point says that if the proposals are taken on wholesale they will "provide clear incentives to change behaviour". This sort of argumeent needs to be exposed for the nonsense that it is. There is no incentive present when you use tax to punish people into changing their ways. Genuine incentives do not use negativity (in this case financial pain) as a means to an end. Attempting to draw a distinction between increased tax and incentives is like arguing in favour of torture because it provides an incentive to talk. Incentives are positive benefits that are acheived from a neutral status-quo position. You do not move the goalposts then ask for money as an incentive to move them back, there is only one name for that, and it's blackmail. To argue as Miliband does is at best disingenuous, and at worst intellectually fatuous.

The reality behind this sdocuemnt is that it's a revenue generation scheme worth literally billions. It proposes even greater extension of the state's ability to monitor and track individual private action through the road pricing proposal, but the most pernicious aspect of the proposals is that they will punish the poor most significantly. They'll have the consequence of increasing dependency on the state and crushing any hope of social mobility.

There is a debate to won on this issue and it the one that argues that incentives to encourage environmentally friendly behaviour must be based on revenue neutrality. We should not be increasing tax and then saying if people act in particularly ways they will get a reduction, because that doesn't represent a reduction at all. We should be introducing policies which offer rebates from the status-quo tax position, not an increased position. We must reject coercion through financial pain as a means to an end.

Government spins different lines on non-emergency 101

The other night on 18 Doughty Street I spotted a story in the Daily Telegraph about the Government's "non-emergency" alternative to 999, 101. The Telegraph reported that they'd seen a leaked letter stating the entire scheme was being shelved after the "Wave 1" pilots had proved rather unsuccessful.

According to an article in the Evening Standard examples of this failure were calls to 101 in Hampshire with request such as "Do you know when the next bus leaves for Southampton?"

The cancellation of Wave 2 has apparently annoyed the Police in Wales, and in Lancashire the Government wasted £100,000 preparing to set it up before changing their mind and scrapping it. The line from the Home Office is that any decisions about the projects future "will be deferred pending the outcome of a full evaluation of Wave One in the autumn of 2007."

What's interesting though is that the Government's official 101 website doesn't say this? It still states that the "second wave areas will start work during 2006 with the aim of launching in 2007, and the service will be available across all of England and Wales by 2008".

Is it on? Is it off? Does the arse know what the elbow is doing?

Blogger apologises for outages

The full horror story of what has been going on over the past weeks or so is available on Blogger Buzz which is an official Blogger blog. Also, for those looking for info when they do have problem, check out the Blogger status pages. The long and short of the tale appears to be to migrate to Beta Blogger, although I fear if everyone were to do that at once it might have problems too.

Still... I have been testing Beta Blogger out for a while now and I think it's functionally better than Blogger and is operationally far more stable. The risk is mitigated by Blogger being awful anyway, there is no going back now.

British citizen questioned by FBI for highlighting airport security flaws

A PhD security student who exposed how easy it was to bypass airline security has had part of his website taken down by the FBI. Chris Soghoian, a British citizen and PhD student at the University of Indiana created a tool which could generate NorthWest American Airline boarding passes with any name of the users choosing (click image for large version). When he posted about it on his blog he gave the following possible uses:

1. Meet your elderly grandparents at the gate
2. 'Upgrade' yourself once on the airplane - by printing another boarding pass for a ticket you're[sic] already purchased, only this time, in Business Class.
3. Demonstrate that the TSA Boarding Pass/ID check is useless.

The last of those reasons is the most important without a doubt. To be able to generate, with such apparent ease, a boarding pass for any NorthWest flight of one's choosing, in any name of one's choosing, represents a threat to airline and airport security of massive proportions. A boarding pass will get you through security check, and once there, well, God knows what mayhem could be caused. It makes a mockery of the so-called "no-fly lists".

However, there is of course a downside to Christopher's decision to publish the tool via his blog as he did. Highlighting security flaws is no doubt important, but doing so ought to be done through official channels else sadly, what eventually happened to Chris happens. It began with calls from the Senator who originally pointed out the potential security for Chris's arrest and the removal of website and ended with the FBI.

The University, according to Chris's blog, told him he was on his own if he got arrested, and yesterday, his blog had a short post saying "The FBI are at the door. Off to chat". The Boarding Pass website is now gone. Three hours after going for a chat with the Feds, he posted again saying "I am now safe (and no longer with the FBI). Still trying to find a lawyer....."

Personally I hope he does find himself a good lawyer. His decision to publish was, I think, unwise, but his intentions certainly lacked malice. He should be praised for having highlighted such a flaw in the system, and, frankly, the US Government should be offering him a job. There is a front to the "War on Terror" on the Internet, and it needs people like Chris.

UPDATE: Apparently the FBI returned to Chris's home last night whilst he stayed elsewhere. They smashed the glass on his door to enter and seized his computers and other belonging, then left the warrant taped to the table. Chris's blog appears to be down at the moment, but more details can be seen here.

Dizzy in Arabic

I just discovered the following in my referrer logs. It would appear someone wanted to read my post regarding MPACUK's decision to juxtapose a 9/11 Rememberance picture with an interesting headline.

I've never seen my words in arabic before but the really cool thing is that when you hover the mouse on the text it pops up the english translation. Rather cool I thought.

Ming Campbell insults UK childcare workers

In a speech today it appears that Ming Campbell has effectively said that the standard of childcare offered by the workers in the UK is of low quality as a result of the workforce being uneducated. In a speech he said:

"In Denmark, those working in childcare need a degree. In Britain, they need no qualifications at all.... By professionalising childcare provision, we can raise the standing and the standard of the service"

I'm sure all those hard working childcare assistant will be well chuffed.

Extra anus kills four-legged chicken

Utterly bizarre I know, but apparently he developed two bottoms and it got "glugged up". I kid you not.

The chicken's corpse is apparently going to the Auckland museum.

Working the dizzy way

Utterly pointless post for a Friday lunchtime, but its been suggested by some that I blog more than I work. I don't work like normal people. One keyboard and mouse controlling two computers with a monitor each where the mouse just glides between screens. This is the joy called x2vnc.

"Disingenuous bastards" you say?

Well, whilst my appearance last night on 18 Doughty Street's End of the Day show was enjoyable it did leave me in a slight pickle this morning. Iain did ask me what I would be writing about today and I was a bit stuck as I'd just spent the evening talking about it. However, thank the lord they didn't have a copy of the Grauniad so I bought that this morning. Unsuprisingly I feel compelled to write about things now... funny that.

Whilst reading it on the Tube, it was not long before I found myself exclaiming, out loud, "disingenuous bastards!". You see, the front page carried a story on MPs' expenses (like the other papers) and it was carried with a picture of David Cameron riding his bicycle with the title "MPs' Expenses: It's 20p a mile for cycling (and 40p a mile for the car behind)". Pretty daming huh? You might even find yourself thinking "what a cheek! He's claiming for cycling and his following car".

The truth though, is buried in the small print as always. A quick turn to the story on page 8 and we find, at the bottom of the second paragraph, the words "[Cameron] did not claim mileage in his total expenses claim". This as you probably now realise, puts my Tube expletives in context.

What Richmond Council ought to be doing

Yesterday, as has been well reported, the Lib Dem run Richmond Council has announced a prescriptive local tax policy on those wishing to have "Resident Parking Permits". Basically, it will band vehicles by CO2 output and charge higher rates for the right to park on the road outside houses.

Without wishing to get too philosophical, this is exactly the wrong way to go about tackling climate change and CO2 output. Using taxation to change behaviour rarely works, when it hurts, and especially when it hurts the poor, as this policy will do, it creates resentment, not compliance.

Instead of arbitrarily trying to reduce emissions by targeting one single small group, Council's should be looking to encourage greater carbon neutrality from its residents. What might that mean in practice? Well here's an idea, if, as Richmond Council claim, there approach is revenue neutral, then how about offering scaled discounts from reasonably set parking permit price on the basis of driver carbon offsetting?

Instead of having a rising price scale, what you do is set your permit price at say, £150 per year (that figure is arbitrary for my example before anyone complains it is too high or too low). You then offer, in conjunction with Climate Care, residents the ability to off-set their car's carbon output. In return they receive a rebate/discount on their parking permit at the end of the year or beginning of the next, which is a notional amount higher than their offset cost. e.g. £150 for a permit at the beginning of year, £25 offset charge at the end of the year, rebate of £50 from the Council.

This kind of policy, unlike that proposed in Richmond, would encourage people to be aware of their impact of the environment and make them act by offering them a discount to their pocket. If Council's genuinely mean it when they say the want revenue neutral schemes then carbon neutral carrots, rather than taxation sticks are what they ought to be doing.

Local dictatorships are not the solution to local democracy?

There is much fanfare being made today about the Government proposals for local government. Read the news and you might start thinking that this represented a massive change in the relationship between Whitehall and Local Government.

Using phrases like "double devolution" sounds very snazzy, but they mask the disconcerting part of the proposal. The Government make it sound like they're repatriating power to the local people, but the reality is they're trying to consolidate power to smaller and less accountable political elites.

Take for example the desire for directly-elected mayors. The argument the Government put forward is that this creates a directly accountable link to local people. However what it really creates is an effective local dictatorship. Lewisham is a case in point.

In Lewisham they have a Labour directly-elected mayor who has a casting vote in a Council where even with his vote Labour have no overall majority. Lewisham is an effective dictatorship as a result. What Steve Bullock wants, Steve Bullock gets, the fact that the majority of local people might be against simply doesn't matter. Directly-elected mayors make a mockery of the democratic process, they do not enhance it.

Quote of the Day

"If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the garden, or in the park, or in the backyard without cover, and the cats come to eat it ... whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat? The uncovered meat is the problem. If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred." - Sheik Taj al Hilali (Australia's most senior Muslim cleric)

A candidate for "Pseuds Corporate"?

"The International Water Association is a global network of water professionals, spanning the contiuum between research and practice and covering all facets of the water cycle"

Plumbers?

Heffer plays the "Dictionary Definition" game

Great news everyone, with a slight deviation last week, normal service has been resumed by Simon Heffer. In today's Telegraph he's back to his anti-Cameron best, only this time he's doing it by playing the "Dictionary Definition" game that anyone that's discussed politics on Usenet will have seen many times before.

Today's Heffer rant is about the terms "ideology" and "ideologues". Heffer points out that "ideology, as the dictionary tells us, is simply the study of ideas: and an ideologue is one who studies them" thus those that reject ideology are "rejecting and condemning ideas". Isn't he clever? Of course, he's deliberately ignored the other defintions in the dictionary that ruin his argument, such is the way when you play the Dictionary Definition game.

As it happens though, Heffer is wrong to say that those that are pragmatic reject ideas. On the contrary, they embrace ideas, the difference is that they are not bound by the doctrinal nature of what Heffer later referred to as an "ideological system".

Being non-ideological does not mean rejecting ideas, it means, for example, rejecting marxism and socialism because it compartmentalises human action into the grand theory of dialectical materialism. On the political flip-side it also means rejecting the world which fails to acknowledge the complexity of human action. Human action cannot be assessed though behaviourism that relies on bedrock assumptions that we will always act in economically rational ways.

Being non-ideological means, quite simply, acknowledging that politics is the art of the possible. Sadly that's something Simon Heffer doesn't appear to "get".

US announces it won't be withdrawing from Iraq?

Has the Bush Administration done enough to starve off the electoral headache of Iraq witht this latest announcement by the US Ambassador in Baghdad, Zalmay Khalilzad? According to reports they announced that local security forces should be able to fully "take control" in about 12 to 18 months. Thus, so the line goes, setting a timetable for US withdrawal. Of course, it's what wasn't said that's the important thing rather than what was.

As far as I can tell, nothing was said about what happens if the security situation does not allow for such a handover of control to take place. Interestingly, General Casey did say that "Iran and Syria continue to be decidedly unhelpful by providing support to the different extremists and terrorist groups operating inside Iraq", which I'd say actually leaves the timetable very open-ended.

I'm left thinking that the announcement was for a domestic US audience about to go to the polls, rather than the wider world audience. There certainly seems to have been a lot of hedging. Hopefully we won't start talking about withdrawal formally either, but I dread to think what will happen when Blair goes.

The Red Flag flies above the Telegraph

Apparently, the NUJ journalists at the Daily Telegraph have overwhelming voted for strike action. About 65% of the staff hacks at the Telegraph are NUJ members. I don't know why, but I think there's something mildly amsuing about Union strikes at the Telegraph.

Brown's Britain: You will all "volunteer"

Putting aside the obvious increases in the tax burden, the fiscal fraud of the PFI on the nations balance books, the CHancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown gave us all a hint of what the "Brown Future" will look like and it seems pretty clear that his three priorities for Government will be legislation legislation and legislation. IN a speech today to the Corporate & Social Responsibilty conference he outlined his vision thus:

A vision for our country to pioneer and be the first to achieve the day when it becomes the norm for:

* Every person to be asked to give some of their income to a charitable cause,;
* Every young person to volunteer some time while in education;
* Every employer has a volunteering scheme for their employees; and
* Every retired person considers helping others with their life's experience and skills.

Supported at each point by an enabling and empowering government that does what it can to make this possible.

The last sentence is the killer that sets the tone for what is to come. Greater social authoriarianism and increased interference. There will be very little that is voluntary in Brown vision of volunteering based on that last sentence.

In Brown's world the state will have an ever increased role in dictating our actions. To quote a wise man from Croydon, Brown is essentially advocating the "nationalisation of free time". God help us all.

Will we wash our hands of it?

According to an ICM poll for the Guardian, 45% of the public want immediate withdrawal of troops for Iraq, and 61% want them "home by Christmas". At the same time, a poll by Communicate Research for the Independent says that 62% want withdrawal "as soon as possible" whilst 72% simultaneously, and bizarrely, acknowledge that the country will descend into civil war when we leave.

For some reason I keep hearing Matthew 27:24 in my head now.

Government facing defeat over "Natwest Three" ammendments

The Government faces a potential defeat at the hands of rebels, the Tories and Lib Dems over safeguards introduced to the shameful "fast track extradition" agreement Britian holds with the US. Back in the summer, to much press coverage, the so-called Natwest Three were extradited for an alleged fraud against Natwest which Natwest says did not happen.

Under the one-sided extradition agreement that Britiain has, the US no longer has to provide prima facie evidence for extradition. This evening the Commons will vote on a Lords Ammendment to require a judge to only allow extradition if it is in the "interest of justice" for a trial to be held abroad.

The Labour rebels are being led by the firebrand socialist John McDonnell (he who wants to be leader) and it's fair to say that anti-americanism populism is far more likely a driver for him than anything else. This said, anything that might course the Government humiliation is surely a good thing?

Don't forget L. Ron Hubbard's maxim

There has been a little bit of coverage here and there today about the Church of Scientology opening a £24m centre in the heart of the Square Mile and how much you have to pay to get near Tom Cruise at Scientology events. Having been intrigued by Scientology whilst a student - I have a passing interest in theology generally - I had a glimpse at "Dianetics" some years ago. It was nonsense as far as I recall.

However, I am also always minded to remember that Scientology's founder, L Ron Hubbard, science fiction writer extraordinaire, is well known to have said (often in many variations), that the easiest "way to make a million dollars is to start a religion." He was right.

US bans vegemite

Much to the annoyance of Australians it appears that the USA has banned the importing of the Vegemite. Apparently, Vegemite contains folate, which is only allowed to be added to breads and cereals in the US, making it effectively illegal. More here.

Firefox 2.0 final release available

Firefox 2.0 final version is now available for download here.

Quote of the Day

A brilliant quote today from the Home Office Minister, Gerry Sutcliffe, in a press release on GNN called Keeping communities safe:

"Protecting the public is at the heart of the Government's priorities, and ensuring the effective management of the most dangerous offenders is a key part of our agenda"

Truly astounding.

Polls are bad mmmkay... except my polls

This little comment gem in the Times made me chuckle this morning. Deborah Mattinson bemoans newspapers for commissioning polls to "manufacture headlines rather than uncover facts" and goes on to attack pollsters who "sell" their ideas.

She then proceeds to sell the poll on page 17 of the same paper as a shining example of a good poll, which just so happens to have been carried out by the polling organisation she is joint Chief Executive of. Go figure!

Undergraduates are not the sum of their parents' earning

This morning's Times is running a story which I'm sure I saw last week somewhere about proposals to lower the entrance requirement for university courses in circumstances where the applicant is poor.

The argument, as any good Leftie will tell you, is that if you're from a poor family then you won't have access to books (or computers in today's world) like the rich kids will. Therefore you are less likely to acheive at school.

This argument is of course complete nonsense and problematic on a number of levels. Firstly it's based on the rather dodgy assumption that affluent parents are good parents who support their children. Conversely it also assumes that parents from less affluent backgrounds will be bad parents and not wish to support their children.

Secondly, the argument punishes children on the basis of hereditary values. In effect, two children of equal intellectual ability, but from differing backgrounds, are expected to achieve different levels of attainment simply because of the circumstance of their birth. How odd that such an argument would be promulgated by those who supposedly hold an ideological opposition to hereditary privilege.

Gaining access to University should be about academic attainment and perhaps, if the institution chooses, an interview. Lowering entry levels on the basis of someone's background does not create equality it actually extenuates difference. It says to prospective undergraduates, "you are not you, you are merely the sum of your parents' earnings".

Ted Kennedy worked with KGB to oust Reagan?

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