Mad, bad and dangerous to know

Following this blog's originator onto Twitter , I was intrigued by the admittedly entertaining 'Moronwatch', evidently someone of leftist thinking, he does however seem admirably open minded, including Islamic extremists and members of the extreme Left on his list of 'following'. This became all the more alarming when this piece by the dreadful Polly Toynbee appeared on the airwaves in the wake of the admittedly contentious 'agreement' on the US budget deficit ,decried as yet another 'sellout' to Radical Republicans, basically the culmination of a 3 year retreat before the fissiparous 'Tea Party' and its acolytes since those heady days of November 2008.

However, the piece's significance is perhaps part of a greater struggle from the Left, a struggle which followers of American 'Higher education' will be familiar with from the Early 1990's and 1980's when the movement for Political correctness reached its apogee in US academe. Whole rafts of European authors were effectively removed from circulation or became 'samizdat' across many institutions, due to their alleged racist, sexist or homophobic viewpoints(part of the 'amputation of the time dimension from our culture' to quote Sir Ernst Gombrich). Authors such as Shakespeare, Milton, Plato, Aristotle and Mill (to mention just five) were shoehorned into the category of 'DWEM' (Dead White European Male) and two decades of college students in departments such as English and especially the Social Sciences were in effect given a narrow, hardline marxist view of the world that anyone with the slightest nous (or indeed critically experience of the real world outside academia)could see was utter nonsense.

To the creditof academics in the UK, outside a few niche disciplines such as 'Women's studies' or 'Race studies' these views never gained much currency in the UK, and it perhaps testament to the relatively benign state of race relations comared with the US that such vicious thinking never did really make its way into the mainstream, save for a few extremist Labour politicians (The famous racist Lee Japser for example) on the left, and the motley crew of the National Front and latterly the BNP and EDL on the extreme right.

However, the left has always sought to control the debate, hence its stranglehold (despite 18 years of Tory government) on the education system. that's whay the Toynbee article, though vaguely ludicrous is perhaops an indicator of how the Left is looking to use the 'Phone hacking' scandal to circumscribe the terms of the debate. The article starts by offering the Tories a backhanded compliment, applauding them (probably very politely!) over their refusal to drift as far right as the 'Tea Party'. It then launches into two paragraphs regarding 'Climate change deniers' that make me ask whether the author's sanity should be questioned. The term 'Denier' is in itself grotesque, designed to elicit comparison with those who would deny the holocaust . the shockingly lazy formulation comes forth:

'for some reason they (referring to commentators in the Mail and Telegraph) seem to consider 'the warmists' a left wing conspiracy'


Whatever could have persuaded them of that? Is it that, almost without exception, environmentalists, many of whom are retread socialists, are in favour of: Greater government intervention, more regulation, more restrictions on people's activities, higher taxes, less freedom of movement, and the list goes on. Whatever would make me believe that such people are left wing? As for the ludicrous assertion that a 'scientific consensus' exists. Such 'consensuses' were used to prove the 'inferiority' of certain races less than two centuries ago, and when the implications for policy are so critical, I would have to examine the background and vested interests of anyone proposing such wide ranging changes as, for example, the Green Party as indeed they no doubt examine closely the links with certain Oil companies or other 'polluters' of the Climate Change sceptics. I note with some interest that Toynbee is a regular contributor and keynote speaker at various Compass conferences. Is this a taste of what's to come under 'Mr.Ed' - people's opinions being silenced by 'consensus' on Global warming/Climate Change?(note the lingustic shift from 'warming' in response to declining temperatures in certain areas during part of the last decade) What next to be judged 'subject to consensus' and no longer worthy of debate? - Immigration/The EU? I for one hope we don't have to find out.

Why is the Guardian giving a platform to Sarah Palin?

I will disclose at the very start of this post that I like The Guardian. It's the Jim Callaghan of what used to be called 'Fleet Street' before everyone moved out (and most of the pubs closed); it's a bit wishy washy, but it's heart is in the right place. And I don't buy the paper often enough because all the good content is online, but I would very gladly pay a subscription if they established one (something I can't say about the Murdoch press, which I hardly ever read anyway. I have a dartboard with David f***ing Aaronovitch's head on in my office). Comment is Free is one of the best comment sites anywhere on the web - full of right-wing nutters of course, but hey, it's care in the community, right?

But I certainly don't buy the Guardian - or click on the website - to read crap by Sarah Palin about how Copenhagen should be boycotted. This sort of rubbish should be left to the Times and in particular the Telegraph, who has its own in-house team of loonies such as Christopher Booker and James Delingpole.

There is in fact an increasing proliferation of syndicated or freelance duff right-wing articles in the Guardian. While some would argue that airing the opposing point of view is a useful exercise in open-mindedness, the right-wing press never reciprocate (when was the last time you read a left-wing article in the Telegraph?) and all it really does is piss off the readership. Which probably increases the number of hits on Comment is Free, but doesn't do much for the paper's coherence, or credibility.

The Guardian should focus on what it does best - marshalling progressive forces for a forthcoming election where the left will need as much help as it can get. Leave the climate scaremongering to the right-wing papers who get paid by vested interests to do this sort of thing. And guys, sort out a system for charging for online content and you can stop losing millions of pounds a year. This is getting really urgent now.

Stansted disruption: heroes on two fronts

Absolutely sterling work by Plane Stupid today at Stansted airport - on two fronts. One, managing to draw attention to the fairly serious inconsistency between the UK government's tough long-term CO2 emissions targets and its obsession with expanding low-cost air travel exponentially. Two, exposing the security arrangements at Stansted as totally lax.

For years now, air travellers have had to contend with a panoply of poorly-thought out security measures which have vastly extended check-in times and resulted in good business for companies selling water bottles airside. These have been high visibility to say the least, and undoubtedly designed to make it look as if the govt was doing "something important" about terrorism. But meanwhile, a group of around 60 protesters with very limited equipment was able to break through the airport's perimeter fence and camp on the runway. Some security system.

Of course, strengthening the perimeter fence would cost substantial amounts of money, whereas enforcing rules about liquids just costs passenger time and patience. That's probably why we get more of the latter than the former.

Really, the country would be run a lot better if we had a lot more protesters. We're gonna have a lot more unemployed very soon, so I think a new branch of the New Deal should be started - the protest option. The government pays you money to find important stuff to protest about. A new form of public service... the DWP should get working on this proposal at once.