Listening

Listening To The People

There are matters of liberty and democracy that the British government is ignoring at the peril of both it and the society it exists to serve. Over the weekend I sat with a group of middle class people, the type who form the backbone of England. These are not wide-eyed radicals; by and large they are a calm group, patient, friendly, almost docile in their decency. I can report that they are now becoming very impatient and angry with the British leadership, unable to accept what’s happening and convinced that no one in governmental power is listening to their concerns. I do not pretend that this is a scientifically chosen or representative group, but I am prepared to bet that this is the view of the vast majority of British people. These are the issues they discussed and I list them in the order they raised them, not in my personal priority listing. On all these matters I am expressing the unanimous view except where I state otherwise.

Prison sentencing is too lax. Life has to mean life for murder, or other serious crime. It is not acceptable that life has come to mean 15 years in the UK, with up to one third off for good behavior. The common view is that if we need to build more prisons we should get on with doing it.

If the system will not allow “proper” life meaning life sentences the consensus is that capital punishment must be reintroduced. I was only one of two who expressed a dissenting view on this. I believe that capital punishment is premeditated murder by the state, which cannot justify taking a life in revenge for taking a life. If it’s wrong for an individual to murder someone, it must be equally wrong for the state to do the same. There is also the reasonable chance that mistakes, that are unalterable, could and would be made.

People no longer understand our criminal justice system, and have lost faith in its fairness, efficiency and transparency. No one in this group believed in the top level of management in the police service any more, although there was widespread respect for the men and women on the beat. There was universal belief that they had too much paper work to do, and that most of this was motivated by political correctness rather than to help maintain law and order and protect the citizenry.

There is total belief in and admiration for the efficiency and bravery of our armed forces. But there is a common perception that they are mismanaged, under resourced and equipped. The old saying from World War 1 comes to mind when the German leader described the British armed forces thus, “Lions led by donkeys.”

Everyone believed that the current fuel taxes and duties are grotesquely high and must be urgently reduced. Only one person felt that the proposed additional duties would in any way help the environment although they provided no evidence as to why they thought this was so. Their view was that if we didn’t take such measures now our children and grandchildren would be fighting for food and other resources.

The entire group thought that the British Prime Minister is a second rater, unable to lead and unwilling to listen. It also should be said that Gordon Brown is as unlucky as his predecessor was lucky. Blair had another huge advantage over his successor, charisma by the truckload whereas Brown is a black hole in the charm stakes. I don’t think anyone can dispute this, including the increasingly peevish PM. If Gordon were a political genius I would love to see any evidence, as would the country. If he’s a nice guy then we need some help us to see it.

Above all the group was furious that we, as a nation, are being spied upon, relentlessly and with increasing frequency. There was only one supporter for the huge increase of CCTV cameras, whereas everyone else was vehemently opposed. The supporter trotted out that old canard “If you’ve done nothing wrong what have you got to worry about?” The correct response is that this constant spying intrudes into our privacy and the presumption of our common innocence. The fact that the nearly 5 million cameras in this small country do occasionally catch a criminal does not mean that there are no other means by which those criminals would have been caught had there been no cameras. Add to this the almost unbelievable and daft spying now directed by the tin pot dictators in our town halls. This includes placing hundreds of thousands of concealed mini cameras in our waste bins to detect whether or not we are correctly sorting our rubbish according to their environmentally friendly regulations. At the same time no official appears to do anything when many families living in sinkhole housing estates throw their rubbish over their balcony parapets, so that they don’t have to bother walking down the steps in order to place it in the correct bins. No one could fabricate such lunacy, but it’s happening all over Britain today.

I think my fellow Brits are right to feel and express these views and it’s long overdue that this, the previously silent majority, is listened to. The British are the most placid of nations, until they are made angry, and then they are an implacable and terrible enemy to those who have offended their sense of decency and fair play. History is peppered with the bleached bones of tyrants destroyed by the British when they became angry.

Secrets

Yet another of our country’s secrets were lost over the weekend। This is the ninth recorded incident over the last few months. It must set a record for ineptitude never before achieved.

Several thoughts occur to me. Perhaps there are just so many bits of secret information being transported around the country that the sheer scale of the transportation of these bits and pieces will result in some of them being mislaid.

Another theory could be that for some strange reason a whole bunch of our most senior secret bureaucrats all decided to get into their nearest train, bus, taxi, airplane or public space so that they could leave top secret information laying around in an envelope marked Top Secret.

We now know that these lapses were not caused by theft of these articles or breaches in internal security. It seems as though, in the majority of cases, senior officials simply walked out of their offices with vital documents that they then appear to have forgotten and “mislaid.”

A person I know, who used to work in Intelligence, told me of another possibility. He stated that this series of events looked much more like a series of attempted “dead letter drops” in which an agent was intending topass information on to a third party. He does know much more about this type of thing than me, but although my normal inclination is to heartily subscribe to the cock up theory I can’t see how any organization would get it so wrong so often and so publicly, unless they wanted to.

There is also a disturbing uniformity to the reactions of the people finding such documents, folders, computers and discs. Almost every time the offending lost item has been handed in to the BBC or a newspaper and then on to the police or security services. Personally I find this strange, as I would deliver an item of such type to the police or directly to the security service. Why would you give it to the BBC or a newspaper first?

All these accidents and oversights where items of top secret or a confidential nature follow a disturbing pattern. They all give the appearance of overwhelming official incompetence. Do you believe that?

Has everyone suddenly become totally stupid? There is another possibility, and this is so far fetched it makes you stop and think. Perhaps this series of errors was not a bunch of innocent accidents. Is it possible that there are people within the security services who decided there needed to be a change in the way the government was handling intelligence issues. What better way to weaken and demoralize senior government than by discrediting it?

If you wanted to achieve this goal there would be no better method than a series of accidents such as these. Is this not more likely than 9 separate, serious incidents in less than one year?

I leave you to draw your own conclusions whilst we all carefully monitor progress on what’s sure to be an interesting series of investigations.

Rita

Most articles I write are about big issues and stories, but today I am going to the funeral of an old family friend so the story is both personal and small. I am very sad. The lady was called Rita, and she was very special to everyone who knew her, including me. The reasons were obvious to all of us who were fortunate to have that opportunity.

Rita always seemed to be smiling, and when she wasn’t she was laughing. Those who came into contact with her found themselves joining in the fun, it was hard not to. One of the favorite compliments I pay is to say someone possesses a generosity of spirit, and Rita had such generosity in spades.

The lady was also bright, loyal, intelligent and a good friend. In fact all of the attributes I admire were packaged in her, including bravery in adversity. She never seemed to complain about her own problems even when they were bad.

I was told that when you go to your afterlife you are greeted, and then guided to your final destination by your ancestors. I find that concept very appealing because our forebears love us whatever we do, and that sounds oddly comforting. I’m sure there’ll be the sound of Rita laughing with her ancestors tomorrow. Maybe this isn’t such a small story, after all what’s bigger than heaven and earth?

Goodbye Rita, travel safely.

Jackpot

Years ago I predicted that someone, and I named Apple, would come up with one package that included all your hand held computing, phone, camera, information and organizational needs; Apple’s new iPhone has achieved this. This new draft of the iPhone is being released on July 11th.

I come to praise the new iPhone not to bury it. I am, it has to be admitted up front, an unashamed fan of most things Apple. I have several Mac products at home and in business, and generally they live up to their brilliant design, packaging and marketing. To put it into perspective this mobile is twice as fast and half as much to buy. That will sound good to everyone. I don’t want to pretend to excessive technical knowledge. I neither know nor care how the thing works, but rather, that it does what it says on the packet. I still have connection difficulties with my solid state MacBook Air when I’m on wifi at home and my security password is in place. Even with all kinds of patches and fixes and technical support we’re still struggling unless I take down the security. So, I’m not a crazy Apple fan, I see faults when they’re there. Not only do I have several Macs at home and business but when I was in charge of such things at a university I also purchased several hundred thousands of dollars of their kit, mostly good, but occasionally with the odd problems attached. With the new iPhone I don’t conceptually see any faults.

Clearly this is the iPhone that should have been released in the first place, but I guess Apple were feeling pressured and had to get the 2G version out last year or suffer from anxious shareholders. The new, 3G version, is a quantum leap forward.

I have not been handed a phone to play with nor am I a Beta tester but I have been following progress via the web and other users. My daughter was an early owner of the previous version but was instantly depressed by the knowledge of the impending, apparent redundancy of her phone. Apple have announced that they will be supplying free downloads and upgrades to this generation of users but it’s not clear whether these patches will compare with the new phone.

One of the big leaps forward is Apple opening up their doors to outside developers. In fact they are actively encouraging them, which is great news. More innovation on an already great platform has got to be desirable. Some of the new Applications already demonstrated are fantastic. Equally amazing is the fact that the developers have managed to deliver on their developments in just a few weeks. This means that the development processes are simple to work with as well as being brilliantly designed and engineered.

I loved the fact that everything you have will now synchronize seamlessly and effortlessly. Stuff that was a real pain will more or less just happen, oh happy days when I can synch my various electronic diaries, photos and media, information and e-mails without having to think about it. When my information is being securely stored without a second’s worry. Oh happy days have arrived with the iPhone.

I’m not a great games player, being more interested in their development, but the iPhone gives a whole new dimension to mobile games playing that millions of people are going to love.

I won’t bore you with the technical specifications, which are stunning, nor will I carry on extolling the virtues of almost every aspect of this amazing piece of kit for fear of it being too obvious that I can’t wait to see the new iPhone be rolled out. I will leave you with the thought that when the new iPhone is available it is going to make every other hand held device redundant; and I want one!

Thanks Ireland

Thank you Ireland. Today the citizens of that fair country voted against ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon. The rules were that if one country out of the entire 27-country membership of the European Union voted against this second version of the previous constitution, it would be abandoned. As there was only one country that allowed its citizens the right to vote, you can guess that in reality the EU was trying not to allow its voters any chance to be contrary. Because Ireland’s constitution doesn’t permit such alterations without a public vote there was no alternative, it was unavoidable. The Irish were allowed to vote and they rejected this treaty, again. Perfect justice has been served.

This is the same treaty that was previously voted against, as a constitution by several countries and had been supposedly abandoned as the rules had stipulated. However, like Dracula, it leapt out of its coffin, bloodied but unbowed. It then morphed from a rejected constitution into a series of parliaments rubber-stamping the new version, now called a treaty. Last time round, when it was called a constitution, we were, you will recall, also told it would be abandoned if any of the countries voted against it. The politicians in Brussels simply changed the rules when they lost. They did a bit of judicious cutting and pasting and regurgitated the same constitutional dinner, re-heated. They clearly can’t believe they are in the wrong, and frankly they don’t care what their people think.

The European President has announced that the ratification process of the now twice rejected constitution / process will proceed despite promises to the contrary. What’s a twice broken promise between old European friends? Public shame should be heaped on all such arrogant, pumped up tin-pot dictators. However, I bet you that this same set of nonentities would accept any vote in their favor.

The EU leadership is demanding further and deeper integration of the European Union but every time the electorate has been allowed to vote on this issue they have responded by rejecting the proposed changes.

The reasons for this continuing objection by the populace are obvious to anyone with a democratic bone in their body. No one wants this constitution or treaty, nor understands it, nor sees the justification for it.

Ladies and gentlemen of Brussels, take your constitution or treaty, and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine, and please, don’t forget the staples!

Feeling Lucky?

Today is Friday the 13th. Some consider this a super unlucky date. I’m not worried by this because in my Jewish religious tradition, the number 13 is thought to be lucky, and as Friday is the start of Sabbath, the most holy of days, it should be doubly lucky today!

It appears obvious to me that our moral decline is both steep and rapid, furthermore there seems to be no end in sight. I am fond of forecasting that this disintegration of our moral core will have dire consequences. I’m also aware that if I keep predicting dire consequences sooner or later I shall turn into a prophet when I eventually get something right!

There are two additional facts that should also be borne in mind; I’m not into any organized religion nor am I superstitious. My being Jewish is what I am culturally, tribally and by tradition. I do, nevertheless fervently believe that we must preserve the moral and ethical dimensions of our civilization. In other words I can sometimes do something wrong, but I do try not to. I admit to weakness, not wickedness. I try very hard to keep within the laws and general rules and conventions of our world.

This goes as far as my trying my utmost not to get a speeding or parking ticket and never to park in a disabled parking space. In fact I once made a citizen’s arrest of someone who did this despite his being a very fit and healthy young man who just didn’t want to bother with parking legally. Yes, I am a pain, but if we don’t draw a line and allow anything, we are doomed to live in a very unpleasant world.

I understand and envy faith in others, and although I’m agnostic about such things I am open to be convinced. I have to admit that when I nearly died I didn’t see any white lights, chaps with wings or hear the chorus fantastic. In fact there was nothing and I was, I admit, most disappointed. Maybe I wasn’t quite ill enough, but I would hate to test the theory just to prove a point.

Despite my lack of religious belief I am a traditionalist. During my childhood my family vigorously taught me the difference between right and wrong. I don’t know if that’s the reason I find it impossible to take a stamp from work, and always have done. I don’t see the difference, other than degree, between the one stamp and several, or some money and where do you draw the line? This has resulted in my being an absolutist in these matters. I would instantly sack anyone for stealing, and indeed I have done so.

Some, who have known me, will tell you that I can be a pain in the bum about such matters. The reason for me raising this matter now is that this week saw the climactic selection of the successful Apprentice, in the TV show of the same name. The winner was a young man called Lee McQueen. He seems a personable, rough diamond sort of fellow. Not especially brilliant, but not total losers like some of his colleagues. During the penultimate weeks show Lee’s CV was exposed. There were many spelling and grammar errors, too many to be excused by most employers I suspect. More importantly, his interviewer asked Lee, did he stand by his statement that he had attended Thames Valley University for 2 years as it stated in his CV? He repeated this claim. His interrogator then showed him a letter he had received from that university which stated that he had actually, only attended for 4 months, “how do you respond to that?”

The young applicant hardly turned a hair. His attitude was OK, I got caught, but he clearly felt no guilt. When the inquests took place this incident was mentioned, but Sir Alan Sugar, the grand inquisitor, didn’t consider the matter to be of sufficient concern to worry him. I was shocked. I have always considered Sir Alan to be a moral man, but his attitude was that he’d probably done the same kind of thing when he was a young man and, to him, it was not an end of the world situation.

It was pointed out to Sugar that the incident proved that Lee would lie when he felt it necessary, and his response was that he could deal with that. His response seemed to indicate that he felt he could still trust Lee, and this wasn’t such an important matter. As Henry Ibsen said so accurately, “Don’t use that foreign word ideals. We have that excellent word lies.”

I had recent experience of both good and bad examples of behavior by colleagues. A “friend” and co-worker, behaved very badly, to my detriment after ten years of our being friends and working together. He told me that the excuse or motivation for his actions was his personal financial situation. Compare that to another ex-colleague and friend in America who felt it appropriate that he gift me shares in his new enterprise, not because he had to, but because he wanted to. Which of these examples will Lee follow, the knife in the back of the former or the generosity of spirit of the latter? I believe Sir Alan should carefully watch his back.

Sir Alan comes across as a shrewd, tough businessman, self confident to the point of arrogance. If you asked Sugar how he sees the future with Lee and he would no doubt tell you that he has the money and business experience to deal with any situation. But ask him in a year’s time, I wonder if Sugar will still have all his money and whether he will rue his disregard for the discredited value of honesty? You can’t buy good character but being able to totally trust your colleagues is still a vital, but increasingly rare virtue.

Looking For A Leader

Britain has always been blessed. Whenever there is a national emergency the country has found a leader to forge a path through the crisis. What a panoply of giants has graced us with their presence over the last millennia. The names read like a roll call of great heroes, Winston Churchill, The Duke of Wellington, Nelson, Queen Elizabeth the First, Walter Raleigh, the list is laced with infinite splendor.

In my own lifetime, my family and I left for America when the country no longer seemed governable. This was in the late 70’s, and we were suffering from innumerable strikes, industrial work limited to three-day weeks because of a lack of electric power, runaway inflation, a sinking pound, enormous unemployment numbers and a gigantic balance of payment deficit.

We left but Margaret Thatcher arrived. When we returned to this country from America it was a country in the midst of a transformation, which it has benefited from ever since. I am not saying that I loved the woman, because, if I was to tell the truth, I didn’t even like her. I found her cold, aloof, patronizing and unkind, but she saved my country from itself. From her genesis the UK was re-branded and re-launched. From a no hope country slipping to ignominy the country re-discovered its balls and over the last twenty years has become one of the world’s powerhouses.

Lest we forget it was Thatcher that changed the world’s mindset about de-nationalization and how the economy could work. It was Thatcher who destroyed the unseemly agglomeration of power that the unions had accumulated which was making the country ungovernable. Without this fundamental shift back to common sense there could have been no other fundamental changes.

Last night the government forced legislation through the House of Commons the new forty-two day detention rule. This means that, should the police believe there is a reason to arrest a terrorist suspect, this person could be held by them for up to six weeks before he is even charged. This is a shameful act, and is yet another breach of habeas corpus enshrined in this country’s original guarantee of democracy, the Magna Carta, signed in 1215. It states a prisoner is entitled to be bought before a court of law so that the legality of his detention can be verified. I quote Article 39, “No freeman shall be arrested or imprisoned or outlawed or exiled or in any way harmed. Nor will we proceed against him, or send others to do so, except according to the lawful sentence of his peers and the Common Law.” This is a disgraceful act of infamy by our lawgivers. It is a victory for the expedient, short-term tacticians who run our affairs, and clearly demonstrates their total lack of respect for the rights of its citizens.

Now, once again the country is on the slide. We need another leader, and it isn’t our present Prime Minister or David Cameron, the leader of the opposition, the man most likely to succeed him when we have our next election. Cameron is simply a watered down carbon copy of Tony Blair. Britain doesn’t need re-packaging, it needs a conviction politician ready to lead from the front, and Cameron doesn’t offer this. Let us all hope that somewhere, lurking in the wings, is such a person. Our country is looking for a leader, the need is becoming urgent!