Longrider

Before I start, a caveat; I use the term “left” in the title as this is the label generally used by those who espouse the ideologies discussed. However, I don’t much like the terms “right” and “left” as they are meaningless today. Rather, I feel that the new battleground is with authoritarianism.

All that said and moving on, I admit to being a little amused by the latest comments from IDS about encouraging a mobile workforce. It has been discussed pretty extensively on the BBC over the past weekend along with sound-bites from Ed Milliband and Ed Balls.

Firstly, what precisely is IDS saying here?

Mr Duncan Smith, the MP for Lord Tebbit’s former parliamentary seat of Chingford, disclosed that ministers were drawing up plans to encourage jobless people living in council houses to move out of unemployment black spots to homes in other areas, perhaps hundreds of miles away.

The former Conservative Party leader said millions of people were “trapped in estates where there is no work” and could not move because they would lose their accommodation.

The proposed scheme would allow them to go to the top of the housing list in another area rather than lose their right to a home if they moved.

Okay, set aside for a moment the argument that actually, the government shouldn’t be involved in any of this at all, and look at it from where we are. The proposal, to give people the option of moving for work by removing the barrier created by housing seems perfectly reasonable to me. Now here’s the rub, back when Norman Tebbit first came out with his “on your bike” comments, I was fairly left wing – I supported the Labour party and pretty much despised the Tories and everything they stood for, but… but… I agreed with him. I was not so blinded by tribal loyalties that I couldn’t see the sense in what he was saying, just as there is sense in what IDS is saying today. Some ten years ago I applied for a job that would have meant moving to Derby. I can’t say that I particularly wanted to move to Derby, but had I been successful, I would have upped sticks and gone. That’s what sensible people do – they go where the work is.

Listening to Balls and Milliband, you would have thought Satan himself had spoken. It’s wrong apparently to think that people might want to move to find work. What we should be doing, Balls told us, is investing in those areas that are unemployment black-spots. I don’t know where this cretin has been for the past few years, but it isn’t on the same planet as the rest of us. Invest what precisely? Okay, if a multinational wants to set up an outlet in the UK, an unemployment black-spot might be an ideal place for them to look for a workforce, but apart from that; what, exactly, does Balls think can be invested? More money stolen from those of us who do work? And what will this investment produce? More diversity outreach workers? Like we need more of those.

And Milliband was no better. He complained about people being forced to move. No one is being forced to move. He is doing what politicians love to do – create a strawman. Every time I hear them speak, I realise that they haven’t moved on from student union politics. The one thing that they are paid to do; indulge in political debate; is the one thing in which they are demonstrably serially incompetent (not the only thing, of course). IDS said nothing about force, but as Labour only understands that, it seems that bug-eyed Ed thinks that’s what everyone else means when they say “encourage” just as Labour understands “voluntary” to mean “compulsory”. The man is an idiot.

What Balls and Milliband want to do is spend more money that we don’t have building up their client vote. Listening to them, you start to wonder if they want people to exist on sink estates with no hope and no future and to keep voting for more of the same. And, listening to members of their client vote being interviewed, it seems that it is mutual. Some stupid, stupid woman when being interviewed in the street, wittered on about creating jobs… What from? Majick?

And therein lies the crux; people have bought the lies. People have fallen for the dogma; that government is the answer to our problems – as opposed to being the cause. And people think that government should “create” jobs out of thin air.

A more desperate example of denial I have yet to see.

Alan Johnson, erstwhile fuckwit in chief at the home office home secretary, is still banging the drum about DNA and how keeping innocent people on the database is a good thing.

The DNA database has identified 410,589 crimes with a DNA match over the last decade.

Last year in 800 of the most serious cases – murder, rape and manslaughter – DNA was central to police inquiries.

The Government plans to reduce the DNA matches that the police can make in such cases because they think that Scotland has a better model. But the police in Scotland, where they have a 13 per cent lower success rate, want to move to the current system in England and Wales.

The Conservatives have got themselves in the terrible position
of supporting criminals in their efforts to evade capture and opposing the police.

Removing innocent people’s profiles is not “supporting criminals”. This is because they are innocent and therefore there is no reason to have them on the database.

Same old authoritarian fuckwittery from the same old authoritarian fuckwits.

Far from being confused, the Conservatives are doing the right thing. Not enough, and nothing like fast enough, but they are moving in the right direction.

Watching the BBC News a few moments ago; the presenter introduced the next topic with the facile comment that everyone over thirty remembers where they were when this happened.

Well, I’m over thirty and… No, I don’t. But that’s because, being an adult, I don’t measure the passage of my life by football matches. Enough of the silly hyperbole, please. It’s just a bloody game and not a very good one at that.

The Japanese government is urging its citizens to go to bed early.

The Japanese government has launched a campaign encouraging people to go to bed and get up extra early in order to reduce household carbon dioxide emissions.

The Morning Challenge campaign, unveiled by the Environment Ministry, is based on the premise that swapping late night electricity for an extra hour of morning sunlight could significantly cut the nation’s carbon footprint.

Are people still taken in by this carbon footprint cockwaffle? I wonder whether our new government will embrace this cack with the same fervour as the previous lot? If they do, I’ll ignore it, just as I ignore everything that the nanny state says. As a rule of thumb, if a politician tells me to do something, it’s probably a good idea to do the exact opposite.

I’ll go to bed when I’m good and ready, not when nanny tells me and nanny can take the nation’s carbon footprint and…

Well, you get the picture.

The new iPhone – for which some rather silly people once more queued to buy and over which Steven Fry engages in verbal incontinence has a glitch.

The issue relates to the mobile phone signal, with users reporting a drop in signal strength when the phone is held.

The casing of Apple’s latest phone is made of stainless steel, which also serves as its antenna.

Richard Warner, who bought his iPhone 4 on Wednesday morning, contacted BBC News, saying that he thought the phone was “useless in its current state”.

“Apple have created a phone that has an antenna on the bottom left-hand side of the phone.”

“This means that when you hold it in your left hand, the signal bars slowly fade until there is no signal,” he wrote.

Oh dear… Mustn’t chuckle. Oh, okay, just a little.

When Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone 4 at Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, he described the integrated antenna as “really cool engineering”.

Yeah, Steve, really cool. Shame it doesn’t work, eh?

—————————————————-

For the record, I don’t hate Apple or its products, I merely have no time for the undeserved hyperbole and idol worship of everything that Jobs comes up with.

—————————————————-

Update: Steve Jobs has a solution:

Apple has responded to reports of reception issues on the new iPhone 4 by advising users to hold the device a different way.

The company’s chief executive, Steve Jobs, replied to an email sent by one user who was experiencing problems. The user, Aram, asked Jobs if there were “any plans” to fix the problem. Jobs responded by advising Aram to “avoid holding [the phone] in that way”.

Or you could fork out £25 for a rubber band that goes round the device.

The bumpers, which cost around £25 and are available in a range of colours, will not be shipped until at least July 16, according to the Apple website.

Colour me unimpressed.

Via JuliaM my attention is drawn to Vera Baird.

The former Labour Solicitor General tried to dodge a driving ban yesterday by claiming ‘hardship’ after being kicked out as an MP at the General election.

Barrister Vera Baird – who occupied the £125,000-a-year post for Gordon Brown until last month – was caught on camera speeding at 98mph.

But she claimed a ban would cause her ‘excessive hardship’ because she needed her car to wind up her affairs after losing her seat in Redcar, Cleveland.

And she told magistrates the punishment would cost taxpayers more money, as she is still eligible to claim MPs’ expenses and would have to file a bill for taxi fares for the delivery of her paperwork.

Put aside for a moment the point Julia makes about chutzpah, and consider this; the M4 where the offence took place is currently reduced to a 50mph speed restriction due to extensive road works as they widen the carriageway in some places and lay cables in others. It goes on pretty much from Newport to just after Cardiff.

Any driver who is prepared to drive at roughly twice the posted speed limit and not see the blindingly obvious speed cameras deserves to lose their licence for failing to possess the necessary observation skills.

Oh, and for thinking that the law only applies to the little people, of course – that goes without saying.

Along with FIFA, the Olympics operate a closed shop when it comes to advertising and merchandising. The latest case to hit the headlines is Visa.

Sports fans who want to buy tickets by card for the London 2012 Olympics will only be able to use the Visa payments system.

The restrictions are part of the sponsorship deal struck between Visa and the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Visa credit and debit cards will be the only ones accepted at shops or cash machines at Olympic venues.

There are two takes on this; their gaff, their rules being the obvious one from a libertarian point of view. However, there is another – who the fuck are they to dictate which payments merchants may or may not accept when dealing with their clients? This is an example of monopolistic behaviour and it stinks, frankly. It’s a bit like the comment made recently in the wake of the FIFA episode – someone (can’t find the exact link, sorry) stated that only Coco Cola will be allowed within 100m of the Olympic stadium, so tough if you prefer Pepsi. However, again, while there is the “their gaff, their rules” point, there is also the little matter of these people deciding what people may be allowed to drink – and in that instance, I tend to take a “my body, my choice” approach, just as I take a “my bank account, my choice of card” approach.

Any transaction between a merchant and the client is between them, not the Olympic committee – and that they are using statue law to impose their restrictive practices is deeply, deeply abhorrent. Not only is this a monopoly in all its vileness, it is a monopoly imposed with the willing violence of the state. They have crossed the line between legitimate sponsorship and advertising, and monopolistic behaviour.

There is a solution, of course, but people are too weak to do it. Stay away. Stay away in your masses and turn the whole horrible junket into an embarrassing loss for the IOC and their bullying sponsors.

Won’t happen, though, and these nasty turds will get away with it again. 

————————————————-

Further thoughts… Following the exchange with Kyle below, another thought occurs to me. “Their gaff, their rules” would apply if, indeed, it was their gaff. Given that the IOC is not paying for this and the infrastructure has been funded at least in part from public money – i.e. yours and mine – it’s as much our gaff as it is theirs. Just a thought…

General McChrystal has been dragged back to Washington to face the music, it seems.

The top US military commander in Afghanistan has left the White House after meeting President Barack Obama to explain his criticism of leading officials.

What about; the comments were perfectly valid, eh? Oh, yeah, of course we cannot criticise politicians, can we? And, being a military man, McChrystal can’t be seen to openly disagree with his commander in chief. But it’s nice to see someone have the balls to do it.

Mr Rob, in referring to this discussion, without naming names accuses me of being impolite and irrational;

As I have mentioned on another blog, where my reception was not nearly as rational and polite (and interesting), we daily accept utilitarian principles when we engage in risk management, why can some people not also accept them with regard to the role of the death penalty in the legal system?

Well, if you come here and regurgitate a stupid point that has already been exposed for its stupidity, some derision should be expected. As it was, my response was pretty mild and I answered the point*, despite it being a blind alley that has nothing to do with the main subject under discussion. I have no desire to be bogged down with reductio ad absurdum and, yes, if you indulge, I will cut you short. If I wanted to discuss utilitarian matters relating to risk management, I would have been discussing it in the first place. I wasn’t, they are not relevant and I indulged your points way beyond what they deserved.

Like a whiny child who constantly asks “why” after every response, you simply repeated the same tedious questions long after a rational and polite response had been proffered. You completed this by patronising me and indulging in grammar pedantry – a fair indication that the argument has been lost.

There is no parallel between road deaths and wrongful execution, if that is what you wish correlation to mean.

I don’t wish anything of the sort; it is what it means in the context. As with other grammar pedants I’ve come across, you fail to take usage into account. The word has a number of valid usages, this was one such.

If you want polite, rational and interesting discussion (which, despite your protestation, you were given), try not asking stupid questions that have already been debunked elsewhere; accept that you have been given a clear and valid explanation once it has been proffered – whether you agree with it or not; don’t keep repeating the same question over and over once it has been answered; don’t insult your host by trying to sidetrack the debate with subjects that have no relationship to the matter being discussed; and don’t patronise me.

Simple, really.

—————————————-

* The answer to the point being twofold; firstly, the matter of risk mitigation in everyday life is not remotely comparable to the entirely avoidable mistaken execution. The second is a matter of intent; drivers do not set out to kill – indeed, most of us actively seek to avoid doing so, whereas the executioner does, knowing full well that sooner or later one of those condemned will be innocent. These points were made clearly enough before, of course.

Trans-Fats are bad for us apparently. So what? We are aware of the kinds of foods that contain them and can make a judgement about whether to consume such products. I do, on occasion, although not regularly. I haven’t died yet – clue; if I had, I wouldn’t be typing this, now, would I?

Still, that’s not good enough for the bansturbators at NICE:

Trans-fats should be eliminated from food in England, NHS watchdog NICE has said.

The artificial fats are often found in biscuits, cakes and fast food – but they can damage health.

NICE is also pressing for further reductions in salt and saturated fats, to help prevent deaths from cardiovascular disease.

I was under the impression that NICE’s remit was setting standards in the NHS, not deciding what we may eat. Still, quangos being quangos, they are always willing to adapt and expand their remit into pastures new. Never mind that it’s none of their business, they do it anyway. One thing Georgie boy should have done today was slash and burn all the quangos and fake charities – it would save millions and save us all the hectoring, lecturing nannying that we have come to expect from the bloated state apparatus.

My diet and the ingredients contained therein are none of NICE’s business and I object to them lying in order to get their way, too.

Experts who worked on the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) guidelines say 40,000 of the 150,000 annual deaths are “eminently preventable”.

They believe that reducing salt and saturated fats, as well as banning trans-fats, would save the NHS more than £1bn.

Maybe so, maybe not. It’s guesswork anyway. And, frankly, none of their concern. I’m inclined to agree with Mark Wadsworth here.

Particular galling was/is:

1. The way in which ‘Professor’ Mike Kelly saw himself as part of the proud tradition of ‘public health’ in this country – he mentioned the Victorians cleaning up the water supplies to prevent cholera etc and the clean air acts of the post-war period (all good stuff, that is truly public health – where there is nothing that any individual can do about it) before slipping in the smoking ban, which he claimed had reduced the number of heart attacks (whether to smoke or not is a personal decision, ergo is not a ‘public health’ issue), and then saying that the crowning achievement of all this was inventing new rules on what ingredients food manufaturers are allowed to use (perhaps they are unhealthy, what do I know, but again, this is not a ‘public health’ issue and none of his f***ing business).

Quite right; it is not a public health issue and Professor Kelly is indulging in rampant hubris in likening himself to the pioneers of previous eras who really did carry out ground breaking work in public health. Kelly and his ilk are not ground breakers, they are nasty little statist bullies, nothing more, nothing less. Sack them, sack them all.

————————————————-

Update: It seems that HMG agrees with me.

But the government reaction was unenthusiastic, implying that it was up to the individual to make healthy choices.

Bloody right too! I may be critical of the LibCons – particularly in that they are not doing enough to cut back the state, but it’s nice to see NICE being told to sod off. Now scrap the bastards and finish the job.