EDL, The Police and our Misleading Mainstream Media
The mainstream media reporting on Saturday’s English Defence League and Unite Against Fascism demonstrations in Bolton has proved worryingly misleading. It indicates that important lessons must be learned by UAF and all those who oppose the growth of the far-right EDL.
Frustratingly I was stuck in a 2-hour tailback on the M6 on Saturday morning, so missed the first stages of the counter-demo. However, I’ve been able to piece together the following from speaking to people in the afternoon and from media reports (though more on whether to trust those later).
Essentially, the EDL and UAF demos were scheduled to begin around 1pm. Greater Manchester Police had established two distinct protest areas for each group, separated by barriers (and later by police with dogs standing between the barriers). However, UAF protestors attempted to occupy the entire protest area in the morning, in a bid to deny the EDL the ability to protest at all. The police response was one of zero-tolerance: riot police and horses were sent in, and the area cleared. The majority of UAF arrests – that have been so publicised in the media – were therefore made in the morning before the EDL had arrived. Certainly, I only saw one arrest in the entire course of the afternoon, and nothing like the 55 reported. continue reading… »
Americans celebrate historic healthcare victory
How’s this for history? The first black President and the first female Speaker of the House just brought America’s health insurance system from the 19th century to the 21st century, doing what no politician before them was able to achieve.
The new law, while insuring 30 million and lowering the deficit, is not perfect. It does little to address cost containment. It contains a mandate without strong enough subsidies. The Medicare reimbursement issue persists. You might blame Barack Obama for these imperfections. You might say that had he shown more forceful leadership, he would have had a stronger bill. And you might be right. But consider this:
In 1993, President Clinton tried to pass health care reform, and didn’t even get a floor vote.
In 1974, President Nixon tried to pass health care reform, but couldn’t quite close the deal with the late Senator Ted Kennedy.
In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson opted to pass Medicare rather than universal coverage, believing it more politically doable.
In 1945, President Truman, like Clinton, proposed universal health care but was unable to get a vote.
In 1935, President Franklin Roosevelt wanted to pass universal health care, but thought it too politically unpopular and didn’t even try.
In 1912, former President Theodore Roosevelt campaigned on the promise of universal health care and couldn’t even recapture the White House.
You can claim that the bill’s inadequacies are proof that President Obama failed to show true leadership on this issue, but history will tell you otherwise. He showed the courage that LBJ and FDR lacked, and his persistance did what Clinton, Nixon, and Truman were unable to do. I call that leadership.
Meanwhile, ConservativeHome complains that letting poor people get health insurance is a “significant leftwards turn”, and rounds up different complaints from North American wingnuts.
‘Cash Gordon’ campaign designed by US anti-healthcare lobbyists
Political Scrapbook has pulled off a hell of scoop this morning…
On the day the US Congress passed legislation providing health coverage to 32 million Americans without insurance, Political Scrapbook can reveal the Conservatives’ Cash Gordon campaign was developed by an anti-healthcare lobbyist described as “Karl Rove 2.0?.
Writing on the Blue Blog yesterday, the affable Sam Coates claimed that Conservatives’ campaign site against Labour/Unite links was “built in just a few days”. What he doesn’t tell you is that the system has been purchased off-the-shelf from Republican strategists David All Group and was originally developed to galvanise opposition to Barack Obama’s healthcare reforms.
Cash Gordon is based on Operation Waiting Game, which leverages social media against reforms which, it is claimed, “will have the same devastating effects in the United States as it has in Canada and in nations across Europe: longer wait times and lower quality care”.
To make matters even worse for the Tories…
In an embarrassment for CCHQ, the party’s flagship campaign is currently hosted alongside those attempting to ”rescue America from government-run health care”, including NotSoSure.org and Hands Off. Another site rails against homosexuals in the armed forces, stating the military “should not be used as a tool to advance the goals of gay activist groups”.
For a party that’s now supposedly ‘gay friendly’, the Tories do seem to have rather a lot of queer-bashing ‘friends’.
Gove accused of strike hypocrisy
Over the weekend, the Sunday People dug up another rather embarrassing blast from Michael Gove’s past:
Yes, that is the young Michael Gove pictured on an official NUJ picket line during a long-running dispute in Aberdeen in around 1989/90.
My how times change….
Defining Children
This is a guest post by Ben Gunn.
Along with “paedophilia”, the term “child” has become so expanded as to risk losing coherent meaning.
In terms of child protection legislation, a child is anyone below the age of 18 years. That you can drive, have sex, get married and go to war whilst still a “child” is just to highlight our decidedly convoluted views on these matters.
Childhood was once a matter of biology. Post-puberty opened the doors to vistas of sweeping chimneys and vanishing down coal mines, proudly sporting long trousers and a waistcoat. Examine early photographs and children look like miniature adults. Some even sported pipes, and the only way to identify the father in family photos was by the walrus moustache.
In a long, stuttering reaction against the exploitation of the young, the Victorians began to redefine childhood as a legal, political and cultural artefact. It has been a bit of a mess ever since.
This reached it’s apogee with the Sexual Offences Act of 2003. This busybody Act created a raft of new offences, including voyeurism and sex in public. As well as missing out on the rave phenomena, it looks as if dogging is something else I’ll never experience…
Child protection wasn’t overlooked either. Whilst it was previously an offence to have sex with someone under the age of 16, this Act extended the prohibition to “any sexual activity”. This is much more insidious and made no allowances for the ages of all involved. School kids snogging and fumbling each other in the local park are now committing child abuse. continue reading… »
Biased media reporting of Bolton EDL riots
I got this highlighted to me while travelling and thought it was worth flagging up. Expose the BNP points out what happened in Bolton and how the media help and aid fascists from the BNP and EDL:
Video on the Bolton News website makes it clear, however, that the violence was not coming from the anti-fascists. It shows an elderly veteran of World War 2 who had joined the protest, and UAF stewards can be heard urging protestors to stay calm in the face of apparent police efforts to provoke a riot.
The Bolton News had a reporter in Victoria Square who described on Twitter how EDL members had broken away from the square to cause violence: “Number of demonstrators intent on causing disorder have broken away from protest site. Large numbers of officers deployed to address.” The journalist saw “missiles flying” as the EDL tried to get out of its enclosure.
The BBC also lets the English Defence League people describe themselves as “a peaceful, non-political group” — which is of course pure rubbish. But this isn’t challenged at all. In the interests of “balance”, UAF spokespeople were not quoted.
Read the full report here
Vote Pirate Party
This originally appeared on Hagley Road to Ladywood’s pre-election series.
I voted for Labour in the last three General Elections. In ’97 I did it with conviction and hope. Four years later, before the War on Terror and all that jazz, I voted Labour with quiet content. At the last election, despite my better judgement and deep anger at the party, I did so again.
I will not be voting Labour in the coming General Election.
The fact remains that some of my closest political friends are still deeply wedded to the party. They don’t have much love for Brown, and they’re not defenders of the Iraq War, but their loyalty is to the party, not the personalities of the current car-wreck of a government. I’ve always been a pragmatist, not a tribalist.
I toyed with voting, and campaigning for, the Lib Dems. But having ‘enjoyed’ many run-ins with leading Lib Dem bloggers, I found many of them to be insufferably self-righteous. I know Lib Dem bloggers who are great, but others seem to believe they have a monopoly on liberalism and a fabulous sense of their own importance.
So, I find myself without a natural home.
Recently I wrote encouraging voters to ignore the largely indistinguishable major parties and vote for the single issue that’s closest to their heart. For me, it is individual rights and the increasing illiberalism of our lawmakers. Following my own advice I’m inclined to vote for the Pirate Party UK. continue reading… »
Not-Lord Ashcroft
A elected second chamber, where we would vote for the Parliamentarians who decide on our laws, could be a desirable democratic innovation.
However, a peerage remains a significant public honour which reflects an important measure of esteem in our political community. (This is why some trouble is supposed to be taken to ensure that peerages go only to fit and proper personages).
A certain Mr Michael Ashcroft, who was in his own words “totally serious about my desire to be known as Lord Ashcroft of Belize”, failed to meet the obligations which were made a condition of his becoming a Lord and which his peers expected him to observe as a matter of personal honour. (Ludicrously, the Lords appointments commission believes it has no power to look again at a process overseen by its now abolished predecessor).
What a shambles.
Yet, as Mr David Cameron reminds us often, social responsibility is not only and always the duty of the state.
So, as a small and symbolic mark of disrespect, this blog will henceforth refer to the non-dom billionaire as Not-Lord Ashcroft.
May we commend the practice to the blogosphere.
Power 2010 in action in Harrow
The campaign to target MPs standing in the way of reform started with a bang this week in Harrow with an open letter to Harrow East MP Tony McNulty which collected almost 3,000 signatures in a few days.
The letter highlighted McNulty’s record which shows him consistently protecting ‘the old top-down politics of command and control and against reform.’ He was a key offender in the expenses scandal, which ended in him resigning from government and paying back £13,837 which he had claimed for a second home. No wonder, then that he had voted against the Freedom of Information Act being applied to MPs. He is also a key champion of ID cards, and voted against a fully elected second chamber and for an appointed Lords.
McNulty was hit hard on Thursday with a full page ad in the Harrow Times and posters with ‘Wanted for crimes against democracy’ delivered to thousands of Swing voters in the constituency, many of which are now stuck up in windows around Harrow.
In case he hadn’t got the message yet, local volunteer residents and a Power2010 sheriff delivered the letter – and the name of every co-signer – direct to his constituency door. Sadly, no-one was there to receive them. McNulty has been rather quiet as the campaign has been building up these past few days and we’re waiting to see what defence, if any, he will offer on the accusations laid against him.
On Monday Power2010 will be adding five more MPs (taken from the public’s suggestions) to their Most Wanted list. Over the next few weeks, volunteers around the country will be making sure that the next parliament is a reforming one.
Why I’m not voting at the next election
This post is part of Hagley Road to Ladywood’s series on the election.
As a voter who’s long felt left behind by Labour, who’s unimpressed by the wet flannel liberalism of Nick Clegg and who remains underwhelmed by parties on the electoral fringe, this election has often felt like a choice between “the lesser of who cares?”.
For me, the prospect of voting this May – a task I might have once grasped with enthusiasm – seems like a tawdry chore, with each party appearing like a cheap imitation of my own values.
Still, after a good few months of dismayed dithering and yawning, I finally came to a decision about how I’m going to vote in this election:
I won’t.
Here’s the thing: 6 years ago a British prisoner called John Hirst went to the European Court of Human Rights demanding that our government give him and his fellow inmates the right to vote. The court ruled that our blanket ban violated the Human Rights Act, and ordered the government to make the necessary changes.
Naturally, the government has deliberately dragged its feet ever since; issuing objections and obfuscations at every turn, and getting no closer to changing the law than the establishment of some weak-willed ‘consulation exercises’.
This was fine for the first five years, but now the election has brought the matter into sharp relief. After ignoring repeated warnings that the General Election must not take place without the ban being lifted, in December the Council of Europe suggested that the election may breach the European convention on human rights. The council repeated that claim last week, along with the notice that, unless the law is changed, tens of thousands of prisoners would be within their rights to sue the British government.
As it stands, the coming election promises to be the first in modern history where tens of thousands of British citizens have illegaly barred from casting a ballot. Whatever crimes these men & women may have committed, however dubious their character, can we really claim to be tough on those who break the law when we are happy for the state to break its own laws in order to punish them?
For me, the answer is an unequivocal ‘no’. I cannot, in good conscience, exercise my legally-guaranteed right to participate in the democratic process when tens of thousands of Britons are illegally deprived of theirs. For that reason, I will be staying at home come election day. Not out of apathy, nor out of a lack of available alternatives, but as a small protest against a big injustice.
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