31st December 2012
The BBC reports today that Hilary Clinton has had a check up following he recent faint apparently brought on by dehydration caused by a stomach virus. That process has discovered a blod clot in her veins possibly resulting from concussion when she fell. She is being tretaed with anticoagulant drugs in hospital and will remain under observation for a few days.
I did not notice at the time but it seems Pakistan released 13 Afghan Taliban prisoners last month as part of a confidence building process. That has continued today with a further three high level officials being set free. It is hoped they will have talks with the Afghan Peace Council so that a form of regional stability can be produced.
The Today programme’s guest editor this morning wanted us to know that since 1990 953 people in this coutry have died whilst in police custody. 15 of those were in the last twelve month period of which 7 individuals had mental health issues. Even though the juries of 11 inquests into such deaths since 1969 have reached verdicts of unlawful killing there have been no successful prosecutions of restraining police officers in the period.
Another story on the programme was about the aggressive selling, as if it were double glazing, of some cosmetic surgery and procedures. Apparently anyone can set up business to inject dermal fillers under the skin to smooth out wrinkles and then employ whoever they like to sell their services. Young girls it seems are bombarded with texts and the like to save up for such routines when they are 18 and are legally able to sign on the dotted line.
In the last few minutes of the broadcast there was a discussion on the dullness of good news. It lacks excitement. From an aside of John Humpry’s then, I see from the internet that some newspapermen have a saying; ‘Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed; everything else is public relations’.
It is being reported today that more than 200 people were killed over the weekend as government forces recaptured part of the city of Homs in Syria. Apparently Russia is also sending a naval ship to the area with the speculation being that it will be available to evacuate their nationals from the country at short notice if needs be. It seems many Russian women emigrated to marry Syrians during the Cold War.
With this being the last day of the year FT journalists have had a punt in today’s paper at predicting what might happen in the world in the next 12 months.
Janan Ganesh thinks it quite possible all our large football clubs, Manchester United, Arsenal, Manchster City and Chelsea will have new managers by mid year.
Roger Blitz guesses that Istanbul will be chosen for the 2020 Olympics in September.
Athough he does not feel shots will be fired, David Pilling quite understandably suggests the deeply held tensions between China and Japan will be evident all year.
The situation in Syria will undoubtedly come to a head and Gideon Rachman believes it more than likely that some form of military intervention will be required by the international community before it is all over.
Guy Dinmore thinks it unlikely Mario Monti will be able to win Italy’s presidential election outright. However in a predicted unsightly battle he wonders if he will still be involved as part of a coalition government. I certainly hope Mr Monti can continue to be a stabilising force for the good of his fellow countrymen.
Philip Stephens plumps for no American military action against Iran, contrary to Israel’s desires. With economic sanctions biting he feels Mr Obama might go for a comprehensive settlement with Ayatollah Khamenei not only dealing with his nuclear programme but offering a US security guarantee for him as well. I dare not even hope he might be right.
1st January 2013
A happy and prosperous New Year to eveyone who reads this note.
Seven female and one male employee working for a Pakistani charity in the north-west of the country have been killed, when their vehicle was raked by gunfire from four men on two motorbikes. The charity runs a polio vaccination programme in the region.
There was an intersesting BBC Magazine webpage up this morning in the most popular list about the life of Queen Victoria, her husband and nine children. Her eldest, Bertie, was King between 1901 and 1910. He did not get on with his mum but he never broke off relations with her. During his time as Prince of Wales he became renowned by those in the know as greedy, highly sexed and having an explosive temper. His one saving grace however was that he had great personal charm. It seems that on his accession he modernised the monarchy which the article puts forward as one reason why our Royal House survived the first world war unlike many others in Europe.
Even with peace for the majority of the population policemen in Northern Ireland have to be continually vigilant about their personal safety. An off duty officer was taking his wife and children out for lunch on Sunday. Fortunately he did not forget to check under his car before they drove off. Attached to the vehicle’s underside was a bomb. Two men have been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. It is hoped the device will provide useful evidence for a prosecution. The province’s Assistant Chief Constable said no one is entitled to take the life of another human being in such circumstances. I would add it is hardly a sign of a civilised society that some law abiding citizens acquiesce in criminals doing such things in their midst.
I Have just watched Goodbye to Canterbury which was presented and written by Rowan Williams to commemorate his home church for the last ten years, Canterbury Cathedral. At one point he briefly went through the entire history of Christians in this country. When he spoke of Henry VIII’s falling out with Rome he was standing in the ruins of the monastry which was originally part of his cathedral. He said no one could have believed at the time that all our monastries would be cast out from our land within a generation.
He did not start talking about Thomas a Becket until three quarters of the way through. But I think his demise was one of his main preoccupations. He compared his predecessor with himself and wondered whether he would be prepared to cut himself off from his friends and family, in that case by death, just to make a point.
Unless we change our ways half of UK citizens could be obese by 2050. There is a report out today from the Royal College of Physicians saying that only trying to treat the effects of rotundness is like putting the cart before the horse. We should be investigating and challenging the psychological causes as well. That should be approached using a multi-discipline team of individuals out in the community.
There was a discussion on the radio this morning about sporting prospects for 2013. It made me think about that element of uncertainty again. We are told it is the one factor that stock markets fear but I wonder if that is really the case. Most of us, I think, like a bit of spice in our life. Anticipating how your sports team may do next year, and mentally egging them on, is all part of the kick.
It was Today’s turn this morning to give it’s senior journalists the opportunity to provide their predictions for 2013. Robert Peston thinks we will lose our financial AAA rating during the year. He feels we should manage spome form of economic growth. Lyse Doucet suggests there will be a normal basket of unexpected challenging global events for our leaders to tackle with the names of some new countries coming into the newsreaders’ lexicon. Mark Easton points out that 2013 is a year of major welfare reform for us. Mark understands social history well in my view and suggests that could lead to some major changes in how many of us live our lives. If so, as has often happened in the past, it might well occur under the radar of public consciousness.
The comedian Al Murray was guest editor on Today this morning and a story on which he wished to concentrate was the recent history of Royal Wootton Bassett in Wiltshire, population 11,000. Al interviewed the lady who became the local coordinator to recognise the war dead from Afghanistan and elsewhere whose bodies had always been driven through the town from the nearby RAF base at Lyneham to the John Ratcliffe hospital in Oxford. It was some town officials who first asked in the summer of 2007, in an uncoordinated way, if they could pay tribute to each fallen serviceman as the cortege drove through by it stopping at the town’s war memorial. Then one day during a remembrance, purely by chance the bell ringers at the church had just started their practice. That extra accidental tribute seemed very fitting. The church were asked if they would like to become officially involved. They said yes and it went from there. The community coalesced around the common aim to pay tribute to our fallen servicemen and women, and the town started to receive national attention. The Gang of course will not have taken kindly to that generosity of spirit at all and I do remember from the time reading about some Muslim demonstrators who wanted to protest in the town. I think the hidden pressure through to the last cermony in September 2011 must have been immense. Indeed Al spoke to the town’s vicar. He said that when the town received it’s Royal recognition of it’s solidarity for our forces there was an immense feeling of relief. They had had no open support from any outsiders in the previous four years. The organisation had all come about through mutual confidence and trust from within the community itself. Sometimes it must have been really difficult. I am full of admiration for them all.
Rowan Williams’ final new year message as Archbishop of Canterbury was on BBC 2 this afternoon. I felt it was very professionally produced. I am giving no details, and I never will, but I found it extremely poignant. The Archbishop wished for us to look a bit more deeply at things, I think, by showing us the technichians he was looking at in order for us to be shown his image and hear his words. Dr Williams praised the public for their steady current of generosity such as shown by the Olympic Games Makers in the summer and faith group volunteers all the time. He asked that more of us should join the silent conspiracy of big hearted dedication so that better things can invisibly be made to happen for the purpose of good. He said that each of us has something to offer, even if it is only through our kind thoughts and actions to others. And perhaps to trust that the entire universe is held together by the quiet, unfailing benevolence of God.
2nd January 2013
When I went to bed last night, and heard that the second most senior Republican in the House of Representatives had said he could not support Mr Obama’s fiscal cliff proposals, I thought there was no way we could get a positive outcome for the bill. I was wrong. In the end the House did vote to increase taxes on the 2% richest Americans, by 257 votes to 167. Of those 167 against, 16 were Democrats. By my calculations 64% of Republican members voted against the measure. Mark Mardell has commented that in the end a sufficent nunmber of Rebuplicans realised they could not scupper the bill without heaping the public’s rancour on themselves. In a televised address President Obama made it clear he was no more than the head of a team of like minded people. For the next stage of the negotiations he asked that they are conducted with less drama. So that people are not scared so much.
3rd January 2013
When things go wrong people do look for someone to blame. I refer to the term hate plank in Chapter 8 of my book. From a BBC webpage up this morning it seems that has happened very much in Japan in respect of the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident following their tsunami. Most Japanese it seems feel badly towards the plant operator Tepco and anyone associated with them. Apparently some of their staff who heroically went into the plant to conduct clean up operations have been shunned by the wider population. Some have had plastic bottles thrown at them, some have had notes pinned on the doors of their homes saying they are not welcome. It is said half of those who fought the reactor meltdown now suffer from depression and post-traumatic stress symptons. The BBC interviewed one man who said that every day since he has felt badly about himself. He no longer finds it possible to be happy. He feels responsible for what has happened. I go through the immediate aftermath of the flooding at the nuclear plant in Chapter 12 of my book.
It is reported today that the leader of one of four militant insurgent groups in Pakistan, supporters of the Afghan Taliban, has been killed in an American drone attack in South Waziristan. It seems he was killed with five others when their stationary vehicle was hit by two missiles after it developed a fault.
Last March was the fifth driest in the UK since 1910. Then the rain came and it ended up being the second wettest year on record. The wettest was 2000, the fourth wettest 2008 and the fifth wettest 2002.
Last June it was announced that the Falkland Islanders would be voting in a referendum this March to say whether they wish to remain a British Overseas Territory. I now think it likely that step was taken on intelligence received from MI6. In an open letter today, published as an advertisement in two British newspapers, the Argentinian president has told David Cameron the islands should be returned to her country’s sovereignty. The complained of event was not the Falklands War nor anything from last century but our colonialising action taken on 3rd January 1833. I think somebody must be laughing at us all.
The Today programme’s reporter was out and about yesterday looking into young people and drugs. Our illegal drug use is the highest in Europe but overall popularity has been going down. Cannabis is now predominately UK grown and much stronger than in the past. In 1996 26% of under 24 year olds said they smoked it, today the number is 16%. I think accurate statistics might be difficult to achieve but it is believed use of Class A drugs over the last decade has been fairly constant at 3% of young people. Overall drug use of all types for that period is thought to have dropped from 12% to 9% of the population. However I suspect the consumption of laboratory produced dance drugs, especially in city areas, is higher now than ever before. I can’t see myself how the authorities will ever be able to tackle the supply side of that particular equation. Demand is the only feasible route. And the trouble with manufactured drugs is that they can have impurities and errors of composition in them even more than official forms of medication. Fine if no one dislikes you. Otherwise it could be difficult.
A discussion on that programme highlighted that America bears the cost of 75% of the Nato budget taking up 4% of it’s GDP. The highest contibution by a European country is 2% of GDP. The USA thinks that unfair.
An experienced overseer of child sexual abuse enquiries in the past, Baroness Butler-Sloss, was firmly of the view on the broadcast that violated chilren under sixteen, however waywardly they may have acted, are ipso facto abused. Any adults with whom they have had sex have broken the law and cannot therefore plead any form of moral mitigation. In such cases she said she had noticed a common theme in that friends, family and colleagues of the abuser found it extemely difficult to believe such an apparently nice person could act in that way. The child can then end up getting the blame for speaking out. She is fearful that might not change. The representative from ACPO was more optimistic. He said we were making progress in turning victims into survivors.
Chris Morris was saying during that edition that he thought futher substantive steps towards european integration would have to wait until after the German elections next September. He referred to our relationship with Europe as a riddle within an enigma, a lovely phrase.
Although I have never worked out quite where their affiliations lie it seems clear to me that Sri Lanka has a strong hidden gang culture. The suicide bomber first performed there in 1980 and the atrocities committed during it’s 26 year civil war were absolutely horrendous. Yesterday’s Today also reported on the murder over Christmas 2011 of a British man who was on holiday at a beach resort on the island with a Russian female friend. She was badly assaulted in the attack by eight man. Since that time the murder has been associated with a local politician who is closely connected with the Sri Lankan ruling family. At one time the man was expelled from his political party but then reinstated two weeks later without explanation. He is now carrying out his political functions, whilst on bail, as normal. The legal process against the men seems to have ground to a halt. The attacked couple worked for the International Red Cross in Gaza.
One more note for that interesting progamme. It seems Iran has always sold less than perfectly refined petrol at it’s filling stations which, combined with it’s generally inefficient car engines, causes quite high levels of pollution, That however has coincided over the last week with a completely static, windless weather pattern in the skies. Because of the danger caused to health from suffocating smog public authorities first of all advised all vunerable citizens to evacuate Tehran and now the same advice has been given to the half million residents of Isfahan. Extremely nasty.
The recent rape and murder incident in India seems to have lanced some sort of boil in their society. From here it looks as though the horrific misogyny of the act has given people the courage to speak out against their leaders, who they have known for too long have been acting against them. I heard a lady say on Today this morning the salutory thing for every family in the country was that it could have happened to any one of them.
No details here for you I am afraid but of course we all have family and friends who go away on holidays sometimes. This morning’s Today informs me that on New Year’s Eve a British man on holiday in Thailand was apparently shot in the crossfire during a fight between two local gangs whilst he was drinking in a beach bar. One of the combatants has been arrested who says it was a mistake. Sir, you are pointless and strange. To the vast majority of people you are a complete irrelevance.
4th January 2013
As I mention in Chapter 7 of my book I believe that Switzerland is home ground of the European Gang, not the American Gang. It is reported today that a small Swiss bank has decided to close after being pursued in the US by tax authorities for allowing over 100 resident Americans to hide their true income position from officials for almost 10 years. The US Attorney General has said the bank willfully and aggressively took advantage when other financial institutions offering such services left the field. Initially the bank’s partners said they would fight the accusations but it seems have now seen sense. They have pleaded guilty to the charges laid against them.
15 year old Malala Yousafzai, shot by the Taliban in Pakistan, has today left hospital in Birmingham to start her recuperation with her family in their temporary home nearby.
I make a connection between Malala’s story and my own. It seems to me the Pakistani and British governments would not have settled on the present arrangements unless they had received advice from their respective security forces they felt Malala could be kept safe both now and into the future. A key day for me I feel, as I describe in Chapter 5 of my book, was 11th March 2009 when I was driving through north London. I came to no harm and the then Metropolitian Police Commissioner made his comments about policing on the streets a few days after. It is all about confidence.
Having said that though I would not want the Gang to jump to conclusions, as they do, and think I have a wish to ever meet Malala. She has her life to lead and I have mine. If we do ever bump into each other it will be a private matter and not mentioned in my published diary extracts. If she wanted to publicise she had ever seen me that would be a decision for her which I would accept, even though I might disagree with it.
Yesterday I wrote how irrelevant the Gang seem to be sometimes. Then by coincidence a good example, in my view, pops up this morning. In response to the Falklands advertisements in our newspapers yesterday The Sun has used the same tactic for an Argentinian paper, no doubt winding up various people in that country. I expect it has also raised tensions for some people within The Sun itself for no good purpose. And just so totally puerile. All the rest of us can do is look and wonder at the pointlessness of it all.
5th January 2013
I have a hunch our politics are going to be different this year. Andy Burnham has been given the go ahead by his party to launch a consultation into our problem of obesity in this country in the hope of stimulating an informed debate. Our incidence is the second worst in the world after America. It seems a third of English children are now obese or overweight when they leave primary school. Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt however has also made sure he has got his bit in today to say the government feel much faster progress can be made through reaching voluntary agrrement with the industry, leaving the promise of legal enforcement in the background if they do not act reasonably. Apparently some branded breakfast cereals contain up to 40% sugar.
Of course in a civilised country no one should tell an adult what they must eat or feed to their children. To that extent the question seems a bit like gun ownership in the USA to me. We must be free to own or eat what we want under society’s norms. However I can see nothing wrong in principle myself with having laws that encourage us to own less lethal weapons or eat less highly processed unhealthy, addictive food. Guns kill. Obesity ultimately kills. It is far too simpistic to say a human being’s right of freedom of action means they must always be allowed to do just as they like.
In paragraph 40 of my 1st March notes in the book I said that Gang would fight to the bitter end. That seems to be very true at the moment in Northern Ireland, even though it is plain to everyone their strenght is puny in comparison to what it was. The flag disturbances have lasted for four weeks now. Over the last few days we have had several nights of trouble in east Belfast with 300 people making a sustained attck on the police last night. It is rumoured that shots have been fired at them this afternoon. That continuous pressure will only make things far worse for those who already hold strong emotional views.
I wonder if it might also have something to do with David Cameron’s decision to host the G8 summit this June in the province, effectively saying that the communities’ problems there are in the past. As I know too well the Gang Master does not like his authority challenged. A possible indication of that appears in today’s FT which reports that mutterings have been made by G8 politicians and officials about what an unsuitable isolated location has been chosen. Apparently the day after the announcement there was a fire in the resort hotel’s spa and pool facility. An ongoing story perhaps.
It is reported today that an elderly lady in east London thought she would dry her clothes in her kitchen with the help of a charcoal barbecue. I suspect a friend suggested that to her and then possibly invited her out somewhere. In the house she left her two daughters-in-law and four children. They started suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning. That could have turned extremely nasty but fortunately, I presume, one of the adults had the presence of mind to make the right phone calls. All six went to hospital but were not admitted. The outcome for a young girl who died from barbecue fumes inhalation whilst in her parents’ tent in the New Forest in April 2012, was not so fortunate. I could not work out at the time how that particular story got into the public domain. I concluded it must have been something to do with the ambulance service personnel who dealt with the incident.
Yesterday the House of Bishops of the Church of England issued a statement saying gay clergy would be allowed to become bishops if they promised to abstain from sexual activity. As you can imagine that satisfies no one, liberals and conservatives alike. It invites gay bishops to be dishonest besides anything else. An example in my view of a committee trying to bridge two opposing views and falling straight into the gap in the middle. I cannot see the decision being maintained.
It seems we have a law in this country which allows alleged war criminals to be prosecuted here wherever the instances occured. That fact has allowed a Nepalese army officer to be charged in Westminster Magistrates court on two counts of torture for apparent happenings in Nepal during it’s civil war in 2005. The man currently works as a UN peacekeeper in South Sudan and has a home in this country. I presume he was here for Christmas.
Unlike our Royal Family I am pleased to say, Spanish monachy seems a bit out of favour at the moment due primarily I think to a couple of publicised mis-steps last year. King Juan Carlos has just given a rare TV interview to express his empathy with his people. From the video clip I watched I personally did not feel he came over as particularly sincere.
Just so that susceptible Americans sleep a bit more uneasily in their beds we are told today that four people have been found shot dead in a home in Aurora, Colorado. One was the gunman who had a five hour stand off with police before they entered the property. Aurora was where 12 people were shot dead in a cinema by a gunman last July.
Last Saturday’s FT reports that the number of people who have now caught the winter vomiting bug, norovirus, is one million, up 83% from last year’s figure at this time. No explanation has been worked out for the rise.
The traditional religion in Zanzibar is the moderate Sufi form od Islam. The same edition tells me this is being pushed out by more organised radical views of faith, a trend which is also happening apparently across large parts of sub-Saharan Africa, from Somalia to Mali. Female tourists in Zanzibar are now being told they must wear headscarves and cover their knees. As the island gains most of it’s income from tourism that is not good news. They will not feel welcome.
I write in Chapter 6 of my book about the power of the unions on the New York waterfronts. That paper reports on a last minute deal between employers and the International Londshoremen’s Association to avert a stike affecting all ports on the American eastern seeboard. The agreement however is only a temporary fix and it seems some of the ports are particulary inefficent with far more dockers than required. Views differ on how things may work out in the future.
Things really are changing across the globe. Another piece in those pages says, possible out of the direct vision and control of the President, that Moscow authorities are sprucing their place up. The two main parks in the city have had a makeover, bicycle lanes have been introduced and pay-and-dispaly parking started. The last is to give an alternative to motorists not to park where they shouldn’t, on pedestrian pavements.
The editorial, a bit further on, remarks that Iranian presidential elections are due in June which could create instability in the country. Also it believes Iran will be able to start testing it’s nuclear capability in 2014. That gives an imperative deadline of 2013 for reaching a negotiated settlement with the West. And the sooner in the year the better.
6th January 2013
There is a BBC most popular wegpage there this morning with Billy Connolly speaking of the sexual abuse he suffered from his father when he was young and how it has not affected his warm memories for his Dad. I have a chapter in my book called It’s all About Sex, Stupid. I think that is undoubedly correct. And consequentially it is the most difficult subject of all. I was never physically abused in any way by my father. But I did have experiences when a young teenager with another man, now dead. Like Billy I do not feel badly towards him for it. Even as a child I could see he was damaged. As long as he got the clear signal from me that I did not enjoy it it any way, I was happy with that. Like Billy too I never spoke to a soul about it for the majority of my life. The trouble arises when others, years after, tell you hearsay things about the man and how, possibly, he did badly affect the lives of innocent children. I myself would never wish to discuss such private issues with an individual unless they wanted to discuss it with me. In that way therefore you put yourself into a box. You have no way of knowing whether the allegations are true or not. You only have your gut instinct. Families are very difficult things too.
Last month apparently Italian authorities stopped the Vatican from processing credit card payments. It seems they have been worried that in the past the episcopal state may have been used as a front for money laundering by organised crime and even, suprisingly, the agents of terrorists.
On Thursday the Manchester City manager had an altercation with one of his players at their training ground. Because press photographers are always there apparently snapping away, we were all able to see it soon afterwards. I call that an invasion of privacy. It comes about, in my view, due to the influence in parts of our society of Organised Crime. I see Sir Alex Ferguson has called the practice ridiculous.
Tasmania has just had it’s hottest day since 1881. That pattern with strong winds is causing a bushfire problem there and in south east Australia. About 40 fires are raging in Tasmania and many homes have been destroyed with 3000 evacuations made. At least, the BBC reporter said on Today yesterday, there have been no reports of deliberate arson as happen in February 2009 during the spate of bushfires in Victoria. Then 2000 properties were destroyed and over 170 people lost their lives.
Today wanted to highlight on Friday that the Google Chairman is making a private visit to North Korea with a former govenor of New Mexico who has been there before on humanitarian missions. The US state department has said that the planned visit is helpful but, as you often find in politics, I do not think they really mean that. I reckon it is a straightforward confidence building measure with an internet angle thrown in.
In a Gang engineered operation I would guess, the second Francis report into the failings at Stafford Hospital, not due for a month or so, appears to have been leaked to the Sunday papers today. It seems likely it will have some strident critiscm of the culture of poor care that persists in some parts of the NHS.
I suspect unofficial American intelligence agents have been all over Columbia for some time now. Last April it was twelve official secret service agents who were caught out improperly using Columbian prostitutes when guarding President Obama attending a summit there. Today it is the Honduran ambassador to the country who is going home after a wild Christmas party in his embassy again involving two prostitutes.