Monday, 23 May 2011

The right way - by Richard... Monday, May 23, 2011


Numerous media reports attest to the extraordinary situation in Spain, where the ruling Socialist party is headed for a bruising defeat in local and regional elections held yesterday. As elsewhere, in Europe, the Left is taking a caning and the Right is picking up some of the spare votes.

But the elections in Spain are being conducted against a background of mass protests, with protest camps, mainly of young people, springing up in cities all around the country. They started a week ago and swelled to tens of thousands of demonstrators who on Saturday defied a government ban on gatherings the day before an election.

We are told that the growing protest movement reflects the strong disillusionment felt by Spaniards toward a political system they say favours economic interests and political fat cats in both major parties on the right and left over ordinary people.

But there is a strong resentment being expressed against what are felt to be "indifferent and corrupt politicians", and the protesters have dug in for another week of what are undoubtedly unprecedented sit-ins and rallies. More demonstrations scheduled for 28 May, and there is a sign reading "revolution" in large Arabic letters is in the square in Madrid where the main demonstration is being held.

One cannot help but compare events here, with the smug, preening debt rally in Britain, and the current obsession with outing promiscuous footballers. One yearns for some grown-up, serious politics, but fears the regression to childhood is irreversible. The youth of Spain are showing us the right way, but there are too few over here listening. These are dark times.

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Where is the Prince of Wales? - by Richard... Sunday, May 22, 2011


In the wake of Booker on the destruction of Wales, Dellers is asking, where is the Prince of Waleswhen you really need him?

What efforts has this famed floral conversationist, this defender of old-school values, this ex-foxhunting, stalking-about-the-Highland-Glens-with-his-crooked-stick countryman made to prevent a 100 square mile stretch of Britain’s most glorious countryside being transformed into a sterile Golgotha of wind towers?

Zip. Nada. Nothing.

Or as they say in Welsh – and I must say the word does seem peculiarly apt where our future King is concerned: Dim.

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The politics of denial - by Richard...


The British formally ends its final military mission in Iraq today – a Navy training operation in the Gulf. Interesting how CNN marks the occasion with a Snatch Land Rover, while Hague says the mission has left Iraq "a better place".

In all probability, Iraq is indeed a better place. But Hague claims too much in taking the credit. The British expedition in southern Iraq was a failure, and only the combined efforts of the Iraqis and the US Forces salvaged something from the wreckage, but not before many people – and especially Iraqis – died unnecessarily.

Ironically, the Snatch Land Rover is the symbol of that failure, representing the inability of the military to adapt to circumstances, and handle a vicious but ultimately beatable insurgency. But to this day, neither the military nor the politicians have to grips with their failures. They are still in denial - a sure recipe for continued failure, of the nature we are currently experiencing in Afghanistan.

Interestingly, the Tories could have started with clean sheet, but they have also bought into the cover-up and are no more able to cope with acknowledging failure than their predecessors. As with so other issues, all we get is the closing of ranks. "Face" is more important to the establishment than success - and certainly more important than the lives of soldiers.

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Closing ranks - by Richard...

Not only does the BBC treat us with contempt, when you complain, the establishment closes ranks around the institution, and behaves in like fashion. See what Autonomous Mind has to say.

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Thank goodness for the MSM - by Richard...


On 17 April, we wrote that, in current money, it looks as if keeping the boys and goils out in the sunny Med is going to cost well over £1 billion for the projected six-monthly deployment against Libya, and that is even before they start playing with their toys or dropping any bombs.

It took until 28 April for The Guardian to work that out, but here it is again, more than a month after the original story, telling us that the Libya operation "could cost UK taxpayers £1bn over six months".

This is "according to expert analysis and data gathered by the Guardian". But "defence economists" have also told the Guardian that the costings are "conservative". Francis Tusa, editor of the Defence Analysis newsletter, estimates that by the end of April, Libyan operations had already cost the UK about £300m and that the bill was increasing by up to £38m a week.

Military chiefs have acknowledged that the air campaign would last six months. At this rate, the MoD's own estimates will put the cost of war at about £400m, but the expert view is that the figure will top £1bn by September.

Well, what would we do without The Guardian and all these wonderful experts to keep up informed? Clearly, without them, people would have to rely on blogs to give them earlier, better information, and that would never do.

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Shocked ... again! - by Richard...

Coalition plans to pull out of Afghanistan are being hampered by theft and fraud totalling nearly $1bn, The Independent on Sunday is telling us. It adds that "hopes of a timely withdrawal of British troops from the region have been dealt a critical blow by revelations about massive bank frauds which have forced donors to suspend vital international aid".

In a country that is possibly even more corrupt than either India or Pakistan, and where it is known to all but the blind, deaf and the stupid (i.e., most of our politicians) that the élites of Afghanistan have been enriching themselves at the expense of international taxpayers, this really can come as no surprise.

And where the people of Afghanistan see daily the lack of progress (being unable to read the ISAF press releases), knowing full well that the bulk of the aid money is being ripped off, the Taliban are seen by many as the only hope for the beleaguered country. Any idea that we are going to walk away, bands playing, to leave a settled, stable, country, is pure fantasy.

When we leave, as leave we must and will shortly, the money spent will have been wasted, the dead soldiers and the broken bodies and minds of the survivors a testament to the egos and stupidities of successive politicians and military geniuses who thought they could waltz in and make a difference without doing the homework.

Collectively, they should hang their heads in shame. But they won't.

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I see no immigrants - by Richard...

Despite the evidence from Calais and Paris, Damian Green, minister for concealing immigration, issued a statement insisting there was "no indication that migrants displaced by events in North Africa are attempting to come to the UK.

But you read it here and now you can read it here. And you thought the Tories would be any different on immigration? The "rules" are set by international convention, endorsed en bloc by EU member states. Therefore, when they arrive, their treatment will be no different from the regime established under the previous administration.

It is but a convenient fiction that there was a specific "Labour policy" on immigration. Increasingly, there is only an EU policy, with ministers falling over themselves to pretend they are in control ... even to the extent, as here, of denying that there is a problem at all. The truth, though - it would seem - is that the UK Border Agency is short of staff.

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Eruption in Grimsvötn - by Richard...


Iceland again, with details here and here. The drama is nowhere near a crisis (yet), although the Met Office and the EU are doubtless working on turning it into a disaster.

Meanwhile, Iceland has closed its main international airport and canceled domestic flights. Airport and air traffic control operator ISAVIA said Keflavik airport was closed at 0830 GMT, and no flights were taking off or landing. But, while the ash plume is covering Iceland, the prevailing wind is blowing the ash was blowing northwest toward Greenland instead of Europe.

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Posted by Britannia Radio at 05:13