Diary
50 years of the EU - and of lies, damn lies.
27 March, 2007
Was it really surprising that so few people took to the streets to celebrate the EU’s 50th birthday? This is, after all, a political institution so mistrusted by the electorate that it makes Tony Blair look like a paragon of virtue. According to one recent opinion poll, only 46% of Europeans now look favourably on the EU and that figure drops to about 33% when you take British voters into account. To understand this general disillusionment, consider what Britons were told in the 1970s when Ted Heath and his Euro fanatic acolytes salivated at the prospect of British entry. Joining Europe, we were informed, would bring untold economic benefits, expand trade and enhance British power, prestige and influence around the globe.
If only this were true. We are net importers of European goods, running a huge trade deficit with the Continent and making the single greatest economic argument for joining up highly questionable. The EU passes a majority of laws at Westminster, siphoning away powers and prerogatives from our Westminster representatives and creating a democratic deficit at the heart of our political life. Thanks to EU membership, we are signatories to the Common Agricultural Policy, which serves the interests of inefficient French farmers but which also has a deleterious impact on the Third World. The Common Fisheries Policy has overseen the destruction of our formerly efficient fishing industry.
European Union membership has brought with it a constant stream of (often pointless) regulations and directives which now affect most areas of public life, and all of which are paid for by hard working taxpayers. As a result of our membership, our judges must bow to the supremacy of European law. Then there is the Human Rights Act, passed by this government, which has subverted the notion of human rights and created endless cases of injustice. EU membership has also robbed us of the chance to control immigration and asylum policy and is thwarting attempts to deal with terrorism. As proof, the Convention on Human Rights prevents a member state deporting individuals to any country where they may be tortured. Above all, it has only widened the fundamental mistrust of British people towards all elected politicians and increased voter apathy.
But worse is the blatant illicit maneuvering at the heart of the European project. This weekend, amid the undeserved orgy of self congratulation, Angela Merkel dredged up the memory of the European constitution which, she argued, had to proceed as quickly as possible. Without batting an eyelid, some of her Euro fanatic friends, including our Prime Minister, agreed. This was despite the clear no votes from the French and Dutch electorates in 2005 which were supposed to deal a decisive blow to the Constitution! A democratic mandate, it seems, cannot be allowed to stand in the way of the powerful EU juggernaut.
The EU project was clearly designed to create a political superstate, a counterweight to American hegemony in the world which would drastically affect the independence and sovereignty of every one of its member states. This may be music to the ears of those who denigrate nation states as well as British history and culture. But for those who believe that nations do matter and that democracy is more than an unpleasant after thought, the EU remains a pernicious institution whose constant interference is objectionable.
A referendum on our continued membership is vital if democracy is to mean anything. And if the British people use their common sense, they will vote Britain out of this meddling organization once and for all.
topBritain must stand up to Iran
26 March, 2007
Iran’s behaviour in arresting, detaining and possibly torturing 15 British service personnel is shocking but not surprising. What else do we expect from a regional bully that has backed the killing of British soldiers in Iraq, supported terror groups in the Middle East and threatened a Holocaust of Jews in Israel? This purpose of this dastardly act could not be clearer. It seems designed to put pressure on Britain during the tense stand off over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. As a form of international blackmail there are unmistakable echoes of the Lebanon war where Tehran’s proxy army, Hezbollah, attacked Israeli soldiers just as Ali Larijani, Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, was meeting UN officials last summer. In each case, Iran has sought to buy breathing space through the most blatant form of international aggression in the hope that appeasement will follow. It is vital that it does not and that we maintain a firm line, insisting on the immediate and unconditional return of these service personnel. If there is one benefit to be derived from this sordid episode, it is that the world can no longer ignore the threat of a nuclear armed Iran. It is bad enough to be confronted by a dangerous bully armed only with conventional weapons and genocidal rhetoric. It is an altogether different proposition when you are dealing with a nuclear armed rogue state. Britain must apply all possible pressure to obtain the release of the personnel while insisting on the termination of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
topThe Iraq war was a mistake but this is no time to pull out
23 March, 2007
Iraq in 2007 must be a depressing sight for those who so eagerly supported the war 4 years ago. In March 2003, President Bush, the Pentagon and the neo cons envisaged a short, sharp and relatively inexpensive war of liberation. They believed that Saddam would be toppled with ease, leading to a democratic revolution that would then be exported to the region. In the process, the oppressed peoples of the Middle East would be liberated and left to challenge their respective autocratic governments, especially in Syria and Iran. In reality, only one of those 3 aims was subsequently fulfilled. Saddam fell easily enough but into the resulting vacuum came a series of bloody sectarian feuds, given increased impetus by the arrival of fanatic jihadis from neighbouring countries. Far from being transformed into an oasis of democracy, Iraq has been convulsed by ethnic, religious and tribal rivalries, all of which reveal the country’s artificiality.
No WMD’s were found in Iraq (only WMD programmes) while the argument in 2002-3 that Saddam was a containable threat, posing few immediate risks to the West, was only borne out by succeeding events. (This does not detract from the fact that from 1979-1990, Saddam was a lethal threat to many surrounding regimes as well as his own people). Quite simply, there was no need to topple the regime (in March 2003) and unleash the subsequent turmoil within the country. Then there is the cost of the conflict. According to Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel prize-winning economist, the final cost of the war, assuming that the US spends another 7-8 years in Iraq, could rise to well over 2 trillion dollars. A pretty sum of money.
More tragic still is the way that this war has undermined the very important moral and political leadership role of the United States in the fight against radical Islam. There is today a global movement among extremist Muslims that craves world domination and the subjugation of non Muslims, based on a hateful and repressive ideology that is totalitarian in nature and repressive in practice. It is manifested in dangerous and murderous regimes in Iran and Sudan while a sizeable minority of Muslims elsewhere, including the West, show growing sympathy and support. The US is best placed to take a stand against radical Islam (with a coalition of the willing that excludes the impotent UN) after the horrendous events of 9/11. But the fallout from Iraq has been grist to the mill of America bashers everywhere who use it to further delegitimize America, Britain and the West. Last night, on Question Time, John Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN, showed that the Bush administration understood the lethal threats posed by WMD, rogue regimes and radical Islamists. But his attempt to lump Saddam with Al Qaeda and radical Islamism only served to confuse the issue.
The anti war movement cannot have it all their own way, however. Their central current contention is that the presence of coalition forces exacerbates the problems in Iraq and that only a precipitate withdrawal of forces is politically or acceptable. The Stop the war coalition, with their left wing and Islamist friends, thus form a natural alliance designed to undermine the Western presence in Iraq, as well as abroad. They have clearly not thought through their reasoning though. Firstly, any sudden withdrawal from Iraq is bound to lead to an upsurge in violence and bloodletting, particularly in the months leading up to the withdrawal and in the years to follow. Secondly, any such withdrawal would be the single greatest victory for Al Qaeda and their Islamist allies around the globe for they would undoubtedly interpret any coalition withdrawal as a profound victory for their tactics. In other words, they will see the West’s ‘defeat’ in Iraq in the same terms as the defeat of Russia in Afghanistan in 1989 and the defeat of the US in Somalia in 1993.
Thirdly, a US withdrawal would entrench Iran’s hegemony in both Iraq and the Middle East as a whole. The new Iraqi Parliament is already dominated by Shias while in Basra the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, whose military have been trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, holds sway. The prospect of enhanced Iranian influence so worries the Saudis that they have recently gone on a ‘peace’ offensive in the region, ostensibly to bring peace to the Palestinians and Iran, while in reality attempting to curb Iranian influence in the region. The Sunni Saudis are desperate to avoid being usurped as the region’s dominant Muslim power by the Shi’ite regime in Tehran.
As things stand, the United States and its allies remain determined to stabilise Iraq as a unified country. But two years from now, President Obama could decide to change course by withdrawing American forces altogether from that country. In time, Iraq may witness the unfolding of a far greater tragedy.
topBudgetary lessons
22 March, 2007
What Gordon giveth, he taketh away. In essence, that was the sum economic total of yesterday’s budget. It was a financially redistributive and ‘fiscally neutral’ budget, meaning little alteration to the massive tax burden suffered by millions across the land. It was rather surprising that David Cameron did not grasp this point straightaway. His immediate post budget riposte was an embarrassment. Brown, he declared, had now joined the ranks of the tax cutters and, better still, he was a wise tax cutter who had followed Tory advice on reducing the tax burden. Within the hour we got a more realistic Tory response. This budget was the mother of all con tricks. The Houdini Brown, far from alleviating the fiscal burden, was merely taking away with one hand what he was offering with another. Brown was staging an image coup, claiming the mantle of tax cutting but in reality, keeping our hard earned money firmly locked in treasury coffers.
But if this was a tax cutters’ budget, would it really be stealing Tory clothes? Far from it. From the start of Cameron’s revolution, the Conservatives have gone to great lengths to distance themselves from anything traditionally Conservative, excepting support for traditional families and marriage. Anything that even hints at the right wing nasty party of yesteryear has had to go. Thus any explicit talk of tax cuts, being tough on crime, selective education, new funding for the NHS or radical changes to the welfare system has been shelved in place of a cosy liberal and ‘green’ agenda.
Whenever these Tories talk tax, the result is confusion. Cameron and the young pretender, George Osborne, endlessly repeat the mantra that as the economy grows in a new administration, the proceeds of growth will be shared between tax cuts and investment in public services. This all sounds nice and reasonable until you figure that tax cuts and economic growth actually go hand in hand. If you cut taxes, you stimulate the economy, increase inward investment and allow the subsequent increases in revenue to fill the Treasury’s coffers. If they wanted, the Tories could be providing a genuine alternative to the obsessive high tax, endless spend of the Gordon Brown years. Simon Heffer writes in the Daily Telegraph today:
'Behind Mr Brown's bluster and showmanship lies a bloated public sector, stuffed and overmanned by the constituents of his client state, which is single-handedly responsible for this country's appalling productivity compared with our rivals. He may have brought unprecedented economic stability, there may have been an end to boom and bust, but he has taken the tax burden up to 40 per cent of income.’
But the Tories are flunking the challenge as image matters more to Cameron than sound policy and fiscal reform. So both parties are secretly agreeing to leave British business and middle income families crippled by a high tax burden, while allowing the public sector to burgeon uncontrollably. Whatever minor criticisms are made of this budget, there is little sign that this Conservative party wishes to free people from the burdensome hand of the state. The Tories are thus losing the chance to put clear blue water between themselves and the Brownites with grave consequences for us all.
topThe ‘Hollywoodisation’ of climate change
22 March, 2007
Several days ago, 2 leading British scientists and members of the Royal Meteorological Society, Chris Collier and Paul Hardaker, hit out at what they termed ‘the Hollywoodisation of climate change.’ Speaking at a conference in Oxford (entitled Making Sense of Weather and Climate), they argued that films such as ‘The Day after tomorrow’, which depicted the catastrophic after effects of the melting of the Arctic ice shelf, would only create confusion in the public mind. Well, not such a big deal, you might think. How often has Hollywood been in the truth industry after all?
But more dramatic was their assertion that some of their scientific colleagues were dramatically overplaying the dire predictions of the effects of climate change. They singled out for opprobrium one of the leading science organizations in the US, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) for making this prediction: "As expected, intensification of droughts, heatwaves, floods, wildfires, and severe storms is occurring, with a mounting toll on vulnerable ecosystems and societies…These events are early warning signs of even more devastating damage to come, some of which will be irreversible.’
For Professor Hardaker, they were ‘guilty of overplaying the message’ as there was ‘no evidence to show we're all due for very short-term devastating impacts as a result of global warming.’ He added: ‘I think these statements can be dangerous where you mix in the science with unscientific assumptions.’ ‘We have to be careful,’ they went on, ‘that we present the facts and don't exaggerate things because it can undermine credibility in the long term." Their comments were supported by Dr Peter Stott, manager of understanding and attributing climate change at the Hadley Centre for Climate Change. For Stott, ‘there is a lot more research to do to understand about exactly what effects its going to have on you and me in the future.’
These scientists are ‘not’ sceptics on climate change. They accept the mainstream view that climate change is happening and that man made emissions play some role in that change. (They also accept that we do not yet know the full extent of humanity’s role.) But the implications of what they said should send a shudder down the spine of every individual who is concerned for truth and rationality. Their diatribe against the AAAS is a scathing indictment of how a supposedly rational organization is abandoning the pursuit of truth (wherever it leads them) by ‘overplaying’ the dangers of climate change when the evidence cannot warrant this. In other words, they are accusing scientists of behaving unscientifically, and doing so in a way which violates the ethics and ethos of the scientific world.
This is, of course, precisely what the sceptics have contended all along. Eager to challenge the thesis that man made CO2 emissions are the prime reason for global warming, they have argued that spin and exaggeration are the chief weapons being used by the IPCC and mainstream science to overplay the dangers of global warming. Now we have a dramatic confirmation of this from mainstream climatologists.
When scientists abandon the quest for truth based on experiment, testing and evidence, they turn science into a playground of propaganda and misinformation while the chances of an honest debate becoming vanishingly small. We owe a great debt to Professors Collier and Hardaker.
topIf we clamp down on free speech, we will succumb to tyranny
19 March, 2007
In the last fortnight, two episodes have highlighted the extent to which free speech is under threat in modern Britain. David Coleman, the Oxford Professor of demographics, is still the target of a campaign of vilification by the Oxford Student Action for Refugees (see previous post). Professor Coleman has spent decades examining population trends in the industrialized world, immigration trends and the demography of ethnic minorities. He has been a consultant for the Home Office and the United Nations, with a number of significant books and articles to his name. His eminence in this field has naturally lent him credibility in examining government spin on asylum and immigration, hence his association with Migration Watch. But for one group of implacable students, and their myriad supporters, his refusal to accept the liberal consensus is undeniably racist.
Shortly afterwards we were treated to another dubious episode, courtesy of the revamped Conservative Party. Patrick Mercer, Tory MP and Shadow Minister for Homeland Security, was peremptorily dismissed by David Cameron for remarks he made in an interview about ethnic minority soldiers. Cameron deemed these remarks ‘unacceptable’ before vigorously denouncing racism, implying that his former shadow minister was guilty of racial prejudice. But did these remarks really merit the Tory leader’s opprobrium? In his interview, Mercer was describing some of the unpleasantness of army life, focusing in particular on how soldiers were routinely abused on the basis of their physical characteristics. Among the taunts would be ‘Come on you fat bastard, come on you ginger bastard, come on you black bastard.’
Now clearly there was a world of difference between the first two (non racist) insults and the third (racist) one, a difference that Mercer ought to have acknowledged. To some, his words came across as clumsy, insensitive and tactless. But nothing in Mr. Mercer’s comments suggested that he condoned these attitudes. Indeed, to do so would have been out of character because, from all accounts, his track record in dealing with black soldiers in the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters was exemplary. Mercer described the 5 black company sergeant majors in his interview as ‘without exception UK-born, Nottingham-born men who were English - as English as you and me.’
Mr. Mercer went on to say that he had come across a lot of ethnic minority soldiers who were ‘idle and useless, but who used racism as cover for their misdemeanors.’ Again, these words were hardly chosen with the greatest sensitivity and care but to conclude that this was a spiteful attack on all ethnic minority soldiers would be grossly unfair. He was not denigrating all black army recruits, merely suggesting that among those who were idle and useless were many who used the charge of racism to excuse their behaviour. In other words, some of these soldiers were playing the race card, aware that it could provide a spurious form of protection to cover up their own shortcomings.
Playing this kind of race card is indeed a chief weapon used by some minorities to divert attention from their own failings. It reflects the growing menace of victim mentality, a culture of blaming ‘the other’ instead of accepting faults that are personal. This warped form of excuse making is particularly dangerous because it makes it harder to tackle real prejudice and racial discrimination, which is surely the prerogative of every political party. Mercer’s only crime, it seems, was to reveal truths that the establishment has deemed unpalatable. By sacking his minister so quickly, Cameron has let down an ally and failed to tackle the prevailing culture of victimhood. Far from raising his anti racist credentials, Cameron has succumbed to the prevailing tyranny of political correctness which is effectively an unofficial ban on free speech. We are all the losers for his decision.
topAn inconvenient truth - for the climate change lobby
14 March, 2007
The Tories are wasting no time in proving their green credentials. They are now proposing to introduce a new set of penalties for air travel which will tax more frequent users of aircraft. The penalties include a levy of fuel duty or VAT on domestic flights and financial penalties for those who exceed their ‘green air miles allowance.’ The Tories are thus engaged in a sinister bidding war with Labour and the Liberal Democrats to see who can most stringently penalize the air traveller and motorist to reduce carbon emissions. Britain’s three main parties have reached a consensus that the best way to deal with climate change is through a statist model - higher taxes, more state intervention, restrictions on consumer behaviour, more regulation and so on.
For the Tories, a traditionally low tax party, these proposals are not just desperately unfair but ill conceived too. They claim that their tax hikes will not affect infrequent users of aircraft. But if so, then the people affected will be the better off class of passengers, including business users, an income group that can absorb any additional costs and make the whole exercise redundant. Worse, these Tory plans are provoking a furious and predictable backlash from the very people the Tories are trying to woo electorally. Single, middle class income earners, accustomed to making several flights a year, can see themselves much worse off under the Tories while the airline industry (with its vast number of employees) is understandably nervous at the proposals. In any case, even a significant reduction in air travel will make no more than a tiny dent in Britain’s carbon emissions output, and a far tinier dent in emissions worldwide. This is gestural politics of the most obvious kind.
Yet there is something else profoundly disturbing about this outbreak of Westminster consensus, indeed something that I do not believe we have witnessed in many years of British politics. All three political parties talk of the urgency of remedial action and believe in the imminence of global danger if we fail to act. This can only spring from a settled conviction that the scientific theory of man made climate change is proven beyond doubt and that debates on the issue are now closed. But the claim that this is a ‘settled’ issue is now looking increasingly hollow. Last week Channel 4 aired the documentary ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ which cast serious doubts on the role of human CO2 in rising global temperatures. There were certainly no ill educated cranks here. Several very distinguished professors, in fields such as meteorology, climatology and earth sciences, were asked to give their views on the reasons for rising temperatures, which they did with devastating effect.
Among their contentions were the following: historically, the earth’s temperature has been in constant variation with some historical periods marked by extremes of hot and cold, thus making the current rise in global temperature particuarly unalarming; between 1940 and 1970, global temperatures went down slightly, despite increasing levels of carbon dioxide emissions from industrialization; in the 1970s, there were fears of a new ice age after 4 decades of global cooling but that ‘scare’ soon fizzled out; the CO2 produced by fossil fuels is dwarfed by other sources of CO2; it is actually solar activity, rather than greenhouse gases, that drives temperature changes; according to the Head of the International Arctic Research Institute, the polar ice caps have always expanded and contracted and this has been happening naturally for many thousands of years.
As a non scientist, I cannot adjudicate between proponents of man made climate change and their critics. But what ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ has done is to shatter the notion that there is complete scientific unanimity on this issue. There are eminent voices of dissent within the scientific world and on any rational analysis, it is essential that their views are heard with tolerance and in a spirit of critical inquiry. But sadly this is far from the case. The scientists who were interviewed claimed that for daring to challenge the ‘establishment’ they were disregarded as reactionary heretics, suffering consequent risks to their livelihoods and sources of funding. Instead of engaging with fellow scientists, the scientific establishment has turned against them with a medieval savagery worthy of the Inquisition.
Of course this spirit of irrationality is hardly confined to the world of science. We can see the same self righteous zeal and arrogant certainty in the political establishment with all three parties vying to prove how much they accept the climate change thesis. In the wider media and in public bodies, it is increasingly taboo to question the human role in global warming. Indeed the acceptance of this contested hypothesis is increasingly becoming the litmus test of your moral worth. That is what makes the whole debate at once surreal and disturbing.
Clearly, science cannot advance if we stifle debate and persecute sceptics. Of course, the sceptics may be entirely wrong. Neither should they claim a monopoly on truth just because they are challenging the establishment. But nor should we dismiss them as a bunch of eccentric fools who are disseminating ignorance. It may be an inconvenient truth, but the climate lobby may just be wrong on this occasion. Perhaps someone should tell David Cameron.
topCash for peerages
11 March, 2007
The ongoing saga of cash for peerages has led to 2 unfortunate episodes this week. The first one, relatively minor in the overall scheme of things, was Rabbi Yitzchak Schochet’s unnecessary suggestion in a TV interview that Lord Levy may have been a victim of anti semitic prejudice. Now, whatever the difficulties of Mr. Blair’s chief fund raiser, and I am sure they are considerable, he is clearly playing a central role in the ongoing police investigation. Without knowing who said what to whom or what was in specific emails, it is unfair to throw around these accusations, especially given police sensitivity to any accusation of racism. They must be allowed to get on with their work in a non hostile atmosphere and therefore playing the race card at this time is irresponsible.
The second episode took place in the House of Commons on Wednesday night when a majority of MPs voted to have a fully elected House of Lords. People have speculated on the motives of MPs for voting in this way, though few doubt that the desire to eradicate the taint of corruption lay behind the eventual decisive majority. To put it simply, a fully elected House of Lords would be a form of constitutional Bedlam. With one fully elected Chamber already, a second elected Chamber, far from strengthening democracy, could cancel it out altogether. A decision reached by the elected Commons might be snuffed out by the elected Lords, leaving Parliament in deadlock. The only way that the Commons could retrieve the situation would be to declare, by fiat, that its vote took precedence, just because it ‘was’ the Commons, and not because its members, unlike those in the other house, had been elected.
A fully elected House of Lords would also create an unnecessary system of political duplication. The second Chamber would fully resemble the Commons, its members divided by party manifestos, beholden to party managers and with much of their independence torn away. It is this independence that makes the Lords such a crucial bulwark against the executive and why a fully appointed body makes proper constitutional sense. Will the public really tolerate more career politicians when their confidence in Westminster's elite is at such an all time low? It seems like the debate on reform of the upper Chamber will rumble on and on.
topTime to stand up for free speech
11 March, 2007
The recent controversy involving Oxford University Professor David Coleman is equally disturbing and predictable. A generously public funded student body, the Oxford Student Action for Refugees, last week launched a vicious McCarthy style campaign to have Coleman, a respected expert in demography, dismissed from Oxford. Dr John Hood, the Oxford vice-chancellor, was asked to "consider the suitability of Coleman's continued tenure as a professor of the university". And just why has this group called for the Professor’s sacking? In large part, it is because he has committed the ‘unpardonable’ sin of being an advisor to MigrationWatch, the group that regularly questions government spin on immigration and asylum.
It is bad enough witnessing such an obnoxious attempt to suppress free speech and debate in 2007. But that it should be happening at one of the world’s most distinguished universities and to one of its most eminent scholars is truly perverse. One wonders if these students have any idea why they are at university in the first place. Do they have nothing better to do than try and persecute one of their elders instead of trying to glean just a smidgen of his knowledge and insight?
According to one of the student co-founders of the petition, Kieran Hutchinson Dean, Professor Coleman had to refrain ‘from using his academic status when promoting his own views.’ He went on, ‘Professor Coleman co-founded Migration Watch which continues to spew out anti-immigration tirades that fuel the far-Right BNP.’ Unlike the odious BNP, Migration Watch is not an anti immigration group. If you think otherwise, take a brief look at their website: ‘We entirely accept that genuine refugees should be welcomed, but nowadays those seeking asylum comprise only about 6% of foreign immigration into Britain .We also recognise that many immigrants have made a valuable contribution to our society in terms of both skills and diversity.’ These are hardly the sentiments of an anti immigration group!
They have, however, questioned whether Britain can integrate a massive immigrant influx in coming decades, given the increasing scale of immigration since 1997. According to the Office for National Statistics, net overall immigration has rocketed since 1994 (particularly since 1997) with a net increase of 300,000 people each year since 2005. It has been estimated that if this rate continues, then there will be an additional 6 million people in Britain by 2026. The social and economic consequences of such an enormous demographic change are hard to predict. Given the limited housing stock in the South East, and the inevitable accumulated pressures on public services, the economic strains alone could be enormous. (This is leaving out the pressure from illegal immigration and failed asylum seekers). In fact, no one can predict how Britain will adapt to such a large scale influx. Clearly, a wide ranging and sustained debate is required at Westminster so that well informed political choices can be made.
But that is fast becoming impossible in PC obsessed modern Britain. If you dare to challenge the left-liberal rosy consensus on immigration and asylum, it invites the instant accusations of racism and xenophobia. You are usually pilloried as a Little Englander clinging to outdated ideas of national grandeur, a tragic Alf Garnett figure that requires social brainwashing to re-enter civilised society. This is not rational debate but a puritanical intolerance reminiscent of a witch hunt. Try questioning multiculturalism, Islamic extremism, the welfare state, Third World poverty and man made climate change and you are, at the very least, being controversial.
Professor Coleman has rightly hit back at the Student group, accusing them of ‘a shameful attempt of the most intolerant and totalitarian kind to suppress the freedom of analysis and informed comment, which is the function of universities.’ Quite right. Let’s hope these Oxford layabouts drop their silly petition and get on with some serious work - like their harassed don!
topThe Bishop of Rochester tells it like it is
5 March, 2007
How refreshing to read Michael Nazir-Ali supporting the idea of renewing Trident. In a recent article, the Bishop of Rochester argues forcefully that in an increasingly uncertain world, the government cannot afford to take chances with our long term security. He argues that it is essential for Britain to maintain its nuclear deterrent, a position that is at odds with a recent motion passed by the General Synod of the Church of England. What is valuable is the Bishop’s cogent reasoning about why such a deterrent is necessary. In his piece, he rejects the Panglossian notion that we live in some kind of post Cold War comfort zone:
‘In an increasingly fragmented and disordered world, there are threats from a number of directions. The North Korean situation has, for the time being, been defused, although no one and knows for how long. Iran continues to cause concern, in a variety of ways, to the security and stability of the Middle East and beyond…It is quite possible to imagine a terrorist group, such as al Qaeda, acquiring enough radioactive material to manufacture a dirty bomb, or indeed, for a terrorist organization to be armed in this way by a rogue state. It is also possible that a presently stable situation, as in Pakistan, is overtaken by unforeseeable, but not unimaginable events.’
Indeed he is right. If Pervez Musharraf were to be deposed in Pakistan, an extremist party could sweep to power, transforming the country into a nuclear armed Islamist state. North Korea could once again renege on its recent commitments while the Islamic Republic of Iran continues to pose unprecedented threats to Middle Eastern stability. (See my earlier post) To be fair, the Bishop does not call for immediate pre emptive action against these states. Instead he argues, quite sensibly, that there would have to be a high threshold before such weapons could legitimately be used, and even then they would have to be used proportionately. Such a nuclear deterrent would, he argues, square with the Christian ‘just war’ tradition.
Bishop Nazir Ali understands the uncertainty of our world very well. But he also knows that as we cannot accurately predict the threats to this country’s interests in coming decades, it would be foolish to abolish our most credible deterrent against aggression. More important still is his straightforward appreciation that what we are confronting today is ‘a global and increasingly well organized ideological movement that has to be tackled as such and not merely in terms of the religious tradition from which it claims to arise.’ These are wise words. It is hard to imagine the Archbishop of Canterbury speaking in such forthright terms about radical Islam's war against the West.
But then Michael Nazir-Ali is not afraid to speak his mind on issues connected with Islam. He has rightly advocated dialogue between Christians and Muslims but also accused some British Muslims of blatant hypocrisy. Writing in the Sunday Times last year, he said that sections of the Muslim community were arguing that it was 'always right to intervene when Muslims are victims... and always wrong when Muslims are the oppressors or terrorists.' As an example of the latter, he cited the case of the Taleban who were clearly 'oppressors', despite their overthrow being greeted with a chorus of disapproval. The Bishop added: 'Given the world view that has given rise to such grievances, there can never be sufficient appeasement and new demands will continue to be made.'
Full credit then to the Bishop of Rochester for speaking so clearly and for telling it like it is.
topThis is no time to lose resolve, Mr. Bush
5 March, 2007
Let’s face facts, President Bush has been a godsend for the liberal elite. On his shoulders they have hung just about all the world’s problems, from global warming to recession, from Third World debt to Islamic terror. Whatever the issue, you can hear the familiar rallying cry clearly enough: It’s Dubya, stupid! Take a dose of American isolationism, an unpopular war in Iraq and Bush’s unfortunate verbal gaffes, and you have the perfect nemesis for the left. The real problem for these chattering (is it clattering?) classes is that George Bush cannot serve a life term as President. Soon enough he will depart the White House and someone more respectable will take over. We can only imagine the hideous turmoil of the Bush Whackers when they realize that they no longer have an obvious scapegoat on which to pin all the world’s problems.
This was roughly my feeling when I read Boris Johnson’s piece on Iran some days ago in The Daily Telegraph. In it he advises us not to allow ‘Dubya’ and his neocon friends in Washington to embark on another catastrophic military intervention, this time against Iran. His argument is straightforward enough: It would be difficult to attack the nuclear plants in Iran; any pre emptive nuclear strike, even if successful, would lead to global reprisals by the Iranian administration; Iran has become the dominant power in Iraq, both in terms of the composition of Iraqi political parties and the Shia infiltration among extremists; thus any attack on Iran would lead to a catastrophic worsening of violence in the country; Bush and his neoconservative acolytes made one mess in Iraq and Johnson believes it would be madness to let them loose again.
There is an undeniable kernel of truth here. Put simply, the war on Iraq has weakened the case for dealing with Tehran. Iraq’s secular Sunni dictatorship was always intolerant of Islamic fundamentalism, seeing itself as a bulwark against Iran’s expansion and, for this reason, the US provided help and support to Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war. He may have been a son of a bitch but at least he was our son of a bitch. Saddam’s fear of Iran survived this 8 year war and the Gulf War of 1990-1 and perhaps for this reason, he tried to bluff the world into thinking that he had non existent weapons of mass destruction. They were a chimera designed to deter Iran, rather than the West. The new Iraqi Parliament is now dominated by Shias taking their orders from Moqtada al-Sadr while, as Johnson points out, in Basra the dominant force is the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, whose military have been trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
But there is a case for robustness in the face of the Mullahs, even if this does not involve military intervention. Sanctions can be tightened to include a ban on the export of Iranian oil, Iran’s President could be tried in absentia for inciting genocide against Israel (a case for this action has been powerfully made), the US and other governments could assemble an Iranian government in exile ready to take over if Ahmadinejad’s regime collapses while the US (and its allies) can make it clear to Iran that any further arming of Shia militias will lead to a robust retaliatory response. If all these measures fail, the case for limited military strikes could be spelled out. These options need to be on the table if the Iranian threat is to be taken seriously.
But there have been recent signs of a catastrophic loss of resolve. Iraq is convening a conference of its neighbours on March 10th, designed to lessen the sectarian violence and create stability on its borders. The US has already said it will attend, even though Syria and Iran, formerly of the axis of evil, will almost certainly be in attendance. This rather humiliating volte face seems to follow the logic of the Iraq Study Group report published last year, which suggested that the way to solve Iraq was through a ‘New Diplomatic Offensive’. This offensive would involve all the major countries of the region, including Iraq’s neighbours, Iran and Syria as well as the parties to the Arab Israeli conflict. The region why they would all have to become involved, according to the ISG report, is that ‘all key issues in the Middle East - the Arab-Israeli conflict, Iraq, Iran…extremism and terrorism - are inextricably linked.’ As one commentator after another has pointed out, the basic problem in Iraq (which includes extremism and terrorism) is that a historically artificial country is being torn apart by sectarian conflicts now that it is no longer held together by iron rule from the centre. So the obvious question is this: Will Iraq’s intra Muslim warfare be lessened by any Israeli pullbacks in the West Bank or will the violence continue unabated? As the Americans say, it’s a no brainer.
A diplomatic offensive involving Iran and Syria ignores the fact that these rogue states are chief instigators of the bloodshed we are witnessing. In particular, to offer Iran diplomatic leverage while it blithely ignores calls to end its nuclear weapons programme, is supine and self defeating appeasement of the worst kind. This is no time to lose resolve. If America falters at this juncture, either in Iraq or in its dealings with Iran, the consequences for the West could be truly terrible.
topA right royal McGaffe
1 March, 2007
It seems Prince Philip is not the only member of the Royal Family to make the occasional gaffe. During a tour of the United Arab Emirates, Prince Charles was reported to have said that the best way to remedy childhood obesity was to ban McDonalds. That measure, he was reported as saying, ‘was the key.’ Now, we have known for a long time that the Prince enjoys a forthright comment or two on issues of national concern. This is of course entirely legitimate provided his comments are not party political in nature. We also know that the Prince advocates organic farming and nutritional food and runs a farm that does not use pesticides or fertilizers. But does he really believe so simplistically that overindulging in McDonalds takeaways ‘causes’ childhood obesity? Obesity is caused by a number of complex and interrelated factors, including genetic inheritance, unbalanced diets, economic choices and lack of exercise. The idea that banning fast food will solve obesity is as absurd as the idea that banning television makes children do their homework. But far more disturbing is the whiff of authoritarianism here. Can it be right for any government to ban us from eating out, even if a constant diet of Chicken and chips makes us obese? Can any government legitimately decide where we can and cannot eat, based on its own (perhaps discredited) scientific assessments? Clearly, the British Parliament would instantly repudiate such an illiberal and draconian measure, though Britain's vast army of political 'nannies' would no doubt welcome it. But in the Arab world, where despots freely dispense with their subjects’ liberties, the Prince's suggestion would seem at once attractive and plausible. But this does not mean that the future Head of State of a democratic nation should be pandering to such authoritarian tendencies. One suspects that this is a Royal gaffe too far.
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