SYNTAGMA

DIARY: Inequality Benedict, Blubbing Brown, Annoyment, Brown’s Five Tests, Booker opens the books, Dambisa Moyo

John Evans — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 14:43:28 +0000

Dominic Lawson has written a solid piece in the Sunday Times on that very un-British bit of potential legislation, Harriet Harman’s Equality Bill. It really is as ghastly as it seems.

The reaction of Pope Benedict to parts of it — although he doesn’t mention it by name — is what caught my eye. The Pope is after all defending the age-old practice of his Church against a dying, destructive shambles of a government, which is more than can be said for the leaders of our Established Church.

Readers of my new book will know I’m exceedingly ambivalent about Roman Catholicism which is largely built on a misleading redaction of evidence in the early centuries AD. However, I have rather taken to the last two Popes.

Benedict, it seems to me, says what he thinks in no uncertain terms, even if he’s had to make a few grovelling retractions in the past, especially to prickly Muslims.

John Paul II started his career with the Rosicrucians, followers of the Rosy Cross, a supposedly occult organization teaching that all is mind (Idealism).

Why can’t we have such leaders in Anglicanism? Archbishop Ramsey was the last one who openly espoused mysticism, if I’m not mistaken.

Let us earnestly hope that David Cameron is more like the two Popes and less like the current Archbishop of Canterbury.

* * * * *

Gordon Brown and his wife are reported to blub freely in a forthcoming friendly Piers Morgan interview on ITV.

What does he mean by that, we are entitled to ask, given the crafty nature of the man? I suspect he may be trying to set a trend.

We know how party leaders determinedly follow each other so they are not left behind on the latest behavourial fashion — David Cameron spent years imitating Tony Blair, and the latter tried but failed to ape Maggie Thatcher.

Here’s the lowdown: Brown has cunningly spotted that the country wants a strong leader, and recognizes that, apart from his brutalist manner, he has signally failed to project a Churchillian persona to the public.

By gushing on TV he may hope to lure Cameron into doing the same. If DavCam is caught whipping out a Kleenex or two in public, Brown may think he will lose votes by the truckload.

It’s only a theory, but with Gordon Brown you can just about believe anything.

* * * * *

Annoyment of the Week
A Gordon Brown Free Zone

Just down the road from me there’s a substantial building with an impressive sign over the door: Casting House.

Whenever I pass it, I conjure up a long line of wannabee hopefuls snaking down the road, waiting excitedly to do their party pieces before a panel of judges. Is that Cheryl Cole I see going in by the back door?

Imagine how they would feel if they ever got in only to find it’s an engineering works?

Too much imagination?

Yeah.

* * * * *

The fate of Greece is one of those “there but for the grace of …” situations in economics. Britain can’t be that far behind as we have a similar budget defict to the birthplace of European democracy.

The one element conferring protection on the UK is our monetary freedom outside the eurozone.

Arch Europhile Peter Mandelson is reported to have altered his language on the topic in recent days, praising our ability to set interest rates and allow the exchange rate to fall. You’d almost think he engineered it himself.

Gordon Brown is widely credited for having “kept the UK out of the euro”. At first glance his Five Tests required for entry certainly did the trick. It was his supreme triumph in office, the spinline goes.

But motive is all.

Was Brown as doughty a defender of the ancient pound as was Tory leader William Hague at the time? Or was he engaged in yet another spiteful battle for supremacy with Tony Blair?

I’d bet a house on the latter.

* * * * *

Ever reliable Christopher Booker has become something of a cult figure in the climate debate. The words Global Warming must be etched on his tonsils.

In today’s Sunday Telegraph he lists a catalogue of mysterious government payments to overseas lost causes, especially those caught up in the Weather-Wheeze bubble. He writes:

“… in its obsession with climate change, different branches of the UK Government have in recent years been pouring hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money into a bewildering array of ‘climate-related’ projects, often throwing a veil of mystery over how much is being paid, to whom and why.”

Another scandal for this wretched administration to shrug off as “political decisions” and therefore not subject to public accountability.

Why?

Shouldn’t these half-baked Che Guevaras be held to account for every penny of our money they’ve squandered over the past calamitous 13 years?

An aspiration perhaps for the next Government?

Or will there not be time enough?

* * * * *

Dambisa Moyo is a Zambian economist “known as a critical thinking realist who, for instance, has highlighted how well intentioned policies (such as foreign aid to Africa) can often have unintended consequences which have detrimental effects on an economy.” (Wikipedia). She’s also said to be one of the world’s hundred most influential people.

She appeared on the Marr show this morning as a paper reviewer. I should have liked a full interview instead.

Her book Dead Aid argues that foreign aid has harmed Africa and that it should be phased out. Note, this is the exact opposite of Handout Brown’s interminable reflex to shove other people’s money into Africa. Dambisa Moyo has the advantage of first-hand knowledge of the continent, plus a first-class, Oxford-educated brain. Brown should listen.

Isn’t it time we applied real evidence and common sense to the whole industry of foreign aid?

Another can of worms for the Tories to sort out. You can’t help feeling sorry for them, can you?

John Evans

Saturday Ramble: Politics and the land of Cockaigne

John Evans — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 13:38:54 +0000

“Do you think Margaret Thatcher ever snorted cocaine before a big Commons occasion?” asked an acquaintance last week.

An 18th-century London scene as painted by Hogarth

My reply was near-instantaneous: “No!”

“Lots of MPs do,” continued my interlocutor, who is something of a self-confessed expert on the subject.

“How do you know?” I asked, slightly incredulous. The idea had never occurred to me.

“In my City days,” he replied, “it was de rigueur, and I’m ashamed to admit I partook of a sniffter or two on occasion. Now when I watch parliamentary performances I have doubts about quite a few of them.”

It’s well known, of course, that Chancellors of the Exchequer are allowed to carry a stiff brandy or Scotch into the House of Commons on Budget day. That’s always been a mystery to me as I find a stiff anything reduces intellectual performance.

There’s an apocryphal tale that Ken Clarke, then Chancellor, was discovered drunk in the Treasury at 2am on the night before the Budget. I could understand if that was Charlie Kennedy, although Clarke is a well-known bon viveur. It can’t be ruled out that he overestimated the dosage of his favourite cordial.

Charlie (the slang name for cocaine) is now so widely available in Britain, traces of it can be found on every banknote in circulation. Does that mean that traces of it are on everyone’s hands and in all wallets? We should be told. We might need it as a defence one day.

As someone who’s never touched the stuff, I marvel at the paraphernalia needed to take it. A credit card is said to be essential — not to buy the drug, but to make sniffable “lines” of the powder prior to ingestion. A £50 note is used to form a tube for inhalation (actually any denomination will do, except those old white fivers which are far too big for the average hooter). We mustn’t forget the possession of a nose, assuming it hasn’t rotted away by now.

MPs are not different from ordinary members of the public. Should we be more aware of the stresses on them and the opportunities to use drugs to enhance their performance? I think we should. It’s not just expenses we should worry about.

I have no idea whether any MP uses Charlie as a stimulant before entering the once-hallowed chamber of the House of Commons, but with 646 members, and given the widespread useage, it does seem more than likely. The good news is that all those sleeping Lords in the Other Place almost prove that cocaine may be virtually unknown on the red benches. We can’t rule out liquid refreshments, of course.

If all that is true, the expenses scandal becomes more explicable. But I won’t enlarge on that in case it’s deemed actionable. I will just state that in my always sober lifestyle, the purchase of aquatic second homes for a newt collection would be frivolous in the extreme. As would many of the other exotic claims by some of our more Hogarthian MPs.

Strange to say, when Edward Elgar decided to write an overture to the old City of London, he called it Cockaigne, and portrayed it as a fabulous country of luxury and delight.

Sounds reminiscent of wild expenses and £50 notes to me.

PS: Finally, for those of you who have written telling me off for deserting the cause just before a General Election, I will paraphrase Gerry Adams — I haven’t gone away, you know!

John Evans

Parish Pump: Designer wanted

John Evans — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 14:44:02 +0000

Syntagma Books is looking for a book cover and page-layout designer for future titles.

Location is not important, but accuracy and fault spotting skills essential. We are not particularly looking for a big design agency, although we don’t rule anyone out at this stage. Home workers with competence, flair and experience are welcome to apply.

Please email examples of work to: john@syntagmabooks.com

Election Notebook: Tories lack of courage creating equality with Brown

John Evans — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 16:32:35 +0000

Harriet Harman must be pleased. Her Equality Bill appears to be having a profound effect on David Cameron — if not the Pope.

Cameron’s apparent loss of strength in recent weeks, his dithering and wobbling on major issues, is creating a level playing field at the top of British politics.

None of us knows what will happen on polling day. My best guess is that the current closeness in the numbers — pointing to a hung Parliament — is wrong for one simple reason. On the day, many supporters of other parties, don’t-knows and stay-at-homes, will swing behind the Conservatives just to get Gordon Brown out.

I may be wrong, but I have a strong hunch it will happen. Of course, the effect may not be enough, especially if Cameron goes into the campaign proper looking like a frightened fawn in a car’s headlights.

People vote for strong leaders, more so in times of acute stress. Watching clips of Tony Blair in recent weeks reminds us that, although he is a fluffier and weaker character than Cameron, he was relentlessly emphatic in his declarations. Despite the chaos and turmoil in Number 10 during his premiership, he always looked in charge front-of-house.

Cameron needs to show just that now. Take the recent shimmy backwards over deficit cuts: “There will be no swingeing cuts at first.” Weakness personified, and possibly his biggest mistake so far.

He might have said: “You can be sure we will deal firmly with the deficit, but until we’ve seen the state of the books in office, and made an assessment of the economy as a whole at that time, we can’t begin writing a detailed Budget.”

Voters do understand honesty and plain common sense. Brown would jeer from the sidelines, but the message will have got through.

David Cameron’s unredeemed “cast-iron guarantee” over the Lisbon Treaty has also inflicted enormous damage on the Tory leader. As Syntagma has written many times, a simple pledge to negotiate a trade-only agreement with Brussels would cauterize that wound and bring over many UKIP votes at the election.

At present in Parliament, Douglas Carswell MP is moving a Bill for a referendum on quitting the EU. He should be supported by his colleagues. Best get it over now or this subject will haunt the leadership after a year or two of government. Some people don’t go into politics to watch the handover of their country to a foreign power.

Such a move would also be in the best interests of the country and make deep cuts in public spending without impacting on services in the UK. It’s a win-win decision and would confer on Cameron a sense of strength and purpose.

As for the rest, a careful building of the manifesto will suffice. He only needs one big symbolic policy, that neither Brown nor Clegg can match, to lift his profile far above theirs.

I once watched an adobe house being built in a day. It had one central support, a giant tree trunk planted firmly in the ground. Around it were attached supporting poles producing a kind of grand tepee. Wattle was intertwined into the supports, followed by dollops of adobe, or mud. It looked quite grand when it was finished and was, I’m told, very cosy in winter, and cool in summer.

It could be a template for the Conservative election campaign. At present, there’s lots of wattle and small sticks around, a few supporting lathes have crept in, together with a pile of mud. No central trunk is yet visible. This house does not look viable as it stands.

Time is getting short. David Cameron needs to play his big card before he loses any more impetus. The more the polls narrow, the more confident Labour looks and the less Prime Ministerial the Tory leader.

The trunk I’m suggesting is unanswerable by the other parties, so can safely be launched early. It would transform the election overnight. The numbers would swing back towards the Conservatives, and the more criticism Cameron was subjected to, the more it would play into his hands.

More than that, the declaration would confer strength and much-needed trustworthiness on the Tory leader. I know from talking to people that his abandonment of the pledge to take the question of Europe to the country has shattered his credibility in many of the minds he will need to win.

This is an election winner, especially with the eurozone splitting into two warring camps as we speak. Every mention of this policy would bolster support for the party.

We keep our promises, he could rightfully chant throughout the election campaign. Brown would be on the back foot all the way to ignominious defeat.

John Evans

Saturday Ramble: We are all doomed!

John Evans — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:50:50 +0000

Received today in a “light-hearted” round-robin email titled: Asylum:

IF YOU CROSS THE NORTH KOREAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU GET 12 YEARS HARD LABOR.

IF YOU CROSS THE IRANIAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU ARE DETAINED INDEFINITELY.

IF YOU CROSS THE AFGHAN BORDER ILLEGALLY, YOU GET SHOT

IF YOU CROSS THE SAUDI ARABIAN BORDER ILEGALLY YOU WILL BE JAILED.

IF YOU CROSS THE CHINESE BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU MAY NEVER BE HEARD FROM AGAIN.

IF YOU CROSS THE VENEZUELAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE BRANDED A SPY AND YOUR FATE WILL BE SEALED.

IF YOU CROSS THE CUBAN BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU WILL BE THROWN INTO POLITICAL PRISON TO ROT.

IF YOU CROSS THE THAI BORDER ILLEGALLY YOU ARE IMMEDIATELY DEPORTED AFTER A SPELL IN THE MONKEY HOUSE.

IF YOU CROSS THE BRITISH BORDER ILLEGALLY; YOU GET A JOB, A DRIVERS LICENSE, SOCIAL INSURANCE CARD, MONEY FROM SOCIAL SECURITY, FOOD STAMPS, CREDIT CARDS, SUBSIDIZED RENT OR A LOAN TO BUY A HOUSE, FREE EDUCATION AND FREE HEALTH CARE.

Now what was it Private Fraser used to say in Dad’s Army …. ?

John Evans