Such as the Department of Trade and Industry, or the Department of Education, for example. Yes, I know it is an old joke but… is it really a joke?
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October 10th, 2004 | 13 comments - (Comments are closed)
 I am thinking of starting a campaign to establish an internationally-recognised system of ‘War Prizes’. It may seem more than a trifle insensitive but, really, it is the perfectly rational thing to do. After all war is a difficult and dangerous business and I think it is only fair that its most skilled practitioners are accorded some due level of public acclaim. We could even have categories of award such as ‘Most Devastating Air Strike’ or ‘Most Creative Use of Field Artillery’. You may think I am being morbid but at least my ‘War Prizes’ would prove a darn sight more interesting than those wretched and depressing ‘Peace prizes’:
Why, exactly, is this person getting a ‘peace’ prize? A horticultural prize? With pleasure. A landscape gardening prize? For sure. But how, precisely, does a lifetime of professional tree-hugging qualify her as a preventer of armed conflict? As far as I can tell, Mrs. Maathai is being rewarded for being a female, African version of George Monbiot. And, excuse me, but surely the last thing that Africa needs is more sodding environment? They have got environment up the ying-yang. In fact, they have got bugger all except bloody environment and most of it is wild, dangerous, parasitical and extremely detrimental to human life. What Africa needs is machine tools and lathes and tarmac roads and heavy trucks and great, big smokestack factories turning the sky black with their belched-out fumes. Given her commitment to maintaining the untamed savagery of that continent, I would judge that the most suitable award for Mrs. Maathai is a Serious Pain in the Arse Prize. People who build tarmac roads and heavy trucks no longer qualify for prizes. They only qualify for taxes, regulations and internationally-recognised opprobrium. Call me old-fashioned but I always thought that ‘peace’ means the absence of war. Now it appears to mean something entirely different. Just like the word ‘liberal’ (in the US context and, increasingly, in Britain too) has become a label to describe people whose ideas and attitudes are anything and everything but liberal, so too the word ‘peace’ has now become a synonym for anything which is suitably and loudly primitivist, anti-development, anti-prosperity, anti-progress, nihilist, communist or just plain nuts! I suppose that is why the remaining children of Lenin and raggedy, ageing Che-worshippers can still march around the thoroughfares of Western cities masquerading as ‘peace campaigners’. ‘Peace’ is the fig-leaf behind which they can try to hide their godawfulness and pretend that they are struggling for a better world. ‘Peace’ is a discredited bromide. All I am saying is give my ‘War Prizes’ a chance. October 10th, 2004 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
To pretend, I actually do the thing: I have therefore only pretended to pretend. Er, yeah, whatever Jack… October 9th, 2004 | 6 comments - (Comments are closed)
Avant-Garde French philosopher, Jacques Derrida, has finally been deconstructed:
Though to say that he has “died” is to, perhaps, impose a structural context defined by the ontology of Western metaphysics. In the grammatic, linguistic and rhetorical senses he has merely desedimented, dismantled and decomposed. Indeed, this is a grand narrative undoing in the egological, methodological and general sense, as opposed to a mere critique in the idiomatic or Kantian sense. Er…or something. October 9th, 2004 | 32 comments - (Comments are closed)
Whenever I’m caught between two evils, I take the one I’ve never tried. (I doubt she had politics in mind but…) October 8th, 2004 | 4 comments - (Comments are closed)
I have always liked J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series (though I must confess I have only seen the movies and not read the books). She writes about wizards and magic and yet the world she creates is populated by characters who still act like real people. Moreover she is the anti-thesis of the sugar coated Disney pabulum of recent years. Not only do her characters act like real people, when the story calls for it, they die. l have long loathed Disney for presenting some of the classic children’s stories of Western literature in such a sanitised and castrated form that Disney’s use of the titles is close to being fraudulent (such as the completely inverted ‘Little Mermaid’). J.K. Rowling is made of far sterner stuff and she realises what the focus-group addled hacks at Disney do not… children are also made of sterner stuff. October 8th, 2004 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
Last evening I enjoyed a pleasant evening chatting to old friends at a reception held at the Institute of Economic Affairs in honour of great Victorian author, Samuel Smiles. His most famous work, Self Help, became a best seller, not just in Britain but also around the world. It is, in fact, probably the great grandaddy of self help books. Go into any bookshop today and you will see shelves crammed with books showing you how to get rich, be healthier, happier, deal with relationships, and so forth. In fact, the spread of liberal ideas will be limited unless people also take the opportunity to liberate their own potential. Reading Smiles is a reminder that there is more, much more to ideas than the pure political realm. After a long period of neglect, I hope this great book will win back the respect it deserves. October 8th, 2004 | One comment - (Comments are closed)
October 8th, 2004 | 9 comments - (Comments are closed)
In a recent Spiked article, Dr Helene Guldberg quotes Liz Kendal talking about a recent IPPR report about child rearing which she co-authored:
I think this quote throws an interesting light on the mania to regulate that now sweeps across the world. There is nothing like an impossible task to enable the regulatory process first to begin, and then, once begun, to go on for ever. Consider. According to Liz Kendal, who emitted the above quote, the government should be “serious about giving children an equal start in life”. Yet think about this. It is impossible. It simply cannot be done. People are different. They think differently and they live in different circumstances. They rear their children differently. How could it possibly be otherwise? It cannot. Yet if this possibility is seriously pursued, as Liz Kendal thinks that it should be, there is no logical end to the process. → Continue reading: The micro-management of parenthood – and of everything October 8th, 2004 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
You said, “but.” I’ve put my finger on the whole trouble. You’re a “but” man. Don’t say, “but.” That little word “but” is the difference between success and failure. Henry Ford said, “I’m going to invent the automobile,” and Arthur T. Flanken said, “But . . .” October 7th, 2004 | 8 comments - (Comments are closed)
Via Catallarchy, here is something you do not hear every day from a legislator:
So said Michigan Representative David Palsrok, sponsor of a bill signed into law today in that state by Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm – a law which bans people suing food companies and restaurants for ‘making’ them fat. And here is another quotation from the same article which is not quite as much of a shocker:
Says who? The Michigan Trial Lawyers’ Association, of course. October 7th, 2004 | 2 comments - (Comments are closed)
A British muslim in the Royal Air Force has been successfully prosecuted for going AWOL after claiming he did not want to help kill fellow muslims in Iraq. It seems to me that an excellent reason for refusing to join a nation’s military is the simple desire to not shoot at, or facilitate shooting at, people that you might not feel should not be shot at. If you have a goodly distrust for the wisdom of the state to begin with, taking the view that you are not going to kill someone just because the government wants you to is a very reasonable default position to adopt. Now of course all states and their militaries are not the same. If you voluntarily contract to do the bidding of the government of Sweden or the Vatican or Switzerland or Costa Rica or Swaziland or Belize or Luxembourg… nations who are certainly not ‘military extroverts’… then the range of things you could reasonably expect to be asked to do will generally not include going to far off places you had never previously heard of and dropping bombs on the locals. However… If you do elect to join a military in circumstances other than fighting off the clear and present danger of an invasion, it seems to me that you are offering to allow the state make the decision for you of when it is appropriate to shoot and at which particular people. Moreover, if you join a military of some place like Britain, France or the USA, i.e. states who frequently sent their soldiers off to kill folks in far off lands for all manner of reasons other than the direct self-defence of the homeland, then it seems a bit rich to take the state’s pay checks for several years but then act surprised if you get asked to, well, help kill folks in far off lands. Read the damn job description before you take the shilling. October 7th, 2004 | 13 comments - (Comments are closed)
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