Debate in this Country, Jonah Lomu and Clara Oswald

It’s December. The motifs of the season have taken their place on stage like one hit wonders.  Where once we were kicking our way through heaped crisp rust red leaves we now find the sun hung low in the sky, constant rain fights it’s way into gutters clogged with the mushed remains of what once crunched underfoot.  It’s dark when we get up in the morning and the same when we scuttle home in the evenings.  The trains are late.  Downton Abbey’s packed in. Cats and dogs aren’t living together.  

It was good to see you last month.  For the second year in a row I’ve thought we’d put on a show, sipping champagne whilst gently swinging from chandeliers and if not the toast then at least the grilled entrées of society.  Instead it was soggy squirrels, unfeasibly large pies and a general malaise brought on from the season and a general fatigue of our working lives.

I did gain a sense that with your inevitable dislocation from the country that once was home in part reinforces the need for this blog.  You may well not need to know who’s just been booted out of strictly, the latest government u-turn or the collapse of all political opposition but I’ll endeavour to provide a flavour of events.  The alternative is that you further descend into the behaviours of a enfeebled high court judge, muttering questions like What is a Harry Kane, Ellie Goulding or Wolf Hall.  With my own expertise being limited to Big Data, the demise of Leeds United, the music of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and the Housewives of Orange County you can start to see why this blog is more trough than peak.

Whilst we were introducing you to the concept of Harry Kane being one of our own during a low wattage England friendly you’ll recall that rumours abounded of a bit of trouble in the France v Germany game.   During the 2nd half of the Spain friendly a strand occupied my thoughts - why were the French and German fans fighting? Why during a friendly? It didn’t make sense.  Of course that wasn’t the issue at all and Paris was experiencing a terrorist assault on a scale difficult to absorb. In the following hours and days the scale of the events became clear and actions continued at pace as the French authorities looked to find everyone involved in the terrorist attacks.  On one day mid week I couldn’t sleep so had taken myself down to the living room to try and fall crash out in front of a film. Sleep did come but I had conspired to do so in front of the rolling 24 hour news.  Around half five that morning I was awoken by the sound of gunfire as the French police raided a flat in the suburbs of northern Paris.  Please excuse the laboured reach for humour but for me literally and for western Governments figuratively it was a wake up call.  

France hadn’t limited its actions to its own borders.  Within days of the Paris attack it had stepped up its bombing raids on Islamic State targets in Syria.  There was a speech in the UN, the French official stated “the use of force would be so fraught with risks for people, for the region and for international stability that it should only be envisioned as a last resort”. Sorry, I’m confusing events.  This was a speech the French made in the run up to the invasion of Iraq post 9/11.  At this point France was incurring bile from US over their questioning of the use of force and what the long term outcomes would be.  For some commentators they were “cheese eating surrender monkeys”, affecting the US’ mandate to take revenge, sorry, appropriate action.  Following the Paris attacks François Hollande said that France “will be merciless toward the barbarians of Islamic State group and will act by all means anywhere, inside or outside the country”.   France rattles its sabre and amongst others the UK heeds the call.  The UK parliament is debating whether to act or not.  Whether Iraq 2003 is different to Syria 2015, whether bombing without aim, either for a targets disguised amongst civilians or when a long term plan is simply not there - these are questions that risk you being labelled “terrorist sympathisers” as David Cameron has described Jeremy Corbyn today.   Keen fans of irony have already pointed out that last time Syria was debated in parliament is was not to bomb ISIS but to attack Assad’s regime.  I haven’t seen the bill put before the house but maybe it should just ask to bomb, to keep bombing, someone, maybe an army, maybe a terrorist, maybe just a concept; to flood europe with refugees, to refuse to take them, to fall victim to new acts or terrorism, to buy bigger bombs, to want to avoid boots on the ground, to get our brave boys and girls home as soon as possible, to stand by a war memorial looking sombre, to promise safety and security, to bomb.  

So we stand back.  It’s going to happen regardless what we say, we say to ourselves. Oh look, Adele has a new album out.  That Christmas advert from the supermarket draws an emotional response from me.  A footballer has kicked balls into a goal in a sequence different to other footballers.  A film is coming out.  It’s the idiom of cliches. When the new product will save the day.  For hard working families.  When decapitating only one victim won't get you on the front page.  When Donald Trump is cheered for approving of waterboarding…”in a heartbeat...It works….Believe me, it works. And you know what? If it doesn't work, they deserve it anyway, for what they're doing. It works."

In the Guardian a resident of Raqqa, Syria was quoted as saying “You never knew what time the bombs would hit, so we preferred to stay at home most of the time. At least if they make a mistake you can die with your family, not alone in the street where no one will know who you are.”

This shouldn’t be a testimony whose message is blunted through repetition.  It is.

Surprise - it's annihilation

Finishing second in the Olympics gets you silver. Finishing second in politics gets you oblivion.

Richard M. Nixon

Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Even from your sun drenched lair you’ll be aware of the outcome of the UK’s five yearly flirtation with democracy. Whilst certainly a results orientated business history will soon summarise the 2015 UK General Election with a simple list of the winners and losers.  Before this submission to tldr brevity I’d like to wind the clock back a few days and walk you through the events, the journey our country has taken and that rarest of things, a shared collective moment when we turned to each other and asked “Hey! what the hell is going on here?”

It’s Wednesday 6 May.  Our political leaders are wrapping up last day coast to coast tours like bleak charity fundraisers.  The latest opinion polls are in and exhibiting similar patterns to those that had been taken in the days and weeks that preceded it. The election result is predicted to be a hung parliament.  This isn’t one poll, it’s all polls.  The numbers go up and down by small increments but the resulting hung parliament is not in doubt.  The final opinion poll is:

Party	Seats
Conservatives	273
Labour	268
Liberal Democrats	28
SNP	56
UKIP	2
Green	1
Other	22

Thursday is a meh day.  A fine weather day, certainly no rain to affect the turnout.  It was the first day in a long time that was mostly free from electioneering.  I stop by my village hall and cast my vote for the fourth different party that I’ve given my pencil cross to in my electoral history. The through the night election broadcasts seem like a wasted effort.  We joke at work, speculating how many days it’ll be before the next government is formed.  Out of habit we tune in at 10pm and the shows start with the exit polls.  These exit polls are targeted across a range of representative constituencies the experts say.  They’re really accurate, the pollsters add.  The results though are different to what we are expecting.  Our attention snaps to the screen. What? we collectively ask.

Party	May 6 Opinion Poll Seats	May 7 Exit Poll Seats
Conservatives	273	316
Labour	268	239
Liberal Democrats	28	10
SNP	56	58
UKIP	2	2
Green	1	-
Other	22	-

Suddenly the conservatives are tantalisingly close to overall majority (322 seat or 326 depending if you discount Sinn Fein not taking their seats). Paddy Ashdown turns to Andrew Neil and announces that if the exit poll is right he’ll eat his hat.  This is debated at some length, not the polls, more the concept of hat ownership.  Cast forward some hours and by morning Andrew Neil has found the required gourmet garment but sadly this turns out to be yet another broken Liberal Democrat promise.  By early morning the result of the election was clear.

Party	May 6 Opinion Poll Seats	May 7 Exit Poll Seats	May 8 General Election Result
Conservatives	273	316	331
Labour	268	239	232
Liberal Democrats	28	10	8
SNP	56	58	56
UKIP	2	2	1
Green	1	-	1
Other	22	-	21

What!? With 36.9% of those voting and 24.4% of those who could vote in the country the Conservatives take just over half of the available seats, enough for an overall majority.  Labour’s vote remains the same as the last election but this in effect sees them losing seats.  In every Liberal Democrat constituency in which the Conservatives came second the result is reversed.  The reward for government stability, participating in a coalition and in soundbite terms, reversing a commitment on tuition fees resulted in the Liberal Democrats being reduced to a scorched root.  Their heartland in the South West gone.  Ministers like Vince Cable and longstanding MPs such as Simon Hughes, gone.   Political opinions aside, there was limited light relief on the night.  Thankfully Ed Balls, the Shadow Chancellor lost his seat by a few hundred votes and that kept us going until we could all cheer in the anonymous tory winning a the expense of Nigel Farage.

The result is a genuine surprise for all.  David Cameron unpacked his suitcase and took the photo of Boris Johnson from his dartboard.  Ed Miliband stopped practicing writing PM after his name and deleted Nicola Sturgeon’s number from his phone.  Nick Clegg crouched in a dark cellar, googling how to tie a noose.  

The morning wore on and the shock remained.  With all the grace of Jose Mourinho winning a trophy David Cameron appeared outside 10 Downing Street to celebrate with party workers and the nation’s press.  He’s a one nation tory they say. Sadly that nation seems to be populated solely by non-doms, our friends in the City and those who can trace their ancestry back to King Canute.  The disabled, economically disadvantaged and those who foolishly pay tax might need to apply to be citizens of this nation.  The words “death camps” seem a touch strong, but their equivalent, sinkhole estates in constituencies they have no interests in will do just fine.  

By lunchtime it’s time for leaders resignation dominos.  Nick, then Ed, then Nigel all fall on their swords for the good of their parties. In contrast Nicola Sturgeon quickly becomes as insufferable as Alex Salmond, full of talk of SNP influence in Westminster and the end of austerity.  The 331 seats that the Conservatives are sat on and the fact that they can ignore all other parties seems yet to register.  Yes they will have a presence but bar destroying the Union and cementing the Tories English 1000 Year electoral Reich we will think little of them.

Jesus rose three days after dying on the cross.  Similarly Nigel Farage spent a similar period, hopefully in a cave before his own political resurrection.  Less a triumph over death and more an acknowledgement of UKIP’s executive’s rejection of his resignation. A tumour would be more welcome.  To extend the metaphor way beyond breaking point it points towards a cancer within our politics, our society - a manifestation of the economic fissures separating the haves and the have nots and how those with opportunism can rabble rouse with a simple message of blaming external actors, to champion division, discord and dissatisfaction.  Fortunately Europe is falling down the political agenda...hang on, what’s that you’re saying David? Let’s have a referendum on Europe in 2016? Great.  I can’t wait. More democracy and no doubt, more surprises.  

Life is essentially a cheat and its conditions are those of defeat; the redeeming things are not happiness and pleasure but the deeper satisfactions that come out of struggle.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Pierrot & Columbine 4eva

One week to go. Seven more days of empty statements, uncosted commitments and repeating the first name of random members of the electorate whilst swapping out answers to their questions with empty manifesto straplines.  One week to go to the election.  Two weeks until the formation of the next minority government. Three months from the next general election.  A short number of days before we’re greeted with the sight of Nicola Sturgeon riding Ed Miliband outside the front of 10 Downing Street like a hen night that's two hours beyond nightclubs closing, tears, smeared eyeliner and a fight outside Boots over Kevin.

Is election fever spreading?  A short perusal of news websites suggest perhaps not.  Your humble correspondent has been tracking the “most read” stories across a range of UK websites this week to get a different viewpoint.  At the beginning of the week the election was barely registering but with the hype over the leaders appearing on Question Time (albeit a relatively anemic version in which they appeared individually) got the election trending at least.  

Marketing, promotion; these are integral to getting your product out there before the masses. This week Cameron v Miliband has struggled for publicity in comparison to Mayweather v Pacquiao.  Maybe this presents the answer.  Let’s scrap Thursday’s election and just have Ed and David in a ring at Trafalgar Square.  Two go in - one comes out.  It’ll be as close to the democratic process as when the parties are playing top trumps with manifesto commitments in back offices over the next weekend.

So what else has been catching our collective eye:

Commuters stuck on trains for hours or in Daily Mail terms “The journey from hell”

-or in summary, yes, commuting still not fun

The price that Ed Miliband is prepared to pay to win the Muslim vote

-and other scare stories the right wing press will issue to pursue their own interests

Negative interest rates put world on course for biggest mass default in history

-sadly financial news, whilst all encompassing in its impact is also really dull so let’s move on

Capital crime: there are as many as 4,300 deaths a year from air pollution in London alone

-somehow, switching taxis from diesel might not be the sole answer

Apple Watch does not like tattoos

-conform iSheep, conform

Brazilian 'unaware' until execution

-foreign country executes someone from another foreign country with mental capacity issues. To be filed in the news agenda somewhere behind global warming

Royal baby: When to induce?

-when it clashes with Britain’s Got Talent?

And all this in the same week of the untimely demise of Orville the Duck.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies says none of the three main parties at Westminster has come "anywhere close" to making it clear where spending cuts would be made.  When one political party spots something they can capitalize on it stays in the news agenda for days.  In the last week we’ve had the Liberals accusing the Conservatives over child benefits and the Conservatives accusing Labour over SNP deals.  The IFS statement was met by near silence by the political parties, an unwelcome jolt of reality amid their stage managed bland statements of empowerment.  The story slipped away to be replaced no doubt by something on the impact of food banks on house prices.   

...but now the players must resume to their spots on the stage and the pantomime must start again. Cue Pierrot, cue hard working families, cue being scared of change, foreigners and the implications of the status quo.  Cue Columbine, cue misrepresentation, disguise and false hope.  The performance is about to start again. Return to your seats. Please be quiet.

Interlude#1

It’s a Tuesday.  The radio’s on with The Pet Shop Boys latest offering “Heart” playing on tight rotation. It’s been number one for three weeks.  That lunchtime, Margaret Thatcher stands up at Prime Minister's Questions and responds to Neil Kinnock on issues of the day such as implementing the Poll Tax in Scotland, the role privatisation could play in the NHS and the implications of Israel's actions in occupied territories in response to a Palestinian uprising.  This is the week that the USSR pledges to withdraw militarily from Afghanistan.  This is the year in which the Iran/Iraq war staggers to a close.  These are the dark ages for Fulham adrift in the third tier of English football, edging towards mid table obscurity.  

And you were born.

Humans...fields...conflict!

We all look at each other.  David looks at Ed who looks at NIck who looks at Nigel who looks at NIcola who looks at Natalie who looks at Leanne.  These are our prospective leaders, summoning the ghosts of our political past, plundering the spirit of Churchill even.  To paraphrase, never in this field of human conflict was so much owed by so few to so many.  Yes, the general election campaigns lumber on and whilst only a couple of weeks in both politicians and electorate are already showing signs of fatigue.  

There’s an amazing disconnect in that our political “leaders” are never away from all media but of everything is stage managed to a level North Korea can only envy and the chance of your voter in the street bumping into a politician and asking them a question that hasn't gone through two workshops and a social media trial is actually zero.  

There is no escape.  Even my twitter feed has paid inserts by a candidate.  Albeit they are standing for a constituency adjacent to my own so it’s literally a wasted message.  That said, seeing as there’s been next to no contact from anyone in my own constituency it’s good to feel part of the democratic courtship.

Whilst the leaders debated on TV I was watching an episode of House of Cards.  The irony that I was more interested in a fictional portrayal of US politics rather than a debate leading up an election in my own country is not lost on me    

This week the party manifestos are starting to be published.  The straplines for each of the main parties are:

Strong Leadership. A clear economic plan. A brighter, more secure future.

Britain only succeeds when working people succeed.

Stronger economy, fairer society.

Vote for what you believe in.

Policies for People.

Together we can make _______ better.

To build post-austerity ______.

I have to confess that I was hoping that they would reach a level of blandness to make them indistinguishable from each other.  I guess you don’t spend all that lobby lolly on high class advertising without getting some degree of “branding”.  Whilst distinct there’s nothing that’s going to get you out of your chair, driving your fist into the air shouting “Yes! Finally there’s a message I can get behind”.

The polls are locked out at 34% each for the Conservatives and Labour, 14% for UKIP,  8% for Lib Dems, 6% for the Greens and 6% spread across the rest.  The gaming that each serving government undertakes on the constituencies (although not in the last term due to the Lib Dems falling out with the Conservatives over reforms in the House of Lords) means that the distribution of each parties’ vote only equates to a certain number of seats, especially for the smaller parties.  All predictions point towards another hung parliament.  Labour and the Conservatives will win around 270-odd seats each with the other main player being SNP with 50-odd.  They will be the king makers (if such a phrase can be used for parliamentary democracy), not the Lib Dems, who will win somewhere around 26 seats.  This will be everyone’s get out of jail cards, in that manifesto commitments will have to be once again sacrificed for the sake of forming a new government.

There is no other news, no culture, no arts just politics.  Oh yes, and sport.  The football season nears its conclusion.  Chelsea, more through pragmatic, stolid attrition are close to winning the “premiership”.  They’re not attracting the neutrals who are more likely flocking to a plucky underdog like Burnley as they look to escape relegation or current form hotshots...Crystal Palace who are mirroring Alan Pardew's rejuvenation in his escape from mediocrity and financial safety pursuers Newcastle.  Like a last chance cancer patient who has discovered they are in the control group of a clinical trial, Hull City have lost any sense of stoicism and would welcome an early exit, from the looks on their faces, existence in general and certainly the premier league.  More importantly, in the league that really matters, the Championship the top six are all WWE, following a dramatic script with twists every weekend, swapping who wins so there remains no points difference between any of them.  For our two sides, we remain spectators in our own league.  I have seen our sides play each other each season.  Less a festival of football it was more a solemn reminder that there will be a lot of pain before the welcome release of death.

If we’re to keep to the Churchillian theme then I’ll close with another of his quotes, mindful that the election remains weeks away - I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat. We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many long months of toil and struggle.

(Infinity+1) is less than 37

The sun sets. It rises.  For you a Caribbean vista. Another palm tree. Another cove.  Despite the repetition please relish your days.  Not because you are in a sun drenched idol, waves of clear blue water lapping against your hull as you head to a new port. No because you are not here in the UK.  We have entered the End of Days.  Parliament has been dissolved.  The General Election is in 37 days and before us awaits a flood of platitudes, untruths and condescension.  After my short winter hiatus I thought I’d mark this doom laden day with a reawakening of this blog.  Consider me your companion through this festival of banality.

Today, David Cameron announced that he was presenting a stark choice to the nation.   Cosmologists talk of a potential end state of the universe in which all matter is driven through entropy to a state of heat death, a point at which there is no thermodynamic energy change.  This was the state of the British electorate at the last election.  Five years later, we have to break the standard model and equate voters to be somewhere akin to political dark matter. We are there, but politicians can’t engage with us, observe us and cause any action in which we would react.  Sadly however, the next stage for us isn’t the welcoming arms of heat death but government by the weak, holding power influenced by the few.  A stark choice? Between what and what?  A party for those inured of the impact of their own policies.  Or to a party scared to voice any view whatsoever.  At least the Conservatives are going through the motions of portraying themselves as some sort of one nation, we’re all in it together (ho ho) pantomime. I’m not even sure that Labour are standing at the election.  Is this the end game from that initiated by Tony Blair in his drive for the middle ground where both main parties stage conflict over inconsequential issues in the centre.  Their message so muted that voters find themselves driven to the causes of minority parties.  Opinions they’re unsure of but at least it’s a choice for something…?   Current polls suggest that no party will achieve an overall majority.  This places power in the hands of the larger minor parties such as Scottish National Party (SNP) or UK Independence Party (UKIP).  Each have their own agendas to elevate beyond the confines of their electoral reach.  Come May’s General Election a majority party is going to make...well I pause because I was about to say difficult but I’m sure the lust for power will significantly aid in the decision making process.   

In the short gap between reporters standing in front of empty buildings, discussing politicians located hundreds of miles away and the bit at the end of the programme normally devoted to pandas trying to procreate in front of the world’s media in a zoo in Paraguay comes come the rest of  news.  Filed under light relief this past week has been a passenger jet crashing in the Alps.  It frustratingly made top billing in the news for a while.  I’m not anti-tragedy, just anti-sensationalism.   On the day of the crash I pettily resorted to browsing the EUs statistics database for comparative fatalities.  Yes, this is who I am.  Every 10 days, a plane crashes somewhere in the world involving a fatality.  In Europe it’s estimated that each day 157 people will commit suicide, 104 will die in road traffic accidents and inexplicably 270 will die in what the EU refers to as home/leisure setting.  These numbers dwarf air crash fatalities but aren’t accompanied by tracking shots of rescue helicopters circling alpine peaks forlornly.  As the story moved from the crash to the cause, evidence was presented that the co-pilot had manipulated the pilot out of the cockpit, locked the door from the inside and instigated the plane’s descent into the mountains.  It is now emerging that he was concealing mental health issues.  A tragedy, larger in scale that most but still one of many taking place every day.

There’s always sport to distract us from thinking things through.  The morphine drip that is football has been turned down this week with just international fixtures in the schedule.  England strolled to an easy win against (and whilst it was only three days ago I’ve just had to look this up) Latvia.  Rooney edged towards the top position in all time English goal scorers….but was eclipsed by the new sensation on the block Harry “he’s one of our own (™ Spurs, apart from when they kept sending him out on loan in previous seasons)” Kane.  A substitute half way through the second half and within 79 seconds he got on the score sheet.  It’s why sport always suffices, obscuring reason, allowing hope to be invested in an abstract concept when reality remains unfulfilled.  That some young bloke with slicked back hair can run about some grass and shove a ball in a net means we can safely disengage from what really matters.

A short circuit has prevent the Large Hadron Collider being turned back on.  When working again the drive in part will be to break the standard model, to challenge the frontiers of knowledge and discover answers to the fundamentals affecting everything we observe in the universe.  Meanwhile, closer to home a politician will fumble over remembering how many food banks/immigrants/enterprising new businesses (delete as appropriate) are in their constituency and then rather than offer a solution, denigrate their opponents.

Ludwig Wittgenstein is quoted as saying “if we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.” It’s going to be a long 37 days.  Let me act as your bitter, prejudiced guide.